henry waited, for a moment, on the stairs. he heard the door close behind katherine, heard the approaching storm invade the house, heard the cuckoo-clock in the passage above him proclaim seven o’clock, then went slowly up to his room. why had katherine gone out to see penhaligan in those clothes, in such weather, at such an hour?... very strange.... and her face too. she was excited, she had almost kissed him.... her eyes....
he entered his familiar room, looked with disgust at his dinner-jacket and trousers lying upon the bed (he hated dressing for dinner), and then wandered up and down, dragging a book from the book-case and pushing it impatiently back again, stumbling over his evening slippers, pulling his coat off and allowing it to fall, unregarded, on to the floor.
katherine!... katherine?... what was ‘up’ with katherine?
he had, in any case, been greatly upset by the events of the day. the crisis for which he had so long been waiting had at length arrived, and, behold, it had been no crisis at all. superficially it had been nothing ... in its reality it had shaken, finally, destructively, the foundations of everything upon which his life had been built. he remembered, very clearly, the family’s comments upon the case of a young man known to them all, who, engaged to a girl in polchester, had confessed, just before the marriage, that he had had a mistress for several years in london, who was however now happily married to a gentleman of means and had no further claim on him. the engagement had been broken off, with the approval of all the best families in glebeshire. henry remembered that his mother had said that it was not only the immorality of the young man but also his continued secrecy concerning the affair that was so abominable, that, of course, “young men must be young men, but you couldn’t expect a nice girl”—and so on.
he remembered all this very clearly, and he had decided at the time that if he ever had a mistress he would take very good care that no one knew about her. that had been a year ago ... and now! he was bewildered, almost breathless with a kind of dismayed terror as to what the world might possibly be coming to. his mother! of whom at least one thing had surely been unalterable—that she, herself, would never change. and now she had taken this thing without horror, without anger, almost with complacency.
she had known of it for months!
it was as though he had cherished a pet with the happy conviction that it was a kitten and had suddenly discovered it to be a cub. and out of this confusion of a wrecked and devastated world there emerged the conviction “that there was something more behind all this”, that “his mother had some plan.” he did not see at all what her plan could possibly be, but she appeared before him now as a sinister and menacing figure, someone who had been close to him for so many years, but whose true immensity he had never even remotely perceived.
he, henry, had, from other points of view, risen out of the affair with considerable good fortune. he had not, as far as he could perceive, earned katherine’s undying hatred; he had not even made a fool of himself, as might naturally be expected. it was plain enough now that philip was to be with them for ever and ever, and that therefore henry must make the best of him. now indeed that it had come to this, henry was not at all sure that he might not like philip very much indeed. that night at the ‘empire’ had been the beginning of life for henry, and the indifference of his mother to philip’s past and the knowledge that katherine had long been aware of it made him not a little ashamed of his indignation and tempers. nevertheless philip had that effect upon him, and would have it many times again no doubt. for a clear and steady moment henry, looking at himself in his looking-glass, wondered whether he were not truly the most terrible of asses.
however, all this was of the past. it was with a sense of advancing to meet a new world that he went down to dinner.
in the drawing-room he found his mother alone. she was wearing an evening dress of black silk, and henry, whose suspicion of the world made him observant, noticed that she was wearing a brooch of old silver set with pearls. this was a family brooch, and henry knew that his mother wore it only ‘on occasions’; his mother’s idea of what made an ‘occasion’ was not always that of the outside world. he wondered what the occasion might be to-night.
he had, for long, been unconsciously in the habit of dividing his mother into two persons, the figure of domination and power who kept the household in awe and was mysterious in her dignity and aloof reserve, and the figure of maternal homeliness who spoke to one about underclothes, was subject to human agitations and pleasures; of the first he was afraid, and would be afraid until he died. the second he loved. his mother to-night was the first of these. she looked, in his eyes, amazingly young. her fair grey hair, her broad shoulders, her straight back, these things showed henry’s mother to be younger than ever henry would be. the pearl brooch gleamed against the black silk that covered her strong bosom; her head was carried high; her eyes feared no man nor woman alive.
therefore henry, as was his manner on such an occasion, did his best to slip quietly into a chair and hide his diminished personality in a book. this, however, was not permitted him.
