"I believe, mother," said my brave girl, "that he will succeed, after all, in spite of those old fogies. He knows a lot more than they do, and he says there's no calculating the power of youth and a sound constitution in these cases. He says – "
But I was too wretched to listen to her. They were not old fogies to me – those two experienced men – and a young doctor is but a young doctor, however clever; I found it impossible to hope at this juncture. Lily was kneeling by me with her arms round my waist, quite hysterical with grief; and for the moment I felt that she was more in sympathy with me than her sister. I realised my mistake when the child suddenly sprang to her feet, hitting my chin with her head as she did so, and declared that she must go to "poor Miss Blount."
"Lily," I cried, as she was flinging out of the room in her impetuous fashion, "what are strangers at such a time as this?"
"Nothing," said Lily, in a brazen way – she would never have spoken to her mother in that tone if she had not been encouraged; "but Miss Blount is not a stranger. She loves Harry, and Harry loves her, and she's broken-hearted, and she's ill, and she's nearly out of her mind, and nobody ever says a kind word to her! Even now that he's dying, and they can't have each other, you treat her as if she were dirt. Poor, poor Emily! Let me go to her! Now that Harry's dying, she's got nobody – not a soul in this house – but me!"
Well, indeed! Who'd be a mother, if she could foresee what would come of it? To have this blow, on the top of all the rest, and at such a moment! I felt quite stunned. At first I could only stare at her – I could not speak; then I said, "Go, go!" and pointed to the door. For I could bear no more.
As soon as she was gone, I turned to my faithful Phyllis, put my head on her shoulder, and sobbed like a baby.
"Oh, Phyllis," I cried, "never you get married, my dear! Never you have children, to suffer through them as I suffer!"
She was wiser than I, however. She said she didn't think it was altogether the children's fault.
I admitted it at once. "You are quite right," I said, "and I was wrong. It is not the children's fault. It's the fault of that hateful creature, who has set them both against me. First Harry, then Lily – the very one she was hired to teach her duty to! Fancy a governess, calling herself a governess, and a B.A. to boot, corrupting an innocent young girl, a mere child, with all the details of a clandestine love intrigue! What infamy! What treachery!" I was beside myself when I thought of it. Any mother would have been.
But Phyllis was not a mother, and she was but lukewarm in this matter upon which I felt so strongly. Indeed, I was half inclined to fear that she, too, had become infected by the evil influence amongst us, until I found that it was Dr. Juke who had been putting ideas into her head. Dr. Juke was undoubtedly very clever, and we were enormously indebted to him; still, I have always felt that he was too fond of giving his opinion upon things that were altogether outside his province. It appeared he had been telling Phyllis that it was very bad for Harry to have any trouble on his mind, and that it was absolutely necessary, if we would give him his full chances of recovery, to remove any that we knew of which could be removed.
"After all," said Phyllis, in a tone that showed how he had talked her over, "she's a ladylike person enough, and certainly a clever one."
"Clever, indeed," I retorted, "to have caught a man like him! And looking all the while as demure and innocent as a nun – as if butter wouldn't melt in her mouth! Oh, Phyllis, it would blight his career for ever."
"Perhaps not," she rejoined tolerantly – for she was too young to know; "but even so, I would rather have him blight his career than die."
"You speak," I cried – "you actually speak as if I wanted him to die!"
Here Tom came in, and when she saw her father she got up to leave us together. I was glad indeed to have him to myself for a few minutes. We, at any rate, understood each other. He has his faults, dear fellow, and I often get impatient with him; but he loves me – he thinks the world of me – he doesn't question my judgment and criticise my conduct, as the children do. I was going to tell him about Lily, and about what Juke had said to Phyllis; but when he took me into his great, strong, kind arms, I was too overcome to utter a word. I could do nothing but weep. Nor could he. We thought how we had toiled and slaved to make our precious boy the man he was – how we had nursed him through his baby illnesses, and pinched ourselves to send him to public school and University, and been so proud of his beauty and his talents and his achievements, and looked forward with such joy to the name he would make in the world; and how we were to lose him after all, just as we were looking for the reward of our love and labours – and in this truly awful way!
Tom said it was quite certain now that he would die. Blood-poisoning had set in; there were swellings in some muscles of his body to prove it – a fatal symptom, as every one knew. It only needed to spread to an internal organ, and the machine would stop at once.
