God and the Wedding Dress

by Marjorie Bowen

  The whole of her life thus had an unnatural cast, all the sweet ordered simplicity had gone. Again and again she wondered if this was a punishment for her ingratitude in complaining when first she came to the loneliness of Eyam.

  This evening she felt the desolation of her household — her children, Ann Trickett and Bessie all gone, and her husband as good as gone, for she saw but little of him. And every time that she did see him she looked at him in terror for fear she would see the marks of the plague on his face. But she knew that he considered himself immune, even as he considered her protected.

  But this horror she would not express and hugged to herself a wild hope that a man of God, doing godly work, might be spared. Yet the hope was indeed but wild and alternated with fits of despair so that her soul was in a continual torment. There was no longer the pleasant routine, the elegance of music, of song, the fine conversation that had once continued for hours in the Rectory. All that Catherine Mompesson could do was to have food ready when her husband and Thomas Stanley were able to eat it. And food was scarce too, and much of it looked on with suspicion, for there were many different and firm convictions as to how the infection went. Some thought it was in meat, and others blamed overripe fruit, and the Rector himself declared that a spare diet was good.

  So Kate kept soups, bread, honey and milk, for neither of the men would touch wine or spirits, ready on her buffet.

  She gazed out into the orchard — the apples were ripe among the curling grey leaves, the August sun was in a thick haze of gold above the beehives, the grass grew knee-high round the red wall that divided the orchard from the garden, there was a heavy, sickly sweetness in the air.

  Kate felt drowsy, even her anguish numbed — she wished only for repose. The yearning for her children had become an obsession with her. Sometimes, when she was alone in this empty, despoiled house, she had been able to forget them for hours together, but now their images were ever-present to her mind. She had not yet had a letter from York, indeed it was too soon for her to have received news from that city. But every day when the messenger went to the stone where letters for Eyam would be placed, she waited eagerly at the door of the Rectory in the foolish hope that somehow Bessie might have sent a word of their progress.

  The Lord-Lieutenant had sent his commendation and admiration of the action of Mr. Mompesson and had taken upon himself to give the dissenter, Thomas Stanley, leave to remain in the village and help during the plague. The Earl had also undertaken to supply the village with what it required in the way of medicines, goods and foods. These were taken at night and left on the stones on the heath that were supposed to be a heathen altar, or on the well at the head of Middleton Dell.

  Those who had private purchases to make left their orders and their money, both well soaked in vinegar, on the stone. In this way, too, letters were exchanged.

  My Lord’s physician came once again to the stream that ran out of the grounds of Chatsworth into the dale near the village, and with the running water between him and Mr. Mompesson or Mr. Stanley, as the case might be, gave advice and directions. Yet these, as poor Kate knew, amounted to very little, for her husband had as much knowledge as the wise physician at Chatsworth. Though now and then some remedy that had been tried in London or Derby was given by the physician in the hopes that it might prove efficacious in Eyam.

  But Kate, like many another in the village, relied also upon spells and charms. She carried round her neck on cords beneath her gown a charm that had been given her by old Mother Sydall; and before she rose in the morning and before she went to bed she repeated an incantation that had been taught her by the old woman. But nothing could cast out fear; waking and dreaming, Catherine Mompesson was a haunted woman.

  She roused herself from her apathy and fatigue and left the window, looking round the kitchen, which was so different now from what it had been under the reign of Ann Trickett. There was much that was awry, for Catherine had little skill in housewifery arts; she did not like to see the disorder, but she had not the strength to remedy it. She had never been in her life before so coarsely dressed — her gown was of drugget, draggled at the bottom from going in and out of the house into the yard and throwing water and bending down to clean. Her hands were coarse, her face drawn, it was long since she had bathed, perfumed and curled her hair, which had been her great pride.

  All her limbs ached, and when she sat down it was small relief; even when stretched in bed she had little repose from her great fatigue.

  Slowly she went up the shallow stairway; through the windows that gave on to the garden beams of thick yellow sunshine fell and in them the motes danced merrily. Bent from her weariness, with one hand supporting herself against the wainscot of the panelled wall, she went along the corridor to the room the children had used and looked at the empty place where their cots had been and at the cupboard where they had kept their toys and at the press where their clothes had hung.

  She knew this room so well, every inch of it, every detail of it, everything that had been in it was a personal matter to her. She had not known till they had gone away how the children had involved themselves with every fibre of her life.

  Kate shut the door resolutely, blaming herself for being a coward because her children were safe and she could not rejoice at it. She had to remind herself of that — They are safe! they are happy! they will even forget me! They will not pine, they are too young. She went then into her own room, which was much neglected. She had almost come to the end of her sheets, and pillows and bolster-cases, so much bandaging was required, for the bandages must not be used twice however carefully washed, but burnt in the fires that were kept glowing in the streets.

  The young woman thought dully: ‘They must ask my Lord for more linen.’

  It was but a short time ago that she would have been distressed to part with her store of fine sheets, so many worked by her fine hand. But this loss no longer concerned her. She opened her press in her tired, fumbling way and took out nightgowns, chemises, petticoats and cambrics. Bent wearily in a chair she began to pull the seams apart and to slit them in strips, using the scissors that hung at her waist. When the strips were made she rolled them, dividing the end, and tied them in little bundles.