“henry,” his mother said softly, “why did you not tell me earlier the things that you had heard about philip?”
henry blushed so intensely that there was a thin white line just below the roots of his hair.
“i didn’t want to make katie unhappy,” he muttered.
“i should have thought your duty to your parents came before your duty to katherine,” his mother replied.
“it wasn’t you who was going to marry philip,” he answered, not looking at his mother.
“nevertheless it’s possible that older heads—yes, older heads—”
“oh! well! it’s all right,” he burst out, “i’m sick of the thing, and you and father don’t seem to mind anything about it—”
“i haven’t told your father,” she interrupted.
“haven’t told father?” henry repeated.
“no. father doesn’t think of such things. if everything goes well, as i am sure that everything will, father will want to know nothing further. i have every confidence in philip.”
“why!” henry burst out, “i always thought you hated philip, mother. i simply don’t understand.”
“there are quite a number of things you don’t understand, henry dear,” his mother answered. “yes, quite a number. philip was perhaps not at home with us at first—but i’m sure that in time he will become quite one of the family—almost as though he had been born a trenchard. i have great hopes.... your tie is as usual, henry, dear, above your collar. let me put it down for you.”
henry waited whilst his mother’s cool, solid fingers rubbed against his neck and sent a little shiver down his spine as though they would remind him that he was a trenchard too and had better not try to forget it. but the great, overwhelming impression that now dominated him was of his mother’s happiness. he knew very well when his mother was happy. there was a note in her voice as sure and melodious as the rhythm of a stream that runs, somewhere hidden, between the rocks. he had known, on many days, that deep joy of his mother’s—often it had been for no reason that he could discover.
to-night she was triumphant; her triumph sang through every note of her voice.
the others come in. george trenchard entered, rubbing his hands and laughing. he seemed, every week, redder in the face and stouter all over; in physical reality he added but little to his girth. it was the stoutness of moral self-satisfaction and cheerful complaisance. his doctrine of pleasant aloofness from contact with other human beings had acted so admirably; he would like to have recommended it to everyone had not such recommendation been too great a trouble.
he was never, after this evening, to be aloof again, but he did not know that.
“well, well,” he cried. “punctual for once, henry. very nice, indeed. dear me, mother, why this gaudiness? people coming to dinner?”
she looked down at her brooch.
“no, dear.... no one. i just thought i’d put it on. i haven’t worn it for quite a time. not for a year at least.”
“very pretty, very pretty,” he cried. “dear me, what a day i’ve had! so busy, scarcely able to breathe!”
“what have you been doing, father?” asked henry.
“one thing and another. one thing and another,” said george airily. “day simply flown.”
he stood there in front of the fire, his legs spread, his huge chest flung out, his face flaming like the sun.
“yes, it’s been a very pleasant day,” said mrs. trenchard, “very pleasant.”
“where’s katie?” asked her father. “she’s generally down before anyone.”
henry, who, in the contemplation of his mother, had forgotten, for the moment, his sister’s strange behaviour, said:
“oh! she’ll be late, i expect. i saw her go out about seven. had to see penhaligan about something important, she told me. went out into all that storm.”
as he spoke eight o’clock struck.
mrs. trenchard looked up.
“went out to see penhaligan?” she asked.
“yes, mother. she didn’t tell me why.”
aunt betty came in. her little body, her cheerful smile, her air as of one who was ready to be pleased with anything, might lead a careless observer into the error of supposing that she was a quite ordinary old maid with a fancy for knitting, the church of england, and hot water with her meals. he would be wrong in his judgment; her sharp little eyes, the corners of her mouth betrayed a sense of humour that, although it had never been encouraged by the family, provided much wise penetration and knowledge. any casual acquaintance in half an hour’s talk would have discovered in aunt betty wisdom and judgment to which her own family would, until the day of its decent and honourable death, be entirely blind.
just now she had lost her spectacles.
“my spectacles,” she said. “hum-hum—very odd. i had them just before tea. i was working over in that corner—i never moved from there except once when—when—oh! there they are! no, they are not. and i played ‘patience’ there, too, in the same corner. very odd.”
“perhaps, dear,” said mrs. trenchard, “you left them in your bedroom.”
“no, harriet, i looked there. hum-hum-hum. very odd it is, because—”
millie came in and then aunt aggie.
“is father coming down to-night?” said george.
