Memoirs of a Midget Part 20

A low, rumbling voice shook up from the kitchen. Mrs Bowater was talking to herself. Dejection drew over me again at the thought of the deceit I was in, and I looked at my love for f.a.n.n.y as I suppose Abraham at the altar of stones looked at his son Isaac. Then suddenly a thought far more matter-of-fact chilled through my mind. I saw again Mr Crimble huddling down towards me in that echoing hall, heard my voice delivering f.a.n.n.y's message, and realized that half of what I had said had been written in mockery. It had been intended for my eye only--"_Let alone my prayers_." In the solitude of the darkness the words had a sound far more sinister than even f.a.n.n.y can have intended.

Mr Crimble, however, had accepted them apparently in good faith--to judge at least from the letter which reached me the following morning:--

"DEAR MISS M.,--Thank you. I write with a mind so overburdened that words fail me. But I realize that Miss Bowater has no truer friend than yourself, and shall be frank. After that _terrible_ morning you might well have refused to help me. I cannot believe that you will--for her sake. This long concealment, believe me, is not of my own seeking. It cannot, it must not, continue, a moment beyond the necessity. For weeks, nay, months, I have been tortured with doubts and misgivings. Her pride, her impenetrable heedlessness; oh, indeed, I realize the difficulties of her situation. I dare not speak till she gives consent. Yet silence puts me in a false position, and tongues, as perhaps even you may be aware, begin to wag. Nor is this my first attempt, and--to be more frank than I feel is discreet--there is my mother (quite apart from _hers_) now, alas, aged and more dependent on my affection and care than ever.

To make a change now--the talk, the absence of Christian _charity_, my own temperament and calling! I pray for counsel to guide my stumbling bark on this sea of _darkest_ tempest.

"Can F. decide that her affections are such as could justify her in committing her future to me? Am I justified in asking her? You, too, must have many anxieties--anxieties perhaps unguessed at by those of coa.r.s.er fibre. And though I cannot venture to ask your confidences, I do ask for your feminine intuition--even though this may seem an _intrusion_ after my sad discomfiture the other day.

And yet, I a.s.sure you, it was not corporeal fear--are not we priests the police of the City Beautiful? Might I not have succeeded merely in making us _both_ ridiculous? But that is past, and the dead past must bury its dead: there is no gentler s.e.xton.

"Need I say that this letter is not the fruit of any mere _impulse_. The thought, the very image of her never leaves my consciousness night or day; and I get no rest. I am almost afraid at the power she has of imprinting herself on the mind. I implore you to be discreet, without needless deception. I will wait patiently. My last desire is to _hasten_ an answer--unless, dear Miss M., one in the affirmative. And would it be possible--indeed the chief purpose of this letter was to make this small request--would it be possible to give me one hour--no tea--this afternoon? There was a phrase in your whispered message--probably because of the peculiar acoustic properties of Brunswick House--that was but half-caught. We must not risk the faintest shadow of misunderstanding.

"Believe me, yours most gratefully, though 'perplexed in the extreme,'

"HAROLD CRIMBLE.

"PS.--I feel at times that it is inc.u.mbent on one to burn one's boats; even though out of sight the further sh.o.r.e.

"And the letter: would it be even possible to share a glance at _that_?"

My old habit of hunting in the crannies of what I read had ample opportunity here. Two things stood out in my mind: a kind of astonishment at Mr Crimble's "stumbling bark" which he was asking _me_ to help to steer, and inexpressible relief that f.a.n.n.y's letter was buried beyond hope of recovery before he could call that afternoon. The more I pitied and understood his state of mind, the more helpless and anxious I felt. Then, in my foolish fashion, I began again picturing in fancy the ceremony that would bring Mr Crimble and my landlady into so close a relationship. Why did he fear the wagging of tongues so much? I didn't. Would Miss Bullace be a bridesmaid? Would I? I searched in my drawer and read over the "Form of Solemnization of Matrimony." I came to "the dreadful day of judgment," and to "serve" and "obey," and shivered. I was not sure that I cared for the way human beings had managed these things. But at least, bridesmaids _said_ nothing, and if I----

While I was thus engaged Mrs Bowater entered the room. I smuggled my prayer-book aside and gave her f.a.n.n.y's letter. She was always a woman of few words. She folded it reflectively; took off her spectacles, replaced them in their leather case, and that in her pocket.

"'Soap, handkerchiefs, stockings,'" she mused, "though why in the world she didn't _say_ 'silk' is merely f.a.n.n.y's way. And I am sure, miss," she added, "she must have had one peculiar moment when the thought occurred to her of the bolt."

"But, Mrs Bowater," I cried in snake-like accents, "you _said_ you were 'soliciting no divulgements.'"

Mrs Bowater's mouth opened in silent laughter. "Between you----" she began, and broke off. "Gracious goodness, but here's that young man, Mr Crimble, calling again."

Mr Crimble drank tea with me, though he ate nothing. And now, his darkest tempest being long since stilled, I completely absolve myself for amending the message which Lady Pollacke's tesselated hall had mercifully left obscure. He sat there, almost like a goldfish--though black in effect beyond description--gaping for the crumb that never comes. "She bade me," I muttered my falsehood, "she bade me say secretly that she has had your letter, that she is giving it her earnest attention, her earnest attention, _alone, and in her prayers_."

The dark liquid pupils appeared for one sheer instant to rotate, then he turned away, and, as if quite helplessly, stifled an unsheltered yawn.

"'Alone,'" he cried desperately. "I see myself, I see myself in her young imagination!"

