Book: The Good Comrade

U >> Una L. Silberrad >> The Good Comrade




He walked away from the window and began to search for writing
materials. He could not go and see her, it was out of the question
under the circumstances; he would have to write, and, on the whole,
perhaps, it was easier that way. He sat down to the table, but he did
not at once begin, for between him and the paper there rose up the
vision of a stately old Norfolk house. It was his; he had not lived
there for years, but he supposed he would some day; all his people
had; he remembered his grandfather there and his grandmother--a tall,
stately woman, a woman of parts. He thought of her, and his mother, a
graceful, gracious woman--he thought of her standing in the
drawing-room between the long windows, receiving company. And then he
thought of Julia.

He turned away from the vision abruptly, and dated his letter. But
soon he had lain down his pen again. He was conservative, and Julia
was not of the breed of the women he had recalled; she had no kinship
with them or their modern prototypes, one of whom he vaguely supposed
he should marry some day--when he went to live in the old Norfolk
house. Hers was not a stately or a gracious or an all pervading
feminine presence; she demanded no court, no care, no carpet for her
way; she could come and go unnoticed and unattended; you could
overlook her--though she never overlooked you or anything else. She
had her points certainly, she was loyal to the core--she would be
loyal to him, he was sure, in this scrape, with a silly wrong-headed
loyalty, more like a man's to a woman than a woman's to a man. She was
loyal to her none too reputable family--that family was a bitter thing
to his pride of race. She was courageous, too, cheerfully enduring,
laughing in the face of disaster, patient when action was impossible
and when it was possible--he found himself smiling when he recalled
her--surely there was never one more gay, more ready, more steady,
more quietly alert than she when there was a struggle with men or
matters in the wind. She had brains of a sort, there was no doubt of
that; it was possible to imagine one would not grow tired of her
undiluted company as one would of the other sort of woman. Only of
course a man did not have the undiluted company of his wife--perhaps
if he were a small shop-keeper or an itinerant organ-grinder--if night
and day they lived together and worked together and looked out on the
world together--if it was the simple life of which she dreamed--

Rawson-Clew picked up his pen and began to write; it was not a case of
whether he would or would not, liked or disliked; he had simply to
make a girl he had compromised the only restitution in his power.

In the meantime Julia had set out for the market-place as the idlers
had said. But her business there did not take long and she was home
again, as she intended, before Mevrouw got back from the Snieders. But
she had not been in much more than five minutes before the old lady,
supported by Vrouw Snieder and Denah, arrived. Mijnheer came home not
long after, and, hearing news of the return of the truant, went to the
house to join the others.

Julia waited to receive the attack in the dim sitting-room. She knew
as well as Rawson-Clew, or better, that she had not a ghost of a
chance of clearing herself; dismissal was inevitable; that was why she
went to the market-place. She had not largely assisted her family in
living by their wits without having those faculties in exceeding good
working order; she had already seen and seized the only thing open to
her when the end should come. But the fact that she knew how it would
end did not prevent her from giving battle; the knowledge only made
her change her tactics, and, as there was no use in defending her
position (and companion) she was able to concentrate her forces in
harassing the enemy.

In these circumstances it is not wonderful that Denah did not derive
the satisfaction she expected from the affair. Julia, unrepentant and
reckless because of her known fate, unhampered by Rawson-Clew's
presence, and flatly declining to give any particulars about him,
would have been an awkward antagonist for one cleverer than the Dutch
girl. Poor Denah lost her temper, and lost her head, and lost control
of her tongue and her tears. Julia did not lose anything, but again
and again winged shafts that went unerringly home. She was genuinely
sorry to have upset and disappointed Mevrouw, but for Denah she did
not care in the least, and the old lady soon contrived to soften some
of the regret, for she was far too angry and shocked at the
impropriety to have any gentler feelings of sorrow or to believe what
she was told. Vrouw Snieder acted principally as chorus of horror; she
was shocked and angry too, on Mevrouw's account and on her own and her
daughter's; she seemed to think they had all been outraged together.

