“No, ma’am! Not if your happy face was the face of an angel from heaven, I wouldn’t believe the lie you’re tellin’ me! It’s a poor thing for a parson’s wife to pick up all the gossip runnin’ in a village an’ take it for gospel — an’ there’s nothin’ against my ‘usband that I’ll hear from ye, ma’am, though you’re a lady, an’ I’m only a poor workin’ woman.”
Her breath caught in a half sob, but she struggled with herself and went on —
“My Dan’s as true as steel to me, ma’am — and it’s only Minchin’s stuff as alters ’im a bit now an’ then. An’ as for Jacynth Miller, Dan knows as well as we all knows, that she’s a waif an’ stray without father nor mother an’ only an old dodderin’ auntie as doesn’t care what becomes of ‘er, an’ there’s a devil in the poor gel as’ll only be got out by pain an’ sorrow. She’ll get all her troubles soon enough, for ‘andsome looks brings evil deeds — so if my Dan’s kind to ‘er a bit now and agin, I’m not for grudgin’ it.” — Here her voice broke in a sudden plaintive wail and she gave vent to a passionate burst of weeping, burying her face in the pillow and crying weakly— “Oh, Dan, my man! You couldn’t be false to me! No, not you, Dan!”
Azalea was speechless and utterly dismayed. Who would have thought a ‘common’ woman would have taken the suggestion of her husband’s infidelity like this? An educated lady would have behaved quite differently, and would have shown the indignation and scorn necessary for the assertion of her own proper pride. Azalea herself, for example, if she had heard that her Richard was ‘carrying on,’ as the vulgar phrase puts it, with another woman, she would have left him, — yes, she was quite sure, so she said to herself, that she would have left him. She would never have forgiven him! The ‘common’ woman’s way of loving was totally beyond her. She did not know what to make of it. She stood by the bedside, helplessly unable to proffer any sympathy or consolation, and she began to feel rather sorry for herself. Then she took refuge in the ever-standing stronghold of feminine inconsistency.
“It’s always the way!” she thought— “If you want to help these kind of people you must never tell them anything that will really be for their good. They’re not a bit pleased! I did hope I might be able to save the poor thing from being deceived any more — but it’s no use! She believes in her husband and merely thinks me a liar!”
Her cheeks burned with offense at this idea, and while she yet hesitated as to whether she should speak again, or take an abrupt departure, Mrs. Adcott appeared in the doorway and beckoned to her.
“Better come away now, ma’am,” — she said rather tartly; “You’ve said enough.”
Azalea moved a few steps — then paused —
“Good-bye, Mrs. Kiernan!” — and she waited for an answer, but none came— “I do hope you’ll soon be all right.”
With this she stepped daintily into the adjoining kitchen where Mrs. Adcott confronted her. The little brown-faced, wrinkled, hard-working woman’s eyes were full of tears.
“I’m sorry, ma’am,” she said tremulously— “I’m right-down sorry as you should ‘ave said anythin’ to Jennie Kiernan about Dan’s goings on with Jacynth Miller. We was all for hidin’ of it till everythin’ was well got over.” Here she wiped her eyes with her apron. “It’ll kill Jennie, it will!”
Azalea was completely taken aback for a moment. Then she rallied herself with a pretty stateliness, indicative of the usual ‘offended virtue.’
“What do you mean?” she asked, with a touch of haughtiness— “You know that it is impossible that such a wicked thing can go on in this parish without everybody knowing it — and everybody does know it, except the poor deceived wife herself—”
“And the Vicar, ma’am, your good ‘usband — he don’t know it,” said Mrs. Adcott, trembling a little— “For he’s that kind an’ gentle as he don’t suspect ‘arm in no man an’ no woman either. An’ we was all in a band like, to try and manage so as he should never know, — an’ that it shouldn’t be a worrit to ’im, an’ one of us was goin’ to take Jacynth away by-and-bye — an’ nobody would a bin a bit the wiser—”
“Then you were all in a plot to deceive the Vicar!” interrupted Azalea, indignantly— “Just to screen a bad girl and a wicked drunken man! Oh! It’s most dreadful! And you come to church and take Communion! What an awful thing!”
