Book: The Foolish Lovers

S >> St. John G. Ervine >> The Foolish Lovers




"What?" she answered.

"Do you ... do you like me?"

"Ummm ... mebbe I do!"

"I love you, Maggie!"

"Aye, so you say!" she said.

"Do you not believe me?..."

She shrugged her shoulders.

"It's true," he affirmed. "I love you!..."

"Good-night," she said.

"Good-night, Maggie!"

He released her hand, but she did not go immediately. She came close to
him, and put her arms about his neck and drew his face down to hers,
and kissed him.

"You're a nice wee fellow," she said. "I like you queer and well!"

Then she withdrew her arms, and this time he did not try to detain her.



IX

He missed the last train to Ballyards, but he did not mind that. He set
out bravely to walk from Belfast. The silence of the streets, the
deeper silence of the country roads, accorded with the pleasure in his
heart. He sang to himself, and sometimes he sang aloud. He was in love
with Maggie Carmichael, and she ... she liked him queer and well. He
could hardly feel the ground beneath his feet. The road ran away from
him. The moon and the stars shared his exultation, and the trees gaily
waved their branches to him, and the leaves of the trees beat their
hands together in applause. "And her sunny locks Hang on her temples
like a golden fleece," he said aloud...

It was very late when he reached the door of the shop in Ballyards. His
Uncle William was standing in the shade of the doorway, peering
anxiously into the street.

"Is that you, John?" he called out, while John was still some distance
away from the shop.

"Aye, Uncle William," John called out in reply.

Uncle William came to meet him. "Oh, whatever kept you, boy?" he said
when they met.

"I missed the train," John answered.

"Your Uncle Matthew, John!..."

Anxiety came into John's mind. "Yes, Uncle?" he said.

"He's bad, John. Desperate bad! We had to send for Dr. Dobbs an hour
ago, and he's still with him. I thought you'd never reach home!"

All the joy fell straight out of John's heart. He did not speak. He
walked swiftly to the house, and passing through the shop, entered the
kitchen, followed by his Uncle William.




THE FOURTH CHAPTER


I

"Your ma's upstairs with the doctor and him," said Uncle William,
closing the kitchen door behind him.

"Is he very bad?" John asked in an anxious voice.

"I'm afeard so," Uncle William replied.

John went towards the staircase, but his uncle called him back. "Better
not go up yet awhile," he said. "The doctor'll be down soon, mebbe, and
he'll tell you whether you can go up or not."

"Very well," John murmured, coming back into the kitchen and sitting
down beside the fire.

"It come on all of a sudden just before bedtime," Uncle William went
on, "He wasn't looking too grand all the morning, as you know, but we
never thought much of it. He never was strong, and he hasn't the
strength to fight against his disease. If he dies, I'll be the last of
the three brothers. Death's a strange thing, John. Your da was the
cleverest and the wisest of us all, and he was the first to go; and now
your Uncle Matthew, that's wise in his way, and has a great amount of
knowledge in his head, is going too ... the second of us ... and I'm
left, the one that could be easiest spared. It's queer to take the best
one first and leave the worst 'til the last. You'd near think God had a
grudge against the world!... What were you doing in Belfast the day?"

"I went to the theatre."

"Aye. What did you see?"

"I saw _Romeo and Juliet_ in the middle of the day, and _Julius
Caesar_ at night!" John answered. "Is my Uncle Matthew unconscious?"

"No. He has all his senses about him. He knows well he's dying. Did he
never speak to you about that?"

John shook his head. "I couldn't bear it if he did. Does he mind, d'you
think?"

"No, he does not. Why should he mind? It's us that's left behind that's
to be pitied, not them that goes. I can't make out the people of these
days, the way they pity the dead and dying, when it's the living's to
be pitied. Did you like the plays, John?"

John roused himself to answer. "Aye," he said, "they were grand. What
happened when he took bad?"

"We had just had our supper, and he started to go up the stairs, and
all of a sudden he called out for your ma, and we both ran to him
together, her and me, and the look on his face frightened me. I didn't
stop to hear what was wrong. I went off to fetch Dr. Dobbs as quick as
I could move. I never saw _Julius Caesar_ myself, but I mind well
the time I saw _Romeo and Juliet_. It was an awful long time ago,
when the oul' Theatre Royal ... not this one, but the one before it,
that was burnt down ... and we saw _Romeo and Juliet_. That's a
tremendous piece, John! It gripped a hold of my heart, I can tell you,
and I came away from the theatre with the tears streaming down my face.
I always was a soft one, anyway. That poor young boy and his lovely wee
girl tormented and tortured by people that was older nor them, but
hadn't half the sense! It grips you, that play!"

