Читать книгу: «Rachel Ray», страница 26

About half a dozen entered the cosy little parlour, and there they remained for a couple of hours. While sitting in that cosy little parlour they really did enjoy themselves. About nine o'clock they had a bit of the raw beef broiled, and in that guise it was pleasant enough; and the water was hot, and the tobacco was grateful and the stiffness of the evening was gone. The men chatted together and made no more speeches, and they talked of matters which bore a true interest to them. Sharpit explained to them how each man might be assisted in his own business if this rich London tailor could be brought in for the borough. And by degrees they came round to the affairs of the brewery, and Tappitt, as the brandy warmed him, spoke loudly against Rowan.

"By George!" said the podgy grocer, "if anybody would offer me a thousand a year to give up, I'd take it hopping."

"Then I wouldn't," said Tappitt, "and what's more, I won't. But brewing ain't like other businesses; – there's more in it than in most others."

"Of course there is," said Sharpit; "it isn't like any common trade."

"That's true too," said the podgy grocer.

A man usually receives some compensation for having gone through the penance of the chairman's duties. For the remainder of the evening he is entitled to the flattery of his companions, and generally receives it till they become tipsy and insubordinate. Tappitt had not the character of an intemperate man, but on this occasion he did exceed the bounds of a becoming moderation. The room was hot and the tobacco smoke was thick. The wine had been bad and the brandy was strong. Sharpit, too, urged him to new mixtures and stronger denunciations against Rowan, till at last, at eleven o'clock, when he took himself to the brewery, he was not in a condition proper for the father of such daughters or for the husband of such a wife.

"Shall I see him home?" said the podgy grocer to Mr. Sharpit.

Tappitt, with the suspicious quickness of a drunken man, turned sharply upon the podgy and abashed grocer, and abused him for his insolence. He then made his way out of the inn-yard, and along the High Street, and down Brewery Lane to his own door, knowing the way as well as though he had been sober, and passing over it as quickly. Nor did he fall or even stumble, though now and again he reeled slightly. And as he went the idea came strongly upon him that Sharpit was a dangerous man, and that perhaps at this very moment he, Tappitt, was standing on the brink of a precipice. Then he remembered that his wife would surely be watching for him, and as he made his first attempt to insert the latch-key into the door his heart became forgetful of the brandy, and sank low within his breast.

How affairs went between him and Mrs. Tappitt on that night I will not attempt to describe. That she used her power with generosity I do not doubt. That she used it with discretion I am quite convinced. On the following morning at ten o'clock Tappitt was still in bed; but a note had been written by Mrs. T. to Messrs. Sharpit and Longfite, saying that the projected visit had, under altered circumstances, become unnecessary. That Tappitt's head was racked with pain, and his stomach disturbed with sickness, there can be no doubt, and as little that Mrs. T. used the consequent weakness of her husband for purposes of feminine dominion; but this she did with discretion and even with kindness. Only a word or two was said as to the state in which he had returned home, – a word or two with the simple object of putting that dominion on a firm basis. After that Mrs. Tappitt took his condition as an established fact, administered to him the comforts of her medicine-chest and teapot, excused his illness to the girls as having been produced by the fish, and never left his bedside till she had achieved her purpose. If ever a man got tipsy to his own advantage, Mr. Tappitt did so on that occasion. And if ever a man in that condition was treated with forbearing kindness by his wife, Mr. Tappitt was so treated then.

"Don't disturb yourself, T.," she said; "there's nothing wants doing in the brewery, and if it did what would it signify in comparison with your health? The brewery won't be much to you now, thank goodness; and I'm sure you've had enough of it. Thirty years of such work as that would make any man sick and weak. I'm sure I don't wonder at your being ill; – not the least. The wonder is that you've ever stood up against it so long as you have. If you'll take my advice you'll just turn round and try to sleep for an hour or so."