“yes,” said mrs. trenchard. “he said that he felt better. thought it would be nice to come down. yes, that it would be rather nice.... aggie, dear, that’s your sewing, isn’t it? you left it here this morning. rocket put it between the pages of my novel to mark the place. i knew it was yours—”
“yes, it’s mine,” said aunt aggie, shortly.
meanwhile henry, looking at the door, waited for katherine. a strange premonition was growing in him that all was not well. katherine and philip, they had not appeared—katherine and philip.... as he thought of it, it occurred to him that he had not heard philip moving as he dressed. philip’s room was next to henry’s, and the division was thin; you could always hear coughs, steps, the pouring of water, the opening and shutting of drawers.
there had been no sounds to-night. henry’s heart began to beat very fast. he listened to the wind that, now that the storm had swung away, was creeping around the house, trying the doors and windows, rattling something here, tugging at something there, all the pipes gurgled and spluttered with the waters of the storm.
“ah! there they are!” cried aunt betty.
henry started, thinking that she must herald the entry of katherine and philip; but no, it was only the gold-rimmed spectacles lying miraculously beneath the sofa.
“now, how,” cried aunt betty, “did they get there? very odd, because i remember distinctly that i never moved from my corner.”
“well,” said george trenchard, who, now that his back was warmed by the fire, wanted his front warmed too, “how much longer are we to wait for dinner? katie and philip. playing about upstairs, i suppose.”
quarter-past eight struck, and rocket, opening the door, announced that dinner was ready.
“suppose you just go up and see what katie’s doing, millie dear,” said mrs. trenchard.
millie left them and ran quickly upstairs. she pushed back katie’s door, then, stepping inside, the darkness and silence and a strange murmurous chill caught her, as though someone had leapt, out of the dusk, at her throat. she knew then instantly what had occurred. she only said once, very softly, “katie!” then gently closed the door behind her, as though she did not want anyone else to see the room.
she stayed there; there, beside the door, for quite a long time. the room was very dark, but the looking-glass glimmered like a white, flickering shadow blown by the wet wind that came in through the open window. something flapped monotonously.
millie, standing quite motionless by the door, thought to herself “katherine and philip! they’ve done it!... at last, they’ve done it!” at first, because she was very young and still believed in freedom and adventure as the things best worth having in life, she felt nothing but a glad, triumphant excitement; an excitement springing not only from her pleasure in any brave movement, but also from her reassurance in her beloved sister, her knowledge that after all katherine did believe in love beyond every other power, was ready to venture all for it. her own impulse was to run after them, as fast as she could, and declare her fidelity to them.
at last she moved away from the door to the dressing-table and lit a candle. its soft white flame for a moment blinded her. she had an instant of hesitation; perhaps after all she had flown too rapidly to her desired conclusions, the two of them were waiting now in the drawing-room for her.... then she saw katherine’s note propped against the looking-glass.
she took it up, saw that it was addressed to her mother, and realised, for the first time, what this would mean to them all. she saw then—the old ones—grandfather, mother, father, aunt sarah, aunt aggie, aunt betty. she was sorry for them, but she knew, as she stood there, that she did not care, really, whether they were hurt or no. she felt her own freedom descend upon her, there in katie’s room, like a golden, flaming cloud. this was the moment for which, all her life, she had been waiting. the old ones had tried to keep them and tie them down, but the day of the old ones was past, their power was broken. it was the new generation that mattered—katherine and philip, millie and henry, and all their kind; it was their world and their dominion—
she suddenly, alone there, with the note in her hand, danced a little dance, the candle-flame flickering in the breeze and katherine’s white, neat bed so cold and tidy.
she was not hard, she was not cruel—her own time would come when she would cry for sympathy and would not find it, and must set her teeth because her day was past ... now was her day—she seized it fiercely.
very quietly she went downstairs....
she opened the drawing-room door: as she entered all their eyes met her and she knew at once, as she saw henry’s, that he was expecting her announcement.
she looked across at her mother.
“katherine’s room’s empty,” she said. “there’s no one there at all.” she hesitated a moment, then added: “there was this note for you, mother, on her dressing-table.”
she went across the room and gave it to her mother. her mother took it; no one spoke.
mrs. trenchard read it; for a dreadful moment she thought that she was going to give way before them all, was going to cry out, to scream, to rush wildly into the road to stop the fugitives, or slap aunt aggie’s face. for a dreadful moment the battle of her whole life to obtain the mastery of herself was almost defeated—then, blindly, obeying some impulse with which she could not reason, of which she was scarcely conscious, some strong call from a far country, she won a triumphant victory.
