She guessed just what he stopped himself from saying.
"But mother is such a dear," she said. "I love her comfortable little plans. They are as touching as a child's. I wouldn't spoil her pleasure for anything. Tell me about the 'Gotterdämmerung'; it is all that which I want to learn. There's love in it, and tragedy, all big. Music says what you feel. Isn't that it? I can see it does to you when you play. And what music says to you, you, the fact of you, say to me."
Yet he felt this was exactly the same girl whom he had long known, comfortable, pleasant, pretty. The change was but the change that happens to a plant when the spike of blossoms shoots upwards from its heart, and was not so much change as growth. She had shot up, far away ahead of him with her budding stem, and all the time she thought she was reaching up to him. And he, gratified and a little embarrassed, thought so, too.
"You mustn't say such things to me," he said. "It makes me feel as if – as if you had put me on a pedestal, somehow. But it is true, that music says to me things which turn into ideas, longings, aspirations. But, so far from me teaching you what it means, it is you who have got to teach me. It is you who are the explanation of it all. Don't you see – "
He stopped a moment, trying himself to grasp the thought which eluded him. So, at least, he imagined to himself; in reality he sought the fire that should kindle him. And fire of a sort was not hard to find, for they sat alone together, and she, whom he liked and admired, clung to him. He kissed her and found himself nearer to passion than he had ever been yet.
"It must have been you that I was looking for," he said.
Again in her the tremulous flame of a girl's first love shot up, fed with the new fuel. Then, by a sudden impulse, she got up and stood a little away from him, passing her hand over her eyes.
"I feel as if it can't be," she said, "and yet when you say it is, I can't disbelieve you. But are you sure?"
He got up also.
"I tell you the truth when I say that I never cared like this before," he said. "All that I know of love is yours; you lit it."
She looked at him mutely, inquiring, scrutinizing. Something within her wanted more, wanted a conviction that she had not yet got. It was as if there was still some closed chamber in her heart that was not yet flooded; the tide did not flow freely throughout her. And for that moment's space she wondered if he, too, was in the same incomplete stress of emotion, if the entire abandonment which she knew she lacked held off from him.
For a moment only the doubt lasted, the next it was enough for her that so much was hers already; the unfolding of love was at work on the petals of her girlhood, and she did not even desire to hurry the hour of full-blowing.
That for the present was the apex of the mounting flame in her, which made the air round it quiver and glow, so that its heat and radiance were beginning to touch with lambency all the common things of every day around her, transforming them, as by the light of an Indian sunset, into opalescent brightnesses. Already to her the sun was of a wider light, the wind of May more caressing, the fields greener, the faces she passed in the street lit with a happiness and a humanity she had never noticed before. She saw and heard and apprehended all that touched her senses with a greater vividness; the paper she read from to Mrs. Hancock when she rested after her bath had a new significance, and as she conned aloud the list of surnames of those who had been born, married, and died – which was the opening chapter of the daily lecture, in case her mother knew any of them – she found herself wondering about the history of their loves. The most commonplace events filled her with reflections which, though delightfully commonplace themselves, were utterly new to her as material for thought. If the Prime Minister went to Balmoral – the kind of news that was particularly gratifying to Mrs. Hancock – Edith now was interested in it, not from wonder – like her mother – as to what they would say to each other, but because before the Prime Minister was a baby in his cradle, a man and a woman had looked with eyes of dawning love on each other. The whole world was vivified, a keener pleasure infused the common actions of life, she ate and drank with a new savour, she went to sleep with a more luxurious sense of that drowsy gulf, and, above all, she awoke with welcome for the day. She joined every morning the ranks of those living and sentient things to whom the knowledge of love had come; she was struggling, yet the struggle was effortless, as if a new force invading her soul did the battle for her – on to the level of real existence, leaving the desert for fertile lands. She read the secret in the eyes and mouths of those she met in the street, for they knew it, even as did the wind and the sun, and the stars that wheeled. Sometimes she spoke of this new thing to her mother, who must be among the initiated, and then the wing of comedy shed a feather as it passed. Mrs. Hancock's reminiscences of her beautiful days were of the nature of pressed flowers; it seemed that their fragrance had departed, though they retained their outward form.
