автордың кітабын онлайн тегін оқу  Sons and Lovers

David Herbert Lawrence

Part I

I The Early Married Life of the Morels

“The Bot­toms” suc­ceeded to “Hell Row.” Hell Row was a block of thatched, bul­ging cot­tages that stood by the brook­side on Green­hill Lane. There lived the col­li­ers who worked in the little gin-pits two fields away. The brook ran un­der the alder trees, scarcely soiled by these small mines, whose coal was drawn to the sur­face by don­keys that plod­ded wear­ily in a circle round a gin. And all over the coun­tryside were these same pits, some of which had been worked in the time of Charles II, the few col­li­ers and the don­keys bur­row­ing down like ants into the earth, mak­ing queer mounds and little black places among the corn­fields and the mead­ows. And the cot­tages of these coal-miners, in blocks and pairs here and there, to­gether with odd farms and homes of the stockingers, stray­ing over the par­ish, formed the vil­lage of Best­wood.

Then, some sixty years ago, a sud­den change took place, gin-pits were el­bowed aside by the large mines of the fin­an­ci­ers. The coal and iron field of Not­ting­ham­shire and Derby­shire was dis­covered. Car­ston, Waite and Co. ap­peared. Amid tre­mend­ous ex­cite­ment, Lord Palmer­ston form­ally opened the com­pany’s first mine at Spin­ney Park, on the edge of Sher­wood Forest.

About this time the no­tori­ous Hell Row, which through grow­ing old had ac­quired an evil repu­ta­tion, was burned down, and much dirt was cleansed away.

Car­ston, Waite & Co. found they had struck on a good thing, so, down the val­leys of the brooks from Selby and Nut­tall, new mines were sunk, un­til soon there were six pits work­ing. From Nut­tall, high up on the sand­stone among the woods, the rail­way ran, past the ruined pri­ory of the Carthu­s­i­ans and past Robin Hood’s Well, down to Spin­ney Park, then on to Min­ton, a large mine among corn­fields; from Min­ton across the farm­lands of the val­ley­side to Bunker’s Hill, branch­ing off there, and run­ning north to Beg­gar­lee and Selby, that looks over at Crich and the hills of Derby­shire: six mines like black studs on the coun­tryside, linked by a loop of fine chain, the rail­way.

To ac­com­mod­ate the re­gi­ments of miners, Car­ston, Waite and Co. built the Squares, great quad­rangles of dwell­ings on the hill­side of Best­wood, and then, in the brook val­ley, on the site of Hell Row, they erec­ted the Bot­toms.

The Bot­toms con­sisted of six blocks of miners’ dwell­ings, two rows of three, like the dots on a blank-six dom­ino, and twelve houses in a block. This double row of dwell­ings sat at the foot of the rather sharp slope from Best­wood, and looked out, from the at­tic win­dows at least, on the slow climb of the val­ley to­wards Selby.

The houses them­selves were sub­stan­tial and very de­cent. One could walk all round, see­ing little front gar­dens with au­ri­cu­las and saxi­frage in the shadow of the bot­tom block, sweet-wil­li­ams and pinks in the sunny top block; see­ing neat front win­dows, little porches, little privet hedges, and dormer win­dows for the at­tics. But that was out­side; that was the view on to the un­in­hab­ited par­lours of all the col­li­ers’ wives. The dwell­ing-room, the kit­chen, was at the back of the house, fa­cing in­ward between the blocks, look­ing at a scrubby back garden, and then at the ash-pits. And between the rows, between the long lines of ash-pits, went the al­ley, where the chil­dren played and the wo­men gos­siped and the men smoked. So, the ac­tual con­di­tions of liv­ing in the Bot­toms, that was so well built and that looked so nice, were quite un­sa­voury be­cause people must live in the kit­chen, and the kit­chens opened on to that nasty al­ley of ash-pits.

Mrs. Morel was not anxious to move into the Bot­toms, which was already twelve years old and on the down­ward path, when she des­cen­ded to it from Best­wood. But it was the best she could do. Moreover, she had an end house in one of the top blocks, and thus had only one neigh­bour; on the other side an ex­tra strip of garden. And, hav­ing an end house, she en­joyed a kind of ar­is­to­cracy among the other wo­men of the “between” houses, be­cause her rent was five shil­lings and six­pence in­stead of five shil­lings a week. But this su­peri­or­ity in sta­tion was not much con­sol­a­tion to Mrs. Morel.

She was thirty-one years old, and had been mar­ried eight years. A rather small wo­man, of del­ic­ate mould but res­ol­ute bear­ing, she shrank a little from the first con­tact with the Bot­toms wo­men. She came down in the July, and in the Septem­ber ex­pec­ted her third baby.

Her hus­band was a miner. They had only been in their new home three weeks when the wakes, or fair, began. Morel, she knew, was sure to make a hol­i­day of it. He went off early on the Monday morn­ing, the day of the fair. The two chil­dren were highly ex­cited. Wil­liam, a boy of seven, fled off im­me­di­ately after break­fast, to prowl round the wakes ground, leav­ing An­nie, who was only five, to whine all morn­ing to go also. Mrs. Morel did her work. She scarcely knew her neigh­bours yet, and knew no one with whom to trust the little girl. So she prom­ised to take her to the wakes after din­ner.

Wil­liam ap­peared at half-past twelve. He was a very act­ive lad, fair-haired, freckled, with a touch of the Dane or Nor­we­gian about him.

“Can I have my din­ner, mother?” he cried, rush­ing in with his cap on. “ ’Cause it be­gins at half-past one, the man says so.”

“You can have your din­ner as soon as it’s done,” replied the mother.

“Isn’t it done?” he cried, his blue eyes star­ing at her in in­dig­na­tion. “Then I’m goin’ be-out it.”

“You’ll do noth­ing of the sort. It will be done in five minutes. It is only half-past twelve.”

“They’ll be be­gin­nin’,” the boy half cried, half shouted.

“You won’t die if they do,” said the mother. “Besides, it’s only half-past twelve, so you’ve a full hour.”

The lad began hast­ily to lay the table, and dir­ectly the three sat down. They were eat­ing bat­ter-pud­ding and jam, when the boy jumped off his chair and stood per­fectly stiff. Some dis­tance away could be heard the first small bray­ing of a merry-go-round, and the toot­ing of a horn. His face quivered as he looked at his mother.

“I told you!” he said, run­ning to the dresser for his cap.

“Take your pud­ding in your hand—and it’s only five past one, so you were wrong—you haven’t got your two­pence,” cried the mother in a breath.

The boy came back, bit­terly dis­ap­poin­ted, for his two­pence, then went off without a word.

“I want to go, I want to go,” said An­nie, be­gin­ning to cry.

“Well, and you shall go, whin­ing, wizzen­ing little stick!” said the mother. And later in the af­ter­noon she trudged up the hill un­der the tall hedge with her child. The hay was gathered from the fields, and cattle were turned on to the ed­dish. It was warm, peace­ful.

Mrs. Morel did not like the wakes. There were two sets of horses, one go­ing by steam, one pulled round by a pony; three or­gans were grind­ing, and there came odd cracks of pis­tol-shots, fear­ful screech­ing of the coconut man’s rattle, shouts of the Aunt Sally man, screeches from the peep­show lady. The mother per­ceived her son gaz­ing en­rap­tured out­side the Lion Wal­lace booth, at the pic­tures of this fam­ous lion that had killed a negro and maimed for life two white men. She left him alone, and went to get An­nie a spin of tof­fee. Presently the lad stood in front of her, wildly ex­cited.

“You never said you was com­ing—isn’t the’ a lot of things?—that lion’s killed three men—I’ve spent my tup­pence—an’ look here.”

He pulled from his pocket two eggcups, with pink moss-roses on them.

“I got these from that stall where y’ave ter get them marbles in them holes. An’ I got these two in two goes—‘ae­penny a go—they’ve got moss-roses on, look here. I wanted these.”

She knew he wanted them for her.

“H’m!” she said, pleased. “They are pretty!”

“Shall you carry ’em, ’cause I’m frightened o’ breakin’ ’em?”

He was tip­ful of ex­cite­ment now she had come, led her about the ground, showed her everything. Then, at the peep­show, she ex­plained the pic­tures, in a sort of story, to which he listened as if spell­bound. He would not leave her. All the time he stuck close to her, brist­ling with a small boy’s pride of her. For no other wo­man looked such a lady as she did, in her little black bon­net and her cloak. She smiled when she saw wo­men she knew. When she was tired she said to her son:

“Well, are you com­ing now, or later?”

“Are you goin’ a’ready?” he cried, his face full of re­proach.

“Already? It is past four, I know.”

“What are you goin’ a’ready for?” he lamen­ted.

“You needn’t come if you don’t want,” she said.

And she went slowly away with her little girl, whilst her son stood watch­ing her, cut to the heart to let her go, and yet un­able to leave the wakes. As she crossed the open ground in front of the Moon and Stars she heard men shout­ing, and smelled the beer, and hur­ried a little, think­ing her hus­band was prob­ably in the bar.

At about half-past six her son came home, tired now, rather pale, and some­what wretched. He was miser­able, though he did not know it, be­cause he had let her go alone. Since she had gone, he had not en­joyed his wakes.

“Has my dad been?” he asked.

“No,” said the mother.

“He’s help­ing to wait at the Moon and Stars. I seed him through that black tin stuff wi’ holes in, on the win­dow, wi’ his sleeves rolled up.”

“Ha!” ex­claimed the mother shortly. “He’s got no money. An’ he’ll be sat­is­fied if he gets his ’low­ance, whether they give him more or not.”

When the light was fad­ing, and Mrs. Morel could see no more to sew, she rose and went to the door. Every­where was the sound of ex­cite­ment, the rest­less­ness of the hol­i­day, that at last in­fec­ted her. She went out into the side garden. Wo­men were com­ing home from the wakes, the chil­dren hug­ging a white lamb with green legs, or a wooden horse. Oc­ca­sion­ally a man lurched past, al­most as full as he could carry. So­me­times a good hus­band came along with his fam­ily, peace­fully. But usu­ally the wo­men and chil­dren were alone. The stay-at-home moth­ers stood gos­sip­ing at the corners of the al­ley, as the twi­light sank, fold­ing their arms un­der their white ap­rons.

Mrs. Morel was alone, but she was used to it. Her son and her little girl slept up­stairs; so, it seemed, her home was there be­hind her, fixed and stable. But she felt wretched with the com­ing child. The world seemed a dreary place, where noth­ing else would hap­pen for her—at least un­til Wil­liam grew up. But for her­self, noth­ing but this dreary en­dur­ance—till the chil­dren grew up. And the chil­dren! She could not af­ford to have this third. She did not want it. The father was serving beer in a pub­lic house, swill­ing him­self drunk. She des­pised him, and was tied to him. This com­ing child was too much for her. If it were not for Wil­liam and An­nie, she was sick of it, the struggle with poverty and ugli­ness and mean­ness.

She went into the front garden, feel­ing too heavy to take her­self out, yet un­able to stay in­doors. The heat suf­foc­ated her. And look­ing ahead, the pro­spect of her life made her feel as if she were bur­ied alive.

The front garden was a small square with a privet hedge. There she stood, try­ing to soothe her­self with the scent of flowers and the fad­ing, beau­ti­ful even­ing. Op­pos­ite her small gate was the stile that led up­hill, un­der the tall hedge between the burn­ing glow of the cut pas­tures. The sky over­head throbbed and pulsed with light. The glow sank quickly off the field; the earth and the hedges smoked dusk. As it grew dark, a ruddy glare came out on the hill­top, and out of the glare the di­min­ished com­mo­tion of the fair.

So­me­times, down the trough of dark­ness formed by the path un­der the hedges, men came lurch­ing home. One young man lapsed into a run down the steep bit that ended the hill, and went with a crash into the stile. Mrs. Morel shuddered. He picked him­self up, swear­ing vi­ciously, rather pathet­ic­ally, as if he thought the stile had wanted to hurt him.

She went in­doors, won­der­ing if things were never go­ing to al­ter. She was be­gin­ning by now to real­ise that they would not. She seemed so far away from her girl­hood, she wondered if it were the same per­son walk­ing heav­ily up the back garden at the Bot­toms as had run so lightly up the break­wa­ter at Sheer­ness ten years be­fore.

“What have I to do with it?” she said to her­self. “What have I to do with all this? Even the child I am go­ing to have! It doesn’t seem as if I were taken into ac­count.”

So­me­times life takes hold of one, car­ries the body along, ac­com­plishes one’s his­tory, and yet is not real, but leaves one­self as it were slurred over.

“I wait,” Mrs. Morel said to her­self—“I wait, and what I wait for can never come.”

Then she straightened the kit­chen, lit the lamp, men­ded the fire, looked out the wash­ing for the next day, and put it to soak. After which she sat down to her sew­ing. Through the long hours her needle flashed reg­u­larly through the stuff. Oc­ca­sion­ally she sighed, mov­ing to re­lieve her­self. And all the time she was think­ing how to make the most of what she had, for the chil­dren’s sakes.

At half-past el­even her hus­band came. His cheeks were very red and very shiny above his black mous­tache. His head nod­ded slightly. He was pleased with him­self.

“Oh! Oh! waitin’ for me, lass? I’ve bin ’elpin’ Anthony, an’ what’s think he’s gen me? Nowt b’r a lousy hae’f-crown, an’ that’s ivry penny—”

“He thinks you’ve made the rest up in beer,” she said shortly.

“An’ I ’aven’t—that I ’aven’t. You b’lieve me, I’ve ’ad very little this day, I have an’ all.” His voice went tender. “Here, an’ I browt thee a bit o’ brandysnap, an’ a coconut for th’ chil­dren.” He laid the ginger­bread and the coconut, a hairy ob­ject, on the table. “Nay, tha niver said thankyer for nowt i’ thy life, did ter?”

As a com­prom­ise, she picked up the coconut and shook it, to see if it had any milk.

“It’s a good ’un, you may back yer life o’ that. I got it fra’ Bill Hodgkisson. ‘Bill,’ I says, ‘tha non wants them three nuts, does ter? Arena ter for gi’ein’ me one for my bit of a lad an’ wench?’ ‘I ham, Wal­ter, my lad,’ ’e says; ‘ta’e which on ’em ter’s a mind.’ An’ so I took one, an’ thanked ’im. I didn’t like ter shake it afore ’is eyes, but ’e says, ‘Tha’d bet­ter ma’e sure it’s a good un, Walt.’ An’ so, yer see, I knowed it was. He’s a nice chap, is Bill Hodgkisson, e’s a nice chap!”

“A man will part with any­thing so long as he’s drunk, and you’re drunk along with him,” said Mrs. Morel.

“Eh, tha mucky little ’ussy, who’s drunk, I sh’d like ter know?” said Morel. He was ex­traordin­ar­ily pleased with him­self, be­cause of his day’s help­ing to wait in the Moon and Stars. He chattered on.

Mrs. Morel, very tired, and sick of his babble, went to bed as quickly as pos­sible, while he raked the fire.

Mrs. Morel came of a good old burgher fam­ily, fam­ous in­de­pend­ents who had fought with Co­l­onel Hutchin­son, and who re­mained stout Con­greg­a­tion­al­ists. Her grand­father had gone bank­rupt in the lace-mar­ket at a time when so many lace-man­u­fac­tur­ers were ruined in Not­ting­ham. Her father, Ge­orge Cop­pard, was an en­gin­eer—a large, hand­some, haughty man, proud of his fair skin and blue eyes, but more proud still of his in­teg­rity. Ger­trude re­sembled her mother in her small build. But her tem­per, proud and un­yield­ing, she had from the Cop­pards.

Ge­orge Cop­pard was bit­terly galled by his own poverty. He be­came fore­man of the en­gin­eers in the dock­yard at Sheer­ness. Mrs. Morel—Ger­trude—was the second daugh­ter. She fa­voured her mother, loved her mother best of all; but she had the Cop­pards’ clear, de­fi­ant blue eyes and their broad brow. She re­membered to have hated her father’s over­bear­ing man­ner to­wards her gentle, hu­mor­ous, kindly-souled mother. She re­membered run­ning over the break­wa­ter at Sheer­ness and find­ing the boat. She re­membered to have been pet­ted and flattered by all the men when she had gone to the dock­yard, for she was a del­ic­ate, rather proud child. She re­membered the funny old mis­tress, whose as­sist­ant she had be­come, whom she had loved to help in the private school. And she still had the Bible that John Field had given her. She used to walk home from chapel with John Field when she was nine­teen. He was the son of a well-to-do trades­man, had been to col­lege in Lon­don, and was to de­vote him­self to busi­ness.

She could al­ways re­call in de­tail a Septem­ber Sunday af­ter­noon, when they had sat un­der the vine at the back of her father’s house. The sun came through the chinks of the vine-leaves and made beau­ti­ful pat­terns, like a lace scarf, fall­ing on her and on him. Some of the leaves were clean yel­low, like yel­low flat flowers.

“Now sit still,” he had cried. “Now your hair, I don’t know what it is like! It’s as bright as cop­per and gold, as red as burnt cop­per, and it has gold threads where the sun shines on it. Fancy their say­ing it’s brown. Your mother calls it mouse-col­our.”

She had met his bril­liant eyes, but her clear face scarcely showed the ela­tion which rose within her.

“But you say you don’t like busi­ness,” she pur­sued.

“I don’t. I hate it!” he cried hotly.

“And you would like to go into the min­istry,” she half im­plored.

“I should. I should love it, if I thought I could make a first-rate preacher.”

“Then why don’t you—why don’t you?” Her voice rang with de­fi­ance. “If I were a man, noth­ing would stop me.”

She held her head erect. He was rather timid be­fore her.

“But my father’s so stiff-necked. He means to put me into the busi­ness, and I know he’ll do it.”

“But if you’re a man?” she had cried.

“Be­ing a man isn’t everything,” he replied, frown­ing with puzzled help­less­ness.

Now, as she moved about her work at the Bot­toms, with some ex­per­i­ence of what be­ing a man meant, she knew that it was not everything.

At twenty, ow­ing to her health, she had left Sheer­ness. Her father had re­tired home to Not­ting­ham. John Field’s father had been ruined; the son had gone as a teacher in Nor­wood. She did not hear of him un­til, two years later, she made de­term­ined in­quiry. He had mar­ried his land­lady, a wo­man of forty, a widow with prop­erty.

And still Mrs. Morel pre­served John Field’s Bible. She did not now be­lieve him to be—Well, she un­der­stood pretty well what he might or might not have been. So she pre­served his Bible, and kept his memory in­tact in her heart, for her own sake. To her dy­ing day, for thirty-five years, she did not speak of him.

When she was twenty-three years old, she met, at a Christ­mas party, a young man from the Ere­wash Val­ley. Morel was then twenty-seven years old. He was well set-up, erect, and very smart. He had wavy black hair that shone again, and a vig­or­ous black beard that had never been shaved. His cheeks were ruddy, and his red, moist mouth was no­tice­able be­cause he laughed so of­ten and so heart­ily. He had that rare thing, a rich, ringing laugh. Ger­trude Cop­pard had watched him, fas­cin­ated. He was so full of col­our and an­im­a­tion, his voice ran so eas­ily into comic grot­esque, he was so ready and so pleas­ant with every­body. Her own father had a rich fund of hu­mour, but it was satiric. This man’s was dif­fer­ent: soft, non­in­tel­lec­tual, warm, a kind of gam­bolling.

She her­self was op­pos­ite. She had a curi­ous, re­cept­ive mind which found much pleas­ure and amuse­ment in listen­ing to other folk. She was clever in lead­ing folk to talk. She loved ideas, and was con­sidered very in­tel­lec­tual. What she liked most of all was an ar­gu­ment on re­li­gion or philo­sophy or polit­ics with some edu­cated man. This she did not of­ten en­joy. So she al­ways had people tell her about them­selves, find­ing her pleas­ure so.

In her per­son she was rather small and del­ic­ate, with a large brow, and drop­ping bunches of brown silk curls. Her blue eyes were very straight, hon­est, and search­ing. She had the beau­ti­ful hands of the Cop­pards. Her dress was al­ways sub­dued. She wore dark blue silk, with a pe­cu­liar sil­ver chain of sil­ver scal­lops. This, and a heavy brooch of twis­ted gold, was her only or­na­ment. She was still per­fectly in­tact, deeply re­li­gious, and full of beau­ti­ful cand­our.

Wal­ter Morel seemed melted away be­fore her. She was to the miner that thing of mys­tery and fas­cin­a­tion, a lady. When she spoke to him, it was with a south­ern pro­nun­ci­ation and a pur­ity of Eng­lish which thrilled him to hear. She watched him. He danced well, as if it were nat­ural and joy­ous in him to dance. His grand­father was a French refugee who had mar­ried an Eng­lish bar­maid—if it had been a mar­riage. Ger­trude Cop­pard watched the young miner as he danced, a cer­tain subtle ex­ulta­tion like glam­our in his move­ment, and his face the flower of his body, ruddy, with tumbled black hair, and laugh­ing alike whatever part­ner he bowed above. She thought him rather won­der­ful, never hav­ing met any­one like him. Her father was to her the type of all men. And Ge­orge Cop­pard, proud in his bear­ing, hand­some, and rather bit­ter; who pre­ferred theo­logy in read­ing, and who drew near in sym­pathy only to one man, the Apostle Paul; who was harsh in gov­ern­ment, and in fa­mili­ar­ity ironic; who ig­nored all sen­su­ous pleas­ure:—he was very dif­fer­ent from the miner. Ger­trude her­self was rather con­temp­tu­ous of dan­cing; she had not the slight­est in­clin­a­tion to­wards that ac­com­plish­ment, and had never learned even a Ro­ger de Cover­ley. She was pur­itan, like her father, high-minded, and really stern. There­fore the dusky, golden soft­ness of this man’s sen­su­ous flame of life, that flowed off his flesh like the flame from a candle, not baffled and gripped into in­can­des­cence by thought and spirit as her life was, seemed to her some­thing won­der­ful, bey­ond her.

He came and bowed above her. A warmth ra­di­ated through her as if she had drunk wine.

“Now do come and have this one wi’ me,” he said caress­ively. “It’s easy, you know. I’m pin­ing to see you dance.”

She had told him be­fore she could not dance. She glanced at his hu­mil­ity and smiled. Her smile was very beau­ti­ful. It moved the man so that he for­got everything.

“No, I won’t dance,” she said softly. Her words came clean and ringing.

Not know­ing what he was do­ing—he of­ten did the right thing by in­stinct—he sat be­side her, in­clin­ing rev­er­en­tially.

“But you mustn’t miss your dance,” she re­proved.

“Nay, I don’t want to dance that—it’s not one as I care about.”

“Yet you in­vited me to it.”

He laughed very heart­ily at this.

“I never thought o’ that. Tha’rt not long in tak­ing the curl out of me.”

It was her turn to laugh quickly.

“You don’t look as if you’d come much un­curled,” she said.

“I’m like a pig’s tail, I curl be­cause I canna help it,” he laughed, rather bois­ter­ously.

“And you are a miner!” she ex­claimed in sur­prise.

“Yes. I went down when I was ten.”

She looked at him in won­der­ing dis­may.

“When you were ten! And wasn’t it very hard?” she asked.

“You soon get used to it. You live like th’ mice, an’ you pop out at night to see what’s go­ing on.”

“It makes me feel blind,” she frowned.

“Like a moud­i­warp!” he laughed. “Yi, an’ there’s some chaps as does go round like moud­i­warps.” He thrust his face for­ward in the blind, snout-like way of a mole, seem­ing to sniff and peer for dir­ec­tion. “They dun though!” he pro­tested na­ively. “Tha niver seed such a way they get in. But tha mun let me ta’e thee down some time, an’ tha can see for thysen.”

She looked at him, startled. This was a new tract of life sud­denly opened be­fore her. She real­ised the life of the miners, hun­dreds of them toil­ing be­low earth and com­ing up at even­ing. He seemed to her noble. He risked his life daily, and with gaiety. She looked at him, with a touch of ap­peal in her pure hu­mil­ity.

“Shouldn’t ter like it?” he asked ten­derly. “ ’Ap­pen not, it ’ud dirty thee.”

She had never been “thee’d” and “thou’d” be­fore.

The next Christ­mas they were mar­ried, and for three months she was per­fectly happy: for six months she was very happy.

He had signed the pledge, and wore the blue rib­bon of a tee­totaller: he was noth­ing if not showy. They lived, she thought, in his own house. It was small, but con­veni­ent enough, and quite nicely fur­nished, with solid, worthy stuff that suited her hon­est soul. The wo­men, her neigh­bours, were rather for­eign to her, and Morel’s mother and sis­ters were apt to sneer at her lady­like ways. But she could per­fectly well live by her­self, so long as she had her hus­band close.

So­me­times, when she her­self wear­ied of love-talk, she tried to open her heart ser­i­ously to him. She saw him listen de­fer­en­tially, but without un­der­stand­ing. This killed her ef­forts at a finer in­tim­acy, and she had flashes of fear. So­me­times he was rest­less of an even­ing: it was not enough for him just to be near her, she real­ised. She was glad when he set him­self to little jobs.

He was a re­mark­ably handy man—could make or mend any­thing. So she would say:

“I do like that coal-rake of your mother’s—it is small and natty.”

“Does ter, my wench? Well, I made that, so I can make thee one!”

“What! why, it’s a steel one!”

“An’ what if it is! Tha s’lt ha’e one very sim­ilar, if not ex­actly same.”

She did not mind the mess, nor the ham­mer­ing and noise. He was busy and happy.

But in the sev­enth month, when she was brush­ing his Sunday coat, she felt pa­pers in the breast pocket, and, seized with a sud­den curi­os­ity, took them out to read. He very rarely wore the frock-coat he was mar­ried in: and it had not oc­curred to her be­fore to feel curi­ous con­cern­ing the pa­pers. They were the bills of the house­hold fur­niture, still un­paid.

“Look here,” she said at night, after he was washed and had had his din­ner. “I found these in the pocket of your wed­ding-coat. Haven’t you settled the bills yet?”

“No. I haven’t had a chance.”

“But you told me all was paid. I had bet­ter go into Not­ting­ham on Saturday and settle them. I don’t like sit­ting on an­other man’s chairs and eat­ing from an un­paid table.”

He did not an­swer.

“I can have your bank­book, can’t I?”

“Tha can ha’e it, for what good it’ll be to thee.”

“I thought—” she began. He had told her he had a good bit of money left over. But she real­ised it was no use ask­ing ques­tions. She sat ri­gid with bit­ter­ness and in­dig­na­tion.

The next day she went down to see his mother.

“Didn’t you buy the fur­niture for Wal­ter?” she asked.

“Yes, I did,” tartly re­tor­ted the elder wo­man.

“And how much did he give you to pay for it?”

The elder wo­man was stung with fine in­dig­na­tion.

“Eighty pound, if you’re so keen on knowin’,” she replied.

“Eighty pounds! But there are forty-two pounds still ow­ing!”

“I can’t help that.”

“But where has it all gone?”

“You’ll find all the pa­pers, I think, if you look—be­side ten pound as he owed me, an’ six pound as the wed­ding cost down here.”

“Six pounds!” echoed Ger­trude Morel. It seemed to her mon­strous that, after her own father had paid so heav­ily for her wed­ding, six pounds more should have been squandered in eat­ing and drink­ing at Wal­ter’s par­ents’ house, at his ex­pense.

“And how much has he sunk in his houses?” she asked.

“His houses—which houses?”

Ger­trude Morel went white to the lips. He had told her the house he lived in, and the next one, was his own.

“I thought the house we live in—” she began.

“They’re my houses, those two,” said the mother-in-law. “And not clear either. It’s as much as I can do to keep the mort­gage in­terest paid.”

Ger­trude sat white and si­lent. She was her father now.

“Then we ought to be pay­ing you rent,” she said coldly.

“Wal­ter is pay­ing me rent,” replied the mother.

“And what rent?” asked Ger­trude.

“Six and six a week,” re­tor­ted the mother.

It was more than the house was worth. Ger­trude held her head erect, looked straight be­fore her.

“It is lucky to be you,” said the elder wo­man, bit­ingly, “to have a hus­band as takes all the worry of the money, and leaves you a free hand.”

The young wife was si­lent.

She said very little to her hus­band, but her man­ner had changed to­wards him. So­mething in her proud, hon­our­able soul had crys­tal­lised out hard as rock.

When Octo­ber came in, she thought only of Christ­mas. Two years ago, at Christ­mas, she had met him. Last Christ­mas she had mar­ried him. This Christ­mas she would bear him a child.

“You don’t dance your­self, do you, mis­sis?” asked her nearest neigh­bour, in Octo­ber, when there was great talk of open­ing a dan­cing-class over the Brick and Tile Inn at Best­wood.

“No—I never had the least in­clin­a­tion to,” Mrs. Morel replied.

“Fancy! An’ how funny as you should ha’ mar­ried your Mester. You know he’s quite a fam­ous one for dan­cing.”

“I didn’t know he was fam­ous,” laughed Mrs. Morel.

“Yea, he is though! Why, he ran that dan­cing-class in the Min­ers’ Arms club­room for over five year.”

“Did he?”

“Yes, he did.” The other wo­man was de­fi­ant. “An’ it was thronged every Tues­day, and Thursday, an’ Sat’day—an’ there was car­ryin’s-on, ac­cordin’ to all ac­counts.”

This kind of thing was gall and bit­ter­ness to Mrs. Morel, and she had a fair share of it. The wo­men did not spare her, at first; for she was su­per­ior, though she could not help it.

He began to be rather late in com­ing home.

“They’re work­ing very late now, aren’t they?” she said to her wash­er­wo­man.

“No later than they al­lers do, I don’t think. But they stop to have their pint at El­len’s, an’ they get talkin’, an’ there you are! Din­ner stone cold—an’ it serves ’em right.”

“But Mr. Morel does not take any drink.”

The wo­man dropped the clothes, looked at Mrs. Morel, then went on with her work, say­ing noth­ing.

Ger­trude Morel was very ill when the boy was born. Morel was good to her, as good as gold. But she felt very lonely, miles away from her own people. She felt lonely with him now, and his pres­ence only made it more in­tense.

The boy was small and frail at first, but he came on quickly. He was a beau­ti­ful child, with dark gold ring­lets, and dark-blue eyes which changed gradu­ally to a clear grey. His mother loved him pas­sion­ately. He came just when her own bit­ter­ness of dis­il­lu­sion was hard­est to bear; when her faith in life was shaken, and her soul felt dreary and lonely. She made much of the child, and the father was jeal­ous.

At last Mrs. Morel des­pised her hus­band. She turned to the child; she turned from the father. He had be­gun to neg­lect her; the nov­elty of his own home was gone. He had no grit, she said bit­terly to her­self. What he felt just at the minute, that was all to him. He could not abide by any­thing. There was noth­ing at the back of all his show.

There began a battle between the hus­band and wife—a fear­ful, bloody battle that ended only with the death of one. She fought to make him un­der­take his own re­spons­ib­il­it­ies, to make him ful­fill his ob­lig­a­tions. But he was too dif­fer­ent from her. His nature was purely sen­su­ous, and she strove to make him moral, re­li­gious. She tried to force him to face things. He could not en­dure it—it drove him out of his mind.

While the baby was still tiny, the father’s tem­per had be­come so ir­rit­able that it was not to be trus­ted. The child had only to give a little trouble when the man began to bully. A little more, and the hard hands of the col­lier hit the baby. Then Mrs. Morel loathed her hus­band, loathed him for days; and he went out and drank; and she cared very little what he did. Only, on his re­turn, she scathed him with her satire.

The es­trange­ment between them caused him, know­ingly or un­know­ingly, grossly to of­fend her where he would not have done.

Wil­liam was only one year old, and his mother was proud of him, he was so pretty. She was not well off now, but her sis­ters kept the boy in clothes. Then, with his little white hat curled with an os­trich feather, and his white coat, he was a joy to her, the twin­ing wisps of hair clus­ter­ing round his head. Mrs. Morel lay listen­ing, one Sunday morn­ing, to the chat­ter of the father and child down­stairs. Then she dozed off. When she came down­stairs, a great fire glowed in the grate, the room was hot, the break­fast was roughly laid, and seated in his arm­chair, against the chim­neypiece, sat Morel, rather timid; and stand­ing between his legs, the child—cropped like a sheep, with such an odd round poll—look­ing won­der­ing at her; and on a news­pa­per spread out upon the hearth­rug, a myriad of cres­cent-shaped curls, like the petals of a marigold scattered in the red­den­ing fire­light.

Mrs. Morel stood still. It was her first baby. She went very white, and was un­able to speak.

“What dost think o’ ’im?” Morel laughed un­eas­ily.

She gripped her two fists, lif­ted them, and came for­ward. Morel shrank back.

“I could kill you, I could!” she said. She choked with rage, her two fists up­lif­ted.

“Yer non want ter make a wench on ’im,” Morel said, in a frightened tone, bend­ing his head to shield his eyes from hers. His at­tempt at laughter had van­ished.

The mother looked down at the jagged, close-clipped head of her child. She put her hands on his hair, and stroked and fondled his head.

“Oh—my boy!” she faltered. Her lip trembled, her face broke, and, snatch­ing up the child, she bur­ied her face in his shoulder and cried pain­fully. She was one of those wo­men who can­not cry; whom it hurts as it hurts a man. It was like rip­ping some­thing out of her, her sob­bing.

Morel sat with his el­bows on his knees, his hands gripped to­gether till the knuckles were white. He gazed in the fire, feel­ing al­most stunned, as if he could not breathe.

Presently she came to an end, soothed the child and cleared away the break­fast-table. She left the news­pa­per, littered with curls, spread upon the hearth­rug. At last her hus­band gathered it up and put it at the back of the fire. She went about her work with closed mouth and very quiet. Morel was sub­dued. He crept about wretchedly, and his meals were a misery that day. She spoke to him civilly, and never al­luded to what he had done. But he felt some­thing fi­nal had happened.

After­wards she said she had been silly, that the boy’s hair would have had to be cut, sooner or later. In the end, she even brought her­self to say to her hus­band it was just as well he had played barber when he did. But she knew, and Morel knew, that that act had caused some­thing mo­ment­ous to take place in her soul. She re­membered the scene all her life, as one in which she had suffered the most in­tensely.

This act of mas­cu­line clum­si­ness was the spear through the side of her love for Morel. Be­fore, while she had striven against him bit­terly, she had fret­ted after him, as if he had gone astray from her. Now she ceased to fret for his love: he was an out­sider to her. This made life much more bear­able.

Never­the­less, she still con­tin­ued to strive with him. She still had her high moral sense, in­her­ited from gen­er­a­tions of Pur­it­ans. It was now a re­li­gious in­stinct, and she was al­most a fan­atic with him, be­cause she loved him, or had loved him. If he sinned, she tor­tured him. If he drank, and lied, was of­ten a pol­troon, some­times a knave, she wiel­ded the lash un­mer­ci­fully.

The pity was, she was too much his op­pos­ite. She could not be con­tent with the little he might be; she would have him the much that he ought to be. So, in seek­ing to make him no­bler than he could be, she des­troyed him. She in­jured and hurt and scarred her­self, but she lost none of her worth. She also had the chil­dren.

He drank rather heav­ily, though not more than many miners, and al­ways beer, so that whilst his health was af­fected, it was never in­jured. The week­end was his chief ca­rouse. He sat in the Min­ers’ Arms un­til turn­ing-out time every Fri­day, every Saturday, and every Sunday even­ing. On Monday and Tues­day he had to get up and re­luct­antly leave to­wards ten o’clock. So­me­times he stayed at home on Wed­nes­day and Thursday even­ings, or was only out for an hour. He prac­tic­ally never had to miss work ow­ing to his drink­ing.

But al­though he was very steady at work, his wages fell off. He was blab-mouthed, a tongue-wag­ger. Author­ity was hate­ful to him, there­fore he could only ab­use the pit-man­agers. He would say, in the Palmer­ston:

“Th’ gaf­fer come down to our stall this morn­ing, an’ ’e says, ‘You know, Wal­ter, this ’ere’ll not do. What about these props?’ An’ I says to him, ‘Why, what art talkin’ about? What d’st mean about th’ props?’ ‘It’ll never do, this ’ere,’ ’e says. ‘You’ll be havin’ th’ roof in, one o’ these days.’ An’ I says, ‘Tha’d bet­ter stan’ on a bit o’ clunch, then, an’ hold it up wi’ thy ’ead.’ So ’e wor that mad, ’e cossed an’ ’e swore, an’ t’other chaps they did laugh.” Morel was a good mimic. He im­it­ated the man­ager’s fat, squeaky voice, with its at­tempt at good Eng­lish.

“ ‘I shan’t have it, Wal­ter. Who knows more about it, me or you?’ So I says, ‘I’ve niver fun out how much tha’ knows, Al­fred. It’ll ’ap­pen carry thee ter bed an’ back.” ’

So Morel would go on to the amuse­ment of his boon com­pan­ions. And some of this would be true. The pit-man­ager was not an edu­cated man. He had been a boy along with Morel, so that, while the two dis­liked each other, they more or less took each other for gran­ted. But Al­fred Char­les­worth did not for­give the butty these pub­lic-house say­ings. Con­sequently, al­though Morel was a good miner, some­times earn­ing as much as five pounds a week when he mar­ried, he came gradu­ally to have worse and worse stalls, where the coal was thin, and hard to get, and un­prof­it­able.

Also, in sum­mer, the pits are slack. Often, on bright sunny morn­ings, the men are seen troop­ing home again at ten, el­even, or twelve o’clock. No empty trucks stand at the pit-mouth. The wo­men on the hill­side look across as they shake the hearth­rug against the fence, and count the wag­ons the en­gine is tak­ing along the line up the val­ley. And the chil­dren, as they come from school at din­ner­time, look­ing down the fields and see­ing the wheels on the head­stocks stand­ing, say:

“Min­ton’s knocked off. My dad’ll be at home.”

And there is a sort of shadow over all, wo­men and chil­dren and men, be­cause money will be short at the end of the week.

Morel was sup­posed to give his wife thirty shil­lings a week, to provide everything—rent, food, clothes, clubs, in­sur­ance, doc­tors. Oc­ca­sion­ally, if he were flush, he gave her thirty-five. But these oc­ca­sions by no means bal­anced those when he gave her twenty-five. In winter, with a de­cent stall, the miner might earn fifty or fifty-five shil­lings a week. Then he was happy. On Fri­day night, Saturday, and Sunday, he spent roy­ally, get­ting rid of his sov­er­eign or there­abouts. And out of so much, he scarcely spared the chil­dren an ex­tra penny or bought them a pound of apples. It all went in drink. In the bad times, mat­ters were more wor­ry­ing, but he was not so of­ten drunk, so that Mrs. Morel used to say:

“I’m not sure I wouldn’t rather be short, for when he’s flush, there isn’t a minute of peace.”

If he earned forty shil­lings he kept ten; from thirty-five he kept five; from thirty-two he kept four; from twenty-eight he kept three; from twenty-four he kept two; from twenty he kept one-and-six; from eight­een he kept a shil­ling; from six­teen he kept six­pence. He never saved a penny, and he gave his wife no op­por­tun­ity of sav­ing; in­stead, she had oc­ca­sion­ally to pay his debts; not pub­lic-house debts, for those never were passed on to the wo­men, but debts when he had bought a ca­nary, or a fancy walk­ing-stick.

