The Mill on the Floss (35 page)

"There's a tin box," whispered Mr. Glegg; "he'd most like put a
small thing like a note in there. Lift it out, Tom; but I'll just
lift up these deeds,–they're the deeds o' the house and mill, I
suppose,–and see what there is under 'em."

Mr. Glegg had lifted out the parchments, and had fortunately
drawn back a little, when the iron holder gave way, and the heavy
lid fell with a loud bang that resounded over the house.

Perhaps there was something in that sound more than the mere
fact of the strong vibration that produced the instantaneous effect
on the frame of the prostrate man, and for the time completely
shook off the obstruction of paralysis. The chest had belonged to
his father and his father's father, and it had always been rather a
solemn business to visit it. All long-known objects, even a mere
window fastening or a particular door-latch, have sounds which are
a sort of recognized voice to us,–a voice that will thrill and
awaken, when it has been used to touch deep-lying fibres. In the
same moment, when all the eyes in the room were turned upon him, he
started up and looked at the chest, the parchments in Mr. Glegg's
hand, and Tom holding the tin box, with a glance of perfect
consciousness and recognition.

"What are you going to do with those deeds?" he said, in his
ordinary tone of sharp questioning whenever he was irritated. "Come
here, Tom. What do you do, going to my chest?"

Tom obeyed, with some trembling; it was the first time his
father had recognized him. But instead of saying anything more to
him, his father continued to look with a growing distinctness of
suspicion at Mr. Glegg and the deeds.

"What's been happening, then?" he said sharply. "What are you
meddling with my deeds for? Is Wakem laying hold of everything? Why
don't you tell me what you've been a-doing?" he added impatiently,
as Mr. Glegg advanced to the foot of the bed before speaking.

"No, no, friend Tulliver," said Mr. Glegg, in a soothing tone.
"Nobody's getting hold of anything as yet. We only came to look and
see what was in the chest. You've been ill, you know, and we've had
to look after things a bit. But let's hope you'll soon be well
enough to attend to everything yourself."

Mr. Tulliver looked around him meditatively, at Tom, at Mr.
Glegg, and at Maggie; then suddenly appearing aware that some one
was seated by his side at the head of the bed he turned sharply
round and saw his sister.

"Eh, Gritty!" he said, in the half-sad, affectionate tone in
which he had been wont to speak to her. "What! you're there, are
you? How could you manage to leave the children?"

"Oh, brother!" said good Mrs. Moss, too impulsive to be prudent,
"I'm thankful I'm come now to see you yourself again; I thought
you'd never know us any more."

"What! have I had a stroke?" said Mr. Tulliver, anxiously,
looking at Mr. Glegg.

"A fall from your horse–shook you a bit,–that's all, I think,"
said Mr. Glegg. "But you'll soon get over it, let's hope."

Mr. Tulliver fixed his eyes on the bed-clothes, and remained
silent for two or three minutes. A new shadow came over his face.
He looked up at Maggie first, and said in a lower tone, "You got
the letter, then, my wench?"

"Yes, father," she said, kissing him with a full heart. She felt
as if her father were come back to her from the dead, and her
yearning to show him how she had always loved him could be
fulfilled.

"Where's your mother?" he said, so preoccupied that he received
the kiss as passively as some quiet animal might have received
it.

"She's downstairs with my aunts, father. Shall I fetch her?"

"Ay, ay; poor Bessy!" and his eyes turned toward Tom as Maggie
left the room.

"You'll have to take care of 'em both if I die, you know, Tom.
You'll be badly off, I doubt. But you must see and pay everybody.
And mind,–there's fifty pound o' Luke's as I put into the
business,–he gave me a bit at a time, and he's got nothing to show
for it. You must pay him first thing."

Uncle Glegg involuntarily shook his head, and looked more
concerned than ever, but Tom said firmly:

"Yes, father. And haven't you a note from my uncle Moss for
three hundred pounds? We came to look for that. What do you wish to
be done about it, father?"

