"Confound the girl!" he thought. "She"s going to faint now! What an infernal nuisance!"
Compunction, instead of softening him, made him angry with himself. He felt awkward, at a loss, furious.
"Mrs. Tams!" he called out, and hurried from the room. "Mrs. Tams!" As he went out he was rather startled to find that the door had not been quite closed.
In the lobby he called again, "Mrs. Tams!"
The kitchen gas showed a speck of blue. He had not noticed it when he came into the house: the kitchen door must have been shut, then. He looked up the stairs. He could discern that the door of Mrs. Tams"s bedroom, at the top, was open, and that there was no light in the room. Puzzled, he rushed to the kitchen, and s.n.a.t.c.hed at his hat as he went, sticking it anyhow on his head.
"Eh, mester, what ever"s amiss?"
With these alarmed words Mrs. Tams appeared suddenly from behind the kitchen door; she seemed a little out of breath, as far as Louis could hear; he could not see her very well. The thought flashed through his mind. "She"s been listening at doors."
"Oh! There you are," he said, with an effort at ordinariness of demeanour. "Just go in to Mrs. Fores, will you? Something"s the matter with her. It"s nothing, but I have to go out."
Mrs. Tams answered, trembling: "Nay, mester, I"m none going to interfere. I go into no parlour."
"But I tell you she"s fainting."
"Ye"d happen better look after her yerself, Mr. Louis," said Mrs. Tams in a queer voice.
"But don"t you understand I"ve got to go out?"
He was astounded and most seriously disconcerted by Mrs. Tams"s very singular behaviour.
"If ye"ll excuse me being so bold, sir," said Mrs. Tams, "ye ought for be right well ashamed o" yeself. And that I"ll say with my dying breath."
She dropped on to the hard Windsor chair, and, lifting her ap.r.o.n, began to whimper.
Louis could feel himself blushing.
"It seems to me you"d better look out for a fresh situation," he remarked curtly, as he turned to leave the kitchen.
"Happen I had, mester," Mrs. Tams agreed sadly; and then with fire: "But I go into no parlour. You get back to her, mester. Going out again at this time o" night, and missis as her is! If you stop where a husband ought for be, her"ll soon mend, I warrant."
He went back, cursing all women, because he had no alternative but to go back. He dared not do otherwise.... It was only a swoon. But was it only a swoon? Suppose ...! He was afraid of public opinion; he was afraid of Mrs. Tams"s opinion. Mrs. Tams had pierced him. He went back, dashing his hat on to the oak chest.
III
Rachel was lying on the hearth-rug, one arm stretched nonchalantly over the fender and the hand close to the fire. Her face was whiter than any face he had ever seen, living or dead. He shook; the inanimate figure with the disarranged clothes and hair, p.r.o.ne and deserted there in the solitude of the warm, familiar room, struck terror into him. He bent down; he knelt down and drew the arm away from the fire. He knew not in the least what was the proper thing to do; and naturally the first impulse of his ignorance was to raise her body from the ground. But she was so heavy, so appallingly inert, that, fortunately, he could not do so, and he let her head subside again.
Then he remembered that the proper thing to do in these cases was to loosen the clothes round the neck; but he could not loosen her bodice because it was fastened behind and the hooks were so difficult. He jumped to the window and opened it. The blind curved inward like a sail under the cold entering breeze. When he returned to Rachel he thought he noticed the faintest pinky flush in her cheeks. And suddenly she gave a deep sigh. He knelt again. There was something about the line of her waist that, without any warning, seemed to him ineffably tender, wistful, girlish, seductive. Her whole figure began to exert the same charm over him. Even her frock, which nevertheless was not even her second best, took on a quality that in its simplicity bewitched him. He recalled her wonderful gesture as she lighted his cigarette on the night when he first saw her in her kitchen; and his memory of it thrilled him.... Rachel opened her eyes and sighed deeply once more. He fanned her with a handkerchief drawn from his sleeve.
"Louis!" she murmured in a tired baby"s voice, after a few moments.
He thought: "It"s a good thing I didn"t go out, and I"m glad Mrs.
Tarns isn"t here blundering about."
"You"re better?" he said mildly.
She raised her arms and clasped him, dragging him to her with a force that was amazing under the circ.u.mstances. They kissed; their faces were merged for a long time. Then she pushed him a little away, and, guarding his shoulders with her hands, examined his face, and smiled pathetically.
"Call me Louise," she whispered.
"Silly little thing! Shall I get you some water?"
"Call me Louise!"
"Louise!"
CHAPTER XIX
RACHEL AND MR. HORROCLEAVE
I
The next morning, Sunday, Rachel had a fancy to superintend in person the boiling of Louis" breakfast egg. For a week past Louis had not been having his usual breakfast, but on this morning the ideal life was recommencing in loveliest perfection for Rachel. The usual breakfast was to be resumed; and she remembered that in the past the sacred egg had seldom, if ever, been done to a turn by Mrs. Tams. Mrs.
Tams, indeed, could not divide a minute into halves, and was apt to regard a preference for a certain consistency in a boiled egg as merely finicking and negligible. To Mrs. Tams a fresh egg was a fresh egg, and there was no more to be said.
Rachel entered the kitchen like a radiance. She was dressed with special care, rather too obviously so, in order that she might be worthy to walk by Louis" side to church. She was going with him to church gladly, because he had rented the pew and she desired to please him by an alert gladness in subscribing to his wishes; it was not enough for her just to do what he wanted. Her eyes glittered above the darkened lower lids; her gaze was self-conscious and yet bold; a faint languor showed beneath her happy energy. But there was no sign that on the previous evening she had been indisposed.
Mrs. Tams was respectfully maternal, but preoccupied. She fetched the egg for Rachel, and Rachel, having deposited it in a cooking-spoon, held it over the small black saucepan of incontestably boiling water until the hand of the clock precisely covered a minute mark, whereupon she deftly slipped the egg into the saucepan; the water ceased to boil for a few seconds and then bubbled up again. And amid the heavenly frizzling of bacon and the odour of her own special coffee Rachel stood sternly watching the clock while Mrs. Tams rattled plates and did the last deeds before serving the meal. Then Mrs. Tarns paused and said--
"I don"t hardly like to tell ye, ma"m--I didn"t hardly like to tell ye last night when ye were worried like--no, and I dunna like now like, but its like as if what must be--I must give ye notice to leave. I canna stop here no longer."
Rachel turned to her, protesting--
"Now, Mrs. Tams, what _are_ you talking about? I thought you were perfectly happy here."
"So I am, mum. n.o.body could wish for a better place. I"m sure I"ve no fault to find. But it"s like as if what must be."
"But what"s the matter?"
"Well, ma"am, it"s Emmy." (Emmy was Mrs. Tams"s daughter and the mother of her favourite grandchild.) "Emmy and all on" em seem to think it"ll be better all round if I don"t take a regular situation, so as I can be more free for "em, and they"ll all look after me i" my old age. I s"ll get my old house back, and be among "em all. There"s so many on "em."
Every sentence contained a lie. And the aged creature went on lying to the same pattern until she had created quite a web of convincing detail--more than enough to persuade her mistress that she was in earnest, foolishly in earnest, that she didn"t know on which side her bread was b.u.t.tered, and that the poorer cla.s.ses in general had no common sense.
"You"re all alike," said the wise Rachel.
"I"m very sorry, ma"m."
"And what am I to do? It"s very annoying for me, you know. I thought you were a permanency."