At the wakes time Morel was work­ing badly, and Mrs. Morel was try­ing to save against her con­fine­ment. So it galled her bit­terly to think he should be out tak­ing his pleas­ure and spend­ing money, whilst she re­mained at home, har­assed. There were two days’ hol­i­day. On the Tues­day morn­ing Morel rose early. He was in good spir­its. Quite early, be­fore six o’clock, she heard him whist­ling away to him­self down­stairs. He had a pleas­ant way of whist­ling, lively and mu­sical. He nearly al­ways whistled hymns. He had been a choir­boy with a beau­ti­ful voice, and had taken so­los in South­well cathed­ral. His morn­ing whist­ling alone be­trayed it.

His wife lay listen­ing to him tinker­ing away in the garden, his whist­ling ringing out as he sawed and hammered away. It al­ways gave her a sense of warmth and peace to hear him thus as she lay in bed, the chil­dren not yet awake, in the bright early morn­ing, happy in his man’s fash­ion.

At nine o’clock, while the chil­dren with bare legs and feet were sit­ting play­ing on the sofa, and the mother was wash­ing up, he came in from his car­pentry, his sleeves rolled up, his waist­coat hanging open. He was still a good-look­ing man, with black, wavy hair, and a large black mous­tache. His face was per­haps too much in­flamed, and there was about him a look al­most of peev­ish­ness. But now he was jolly. He went straight to the sink where his wife was wash­ing up.

“What, are thee there!” he said bois­ter­ously. “Sluthe off an’ let me wesh mysen.”

“You may wait till I’ve fin­ished,” said his wife.

“Oh, mun I? An’ what if I shonna?”

This good-hu­moured threat amused Mrs. Morel.

“Then you can go and wash your­self in the soft-wa­ter tub.”

“Ha! I can’ an’ a’, tha mucky little ’ussy.”

With which he stood watch­ing her a mo­ment, then went away to wait for her.

When he chose he could still make him­self again a real gal­lant. Usu­ally he pre­ferred to go out with a scarf round his neck. Now, how­ever, he made a toi­let. There seemed so much gusto in the way he puffed and swilled as he washed him­self, so much alac­rity with which he hur­ried to the mir­ror in the kit­chen, and, bend­ing be­cause it was too low for him, scru­pu­lously par­ted his wet black hair, that it ir­rit­ated Mrs. Morel. He put on a turndown col­lar, a black bow, and wore his Sunday tail­coat. As such, he looked spruce, and what his clothes would not do, his in­stinct for mak­ing the most of his good looks would.

At half-past nine Jerry Purdy came to call for his pal. Jerry was Morel’s bosom friend, and Mrs. Morel dis­liked him. He was a tall, thin man, with a rather foxy face, the kind of face that seems to lack eye­lashes. He walked with a stiff, brittle dig­nity, as if his head were on a wooden spring. His nature was cold and shrewd. Gen­er­ous where he in­ten­ded to be gen­er­ous, he seemed to be very fond of Morel, and more or less to take charge of him.

Mrs. Morel hated him. She had known his wife, who had died of con­sump­tion, and who had, at the end, con­ceived such a vi­ol­ent dis­like of her hus­band, that if he came into her room it caused her haem­or­rhage. None of which Jerry had seemed to mind. And now his eld­est daugh­ter, a girl of fif­teen, kept a poor house for him, and looked after the two younger chil­dren.

“A mean, wizzen-hearted stick!” Mrs. Morel said of him.

“I’ve never known Jerry mean in my life,” pro­tested Morel. “A opener-handed and more freer chap you couldn’t find any­where, ac­cordin’ to my know­ledge.”

“Open­han­ded to you,” re­tor­ted Mrs. Morel. “But his fist is shut tight enough to his chil­dren, poor things.”

“Poor things! And what for are they poor things, I should like to know.”

But Mrs. Morel would not be ap­peased on Jerry’s score.

The sub­ject of ar­gu­ment was seen, cran­ing his thin neck over the scull­ery cur­tain. He caught Mrs. Morel’s eye.

“Mornin’, mis­sis! Mester in?”

“Yes—he is.”

Jerry entered un­asked, and stood by the kit­chen door­way. He was not in­vited to sit down, but stood there, coolly as­sert­ing the rights of men and hus­bands.

“A nice day,” he said to Mrs. Morel.

“Yes.

“Grand out this morn­ing—grand for a walk.”

“Do you mean you’re go­ing for a walk?” she asked.

“Yes. We mean walkin’ to Not­ting­ham,” he replied.

“H’m!”

The two men greeted each other, both glad: Jerry, how­ever, full of as­sur­ance, Morel rather sub­dued, afraid to seem too ju­bil­ant in pres­ence of his wife. But he laced his boots quickly, with spirit. They were go­ing for a ten-mile walk across the fields to Not­ting­ham. Climb­ing the hill­side from the Bot­toms, they moun­ted gaily into the morn­ing. At the Moon and Stars they had their first drink, then on to the Old Spot. Then a long five miles of drought to carry them into Bul­well to a glor­i­ous pint of bit­ter. But they stayed in a field with some hay­makers whose gal­lon bottle was full, so that, when they came in sight of the city, Morel was sleepy. The town spread up­wards be­fore them, smoking vaguely in the mid­day glare, fridging the crest away to the south with spires and fact­ory bulks and chim­neys. In the last field Morel lay down un­der an oak tree and slept soundly for over an hour. When he rose to go for­ward he felt queer.

The two had din­ner in the Mead­ows, with Jerry’s sis­ter, then re­paired to the Punch Bowl, where they mixed in the ex­cite­ment of pi­geon-ra­cing. Morel never in his life played cards, con­sid­er­ing them as hav­ing some oc­cult, malevol­ent power—“the devil’s pic­tures,” he called them! But he was a mas­ter of skittles and of dom­in­oes. He took a chal­lenge from a Ne­wark man, on skittles. All the men in the old, long bar took sides, bet­ting either one way or the other. Morel took off his coat. Jerry held the hat con­tain­ing the money. The men at the tables watched. Some stood with their mugs in their hands. Morel felt his big wooden ball care­fully, then launched it. He played havoc among the nine­pins, and won half a crown, which re­stored him to solvency.

By seven o’clock the two were in good con­di­tion. They caught the 7:30 train home.

In the af­ter­noon the Bot­toms was in­tol­er­able. Every in­hab­it­ant re­main­ing was out of doors. The wo­men, in twos and threes, bare­headed and in white ap­rons, gos­siped in the al­ley between the blocks. Men, hav­ing a rest between drinks, sat on their heels and talked. The place smelled stale; the slate roofs glistered in the arid heat.

Mrs. Morel took the little girl down to the brook in the mead­ows, which were not more than two hun­dred yards away. The wa­ter ran quickly over stones and broken pots. Mother and child leaned on the rail of the old sheep-bridge, watch­ing. Up at the dip­ping-hole, at the other end of the meadow, Mrs. Morel could see the na­ked forms of boys flash­ing round the deep yel­low wa­ter, or an oc­ca­sional bright fig­ure dart glit­ter­ing over the black­ish stag­nant meadow. She knew Wil­liam was at the dip­ping-hole, and it was the dread of her life lest he should get drowned. An­nie played un­der the tall old hedge, pick­ing up alder cones, that she called cur­rants. The child re­quired much at­ten­tion, and the flies were teas­ing.

The chil­dren were put to bed at seven o’clock. Then she worked awhile.

When Wal­ter Morel and Jerry ar­rived at Best­wood they felt a load off their minds; a rail­way jour­ney no longer im­pen­ded, so they could put the fin­ish­ing touches to a glor­i­ous day. They entered the Nel­son with the sat­is­fac­tion of re­turned trav­el­lers.

The next day was a work­day, and the thought of it put a damper on the men’s spir­its. Most of them, moreover, had spent their money. Some were already rolling dis­mally home, to sleep in pre­par­a­tion for the mor­row. Mrs. Morel, listen­ing to their mourn­ful singing, went in­doors. Nine o’clock passed, and ten, and still “the pair” had not re­turned. On a door­step some­where a man was singing loudly, in a drawl: “Lead, kindly Light.” Mrs. Morel was al­ways in­dig­nant with the drunken men that they must sing that hymn when they got maudlin.

“As if ‘Genevieve’ weren’t good enough,” she said.

The kit­chen was full of the scent of boiled herbs and hops. On the hob a large black sauce­pan steamed slowly. Mrs. Morel took a pancheon, a great bowl of thick red earth, streamed a heap of white sugar into the bot­tom, and then, strain­ing her­self to the weight, was pour­ing in the li­quor.

Just then Morel came in. He had been very jolly in the Nel­son, but com­ing home had grown ir­rit­able. He had not quite got over the feel­ing of ir­rit­ab­il­ity and pain, after hav­ing slept on the ground when he was so hot; and a bad con­science af­flic­ted him as he neared the house. He did not know he was angry. But when the garden gate res­isted his at­tempts to open it, he kicked it and broke the latch. He entered just as Mrs. Morel was pour­ing the in­fu­sion of herbs out of the sauce­pan. Sway­ing slightly, he lurched against the table. The boil­ing li­quor pitched. Mrs. Morel star­ted back.

“Good gra­cious,” she cried, “com­ing home in his drunk­en­ness!”

“Comin’ home in his what?” he snarled, his hat over his eye.

Sud­denly her blood rose in a jet.

“Say you’re not drunk!” she flashed.

She had put down her sauce­pan, and was stir­ring the sugar into the beer. He dropped his two hands heav­ily on the table, and thrust his face for­wards at her.

“ ‘Say you’re not drunk,’ ” he re­peated. “Why, nobody but a nasty little bitch like you ’ud ’ave such a thought.”

He thrust his face for­ward at her.

“There’s money to bezzle with, if there’s money for noth­ing else.”

“I’ve not spent a two-shil­lin’ bit this day,” he said.

“You don’t get as drunk as a lord on noth­ing,” she replied. “And,” she cried, flash­ing into sud­den fury, “if you’ve been spon­ging on your be­loved Jerry, why, let him look after his chil­dren, for they need it.”

“It’s a lie, it’s a lie. Shut your face, wo­man.”

They were now at battle-pitch. Each for­got everything save the hatred of the other and the battle between them. She was fiery and furi­ous as he. They went on till he called her a liar.

“No,” she cried, start­ing up, scarce able to breathe. “Don’t call me that—you, the most despic­able liar that ever walked in shoe-leather.” She forced the last words out of suf­foc­ated lungs.

“You’re a liar!” he yelled, banging the table with his fist. “You’re a liar, you’re a liar.”

She stiffened her­self, with clenched fists.

“The house is filthy with you,” she cried.

“Then get out on it—it’s mine. Get out on it!” he shouted. “It’s me as brings th’ money whoam, not thee. It’s my house, not thine. Then ger out on’t—ger out on’t!”

“And I would,” she cried, sud­denly shaken into tears of im­pot­ence. “Ah, wouldn’t I, wouldn’t I have gone long ago, but for those chil­dren. Ay, haven’t I re­pen­ted not go­ing years ago, when I’d only the one”—sud­denly dry­ing into rage. “Do you think it’s for you I stop—do you think I’d stop one minute for you?”

“Go, then,” he shouted, be­side him­self. “Go!”

“No!” She faced round. “No,” she cried loudly, “you shan’t have it all your own way; you shan’t do all you like. I’ve got those chil­dren to see to. My word,” she laughed, “I should look well to leave them to you.”

“Go,” he cried thickly, lift­ing his fist. He was afraid of her. “Go!”

“I should be only too glad. I should laugh, laugh, my lord, if I could get away from you,” she replied.

He came up to her, his red face, with its blood­shot eyes, thrust for­ward, and gripped her arms. She cried in fear of him, struggled to be free. Com­ing slightly to him­self, pant­ing, he pushed her roughly to the outer door, and thrust her forth, slot­ting the bolt be­hind her with a bang. Then he went back into the kit­chen, dropped into his arm­chair, his head, burst­ing full of blood, sink­ing between his knees. Thus he dipped gradu­ally into a stupor, from ex­haus­tion and in­tox­ic­a­tion.

The moon was high and mag­ni­fi­cent in the August night. Mrs. Morel, seared with pas­sion, shivered to find her­self out there in a great white light, that fell cold on her, and gave a shock to her in­flamed soul. She stood for a few mo­ments help­lessly star­ing at the glisten­ing great rhu­barb leaves near the door. Then she got the air into her breast. She walked down the garden path, trem­bling in every limb, while the child boiled within her. For a while she could not con­trol her con­scious­ness; mech­an­ic­ally she went over the last scene, then over it again, cer­tain phrases, cer­tain mo­ments com­ing each time like a brand red-hot down on her soul; and each time she en­acted again the past hour, each time the brand came down at the same points, till the mark was burnt in, and the pain burnt out, and at last she came to her­self. She must have been half an hour in this de­li­ri­ous con­di­tion. Then the pres­ence of the night came again to her. She glanced round in fear. She had wandered to the side garden, where she was walk­ing up and down the path be­side the cur­rant bushes un­der the long wall. The garden was a nar­row strip, bounded from the road, that cut trans­versely between the blocks, by a thick thorn hedge.

She hur­ried out of the side garden to the front, where she could stand as if in an im­mense gulf of white light, the moon stream­ing high in face of her, the moon­light stand­ing up from the hills in front, and filling the val­ley where the Bot­toms crouched, al­most blind­ingly. There, pant­ing and half weep­ing in re­ac­tion from the stress, she mur­mured to her­self over and over again: “The nuis­ance! the nuis­ance!”

She be­came aware of some­thing about her. With an ef­fort she roused her­self to see what it was that pen­et­rated her con­scious­ness. The tall white lilies were reel­ing in the moon­light, and the air was charged with their per­fume, as with a pres­ence. Mrs. Morel gasped slightly in fear. She touched the big, pal­lid flowers on their petals, then shivered. They seemed to be stretch­ing in the moon­light. She put her hand into one white bin: the gold scarcely showed on her fin­gers by moon­light. She bent down to look at the bin­ful of yel­low pol­len; but it only ap­peared dusky. Then she drank a deep draught of the scent. It al­most made her dizzy.

Mrs. Morel leaned on the garden gate, look­ing out, and she lost her­self awhile. She did not know what she thought. Ex­cept for a slight feel­ing of sick­ness, and her con­scious­ness in the child, her­self melted out like scent into the shiny, pale air. After a time the child, too, melted with her in the mix­ing-pot of moon­light, and she res­ted with the hills and lilies and houses, all swum to­gether in a kind of swoon.

When she came to her­self she was tired for sleep. Lan­guidly she looked about her; the clumps of white phlox seemed like bushes spread with linen; a moth ri­co­chetted over them, and right across the garden. Fol­low­ing it with her eye roused her. A few whiffs of the raw, strong scent of phlox in­vig­or­ated her. She passed along the path, hes­it­at­ing at the white rose­bush. It smelled sweet and simple. She touched the white ruffles of the roses. Their fresh scent and cool, soft leaves re­minded her of the morn­ing-time and sun­shine. She was very fond of them. But she was tired, and wanted to sleep. In the mys­ter­i­ous out-of-doors she felt for­lorn.

There was no noise any­where. Evidently the chil­dren had not been wakened, or had gone to sleep again. A train, three miles away, roared across the val­ley. The night was very large, and very strange, stretch­ing its hoary dis­tances in­fin­itely. And out of the sil­ver-grey fog of dark­ness came sounds vague and hoarse: a corncrake not far off, sound of a train like a sigh, and dis­tant shouts of men.

Her quietened heart be­gin­ning to beat quickly again, she hur­ried down the side garden to the back of the house. Softly she lif­ted the latch; the door was still bolted, and hard against her. She rapped gently, waited, then rapped again. She must not rouse the chil­dren, nor the neigh­bours. He must be asleep, and he would not wake eas­ily. Her heart began to burn to be in­doors. She clung to the door-handle. Now it was cold; she would take a chill, and in her present con­di­tion!

Put­ting her ap­ron over her head and her arms, she hur­ried again to the side garden, to the win­dow of the kit­chen. Lean­ing on the sill, she could just see, un­der the blind, her hus­band’s arms spread out on the table, and his black head on the board. He was sleep­ing with his face ly­ing on the table. So­mething in his at­ti­tude made her feel tired of things. The lamp was burn­ing smokily; she could tell by the cop­per col­our of the light. She tapped at the win­dow more and more nois­ily. Al­most it seemed as if the glass would break. Still he did not wake up.

After vain ef­forts, she began to shiver, partly from con­tact with the stone, and from ex­haus­tion. Fear­ful al­ways for the un­born child, she wondered what she could do for warmth. She went down to the coal-house, where there was an old hearth­rug she had car­ried out for the rag-man the day be­fore. This she wrapped over her shoulders. It was warm, if grimy. Then she walked up and down the garden path, peep­ing every now and then un­der the blind, knock­ing, and telling her­self that in the end the very strain of his po­s­i­tion must wake him.

At last, after about an hour, she rapped long and low at the win­dow. Gradu­ally the sound pen­et­rated to him. When, in des­pair, she had ceased to tap, she saw him stir, then lift his face blindly. The la­bour­ing of his heart hurt him into con­scious­ness. She rapped im­per­at­ively at the win­dow. He star­ted awake. In­stantly she saw his fists set and his eyes glare. He had not a grain of phys­ical fear. If it had been twenty burg­lars, he would have gone blindly for them. He glared round, be­wildered, but pre­pared to fight.

“Open the door, Wal­ter,” she said coldly.

His hands re­laxed. It dawned on him what he had done. His head dropped, sul­len and dogged. She saw him hurry to the door, heard the bolt chock. He tried the latch. It opened—and there stood the sil­ver-grey night, fear­ful to him, after the tawny light of the lamp. He hur­ried back.

When Mrs. Morel entered, she saw him al­most run­ning through the door to the stairs. He had ripped his col­lar off his neck in his haste to be gone ere she came in, and there it lay with bursten but­ton­holes. It made her angry.

She warmed and soothed her­self. In her wear­i­ness for­get­ting everything, she moved about at the little tasks that re­mained to be done, set his break­fast, rinsed his pit-bottle, put his pit-clothes on the hearth to warm, set his pit-boots be­side them, put him out a clean scarf and snap-bag and two apples, raked the fire, and went to bed. He was already dead asleep. His nar­row black eye­brows were drawn up in a sort of peev­ish misery into his fore­head while his cheeks’ down­strokes, and his sulky mouth, seemed to be say­ing: “I don’t care who you are nor what you are, I shall have my own way.”

Mrs. Morel knew him too well to look at him. As she un­fastened her brooch at the mir­ror, she smiled faintly to see her face all smeared with the yel­low dust of lilies. She brushed it off, and at last lay down. For some time her mind con­tin­ued snap­ping and jet­ting sparks, but she was asleep be­fore her hus­band awoke from the first sleep of his drunk­en­ness.

II The Birth of Paul, and Another Battle

After such a scene as the last, Wal­ter Morel was for some days abashed and ashamed, but he soon re­gained his old bul­ly­ing in­dif­fer­ence. Yet there was a slight shrink­ing, a di­min­ish­ing in his as­sur­ance. Phys­ic­ally even, he shrank, and his fine full pres­ence waned. He never grew in the least stout, so that, as he sank from his erect, as­sert­ive bear­ing, his physique seemed to con­tract along with his pride and moral strength.

But now he real­ised how hard it was for his wife to drag about at her work, and, his sym­pathy quickened by pen­it­ence, hastened for­ward with his help. He came straight home from the pit, and stayed in at even­ing till Fri­day, and then he could not re­main at home. But he was back again by ten o’clock, al­most quite sober.

He al­ways made his own break­fast. Be­ing a man who rose early and had plenty of time he did not, as some miners do, drag his wife out of bed at six o’clock. At five, some­times earlier, he woke, got straight out of bed, and went down­stairs. When she could not sleep, his wife lay wait­ing for this time, as for a period of peace. The only real rest seemed to be when he was out of the house.

He went down­stairs in his shirt and then struggled into his pit-trousers, which were left on the hearth to warm all night. There was al­ways a fire, be­cause Mrs. Morel raked. And the first sound in the house was the bang, bang of the poker against the raker, as Morel smashed the re­mainder of the coal to make the kettle, which was filled and left on the hob, fi­nally boil. His cup and knife and fork, all he wanted ex­cept just the food, was laid ready on the table on a news­pa­per. Then he got his break­fast, made the tea, packed the bot­tom of the doors with rugs to shut out the draught, piled a big fire, and sat down to an hour of joy. He toasted his ba­con on a fork and caught the drops of fat on his bread; then he put the rasher on his thick slice of bread, and cut off chunks with a clasp-knife, poured his tea into his sau­cer, and was happy. With his fam­ily about, meals were never so pleas­ant. He loathed a fork: it is a mod­ern in­tro­duc­tion which has still scarcely reached com­mon people. What Morel pre­ferred was a clasp-knife. Then, in solitude, he ate and drank, of­ten sit­ting, in cold weather, on a little stool with his back to the warm chim­neypiece, his food on the fender, his cup on the hearth. And then he read the last night’s news­pa­per—what of it he could—spelling it over la­bor­i­ously. He pre­ferred to keep the blinds down and the candle lit even when it was day­light; it was the habit of the mine.

At a quarter to six he rose, cut two thick slices of bread and but­ter, and put them in the white calico snap-bag. He filled his tin bottle with tea. Cold tea without milk or sugar was the drink he pre­ferred for the pit. Then he pulled off his shirt, and put on his pit-sing­let, a vest of thick flan­nel cut low round the neck, and with short sleeves like a chemise.

Then he went up­stairs to his wife with a cup of tea be­cause she was ill, and be­cause it oc­curred to him.

“I’ve brought thee a cup o’ tea, lass,” he said.

“Well, you needn’t, for you know I don’t like it,” she replied.

“Drink it up; it’ll pop thee off to sleep again.”

She ac­cep­ted the tea. It pleased him to see her take it and sip it.

“I’ll back my life there’s no sugar in,” she said.

“Yi—there’s one big ’un,” he replied, in­jured.

“It’s a won­der,” she said, sip­ping again.

She had a win­some face when her hair was loose. He loved her to grumble at him in this man­ner. He looked at her again, and went, without any sort of leave-tak­ing. He never took more than two slices of bread and but­ter to eat in the pit, so an apple or an or­ange was a treat to him. He al­ways liked it when she put one out for him. He tied a scarf round his neck, put on his great, heavy boots, his coat, with the big pocket, that car­ried his snap-bag and his bottle of tea, and went forth into the fresh morn­ing air, clos­ing, without lock­ing, the door be­hind him. He loved the early morn­ing, and the walk across the fields. So he ap­peared at the pit-top, of­ten with a stalk from the hedge between his teeth, which he chewed all day to keep his mouth moist, down the mine, feel­ing quite as happy as when he was in the field.

Later, when the time for the baby grew nearer, he would bustle round in his slov­enly fash­ion, pok­ing out the ashes, rub­bing the fire­place, sweep­ing the house be­fore he went to work. Then, feel­ing very self-right­eous, he went up­stairs.

“Now I’m cleaned up for thee: tha’s no ’ca­sions ter stir a peg all day, but sit and read thy books.”

Which made her laugh, in spite of her in­dig­na­tion.

“And the din­ner cooks it­self?” she answered.

“Eh, I know nowt about th’ din­ner.”

“You’d know if there weren’t any.”

“Ay, ’ap­pen so,” he answered, de­part­ing.

When she got down­stairs, she would find the house tidy, but dirty. She could not rest un­til she had thor­oughly cleaned; so she went down to the ash-pit with her dust­pan. Mrs. Kirk, spy­ing her, would con­trive to have to go to her own coal-place at that minute. Then, across the wooden fence, she would call:

“So you keep wag­ging on, then?”

“Ay,” answered Mrs. Morel de­prec­at­ingly. “There’s noth­ing else for it.”

“Have you seen Hose?” called a very small wo­man from across the road. It was Mrs. Anthony, a black-haired, strange little body, who al­ways wore a brown vel­vet dress, tight fit­ting.

“I haven’t,” said Mrs. Morel.

“Eh, I wish he’d come. I’ve got a cop­per­ful of clothes, an’ I’m sure I heered his bell.”

“Hark! He’s at the end.”

The two wo­men looked down the al­ley. At the end of the Bot­toms a man stood in a sort of old-fash­ioned trap, bend­ing over bundles of cream-col­oured stuff; while a cluster of wo­men held up their arms to him, some with bundles. Mrs. Anthony her­self had a heap of creamy, un­dyed stock­ings hanging over her arm.

“I’ve done ten dozen this week,” she said proudly to Mrs. Morel.

“T-t-t!” went the other. “I don’t know how you can find time.”

“Eh!” said Mrs. Anthony. “You can find time if you make time.”

“I don’t know how you do it,” said Mrs. Morel. “And how much shall you get for those many?”

“Tup­pence-ha’penny a dozen,” replied the other.

“Well,” said Mrs. Morel. “I’d starve be­fore I’d sit down and seam twenty-four stock­ings for two­pence ha’penny.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Mrs. Anthony. “You can rip along with ’em.”

Hose was com­ing along, ringing his bell. Wo­men were wait­ing at the yard-ends with their seamed stock­ings hanging over their arms. The man, a com­mon fel­low, made jokes with them, tried to swindle them, and bul­lied them. Mrs. Morel went up her yard dis­dain­fully.

It was an un­der­stood thing that if one wo­man wanted her neigh­bour, she should put the poker in the fire and bang at the back of the fire­place, which, as the fires were back to back, would make a great noise in the ad­join­ing house. One morn­ing Mrs. Kirk, mix­ing a pud­ding, nearly star­ted out of her skin as she heard the thud, thud, in her grate. With her hands all floury, she rushed to the fence.

“Did you knock, Mrs. Morel?”

“If you wouldn’t mind, Mrs. Kirk.”

Mrs. Kirk climbed on to her cop­per, got over the wall on to Mrs. Morel’s cop­per, and ran in to her neigh­bour.

“Eh, dear, how are you feel­ing?” she cried in con­cern.

“You might fetch Mrs. Bower,” said Mrs. Morel.

Mrs. Kirk went into the yard, lif­ted up her strong, shrill voice, and called:

“Ag-gie—Ag-gie!”

The sound was heard from one end of the Bot­toms to the other. At last Ag­gie came run­ning up, and was sent for Mrs. Bower, whilst Mrs. Kirk left her pud­ding and stayed with her neigh­bour.

Mrs. Morel went to bed. Mrs. Kirk had An­nie and Wil­liam for din­ner. Mrs. Bower, fat and wad­dling, bossed the house.

“Hash some cold meat up for the mas­ter’s din­ner, and make him an apple-char­lotte pud­ding,” said Mrs. Morel.

“He may go without pud­ding this day,” said Mrs. Bower.

Morel was not as a rule one of the first to ap­pear at the bot­tom of the pit, ready to come up. Some men were there be­fore four o’clock, when the whistle blew loose-all; but Morel, whose stall, a poor one, was at this time about a mile and a half away from the bot­tom, worked usu­ally till the first mate stopped, then he fin­ished also. This day, how­ever, the miner was sick of the work. At two o’clock he looked at his watch, by the light of the green candle—he was in a safe work­ing—and again at half-past two. He was hew­ing at a piece of rock that was in the way for the next day’s work. As he sat on his heels, or kneeled, giv­ing hard blows with his pick, “Uszza—uszza!” he went.

“Shall ter fin­ish, Sorry?”1 cried Barker, his fel­low butty.

“Fin­ish? Niver while the world stands!” growled Morel.

And he went on strik­ing. He was tired.

“It’s a heart­break­ing job,” said Barker.

But Morel was too ex­as­per­ated, at the end of his tether, to an­swer. Still he struck and hacked with all his might.

“Tha might as well leave it, Wal­ter,” said Barker. “It’ll do to­mor­row, without thee hackin’ thy guts out.”

“I’ll lay no b—— fin­ger on this to­mor­row, Isr’el!” cried Morel.

“Oh, well, if tha wunna, some­body else’ll ha’e to,” said Is­rael.

Then Morel con­tin­ued to strike.

“Hey-up there—loose-a’!” cried the men, leav­ing the next stall.

Morel con­tin­ued to strike.

“Tha’ll hap­pen catch me up,” said Barker, de­part­ing.

When he had gone, Morel, left alone, felt sav­age. He had not fin­ished his job. He had over­worked him­self into a frenzy. Rising, wet with sweat, he threw his tool down, pulled on his coat, blew out his candle, took his lamp, and went. Down the main road the lights of the other men went swinging. There was a hol­low sound of many voices. It was a long, heavy tramp un­der­ground.

He sat at the bot­tom of the pit, where the great drops of wa­ter fell plash. Many col­li­ers were wait­ing their turns to go up, talk­ing nois­ily. Morel gave his an­swers short and dis­agree­able.

“It’s rainin’, Sorry,” said old Giles, who had had the news from the top.

Morel found one com­fort. He had his old um­brella, which he loved, in the lamp cabin. At last he took his stand on the chair, and was at the top in a mo­ment. Then he handed in his lamp and got his um­brella, which he had bought at an auc­tion for one-and-six. He stood on the edge of the pit-bank for a mo­ment, look­ing out over the fields; grey rain was fall­ing. The trucks stood full of wet, bright coal. Water ran down the sides of the wag­ons, over the white “C. W. and Co.” Col­li­ers, walk­ing in­dif­fer­ent to the rain, were stream­ing down the line and up the field, a grey, dis­mal host. Morel put up his um­brella, and took pleas­ure from the pep­per­ing of the drops thereon.

All along the road to Best­wood the miners tramped, wet and grey and dirty, but their red mouths talk­ing with an­im­a­tion. Morel also walked with a gang, but he said noth­ing. He frowned peev­ishly as he went. Many men passed into the Prince of Wales or into El­len’s. Morel, feel­ing suf­fi­ciently dis­agree­able to res­ist tempta­tion, trudged along un­der the drip­ping trees that over­hung the park wall, and down the mud of Green­hill Lane.

Mrs. Morel lay in bed, listen­ing to the rain, and the feet of the col­li­ers from Min­ton, their voices, and the bang, bang of the gates as they went through the stile up the field.

“There’s some herb beer be­hind the pantry door,” she said. “Th’ mas­ter’ll want a drink, if he doesn’t stop.”

But he was late, so she con­cluded he had called for a drink, since it was rain­ing. What did he care about the child or her?

She was very ill when her chil­dren were born.

“What is it?” she asked, feel­ing sick to death.

“A boy.”

And she took con­sol­a­tion in that. The thought of be­ing the mother of men was warm­ing to her heart. She looked at the child. It had blue eyes, and a lot of fair hair, and was bonny. Her love came up hot, in spite of everything. She had it in bed with her.

Morel, think­ing noth­ing, dragged his way up the garden path, wear­ily and an­grily. He closed his um­brella, and stood it in the sink; then he sluthered his heavy boots into the kit­chen. Mrs. Bower ap­peared in the in­ner door­way.

“Well,” she said, “she’s about as bad as she can be. It’s a boy childt.”

The miner grunted, put his empty snap-bag and his tin bottle on the dresser, went back into the scull­ery and hung up his coat, then came and dropped into his chair.

“Han yer got a drink?” he asked.

The wo­man went into the pantry. There was heard the pop of a cork. She set the mug, with a little, dis­gus­ted rap, on the table be­fore Morel. He drank, gasped, wiped his big mous­tache on the end of his scarf, drank, gasped, and lay back in his chair. The wo­man would not speak to him again. She set his din­ner be­fore him, and went up­stairs.

“Was that the mas­ter?” asked Mrs. Morel.

“I’ve gave him his din­ner,” replied Mrs. Bower.

After he had sat with his arms on the table—he re­sen­ted the fact that Mrs. Bower put no cloth on for him, and gave him a little plate, in­stead of a full-sized din­ner-plate—he began to eat. The fact that his wife was ill, that he had an­other boy, was noth­ing to him at that mo­ment. He was too tired; he wanted his din­ner; he wanted to sit with his arms ly­ing on the board; he did not like hav­ing Mrs. Bower about. The fire was too small to please him.

After he had fin­ished his meal, he sat for twenty minutes; then he stoked up a big fire. Then, in his stockinged feet, he went re­luct­antly up­stairs. It was a struggle to face his wife at this mo­ment, and he was tired. His face was black, and smeared with sweat. His sing­let had dried again, soak­ing the dirt in. He had a dirty wool­len scarf round his throat. So he stood at the foot of the bed.

“Well, how are ter, then?” he asked.

“I s’ll be all right,” she answered.

“H’m!”

He stood at a loss what to say next. He was tired, and this bother was rather a nuis­ance to him, and he didn’t quite know where he was.

“A lad, tha says,” he stammered.

She turned down the sheet and showed the child.

“Bless him!” he mur­mured. Which made her laugh, be­cause he blessed by rote—pre­tend­ing pa­ternal emo­tion, which he did not feel just then.

“Go now,” she said.

“I will, my lass,” he answered, turn­ing away.

Dis­missed, he wanted to kiss her, but he dared not. She half wanted him to kiss her, but could not bring her­self to give any sign. She only breathed freely when he was gone out of the room again, leav­ing be­hind him a faint smell of pit-dirt.

Mrs. Morel had a visit every day from the Con­greg­a­tional cler­gy­man. Mr. Heaton was young, and very poor. His wife had died at the birth of his first baby, so he re­mained alone in the manse. He was a Bach­elor of Arts of Cam­bridge, very shy, and no preacher. Mrs. Morel was fond of him, and he de­pended on her. For hours he talked to her, when she was well. He be­came the god­par­ent of the child.

Oc­ca­sion­ally the min­is­ter stayed to tea with Mrs. Morel. Then she laid the cloth early, got out her best cups, with a little green rim, and hoped Morel would not come too soon; in­deed, if he stayed for a pint, she would not mind this day. She had al­ways two din­ners to cook, be­cause she be­lieved chil­dren should have their chief meal at mid­day, whereas Morel needed his at five o’clock. So Mr. Heaton would hold the baby, whilst Mrs. Morel beat up a bat­ter-pud­ding or peeled the pota­toes, and he, watch­ing her all the time, would dis­cuss his next ser­mon. His ideas were quaint and fant­astic. She brought him ju­di­ciously to earth. It was a dis­cus­sion of the wed­ding at Cana.

“When He changed the wa­ter into wine at Cana,” he said, “that is a sym­bol that the or­din­ary life, even the blood, of the mar­ried hus­band and wife, which had be­fore been un­in­spired, like wa­ter, be­came filled with the Spirit, and was as wine, be­cause, when love enters, the whole spir­itual con­sti­tu­tion of a man changes, is filled with the Holy Ghost, and al­most his form is altered.”

Mrs. Morel thought to her­self:

“Yes, poor fel­low, his young wife is dead; that is why he makes his love into the Holy Ghost.”

They were halfway down their first cup of tea when they heard the sluther of pit-boots.

“Good gra­cious!” ex­claimed Mrs. Morel, in spite of her­self.

The min­is­ter looked rather scared. Morel entered. He was feel­ing rather sav­age. He nod­ded a “How d’yer do” to the cler­gy­man, who rose to shake hands with him.

“Nay,” said Morel, show­ing his hand, “look thee at it! Tha niver wants ter shake hands wi’ a hand like that, does ter? There’s too much pick-haft and shovel-dirt on it.”

The min­is­ter flushed with con­fu­sion, and sat down again. Mrs. Morel rose, car­ried out the steam­ing sauce­pan. Morel took off his coat, dragged his arm­chair to table, and sat down heav­ily.

“Are you tired?” asked the cler­gy­man.

“Tired? I ham that,” replied Morel. “you don’t know what it is to be tired, as I’m tired.”

“No,” replied the cler­gy­man.

“Why, look yer ’ere,” said the miner, show­ing the shoulders of his sing­let. “It’s a bit dry now, but it’s wet as a clout with sweat even yet. Feel it.”

“Good­ness!” cried Mrs. Morel. “Mr. Heaton doesn’t want to feel your nasty sing­let.”

The cler­gy­man put out his hand gingerly.

“No, per­haps he doesn’t,” said Morel; “but it’s all come out of me, whether or not. An’ iv’ry day alike my sing­let’s wringin’ wet. ’Aven’t you got a drink, Mis­sis, for a man when he comes home barkled up from the pit?”

“You know you drank all the beer,” said Mrs. Morel, pour­ing out his tea.

“An’ was there no more to be got?” Turn­ing to the cler­gy­man—“A man gets that caked up wi’ th’ dust, you know—that clogged up down a coal-mine, he needs a drink when he comes home.”

“I am sure he does,” said the cler­gy­man.

“But it’s ten to one if there’s owt for him.”

“There’s wa­ter—and there’s tea,” said Mrs. Morel.

“Water! It’s not wa­ter as’ll clear his throat.”

He poured out a sau­cer­ful of tea, blew it, and sucked it up through his great black mous­tache, sigh­ing af­ter­wards. Then he poured out an­other sau­cer­ful, and stood his cup on the table.

“My cloth!” said Mrs. Morel, put­ting it on a plate.

“A man as comes home as I do ’s too tired to care about cloths,” said Morel.

“Pity!” ex­claimed his wife, sar­castic­ally.

The room was full of the smell of meat and ve­get­ables and pit-clothes.

He leaned over to the min­is­ter, his great mous­tache thrust for­ward, his mouth very red in his black face.

“Mr. Heaton,” he said, “a man as has been down the black hole all day, din­gin’ away at a coal­face, yi, a sight harder than that wall—”

“Needn’t make a moan of it,” put in Mrs. Morel.

She hated her hus­band be­cause, whenever he had an audi­ence, he whined and played for sym­pathy. Wil­liam, sit­ting nurs­ing the baby, hated him, with a boy’s hatred for false sen­ti­ment, and for the stu­pid treat­ment of his mother. An­nie had never liked him; she merely avoided him.

When the min­is­ter had gone, Mrs. Morel looked at her cloth.

“A fine mess!” she said.

“Dos’t think I’m goin’ to sit wi’ my arms danglin’, cos tha’s got a par­son for tea wi’ thee?” he bawled.

They were both angry, but she said noth­ing. The baby began to cry, and Mrs. Morel, pick­ing up a sauce­pan from the hearth, ac­ci­dent­ally knocked An­nie on the head, whereupon the girl began to whine, and Morel to shout at her. In the midst of this pan­de­monium, Wil­liam looked up at the big glazed text over the man­tel­piece and read dis­tinctly:

“God Bless Our Home!”

Whereupon Mrs. Morel, try­ing to soothe the baby, jumped up, rushed at him, boxed his ears, say­ing:

“What are you put­ting in for?”

And then she sat down and laughed, till tears ran over her cheeks, while Wil­liam kicked the stool he had been sit­ting on, and Morel growled:

“I canna see what there is so much to laugh at.”

One even­ing, dir­ectly after the par­son’s visit, feel­ing un­able to bear her­self after an­other dis­play from her hus­band, she took An­nie and the baby and went out. Morel had kicked Wil­liam, and the mother would never for­give him.

She went over the sheep-bridge and across a corner of the meadow to the cricket-ground. The mead­ows seemed one space of ripe, even­ing light, whis­per­ing with the dis­tant millrace. She sat on a seat un­der the alders in the cricket-ground, and fron­ted the even­ing. Be­fore her, level and solid, spread the big green cricket-field, like the bed of a sea of light. Chil­dren played in the blu­ish shadow of the pa­vil­ion. Many rooks, high up, came caw­ing home across the softly-woven sky. They stooped in a long curve down into the golden glow, con­cen­trat­ing, caw­ing, wheel­ing, like black flakes on a slow vor­tex, over a tree clump that made a dark boss among the pas­ture.

