A God and His Gifts (13 page)

“Hetty must live on the edge of a precipice,” said Reuben.

“She was prepared. And she keeps her foothold. Father is on it, and is growing unwary. He should be warned, and we cannot warn him. We are in peril.”

“I suppose Mother has never suspected?”

“Why should she? We did not suspect. She would not think it possible. And in a sense it was not. A father's having that relation with his son's promised wife! What man would have come to it?”

“This one,” said Reuben. “He yields to all his feelings. He does more; he fosters them. That is how he gets them on to paper. If he subdued them, they would lose their force. And releasing them sets them free in his life. I understand it all.”

“You have great understanding. Take care that it does not betray you. And remember that other people are without it. If this came out, they would see it through their own eyes.”

“How do you see it?” said Reuben.

“Through mine. I cannot help it. I should not have thought it of him. What man would of his father? I
resent being forced to think it. It is not a lapse we can condone. If he was helpless, he should not have been. We are masters of ourselves.”

“Perhaps he was not. He is not a man who would always be. He can be carried away. Think how he is affected by his books.”

“This was actual life. He knew it for what it was. The truth is what it is. It must not escape. It proves what we think of it, that we fear it so much. And Mother and Merton do not know. Remember they do not. If they do, the guilt will be ours. And it is a guilt that no man should incur.”

“Why, what a solemn pair!” said Hereward. “What serious matter is on foot?”

“Henry and his story,” said Salomon. “You will not be surprised.”

“No, he makes a strange appeal to me. There is wonder in every child. And in this one I find so much. I feel that my love for him will remain and grow, instead of changing to another, as with all of you. It may be so with a late child. And to me he is the last of my sons. It is strange that so great a good should arise from what might be called a wrong.”

“It must be called one,” said Salomon. “What else could we call it?”

“It might have been almost unconscious.”

“What led up to it was not.”

“Well, well, we will not judge,” said Hereward, as he turned away.

“We can't all arrange for our wrong-doing not to be judged,” said Salomon. “The weak point about it is the judgement.”

“It is what there is to trouble us. We don't find anything else. Anyhow Father does not. And people feel a zest in judging. I am glad I never do wrong.”

“I never do either. ‘Not anything the world calls wrong.' And I think the world must know. Indeed we
see it does. But if we cannot speak without referring to the matter, we are bound to betray it. I feel the deepest misgiving.”

“And Father feels none. The danger is there. What has happened can happen again.”

“The words may escape at any moment. They are on the edge of his mind. But are we quite sure of their meaning? Were they used in a literal sense? He has been fond of us all as children.”

“He has,” said Reuben. “And here is one of us.”

A cry came from an upper floor, and the brothers' footsteps joined the others on their way to it.

Henry was sitting up in bed, looking small enough for any trouble to be large for him, and Nurse was standing, remonstrant and unruffled, at his side. He spoke in an accusing tone.

“Poor Grandpa Merton wear them! Hurt him very much.”

“No, no, he is not wearing them now,” said Ada.

“Yes, Henry see him. He always wear them. Oh, dear Grandpa Merton!”

“No, he left them behind,” said Hereward, with a glance at his wife. “He will never wear them again.”

“No?” said Henry, relaxing in a doubtful manner.

“There is a pair on the table in my room,” said Hereward, in a rapid, incidental tone that eluded Henry. “Let someone fetch them.”

This was done, and Henry looked at them in recognition.

“Yes,” he said in relief.

“So that is all right,” said Ada. “You can go to sleep.”

Henry kept his eyes on the glasses.

“You don't want them, do you?” said Nurse.

“Yes,” said Henry, holding out his hands.

“What will you do with them?” said Salomon.

“Not wear them. No. But very nice spectacles. Henry's.”

“Look how well they suit me,” said Reuben, putting them on.

“Yes,” said Henry, smiling at the sight, “But Henry's spectacles. Grandpa Merton give them.”

“Oh, are you sure that is true?” said Nurse.

Henry nodded without looking at her.

“Put them in their case,” said Ada. “Then you can have them under your pillow.”

Henry manipulated the case with interest and appreciation, laid it on the pillow by his own head, and prepared to sleep in its company, having an equal regard for its accommodation and his own.

“Henry is a person of a great compassion,” said Salomon.

“He shows many qualities,” said Hereward.

“He is a person of a great acquisitiveness,” said Reuben.

“Not more than any other child,” said Nurse.

“And of a great self-complacence.”

“Not more than you were at his age. All children are alike.”

“I wonder who thought of the innocence of childhood. It must have been a person of a great originality.”

“But how innocent a child is, compared to ourselves!” said Hereward. “We have only to think to know it.”

“It hardly needs thought,” said Salomon.

“Well, well, we can hardly go through life without a stumble.”

“We all do wrong, sir, it is true,” said Nurse, accepting the current theory, though she was herself an exception to it.

“And the wrong is great more often than we know,” said Ada.

“Well, if it was great, we should not know,” said Salomon.

“I am surprised at myself,” said Reuben. “I am just like everyone else. I am sure you will all be surprised. Of course I think you are all thinking about me. I said I was like everyone else.”

“One moment, my boy,” said Ada, who did the family carving and was engaged on it. “Let me hear when I can attend.”

“You will not hear until you do. I take myself very seriously. I am exactly like everyone else.”

“Well, what is it?” said his mother, with her eyes on a plate that Galleon was taking from her.

“I am treading in the usual steps, and thinking I am the only person who has done so.”

“You yourself?” said Ada, in a different tone. “You are going to be married! Or you think you are. Another of you. And at your age!”

“It would not be unnatural, if it was all of them,” said Hereward. “They are at the normal age.”

