The Daughters of Danaus Part 42

"Oh, thank you! (Infant, I implore!)"

"The baby ably impersonates Society with all its sentiments and laws, written and unwritten."

"Ah!--and my impounded property?"

"Woman's life and freedom."

"Ingenious! And the chain? (Oh, inexorable babe, have mercy on the sufferings of imprisoned vigour!)"

"Her affections, her pity, her compunction, which forbid her to wrench away her rightful property, because ignorant and tender hands are grasping it. The a.n.a.logy is a little mixed, but no matter."

"I should enjoy the intellectual treat that is spread before me better, in happier circ.u.mstances, Mrs. Temperley."

"Apply your remark to your prototype--intelligently," she added.

"My intelligence is rapidly waning; I am benumbed. I fail to follow the intricacies of a.n.a.logy, in this constrained position."

"Ah, so does she!"

"Oh, pitiless cherub, my muscles ache with this monotony."

"And hers," said Hadria.

"Come, come, life is pa.s.sing; I have but one; relax these fetters, or I die."

Martha frowned and fretted. She even looked shocked, according to Hadria, who stood by laughing. The baby, she pointed out, failed to understand how her captive could so far forget himself as to desire to regain his liberty.

"She reminds you, sternly, that this is your proper sphere."

"Perdition!" he exclaimed.

"As a general rule," she a.s.sented.

The Professor laughed, and said he was tired of being a Type.

At length a little gentle force had to be used, in spite of furious resentment on the part of the baby. A more injured and ill-treated mortal could not have been imagined. She set up a heaven-piercing wail, evidently overcome with indignation and surprise at the cruel treatment that she had received. What horrid selfishness to take oneself and one's property away, when an engaging innocent enjoys grasping it and stuffing it into its mouth!

"Don't you feel a guilty monster?" Hadria enquired, as the lament of the offended infant followed them up the road.

"I feel as if I were slinking off after a murder!" he exclaimed ruefully. "I wonder if we oughtn't to go back and try again to soothe the child." He paused irresolutely.

Hadria laughed. "You _do_ make a lovely allegory!" she exclaimed. "This sense of guilt, this disposition to go back--this att.i.tude of apology--it is speaking, inimitable!"

"But meanwhile that wretched child is shrieking itself into a fit!"

cried the allegory, with the air of a repentant criminal.

"Whenever you open your mouth, out falls a symbol," exclaimed Hadria.

"Be calm; Hannah will soon comfort her, and it is truer kindness not to remind her again of her grievance, poor little soul. But we will go back if you like (you are indeed a true woman!), and you can say you are sorry you made so free with your own possessions, and you wish you had done your duty better, and are eager to return and let Her Majesty hold you captive. Your prototype always does, you know, and she is nearly always pardoned, on condition that she never does anything of that kind again."

Professor Theobald seemed too much concerned about the child, who was still wailing, to pay much attention to any other topic. He turned to retrace his steps.

"I think you make a mistake," said Hadria. "As soon as she sees you she will want the watch, and then you will be placed between the awful alternatives of voluntarily surrendering your freedom, and heartlessly refusing to present yourself to her as a big plaything. In one respect you have not yet achieved a thorough fidelity to your model; you don't seem to enjoy sacrifice for its own sake. That will come with practice."

"I wish that child would leave off crying."

Hadria stopped in the road to laugh at the perturbed Professor.

"She will presently. That is only a cry of anger, not of distress. I would not leave her, if it were. Yes; your vocation is clearly allegorical. Feminine to your finger-tips, in this truly feminine predicament. We are all--_nous autres femmes_--like the hero of the _White Ship_, who is described by some delightful boy in an examination paper as being 'melted by the shrieks of a near relation.'"

The Professor stumbled over a stone in the road, and looked back at it vindictively.

"The near relation does so want to hold one's watch and to stuff it into his mouth, and he shrieks so movingly if one brutally removes one's property and person!"

"Alas! I am still a little bewildered by my late captivity. I can't see the bearings of things."

"As allegory, you are as perfect as ever."

"I seem to be a sort of involuntary _Pilgrim's Progress_!" he exclaimed.

"Ah, indeed!" cried Hadria, "and how the symbolism of that old allegory would fit this subject!"

"With me for wretched hero, I suppose!"

"Your archetype;--with a little adaptation--yes, and wonderfully little--the Slough of Despond, Doubting Castle, the Valley of the Shadow of Death--they all fall into place. Ah! the modern _Pilgrim's Progress_ would read strangely and significantly with woman as the pilgrim! But the end--that would be a difficulty."

"One for your s.e.x to solve," said the Professor.

When they arrived at the cottage the wails were dying away, and Hadria advised that they should leave well alone. So the baby's victim somewhat reluctantly retired.

"After all, you see, if one has strength of purpose, one _can_ achieve freedom," he observed.

"At the expense of the affections, it would seem," said Hadria.

The walk was pursued towards Craddock. Hadria said she had to ask Dodge, the old gravedigger, if he could give a few days' work in the garden at the Red House.

The Professor was walking for walking's sake.

"She is a pretty child, isn't she?" said Hadria.

"Very; an attractive mite; but she has a will of her own."

"Yes; I confess I have a moment of exultation when that child sets up one of her pa.s.sionate screams--the thrilling shriek of a near relation!"

"Really, why?"

"She has to make her way in the world. She must not be too meek. Her mother was a victim to the general selfishness and stupidity. She was too gentle and obedient; too apt to defer to others, to be able to protect herself. I want her child to be strengthened for the battle by a good long draught of happiness, and to be armed with that stoutest of all weapons--perfect health."

"You are very wise, Mrs. Temperley," murmured the Professor.