Noble in Reason (11 page)

“I don't think,” I began, when the rain settled the matter by suddenly intensifying. A chill unpleasing drizzle before, it became in a moment an intolerably heavy deluge. Such passers-by as were to be seen cried out and ran for shelter, and we perforce did the same. It simply was not possible, at any rate for me (Henry being out at a concert), either to shut the door in Florrie's face or leave her shivering in the tiny hall. I took her upstairs to our small sitting-room, revived the fire, cut bread and butter, made preparations for brewing tea. Florrie took off her thin soaked jacket (which I could not help seeing was of abominably poor cloth) and toasted her boots (which had large thin patches on the soles) at the fire. She looked around her at our little room, commented cheerfully on its details, thought we were very snug, while I longed for the kettle to boil quickly, so that she might be safely gone before Henry came home.

The kettle boiled, and Florrie drank three cups of tea and ate voraciously of our bread and butter, but showed no inclination to go. It was almost with relief, though also with agonized fear, that I at last heard Henry's quick light step on the stairs.

“Here's my brother,” I faltered.

No doubt my face expressed my emotions clearly enough,
for Florrie got up at once, and with a vexed though cringing look took up her jacket. If only Henry went into our bedroom first, I thought, all might yet be well. But no doubt he saw the light under the edges of the ill-fitting door, for he burst in energetically, with a frown on his forehead and a rebuke for my late sitting-up on his lips.

I shall always see him standing there, his hand on the doorknob which he held at arm's stretch, while his handsome face contorted into a look of livid disgust.

“What is the meaning of this?” he said.

“I'm just going,” piped Florrie, making to put on her jacket.

“On the bus,” I croaked: “We met on the bus.”

“Chris, go to bed,” commanded Henry. “At once.”

He threw back the door, and I, feeble and foolish wretch, stumbled past him out of the room. The horror and fury which emanated from his person were so strong that I hardly dared pass close to him, and felt scorched, like a moth which has fluttered through a candle-flame, when I reached the safety of the landing.

My habits of obedience to my family, my cowardly inability to assert my will, still held me in so strong a grip that I followed Henry's command exactly, undressed with trembling hands and climbed into a bed which seemed singularly cold. For a time I lay there shuddering, expecting every moment to hear Florrie's departure and Henry's entry like an avenging angel into our room. Then it occurred to me that if I could be asleep when he came in, I could postpone his anger till tomorrow morning. This passage of time might diminish his anger, cool it; in any case, postponement of the awful moment would be a gain. I cowered down in my pillow, drew up the bedclothes about my head, lay very still and closed my eyes; soon this simulation produced the reality; I slept.

I awoke to find daylight streaming into the room. As so
often happens, at the moment of awakening I knew that some gloomy and unpleasant affair was weighing upon me, but did not know what it was; then full memory returned and I remembered with terror the fearful interview with Henry that lay ahead. Very cautiously and slowly I turned over so as to face towards Henry's bed, hoping greatly that he would be still asleep. But the bed was unoccupied; it was in fact “made”, a service which Henry usually performed for himself because he disapproved of Mrs. Tedding's methods. My heart sank. Henry had risen early, then, and was busy in the sitting-room with his musical work. I tried to sleep again, but could not; the anguish of suspense was too great; I was obliged to rise and get the interview I dreaded as soon as might be into the past. Sighing heavily, I made the effort. Our washing arrangements would be regarded now as primitive: large white china ewers filled with cold water, with basins to match, stood on wooden washstands; a lidded can of hot water was brought up by Mrs. Tedding at a specified time each morning, and from its meagre contents we had both to wash and Henry to shave. The can was not in evidence in the room this morning, I noticed; perhaps the hour was earlier than I had thought; at any rate, I would make no fuss, I would wash in cold. A few moments later, dressed and brushed, I stepped out of the bedroom to face my ordeal.