A few gen­tle­men were prac­tising, and Mrs. Morel could hear the chock of the ball, and the voices of men sud­denly roused; could see the white forms of men shift­ing si­lently over the green, upon which already the un­der shad­ows were smoul­der­ing. Away at the grange, one side of the hay­stacks was lit up, the other sides blue-grey. A wagon of sheaves rocked small across the melt­ing yel­low light.

The sun was go­ing down. Every open even­ing, the hills of Derby­shire were blazed over with red sun­set. Mrs. Morel watched the sun sink from the glisten­ing sky, leav­ing a soft flower-blue over­head, while the west­ern space went red, as if all the fire had swum down there, leav­ing the bell cast flaw­less blue. The moun­tain-ash ber­ries across the field stood fier­ily out from the dark leaves, for a mo­ment. A few shocks of corn in a corner of the fal­low stood up as if alive; she ima­gined them bow­ing; per­haps her son would be a Joseph. In the east, a mirrored sun­set floated pink op­pos­ite the west’s scar­let. The big hay­stacks on the hill­side, that but­ted into the glare, went cold.

With Mrs. Morel it was one of those still mo­ments when the small frets van­ish, and the beauty of things stands out, and she had the peace and the strength to see her­self. Now and again, a swal­low cut close to her. Now and again, An­nie came up with a hand­ful of alder-cur­rants. The baby was rest­less on his mother’s knee, clam­ber­ing with his hands at the light.

Mrs. Morel looked down at him. She had dreaded this baby like a cata­strophe, be­cause of her feel­ing for her hus­band. And now she felt strangely to­wards the in­fant. Her heart was heavy be­cause of the child, al­most as if it were un­healthy, or mal­formed. Yet it seemed quite well. But she no­ticed the pe­cu­liar knit­ting of the baby’s brows, and the pe­cu­liar heav­i­ness of its eyes, as if it were try­ing to un­der­stand some­thing that was pain. She felt, when she looked at her child’s dark, brood­ing pu­pils, as if a bur­den were on her heart.

“He looks as if he was think­ing about some­thing—quite sor­row­ful,” said Mrs. Kirk.

Sud­denly, look­ing at him, the heavy feel­ing at the mother’s heart melted into pas­sion­ate grief. She bowed over him, and a few tears shook swiftly out of her very heart. The baby lif­ted his fin­gers.

“My lamb!” she cried softly.

And at that mo­ment she felt, in some far in­ner place of her soul, that she and her hus­band were guilty.

The baby was look­ing up at her. It had blue eyes like her own, but its look was heavy, steady, as if it had real­ised some­thing that had stunned some point of its soul.

In her arms lay the del­ic­ate baby. Its deep blue eyes, al­ways look­ing up at her un­blink­ing, seemed to draw her in­ner­most thoughts out of her. She no longer loved her hus­band; she had not wanted this child to come, and there it lay in her arms and pulled at her heart. She felt as if the na­vel string that had con­nec­ted its frail little body with hers had not been broken. A wave of hot love went over her to the in­fant. She held it close to her face and breast. With all her force, with all her soul she would make up to it for hav­ing brought it into the world un­loved. She would love it all the more now it was here; carry it in her love. Its clear, know­ing eyes gave her pain and fear. Did it know all about her? When it lay un­der her heart, had it been listen­ing then? Was there a re­proach in the look? She felt the mar­row melt in her bones, with fear and pain.

Once more she was aware of the sun ly­ing red on the rim of the hill op­pos­ite. She sud­denly held up the child in her hands.

“Look!” she said. “Look, my pretty!”

She thrust the in­fant for­ward to the crim­son, throb­bing sun, al­most with re­lief. She saw him lift his little fist. Then she put him to her bosom again, ashamed al­most of her im­pulse to give him back again whence he came.

“If he lives,” she thought to her­self, “what will be­come of him—what will he be?”

Her heart was anxious.

“I will call him Paul,” she said sud­denly; she knew not why.

After a while she went home. A fine shadow was flung over the deep green meadow, dark­en­ing all.

As she ex­pec­ted, she found the house empty. But Morel was home by ten o’clock, and that day, at least, ended peace­fully.

Wal­ter Morel was, at this time, ex­ceed­ingly ir­rit­able. His work seemed to ex­haust him. When he came home he did not speak civilly to any­body. If the fire were rather low he bul­lied about that; he grumbled about his din­ner; if the chil­dren made a chat­ter he shouted at them in a way that made their mother’s blood boil, and made them hate him.

On the Fri­day, he was not home by el­even o’clock. The baby was un­well, and was rest­less, cry­ing if he were put down. Mrs. Morel, tired to death, and still weak, was scarcely un­der con­trol.

“I wish the nuis­ance would come,” she said wear­ily to her­self.

The child at last sank down to sleep in her arms. She was too tired to carry him to the cradle.

“But I’ll say noth­ing, whatever time he comes,” she said. “It only works me up; I won’t say any­thing. But I know if he does any­thing it’ll make my blood boil,” she ad­ded to her­self.

She sighed, hear­ing him com­ing, as if it were some­thing she could not bear. He, tak­ing his re­venge, was nearly drunk. She kept her head bent over the child as he entered, not wish­ing to see him. But it went through her like a flash of hot fire when, in passing, he lurched against the dresser, set­ting the tins rat­tling, and clutched at the white pot knobs for sup­port. He hung up his hat and coat, then re­turned, stood glower­ing from a dis­tance at her, as she sat bowed over the child.

“Is there noth­ing to eat in the house?” he asked, in­solently, as if to a ser­vant. In cer­tain stages of his in­tox­ic­a­tion he af­fected the clipped, min­cing speech of the towns. Mrs. Morel hated him most in this con­di­tion.

“You know what there is in the house,” she said, so coldly, it soun­ded im­per­sonal.

He stood and glared at her without mov­ing a muscle.

“I asked a civil ques­tion, and I ex­pect a civil an­swer,” he said af­fectedly.

“And you got it,” she said, still ig­nor­ing him.

He glowered again. Then he came un­stead­ily for­ward. He leaned on the table with one hand, and with the other jerked at the table drawer to get a knife to cut bread. The drawer stuck be­cause he pulled side­ways. In a tem­per he dragged it, so that it flew out bod­ily, and spoons, forks, knives, a hun­dred metal­lic things, splashed with a clat­ter and a clang upon the brick floor. The baby gave a little con­vulsed start.

“What are you do­ing, clumsy, drunken fool?” the mother cried.

“Then tha should get the flamin’ thing thysen. Tha should get up, like other wo­men have to, an’ wait on a man.”

“Wait on you—wait on you?” she cried. “Yes, I see my­self.”

“Yis, an’ I’ll learn thee tha’s got to. Wait on me, yes tha sh’lt wait on me—”

“Never, mi­lord. I’d wait on a dog at the door first.”

“What—what?”

He was try­ing to fit in the drawer. At her last speech he turned round. His face was crim­son, his eyes blood­shot. He stared at her one si­lent second in threat.

“P-h!” she went quickly, in con­tempt.

He jerked at the drawer in his ex­cite­ment. It fell, cut sharply on his shin, and on the re­flex he flung it at her.

One of the corners caught her brow as the shal­low drawer crashed into the fire­place. She swayed, al­most fell stunned from her chair. To her very soul she was sick; she clasped the child tightly to her bosom. A few mo­ments elapsed; then, with an ef­fort, she brought her­self to. The baby was cry­ing plaint­ively. Her left brow was bleed­ing rather pro­fusely. As she glanced down at the child, her brain reel­ing, some drops of blood soaked into its white shawl; but the baby was at least not hurt. She bal­anced her head to keep equi­lib­rium, so that the blood ran into her eye.

Wal­ter Morel re­mained as he had stood, lean­ing on the table with one hand, look­ing blank. When he was suf­fi­ciently sure of his bal­ance, he went across to her, swayed, caught hold of the back of her rock­ing-chair, al­most tip­ping her out; then lean­ing for­ward over her, and sway­ing as he spoke, he said, in a tone of won­der­ing con­cern:

“Did it catch thee?”

He swayed again, as if he would pitch on to the child. With the cata­strophe he had lost all bal­ance.

“Go away,” she said, strug­gling to keep her pres­ence of mind.

He hic­coughed. “Let’s—let’s look at it,” he said, hic­cough­ing again.

“Go away!” she cried.

“Lemme—lemme look at it, lass.”

She smelled him of drink, felt the un­equal pull of his sway­ing grasp on the back of her rock­ing-chair.

“Go away,” she said, and weakly she pushed him off.

He stood, un­cer­tain in bal­ance, gaz­ing upon her. Sum­mon­ing all her strength she rose, the baby on one arm. By a cruel ef­fort of will, mov­ing as if in sleep, she went across to the scull­ery, where she bathed her eye for a minute in cold wa­ter; but she was too dizzy. Afraid lest she should swoon, she re­turned to her rock­ing-chair, trem­bling in every fibre. By in­stinct, she kept the baby clasped.

Morel, bothered, had suc­ceeded in push­ing the drawer back into its cav­ity, and was on his knees, grop­ing, with numb paws, for the scattered spoons.

Her brow was still bleed­ing. Presently Morel got up and came cran­ing his neck to­wards her.

“What has it done to thee, lass?” he asked, in a very wretched, humble tone.

“You can see what it’s done,” she answered.

He stood, bend­ing for­ward, sup­por­ted on his hands, which grasped his legs just above the knee. He peered to look at the wound. She drew away from the thrust of his face with its great mous­tache, avert­ing her own face as much as pos­sible. As he looked at her, who was cold and im­pass­ive as stone, with mouth shut tight, he sickened with feeble­ness and hope­less­ness of spirit. He was turn­ing drear­ily away, when he saw a drop of blood fall from the aver­ted wound into the baby’s fra­gile, glisten­ing hair. Fas­cin­ated, he watched the heavy dark drop hang in the glisten­ing cloud, and pull down the gos­samer. Another drop fell. It would soak through to the baby’s scalp. He watched, fas­cin­ated, feel­ing it soak in; then, fi­nally, his man­hood broke.

“What of this child?” was all his wife said to him. But her low, in­tense tones brought his head lower. She softened: “Get me some wad­ding out of the middle drawer,” she said.

He stumbled away very obed­i­ently, presently re­turn­ing with a pad, which she singed be­fore the fire, then put on her fore­head, as she sat with the baby on her lap.

“Now that clean pit-scarf.”

Again he rum­maged and fumbled in the drawer, re­turn­ing presently with a red, nar­row scarf. She took it, and with trem­bling fin­gers pro­ceeded to bind it round her head.

“Let me tie it for thee,” he said humbly.

“I can do it my­self,” she replied. When it was done she went up­stairs, telling him to rake the fire and lock the door.

In the morn­ing Mrs. Morel said:

“I knocked against the latch of the coal-place, when I was get­ting a raker in the dark, be­cause the candle blew out.” Her two small chil­dren looked up at her with wide, dis­mayed eyes. They said noth­ing, but their par­ted lips seemed to ex­press the un­con­scious tragedy they felt.

Wal­ter Morel lay in bed next day un­til nearly din­ner­time. He did not think of the pre­vi­ous even­ing’s work. He scarcely thought of any­thing, but he would not think of that. He lay and suffered like a sulk­ing dog. He had hurt him­self most; and he was the more dam­aged be­cause he would never say a word to her, or ex­press his sor­row. He tried to wriggle out of it. “It was her own fault,” he said to him­self. Noth­ing, how­ever, could pre­vent his in­ner con­scious­ness in­flict­ing on him the pun­ish­ment which ate into his spirit like rust, and which he could only al­le­vi­ate by drink­ing.

He felt as if he had not the ini­ti­at­ive to get up, or to say a word, or to move, but could only lie like a log. Moreover, he had him­self vi­ol­ent pains in the head. It was Saturday. Towards noon he rose, cut him­self food in the pantry, ate it with his head dropped, then pulled on his boots, and went out, to re­turn at three o’clock slightly tipsy and re­lieved; then once more straight to bed. He rose again at six in the even­ing, had tea and went straight out.

Sunday was the same: bed till noon, the Palmer­ston Arms till 2:30, din­ner, and bed; scarcely a word spoken. When Mrs. Morel went up­stairs, to­wards four o’clock, to put on her Sunday dress, he was fast asleep. She would have felt sorry for him, if he had once said, “Wife, I’m sorry.” But no; he in­sisted to him­self it was her fault. And so he broke him­self. So she merely left him alone. There was this dead­lock of pas­sion between them, and she was stronger.

The fam­ily began tea. Sunday was the only day when all sat down to meals to­gether.

“Isn’t my father go­ing to get up?” asked Wil­liam.

“Let him lie,” the mother replied.

There was a feel­ing of misery over all the house. The chil­dren breathed the air that was poisoned, and they felt dreary. They were rather dis­con­sol­ate, did not know what to do, what to play at.

Im­me­di­ately Morel woke he got straight out of bed. That was char­ac­ter­istic of him all his life. He was all for activ­ity. The pros­trated in­activ­ity of two morn­ings was stifling him.

It was near six o’clock when he got down. This time he entered without hes­it­a­tion, his win­cing sens­it­ive­ness hav­ing hardened again. He did not care any longer what the fam­ily thought or felt.

The tea-things were on the table. Wil­liam was read­ing aloud from The Child’s Own, An­nie listen­ing and ask­ing etern­ally “why?” Both chil­dren hushed into si­lence as they heard the ap­proach­ing thud of their father’s stockinged feet, and shrank as he entered. Yet he was usu­ally in­dul­gent to them.

Morel made the meal alone, bru­tally. He ate and drank more nois­ily than he had need. No one spoke to him. The fam­ily life with­drew, shrank away, and be­came hushed as he entered. But he cared no longer about his ali­en­a­tion.

Im­me­di­ately he had fin­ished tea he rose with alac­rity to go out. It was this alac­rity, this haste to be gone, which so sickened Mrs. Morel. As she heard him sous­ing heart­ily in cold wa­ter, heard the eager scratch of the steel comb on the side of the bowl, as he wet­ted his hair, she closed her eyes in dis­gust. As he bent over, la­cing his boots, there was a cer­tain vul­gar gusto in his move­ment that di­vided him from the re­served, watch­ful rest of the fam­ily. He al­ways ran away from the battle with him­self. Even in his own heart’s pri­vacy, he ex­cused him­self, say­ing, “If she hadn’t said so-and-so, it would never have happened. She asked for what she’s got.” The chil­dren waited in re­straint dur­ing his pre­par­a­tions. When he had gone, they sighed with re­lief.

He closed the door be­hind him, and was glad. It was a rainy even­ing. The Palmer­ston would be the co­sier. He hastened for­ward in an­ti­cip­a­tion. All the slate roofs of the Bot­toms shone black with wet. The roads, al­ways dark with coal-dust, were full of black­ish mud. He hastened along. The Palmer­ston win­dows were steamed over. The pas­sage was paddled with wet feet. But the air was warm, if foul, and full of the sound of voices and the smell of beer and smoke.

“What shollt ha’e, Wal­ter?” cried a voice, as soon as Morel ap­peared in the door­way.

“Oh, Jim, my lad, whe­river has thee sprung frae?”

The men made a seat for him, and took him in warmly. He was glad. In a minute or two they had thawed all re­spons­ib­il­ity out of him, all shame, all trouble, and he was clear as a bell for a jolly night.

On the Wed­nes­day fol­low­ing, Morel was pen­ni­less. He dreaded his wife. Hav­ing hurt her, he hated her. He did not know what to do with him­self that even­ing, hav­ing not even two­pence with which to go to the Palmer­ston, and be­ing already rather deeply in debt. So, while his wife was down the garden with the child, he hunted in the top drawer of the dresser where she kept her purse, found it, and looked in­side. It con­tained a half-crown, two half­pen­nies, and a six­pence. So he took the six­pence, put the purse care­fully back, and went out.

The next day, when she wanted to pay the green­gro­cer, she looked in the purse for her six­pence, and her heart sank to her shoes. Then she sat down and thought: “Was there a six­pence? I hadn’t spent it, had I? And I hadn’t left it any­where else?”

She was much put about. She hunted round every­where for it. And, as she sought, the con­vic­tion came into her heart that her hus­band had taken it. What she had in her purse was all the money she pos­sessed. But that he should sneak it from her thus was un­bear­able. He had done so twice be­fore. The first time she had not ac­cused him, and at the week­end he had put the shil­ling again into her purse. So that was how she had known he had taken it. The second time he had not paid back.

This time she felt it was too much. When he had had his din­ner—he came home early that day—she said to him coldly:

“Did you take six­pence out of my purse last night?”

“Me!” he said, look­ing up in an of­fen­ded way. “No, I didna! I niver clapped eyes on your purse.”

But she could de­tect the lie.

“Why, you know you did,” she said quietly.

“I tell you I didna,” he shouted. “Yer at me again, are yer? I’ve had about enough on’t.”

“So you filch six­pence out of my purse while I’m tak­ing the clothes in.”

“I’ll may yer pay for this,” he said, push­ing back his chair in des­per­a­tion. He bustled and got washed, then went de­term­inedly up­stairs. Presently he came down dressed, and with a big bundle in a blue-checked, enorm­ous handker­chief.

“And now,” he said, “you’ll see me again when you do.”

“It’ll be be­fore I want to,” she replied; and at that he marched out of the house with his bundle. She sat trem­bling slightly, but her heart brim­ming with con­tempt. What would she do if he went to some other pit, ob­tained work, and got in with an­other wo­man? But she knew him too well—he couldn’t. She was dead sure of him. Never­the­less her heart was gnawed in­side her.

“Where’s my dad?” said Wil­liam, com­ing in from school.

“He says he’s run away,” replied the mother.

“Where to?”

“Eh, I don’t know. He’s taken a bundle in the blue handker­chief, and says he’s not com­ing back.”

“What shall we do?” cried the boy.

“Eh, never trouble, he won’t go far.”

“But if he doesn’t come back,” wailed An­nie.

And she and Wil­liam re­tired to the sofa and wept. Mrs. Morel sat and laughed.

“You pair of gabeys!” she ex­claimed. “You’ll see him be­fore the night’s out.”

But the chil­dren were not to be con­soled. Twilight came on. Mrs. Morel grew anxious from very wear­i­ness. One part of her said it would be a re­lief to see the last of him; an­other part fret­ted be­cause of keep­ing the chil­dren; and in­side her, as yet, she could not quite let him go. At the bot­tom, she knew very well he could not go.

When she went down to the coal-place at the end of the garden, how­ever, she felt some­thing be­hind the door. So she looked. And there in the dark lay the big blue bundle. She sat on a piece of coal and laughed. Every time she saw it, so fat and yet so ig­no­mini­ous, slunk into its corner in the dark, with its ends flop­ping like de­jec­ted ears from the knots, she laughed again. She was re­lieved.

Mrs. Morel sat wait­ing. He had not any money, she knew, so if he stopped he was run­ning up a bill. She was very tired of him—tired to death. He had not even the cour­age to carry his bundle bey­ond the yard-end.

As she med­it­ated, at about nine o’clock, he opened the door and came in, slink­ing, and yet sulky. She said not a word. He took off his coat, and slunk to his arm­chair, where he began to take off his boots.

“You’d bet­ter fetch your bundle be­fore you take your boots off,” she said quietly.

“You may thank your stars I’ve come back to­night,” he said, look­ing up from un­der his dropped head, sulkily, try­ing to be im­press­ive.

“Why, where should you have gone? You daren’t even get your par­cel through the yard-end,” she said.

He looked such a fool she was not even angry with him. He con­tin­ued to take his boots off and pre­pare for bed.

“I don’t know what’s in your blue handker­chief,” she said. “But if you leave it the chil­dren shall fetch it in the morn­ing.”

Whereupon he got up and went out of the house, re­turn­ing presently and cross­ing the kit­chen with aver­ted face, hur­ry­ing up­stairs. As Mrs. Morel saw him slink quickly through the in­ner door­way, hold­ing his bundle, she laughed to her­self: but her heart was bit­ter, be­cause she had loved him.

III The Casting Off of Morel—The Taking on of William

Dur­ing the next week Morel’s tem­per was al­most un­bear­able. Like all miners, he was a great lover of medi­cines, which, strangely enough, he would of­ten pay for him­self.

“You mun get me a drop o’ laxy vit­ral,” he said. “It’s a winder as we canna ha’e a sup i’ th’ ’ouse.”

So Mrs. Morel bought him elixir of vit­riol, his fa­vour­ite first medi­cine. And he made him­self a jug of worm­wood tea. He had hanging in the at­tic great bunches of dried herbs: worm­wood, rue, hore­hound, elder flowers, pars­ley-purt, marsh­mal­low, hyssop, dan­delion, and cen­taury. Usu­ally there was a jug of one or other de­coc­tion stand­ing on the hob, from which he drank largely.

“Grand!” he said, smack­ing his lips after worm­wood. “Grand!” And he ex­hor­ted the chil­dren to try.

“It’s bet­ter than any of your tea or your co­coa stews,” he vowed. But they were not to be temp­ted.

This time, how­ever, neither pills nor vit­riol nor all his herbs would shift the “nasty peens in his head.” He was sick­en­ing for an at­tack of an in­flam­ma­tion of the brain. He had never been well since his sleep­ing on the ground when he went with Jerry to Not­ting­ham. Since then he had drunk and stormed. Now he fell ser­i­ously ill, and Mrs. Morel had him to nurse. He was one of the worst pa­tients ima­gin­able. But, in spite of all, and put­ting aside the fact that he was bread­win­ner, she never quite wanted him to die. Still there was one part of her wanted him for her­self.

The neigh­bours were very good to her: oc­ca­sion­ally some had the chil­dren in to meals, oc­ca­sion­ally some would do the down­stairs work for her, one would mind the baby for a day. But it was a great drag, nev­er­the­less. It was not every day the neigh­bours helped. Then she had nurs­ing of baby and hus­band, clean­ing and cook­ing, everything to do. She was quite worn out, but she did what was wanted of her.

And the money was just suf­fi­cient. She had sev­en­teen shil­lings a week from clubs, and every Fri­day Barker and the other butty put by a por­tion of the stall’s profits for Morel’s wife. And the neigh­bours made broths, and gave eggs, and such in­val­ids’ trifles. If they had not helped her so gen­er­ously in those times, Mrs. Morel would never have pulled through, without in­cur­ring debts that would have dragged her down.

The weeks passed. Morel, al­most against hope, grew bet­ter. He had a fine con­sti­tu­tion, so that, once on the mend, he went straight for­ward to re­cov­ery. Soon he was pot­ter­ing about down­stairs. Dur­ing his ill­ness his wife had spoilt him a little. Now he wanted her to con­tinue. He of­ten put his band to his head, pulled down the corners of his mouth, and shammed pains he did not feel. But there was no de­ceiv­ing her. At first she merely smiled to her­self. Then she scol­ded him sharply.

“Good­ness, man, don’t be so lach­rym­ose.”

That wounded him slightly, but still he con­tin­ued to feign sick­ness.

“I wouldn’t be such a mardy baby,” said the wife shortly.

Then he was in­dig­nant, and cursed un­der his breath, like a boy. He was forced to re­sume a nor­mal tone, and to cease to whine.

Never­the­less, there was a state of peace in the house for some time. Mrs. Morel was more tol­er­ant of him, and he, de­pend­ing on her al­most like a child, was rather happy. Neither knew that she was more tol­er­ant be­cause she loved him less. Up till this time, in spite of all, he had been her hus­band and her man. She had felt that, more or less, what he did to him­self he did to her. Her liv­ing de­pended on him. There were many, many stages in the ebbing of her love for him, but it was al­ways ebbing.

Now, with the birth of this third baby, her self no longer set to­wards him, help­lessly, but was like a tide that scarcely rose, stand­ing off from him. After this she scarcely de­sired him. And, stand­ing more aloof from him, not feel­ing him so much part of her­self, but merely part of her cir­cum­stances, she did not mind so much what he did, could leave him alone.

There was the halt, the wist­ful­ness about the en­su­ing year, which is like au­tumn in a man’s life. His wife was cast­ing him off, half re­gret­fully, but re­lent­lessly; cast­ing him off and turn­ing now for love and life to the chil­dren. Hence­for­ward he was more or less a husk. And he him­self ac­qui­esced, as so many men do, yield­ing their place to their chil­dren.

Dur­ing his re­cu­per­a­tion, when it was really over between them, both made an ef­fort to come back some­what to the old re­la­tion­ship of the first months of their mar­riage. He sat at home and, when the chil­dren were in bed, and she was sew­ing—she did all her sew­ing by hand, made all shirts and chil­dren’s cloth­ing—he would read to her from the news­pa­per, slowly pro­noun­cing and de­liv­er­ing the words like a man pitch­ing quoits. Often she hur­ried him on, giv­ing him a phrase in an­ti­cip­a­tion. And then he took her words humbly.

The si­lences between them were pe­cu­liar. There would be the swift, slight “cluck” of her needle, the sharp “pop” of his lips as he let out the smoke, the warmth, the sizzle on the bars as he spat in the fire. Then her thoughts turned to Wil­liam. Already he was get­ting a big boy. Already he was top of the class, and the mas­ter said he was the smartest lad in the school. She saw him a man, young, full of vigour, mak­ing the world glow again for her.

And Morel sit­ting there, quite alone, and hav­ing noth­ing to think about, would be feel­ing vaguely un­com­fort­able. His soul would reach out in its blind way to her and find her gone. He felt a sort of empti­ness, al­most like a va­cuum in his soul. He was un­settled and rest­less. Soon he could not live in that at­mo­sphere, and he af­fected his wife. Both felt an op­pres­sion on their breath­ing when they were left to­gether for some time. Then he went to bed and she settled down to en­joy her­self alone, work­ing, think­ing, liv­ing.

Mean­while an­other in­fant was com­ing, fruit of this little peace and ten­der­ness between the sep­ar­at­ing par­ents. Paul was sev­en­teen months old when the new baby was born. He was then a plump, pale child, quiet, with heavy blue eyes, and still the pe­cu­liar slight knit­ting of the brows. The last child was also a boy, fair and bonny. Mrs. Morel was sorry when she knew she was with child, both for eco­nomic reas­ons and be­cause she did not love her hus­band; but not for the sake of the in­fant.

They called the baby Ar­thur. He was very pretty, with a mop of gold curls, and he loved his father from the first. Mrs. Morel was glad this child loved the father. Hear­ing the miner’s foot­steps, the baby would put up his arms and crow. And if Morel were in a good tem­per, he called back im­me­di­ately, in his hearty, mel­low voice:

“What then, my beauty? I sh’ll come to thee in a minute.”

And as soon as he had taken off his pit-coat, Mrs. Morel would put an ap­ron round the child, and give him to his father.

“What a sight the lad looks!” she would ex­claim some­times, tak­ing back the baby, that was smut­ted on the face from his father’s kisses and play. Then Morel laughed joy­fully.

“He’s a little col­lier, bless his bit o’ mut­ton!” he ex­claimed.

And these were the happy mo­ments of her life now, when the chil­dren in­cluded the father in her heart.

Mean­while Wil­liam grew big­ger and stronger and more act­ive, while Paul, al­ways rather del­ic­ate and quiet, got slim­mer, and trot­ted after his mother like her shadow. He was usu­ally act­ive and in­ter­ested, but some­times he would have fits of de­pres­sion. Then the mother would find the boy of three or four cry­ing on the sofa.

“What’s the mat­ter?” she asked, and got no an­swer.

“What’s the mat­ter?” she in­sisted, get­ting cross.

“I don’t know,” sobbed the child.

So she tried to reason him out of it, or to amuse him, but without ef­fect. It made her feel be­side her­self. Then the father, al­ways im­pa­tient, would jump from his chair and shout:

“If he doesn’t stop, I’ll smack him till he does.”

“You’ll do noth­ing of the sort,” said the mother coldly. And then she car­ried the child into the yard, plumped him into his little chair, and said: “Now cry there, Misery!”

And then a but­ter­fly on the rhu­barb-leaves per­haps caught his eye, or at last he cried him­self to sleep. These fits were not of­ten, but they caused a shadow in Mrs. Morel’s heart, and her treat­ment of Paul was dif­fer­ent from that of the other chil­dren.

Sud­denly one morn­ing as she was look­ing down the al­ley of the Bot­toms for the barm-man, she heard a voice call­ing her. It was the thin little Mrs. Anthony in brown vel­vet.

“Here, Mrs. Morel, I want to tell you about your Wil­lie.”

“Oh, do you?” replied Mrs. Morel. “Why, what’s the mat­ter?”

“A lad as gets ’old of an­other an’ rips his clothes off’n ’is back,” Mrs. Anthony said, “wants show­ing some­thing.”

“Your Al­fred’s as old as my Wil­liam,” said Mrs. Morel.

“ ’Ap­pen ’e is, but that doesn’t give him a right to get hold of the boy’s col­lar, an’ fair rip it clean off his back.”

“Well,” said Mrs. Morel, “I don’t thrash my chil­dren, and even if I did, I should want to hear their side of the tale.”

“They’d hap­pen be a bit bet­ter if they did get a good hid­ing,” re­tor­ted Mrs. Anthony. “When it comes ter rip­pin’ a lad’s clean col­lar off’n ’is back a-pur­pose—”

“I’m sure he didn’t do it on pur­pose,” said Mrs. Morel.

“Make me a liar!” shouted Mrs. Anthony.

Mrs. Morel moved away and closed her gate. Her hand trembled as she held her mug of barm.

“But I s’ll let your mester know,” Mrs. Anthony cried after her.

At din­ner­time, when Wil­liam had fin­ished his meal and wanted to be off again—he was then el­even years old—his mother said to him:

“What did you tear Al­fred Anthony’s col­lar for?”

“When did I tear his col­lar?”

“I don’t know when, but his mother says you did.”

“Why—it was yes­ter­day—an’ it was torn a’ready.”

“But you tore it more.”

“Well, I’d got a cob­bler as ’ad licked sev­en­teen—an’ Alfy Ant’ny ’e says:

‘Adam an’ Eve an’ pinch-me,
Went down to a river to bade.
Adam an’ Eve got drown­ded,
Who do yer think got saved?’

An’ so I says: ‘Oh, Pinch-you,’ an’ so I pinched ’im, an’ ’e was mad, an’ so he snatched my cob­bler an’ run off with it. An’ so I run after ’im, an’ when I was get­tin’ hold of ’im, ’e dodged, an’ it ripped ’is col­lar. But I got my cob­bler—”

He pulled from his pocket a black old horse-chest­nut hanging on a string. This old cob­bler had “cobbled”—hit and smashed—sev­en­teen other cob­blers on sim­ilar strings. So the boy was proud of his vet­eran.

“Well,” said Mrs. Morel, “you know you’ve got no right to rip his col­lar.”

“Well, our mother!” he answered. “I never meant tr’a done it—an’ it was on’y an old in­dir­rub­ber col­lar as was torn a’ready.”

“Next time,” said his mother, “you be more care­ful. I shouldn’t like it if you came home with your col­lar torn off.”

“I don’t care, our mother; I never did it a-pur­pose.”

The boy was rather miser­able at be­ing rep­rim­anded.

“No—well, you be more care­ful.”

Wil­liam fled away, glad to be ex­on­er­ated. And Mrs. Morel, who hated any bother with the neigh­bours, thought she would ex­plain to Mrs. Anthony, and the busi­ness would be over.

But that even­ing Morel came in from the pit look­ing very sour. He stood in the kit­chen and glared round, but did not speak for some minutes. Then:

“Wheer’s that Willy?” he asked.

“What do you want him for?” asked Mrs. Morel, who had guessed.

“I’ll let ’im know when I get him,” said Morel, banging his pit-bottle on to the dresser.

“I sup­pose Mrs. Anthony’s got hold of you and been yarn­ing to you about Alfy’s col­lar,” said Mrs. Morel, rather sneer­ing.

“Niver mind who’s got hold of me,” said Morel. “When I get hold of ’im I’ll make his bones rattle.”

“It’s a poor tale,” said Mrs. Morel, “that you’re so ready to side with any snipey vixen who likes to come telling tales against your own chil­dren.”

“I’ll learn ’im!” said Morel. “It none mat­ters to me whose lad ’e is; ’e’s none goin’ rip­pin’ an’ tearin’ about just as he’s a mind.”

“ ‘Rip­ping and tear­ing about!’ ” re­peated Mrs. Morel. “He was run­ning after that Alfy, who’d taken his cob­bler, and he ac­ci­dent­ally got hold of his col­lar, be­cause the other dodged—as an Anthony would.”

“I know!” shouted Morel threat­en­ingly.

“You would, be­fore you’re told,” replied his wife bit­ingly.

“Niver you mind,” stormed Morel. “I know my busi­ness.”

“That’s more than doubt­ful,” said Mrs. Morel, “sup­pos­ing some loud-mouthed creature had been get­ting you to thrash your own chil­dren.”

“I know,” re­peated Morel.

And he said no more, but sat and nursed his bad tem­per. Sud­denly Wil­liam ran in, say­ing:

“Can I have my tea, mother?”

“Tha can ha’e more than that!” shouted Morel.

“Hold your noise, man,” said Mrs. Morel; “and don’t look so ri­dicu­lous.”

“He’ll look ri­dicu­lous be­fore I’ve done wi’ him!” shouted Morel, rising from his chair and glar­ing at his son.

Wil­liam, who was a tall lad for his years, but very sens­it­ive, had gone pale, and was look­ing in a sort of hor­ror at his father.

“Go out!” Mrs. Morel com­manded her son.

Wil­liam had not the wit to move. Sud­denly Morel clenched his fist, and crouched.

“I’ll gi’e him ‘go out’!” he shouted like an in­sane thing.

“What!” cried Mrs. Morel, pant­ing with rage. “You shall not touch him for her telling, you shall not!”

“Shonna I?” shouted Morel. “Shonna I?”

And, glar­ing at the boy, he ran for­ward. Mrs. Morel sprang in between them, with her fist lif­ted.

“Don’t you dare!” she cried.

“What!” he shouted, baffled for the mo­ment. “What!”

She spun round to her son.

“Go out of the house!” she com­manded him in fury.

The boy, as if hyp­not­ised by her, turned sud­denly and was gone. Morel rushed to the door, but was too late. He re­turned, pale un­der his pit-dirt with fury. But now his wife was fully roused.

“Only dare!” she said in a loud, ringing voice. “Only dare, mi­lord, to lay a fin­ger on that child! You’ll re­gret it forever.”

He was afraid of her. In a tower­ing rage, he sat down.

When the chil­dren were old enough to be left, Mrs. Morel joined the Wo­men’s Guild. It was a little club of wo­men at­tached to the Co­op­er­at­ive Whole­sale So­ci­ety, which met on Monday night in the long room over the gro­cery shop of the Best­wood Co-op. The wo­men were sup­posed to dis­cuss the be­ne­fits to be de­rived from co­oper­a­tion, and other so­cial ques­tions. So­me­times Mrs. Morel read a pa­per. It seemed queer to the chil­dren to see their mother, who was al­ways busy about the house, sit­ting writ­ing in her rapid fash­ion, think­ing, re­fer­ring to books, and writ­ing again. They felt for her on such oc­ca­sions the deep­est re­spect.

But they loved the Guild. It was the only thing to which they did not grudge their mother—and that partly be­cause she en­joyed it, partly be­cause of the treats they de­rived from it. The Guild was called by some hos­tile hus­bands, who found their wives get­ting too in­de­pend­ent, the “clat-fart” shop—that is, the gos­sip-shop. It is true, from off the basis of the Guild, the wo­men could look at their homes, at the con­di­tions of their own lives, and find fault. So the col­li­ers found their wo­men had a new stand­ard of their own, rather dis­con­cert­ing. And also, Mrs. Morel al­ways had a lot of news on Monday nights, so that the chil­dren liked Wil­liam to be in when their mother came home, be­cause she told him things.

Then, when the lad was thir­teen, she got him a job in the Co-op of­fice. He was a very clever boy, frank, with rather rough fea­tures and real vik­ing blue eyes.

“What dost want ter ma’e a stool-harsed Jack on ’im for?” said Morel. “All he’ll do is to wear his britches be­hind out an’ earn nowt. What’s ’e startin’ wi’?”

“It doesn’t mat­ter what he’s start­ing with,” said Mrs. Morel.

“It wouldna! Put ’im i’ th’ pit we me, an’ ’ell earn a easy ten shil­lin’ a wik from th’ start. But six shil­lin’ wearin’ his truck-end out on a stool’s bet­ter than ten shil­lin’ i’ th’ pit wi’me, I know.”

“He is not go­ing in the pit,” said Mrs. Morel, “and there’s an end of it.”

“It wor good enough for me, but it’s non good enough for ’im.”

“If your mother put you in the pit at twelve, it’s no reason why I should do the same with my lad.”

“Twelve! It wor a sight afore that!”

“Whenever it was,” said Mrs. Morel.

She was very proud of her son. He went to the night school, and learned short­hand, so that by the time he was six­teen he was the best short­hand clerk and book­keeper on the place, ex­cept one. Then he taught in the night schools. But he was so fiery that only his good-nature and his size pro­tec­ted him.

All the things that men do—the de­cent things—Wil­liam did. He could run like the wind. When he was twelve he won a first prize in a race; an ink­stand of glass, shaped like an an­vil. It stood proudly on the dresser, and gave Mrs. Morel a keen pleas­ure. The boy only ran for her. He flew home with his an­vil, breath­less, with a “Look, mother!” That was the first real trib­ute to her­self. She took it like a queen.

“How pretty!” she ex­claimed.

Then he began to get am­bi­tious. He gave all his money to his mother. When he earned four­teen shil­lings a week, she gave him back two for him­self, and, as he never drank, he felt him­self rich. He went about with the bour­geois of Best­wood. The town­let con­tained noth­ing higher than the cler­gy­man. Then came the bank man­ager, then the doc­tors, then the trades­people, and after that the hosts of col­li­ers. Wil­lam began to con­sort with the sons of the chem­ist, the school­mas­ter, and the trades­men. He played bil­liards in the Mech­an­ics’ Hall. Also he danced—this in spite of his mother. All the life that Best­wood offered he en­joyed, from the six­penny-hops down Church Street, to sports and bil­liards.

Paul was treated to dazzling de­scrip­tions of all kinds of flower-like ladies, most of whom lived like cut blooms in Wil­liam’s heart for a brief fort­night.

Oc­ca­sion­ally some flame would come in pur­suit of her er­rant swain. Mrs. Morel would find a strange girl at the door, and im­me­di­ately she sniffed the air.

“Is Mr. Morel in?” the dam­sel would ask ap­peal­ingly.

“My hus­band is at home,” Mrs. Morel replied.

“I—I mean young Mr. Morel,” re­peated the maiden pain­fully.

“Which one? There are sev­eral.”

Whereupon much blush­ing and stam­mer­ing from the fair one.

“I—I met Mr. Morel—at Ripley,” she ex­plained.

“Oh—at a dance!”

“Yes.”

“I don’t ap­prove of the girls my son meets at dances. And he is not at home.”