"Your father was a very handsome young man, dear," she would say – "very handsome, indeed, with a rather bluish chin, for at that time he had no beard. I don't think there can ever have been a more poetical lover, and scarcely a day passed when he did not bring me some volume of Tennyson's early poems, or Mr. Browning's. Edith, if you would put the window just an inch more up we can talk. Thank you, dear! He could understand all Mr. Browning wrote about different ways of love, and explained it most beautifully. There was 'One Way of Love' and 'Another Way of Love,' and one of them happened about the middle of June. I learned that one by heart in order to please him. He used to say the most wonderful of all was 'By the Fireside,' which was in November; but that was after they married. Oh, look, dear; what a tiresome dog! Some day it will be run over, and it won't be Denton's fault. Your father was very jealous, and, though I hope you will never give Edward any cause for that any more, I am sure, than I did, men are like that sometimes, and they don't seem to be able to help it. He was quite devoted to me, so it sprang from a good cause. Yes, he used to read Mr. Browning's poems, though he was very fond of Mrs. Browning's too. Mr. and Mrs. Browning! What a lot of poetry they must have read to each other – all made up by themselves! I wonder if she understood it as well as your father! He never found any difficulty about carrying on the sense between the lines, which I think is the hardest part. And to think that now you are going through the same happy time! Darling, look, it is half-past three; and we must turn at once, else we shall never get home in time for tea. Will you tell Denton down the tube to turn as soon as he possibly can? When we get home I will let you read the copies of Mr. Browning's poems which your father gave me. Have you heard from Edward this morning? When he comes I shall have to talk to him about business."
This business talk, which, so far as Mrs. Hancock was concerned, followed on the lines which she had laid down for herself in the matter of allowance for Edith, took place next morning. He had suggested the more usual course that their respective solicitors should represent their clients' views to each other, but Mrs. Hancock preferred a personal and direct interview. She felt that Edward, who was so generous, would understand the somewhat peculiar position that she fully intended to take up, whereas the more practical and less sympathetic mind of a solicitor might not see things in so romantic a light. So Edith was informed when it was twenty minutes to eleven and time that she should put her hat on, while Edward was told that it was quite excusable that he should not want to go to church after sitting in an airless office all the week. But it was a little chilly, and she asked him to shut completely the window of the sitting-room.
"And now, dear Edward," she said, "we must have a little business talk, which I am sure will soon be done, since I am as certain to approve of your plans about Edith as you are to approve of mine. And then, when we have talked it over, we can instruct our solicitors, and they will draw up the settlement. Please smoke a cigarette; you will be more comfortable so. There we are!"
Mrs. Hancock, indeed, felt perfectly comfortable. She had pictured her plans in such delicious grandmotherly colours to herself that they could not fail to touch Edward's heart. And she proceeded to lay them before him.
"I am what they call fairly off, my dear," she said, "and, indeed, I put by a little every year, though, as you know, to do that I live extremely simply, just with the ordinary little comforts of life to which I have been accustomed. Now at my death every penny of my fortune will go to Edith, with the exception of two or three little bequests to servants. At present it is something over a hundred thousand pounds. You and Edith will enjoy that for many, many years after I am gone."
Mrs. Hancock felt as if she was making some deed of tremendous generosity; the sense of that and the allusion to her own death caused her eyes to stand in moisture, which she wiped away with one of her new handkerchiefs, which were so expensive.
"But I am beginning at the end," she said, "and we must come back to the present. I mean, dear Edward, to give Edith the whole of her trousseau. I shall be very much vexed with you if you want not to let me have my way about that. Everything she can want, and, indeed, much more than I ever had, in the way of frocks and linen, shall be hers, and shall be paid for by me. Put your cigarette in your mouth, and don't think of interrupting me."