"Aye," said John.

"You'll hardly believe me, John, but the play was so real to me that
when they talked about getting married, I said to myself I'd go and see
the wedding. I did by my troth!"

"Eh?" said John abstractedly.

"I was talking about the play!..."

"Oh, aye, aye! Aye!"

"It sounds silly, I know," Uncle William continued, "but it's the God's
own truth, as sure as I'm sitting here. And whenever I pass 'The
Royal,' I always think of _Romeo and Juliet,_ and I see that poor
boy and girl stretched dead, and them ought to have been happy together
and having fine, strong childher!"

"I wonder how he is now. Do you think I should go up now?" John said.

"Wait 'til the doctor comes down. I have great faith in Dr. Dobbs. He
never humbugs you, that man, but tells you plump and plain what's wrong
with you!" He sat back in his chair, and for a while there was no sound
in the kitchen, but the noise of the clock and the small drooping noise
made by the dying fire. There was no sound from overhead.

Uncle William glanced at the clock. He got up and stopped the pendulum.
"I can't bear the sound of it," he said to John as he sat down again.
They remained in silence for a while longer, and then Uncle William got
up and started the clock again. "Mebbe ... mebbe, it's better for it to
be going." he said.

He searched for his pipe on the mantel-shelf and, when he had found it,
lit it with a coal which he picked out of the fire with the tongs.

"Your Uncle Matthew was terribly upset by it," he said, reverting to
the play. "It was a wild and wet night, we had to walk every inch, of
the way, for there was no late trains in them days, John, and we were
drenched to the skin. Your Uncle Matthew never said one word to me the
whole road home. He just held his head high and stared straight in
front of him, and when I looked at him, though the night was dark, I
could see that his fists were clenched and his lips were moving, though
he didn't speak. You never see no plays like that, these days, John.
The last piece I saw in Belfast was a fearful foolish piece, with a lot
of love and villainy in it. The girl was near drowned in real water,
and then the villain tied her on to a circular saw, and if it hadn't
been for the hero coming in the nick of time, she'd have been cut in
two. No man would treat a woman that way, tying her on to a saw! I'm
afeard some of these pieces nowadays are terribly foolish, John, so I
never want to go now!"



II

There was a sound of footsteps on the stairs, and presently Dr. Dobbs,
a lean, stooping man, came into the kitchen, followed by Mrs.
MacDermott. The Doctor nodded to John, and Mrs. MacDermott said,
"You're back!" and then went into the scullery from which she soon
returned, carrying a glass with which she hurried upstairs again.

"Your Uncle's been asking for you, John," said the doctor, drawing on
his gloves.

"Can I go up and see him, sir?" John asked.

"In a minute or two. Your mother'll call for you when he's ready. I'm
afraid there's not much hope, William!" the doctor said.

John leant against the mantel-shelf, waiting to hear more. He listened
in a dazed way to what the doctor was saying, but hardly comprehended
it, for in his mind the words, "I'm afraid there's not much hope!" made
echoes and re-echoes. Uncle Matthew was dying, might, in a little
while, be dead. Dear, simple, honest, kindly Uncle Matthew who had
loved literature and good faith too well, and had suffered for his
simple loyalty.

"He's easier now than he was," the doctor continued, "and he may last a
good while ... and he may not. I _think_ he'll last a while yet,
but he might die before the morning. I want you to be prepared for the
worst. You know where to find me if you want me, William!"

"Yes, doctor!"

"I've left him in good hands. Your mother's a great nurse, John," he
said, turning to the boy.

"Can I go up to him now, doctor?"

"Yes, I think perhaps ... oh, yes, I think you may. But go up quietly,
will you, in case he's dozed off!..."

John did not wait to hear any more, but, walking on tiptoe, went up the
stairs to his uncle's room.

Uncle Matthew turned to greet him as he entered the room.

"Is that you, John?" he said.

"Yes, Uncle Matthew," John answered, tiptoeing to the side of the bed.
"I'm sorry I wasn't here earlier. I never thought!..."

Uncle Matthew smiled at him. "Sure, son, it doesn't matter. You
couldn't know ... none of us did. Well, was the play good?"

But John did not wish to speak about the play. He wished only to sit by
his Uncle's bed and hold his Uncle's hand.

"I'll go downstairs now for a wee while," Mrs. MacDermott said. "I have
a few things to do, and John can call me if you need me, Matt!"

"Aye, Hannah!" said Uncle Matthew.

John looked up at his mother, but she had turned to leave the room, and
he could not see her face.