“It may seem awful to you, ma’am,” — and Mrs. Adcott raised her keen shrewd gray eyes, and fixed them steadily on Azalea’s crimsoning face— “For you see you’re a lady, an’ you’re young an’ ‘appy, and well cared for — an’ you’re not supposed to know the ins an’ outs of sorrows an’ sins. Dan’s a bad man, — I’d rather say he’s a good man spoilt by the drink, an’ he’s got no ‘old now over ‘imself at all, — an’ he’s as mad for Jacynth as he is for Minchin’s poison. There ain’t no ‘elp for it — no one can hold ’im — an’ the gel herself ‘ull go to any man good or bad — that’s ‘er nature. An’ we poor folks sees ‘ow it is, an’ we makes the best of a bad business — an’ all we sez is, let’s try to save the wife as ain’t done no ‘arm — an’ keep the parson quiet so as ’e shan’t fret hisself over it. An’, now you comes an’ tells Jennie — —”
“How could I prevent myself telling her!” exclaimed Azalea, with some excitement— “Especially when you said her husband had sat up all last night with Jacynth Miller in this very kitchen, and she, poor deceived thing! — lying ill in the next room! And you left them together! — You actually went home and left them together!”
“Dan put me out,” — said Mrs. Adcott quietly— “An’ if I ‘adn’t gone, ‘e’d a throw’d me out. He was sober enough — but ’e was wild to be with Jacynth. She came up, smilin’ at ’im innocent-like, an’ said she’d promised parson to take care of ’im. An’ I knew she’d keep ’im from the drink — an’ there couldn’t be no more ‘arm done than was done already — —”
Azalea stared — her cheeks alternately flushing and paling. ‘You mean— “she began.
“I mean that Jacynth’s got into trouble with Dan,” — said Mrs. Adcott— “An’ that it’s no good cryin’ over spilt milk. An’ as I told ye, ma’am, we was goin’ to get Jacynth quietly out o’ the village presently — an’ Jennie would never ‘ave known — nor parson neither—”
“And you would have deceived everybody.” Azalea’s eyes sparkled with indignation as she said this— “You were all in a positive conspiracy to hide this dreadful thing from your own Vicar, and you didn’t think it wrong?”
Mrs. Adcott sighed a little.
“No, ma’am,” — she confessed at last— “I’m afraid none of us thought it wrong. You see we’ve all liked Jennie Kiernan; an’ we wanted to spare ‘er more sorrow an’ cryin’, seein’ she’s ‘ad ‘er share.”
Azalea was silent. The position was, to her, quite terrible and incomprehensible. Here was a hopelessly bad girl ‘in trouble’ (according to the common and significant expression) with a hopelessly bad man — and yet a whole village was apparently sworn to silence about it on account of the pain it would cause to the bad man’s suffering wife! Was there ever anything more ‘unnatural’? Where, she asked herself, was the morality of these people? Where indeed! Where the Christianity? Stop! — Christianity was an uncomfortable, an awkward suggestion. Perhaps — only perhaps, of course — the conspiring villagers had a vague conception — or shall we say misconception? — of Christ’s words— “If ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Heavenly Father forgive you your trespasses.” But it was all wrong — all very wrong! — so Azalea vaguely repeated to herself over and over again, the while Mrs. Adcott stood looking at her in a curious, half-imploring, half-resentful way, wondering what this pretty, bright-eyed, golden-haired clergyman’s wife was thinking of Shadbrook and its people. And it was Mrs. Adcott who first spoke again.
“I suppose, ma’am, ye’ll be tellin’ the Vicar all about it now,” — she said, and her lips trembled— “An’ if ye do, I’m afraid there’
ll be trouble!”
“I’m sure there can be no more trouble than there is already,” — Azalea answered, very coldly— “Naturally I do not intend to keep anything a secret from my husband. He ought to know of this wretched, shameful scandal in his parish — and of course he will deal with it in the proper way.”
Mrs. Adcott’s eyes brimmed over again.
“Might I ask ye, ma’am, to wait a day or two — just till Jennie’s better an’ able to bear it like? For if Dan gets any blame — or Jacynth either, — he’ll visit it all on Jennie. Oh, ma’am, you don’t know! — you don’t know! You can’t tell what it is to see a man like Dan blind with drink an’ love for a gel, both together — with no sense in ’im to ‘ear reason an’ no thought o’ what he’s doin’, — it’s worse than ‘avin’ a mad brute beast to deal with — it is, ma’am, God knows it is! If ye’ll just wait a day or two before speakin’, it’ll be better for Jennie an’ better for all of us — it’ll be a real mercy ye’re showin’, an’ God’ll bless ye for it!”
