october was in, mild and languorous; the trees dripped all day, the mist seemed unable to lift itself from the low-lying city. mary grew restless and discontented. the usual things happened, but had ceased to entertain. mr. bloxam, after taking her for excursions by water, had one day proposed that she should take tea with his people, prosperous hucksters in the town. she agreed—to find out very soon that she was on exhibition, on approval, you might say. mrs. bloxam, the mother, addressed her particular inquiries, mr. bloxam, the father, gave her a carnation out of the conservatory. shortly afterwards mr. bloxam, the son, made her another proposition, and was exceedingly surprised that she did not jump at it. can such things be? he inquired, looking about. she had shaken her head at him very gently when she told him that really she couldn’t. it was charmingly done, with kindness, but complete finality. that he saw.
he told her that his heart was broken, that she saw before her a man beaten down. “it is dreadful,” he said. “my mother liked you so much. she is hard to please. i suppose you wouldn’t care to think it over?”
again she shook her head. a mr. bloxam of exeter! if he only knew, or could be made to know! “no, no,” she said. “i sha’n’t alter. but i hope we are not to be bad friends.”
mr. bloxam had bowed, and said, “i should be most happy”—and one sees what he meant. “my mother, you know, won’t like it. naturally she is partial. she will say that you led me on.”
“then she will say what is very untrue,” cried mary, with flashing eyes, “and i hope you will tell her so. it is very hard if i may not have friends without being accused of ridiculous things.”
“girls do them, you know,” said mr. bloxam dubiously. “i’ve met with several cases.”
“if you are likely to include this among them, i must ask you to let me go,” she said with spirit; “but perhaps you would like to give me some tea first.”
mr. bloxam, murmuring about the sacred rites of hospitality, assured her that he would; and they parted on good terms. he told her that he intended to travel; and indeed he did afterwards go to weston-super-mare for a month.
the unfortunate but absurd episode taught her to be circumspect with the literary curate. he, however, was of a more cautious temperament, and went away for his holiday with no more pronounced symptom than a promise to send her picture postcards from the cathedral cities which he purposed visiting. “you may like to have these afterwards,” he darkly said, and then took himself away on a bicycle.
the year was come to a critical point for her. about this time halfway house would be plodding its way to the west, its owner, loose-limbed and leisurely, smoking on the tilt. almost any day now it might pass by exeter, or through it; almost any day she might come plump upon it—and what was to happen to her then? could she endure the year’s round, or know him by her cornish sea, in her white cottage on the cliff, and stay here nursing her wound, feeling the throb and the ache? it seemed impossible—and yet women do such things. it was almost the worst of her plight that she knew she could do it. it was in her blood to do it. the poor were like that: dumb beasts.
and now the delicacy which she had felt at first, and which had kept her away from land’s end, became a tyrant, as the temptations grew upon her. it prevented her riding afield by any road leading into exeter from the east. she had a bicycle; more, she had a certain way of bringing him directly to her side. he had taught her. the patteran. but no! she couldn’t. so she worked on doggedly, with the fret and fever in her bones; and day by day october slipped into november; the days slipped off as the wet leaves fell.
early in november, on a day of sunny weather, polly merritt announced a visitor, who followed her immediately into the room, his straw hat under his left arm, his right hand held out.
“a gentleman to see miss middleham, if you please,” says polly merritt, and mary had sprung up, with her hand to her side.
“it’s the tall one, mother, not the windy one,” was explained in the kitchen, but mrs. merritt, sniffing, had declared they were all the same.
“i don’t know anything about that,” said polly. “but this gentleman talks like asking and having, if you want my opinion.”
the riot in her breast was betrayed by her shining eyes and the quick flood of colour from neck to brows; but he played the man of the world so well that she was able to recover herself.
he made his excuses for breaking in upon her. he had been going through exeter in any case. it was hardly to be resisted, she would allow. he owned that horace wing had given him the clue. “poor horace, you hurt him. it took two months’ hard talking in town and at least a month of surmise in scotland before horace could find strength enough to own up to the fact that he had met you, that you had bowed—and bolted. he mentioned it with tears in his eyes, as an extreme case. he had heard you book to exeter—second single.” then he looked at her and smiled. “but why miss middleham?”
