by F. M. Mayor
As she expanded, Mary threw off some of her father’s belated views. One must be much influenced by one’s surroundings. In her new circle there was neither a Canon Jocelyn nor a Mr Herbert. Perhaps she lost some of that individuality, that unlikeness to the ordinary world which had given her a kind of gauche, innocent charm. Perhaps, also, living more in the middle of things, she could no longer have the critical onlooker’s sense of proportion. In fact, she gained and she lost.
‘It’s wonderful,’ Ella said joyously. ‘Mary is getting so much more like other people.’
The Redlands had been sensibly insistent that Mary should not immolate herself for Aunt Lottie, and Aunt Lottie did not grudge her outside interests; she enjoyed the reflected glory of Mary’s success. But Ella was vexed that Mary would not go away for a night, because Aunt Lottie had a weak heart.
‘I would come and stay whenever you wanted,’ said Dora. ‘At a moment’s notice.’
But Mary was firm. If she went away, she must accept her many invitations to the Merytons and the Herberts; she would rather not go.
She recognized the advantages of her outer life. It was more cheerful, in some ways more congenial, than Dedmayne. What was her inner life?
‘We’re all so fond of you, Mary,’ a new friend said to her. ‘But I don’t believe you care much for any of us.’
‘Yes, I do,’ answered Mary, taking her hand. ‘But my heart seems like a stone. I have been through a good deal.’
‘I know you have,’ said the friend, not knowing. Mary never revealed what she endured when she first left Dedmayne. She wondered afterwards how she had lived through it. She not only lived through it, but preserved a calm, not unduly sad front to the world. Ella said with surprised satisfaction:
‘I think Mary herself feels it a release.’
In youth she had resolved not to yield to the luxury of self-pity. That resolution had not been kept. She had yielded at Mr Herbert’s engagement, and again after his kiss. The recollection frightened her. She had found self-pity a quagmire in which it was difficult not to be submerged.
Looking back, she could not understand how she had then felt there was nothing left, while she still had her father. Now all was gone. She lost the sense of her father being near. She was convinced he could never be near, or had been, because he had ceased to be. Christian hope failed her not for hours and days, but for weeks and months. Books, sermons, her longing, the dictates of her reason availed her nothing. She went to the friendly Vicar and said she had doubts; they were not doubts, they were certainties. He talked with sympathetic consolation; he assured her he had no doubts. She came back; she was still more certain. She would confide in no one else. Dora wrote proposing herself – she and Aunt Lottie had become very friendly – ‘I have thought of you so often. Do let me come. I know it gets worse and worse in the first few months.’ Mary felt that kind Dora’s piety would add to her torture. She wanted to be alone, to go through this bitterness alone.
She did not relax even to herself. She had realized it was not wise for a Jocelyn to relax. She wanted this remnant of her life to be worthy of her father and Mr Herbert. She thought of Mr Herbert’s words about the chink of light that occasionally came through. She knew now there would be no chink of light; one must walk on without it.
Her solace, sometimes severe, were the duties that sprang up in the little home: the daily winding-up of two clocks, the weekly winding-up of three more; the morning paper, which she read all through to Aunt Lottie and later Aunt Lottie read all through to her, and the evening paper, in which the same news appeared in a still brighter form; the cat and dog, who wanted to be let in, and as soon as they were in to be let out, and as soon as they were out to be let in again; the knitting, which she set ready for Aunt Lottie, undid when she was gone to bed, and knitted up again to be ready for Aunt Lottie next afternoon; the explanations and answers to questions, which must be repeated several times, for Aunt Lottie, though not deaf, was inquisitive and inattentive; the listening to little whining digs of Aunt Lottie against various people, not made in malice, but just a habit, like sniffing. ‘And that little inlaid table. I told your father particularly I only lent it to your mother, and I wanted it back. I always thought it was not very considerate of him, and there were other little things . . . about poking the fire. . . and I left him so many of my things at the Rectory. . . all those books in the spare room were mine.’ And though the matter of the inlaid table might seem satisfactorily laid to rest by Mary, it would soon crop up again as robust as ever. Altogether, the Aunt Lottie part of the daily routine had something of a Sisyphus character. Then there was the more exciting, energetic part. Mary showed pleasant interest and gratitude about all her new friends prepared for her to do. They should not realize her mind was elsewhere. She was indifferent to their proffered intimacy. There were two people in the world she wanted – her father and Mr Herbert. Nothing besides existed for her. She had felt beyond the verge of feeling; at present she could feel no more.