He had never heard her call his Uncle by the name of "Matt" before, nor
had he often heard Uncle Matthew use her Christian name in addressing
her. He avoided it, John had observed, as much as possible, and it had
seemed to him that his Uncle did so because of his mother's antagonism
to him.

"What are you staring at, John?" Uncle Matthew said feebly.

"She called you 'Matt', Uncle!"

"That's my name," Uncle Matthew replied, smiling at his nephew.

"Aye, but!..."

"She used to call me 'Matt' before she was married, and for a wee while
afterwards, when we were all friends together. Your da's death was a
fearful blow to her, and she never overed it. And she thought I was a
bad influence on you, filling your head with stuff out of books. You
see, John, women are not like men ... they don't value things the way
we do ... and things that seem important to us, aren't worth a flip of
your hand to them. And the other way round, I suppose. But a woman
can't be bitter against a sick man, no matter how much she hated him
when he had his health. That's where we have the whiphand of them,
John. They can't stand against us when we're sick, but we can stand up
against anything, well or sick!..."

John remembered his mother's caution that he was not to let his Uncle
talk much.

"You ought to lie still, Uncle Matthew," he said, but Uncle Matthew
would not heed him.

"I'm as well as I'll ever be." he said. "I know rightly I'll never
leave this bed 'til I'm carried out of it for good and all. And I'm not
going to deny myself the pleasure of a talk for the sake of an extra
day or two!..."

"Wheesht, Uncle Matthew!" John begged.

"Why, son, what's there to cry about? I'm not afeard to die. No
MacDermott was ever afeard to die, and _I_ won't be the first to
give in. Oh, dear, no!"

"But you'll get better, Uncle Matthew, you will, if you'll only take
care of yourself!..."

"Ah, quit blethering John. I won't get better!... What were we saying?
Something about your ma!..."

"Yes. Her calling you 'Matt'!"

"Oh, aye. You'd be surprised, mebbe, to hear that your Uncle William
and me both had a notion of her before your da stepped in and took her
from us? We had no chance against him. That man could have lifted a
queen from a king's bed!..."

"You ought not to be talking so much, Uncle Matthew!"

"Ah, let me talk, John. It's the only comfort I have, and I'll get all
the rest I want by and bye. Was it a girl kept you late the night?"

"How did you know, Uncle Matthew?"

"How did I know!" Uncle Matthew said with raillery. "How would anyone
know anything but by using the bit of wit the Almighty God's put in his
head. What is it makes any lad lose his train, and walk miles in the
dark? It's either women or drink ... and you're no drinker, John. Tell
me about her. I'd like to be the first to know!"

"I only met her the day!..."

"Aye?"

"I hardly know her yet ... but she's lovely!"

"Go on ... go on!"

"I took her to the theatre with me to see _Julius Caesar_ and then
I left her home. She lives up near the Lagan ... out Stranmillis
way!..."

"I know it well," said Uncle Matthew. "Is she a fair girl or a dark
girl?"

"She has the loveliest golden hair you ever clapped your eyes on. It
was that made me fall in love with her!..."

"You're in love with her then! You're not just going with her?"

"Of course I'm in love with her. I never was in the habit of just going
with girls. That's all right, mebbe, for Willie Logan, but I'm not fond
of it," said John indignantly.

"You fell in love with her in a terrible great hurry," Uncle Matthew
exclaimed.

"Aye," said John laughing. "It was queer and comic the way I fell in
love with her, for I had no notion of such a thing when I went in the
shop to have my tea. She's in a restaurant off High Street. I'd been to
the Royal to see _Romeo and Juliet_, and I was full of the play
and just wandering about, not thinking of what I was doing, when all of
a sudden I saw this place fornent my eyes, and I just went in, and she
was there by her lone. The woman that keeps the place had gone home
with a sore head, and left her to look after it!"

"What's her name?"

"Maggie Carmichael. It's a nice name. They don't do much trade on a
Saturday, and her and me were alone in the shop by ourselves so I asked
her to have tea with me, and then I asked her to go to the Royal, and
she agreed after a while, and when it was over, I took her home, and
that's why I missed the train and had to tramp it the whole way home.
She's older nor I am. She says she's twenty-two. She was codding me for
never having kissed any other girl but her!..."

"You got that length, did you?"

"Aye," said John in confusion.

"You're like your da. Take what you want, the minute you want it.
She'll think you're in earnest, John!"

"I am in earnest. I couldn't be any other way. How could a man feel
about a woman, the way I feel about her, and not be in earnest?"