Tappitt took her advice at any rate, so far that he turned round and closed his eyes. Up to this time he had not given way about the brewery. He had uttered no word of assent. But he was gradually becoming aware that he would have to yield before he would be allowed to put on his clothes. And now, in the base and weak condition of his head and stomach, yielding did not seem to him to be so very bad a thing. After all, the brewery was troublesome, the fight was harassing. Rowan was young and strong, and Mr. Sharpit was very dangerous. Rowan, too, had risen in his estimation as in that of others, and he could not longer argue, even to himself, that the stipulated income would not be paid. He did not sleep, but got into that half-drowsy state in which men think of their existing affairs, but without any power of active thought. He knew that he ought to be in his counting-house and at work. He half feared that the world was falling away from him because he was not there. He was ashamed of himself, and sometimes almost entertained a thought of rising up and shaking off his lethargy. But his stomach was bad, and he could not bring himself to move. His head was tormented, and his pillow was soft; and therefore there he lay. He wondered what was the time of day, but did not think of looking at his watch which was under his head. He heard his wife's steps about the room as she shaded some window from his eyes, or crept to the door to give some household order to one of her girls outside; but he did not speak to her, nor she to him. She did not speak to him as long as he lay there motionless, and when he moved with a small low groan she merely offered him some beef tea.

It was nearly six o'clock, and the hour of dinner at the brewery was long passed, when Mrs. Tappitt sat herself down by the bedside determined to reap the fruit of her victory. He had just raised himself in his bed and announced his intention of getting up, – declaring, as he did so, that he would never again eat any of that accursed fish. The moment of his renovation had come upon him, and Mrs. Tappitt perceived that if he escaped from her now, there might even yet be more trouble.

"It wasn't only the fish, T.," she said, with somewhat of sternness in her eye.

"I hardly drank anything," said Tappitt.

"Of course I wasn't there to see what you took," said she; "but you were very bad when you came home last night; – very bad indeed. You couldn't have got in at the door only for me."

"That's nonsense."

"But it is quite true. It's a mercy, T., that neither of the girls saw you. Only think! But there'll be nothing more of that kind, I'm sure, when we are out of this horrid place; and it wouldn't have happened now, only for all this trouble."

To this Tappitt made no answer, but he grunted, and again said that he thought he would get up.

"Of course it's settled now, T., that we're to leave this place."

"I don't know that at all."

"Then, T., you ought to know it. Come now; just look at the common sense of the thing. If we don't give up the brewery what are we to do? There isn't a decent respectable person in the town in favour of our staying here, only that rascal Sharpit. You desired me this morning to write and tell him you'd have nothing more to do with him; and so I did." Tappitt had not seen his wife's letter to the lawyer, – had not asked to see it, and now became aware that his only possible supporter might probably have been driven away from him. Sharpit too, though dangerous as an enemy, was ten times more dangerous as a friend!

"Of course you'll take that young man's offer. Shall I sit down and write a line to Honyman, and tell him to come in the morning?"

Tappitt groaned again and again, said that he would get up, but Mrs. T. would not let him out of bed till he had assented to her proposition that Honyman should be again invited to the brewery. He knew well that the battle was gone from him, – had in truth known it through all those half-comatose hours of his bedridden day. But a man, or a nation, when yielding must still resist even in yielding. Tappitt fumed and fussed under the clothes, protesting that his sending for Honyman would be useless. But the letter was written in his name and sent with his knowledge; and it was perfectly understood that that invitation to Honyman signified an unconditional surrender on the part of Mr. Tappitt. One word Mrs. T. said as she allowed her husband to escape from his prison amidst the blankets, one word by which to mark that the thing was done, and one word only. "I suppose we needn't leave the house for about a month or so, – because it would be inconvenient about the furniture."

"Who's to turn you out if you stay for six months?" said Tappitt.

The thing was marked enough then, and Mrs. Tappitt retired in muffled triumph, – retired when she had made all things easy for the simplest ceremony of dressing.

"Just sponge your face, my dear," she said, "and put on your dressing-gown, and come down for half an hour or so."

"I'm all right now," said Tappitt.

"Oh! quite so; – but I wouldn't go to the trouble of much dressing." Then she left him, descended the stairs, and entered the parlour among her daughters. When there she could not abstain from one blast of the trumpet of triumph. "Well, girls," she said, "it's all settled, and we shall be in Torquay now before the winter."

"No!" said Augusta.

"That'll be a great change," said Martha.

"In Torquay before the winter!" said Cherry. "Oh, mamma, how clever you have been!"

"And now your papa is coming down, and you should thank him for what he's doing for you. It's all for your sake that he's doing it."

Mr. Tappitt crept into the room, and when he had taken his seat in his accustomed arm-chair, the girls went up to him and kissed him. Then they thanked him for his proposed kindness in taking them out of the brewery.