Then he came home angry with his mother for hav­ing turned the girl away so rudely. He was a care­less, yet eager-look­ing fel­low, who walked with long strides, some­times frown­ing, of­ten with his cap pushed jol­lily to the back of his head. Now he came in frown­ing. He threw his cap on to the sofa, and took his strong jaw in his hand, and glared down at his mother. She was small, with her hair taken straight back from her fore­head. She had a quiet air of au­thor­ity, and yet of rare warmth. Know­ing her son was angry, she trembled in­wardly.

“Did a lady call for me yes­ter­day, mother?” he asked.

“I don’t know about a lady. There was a girl came.”

“And why didn’t you tell me?”

“Be­cause I for­got, simply.”

He fumed a little.

“A good-look­ing girl—seemed a lady?”

“I didn’t look at her.”

“Big brown eyes?”

“I did not look. And tell your girls, my son, that when they’re run­ning after you, they’re not to come and ask your mother for you. Tell them that—brazen bag­gages you meet at dan­cing-classes.”

“I’m sure she was a nice girl.”

“And I’m sure she wasn’t.”

There ended the al­ter­ca­tion. Over the dan­cing there was a great strife between the mother and the son. The griev­ance reached its height when Wil­liam said he was go­ing to Huck­nall Tork­ard—con­sidered a low town—to a fancy-dress ball. He was to be a High­lander. There was a dress he could hire, which one of his friends had had, and which fit­ted him per­fectly. The High­land suit came home. Mrs. Morel re­ceived it coldly and would not un­pack it.

“My suit come?” cried Wil­liam.

“There’s a par­cel in the front room.”

He rushed in and cut the string.

“How do you fancy your son in this!” he said, en­rap­tured, show­ing her the suit.

“You know I don’t want to fancy you in it.”

On the even­ing of the dance, when he had come home to dress, Mrs. Morel put on her coat and bon­net.

“Aren’t you go­ing to stop and see me, mother?” he asked.

“No; I don’t want to see you,” she replied.

She was rather pale, and her face was closed and hard. She was afraid of her son’s go­ing the same way as his father. He hes­it­ated a mo­ment, and his heart stood still with anxi­ety. Then he caught sight of the High­land bon­net with its rib­bons. He picked it up glee­fully, for­get­ting her. She went out.

When he was nine­teen he sud­denly left the Co-op of­fice and got a situ­ation in Not­ting­ham. In his new place he had thirty shil­lings a week in­stead of eight­een. This was in­deed a rise. His mother and his father were brimmed up with pride. Every­body praised Wil­liam. It seemed he was go­ing to get on rap­idly. Mrs. Morel hoped, with his aid, to help her younger sons. An­nie was now study­ing to be a teacher. Paul, also very clever, was get­ting on well, hav­ing les­sons in French and Ger­man from his god­father, the cler­gy­man who was still a friend to Mrs. Morel. Ar­thur, a spoilt and very good-look­ing boy, was at the Board school, but there was talk of his try­ing to get a schol­ar­ship for the High School in Not­ting­ham.

Wil­liam re­mained a year at his new post in Not­ting­ham. He was study­ing hard, and grow­ing ser­i­ous. So­mething seemed to be fret­ting him. Still he went out to the dances and the river parties. He did not drink. The chil­dren were all ra­bid tee­totallers. He came home very late at night, and sat yet longer study­ing. His mother im­plored him to take more care, to do one thing or an­other.

“Dance, if you want to dance, my son; but don’t think you can work in the of­fice, and then amuse your­self, and then study on top of all. You can’t; the hu­man frame won’t stand it. Do one thing or the other—amuse your­self or learn Latin; but don’t try to do both.”

Then he got a place in Lon­don, at a hun­dred and twenty a year. This seemed a fab­ulous sum. His mother doubted al­most whether to re­joice or to grieve.

“They want me in Lime Street on Monday week, mother,” he cried, his eyes blaz­ing as he read the let­ter. Mrs. Morel felt everything go si­lent in­side her. He read the let­ter: “ ‘And will you reply by Thursday whether you ac­cept. Yours faith­fully—’ They want me, mother, at a hun­dred and twenty a year, and don’t even ask to see me. Didn’t I tell you I could do it! Think of me in Lon­don! And I can give you twenty pounds a year, ma­ter. We s’ll all be rolling in money.”

“We shall, my son,” she answered sadly.

It never oc­curred to him that she might be more hurt at his go­ing away than glad of his suc­cess. Indeed, as the days drew near for his de­par­ture, her heart began to close and grow dreary with des­pair. She loved him so much! More than that, she hoped in him so much. Al­most she lived by him. She liked to do things for him: she liked to put a cup for his tea and to iron his col­lars, of which he was so proud. It was a joy to her to have him proud of his col­lars. There was no laun­dry. So she used to rub away at them with her little con­vex iron, to pol­ish them, till they shone from the sheer pres­sure of her arm. Now she would not do it for him. Now he was go­ing away. She felt al­most as if he were go­ing as well out of her heart. He did not seem to leave her in­hab­ited with him­self. That was the grief and the pain to her. He took nearly all him­self away.

A few days be­fore his de­par­ture—he was just twenty—he burned his love-let­ters. They had hung on a file at the top of the kit­chen cup­board. From some of them he had read ex­tracts to his mother. Some of them she had taken the trouble to read her­self. But most were too trivial.

Now, on the Saturday morn­ing he said:

“Come on, ’Postle, let’s go through my let­ters, and you can have the birds and flowers.”

Mrs. Morel had done her Saturday’s work on the Fri­day, be­cause he was hav­ing a last day’s hol­i­day. She was mak­ing him a rice cake, which he loved, to take with him. He was scarcely con­scious that she was so miser­able.

He took the first let­ter off the file. It was mauve-tin­ted, and had purple and green thistles. Wil­liam sniffed the page.

“Nice scent! Smell.”

And he thrust the sheet un­der Paul’s nose.

“Um!” said Paul, breath­ing in. “What d’you call it? Smell, mother.”

His mother ducked her small, fine nose down to the pa­per.

“I don’t want to smell their rub­bish,” she said, sniff­ing.

“This girl’s father,” said Wil­liam, “is as rich as Croe­sus. He owns prop­erty without end. She calls me La­fay­ette, be­cause I know French. ‘You will see, I’ve for­given you’—I like her for­giv­ing me. ‘I told mother about you this morn­ing, and she will have much pleas­ure if you come to tea on Sunday, but she will have to get father’s con­sent also. I sin­cerely hope he will agree. I will let you know how it tran­spires. If, how­ever, you—’ ”

“ ‘Let you know how it’ what?” in­ter­rup­ted Mrs. Morel.

“ ‘Tran­spires’—oh yes!”

“ ‘Tran­spires!’ ” re­peated Mrs. Morel mock­ingly. “I thought she was so well edu­cated!”

Wil­liam felt slightly un­com­fort­able, and aban­doned this maiden, giv­ing Paul the corner with the thistles. He con­tin­ued to read ex­tracts from his let­ters, some of which amused his mother, some of which saddened her and made her anxious for him.

“My lad,” she said, “they’re very wise. They know they’ve only got to flat­ter your van­ity, and you press up to them like a dog that has its head scratched.”

“Well, they can’t go on scratch­ing forever,” he replied. “And when they’ve done, I trot away.”

“But one day you’ll find a string round your neck that you can’t pull off,” she answered.

“Not me! I’m equal to any of ’em, ma­ter, they needn’t flat­ter them­selves.”

“You flat­ter your­self,” she said quietly.

Soon there was a heap of twis­ted black pages, all that re­mained of the file of scen­ted let­ters, ex­cept that Paul had thirty or forty pretty tick­ets from the corners of the note­pa­per—swal­lows and for­get-me-nots and ivy sprays. And Wil­liam went to Lon­don, to start a new life.

IV The Young Life of Paul

Paul would be built like his mother, slightly and rather small. His fair hair went red­dish, and then dark brown; his eyes were grey. He was a pale, quiet child, with eyes that seemed to listen, and with a full, drop­ping un­der­lip.

As a rule he seemed old for his years. He was so con­scious of what other people felt, par­tic­u­larly his mother. When she fret­ted he un­der­stood, and could have no peace. His soul seemed al­ways at­tent­ive to her.

As he grew older he be­came stronger. Wil­liam was too far re­moved from him to ac­cept him as a com­pan­ion. So the smal­ler boy be­longed at first al­most en­tirely to An­nie. She was a tom­boy and a “fly­bie-sky­bie,” as her mother called her. But she was in­tensely fond of her second brother. So Paul was towed round at the heels of An­nie, shar­ing her game. She raced wildly at lerky with the other young wild­cats of the Bot­toms. And al­ways Paul flew be­side her, liv­ing her share of the game, hav­ing as yet no part of his own. He was quiet and not no­tice­able. But his sis­ter ad­ored him. He al­ways seemed to care for things if she wanted him to.

She had a big doll of which she was fear­fully proud, though not so fond. So she laid the doll on the sofa, and covered it with an an­ti­macas­sar, to sleep. Then she for­got it. Mean­time Paul must prac­tise jump­ing off the sofa arm. So he jumped crash into the face of the hid­den doll. An­nie rushed up, uttered a loud wail, and sat down to weep a dirge. Paul re­mained quite still.

“You couldn’t tell it was there, mother; you couldn’t tell it was there,” he re­peated over and over. So long as An­nie wept for the doll he sat help­less with misery. Her grief wore it­self out. She for­gave her brother—he was so much up­set. But a day or two af­ter­wards she was shocked.

“Let’s make a sac­ri­fice of Ara­bella,” he said. “Let’s burn her.”

She was hor­ri­fied, yet rather fas­cin­ated. She wanted to see what the boy would do. He made an al­tar of bricks, pulled some of the shav­ings out of Ara­bella’s body, put the waxen frag­ments into the hol­low face, poured on a little par­affin, and set the whole thing alight. He watched with wicked sat­is­fac­tion the drops of wax melt off the broken fore­head of Ara­bella, and drop like sweat into the flame. So long as the stu­pid big doll burned he re­joiced in si­lence. At the end be poked among the em­bers with a stick, fished out the arms and legs, all blackened, and smashed them un­der stones.

“That’s the sac­ri­fice of Mis­sis Ara­bella,” he said. “An’ I’m glad there’s noth­ing left of her.”

Which dis­turbed An­nie in­wardly, al­though she could say noth­ing. He seemed to hate the doll so in­tensely, be­cause he had broken it.

All the chil­dren, but par­tic­u­larly Paul, were pe­cu­li­arly against their father, along with their mother. Morel con­tin­ued to bully and to drink. He had peri­ods, months at a time, when he made the whole life of the fam­ily a misery. Paul never for­got com­ing home from the Band of Hope one Monday even­ing and find­ing his mother with her eye swollen and dis­col­oured, his father stand­ing on the hearth­rug, feet astride, his head down, and Wil­liam, just home from work, glar­ing at his father. There was a si­lence as the young chil­dren entered, but none of the eld­ers looked round.

Wil­liam was white to the lips, and his fists were clenched. He waited un­til the chil­dren were si­lent, watch­ing with chil­dren’s rage and hate; then he said:

“You cow­ard, you daren’t do it when I was in.”

But Morel’s blood was up. He swung round on his son. Wil­liam was big­ger, but Morel was hard-muscled, and mad with fury.

“Dossn’t I?” he shouted. “Dossn’t I? Ha’e much more o’ thy chelp, my young jockey, an’ I’ll rattle my fist about thee. Ay, an’ I sholl that, dost see?”

Morel crouched at the knees and showed his fist in an ugly, al­most beast-like fash­ion. Wil­liam was white with rage.

“Will yer?” he said, quiet and in­tense. “It ’ud be the last time, though.”

Morel danced a little nearer, crouch­ing, draw­ing back his fist to strike. Wil­liam put his fists ready. A light came into his blue eyes, al­most like a laugh. He watched his father. Another word, and the men would have be­gun to fight. Paul hoped they would. The three chil­dren sat pale on the sofa.

“Stop it, both of you,” cried Mrs. Morel in a hard voice. “We’ve had enough for one night. And you,” she said, turn­ing on to her hus­band, “look at your chil­dren!”

Morel glanced at the sofa.

“Look at the chil­dren, you nasty little bitch!” he sneered. “Why, what have I done to the chil­dren, I should like to know? But they’re like your­self; you’ve put ’em up to your own tricks and nasty ways—you’ve learned ’em in it, you ’ave.”

She re­fused to an­swer him. No one spoke. After a while he threw his boots un­der the table and went to bed.

“Why didn’t you let me have a go at him?” said Wil­liam, when his father was up­stairs. “I could eas­ily have beaten him.”

“A nice thing—your own father,” she replied.

“ ‘Father!’ ” re­peated Wil­liam. “Call him my father!”

“Well, he is—and so—”

“But why don’t you let me settle him? I could do, eas­ily.”

“The idea!” she cried. “It hasn’t come to that yet.”

“No,” he said, “it’s come to worse. Look at your­self. Why didn’t you let me give it him?”

“Be­cause I couldn’t bear it, so never think of it,” she cried quickly.

And the chil­dren went to bed, miser­ably.

When Wil­liam was grow­ing up, the fam­ily moved from the Bot­toms to a house on the brow of the hill, com­mand­ing a view of the val­ley, which spread out like a con­vex cockleshell, or a clamp-shell, be­fore it. In front of the house was a huge old ash-tree. The west wind, sweep­ing from Derby­shire, caught the houses with full force, and the tree shrieked again. Morel liked it.

“It’s mu­sic,” he said. “It sends me to sleep.”

But Paul and Ar­thur and An­nie hated it. To Paul it be­came al­most a de­moni­acal noise. The winter of their first year in the new house their father was very bad. The chil­dren played in the street, on the brim of the wide, dark val­ley, un­til eight o’clock. Then they went to bed. Their mother sat sew­ing be­low. Hav­ing such a great space in front of the house gave the chil­dren a feel­ing of night, of vast­ness, and of ter­ror. This ter­ror came in from the shriek­ing of the tree and the an­guish of the home dis­cord. Often Paul would wake up, after he had been asleep a long time, aware of thuds down­stairs. In­stantly he was wide awake. Then he heard the boom­ing shouts of his father, come home nearly drunk, then the sharp replies of his mother, then the bang, bang of his father’s fist on the table, and the nasty snarling shout as the man’s voice got higher. And then the whole was drowned in a pier­cing med­ley of shrieks and cries from the great, windswept ash-tree. The chil­dren lay si­lent in sus­pense, wait­ing for a lull in the wind to hear what their father was do­ing. He might hit their mother again. There was a feel­ing of hor­ror, a kind of brist­ling in the dark­ness, and a sense of blood. They lay with their hearts in the grip of an in­tense an­guish. The wind came through the tree fiercer and fiercer. All the chords of the great harp hummed, whistled, and shrieked. And then came the hor­ror of the sud­den si­lence, si­lence every­where, out­side and down­stairs. What was it? Was it a si­lence of blood? What had he done?

The chil­dren lay and breathed the dark­ness. And then, at last, they heard their father throw down his boots and tramp up­stairs in his stockinged feet. Still they listened. Then at last, if the wind al­lowed, they heard the wa­ter of the tap drum­ming into the kettle, which their mother was filling for morn­ing, and they could go to sleep in peace.

So they were happy in the morn­ing—happy, very happy play­ing, dan­cing at night round the lonely lamp­post in the midst of the dark­ness. But they had one tight place of anxi­ety in their hearts, one dark­ness in their eyes, which showed all their lives.

Paul hated his father. As a boy he had a fer­vent private re­li­gion.

“Make him stop drink­ing,” he prayed every night. “Lord, let my father die,” he prayed very of­ten. “Let him not be killed at pit,” he prayed when, after tea, the father did not come home from work.

That was an­other time when the fam­ily suffered in­tensely. The chil­dren came from school and had their teas. On the hob the big black sauce­pan was sim­mer­ing, the stew-jar was in the oven, ready for Morel’s din­ner. He was ex­pec­ted at five o’clock. But for months he would stop and drink every night on his way from work.

In the winter nights, when it was cold, and grew dark early, Mrs. Morel would put a brass can­dle­stick on the table, light a tal­low candle to save the gas. The chil­dren fin­ished their bread-and-but­ter, or drip­ping, and were ready to go out to play. But if Morel had not come they faltered. The sense of his sit­ting in all his pit-dirt, drink­ing, after a long day’s work, not com­ing home and eat­ing and wash­ing, but sit­ting, get­ting drunk, on an empty stom­ach, made Mrs. Morel un­able to bear her­self. From her the feel­ing was trans­mit­ted to the other chil­dren. She never suffered alone any more: the chil­dren suffered with her.

Paul went out to play with the rest. Down in the great trough of twi­light, tiny clusters of lights burned where the pits were. A few last col­li­ers straggled up the dim field path. The lamp­lighter came along. No more col­li­ers came. Dark­ness shut down over the val­ley; work was done. It was night.

Then Paul ran anxiously into the kit­chen. The one candle still burned on the table, the big fire glowed red. Mrs. Morel sat alone. On the hob the sauce­pan steamed; the din­ner-plate lay wait­ing on the table. All the room was full of the sense of wait­ing, wait­ing for the man who was sit­ting in his pit-dirt, din­ner­less, some mile away from home, across the dark­ness, drink­ing him­self drunk. Paul stood in the door­way.

“Has my dad come?” he asked.

“You can see he hasn’t,” said Mrs. Morel, cross with the fu­til­ity of the ques­tion.

Then the boy dawdled about near his mother. They shared the same anxi­ety. Presently Mrs. Morel went out and strained the pota­toes.

“They’re ruined and black,” she said; “but what do I care?”

Not many words were spoken. Paul al­most hated his mother for suf­fer­ing be­cause his father did not come home from work.

“What do you bother your­self for?” he said. “If he wants to stop and get drunk, why don’t you let him?”

“Let him!” flashed Mrs. Morel. “You may well say ‘let him.’ ”

She knew that the man who stops on the way home from work is on a quick way to ru­in­ing him­self and his home. The chil­dren were yet young, and de­pended on the bread­win­ner. Wil­liam gave her the sense of re­lief, provid­ing her at last with someone to turn to if Morel failed. But the tense at­mo­sphere of the room on these wait­ing even­ings was the same.

The minutes ticked away. At six o’clock still the cloth lay on the table, still the din­ner stood wait­ing, still the same sense of anxi­ety and ex­pect­a­tion in the room. The boy could not stand it any longer. He could not go out and play. So he ran in to Mrs. Inger, next door but one, for her to talk to him. She had no chil­dren. Her hus­band was good to her but was in a shop, and came home late. So, when she saw the lad at the door, she called:

“Come in, Paul.”

The two sat talk­ing for some time, when sud­denly the boy rose, say­ing:

“Well, I’ll be go­ing and see­ing if my mother wants an er­rand do­ing.”

He pre­ten­ded to be per­fectly cheer­ful, and did not tell his friend what ailed him. Then he ran in­doors.

Morel at these times came in churl­ish and hate­ful.

“This is a nice time to come home,” said Mrs. Morel.

“Wha’s it mat­ter to yo’ what time I come whoam?” he shouted.

And every­body in the house was still, be­cause he was dan­ger­ous. He ate his food in the most bru­tal man­ner pos­sible, and, when he had done, pushed all the pots in a heap away from him, to lay his arms on the table. Then he went to sleep.

Paul hated his father so. The col­lier’s small, mean head, with its black hair slightly soiled with grey, lay on the bare arms, and the face, dirty and in­flamed, with a fleshy nose and thin, paltry brows, was turned side­ways, asleep with beer and wear­i­ness and nasty tem­per. If any­one entered sud­denly, or a noise were made, the man looked up and shouted:

“I’ll lay my fist about thy y’ead, I’m tel­lin’ thee, if tha doesna stop that clat­ter! Dost hear?”

And the two last words, shouted in a bul­ly­ing fash­ion, usu­ally at An­nie, made the fam­ily writhe with hate of the man.

He was shut out from all fam­ily af­fairs. No one told him any­thing. The chil­dren, alone with their mother, told her all about the day’s hap­pen­ings, everything. Noth­ing had really taken place in them un­til it was told to their mother. But as soon as the father came in, everything stopped. He was like the scotch in the smooth, happy ma­chinery of the home. And he was al­ways aware of this fall of si­lence on his entry, the shut­ting off of life, the un­wel­come. But now it was gone too far to al­ter.

He would dearly have liked the chil­dren to talk to him, but they could not. So­me­times Mrs. Morel would say:

“You ought to tell your father.”

Paul won a prize in a com­pet­i­tion in a child’s pa­per. Every­body was highly ju­bil­ant.

“Now you’d bet­ter tell your father when he comes in,” said Mrs. Morel. “You know how be car­ries on and says he’s never told any­thing.”

“All right,” said Paul. But he would al­most rather have for­feited the prize than have to tell his father.

“I’ve won a prize in a com­pet­i­tion, dad,” he said. Morel turned round to him.

“Have you, my boy? What sort of a com­pet­i­tion?”

“Oh, noth­ing—about fam­ous wo­men.”

“And how much is the prize, then, as you’ve got?”

“It’s a book.”

“Oh, in­deed!”

“About birds.”

“Hm—hm!”

And that was all. Con­ver­sa­tion was im­possible between the father and any other mem­ber of the fam­ily. He was an out­sider. He had denied the God in him.

The only times when he entered again into the life of his own people was when he worked, and was happy at work. So­me­times, in the even­ing, he cobbled the boots or men­ded the kettle or his pit-bottle. Then he al­ways wanted sev­eral at­tend­ants, and the chil­dren en­joyed it. They united with him in the work, in the ac­tual do­ing of some­thing, when he was his real self again.

He was a good work­man, dex­ter­ous, and one who, when he was in a good hu­mour, al­ways sang. He had whole peri­ods, months, al­most years, of fric­tion and nasty tem­per. Then some­times he was jolly again. It was nice to see him run with a piece of red-hot iron into the scull­ery, cry­ing:

“Out of my road—out of my road!”

Then he hammered the soft, red-glow­ing stuff on his iron goose, and made the shape he wanted. Or he sat ab­sorbed for a mo­ment, sol­der­ing. Then the chil­dren watched with joy as the metal sank sud­denly mol­ten, and was shoved about against the nose of the sol­der­ing-iron, while the room was full of a scent of burnt resin and hot tin, and Morel was si­lent and in­tent for a minute. He al­ways sang when he men­ded boots be­cause of the jolly sound of ham­mer­ing. And he was rather happy when he sat put­ting great patches on his mole­skin pit trousers, which he would of­ten do, con­sid­er­ing them too dirty, and the stuff too hard, for his wife to mend.

But the best time for the young chil­dren was when he made fuses. Morel fetched a sheaf of long sound wheat-straws from the at­tic. These he cleaned with his hand, till each one gleamed like a stalk of gold, after which he cut the straws into lengths of about six inches, leav­ing, if he could, a notch at the bot­tom of each piece. He al­ways had a beau­ti­fully sharp knife that could cut a straw clean without hurt­ing it. Then he set in the middle of the table a heap of gun­powder, a little pile of black grains upon the white-scrubbed board. He made and trimmed the straws while Paul and An­nie rifled and plugged them. Paul loved to see the black grains trickle down a crack in his palm into the mouth of the straw, pep­per­ing jol­lily down­wards till the straw was full. Then he bunged up the mouth with a bit of soap—which he got on his thumb­nail from a pat in a sau­cer—and the straw was fin­ished.

“Look, dad!” he said.

“That’s right, my beauty,” replied Morel, who was pe­cu­li­arly lav­ish of en­dear­ments to his second son. Paul popped the fuse into the powder-tin, ready for the morn­ing, when Morel would take it to the pit, and use it to fire a shot that would blast the coal down.

Mean­time Ar­thur, still fond of his father, would lean on the arm of Morel’s chair and say:

“Tell us about down pit, daddy.”

This Morel loved to do.

“Well, there’s one little ’oss—we call ’im Taffy,” he would be­gin. “An’ he’s a fawce ’un!”

Morel had a warm way of telling a story. He made one feel Taffy’s cun­ning.

“He’s a brown ’un,” he would an­swer, “an’ not very high. Well, he comes i’ th’ stall wi’ a rattle, an’ then yo’ ’ear ’im sneeze.

“ ‘’Ello, Taff,’ you say, ‘what art sneezin’ for? Bin ta’ein’ some snuff?’

“An’ ’e sneezes again. Then he slives up an’ shoves ’is ’ead on yer, that cadin’.

“ ‘What’s want, Taff?’ yo’ say.”

“And what does he?” Ar­thur al­ways asked.

“He wants a bit o’ bacca, my duckie.”

This story of Taffy would go on in­ter­min­ably, and every­body loved it.

Or some­times it was a new tale.

“An’ what dost think, my darlin’? When I went to put my coat on at snap-time, what should go run­nin’ up my arm but a mouse.

“ ‘Hey up, theer!’ I shouts.

“An’ I wor just in time ter get ’im by th’ tail.”

“And did you kill it?”

“I did, for they’re a nuis­ance. The place is fair snied wi’ ’em.”

“An’ what do they live on?”

“The corn as the ’osses drops—an’ they’ll get in your pocket an’ eat your snap, if you’ll let ’em—no mat­ter where yo’ hing your coat—the slivin’, nib­blin’ little nuis­ances, for they are.”

These happy even­ings could not take place un­less Morel had some job to do. And then he al­ways went to bed very early, of­ten be­fore the chil­dren. There was noth­ing re­main­ing for him to stay up for, when he had fin­ished tinker­ing, and had skimmed the head­lines of the news­pa­per.

And the chil­dren felt se­cure when their father was in bed. They lay and talked softly a while. Then they star­ted as the lights went sud­denly sprawl­ing over the ceil­ing from the lamps that swung in the hands of the col­li­ers tramp­ing by out­side, go­ing to take the nine o’clock shift. They listened to the voices of the men, ima­gined them dip­ping down into the dark val­ley. So­me­times they went to the win­dow and watched the three or four lamps grow­ing ti­nier and ti­nier, sway­ing down the fields in the dark­ness. Then it was a joy to rush back to bed and cuddle closely in the warmth.

Paul was rather a del­ic­ate boy, sub­ject to bron­chitis. The oth­ers were all quite strong; so this was an­other reason for his mother’s dif­fer­ence in feel­ing for him. One day he came home at din­ner­time feel­ing ill. But it was not a fam­ily to make any fuss.

“What’s the mat­ter with you?” his mother asked sharply.

“Noth­ing,” he replied.

But he ate no din­ner.

“If you eat no din­ner, you’re not go­ing to school,” she said.

“Why?” he asked.

“That’s why.”

So after din­ner he lay down on the sofa, on the warm chintz cush­ions the chil­dren loved. Then he fell into a kind of doze. That af­ter­noon Mrs. Morel was iron­ing. She listened to the small, rest­less noise the boy made in his throat as she worked. Again rose in her heart the old, al­most weary feel­ing to­wards him. She had never ex­pec­ted him to live. And yet he had a great vi­tal­ity in his young body. Per­haps it would have been a little re­lief to her if he had died. She al­ways felt a mix­ture of an­guish in her love for him.

He, in his semi­con­scious sleep, was vaguely aware of the clat­ter of the iron on the iron-stand, of the faint thud, thud on the iron­ing-board. Once roused, he opened his eyes to see his mother stand­ing on the hearth­rug with the hot iron near her cheek, listen­ing, as it were, to the heat. Her still face, with the mouth closed tight from suf­fer­ing and dis­il­lu­sion and self-denial, and her nose the smal­lest bit on one side, and her blue eyes so young, quick, and warm, made his heart con­tract with love. When she was quiet, so, she looked brave and rich with life, but as if she had been done out of her rights. It hurt the boy keenly, this feel­ing about her that she had never had her life’s ful­fil­ment: and his own in­cap­ab­il­ity to make up to her hurt him with a sense of im­pot­ence, yet made him pa­tiently dogged in­side. It was his child­ish aim.

She spat on the iron, and a little ball of spit bounded, raced off the dark, glossy sur­face. Then, kneel­ing, she rubbed the iron on the sack lin­ing of the hearth­rug vig­or­ously. She was warm in the ruddy fire­light. Paul loved the way she crouched and put her head on one side. Her move­ments were light and quick. It was al­ways a pleas­ure to watch her. Noth­ing she ever did, no move­ment she ever made, could have been found fault with by her chil­dren. The room was warm and full of the scent of hot linen. Later on the cler­gy­man came and talked softly with her.

Paul was laid up with an at­tack of bron­chitis. He did not mind much. What happened happened, and it was no good kick­ing against the pricks. He loved the even­ings, after eight o’clock, when the light was put out, and he could watch the fire-flames spring over the dark­ness of the walls and ceil­ing; could watch huge shad­ows wav­ing and toss­ing, till the room seemed full of men who battled si­lently.

On re­tir­ing to bed, the father would come into the sick­room. He was al­ways very gentle if any­one were ill. But he dis­turbed the at­mo­sphere for the boy.

“Are ter asleep, my darlin’?” Morel asked softly.

“No; is my mother comin’?”

“She’s just fin­ishin’ foldin’ the clothes. Do you want any­thing?” Morel rarely “thee’d” his son.

“I don’t want noth­ing. But how long will she be?”

“Not long, my duckie.”

The father waited un­de­cidedly on the hearth­rug for a mo­ment or two. He felt his son did not want him. Then he went to the top of the stairs and said to his wife:

“This childt’s axin’ for thee; how long art goin’ to be?”

“Until I’ve fin­ished, good gra­cious! Tell him to go to sleep.”

“She says you’re to go to sleep,” the father re­peated gently to Paul.

“Well, I want her to come,” in­sisted the boy.

“He says he can’t go off till you come,” Morel called down­stairs.

“Eh, dear! I shan’t be long. And do stop shout­ing down­stairs. There’s the other chil­dren—”

Then Morel came again and crouched be­fore the bed­room fire. He loved a fire dearly.

“She says she won’t be long,” he said.

He loitered about in­def­in­itely. The boy began to get fe­ver­ish with ir­rit­a­tion. His father’s pres­ence seemed to ag­grav­ate all his sick im­pa­tience. At last Morel, after hav­ing stood look­ing at his son awhile, said softly:

“Good night, my darling.”

“Good night,” Paul replied, turn­ing round in re­lief to be alone.

Paul loved to sleep with his mother. Sleep is still most per­fect, in spite of hy­gien­ists, when it is shared with a be­loved. The warmth, the se­cur­ity and peace of soul, the ut­ter com­fort from the touch of the other, knits the sleep, so that it takes the body and soul com­pletely in its heal­ing. Paul lay against her and slept, and got bet­ter; whilst she, al­ways a bad sleeper, fell later on into a pro­found sleep that seemed to give her faith.

In con­vales­cence he would sit up in bed, see the fluffy horses feed­ing at the troughs in the field, scat­ter­ing their hay on the trod­den yel­low snow; watch the miners troop home—small, black fig­ures trail­ing slowly in gangs across the white field. Then the night came up in dark blue va­pour from the snow.

In con­vales­cence everything was won­der­ful. The snow­flakes, sud­denly ar­riv­ing on the win­dowpane, clung there a mo­ment like swal­lows, then were gone, and a drop of wa­ter was crawl­ing down the glass. The snow­flakes whirled round the corner of the house, like pi­geons dash­ing by. Away across the val­ley the little black train crawled doubt­fully over the great white­ness.

While they were so poor, the chil­dren were de­lighted if they could do any­thing to help eco­nom­ic­ally. An­nie and Paul and Ar­thur went out early in the morn­ing, in sum­mer, look­ing for mush­rooms, hunt­ing through the wet grass, from which the larks were rising, for the white-skinned, won­der­ful na­ked bod­ies crouched secretly in the green. And if they got half a pound they felt ex­ceed­ingly happy: there was the joy of find­ing some­thing, the joy of ac­cept­ing some­thing straight from the hand of Nature, and the joy of con­trib­ut­ing to the fam­ily ex­chequer.

But the most im­port­ant har­vest, after glean­ing for fru­menty, was the black­ber­ries. Mrs. Morel must buy fruit for pud­dings on the Saturdays; also she liked black­ber­ries. So Paul and Ar­thur scoured the cop­pices and woods and old quar­ries, so long as a black­berry was to be found, every week­end go­ing on their search. In that re­gion of min­ing vil­lages black­ber­ries be­came a com­par­at­ive rar­ity. But Paul hunted far and wide. He loved be­ing out in the coun­try, among the bushes. But he also could not bear to go home to his mother empty. That, he felt, would dis­ap­point her, and he would have died rather.

“Good gra­cious!” she would ex­claim as the lads came in, late, and tired to death, and hungry, “wherever have you been?”

“Well,” replied Paul, “there wasn’t any, so we went over Misk Hills. And look here, our mother!”

She peeped into the bas­ket.

“Now, those are fine ones!” she ex­claimed.

“And there’s over two pounds—isn’t there over two pounds?”

She tried the bas­ket.

“Yes,” she answered doubt­fully.

Then Paul fished out a little spray. He al­ways brought her one spray, the best he could find.

“Pretty!” she said, in a curi­ous tone, of a wo­man ac­cept­ing a love-token.

The boy walked all day, went miles and miles, rather than own him­self beaten and come home to her empty-handed. She never real­ised this, whilst he was young. She was a wo­man who waited for her chil­dren to grow up. And Wil­liam oc­cu­pied her chiefly.

But when Wil­liam went to Not­ting­ham, and was not so much at home, the mother made a com­pan­ion of Paul. The lat­ter was un­con­sciously jeal­ous of his brother, and Wil­liam was jeal­ous of him. At the same time, they were good friends.

Mrs. Morel’s in­tim­acy with her second son was more subtle and fine, per­haps not so pas­sion­ate as with her eld­est. It was the rule that Paul should fetch the money on Fri­day af­ter­noons. The col­li­ers of the five pits were paid on Fri­days, but not in­di­vidu­ally. All the earn­ings of each stall were put down to the chief butty, as con­tractor, and he di­vided the wages again, either in the pub­lic-house or in his own home. So that the chil­dren could fetch the money, school closed early on Fri­day af­ter­noons. Each of the Morel chil­dren—Wil­liam, then An­nie, then Paul—had fetched the money on Fri­day af­ter­noons, un­til they went them­selves to work. Paul used to set off at half-past three, with a little calico bag in his pocket. Down all the paths, wo­men, girls, chil­dren, and men were seen troop­ing to the of­fices.

These of­fices were quite hand­some: a new, red­brick build­ing, al­most like a man­sion, stand­ing in its own grounds at the end of Green­hill Lane. The wait­ing-room was the hall, a long, bare room paved with blue brick, and hav­ing a seat all round, against the wall. Here sat the col­li­ers in their pit-dirt. They had come up early. The wo­men and chil­dren usu­ally loitered about on the red gravel paths. Paul al­ways ex­amined the grass bor­der, and the big grass bank, be­cause in it grew tiny pan­sies and tiny for­get-me-nots. There was a sound of many voices. The wo­men had on their Sunday hats. The girls chattered loudly. Little dogs ran here and there. The green shrubs were si­lent all around.

Then from in­side came the cry “Spin­ney Park—Spin­ney Park.” All the folk for Spin­ney Park trooped in­side. When it was time for Bretty to be paid, Paul went in among the crowd. The pay-room was quite small. A counter went across, di­vid­ing it into half. Be­hind the counter stood two men—Mr. Braith­waite and his clerk, Mr. Win­ter­bot­tom. Mr. Braith­waite was large, some­what of the stern pat­ri­arch in ap­pear­ance, hav­ing a rather thin white beard. He was usu­ally muffled in an enorm­ous silk necker­chief, and right up to the hot sum­mer a huge fire burned in the open grate. No win­dow was open. So­me­times in winter the air scorched the throats of the people, com­ing in from the fresh­ness. Mr. Win­ter­bot­tom was rather small and fat, and very bald. He made re­marks that were not witty, whilst his chief launched forth pat­ri­archal ad­mon­i­tions against the col­li­ers.

The room was crowded with miners in their pit-dirt, men who had been home and changed, and wo­men, and one or two chil­dren, and usu­ally a dog. Paul was quite small, so it was of­ten his fate to be jammed be­hind the legs of the men, near the fire which scorched him. He knew the or­der of the names—they went ac­cord­ing to stall num­ber.

“Hol­l­i­day,” came the ringing voice of Mr. Braith­waite. Then Mrs. Hol­l­i­day stepped si­lently for­ward, was paid, drew aside.

“Bower—John Bower.”

A boy stepped to the counter. Mr. Braith­waite, large and iras­cible, glowered at him over his spec­tacles.

“John Bower!” he re­peated.

“It’s me,” said the boy.

“Why, you used to ’ave a dif­fer­ent nose than that,” said glossy Mr. Win­ter­bot­tom, peer­ing over the counter. The people tittered, think­ing of John Bower senior.

“How is it your father’s not come!” said Mr. Braith­waite, in a large and ma­gis­terial voice.

“He’s badly,” piped the boy.

“You should tell him to keep off the drink,” pro­nounced the great cash­ier.

“An’ niver mind if he puts his foot through yer,” said a mock­ing voice from be­hind.

All the men laughed. The large and im­port­ant cash­ier looked down at his next sheet.

“Fred Pilk­ing­ton!” he called, quite in­dif­fer­ent.

Mr. Braith­waite was an im­port­ant share­holder in the firm.

Paul knew his turn was next but one, and his heart began to beat. He was pushed against the chim­neypiece. His calves were burn­ing. But he did not hope to get through the wall of men.

“Wal­ter Morel!” came the ringing voice.

“Here!” piped Paul, small and in­ad­equate.

“Morel—Wal­ter Morel!” the cash­ier re­peated, his fin­ger and thumb on the in­voice, ready to pass on.

Paul was suf­fer­ing con­vul­sions of self-con­scious­ness, and could not or would not shout. The backs of the men ob­lit­er­ated him. Then Mr. Win­ter­bot­tom came to the res­cue.

“He’s here. Where is he? Morel’s lad?”

The fat, red, bald little man peered round with keen eyes. He poin­ted at the fire­place. The col­li­ers looked round, moved aside, and dis­closed the boy.

“Here he is!” said Mr. Win­ter­bot­tom.

Paul went to the counter.

“Seven­teen pounds el­even and five­pence. Why don’t you shout up when you’re called?” said Mr. Braith­waite. He banged on to the in­voice a five-pound bag of sil­ver, then in a del­ic­ate and pretty move­ment, picked up a little ten-pound column of gold, and plumped it be­side the sil­ver. The gold slid in a bright stream over the pa­per. The cash­ier fin­ished count­ing off the money; the boy dragged the whole down the counter to Mr. Win­ter­bot­tom, to whom the stop­pages for rent and tools must be paid. Here he suffered again.

“Six­teen an’ six,” said Mr. Win­ter­bot­tom.

The lad was too much up­set to count. He pushed for­ward some loose sil­ver and half a sov­er­eign.

“How much do you think you’ve given me?” asked Mr. Win­ter­bot­tom.

The boy looked at him, but said noth­ing. He had not the faintest no­tion.

“Haven’t you got a tongue in your head?”

Paul bit his lip, and pushed for­ward some more sil­ver.

“Don’t they teach you to count at the Board-school?” he asked.

“Nowt but al­gib­bra an’ French,” said a col­lier.

“An’ cheek an’ imp­id­ence,” said an­other.

Paul was keep­ing someone wait­ing. With trem­bling fin­gers he got his money into the bag and slid out. He suffered the tor­tures of the damned on these oc­ca­sions.