It was impossible not to feel touched by the simple earnestness of this poor woman, whose pleading for the better comfort of her sick neighbor was so perfectly unselfish and tender, — and Azalea, being an affectionate little thing in her way, was not entirely without sentiment. She took Mrs. Adcott’s hand in her own and patted it.
“You are a very kind woman,” — she said— “And I promise you I’ll not mention anything to the Vicar till Mrs. Kiernan is quite well. But then — well, then something must be done.”
“Yes, ma’am, and perhaps God’ll show us ‘ow to do it” — murmured Mrs. Adcott tearfully— “For it’s ‘ard — it’s terrible ‘ard to ‘ave a man like Dan Kiernan to manage, — there’s a good many as goes mad on the drink, but none of ’em is as mad as he, an’ there’s often such times with ’im as I’ve never seen with any livin’ soul, whether drunk or sober. You don’t know a bit what he’s like— ‘tain’t nat’ral as you should, bein’ a lady livin’ well out of ‘arm’s way an’ safe with a good ‘usband o’ your own, — but for us poor women it’s like ‘avin’ the devil let loose when Dan Kiernan’s at his worst.”
Azalea gave a little movement of impatience and disgust.
“He’s a brute!” she said decisively.
“He worn’t always a brute,” — and Mrs. Adcott gave a regretful sigh— “Afore ’e came to Shadbrook I’ve ‘eard tell ’e was a fine workman somewheres down by Tewkesbury way. But ’e thought to better hisself by comin’ up ’ere where Squire Hazlitt gives good wages for farm-work — an’ of course ’ere ’e finds two publics as ‘andy to ’is mouth as the village pump and ‘andier, an’ so ’e goes from good to bad as easy as a child tumblin’ downstairs. It’s the drink, ma’am — it’s nothin’ but the drink as is the curse o’ the whole village.”
Azalea shrugged her graceful shoulders and raised her pretty eyebrows as one who despised the contemptible weakness of the whole human race. But she said nothing on the subject, simply because she knew very well there was nothing to say. The ‘Drink Question’ was and is one of those inexhaustible topics on which both the British Parliament and Press discourse perpetually in the most obvious and worn-out platitudes. It is a national evil which is for ever being deplored in the most eloquently rounded periods by gentlemen who at the same time do all they can to increase the profits obtained by the sale of spirituous liquors to the million, and who, while they nobly denounce the intemperance of the people, forget to equally denounce the equally intemperate and criminal adulteration of those same spirituous liquors by such of their friends in the House of Commons who are brewers and whisky distillers. It is all very well to blame the people for drinking poison, but the worst of the evil is with the national Government, which not only allows poison to be made and sold freely, but which actually legalizes the sale, and not unfrequently rewards some of the chief Poisoners with Peerages and other titles of honor. Pretty Azalea Everton, for instance, was not half or quarter as rich in this world’s goods as ugly Mrs. Minchin, the brewer’s wife, — yet Azalea’s husband was a good and honest man, and Mrs. Minchin’s better half was a hypocritical Fraud. Why, then, should fortune or providence appear to favor Fraud more than Honesty? This was the purely personal question which Azalea put to herself by way of an unuttered comment on Mrs. Adcott’s jeremiad; it was no use, she said inwardly, no use at all for Richard to take parish matters so much to heart, for improvement was impossible so long as two public-houses dominated the village. Minchin was the supreme ruler of the place and its inhabitants — and for a clergyman — a ‘man of God’ to contend with a man of Belial was as if an idealist should contend with an usurer.
“It’s a great pity,” — she said, at last, after a pause— “that the people are not sensible enough to see where drink is bound to lead them, and that they do not try to be better. If they denied themselves a little and prayed to God to help them—”
She hesitated here and colored a little, — she had a kind of instinctive feeling that her words were but wasted breath.
“Ah!” — and Mrs. Adcott shook her head dismally— “Prayin’ God don’t do much good! Many’s the woman who’s been all night on ‘er knees a-prayin’ an’ a-prayin’ God to keep ‘er man from drink, an’ ten to one ‘e’ll come ‘ome and fetch ‘er a blow on the ‘ed for ‘avin’ set up for ’im. Marriage ain’t all a bed o’ roses, ma’am, an’ I often thinks when we sez ‘for better for worse’ at the altar, we’ve not much notion what the worse is like or we’d ‘ang ourselves afore we ever got married at all! There goes Jacynth now!”