"Oh, papa, it is so jolly!" said Cherry.

Mr. Tappitt did not say much in answer to this; – but luckily there was no necessity that he should say anything. It was an occasion on which silence was understood as giving a perfect consent.

CHAPTER XIII.
WHAT TOOK PLACE AT BRAGG'S END FARM

When Mrs. Tappitt had settled within her own mind that the brewery should be abandoned to Rowan, she was by no means, therefore, ready to assent that Rachel Ray should become the mistress of the brewery house. "Never," she had exclaimed when Cherry had suggested such a result; "never!" And Augusta had echoed the protestation, "Never, never!" I will not say that she would have allowed her husband to remain in his business in order that she might thus exclude Rachel from such promotion, but she could not bring herself to believe that Luke Rowan would be so fatuous, so ignorant of his own interests, so deluded, as to marry that girl from Bragg's End! It is thus that the Mrs. Tappitts of the world regard other women's daughters when they have undergone any disappointment as to their own. She had no reason for wishing well to Rowan, and would not have cared if he had taken to his bosom a harpy in marriage; but she could not endure to hear of the success of the girl whose attractions had foiled her own little plan. "I don't believe that the man can ever be such a fool as that!" she said again to Augusta, when on the evening of the day following Tappitt's abdication, a rumour reached the brewery that Luke Rowan had been seen walking out upon the Cawston road.

Mr. Honyman, in accordance with his instructions, called at the brewery on that morning, and was received by Mr. Tappitt with a sullen and almost savage submission. Mrs. T. had endeavoured to catch him first, but in that she had failed; she did, however, manage to see the attorney as he came out from her husband.

"It's all settled," said Honyman; "and I'll see Rowan myself before half an hour is over."

"I'm sure it's a great blessing, Mr. Honyman," said the lady, – not on that occasion assuming any of the glory to herself.

"It was the only thing for him," said Mr. Honyman; – "that is if he didn't like to take the young man in as acting partner."

"That wouldn't have done at all," said Mrs. T. And then the lawyer went his way.

In the mean time Tappitt sat sullen and wretched in the counting-house. Such moments occur in the lives of most of us, – moments in which the real work of life is brought to an end, – and they cannot but be sad. It is very well to talk of ease and dignity; but ease of spirit comes from action only, and the world's dignity is given to those who do the world's work. Let no man put his neck from out of the collar till in truth he can no longer draw the weight attached to it. Tappitt had now got rid of his collar, and he sat very wretched in his brewery counting-house.

"Be I to go, sir?"

Tappitt in his meditation was interrupted by these words, spoken not in a rough voice, and looking up he saw Worts standing in the counting-house before him. Worts had voted for Butler Cornbury, whereas, had he voted for Mr. Hart, Mr. Hart would have been returned; and, upon that, Worts, as a rebellious subject, had received notice to quit the premises. Now his time was out, and he came to ask whether he was to leave the scene of his forty years of work. But what would be the use of sending Worts away even if the wish to punish his contumacy still remained? In another week Worts would be brought back again in triumph, and would tread those brewery floors with the step almost of a master, while he, Tappitt, could tread them only as a stranger, if he were allowed to tread them at all.

"You can stay if you like," said Tappitt, hardly looking up at the man.

"I know you be a going, Mr. Tappitt," said the man; "and I hear you be a going very handsome like. Gentlefolk such as yeu needn't go on working allays like uz. If so be yeu be a going, Mr. Tappitt, I hope yeu and me'll part friendly. We've been together a sight o' years; – too great a sight for uz to part unfriendly."

Mr. Tappitt admitted the argument, shook hands with the man, and then of course took him into his immediate confidence with more warmth than he would have done had there been no quarrel between them. And I think he found some comfort in this. He walked about the premises with Worts, telling him much that was true, and some few things that were not strictly accurate. For instance, he said that he had made up his mind to leave the place, whereas that action of decisive resolution which we call making up our minds had perhaps been done by Mrs. Tappitt rather than by him. But Worts took all these assertions with an air of absolute belief which comforted the brewer. Worts was very wise in his discretion on that day, and threw much oil on the troubled waters; so that Tappitt when he left him bade God bless him, and expressed a hope that the old place might still thrive for his sake.