“But it is me, Father. That is not natural. I am sure you can't think so. Anyhow no one will agree. You see that Mother does not.”

“Well, I am glad,” said Sir Michael. “I find it good news. I don't believe in postponing everything and prolonging youth until there is none of it left. I did not do it myself, and it has turned out as you see. Where would you all be, if I had? I congratulate you, my boy. I am glad to have lived to see the day.”

“So am I,” said Joanna. “I am sure we all are. That is what we do live for. To see days.”

“I must know a little more before I am glad,” said Ada. “Where did you meet her, my son?”

“At the natural place, the scene of my life. Where else should it be?”

“At the school? You met her there? She has not anything to do with it?”

“Yes, she has a minor position there. I share the general view of that. We are all like everyone else.”

“You want to rescue her from it,” said Sir Michael. “It is another reason for marrying. I sympathise with you. It would be my own feeling.”

“It hardly sounds quite what I wished for him,” said Ada. “But I have not heard the whole.”

“Well, I suppose it does not,” said Reuben. “It would be a strange wish for a mother.”

“Tell us everything, my son,” said Hereward. “You know we are waiting to hear.”

“I have told you most of it. And the rest you seem able to supply. But I need not keep anything from you. Her name is
Beatrice,
and she is called
Trissie.
She has nothing, and to me she is everything. It somehow sounds rather clever.”

“It sounds as if cleverness might be needed,” said Salomon.

“What a very nice name!” said Joanna. “Of course she would not have anything.
Beatrice
means ‘blessed', and naturally blessed people would not. They would be ashamed to.”

“And it is more blessed to give than to receive,” said Reuben. “And she finds it is, and so would never have anything.”

“Come, come, money is not everything,” said Hereward. “It plays its part, and I am glad to have and use it. I may be able to help. Reuben may be thinking of it.”

“I was not, Father. But I am glad if you were. I have no reluctance to be under an obligation. I should like to be under one. You know I am like everyone else.”

“How good human beings must be!” said Joanna. “I don't think they have the credit of it.”

“How long have you known her, my boy?” said Ada.

“Since she came to the school a year ago. We met on a common ground of grievances.”

“But when they pass, your feeling may pass with them.”

“They will not pass,” said Joanna. “He spoke of grievances.”

“What does she teach?” said Zillah.

“Something to the younger boys.”

“Don't you know what it is?”

“I know what it is called. The name is
English.
”

“What does she call it?”

“
English.
I said that was the name.”

“Does not she know what it is?”

“No, or she would be teaching older boys.”

“Are you serious, Reuben?” said Ada. “This is not a joke to us.”

“Yes, I am. It is only the little way I have.”

“Has she a little way too?” said Salomon.

“Yes, people will smile at the sight of us. We shall be such a quaint little pair.”

“Well, I smile at the talk of you,” said Sir Michael. “I am amused by it, whether I should be or not. And I think it will all turn out well. I have a feeling that it will. And my feelings are usually sound.”

“My feelings are mixed,” said Ada. “May it be the right thing for you, my son. When are we to meet your Trissie?”

“Next week. I have asked her to stay. You are right that she is mine. She did not want a single, great occasion. She felt an ordinary visit would be more in accordance with her.”

“What does she mean?” said Sir Michael.

“You will soon know,” said his grandson.

This was not to be wholly true. Trissie came in without embarrassment, and with a simple acceptance of what was to become her own. She was small and spare without being fragile, with light eyes, a pale, freckled skin, a small, alert nose, and an almost covert look of something that was akin
to humour. A certain ease and confidence lay under a subdued exterior.

“Now you are to be my second daughter,” said Hereward. “I am in want of daughters, and grateful to my sons for providing them.”

“I am glad I am to be the second. I am never first in anything.”

“Oh, come, you are first to Reuben in everything,” said Sir Michael.

“Yes, but he is a third himself. He would never be first either. Of course he is better than I am.”

“You will be sorry to give up your work,” said Zillah, after a pause.

“No, I shall be glad to. Before I am found out.”

“Found out? In what way?”

“In not being equal to it. And so in being dishonourable in doing it.”

“Why did you take it?” said Sir Michael. “I mean, how did you come to make the choice?”

“I had to do something. And there was nothing I could do. So there was no choice.”

“Of course there was not,” said Reuben. “It was the first thing we had in common. And it led us to see that we should have everything.”

“Do you like the head master?” said Ada. “Reuben does not very much.”

“No. I am afraid he will ask me how the boys are getting on.”

“And can you not tell him?”

“Well, I can't say I don't see how they can be. He would only be surprised.”

“You could make up something that would satisfy him,” said Salomon.

“I think he would be able to tell. A schoolmaster would be so used to it.”

“I suppose it is dreadful to work? I am the one of us who has never done it.”

“Yes, it is,” said Trissie, soberly.

“My son knows quite well what it is,” said Hereward. “He does the work I should do, if I had the time.”

“You do not call that work?” said Salomon to Trissie.

“Well, it is just looking after what is your own.”

“You will have a house to look after, if you marry Reuben.”

“Yes, and that will be the same.”

“A poor thing but our own,” said Reuben. “That is what you feel it will be. I have found it. That is what it is.”

“I daresay no one else would want it,” said Trissie. “But I always like what is mine. It isn't very nice when nothing is.”

“Where is your home?” said Zillah.

“In a country village. My father is the clergyman. That is why I had to work.”

“And you were busy in the parish as well?” said Sir Michael.

“Well, we did sometimes take things to the poor.”

“That must be a pleasant thing to be able to do.”

“Well, we really weren't able to. A clergyman has to do it, even when he isn't.”

“Is your father pleased for you to marry?”