SHE and I alone in the house! I do not think that I could express our desolation more fully were I to write a whole book. He who had brought us together was gone. The link between us was broken—we were two strangers, rather hostile to each other than otherwise. No pretence of love had ever existed between us. She had never had any occasion to be jealous of me; but she had known and must have felt that I was jealous of her, and grudged her position, her happiness, her very name. She knew this, and it had not mattered to her so long as he was alive; but now that he was gone, now that she and I, bearing the same name, supposed to belong to each other, were left within our dismal house alone——
We went together to the funeral. I was too much absorbed in my own feelings, I believe, to think of her; and yet I noticed everything, as people do when they are deeply excited. She walked by herself, and so did I. There was no one to support either of us, and we did not cling to each other. The churchwardens were there, and Spicer the grocer, to my annoyance. When I saw him all the conversation which I had once overheard came to my mind. Even as I stood by my father’s grave it came back to me. I understood it only partially, but it seemed to me as if the time had come on which he calculated, and which he had spoken of. I do not think it had ever recurred to me till that moment. She would be better off with a thousand pounds than with nothing. A thousand pounds—— and—— what had he said? I thought my heart had been too faint to feel at all, and yet it began to quicken now with excitement. I looked at her as she walked before me. What was to become of her? What was to become of me? But I did not think of myself.
When we got back to the house Spicer came in and the churchwardens with him; they came into the parlour. When I was going away Mr Turnham, who was one of them, called me back. “Miss Mary,” he said, “wait a little. It is hard upon you, but there is some business to be settled. Pray, come back.”
I went, of course. She had dropped into the chair my father used to sit in. He had given it up to her when they were married, but now death had unmarried them, and I could not bear to see her there. Spicer had gone to sit by her; they were at one side of the room, Mr Turnham and I at the other, as if we were opposite sides. The other churchwarden had shaken hands with us all and gone away.
“In the present melancholy circumstances it is our duty,” said Mr Turnham, “to inquire into our late dear friend’s monetary arrangements; there must have been some settlement or other—some explanation at least, as he married so short a time ago.”
Then Spicer cleared his throat, and edged still more on to the edge of his chair. Oh, heaven knows. I was as miserable as a girl could be—but yet I noticed all this as if I did not care.
“There was no settlement,” he said, “reason good, there wasn’t nothing to settle as was worth the while; but being Mrs Peveril’s only relation, and responsible like, he spoke very clear and honourable about his means to me. ‘I ain’t got no money, Mr Spicer,’ he said, ‘but I’ve insured my life for my daughter, and I’ll do as much for her. They’ll have a thousand pounds apiece, and that’s better than nothing,’ he said; ‘it will get them into some snug little way of business or something.’ He was a sensible man, Mr Peveril, and spoke up handsome when he saw as nothing was exacted of him. I don’t know what office it’s in, but I believe as what he said must be true.”
“Perhaps if we were to adjourn into the study, and if one of the ladies would get the keys, we might look in his desk if there was a will,” said Mr Turnham. “I am very sorry that our late lamented friend had so short an illness, and therefore was unable to say anything as to what he wished.”
“Stop, please,” Mrs Peveril said all at once. “Stop: neither of us is able to give you any help to-day; and afterwards we will try to manage for ourselves. We thank you very much, but it is best to leave us to ourselves. I speak for Mary too.”
“But, my dear Mrs Peveril, you will want some one to manage for you; it is painful, I know, but it is best to do it at once; you will want some one to manage——”
“I do not see the necessity,” she said. She was dreadfully pale; I never saw any one so pale; and it went to my heart to be obliged to side with her, and acquiesce in what she said; but I could not help it, I was obliged to give in. She spoke for me too.
“As long as there’s me, you may make your mind easy,” said Spicer. “A relation; and on the premises, so to speak. I’ll do for ’em all as is necessary; you may make your mind quite easy, Mr Turnham—you trust to me.”
Then she got up; her head drooped in her great heavy black bonnet and veil. She was not like a lily now, in all that crape; but I could not keep my eyes from her. She was not afraid of these men, as I was. She held out her hand first to the one, then to the other. “Good-bye,” she said. “We thank you very much for taking so much interest, but we would like to be alone to-day. Good-bye.”
Mr Turnham got up not quite pleased, but he shook hands with her and then with me, and said “Good-bye and God bless you” to us both. “If you want me, you know where I am to be found,” he said, with a little look of offence. Spicer stayed behind him, as if he belonged to us.
“I agree with you,” he said, putting his hand on her shoulder. “Them as is strangers has no business with your affairs. Trust ’em to me, my dear; trust ’em to me. When your money’s safe in a good snug little business you won’t be so badly off; at least it’s always something to fall back upon;—don’t you be downhearted, my dear. I don’t see as you will be so badly off.”
“Good-bye, Mr Spicer,” she said. She pushed past him and left the room with an impatience which I understood. He and I were left standing together, looking at each other. Nobody considered me much. It was the wife who was thought of—not the daughter. He shook his head as he looked after her.
“Bless us all! bless us all!” he said. “That’s what comes of turning a woman’s head. Miss Mary, I ain’t going to forsake you, though she’s far from civil. I’ll stand by you, never fear. If the money’s well invested you’ll both get something ’andsome. Nothing pays like business; and as there ain’t no babby—which was what I always feared——”
“I don’t want to talk about Mrs Peveril,” I said.
“Oh, you don’t want to talk about her! no more do I. She’s very flighty and hoity-toighty. I remember when she was very glad to get a corner at my table. She thinks she’s set up now, with her thousand pounds. It’s a blessing as there’s no family. Miss Mary, I’ll take your instructions next time as I comes if you’ll put yourself in my hands. I’ve come to think on you as a relation too; but bless you, my dear, I know as you can’t be cheerful with visitors not just the first day. Don’t stand upon no ceremony with me.”