“why not?” she echoed him bravely. “i had to be somebody.”
“weren’t you person enough?”
“ah, yes, i was too much of a person, i was almost a personage. i was never happy in that disguise. my clothes never fitted me.”
“you should let other people judge of that. if you would like my opinion of your clothes, for instance——”
she shook her head, without speaking. he tried a more direct attack.
“you forgive me for coming?”
she suspected a tenderness. “oh, it is very kind of you. i don’t have many visitors. i am glad to see you.”
“that’s good. may i see you again, then, while i can?”
she inquired: “are you likely to be here long?”
a light hand was necessary now. “oh, dear no—unfortunately. a day or two at the outside; time to buy cartridges. you remember the ogmores? i am due at wraybrook on the seventh. pheasants. but until then——”
this was the fourth, you see. he would be horribly in the way. “i am occupied a good part of the day,” she told him. “i have pupils.”
he raised his eyebrows. “really! have you—” he flushed, and leaned forward. “have you renounced your——?”
“not in so many words,” she said. “i have simply dropped it. nobody knows where i am.”
“you knew that i had formally renounced mine?”
she had not known that. there was an implication in it—which she had run here to avoid; and here it was. “did you?” she said shortly. “i’m not surprised.”
“of course not,” he agreed. “you could not expect me to do anything else. and you have done precisely the same. that, also, i took leave to expect.” he saw concern gather in her eyes, broke off abruptly, and plunged into gossip. “does your late world interest you still? do you want to hear the news? palmer lovell’s engagement, for instance? a princess of italy, i give you my word—a donna teresa scalchi, rather a beauty, and a great shrew. palmer can bite a bit, too. that will end in tears. and hertha de speyne marries abroad. morosov, an anarchist of sort. they can collect plants in siberia—” he broke off again, remembering that others had collected plants in siberia. watching her, he saw that she remembered it, too. “oh, and old constantine and i have kissed; we are fast friends. once more i write speeches, which he mangles. he’s to be at wraybrook, waiting for me. he can’t bear me out of his sight—he’s like an elderly wife. frightful nuisance, of course—but i hope you are pleased.”
she looked at him for a moment. “of course i am pleased. i always wanted you to succeed.”
he rattled on. she had never seen him in such good spirits or manners. when he left her after an hour she was quite at her ease. he said that, if he might, he would come in the evening, and take her for a walk. it would do her good; and as for him she might have pity upon a fellow at a loose end, with nothing on earth to do but buy cartridges.
when he had gone she sat still, looking at her hands in her lap. could she maintain herself for three days? already she felt the fences closing in—she had felt them, as they moved, though never once had she been able to hold up her hand or say, stop: that you may not assume. tristram was master of implication, and her master there. throughout his airy monologue he had taken her for granted—her and her origin, her humility, her subservience to his nod, her false position with germain, her false position now. why, his very amiability, his deference to her opinion, his tentative approach—what were these but implications of his passion for her, a passion so strong that it could bend his arrogant back, and show a tristram duplessis at the feet of a mary middleham? she writhed, she burned to feel these things, and to be powerless against such attack. and he was to come again this evening, and every day for three days he was to come—and no help for her, she must fall without a cry. yes, without a cry; for she was cut off from her friend, by the very need she had of him. what was she to do? what could she do—but fall?
