Complete Works of Bram Stoker (12 page)

Jerry covered his face with his hands: and Katey was just about to rush forward with a wild prayer of mercy on her lips when a policeman standing by pulled her back, saying in a kindly voice:

‘No use, my girl. It would only get you into trouble, and could do no good. Best go home and take care of the children till he comes out.’

Katey felt the wisdom of the remark, and stayed still.

Before Jerry left the dock he dropped his hands from his face and looked round the court with a hard cold look of recklessness that made Katey shudder. He did not seem to notice her at first, but seemed to include her in the category of his enemies. As he passed her on his way out, however, he gave her a look which said to her as plainly as if he had used the words -

‘This is your work. You couldn’t keep your cut face away for once. Very well, you’ll see that I’ll be even with you yet.’

Katey went home without crying. Despair is dry-eyed when it is most blank. It had seemed to her at each successive disaster that now at last had come the culmination of all that was most dreadful to be borne; but it was not till now that she knew the bitterness of despair. It was not even that Jerry no longer loved her, but that he hated her, and to her attributed a shame that she would have given her life to avert.

Grinnell called to her to try his powers of consolation. He told her most soothingly that a week was not long, and that the shock of the sentence would tend to sober Jerry; and, with many arguments of a like kind, tried to raise her spirits. He stayed a long time, and left her in a tranquil frame of mind.

He came again for a few minutes in the evening, and made some kindly offers of help, which, however, she did not accept.

Next day he came again; and every day that week - sometimes twice in the day. Katey did not like his coming so often, but he seemed so disinterested and kindly-disposed that she did not like to hurt his feelings by telling him so.

At last her eyes were opened to the fact that instinct may be stronger than reason.

She was working in the theatre, where she had got a job of cleaning to do, when she overheard some of the men talking. Katey was too honourable to voluntarily listen, and would never have done so in cold blood, but she heard her husband’s name mentioned, and the curiosity arising from her great love, which made her anxious to find how he stood in the opinions of his companions, made her pause and listen with bated breath.

She found what pained her much, and yet had in it a gleam of hope. The men seemed to think that Jerry was drifting into being a hopeless drunkard, and that if he continued to go on, as he had been going on, he would get an attack of delirium tremens. One of them remarked presently:

‘That was a damnable trick of Grin’s.’

‘What was that?’ asked another.

‘Don’t you know? or you? or you? Why, men, you’re as blind as bats. I saw it all long ago.’

‘Saw what? Out with it, man.’

‘Well, you see, Grinnell is sweet on the pretty little Irishwoman, and wanted to get the husband out of the way - What’s that?’

It was the stir Katey made as she rose from her knees, where she had been scrubbing and leaned against the wall, with her heart beating wildly and her face on fire.

‘Well, but what was the trick?’

‘Why, man, can’t you see? He put Dirty Dick up to make him pick a quarrel when he was full of drink, and then quietly sent the pot-boy to send round a policeman.’

‘Oh, the blackguard. Tell you what, boys, we oughtn’t to stand that,’ the voice was that of a man who had not yet spoken.

‘Don’t make a blamed ass of yourself. What call is it of ours? Don’t you see that it would do no good. The woman is glad enough of it for all she takes on.’

‘How do you know that?’

‘How do I know it? Why, because I have eyes, and ears, and amn’t a fool. Sure he spends half the day with her, till all the neighbours are beginnin’ to talk.’

Katey felt as though she were going mad. The scales seemed to have fallen from her eyes, and, with the clear light of her present knowledge, she understood the villainy of Grinnell. She was afraid to hear more, and moved away and worked with such desperation, that presently her strength began to leave her.

When her work was over she tottered home, being scarcely able to walk steadily, and having arrived, shut the door behind her and locked it; and then she lay down on her bed in a state of mental and physical prostration, which was akin to death.

When Grinnell called he found the door locked, and, having knocked several times without getting any answer, went away without saying a word.