He wanted me to leave him, I thought, that he might examine everything, and perhaps, get at poor papa’s papers; but I would not do that. I stayed, though my heart was bursting, until he went away. What an afternoon that was! it was summer, but it rained all day. It rained and rained into the smoky street, and upon papa’s grave, which I seemed to see before me wet and cold and sodden, with little pools of water about. How heartless it seemed, how terrible, to have come into shelter ourselves and to have left him there alone in the wet, and the cold, and the misery! If one could but have gone back there and sat down by him and got one’s death, it would have been some consolation. I went up to my room and sat there drearily, watching the drops that chased each other down the window panes. It was so wet that the street was quite silent outside, nobody coming or going, except the milkman with his pails making a clank at every area. There were no cries in the street, no sound of children playing, nothing but the rain pattering, pattering, upon the roofs and the pavement, and in every little hollow on both. The house, too, was perfectly still; there was no dinner, nothing to break the long monotony. Ellen came up in her new black gown, with tears on her cheeks, to bring me a glass of wine and a sandwich. I could not eat, but I drank the wine. “Oh, Miss Mary,” said Ellen, “won’t you go to her now? There’s only you two. It ain’t a time, Miss, oh, it ain’t a time to think on things as may have been unpleasant. And she’s a taking on so, shut up in that room, as I think she’ll die.”
Why should she die any more than me? Why should she be more pitied than I was? I had lost as much, more than she had. She had known him but a short time, not two years; but he had been mine all my life. I turned my back upon Ellen’s appeal, and she went away crying, shaking her head and saying I was unkind, I was without feeling. Oh, was I without feeling? How my head ached, how my heart swelled, how the sobs rose into my throat; I should have been glad could I have felt that it was likely I should die.
“Will you go down to tea, Miss Mary,” Ellen said, coming back as the night began to fall. I was weary, weary of sitting and crying by myself; any change looked as if it must be better. I was cold and faint and miserable; and then there was in my mind a sort of curiosity to see how she looked, and if she would say anything—even to know what were to be the relations between us now. I went down accordingly, down to the dark little parlour which, during all papa’s illness, I had lived in alone. She was there, scarcely visible in the dark, crouching over a little fire which Ellen had lighted. It was very well-meant on Ellen’s part, but the wood was damp, and the coals black, and I think it made the place look almost more wretched. She sat holding out her thin hands to it. The tea was on the table, and after I went in Ellen brought the candles. We did not say anything to each other. After a while she gave me some tea and I took it. She seemed to try to speak two or three times. I waited for her to begin. I would not say a word; and we had been thus for a long time mournfully seated together before she at last broke the silence. “Mary,” she said, and then paused. I suppose it was because I was younger than she that I had more command of myself, and felt able to observe every little movement she made and every tone. I was so curious about her—anxious, I could not tell why, as to what she would do and say.
“Mary,” she repeated, “we have never been very good friends, you and I; I don’t know why this has been. I have not wished it—but we have not been very good friends.”
“No.”
“No; that is all you say? Could we not do any better now? When I came here first, I did not think I was doing you any wrong. I did not mean it as a wrong to you. Now we are two left alone in the world. I have no one, and you have no one. Could we not do any better! Mary, I think it would please him, perhaps, if we tried to be friends.”
My heart was quite full. I could have thrown myself upon her, and kissed her. I could have killed her. I did not know what to do.
“We have never been enemies,” I said.
“No. But friends—that is different. There never were two so lonely. If we stayed together we might get to be fond of each other, Mary; we might keep together out of the cold world. Two together are stronger than one alone. You don’t know how cold the world is, you are so young. If we were to keep together we might stay—at home.”
Some evil spirit moved me, I cannot tell how; it seemed to me that I had found her out, that it was this she wanted. I got up from my chair flaming with the momentary hot passion of grief. “If there is any money for me, and if you want that, you can have it,” I cried, and tried to go away.
She gave a little moaning cry, as if I had struck her. “Oh, Mary, Mary!” she cried, with a wailing voice more of sorrow than of indignation; and then she put out her hand and caught my dress. I could not have got away if I had wished, and I did not wish it, for I was devoured by curiosity about what she would do and say. This curiosity was the beginning of interest, though I did not know it; it fascinated me to her. She caught my dress and drew me closer. She put her other hand on mine, and drew me down to her, so that my face approached hers. She put up her white cheek, her eyes all hollowed out with crying, to mine: “Mary,” she said, in a heartrending tone, “do not go away from me. I have nobody but you in the world.” Then she paused. “I am going to have a baby,” she said all at once, with a low, sharp cry.
I was confounded. I do not know what I said or did. Shame, wonder, pity, emotion—all mingled in me. I was very young, younger in heart than I was in years; and to have such a thing told to me overwhelmed me with shame and awe. It was so wonderful, so mysterious, so terrible. I dropped on my knees beside her, and covered my face with my hands, and cried. I could not resist any longer, or shut myself up. We cried together, clinging to each other, weeping over our secret. He had not known. At the last, when she was aware herself, she would not tell him to add to his pains. “He will know in heaven, Mary,” she said, winding her arms round me, weeping on my shoulder, shaking me, frail support as I was, with her sobs. This was how the other Mary and I became one. We were not without comfort as we crept upstairs, with our pale faces. She went with me to my room; she would not let me go. I had to hold her hand even when we went to sleep. “Do not leave me, Mary; stay with me, Mary,” she moaned, whenever I stirred. And we slept by snatches, in our weariness; slept and woke to sob, and then slept again.