She beamed delightedly at him, sure that had she not positively forbidden it he would have protested against her munificence. Munificence, too, she really thought it, when she considered how much lace…
"But that is not my great plan," she said. "I know so well, without your telling me, that you will shower on Edith more than a girl accustomed to the simplicity of life she has hitherto led can possibly dream of spending, and so I have thought of a great expense which, please God, will certainly come upon you and her, which you have not, I expect, taken into consideration. Children, my dear Edward; I want it to be my pleasure and privilege to provide for them, and, with careful management, I shall be able to give each of your children as they are born the sum of a hundred pounds, and on every one of all their birthdays, if they live to be a hundred, fifty pounds more!"
To Mrs. Hancock's cars this sounded immense. It is true that her original plan had been to make the yearly birthday gift a hundred pounds to each of them, but in the interval between forming that idea and to-day she had seen that such a scheme would amount to a lavishness that was positively unreasonable, if not actually wrong. It is true that it was not exactly likely that she would continue to be in a position to shower this largess on children that were yet unborn for a hundred years after their birth, unless she was to outrival the decades of old Parr; but the sentence sounded well, and expressed, though hyperbolically, the sumptuous extent of her intentions. But she had to climb down from those great heights, and proceeded to small details.
"Take another cigarette, Edward," she said, "or otherwise you will be arguing with me, and, as I have quite made up my mind, there would be no use in that. My dear, I am a very determined person when once my mind is made up, and I shan't listen to your remonstrances, so you needn't trouble to make them. There! I can afford to do this, and since I can, I am determined to. Now, as regards smaller matters, I know you are very well off, but I want to spare you any extra expenses that I possibly can, and a hundred little schemes occur to me. I send myself to sleep at night with thinking what I can take on my shoulders, for I assure you it is the little drains on one's purse that make the big hole in it, so in the first place let me tell you that your motor bills for tyres and petrol needn't be a penny more after your marriage than they are to-day. I intend that Edith – and I shall tell her so – shall consider my car as hers, in exactly the same manner as she has always considered it ours, shall we say? Morning and afternoon, whenever she feels inclined, she can have her drive with me, on my tyres, and on my petrol. You will be sure when you are away in the City that your car won't be scouring all over the country, eating up every penny you make."
There is a psychical phenomenon known as suggestion, whereby the operator produces a hypnotic effect on his subject, causing his mind to receive and adopt the desired attitude. For the moment, at any rate, Mrs. Hancock was producing this effect on Edward; her own sublime conviction that she was making the most generous provision infected him as she reeled off this string of benefits. But there are subtle conditions under which suggestion acts, which, perhaps, she did not appreciate, for at this point the effect began to wear off. Probably she should have stopped there; unfortunately she continued. It may be that she began to see through herself, and thus enabled her subject to see through her.
"Household books, too!" she said. "You have no conception, nor has Edith – for it takes years of careful housekeeping to understand all about it – you have no conception what economies can be made in them, nor, if you do not practise them, what a tremendous drain they are. Let us say that Edith is alone for lunch, while you are in the City, and she orders a fillet of sole, and a cutlet, with some French beans, and a little cherry tart, and perhaps a peach to finish up with, for dear Edith has such an excellent appetite, I am glad to say, and is not like so many women who, when they are alone, have a sandwich on a tray or a piece of cake, and find themselves getting anæmic and run down in consequence. Edith, as I was saying, orders a decent little lunch like what she is accustomed to, every day like that, when she is alone, and at the end of the week I shouldn't wonder if her lunches had cost her twenty-five or thirty shillings. Well, I want to spare you all that expense; there will be lunch for Edith every day at my house, so that all the household books for your purse will be a couple of poached eggs in the morning and a plain little dinner in the evening, if you want to be alone with her. Otherwise you can both find your dinner, and such a warm welcome, my dear, as often as you like where she had her lunch. And even if it costs me another gardener, I am determined to have my croquet-lawn as good as a croquet-lawn can be, and you can come across and play on it, and have your cup of tea or your whisky and soda with me any day you like. I mean to turn my house into a hotel for you and my darling, where you will ask for whatever you like, motors and what not, and never have a bill sent in to you. Everything provided, Edward, all the year round, and the warmest welcome from the old proprietress. There! I don't think I can say more than that; and I certainly don't mean less. About wedding presents I shall say nothing, because I mean them to be a surprise."