"Ah! I'm glad you thought o' that, my lad," said Mr. Tulliver.
"I allays meant to be easy about that money, because o' your aunt.
You mustn't mind losing the money, if they can't pay it,–and it's
like enough they can't. The note's in that box, mind! I allays
meant to be good to you, Gritty," said Mr. Tulliver, turning to his
sister; "but you know you aggravated me when you would have
Moss."

At this moment Maggie re-entered with her mother, who came in
much agitated by the news that her husband was quite himself
again.

"Well, Bessy," he said, as she kissed him, "you must forgive me
if you're worse off than you ever expected to be.

But it's the fault o' the law,–it's none o' mine," he added
angrily. "It's the fault o' raskills. Tom, you mind this: if ever
you've got the chance, you make Wakem smart. If you don't, you're a
good-for-nothing son. You might horse-whip him, but he'd set the
law on you,–the law's made to take care o' raskills."

Mr. Tulliver was getting excited, and an alarming flush was on
his face. Mr. Glegg wanted to say something soothing, but he was
prevented by Mr. Tulliver's speaking again to his wife. "They'll
make a shift to pay everything, Bessy," he said, "and yet leave you
your furniture; and your sisters'll do something for you–and Tom'll
grow up–though what he's to be I don't know–I've done what I
could–I've given him a eddication–and there's the little wench,
she'll get married–but it's a poor tale––"

The sanative effect of the strong vibration was exhausted, and
with the last words the poor man fell again, rigid and insensible.
Though this was only a recurrence of what had happened before, it
struck all present as if it had been death, not only from its
contrast with the completeness of the revival, but because his
words had all had reference to the possibility that his death was
near. But with poor Tulliver death was not to be a leap; it was to
be a long descent under thickening shadows.

Mr. Turnbull was sent for; but when he heard what had passed, he
said this complete restoration, though only temporary, was a
hopeful sign, proving that there was no permanent lesion to prevent
ultimate recovery.

Among the threads of the past which the stricken man had
gathered up, he had omitted the bill of sale; the flash of memory
had only lit up prominent ideas, and he sank into forgetfulness
again with half his humiliation unlearned.

But Tom was clear upon two points,–that his uncle Moss's note
must be destroyed; and that Luke's money must be paid, if in no
other way, out of his own and Maggie's money now in the savings
bank. There were subjects, you perceive, on which Tom was much
quicker than on the niceties of classical construction, or the
relations of a mathematical demonstration.

Chapter V
Tom Applies His Knife to the Oyster

The next day, at ten o'clock, Tom was on his way to St. Ogg's,
to see his uncle Deane, who was to come home last night, his aunt
had said; and Tom had made up his mind that his uncle Deane was the
right person to ask for advice about getting some employment. He
was in a great way of business; he had not the narrow notions of
uncle Glegg; and he had risen in the world on a scale of
advancement which accorded with Tom's ambition.

It was a dark, chill, misty morning, likely to end in rain,–one
of those mornings when even happy people take refuge in their
hopes. And Tom was very unhappy; he felt the humiliation as well as
the prospective hardships of his lot with all the keenness of a
proud nature; and with all his resolute dutifulness toward his
father there mingled an irrepressible indignation against him which
gave misfortune the less endurable aspect of a wrong. Since these
were the consequences of going to law, his father was really
blamable, as his aunts and uncles had always said he was; and it
was a significant indication of Tom's character, that though he
thought his aunts ought to do something more for his mother, he
felt nothing like Maggie's violent resentment against them for
showing no eager tenderness and generosity. There were no impulses
in Tom that led him to expect what did not present itself to him as
a right to be demanded. Why should people give away their money
plentifully to those who had not taken care of their own money? Tom
saw some justice in severity; and all the more, because he had
confidence in himself that he should never deserve that just
severity. It was very hard upon him that he should be put at this
disadvantage in life by his father's want of prudence; but he was
not going to complain and to find fault with people because they
did not make everything easy for him. He would ask no one to help
him, more than to give him work and pay him for it. Poor Tom was
not without his hopes to take refuge in under the chill damp
imprisonment of the December fog, which seemed only like a part of
his home troubles. At sixteen, the mind that has the strongest
affinity for fact cannot escape illusion and self-flattery; and
Tom, in sketching his future, had no other guide in arranging his
facts than the suggestions of his own brave self-reliance. Both Mr.
Glegg and Mr. Deane, he knew, had been very poor once; he did not
want to save money slowly and retire on a moderate fortune like his
uncle Glegg, but he would be like his uncle Deane–get a situation
in some great house of business and rise fast. He had scarcely seen
anything of his uncle Deane for the last three years–the two
families had been getting wider apart; but for this very reason Tom
was the more hopeful about applying to him. His uncle Glegg, he
felt sure, would never encourage any spirited project, but he had a
vague imposing idea of the resources at his uncle Deane's command.
He had heard his father say, long ago, how Deane had made himself
so valuable to Guest & Co. that they were glad enough to offer
him a share in the business; that was what Tom resolved
he
would do. It was intolerable to think of being poor and looked down
upon all one's life. He would provide for his mother and sister,
and make every one say that he was a man of high character. He
leaped over the years in this way, and, in the haste of strong
purpose and strong desire, did not see how they would be made up of
slow days, hours, and minutes.