His re­lief, when he got out­side, and was walk­ing along the Mans­field Road, was in­fin­ite. On the park wall the mosses were green. There were some gold and some white fowls peck­ing un­der the apple trees of an orch­ard. The col­li­ers were walk­ing home in a stream. The boy went near the wall, self-con­sciously. He knew many of the men, but could not re­cog­nise them in their dirt. And this was a new tor­ture to him.

When he got down to the New Inn, at Bretty, his father was not yet come. Mrs. Wharmby, the land­lady, knew him. His grand­mother, Morel’s mother, had been Mrs. Wharmby’s friend.

“Your father’s not come yet,” said the land­lady, in the pe­cu­liar half-scorn­ful, half-pat­ron­ising voice of a wo­man who talks chiefly to grown men. “Sit you down.”

Paul sat down on the edge of the bench in the bar. Some col­li­ers were “reck­on­ing”—shar­ing out their money—in a corner; oth­ers came in. They all glanced at the boy without speak­ing. At last Morel came; brisk, and with some­thing of an air, even in his black­ness.

“Hello!” he said rather ten­derly to his son. “Have you bested me? Shall you have a drink of some­thing?”

Paul and all the chil­dren were bred up fierce anti-al­co­hol­ists, and he would have suffered more in drink­ing a lem­on­ade be­fore all the men than in hav­ing a tooth drawn.

The land­lady looked at him de haut en bas, rather pity­ing, and at the same time, re­sent­ing his clear, fierce mor­al­ity. Paul went home, glower­ing. He entered the house si­lently. Fri­day was bak­ing day, and there was usu­ally a hot bun. His mother put it be­fore him.

Sud­denly he turned on her in a fury, his eyes flash­ing:

“I’m not go­ing to the of­fice any more,” he said.

“Why, what’s the mat­ter?” his mother asked in sur­prise. His sud­den rages rather amused her.

“I’m not go­ing any more,” he de­clared.

“Oh, very well, tell your father so.”

He chewed his bun as if he hated it.

“I’m not—I’m not go­ing to fetch the money.”

“Then one of Carlin’s chil­dren can go; they’d be glad enough of the six­pence,” said Mrs. Morel.

This six­pence was Paul’s only in­come. It mostly went in buy­ing birth­day presents; but it was an in­come, and he treas­ured it. But—

“They can have it, then!” he said. “I don’t want it.”

“Oh, very well,” said his mother. “But you needn’t bully me about it.”

“They’re hate­ful, and com­mon, and hate­ful, they are, and I’m not go­ing any more. Mr. Braith­waite drops his h’s, an’ Mr. Win­ter­bot­tom says ‘You was.’ ”

“And is that why you won’t go any more?” smiled Mrs. Morel.

The boy was si­lent for some time. His face was pale, his eyes dark and furi­ous. His mother moved about at her work, tak­ing no no­tice of him.

“They al­ways stan’ in front of me, so’s I can’t get out,” he said.

“Well, my lad, you’ve only to ask them,” she replied.

“An’ then Al­fred Win­ter­bot­tom says, ‘What do they teach you at the Board-school?’ ”

“They never taught him much,” said Mrs. Morel, “that is a fact—neither man­ners nor wit—and his cun­ning he was born with.”

So, in her own way, she soothed him. His ri­dicu­lous hy­per­sens­it­ive­ness made her heart ache. And some­times the fury in his eyes roused her, made her sleep­ing soul lift up its head a mo­ment, sur­prised.

“What was the cheque?” she asked.

“Seven­teen pounds el­even and five­pence, and six­teen and six stop­pages,” replied the boy. “It’s a good week; and only five shil­lings stop­pages for my father.”

So she was able to cal­cu­late how much her hus­band had earned, and could call him to ac­count if he gave her short money. Morel al­ways kept to him­self the secret of the week’s amount.

Fri­day was the bak­ing night and mar­ket night. It was the rule that Paul should stay at home and bake. He loved to stop in and draw or read; he was very fond of draw­ing. An­nie al­ways “gal­li­vanted” on Fri­day nights; Ar­thur was en­joy­ing him­self as usual. So the boy re­mained alone.

Mrs. Morel loved her mar­ket­ing. In the tiny mar­ket­place on the top of the hill, where four roads, from Not­ting­ham and Derby, Ilke­ston and Mans­field, meet, many stalls were erec­ted. Brakes ran in from sur­round­ing vil­lages. The mar­ket­place was full of wo­men, the streets packed with men. It was amaz­ing to see so many men every­where in the streets. Mrs. Morel usu­ally quar­relled with her lace wo­man, sym­path­ised with her fruit man—who was a gabey, but his wife was a bad ’un—laughed with the fish man—who was a scamp but so droll—put the li­no­leum man in his place, was cold with the odd-wares man, and only went to the crock­ery man when she was driven—or drawn by the corn­flowers on a little dish; then she was coldly po­lite.

“I wondered how much that little dish was,” she said.

“Seven­pence to you.”

“Thank you.”

She put the dish down and walked away; but she could not leave the mar­ket­place without it. Again she went by where the pots lay coldly on the floor, and she glanced at the dish furt­ively, pre­tend­ing not to.

She was a little wo­man, in a bon­net and a black cos­tume. Her bon­net was in its third year; it was a great griev­ance to An­nie.

“Mother!” the girl im­plored, “don’t wear that nub­bly little bon­net.”

“Then what else shall I wear,” replied the mother tartly. “And I’m sure it’s right enough.”

It had star­ted with a tip; then had had flowers; now was re­duced to black lace and a bit of jet.

“It looks rather come down,” said Paul. “Couldn’t you give it a pick-me-up?”

“I’ll jowl your head for im­pudence,” said Mrs. Morel, and she tied the strings of the black bon­net vali­antly un­der her chin.

She glanced at the dish again. Both she and her en­emy, the pot man, had an un­com­fort­able feel­ing, as if there were some­thing between them. Sud­denly he shouted:

“Do you want it for five­pence?”

She star­ted. Her heart hardened; but then she stooped and took up her dish.

“I’ll have it,” she said.

“Yer’ll do me the fa­vour, like?” he said. “Yer’d bet­ter spit in it, like yer do when y’ave some­thing give yer.”

Mrs. Morel paid him the five­pence in a cold man­ner.

“I don’t see you give it me,” she said. “You wouldn’t let me have it for five­pence if you didn’t want to.”

“In this flamin’, scrat­tlin’ place you may count yer­self lucky if you can give your things away,” he growled.

“Yes; there are bad times, and good,” said Mrs. Morel.

But she had for­given the pot man. They were friends. She dare now fin­ger his pots. So she was happy.

Paul was wait­ing for her. He loved her home­com­ing. She was al­ways her best so—tri­umphant, tired, laden with par­cels, feel­ing rich in spirit. He heard her quick, light step in the entry and looked up from his draw­ing.

“Oh!” she sighed, smil­ing at him from the door­way.

“My word, you are loaded!” he ex­claimed, put­ting down his brush.

“I am!” she gasped. “That brazen An­nie said she’d meet me. Such a weight!”

She dropped her string bag and her pack­ages on the table.

“Is the bread done?” she asked, go­ing to the oven.

“The last one is soak­ing,” he replied. “You needn’t look, I’ve not for­got­ten it.”

“Oh, that pot man!” she said, clos­ing the oven door. “You know what a wretch I’ve said he was? Well, I don’t think he’s quite so bad.”

“Don’t you?”

The boy was at­tent­ive to her. She took off her little black bon­net.

“No. I think he can’t make any money—well, it’s every­body’s cry alike nowadays—and it makes him dis­agree­able.”

“It would me,” said Paul.

“Well, one can’t won­der at it. And he let me have—how much do you think he let me have this for?”

She took the dish out of its rag of news­pa­per, and stood look­ing on it with joy.

“Show me!” said Paul.

The two stood to­gether gloat­ing over the dish.

“I love corn­flowers on things,” said Paul.

“Yes, and I thought of the teapot you bought me—”

“One and three,” said Paul.

“Five­pence!”

“It’s not enough, mother.”

“No. Do you know, I fairly sneaked off with it. But I’d been ex­tra­vag­ant, I couldn’t af­ford any more. And he needn’t have let me have it if he hadn’t wanted to.”

“No, he needn’t, need he,” said Paul, and the two com­for­ted each other from the fear of hav­ing robbed the pot man.

“We c’n have stewed fruit in it,” said Paul.

“Or cus­tard, or a jelly,” said his mother.

“Or radishes and lettuce,” said he.

“Don’t for­get that bread,” she said, her voice bright with glee.

Paul looked in the oven; tapped the loaf on the base.

“It’s done,” he said, giv­ing it to her.

She tapped it also.

“Yes,” she replied, go­ing to un­pack her bag. “Oh, and I’m a wicked, ex­tra­vag­ant wo­man. I know I s’ll come to want.”

He hopped to her side eagerly, to see her latest ex­tra­vag­ance. She un­fol­ded an­other lump of news­pa­per and dis­closed some roots of pan­sies and of crim­son dais­ies.

“Four penn’orth!” she moaned.

“How cheap!” he cried.

“Yes, but I couldn’t af­ford it this week of all weeks.”

“But lovely!” he cried.

“Aren’t they!” she ex­claimed, giv­ing way to pure joy. “Paul, look at this yel­low one, isn’t it—and a face just like an old man!”

“Just!” cried Paul, stoop­ing to sniff. “And smells that nice! But he’s a bit splashed.”

He ran in the scull­ery, came back with the flan­nel, and care­fully washed the pansy.

“Now look at him now he’s wet!” he said.

“Yes!” she ex­claimed, brim­ful of sat­is­fac­tion.

The chil­dren of Scar­gill Street felt quite se­lect. At the end where the Morels lived there were not many young things. So the few were more united. Boys and girls played to­gether, the girls join­ing in the fights and the rough games, the boys tak­ing part in the dan­cing games and rings and make-be­lief of the girls.

An­nie and Paul and Ar­thur loved the winter even­ings, when it was not wet. They stayed in­doors till the col­li­ers were all gone home, till it was thick dark, and the street would be deser­ted. Then they tied their scarves round their necks, for they scorned over­coats, as all the col­li­ers’ chil­dren did, and went out. The entry was very dark, and at the end the whole great night opened out, in a hol­low, with a little tangle of lights be­low where Min­ton pit lay, and an­other far away op­pos­ite for Selby. The farthest tiny lights seemed to stretch out the dark­ness forever. The chil­dren looked anxiously down the road at the one lamp­post, which stood at the end of the field path. If the little, lu­min­ous space were deser­ted, the two boys felt genu­ine des­ol­a­tion. They stood with their hands in their pock­ets un­der the lamp, turn­ing their backs on the night, quite miser­able, watch­ing the dark houses. Sud­denly a pin­a­fore un­der a short coat was seen, and a long-legged girl came fly­ing up.

“Where’s Billy Pillins an’ your An­nie an’ Ed­die Dakin?”

“I don’t know.”

But it did not mat­ter so much—there were three now. They set up a game round the lamp­post, till the oth­ers rushed up, yelling. Then the play went fast and furi­ous.

There was only this one lamp­post. Be­hind was the great scoop of dark­ness, as if all the night were there. In front, an­other wide, dark way opened over the hill brow. Oc­ca­sion­ally some­body came out of this way and went into the field down the path. In a dozen yards the night had swal­lowed them. The chil­dren played on.

They were brought ex­ceed­ingly close to­gether ow­ing to their isol­a­tion. If a quar­rel took place, the whole play was spoilt. Ar­thur was very touchy, and Billy Pillins—really Philips—was worse. Then Paul had to side with Ar­thur, and on Paul’s side went Alice, while Billy Pillins al­ways had Em­mie Limb and Ed­die Dakin to back him up. Then the six would fight, hate with a fury of hatred, and flee home in ter­ror. Paul never for­got, after one of these fierce in­terne­cine fights, see­ing a big red moon lift it­self up, slowly, between the waste road over the hill­top, stead­ily, like a great bird. And he thought of the Bible, that the moon should be turned to blood. And the next day he made haste to be friends with Billy Pillins. And then the wild, in­tense games went on again un­der the lamp­post, sur­roun­ded by so much dark­ness. Mrs. Morel, go­ing into her par­lour, would hear the chil­dren singing away:

“My shoes are made of Span­ish leather,
My socks are made of silk;
I wear a ring on every fin­ger,
I wash my­self in milk.”

They soun­ded so per­fectly ab­sorbed in the game as their voices came out of the night, that they had the feel of wild creatures singing. It stirred the mother; and she un­der­stood when they came in at eight o’clock, ruddy, with bril­liant eyes, and quick, pas­sion­ate speech.

They all loved the Scar­gill Street house for its open­ness, for the great scal­lop of the world it had in view. On sum­mer even­ings the wo­men would stand against the field fence, gos­sip­ing, fa­cing the west, watch­ing the sun­sets flare quickly out, till the Derby­shire hills ridged across the crim­son far away, like the black crest of a newt.

In this sum­mer sea­son the pits never turned full time, par­tic­u­larly the soft coal. Mrs. Dakin, who lived next door to Mrs. Morel, go­ing to the field fence to shake her hearth­rug, would spy men com­ing slowly up the hill. She saw at once they were col­li­ers. Then she waited, a tall, thin, shrew-faced wo­man, stand­ing on the hill brow, al­most like a men­ace to the poor col­li­ers who were toil­ing up. It was only el­even o’clock. From the far-off wooded hills the haze that hangs like fine black crape at the back of a sum­mer morn­ing had not yet dis­sip­ated. The first man came to the stile. “Chock-chock!” went the gate un­der his thrust.

“What, han’ yer knocked off?” cried Mrs. Dakin.

“We han, mis­sis.”

“It’s a pity as they letn yer goo,” she said sar­castic­ally.

“It is that,” replied the man.

“Nay, you know you’re flig to come up again,” she said.

And the man went on. Mrs. Dakin, go­ing up her yard, spied Mrs. Morel tak­ing the ashes to the ash-pit.

“I reckon Min­ton’s knocked off, mis­sis,” she cried.

“Isn’t it sick­enin!” ex­claimed Mrs. Morel in wrath.

“Ha! But I’n just seed Jont Hutchby.”

“They might as well have saved their shoe-leather,” said Mrs. Morel. And both wo­men went in­doors dis­gus­ted.

The col­li­ers, their faces scarcely blackened, were troop­ing home again. Morel hated to go back. He loved the sunny morn­ing. But he had gone to pit to work, and to be sent home again spoilt his tem­per.

“Good gra­cious, at this time!” ex­claimed his wife, as he entered.

“Can I help it, wo­man?” he shouted.

“And I’ve not done half enough din­ner.”

“Then I’ll eat my bit o’ snap as I took with me,” he bawled pathet­ic­ally. He felt ig­no­mini­ous and sore.

And the chil­dren, com­ing home from school, would won­der to see their father eat­ing with his din­ner the two thick slices of rather dry and dirty bread-and-but­ter that had been to pit and back.

“What’s my dad eat­ing his snap for now?” asked Ar­thur.

“I should ha’e it holled at me if I didna,” snorted Morel.

“What a story!” ex­claimed his wife.

“An’ is it goin’ to be wasted?” said Morel. “I’m not such a ex­tra­vag­ant mor­tal as you lot, with your waste. If I drop a bit of bread at pit, in all the dust an’ dirt, I pick it up an’ eat it.”

“The mice would eat it,” said Paul. “It wouldn’t be wasted.”

“Good bread-an’-but­ter’s not for mice, either,” said Morel. “Dirty or not dirty, I’d eat it rather than it should be wasted.”

“You might leave it for the mice and pay for it out of your next pint,” said Mrs. Morel.

“Oh, might I?” he ex­claimed.

They were very poor that au­tumn. Wil­liam had just gone away to Lon­don, and his mother missed his money. He sent ten shil­lings once or twice, but he had many things to pay for at first. His let­ters came reg­u­larly once a week. He wrote a good deal to his mother, telling her all his life, how he made friends, and was ex­chan­ging les­sons with a French­man, how he en­joyed Lon­don. His mother felt again he was re­main­ing to her just as when he was at home. She wrote to him every week her dir­ect, rather witty let­ters. All day long, as she cleaned the house, she thought of him. He was in Lon­don: he would do well. Al­most, he was like her knight who wore her fa­vour in the battle.

He was com­ing at Christ­mas for five days. There had never been such pre­par­a­tions. Paul and Ar­thur scoured the land for holly and ever­greens. An­nie made the pretty pa­per hoops in the old-fash­ioned way. And there was un­heard-of ex­tra­vag­ance in the lar­der. Mrs. Morel made a big and mag­ni­fi­cent cake. Then, feel­ing queenly, she showed Paul how to blanch al­monds. He skinned the long nuts rev­er­ently, count­ing them all, to see not one was lost. It was said that eggs whisked bet­ter in a cold place. So the boy stood in the scull­ery, where the tem­per­at­ure was nearly at freez­ing-point, and whisked and whisked, and flew in ex­cite­ment to his mother as the white of egg grew stiffer and more snowy.

“Just look, mother! Isn’t it lovely?”

And he bal­anced a bit on his nose, then blew it in the air.

“Now, don’t waste it,” said the mother.

Every­body was mad with ex­cite­ment. Wil­liam was com­ing on Christ­mas Eve. Mrs. Morel sur­veyed her pantry. There was a big plum cake, and a rice cake, jam tarts, lemon tarts, and mince-pies—two enorm­ous dishes. She was fin­ish­ing cook­ing—Span­ish tarts and cheese­cakes. Every­where was dec­or­ated. The kiss­ing bunch of ber­ried holly hung with bright and glit­ter­ing things, spun slowly over Mrs. Morel’s head as she trimmed her little tarts in the kit­chen. A great fire roared. There was a scent of cooked pastry. He was due at seven o’clock, but he would be late. The three chil­dren had gone to meet him. She was alone. But at a quarter to seven Morel came in again. Neither wife nor hus­band spoke. He sat in his arm­chair, quite awk­ward with ex­cite­ment, and she quietly went on with her bak­ing. Only by the care­ful way in which she did things could it be told how much moved she was. The clock ticked on.

“What time dost say he’s com­ing?” Morel asked for the fifth time.

“The train gets in at half-past six,” she replied em­phat­ic­ally.

“Then he’ll be here at ten past seven.”

“Eh, bless you, it’ll be hours late on the Mid­land,” she said in­dif­fer­ently. But she hoped, by ex­pect­ing him late, to bring him early. Morel went down the entry to look for him. Then he came back.

“Good­ness, man!” she said. “You’re like an ill-sit­ting hen.”

“Hadna you bet­ter be get­tin’ him sum­mat t’ eat ready?” asked the father.

“There’s plenty of time,” she answered.

“There’s not so much as I can see on,” he answered, turn­ing crossly in his chair. She began to clear her table. The kettle was singing. They waited and waited.

Mean­time the three chil­dren were on the plat­form at Seth­ley Bridge, on the Mid­land main line, two miles from home. They waited one hour. A train came—he was not there. Down the line the red and green lights shone. It was very dark and very cold.

“Ask him if the Lon­don train’s come,” said Paul to An­nie, when they saw a man in a tip cap.

“I’m not,” said An­nie. “You be quiet—he might send us off.”

But Paul was dy­ing for the man to know they were ex­pect­ing someone by the Lon­don train: it soun­ded so grand. Yet he was much too much scared of broach­ing any man, let alone one in a peaked cap, to dare to ask. The three chil­dren could scarcely go into the wait­ing-room for fear of be­ing sent away, and for fear some­thing should hap­pen whilst they were off the plat­form. Still they waited in the dark and cold.

“It’s an hour an’ a half late,” said Ar­thur pathet­ic­ally.

“Well,” said An­nie, “it’s Christ­mas Eve.”

They all grew si­lent. He wasn’t com­ing. They looked down the dark­ness of the rail­way. There was Lon­don! It seemed the ut­ter­most of dis­tance. They thought any­thing might hap­pen if one came from Lon­don. They were all too troubled to talk. Cold, and un­happy, and si­lent, they huddled to­gether on the plat­form.

At last, after more than two hours, they saw the lights of an en­gine peer­ing round, away down the dark­ness. A porter ran out. The chil­dren drew back with beat­ing hearts. A great train, bound for Manchester, drew up. Two doors opened, and from one of them, Wil­liam. They flew to him. He handed par­cels to them cheer­ily, and im­me­di­ately began to ex­plain that this great train had stopped for his sake at such a small sta­tion as Seth­ley Bridge: it was not booked to stop.

Mean­while the par­ents were get­ting anxious. The table was set, the chop was cooked, everything was ready. Mrs. Morel put on her black ap­ron. She was wear­ing her best dress. Then she sat, pre­tend­ing to read. The minutes were a tor­ture to her.

“H’m!” said Morel. “It’s an hour an’ a ha’ef.”

“And those chil­dren wait­ing!” she said.

“Th’ train canna ha’ come in yet,” he said.

“I tell you, on Christ­mas Eve they’re hours wrong.”

They were both a bit cross with each other, so gnawed with anxi­ety. The ash tree moaned out­side in a cold, raw wind. And all that space of night from Lon­don home! Mrs. Morel suffered. The slight click of the works in­side the clock ir­rit­ated her. It was get­ting so late; it was get­ting un­bear­able.

At last there was a sound of voices, and a foot­step in the entry.

“Ha’s here!” cried Morel, jump­ing up.

Then he stood back. The mother ran a few steps to­wards the door and waited. There was a rush and a pat­ter of feet, the door burst open. Wil­liam was there. He dropped his Glad­stone bag and took his mother in his arms.

“Mater!” he said.

“My boy!” she cried.

And for two seconds, no longer, she clasped him and kissed him. Then she with­drew and said, try­ing to be quite nor­mal:

“But how late you are!”

“Aren’t I!” he cried, turn­ing to his father. “Well, dad!”

The two men shook hands.

“Well, my lad!”

Morel’s eyes were wet.

“We thought tha’d niver be com­min’,” he said.

“Oh, I’d come!” ex­claimed Wil­liam.

Then the son turned round to his mother.

“But you look well,” she said proudly, laugh­ing.

“Well!” he ex­claimed. “I should think so—com­ing home!”

He was a fine fel­low, big, straight, and fear­less-look­ing. He looked round at the ever­greens and the kiss­ing bunch, and the little tarts that lay in their tins on the hearth.

“By jove! mother, it’s not dif­fer­ent!” he said, as if in re­lief.

Every­body was still for a second. Then he sud­denly sprang for­ward, picked a tart from the hearth, and pushed it whole into his mouth.

“Well, did iver you see such a par­ish oven!” the father ex­claimed.

He had brought them end­less presents. Every penny he had he had spent on them. There was a sense of lux­ury over­flow­ing in the house. For his mother there was an um­brella with gold on the pale handle. She kept it to her dy­ing day, and would have lost any­thing rather than that. Every­body had some­thing gor­geous, and be­sides, there were pounds of un­known sweets: Turk­ish de­light, crys­tal­lised pine­apple, and such­like things which, the chil­dren thought, only the splend­our of Lon­don could provide. And Paul boas­ted of these sweets among his friends.

“Real pine­apple, cut off in slices, and then turned into crys­tal—fair grand!”

Every­body was mad with hap­pi­ness in the fam­ily. Home was home, and they loved it with a pas­sion of love, whatever the suf­fer­ing had been. There were parties, there were re­joicings. People came in to see Wil­liam, to see what dif­fer­ence Lon­don had made to him. And they all found him “such a gen­tle­man, and such a fine fel­low, my word!”

When he went away again the chil­dren re­tired to vari­ous places to weep alone. Morel went to bed in misery, and Mrs. Morel felt as if she were numbed by some drug, as if her feel­ings were para­lysed. She loved him pas­sion­ately.

He was in the of­fice of a law­yer con­nec­ted with a large ship­ping firm, and at the mid­sum­mer his chief offered him a trip in the Medi­ter­ranean on one of the boats, for quite a small cost. Mrs. Morel wrote: “Go, go, my boy. You may never have a chance again, and I should love to think of you cruis­ing there in the Medi­ter­ranean al­most bet­ter than to have you at home.” But Wil­liam came home for his fort­night’s hol­i­day. Not even the Medi­ter­ranean, which pulled at all his young man’s de­sire to travel, and at his poor man’s won­der at the glam­or­ous south, could take him away when he might come home. That com­pensated his mother for much.

V Paul Launches Into Life

Morel was rather a heed­less man, care­less of danger. So he had end­less ac­ci­dents. Now, when Mrs. Morel heard the rattle of an empty coal-cart cease at her entry-end, she ran into the par­lour to look, ex­pect­ing al­most to see her hus­band seated in the wagon, his face grey un­der his dirt, his body limp and sick with some hurt or other. If it were he, she would run out to help.

About a year after Wil­liam went to Lon­don, and just after Paul had left school, be­fore he got work, Mrs. Morel was up­stairs and her son was paint­ing in the kit­chen—he was very clever with his brush—when there came a knock at the door. Crossly he put down his brush to go. At the same mo­ment his mother opened a win­dow up­stairs and looked down.

A pit-lad in his dirt stood on the threshold.

“Is this Wal­ter Morel’s?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Mrs. Morel. “What is it?”

But she had guessed already.

“Your mester’s got hurt,” he said.

“Eh, dear me!” she ex­claimed. “It’s a won­der if he hadn’t, lad. And what’s he done this time?”

“I don’t know for sure, but it’s ’is leg some­where. They ta’ein’ ’im ter th’ ’os­pital.”

“Good gra­cious me!” she ex­claimed. “Eh, dear, what a one he is! There’s not five minutes of peace, I’ll be hanged if there is! His thumb’s nearly bet­ter, and now—Did you see him?”

“I seed him at th’ bot­tom. An’ I seed ’em bring ’im up in a tub, an’ ’e wor in a dead faint. But he shouted like any­think when Doc­tor Fraser ex­amined him i’ th’ lamp cabin—an’ cossed an’ swore, an’ said as ’e wor goin’ to be ta’en whoam—‘e worn’t goin’ ter th’ ’os­pital.”

The boy faltered to an end.

“He would want to come home, so that I can have all the bother. Thank you, my lad. Eh, dear, if I’m not sick—sick and sur­feited, I am!”

She came down­stairs. Paul had mech­an­ic­ally re­sumed his paint­ing.

“And it must be pretty bad if they’ve taken him to the hos­pital,” she went on. “But what a care­less creature he is! Other men don’t have all these ac­ci­dents. Yes, he would want to put all the bur­den on me. Eh, dear, just as we were get­ting easy a bit at last. Put those things away, there’s no time to be paint­ing now. What time is there a train? I know I s’ll have to go trail­ing to Ke­ston. I s’ll have to leave that bed­room.”

“I can fin­ish it,” said Paul.

“You needn’t. I shall catch the seven o’clock back, I should think. Oh, my blessed heart, the fuss and com­mo­tion he’ll make! And those gran­ite setts at Tinder Hill—he might well call them kid­ney pebbles—they’ll jolt him al­most to bits. I won­der why they can’t mend them, the state they’re in, an’ all the men as go across in that am­bu­lance. You’d think they’d have a hos­pital here. The men bought the ground, and, my sirs, there’d be ac­ci­dents enough to keep it go­ing. But no, they must trail them ten miles in a slow am­bu­lance to Not­ting­ham. It’s a cry­ing shame! Oh, and the fuss he’ll make! I know he will! I won­der who’s with him. Barker, I s’d think. Poor beg­gar, he’ll wish him­self any­where rather. But he’ll look after him, I know. Now there’s no telling how long he’ll be stuck in that hos­pital—and won’t he hate it! But if it’s only his leg it’s not so bad.”

All the time she was get­ting ready. Hur­riedly tak­ing off her bod­ice, she crouched at the boiler while the wa­ter ran slowly into her lad­ing-can.

“I wish this boiler was at the bot­tom of the sea!” she ex­claimed, wrig­gling the handle im­pa­tiently. She had very hand­some, strong arms, rather sur­pris­ing on a smallish wo­man.

Paul cleared away, put on the kettle, and set the table.

“There isn’t a train till four-twenty,” he said. “You’ve time enough.”

“Oh no, I haven’t!” she cried, blink­ing at him over the towel as she wiped her face.

“Yes, you have. You must drink a cup of tea at any rate. Should I come with you to Ke­ston?”

“Come with me? What for, I should like to know? Now, what have I to take him? Eh, dear! His clean shirt—and it’s a bless­ing it is clean. But it had bet­ter be aired. And stock­ings—he won’t want them—and a towel, I sup­pose; and handker­chiefs. Now what else?”

“A comb, a knife and fork and spoon,” said Paul. His father had been in the hos­pital be­fore.

“Good­ness knows what sort of state his feet were in,” con­tin­ued Mrs. Morel, as she combed her long brown hair, that was fine as silk, and was touched now with grey. “He’s very par­tic­u­lar to wash him­self to the waist, but be­low he thinks doesn’t mat­ter. But there, I sup­pose they see plenty like it.”

Paul had laid the table. He cut his mother one or two pieces of very thin bread and but­ter.

“Here you are,” he said, put­ting her cup of tea in her place.

“I can’t be bothered!” she ex­claimed crossly.

“Well, you’ve got to, so there, now it’s put out ready,” he in­sisted.

So she sat down and sipped her tea, and ate a little, in si­lence. She was think­ing.

In a few minutes she was gone, to walk the two and a half miles to Ke­ston Sta­tion. All the things she was tak­ing him she had in her bul­ging string bag. Paul watched her go up the road between the hedges—a little, quick-step­ping fig­ure, and his heart ached for her, that she was thrust for­ward again into pain and trouble. And she, trip­ping so quickly in her anxi­ety, felt at the back of her her son’s heart wait­ing on her, felt him bear­ing what part of the bur­den he could, even sup­port­ing her. And when she was at the hos­pital, she thought: “It will up­set that lad when I tell him how bad it is. I’d bet­ter be care­ful.” And when she was trudging home again, she felt he was com­ing to share her bur­den.

“Is it bad?” asked Paul, as soon as she entered the house.

“It’s bad enough,” she replied.

“What?”

She sighed and sat down, un­do­ing her bon­net-strings. Her son watched her face as it was lif­ted, and her small, work-hardened hands fin­ger­ing at the bow un­der her chin.

“Well,” she answered, “it’s not really dan­ger­ous, but the nurse says it’s a dread­ful smash. You see, a great piece of rock fell on his leg—here—and it’s a com­pound frac­ture. There are pieces of bone stick­ing through—”

“Ugh—how hor­rid!” ex­claimed the chil­dren.

“And,” she con­tin­ued, “of course he says he’s go­ing to die—it wouldn’t be him if he didn’t. ‘I’m done for, my lass!’ he said, look­ing at me. ‘Don’t be so silly,’ I said to him. ‘You’re not go­ing to die of a broken leg, how­ever badly it’s smashed.’ ‘I s’ll niver come out of ’ere but in a wooden box,’ he groaned. ‘Well,’ I said, ‘if you want them to carry you into the garden in a wooden box, when you’re bet­ter, I’ve no doubt they will.’ ‘If we think it’s good for him,’ said the Sister. She’s an aw­fully nice Sister, but rather strict.”

Mrs. Morel took off her bon­net. The chil­dren waited in si­lence.

“Of course, he is bad,” she con­tin­ued, “and he will be. It’s a great shock, and he’s lost a lot of blood; and, of course, it is a very dan­ger­ous smash. It’s not at all sure that it will mend so eas­ily. And then there’s the fever and the mor­ti­fic­a­tion—if it took bad ways he’d quickly be gone. But there, he’s a clean-blooded man, with won­der­ful heal­ing flesh, and so I see no reason why it should take bad ways. Of course there’s a wound—”

She was pale now with emo­tion and anxi­ety. The three chil­dren real­ised that it was very bad for their father, and the house was si­lent, anxious.

“But he al­ways gets bet­ter,” said Paul after a while.

“That’s what I tell him,” said the mother.

Every­body moved about in si­lence.

“And he really looked nearly done for,” she said. “But the Sister says that is the pain.”

An­nie took away her mother’s coat and bon­net.

“And he looked at me when I came away! I said: ‘I s’ll have to go now, Wal­ter, be­cause of the train—and the chil­dren.’ And he looked at me. It seems hard.”

Paul took up his brush again and went on paint­ing. Ar­thur went out­side for some coal. An­nie sat look­ing dis­mal. And Mrs. Morel, in her little rock­ing-chair that her hus­band had made for her when the first baby was com­ing, re­mained mo­tion­less, brood­ing. She was grieved, and bit­terly sorry for the man who was hurt so much. But still, in her heart of hearts, where the love should have burned, there was a blank. Now, when all her wo­man’s pity was roused to its full ex­tent, when she would have slaved her­self to death to nurse him and to save him, when she would have taken the pain her­self, if she could, some­where far away in­side her, she felt in­dif­fer­ent to him and to his suf­fer­ing. It hurt her most of all, this fail­ure to love him, even when he roused her strong emo­tions. She brooded a while.

“And there,” she said sud­denly, “when I’d got halfway to Ke­ston, I found I’d come out in my work­ing boots—and look at them.” They were an old pair of Paul’s, brown and rubbed through at the toes. “I didn’t know what to do with my­self, for shame,” she ad­ded.

In the morn­ing, when An­nie and Ar­thur were at school, Mrs. Morel talked again to her son, who was help­ing her with her house­work.

“I found Barker at the hos­pital. He did look bad, poor little fel­low! ‘Well,’ I said to him, ‘what sort of a jour­ney did you have with him?’ ‘Dunna ax me, mis­sis!’ he said. ‘Ay,’ I said, ‘I know what he’d be.’ ‘But it wor bad for him, Mrs. Morel, it wor that!’ he said. ‘I know,’ I said. ‘At ivry jolt I thought my ’eart would ha’ flown clean out o’ my mouth,’ he said. ‘An’ the scream ’e gives some­times! Mis­sis, not for a for­tune would I go through wi’ it again.’ ‘I can quite un­der­stand it,’ I said. ‘It’s a nasty job, though,’ he said, ‘an’ one as’ll be a long while afore it’s right again.’ ‘I’m afraid it will,’ I said. I like Mr. Barker—I do like him. There’s some­thing so manly about him.”

Paul re­sumed his task si­lently.

“And of course,” Mrs. Morel con­tin­ued, “for a man like your father, the hos­pital is hard. He can’t un­der­stand rules and reg­u­la­tions. And he won’t let any­body else touch him, not if he can help it. When he smashed the muscles of his thigh, and it had to be dressed four times a day, would he let any­body but me or his mother do it? He wouldn’t. So, of course, he’ll suf­fer in there with the nurses. And I didn’t like leav­ing him. I’m sure, when I kissed him an’ came away, it seemed a shame.”

So she talked to her son, al­most as if she were think­ing aloud to him, and he took it in as best he could, by shar­ing her trouble to lighten it. And in the end she shared al­most everything with him without know­ing.

Morel had a very bad time. For a week he was in a crit­ical con­di­tion. Then he began to mend. And then, know­ing he was go­ing to get bet­ter, the whole fam­ily sighed with re­lief, and pro­ceeded to live hap­pily.

They were not badly off whilst Morel was in the hos­pital. There were four­teen shil­lings a week from the pit, ten shil­lings from the sick club, and five shil­lings from the Dis­ab­il­ity Fund; and then every week the but­ties had some­thing for Mrs. Morel—five or seven shil­lings—so that she was quite well to do. And whilst Morel was pro­gress­ing fa­vour­ably in the hos­pital, the fam­ily was ex­traordin­ar­ily happy and peace­ful. On Saturdays and Wed­nes­days Mrs. Morel went to Not­ting­ham to see her hus­band. Then she al­ways brought back some little thing: a small tube of paints for Paul, or some thick pa­per; a couple of post­cards for An­nie, that the whole fam­ily re­joiced over for days be­fore the girl was al­lowed to send them away; or a fret­saw for Ar­thur, or a bit of pretty wood. She de­scribed her ad­ven­tures into the big shops with joy. Soon the folk in the pic­ture-shop knew her, and knew about Paul. The girl in the book­shop took a keen in­terest in her. Mrs. Morel was full of in­form­a­tion when she got home from Not­ting­ham. The three sat round till bed­time, listen­ing, put­ting in, ar­guing. Then Paul of­ten raked the fire.

“I’m the man in the house now,” he used to say to his mother with joy. They learned how per­fectly peace­ful the home could be. And they al­most re­gret­ted—though none of them would have owned to such cal­lous­ness—that their father was soon com­ing back.

Paul was now four­teen, and was look­ing for work. He was a rather small and rather finely-made boy, with dark brown hair and light blue eyes. His face had already lost its youth­ful chub­bi­ness, and was be­com­ing some­what like Wil­liam’s—rough-fea­tured, al­most rugged—and it was ex­traordin­ar­ily mo­bile. Usu­ally he looked as if he saw things, was full of life, and warm; then his smile, like his mother’s, came sud­denly and was very lov­able; and then, when there was any clog in his soul’s quick run­ning, his face went stu­pid and ugly. He was the sort of boy that be­comes a clown and a lout as soon as he is not un­der­stood, or feels him­self held cheap; and, again, is ad­or­able at the first touch of warmth.

He suffered very much from the first con­tact with any­thing. When he was seven, the start­ing school had been a night­mare and a tor­ture to him. But af­ter­wards he liked it. And now that he felt he had to go out into life, he went through ag­on­ies of shrink­ing self-con­scious­ness. He was quite a clever painter for a boy of his years, and he knew some French and Ger­man and math­em­at­ics that Mr. Heaton had taught him. But noth­ing he had was of any com­mer­cial value. He was not strong enough for heavy manual work, his mother said. He did not care for mak­ing things with his hands, pre­ferred ra­cing about, or mak­ing ex­cur­sions into the coun­try, or read­ing, or paint­ing.

“What do you want to be?” his mother asked.

“Anything.”

“That is no an­swer,” said Mrs. Morel.

But it was quite truth­fully the only an­swer he could give. His am­bi­tion, as far as this world’s gear went, was quietly to earn his thirty or thirty-five shil­lings a week some­where near home, and then, when his father died, have a cot­tage with his mother, paint and go out as he liked, and live happy ever after. That was his pro­gramme as far as do­ing things went. But he was proud within him­self, meas­ur­ing people against him­self, and pla­cing them, in­ex­or­ably. And he thought that per­haps he might also make a painter, the real thing. But that he left alone.

“Then,” said his mother, “you must look in the pa­per for the ad­vert­ise­ments.”

He looked at her. It seemed to him a bit­ter hu­mi­li­ation and an an­guish to go through. But he said noth­ing. When he got up in the morn­ing, his whole be­ing was knot­ted up over this one thought:

“I’ve got to go and look for ad­vert­ise­ments for a job.”

It stood in front of the morn­ing, that thought, killing all joy and even life, for him. His heart felt like a tight knot.

And then, at ten o’clock, he set off. He was sup­posed to be a queer, quiet child. Go­ing up the sunny street of the little town, he felt as if all the folk he met said to them­selves: “He’s go­ing to the Co-op read­ing-room to look in the pa­pers for a place. He can’t get a job. I sup­pose he’s liv­ing on his mother.” Then he crept up the stone stairs be­hind the drapery shop at the Co-op, and peeped in the read­ing-room. Usu­ally one or two men were there, either old, use­less fel­lows, or col­li­ers “on the club.” So he entered, full of shrink­ing and suf­fer­ing when they looked up, seated him­self at the table, and pre­ten­ded to scan the news. He knew they would think: “What does a lad of thir­teen want in a read­ing-room with a news­pa­per?” and he suffered.

