Men and Wives (29 page)

“That is a feeling, Mrs. Christy, that has anyhow essential force.”

“I thought I saw such sorrow in the eyes of her children,” said Agatha, with full and womanly concession, “especially I think in those of Matthew, the eldest son. I can imagine the indissoluble thing between him and his mother. I often think the eldest son takes the place of the only son, the special place. Of course for the younger ones it is possible to do more in the way of compensation. It was rather wistfulness and bewilderment and a longing to lean on an older spirit, that I saw in those young faces.”

Dominic's attitude could only yield before this light thrown upon hidden truth.

“Gregory is the one who was most dependent on his mother,” said Polly.

“Most dependent. Yes,” said Agatha, with impartial and interested weighing of the phrase. “That is a very good expression. Dependent on her, for advice, for understanding, for guidance through some of the intricate mazes of youth.” She smiled at Polly to give her her part in these words. “But not so much involved in the something that can only be given by a mother to a son, that is given perhaps in full measure to the eldest or only son. Now I should never try to take a mother's place to either of those.”

“Let us go on to the Haslams', and see if Mater is there,” said Polly to her sister.

“It is a good thing she is not here,” said Mellicent.

“Is it?” said Polly, as if she had thought the opposite.

“Will you say to Gregory for me, that I hope he will come to tea this afternoon?” said Agatha, stepping towards them. “I think it will hardly be a breach of convention for him to come to me.”

“We will give the message most certainly,” said Mellicent.

“Then I think we can count upon him,” said Agatha, returning to the group with an unconscious air of purpose.

“Do people always stand about and argue after funerals?” asked Polly, proceeding on her sister's arm.

“Probably some people,” said Mellicent.

“Oh, yes, I see,” said Polly. “Mater will be with the Haslams, won't she?”

Rachel had sat with Griselda during the service, and came to the door to meet the men on their return.

“Godfrey, you carry yourself very becomingly as the foremost person in people's thoughts. I hope Percy watched you and took a lesson, as he will so soon have to do the same. His practice can't do everything for him. I have been reading in the papers all about Harriet, and I think the accounts are satisfactory and do her justice. Several of them commented on her skill and forethought. She really chose a simple method, but that makes it all the nicer of the papers. You all look very well in funeral clothes, quite your best. I am glad the Press people were there to photograph you, and that Percy did not have to be included.”

“Shall I be in the photograph?” said Polly from the doorway.

“I hope not, my child,” said her stepmother.

“I hadn't any real black of my own,” Polly exclaimed.

“My dear, to think it belongs to someone!”

“So you were with us, little Polly?” said Godfrey.

“Yes. I hadn't ever been to a funeral,” said Polly with an open and startled gaze.

“And do you feel inclined to make a habit of it?” said Gregory.

“No. I think they ought to have different kinds of funerals for different people.”

“So they ought,” said Gregory, approaching her. “You must see about it, Polly.”

“Mrs. Calkin wants you to go to tea this afternoon,”
said Polly, bound in duty to deliver this startling statement.

“And will you come with me, Polly, or shall I have to go by myself?”

“I think she wanted you by yourself.”

“You must go with quiet self-restraint,” said Rachel. “You must forget my example of behaving as if my own feelings were important, so uncivilised and like the people in the Bible. Sackcloth and ashes are too ill-behaved. I will begin showing self-restraint at once. Gregory may give Geraldine my love.”

“You don't really like any of them, do you?” said Gregory.

“Well, it is foolish to dislike Agatha for having been married, and Geraldine for not having been, especially when you resent being despised for both yourself. That is what they are disliked for. I don't dislike them for those reasons at all.”

“I am afraid of the old one,” said Polly.

Gregory turned on her interested eyes.

“My darling, that doesn't sound enough like the Bible, and really it is too like it,” said Rachel. “I always say you are just like my own child. But you are far too young to go to a funeral. You have missed something in the spirit.”