I think he guessed that my words were false, that his ear had not been as treacherous as all that. Whether or not, no human utterance have I ever heard so humble, tragic, final. It knelled in my ear like the surrender of all hope. And yet it brought me, personally, some enlightenment. It was with Mr Crimble's eyes that I now scanned not only his phantom presence in f.a.n.n.y's imagination, but my own, standing beside him--a "knick-knack" figure of fun, pygmied beneath the flappets of his clerical coat, like a sun-beetle by a rook. The spectacle strengthened me without much affecting f.a.n.n.y. She was no longer the absolute sultana of my being. I could _think_ now, as well as adore.

How strange it is that when our minds are needled to a sharp focus mere "things" swarm so close. There was not a single ornament or book or fading photograph in Mrs Bowater's parlour that in this queer privacy did not mutely seem to cry, "Yes, here am I. This is how things go."

I leant forward and looked at him. "We mustn't care what she sees, what she thinks, if only we can go on loving her."

"'Can, can'?" echoed Mr Crimble, "I have prayed on my knees _not_ to."

This was a sharp ray on my thoughts of love. "But why?" I said. "Even when I was a child, I knew by my mother's face that I must go on, and should go on, loving her, Mr Crimble, whether she loved me or not. One can't make a bad mistake in giving, can one? And yet--well, you must remember that I cannot but have been a--a disappointment; that as long as I live I can't expect any great affection, any disproportionate one, I mean."

"But, but," he stumbled on, "a daughter's affection--it's different. I mustn't brood on my trouble. It unhinges me. Why, the clock stops. But nevertheless may G.o.d bless you for that."

"But surely," I persisted, smiling as cheerfully as I could, "_Nil desperandum_, Mr Crimble. And you know what they say about fish in the sea."

His eye rolled round on me as if a serpent had spoken. "I am sorry, I am sorry," he repeated rapidly, in the same low, unemphatic undertone as if to himself. "I must just wait. You have never seen a sheep--a bullock, shall we call him?--being driven to the slaughter-house. On, on--from despair to despair. That's my position." His face was emptied of expression, his eyes fixed.

These words, his air, his look, this awful private thing--I can't say--it shocked and frightened me beyond words. But I answered him steadily none the less. "Listen, Mr Crimble," I said, "look at _me_, here, what I am. I have had my desperate moments too--more alone in the world than you can ever be! And I swear before G.o.d that I will never, never be _not_ myself." I wonder what the listener thought of this little challenge, not perhaps what Mr Crimble did.

"Well," he replied, with sudden calm, "that's the courage of the martyrs, and not all of them perhaps have been Christians, if history is to be credited. Yes, and in sober truth, I a.s.sure you, _you_, that I would go to the stake for--for Miss Bowater."

He rose, and in that instant of dignity I foresaw what was never to be--lawn sleeves encasing those loose, black arms. He had somehow wafted me back to my Confirmation.

"And the letter? I have no wish to intrude. But her actual words. I mayn't see _that_?"

"You will please forgive me," I entreated helplessly, "it is buried; because, you see, f.a.n.n.y--you see, Mrs Bowater----"

"Ah," he said. "It is this deception which dismays, scandalizes me most.

But you will keep me informed?"

He seized his soft round hat, and it was on this cold word we parted. I stood by the window, with hand stretched out to summon him back. But no word of comfort or hope came to my aid, and I watched him out of sight.

Chapter Twenty-One

That night I wrote to f.a.n.n.y, copying out my letter from the scrawling draft from which I am copying it now:--

"DEAR f.a.n.n.y,--I have given Mr Crimble your message; first, exactly in your own words, though he did not quite hear them, and then, leaving out a little. You may be angry at what I am going to say--but I am quite sure you ought to answer him at _once_. f.a.n.n.y, he's _dreadfully_ fond of you. I never even dreamed people were like that--in such torture for what can't be, unless you mean you _do_ care, but are too proud to tell him so. If he knows you have no heart for him, he may soon be better. This sounds hateful. But I am not such a pin in a pincushion as not to know that even the greatest sorrows and disappointments wear out. Why, isn't that beech-tree we sat under a kind of cannibal of its own dead leaves?

"Your private letter is quite safe; though I prefer not to burn it--indeed, _cannot_ burn it. You know how I have longed for it.

But please, if possible, don't send me two in future. It doesn't seem fair; and your mother knew already about our star-gazing. You see, how else could the door have been bolted!! But it's best to have been found out--next, I mean, to telling oneself.

"What day are you coming home? I look at it, as if it were a lighthouse--even though it is out of sight. Shall we go on with _Wuthering Heights_ when you do come? I saw the 'dazzling'

moon--but there, f.a.n.n.y, what I want most to beg of you is to write to Mr. Crimble--all that you feel, even if not all that you think.

No, perhaps I mean the reverse. He must have been wondering about you long before I began to. And there it was, all sunken in; no one could have guessed his longing by looking at him. I am afraid it must affect his health.

"And now good-bye. I have made a vow to myself not to think into things too much. Your affectionate friend (as much of her as there is)--

"MIDGETINA.

"PS.--Please tell me the _day_ you are coming; and that shall be my birthday."

f.a.n.n.y was prompt in reply:--

"DEAR MIDGETINA,--It's a strange fact, but while, to judge from your letter, _you_ seem to be growing smaller, I (in spite of Miss Stebbings's water porridge) am growing fatter. Now, which is the tragedy? I _may_ come home on the 30th. If so, kill the fatted calf; I will supply the birthday-cake. How foolish of you to keep letters. I never do, lest I should remember the answers. Anyhow, I shall not write again. But if, by any chance, Mr Crimble should make another call, will you explain that my chief motive in not singing at the concert was because I should have been a second mezzo-soprano. One of two in one concert _must_ be superfluous.