The White Peacock (38 page)

Gradually George fell out of the socialist movement. It wearied him. It
did not feed him altogether. He began by mocking his friends of the
confraternity. Then he spoke in bitter dislike of Hudson, the wordy,
humorous, shallow leader of the movement in Eberwich; it was Hudson with
his wriggling and his clap–trap who disgusted George with the cause.
Finally the meetings at the 'Hollies' ceased, and my friend dropped all
connection with his former associates.

He began to speculate in land. A hosiery factory moved to Eberwich,
giving the place a new stimulus to growth. George happened to buy a
piece of land at the end of the street of the village. When he got it,
it was laid out in allotment gardens. These were becoming valueless
owing to the encroachment of houses. He took it, divided it up, and
offered it as sites for a new row of shops. He sold at a good profit.

Altogether he was becoming very well off. I heard from Meg that he was
flourishing, that he did not drink "anything to speak of," but that he
was always out, she hardly saw anything of him. If getting–on was to
keep him so much away from home, she would be content with a little less
fortune. He complained that she was narrow, and that she would not
entertain any sympathy with any of his ideas.

"Nobody comes here to see me twice," he said. "Because Meg receives them
in such an off–hand fashion. I asked Jim Curtiss and his wife from
Everley Hall one evening. We were uncomfortable all the time. Meg had
hardly a word for anybody—'Yes' and 'No' and 'Hm Hm!'—They'll never
come again."

Meg herself said:

"Oh, I can't stand stuck–up folks. They make me feel uncomfortable. As
soon as they begin mincing their words I'm done for—I can no more talk
than a lobster——"

Thus their natures contradicted each other. He tried hard to gain a
footing in Eberwich. As it was he belonged to no class of society
whatsoever. Meg visited and entertained the wives of small shop–keepers
and publicans: this was her set.

George voted the women loud–mouthed, vulgar, and narrow—not without
some cause. Meg, however, persisted. She visited when she thought fit,
and entertained when he was out. He made acquaintance after
acquaintance: Dr. Francis; Mr. Cartridge, the veterinary surgeon; Toby
Heswall, the brewer's son; the Curtisses, farmers of good standing from
Everley Hall. But it was no good. George was by nature a family man. He
wanted to be private and secure in his own rooms, then he was at ease.
As Meg never went out with him, and as every attempt to entertain at the
"Hollies" filled him with shame and mortification, he began to give up
trying to place himself, and remained suspended in social isolation at
the "Hollies."

The friendship between Lettie and himself had been kept up, in spite of
all things. Leslie was sometimes jealous, but he dared not show it
openly, for fear of his wife's scathing contempt. George went to
"Highclose" perhaps once in a fortnight, perhaps not so often. Lettie
never went to the "Hollies," as Meg's attitude was too antagonistic.

Meg complained very bitterly of her husband. He often made a beast of
himself drinking, he thought more of himself than he ought, home was not
good enough for him, he was selfish to the back–bone, he cared neither
for her nor the children, only for himself.

I happened to be at home for Lettie's thirty–first birthday. George was
then thirty–five. Lettie had allowed her husband to forget her birthday.
He was now very much immersed in politics, foreseeing a general election
in the following year, and intending to contest the seat in parliament.
The division was an impregnable Liberal stronghold, but Leslie had hopes
that he might capture the situation. Therefore he spent a great deal of
time at the conservative club, and among the men of influence in the
southern division. Lettie encouraged him in these affairs. It relieved
her of him. It was thus that she let him forget her birthday, while, for
some unknown reason, she let the intelligence slip to George. He was
invited to dinner, as I was at home.

George came at seven o'clock. There was a strange feeling of festivity
in the house, although there were no evident signs. Lettie had dressed
with some magnificence in a blackish purple gauze over soft satin of
lighter tone, nearly the colour of double violets. She wore vivid green
azurite ornaments on the fairness of her bosom, and her bright hair was
bound by a band of the same colour. It was rather startling. She was
conscious of her effect, and was very excited. Immediately George saw
her his eyes wakened with a dark glow. She stood up as he entered, her
hand stretched straight out to him, her body very erect, her eyes bright
and rousing, like two blue pennants.