But the suggestive glamour had faded, and Edward found himself adding up in a clear-sighted and business-like manner what this all amounted to. Immediately the result seemed to be that Mrs. Hancock would have Edith's companionship at lunch and in her drives, and that he could play croquet next door. Edith the day before had alluded to her mother's childlike pleasure in her plans, but it seemed to him that a certain power of parsimonious calculation presided over their childlikeness, and it was not without a sense of surprise and almost of incredulity that he made the inference that Mrs. Hancock had no intention of giving her daughter any allowance or of settling anything on her. For himself, he could not by any stretch of malignant criticism be called niggardly or close-handed, and he felt justified in making quite sure of the unlooked-for situation.
"Then you do not propose to settle anything on Edith," he said, "or make her any allowance?"
He knew that this was a perfectly proper suggestion to make, that the absence of any provision for Edith was ludicrous, yet the moment he had made the suggestion he was sorry. He understood also what Edith had meant by "childlikeness," for Mrs. Hancock's face changed suddenly from its beaming and delighted aspect, and looked pathetic, hurt, misunderstood. It was clear that she had taken the sincerest pleasure in devising all these dazzling plans, which at present, anyhow, cost her nothing, and in avoiding any direct expenditure. She had quite certainly convinced herself of her own generosity, and of the unselfish thought and ingenuity – which caused her to lie awake at night – that had devised those schemes. But this miserliness, the ingenuity of which was so perfectly transparent to anybody else, was not, he felt convinced, transparent to her. Hurriedly he corrected himself; it was as if he had unthinkingly taken a toy away from a child; now he made the utmost haste to restore it, to anticipate the howl in preparation for which it had opened its mouth.
"How stupid of me!" he said. "I had quite forgotten in the multitude of your gifts that you were providing with such generosity for our children. Of course you do that instead of giving money to Edith. I think that is a delightful plan. Why, they will all be heirs and heiresses by the time they grow up. And the lunches and drives for Edith, too; she will never be lonely while I am away in town. And the croquet and everything. I never heard so many nice plans."
He knew he was being weak, was yielding on points on which he really had no business to yield, in order to avoid a scene. It was quite ridiculous – and he was aware of that fact – to treat this middle-aged and wideawake woman as if she was a child, to give her anything to prevent her howling, but the morality of the matter did not trouble him at all. She was like a child; he saw the resemblance; but no less striking was the resemblance to a selfish child, or to a very miserly grown-up person. He did not really doubt that some part of her brain, carefully walled up and sequestered, knew that she was acting in a thoroughly miserly manner, but she entirely refused to attend to that, treating it as we treat some involuntary suggestion of a disobedient mind, putting it from her even as she put away secular reflections when in church, and indulging instead and painting in tender but vivid colours the image of the beloved old granny – not so old, either – incessantly signing the most sumptuous cheques for the benefit of her beloved chicks, or looking from the drawing-room window on to the velvet-napped croquet-lawn where Edward stood with brimming whisky and soda, while Edith, a child tugging at her skirts, went through hoop after hoop. She loved to see everybody happy round her, all enjoying the fruits of her bounty, and if, incidentally, she herself gained a companion in her daily drives, at any rate Edith would not sit solitary over her expensive lunch while Edward was in town. And if, in reality, she was a somewhat selfish person, and one somewhat insincere, how much more comfortable that she should think that she was brimming with kind plans for other people, when as a matter of fact she was only making the most pleasing schemes for herself. It was not possible entirely to agree with her in her estimate of herself, but there was certainly no use in distressing her by letting her know that he saw through her. She had hypnotized herself – by excessive gazing – into her creed about herself, and any dissension from it was only likely to make her think that the dissentient was unkind, not shake her belief in her own tender benevolence. She started from that even as Euclid starts his amazing propositions from certain postulates; if you did not accept the postulates you could not proceed any further in her company.