When Mijnheer came in they were all talking at once and Denah was
weeping copiously. Julia's part in the conversation was small; she
just shot a word in here and there, but apparently never without
effect, for her utterances, like drops of water on hot metal, were
always followed by fresh bursts of excitement. The good man tried in
vain to make out what was the matter and what had happened. At last,
after his fifth effort elsewhere, he turned to Julia, and she told him
briefly. She told the truth, only suppressing Rawson-Clew's name and
all details concerning him, saying merely that he was a man she had
met before she left England. The two elder sisters gradually became
silent to listen; Denah listened too, only sniffing occasionally.

"You pretended you did not know him the day we went the excursion,"
she said vindictively; "I saw you; I knew you were not to be trusted
then. Why did you pretend, and how do you know him? He is a man of
family; he has the air of it, very distinguished, and you are nothing
at all, nobody--"

"Hush!" said Mijnheer; "that is not the point; it is of no importance
who the man may be, he is a man, that is enough; and she was out with
him--alone--a whole day and night; it is certainly very bad indeed;
shocking, if it is true--is it true?"

He looked at Julia, and she answered, "Yes."

She was sorry, very sorry, but more on his account than her own; she
could see how heinous he thought it, how she had fallen in his esteem,
and she was sorry for it. But at the same time she knew her conduct
really had been no more than indiscreet; and she did not repent; she
regretted nothing but being found out, and that not so much as she
ought now that the joy of battle was upon her. As for the women, they
suspected far worse than Mijnheer believed; but even if they had not,
if they had believed no more than the truth, that would have been
enough for condemnation; her offence--the real one--was past
forgiveness; she must go. She received the sentence meekly; she knew
she deserved no less from these kind if narrow-minded people. Denah
smiled triumphantly; Julia felt she deserved that too; moreover,
Denah's nose was so pink and her face so swelled with tears, that the
smile was more amusing than exasperating.

"I am sorry," she said; "I am sorry you should all have to think so
ill of me, and that I should deserve it. You have been very kind to me
while I have been here, and made my service easy; I am ashamed to have
deceived you and behaved in such a way as you must condemn."

Unfortunately Vrouw Snieder snorted here; she did not believe in these
protestations and she said so, inducing Vrouw Van Heigen to do the
same. Mijnheer looked doubtfully at Julia for a moment, then he came
to the conclusion that if she was not too abandoned a person to be
really repentant, it would be as well to take advantage of her
professed state of mind and drive home some moral lessons. Accordingly
he and the two elder ladies drove them home, with the result that
Julia's regret dwindled to nothing.

"Mijnheer," she said at last, quietly yet effectually breaking in upon
his words; "Mijnheer, you are a very good man, Mevrouw is a virtuous
woman, and Vrouw Snieder also, all of you. I have often admired your
goodness; when you were least conscious of it it preached to me,
making me ashamed of my wickedness. But now that you, in your
goodness, have taken to preaching to me yourselves, I am no longer
ashamed, for it is clear that your goodness dares to do a thing that
no man's wickedness would; it turns the foolish and indiscreet into
sinners and sinners into devils; it makes the way of wrong-doing very
easy. You are so good," she went on, putting aside an interruption;
"perhaps you do not know wickedness when you see it; you cannot
distinguish between sin and sin; you are like those who would hang a
man for stealing bread as soon as for killing a child. What! Are you
indignant, Mevrouw, at such a charge? Are you not turning out, with no
character and no chance--a good enough imitation of hanging--a girl
who has been no more than foolish, just the same as if she had
committed the greatest sin?"

Vrouw Heigen broke in angrily, and Vrouw Snieder and Denah,
inexpressibly shocked; Mijnheer was also shocked, but he, and they
too, were vaguely uneasy under the reproach. Julia was satisfied; more
especially as her experience of them led her to expect they would,
though never persuaded they had made a mistake, yet feel more uneasy
by and by.

She rose from her chair. "Yes," she said, "it is a shame to speak of
such things, as you observe; do not let us speak of them any more.
Perhaps Mijnheer you would like to pay me, then I can go."

Mijnheer agreed rather hastily; then, realising the suddenness of the
step, he paused with his purse in his hand. "But can you go now?" he
asked. "Nothing is arranged; you had better wait a day or two."

"No," Julia answered, "I think not; it would be well to get the thing
over and done with; you would rather and so would I."

No one contradicting this, Mijnheer counted the money and gave it to
Julia.

