CHAPTER VII.
Her first case was in Brown's Buildings itself--a woman suffering frombronchitis and heart complaint, and tormented besides by an ulceratedfoot which Marcella had now dressed daily for some weeks. She lived onthe top floor of one of the easterly blocks, with two daughters and ason of eighteen.
When Marcella entered the little room it was as usual spotlessly cleanand smelt of flowers. The windows were open, and a young woman was busyshirt-ironing on a table in the centre of the room. Both she and hermother looked up with smiles as Marcella entered. Then, they introducedher with some ceremony to a "lady," who was sitting beside the patient,a long-faced melancholy woman employed at the moment in marking linenhandkerchiefs, which she did with extraordinary fineness and delicacy.The patient and her daughter spoke of Marcella to their friend as "theyoung person," but all with a natural courtesy and charm that could nothave been surpassed.
Marcella knelt to undo the wrappings of the foot. The woman, a paletransparent creature, winced painfully as the dressing was drawn off;but between each half stifled moan of pain she said something eager andgrateful to her nurse. "I never knew any one, Nurse, do it as gentle asyou--" or--"I _do_ take it kind of you, Nurse, to do it so _slow_--oh!there were a young person before you--" or "hasn't she got nice hands,Mrs. Burton? they don't never seem to _jar_ yer."
"Poor foot! but I think it is looking better," said Marcella, getting upat last from her work, when all was clean and comfortable and she hadreplaced the foot on the upturned wooden box that supported it--for itsowner was not in bed, but sitting propped up in an old armchair. "Andhow is your cough, Mrs. Jervis?"
"Oh! it's very bad, nights," said Mrs. Jervis, mildly--"disturbs Emilydreadful. But I always pray every night, when she lifts me into bed, asI may be took before the morning, an' God ull do it soon."
"Mother!" cried Emily, pausing in her ironing, "you know you oughtn't tosay them things."
Mrs. Jervis looked at her with a sly cheerfulness. Her emaciated facewas paler than usual because of the pain of the dressing, but from thefrail form there breathed an indomitable air of _life_, a gay courageindeed which had already struck Marcella with wonder.
"Well, yer not to take 'em to heart, Em'ly. It ull be when it willbe--for the Lord likes us to pray, but He'll take his own time--an'she's got troubles enough of her own, Nurse. D'yer see as she's leff offher ring?"
Marcella looked at Emily's left hand, while the girl flushed all over,and ironed with a more fiery energy than before.
"I've 'eerd such things of 'im, Nurse, this last two days," she saidwith low vehemence--"as I'm _never_ goin' to wear it again. It 'ud burnme!"
Emily was past twenty. Some eighteen months before this date she hadmarried a young painter. After nearly a year of incredible misery herbaby was born. It died, and she very nearly died also, owing to thebrutal ill-treatment of her husband. As soon as she could get on herfeet again, she tottered home to her widowed mother, broken for the timein mind and body, and filled with loathing of her tyrant. He made noeffort to recover her, and her family set to work to mend if they couldwhat he had done. The younger sister of fourteen was earning sevenshillings a week at paper-bag making; the brother, a lad of eighteen,had been apprenticed by his mother, at the cost of heroic efforts somesix years before, to the leather-currying trade, in a highly skilledbranch of it, and was now taking sixteen shillings a week with theprospect of far better things in the future. He at once put aside fromhis earnings enough to teach Emily "the shirt-ironing," denying himselfevery indulgence till her training was over.
Then they had their reward. Emily's colour and spirits came back; herearnings made all the difference to the family between penury and ease;while she and her little sister kept the three tiny rooms in which theylived, and waited on their invalid mother, with exquisite cleanlinessand care.
Marcella stood by the ironing-table a moment after the girl's speech.
"Poor Emily!" she said softly, laying her hand on the ringless one thatheld down the shirt on the board.
Emily looked up at her in silence. But the girl's eyes glowed withthings unsaid and inexpressible--the "eternal passion, eternal pain,"which in half the human race have no voice.
"He was a very rough man was Em'ly's husband," said Mrs. Jervis, in herdelicate thoughtful voice--"a very uncultivated man."
Marcella turned round to her, startled and amused by the adjective. Butthe other two listeners took it quite quietly. It seemed to themapparently to express what had to be said.
"It's a sad thing is want of edication," Mrs. Jervis went on in the sametone. "Now there's that lady there"--with a little courtly wave of herhand towards Mrs. Burton--"she can't read yer know, Nurse, and I'm thatsorry for her! But I've been reading to her, an' Emily--just while mycough's quiet--one of my ole tracks."
She held up a little paper-covered tract worn with use. It was called "APennorth of Grace, or a Pound of Works?" Marcella looked at it inrespectful silence as she put on her cloak. Such things were not in herline.