Moved by a quick curiosity, Mrs. Everton went to the cottage window and peeped out. The sun was shining brightly by this time, and on the opposite side of the road Jacynth Miller was walking, dressed in a plain blue cotton gown, her hair braided in shining coils round her graceful head, and a knot of primroses fastened carelessly at her throat. She was smiling to herself — there was a lovely color on her cheeks, — her step was light and buoyant — she looked not only a happy girl, but a good girl, — a girl full of the careless innocence of some forest animal that thinks no evil because it knows none.
“She’s got a rare deceivin’ face of ‘er own,” — said Mrs. Adcott, watching her— “An’ it’ll take in a good many more men besides Dan Kiernan!”
Mrs. Everton moved from the window. Her charming features had grown suddenly hard and cold. She was annoyed; and she had not the moral courage to admit to herself that the cause of her annoyance was Jacynth’s singular beauty. The conviction that she is virtuous cannot always atone to a woman for the triumph of vice. Nor can the possessor of a pretty face be entirely satisfied with the contemplation of a prettier one.
“I must be going now,” — she said, stiffly— “Please send up to the Vicarage if you want anything for Mrs. Kiernan. I don’t think she will worry over what I have said — because — you see — She doesn’t believe it—”
“It’s a good thing if she doesn’t,” — said Mrs. Adcott sorrowfully— “But there’s many a woman as says she doesn’t believe bad news just for the pride o’ not complainin’, when all the time the knife’s in ‘er ‘art. Howsomever, I’ll do my best to keep Jennie quiet till she gets ‘er strength up.”
“And, of course,” went on Mrs. Everton— “as I have promised you, I shall say nothing to the Vicar about this painful business — not at present. I think, however,” — here she paused and reflected— “I think if Jacynth Miller did the proper thing, she would leave the village.”
“It’s quite likely she will, ma’am,” — and Mrs. Adcott smoothed her apron down with rather trembling hands— “There’s plenty o’ men as ‘ull take ‘er!”
“Plenty of men!” echoed Azalea, in surprise— “Plenty of men who — who know?”
Mrs. Adcott gave one emphatic nod which spoke volumes. Azalea was shocked and disgusted.
“Well — good-morning!” she said, rather hurriedly.
“Good-mornin’, ma’am.”
&nbs
p; And the world, as epitomized in Shadbrook, seemed a very strange place to the Vicar’s pretty young wife as she tripped lightly away on her little high heels back to her own home. It never occurred to her to think that she had done no good by her visit to Jennie Kiernan, but rather harm, — and she had no foresight or skill to calculate the extent to which the harm might lead. She was one of the many who judge the poor by the rich, — or rather, who consider the poor as a class of beings altogether apart from the rich, hardly to be counted in with ordinary humanity, — a species of savage as it were, to be treated differently, fed differently, talked to differently, and instructed differently. The one broad grand fact so plainly set forth in Scripture, that ‘God is no respecter of persons,’ carried no conviction to her mind, — she and her husband were, she felt, altogether of a finer quality to the gross material composing the parishioners of Shadbrook, and she saw not a shadow of resemblance between her ‘baby Laurence’ and the little village urchins who crawled down to the side of the dirty brook on fine days and made mud pies till they looked the very offspring of the mud themselves. And though she knew that her religious creed demanded that she should believe that we are one and all the same before God, she could not resist the temptation of making certain definitions which were narrowed or widened according to her mood of the moment. As she went through the Vicarage garden on her way into the house, she passed her husband’s study window. She saw him writing busily at his desk — but he looked up as he heard her footstep on the gravel path and nodded and smiled at her. And then —
“How dreadful it all is!” she thought— “I suppose he actually thinks Shadbrook is a moral village, and that he is helping to keep it so! And he isn’t the least bit of use — I’m sure he isn’t — not the very least little bit!”
CHAPTER V
AS a natural consequence of his wife’s visit to Mrs. Kiernan, Everton could gain from her very little information as to the injured woman’s actual condition beyond the fact that she was ‘very bad.’
Delphi Collected Works of Marie Corelli Page 707