Normal human vanity renders complete self-knowledge impossible, but complete self-blindness is almost equally uncommon, and at the very back of her mind Mrs. Hancock knew very well that she was acting in a manner which, if occurring in anybody else, she would have unhesitatingly labelled mean. But she never indulged in such thoughts about herself; she turned a deliberate back upon them, for they were rankly inconsistent with the spirit of cheerful selfishness which was the key to her character. She shut the door on them as she shut it on tales of misery and crime, ignoring and, if necessary, denying their existence. And if it was easy to spoil her childlike pleasures, it was easy also to restore them in all their integrity, and Edward's assurance that he had never heard so many nice plans was amply sufficient for her. Again her well-favoured face beamed with delighted smiles.
"I thought you would like them," she said, shutting the door not only on her knowledge of her meanness, but on his also, "and you have no idea what a pleasure it was to me to make them. So, since you approve, we will regard my share of the arrangements as settled. And now for your part. I am certain I shall be as satisfied with what you intend to do as you are with my intentions. But before we go on you must tell me what I have to do. Must I have a deed drawn up? Is it a deed they call it?"
He was careful not to spoil pleasure this time.
"I think that is scarcely necessary," he said. "You see you are – are making no settlements on Edith. You have promised to do certain things for our children, but for the present, anyhow – "
She interrupted.
"I see," she said, "but you must be certain to tell me whenever it is necessary for me to have a deed drawn up. I shall be always ready to do it, and to thank you for reminding me. Well, then."
She settled herself in her chair with an air of pleased expectation, and, it must be confessed, a secret gratification that she had not got to "put her name" to anything at all.
"I shall draw up a will," he said, "settling the whole of my property on Edith in trust for her children, if she has any, and, if not, for her use during her lifetime. In other words, she will enjoy the interest on my money, though the property itself will be in the hands of trustees. It amounts at present to about thirty thousand pounds."
Edward paused, for it was clear that Mrs. Hancock was pondering some point.
"Let me thoroughly understand," she said. "In case of your death, Edward, without children (though it really is quite horrid to think about such a thing), if she wanted to build herself a little house, shall we say, would she not be able to put her hand on three or four thousand pounds?"
"No. She would have the income from my money for life."
Mrs. Hancock was almost as eager to secure financial advantages for Edith, as she was to retain her own herself – almost, not quite.
"But she would find it difficult to live in a suitable house, the sort of house to which she has been accustomed, on the interest of thirty thousand pounds," said she.
"Do you think so? It means about fifteen hundred a year."
"Yes, I know, my dear, a very nice pleasant little income. But you must think what she has been accustomed to, for I must say that, though, as you know, I live very simply, yet I have never grudged Edith anything. Think if she was ill! A long illness is so terribly expensive. Would it not be better to insure your life, and settle that on her, so that she could have a little fund for a rainy day? I know my husband insured his life long before he married me."
Edward stiffened a little.
"I think, then, she might look to you for assistance," he said.
"Ah, how pleased I should be to make any economies for her sake," she said, with feeling. "But what if I am no longer here to help her?"
"In that case she will have all your money in her complete command," he remarked.
This was undoubtedly the case, and it was not possible to pursue that particular line of grabbing any further. She smiled at him not quite so tenderly.