"As easy as winking," said Uncle Matthew. "You'll mebbe be in love a
hundred times before you marry, and every time you'll think it's the
right one at last. There's no law in love, John. You can't say about
it, that you've got to know a woman well before you're safe in marrying
her, nor you can't just shut your eyes and grab hold of the first one
that comes to your hand. There's no law, John ... none at all. It's an
adventure, love. That's what it is. You don't know what lies at the end
of your journey ... and you can't know ... and mebbe when you reach the
end, you don't know. You just have to take your chance, and trust to
God it'll be all right! Is she in love with you?"

"I don't know. I don't suppose so. She made fun of me, so I suppose she
can't be. But she said she liked me."

"Making fun of you is nothing to go by. Some women would make fun of
God Almighty, and think no harm of it. You'll soon know whether she's
in love with you or not, my son!"

"How will I, Uncle Matthew?"

"When she begins to treat you as if you were her property. That's a
sure and certain sign. The minute a woman looks at a man as much as to
say, 'That fellow belongs to me,' she's in love with him, as sure as
death. Anyway, she's going to marry him! Boys-a-boys, John, but you're
the lucky lad with all your youth and health in front of you, and
you setting out in the world. Many's the time I've longed at nights
to be lying snug and comfortable and quiet in a woman's arms, but
I never had that pleasure. Whatever you do, John, don't die an unmarried
man like your Uncle William and me. It's better to live with a cross
sour-natured woman nor it is to live with no woman at all; for even the
worst woman in the world has given a wee while of happiness to her man,
and he always has that in his mind to comfort him however bad she turns
out after. And if she is bad, sure you can run away from her!"

"Run away from her! You'd never advocate the like of that, Uncle
Matthew?"

"I would. I'm a dying man, John, and mebbe I'll be dead by the morrow's
morn, so you may be sure I'm saying things now that I mean with all my
heart, for no man wants to go before his God with lies on his lips. And
I tell you now, boy, that if a man and woman are not happy together,
they ought to separate and go away from each other as far as they can
get, no matter what the cost is. Them's my solemn words, John. I'd like
well to see this girl you're after, but I'll mebbe not be able. No
matter for that. Pay heed to me now, for fear I don't get the
opportunity to say it to you again. Whatever adventures you set out on,
never forget they're only adventures, and if one turns out to be bad,
another'll mebbe turn out to be good. Don't be like me, don't let one
thing affect your life for ever!..." He lay back on his pillow for a
few moments and did not speak. John waited a little while, and then he
leant forward. "Will I fetch my ma?" he asked.

Uncle Matthew shook his head and waved feebly with his hand, and John
sat back again in his chair.

"Life's just balancing one adventure against another," Uncle Matthew
said at last, without raising his head from the pillow. "The good
against the bad. And the happy man is him that can set off a lot of
good adventures against bad ones, and have a balance of good ones in
his favour. But it takes courage to have a lot, John. The Jenny-joes of
the world never try again after the first bad one. I ... I was
staggered that time ... I ... I never got my foothold again. The
balance is against me, John!..."

Mrs. MacDermott came into the room.

"It's time you went to your bed, son," she said, "and your Uncle'll
want to get to sleep, mebbe. Are you all right, Matt?"

"I'm nicely, thank you, Hannah!"

John got up from his seat and said "Good-night!" to his Uncle.

"Good-night, John. Mind well what I've said to you!"

"I will, Uncle Matthew!"

"Good-night, son, dear!" said Uncle Matthew, smiling at him.



III

In the morning, Uncle Matthew was better than he had been during the
night, and Dr. Dobbs, when he called to see him, thought that he would
live for several weeks more. John went down to the kitchen from his
Uncle's room, happy at the thought that his Uncle might recover in
spite of the doctor's statement that death was inevitable within a
short time. Doctors, he told himself, had made many mistakes, and
perhaps Dr. Dobbs was making a mistake about Uncle Matthew.

He had lain late, heavy with fatigue, for Mrs. MacDermott had not
called him at his usual hour and so the morning was well advanced when
he came down.

"There's a letter for you," said Uncle William, pointing to the
mantel-shelf, where a foolscap envelope rested against the clock. "It'll
be about the story, I'm thinking!"

John took the letter in his trembling fingers and tore it open.

"They've sent it back," he said in a low tone.

"There'll be a note with it," Uncle William murmured.

"Yes!..." He straightened out the printed note and read it. "They've
declined it," he said.

"They've what?" Uncle William exclaimed, taking the printed slip from
John's hands. He read the note of rejection through several times.

"What does it say?" Mrs. MacDermott asked.