Agatha Did Not follow her custom of coming to the door to welcome Gregory, but waited at her fireside while he approached.

“This is not the first time I have received you in this trouble. I know you understand that I will do anything that is in me to make it easier for you. Happily you are young enough for compensation.”

“I wish I could get at Mother's feelings,” said Gregory, taking his place at her feet, and speaking as if he knew he might open his mind. “She tried to tell me the first time, and I suppose this was something like it, but she herself didn't seem at all the same. I feel that if I could realise how she felt, I should be more at rest.”

“Isn't that a little too like your mother?” said Agatha, stroking his hair.

“That is the first thing we shall aim at now,” said Gregory.

“In some things, yes, indeed,” said Agatha, “but there are others in which she would be the last person to wish you to follow her.”

“The one thing at the end she didn't recommend the first time, but she seems to have thought better even of that. She was quite herself the last day and night, really more natural than when she first came home.” A shadow of condemnation crossed Agatha's face. “On the whole she believed she had no child on her own plane. She must have known she had not.”

“Don't you think,” said Agatha softly, “that you are at a time when we are apt to take pronounced, even exaggerated views of what we have lost? I can remember doing it myself, in those of my sorrows that could bear the light thrown upon them.”

“I feel as if I were taking the right view for the first time. I don't know though that that is fair to myself; I think I always took it. But I wonder if Mother knew that I did.”

“I think that whatever we feel honestly always comes through. I am sure we need not be in any doubt about that. What we do not feel honestly, what we only imagine or wish we felt, will separate itself in the end; and we shall be glad to feel it sorted out, and to lay it aside, knowing that we want only sincerity between ourselves and our dear one. I think I can tell you that for certain.”

“Did you find that when your husband died?” said Gregory.

“Oh, that is a different loss,” said Agatha, drawing herself back. “That is a loss we do not compare to any but itself, the loss unique, isolated, supreme. I did not mean that when I spoke about my sorrows; I thought I gave a hint of that. I hope you will never have to face it. That is generally the woman's lot.”

“No one knows the difference it makes, when someone has died by her own will.”

“Ah, that is what you have to face alone. That is where your experience has its own isolation,” said Agatha, seeming to grant the advantage here. “There is the darkness, the hint of tragedy, the shadow of feeling that we must condemn. But in a way, does it not soften the trouble”—she bent down and just looked into his face— “that she left you by her own choice? That she had no will to live to be thwarted? Would not that have been a harder thing? You are spared that.”

“That is the worst of it,” said Gregory, with tears under his words. “She had nothing; she felt she had nothing. Her own courage was all she had. It gave way, and it meant the end.”

“That is how I should wish my son to feel about me,” said Agatha, as though struck by this realisation, “if I could be in the same place. We will imagine it for a
moment for your sake. Of course he would know I could not choose that way out. It is not quite what we all call courage. But if I were not as I am, and could do the same, I should wish him to feel as you do.”

“Would you dare to do it?” said Gregory.

“It is not a question of daring to do it,” said Agatha, lifting her head. “It is a question rather of daring not to do it. Ah, I remember when my husband died. It did take some daring.”

“Are you speaking honestly?” said Gregory.

“What did you say?” said Agatha.

“I said, ‘Are you speaking honestly?'”

“It is of no good to ask a question if you are not sure about that. The answer would mean nothing.”

“I never think those answers do mean anything. You are right that it was a useless question. I know we all give the answers. I should not have said the things that lead to them. Of course my trouble should stay where it is.”

“Surely not, when you are talking to an old friend. If I have made you feel that, I have failed you. That is how we must put it.”

“No, you have been too forbearing. The person does not exist who would not fail me at the moment. I make too much demand. Rachel will be killed amongst us all.”

“Lady Hardisty is staying with you?” said Agatha.

“Yes, for a few days. Sir Percy is utterly kind to us.”

“She is a very charming woman,” said Agatha.