she struggled. at three o’clock in the afternoon she told polly merritt that if the gentleman called again he was to be told that miss middleham was not well and had gone to bed. polly wondered, but obeyed. “lovers’ tricks!” quoth mrs. merritt. “that’ll bring him to the scratch.” it did. he received the news at the door, with an impassive face—all but for his eyes, which, keen and coldly blue, pierced polly’s sloe-blacks to the brain, and extracted what might be useful to him. “many thanks, miss polly,” he had said presently. “you’re a good friend, i see. look here, i’ll tell you what to do. i’ll bring some flowers round presently, and you shall put ’em in her room, and say nothing about it. do you see?” polly saw.
the next day was a busy one for her, and she saw nothing of tristram until the evening. then, to her dismay, she found him waiting for her outside the gates of rosemount academy, where her italian lesson had been given. if she bit her lip, she blushed also; and if he remarked but one of these signals it was not her fault. cavaliers had attended at those gates before—not for her only, but for her among others. such a cavalier, however, so evidently of the great world, had never yet been looked upon by the young ladies of rosemount.
“oh,” cried mary, startled, “who told you——?”
“your amiable friend, miss polly, betrayed you. i hope you’ll forgive her.”
“i suppose i must. probably you frightened her out of her wits.” but he swore that they were very good friends indeed. he thought that miss polly liked him, upon his word; and mary could not deny that. polly undoubtedly did.
his admirable behaviour inspired confidence; inquiries after her health, no reference to ambiguous exotics, no assumptions, no plans for evening walks. he went with her to her door, and left her there with a salute. but before she could get in, while she stood with her hand on the knocker, as if by an after-thought he came back to her from the gate. jess had summoned him to wraybrook, he said. he knew that there was something to tell her. positively he must go the day after to-morrow. now, was she free to-morrow?
she was; but she hesitated to say so. well, then, would she give him a great pleasure? would she come with him to powderham—explore the park and the shore, have a picnic luncheon and all that sort of thing? would she? as he stood down there below her, with flushed face and smiling, obsequious eyes, she thought that she really might trust herself, if not him. polly, opening the door, was nodded to, and told that she need not wait. polly needed no telling.
“come, mrs. mary,” he urged her, “what do you say? will you let me look after you for this once? will you please to remember that never once since we have known each other—how many years?—have we had a whole day together? extraordinary fact.”
“it’s quite true,” she reflected, “we never have. once we very nearly did, though.”
“twice,” he corrected her; but she could not admit that. well, which was her instance?
it was long ago, when she had been at misperton—had been some six months there. one midsummer day—surely he remembered! he had promised to take her to glastonbury; the dog-cart was to meet them at clewgate station——
“ah, yes,” he cried—“and i called for you—and you were ready—in a brown holland frock——”
“had i a brown holland? i remember that i was quite ready. and then a note came down from mrs. james——”
“beloved mrs. james——”
“and you pretended to be angry——”
“pretended! oh, my dearest friend—i swore.”
“i know you did. and i——”
“you pretended to cry——”
“no, no, there was no pretence. i did cry.”
“mary,” he said, “why did you cry?”
she recovered herself. “because i was very young, and very stupid.”
“now for my instance,” he said. “not so very long ago, you were to go to blackheath—by train; and i went to charing cross station.” but, with a flaming face, and real trouble in her eyes, she stopped him.
“please, don’t—you hurt me. i think that you forget.”
he begged her pardon so sincerely that she could not refuse the morrow’s appointment.
they met at the station—she in a straw hat and linen frock—for the weather was wonderful; he in flannels. the perils of adventure glittered in her eyes; he played the courtier, sure now of his game. she begged for third-class tickets, but he compromised for second—and flagrantly bribed the guard to keep the carriage. it was impossible that she should avoid the knowledge that she was practically in possession—impossible that she should not see the approving smiles of the bystanders. “a pretty girl and her sweetheart”; simple comedy, of never-ending charm. abhorrent to the senhouses of this world, but not to be extirpated until birnam come to dunsinane.