Sometimes in the morning she shrank at the day’s prospect. ‘Life hath a load which must be carried on. And safely may.’ She said these words, but did not agree with them. To those as near the breaking-point as she was then, there seems no safety. She found the load heaviest in the spring and summer after her father’s death. It was then that the suburb looked its crudest – the asphalt paths, the tarred roads, the hoardings, the red and yellow houses with white and chocolate paint, the mustard-coloured privet, the pink may, lilac, copper beech, laburnum, vivid spring green leaves, orange wallflower, and blue forget-me-not, seen under an east-wind mauve sky, made a bright picture, which the inhabitants could not admire enough. Aunt Lottie liked to look at the picture in the public gardens with the ‘summer girls’ disporting themselves in their vulgarity.
When Mary was alone, she went to the one field left within reach, and gazed at the haystack, able with the faculty which usually goes with childhood to imagine that the houses partially hidden by the trees were not really there. She was not merely country-bred; the country was part of her. Her heart clung to all its most exasperating characteristics: the stumbling walks in uneven, lumpy fields under feeble starlight, or in black, black darkness; tracts of mud; dank, damp grass; streams of dead leaves in which one can walk ankle deep; shining puddles flowing right across the path; brambles and underwood stretching out their tentacles to catch one; thick, soft, white mist – she loved to stand in it and feel it saturating her; smells of cows and pigs; all the unmusical sounds of animals. Nature did not seem at ease in the suburbs; even her favourite wind was subdued and not himself. Mary wanted to be back in the Dedmayne lanes, where she remembered the snow lying thick and undisturbed. In the early summer she was hungry for the insignificant country flowers – pink, yellow, purple, white – hiding in the grass. Sometimes Mary fancied if she could only be in Dedmayne her numb heart would get warm. But if she saw Mr Herbert it might melt too much.
The soft power of time at length healed her. Autumn came with charm strong enough to transform the suburb. She began to feel again. She remembered the moment that she could say after all life was not over. It was when she heard the small piping song a robin was making to himself, different from the loud chirp with which he greeted his human friends, realizing how deaf and stupid they were. She had heard it and enjoyed it hundreds of times. Now it spoke to her with inexpressible consolation. Another day it was the lovely silvery clouds reposing with majestic tranquillity in the winter sky. It seemed as if Nature drew near Mary in her need. Having done her part of comfort, she retired, and as Mary became more immersed in her present life, Nature withdrew still farther.
Hope had returned. Sometimes it was sudden and transitory, sometimes it lingered. She was able occasionally to experience a mysterious acquiescent joy.
She could think again with happiness of her father. There was a certain hour she kept for him on Sunday evening. With him she thought of Mr Herbert, feeling now, she could not have explained why, that there w
as nothing which would jar on her father in her remembering them together. She allowed herself to re-read his love-letter, and went over their talks again and again, idealizing perhaps both him and them, as if he were dead also.
Her heart expanded. She could now give something more than dutiful gratitude to her friends; her natural tenderness found many outlets. The interest she had pretended to became genuine. But going on with her outer life she had from henceforth an inner life, and whereas her circle was cheerfully absorbed in the present, she thought much of the past and of the future, feeling the truth of words, which most people find disturbing. ‘We have here no continuing city; we seek that which is to come.’
Mary had sent her writings to Canon Jocelyn’s publisher before she left Dedmayne. But Mr Stephens was ill abroad, and the younger, smarter partner returned the MS. At the time it had been a very bitter disappointment. She had not the spirit to try elsewhere, and the parcel went back to her drawer; it was replenished now and then in her months of dejection. Later, as her life became busier, she wrote no more.
