George Gissing
The Unclassed
Waymark laughed at this incident, and stood watching O'Gree's progress down the street for a minute or two. Then he went to his room again, and sitting down with a sigh, fell into deep brooding.
CHAPTER XXXII
A VISION OF SIN
Maud Enderby's life at home became ever more solitary. Such daily intercourse as had been established between her mother and herself grew less and less fruitful of real intimacy, till at length it was felt by both to be mere form. Maud strove against this, but there was no corresponding effort on the other side; Mrs. Enderby showed no dislike for her daughter, yet unmistakably shunned her. If she chanced to enter the sitting-room whilst Maud was there, she would, if possible, retreat unobserved; or else she would feign to have come in quest of something, and at once go away with it. Maud could not fail to observe this, and its recurrence struck a chill to her heart. She had not the courage to speak to her mother; a deadweight of trouble, a restless spirit of apprehension, made her life one of passive endurance; she feared to have the unnatural conditions of their home openly recognised. Very often her thoughts turned to the time when she had found refuge from herself in the daily occupation of teaching, and, had she dared, she would gladly have gone away once more as a governess. But she could not bring herself to propose such a step. To do so would necessitate explanations, and that was what she dreaded most of all. Whole days, with the exception of meal-times, she spent in her own room, and there no one ever disturbed her. Sometimes she read, but most often sat in prolonged brooding, heedless of the hours.
Her father was now constantly away from home. He told her that he travelled on business. It scarcely seemed to be a relief to him to rest awhile in his chair; indeed, Paul had grown incapable of resting. Time was deepening the lines of anxiety on his sallow face. His mind seemed for ever racked with painful calculation. Mrs. Enderby, too, spent much time away from the house, and Maud knew nothing of her engagements. One thing, however, Maud could not help noticing, and that was that her mother was clearly very extravagant in her mode of living. New and costly dresses were constantly being purchased, as well as articles of luxury for the house. Mrs. Enderby had of late provided herself with a femme de chambre, a young woman who arrayed herself with magnificence in her mistresses castoff dresses, and whose appearance and demeanour had something the reverse of domestic. Maud almost feared her. Then there was a hired brougham constantly in use. Whenever Mrs. Enderby spent an evening at home, company was sure to be entertained; noisy and showy people filled the drawing-room, and remained till late hours. Maud did not even see their faces, but the voices of one or two men and women became only too familiar to her; even in the retirement of her room she could not avoid hearing these voices, and they made her shudder. Especially she was conscious of Mr. Rudge's presence; she knew his very step on the stairs, and waited in feverish apprehension for the first notes of an accompaniment on the piano, which warned her that he was going to sing. He had a good voice, and it was often in request. Sometimes the inexplicable dread of his singing was more than she could bear; she would hurry on her walking-attire, and, stealing like a shadow down the stairs, would seek refuge in pacing about the streets of the neighbourhood, heedless of weather or the hour.
Mrs. Enderby never came down to breakfast. One morning, when Paul happened to be at home, he and Maud had finished that meal in silence, and Maud was rising to leave the room, when her father checked her. He leaned over the table towards her, and spoke in an anxious undertone.
"Have you noticed anything a little—a little strange in your mother lately, Maud? Anything in her way of speaking, I mean—her general manner?"
The girl met his look, and shook her head. The approach to such a conversation affected her as with a shock; she could not speak.
"She has very bad nights, you know," Paul went on, still in a tone just above a whisper, "and of late she has been taking chloral. It's against my wish, but the relief makes it an irresistible temptation. I fear—I am afraid it is having some deleterious effect upon her; she seemed to be a little—just a little delirious in the night, I thought."
There was something horrible in his voice and face as he uttered these words; he shuddered slightly, and his tongue seemed to labour for utterance, as though he dreaded the sound of his own speech.
Maud sat unmoving and silent.
"I thought, also," Paul went on, "that she appeared a little strange last evening, when the people were here.—You weren't in the drawing-room?"
Maud shook her head again.
"Do you—do you think," he asked, "she is having too much excitement? I know she needs a life of constant variety; it is essential to her. I'm sure you understand that, Maud? You—you don't misjudge her?"