CHAPTER 10

THE END OF THE JOURNEY

Katey waited in, in the morning, at the time at which Grinnell had been in the habit of calling for the last few days; her object was to avoid him, and she feared meeting him if she should go out. Later on, however, when she had to go to her work, she met him outside the door of the house, where he had evidently been waiting for some time. She pretended not to see him, and walked quickly down the street. He walked alongside of her in silence for a while before he spoke.

‘What’s the meaning of all this?’

Katey hurried still faster, dragging her poor shawl closer as she went.

After another pause, Grinnell said again:

‘You seem to have changed?’

‘I have.’ She turned, as she spoke, and looked him full in the face.

Something told him that her mind was made up, and that she knew or suspected his villainy; and there was passion in his voice now.

‘It was mighty quick.’

‘It was.’

After a pause he said, so slowly and impressively, and with such hidden purpose, that she grew cold as she listened:

‘People are often too quick; it would sometimes be better for them - and those belonging to them - if they were a little slower.’

Seeing that she did not answer he changed his tone.

‘A man can put his thumb on a fly - I wonder have flies wives - or children?’ He said the last words with a tone of deadly malice.

Katey winced, but said nothing. Grinnell saw that he was foiled, and all the hate of his nature spoke. He came closer to Katey and hissed at her:

‘Take care! I am not to be got rid of so easily as you think. I will be revenged on you for your scorn, bitterly revenged; and even when I see you crawling in the dust at my feet, I shall spurn you. Wait till you see your husband a hopeless drunkard, and your children in the workhouse burial-cart, and then perhaps you will be sorry that you despised me.’

Still seeing no signs of any answer, he added:

‘Very well. It’s war - is it then? Good-bye to you,’ and, so saying, he turned on his heel and left her.

Katey worked all that day as if in a dream, and when her work was over, shut herself up again with her children. The next day was the same. She did not see Grinnell, but somehow she mistrusted his silence even more than she feared his malice.

When the time came for Jerry’s liberation, Katey was in waiting outside the prison door. Katey had made herself look as smart as possible, and the bruises on her face were nearly well. When Jerry caught sight of her, he started as if with a glad surprise, but the instant after, as if from remembrance, a dark frown gathered on his face, and he walked past her without seeming to notice her present. Katey was cut to the heart, but, nevertheless, she did not let her pain appear on her face. She came and touched him on the shoulder and said:

‘Jerry, dear, here I am.’

‘I see you’ - this in a harsh, cold voice.

‘Are you coming home, dear.’

‘Ay, a nice home.’

‘Come home, Jerry.’

‘I will not. I must get something to make my hair grow,’ and without another word he strode away from her side. She went home and wept bitterly.

Jerry came home drunk late that night, and neither then nor the next morning would speak kindly to his wife. In the afternoon he went to the theatre, but found that his place had been given away.

He could get no work that suited him, and after a few days’ seeking, gave it up as a hopeless task, and took to drinking all day long in Grinnell’s, where he was allowed credit.

As he earned no money, the entire support of the family once more devolved on Katey, and once again the brave little woman tried to meet the storm. Morning, noon, and night she worked, when work could be got; but the long suffering and anxiety had told on her strength, and, in addition, there had lately come a new trial. Mrs O’Sullivan had got a stroke of paralysis, and her failing business had entirely deserted her. She now required help, and as Jerry could give none, had been removed to the workhouse.

Day after day things got worse and worse. The room, up to the present occupied, had to be given up as Katey could not pay for it, and the change was to a squalid garret, bare, and bleak, and cold. One by one the last necessary articles of furniture vanished, till nothing was left but an old table and chair, and some wretched bed gear, which had not been worth pawning, and which now covered two wretched beds, knocked up by Jerry with old boards. Jerry, too, had gone down and down. He was not the scoff of his comrades, for he was too quarrelsome, but he was their unconscious tool, and occupied a position somewhat akin to that of a vicious bulldog ready to be set at any comer. Grinnell gave him as much drink as he required, and in every way tried to get him into his power.