  This was the hour that Catherine Mompesson put aside for meditation and under her husband’s instructions tried to put herself into communication with God. She did not find this easy, her mind was too distracted with worldly affairs and worldly terrors. God seemed to her an impenetrable mystery; she could not fathom His Will, she dared not question it. Yet her belief was simple and profound. She had not a sceptical nor a challenging spirit; she was convinced of the reality of Heaven and Hell; she believed that the stars lit the angels and that God had His throne beyond the sun, that the world was a land of darkness and blind eyes, that a painted veil was drawn over the glorious moon of God.

  But how to feel that this belief was a living, comforting thing, how to trust herself to God’s mercy when He had shown so little?

  She thought of the dead whom she had seen die in Eyam, she who had never looked upon death before. Those who with cries and groans and rolling eyes and hideous sweats had died in the pest-house, pallid children, the ashy-cheeked babes whom she had seen in the cottages! Why did God permit this slaughter?

  Thomas Stanley had spoken of a judgment on the village, but though Catherine Mompesson did not dare to murmur at the words, she thought that a judgment on these poor souls was like checking a wilful child at its play.

  ‘Should I make a judgment on Bessie and George for some little thing they did amiss in their innocence and ignorance?’

  Foul men, the dissenter said, had driven the angels away from Eyam, and Catherine believed that he referred to the villagers’ return to the church. Between him and the Rector was always this cleavage of religious belief, although they agreed not to speak of it in the present hour of distress.

  Here again Catherine was bemused and bewildered. Both her husba
nd and the dissenter seemed to her holy men, she knew them brave and admirable, perhaps saintly. And each claimed to be in communion with God, yet they regarded one another as lost, disobedient, if not damned.

  “It is not for your feminine intellect,” the Rector had told her tenderly, “to consider such things,”

  He had told her to resign herself meekly and he reminded her, as he always reminded his congregation now, that the greater crosses borne on the earth the brighter the crowns to be won in Heaven. Yet all this was a thin consolation to Kate Mompesson.

  She wanted her worldly life, she wanted her husband, to sleep with, to eat with, to talk with, to walk with. She wanted her children about her, and the merry gossiping housewifely life, and fine dresses and good food and music. Why, she had not touched the virginal since the plague began. She wanted these things and she had lost them, and the consolation of a promised paradise seemed dim and far away.

  Kate tried to pray. She bent her weary knees and put her tired, trembling hands before her worn face and thus in the darkness tried to smooth out her disordered life, her restless sorrows, into a sacred calm.

  When she rose she was a little consoled. Her weariness had passed into a gloss of tranquillity.

  How lonely and empty the old house seemed! When would the Rector and Mr. Stanley return? She had set their food, she had covered the fire so that it would be easy to heat the soup.

  Kate moved slowly from the bedroom, down the corridor and down the shallow stairs, and then she heard two familiar voices that caused the blood to rush into her cheeks — Ann and Bessie! She could hardly believe this to be the dear truth; her step was lighter and her pace quicker than it had been for many days as she hastened into the parlour.

  And there stood Bessie and Ann, with their trunks before them. Outside, beyond the garden gate, she could see the Corbyns’s carriage and the old coachman moving away.

  “Oh, Bess!” she said. “Oh, Bess!”

  And could say no more, but lay and wept passionately on her sister’s shoulder. Bessie could not speak either; she sobbed too and the two girls sat in the window place holding one another tightly, while Ann, who was composed and even smiling, gave the story.

  “Did you think, mistress, that we had forsaken you? We would not say that we meant to return, for then we feared we should not be let out of the village, and the children required minding.”

  “Oh, the children, the children!” said Kate. “You should not have left them, Bessie. Are they happy, are they well?”

  “Why, of course, dear heart, they are well and happy.”

  And again Ann Trickett took up the story.

  “They are well enough, and happy enough, I warrant, mistress. Why, Mr. Beilby is delighted to have them, they are just like two treasures to him. And he has a good woman who looks after his house, and two willing maids, and the little ones have a fine room and a cupboard full of toys. And there’s not one case of the plague in York.”

  “Oh, you should have stayed. Have you heard what’s happened here? Was it decided before you went away? I’ve forgotten,” smiled Kate, trying to dry her tears. “But we are shut in, you know, none is allowed out.”

  “I know that,” said Ann Trickett, “they told us as much at Bakewell. They said those that went into Eyam now must stay there. But we came back to our places. I am sorry, mistress,” she added, “that you should have thought otherwise of me. And of your own sister!”

  Now Kate Mompesson was roused to a sense of the danger that Bessie ran. Her selfish pleasure at seeing her sister vanished into fear.

  “Bess, you should not have come back,” she said in deep distress. “The plague is terrible. People die every day, yes, every day more. Mr. Stanley and Mr. Mompesson are ever on their feet, going from one to another. It may be here any moment, nobody knows how the contagion goes. Oh, Bess, I should have been happier if you had stayed in York.”