"Thank you," she said; "now I will set the table for coffee drinking.
You will stay, of course, Mevrouw," she went on, turning to Vrouw
Snieder--"and Miss Denah, that will be two extra--Mijnheer Joost will
be in, Denah; you can tell him about it."

Denah flushed indignantly, and Vrouw Snieder could only say
"You--You--"

"Oh, I will not sit down with you, of course," Julia answered sweetly;
"I will take my coffee in the little room; is it not so, Mevrouw?"

Vrouw Van Heigen nodded; she did not know what else to do, and Julia
went away, leaving them as awkward and at a loss for words as if they
were the delinquents, not she. Denah felt this and resented it; the
elders felt it too, and for a moment or two looked at one another ill
at ease. However, in a little they recovered and began to talk over
Julia and her wrong doings till they felt quite comfortable again.
Denah did not join very much in the discussion; after she had once
again, by request, repeated what she had seen and what deduced
therefrom, she was left rather to herself. She went to the window and
sat there looking out for Joost; he was certain to come in soon, and
she found consolation in the thought. Joost, the model of modesty and
decorous serious propriety, would know the English girl in her true
colours now, and be justly disgusted and shocked to think that he had
ever ridden beside her on a merry-go-round.

Just then Julia passed carrying a tray of cups. "Denah," she said,
pitching her voice soft and low in the tone the Dutch girl hated most,
"I will give you a piece of advice; take care how you tell Joost about
my wickedness; you want to be ever so clever to abuse another girl to
a man; it is one of the most difficult things in the world--and you
are not very clever, you know, not even clever enough to take my
advice."

Denah was not clever enough to take the advice nor in any humour to do
so; she stared angrily at Julia, who unconcernedly put the cups on the
table and vanished into the kitchen.

Joost came in for coffee drinking, and the whole party with one accord
told him the tale; Julia heard them through the closed door as she sat
sipping her coffee in the little room. She did not hear him say
anything at all except just at first, "I won't believe it!" in a tone
which roused again, and with added strength, the regret she had felt
before for repaying belief and kindness by such disillusioning.
Afterwards he seemed to say nothing more; presumably they had
convinced him with overwhelming evidence. She wondered how he looked;
she could picture his serious blue eyes uncomfortable well; poor
Joost, who had such high opinions of her, who thought she, seeing the
low, chose the high path always in the greatness of her knowledge and
strength; who had called her a lantern, sometimes dimmed, but always a
beacon! The lantern was obscured just now, very badly obscured. She
rose and went up to her room; she would clear the table after Joost
had gone back to work.

She did so, coming down when he and Mijnheer were safely in the
office. When she had done she went to Mevrouw, who had betaken herself
to her room worn out by the morning's excitement.

"Would you prefer that I went at once?" she inquired, "or that I
waited till after dinner? I will stay till six if you wish it, or I
will go now without waiting to attend to the dinner."

Vrouw Van Heigen preferred the waiting; it would be so very much
better for the dinner, and really it hardly seemed as if propriety
could suffer much; accordingly she said with what dignity she could
that the girl had better stay till the evening.

Julia went down-stairs again and set to work preparing the dinner, and
it was perhaps only natural that she took pains to make that dinner a
memorably good one. It was while she was busy in the kitchen that a
note was brought to her.

"Put it on the table," she said to the servant girl; her hands just
then were too floury to take it, but she looked at it as it lay on the
table beside her. She did not recognise the writing, though she saw at
once that it was not that of a Dutchman. "Who brought it?" she asked,
beginning to clean her hands.

The servant could not say, but from her description Julia gathered
that it must have been a special messenger of some sort. On hearing
this, she did not trouble to clean her hands any more, but opened the
letter at once, making floury finger-prints upon it.

"DEAR MISS POLKINGTON, (it ran),

"There is one subject I did not mention to you yesterday;
you might perhaps have thought it too serious for holiday
consideration; nevertheless, it is a question that I feel I
must ask before I leave Holland. Will you do me the honour
of becoming my wife? I know there is rather a difference in
years between us, but if you can overlook the discrepancy,
and consent, you will give me the utmost satisfaction. I
honestly believe it will make for the happiness of us both;
I have a feeling that we were meant to continue our
'excursion' together.

