One of Life's Slaves Part 4

His stronghold was not easy to hit upon either, for it was something very like looking in her own pocket. In common with other evil-doers, Nikolai was driven by an irresistible desire--like moths that flutter round a candle--to hide himself as near as possible to the place of his fear and dread, where Mrs. Holman was, and where he could catch a glimpse of Silla.

Holman lay at night and felt, through his intoxication, that things were going wrong with Nikolai. He heard it dripping and dripping in the thaw outside--splash, splash! The sound came in a monotonous chant: Ni-ko-lai, Ni-ko-lai.

He would ruin his health out there!

With sudden energy he sat up in bed. Where else would Nikolai be than under the old carriage hood that stood in the loft over the coach-house, mouldy and dropping to pieces with its opening towards the wall?

It was in the light of this idea that he rushed out.

Nikolai never felt the blockmaker's hand; he still slept on happily, as it lifted him up by the coat collar.

It was only when he stood erect on both feet that he grasped the situation, and threw himself down again, kicking and screaming. He would not go home, they might kill him first, or take off his head!

The heels of his boots made it evident both to sight and feeling that he meant it: he was utterly beside himself.

Only let Holman get him inside the door, and the strap should dance!

Holman had worked himself up into a state of excitement.

Mrs. Holman was waiting in the doorway with a candle. By its light she saw an ashy pale face, with eyes staring at her, and at the same time heard the words: "You won't get me in! If I was born in the street, I can live in the street!" She caught a glance from the sharp, defiant grey eyes--then out of the blockmaker's hands, out of the gate, and he was gone!

The blows on Ludvig's nose had gone to Barbara's heart. But when she heard that Nikolai had run away from the Holmans' and that there was some talk of getting him into an inst.i.tute for morally depraved children, there was crying and weeping. She had had shame enough with the boy, and this she could not survive! Her mistress must prevent it.

She was conscious of having done her duty and more than her duty all these years that she had been Ludvig and Lizzie's nurse, but she could not put up with this! Her mistress must prevent it, or she did not know what she might do, or what might happen: she felt quite capable of leaving them.

Barbara sat sighing and weeping in the nursery, until the children were almost afraid to go in.

Such attacks generally lasted, at the most, one day; but this one had now been going on for three, and was disturbing the comfort of the house. Then Mrs. Veyergang got one of her headaches, and was going to have an afternoon nap, her accustomed cure, during which everything must be kept perfectly quiet around her.

It was Barbara who generally guarded her slumbers by going hushing and quieting right out into the kitchen, and keeping watch at the door into the pa.s.sage. But now she only sat in her room sobbing.

It did surprise her a little that her mistress lay so quiet all the time without calling her. On the other hand, she rather enjoyed the sentence she was carrying out. Her mistress should know what opposing her meant, even if it were to last the whole week.

It grew dark, and still her mistress lay there. She lay until the Consul came driving home towards evening; and she did not even ring for lights when she got up.

It was with a shawl about her head and a face red with weeping, that Mrs. Veyergang received her husband that evening; she was in a violently excited state of mind, and her voice quite trembled.

She wanted nothing less than that he should give Barbara warning.

A tyranny existed in the house that was quite unparalleled--had existed for several years--and if she had put up with it without complaining--her husband knew that she had never complained--it was for the children's sake. But it was really unnecessary now, and "it may be just as well to seize the opportunity; she has become far, far too overbearing in the house!"

It was a matter of course that the warning was given in the most appreciative and considerate, although firmly decisive manner. The whole circle of Mrs. Veyergang's acquaintance agreed that they had all expected that the Veyergangs would really one day part with that pampered creature!

The only person who was thoroughly astonished and quite stunned, as if by a thunder-clap, was Barbara herself; and for a long time she could not understand that she, the Veyergangs' Barbara, had actually received warning to leave Ludvig and Lizzie and the house where she had been so indispensable.

She went about with a solemn, injured air, and expected that a change of decision would some day take place. Then she became humble to her mistress, and wept before the children.

But there was always only the same kindness, which ever clenched the dismissal more firmly.

And now her mistress began to talk about a substantial acknowledgement of her services with which the Consul would present her on her departure.

In indignation Barbara tied the strings of her best bonnet beneath her chin, and with offended dignity requested permission to go into town.

Her mistress was to know the meaning of this when she returned later in the day. It was nothing less than that it was her fixed, resolute purpose to offer herself to others who would appreciate her better than the Veyergangs did.