"And the sooner it's over, the better," groaned Tom, "and the poor chap's sufferings at an end. Ah, Polly, old girl, little we thought of this when he was born, and we were as vain as two peacocks over him! Do you remember how you brought him up to Sydney, because you couldn't wait till I got home – and we had him on the bridge at night when the passengers were a-bed below – "
"Oh, don't!" I wailed in agony. Remember it! Did I not remember it? And a hundred thousand heart-breaking things.
But we had to compose ourselves as best we could, and go back to our dreadful duties; he to see that the doctors had a proper lunch before they left, I to renew my watch in the sick-room – to see the last, as I supposed, of my dying boy.
On my way I came upon Jane hurrying along the passage with a basin of hot broth. Harry was not allowed animal food, so I stopped her to ask what she was doing with it.
"Taking it to Miss Blount," she replied; and I fancied she did not speak quite so respectfully as usual. "That poor young lady hardly touches her meals, and it do go to my heart to see her look so ill. I thought perhaps a drop of good soup'd tempt her."
Now I did not want to get the character – which I am the last person to deserve – of being a hard woman. I am not one of those low creatures that one reads of in novels who don't know how to treat a governess properly. To me Miss Blount was as much a lady as I was myself, and I had always made a point of considering her in anything. Besides, it was not the time for animosities. All was changed in view of Harry's approaching death. She could not injure him any more. So I took the little tray from Jane, and said to her, "Go back to your kitchen, and attend to the doctors' lunch. I will take the broth to Miss Blount, and find out what is the matter with her."
The girl was in her bedroom. When she saw me she jumped up, as scared as if I had been an ogress come to eat her; but when I first opened the door she was kneeling against her bed, as if saying her prayers. Certainly, she did look ill. She had had a very nice complexion – no doubt poor Harry had noticed it – and her eyes were good; but now her skin was like tallow, and her eyes all dark and washed out, and they had a curious empty expression in them that I did not like at all. I put the tray on the drawers and went up to her, and laid my hand on her shoulder. "My dear," I said, as kindly as I could speak, "I have brought you a little nourishing broth, that I think will do you good. And you must take it at once, while it is hot, to please me."
She did not so much as say thank you, but just stood and stared in a dazed, fixed way, like a deaf mute. So, naturally, I did not feel inclined to bother myself further about her, and I turned to go. As soon as I did that, however, she spoke to me, calling my name. Her voice had a sort of lost sound in it, as if she were talking in her sleep.
"Mrs. Braye," she said, "there's something I have been wanting to say to you."
"What is it?" I inquired.
"If Mr. Harry gets well, I will not marry him – to blight his career. I never would have injured him, and I never will. I would die sooner."
Well, it seemed rather late to think of that. Still, it showed a nice spirit, and I liked the way she spoke of him. She really was a lady, in her way, and – poor thing! – she did look the picture of misery. I am a tender-hearted woman, and I could not but feel a pang of pity for her.
"Ah, my dear," I said, "there's no question of marrying or not now! He is going fast, and nothing matters any more."
Then I kissed her – I kissed her affectionately – and bade her lie down, and not trouble about Lily's lessons; and I told her that whenever there was a change in Harry's condition I would let her know.
The change came a few days later – not suddenly, but creeping inch by inch; and it was not the change we had all anticipated. My splendid boy! Just as he had struggled and triumphed at football and cricket, so his magnificent strength fought with and overcame the poison in his blood before it could deposit itself in vital organs. It was marvellous. The very doctors, accustomed to miracles, could not believe their senses when they counted his pulse and looked at the little thermometer, and felt the places where the sore lumps had been. For weeks, I may say, we seemed to hold our breath in the maddening suspense, tantalised and intoxicated with a hope we dared not call a certainty; but at last we knew that life had conquered death, and that I was not called upon to undergo this agony of motherhood a second time. Of course he was weaker than a new-born baby – a mere shadow of himself; but he was saved. When they told me, I fell on my knees, just where I stood, and cried in my wild rapture and thankfulness, "Oh, God! God! What can I do – what uttermost service or sacrifice can I offer – for all Thy goodness to me?"