"No, no; it is necessary to her," said the girl mechanically.
"But," her father pursued, with still lower voice, "there is always the danger lest she should over-exert herself. Last night I—I thought I noticed—but it was scarcely worth speaking of; I am so easily alarmed, you know."
Maud tried to say something, but in vain.
"You—you won't desert her—quite—Maud?" said her father in a tone of pleading. "I am obliged to be so much away—God knows I can't help it. And then I—I wonder whether you have noticed? I seem to have little influence with her."
He stopped, but the next moment forced himself to utter what was in his mind.
"Can't you help me a little more, Maud? Couldn't you induce her to live a little more—more restfully at times?"
She rose, pushing the chair back behind her.
"Father, I can't!" she cried; then burst into a passion of tears.
"God help us!" her father breathed, rising and looking at her in blank misery. But in a moment she had recovered herself. They faced each other for an instant, but neither ventured to speak again, and Maud turned and left him.
Waymark came as usual, but now he seldom saw Mrs. Enderby. Maud received him alone. There was little that was lover-like in these hours spent together. They kissed each other at meeting and parting, but, with this exception, the manner of both was very slightly different from what it had been before their engagement. They sat apart, and talked of art, literature, religion, seldom of each other. It had come to this by degrees; at first there had been more warmth, but passion never. Waymark's self-consciousness often weighed upon his tongue, and made his conversation but a string of commonplaces; Maud was often silent for long intervals. Their eyes never met in a steady gaze.
Waymark often asked himself whether Maud's was a passionless nature, or whether it was possible that her reserve had the same origin as his own. The latter he felt to be unlikely; sometimes there was a pressure of her hands as their lips just touched, the indication, he believed, of feeling held in restraint for uncertain reasons. She welcomed him, too, with a look which he in vain endeavoured to respond to—a look of sudden relief from weariness, of gentle illumination; it smote him like a reproach. When the summer had set in, he was glad to change the still room for the open air; they walked frequently about Regent's Park, and lingered till after sunset.
One evening, when it was dull and threatened rain, they returned to the house sooner than usual. Waymark would have taken his leave at the door, as he ordinarily did, but Maud begged him to enter, if only for a few minutes. It was not quite nine o'clock, and Mrs. Enderby was from home.
He seated himself, but Maud remained standing irresolutely. Waymark glanced at her from under his eyebrows. He did not find it easy to speak; they had both been silent since they left the park, with the exception of the few words exchanged at the door.
"Will you let me sit here?" Maud asked suddenly, pushing a footstool near to his chair, and kneeling upon it.
He smiled and nodded.
"When will they begin the printing?" she asked, referring to his book, which was now in the hands of the publisher who had undertaken it.
"Not for some months. It can't come out till the winter season."
"If it should succeed, it will make a great difference in your position, won't it?"
"It might," he replied, looking away.
She sat with her eyes fixed on the ground. She wished to continue, but something stayed her.
"I don't much count upon it," Waymark said, when he could no longer endure the silence. "We mustn't base any hopes on that."
He rose; the need of changing his attitude seemed imperative.
"Must you go?" Maud asked, looking up at him with eyes which spoke all that her voice failed to utter.
He moved his head affirmatively, and held out his hand to raise her. She obeyed his summons, and stood up before him; her eyes had fixed themselves upon his; he could not avoid their strange gaze.
"Good-bye," he said.
Her free hand rose to his shoulder, upon which it scarcely rested. He could not escape her eyes, though to meet them tortured him. Her lips were moving, but he could distinguish no syllable; they moved again, and he could just gather the sense of her whisper.
"Do you love me?"
An immense pity thrilled through him. He put his arm about her, held her closely, and pressed his lips against her cheek. She reddened, and hid her face against him. Waymark touched her hair caressingly, then freed his other hand, and went from the room.