Then he looked wist­fully out of the win­dow. Already he was a pris­oner of in­dus­tri­al­ism. Large sun­flowers stared over the old red wall of the garden op­pos­ite, look­ing in their jolly way down on the wo­men who were hur­ry­ing with some­thing for din­ner. The val­ley was full of corn, bright­en­ing in the sun. Two col­lier­ies, among the fields, waved their small white plumes of steam. Far off on the hills were the woods of An­nes­ley, dark and fas­cin­at­ing. Already his heart went down. He was be­ing taken into bond­age. His free­dom in the be­loved home val­ley was go­ing now.

The brew­ers’ wag­ons came rolling up from Ke­ston with enorm­ous bar­rels, four a side, like beans in a burst bean-pod. The wag­oner, throned aloft, rolling massively in his seat, was not so much be­low Paul’s eye. The man’s hair, on his small, bul­let head, was bleached al­most white by the sun, and on his thick red arms, rock­ing idly on his sack ap­ron, the white hairs glistened. His red face shone and was al­most asleep with sun­shine. The horses, hand­some and brown, went on by them­selves, look­ing by far the mas­ters of the show.

Paul wished he were stu­pid. “I wish,” he thought to him­self, “I was fat like him, and like a dog in the sun. I wish I was a pig and a brewer’s wag­oner.”

Then, the room be­ing at last empty, he would hast­ily copy an ad­vert­ise­ment on a scrap of pa­per, then an­other, and slip out in im­mense re­lief. His mother would scan over his cop­ies.

“Yes,” she said, “you may try.”

Wil­liam had writ­ten out a let­ter of ap­plic­a­tion, couched in ad­mir­able busi­ness lan­guage, which Paul copied, with vari­ations. The boy’s hand­writ­ing was ex­ec­rable, so that Wil­liam, who did all things well, got into a fever of im­pa­tience.

The elder brother was be­com­ing quite swanky. In Lon­don he found that he could as­so­ci­ate with men far above his Best­wood friends in sta­tion. Some of the clerks in the of­fice had stud­ied for the law, and were more or less go­ing through a kind of ap­pren­tice­ship. Wil­liam al­ways made friends among men wherever he went, he was so jolly. There­fore he was soon vis­it­ing and stay­ing in houses of men who, in Best­wood, would have looked down on the un­ap­proach­able bank man­ager, and would merely have called in­dif­fer­ently on the Rector. So he began to fancy him­self as a great gun. He was, in­deed, rather sur­prised at the ease with which he be­came a gen­tle­man.

His mother was glad, he seemed so pleased. And his lodging in Waltham­stow was so dreary. But now there seemed to come a kind of fever into the young man’s let­ters. He was un­settled by all the change, he did not stand firm on his own feet, but seemed to spin rather gid­dily on the quick cur­rent of the new life. His mother was anxious for him. She could feel him los­ing him­self. He had danced and gone to the theatre, boated on the river, been out with friends; and she knew he sat up af­ter­wards in his cold bed­room grind­ing away at Latin, be­cause he in­ten­ded to get on in his of­fice, and in the law as much as he could. He never sent his mother any money now. It was all taken, the little he had, for his own life. And she did not want any, ex­cept some­times, when she was in a tight corner, and when ten shil­lings would have saved her much worry. She still dreamed of Wil­liam, and of what he would do, with her­self be­hind him. Never for a minute would she ad­mit to her­self how heavy and anxious her heart was be­cause of him.

Also he talked a good deal now of a girl he had met at a dance, a hand­some bru­nette, quite young, and a lady, after whom the men were run­ning thick and fast.

“I won­der if you would run, my boy,” his mother wrote to him, “un­less you saw all the other men chas­ing her too. You feel safe enough and vain enough in a crowd. But take care, and see how you feel when you find your­self alone, and in tri­umph.” Wil­liam re­sen­ted these things, and con­tin­ued the chase. He had taken the girl on the river. “If you saw her, mother, you would know how I feel. Tall and el­eg­ant, with the clearest of clear, trans­par­ent olive com­plex­ions, hair as black as jet, and such grey eyes—bright, mock­ing, like lights on wa­ter at night. It is all very well to be a bit satir­ical till you see her. And she dresses as well as any wo­man in Lon­don. I tell you, your son doesn’t half put his head up when she goes walk­ing down Pic­ca­dilly with him.”

Mrs. Morel wondered, in her heart, if her son did not go walk­ing down Pic­ca­dilly with an el­eg­ant fig­ure and fine clothes, rather than with a wo­man who was near to him. But she con­grat­u­lated him in her doubt­ful fash­ion. And, as she stood over the wash­ing-tub, the mother brooded over her son. She saw him saddled with an el­eg­ant and ex­pens­ive wife, earn­ing little money, drag­ging along and get­ting draggled in some small, ugly house in a sub­urb. “But there,” she told her­self, “I am very likely a silly—meet­ing trouble halfway.” Never­the­less, the load of anxi­ety scarcely ever left her heart, lest Wil­liam should do the wrong thing by him­self.

Presently, Paul was bid­den call upon Tho­mas Jordan, Man­u­fac­turer of Sur­gical Ap­pli­ances, at 21, Span­iel Row, Not­ting­ham. Mrs. Morel was all joy.

“There, you see!” she cried, her eyes shin­ing. “You’ve only writ­ten four let­ters, and the third is answered. You’re lucky, my boy, as I al­ways said you were.”

Paul looked at the pic­ture of a wooden leg, ad­orned with elastic stock­ings and other ap­pli­ances, that figured on Mr. Jordan’s note­pa­per, and he felt alarmed. He had not known that elastic stock­ings ex­is­ted. And he seemed to feel the busi­ness world, with its reg­u­lated sys­tem of val­ues, and its im­per­son­al­ity, and he dreaded it. It seemed mon­strous also that a busi­ness could be run on wooden legs.

Mother and son set off to­gether one Tues­day morn­ing. It was August and blaz­ing hot. Paul walked with some­thing screwed up tight in­side him. He would have suffered much phys­ical pain rather than this un­reas­on­able suf­fer­ing at be­ing ex­posed to strangers, to be ac­cep­ted or re­jec­ted. Yet he chattered away with his mother. He would never have con­fessed to her how he suffered over these things, and she only partly guessed. She was gay, like a sweet­heart. She stood in front of the ticket-of­fice at Best­wood, and Paul watched her take from her purse the money for the tick­ets. As he saw her hands in their old black kid gloves get­ting the sil­ver out of the worn purse, his heart con­trac­ted with pain of love of her.

She was quite ex­cited, and quite gay. He suffered be­cause she would talk aloud in pres­ence of the other trav­el­lers.

“Now look at that silly cow!” she said, “ca­reer­ing round as if it thought it was a cir­cus.”

“It’s most likely a bot­fly,” he said very low.

“A what?” she asked brightly and un­ashamed.

They thought a while. He was sens­ible all the time of hav­ing her op­pos­ite him. Sud­denly their eyes met, and she smiled to him—a rare, in­tim­ate smile, beau­ti­ful with bright­ness and love. Then each looked out of the win­dow.

The six­teen slow miles of rail­way jour­ney passed. The mother and son walked down Sta­tion Street, feel­ing the ex­cite­ment of lov­ers hav­ing an ad­ven­ture to­gether. In Car­ring­ton Street they stopped to hang over the para­pet and look at the barges on the canal be­low.

“It’s just like Venice,” he said, see­ing the sun­shine on the wa­ter that lay between high fact­ory walls.

“Per­haps,” she answered, smil­ing.

They en­joyed the shops im­mensely.

“Now you see that blouse,” she would say, “wouldn’t that just suit our An­nie? And for one-and-el­even-three. Isn’t that cheap?”

“And made of nee­dle­work as well,” he said.

“Yes.”

They had plenty of time, so they did not hurry. The town was strange and de­light­ful to them. But the boy was tied up in­side in a knot of ap­pre­hen­sion. He dreaded the in­ter­view with Tho­mas Jordan.

It was nearly el­even o’clock by St. Peter’s Church. They turned up a nar­row street that led to the Castle. It was gloomy and old-fash­ioned, hav­ing low dark shops and dark green house doors with brass knock­ers, and yel­low-ochred door­steps pro­ject­ing on to the pave­ment; then an­other old shop whose small win­dow looked like a cun­ning, half-shut eye. Mother and son went cau­tiously, look­ing every­where for “Tho­mas Jordan and Son.” It was like hunt­ing in some wild place. They were on tip­toe of ex­cite­ment.

Sud­denly they spied a big, dark arch­way, in which were names of vari­ous firms, Tho­mas Jordan among them.

“Here it is!” said Mrs. Morel. “But now where is it?”

They looked round. On one side was a queer, dark, card­board fact­ory, on the other a Com­mer­cial Hotel.

“It’s up the entry,” said Paul.

And they ven­tured un­der the arch­way, as into the jaws of the dragon. They emerged into a wide yard, like a well, with build­ings all round. It was littered with straw and boxes, and card­board. The sun­shine ac­tu­ally caught one crate whose straw was stream­ing on to the yard like gold. But else­where the place was like a pit. There were sev­eral doors, and two flights of steps. Straight in front, on a dirty glass door at the top of a stair­case, loomed the omin­ous words “Tho­mas Jordan and Son—Sur­gical Ap­pli­ances.” Mrs. Morel went first, her son fol­lowed her. Charles I moun­ted his scaf­fold with a lighter heart than had Paul Morel as he fol­lowed his mother up the dirty steps to the dirty door.

She pushed open the door, and stood in pleased sur­prise. In front of her was a big ware­house, with creamy pa­per par­cels every­where, and clerks, with their shirtsleeves rolled back, were go­ing about in an at-home sort of way. The light was sub­dued, the glossy cream par­cels seemed lu­min­ous, the coun­ters were of dark brown wood. All was quiet and very homely. Mrs. Morel took two steps for­ward, then waited. Paul stood be­hind her. She had on her Sunday bon­net and a black veil; he wore a boy’s broad white col­lar and a Nor­folk suit.

One of the clerks looked up. He was thin and tall, with a small face. His way of look­ing was alert. Then he glanced round to the other end of the room, where was a glass of­fice. And then he came for­ward. He did not say any­thing, but leaned in a gentle, in­quir­ing fash­ion to­wards Mrs. Morel.

“Can I see Mr. Jordan?” she asked.

“I’ll fetch him,” answered the young man.

He went down to the glass of­fice. A red-faced, white-whiskered old man looked up. He re­minded Paul of a pom­er­a­nian dog. Then the same little man came up the room. He had short legs, was rather stout, and wore an alpaca jacket. So, with one ear up, as it were, he came stoutly and in­quir­ingly down the room.

“Good morn­ing!” he said, hes­it­at­ing be­fore Mrs. Morel, in doubt as to whether she were a cus­tomer or not.

“Good morn­ing. I came with my son, Paul Morel. You asked him to call this morn­ing.”

“Come this way,” said Mr. Jordan, in a rather snappy little man­ner in­ten­ded to be busi­ness­like.

They fol­lowed the man­u­fac­turer into a grubby little room, up­holstered in black Amer­ican leather, glossy with the rub­bing of many cus­tom­ers. On the table was a pile of trusses, yel­low wash-leather hoops tangled to­gether. They looked new and liv­ing. Paul sniffed the odour of new wash-leather. He wondered what the things were. By this time he was so much stunned that he only no­ticed the out­side things.

“Sit down!” said Mr. Jordan, ir­rit­ably point­ing Mrs. Morel to a horse­hair chair. She sat on the edge in an un­cer­tain fash­ion. Then the little old man fid­geted and found a pa­per.

“Did you write this let­ter?” he snapped, thrust­ing what Paul re­cog­nised as his own note­pa­per in front of him.

“Yes,” he answered.

At that mo­ment he was oc­cu­pied in two ways: first, in feel­ing guilty for telling a lie, since Wil­liam had com­posed the let­ter; second, in won­der­ing why his let­ter seemed so strange and dif­fer­ent, in the fat, red hand of the man, from what it had been when it lay on the kit­chen table. It was like part of him­self, gone astray. He re­sen­ted the way the man held it.

“Where did you learn to write?” said the old man crossly.

Paul merely looked at him shamedly, and did not an­swer.

“He is a bad writer,” put in Mrs. Morel apo­lo­get­ic­ally. Then she pushed up her veil. Paul hated her for not be­ing prouder with this com­mon little man, and he loved her face clear of the veil.

“And you say you know French?” in­quired the little man, still sharply.

“Yes,” said Paul.

“What school did you go to?”

“The Board-school.”

“And did you learn it there?”

“No—I—” The boy went crim­son and got no farther.

“His god­father gave him les­sons,” said Mrs. Morel, half plead­ing and rather dis­tant.

Mr. Jordan hes­it­ated. Then, in his ir­rit­able man­ner—he al­ways seemed to keep his hands ready for ac­tion—he pulled an­other sheet of pa­per from his pocket, un­fol­ded it. The pa­per made a crack­ling noise. He handed it to Paul.

“Read that,” he said.

It was a note in French, in thin, flimsy for­eign hand­writ­ing that the boy could not de­cipher. He stared blankly at the pa­per.

“ ‘Mon­sieur,’ ” he began; then he looked in great con­fu­sion at Mr. Jordan. “It’s the—it’s the—”

He wanted to say “hand­writ­ing,” but his wits would no longer work even suf­fi­ciently to sup­ply him with the word. Feel­ing an ut­ter fool, and hat­ing Mr. Jordan, he turned des­per­ately to the pa­per again.

“ ‘Sir—Please send me’—er—er—I can’t tell the—er—‘two pairs—gris fil bas—grey thread stock­ings’—er—er—‘sans—without’—er—I can’t tell the words—er—‘doigts—fin­gers’—er—I can’t tell the—”

He wanted to say “hand­writ­ing,” but the word still re­fused to come. See­ing him stuck, Mr. Jordan snatched the pa­per from him.

“ ‘Please send by re­turn two pairs grey thread stock­ings without toes.’ ”

“Well,” flashed Paul, “ ‘doigts’ means ‘fin­gers’—as well—as a rule—”

The little man looked at him. He did not know whether “doigts” meant “fin­gers”; he knew that for all his pur­poses it meant “toes.”

“Fingers to stock­ings!” he snapped.

“Well, it does mean fin­gers,” the boy per­sisted.

He hated the little man, who made such a clod of him. Mr. Jordan looked at the pale, stu­pid, de­fi­ant boy, then at the mother, who sat quiet and with that pe­cu­liar shut-off look of the poor who have to de­pend on the fa­vour of oth­ers.

“And when could he come?” he asked.

“Well,” said Mrs. Morel, “as soon as you wish. He has fin­ished school now.”

“He would live in Best­wood?”

“Yes; but he could be in—at the sta­tion—at quarter to eight.”

“H’m!”

It ended by Paul’s be­ing en­gaged as ju­nior spiral clerk at eight shil­lings a week. The boy did not open his mouth to say an­other word, after hav­ing in­sisted that “doigts” meant “fin­gers.” He fol­lowed his mother down the stairs. She looked at him with her bright blue eyes full of love and joy.

“I think you’ll like it,” she said.

“ ‘Doigts’ does mean ‘fin­gers,’ mother, and it was the writ­ing. I couldn’t read the writ­ing.”

“Never mind, my boy. I’m sure he’ll be all right, and you won’t see much of him. Wasn’t that first young fel­low nice? I’m sure you’ll like them.”

“But wasn’t Mr. Jordan com­mon, mother? Does he own it all?”

“I sup­pose he was a work­man who has got on,” she said. “You mustn’t mind people so much. They’re not be­ing dis­agree­able to you—it’s their way. You al­ways think people are mean­ing things for you. But they don’t.”

It was very sunny. Over the big des­ol­ate space of the mar­ket­place the blue sky shimmered, and the gran­ite cobbles of the pav­ing glistened. Shops down the Long Row were deep in ob­scur­ity, and the shadow was full of col­our. Just where the horse trams trundled across the mar­ket was a row of fruit stalls, with fruit blaz­ing in the sun—apples and piles of red­dish or­anges, small green­gage plums and ba­na­nas. There was a warm scent of fruit as mother and son passed. Gradu­ally his feel­ing of ig­no­miny and of rage sank.

“Where should we go for din­ner?” asked the mother.

It was felt to be a reck­less ex­tra­vag­ance. Paul had only been in an eat­ing-house once or twice in his life, and then only to have a cup of tea and a bun. Most of the people of Best­wood con­sidered that tea and bread-and-but­ter, and per­haps pot­ted beef, was all they could af­ford to eat in Not­ting­ham. Real cooked din­ner was con­sidered great ex­tra­vag­ance. Paul felt rather guilty.

They found a place that looked quite cheap. But when Mrs. Morel scanned the bill of fare, her heart was heavy, things were so dear. So she ordered kid­ney-pies and pota­toes as the cheapest avail­able dish.

“We oughtn’t to have come here, mother,” said Paul.

“Never mind,” she said. “We won’t come again.”

She in­sisted on his hav­ing a small cur­rant tart, be­cause he liked sweets.

“I don’t want it, mother,” he pleaded.

“Yes,” she in­sisted; “you’ll have it.”

And she looked round for the wait­ress. But the wait­ress was busy, and Mrs. Morel did not like to bother her then. So the mother and son waited for the girl’s pleas­ure, whilst she flir­ted among the men.

“Brazen hussy!” said Mrs. Morel to Paul. “Look now, she’s tak­ing that man his pud­ding, and he came long after us.”

“It doesn’t mat­ter, mother,” said Paul.

Mrs. Morel was angry. But she was too poor, and her or­ders were too mea­gre, so that she had not the cour­age to in­sist on her rights just then. They waited and waited.

“Should we go, mother?” he said.

Then Mrs. Morel stood up. The girl was passing near.

“Will you bring one cur­rant tart?” said Mrs. Morel clearly.

The girl looked round in­solently.

“Dir­ectly,” she said.

“We have waited quite long enough,” said Mrs. Morel.

In a mo­ment the girl came back with the tart. Mrs. Morel asked coldly for the bill. Paul wanted to sink through the floor. He mar­velled at his mother’s hard­ness. He knew that only years of bat­tling had taught her to in­sist even so little on her rights. She shrank as much as he.

“It’s the last time I go there for any­thing!” she de­clared, when they were out­side the place, thank­ful to be clear.

“We’ll go,” she said, “and look at Keep’s and Boot’s, and one or two places, shall we?”

They had dis­cus­sions over the pic­tures, and Mrs. Morel wanted to buy him a little sable brush that he hankered after. But this in­dul­gence he re­fused. He stood in front of mil­liners’ shops and drapers’ shops al­most bored, but con­tent for her to be in­ter­ested. They wandered on.

“Now, just look at those black grapes!” she said. “They make your mouth wa­ter. I’ve wanted some of those for years, but I s’ll have to wait a bit be­fore I get them.”

Then she re­joiced in the flor­ists, stand­ing in the door­way sniff­ing.

“Oh! oh! Isn’t it simply lovely!”

Paul saw, in the dark­ness of the shop, an el­eg­ant young lady in black peer­ing over the counter curi­ously.

“They’re look­ing at you,” he said, try­ing to draw his mother away.

“But what is it?” she ex­claimed, re­fus­ing to be moved.

“Stocks!” he answered, sniff­ing hast­ily. “Look, there’s a tub­ful.”

“So there is—red and white. But really, I never knew stocks to smell like it!” And, to his great re­lief, she moved out of the door­way, but only to stand in front of the win­dow.

“Paul!” she cried to him, who was try­ing to get out of sight of the el­eg­ant young lady in black—the shop-girl. “Paul! Just look here!”

He came re­luct­antly back.

“Now, just look at that fuch­sia!” she ex­claimed, point­ing.

“H’m!” He made a curi­ous, in­ter­ested sound. “You’d think every second as the flowers was go­ing to fall off, they hang so big an’ heavy.”

“And such an abund­ance!” she cried.

“And the way they drop down­wards with their threads and knots!”

“Yes!” she ex­claimed. “Lovely!”

“I won­der who’ll buy it!” he said.

“I won­der!” she answered. “Not us.”

“It would die in our par­lour.”

“Yes, beastly cold, sun­less hole; it kills every bit of a plant you put in, and the kit­chen chokes them to death.”

They bought a few things, and set off to­wards the sta­tion. Look­ing up the canal, through the dark pass of the build­ings, they saw the Castle on its bluff of brown, green-bushed rock, in a pos­it­ive mir­acle of del­ic­ate sun­shine.

“Won’t it be nice for me to come out at din­ner-times?” said Paul. “I can go all round here and see everything. I s’ll love it.”

“You will,” as­sen­ted his mother.

He had spent a per­fect af­ter­noon with his mother. They ar­rived home in the mel­low even­ing, happy, and glow­ing, and tired.

In the morn­ing he filled in the form for his sea­son-ticket and took it to the sta­tion. When he got back, his mother was just be­gin­ning to wash the floor. He sat crouched up on the sofa.

“He says it’ll be here on Saturday,” he said.

“And how much will it be?”

“About one pound el­even,” he said.

She went on wash­ing her floor in si­lence.

“Is it a lot?” he asked.

“It’s no more than I thought,” she answered.

“An’ I s’ll earn eight shil­lings a week,” he said.

She did not an­swer, but went on with her work. At last she said:

“That Wil­liam prom­ised me, when he went to Lon­don, as he’d give me a pound a month. He has given me ten shil­lings—twice; and now I know he hasn’t a farth­ing if I asked him. Not that I want it. Only just now you’d think he might be able to help with this ticket, which I’d never ex­pec­ted.”

“He earns a lot,” said Paul.

“He earns a hun­dred and thirty pounds. But they’re all alike. They’re large in prom­ises, but it’s pre­cious little ful­fil­ment you get.”

“He spends over fifty shil­lings a week on him­self,” said Paul.

“And I keep this house on less than thirty,” she replied; “and am sup­posed to find money for ex­tras. But they don’t care about help­ing you, once they’ve gone. He’d rather spend it on that dressed-up creature.”

“She should have her own money if she’s so grand,” said Paul.

“She should, but she hasn’t. I asked him. And I know he doesn’t buy her a gold bangle for noth­ing. I won­der who­ever bought me a gold bangle.”

Wil­liam was suc­ceed­ing with his “Gipsy,” as he called her. He asked the girl—her name was Louisa Lily Denys Western—for a pho­to­graph to send to his mother. The photo came—a hand­some bru­nette, taken in pro­file, smirk­ing slightly—and, it might be, quite na­ked, for on the pho­to­graph not a scrap of cloth­ing was to be seen, only a na­ked bust.

“Yes,” wrote Mrs. Morel to her son, “the pho­to­graph of Louie is very strik­ing, and I can see she must be at­tract­ive. But do you think, my boy, it was very good taste of a girl to give her young man that photo to send to his mother—the first? Cer­tainly the shoulders are beau­ti­ful, as you say. But I hardly ex­pec­ted to see so much of them at the first view.”

Morel found the pho­to­graph stand­ing on the chif­fonier in the par­lour. He came out with it between his thick thumb and fin­ger.

“Who dost reckon this is?” he asked of his wife.

“It’s the girl our Wil­liam is go­ing with,” replied Mrs. Morel.

“H’m! ’Er’s a bright spark, from th’ look on ’er, an’ one as wunna do him ower­much good neither. Who is she?”

“Her name is Louisa Lily Denys Western.”

“An’ come again to-mor­rer!” ex­claimed the miner. “An’ is ’er an act­ress?”

“She is not. She’s sup­posed to be a lady.”

“I’ll bet!” he ex­claimed, still star­ing at the photo. “A lady, is she? An’ how much does she reckon ter keep up this sort o’ game on?”

“On noth­ing. She lives with an old aunt, whom she hates, and takes what bit of money’s given her.”

“H’m!” said Morel, lay­ing down the pho­to­graph. “Then he’s a fool to ha’ ta’en up wi’ such a one as that.”

“Dear Mater,” Wil­liam replied. “I’m sorry you didn’t like the pho­to­graph. It never oc­curred to me when I sent it, that you mightn’t think it de­cent. However, I told Gyp that it didn’t quite suit your prim and proper no­tions, so she’s go­ing to send you an­other, that I hope will please you bet­ter. She’s al­ways be­ing pho­to­graphed; in fact, the pho­to­graph­ers ask her if they may take her for noth­ing.”

Presently the new pho­to­graph came, with a little silly note from the girl. This time the young lady was seen in a black satin even­ing bod­ice, cut square, with little puff sleeves, and black lace hanging down her beau­ti­ful arms.

“I won­der if she ever wears any­thing ex­cept even­ing clothes,” said Mrs. Morel sar­castic­ally. “I’m sure I ought to be im­pressed.”

“You are dis­agree­able, mother,” said Paul. “I think the first one with bare shoulders is lovely.”

“Do you?” answered his mother. “Well, I don’t.”

On the Monday morn­ing the boy got up at six to start work. He had the sea­son-ticket, which had cost such bit­ter­ness, in his waist­coat pocket. He loved it with its bars of yel­low across. His mother packed his din­ner in a small, shut-up bas­ket, and he set off at a quarter to seven to catch the 7:15 train. Mrs. Morel came to the entry-end to see him off.

It was a per­fect morn­ing. From the ash tree the slender green fruits that the chil­dren call “pi­geons” were twink­ling gaily down on a little breeze, into the front gar­dens of the houses. The val­ley was full of a lus­trous dark haze, through which the ripe corn shimmered, and in which the steam from Min­ton pit melted swiftly. Puffs of wind came. Paul looked over the high woods of Alder­s­ley, where the coun­try gleamed, and home had never pulled at him so power­fully.

“Good morn­ing, mother,” he said, smil­ing, but feel­ing very un­happy.

“Good morn­ing,” she replied cheer­fully and ten­derly.

She stood in her white ap­ron on the open road, watch­ing him as he crossed the field. He had a small, com­pact body that looked full of life. She felt, as she saw him trudging over the field, that where he de­term­ined to go he would get. She thought of Wil­liam. He would have leaped the fence in­stead of go­ing round the stile. He was away in Lon­don, do­ing well. Paul would be work­ing in Not­ting­ham. Now she had two sons in the world. She could think of two places, great centres of in­dustry, and feel that she had put a man into each of them, that these men would work out what she wanted; they were de­rived from her, they were of her, and their works also would be hers. All the morn­ing long she thought of Paul.

At eight o’clock he climbed the dis­mal stairs of Jordan’s Sur­gical Ap­pli­ance Fact­ory, and stood help­lessly against the first great par­cel-rack, wait­ing for some­body to pick him up. The place was still not awake. Over the coun­ters were great dust sheets. Two men only had ar­rived, and were heard talk­ing in a corner, as they took off their coats and rolled up their shirtsleeves. It was ten past eight. Evidently there was no rush of punc­tu­al­ity. Paul listened to the voices of the two clerks. Then he heard someone cough, and saw in the of­fice at the end of the room an old, de­cay­ing clerk, in a round smoking-cap of black vel­vet em­broidered with red and green, open­ing let­ters. He waited and waited. One of the ju­nior clerks went to the old man, greeted him cheer­ily and loudly. Evidently the old “chief” was deaf. Then the young fel­low came strid­ing im­port­antly down to his counter. He spied Paul.

“Hello!” he said. “You the new lad?”

“Yes,” said Paul.

“H’m! What’s your name?”

“Paul Morel.”

“Paul Morel? All right, you come on round here.”

Paul fol­lowed him round the rect­angle of coun­ters. The room was second storey. It had a great hole in the middle of the floor, fenced as with a wall of coun­ters, and down this wide shaft the lifts went, and the light for the bot­tom storey. Also there was a cor­res­pond­ing big, ob­long hole in the ceil­ing, and one could see above, over the fence of the top floor, some ma­chinery; and right away over­head was the glass roof, and all light for the three storeys came down­wards, get­ting dim­mer, so that it was al­ways night on the ground floor and rather gloomy on the second floor. The fact­ory was the top floor, the ware­house the second, the store­house the ground floor. It was an in­san­it­ary, an­cient place.

Paul was led round to a very dark corner.

“This is the ‘Spiral’ corner,” said the clerk. “You’re Spiral, with Pap­ple­worth. He’s your boss, but he’s not come yet. He doesn’t get here till half-past eight. So you can fetch the let­ters, if you like, from Mr. Melling down there.”

The young man poin­ted to the old clerk in the of­fice.

“All right,” said Paul.

“Here’s a peg to hang your cap on. Here are your entry ledgers. Mr. Pap­ple­worth won’t be long.”

And the thin young man stalked away with long, busy strides over the hol­low wooden floor.

After a minute or two Paul went down and stood in the door of the glass of­fice. The old clerk in the smoking-cap looked down over the rim of his spec­tacles.

“Good morn­ing,” he said, kindly and im­press­ively. “You want the let­ters for the Spiral de­part­ment, Tho­mas?”

Paul re­sen­ted be­ing called “Tho­mas.” But he took the let­ters and re­turned to his dark place, where the counter made an angle, where the great par­cel-rack came to an end, and where there were three doors in the corner. He sat on a high stool and read the let­ters—those whose hand­writ­ing was not too dif­fi­cult. They ran as fol­lows:

“Will you please send me at once a pair of lady’s silk spiral thigh-hose, without feet, such as I had from you last year; length, thigh to knee, etc.” Or, “Ma­jor Cham­ber­lain wishes to re­peat his pre­vi­ous or­der for a silk non-elastic sus­pens­ory band­age.”

Many of these let­ters, some of them in French or Nor­we­gian, were a great puzzle to the boy. He sat on his stool nervously await­ing the ar­rival of his boss. He suffered tor­tures of shy­ness when, at half-past eight, the fact­ory girls for up­stairs trooped past him.

Mr. Pap­ple­worth ar­rived, chew­ing a chloro­dyne gum, at about twenty to nine, when all the other men were at work. He was a thin, sal­low man with a red nose, quick, stac­cato, and smartly but stiffly dressed. He was about thirty-six years old. There was some­thing rather “doggy,” rather smart, rather cute and shrewd, and some­thing warm, and some­thing slightly con­tempt­ible about him.

“You my new lad?” he said.

Paul stood up and said he was.

“Fetched the let­ters?”

Mr. Pap­ple­worth gave a chew to his gum.

“Yes.”

“Copied ’em?”

“No.”

“Well, come on then, let’s look slippy. Changed your coat?”

“No.”

“You want to bring an old coat and leave it here.” He pro­nounced the last words with the chloro­dyne gum between his side teeth. He van­ished into the dark­ness be­hind the great par­cel-rack, re­appeared coat­less, turn­ing up a smart striped shirt-cuff over a thin and hairy arm. Then he slipped into his coat. Paul no­ticed how thin he was, and that his trousers were in folds be­hind. He seized a stool, dragged it be­side the boy’s, and sat down.

“Sit down,” he said.

Paul took a seat.

Mr. Pap­ple­worth was very close to him. The man seized the let­ters, snatched a long entry-book out of a rack in front of him, flung it open, seized a pen, and said:

“Now look here. You want to copy these let­ters in here.” He sniffed twice, gave a quick chew at his gum, stared fix­edly at a let­ter, then went very still and ab­sorbed, and wrote the entry rap­idly, in a beau­ti­ful flour­ish­ing hand. He glanced quickly at Paul.

“See that?”

“Yes.”

“Think you can do it all right?”

“Yes.”

“All right then, let’s see you.”

He sprang off his stool. Paul took a pen. Mr. Pap­ple­worth dis­ap­peared. Paul rather liked copy­ing the let­ters, but he wrote slowly, la­bor­i­ously, and ex­ceed­ingly badly. He was do­ing the fourth let­ter, and feel­ing quite busy and happy, when Mr. Pap­ple­worth re­appeared.

“Now then, how’r’ yer get­ting on? Done ’em?”

He leaned over the boy’s shoulder, chew­ing, and smelling of chloro­dyne.

“Strike my bob, lad, but you’re a beau­ti­ful writer!” he ex­claimed satir­ic­ally. “Ne’er mind, how many h’yer done? Only three! I’d ’a eaten ’em. Get on, my lad, an’ put num­bers on ’em. Here, look! Get on!”

Paul ground away at the let­ters, whilst Mr. Pap­ple­worth fussed over vari­ous jobs. Sud­denly the boy star­ted as a shrill whistle soun­ded near his ear. Mr. Pap­ple­worth came, took a plug out of a pipe, and said, in an amaz­ingly cross and bossy voice:

“Yes?”

Paul heard a faint voice, like a wo­man’s, out of the mouth of the tube. He gazed in won­der, never hav­ing seen a speak­ing-tube be­fore.

“Well,” said Mr. Pap­ple­worth dis­agree­ably into the tube, “you’d bet­ter get some of your back work done, then.”

Again the wo­man’s tiny voice was heard, sound­ing pretty and cross.

“I’ve not time to stand here while you talk,” said Mr. Pap­ple­worth, and he pushed the plug into the tube.

“Come, my lad,” he said im­plor­ingly to Paul, “there’s Polly cry­ing out for them or­ders. Can’t you buck up a bit? Here, come out!”

He took the book, to Paul’s im­mense chag­rin, and began the copy­ing him­self. He worked quickly and well. This done, he seized some strips of long yel­low pa­per, about three inches wide, and made out the day’s or­ders for the work-girls.

“You’d bet­ter watch me,” he said to Paul, work­ing all the while rap­idly. Paul watched the weird little draw­ings of legs, and thighs, and ankles, with the strokes across and the num­bers, and the few brief dir­ec­tions which his chief made upon the yel­low pa­per. Then Mr. Pap­ple­worth fin­ished and jumped up.

“Come on with me,” he said, and the yel­low pa­pers fly­ing in his hands, he dashed through a door and down some stairs, into the base­ment where the gas was burn­ing. They crossed the cold, damp stor­e­room, then a long, dreary room with a long table on trestles, into a smal­ler, cosy apart­ment, not very high, which had been built on to the main build­ing. In this room a small wo­man with a red serge blouse, and her black hair done on top of her head, was wait­ing like a proud little ban­tam.

“Here y’are!” said Pap­ple­worth.

“I think it is ‘here you are’!” ex­claimed Polly. “The girls have been here nearly half an hour wait­ing. Just think of the time wasted!”

“You think of get­ting your work done and not talk­ing so much,” said Mr. Pap­ple­worth. “You could ha’ been fin­ish­ing off.”

“You know quite well we fin­ished everything off on Saturday!” cried Pony, fly­ing at him, her dark eyes flash­ing.

“Tu­tutu-tu-terterter!” he mocked. “Here’s your new lad. Don’t ruin him as you did the last.”

“As we did the last!” re­peated Polly. “Yes, we do a lot of ru­in­ing, we do. My word, a lad would take some ru­in­ing after he’d been with you.”

“It’s time for work now, not for talk,” said Mr. Pap­ple­worth severely and coldly.

“It was time for work some time back,” said Polly, march­ing away with her head in the air. She was an erect little body of forty.

In that room were two round spiral ma­chines on the bench un­der the win­dow. Through the in­ner door­way was an­other longer room, with six more ma­chines. A little group of girls, nicely dressed in white ap­rons, stood talk­ing to­gether.

“Have you noth­ing else to do but talk?” said Mr. Pap­ple­worth.

“Only wait for you,” said one hand­some girl, laugh­ing.

“Well, get on, get on,” he said. “Come on, my lad. You’ll know your road down here again.”

And Paul ran up­stairs after his chief. He was given some check­ing and in­voicing to do. He stood at the desk, la­bour­ing in his ex­ec­rable hand­writ­ing. Presently Mr. Jordan came strut­ting down from the glass of­fice and stood be­hind him, to the boy’s great dis­com­fort. Sud­denly a red and fat fin­ger was thrust on the form he was filling in.

“Mr. J. A. Bates, Es­quire!” ex­claimed the cross voice just be­hind his ear.

Paul looked at “Mr. J. A. Bates, Es­quire” in his own vile writ­ing, and wondered what was the mat­ter now.

“Didn’t they teach you any bet­ter than that while they were at it? If you put ‘Mr.’ you don’t put ‘Es­quire’-a man can’t be both at once.”

The boy re­gret­ted his too-much gen­er­os­ity in dis­pos­ing of hon­ours, hes­it­ated, and with trem­bling fin­gers, scratched out the “Mr.” Then all at once Mr. Jordan snatched away the in­voice.

“Make an­other! Are you go­ing to send that to a gen­tle­man?” And he tore up the blue form ir­rit­ably.

Paul, his ears red with shame, began again. Still Mr. Jordan watched.

“I don’t know what they do teach in schools. You’ll have to write bet­ter than that. Lads learn noth­ing nowadays, but how to re­cite po­etry and play the fiddle. Have you seen his writ­ing?” he asked of Mr. Pap­ple­worth.

“Yes; prime, isn’t it?” replied Mr. Pap­ple­worth in­dif­fer­ently.

Mr. Jordan gave a little grunt, not un­ami­able. Paul di­vined that his mas­ter’s bark was worse than his bite. Indeed, the little man­u­fac­turer, al­though he spoke bad Eng­lish, was quite gen­tle­man enough to leave his men alone and to take no no­tice of trifles. But he knew he did not look like the boss and owner of the show, so he had to play his role of pro­pri­etor at first, to put things on a right foot­ing.

“Let’s see, what’s your name?” asked Mr. Pap­ple­worth of the boy.

“Paul Morel.”

It is curi­ous that chil­dren suf­fer so much at hav­ing to pro­nounce their own names.

“Paul Morel, is it? All right, you Paul-Morel through them things there, and then—”

Mr. Pap­ple­worth sub­sided on to a stool, and began writ­ing. A girl came up from out of a door just be­hind, put some newly-pressed elastic web ap­pli­ances on the counter, and re­turned. Mr. Pap­ple­worth picked up the whitey-blue knee-band, ex­amined it, and its yel­low or­der-pa­per quickly, and put it on one side. Next was a flesh-pink “leg.” He went through the few things, wrote out a couple of or­ders, and called to Paul to ac­com­pany him. This time they went through the door whence the girl had emerged. There Paul found him­self at the top of a little wooden flight of steps, and be­low him saw a room with win­dows round two sides, and at the farther end half a dozen girls sit­ting bend­ing over the benches in the light from the win­dow, sew­ing. They were singing to­gether “Two Little Girls in Blue.” Hear­ing the door opened, they all turned round, to see Mr. Pap­ple­worth and Paul look­ing down on them from the far end of the room. They stopped singing.

“Can’t you make a bit less row?” said Mr. Pap­ple­worth. “Folk’ll think we keep cats.”

A hunch­back wo­man on a high stool turned her long, rather heavy face to­wards Mr. Pap­ple­worth, and said, in a con­tralto voice:

“They’re all tom­cats then.”

In vain Mr. Pap­ple­worth tried to be im­press­ive for Paul’s be­ne­fit. He des­cen­ded the steps into the fin­ish­ing-off room, and went to the hunch­back Fanny. She had such a short body on her high stool that her head, with its great bands of bright brown hair, seemed over large, as did her pale, heavy face. She wore a dress of green-black cashmere, and her wrists, com­ing out of the nar­row cuffs, were thin and flat, as she put down her work nervously. He showed her some­thing that was wrong with a knee­cap.

“Well,” she said, “you needn’t come blam­ing it on to me. It’s not my fault.” Her col­our moun­ted to her cheek.