"I do _love_ a track!" said Mrs. Jervis, pensively. "That's why I don'tlike these buildings so well as them others, Em'ly. Here you never getno tracks; and there, what with one person and another, there was a newone most weeks. But"--her voice dropped, and she looked timidly first ather friend, and then at Marcella--"she isn't a Christian, Nurse. Isn'tit sad?"
Mrs. Burton, a woman of a rich mahogany complexion, with a black"front," and a mouth which turned down decisively at the corners,looked up from her embroidery with severe composure.
"No, Nurse, I'm not a Christian," she said in the tone of one stating adisagreeable fact for which they are noways responsible. "My brotheris--and my sisters--real good Christian people. One of my sistersmarried a gentleman up in Wales. She 'as two servants, an' fam'lyprayers reg'lar. But I've never felt no 'call,' and I tell 'em I can'tpurtend. An' Mrs. Jervis here, she don't seem to make me see it nodifferent."
She held her head erect, however, as though the unusually high sense ofprobity involved, was, after all, some consolation. Mrs. Jervis lookedat her with pathetic eyes. But Emily coloured hotly. Emily was achurchwoman.
"Of course you're a Christian, Mrs. Burton," she said indignantly. "Whatshe means, Nurse, is she isn't a 'member' of any chapel, like mother.But she's been baptised and confirmed, for I asked her. And of courseshe's a Christian."
"Em'ly!" said Mrs. Jervis, with energy.
Emily looked round trembling. The delicate invalid was sitting boltupright, her eyes sparkling, a spot of red on either hollow cheek. Theglances of the two women crossed; there seemed to be a mute strugglebetween them. Then Emily laid down her iron, stepped quickly across toher mother, and kneeling beside her, threw her arms around her.
"Have it your own way, mother," she said, while her lip quivered; "Iwasn't a-goin' to cross you."
Mrs. Jervis laid her waxen cheek against her daughter's tangle of brownhair with a faint smile, while her breathing, which had grown quick andpanting, gradually subsided. Emily looked up at Marcella with aterrified self-reproach. They all knew that any sudden excitement mightkill out the struggling flame of life.
"You ought to rest a little, Mrs. Jervis," said Marcella, with gentleauthority. "You know the dressing must tire you, though you won'tconfess it. Let me put you comfortable. There; aren't the pillows easierso? Now rest--and good-bye."
But Mrs. Jervis held her, while Emily slipped away.
"I shall rest soon," she said significantly. "An' it hurts me when Emilytalks like that. It's the only thing that ever comes atween us. Shethinks o' forms an' ceremonies; an' _I_ think o' _grace_."
Her old woman's eyes, so clear and vivid under the blanched brow,searched Marcella's face for sympathy. But Marcella stood, shy andwondering in the presence of words and emotions she understood solittle. So narrow a life, in these poor rooms, under these cripplingconditions of disease!--and all this preoccupation with, this passionover, the things not of the flesh, the thwarted, cabined flesh, but ofthe spirit--wonderfu
l!
* * * * *
On coming out from Brown's Buildings, she turned her steps reluctantlytowards a street some distance from her own immediate neighbourhood,where she had a visit to pay which filled her with repulsion and anunusual sense of helplessness. A clergyman who often availed himself ofthe help of the St. Martin's nurses had asked the superintendent toundertake for him "a difficult case." Would one of their nurses goregularly to visit a certain house, ostensibly for the sake of a littleboy of five just come back from the hospital, who required care at homefor a while, _really_ for the sake of his young mother, who had suddenlydeveloped drinking habits and was on the road to ruin?
Marcella happened to be in the office when the letter arrived. Shesomewhat unwillingly accepted the task, and she had now paid two orthree visits, always dressing the child's sore leg, and endeavouring tomake acquaintance with the mother. But in this last attempt she had nothad much success. Mrs. Vincent was young and pretty, with a flighty,restless manner. She was always perfectly civil to Marcella, andgrateful to her apparently for the ease she gave the boy. But sheoffered no confidences; the rooms she and her husband occupied showedthem to be well-to-do; Marcella had so far found them well-kept; andthough the evil she was sent to investigate was said to be notorious,she had as yet discovered nothing of it for herself. It seemed to herthat she must be either stupid, or that there must be something abouther which made Mrs. Vincent more secretive with her than with others;and neither alternative pleased her.
To-day, however, as she stopped at the Vincents' door, she noticed thatthe doorstep, which was as a rule shining white, was muddy andneglected. Then nobody came to open, though she knocked and rangrepeatedly. At last a neighbour, who had been watching the strangenurse through her own parlour window, came out to the street.
"I think, miss," she said, with an air of polite mystery, "as you'dbetter walk in. Mrs. Vincent 'asn't been enjyin' very good 'ealth thislast few days."
