The White Peacock (18 page)

I shook my head and looked at him. His head had dropped down on his
chest again.

"Is he hurt?" she asked, her voice becoming audible, and dangerous. He
lifted his head, and looked at her with heavy, angry eyes.

"George!" she said sharply, in bewilderment and fear. His eyes seemed to
contract evilly.

"Is he drunk?" she whispered, shrinking away, and looking at me. "Have
you made him drunk—you?"

I nodded. I too was angry.

"Oh, if mother gets up! I must get him to bed! Oh, how could you!"

This sibilant whispering irritated him, and me. I tugged at his coat. He
snarled incoherently, and swore. She caught her breath. He looked at her
sharply, and I was afraid he would wake himself into a rage.

"Go upstairs!" I whispered to her. She shook her head. I could see him
taking heavy breaths, and the veins of his neck were swelling. I was
furious at her disobedience.

"Go at once," I said fiercely, and she went, still hesitating and
looking back.

I had hauled off his coat and waistcoat, so I let him sink again into
stupidity while I took off my boots. Then I got him to his feet, and,
walking behind him, impelled him slowly upstairs. I lit a candle in his
bedroom. There was no sound from the other rooms. So I undressed him,
and got him in bed at last, somehow. I covered him up and put over him
the calf–skin rug, because the night was cold. Almost immediately he
began to breathe heavily. I dragged him over to his side, and pillowed
his head comfortably. He looked like a tired boy, asleep.

I stood still, now I felt myself alone, and looked round. Up to the low
roof rose the carven pillars of dark mahogany; there was a chair by the
bed, and a little yellow chest of drawers by the windows, that was all
the furniture, save the calf–skin rug on the floor. In the drawers I
noticed a book. It was a copy of Omar Khayyam, that Lettie had given him
in her Khayyam days, a little shilling book with coloured illustrations.

I blew out the candle, when I had looked at him again. As I crept on to
the landing, Emily peeped from her room, whispering, "Is he in bed?"

I nodded, and whispered good–night. Then I went home, heavily.

After the evening at the farm, Lettie and Leslie drew closer together.
They eddied unevenly down the little stream of courtship, jostling and
drifting together and apart. He was unsatisfied and strove with every
effort to bring her close to him, submissive. Gradually she yielded, and
submitted to him. She folded round her and him the snug curtain of the
present, and they sat like children playing a game behind the hangings
of an old bed. She shut out all distant outlooks, as an Arab unfolds his
tent and conquers the mystery and space of the desert. So she lived
gleefully in a little tent of present pleasures and fancies.

Occasionally, only occasionally, she would peep from her tent into the
out space. Then she sat poring over books, and nothing would be able to
draw her away; or she sat in her room looking out of the window for
hours together. She pleaded headaches; mother said liver; he, angry like
a spoilt child denied his wish, declared it moodiness and perversity.

With spring came trouble. The Saxtons declared they were being bitten
off the estate by rabbits. Suddenly, in a fit of despair, the father
bought a gun. Although he knew that the Squire would not for one moment
tolerate the shooting of that manna, the rabbits, yet he was out in the
first cold morning twilight banging away. At first he but scared the
brutes, and brought Annable on the scene; then, blooded by the use of
the weapon, he played havoc among the furry beasts, bringing home some
eight or nine couples.

George entirely approved of this measure; it rejoiced him even; yet he
had never had the initiative to begin the like himself, or even to urge
his father to it. He prophesied trouble, and possible loss of the farm.
It disturbed him somewhat, to think they must look out for another
place, but he postponed the thought of the evil day till the time should
be upon him.

A vendetta was established between the Mill and the keeper, Annable. The
latter cherished his rabbits:

"Call 'em vermin!" he said. "I only know one sort of vermin—and that's
the talkin sort." So he set himself to thwart and harass the rabbit
slayers.

It was about this time I cultivated the acquaintance of the keeper. All
the world hated him—to the people in the villages he was like a devil
of the woods. Some miners had sworn vengeance on him for having caused
their committal to gaol. But he had a great attraction for me; his
magnificent physique, his great vigour and vitality, and his swarthy,
gloomy face drew me.

He was a man of one idea:—that all civilisation was the painted fungus
of rottenness. He hated any sign of culture. I won his respect one
afternoon when he found me trespassing in the woods because I was
watching some maggots at work in a dead rabbit. That led us to a
discussion of life. He was a thorough materialist—he scorned religion
and all mysticism. He spent his days sleeping, making intricate traps
for weasels and men, putting together a gun, or doing some amateur
forestry, cutting down timber, splitting it in logs for use in the hall,
and planting young trees. When he thought, he reflected on the decay of
mankind—the decline of the human race into folly and weakness and
rottenness. "Be a good animal, true to your animal instinct," was his
motto. With all this, he was fundamentally very unhappy—and he made me
also wretched. It was this power to communicate his unhappiness that
made me somewhat dear to him, I think. He treated me as an affectionate
father treats a delicate son; I noticed he liked to put his hand on my
shoulder or my knee as we talked; yet withal, he asked me questions, and
saved his thoughts to tell me, and believed in my knowledge like any
acolyte.