She directed her wrathful steps straight to Scheele, the magistrate's house: they had four children, and were looking for a nurse. They were the Consul's most intimate friends, where she would only need to present herself, and they would jump at the opportunity. How often the magistrate's wife had praised her management, and talked condescendingly to her, when they had dined at the Veyergangs on Sundays! She had more than once thought Mrs. Veyergang fortunate in having such a treasure in the house, and sighed over her own inability to find just such another.

But--how unfortunate it was--Mrs. Scheele was extremely sorry--they had just engaged another nurse!

"Fancy!" exclaimed Mrs. Scheele, when her husband came down from his office, "there is a revolution at the Veyergangs', and that high and mighty Nurse Barbara has got her dismissal. She has been here and offered herself to us. I wouldn't have that pampered creature at any price!"

Barbara walked a long way that day and to the best houses. On a large sheet of paper, folded in three, she had the Consul-General's long and excellent testimonial to exhibit; moreover she was fully conscious of the extent to which she was known. But though she stood so large and erect and smart at the door, and comported herself so well, there was no one who could make any use of her!

And late in the evening, later than was needful, as she did not wish to show herself, she came home again, disappointed and weary.

It really seemed as if all the celebrity she had acquired during all these years, all her fidelity, all her prestige as nurse at the Veyergangs, was to vanish at one stroke into thin air!

Deeply hurt as she was after her unlucky expedition, it was remarkable that no one in the house asked her how she had got on--though there were plenty of mischievous glances from her fellow-servants, whose standing with their mistress had depended for so many years upon her. And whenever she tried to broach the subject with Mrs. Veyergang, the latter always turned the conversation--indeed, once she even dismissed the subject, saying that Barbara must know that she never meddled with such things.

But the kindness increased as the day of her departure approached.

Barbara began to perceive how this screw of kindness, that turned so gently, was s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g her farther and farther out of the house. The Consul had Nikolai placed on trial as apprentice in a smithy down by the crane, and from Mrs. Veyergang she received one thing after another, as remembrances. But when, one day, the Consul--very thoughtfully--made her a present of one of his old travelling trunks, she let her large, heavy person sink down upon its lid, completely overwhelmed. She could not bring herself to think, had never believed, that the day would come when she must part from her mistress and Ludvig and Lizzie--it would kill her!

This was a direct appeal to the Consul himself, but the answer was not exactly as Barbara wished. He patted her on the shoulder, saying:

"I'm glad, my dear Barbara, that you feel that you have been well off."

When she went into the Consul's office for a settlement and to receive her savings-bank book--the amount it contained was a hundred and fourteen specie-dollars, a result, the Consul said, with which she ought to be thoroughly satisfied, when she considered the great expense she had been put to with Nikolai--she declared her intention of resting for a time before she went out to service again, and had made arrangements to lodge with a farmer out in the country: she had now been toiling for others for fourteen years!

The last evening, which she had dreaded so, went more easily than she had expected. The Consul and his wife were invited to the Willocks'

country-house in the afternoon with the children, so the farewell could only be a short one, before they got into the carriage.

She was left standing with the feeling of Lizzie's soft fur, which she had stroked, in her fingers.

CHAPTER IV

A STOLEN INTERVIEW

Holman made his usual turn into Selvig's public-house every evening to brace himself for his return home. When the ale-bottle had been emptied, and a proper number of drams consumed, his at first hurried, restless look was stiffened into a dull, staring, fixed mask. It was the crust about his heart, far within the unconscious, degraded man, who enjoyed his daily hour of oblivion to that life-struggle which he had taken upon himself when he chose to unite his lot inseparably with that of his duty-breathing wife, that life-struggle in which he continually declared "pa.s.s," and turned aside. When he sat there silently staring over his gla.s.s, it was felt that he was brooding over something, possibly only the number of drams he had drunk, possibly his bill, possibly, too, a remote world of thought, where, like a philosopher, he gazed silently down into unfathomable depths. Or possibly he was musing in silent resignation upon the problem of matrimony, and the strange law of consequence which had set him down here in the public-house.

But regularity in all things, said Holman, and when the clock struck eight, with his tools in his hand and his head bent, he turned his faltering steps homewards.

On Sat.u.r.day evenings, when work was over at the workshop, a tall, active young girl, with large wrists, thin arms and a stooping figure, would often come down to fetch him. She had a basket, and a piece of paper on which was written what she was to buy with the week's wages.

The two would then go up the street together, walking slower and slower as they went. Time after time he would stop, and look thoughtfully about him with one hand in his pocket, and an occasionally e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed "H'm, h'm!"--until they arrived at Mrs. Selvig's steps and green door, when he would suddenly declare that he had some "things" lying in there: he would be out again directly.

Silla knew by experience what "directly" meant, and meanwhile went her own way over the yards.