“it’s from katherine!” she said. “the child’s mad. she’s gone up to london.”
“london!” george trenchard cried.
“london!” cried aunt aggie.
“yes. with philip. they have caught the eight train. they are to be married to-morrow. ‘because i would not let philip go,’ she says. but she’s mad—”
for an instant she gripped the mantelpiece behind her. she could hear them, only from a distance, as though their voices were muffled by the roar of sea or wind, their exclamations.
her husband was, of course, useless. she despised him. he cried:
“they must be stopped! they must be stopped. this is impossible! that fellow mark—one might have guessed! they must be stopped. at once! at once!”
“they can’t be.” she heard her voice far away with the others. “they can’t be stopped. the train left at eight o’clock, nearly half an hour ago. there’s nothing to be done.”
“but, of course,” cried george, “there’s something to be done. they must be stopped at once. i’ll go up by the next train.”
“there’s no train until six to-morrow morning—and what good would you do? they’re engaged. you gave your permission. katherine’s of age. it is her own affair.”
they all cried out together. their voices sounded to mrs. trenchard like the screams of children.
through the confusion there came the sound of an opening door. they all turned, and saw that it was old mr. trenchard, assisted by rocket.
“why don’t you come in to dinner?” he said, in his clear, thin voice. “i went straight into the dining-room because i was late, and here you all are, and it’s nearly half-past eight.”
the same thought instantly struck them all. grandfather must know nothing about it; a very slight shock, they were all aware, would kill grandfather, and there could not possibly be any shock to him like this amazing revolt of katherine’s. therefore he must know nothing. like bathers asserting themselves after the first quiver of an icy plunge, they fought their way to the surface.
until grandfather was safely once more alone in his room the situation must be suspended. after all, there was nothing to be done! he, because he was feeling well that evening, was intent upon his dinner.
“what! waiting for katherine?” he said.
“katherine isn’t coming down to dinner, father,” mrs. trenchard said.
“what, my dear?”
“katherine isn’t coming down to dinner.”
“not ill, i hope.”
“no—a little tired.”
george trenchard was the only one who did not support his part. when the old man had passed through the door, george caught his wife’s arm.
“but, i say,” he whispered, “something—”
she turned for an instant, looking at him with scorn.
“nothing!” she said. “it’s too late.”
they went in to dinner.
it was fortunate that grandfather was hungry; he did not, it seems, notice philip’s absence.
“very nice to see you down, father,” mrs. trenchard said pleasantly. “very nice for us all.”
“thank ye, my dear. very agreeable—very agreeable. quite myself this evening. that rheumatism passed away, so i said to rocket, ‘well, ’pon my word, rocket, i think i’ll come down to-night’ livelier for us all to be together. hope katie isn’t ill, though?”
“no—no—nothing at all.”
“i saw her this morning. she seemed quite well.”
“a little headache, father dear. she thought she was better by herself.”
“dear katie—never do to have her ill. well, george. what’s the matter with ’ee? looking quite hipped. dig your father in the ribs, millie, my dear, and cheer him up a bit.”
so seldom was old mr. trenchard in his merry mood, and so difficult of him to be in it now. so often he was consumed with his own thoughts, his death, perhaps, the present degradation of the world, the tyranny of aches and pains, impatience with the monotonous unvariety of relations, past trenchard glories, old scenes and days and hours ... he, thus caught up into his own life, would be blind to them all. but to-night, pleased with his food because he was hungry, and because his body was not paining him anywhere just now, he was interested in them. his bright little eyes darted all about the table.
there came at last the question that they dreaded:
“why, where’s the young man? katie’s young man?”
a moment’s silence, and then mrs. trenchard said quietly, and with her eyes upon the new ‘girl,’ introduced into the house only last week and fresh to the mysteries of a dinner-table:
“he’s dining with timothy to-night, father.”
rocket could be heard whispering to lucy, the ‘girl’:
“potatoes first—then the sauce.”
of them all, it was george trenchard who covered with least success the yawning chasm, even aunt betty, although her hands shook as she crumbled her bread, had not surrendered her control.