I went up to the quarry woods one evening in early April, taking a look
for Annable. I could not find him, however, in the wood. So I left the
wildlands, and went along by the old red wall of the kitchen garden,
along the main road as far as the mouldering church which stands high on
a bank by the road–side, just where the trees tunnel the darkness, and
the gloom of the highway startles the travellers at noon. Great trees
growing on the banks suddenly fold over everything at this point in the
swinging road, and in the obscurity rots the Hall church, black and
melancholy above the shrinking head of the traveller.

The grassy path to the churchyard was still clogged with decayed leaves.
The church is abandoned. As I drew near an owl floated softly out of the
black tower. Grass overgrew the threshold. I pushed open the door,
grinding back a heap of fallen plaster and rubbish and entered the
place. In the twilight the pews were leaning in ghostly disorder, the
prayer–books dragged from their ledges, scattered on the floor in the
dust and rubble, torn by mice and birds. Birds scuffled in the darkness
of the roof. I looked up. In the upward well of the tower I could see a
bell hanging. I stooped and picked up a piece of plaster from the ragged
confusion of feathers, and broken nests, and remnants of dead birds. Up
into the vault overhead I tossed pieces of plaster until one hit the
bell, and it "tonged" out its faint remonstrance. There was a rustle of
many birds like spirits. I sounded the bell again, and dark forms moved
with cries of alarm overhead, and something fell heavily. I shivered in
the dark, evil–smelling place, and hurried to get out of doors. I
clutched my hands with relief and pleasure when I saw the sky above me
quivering with the last crystal lights, and the lowest red of sunset
behind the yew–boles. I drank the fresh air, that sparkled with the
sound of the blackbirds and thrushes whistling their strong bright
notes.

I strayed round to where the headstones, from their eminence leaned to
look on the Hall below, where great windows shone yellow light on to the
flagged court–yard, and the little fish pool. A stone staircase
descended from the graveyard to the court, between stone balustrades
whose pock–marked grey columns still swelled gracefully and with
dignity, encrusted with lichens. The staircase was filled with ivy and
rambling roses—impassable. Ferns were unrolling round the big square
halting place, half way down where the stairs turned.

A peacock, startled from the back premises of the Hall, came flapping up
the terraces to the churchyard. Then a heavy footstep crossed the flags.
It was the keeper. I whistled the whistle he knew, and he broke his way
through the vicious rose–boughs up the stairs. The peacock flapped
beyond me, on to the neck of an old bowed angel, rough and dark, an
angel which had long ceased sorrowing for the lost Lucy, and had died
also. The bird bent its voluptuous neck and peered about. Then it lifted
up its head and yelled. The sound tore the dark sanctuary of twilight.
The old grey grass seemed to stir, and I could fancy the smothered
primroses and violets beneath it waking and gasping for fear.

The keeper looked at me and smiled. He nodded his head towards the
peacock, saying:

"Hark at that damned thing!"

Again the bird lifted its crested head and gave a cry, at the same time
turning awkwardly on its ugly legs, so that it showed us the full wealth
of its tail glimmering like a stream of coloured stars over the sunken
face of the angel.

"The proud fool!—look at it! Perched on an angel, too, as if it were a
pedestal for vanity. That's the soul of a woman—or it's the devil."

He was silent for a time, and we watched the great bird moving uneasily
before us in the twilight.

"That's the very soul of a lady," he said, "the very, very soul. Damn
the thing, to perch on that old angel. I should like to wring its neck."

Again the bird screamed, and shifted awkwardly on its legs; it seemed to
stretch its beak at us in derision. Annable picked up a piece of sod and
flung it at the bird, saying:

"Get out, you screeching devil! God!" he laughed. "There must be plenty
of hearts twisting under here,"—and he stamped on a grave, "when they
hear that row."

He kicked another sod from a grave and threw at the big bird. The
peacock flapped away, over the tombs, down the terraces.

"Just look!" he said, "the miserable brute has dirtied that angel. A
woman to the end, I tell you, all vanity and screech and defilement."

He sat down on a vault and lit his pipe. But before he had smoked two
minutes, it was out again. I had not seen him in a state of perturbation
before.

"The church," said I, "is rotten. I suppose they'll stand all over the
country like this, soon—with peacocks trailing the graveyards."

"Ay," he muttered, taking no notice of me.

"This stone is cold," I said, rising.

He got up too, and stretched his arms as if he were tired. It was quite
dark, save for the waxing moon which leaned over the east.

"It is a very fine night," I said. "Don't you notice a smell of
violets?"

"Ay! The moon looks like a woman with child. I wonder what Time's got in
her belly."

"You?" I said. "You don't expect anything exciting do you?"

"Exciting!—No—about as exciting as this rotten old place—just rot
off—Oh, my God!—I'm like a good house, built and finished, and left to
tumble down again with nobody to live in it."

"Why—what's up—really?"

He laughed bitterly, saying, "Come and sit down."