To my surprise the sitting-room door stood open, and our empty trunk—which, genteelly swathed by Mrs. Tedding in an embroidered cloth, usually served as a low table on the landing—lay overturned, almost as though kicked aside, a yard or so from its foot. I righted the trunk, then, screwing up my courage, I stepped towards the doorway, but fell back with a loud cry. A body hung against the door, its feet turned inwards, its neck supported by a blue cord which passed over the top to the coat-hook on the other side. So purple and distorted were the features, so strange the angle of the head, that
I did not at first in the least recognise my brother, but ran into the sitting-room and back into the bedroom—the boots of the corpse knocking against the door as I brushed past—crying wildly: “Henry! Henry!” and felt astonished when he did not reply. Presently something familiar in the clothes struck me, and I stood gasping and trembling before the body when Mr. Tedding, who had heard my cries and hurried footsteps, came up in his shirt-sleeves to see what was going on. Seizing my shoulder with his hand, he quickly turned me away from the lamentable sight, and shouting loudly for his wife, delivered me into her hands on the landing below.

“But it can't be
Henry
?” I cried as she guided me to a sofa and sat down beside me with her thin kindly arm around my shoulders: “It isn't
Henry?”

“I'm afraid it is, Mr. Chris dear,” she said, and this awful verdict was confirmed by a nod from Mr. Tedding when he presently entered the room.

“But why, why?” I gasped. “Why should he-”

“Hang himself?” said Mr. Tedding sadly. “Ah, that'll be the question.”

It was indeed the question which was put to me over and over again during the next few days by a variety of persons, though by none with more heart-searching anguish than myself: the doctor, the police, Mr. Hodgson, the junior partner of Messrs. Cockerylls, teachers from the Guildhall, Mr. Tedding—not his wife, who simply shook her head and said mournfully that young men have strange ideas. The police took the line that Henry must have been in money difficulties; did he gamble, they asked, or drink, or go racing? They received my vehement denials on these points with calm scepticism, and hinted, it seemed, to Messrs. Cockerylls that they had better check their accounts. Messrs. Cockerylls replied that Henry was not that kind of young man and had in any case no opportunity for theft; however, they checked
their accounts and established, as they expected, Henry's complete innocence. The Guildhall officials said that Henry was a promising young student who without doubt would have been able to pass the necessary examinations and set himself up in the provinces as a music teacher. To my ears this confirmed my estimate of Henry's musical disappointment, but my other interrogators did not hear it so; they did not realize the height of Henry's ambitions.

Mr. Hodgson summoned my father by telegraph, but the Sunday train-service from Hudley being notoriously poor, he could not arrive till late at night. Before setting out to meet him, Mr. Hodgson came to see me once again, and after an interchange of nods between him and the Teddings, we were left alone together. Settling himself in the creaking basket chair which all my questioners in turn had occupied, so that the sound flayed my nerves, he leaned forward and laid his hand on my knee.

“Now, Chris,” he said soberly: “Just tell me why Henry did it. Private like, between you and me.”

“But I don't
know,
Mr. Hodgson!” I cried, frantic. “He was a little disappointed about his music—and distressed because of the family misfortunes—but not enough, surely—at least I should have thought not. I don't
know.”

Mr. Hodgson hitched his chair nearer.

“Chris,” he said, lowering his voice: “Was it a woman?”

“A woman!” I exclaimed. “How could it be?”

“Hush!” said Mr. Hodgson, looking about him. “Keep your voice down. Mrs. Tedding said to me privately that she thought there was a smell of scent in that room, this morning.”

“But good heavens!” I exclaimed. “What could that have to do with it?”

“He hadn't—got involved—with any sort of woman?”

“No, no!”

“Are you sure, Chris?”

“Absolutely certain sure.”

“What about the scent, then?”

I expect I coloured or showed some other sign of confusion, for Mr. Hodgson said quickly:

“If it was a woman, Chris, my advice to you is: Don't tell your father. It would only break his heart.”

“But it
wasn't.”

“We can't bring the poor lad back, whatever we say. So why blacken his reputation?”

“Mr. Hodgson, nobody could say anything to blacken Henry's reputation, because it was absolutely clear. Henry was the most honourable person I've ever known.”

Mr. Hodgson's face softened at this. He stood up, laid one hand on my shoulder, and said:

“Good boy. Well, I must go.”