They looked at me in an odd way. They all looked at me, even my boy with his hollow eyes. And Tom said, "Come here, Polly, I want to speak to you;" and took me into our room, and laid his hand on my shoulders. He stood six feet in his socks, and weighed sixteen stone, but he trembled like a child.
"Old girl," he said, "you'll have to let him have her."
"Oh," I replied, "if he wants the moon, give it to him! I don't care."
It was a figurative way of expressing my mood of joy – my longing to compensate him utterly for what he had gone through; and I don't think I ought to have been taken so literally. But, before the words were well out of my mouth, Tom made off to Harry's room, and there and then informed him that "mother had given her consent."
And he did not tell me he was going to catch me up in this way. When next I went to my boy's bedside, and he murmured, "Good old mummy!" and remarked, with that deep thrill in his voice, that it was worth while getting well, I thought he meant that it was worth while getting well to see us all so happy.
"Ay," I said, from my heart, "if you hadn't got well, it's little that would have been worth while to me any more."
"Poor old mummy!" he ejaculated. And then, turning serious eyes upon my face, "You will never regret it. I can answer for that."
"You need not waste breath to tell me what I know better than I know anything," I responded, smiling.
"I mean," he said, still seriously, "about her."
Then I understood why he had said it was worth while to get well. She was of more consequence to him than all his own people put together.
"Her?" I queried, smoothing his hair – not letting him guess the pang I felt.
"Miss Blount. Father says you have been so good to us – that you have given us leave – that it's all right now. Look here, mother, if you only knew her – "
I stopped him, for he was getting agitated.
"If your heart is set on it, darling – by and by, I mean, when you are quite well, and have thoroughly considered the matter – don't imagine I shall be the one to disappoint you and make you unhappy. I never have been a cruel mother, have I? And as for knowing Miss Blount, if I don't know her, having her constantly in the house with me, who should? Don't worry yourself about Miss Blounts or anything else till you are stronger, dearest. Put everything out of your head – think of nothing whatever – except getting well. And when you are quite well – then we'll see."
"I can't put her out of my head. I want to see her, mother."
"So you shall, dear – as soon as you are fit to see people. I will ask the doctor about it."
"Juke wouldn't object; he'd be glad. Oh, mother – !"
The nurse came up, and said she thought he had talked enough. I thought so too. His thin cheek was flushed, and his lip trembled; he was inclined to excite himself, and had not strength to spare for that just yet. I gave him his nourishment, turned his pillow, and whispered to him that, if he would sleep for a few hours, then he should have his wish.
"Honour bright?" he whispered back.
"Don't insult me," I retorted. "When did you ever know me to break a promise?"
"To-day, mother?"
"To-day – if Dr. Juke approves. Of course we must have doctor's express permission."
"All right. Give me a squirt of morphia, nurse."
"No, Master Harry. No more morphia, my dear – except maybe a time or two at night, when you can't do without it."
"I can't do without it now," he said. "I've got to sleep before I can see her, and I can't sleep, of myself, until I do see her."
"There," I exclaimed, flinging out a hand. "What did I say? I knew what the effect would be."
The woman – who, I found, was actually privy to the whole affair – Tom's doing, no doubt – began to give her opinion, as is the way of those nurses. "If you'll take my advice," said she, "you'll let him see her now, and sleep afterwards. It'll tire him less than fretting for her."
"And if you will be so good as to mind your own business," I replied, quietly but firmly, "I shall be infinitely obliged to you."
I had not been out of the room five minutes before Tom came to seek me, looking quite hoity-toity, as if he thought himself aboard ship again, with sailors.
"Now then, Polly," he said, "I'm not going to have any more nonsense about this. The boy is too weak to be worried. I am going to fetch Emily."
"Since when," I asked, "has it been your habit to call her Emily?"
He stared, and looked confused. "I suppose," he said, "I've caught it from Harry."
"Talking with him so much about her, when it was so necessary to keep him calm? And to that nurse woman, behind my back – as if the private concerns of our family were any concern of servants! Tom, I didn't think you would ever be disloyal to me."
"I don't think I ever have been, Polly. What's more, I don't think you would ever imagine such a thing in cool blood. Come, you are not going to spoil this happy day for us all, are you? The boy has been given back to us by a miracle – "
That was enough. I flung myself into his arms.
"Forgive me! Forgive me!" I cried. "I know it is wicked of me. But you don't know how I feel it, Tom!"