“I never said it was your fault. Will you do as I tell you?” replied Mr. Pap­ple­worth shortly.

“You don’t say it’s my fault, but you’d like to make out as it was,” the hunch­back wo­man cried, al­most in tears. Then she snatched the knee­cap from her boss, say­ing: “Yes, I’ll do it for you, but you needn’t be snappy.”

“Here’s your new lad,” said Mr. Pap­ple­worth.

Fanny turned, smil­ing very gently on Paul.

“Oh!” she said.

“Yes; don’t make a softy of him between you.”

“It’s not us as ’ud make a softy of him,” she said in­dig­nantly.

“Come on then, Paul,” said Mr. Pap­ple­worth.

“Au re­voy, Paul,” said one of the girls.

There was a tit­ter of laughter. Paul went out, blush­ing deeply, not hav­ing spoken a word.

The day was very long. All morn­ing the work-people were com­ing to speak to Mr. Pap­ple­worth. Paul was writ­ing or learn­ing to make up par­cels, ready for the mid­day post. At one o’clock, or, rather, at a quarter to one, Mr. Pap­ple­worth dis­ap­peared to catch his train: he lived in the sub­urbs. At one o’clock, Paul, feel­ing very lost, took his din­ner-bas­ket down into the stock­room in the base­ment, that had the long table on trestles, and ate his meal hur­riedly, alone in that cel­lar of gloom and des­ol­a­tion. Then he went out of doors. The bright­ness and the free­dom of the streets made him feel ad­ven­tur­ous and happy. But at two o’clock he was back in the corner of the big room. Soon the work-girls went troop­ing past, mak­ing re­marks. It was the com­moner girls who worked up­stairs at the heavy tasks of truss-mak­ing and the fin­ish­ing of ar­ti­fi­cial limbs. He waited for Mr. Pap­ple­worth, not know­ing what to do, sit­ting scrib­bling on the yel­low or­der-pa­per. Mr. Pap­ple­worth came at twenty minutes to three. Then he sat and gos­siped with Paul, treat­ing the boy en­tirely as an equal, even in age.

In the af­ter­noon there was never very much to do, un­less it were near the week­end, and the ac­counts had to be made up. At five o’clock all the men went down into the dun­geon with the table on trestles, and there they had tea, eat­ing bread-and-but­ter on the bare, dirty boards, talk­ing with the same kind of ugly haste and slov­en­li­ness with which they ate their meal. And yet up­stairs the at­mo­sphere among them was al­ways jolly and clear. The cel­lar and the trestles af­fected them.

After tea, when all the gases were lighted, work went more briskly. There was the big even­ing post to get off. The hose came up warm and newly pressed from the work­rooms. Paul had made out the in­voices. Now he had the pack­ing up and ad­dress­ing to do, then he had to weigh his stock of par­cels on the scales. Every­where voices were call­ing weights, there was the chink of metal, the rapid snap­ping of string, the hur­ry­ing to old Mr. Melling for stamps. And at last the post­man came with his sack, laugh­ing and jolly. Then everything slacked off, and Paul took his din­ner-bas­ket and ran to the sta­tion to catch the eight-twenty train. The day in the fact­ory was just twelve hours long.

His mother sat wait­ing for him rather anxiously. He had to walk from Ke­ston, so was not home un­til about twenty past nine. And he left the house be­fore seven in the morn­ing. Mrs. Morel was rather anxious about his health. But she her­self had had to put up with so much that she ex­pec­ted her chil­dren to take the same odds. They must go through with what came. And Paul stayed at Jordan’s, al­though all the time he was there his health suffered from the dark­ness and lack of air and the long hours.

He came in pale and tired. His mother looked at him. She saw he was rather pleased, and her anxi­ety all went.

“Well, and how was it?” she asked.

“Ever so funny, mother,” he replied. “You don’t have to work a bit hard, and they’re nice with you.”

“And did you get on all right?”

“Yes: they only say my writ­ing’s bad. But Mr. Pap­ple­worth—he’s my man—said to Mr. Jordan I should be all right. I’m Spiral, mother; you must come and see. It’s ever so nice.”

Soon he liked Jordan’s. Mr. Pap­ple­worth, who had a cer­tain “sa­loon bar” fla­vour about him, was al­ways nat­ural, and treated him as if he had been a com­rade. So­me­times the “Spiral boss” was ir­rit­able, and chewed more loz­enges than ever. Even then, how­ever, he was not of­fens­ive, but one of those people who hurt them­selves by their own ir­rit­ab­il­ity more than they hurt other people.

“Haven’t you done that yet?” he would cry. “Go on, be a month of Sundays.”

Again, and Paul could un­der­stand him least then, he was joc­u­lar and in high spir­its.

“I’m go­ing to bring my little York­shire ter­rier bitch to­mor­row,” he said ju­bil­antly to Paul.

“What’s a York­shire ter­rier?”

“Don’t know what a York­shire ter­rier is? Don’t know a York­shire—” Mr. Pap­ple­worth was aghast.

“Is it a little silky one—col­ours of iron and rusty sil­ver?”

“That’s it, my lad. She’s a gem. She’s had five pounds’ worth of pups already, and she’s worth over seven pounds her­self; and she doesn’t weigh twenty ounces.”

The next day the bitch came. She was a shiv­er­ing, miser­able morsel. Paul did not care for her; she seemed so like a wet rag that would never dry. Then a man called for her, and began to make coarse jokes. But Mr. Pap­ple­worth nod­ded his head in the dir­ec­tion of the boy, and the talk went on sotto voce.

Mr. Jordan only made one more ex­cur­sion to watch Paul, and then the only fault he found was see­ing the boy lay his pen on the counter.

“Put your pen in your ear, if you’re go­ing to be a clerk. Pen in your ear!” And one day he said to the lad: “Why don’t you hold your shoulders straighter? Come down here,” when he took him into the glass of­fice and fit­ted him with spe­cial braces for keep­ing the shoulders square.

But Paul liked the girls best. The men seemed com­mon and rather dull. He liked them all, but they were un­in­ter­est­ing. Polly, the little brisk over­seer down­stairs, find­ing Paul eat­ing in the cel­lar, asked him if she could cook him any­thing on her little stove. Next day his mother gave him a dish that could be heated up. He took it into the pleas­ant, clean room to Polly. And very soon it grew to be an es­tab­lished cus­tom that he should have din­ner with her. When he came in at eight in the morn­ing he took his bas­ket to her, and when he came down at one o’clock she had his din­ner ready.

He was not very tall, and pale, with thick chest­nut hair, ir­reg­u­lar fea­tures, and a wide, full mouth. She was like a small bird. He of­ten called her a “robinet.” Though nat­ur­ally rather quiet, he would sit and chat­ter with her for hours telling her about his home. The girls all liked to hear him talk. They of­ten gathered in a little circle while he sat on a bench, and held forth to them, laugh­ing. Some of them re­garded him as a curi­ous little creature, so ser­i­ous, yet so bright and jolly, and al­ways so del­ic­ate in his way with them. They all liked him, and he ad­ored them. Polly he felt he be­longed to. Then Con­nie, with her mane of red hair, her face of apple-blos­som, her mur­mur­ing voice, such a lady in her shabby black frock, ap­pealed to his ro­mantic side.

“When you sit wind­ing,” he said, “it looks as if you were spin­ning at a spin­ning-wheel—it looks ever so nice. You re­mind me of Elaine in the Idylls of the King. I’d draw you if I could.”

And she glanced at him blush­ing shyly. And later on he had a sketch he prized very much: Con­nie sit­ting on the stool be­fore the wheel, her flow­ing mane of red hair on her rusty black frock, her red mouth shut and ser­i­ous, run­ning the scar­let thread off the hank on to the reel.

With Louie, hand­some and brazen, who al­ways seemed to thrust her hip at him, he usu­ally joked.

Emma was rather plain, rather old, and con­des­cend­ing. But to con­des­cend to him made her happy, and he did not mind.

“How do you put needles in?” he asked.

“Go away and don’t bother.”

“But I ought to know how to put needles in.”

She ground at her ma­chine all the while stead­ily.

“There are many things you ought to know,” she replied.

“Tell me, then, how to stick needles in the ma­chine.”

“Oh, the boy, what a nuis­ance he is! Why, this is how you do it.”

He watched her at­tent­ively. Sud­denly a whistle piped. Then Polly ap­peared, and said in a clear voice:

“Mr. Pap­ple­worth wants to know how much longer you’re go­ing to be down here play­ing with the girls, Paul.”

Paul flew up­stairs, call­ing “Good­bye!” and Emma drew her­self up.

“It wasn’t me who wanted him to play with the ma­chine,” she said.

As a rule, when all the girls came back at two o’clock, he ran up­stairs to Fanny, the hunch­back, in the fin­ish­ing-off room. Mr. Pap­ple­worth did not ap­pear till twenty to three, and he of­ten found his boy sit­ting be­side Fanny, talk­ing, or draw­ing, or singing with the girls.

Often, after a minute’s hes­it­a­tion, Fanny would be­gin to sing. She had a fine con­tralto voice. Every­body joined in the chorus, and it went well. Paul was not at all em­bar­rassed, after a while, sit­ting in the room with the half a dozen work-girls.

At the end of the song Fanny would say:

“I know you’ve been laugh­ing at me.”

“Don’t be so soft, Fanny!” cried one of the girls.

Once there was men­tion of Con­nie’s red hair.

“Fanny’s is bet­ter, to my fancy,” said Emma.

“You needn’t try to make a fool of me,” said Fanny, flush­ing deeply.

“No, but she has, Paul; she’s got beau­ti­ful hair.”

“It’s a treat of a col­our,” said he. “That cold­ish col­our like earth, and yet shiny. It’s like bog-wa­ter.”

“Good­ness me!” ex­claimed one girl, laugh­ing.

“How I do but get cri­ti­cised,” said Fanny.

“But you should see it down, Paul,” cried Emma earn­estly. “It’s simply beau­ti­ful. Put it down for him, Fanny, if he wants some­thing to paint.”

Fanny would not, and yet she wanted to.

“Then I’ll take it down my­self,” said the lad.

“Well, you can if you like,” said Fanny.

And he care­fully took the pins out of the knot, and the rush of hair, of uni­form dark brown, slid over the humped back.

“What a lovely lot!” he ex­claimed.

The girls watched. There was si­lence. The youth shook the hair loose from the coil.

“It’s splen­did!” he said, smelling its per­fume. “I’ll bet it’s worth pounds.”

“I’ll leave it you when I die, Paul,” said Fanny, half jok­ing.

“You look just like any­body else, sit­ting dry­ing their hair,” said one of the girls to the long-legged hunch­back.

Poor Fanny was mor­bidly sens­it­ive, al­ways ima­gin­ing in­sults. Polly was curt and busi­ness­like. The two de­part­ments were forever at war, and Paul was al­ways find­ing Fanny in tears. Then he was made the re­cip­i­ent of all her woes, and he had to plead her case with Polly.

So the time went along hap­pily enough. The fact­ory had a homely feel. No one was rushed or driven. Paul al­ways en­joyed it when the work got faster, to­wards post-time, and all the men united in la­bour. He liked to watch his fel­low-clerks at work. The man was the work and the work was the man, one thing, for the time be­ing. It was dif­fer­ent with the girls. The real wo­man never seemed to be there at the task, but as if left out, wait­ing.

From the train go­ing home at night he used to watch the lights of the town, sprinkled thick on the hills, fus­ing to­gether in a blaze in the val­leys. He felt rich in life and happy. Draw­ing farther off, there was a patch of lights at Bul­well like myriad petals shaken to the ground from the shed stars; and bey­ond was the red glare of the fur­naces, play­ing like hot breath on the clouds.

He had to walk two and more miles from Ke­ston home, up two long hills, down two short hills. He was of­ten tired, and he coun­ted the lamps climb­ing the hill above him, how many more to pass. And from the hill­top, on pitch-dark nights, he looked round on the vil­lages five or six miles away, that shone like swarms of glit­ter­ing liv­ing things, al­most a heaven against his feet. Marl­pool and Heanor scattered the far-off dark­ness with bril­liance. And oc­ca­sion­ally the black val­ley space between was traced, vi­ol­ated by a great train rush­ing south to Lon­don or north to Scot­land. The trains roared by like pro­jectiles level on the dark­ness, fum­ing and burn­ing, mak­ing the val­ley clang with their pas­sage. They were gone, and the lights of the towns and vil­lages glittered in si­lence.

And then he came to the corner at home, which faced the other side of the night. The ash-tree seemed a friend now. His mother rose with glad­ness as he entered. He put his eight shil­lings proudly on the table.

“It’ll help, mother?” he asked wist­fully.

“There’s pre­cious little left,” she answered, “after your ticket and din­ners and such are taken off.”

Then he told her the budget of the day. His life-story, like an Ar­a­bian Nights, was told night after night to his mother. It was al­most as if it were her own life.

VI Death in the Family

Ar­thur Morel was grow­ing up. He was a quick, care­less, im­puls­ive boy, a good deal like his father. He hated study, made a great moan if he had to work, and es­caped as soon as pos­sible to his sport again.

In ap­pear­ance he re­mained the flower of the fam­ily, be­ing well made, grace­ful, and full of life. His dark brown hair and fresh col­our­ing, and his ex­quis­ite dark blue eyes shaded with long lashes, to­gether with his gen­er­ous man­ner and fiery tem­per, made him a fa­vour­ite. But as he grew older his tem­per be­came un­cer­tain. He flew into rages over noth­ing, seemed un­bear­ably raw and ir­rit­able.

His mother, whom he loved, wear­ied of him some­times. He thought only of him­self. When he wanted amuse­ment, all that stood in his way he hated, even if it were she. When he was in trouble he moaned to her cease­lessly.

“Good­ness, boy!” she said, when he groaned about a mas­ter who, he said, hated him, “if you don’t like it, al­ter it, and if you can’t al­ter it, put up with it.”

And his father, whom he had loved and who had wor­shipped him, he came to de­test. As he grew older Morel fell into a slow ruin. His body, which had been beau­ti­ful in move­ment and in be­ing, shrank, did not seem to ripen with the years, but to get mean and rather despic­able. There came over him a look of mean­ness and of pal­tri­ness. And when the mean-look­ing eld­erly man bul­lied or ordered the boy about, Ar­thur was furi­ous. Moreover, Morel’s man­ners got worse and worse, his habits some­what dis­gust­ing. When the chil­dren were grow­ing up and in the cru­cial stage of ad­oles­cence, the father was like some ugly ir­rit­ant to their souls. His man­ners in the house were the same as he used among the col­li­ers down pit.

“Dirty nuis­ance!” Ar­thur would cry, jump­ing up and go­ing straight out of the house when his father dis­gus­ted him. And Morel per­sisted the more be­cause his chil­dren hated it. He seemed to take a kind of sat­is­fac­tion in dis­gust­ing them, and driv­ing them nearly mad, while they were so ir­rit­ably sens­it­ive at the age of four­teen or fif­teen. So that Ar­thur, who was grow­ing up when his father was de­gen­er­ate and eld­erly, hated him worst of all.

Then, some­times, the father would seem to feel the con­temp­tu­ous hatred of his chil­dren.

“There’s not a man tries harder for his fam­ily!” he would shout. “He does his best for them, and then gets treated like a dog. But I’m not go­ing to stand it, I tell you!”

But for the threat and the fact that he did not try so hard as he ima­gined, they would have felt sorry. As it was, the battle now went on nearly all between father and chil­dren, he per­sist­ing in his dirty and dis­gust­ing ways, just to as­sert his in­de­pend­ence. They loathed him.

Ar­thur was so in­flamed and ir­rit­able at last, that when he won a schol­ar­ship for the Gram­mar School in Not­ting­ham, his mother de­cided to let him live in town, with one of her sis­ters, and only come home at week­ends.

An­nie was still a ju­nior teacher in the Board-school, earn­ing about four shil­lings a week. But soon she would have fif­teen shil­lings, since she had passed her ex­am­in­a­tion, and there would be fin­an­cial peace in the house.

Mrs. Morel clung now to Paul. He was quiet and not bril­liant. But still he stuck to his paint­ing, and still he stuck to his mother. Everything he did was for her. She waited for his com­ing home in the even­ing, and then she un­burdened her­self of all she had pondered, or of all that had oc­curred to her dur­ing the day. He sat and listened with his earn­est­ness. The two shared lives.

Wil­liam was en­gaged now to his bru­nette, and had bought her an en­gage­ment ring that cost eight guineas. The chil­dren gasped at such a fab­ulous price.

“Eight guineas!” said Morel. “More fool him! If he’d gen me some on’t, it ’ud ha’ looked bet­ter on ’im.”

“Given you some of it!” cried Mrs. Morel. “Why give you some of it!”

She re­membered he had bought no en­gage­ment ring at all, and she pre­ferred Wil­liam, who was not mean, if he were fool­ish. But now the young man talked only of the dances to which he went with his be­trothed, and the dif­fer­ent resplen­dent clothes she wore; or he told his mother with glee how they went to the theatre like great swells.

He wanted to bring the girl home. Mrs. Morel said she should come at the Christ­mas. This time Wil­liam ar­rived with a lady, but with no presents. Mrs. Morel had pre­pared sup­per. Hear­ing foot­steps, she rose and went to the door. Wil­liam entered.

“Hello, mother!” He kissed her hast­ily, then stood aside to present a tall, hand­some girl, who was wear­ing a cos­tume of fine black-and-white check, and furs.

“Here’s Gyp!”

Miss Western held out her hand and showed her teeth in a small smile.

“Oh, how do you do, Mrs. Morel!” she ex­claimed.

“I am afraid you will be hungry,” said Mrs. Morel.

“Oh no, we had din­ner in the train. Have you got my gloves, Chubby?”

Wil­liam Morel, big and rawboned, looked at her quickly.

“How should I?” he said.

“Then I’ve lost them. Don’t be cross with me.”

A frown went over his face, but he said noth­ing. She glanced round the kit­chen. It was small and curi­ous to her, with its glit­ter­ing kiss­ing-bunch, its ever­greens be­hind the pic­tures, its wooden chairs and little deal table. At that mo­ment Morel came in.

“Hello, dad!”

“Hello, my son! Tha’s let on me!”

The two shook hands, and Wil­liam presen­ted the lady. She gave the same smile that showed her teeth.

“How do you do, Mr. Morel?”

Morel bowed ob­sequiously.

“I’m very well, and I hope so are you. You must make your­self very wel­come.”

“Oh, thank you,” she replied, rather amused.

“You will like to go up­stairs,” said Mrs. Morel.

“If you don’t mind; but not if it is any trouble to you.”

“It is no trouble. An­nie will take you. Wal­ter, carry up this box.”

“And don’t be an hour dress­ing your­self up,” said Wil­liam to his be­trothed.

An­nie took a brass can­dle­stick, and, too shy al­most to speak, pre­ceded the young lady to the front bed­room, which Mr. and Mrs. Morel had va­cated for her. It, too, was small and cold by candle­light. The col­li­ers’ wives only lit fires in bed­rooms in case of ex­treme ill­ness.

“Shall I un­strap the box?” asked An­nie.

“Oh, thank you very much!”

An­nie played the part of maid, then went down­stairs for hot wa­ter.

“I think she’s rather tired, mother,” said Wil­liam. “It’s a beastly jour­ney, and we had such a rush.”

“Is there any­thing I can give her?” asked Mrs. Morel.

“Oh no, she’ll be all right.”

But there was a chill in the at­mo­sphere. After half an hour Miss Western came down, hav­ing put on a purplish-col­oured dress, very fine for the col­lier’s kit­chen.

“I told you you’d no need to change,” said Wil­liam to her.

“Oh, Chubby!” Then she turned with that sweet­ish smile to Mrs. Morel. “Don’t you think he’s al­ways grumbling, Mrs. Morel?”

“Is he?” said Mrs. Morel. “That’s not very nice of him.”

“It isn’t, really!”

“You are cold,” said the mother. “Won’t you come near the fire?”

Morel jumped out of his arm­chair.

“Come and sit you here!” he cried. “Come and sit you here!”

“No, dad, keep your own chair. Sit on the sofa, Gyp,” said Wil­liam.

“No, no!” cried Morel. “This cheer’s warmest. Come and sit here, Miss Wesson.”

“Thank you so much,” said the girl, seat­ing her­self in the col­lier’s arm­chair, the place of hon­our. She shivered, feel­ing the warmth of the kit­chen pen­et­rate her.

“Fetch me a hanky, Chubby dear!” she said, put­ting up her mouth to him, and us­ing the same in­tim­ate tone as if they were alone; which made the rest of the fam­ily feel as if they ought not to be present. The young lady evid­ently did not real­ise them as people: they were creatures to her for the present. Wil­liam winced.

In such a house­hold, in Streatham, Miss Western would have been a lady con­des­cend­ing to her in­feri­ors. These people were to her, cer­tainly clown­ish—in short, the work­ing classes. How was she to ad­just her­self?

“I’ll go,” said An­nie.

Miss Western took no no­tice, as if a ser­vant had spoken. But when the girl came down­stairs again with the handker­chief, she said: “Oh, thank you!” in a gra­cious way.

She sat and talked about the din­ner on the train, which had been so poor; about Lon­don, about dances. She was really very nervous, and chattered from fear. Morel sat all the time smoking his thick twist to­bacco, watch­ing her, and listen­ing to her glib Lon­don speech, as he puffed. Mrs. Morel, dressed up in her best black silk blouse, answered quietly and rather briefly. The three chil­dren sat round in si­lence and ad­mir­a­tion. Miss Western was the prin­cess. Everything of the best was got out for her: the best cups, the best spoons, the best table cloth, the best cof­fee-jug. The chil­dren thought she must find it quite grand. She felt strange, not able to real­ise the people, not know­ing how to treat them. Wil­liam joked, and was slightly un­com­fort­able.

At about ten o’clock he said to her:

“Aren’t you tired, Gyp?”

“Rather, Chubby,” she answered, at once in the in­tim­ate tones and put­ting her head slightly on one side.

“I’ll light her the candle, mother,” he said.

“Very well,” replied the mother.

Miss Western stood up, held out her hand to Mrs. Morel.

“Good night, Mrs. Morel,” she said.

Paul sat at the boiler, let­ting the wa­ter run from the tap into a stone beer-bottle. An­nie swathed the bottle in an old flan­nel pit-sing­let, and kissed her mother good night. She was to share the room with the lady, be­cause the house was full.

“You wait a minute,” said Mrs. Morel to An­nie. And An­nie sat nurs­ing the hot-wa­ter bottle. Miss Western shook hands all round, to every­body’s dis­com­fort, and took her de­par­ture, pre­ceded by Wil­liam. In five minutes he was down­stairs again. His heart was rather sore; he did not know why. He talked very little till every­body had gone to bed, but him­self and his mother. Then he stood with his legs apart, in his old at­ti­tude on the hearth­rug, and said hes­it­at­ingly:

“Well, mother?”

“Well, my son?”

She sat in the rock­ing-chair, feel­ing some­how hurt and hu­mi­li­ated, for his sake.

“Do you like her?”

“Yes,” came the slow an­swer.

“She’s shy yet, mother. She’s not used to it. It’s dif­fer­ent from her aunt’s house, you know.”

“Of course it is, my boy; and she must find it dif­fi­cult.”

“She does.” Then he frowned swiftly. “If only she wouldn’t put on her blessed airs!”

“It’s only her first awk­ward­ness, my boy. She’ll be all right.”

“That’s it, mother,” he replied grate­fully. But his brow was gloomy. “You know, she’s not like you, mother. She’s not ser­i­ous, and she can’t think.”

“She’s young, my boy.”

“Yes; and she’s had no sort of show. Her mother died when she was a child. Since then she’s lived with her aunt, whom she can’t bear. And her father was a rake. She’s had no love.”

“No! Well, you must make up to her.”

“And so—you have to for­give her a lot of things.”

“What do you have to for­give her, my boy?”

“I dunno. When she seems shal­low, you have to re­mem­ber she’s never had any­body to bring her deeper side out. And she’s fear­fully fond of me.”

“Anybody can see that.”

“But you know, mother—she’s—she’s dif­fer­ent from us. Those sort of people, like those she lives amongst, they don’t seem to have the same prin­ciples.”

“You mustn’t judge too hast­ily,” said Mrs. Morel.

But he seemed un­easy within him­self.

In the morn­ing, how­ever, he was up singing and lark­ing round the house.

“Hello!” he called, sit­ting on the stairs. “Are you get­ting up?”

“Yes,” her voice called faintly.

“Merry Christ­mas!” he shouted to her.

Her laugh, pretty and tink­ling, was heard in the bed­room. She did not come down in half an hour.

“Was she really get­ting up when she said she was?” he asked of An­nie.

“Yes, she was,” replied An­nie.

He waited a while, then went to the stairs again.

“Happy New Year,” he called.

“Thank you, Chubby dear!” came the laugh­ing voice, far away.

“Buck up!” he im­plored.

It was nearly an hour, and still he was wait­ing for her. Morel, who al­ways rose be­fore six, looked at the clock.

“Well, it’s a winder!” he ex­claimed.

The fam­ily had break­fas­ted, all but Wil­liam. He went to the foot of the stairs.

“Shall I have to send you an Easter egg up there?” he called, rather crossly. She only laughed. The fam­ily ex­pec­ted, after that time of pre­par­a­tion, some­thing like ma­gic. At last she came, look­ing very nice in a blouse and skirt.

“Have you really been all this time get­ting ready?” he asked.

“Chubby dear! That ques­tion is not per­mit­ted, is it, Mrs. Morel?”

She played the grand lady at first. When she went with Wil­liam to chapel, he in his frock-coat and silk hat, she in her furs and Lon­don-made cos­tume, Paul and Ar­thur and An­nie ex­pec­ted every­body to bow to the ground in ad­mir­a­tion. And Morel, stand­ing in his Sunday suit at the end of the road, watch­ing the gal­lant pair go, felt he was the father of princes and prin­cesses.

And yet she was not so grand. For a year now she had been a sort of sec­ret­ary or clerk in a Lon­don of­fice. But while she was with the Morels she queened it. She sat and let An­nie or Paul wait on her as if they were her ser­vants. She treated Mrs. Morel with a cer­tain glib­ness and Morel with pat­ron­age. But after a day or so she began to change her tune.

Wil­liam al­ways wanted Paul or An­nie to go along with them on their walks. It was so much more in­ter­est­ing. And Paul really did ad­mire “Gipsy” whole­heartedly; in fact, his mother scarcely for­gave the boy for the ad­u­la­tion with which he treated the girl.

On the second day, when Lily said: “Oh, An­nie, do you know where I left my muff?” Wil­liam replied:

“You know it is in your bed­room. Why do you ask An­nie?”

And Lily went up­stairs with a cross, shut mouth. But it angered the young man that she made a ser­vant of his sis­ter.

On the third even­ing Wil­liam and Lily were sit­ting to­gether in the par­lour by the fire in the dark. At a quarter to el­even Mrs. Morel was heard rak­ing the fire. Wil­liam came out to the kit­chen, fol­lowed by his be­loved.

“Is it as late as that, mother?” he said. She had been sit­ting alone.

“It is not late, my boy, but it is as late as I usu­ally sit up.”

“Won’t you go to bed, then?” he asked.

“And leave you two? No, my boy, I don’t be­lieve in it.”

“Can’t you trust us, mother?”

“Whether I can or not, I won’t do it. You can stay till el­even if you like, and I can read.”

“Go to bed, Gyp,” he said to his girl. “We won’t keep ma­ter wait­ing.”

“An­nie has left the candle burn­ing, Lily,” said Mrs. Morel; “I think you will see.”

“Yes, thank you. Good night, Mrs. Morel.”

Wil­liam kissed his sweet­heart at the foot of the stairs, and she went. He re­turned to the kit­chen.

“Can’t you trust us, mother?” he re­peated, rather of­fen­ded.

“My boy, I tell you I don’t be­lieve in leav­ing two young things like you alone down­stairs when every­one else is in bed.”

And he was forced to take this an­swer. He kissed his mother good night.

At Easter he came over alone. And then he dis­cussed his sweet­heart end­lessly with his mother.

“You know, mother, when I’m away from her I don’t care for her a bit. I shouldn’t care if I never saw her again. But, then, when I’m with her in the even­ings I am aw­fully fond of her.”

“It’s a queer sort of love to marry on,” said Mrs. Morel, “if she holds you no more than that!”

“It is funny!” he ex­claimed. It wor­ried and per­plexed him. “But yet—there’s so much between us now I couldn’t give her up.”

“You know best,” said Mrs. Morel. “But if it is as you say, I wouldn’t call it love—at any rate, it doesn’t look much like it.”

“Oh, I don’t know, mother. She’s an orphan, and—”

They never came to any sort of con­clu­sion. He seemed puzzled and rather fret­ted. She was rather re­served. All his strength and money went in keep­ing this girl. He could scarcely af­ford to take his mother to Not­ting­ham when he came over.

Paul’s wages had been raised at Christ­mas to ten shil­lings, to his great joy. He was quite happy at Jordan’s, but his health suffered from the long hours and the con­fine­ment. His mother, to whom he be­came more and more sig­ni­fic­ant, thought how to help.

His half-day hol­i­day was on Monday af­ter­noon. On a Monday morn­ing in May, as the two sat alone at break­fast, she said:

“I think it will be a fine day.”

He looked up in sur­prise. This meant some­thing.

“You know Mr. Leiv­ers has gone to live on a new farm. Well, he asked me last week if I wouldn’t go and see Mrs. Leiv­ers, and I prom­ised to bring you on Monday if it’s fine. Shall we go?”

“I say, little wo­man, how lovely!” he cried. “And we’ll go this af­ter­noon?”

Paul hur­ried off to the sta­tion ju­bil­ant. Down Derby Road was a cherry-tree that glistened. The old brick wall by the Stat­utes ground burned scar­let, spring was a very flame of green. And the steep swoop of highroad lay, in its cool morn­ing dust, splen­did with pat­terns of sun­shine and shadow, per­fectly still. The trees sloped their great green shoulders proudly; and in­side the ware­house all the morn­ing, the boy had a vis­ion of spring out­side.

When he came home at din­ner­time his mother was rather ex­cited.

“Are we go­ing?” he asked.

“When I’m ready,” she replied.

Presently he got up.

“Go and get dressed while I wash up,” he said.

She did so. He washed the pots, straightened, and then took her boots. They were quite clean. Mrs. Morel was one of those nat­ur­ally ex­quis­ite people who can walk in mud without dirty­ing their shoes. But Paul had to clean them for her. They were kid boots at eight shil­lings a pair. He, how­ever, thought them the most dainty boots in the world, and he cleaned them with as much rev­er­ence as if they had been flowers.

Sud­denly she ap­peared in the in­ner door­way rather shyly. She had got a new cot­ton blouse on. Paul jumped up and went for­ward.

“Oh, my stars!” he ex­claimed. “What a bobby-dazzler!”

She sniffed in a little haughty way, and put her head up.

“It’s not a bobby-dazzler at all!” she replied. “It’s very quiet.”

She walked for­ward, whilst he hovered round her.

“Well,” she asked, quite shy, but pre­tend­ing to be high and mighty, “do you like it?”

“Aw­fully! You are a fine little wo­man to go jaunt­ing out with!”

He went and sur­veyed her from the back.

“Well,” he said, “if I was walk­ing down the street be­hind you, I should say: ‘Doesn’t that little per­son fancy her­self!” ’

“Well, she doesn’t,” replied Mrs. Morel. “She’s not sure it suits her.”

“Oh no! she wants to be in dirty black, look­ing as if she was wrapped in burnt pa­per. It does suit you, and I say you look nice.”

She sniffed in her little way, pleased, but pre­tend­ing to know bet­ter.

“Well,” she said, “it’s cost me just three shil­lings. You couldn’t have got it ready-made for that price, could you?”

“I should think you couldn’t,” he replied.

“And, you know, it’s good stuff.”

“Aw­fully pretty,” he said.

The blouse was white, with a little sprig of he­lio­trope and black.

“Too young for me, though, I’m afraid,” she said.

“Too young for you!” he ex­claimed in dis­gust. “Why don’t you buy some false white hair and stick it on your head.”

“I s’ll soon have no need,” she replied. “I’m go­ing white fast enough.”

“Well, you’ve no busi­ness to,” he said. “What do I want with a white-haired mother?”

“I’m afraid you’ll have to put up with one, my lad,” she said rather strangely.

They set off in great style, she car­ry­ing the um­brella Wil­liam had given her, be­cause of the sun. Paul was con­sid­er­ably taller than she, though he was not big. He fan­cied him­self.

On the fal­low land the young wheat shone silkily. Min­ton pit waved its plumes of white steam, coughed, and rattled hoarsely.

“Now look at that!” said Mrs. Morel. Mother and son stood on the road to watch. Along the ridge of the great pit-hill crawled a little group in sil­hou­ette against the sky, a horse, a small truck, and a man. They climbed the in­cline against the heav­ens. At the end the man tipped the wagon. There was an un­due rattle as the waste fell down the sheer slope of the enorm­ous bank.

“You sit a minute, mother,” he said, and she took a seat on a bank, whilst he sketched rap­idly. She was si­lent whilst he worked, look­ing round at the af­ter­noon, the red cot­tages shin­ing among their green­ness.

“The world is a won­der­ful place,” she said, “and won­der­fully beau­ti­ful.”

“And so’s the pit,” he said. “Look how it heaps to­gether, like some­thing alive al­most—a big creature that you don’t know.”

“Yes,” she said. “Per­haps!”

“And all the trucks stand­ing wait­ing, like a string of beasts to be fed,” he said.

“And very thank­ful I am they are stand­ing,” she said, “for that means they’ll turn mid­dling time this week.”

“But I like the feel of men on things, while they’re alive. There’s a feel of men about trucks, be­cause they’ve been handled with men’s hands, all of them.”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Morel.

They went along un­der the trees of the highroad. He was con­stantly in­form­ing her, but she was in­ter­ested. They passed the end of Neth­ermere, that was toss­ing its sun­shine like petals lightly in its lap. Then they turned on a private road, and in some trep­id­a­tion ap­proached a big farm. A dog barked furi­ously. A wo­man came out to see.

“Is this the way to Wil­ley Farm?” Mrs. Morel asked.

Paul hung be­hind in ter­ror of be­ing sent back. But the wo­man was ami­able, and dir­ec­ted them. The mother and son went through the wheat and oats, over a little bridge into a wild meadow. Pee­wits, with their white breasts glisten­ing, wheeled and screamed about them. The lake was still and blue. High over­head a heron floated. Op­pos­ite, the wood heaped on the hill, green and still.

“It’s a wild road, mother,” said Paul. “Just like Canada.”

“Isn’t it beau­ti­ful!” said Mrs. Morel, look­ing round.

“See that heron—see—see her legs?”

He dir­ec­ted his mother, what she must see and what­not. And she was quite con­tent.

“But now,” she said, “which way? He told me through the wood.”

The wood, fenced and dark, lay on their left.

“I can feel a bit of a path this road,” said Paul. “You’ve got town feet, some­how or other, you have.”

They found a little gate, and soon were in a broad green al­ley of the wood, with a new thicket of fir and pine on one hand, an old oak glade dip­ping down on the other. And among the oaks the blue­bells stood in pools of azure, un­der the new green hazels, upon a pale fawn floor of oak-leaves. He found flowers for her.

“Here’s a bit of new-mown hay,” he said; then, again, he brought her for­get-me-nots. And, again, his heart hurt with love, see­ing her hand, used with work, hold­ing the little bunch of flowers he gave her. She was per­fectly happy.

But at the end of the rid­ing was a fence to climb. Paul was over in a second.

“Come,” he said, “let me help you.”

“No, go away. I will do it in my own way.”

He stood be­low with his hands up ready to help her. She climbed cau­tiously.

“What a way to climb!” he ex­claimed scorn­fully, when she was safely to earth again.

“Hate­ful stiles!” she cried.

“Duffer of a little wo­man,” he replied, “who can’t get over ’em.”

In front, along the edge of the wood, was a cluster of low red farm build­ings. The two hastened for­ward. Flush with the wood was the apple orch­ard, where blos­som was fall­ing on the grind­stone. The pond was deep un­der a hedge and over­hanging oak trees. Some cows stood in the shade. The farm and build­ings, three sides of a quad­rangle, em­braced the sun­shine to­wards the wood. It was very still.

Mother and son went into the small railed garden, where was a scent of red gil­li­v­ers. By the open door were some floury loaves, put out to cool. A hen was just com­ing to peck them. Then, in the door­way sud­denly ap­peared a girl in a dirty ap­ron. She was about four­teen years old, had a rosy dark face, a bunch of short black curls, very fine and free, and dark eyes; shy, ques­tion­ing, a little re­sent­ful of the strangers, she dis­ap­peared. In a minute an­other fig­ure ap­peared, a small, frail wo­man, rosy, with great dark brown eyes.

“Oh!” she ex­claimed, smil­ing with a little glow, “you’ve come, then. I am glad to see you.” Her voice was in­tim­ate and rather sad.

The two wo­men shook hands.

“Now are you sure we’re not a bother to you?” said Mrs. Morel. “I know what a farm­ing life is.”

“Oh no! We’re only too thank­ful to see a new face, it’s so lost up here.”

“I sup­pose so,” said Mrs. Morel.

They were taken through into the par­lour—a long, low room, with a great bunch of guelder-roses in the fire­place. There the wo­men talked, whilst Paul went out to sur­vey the land. He was in the garden smelling the gil­li­v­ers and look­ing at the plants, when the girl came out quickly to the heap of coal which stood by the fence.

“I sup­pose these are cab­bage-roses?” he said to her, point­ing to the bushes along the fence.

She looked at him with startled, big brown eyes.

“I sup­pose they are cab­bage-roses when they come out?” he said.

“I don’t know,” she faltered. “They’re white with pink middles.”

“Then they’re maiden-blush.”

Miriam flushed. She had a beau­ti­ful warm col­our­ing.

“I don’t know,” she said.

“You don’t have much in your garden,” he said.

“This is our first year here,” she answered, in a dis­tant, rather su­per­ior way, draw­ing back and go­ing in­doors. He did not no­tice, but went his round of ex­plor­a­tion. Presently his mother came out, and they went through the build­ings. Paul was hugely de­lighted.

“And I sup­pose you have the fowls and calves and pigs to look after?” said Mrs. Morel to Mrs. Leiv­ers.

“No,” replied the little wo­man. “I can’t find time to look after cattle, and I’m not used to it. It’s as much as I can do to keep go­ing in the house.”

“Well, I sup­pose it is,” said Mrs. Morel.

Presently the girl came out.

“Tea is ready, mother,” she said in a mu­sical, quiet voice.

“Oh, thank you, Miriam, then we’ll come,” replied her mother, al­most in­gra­ti­at­ingly. “Would you care to have tea now, Mrs. Morel?”

“Of course,” said Mrs. Morel. “Whenever it’s ready.”

Paul and his mother and Mrs. Leiv­ers had tea to­gether. Then they went out into the wood that was flooded with blue­bells, while fumy for­get-me-nots were in the paths. The mother and son were in ec­stasy to­gether.

When they got back to the house, Mr. Leiv­ers and Edgar, the eld­est son, were in the kit­chen. Edgar was about eight­een. Then Geof­frey and Maurice, big lads of twelve and thir­teen, were in from school. Mr. Leiv­ers was a good-look­ing man in the prime of life, with a golden-brown mous­tache, and blue eyes screwed up against the weather.