softly the knowledge brooded upon her, softly virginal she sat, very much aware. the epicure returned to master tristram, who by a whisper could have had her, but refrained. he sat by her, but respectfully—he discoursed at large. powderham castle—he spoke of that. it was a pity that the fine place could not be seen; but the courteneys had let it, and he didn’t know the people. it was full, he happened to have heard. he believed that bramleigh was staying there. he forgot if she knew bramleigh; a quaint little man. but probably she wouldn’t want to be bothered with a lot of people; so they must be contented with the park. thus tristram discoursed; and at his discretion sat she, saying little, looking at him never, heeding every shade of inflection, and every hair’s breadth of movement of his. they reached the station; he helped her to descend.
all seemed well with tristram’s wooing. his lady was in a pensive mood, softly receptive of his implications. the temptation to paint in bolder masses was not resisted, nor that more subtle form of art—the silent art. speechless they loitered together; and sometimes their hands touched, and sometimes he hovered over her, as if protecting her with wings. her eyes were veiled; she appeared sleek as a dove under his hand. once he breathed her name—“mary, oh, mary—”; but he saw her shiver and stiffen, and knew that she was still to be won. so be it! but he could not give over the delicious chase. to have her thus wide-eyed, quivering, straining beside him—like a greyhound taut at his leash; he was beside himself with longing, and like a fool gave way.
“my dearest—” he began, but she checked him with a fierce cry—“no, no!—not that—” and though he could see nothing but the sharp outline of her cheek and chin he knew that she was watching something. he looked about him vaguely. what on earth—? the sea—a narrow strip of blue tumbling water, spuming where it touched the yellow sands—the flecked, pale sky—the gorse—larks above it—in a far corner a gipsy’s tent, and a white horse foraging—. what on earth—?
he drew back. she seemed to start forwards as if to escape from him—but then she turned suddenly, and he saw that she was pale, that she trembled, and that there was real trouble in her eyes.
“i am tired,” she said, “very tired. may we go home now?”
“of course—what a brute i am. but i thought that you— won’t you tell me what has tired you all at once?”
“i don’t know—it came over me—suddenly. but i do want to go home, please—immediately.” her eyes were full—brimming. he was touched.
“come then, we’ll go to the station. it’s no great distance. unless you would rather sit——”
“oh, no, i couldn’t possibly! no, no, indeed, i must go home. my head aches dreadfully. i think a sunstroke—perhaps. i can hardly stand up——”
he saw that that was true. “come,” he said, “take my arm. we’ll go at once.”
when they had turned back she seemed to recover. she walked, at any rate, as fast as he did—set the pace. but she would not talk any more. in the train she sat apart, looking out of the window—and after a time he let her alone.
at exeter when he put her in the fly and would have followed her, she put her hand on his arm. “please don’t come with me. i shall be myself directly. i beg you not to come. and don’t think me ungrateful—indeed, you have been kindness itself. i’m very much ashamed of myself——”
“i’ll see you to-morrow—to say good-bye. you will let me do that? i must know how you are, you see.”
“yes—come to-morrow if you will. good-bye. i am much better. i shall be quite well. but come, of course, if you had rather.”
“of course i shall come.” he lifted his hat, bowed, and turned away. she watched him walk towards his hotel. then, with a face of flame, she turned to her own affair.
this was to be her last bid for freedom; her last chance. if she was to be the crying shame of her sex, it must be so. come what might, she must call for help.
she stayed the fly at the door, paid the man, and watched him turn and go galloping down the hill. then she turned to her affair—across exeter it took her, to the honiton road.
she walked the whole way, some two miles out of the city, beyond the suburbs to where the open country began. and here she laid her patteran, with branches of crimson maple, torn from the sunny side of the hedge. at the corners of two by-roads she laid them—one to the south, one to the north. not satisfied with that, she went north herself to the cullompton road, and laid two patterans more. her cheeks burned like fire, and in her heart was a bitter pain; she felt that she had unsexed herself, was bedraggled and bemired. but her need had racked her—you can’t blame the wretch writhing there if he call upon his god.