Maud sat in thought till a loud ring at the door-bell made her start and flee upstairs. The room in which she and Waymark sat when they were by themselves was in no danger of invasion, but she feared the possibility of meeting her mother to-night. Her father was away from home, as usual, but the days of his return were always uncertain, and Mrs. Enderby might perchance open the door of the little sitting-room just to see whether he was there, as it was here he ordinarily employed himself when in the house. From her bedroom Maud could hear several people ascend the stairs. It was ten o'clock, but an influx of visitors at such an hour was nothing remarkable. She could hear her mother's laugh, and then the voice of a man, a voice she knew but too well—that of Mr. Rudge.
Her nerves were excited. The night was close, and there were mutterings of thunder at times; the cloud whence they came seemed to her to spread its doleful blackness over this one roof. An impulse seized her; she took paper and sat down at her desk to write. It was a letter to Waymark, a letter such as she had never addressed to him, and which, even in writing it, she was conscious she could not send. Her hand trembled as she filled the pages with burning words. She panted for more than he had given her; this calm, half-brotherly love of his was just now like a single drop of water to one dying of thirst; she cried to him for a deeper draught of the joy of life. The words came to her without need of thought; tears fell hot from her eyes and blotted what she wrote.
The tears brought her relief; she was able to throw her writing aside, and by degrees to resume that dull, vacant mood of habitual suffering which at all events could be endured. From this, too, there was at times a retreat possible with the help of a book. She had no mind to sleep, and on looking round, she remembered that the book she had been reading in the early part of the day was downstairs. It was after midnight, and she seemed to have a recollection of hearing the visitors leave the house a little while ago; it would be safe to venture as far as the sitting-room below.
She began to descend the stairs quietly. There was still a light in the hall, but the quietness of the house reassured her. On turning an angle of the stairs, however, she saw that the door of the drawing-room was open, and that just within stood two figures—her mother and Mr. Rudge. They seemed to be whispering together, and in the same moment their lips met. Then the man came out and went downstairs. Mrs. Enderby turned back into the drawing-room.
Maud stood fixed to the spot. Darkness had closed in around her, and she clung to the banisters to save herself from the gulf which seemed to yawn before her feet. The ringing of a bell, the drawing-room bell summoning Mrs. Enderby's maid, brought her back to consciousness, and with trembling limbs she regained her room. It was as though some ghastly vision of the night had shaken her soul. The habit of her mind overwhelmed her with the conviction that she knew at last the meaning of that mystery of horror which had of late been strengthening its hold upon her imagination. The black cloud which lowered above the house had indeed its significance; the voices which wailed to her of sin and woe were the true expression of things amid which she had been moving unconsciously. That instinct which made her shrink from her mother's presence was not without its justification; the dark powers which circled her existence had not vainly forced their influence upon her. Her first impulse was to flee from the house; the air breathed pestilence and death, death of the soul. Looking about her in the anguish of conflicting thoughts, her eyes fell upon the pages she had written. These now came before her as a proof of contagion which had seized upon her own nature; she tore the letter hastily into fragments, and, striking fire with a match, consumed them in the grate. As she watched the sparks go out, there came a rustling of dresses past her door. She flung herself upon her knees and sought refuge in wild, wordless prayer.
A fortnight after this Maud went late in the evening to the room where she knew her father was sitting alone. Paul Enderby looked up from his papers in surprise; it was some time since Maud had sought private conversation with him. As he met her pale, resolute face, he knew that she had a serious purpose in thus visiting him, and his look changed to one of nervous anticipation.
"Do I disturb you, father?" Maud asked. "Could you spare me a few minutes?"
Paul nodded, and she took a seat near him.
"Father, I am going to leave home, going to be a governess again."
He drew a sigh of relief; he had expected something worse than this. Yet the relief was only for a moment, and then he looked at her with eyes which made her soul fail for very compassion.
"You will desert me, Maud?" he asked, trying to convey in his look that which he could not utter in words.
"Father, I can be of no help, and I feel that I must not remain here."
"Have you found a place?"
"This afternoon I engaged myself to go to Paris with a French family. They have been in England some time, and want to take back an English governess for their children."
Paul was silent.
"I leave the day after to-morrow," she added; at first she had feared to say how soon she was to go.
"You are right," her father said, shifting some papers about with a tremulous hand. "You are right to leave us. You at least will be safe."
"Safe?" she asked, under her breath.