"Thank you so much," she said softly, giving his hand a last pressure
before she let it go. He could not answer, so he sat down, bowing his
head, then looking up at her in suspense. She smiled at her.

Presently the children came in. They looked very quaint, like acolytes,
in their long straight dressing–gowns of quilted blue silk. The boy,
particularly, looked as if he were going to light the candles in some
childish church in paradise. He was very tall and slender and fair, with
a round fine head, and serene features. Both children looked remarkably,
almost transparently clean: it is impossible to consider anything more
fresh and fair. The girl was a merry, curly headed puss of six. She
played with her mother's green jewels and prattled prettily, while the
boy stood at his mother's side, a slender and silent acolyte in his pale
blue gown. I was impressed by his patience and his purity. When the girl
had bounded away into George's arms, the lad laid his hand timidly on
Lettie's knee and looked with a little wonder at her dress.

"How pretty those green stones are, mother!" he said.

"Yes," replied Lettie brightly, lifting them and letting their strange
pattern fall again on her bosom. "I like them."

"Are you going to sing, mother?" he asked.

"Perhaps. But why?" said Lettie, smiling.

"Because you generally sing when Mr. Saxton comes."

He bent his head and stroked Lettie's dress shyly.

"Do I," she said, laughing, "Can you hear?"

"Just a little," he replied. "Quite small, as if it were nearly lost in
the dark."

He was hesitating, shy as boys are. Lettie laid her hand on his head and
stroked his smooth fair hair.

"Sing a song for us before we go, mother" he asked, almost shamefully.
She kissed him.

"You shall sing with me," she said. "What shall it be?"

She played without a copy of the music. He stood at her side, while
Lucy, the little mouse, sat on her mother's skirts, pressing Lettie's
silk slippers in turn upon the pedals. The mother and the boy sang their
song.

"Gaily the troubadour touched his guitar
As he was hastening from
the war."

The boy had a pure treble, clear as the flight of swallows in the
morning. The light shone on his lips. Under the piano the girl child sat
laughing, pressing her mother's feet with all her strength, and laughing
again. Lettie smiled as she sang.

At last they kissed us a gentle "good–night," and flitted out of the
room. The girl popped her curly head round the door again. We saw the
white cuff on the nurse's wrist as she held the youngster's arm.

"You'll come and kiss us when we're in bed, Mum?" asked the rogue. Her
mother laughed and agreed.

Lucy was withdrawn for a moment; then we heard her, "Just a tick, nurse,
just half–a–tick!"

The curly head appeared round the door again.

"And
one
teenie sweetie," she suggested, "only
one!
"

"Go, you——!" Lettie clapped her hands in mock wrath. The child
vanished, but immediately there appeared again round the door two blue
laughing eyes and the snub tip of a nose.

"A nice one, Mum—not a jelly–one!"

Lettie rose with a rustle to sweep upon her. The child vanished with a
glitter of laughter. We heard her calling breathlessly on the
stairs—"Wait a bit, Freddie,—wait for me!"

George and Lettie smiled at each other when the children had gone. As
the smile died from their faces they looked down sadly, and until dinner
was announced they were very still and heavy with melancholy. After
dinner Lettie debated pleasantly which bon–bon she should take for the
children. When she came down again she smoked a cigarette with us over
coffee. George did not like to see her smoking, yet he brightened a
little when he sat down after giving her a light, pleased with the mark
of recklessness in her.

"It is ten years to–day since my party at Woodside," she said, reaching
for the small Roman salt–cellar of green jade that she used as an
ash–tray.

"My Lord—ten years!" he exclaimed bitterly. "It seems a hundred."

"It does and it doesn't," she answered, smiling.

"If I look straight back, and think of my excitement, it seems only
yesterday. If I look between then and now, at all the days that lie
between, it is an age."

"If I look at myself," he said, "I think I am another person
altogether."