"Very sincerely yours,

"H. F. RAWSON-CLEW."

So Julia read, and sat down suddenly on the flour barrel. She turned
to the beginning of the letter and read it through again, and when she
looked up her eyes were shining with admiration. "I am glad!" she said
aloud, but in English, "I am glad he has done it! It's splendid,
splendid! I never thought of it--but then I don't believe I knew what
a real gentleman was before!"

The maidservant started at her curiously; she could not understand a
word, but she saw that the letter gave pleasure, for which she was
glad; she liked Julia, and was very sorry she was going in disgrace;
she herself had occasional lapses from rectitude and so consequently
had a fellow feeling.

"You have a good letter?" she asked.

"Very good," Julia said; "but we must get on with the cooking; I will
answer it by and by."

Julia put it in her pocket after another glance, purring to herself in
English, "It is so well done, too," she said; "never a word of to-day,
only of yesterday--yesterday!" and she laughed softly.

There is no doubt about it, if Julia had got to receive a death
sentence she would have liked it to be well given; it is quite
possible, had she lived at the time, she would have been one of those
who objected to the indignity of riding in the tumbrils quite as much
as to the guillotine at the end of the ride.

She finished the preparations for dinner, got her pots and pans all
nicely simmering and her oven at the right heat; then, giving some
necessary directions, she left the servant to watch the cooking and
went up to her own room. There she at once proceeded to answer the
letter--

"DEAR MR. RAWSON-CLEW, (she wrote),

"I am as glad as anything that you have done it; I never for
a moment thought of it myself, though I ought, for it is
just like you; thank you ever so much.

"Please don't bother about me, I am all right and have
arranged capitally."

Here she turned over his letter to see how he had signed
himself and, seeing, signed in imitation--

"Yours very sincerely,

"JULIA POLKINGTON."

"I wonder what his name is?" she speculated; "H. F.--H.--Henry,
Horace--I shouldn't think he had a name people called him by."

She read her own letter through, and as she was folding it stopped; it
occurred to her that he might think courtesy demanded a formal refusal
of his proposal. It was, of course, quite unnecessary; the refusal
went without saying; she would no more have dreamed of accepting his
quixotic offer than he would have dreamed of avoiding the necessity of
making it; the one was as much a _sine qua non_ to her as the other
was to him. From which it would appear that in some ways at least
their notions of honour were not so many miles apart.

She flattened her letter again; perhaps he would think the definite
word more polite, so she added a postscript--

"Of course this means no. I am sorry we can't go on with the
excursion, but we can't, you know. The holiday is over; this
is 'to-morrow,' so good-bye."

After that she fastened the envelope, and a while later went out to
post it. As she went up the drive she caught sight of Joost some
distance away in the gardens; his face was not towards her, and she
congratulated herself that he had not seen her. However, the
congratulations were premature; when she came back from the post she
found him standing just inside the gate waiting for her, obviously
waiting. At least it was obvious to her; she had caught people herself
before now, and so recognised that she was caught too plainly to
uselessly attempt getting away.

"Do you want to hear what happened yesterday?" she asked, with an
effrontery she did not feel. "I expect Denah has told you all, perhaps
a little more than all, still, enough of it was true."

"I want to speak to you," he said, and parted the high bushes that
bordered the left of the drive.

Julia reluctantly enough, but feeling that she owed him what
explanation was possible, went through. Behind the bushes there was a
small enclosed space used for growing choice bulbs; it was empty now,
the sandy soil quite bare and dry; but it was very retired, being
surrounded by an eight foot hedge with only one opening besides the
way by which they had come in through the looser-growing bushes. Julia
made her way down to the opening; with her practical eye for such
things, she recognised that it would be the best way of escape, just
as the loose-growing bushes offered the likeliest point of attack.
This, of course, did not matter to her, she being in the case of "he
who is down," but it might matter a good deal to Joost if his father
looked through the bushes, and he would never know how to take care of
himself.