"Yes, I do, pet; I know exactly."
"No one but a mother can know. I used to be everything to him once, and now he is only glad to get well because of her!"
"Well, it's natural. We – "
"No, we didn't. We had no mothers. But never mind – I won't be selfish. I will go and fetch her at once."
"Would you rather I went?"
"Certainly not! Do you suppose I want them to go on thinking that you are their only friend, and I their implacable enemy? I want to make him happy as much as ever you can do."
"That's right, old girl. If you're going to do a kind thing, do it the kindest way you know. They'll be just fit to worship you, both of 'em."
I did not ask to be worshipped, but I did want my boy to love his mother a little. I ran to him, brushing the nurse aside.
"Dearest," I whispered, "I am going to bring Emily. She shall sit with you as long and as often as you like. She shall be your wife, if you want her. I will make a daughter of her – for your sake."
I took the kiss I had so richly earned, and hurried to the schoolroom. There sat Miss Blount, still faded and tearful, but beaming with the joy that filled the house, like the sun through rain. She and Lily had been crying and rejoicing together, congratulating one another. I waved the child aside, and, taking her governess by the hand, with a "Come, dear," which I could see explained everything in a moment, led her into Harry's room.
After all, she was a lady, and a B.A. He might have done worse. But when I saw the look he turned to her when she ran like a deer to his arms – poor sticks of arms! – and how he held her, and crooned over her – oh, it was like a dagger in my breast!
Tom took me away, and tried to comfort me. He reminded me that we did the same ourselves when we were young, and that we still had each other.
"You've still got me, Polly. I sha'n't desert you."
Yes, yes; of course I still had him. But —
Well, a man can't understand.
CHAPTER VII
A BITTER DISAPPOINTMENT
A boy who is not yet twenty-four, and who has nothing beyond his salary as a clerk in a shipping office, and whose young lady is a pauper, can get engaged if he likes; but he cannot get married. I pointed this out to Harry as soon as he was well enough to be reasoned with. I said to him, "You know, my dearest, that there's nothing in the world I would not do to make you happy, but it would not be making you happy to let you think for a moment of such madness." It appeared, from Tom's account, that the child had been thinking of it – doubtless at Emily's instigation. "I might as well encourage you to cut your throat. Far better, indeed."
"Better?" he echoed, lifting his eyebrows, and smiling in that queer way of his.
"Better!" I insisted firmly. "You little know what it means – that rushing into irrevocable matrimony without counting the cost – without knowing what it entails – without experience or means – "
"Mother," he interrupted, still smiling – a little impudently, though I don't think he meant to be rude – "you were not any more experienced than we are, and not any older or richer, were you?"
I replied with dignity that my case was nowise in point. He wanted to know why it was not. I said, because I – unlike him – had been practically homeless at the time. And he cried, "Were you? I never heard of that!" and stared at me in such a way that I blushed hotly, though old enough to know better. He was an obstinate fellow, and he corresponded with his grandfather and young uncles and aunts in England, and had a heap of their autographed photos in his room. I thought I had better turn him over to his father.
Tom was walking in the garden with Emily, who had managed to get around him in that innocent-seeming way of hers – well, I must not be uncharitable; I daresay it was innocent, and I could almost have fancied that they did not care about being interrupted. Only, of course, that's nonsense.
"My dear," I said, in a sprightly voice, "your young man seems to find his mother a bore these days, and it's only natural. I have been trying to cheer him, and he responds by yawning in my face. Pray do go and exercise your spells, which are so much more potent, and leave me my old man, who is still my own."
Was there any harm in a little light chaff of this kind? One would surely think not. But Tom, standing and looking after her as she slipped away, blushing in her ready, ingénue fashion – so unlike a B.A. – said, quite gravely —
"That's a dear little soul, Polly! And I wouldn't speak to her in just that sort of a way, if I were you. It hurts her."
"It hurts me," I returned, "when you speak in that sort of a way. It is most unjust. Can't you take a joke? You know perfectly well that I treat her with the utmost kindness and consideration – that I have accepted her unreservedly, for my boy's sake."
"Well, well," said he, "I know you don't mean it. Your bark's worse than your bite, old girl. Come and look at the new pigs."