but for george this was the first blow, in all his life, to reach his heart. nothing really had ever touched him before. and he could not understand it—he simply could not understand it. it had been as sudden as an earthquake, and then, after all, there had been nothing to be done. that was the awful thing. there had been nothing to be done.... it was also so mysterious. nothing had ever been mysterious to him before. he had been dimly aware that during these last months all had not been well, but he had pursued his old safe plan, namely, that if you didn’t mention things and just smiled upon life without inviting it to approach you closely, all would, in the end, be well.
but now he could no longer hold aloof—he was in the middle of something, as surely as though he had been plunged into a deep tab of tossing, foaming water. katherine ... katie ... dear, devoted katie ... who had always loved him and done as he wished; katie, nearest of all human beings to his heart, and nearest because he had always known that she cared for him more than for any other human being. and now it was obvious that that was not so, it was obvious that she cared more for that young man, that abominable young man.... o, damn it! damn it! damn it! katherine was gone, and for no reason, for nothing at all except pride and impatience. already, as he sat there, he was wondering how soon, by any means whatever, he could establish pleasant relations with her, and so make his life comfortable once more. but, beyond katherine, there was his wife. what was he to do about harriet? for so many years now he had decided that the only way to deal comfortably with harriet was not to deal with her, and this had seemed to work so well ... but now ... now ... he must deal with her. he saw that she was in terrible distress; he knew her well enough to be sure of that. he would have liked to have helped and comforted her; it really distressed him to see anyone in pain, but he discovered now, with a sharp surprise, that she was a complete stranger, that he did not know any more about the real harriet trenchard than he did about lucy, the maid-servant. there was approaching him that awful moment when he would be compelled to draw close to her ... he was truly terrified of this.
it was a terrible dinner for all of them; once lucy dropped a knife, and they started, all of them, as though a bomb had screamed through the ceiling. and perhaps, to the older ones, there was nothing in it more alarming than the eyes, the startled, absorbed and challenging eyes, of millie and henry....
slowly, as the dinner progressed, old mr. trenchard discovered that something was the matter. he discovered it as surely by the nervous laughter and chatter of aunt betty as by the disconcerted discomfort of his son george. his merriment fell away from him; he loved ‘angels on horseback’—to-night there were ‘angels on horseback’, and he ate them with a peevish irritation. whatever was the matter now? he felt lost without sarah; she knew when and why things were the matter more quickly than anyone, aware of her deafness, would consider possible. but before he was assisted from the table he was sure that the ‘something’ was connected with his dear katherine.... the men did not stay behind to-night. in the hall they were grouped together, on the way to the drawing-room, waiting for the old man’s slow progress.
he paused suddenly beside the staircase.
“george,” he said, “george, just run up and see how katie is. give her my love, will ’ee?”
george turned, his face white. mrs. trenchard said:
“she’s probably asleep, father. with her headache—it would be a pity to wake her.”
at that moment the hall door pushed slowly open, and there, the wind eddying behind him, his ulster up over his neck, his hair and beard wet with the rain, stood uncle timothy.
“hullo!” he cried, seeing them all grouped together. but old mr. trenchard called to him in a voice that trembled now with some troubled anticipation:
“why, your dinner’s soon done? where’s the young man?”
uncle timothy stared at them; he looked round at them, then, at a loss for the first time in his life, stammered: “why, don’t you know...?”
the old man turned, his stick shaking in his hand: “where’s katherine? katie.... what’s happened to katie? what’s this mean?”
mrs. trenchard looked at him, then said:
“it’s all right, father—really. it’s quite all right.”
“it’s not all right.” fright like the terror of a child alone in the dark was in his eyes. “what have you done with her?”
her voice cold, without moving, she answered:
“katherine went up by the eight o’clock train to london with philip. she has gone to rachel seddon.”
“with philip?... what do you say? i can’t hear you.”
“yes. she is to stay with rachel seddon.”
“but why? what have you done? why did you tell me lies?”
“we have done nothing. we did not know that she was going.”