“Who is?” said Geraldine, entering the room with her sister. “Of the many women in the neighbourhood who is your choice?”

“Charm is rarer than women,” said Kate.

“That is the point,” said Geraldine.

“Lady Hardisty,” said Agatha in an easy, open tone.

“Yes, she is charming. I should say brilliant is more her word,” said Geraldine.

“Fortunate creature, to offer such a choice of words!”
said Kate. “She undoubtedly does offer it. I was going to say clever.”

“She is certainly an effective talker,” said Agatha, moving with a soft rustle to the tea-table. “It gives one quite a thrill to see her come in and sight her victim. We are certainly indebted to her for a good deal of enlivening though perhaps we ought not always to enjoy it as we do.”

“I did not know she made victims,” said Geraldine.

“Didn't you? Oh, yes,” said Agatha.

“Another gift,” said Kate. “But I had not observed it. Her humour strikes me as so kind.”

“True humour is always kind,” said Agatha. “And Lady Hardisty is not without the knowledge of it. By no means. But she takes a pleasure sometimes in getting her shafts home. Oh yes, she does. Haven't you been struck by it? Oh yes.”

“I believe I have noticed her getting them in at you, Agatha,” said Geraldine.

“Well, it is no wonder if I have perceived it then,” said Agatha, laughing and looking round, as she stooped to offer something to Kate. “I don't think it is anything to be surprised at, if it has not escaped me.”

“You poor thing!” said Geraldine. “Ought we to have come to your rescue? I don't remember more than half noticing it.”

“I don't remember noticing it at all,” said Agatha, laughing again, and motioning Gregory to keep his seat. “But it is no wonder, if it was so, that something came home. It would have been the last thing she was out for, to fail of that. I am glad I saved her effort from being quite wasted.”

“Even though your perceptions were rather dim,” said Geraldine.

“Yes, well, it is a thing I am hardly prepared for,” said Agatha, standing up and speaking with deliberate frankness. “It is a thing I should never do myself, and that
does not predispose me to think it likely that anyone else should do it. But if I have afforded any satisfaction, I am delighted.”

“Rather a sardonic kind of delight,” said Geraldine.

“No,” said Agatha consideringly. “No, I do not think so. I should honestly have no objection to being the target for a little innocent fun, or the excuse for it, if you like. I think there is nothing we should rightly object to in that position.”

“Then I should wrongly object,” said Geraldine. “Nobody would dare to use me for such purposes. It is no wonder Lady Hardisty settles on you. Perhaps she would not do it if she knew you.”

“I am sure she would intend nothing that was really ill-natured or malicious,” said Agatha, glancing at Gregory. “I think I found her shafts rather flattering than otherwise, though she did not intend them to be so. Missiles often hit the mark better when they are not aimed.”

“I thought you had not noticed them!” said Geraldine.

“I must be going. Thank you very much for putting up with me. I said I would be home early,” said Gregory.

“Now what I think you want, is a succession of long nights,” said Agatha. “You take my advice and see that you get them. If I were coming with you I should not leave it in your hands.”

“Poor boy, he was very silent,” said Kate. “I am sure I don't wonder.”

“I wonder he came,” said Geraldine. “I should have felt too self-conscious in my sensitive youth.”

“Oh, he had plenty to say when he first came in, before he had an audience,” said Agatha. “That might have made him self-conscious; I daresay it did. He came to get it all off his mind, I think.”

“What did he say?” said Geraldine.

“Oh, we had the whole gambit to run through,” said Agatha, standing with a pitying, tolerant smile. “I was not spared any of it. The poor boy felt he had to tell
someone, I suppose. Well, I am only too glad that I could be of any relief to him.”

“You were alone in being up to that,” said Kate.

“I think there is not much in it,” said Agatha. “I think it was only that he wanted just the life-stamp, that drew out his boyish confidences, without making him feel there was anything unnatural in his pouring them forth. That was all it was, I believe.”