He led me off to a seat by the north door, between two pews, very black
and silent. There we sat, he putting his gun carefully beside him. He
remained perfectly still, thinking.

"Whot's up?" he said at last, "Why—I'll tell you. I went to
Cambridge—my father was a big cattle dealer—he died bankrupt while I
was in college, and I never took my degree. They persuaded me to be a
parson, and a parson I was.

I went a curate to a little place in Leicestershire—a bonnie place with
not many people, and a fine old church, and a great rich parsonage. I
hadn't overmuch to do, and the rector—he was the son of an Earl—was
generous. He lent me a horse and would have me hunt like the rest. I
always think of that place with a smell of honeysuckle while the grass
is wet in the morning. It was fine, and I enjoyed myself, and did the
parish work all right. I believe I was pretty good.

A cousin of the rector's used to come in the hunting season—a Lady
Crystabel, lady in her own right. The second year I was there she came
in June. There wasn't much company, so she used to talk to me—I used to
read then—and she used to pretend to be so childish and unknowing, and
would get me telling her things, and talking to her, and I was hot on
things. We must play tennis together, and ride together, and I must row
her down the river. She said we were in the wilderness and could do as
we liked. She made me wear flannels and soft clothes. She was very fine
and frank and unconventional—ripping, I thought her. All the summer she
stopped on. I should meet her in the garden early in the morning when I
came from a swim in the river—it was cleared and deepened on
purpose—and she'd blush and make me walk with her. I can remember I
used to stand and dry myself on the bank full where she might see me—I
was mad on her—and she was madder on me.

We went to some caves in Derbyshire once, and she would wander from the
rest, and loiter, and, for a game, we played a sort of hide and seek
with the party. They thought we'd gone, and they went and locked the
door. Then she pretended to be frightened and clung to me, and said what
would they think, and hid her face in my coat. I took her and kissed
her, and we made it up properly. I found out afterwards—she actually
told me—she'd got the idea from a sloppy French novel—the Romance of A
Poor Young Man. I was the Poor Young Man.

We got married. She gave me a living she had in her parsonage, and we
went to live at her Hall. She wouldn't let me out of her sight.
Lord!—we were an infatuated couple—and she would choose to view me in
an aesthetic light. I was Greek statues for her, bless you: Croton,
Hercules, I don't know what! She had her own way too much—I let her do
as she liked with me.

Then gradually she got tired—it took her three years to be really
glutted with me. I had a physique then—for that matter I have now."

He held out his arm to me, and bade me try his muscle. I was startled.
The hard flesh almost filled his sleeve.

"Ah," he continued, "You don't know what it is to have the pride of a
body like mine. But she wouldn't have children—no, she wouldn't—said
she daren't. That was the root of the difference at first. But she
cooled down, and if you don't know the pride of my body you'd never know
my humiliation. I tried to remonstrate—and she looked simply astounded
at my cheek. I never got over that amazement.

She began to get souly. A poet got hold of her, and she began to affect
Burne–Jones—or Waterhouse—it was Waterhouse—she was a lot like one of
his women—Lady of Shalott, I believe. At any rate, she got souly, and I
was her animal—son animal—son boeuf. I put up with that for above a
year. Then I got some servants' clothes and went.

I was seen in France—then in Australia—though I never left England. I
was supposed to have died in the bush. She married a young fellow. Then
I was proved to have died, and I read a little obituary notice on myself
in a woman's paper she subscribed to. She wrote it herself—as a warning
to other young ladies of position not to be seduced by plausible "Poor
Young Men."

Now she's dead. They've got the paper—her paper—in the kitchen down
there, and it's full of photographs, even an old photo of me—"an
unfortunate misalliance." I feel, somehow, as if I were at an end too. I
thought I'd grown a solid, middle–aged–man, and here I feel sore as I
did at twenty–six, and I talk as I used to.

One thing—I have got some children, and they're of a breed as you'd not
meet anywhere. I was a good animal before everything, and I've got some
children."

He sat looking up where the big moon swam through the black branches of
the yew.

"So she's dead—your poor peacock!" I murmured.

He got up, looking always at the sky, and stretched himself again. He
was an impressive figure massed in blackness against the moonlight, with
his arms outspread.

"I suppose," he said, "it wasn't all her fault."

"A white peacock, we will say," I suggested.

He laughed.

"Go home by the top road, will you!" he said. "I believe there's
something on in the bottom wood."

"All right," I answered, with a quiver of apprehension.

"Yes, she was fair enough," he muttered.

"Ay," said I, rising. I held out my hand from the shadow. I was startled
myself by the white sympathy it seemed to express, extended towards him
in the moonlight. He gripped it, and cleaved to me for a moment, then he
was gone.

I went out of the churchyard feeling a sullen resentment against the
tousled graves that lay inanimate across my way. The air was heavy to
breathe, and fearful in the shadow of the great trees. I was glad when I
came out on the bare white road, and could see the copper lights from
the reflectors of a pony–cart's lamps, and could hear the amiable
chat–chat of the hoofs trotting towards me. I was lonely when they had
passed.