He looked at her in the same despairing way, but said nothing.
"Father," she began, her lips quivering in the intensity of her inward struggle, "can you not go away from here? Can you not take mother away?"
They gazed at each other, each trying to divine what it was that made the other so pale. Did her father know?—Maud asked herself. Did Maud know something more than he himself?—was the doubt in Paul's mind. But they were thinking of different things.
"I can't, I can't!" the wretched man exclaimed, spreading out his arms on the desk. "Perhaps in a few months—but I doubt. I can do nothing now; I am helpless; I am not my own master. O God, if I could but go and leave it all behind me!"
Maud could only guess at the meaning of this. He had already hinted to her of business troubles which were crushing him. But this was a matter of no moment in her sight. There was something more terrible, and she could not force her tongue to speak of it.
"You fear for her?" Paul went on. "You have noticed her strangeness?" He lowered his voice. "What can I do, Maud?"
"You are so much away," she said hurriedly, laying her hand on his arm. "Her visitors—she has so many temptations—"
"Temptations?"
"Father, help her against herself!"
"My help is vain. There is a curse on her life, and on mine. I can only stand by and wait for the worst."
She could not speak. It was her duty, clearly her imperative duty, yet she durst not fulfil it. She had come down from her room with the fixed purpose, attained after nights of sleepless struggle, of telling him what she had seen. She found herself alone again, the task unfulfilled. And she knew that she could not face him again.
CHAPTER XXXIII
A GARDEN-PARTY
Waymark received with astonishment Maud's letter from Paris. He had seen her only two days before, and their conversation had been of the ordinary kind; Maud had given him no hint of her purpose, not even when he spoke to her of the coming holiday season, and the necessity of her having a change. She confessed she was not well. Sometimes, when they had both sat for some minutes in silence, she would raise her eyes and meet his gaze steadily, seeming to search for something. Waymark could not face this look; it drove him to break the suspense by any kind of remark on an indifferent subject. He remembered now that she had gazed at him in that way persistently on the last evening that they were together. When he was saying good-bye, and as he bent to kiss her, she held him back for a moment, and seemed to wish to say something. Doubtless she had been on the point of telling him that she was going away; but she let him leave in silence.
It was not a long letter that she wrote; she merely said that change had become indispensable to body and soul, and that it had seemed best to make it suddenly.
"I hope," she wrote in conclusion, "that you will see my father as often as you can; he is very much in need of friendly company, and I should like you to be able to send me news of him. Do not fear for me; I feel already better. I am always with you in spirit, and in the spirit I love you; God help me to keep my love pure!"
Waymark put away the letter carelessly; the first sensation of surprise over, he did not even care to speculate on the reasons which had led Maud to leave home. It was but seldom now that his thoughts busied themselves with Maud; the unreal importance which she had for a time assumed in his life was only a recollection; her very face was ghostlike in his mind's eye, dim, always vanishing. If the news of her departure from England moved him at all, it was with a slight sense of satisfaction; it would be so much easier to write letters to her than to speak face to face. Yet, in the days that followed, the ghostlike countenance hovered more persistently before him than was its wont; there was a far-off pleading in its look, and sometimes that shadow of reproach which our uneasy conscience will cast upon the faces of those we have wronged. This passed, however, and another image, one which had ever grown in clearness and persistency of presentment in proportion as Maud's faded away, glided before him in the hours of summer sunlight, and shone forth with the beauty of a rising star against the clouded heaven of his dreams.
Waymark's mood was bitter, but, in spite of himself, it was no longer cynical. He could not indulge himself in that pessimistic scepticism which had aided him in bearing his poverty, and the restless craving of sense and spirit which had accompanied it. His enthusiasm for art was falling away; as a faith it had failed him in his hour of need. In its stead another faith had come to him, a faith which he felt to be all-powerful, and the sole stay of a man's life amid the shifting shadows of intellectual creeds. And it had been revealed too late. Led by perverse motives, now no longer intelligible, he had reached a goal of mere frustration; between him and the true end of his being there was a great gulf fixed.