  “Have you forgotten my condition?” replied Bessie Carr. “Don’t you understand, Kate, that since Jack died all life’s vain to me? I truly hate to be staying here below. My one pleasure is that I might be of some service to you. There must be something I can do.”

  “I’ll warrant there’s plenty I can do,” said Ann Trickett, taking off her hood and cloak and flinging them over her arm.

  “Yes,” smiled Kate, “I’ve not done too well in the house for myself. I’ve been so tired, not able to sleep, and no woman can be obtained.”

  “I’ll soon have things to rights, mistress. I suppose Jonathan Mortin is still here — doesn’t he help you?”

  “Oh, he brings in the water and washes down the floors in the kitchen and closets. But there are many things to do, queer things we never thought of before. So much to fumigate and the bandages to make. And I help put up the medicines. Bess, it is terrible. You know they are burying the dead in sheets now, and there’s not enough of those because they want them for bandages for the sick.”

  “Have they made the headstone for Jack?” asked Bess wearily. Her pleasure at returning home and seeing Kate again had soon died out, her face was fatigued, like her sister she looked ten years more than her age. Both these young women seemed benumbed by a long frost of sorrow.

  But Ann left the room and went into the kitchen, which was her own peculiar region, and they could hear her moving about, and the clatter of pots and pans, the snap of wood as she kindled a fresh fire.

  “It’s so hot,” sighed Kate, “so hot.”

  “Yes, that’s strange,” said Bess, “up here in the mountains. It seems hotter than it was down in the valley. Is the infection in the air, do you think, Kate?”

  “I don’t know, dear, no one seems to know! Mompesson is always reading his learned books, and Mr. Stanley has his head full of conceits, but between them they cannot come to the truth of the matter. Oh, Bess, all I know is that people die and die in pain and in agonies. So foul, too. The stench, the tremors, the vomiting and the sweat.”

  “Let us try to forget it,” begged Bess, drawing her sister up to her bosom. “Poor Kate! Bathe your face and your hands and comb your hair and we will have a little music.”

  “Music! I have not played for many a day now! How does one dare? The death bell was ever tolling, and now it ceases to toll it is worse still, for one knows that funerals come too quick and the bell-ringers have other things to do.”

  “Never mind, Kate, Ann Trickett will get the meals to-night.”

  “We have no meals now, Bess, but just put the food aside for Mompesson and Mr. Stanley when they come in.”

  “Never mind, never mind, remember that the children are safe, there is some hope there. But as for me, I have my glance above.”

  “Hast thou truly, Bess? I would that I could. Art thou resigned to die and join thy Jack in Paradise?”

  “I am resigned.”

  She drew her sister to the virginal; it was an old-fashioned instrument that had belonged to the girl’s grandmother, but was still sweet and pure in tone.

  But Kate did not play, her soiled fingers rested languidly on the yellow keys.

  “Bessie, do you think that it is our fault, that it is a judgment?”

  “What have we done that there should be a judgment on us?” asked the younger sister wildly.

  “I don’t know. We played with fire, perhaps! Spurned good advice. We never thought this could happen, never realized how our souls could ache. Do you remember all the glorious deceptions we had, like gilded mists before our eyes — false joys, fantastic flights. How we gave our fond humours their wings, all our plays, toys, conceits?”

  “I remember well enough,” said Bessie Carr, “the days at Rufford Park and Jack’s visits and the games we had”; she stared in front of her. “But what evil was there in that?”

  “I don’t know, Bessie, that there was evil in it. But our eyes were not turned to Heaven as they should have been. We were enjoying ourselves on earth instead of making haste to be away. And now — there a
re the dead all around us! You know, when I go upstairs at night, I seem to meet a dead man on every tread. And he reminds me how I, even like my toys and games, must fain vanish away.

  “I remember when we first came here and I was gathering some early flowers in Middleton Dell, and Mr. Stanley met me, and told me that my garland would be dead in the morning. But if I wished for one that would not fade, I must think of good deeds and Heaven. And I laughed at him then when he told me that my pleasures were but a sugared dose of wormwood.”

  “Play some music, Kate,” said Bessie, “play some music. Do not think so sadly. We must pine for home — which is with God — you and I. My loss, so far at least, is greater than thine. Play a little melody, Kate.”

  At this appeal the elder sister obeyed, and the thin tinkling notes fell in the sweet, thick, golden air. The sun was setting now and low level rays fell through the wide parlour windows.

  “Let us think,” said Bessie, when Kate dropped her worn hands on the lap of her drugget gown, “that we sleep, you and I, and that when we wake we shall be happy. And remember, dear, humanly speaking, that the little ones are safe.”

  There was a step on the threshold, and the Rector stood there, astonished.

  “Bessie! Returned!”

  And yet in his inner heart he had thought of this. The girl had gone so quietly that he could not believe that she had gone for ever. He knew her true heart, she was another like his Kate, staunch and loyal, and grief had purged her from her childish follies and affectations.

  So there was not need for much explanation between them. The Rector bade her stand away from him, until he had been to his closet and fumigated his clothes and washed his hands in vinegar.

  “For I have been in three infected houses this afternoon,” he said. “I am glad for Kate’s sake you have returned, dear Bess.”