I faltered: “I suppose I must wait up to see my father?”

No doubt my fear showed in my face and voice, for Mr. Hodgson answered quickly:

“No need at all. You go to bed and take some of that stuff the doctor brought you.”

The Teddings confirming this, I retired with much relief. My brother's body had been removed by the police and, anxious to be alone, I assured the Teddings that I should not mind occupying the bedroom which I had shared with Henry. But when I found myself in the room, surrounded by evidences of Henry's occupation—his hairbrushes, his boots, his clothes— I was unable to banish him from my mind, and my last two visions of him, pale with anger against me and pitiable in death, constantly rose before me in all their vivid pain. Could Florrie really have anything to do with his death? But how? Why? The doctor's drug was powerless against this torment; I tossed and turned and grieved. Presently there came the subdued noise of arrival downstairs; hushed voices floated up
towards me, a light appeared outside on the landing. In terror I cowered beneath the bedclothes as Mrs. Tedding made an anxious enquiry.

“I shall be all right here with Chris, thank you,” was the gruff reply.

It was the voice of John. I sat up in bed as he came in.

“Chris! Are you awake?”

“I couldn't sleep. Where's father?”

“He couldn't come. Mother's ill.”

“Mother ill?” I gasped. “What with?”

“Oh, it's nothing serious,” said John impatiently. “Don't bother about it. But what have you been about, Chris,” said John, sitting down on the bed beside me, “to let poor Henry do this to himself, eh?”

There were tears in his eyes as he spoke. It had never occurred to me before that John had any affection for Henry, or indeed that I had any affection for Henry myself, but now we wept together, and our grief was real.

“But why did he do it, Chris love?”

“I don't
know,
John. Honestly, I don't know.”

There was a pause. John, crossing one leg over the other, began to unlace his boots. It struck me that my eldest brother had grown up a great deal since I last saw him; he was a man now, with a strong determined face and a powerful frame, looking very much older than his couple of years' advantage over Henry seemed to warrant. He was also a good deal better dressed than Henry and I had lately managed to be.

“It was a mistake you two coming off here together,” said John.

“I like it here,” I said feebly.

“Well, you'll have to come home now, choose how,” said John.

And indeed his strong Yorkshire presence seemed to make all our London arrangements appear petty and cheap. I
sighed. John glanced at me shrewdly, then looked away.

“Chris—was it about Beatrice? That Henry did it, I mean?”

“I don't think so,” I faltered, perplexed.

“He wrote to her sometimes, though?”

“Yes. Perhaps it wasn't any one reason, John. He was disappointed about his music a little, I think, and vexed that he didn't get on as fast as he hoped.”

“Well, he always liked himself too much, did Henry,” said John grimly.

It was Henry's epitaph.

It was many years later, in the moment of satiety which terminated an unworthy
affaire,
that I realized why Henry had killed himself. A young man of much sensibility, deeply in love, surrounded by the temptations to wine, women and song offered by a great metropolis in its careless heyday, Henry enforced a stern abstinence upon himself not only as regarded sex but in all other pleasant relaxations. He worked from morning to night at a task where the brilliant success which alone he thought worthy of him continually eluded him; and meanwhile he starved his senses of every satisfaction. (In this I think he had been partly infected by my father, whose disgust against any form of sensual enjoyment I have already noted.) Then the wretched Florrie, anxious to earn enough for her night's lodging, through my foolish indiscretion presented herself—offered herself would perhaps be the better word. The temptation was too strong, Henry's frustrated hunger too great, his revolt against his over-severe self-discipline too sudden and powerful, to be resisted—after all Henry was his mother's son as well as his father's. Henry took Florrie (or perhaps merely caressed her), then found his shame, his self-disgust, his infidelity to Beatrice, too hateful to be endured.
As John said, Henry liked himself too well—too well to be able to live with a soiled and tarnished version of his personality.

For myself, the great shock of Henry's death undoubtedly accentuated the melancholy and timidity of my disposition, my anxious uncertainty about myself and my family. The tragedy also returned me to the West Riding.