Marcella turned the handle, found it yielded, and went in. It was aftersix o'clock, and the evening sun streamed in through a door at the backof the house. But in the Vincents' front parlour the blinds were allpulled down, and the only sound to be heard was the fretful wailing of achild. Marcella timidly opened the sitting-room door.
The room at first seemed to her dark. Then she perceived Mrs. Vincentsitting by the grate, and the two children on the floor beside her. Theelder, the little invalid, was simply staring at his mother in awretched silence; but the younger, the baby of three, was restlesslythrowing himself hither and thither, now pulling at the woman's skirts,now crying lustily, now whining in a hungry voice, for "Mama! din-din!Mama! din-din!"
Mrs. Vincent neither moved nor spoke, even when Marcella came in. Shesat with her hands hanging over her lap in a desolation incapable ofwords. She was dirty and unkempt; the room was covered with litter; thebreakfast things were still on the table; and the children wereevidently starving.
Marcella, seized with pity, and divining what had happened, tried torouse and comfort her. But she got no answer. Then she asked formatches. Mrs. Vincent made a mechanical effort to find them, butsubsided helpless with a shake of the head. At last Marcella found themherself, lit a tire of some sticks she discovered in a cupboard, and puton the kettle. Then she cut a slice of bread and dripping for each ofthe children--the only eatables she could find--and after she haddressed Bertie's leg she began to wash up the tea things and tidy theroom, not knowing very well what to be at, but hoping minute by minuteto get Mrs. Vincent to speak to her.
In the midst of her labours, an elderly woman cautiously opened the doorand beckoned to her.
Marcella went out into the passage.
"I'm her mother, miss! I 'eered you were 'ere, an' I follered yer. Oh!such a business as we 'ad, 'er 'usband an' me, a gettin' of 'er 'omelast night. There's a neighbour come to me, an' she says: 'Mrs. Lucas,there's your daughter a drinkin' in that public 'ouse, an' if I was youI'd go and fetch her out; for she's got a lot o' money, an' she'streatin' everybody all round.' An' Charlie--that's 'er 'usband--ee comealong too, an' between us we got holt on her. An' iver sence we broughther 'ome last night, she set there in that cheer, an' niver a word tonobody! Not to me 't any rate, nor the chillen. I believe 'er 'usbandan' 'er 'ad words this mornin'. But she won't tell me nothin'. She sitsthere--just heart-broke"--the woman put up her apron to her eyes andbegan crying. "She ain't eatin' nothink all day, an' I dursen't leavethe 'ouse out o' me sight--I lives close by, miss--for fear of 'er doing'erself a mischief."
"How long has she been like this?" said Marcella, drawing the doorcautiously to behind her.
"About fourteen month," said the woman, hopelessly. "An' none of usknows why. She was such a neat, pretty girl when she married 'im--an' eesuch a steady fellow. An' I've done _my_ best. I've talked to 'er, an'I've 'id 'er 'at an' her walking things, an' taken 'er money out of 'erpockets. An', bless yer, she's been all right now for seven weeks--tilllast night. Oh, deary, deary, me! whatever 'ull become o' them--'er, an''im, an' the children!"
The tears coursed down the mother's wrinkled face.
"Leave her to me a little longer," said Marcella, softly; "but come backto me in about half an hour, and don't let her be alone."
The woman nodded, and went away.
Mrs. Vincent turned quickly round as Marcella came back again, and spokefor the first time:
"That was my mother you were talkin' to?"
"Yes," said Marcella, quietly, as she took the kettle off the fire. "NowI do want you to have a cup of tea, Mrs. Vincent. Will you, if I makeit?"
The poor creature did not speak, but she followed Marcella's movementswith her weary eyes. At last when Marcella knelt down beside her holdingout a cup of tea and some bread and butter, she gave a sudden cry.Marcella hastily put down what she carried, lest it should be knockedout of her hand.
"He struck me this morning!--Charlie did--the first time in seven years.Look here!"
She pulled up her sleeve, and on her white, delicate arm she showed alarge bruise. As she pointed to it her eyes filled with miserable tears;her lips quivered; anguish breathed in every feature. Yet even in thisabasement Marcella was struck once more with her slim prettiness, herrefined air. This woman drinking and treating in a low public-house atmidnight!--rescued thence by a decent husband!
She soothed her as best she could, but when she had succeeded in makingthe wretched soul take food, and so in putting some physical life intoher, she found herself the recipient of an outburst of agony beforewhich she quailed. The woman clung to her, moaning about her husband,about the demon instinct that had got hold of her, she hardly knewhow--by means it seemed originally of a few weeks of low health andsmall self-indulgences--and she felt herself powerless to fight; aboutthe wreck she had brought upon her home, the shame upon her husband, whowas the respected, well-paid foreman of one of the large shops of theneighbourhood. All through it came back to him.