"You have changed," she agreed, looking at him sadly. "There is a great
change—but you are not another person. I often think—there is one of
his old looks, he is just the same at the bottom!"

They embarked on a barge of gloomy recollections and drifted along the
soiled canal of their past.

"The worst of it is," he said. "I have got a miserable carelessness, a
contempt for things. You know I had such a faculty for reverence. I
always believed in things."

"I know you did," she smiled. "You were so humbly–minded—too
humbly–minded, I always considered. You always thought things had a deep
religious meaning, somewhere hidden, and you reverenced them. Is it
different now?"

"You know me very well," he laughed. "What is there left for me to
believe in, if not in myself?"

"You have to live for your wife and children," she said with firmness.

"Meg has plenty to secure her and the children as long as they live," he
said, smiling. "So I don't know that I'm essential."

"But you are," she replied. "You are necessary as a father and a
husband, if not as a provider."

"I think," said he, "marriage is more of a duel than a duet. One party
wins and takes the other captive, slave, servant—what you like. It is
so, more or less."

"Well?" said Lettie.

"Well!" he answered. "Meg is not like you. She wants me, part of me, so
she'd kill me rather than let me go loose."

"Oh, no!" said Lettie, emphatically.

"You know nothing about it," he said quietly.

"In the marital duel Meg is winning. The woman generally does; she has
the children on her side. I can't give her any of the real part of me,
the vital part that she wants—I can't, any more than you could give
kisses to a stranger. And I feel that I'm losing—and don't care."

"No," she said, "you are getting morbid."

He put the cigarette between his lips, drew a deep breath, then slowly
sent the smoke down his nostrils.

"No," he said.

"Look here!" she said. "Let me sing to you, shall I, and make you
cheerful again?"

She sang from Wagner. It was the music of resignation and despair. She
had not thought of it. All the time he listened he was thinking. The
music stimulated his thoughts and illuminated the trend of his brooding.
All the time he sat looking at her his eyes were dark with his thoughts.
She finished the "Star of Eve" from Tannhäuser and came over to him.

"Why are you so sad to–night, when it is my birthday?" she asked
plaintively.

"Am I slow?" he replied. "I am sorry."

"What is the matter?" she said, sinking onto the small sofa near to him.

"Nothing!" he replied—"You are looking very beautiful."

"There, I wanted you to say that! You ought to be quite gay, you know,
when I am so smart to–night."

"Nay," he said, "I know I ought. But the to–morrow seems to have fallen
in love with me. I can't get out of its lean arms."

"Why!" she said. "To–morrow's arms are not lean. They are white, like
mine." She lifted her arms and looked at them, smiling.

"How do you know?" he asked, pertinently.

"Oh, of course they are," was her light answer.

He laughed, brief and sceptical.

"No!" he said. "It came when the children kissed us."

"What?" she asked.

"These lean arms of tomorrow's round me, and the white arms round you,"
he replied, smiling whimsically. She reached out and clasped his hand.

"You foolish boy," she said.

He laughed painfully, not able to look at her.

"You know," he said, and his voice was low and difficult "I have needed
you for a light. You will soon be the only light again."

"Who is the other?" she asked.

"My little girl!" he answered. Then he continued, "And you know, I
couldn't endure complete darkness, I couldn't. It's the solitariness."

"You mustn't talk like this," she said. "You know you mustn't." She put
her hand on his head and ran her fingers through the hair he had so
ruffled.

"It is as thick as ever, your hair," she said.

He did not answer, but kept his face bent out of sight. She rose from
her seat and stood at the back of his low arm–chair. Taking an amber
comb from her hair, she bent over him, and with the translucent comb and
her white fingers she busied herself with his hair.

"I believe you
would
have a parting," she said softly.

He laughed shortly at her playfulness. She continued combing, just
touching, pressing the strands in place with the tips of her fingers.

"I was only a warmth to you," he said, pursuing the same train of
thought. "So you could do without me. But you were like the light to me,
and otherwise it was dark and aimless. Aimlessness is horrible."