"And for your'n too, master," said Worts, "for yeu'll allays have the best egg still. The young master, he'll only be a working for yeu."

There was comfort in this thought; and Tappitt, when he went into his dinner, was able to carry himself like a man.

The tidings which had reached Mrs. Tappitt as to Rowan having been seen on that evening walking on the Cawston road with his face towards Bragg's End were true. On that morning Mr. Honyman had come to him, and his career in life was at once settled for him.

"Mr. Tappitt is quite in time, Mr. Honyman," he had said. "But he would not have been in time this day week unless he had consented to pay for what work had been already done; for I had determined to begin at once."

"The truth is, Mr. Rowan, you step into an uncommon good thing; but Mr. Tappitt is tired of the work, and glad to give it up."

Thus the matter was arranged between them, and before nightfall everybody in Baslehurst knew that Tappitt and Rowan had come to terms, and that Tappitt was to retire upon a pension. There was some little discrepancy as to the amount of Tappitt's annuity, the liberal faction asserting that he was to receive two thousand a year, and those of the other side cutting him down to two hundred.

On the evening of that day – in the cool of the evening – Luke Rowan sauntered down the High Street of Baslehurst, and crossed over Cawston bridge. On the bridge he was all alone, and he stood there for a moment or two leaning upon the parapet looking down upon the little stream beneath the arch. During the day many things had occupied him, and he had hardly as yet made up his mind definitely as to what he would do and what he would say during the hours of the evening. From the moment in which Honyman had announced to him Tappitt's intended resignation he became aware that he certainly should go out to Bragg's End before that day was over. It had been with him a settled thing, a thing settled almost without thought ever since the receipt of Rachel's letter, that he would take this walk to Bragg's End when he should have put his affairs at Baslehurst on some stable footing; but that he would not take that walk before he had so done.

"They say," Rachel had written in her letter, "they say that as the business here about the brewery is so very unsettled, they think it probable that you will not have to come back to Baslehurst any more."

In that had been the offence. They had doubted his stability, and, beyond that, had almost doubted his honesty. He would punish them by taking them at their word till both should be put beyond all question. He knew well that the punishment would fall on Rachel, whereas none of the sin would have been Rachel's sin; but he would not allow himself to be deterred by that consideration.

"It is her letter," he said to himself, "and in that way will I answer her. When I do go there again they will all understand me better."

It had been, too, a matter of pride to him that Mr. Comfort and Mrs. Butler Cornbury should thus be made to understand him. He would say nothing of himself and his own purposes to any of them. He would speak neither of his own means nor his own stedfastness. But he would prove to them that he was stedfast, and that he had boasted of nothing which he did not possess. When Mrs. Butler Cornbury had spoken to him down by the Cleeves, asking him of his purpose, and struggling to do a kind thing by Rachel, he had resolved at once that he would tell her nothing. She should find him out. He liked her for loving Rachel; but neither to her, nor even to Rachel herself, would he say more till he could show them that the business about the brewery was no longer unsettled.

But up to this moment – this moment in which he was standing on the bridge, he had not determined what he would say to Rachel or to Rachel's mother. He had never relaxed in his purpose of making Rachel his wife since his first visit to the cottage. He was one who, having a fixed resolve, feels certain of their ultimate success in achieving it. He was now going to Bragg's End to claim that which he regarded as his own; but he had not as yet told himself in what terms he would put forward his claim. So he stood upon the bridge thinking.

He stood upon the bridge thinking, but his thoughts would only go backwards, and would do nothing for him as to his future conduct. He remembered his first walk with her, and the churchyard elms with the setting sun, and the hot dances in Mrs. Tappitt's house; and he remembered them without much of the triumph of a successful lover. It had been very sweet, but very easy. In so saying to himself he by no means threw blame upon Rachel. Things were easy, he thought, and it was almost a pity that they should be so. As for Rachel, nothing could have been more honest or more to his taste, than her mode of learning to love him. A girl who, while intending to accept him, could yet have feigned indifference, would have disgusted him at once. Nevertheless he could not but wish that there had been some castles for him to storm in his career. Tappitt had made but poor pretence of fighting before he surrendered; and as to Rachel, it had not been in Rachel's nature to make any pretence. He passed from the bridge at last without determining what he would say when he reached the cottage, but he did not pass on till he had been seen by the scrutinizing eyes of Miss Pucker.