"We had words, Nurse, this morning, when he went out to his work. Hesaid he'd nearly died of shame last night; that he couldn't bear it nomore; that he'd take the children from me. And I was all queer in thehead still, and I sauced him--and then--he looked like a devil--and hetook me by the arm--and _threw_ me down--as if I'd been a sack. An' henever, _never,_--touched me--before--in all his life. An' he's nevercome in all day. An' perhaps I shan't ever see him again. An' lasttime--but it wasn't so bad as this--he said he'd try an' love me againif I'd behave. An' he did try--and I tried too. But now it's no good,an' perhaps he'll not come back. Oh, what shall I do? what shall I do!"she flung her arms above her head. "Won't _anybody_ find him? won't_anybody_ help me?"
She dropped a hand upon Marcella's arm, clutching it, her wild eyesseeking her companion's.
But at the same moment, with the very extremity of her own emotion, acloud of impotence fell upon Marcella. She suddenly felt that she coulddo nothing--that there was nothing in her adequate to such anappeal--nothing strong enough to lift the weight of a huma
n life thusflung upon her.
She was struck with a dryness, a numbness, that appalled her. She triedstill to soothe and comfort, but nothing that she said went home--tookhold. Between the feeling in her heart which might have reached andtouched this despair, and the woman before her, there seemed to be abarrier she could not break. Or was it that she was really barren andpoor in soul, and had never realised it before? A strange misery rose inher too, as she still knelt, tending and consoling, but with noefficacy--no power.
At last Mrs. Vincent sank into miserable quiet again. The mother camein, and silently began to put the children to bed. Marcella pressed thewife's cold hand, and went out hanging her head. She had just reachedthe door when it opened, and a man entered. A thrill passed through herat the sight of his honest, haggard face, and this time she found whatto say.
"I have been sitting by your wife, Mr. Vincent. She is very ill andmiserable, and very penitent. You will be kind to her?"
The husband looked at her, and then turned away.
"God help us!" he said; and Marcella went without another word, andwith that same wild, unaccustomed impulse of prayer rilling her beingwhich had first stirred in her at Mellor at the awful moment of Hurd'sdeath.
* * * * *
She was very silent and distracted at tea, and afterwards--saying thatshe must write some letters and reports--she shut herself up, and badegood-night to Minta and the children.
But she did not write or read. She hung at the window a long time,watching the stars come out, as the summer light died from the sky, andeven the walls and roofs and chimneys of this interminable London spreadout before her took a certain dim beauty. And then, slipping down on thefloor, with her head against a chair--an attitude of her stormychildhood--she wept with an abandonment and a passion she had not knownfor years. She thought of Mrs. Jervis--the saint--so near to death, sosatisfied with "grace," so steeped in the heavenly life; then of thepoor sinner she had just left and of the agony she had no power to stay.Both experiences had this in common--that each had had some part inplunging her deeper into this darkness of self-contempt.
What had come to her? Daring the past weeks there had been somethingwrestling in her--some new birth--some "conviction of sin," as Mrs.Jervis would have said. As she looked back over all her strenuous youthshe hated it. What was wrong with her? Her own word to Anthony Cravenreturned upon her, mocked her--made now a scourge for her own pride, nota mere, measure of blame for others. Aldous Raeburn, her father andmother, her poor--one and all rose against her--plucked ather--reproached her. "Aye! what, indeed, are wealth and poverty?" crieda voice, which was the voice of them all; "what are opinions--what isinfluence, beauty, cleverness?--what is anything worth but_character_--but _soul?_"
And character--soul--can only be got by self-surrender; andself-surrender comes not of knowledge but of love.
A number of thoughts and phrases, hitherto of little meaning to her,floated into her mind--sank and pressed there. That strange word "grace"for instance!
A year ago it would not have smitten or troubled her. After her firstinevitable reaction against the evangelical training of her schoolyears, the rebellious cleverness of youth had easily decided thatreligion was played out, that Socialism and Science were enough formankind.
But nobody could live in hospital--nobody could go among thepoor--nobody could share the thoughts and hopes of people like EdwardHallin and his sister, without understanding that it is still here inthe world--this "grace" that "sustaineth"--however variouslyinterpreted, still living and working, as it worked of old, among thelittle Galilean towns, in Jerusalem, in Corinth. To Edward Hallin it didnot mean the same, perhaps, as it meant to the hard-worked clergymen sheknew, or to Mrs. Jervis. But to all it meant the motive power oflife--something subduing, transforming, delivering--something thatto-night she envied with a passion and a yearning that amazed herself.
How many things she craved, as an eager child craves them! First somemoral change, she knew not what--then Aldous Raeburn's pardon andfriendship--then and above all, the power to lose herself--the power to_love_.
Dangerous significant moment in a woman's life--moment at once ofdespair and of illusion!