He drew my hand under his arm and patted it. We had had so many little tiffs lately – things we never dreamt of till Miss Blount came! – that I was determined not to quarrel now. It should never be said that I was to blame for making a happy home unhappy. I swallowed my vexation and went to see the pigs – thirteen little black Berkshires, all as lively as they could be, on which he gloated whole-heartedly for the moment, as if they were more than wife or children. In his expansive ardour he offered me one of them to make a festive dish of for Sunday.
"Let us have a little feast, Polly, for the young folks. Harry is able to sit up to table now, and we have done nothing to celebrate the engagement yet. Sucking-pig and one of the fat turkeys, and ask Juke to join us. Eh?"
"My dear," I replied, "I am perfectly willing to celebrate the engagement in any way you like – yes, we'll have a nice dinner, and ask Dr. Juke – I am sure we owe him every attention that we can possibly pay him; but what I want to warn you against is letting them suppose that there is to be any celebration of the marriage – with our consent."
Tom stared as if he did not understand.
"You mean, not immediately?" he questioned. "Of course not."
"I mean, not for years," I solemnly urged. "Tom, you must back me up in this. The boy is but a boy, with his way to make in the world. Before we allow him to saddle himself with a wife who will probably be quite useless – those University women always are – and the responsibilities of a family, he must be in a position to afford it."
"Yes," said Tom, in a tepid way. "But you and I, Polly – "
"Oh, never mind about you and me," I broke in; "that is altogether different" – for of course it was. "You were a man of twice his age."
"Which would make him about fourteen," said my husband, trying to be funny.
As for me, I saw nothing to laugh at. I cannot imagine a more serious position as between parent and child. "At his time of life," I said, "four years are equal to ten at any other stage. Let him have those four years – let him begin where his father did – and I shall be quite satisfied."
"Well, you see, my dear, it hardly rests with us, does it?"
Tom stirred up the mother sow with his walking-stick, and sniggered in a most feeble-minded fashion.
"How? Why not?" I demanded. "Do you mean to say you have not the power to influence him? Do you think that Harry, if properly advised, would persist in taking his own way in spite of us? I refuse to believe that any son of mine could do such a thing."
Again Tom laughed, looking at me as if he saw some great joke somewhere. I asked him what it was, and he said, "Oh, never mind – nothing." But I knew. He was thinking of my own elopement, to which I was driven by my father's second marriage – an incident that had no bearing whatever upon the present case. It exasperated me to see him so flippant about a matter of really grave importance, but I determined not to let him draw me into a dispute.
"Four years," I said mildly, "would give them time to know each other and their own minds. It would be a test, to prove them. If at the end of four years they were still faithful, I should feel assured that all was well. But of course they would get tired of each other long before that, and so he would be spared a terrible fate, and all the trouble would be at an end."
We had left the pigsty and were pacing the paths of the kitchen garden, surveying the depredations of the irrepressible slug.
"The rain seems to wash the soot away as fast as I put it on," sighed Tom. "I'll get a bag of lime, and try what that'll do. Well, Polly, for my part, I should be very sorry to think them likely to get tired of each other. And I don't believe it, either. I don't think she's that sort of a girl somehow."
"How like a man!" I ejaculated. "Just because she's got a pretty face!"
"No, not because she's got a pretty face – though it is a pretty face – but because she's good as well as pretty. She's a right down good girl, my dear, believe me – just the sort of daughter-in-law I'd have chosen for myself, if I had had the choosing. I told Harry so. You should have seen how pleased he was!"
"No doubt. But I don't see how you can know whether she's good or not. You are not always with her, as we are."
"Oh, I see her at times. We have little talks occasionally. A man can soon tell." He put his arm round my waist as we paced along. "I haven't been married to you for all these years without knowing a good woman from a bad one, Polly."
It was intended for a compliment, but somehow I could not smile at it. In fact, I shed a tear instead. And when he saw it, and stooped to kiss it away, my feelings overcame me. I threw my arms round his neck and begged him not to let fascinating daughters-in-law draw away his heart from his old wife. I daresay it was silly, but I could not help it. Of course he chuckled as if I had said something very funny. And his only reply was "Baby!" – in italics. So like a man, who never can see a meaning that is not right on the top of a word.
However, I promised to be nice to Emily – nicer, rather, for, as I told him, I had always been nice to her – and he said he would take an early opportunity to have a serious talk with Harry.