To Ida, in the meanwhile, these weeks of early summer were bringing health of body and cheerfulness of mind. She spent very much of her time in the open air. Whenever it was possible she and Miss Hurst took their books out into the garden, and let the shadows of the rose-bushes mark the hours for them. Ida's natural vigour throve on the strength-giving properties of sun and breeze the last traces of unwholesome pallor passed from her face, and exercise sent her home flushed like the dawn.
One afternoon she went to sit with her grandfather on a bench beneath an apple-tree. The old man had his pipe and a newspaper. Ida was quiet, and glancing at her presently, Abraham found her eyes fixed upon him.
"Grandfather," she said, in her gentlest voice, "will you let me give a garden-party some day next week?"
"A party?" Mr. Woodstock raised his brows in astonishment. "Who are you going to invite?"
"You'll think it a strange notion.—I wonder whether I can make it seem as delightful to you as it does to me. Suppose we went to those houses of yours, and got together as many poor little girls as we could, and brought them all here to spend an afternoon in the garden. Think what an unheard-of thing it would be to them! And then we would give them some tea, and take them back again before dark."
The proposal filled Mr. Woodstock with dismay, and the habitual hardness of his face suggested a displeasure he did not in reality feel.
"As you say, it's a strange notion," he remarked, smiling very slightly. "I don't know why you shouldn't have your own way, Ida, but—it'll cost you a good deal of trouble, you know."
"You are mistaking me, grandfather. You think this a curious whim I have got into my head, and your kindness would tempt you to let me do a silly thing just for the sake of having my way. It is no foolish fancy. It's not for my sake, but for the children's."
Her eyes were aglow with earnestness, and her voice trembled.
"Do you think they'd care for it?" asked her grandfather, impressed by something in her which he had never seen before.
"Care for it!—Imagine a poor little thing that has been born in a wretched, poverty-stricken, disorderly home, a home that is no home, and growing up with no knowledge of anything but those four hateful walls and the street outside. No toys, no treats, no change of air; playing in the gutter, never seeing a beautiful thing, never hearing of the pleasures which rich people's children would pine and die without And a child for all that."
Mr. Woodstock cleared his throat and smoothed the newspaper upon his knee.
"How will you get them here, Ida?"
"Oh, leave that to me! Let us choose a day; wouldn't Saturday be best! I will go there myself, and pick out the children, and get their mothers to promise to have them ready. Then I'll arrange to have one of those carts you see at Sunday-school treats. Why, the ride here, that alone! And you'll let me have tea for them,—just bread and butter and a bun,—it will cost not half as much as my new dress this week, not half as much—"
"Come, come, I can't stand this!" growled out Abraham, getting up from the seat. "I'd give them the garden, for good and all, rather than see you like that. Say Saturday, if it's fine; if not, Monday, or when you like."
On the following morning the details were arranged, and the next day Ida went to Litany Lane. She preferred to go alone, and on this errand Mr. Woodstock would have found a difficulty in accompanying her. Ida knew exactly the nature of the task she had taken in hand, and found it easier than it would have been to the ordinary young lady. She jotted down the names of some twenty little girls, selecting such as were between the ages of eight and twelve, and obtained promises that all should be ready at a fixed hour next Saturday. She met with doubts and objections and difficulties enough, but only failed in one or two instances. Then followed fresh talks with her grandfather, and all the details were arranged.
There was rain on the Thursday and Friday, but when Ida drew up her blind at six o'clock on Saturday morning, the sky gave promise of good things. She was walking in the garden long before breakfast-time, and gladdened to rapture as she watched the sun gain power, till it streamed gloriously athwart cloudless blue. By one o'clock she was at the end of Litany Lane, where the cart with long seats was already waiting; its arrival had become known to the little ones, and very few needed summoning. Of course there were disappointments now and again. In spite of mothers' promises, half the children had their usual dirty faces, and showed no sign of any preparation. Five or six of them had nothing to put on their heads; two had bare feet. It was too late to see to these things now; as they were, the children clambered, or were lifted, on to the cart, and Ida took her seat among them. Then a crack of the driver's whip, and amid the shouts of envious brothers and sisters, and before the wondering stare of the rest of the population, off they drove away.