"My dear, how sharp the City makes you business men," she observed.
Heathmoor seemed to have done pretty well in that line for her, but he did not draw attention to that.
"I don't think I feel inclined to make any further provision over that," he said. "Edith is coming to me, I must remind you, quite portionless."
A sudden resentment at her attitude seized him.
"Or how would it be if you and I both insured our lives for, let us say, ten thousand pounds," he suggested, "and settled it on her?"
Mrs. Hancock became dignified.
"At my death," she said, "she already comes into a considerable fortune."
"Very well. I quite agree with you that no further provision is necessary."
Mrs. Hancock had not much liked the reminder that Edith came portionless to him, and did not want that section of the argument – for it really was becoming an argument – pursued further. She retreated into her stronghold of satisfaction again.
"And now about the allowance you will make her?" she asked genially.
"I was proposing to give her two hundred and fifty a year for her private and personal expenses," he said.
Mrs. Hancock's smile completely faded.
"Yes," she said, "yes."
"I gather from your tone that you are not satisfied?" said he.
There was a short, rather unpleasant pause. Then she assumed an air of confiding candour.
"I did expect, dear Edward," she said, "that you would make a rather larger allowance than that for her. It is no use my denying it. And would you mind not smoking another cigarette just yet? The air is getting quite thick. Now, just as you have told me quite frankly what you think of my provision for Edith, so I will tell you. There is nothing like a perfectly frank talk for getting over difficulties. All her life dear Edith has had a very handsome allowance from me, with really nothing to spend it on except a dress or a pair of boots. I don't deny that I have often stinted myself so as not to stint her, but what her mother has done, that, I think, her husband should do. I don't think you consider how many more calls a married woman has on her purse than a girl living at home – all the running up to London to get household necessities for you, all the greater expenditure on dress that a married woman must make beyond what a girl requires. Indeed, I don't see how Edith can manage it on the sum you mention."
Edward's sympathy with Mrs. Hancock's childlike pleasure evaporated. He did not believe for a moment that the "very handsome allowance" given her by her mother amounted to anything like the sum he proposed. He knew also that the sum he proposed was a very reasonable one.
"If you would tell me how much she has hitherto spent," he said, "I should have some guide."
This Mrs. Hancock did not in the least wish to do.
"I do not mean to say that dear Edith is extravagant," said she, "but there is a great deal of difference between extravagance and counting every penny. There has been no need for her to do that; she is not accustomed to it."
It was impossible for him to ask her point blank what Edith's allowance had been; it was impossible also to ask the girl herself. He could not do such things; they were contrary to his average politeness of behaviour.
"It is true that when I settled to give Edith this allowance," he said, "I supposed that you would also give her something. I did not know what your intentions might be."
Mrs. Hancock brightened.
"But you do now, dear Edward," she said, "and you said you quite appreciate them. Dear me, what was the expression you used which warmed my heart so? Oh, yes; you had never heard so many nice plans. I am going to provide – and I assure you the more it costs me the better shall I be pleased – for your children when I give Edith, oh, so gaily, into your care. That shall be my part; you were pleased with that. I dare say it had never occurred to you, and you thought it very likely, that I should give Edith a hundred or a hundred and fifty a year, so that she would have three hundred and fifty or four hundred pounds of her own a year. Then, indeed, she would be well off; she would be as comfortable as she had ever been."
Suddenly the intolerable sordidness of the discussion struck him. Justly he told himself that it was none of his making, but he could at any rate decline to let it continue. He did not hug himself over his generosity, for he knew that in his comfortable circumstances it made no real difference whether he gave Edith four hundred a year or not; merely he could not possibly go on bargaining and disputing. He got up.
"She shall have four hundred a year," he said.
Mrs. Hancock gave a little cry of delight.
"Exactly what I thought that your generosity would insist on giving her," she said. "It is nice to find how well we agree. I was sure we should. And what a delicious sunny morning!"