By the time he had crossed the stone bridge over the Floss and
was entering St. Ogg's, he was thinking that he would buy his
father's mill and land again when he was rich enough, and improve
the house and live there; he should prefer it to any smarter, newer
place, and he could keep as many horses and dogs as he liked.

Walking along the street with a firm, rapid step, at this point
in his reverie he was startled by some one who had crossed without
his notice, and who said to him in a rough, familiar voice:

"Why, Master Tom, how's your father this morning?" It was a
publican of St. Ogg's, one of his father's customers.

Tom disliked being spoken to just then; but he said civilly,
"He's still very ill, thank you."

"Ay, it's been a sore chance for you, young man, hasn't it,–this
lawsuit turning out against him?" said the publican, with a
confused, beery idea of being good-natured.

Tom reddened and passed on; he would have felt it like the
handling of a bruise, even if there had been the most polite and
delicate reference to his position.

"That's Tulliver's son," said the publican to a grocer standing
on the adjacent door-step.

"Ah!" said the grocer, "I thought I knew his features. He takes
after his mother's family; she was a Dodson. He's a fine, straight
youth; what's he been brought up to?"

"Oh! to turn up his nose at his father's customers, and be a
fine gentleman,–not much else, I think."

Tom, roused from his dream of the future to a thorough
consciousness of the present, made all the greater haste to reach
the warehouse offices of Guest & Co., where he expected to find
his uncle Deane. But this was Mr. Deane's morning at the bank, a
clerk told him, and with some contempt for his ignorance; Mr. Deane
was not to be found in River Street on a Thursday morning.

At the bank Tom was admitted into the private room where his
uncle was, immediately after sending in his name. Mr. Deane was
auditing accounts; but he looked up as Tom entered, and putting out
his hand, said, "Well, Tom, nothing fresh the matter at home, I
hope? How's your father?"

"Much the same, thank you, uncle," said Tom, feeling nervous.
"But I want to speak to you, please, when you're at liberty."

"Sit down, sit down," said Mr. Deane, relapsing into his
accounts, in which he and the managing-clerk remained so absorbed
for the next half-hour that Tom began to wonder whether he should
have to sit in this way till the bank closed,–there seemed so
little tendency toward a conclusion in the quiet, monotonous
procedure of these sleek, prosperous men of business. Would his
uncle give him a place in the bank? It would be very dull, prosy
work, he thought, writing there forever to the loud ticking of a
timepiece. He preferred some other way of getting rich. But at last
there was a change; his uncle took a pen and wrote something with a
flourish at the end.

"You'll just step up to Torry's now, Mr. Spence, will you?" said
Mr. Deane, and the clock suddenly became less loud and deliberate
in Tom's ears.

"Well, Tom," said Mr. Deane, when they were alone, turning his
substantial person a little in his chair, and taking out his
snuff-box; "what's the business, my boy; what's the business?" Mr.
Deane, who had heard from his wife what had passed the day before,
thought Tom was come to appeal to him for some means of averting
the sale.