Jerry often struck his wife now, and it was not due to his efforts that he did not do it oftener. When he was drunk she always kept as much as possible out of the way, often waiting outside the door till he had fallen asleep, well knowing that if he met her she would suffer violence. More than once he was arrested either for drunkenness or assault, or both, and so often that his hair never had time to grow to a decent length.

After this life had gone on for some time, and Katey was showing signs of failing health, Grinnell tried to renew his acquaintance. Katey told him plainly that she would have nothing to do with him in any way, not even so far as speaking to him was concerned. He answered with such a cruel threat that Katey fainted. This was in the street, and whilst she was still senseless a policeman appeared, sent by Grinnell, who had told him that there was a drunken woman lying on the pathway.

The man, with the instinct of his profession, which sees a crime in every doubtful case, procured assistance, and brought her to the station-house, which was close at hand. There she was restored with a little care, but the charge of drunkenness had been preferred against her, and she would not be allowed to go home. The sergeant in charge said that he would allow her to go home if she got bail. She did not know where to turn to; she could only sit down in the cell and cry. Presently Grinnell, who knew what would happen, arrived, and having ascertained the state of the case went through the formality of going bail, and Katey was released. Grinnell was waiting outside, and walked up the street with her. Katey walked so fast that he had trouble to keep up with her.

‘I think you might speak to me after I have kept you out of jail?’ Katey did not answer. He waited, and then said, ‘Very well, go your own road. If anything happens to you just think of me.’ Then he walked away.

Katey did not sleep that night. She knew that on the morrow she would have to stand in the dock charged with an offence whose very name she hated; and she did not know where in the wide world to look for help in case a fine should be imposed. She could not look into the possibility of her being sent to prison. It was too terrible both for herself and her children.

Early in the morning she rose. Jerry had not been home all night, and so she had been unable to tell him of the charge.

There was still one article in the room on which money could be raised. This was Jerry’s tool-basket, which, with something of traditional reverence and something of hope, he had still spared. He could not bear to pledge the tools he had worked with, and both he and Katey felt that whilst these tools remained to his hand there was a prospect that things would mend. Katey now regarded the tool-basket with longing eyes. She felt that should she be sent to prison there was hunger and suffering and, perhaps, ruin for her children, and a shame that would make Jerry worse. She thought of pledging it, but the thought arose to restrain her - ‘It would take away Jerry’s last hope  —  pull down the prop of his better life, and his wife’s should not be the hand to do this at any cost.’ And so she spared the basket.

She had to wait a long time in the court, and when she was put in the dock felt faintish. However, she nerved herself, and answered all the questions put to her. The magistrate was a kind and just one, and recognised truth in her story, and ordered her to be discharged. She left the court crying, after calling down a thousand blessings on his head.

When she came home she found the basket gone. Jerry had taken it that very morning and pledged it to get money for dissipation. This was a great blow to Katey, for she felt that despair was gathering when Jerry had made up his mind to part with his tools. Nevertheless, she felt in her heart a gleam of comfort in the thought that she had acted rightly, and that the prop had not been shorn away by her hand.

Jerry drank frightfully that day, and came home early in the evening in a state of semi-madness. He rushed into the room and caught Katey by the shoulder so roughly that she screamed out. He said hoarsely  — 

‘Is this true what I heard about you?’

‘What, Jerry? Oh, let go of me, you are hurting me.’

‘What? I suppose you don’t know. Well, I’ll tell you  —  that you were run in for bein’ drunk?’

‘Let me explain, Jerry dear.’

‘Let me explain, Jerry dear. Explain away, but you won’t explain that out of my head. So this is my model wife that abuses me for gettin’ drunk. This is the woman that thinks it wrong and a sin. I know you now.’

Katey spoke in desperation  — 

‘Jerry, listen to me. I was not drunk. I fainted in the street, and they brought me to the station, but indeed, indeed I was not drunk. I haven’t tasted even a drop of liquor for years - sure don’t you believe me, Jerry. I was discharged this morning. The magistrate said there was no case against me.’