Kathy more than once made projects for seeing Mary. Besides invitations to Lanchester, she had twice suggested meeting in London, but the plan fell through. The Herberts rarely came to town; neither cared for it. At length Kathy arranged lunch at a restaurant, and a matinée to follow.
‘I wanted a good old scream, but I know what you two are,’ she explained, beaming on Mary and Mr Herbert, ‘so I’ve fixed on a highbrow show, where you could take dozens of maiden aunts, and none of them turn a hair.’
Mary had supposed unreasonably she should never see Mr Herbert again. She would like to keep that ‘God bless you, Mary,’ as his last words. Still, she longed to see him, while she dreaded it. But the meeting, when it came, damped any dangerous ardour.
The crude brilliance of the restaurant, the crowd, the bustle, ‘the jolly good feed’ pressed on them by Kathy – ‘Don’t let him choose, or we shall get nothing but leg of mutton and tapioca pudding’ – brought Mary to earth rather roughly.
There was much old chaff from Kathy, and some new.
‘I say, Towzer, you are blooming, quite handsome. I think it’s rather a risk having you about with my susceptible husband; I shan’t leave you alone together.’
It was fortunate that Kathy’s own hearty laugh supplied a comment, for Mary was speechless. That joke cut her. She had never seen Kathy in London clothes before. Smart Kathy must always be, but today she was in rich furs and a plumy hat; she looked a splendid cavalier. Never had Mary felt so much her own insignificance.
They talked a great deal about the children, and gossip of the neighbourhood. They had some general conversation about passing topics. Mary contributed her share. She was more at home in the world’s affairs than formerly. It was unreasonable to regret this. Mr Herbert assured himself that she could not have become commonplace, but he wanted her the same; the reality did not seem to correspond to the Mary he mused about. He hardly owned it to himself, but Mary was convinced that he felt a twinge of something, not strong enough to be called disappointment. As for her, she saw him looking well enough, happy enough, almost young enough to match his lovely wife. He seemed to have nothing to do with the Mr Herbert she thought of on Sundays. She was seized with jealousy of him and Kathy – the primal jealousy of an unsuccessful rival. Kathy had him, had children, had everything. If only he could be a little dissatisfied – Mary did not want him to be unhappy – she did not want Kathy to be unhappy, but why should he feel her perfection?
In his happy marriage Mr Herbert thought seldom of Mary, but when he found he was to meet her, something came back with irresistible force.
He and Mary had both unconsciously imagined they should meet one another as all that they always had been, and yet sublimated into angels. They had longed too much, and that cruel nervous reaction, which reminds us so pitilessly that we are only mortals, spoilt the reality, and tormented them with criticisms and doubts.
‘I must arrange my veil,’ said Kathy in the cloakroom after lunch. ‘Veils are the deuce, but Lesbia’s Polish barber man I went to this morning has got my hair into such a fluff I’m not respectable without a veil. Did I tell you Jack’s back? That’s why we’re up. All merry as a marriage bell so far. I don’t suppose that will last long. Well, old thing, it is jolly seeing you again, and not changed one bit, except that you’re so awfully fit. You haven’t told me a thing about yourself. What do you do with yourself all day, without me to see that you don’t get into mischief?’
Mary thought of her busy, happy life. She compared it to Kathy’s fullness; it seemed starvation.
‘I don’t think there’s much to tell,’ said she. ‘I only –’ She stopped; she felt herself near tears.
‘I say!’ cried Kathy. ‘It’s nearly the half-hour. We must fly. I loathe being late. And I don’t know where Crab won’t have wandered off to, not to mention that probably he’s forgotten to tip the waiter, though I told him exactly what it was to be. Crab’s more responsibility than three children any day.’
Mary had the guest’s place between the Herberts at the matinee. During the ‘high-brow’ play, a sentimental costume melodrama, Mr Herbert sat gazing gloomily at vacancy in transports of boredom, which, man-like, he made no efforts to conceal. He was even provoked because Mary pretended successfully to enjoy herself. Kathy was delighted with the play, as touched by its sentiment and as amused by its jokes as the Cosmopolitan producers, gauging its public well, knew she would be. Mr Herbert allowed his disgust to infect the intervals. He did not take much pains to make himself pleasant. The little time there was, was taken up with matinée talk with Kathy.