"It's a queer kind of a note, this!" said Uncle William. "You'd think
the man was breaking his heart at the idea of not printing the story.
He doesn't say anything about it, whether it's good or bad. He just
thanks John for sending it to him and says he's sorry he can't accept
it. If he's so sorry as all that, why the hell doesn't he print it?"

"William!" said Mrs. MacDermott sharply. "This is Sunday!"

"Well, dear knows I don't want to desecrate God's Day," Uncle William
answered, accepting the rebuke, "but that is a lamentable letter to
get. I must say!"

Mrs. MacDermott held her hand out for the letter. "Give it to me," she
said, and she took it from Uncle William.

"This is his way of saying your story's no good, John," she said, when
she had read through the note. "No man would refuse a thing if he
thought it was worth printing!"

Her words hurt John very sorely. He looked at her, but he did not
speak, and then, after a moment or two, he turned away.

"Now, now, that's not right at all," Uncle William said comfortingly.
"There might be a thousand things to prevent the man from printing the
story. Mebbe he doesn't know a good story when he sees it. Sure, half
these papers nowadays print stories that would turn a child's stomach,
and a thing's not bad just because one paper won't take it. There's
other magazines besides _Blackwood's_, John, as good, too, and
mebbe better!" He went over to his nephew and put his hand on the boy's
shoulder. "There, there, now, don't let this upset you! Your Uncle
Matthew was telling me the other day that some of the greatest writers
in the world had their best stories refused time after time. Don't lose
heart over a thing like that!"

"I haven't lost heart, Uncle William. I daresay it isn't as good as I
thought it was, but I'll improve. It wasn't to be expected I'd succeed
the first time!"

"That's the spirit, boy. That's the spirit!"

"Only I'm disappointed all the same. It's likely I don't know enough
yet!"

"Oh, that's very likely," said Uncle William. "You're only a young
fellow yet, you know!"

"Mebbe that story of mine is full of ignorant mistakes I wouldn't have
made if I'd been about the world a bit and seen more!"

"I daresay you're right! I daresay you're right!..."

Mrs. MacDermott came between them. "What are you leading up to?" she
demanded.

"I must travel a bit before I start writing things," John answered. "I
must know more and see more. My Uncle Matthew's right. You have to go
out into the world to get adventure and romance!..."

"Can't you get all the adventure and romance you need in this place,
and not go tramping among strangers and foreigners for it?" Mrs.
MacDermott retorted angrily.

"How can I get adventure and romance in a place where I know
everybody?" John rejoined.

"Are you proposing to leave home, John!" Uncle William asked.

"Aye! For a while anyway," John answered, "I'll go to London!..."

"You'll not go to no London," Mrs. MacDermott retorted, "and your
Uncle, Matthew lying on his deathbed!..."

"I'm not proposing to go this minute, ma!..."

"You'll not go at all," she insisted.

"I will!"

"You will not, I tell you. What would a lump of a lad like you do in a
place of that sort, where there's temptation and sin at every corner!
Doesn't everyone know that the Devil's roaming up and down the streets
of London day and night, luring young men to their ruin? There's bad
women in London!..."

"There's bad women everywhere," John replied. "You don't need to be
your age to know that!"

She listened angrily while John explained his point of view to his
Uncle William. Travel and new experiences were necessary to the
development of his mind.

"Don't you go up to Belfast every week!" Mrs. MacDermott interrupted.

"I was in Belfast yesterday," John retorted, "but there wasn't a thing
happened to me, romantic or anything else!..." He stopped abruptly,
smitten by the recollection of his meeting with Maggie Carmichael.
After all, _that_ was a romantic adventure! Most strange that he
had not thought of his love affair in that way before! Of course, it
was a romantic adventure! He had walked straight out of a dull street,
you might say, into an enchanted café ... and had found Maggie in
captivity, waiting for him to deliver her from it. She had been
lonely ... and he had come to comfort her. He had taken her from that
dull, cheerless ... prison ... you could call it that!... and had taken
her to a pleasant place and made love to her! Oh, but of course it was a
romantic adventure, with love and a beautiful golden-haired girl at the
end of it. And here he was, moping over the misadventure of a
manuscript and talking of travel in distant places in search of
exciting experiences as if he had not already had the most thrilling
and wonderful adventure that is possible to a man! Why, if he were to
leave Ballyards and go to London, he would lose Maggie ... would not
see her again!... By the Holy O, his mother was right after all! Women
_were_ right sometimes! There was plenty of romance and adventure
lying at your hand, if you only took the trouble to look for it.
Mebbe... mebbe a thing was romantic or not romantic, just according to
the way you looked at it. One man could see romance in a grocer's shop,
and another man could not see romance anywhere but in places where he
had never been!...

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