"If there ain't young Rowan going out to Bragg's End again!" she said to herself, comforting herself, I fear, or striving to comfort herself, with an inward assertion that he was not going there for any good. Striving to comfort herself, but not effectually; for though the assertion was made by herself to herself, yet it was not believed. Though she declared, with well-pronounced mental words, that Luke Rowan was going on that path for no good purpose, she felt a wretched conviction at her heart's core that Rachel Ray would be made to triumph over her and her early suspicions by a happy marriage. Nevertheless she carried the tidings up into Baslehurst, and as she repeated it to the grocer's daughters and the baker's wife she shook her head with as much apparent satisfaction as though she really believed that Rachel oscillated between a ruined name and a broken heart.

He walked on very slowly towards Bragg's End, as though he almost dreaded the interview, swinging his stick as was his custom, and keeping his feet on the grassy edges of the road till he came to the turn which brought him on to the green. When on the green he did not take the highway, but skirted along under Farmer Sturt's hedge, so that he had to pass by the entrance of the farmyard before he crossed over to the cottage. Here, just inside her own gate, he encountered Mrs. Sturt standing alone. She had been intent on the cares of her poultry-yard till she had espied Luke Rowan; but then she had forgotten chickens and ducks and all, and had given herself up to thoughts of Rachel's happiness in having her lover back again.

"It's he as sure as eggs," she had said to herself when she first saw him; "how mortal slow he do walk, to be sure! If he was coming as joe to me I'd soon shake him into quicker steps than them."

"Oh, Mrs. Sturt!" said he, "I hope you're quite well," and he stopped short at her gate.

"Pretty bobbish, thankee, Mr. Rowan; and how's yourself? Are you going over to the cottage this evening?"

"Who's at home there, Mrs. Sturt?"

"Well, they're all at home; Mrs. Ray, and Rachel, and Mrs. Prime. I doubt whether you know the eldest daughter, Mr. Rowan?"

Luke did not know Mrs. Prime, and by no means wished to spend any of the hours of the present evening in making her acquaintance.

"Is Mrs. Prime there?" he asked.

"'Deed she is, Mr. Rowan. She's come back these last two days."

Thereupon Rowan paused for a moment, having carefully placed himself inside the gate-posts of the farmyard so that he might not be seen by the inmates of the cottage, if haply he had hitherto escaped their eyes.

"Mrs. Sturt," said he, "I wonder whether you'd do me a great favour."

"That depends – " said Mrs. Sturt. "If it's to do any good to any of them over there, I will."

"If I wanted to do harm to any of them I shouldn't come to you."

"Well, I should hope not. Is she and you going to be one, Mr. Rowan? That's about the whole of it."

"It shan't be my fault if we're not," said Rowan.

"That's spoken honest," said the lady; "and now I'll do anything in my power to bring you together. If you'll just go into my little parlour, I'll bring her to you in five seconds; I will indeed, Mr. Rowan. You won't mind going through the kitchen for once, will you?"

Luke did not mind going through the kitchen, and immediately found himself shut up in Mrs. Sturt's back parlour, looking out among the mingled roses and cabbages.

Mrs. Sturt walked quickly across the road to the cottage door, and went at once to the open window of the sitting-room. Mrs. Ray was there with a book in her hand, – a serious book, the perusal of which I fear was in some degree due to the presence of her elder daughter; and Mrs. Prime was there with another book, evidently very serious; and Rachel was there too, seated on the sofa, deeply buried in the manipulation of a dress belonging to her mother. Mrs. Sturt was sure at once that they had not seen Luke Rowan as he passed inside the farmyard gate, and that they did not suspect that he was near them.

"Oh, Mrs. Sturt, is that you?" said the widow, looking up. "You'll just come in for a minute, won't you?" and Mrs. Ray showed by a suppressed yawn that her attention had not been deeply fixed by that serious book. Rachel looked up, and bade the visitor welcome with a little nod; but it was not a cheery nod as it would have been in old days, before her sorrow had come upon her.

"I'll have the cherries back in her cheeks before the evening's over," said Mrs. Sturt to herself, as she looked at the pale-faced girl. Mrs. Prime also made some little salutation to their neighbour; but she did so with the very smallest expenditure of thoughts or moments. Mrs. Sturt was all very well, but Mrs. Prime had greater work on hand than gossiping with Mrs. Sturt.