“you didn’t know?... then she’s left us?”
mrs. trenchard said nothing.
he cried: “i told him—what it would be—if he took her ... katie!”
then, his stick dropping with a rattle on to the stone floor, he fell back. rocket caught him.
there was a movement forward, but mrs. trenchard, saying swiftly, “george ... rocket,” had swept them all outside the figure—the figure of an old, broken, tumbled-to-pieces man, held now by his son and rocket, huddled, with his white, waxen hand trailing across george trenchard’s strong arm.
harriet trenchard said to her brother:
“you knew!” then turned up the stairs.
in the drawing-room aunt aggie, aunt betty, millie and henry faced uncle timothy.
“well!” said aunt aggie, “so you know all about it.... you’ve killed father!” she ended with a grim, malignant triumph.
he answered fiercely: “yes, i knew. that’s why i came. she said that she would send up a note from the village. i thought that you wouldn’t have heard it yet. i came up to explain.”
they all burst upon him then with questions:
“what?” “did you see her?” “what did she say?” “where was she?”
“of course i saw her. she came to me before she went off.”
“she came and you didn’t stop her!” this from aunt aggie. he turned then and addressed himself solely to her.
“no. i didn’t stop her. i gave her my blessing.”
aunt aggie would have spoken, but he went on: “yes, and it’s you—you and harriet and the others—who are responsible. i warned harriet months ago, but she wouldn’t listen. what did you expect? do you think the world’s always going on made for you and you alone? the more life’s behind you the more important you think you are, whereas it doesn’t matter a damn to anybody what you’ve done compared with what others are going to do. you thought you could tie katherine and philip down, take away their freedom? well, you couldn’t, that’s all.”
“yes,” cried aunt aggie, who was shaking with anger, “it’s such doctrines as yours, timothy, that lead to katherine and others doing the dreadful things they do. it’s all freedom now and such words, and young men like mr. mark, who don’t fear god and have no morals and make reprobates of themselves and all around them, can do what they please, i suppose. you talk about common-sense, but what about god? what about the commandments and duty to your parents? they may think what they like abroad, but, heaven be praised, there are some of us still in england who know our duty.”
he had recovered his control before she ended her speech. he smiled at her.
“the time will come,” he answered, “and i daresay it isn’t so distant as you think, when you and you fellow-patriots, aggie, will learn that england isn’t all alone, on her fine moral pedestal, any longer. there won’t be any pedestal, and you and your friends will have to wake up and realise that the world’s pushed a bit closer together now-a-days, that you’ve got to use your eyes a bit, or you’ll get jostled out of existence. the world’s going to be for the young and the independent and the unprejudiced, not the old and narrow-minded.
“philip mark’s woken you all up, and thank god he has!”
“heaven forgive you,” aunt aggie answered, “for taking his name. you’ve got terrible things to answer to him for, timothy, when the time comes.”
“i’m not afraid, aggie,” he said.
but it was millie who spoke the final word.
“oh, what are you all talking about!” she broke in. “what does it matter who’s good or bad or right or wrong. it’s katie’s happiness that matters, nothing else. of course, she’s gone. she ought to have gone months ago. you all wanted to make her and phil live your life just as you wished it, and phil, because he loved katie so much, was ready to, but why should they? you say you all loved her, but i think it was just selfishness. i’ve been as bad as the rest of you. i’ve been thinking of myself more than katie, but at heart now i’m glad, and i hope they’ll be happy, happy for ever.”
“and your mother?” said aunt aggie. “did katherine owe her nothing?”
“yes,” answered millie, stoutly, “but she didn’t owe her all her life. mother’s still got her if she wants her. katie will never change—she isn’t that kind. it’s mother’s pride that’s hurt, not her love.”
aunt betty, who had been quite silent, said:
“i do indeed hope that she will be very happy ... but life will never be the same again. we mustn’t be selfish, of course, but we shall miss her—terribly.”
at a later hour george trenchard, in pyjamas and a dressing gown, knocked on his wife’s door. she opened it, and he found her fully clothed; she had, it seemed to him, been reading.
he looked at her; he felt very wretched and uncomfortable.
“father’s asleep,” he said.
“i’m glad of that,” she answered.
“i think he’ll be none the worse in the morning.”
“i hope not. dr. pierson seemed reassured.”
there was a pause; in spite of his bedroom slippers, his feet were cold.
“harriet.”
“yes, george.”