"Who'd like an apple?" Ida asked, as soon as they were well clear of the narrow streets. There was a general scream of delight, and from a hamper by her side she brought out apples and distributed them. Only for a minute or two had there been anything like shyness in Ida's presence; she knew how to talk and behave to these poor little waifs. Her eyes filled with tears as she listened to their chatter among themselves, and recognised so many a fragment of her own past life. One child, who sat close by her, had been spending the morning in washing vegetables for the Saturday-night market. Did not that call to mind something?—so far off; so far, yet nearer to her than many things which had intervened. How they all laughed, as the big, black houses gave way to brighter streets, and these again began to open upon glimpses of field or garden! Not one of them had the slightest conception of whither they were being taken, or what was to happen to them at length. But they had confidence in "the lady." She was a sorceress in their eyes; what limit could there be to her powers? Something good and joyous awaited them; that was all they knew or cared; leagues of happiness, stretching away to the remote limits of the day's glory; a present rapture beyond knowledge, and a memory for ever.
Mr. Woodstock stood within the gate of the garden, his hands in his pockets, and as the vehicle came in sight he drew just a little back.
They streamed along the carriage-drive, and in a minute or two were all clustered upon the lawn behind the house. What was expected of them? Had an angel taken them by the hand and led them straight from Litany Lane through the portals of paradise, they could not have been more awed and bewildered. Trees and rose-bushes, turf and beds of flowers, seats in the shade, skipping-ropes thrown about on the open—and there, hark, a hand-organ, a better one than ever they danced to on the pavement, striking up to make them merry. That was the happiest thought! It was something not too unfamiliar; the one joyful thing of which they had experience meeting them here to smooth over the first introduction to a new world. Ida knew it well, the effect of that organ; had it not lightened her heart many and many a time in the by-gone darkness? Two of the girls had caught each other by the waist at the first sounds. Might they? Would "the lady" like it?
Miss Hurst had come out as soon as the music began, and Ida ran to talk with her. There was whispering between them, and pointing to one and another of the children, and then the governess, with a pleased face, disappeared again. She was away some time, but on her return two of the children were called into the house. Bare-footed they went in, but came forth again with shoes and stockings on, hardly able to comprehend what had happened to them. Then were summoned those who had nothing on their heads, and to each of these a straw hat was given, a less wonderful possession than the shoes and stockings, but a source of gladness and pride.
In the meantime, however, marvels had accumulated on the lawn. Whilst yet the organ was playing, there appeared two men, one of them carrying a big drum, the other hidden under a Punch and Judy show. Of a sudden there sounded a shrill note, high above the organ, a fluting from the bottom to the top of the gamut, the immemorial summons to children, the overture to the primitive drama. It was drowned in a scream of welcome, which, in its turn, was outdone by thunderous peals upon the drum.
Mr. Woodstock said little during the whole afternoon. Perhaps he thought the more.
Tables had been fixed in one part of the garden, and as the drama of Punch drew to an end, its interest found a serious rival in the spectacle of piled plates of cake. But there was to intervene nearly half-an-hour before the tea-urns were ready to make an appearance. The skipping-ropes came into requisition outside, but in the house was proceeding simultaneously a rather more serious pastime, which fell to Ida's share to carry out. Choosing the little girl whose face was the dirtiest and hair the untidiest of any she could see, she led her gently away to a place where a good bowl of warm water and plenty of soap were at hand, and, with the air of bestowing the greatest kindness of all, fell to work to such purpose that in a few minutes the child went back to the garden a resplendent being, positively clean and kempt for the first time in her life.
"I know you'll feel uncomfortable for a little, dear," Ida said, dismissing the astonished maiden with a kiss, "but the strangeness will wear off; and you'll see how much nicer it is."
One after another, all were dealt with in this way, presently with a good-natured servant-girl's assistance, as time pressed. The result was that a transformed company sat down to tea. The feeling wore off, as Ida said, but at first cleanliness meant positive discomfort, taking the form of loss of identity and difficulty of mutual recognition. They looked at their hands, and were amazed at the whiteness that had come upon them; they kept feeling their faces and their ordered hair. But the appetite of one and all was improved by the process.