"I'll not just come in, thankee, Mrs. Ray; but if it ain't troubling you I want to speak a word to you outside; and a word to Rachel too, if she don't mind coming."

"A word to me!" said Rachel getting up and putting down her dress. Her thoughts now-a-days were always fixed on the same subject, and it seemed that any special word to her must have reference to that. Mrs. Ray also got up, leaving her mark in her book. Mrs. Prime went on reading, harder than ever. There was to be some conference of importance from which she could not but feel herself to be excluded in a very special way. Something wicked was surely to be proposed, or she would have been allowed to hear it. She said nothing, but her head was almost shaken by the vehemence with which she read the book in her lap.

Mrs. Sturt retired beyond the precincts of the widow's front garden before she said a word. Rachel had followed her first through the gate, and Mrs. Ray came after with her apron turned over her head. "What is it, Mrs. Sturt?" said Rachel. "Have you heard anything?"

"Heard anything? Well; I'm always a hearing of something. Do you slip across the green while I speak just one word to your mother. And Rachel, wait for me at the gate. Mrs. Ray, he's in my little parlour."

"Who? not Luke Rowan?"

"But he is though; that very young man! He's come over to make it up with her. He's told me so with his own mouth. You may be as sure of it as, – as, – as anything. You leave 'em to me, Mrs. Ray; I wouldn't bring them together if it wasn't for good. It's my belief our pet would a' died if he hadn't come back to her – it is then." And Mrs. Sturt put her apron up to her eyes.

Rachel having paused for a moment, as she looked first at her mother and then at Mrs. Sturt, had done as she was bidden, and had walked quickly across the green. Mrs. Ray, when she heard her neighbour's tidings, stood fixed by dismay and dread, mingled with joy. She had longed for his coming back; but now that he was there, close upon them, intending to do all that she had wished him to do, she was half afraid of him! After all was he not a young man; and might he not, even yet, be a wolf? She was horrorstricken at the idea of sending Rachel over to see a lover, and looked back at the cottage window, towards Mrs. Prime, as though to see whether she was being watched in her iniquity. "Oh, Mrs. Sturt!" she said, "why didn't you give us time to think about it?"

"Give you time! How could I give you time, and he here on the spot? There's been too much time to my thinking. When young folk are agreeable and the old folk are agreeable too, there can't be too little time. Come along over and we'll talk of it in the kitchen while they talks in the parlour. He'd a' been in there among you all only for Mrs. Prime. She is so dour like for a young man to have to say anything before her, of the likes of that. That's why I took him into our place."

They overtook Rachel at the house door and they all went through together into the great kitchen. "Oh, Rachel!" said Mrs. Ray. "Oh, dear!"

"What is it, mamma?" said Rachel. Then looking into her mother's face, she guessed the truth. "Mamma," she said, "he's here! Mr. Rowan is here!" And she took hold of her mother's arm, as though to support herself.

"And that's just the truth," said Mrs. Sturt, triumphantly. "He's through there in the little parlour, and you must just go to him, my dear, and hear what he's got to say to you."

"Oh, mamma!" said Rachel.

"I suppose you must do what she tells you," said Mrs. Ray.

"Of course she must," said Mrs. Sturt.

"Mamma, you must go to him," said Rachel.

"That won't do at all," said Mrs. Sturt.

"And why has he come here?" said Rachel.

"Ah! I wonder why," said Mrs. Sturt. "I wonder why any young man should come on such an errand! But it won't do to leave him there standing in my parlour by himself, so do you come along with me."

So saying Mrs. Sturt took Rachel by the arm to lead her away. Mrs. Ray in this great emergency was perfectly helpless. She could simply look at her daughter with imploring, loving eyes, and stand quivering in doubt against the dresser. Mrs. Sturt had very decided views on the matter. She had put Luke Rowan into the parlour with a promise that she would bring Rachel to him there, and she was not going to break her word through any mock delicacy. The two young people liked one another, and they should have this opportunity of saying so in each other's hearing. So she took Rachel by the arm, and opening the door of the parlour led her into the room. "Mr. Rowan," she said, "when you and Miss Rachel have had your say out, you'll find me and her mamma in the kitchen." Then she closed the door and left them alone.