"Well?" she said, when she had taken up this discreet position. But as
he did not seem ready she went on, "I really don't think there is
anything to say; I did wrong yesterday, not quite as much wrong as
your mother and Denah think, still wrong--what my own people would
have disapproved, at least if it were found out; that's the biggest
crime on their list--and what I knew your people would condemn
utterly. I am afraid I have no excuse to offer; I knew what I was
doing, and I did it with my eyes open. I did not see any harm in it
myself but I knew other people would, so I meant to say nothing. I had
deceived your parents before, and I meant to keep on doing it. You
know I had walked with that man lots of times before yesterday; all
the time your mother thought me so good to visit your cousin I really
enjoyed doing it because I walked with him."

"Do you love him?" The question was asked low and almost jerkily.

"Love him?" Julia said in surprise; "no, of course not. That is where
the difference comes in, I believe; you all seem to think there is
nothing but love and love-making and kissing and cuddling. I have just
liked talking to him and I suppose he liked talking to me, as you
might some friend, or Denah some girl she knew. We never thought about
love and all that; we couldn't, you know; he belongs to a different
lot from what I do. Do you understand?"

"Yes, I understand," he answered, and there was a vibrant note in his
voice which was new to her. "I understand that it is you who are right
and we who are wrong--you who know good and evil and can choose, we
who suspect and think and hint, believing ill when there is none.
Rather than send you away, we should ask your forgiveness!"

"You should do nothing of the kind," Julia said decidedly, beginning
to take alarm. "I may not have been wrong in quite the way your
parents think, but I was wrong all the same. I am not good, believe
me; I am not as you are. Look at me, I am bad inwardly, and really I
am what you would condemn and despise."

She was standing in the afternoon sunlight, dark, slim, alert,
intensely alive, full of a twisty varied knowledge, a creature of
another world. She felt that he must know and recognise the gulf
between if only he would look fairly at her.

He did look fairly, but he recognised only what was in his own mind.

"You are to me a beacon--" he began.

But she, realising at last that Denah's jealousy was not after all
without foundations, cut him short.

"I am not a beacon," she said, "before you take me for a guiding light
you had better hear something about me. Do you know why I came here? I
will tell you--it was to get your blue daffodil!"

He stared at her speechless, and she found it bad to see the surprise
and almost uncomprehending pain which came into his face, as into the
face of a child unjustly smitten. But she went on resolutely: "I heard
of it in England, that it was worth a lot of money--and I wanted
money--so I came here; I meant to get a bulb and sell it."

"You meant to?" he said slowly; "but you haven't--you couldn't?"

"I could, six times over if I liked."

"But you have not."

"No. I was a fool, and you were--Oh, I can't explain; you would never
understand, and it does not matter. The thing that matters is that I
came here to get your blue daffodil."

"You must have needed money very greatly," he said in a puzzled,
pitying voice.

"I did, I wanted it desperately, but that does not matter either--I
came here to steal; I go away because I am found out to have deceived
and to have behaved improperly--I want you to understand that."

"I do not understand," he answered; "I understand nothing but that you
are you, and--and I love you."

"You don't!" she cried in sharp protest. "You do not, and you cannot!
You think you love what you think I am. But I am not that; it is all
quite different; when you, know, when you realise, you will see it."

"I realise now," he answered; "it is still the light, only sometimes
dim."

"Dim!" she repeated, "it has gone out!"

"And if it has, what then? If you are all you say you are, and all
they say you are, and many worse things besides, what then? It makes
no difference."

He spoke with the curious quietness with which he always spoke of what
he was quite sure. But she drew back against the hedge, clasping her
hands together, her calmness all gone. "Oh, what have I done! What
have I done!" she said, overcome with pity and remorse.

He drew a step nearer, misinterpreting the emotion. "I will take care
of you," he said. "Will you not let me take care of you?"

She looked up, and though her eyes were full of tears he might have
read his answer there, in her recovered calmness, in the very
gentleness of her manner. "You cannot," she said sadly; "you couldn't
possibly do it. Don't you see that it is impossible? Your parents, the
people--"

"That is of no importance," he answered; "my parents would very soon
see you in your true light, and for the rest--what does it matter? If
you will marry me I--"

"But Joost, I can't! Don't you feel yourself that I can't? We are not
only of two nations--that is nothing--but we are almost of two races;
we are night and day, oil and water, black and white. It would never
do; we should be on the outskirts of each other's lives, you would
never know mine, and though I might know yours, I could never really
enter in."

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