“i only wanted to say—well, i don’t know—only that—i’m sorry if this—this business of katherine’s—has been a great blow to you.”
her mind returned to that day, now so long ago, when, after her visit to the stores, she had gone to his study. their position now was reversed. but she was tired; she did not care. george did not exist for her.
“it has surprised me, of course,” she answered, in her even, level voice. “i thought katherine cared more for us all than she has shown that she does. i certainly thought so. perhaps my pride is hurt.”
by making this statement—not especially to george, but to the world in general—she could say to herself: “you see how honest you are. you are hiding nothing.”
he meanwhile hated his position, but was driven on by a vague sense that she needed comfort, and that he ought to give it her.
“see here, harriet,” he said, awkwardly, “perhaps it needn’t be so bad. nothing very terrible’s happened, i mean. after all, they were going to marry anyway. they’ve only done it a bit sooner. they might have told us, it’s true—they ought to have told us—but, after all, young people will be young people, won’t they? we can’t be very angry with them. and young mark isn’t quite an englishman, you know. been abroad so long.”
as he spoke he dwindled and dwindled before her until his huge, healthy body seemed like a little speck, a fly, crawling upon the distant wall.
“nothing very terrible’s happened” ... “nothing very terrible’s happened” ... “nothing very terrible’s happened.”
george, who, during these many years had been very little in her life, disappeared, as he made that speech, utterly and entirely out of it. he was never to figure in it again, but he did not know that.
he suddenly sat down beside her on the old sofa and put his arm round her. she did not move.
they sat there in utter silence. at last desperately, as though he were committing the crime of his life, he kissed her. she patted his hand.
“you look tired,” he said, feeling an immense relief, now that he had done his duty. “you go to bed.”
“good night, george dear,” she said.
he raised his big body from the sofa, smiled at her and padded away....
when he had gone and she was alone, for a terrible time she fought her defeat. she knew now quite clearly that her ruling passion during all these months had not been, as she had supposed, her love of katherine, but her hatred of philip.
from the first moment of seeing him she had known him for her enemy. he had been, although at the time she had not realised it, the very figure whose appearance, all her life, she had dreaded; that figure, from outside, of whose coming timothy had long ago prophesied. how she had hated him! from the very first she had made her plans, influencing the others against him, watching how she might herself most securely influence him against himself, breaking in his will, using katherine against him; finally, when seymour had told her the scandal, how she had treasured it up for the moment when he, because of his love for katherine, should be completely delivered over to her!
and the moment had come. she had had her triumph! she had seen his despair in his eyes! she had got him, she thought, securely for ever and ever.
then how she had known what she would do in the future, the slave that she would make of him, the ways that she would trouble him with katherine, with that russian woman, with aggie, with all of them!
ah! it had been so perfect! and—at the very moment of her triumph—he had escaped!
that love for katherine that had been a true motive in her earlier life, a true motive even until six months ago, was now converted into a cold, implacable resentment, because it was katherine who had opened the door of philip’s cage. strange the complexities of the human heart! that very day, as she won her triumph she had loved her daughter. she had thought: “now that i have beaten him i can take you back to my heart. we can be, my dear, as we used to be”—but now, had katherine entered the room, she would have been spurned, dismissed for ever.
in the lust of love there is embedded, as the pearl is embedded in its shell, a lust of hate. very closely they are pressed together. mrs. trenchard was beaten—beaten by her daughter, by a new generation, by a new world, by a new age—beaten in the very moment of her victory.
she would never forgive.
what was left to her?
her heart was suddenly empty of love, of hatred, of triumph, of defeat. she was tired and lonely. somewhere, dimly, from the passage, the cuckoo-clock proclaimed the hour.
the house! that at least was left to her. these rooms, these roofs, the garden, the village, the fields, the hedges the roads to the sea. the place had not deceived her, had not shared in the victory over her; it had, rather, shared in her defeat.
it seemed, as she stood there, to come up to her, to welcome her, to console her.
she put a shawl over her shoulders, went softly through the dark passages, down into the drawing-room.
there, feeling her way, she found candles and lit them. she went to her cabinet, opened drawers, produced papers, plans, rows of figures. here was a plan of a new barn behind the house, here the addition of a conservatory to the drawing-room. before her was a map of south glebeshire, with the roads, the fields, the farms. she began to work, adding figures, following the plans, writing....
the light of the summer morning found her working there in the thin candle-light.