Mary had to catch a train immediately after the play. There were cordial and hurried goodbyes, and proposals from Kathy of another matinée next time they came to town. But Mary had determined she would never see the Herberts again, and she never did see them again.
It was not at once that Mary could conquer the jealousy she so much despised. It burned again with the fierceness of its first flame after Mr Herbert’s engagement.
For some time the remembrance of the matinée took the whole sweetness out of Mary’s past. But there is something very romantic about memory. The Mr Herbert of her dreams was reinstated, and the luncheon was blotted out as if it had not been.
28
Mary was stricken with influenza. How long it was after her father’s death depends on how one judges of time. Kathy’s three boys were well past babyhood, and the delightful years seemed long to her from their fullness. To Mr Sykes, living on alone at Yeabsley, they seemed a few rather melancholy months.
Dora Redland came to help in the nursing and look after Aunt Lottie. Her gentleness awed Nurse into quietness and soothed Aunt Lottie’s restless distress. Nurse said to professional friends, ‘No one could call Miss Redland trained, mind you, though she takes a great deal upon herself. Cottage Hospital – you know the style.’
Mary’s mind wandered a little. For the most part she talked confusedly of trifling matters of her present life. She mentioned Ruth, the little sister who had seemed to pass entirely out of her life. In many sentences the word ‘he’ kept recurring. She had never thought of Mr Herbert as anything but ‘he.’ ‘It’s such a strange fancy of dear Mary’s,’ said Dora to Aunt Lottie. ‘She is always talking about her father in the study at Lanchester.’ Once Mary said to Dora drowsily, with a half-whimsical smile, ‘Dora, do you think it isn’t going to be forty years after all?’
‘I wonder,’ said Dora, with her sweetest nurse’s smile, not in the least understanding what Mary was driving at. ‘And now the precocious infant’ – the Redlands’ pet name for Mary as a little girl (being very ill, Mary was back as a darling child to Dora) – ‘must have her Benger’s. Cook wants to hear that you’ve finished every scrap today.’
~
Though the influenza had not seemed a severe attack first of all, Mary gradually sank, and she died after a three weeks’ illness. Then Dora remembered Mary’s wor
ds after Canon Jocelyn’s death, and she said through her tears, ‘Darling Mary, I believe she was glad it wasn’t forty years.’
Mary was buried at Dedmayne by her father. Emma was hysterical at the funeral. Cook shed no tears, but she had suddenly grown very small, turned into a little, thin, old woman. Dora gave her a kiss – the last act she could do for Mary. Cook did not cry even then, but said very quietly, ‘Oh, miss, I never thought it would be like this. I thought she would have been by me at the end. You feel it, Miss Dora, same almost as me, because you’ve been about the world just as I’ve done, and I know ladies, and there never will be any one like her again.’
Dora had felt the harshness, the ingratitude of Death, which would make Mary soon forgotten in the village she had so cherished. But the Jocelyns were not being forgotten yet.
‘Ah,’ said old Barnes, whom Dora went to visit after the funeral, ‘there’s terrible changes here with the new Rector.’ He was hardly new in point of time, but, as different from the Jocelyns, he and his wife would be new to Dedmayne for years to come.
‘I’ve left the choir,’ went on Barnes. ‘We was all to turn our faces to the Commandments, same as the congregation, when we says the Creed; he don’t seem to know what’s the choir’s due; and he have cut down the monkey-tree at the Rectory, what was the first monkey-tree planted in the British Isles, so you wouldn’t know the old place.’
At tea at the Rectory, Dora saw the reverse side of the shield. ‘I know,’ said the Rector’s wife, who managed to create a feeling of bustle even at a funeral. ‘The Jocelyns must have been wonderful, and the people were dreadfully upset when they heard she had passed away, but weren’t they rather curious? Fancy no water laid on upstairs. We want to start the Guides here to make it a little brighter, and they say the Canon wouldn’t have liked it. I think country people are most difficult, and we had such a nice congregation at Brixton. No, darling, not now; Mummy’s busy.’