"But let the poor chap alone till he gets his strength again," he pleaded – as if I were a perfect tyrant, bent on making the boy miserable; "let the poor children enjoy their love-making for the little while that Emily remains here. She has been telling me that she's got a fine appointment in a school – joint principal – and that she's going to work in a fortnight – to work and save for their little home, till Harry is ready for her."
"What?" I exclaimed. "She never told me that."
"She will, of course, when you give her the chance," said Tom, with an air of apology.
"She ought to have told me, she ought to have confided in me, first of all," I urged, much hurt, as I had every right to be; "I can't understand why she did not. You seem," I concluded passionately – "you all seem to be having secrets behind my back, and shutting me out of everything, as if I were everybody's enemy. It is always so!"
"It is never so," replied Tom, laying his arm round my shoulder. "You are never outside, old girl, except when you won't come in."
That was what they always said when they wanted to defend themselves.
But here we dropped the painful subject, and discussed the details of our proposed festival.
"Only Juke?" I inquired, counting on my fingers. "That makes seven in all – an awkward number."
"No matter for a family party," said Tom. "We are not going in for style this time. The boy in his armchair and pillows will take the room of two."
"Still, we may as well make it an even eight," I urged. "Otherwise the table will look lopsided, and one or other of the girls will have nobody to talk to."
"They will be quite satisfied to have their brother to look at. No, no, Polly, don't let us make a company affair of it, for goodness' sake. Harry wouldn't like it, or be fit for it either."
"And isn't Juke company?"
"By Heavens, no! We owe it to that young fellow that our only son isn't in his grave – yes, Polly, I am convinced of it – and my house is his, and all that's in it. Besides, he'll be here professionally – to see that Harry doesn't overeat himself. Oh, Juke is quite another pair of shoes."
I certainly did not see it. He had served us well, no doubt, and we had paid him well; each side had done its part in a generous and conscientious spirit. I considered he had no more claim on us now than the thousands of passengers Tom had carried when he was a sea captain had on him. I am sure no doctor in the world can match a ship's commander of the most common type for self-denying devotion to the cause of duty. But, seeing Tom so inclined to be cross and unreasonable, I thought it better to say no more. We returned to the sty to select the piglet that was to be killed, and in my own mind I selected the guest who should make the table symmetrical. I knew that Harry would only rejoice to see another friend, and it was due to Phyllis to provide her as well as the others with a companion. It was also an opportunity which I did not feel it right to miss for serving her interests in other ways.
I am not one of those vulgar match-makers who are the laughing-stock of the young men, and properly so – quite the contrary, indeed: no one can accuse me of scheming to get my daughters married. Still, they must be married some day – or should be, in the order of nature – and surely to goodness a mother is permitted to safeguard, to some extent, a thoughtless and ignorant girl against the greatest of all the perils that her inexperience of life can expose her to. Not for the world would I force her inclination in any way, but there is a difference between doing that and letting her make a fool of herself with the first casual puppy in coat and trousers that crosses her path. The duty of parents is to protect their adolescent children from themselves, as it were, in this incalculably important matter; that is to say, to keep their path clear of acquaintanceships from which undesirable complications might result, while encouraging innocent friendships that may develop with impunity. Otherwise, what's the use of being parents at all? Your children might as well be orphans, and better. I neglected this duty, certainly, when I allowed Harry and Emily Blount to have access to each other; but then a son is not like a daughter – you can't be always overlooking him – and that affair was a lesson to me. I determined to be more vigilant in Phyllis's case.
Phyllis is not like other girls. I think I may say, without a particle of vanity, that she is the very prettiest in Australia, at the least. There may be greater beauties at home – I don't know, it is so long since I was there; but if there be, I should like to see them. Her features are not classical, of course, and that dear little piquant suggestion of a cast in the left eye is a peculiarity, though it is not a defect, any more than are the freckles she gets in summer: these trifles of detail merely go to make the tout-ensemble what it is – so charming that she has but to enter a room to eclipse every other woman in it. This being so, I was naturally anxious that she should marry, when she did marry, into her proper sphere, and not be thrown away upon a man unworthy of her. And I only took the most simple and necessary precaution for her safety when I limited my invitations to young fellows whom I could trust – like Spencer Gale.