The boys were con­des­cend­ing, but Paul scarcely ob­served it. They went round for eggs, scram­bling into all sorts of places. As they were feed­ing the fowls Miriam came out. The boys took no no­tice of her. One hen, with her yel­low chick­ens, was in a coop. Maurice took his hand full of corn and let the hen peck from it.

“Durst you do it?” he asked of Paul.

“Let’s see,” said Paul.

He had a small hand, warm, and rather cap­able-look­ing. Miriam watched. He held the corn to the hen. The bird eyed it with her hard, bright eye, and sud­denly made a peck into his hand. He star­ted, and laughed. “Rap, rap, rap!” went the bird’s beak in his palm. He laughed again, and the other boys joined.

“She knocks you, and nips you, but she never hurts,” said Paul, when the last corn had gone. “Now, Miriam,” said Maurice, “you come an ’ave a go.”

“No,” she cried, shrink­ing back.

“Ha! baby. The mardy-kid!” said her broth­ers.

“It doesn’t hurt a bit,” said Paul. “It only just nips rather nicely.”

“No,” she still cried, shak­ing her black curls and shrink­ing.

“She dursn’t,” said Geof­frey. “She niver durst do any­thing ex­cept re­cite poitry.”

“Dursn’t jump off a gate, dursn’t tweedle, dursn’t go on a slide, dursn’t stop a girl hit­tin’ her. She can do nowt but go about thinkin’ her­self some­body. ‘The Lady of the Lake.’ Yah!” cried Maurice.

Miriam was crim­son with shame and misery.

“I dare do more than you,” she cried. “You’re never any­thing but cow­ards and bul­lies.”

“Oh, cow­ards and bul­lies!” they re­peated min­cingly, mock­ing her speech.

“Not such a clown shall an­ger me,
A boor is answered si­lently,”

he quoted against her, shout­ing with laughter.

She went in­doors. Paul went with the boys into the orch­ard, where they had rigged up a par­al­lel bar. They did feats of strength. He was more agile than strong, but it served. He fingered a piece of apple-blos­som that hung low on a swinging bough.

“I wouldn’t get the apple-blos­som,” said Edgar, the eld­est brother. “There’ll be no apples next year.”

“I wasn’t go­ing to get it,” replied Paul, go­ing away.

The boys felt hos­tile to him; they were more in­ter­ested in their own pur­suits. He wandered back to the house to look for his mother. As he went round the back, he saw Miriam kneel­ing in front of the hen-coop, some maize in her hand, bit­ing her lip, and crouch­ing in an in­tense at­ti­tude. The hen was eye­ing her wickedly. Very gingerly she put for­ward her hand. The hen bobbed for her. She drew back quickly with a cry, half of fear, half of chag­rin.

“It won’t hurt you,” said Paul.

She flushed crim­son and star­ted up.

“I only wanted to try,” she said in a low voice.

“See, it doesn’t hurt,” he said, and, put­ting only two corns in his palm, he let the hen peck, peck, peck at his bare hand. “It only makes you laugh,” he said.

She put her hand for­ward and dragged it away, tried again, and star­ted back with a cry. He frowned.

“Why, I’d let her take corn from my face,” said Paul, “only she bumps a bit. She’s ever so neat. If she wasn’t, look how much ground she’d peck up every day.”

He waited grimly, and watched. At last Miriam let the bird peck from her hand. She gave a little cry—fear, and pain be­cause of fear—rather pathetic. But she had done it, and she did it again.

“There, you see,” said the boy. “It doesn’t hurt, does it?”

She looked at him with dilated dark eyes.

“No,” she laughed, trem­bling.

Then she rose and went in­doors. She seemed to be in some way re­sent­ful of the boy.

“He thinks I’m only a com­mon girl,” she thought, and she wanted to prove she was a grand per­son like the “Lady of the Lake.”

Paul found his mother ready to go home. She smiled on her son. He took the great bunch of flowers. Mr. and Mrs. Leiv­ers walked down the fields with them. The hills were golden with even­ing; deep in the woods showed the dark­en­ing purple of blue­bells. It was every­where per­fectly stiff, save for the rust­ling of leaves and birds.

“But it is a beau­ti­ful place,” said Mrs. Morel.

“Yes,” answered Mr. Leiv­ers; “it’s a nice little place, if only it weren’t for the rab­bits. The pas­ture’s bit­ten down to noth­ing. I dunno if ever I s’ll get the rent off it.”

He clapped his hands, and the field broke into mo­tion near the woods, brown rab­bits hop­ping every­where.

“Would you be­lieve it!” ex­claimed Mrs. Morel.

She and Paul went on alone to­gether.

“Wasn’t it lovely, mother?” he said quietly.

A thin moon was com­ing out. His heart was full of hap­pi­ness till it hurt. His mother had to chat­ter, be­cause she, too, wanted to cry with hap­pi­ness.

“Now wouldn’t I help that man!” she said. “Wouldn’t I see to the fowls and the young stock! And I’d learn to milk, and I’d talk with him, and I’d plan with him. My word, if I were his wife, the farm would be run, I know! But there, she hasn’t the strength—she simply hasn’t the strength. She ought never to have been burdened like it, you know. I’m sorry for her, and I’m sorry for him too. My word, if I’d had him, I shouldn’t have thought him a bad hus­band! Not that she does either; and she’s very lov­able.”

Wil­liam came home again with his sweet­heart at the Whit­sun­tide. He had one week of his hol­i­days then. It was beau­ti­ful weather. As a rule, Wil­liam and Lily and Paul went out in the morn­ing to­gether for a walk. Wil­liam did not talk to his be­loved much, ex­cept to tell her things from his boy­hood. Paul talked end­lessly to both of them. They lay down, all three, in a meadow by Min­ton Church. On one side, by the Castle Farm, was a beau­ti­ful quiv­er­ing screen of pop­lars. Hawthorn was drop­ping from the hedges; penny dais­ies and ragged robin were in the field, like laughter. Wil­liam, a big fel­low of twenty-three, thin­ner now and even a bit gaunt, lay back in the sun­shine and dreamed, while she fingered with his hair. Paul went gath­er­ing the big dais­ies. She had taken off her hat; her hair was black as a horse’s mane. Paul came back and threaded dais­ies in her jet-black hair—big spangles of white and yel­low, and just a pink touch of ragged robin.

“Now you look like a young witch-wo­man,” the boy said to her. “Doesn’t she, Wil­liam?”

Lily laughed. Wil­liam opened his eyes and looked at her. In his gaze was a cer­tain baffled look of misery and fierce ap­pre­ci­ation.

“Has he made a sight of me?” she asked, laugh­ing down on her lover.

“That he has!” said Wil­liam, smil­ing.

He looked at her. Her beauty seemed to hurt him. He glanced at her flower-decked head and frowned.

“You look nice enough, if that’s what you want to know,” he said.

And she walked without her hat. In a little while Wil­liam re­covered, and was rather tender to her. Com­ing to a bridge, he carved her ini­tials and his in a heart.

She watched his strong, nervous hand, with its glisten­ing hairs and freckles, as he carved, and she seemed fas­cin­ated by it.

All the time there was a feel­ing of sad­ness and warmth, and a cer­tain ten­der­ness in the house, whilst Wil­liam and Lily were at home. But of­ten he got ir­rit­able. She had brought, for an eight-days’ stay, five dresses and six blouses.

“Oh, would you mind,” she said to An­nie, “wash­ing me these two blouses, and these things?”

And An­nie stood wash­ing when Wil­liam and Lily went out the next morn­ing. Mrs. Morel was furi­ous. And some­times the young man, catch­ing a glimpse of his sweet­heart’s at­ti­tude to­wards his sis­ter, hated her.

On Sunday morn­ing she looked very beau­ti­ful in a dress of foul­ard, silky and sweep­ing, and blue as a jay­bird’s feather, and in a large cream hat covered with many roses, mostly crim­son. Nobody could ad­mire her enough. But in the even­ing, when she was go­ing out, she asked again:

“Chubby, have you got my gloves?”

“Which?” asked Wil­liam.

“My new black suede.”

“No.”

There was a hunt. She had lost them.

“Look here, mother,” said Wil­liam, “that’s the fourth pair she’s lost since Christ­mas—at five shil­lings a pair!”

“You only gave me two of them,” she re­mon­strated.

And in the even­ing, after sup­per, he stood on the hearth­rug whilst she sat on the sofa, and he seemed to hate her. In the af­ter­noon he had left her whilst he went to see some old friend. She had sat look­ing at a book. After sup­per Wil­liam wanted to write a let­ter.

“Here is your book, Lily,” said Mrs. Morel. “Would you care to go on with it for a few minutes?”

“No, thank you,” said the girl. “I will sit still.”

“But it is so dull.”

Wil­liam scribbled ir­rit­ably at a great rate. As he sealed the en­vel­ope he said:

“Read a book! Why, she’s never read a book in her life.”

“Oh, go along!” said Mrs. Morel, cross with the ex­ag­ger­a­tion,

“It’s true, mother—she hasn’t,” he cried, jump­ing up and tak­ing his old po­s­i­tion on the hearth­rug. “She’s never read a book in her life.”

“ ’Er’s like me,” chimed in Morel. “ ’Er canna see what there is i’ books, ter sit borin’ your nose in ’em for, nor more can I.”

“But you shouldn’t say these things,” said Mrs. Morel to her son.

“But it’s true, mother—she can’t read. What did you give her?”

“Well, I gave her a little thing of An­nie Swan’s. Nobody wants to read dry stuff on Sunday af­ter­noon.”

“Well, I’ll bet she didn’t read ten lines of it.”

“You are mis­taken,” said his mother.

All the time Lily sat miser­ably on the sofa. He turned to her swiftly.

“Did you read any?” he asked.

“Yes, I did,” she replied.

“How much?”

“I don’t know how many pages.”

“Tell me one thing you read.”

She could not.

She never got bey­ond the second page. He read a great deal, and had a quick, act­ive in­tel­li­gence. She could un­der­stand noth­ing but love­mak­ing and chat­ter. He was ac­cus­tomed to hav­ing all his thoughts sifted through his mother’s mind; so, when he wanted com­pan­ion­ship, and was asked in reply to be the billing and twit­ter­ing lover, he hated his be­trothed.

“You know, mother,” he said, when he was alone with her at night, “she’s no idea of money, she’s so wessel-brained. When she’s paid, she’ll sud­denly buy such rot as mar­rons glacés, and then I have to buy her sea­son ticket, and her ex­tras, even her un­der­cloth­ing. And she wants to get mar­ried, and I think my­self we might as well get mar­ried next year. But at this rate—”

“A fine mess of a mar­riage it would be,” replied his mother. “I should con­sider it again, my boy.”

“Oh, well, I’ve gone too far to break off now,” he said, “and so I shall get mar­ried as soon as I can.”

“Very well, my boy. If you will, you will, and there’s no stop­ping you; but I tell you, I can’t sleep when I think about it.”

“Oh, she’ll be all right, mother. We shall man­age.”

“And she lets you buy her un­der­cloth­ing?” asked the mother.

“Well,” he began apo­lo­get­ic­ally, “she didn’t ask me; but one morn­ing—and it was cold—I found her on the sta­tion shiv­er­ing, not able to keep still; so I asked her if she was well wrapped up. She said: ‘I think so.’ So I said: ‘Have you got warm un­der­things on?’ And she said: ‘No, they were cot­ton.’ I asked her why on earth she hadn’t got some­thing thicker on in weather like that, and she said be­cause she had noth­ing. And there she is—a bron­chial sub­ject! I had to take her and get some warm things. Well, mother, I shouldn’t mind the money if we had any. And, you know, she ought to keep enough to pay for her sea­son-ticket; but no, she comes to me about that, and I have to find the money.”

“It’s a poor lookout,” said Mrs. Morel bit­terly.

He was pale, and his rugged face, that used to be so per­fectly care­less and laugh­ing, was stamped with con­flict and des­pair.

“But I can’t give her up now; it’s gone too far,” he said. “And, be­sides, for some things I couldn’t do without her.”

“My boy, re­mem­ber you’re tak­ing your life in your hands,” said Mrs. Morel. “Noth­ing is as bad as a mar­riage that’s a hope­less fail­ure. Mine was bad enough, God knows, and ought to teach you some­thing; but it might have been worse by a long chalk.”

He leaned with his back against the side of the chim­neypiece, his hands in his pock­ets. He was a big, rawboned man, who looked as if he would go to the world’s end if he wanted to. But she saw the des­pair on his face.

“I couldn’t give her up now,” he said.

“Well,” she said, “re­mem­ber there are worse wrongs than break­ing off an en­gage­ment.”

“I can’t give her up now,” he said.

The clock ticked on; mother and son re­mained in si­lence, a con­flict between them; but he would say no more. At last she said:

“Well, go to bed, my son. You’ll feel bet­ter in the morn­ing, and per­haps you’ll know bet­ter.”

He kissed her, and went. She raked the fire. Her heart was heavy now as it had never been. Be­fore, with her hus­band, things had seemed to be break­ing down in her, but they did not des­troy her power to live. Now her soul felt lamed in it­self. It was her hope that was struck.

And so of­ten Wil­liam mani­fes­ted the same hatred to­wards his be­trothed. On the last even­ing at home he was rail­ing against her.

“Well,” he said, “if you don’t be­lieve me, what she’s like, would you be­lieve she has been con­firmed three times?”

“Non­sense!” laughed Mrs. Morel.

“Non­sense or not, she has! That’s what con­firm­a­tion means for her—a bit of a the­at­rical show where she can cut a fig­ure.”

“I haven’t, Mrs. Morel!” cried the girl—“I haven’t! it is not true!”

“What!” he cried, flash­ing round on her. “Once in Brom­ley, once in Beck­en­ham, and once some­where else.”

“Nowhere else!” she said, in tears—“nowhere else!”

“It was! And if it wasn’t why were you con­firmed twice?”

“Once I was only four­teen, Mrs. Morel,” she pleaded, tears in her eyes.

“Yes,” said Mrs. Morel; “I can quite un­der­stand it, child. Take no no­tice of him. You ought to be ashamed, Wil­liam, say­ing such things.”

“But it’s true. She’s re­li­gious—she had blue vel­vet Prayer-Books—and she’s not as much re­li­gion, or any­thing else, in her than that table-leg. Gets con­firmed three times for show, to show her­self off, and that’s how she is in everything—everything!”

The girl sat on the sofa, cry­ing. She was not strong.

“As for love!” he cried, “you might as well ask a fly to love you! It’ll love set­tling on you—”

“Now, say no more,” com­manded Mrs. Morel. “If you want to say these things, you must find an­other place than this. I am ashamed of you, Wil­liam! Why don’t you be more manly. To do noth­ing but find fault with a girl, and then pre­tend you’re en­gaged to her!”

Mrs. Morel sub­sided in wrath and in­dig­na­tion.

Wil­liam was si­lent, and later he re­pen­ted, kissed and com­for­ted the girl. Yet it was true, what he had said. He hated her.

When they were go­ing away, Mrs. Morel ac­com­pan­ied them as far as Not­ting­ham. It was a long way to Ke­ston sta­tion.

“You know, mother,” he said to her, “Gyp’s shal­low. Noth­ing goes deep with her.”

“Wil­liam, I wish you wouldn’t say these things,” said Mrs. Morel, very un­com­fort­able for the girl who walked be­side her.

“But it doesn’t, mother. She’s very much in love with me now, but if I died she’d have for­got­ten me in three months.”

Mrs. Morel was afraid. Her heart beat furi­ously, hear­ing the quiet bit­ter­ness of her son’s last speech.

“How do you know?” she replied. “You don’t know, and there­fore you’ve no right to say such a thing.”

“He’s al­ways say­ing these things!” cried the girl.

“In three months after I was bur­ied you’d have some­body else, and I should be for­got­ten,” he said. “And that’s your love!”

Mrs. Morel saw them into the train in Not­ting­ham, then she re­turned home.

“There’s one com­fort,” she said to Paul—“he’ll never have any money to marry on, that I am sure of. And so she’ll save him that way.”

So she took cheer. Mat­ters were not yet very des­per­ate. She firmly be­lieved Wil­liam would never marry his Gipsy. She waited, and she kept Paul near to her.

All sum­mer long Wil­liam’s let­ters had a fe­ver­ish tone; he seemed un­nat­ural and in­tense. So­me­times he was ex­ag­ger­atedly jolly, usu­ally he was flat and bit­ter in his let­ter.

“Ah,” his mother said, “I’m afraid he’s ru­in­ing him­self against that creature, who isn’t worthy of his love—no, no more than a rag doll.”

He wanted to come home. The mid­sum­mer hol­i­day was gone; it was a long while to Christ­mas. He wrote in wild ex­cite­ment, say­ing he could come for Saturday and Sunday at Goose Fair, the first week in Octo­ber.

“You are not well, my boy,” said his mother, when she saw him. She was al­most in tears at hav­ing him to her­self again.

“No, I’ve not been well,” he said. “I’ve seemed to have a drag­ging cold all the last month, but it’s go­ing, I think.”

It was sunny Octo­ber weather. He seemed wild with joy, like a school­boy es­caped; then again he was si­lent and re­served. He was more gaunt than ever, and there was a hag­gard look in his eyes.

“You are do­ing too much,” said his mother to him.

He was do­ing ex­tra work, try­ing to make some money to marry on, he said. He only talked to his mother once on the Saturday night; then he was sad and tender about his be­loved.

“And yet, you know, mother, for all that, if I died she’d be broken­hearted for two months, and then she’d start to for­get me. You’d see, she’d never come home here to look at my grave, not even once.”

“Why, Wil­liam,” said his mother, “you’re not go­ing to die, so why talk about it?”

“But whether or not—” he replied.

“And she can’t help it. She is like that, and if you choose her—well, you can’t grumble,” said his mother.

On the Sunday morn­ing, as he was put­ting his col­lar on:

“Look,” he said to his mother, hold­ing up his chin, “what a rash my col­lar’s made un­der my chin!”

Just at the junc­tion of chin and throat was a big red in­flam­ma­tion.

“It ought not to do that,” said his mother. “Here, put a bit of this sooth­ing oint­ment on. You should wear dif­fer­ent col­lars.”

He went away on Sunday mid­night, seem­ing bet­ter and more solid for his two days at home.

On Tues­day morn­ing came a tele­gram from Lon­don that he was ill. Mrs. Morel got off her knees from wash­ing the floor, read the tele­gram, called a neigh­bour, went to her land­lady and bor­rowed a sov­er­eign, put on her things, and set off. She hur­ried to Ke­ston, caught an ex­press for Lon­don in Not­ting­ham. She had to wait in Not­ting­ham nearly an hour. A small fig­ure in her black bon­net, she was anxiously ask­ing the port­ers if they knew how to get to Elmers End. The jour­ney was three hours. She sat in her corner in a kind of stupor, never mov­ing. At King’s Cross still no one could tell her how to get to Elmers End. Car­ry­ing her string bag, that con­tained her night­dress, a comb and brush, she went from per­son to per­son. At last they sent her un­der­ground to Can­non Street.

It was six o’clock when she ar­rived at Wil­liam’s lodging. The blinds were not down.

“How is he?” she asked.

“No bet­ter,” said the land­lady.

She fol­lowed the wo­man up­stairs. Wil­liam lay on the bed, with blood­shot eyes, his face rather dis­col­oured. The clothes were tossed about, there was no fire in the room, a glass of milk stood on the stand at his bed­side. No one had been with him.

“Why, my son!” said the mother bravely.

He did not an­swer. He looked at her, but did not see her. Then he began to say, in a dull voice, as if re­peat­ing a let­ter from dic­ta­tion: “Owing to a leak­age in the hold of this ves­sel, the sugar had set, and be­come con­ver­ted into rock. It needed hack­ing—”

He was quite un­con­scious. It had been his busi­ness to ex­am­ine some such cargo of sugar in the Port of Lon­don.

“How long has he been like this?” the mother asked the land­lady.

“He got home at six o’clock on Monday morn­ing, and he seemed to sleep all day; then in the night we heard him talk­ing, and this morn­ing he asked for you. So I wired, and we fetched the doc­tor.”

“Will you have a fire made?”

Mrs. Morel tried to soothe her son, to keep him still.

The doc­tor came. It was pneu­mo­nia, and, he said, a pe­cu­liar ery­sipelas, which had star­ted un­der the chin where the col­lar chafed, and was spread­ing over the face. He hoped it would not get to the brain.

Mrs. Morel settled down to nurse. She prayed for Wil­liam, prayed that he would re­cog­nise her. But the young man’s face grew more dis­col­oured. In the night she struggled with him. He raved, and raved, and would not come to con­scious­ness. At two o’clock, in a dread­ful par­oxysm, he died.

Mrs. Morel sat per­fectly still for an hour in the lodging bed­room; then she roused the house­hold.

At six o’clock, with the aid of the char­wo­man, she laid him out; then she went round the dreary Lon­don vil­lage to the re­gis­trar and the doc­tor.

At nine o’clock to the cot­tage on Scar­gill Street came an­other wire:

“Wil­liam died last night. Let father come, bring money.”

An­nie, Paul, and Ar­thur were at home; Mr. Morel was gone to work. The three chil­dren said not a word. An­nie began to whim­per with fear; Paul set off for his father.

It was a beau­ti­ful day. At Brins­ley pit the white steam melted slowly in the sun­shine of a soft blue sky; the wheels of the head­stocks twinkled high up; the screen, shuff­ling its coal into the trucks, made a busy noise.

“I want my father; he’s got to go to Lon­don,” said the boy to the first man he met on the bank.

“Tha wants Wal­ter Morel? Go in theer an’ tell Joe Ward.”

Paul went into the little top of­fice.

“I want my father; he’s got to go to Lon­don.”

“Thy feyther? Is he down? What’s his name?”

“Mr. Morel.”

“What, Wal­ter? Is owt amiss?”

“He’s got to go to Lon­don.”

The man went to the tele­phone and rang up the bot­tom of­fice.

“Wal­ter Morel’s wanted, num­ber 42, Hard. Sum­mat’s amiss; there’s his lad here.”

Then he turned round to Paul.

“He’ll be up in a few minutes,” he said.

Paul wandered out to the pit-top. He watched the chair come up, with its wagon of coal. The great iron cage sank back on its rest, a full car­fle was hauled off, an empty tram run on to the chair, a bell ting’ed some­where, the chair heaved, then dropped like a stone.

Paul did not real­ise Wil­liam was dead; it was im­possible, with such a bustle go­ing on. The puller-off swung the small truck on to the turntable, an­other man ran with it along the bank down the curving lines.

“And Wil­liam is dead, and my mother’s in Lon­don, and what will she be do­ing?” the boy asked him­self, as if it were a conun­drum.

He watched chair after chair come up, and still no father. At last, stand­ing be­side a wagon, a man’s form! the chair sank on its rests, Morel stepped off. He was slightly lame from an ac­ci­dent.

“Is it thee, Paul? Is ’e worse?”

“You’ve got to go to Lon­don.”

The two walked off the pit-bank, where men were watch­ing curi­ously. As they came out and went along the rail­way, with the sunny au­tumn field on one side and a wall of trucks on the other, Morel said in a frightened voice:

“ ’E’s niver gone, child?”

“Yes.”

“When wor’t?”

“Last night. We had a tele­gram from my mother.”

Morel walked on a few strides, then leaned up against a truck-side, his hand over his eyes. He was not cry­ing. Paul stood look­ing round, wait­ing. On the weigh­ing ma­chine a truck trundled slowly. Paul saw everything, ex­cept his father lean­ing against the truck as if he were tired.

Morel had only once be­fore been to Lon­don. He set off, scared and peaked, to help his wife. That was on Tues­day. The chil­dren were left alone in the house. Paul went to work, Ar­thur went to school, and An­nie had in a friend to be with her.

On Saturday night, as Paul was turn­ing the corner, com­ing home from Ke­ston, he saw his mother and father, who had come to Seth­ley Bridge Sta­tion. They were walk­ing in si­lence in the dark, tired, strag­gling apart. The boy waited.

“Mother!” he said, in the dark­ness.

Mrs. Morel’s small fig­ure seemed not to ob­serve. He spoke again.

“Paul!” she said, un­in­ter­estedly.

She let him kiss her, but she seemed un­aware of him.

In the house she was the same—small, white, and mute. She no­ticed noth­ing, she said noth­ing, only:

“The coffin will be here to­night, Wal­ter. You’d bet­ter see about some help.” Then, turn­ing to the chil­dren: “We’re bring­ing him home.”

Then she re­lapsed into the same mute look­ing into space, her hands fol­ded on her lap. Paul, look­ing at her, felt he could not breathe. The house was dead si­lent.

“I went to work, mother,” he said plaint­ively.

“Did you?” she answered, dully.

After half an hour Morel, troubled and be­wildered, came in again.

“Wheer s’ll we ha’e him when he does come?” he asked his wife.

“In the front-room.”

“Then I’d bet­ter shift th’ table?”

“Yes.”

“An’ ha’e him across th’ chairs?”

“You know there—Yes, I sup­pose so.”

Morel and Paul went, with a candle, into the par­lour. There was no gas there. The father un­screwed the top of the big ma­hogany oval table, and cleared the middle of the room; then he ar­ranged six chairs op­pos­ite each other, so that the coffin could stand on their beds.

“You niver seed such a length as he is!” said the miner, and watch­ing anxiously as he worked.

Paul went to the bay win­dow and looked out. The ash-tree stood mon­strous and black in front of the wide dark­ness. It was a faintly lu­min­ous night. Paul went back to his mother.

At ten o’clock Morel called:

“He’s here!”

Every­one star­ted. There was a noise of un­bar­ring and un­lock­ing the front door, which opened straight from the night into the room.

“Bring an­other candle,” called Morel.

An­nie and Ar­thur went. Paul fol­lowed with his mother. He stood with his arm round her waist in the in­ner door­way. Down the middle of the cleared room waited six chairs, face to face. In the win­dow, against the lace cur­tains, Ar­thur held up one candle, and by the open door, against the night, An­nie stood lean­ing for­ward, her brass can­dle­stick glit­ter­ing.

There was the noise of wheels. Out­side in the dark­ness of the street be­low Paul could see horses and a black vehicle, one lamp, and a few pale faces; then some men, miners, all in their shirtsleeves, seemed to struggle in the ob­scur­ity. Presently two men ap­peared, bowed be­neath a great weight. It was Morel and his neigh­bour.

“Steady!” called Morel, out of breath.

He and his fel­low moun­ted the steep garden step, heaved into the candle­light with their gleam­ing coffin-end. Limbs of other men were seen strug­gling be­hind. Morel and Burns, in front, staggered; the great dark weight swayed.

“Steady, steady!” cried Morel, as if in pain.

All the six bear­ers were up in the small garden, hold­ing the great coffin aloft. There were three more steps to the door. The yel­low lamp of the car­riage shone alone down the black road.

“Now then!” said Morel.

The coffin swayed, the men began to mount the three steps with their load. An­nie’s candle flickered, and she whimpered as the first men ap­peared, and the limbs and bowed heads of six men struggled to climb into the room, bear­ing the coffin that rode like sor­row on their liv­ing flesh.

“Oh, my son—my son!” Mrs. Morel sang softly, and each time the coffin swung to the un­equal climb­ing of the men: “Oh, my son—my son—my son!”

“Mother!” Paul whimpered, his hand round her waist.

She did not hear.

“Oh, my son—my son!” she re­peated.

Paul saw drops of sweat fall from his father’s brow. Six men were in the room—six coat­less men, with yield­ing, strug­gling limbs, filling the room and knock­ing against the fur­niture. The coffin veered, and was gently lowered on to the chairs. The sweat fell from Morel’s face on its boards.

“My word, he’s a weight!” said a man, and the five miners sighed, bowed, and, trem­bling with the struggle, des­cen­ded the steps again, clos­ing the door be­hind them.

The fam­ily was alone in the par­lour with the great pol­ished box. Wil­liam, when laid out, was six feet four inches long. Like a monu­ment lay the bright brown, pon­der­ous coffin. Paul thought it would never be got out of the room again. His mother was strok­ing the pol­ished wood.

They bur­ied him on the Monday in the little cemetery on the hill­side that looks over the fields at the big church and the houses. It was sunny, and the white chrys­an­them­ums frilled them­selves in the warmth.

Mrs. Morel could not be per­suaded, after this, to talk and take her old bright in­terest in life. She re­mained shut off. All the way home in the train she had said to her­self: “If only it could have been me!”

When Paul came home at night he found his mother sit­ting, her day’s work done, with hands fol­ded in her lap upon her coarse ap­ron. She al­ways used to have changed her dress and put on a black ap­ron, be­fore. Now An­nie set his sup­per, and his mother sat look­ing blankly in front of her, her mouth shut tight. Then he beat his brains for news to tell her.

“Mother, Miss Jordan was down today, and she said my sketch of a col­li­ery at work was beau­ti­ful.”

But Mrs. Morel took no no­tice. Night after night he forced him­self to tell her things, al­though she did not listen. It drove him al­most in­sane to have her thus. At last:

“What’s a-mat­ter, mother?” he asked.

She did not hear.

“What’s a-mat­ter?” he per­sisted. “Mother, what’s a-mat­ter?”

“You know what’s the mat­ter,” she said ir­rit­ably, turn­ing away.

The lad—he was six­teen years old—went to bed drear­ily. He was cut off and wretched through Octo­ber, Novem­ber and Decem­ber. His mother tried, but she could not rouse her­self. She could only brood on her dead son; he had been let to die so cruelly.

At last, on Decem­ber 23, with his five shil­lings Christ­mas-box in his pocket, Paul wandered blindly home. His mother looked at him, and her heart stood still.

“What’s the mat­ter?” she asked.

“I’m badly, mother!” he replied. “Mr. Jordan gave me five shil­lings for a Christ­mas-box!”

He handed it to her with trem­bling hands. She put it on the table.

“You aren’t glad!” he re­proached her; but he trembled vi­ol­ently.

“Where hurts you?” she said, un­but­ton­ing his over­coat.

It was the old ques­tion.

“I feel badly, mother.”

She un­dressed him and put him to bed. He had pneu­mo­nia dan­ger­ously, the doc­tor said.

“Might he never have had it if I’d kept him at home, not let him go to Not­ting­ham?” was one of the first things she asked.

“He might not have been so bad,” said the doc­tor.

Mrs. Morel stood con­demned on her own ground.

“I should have watched the liv­ing, not the dead,” she told her­self.

Paul was very ill. His mother lay in bed at nights with him; they could not af­ford a nurse. He grew worse, and the crisis ap­proached. One night he tossed into con­scious­ness in the ghastly, sickly feel­ing of dis­sol­u­tion, when all the cells in the body seem in in­tense ir­rit­ab­il­ity to be break­ing down, and con­scious­ness makes a last flare of struggle, like mad­ness.

“I s’ll die, mother!” he cried, heav­ing for breath on the pil­low.

She lif­ted him up, cry­ing in a small voice:

“Oh, my son—my son!”

That brought him to. He real­ised her. His whole will rose up and ar­res­ted him. He put his head on her breast, and took ease of her for love.

“For some things,” said his aunt, “it was a good thing Paul was ill that Christ­mas. I be­lieve it saved his mother.”

Paul was in bed for seven weeks. He got up white and fra­gile. His father had bought him a pot of scar­let and gold tulips. They used to flame in the win­dow in the March sun­shine as he sat on the sofa chat­ter­ing to his mother. The two knit­ted to­gether in per­fect in­tim­acy. Mrs. Morel’s life now rooted it­self in Paul.

Wil­liam had been a prophet. Mrs. Morel had a little present and a let­ter from Lily at Christ­mas. Mrs. Morel’s sis­ter had a let­ter at the New Year.

“I was at a ball last night. Some de­light­ful people were there, and I en­joyed my­self thor­oughly,” said the let­ter. “I had every dance—did not sit out one.”

Mrs. Morel never heard any more of her.

Morel and his wife were gentle with each other for some time after the death of their son. He would go into a kind of daze, star­ing wide-eyed and blank across the room. Then he got up sud­denly and hur­ried out to the Three Spots, re­turn­ing in his nor­mal state. But never in his life would he go for a walk up Shep­stone, past the of­fice where his son had worked, and he al­ways avoided the cemetery.

Part II

VII Lad-And-Girl Love

Paul had been many times up to Wil­ley Farm dur­ing the au­tumn. He was friends with the two young­est boys. Edgar the eld­est, would not con­des­cend at first. And Miriam also re­fused to be ap­proached. She was afraid of be­ing set at nought, as by her own broth­ers. The girl was ro­mantic in her soul. Every­where was a Wal­ter Scott heroine be­ing loved by men with hel­mets or with plumes in their caps. She her­self was some­thing of a prin­cess turned into a swine-girl in her own ima­gin­a­tion. And she was afraid lest this boy, who, nev­er­the­less, looked some­thing like a Wal­ter Scott hero, who could paint and speak French, and knew what al­gebra meant, and who went by train to Not­ting­ham every day, might con­sider her simply as the swine-girl, un­able to per­ceive the prin­cess be­neath; so she held aloof.

Her great com­pan­ion was her mother. They were both brown-eyed, and in­clined to be mys­tical, such wo­men as treas­ure re­li­gion in­side them, breathe it in their nos­trils, and see the whole of life in a mist thereof. So to Miriam, Christ and God made one great fig­ure, which she loved trem­blingly and pas­sion­ately when a tre­mend­ous sun­set burned out the west­ern sky, and Ediths, and Lucys, and Rowenas, Brian de Bois Guil­berts, Rob Roys, and Guy Man­ner­ings, rustled the sunny leaves in the morn­ing, or sat in her bed­room aloft, alone, when it snowed. That was life to her. For the rest, she drudged in the house, which work she would not have minded had not her clean red floor been mucked up im­me­di­ately by the tramp­ling farm-boots of her broth­ers. She madly wanted her little brother of four to let her swathe him and stifle him in her love; she went to church rev­er­ently, with bowed head, and quivered in an­guish from the vul­gar­ity of the other choir-girls and from the com­mon-sound­ing voice of the cur­ate; she fought with her broth­ers, whom she con­sidered bru­tal louts; and she held not her father in too high es­teem be­cause he did not carry any mys­tical ideals cher­ished in his heart, but only wanted to have as easy a time as he could, and his meals when he was ready for them.

She hated her po­s­i­tion as swine-girl. She wanted to be con­sidered. She wanted to learn, think­ing that if she could read, as Paul said he could read, Co­lomba, or the Voy­age Au­tour de ma Chambre, the world would have a dif­fer­ent face for her and a deepened re­spect. She could not be prin­cess by wealth or stand­ing. So she was mad to have learn­ing whereon to pride her­self. For she was dif­fer­ent from other folk, and must not be scooped up among the com­mon fry. Learn­ing was the only dis­tinc­tion to which she thought to as­pire.

Her beauty—that of a shy, wild, quiv­er­ingly sens­it­ive thing—seemed noth­ing to her. Even her soul, so strong for rhaps­ody, was not enough. She must have some­thing to re­in­force her pride, be­cause she felt dif­fer­ent from other people. Paul she eyed rather wist­fully. On the whole, she scorned the male sex. But here was a new spe­ci­men, quick, light, grace­ful, who could be gentle and who could be sad, and who was clever, and who knew a lot, and who had a death in the fam­ily. The boy’s poor morsel of learn­ing ex­al­ted him al­most sky-high in her es­teem. Yet she tried hard to scorn him, be­cause he would not see in her the prin­cess but only the swine-girl. And he scarcely ob­served her.

Then he was so ill, and she felt he would be weak. Then she would be stronger than he. Then she could love him. If she could be mis­tress of him in his weak­ness, take care of him, if he could de­pend on her, if she could, as it were, have him in her arms, how she would love him!

As soon as the skies brightened and plum-blos­som was out, Paul drove off in the milk­man’s heavy float up to Wil­ley Farm. Mr. Leiv­ers shouted in a kindly fash­ion at the boy, then clicked to the horse as they climbed the hill slowly, in the fresh­ness of the morn­ing. White clouds went on their way, crowding to the back of the hills that were rous­ing in the spring­time. The wa­ter of Neth­ermere lay be­low, very blue against the seared mead­ows and the thorn-trees.

It was four and a half miles’ drive. Tiny buds on the hedges, vivid as cop­per-green, were open­ing into rosettes; and thrushes called, and black­birds shrieked and scol­ded. It was a new, glam­or­ous world.

Miriam, peep­ing through the kit­chen win­dow, saw the horse walk through the big white gate into the farm­yard that was backed by the oak-wood, still bare. Then a youth in a heavy over­coat climbed down. He put up his hands for the whip and the rug that the good-look­ing, ruddy farmer handed down to him.

Miriam ap­peared in the door­way. She was nearly six­teen, very beau­ti­ful, with her warm col­our­ing, her grav­ity, her eyes dilat­ing sud­denly like an ec­stasy.

“I say,” said Paul, turn­ing shyly aside, “your daf­fodils are nearly out. Isn’t it early? But don’t they look cold?”

“Cold!” said Miriam, in her mu­sical, caress­ing voice.

“The green on their buds—” and he faltered into si­lence tim­idly.

“Let me take the rug,” said Miriam over-gently.

“I can carry it,” he answered, rather in­jured. But he yiel­ded it to her.

Then Mrs. Leiv­ers ap­peared.

“I’m sure you’re tired and cold,” she said. “Let me take your coat. It is heavy. You mustn’t walk far in it.”

She helped him off with his coat. He was quite un­used to such at­ten­tion. She was al­most smothered un­der its weight.

“Why, mother,” laughed the farmer as he passed through the kit­chen, swinging the great milk-churns, “you’ve got al­most more than you can man­age there.”

She beat up the sofa cush­ions for the youth.

The kit­chen was very small and ir­reg­u­lar. The farm had been ori­gin­ally a la­bourer’s cot­tage. And the fur­niture was old and battered. But Paul loved it—loved the sack-bag that formed the hearth­rug, and the funny little corner un­der the stairs, and the small win­dow deep in the corner, through which, bend­ing a little, he could see the plum trees in the back garden and the lovely round hills bey­ond.

“Won’t you lie down?” said Mrs. Leiv­ers.

“Oh no; I’m not tired,” he said. “Isn’t it lovely com­ing out, don’t you think? I saw a sloe-bush in blos­som and a lot of celandines. I’m glad it’s sunny.”

“Can I give you any­thing to eat or to drink?”

“No, thank you.”

“How’s your mother?”

“I think she’s tired now. I think she’s had too much to do. Per­haps in a little while she’ll go to Skeg­ness with me. Then she’ll be able to rest. I s’ll be glad if she can.”

“Yes,” replied Mrs. Leiv­ers. “It’s a won­der she isn’t ill her­self.”

Miriam was mov­ing about pre­par­ing din­ner. Paul watched everything that happened. His face was pale and thin, but his eyes were quick and bright with life as ever. He watched the strange, al­most rhaps­odic way in which the girl moved about, car­ry­ing a great stew-jar to the oven, or look­ing in the sauce­pan. The at­mo­sphere was dif­fer­ent from that of his own home, where everything seemed so or­din­ary. When Mr. Leiv­ers called loudly out­side to the horse, that was reach­ing over to feed on the rose­bushes in the garden, the girl star­ted, looked round with dark eyes, as if some­thing had come break­ing in on her world. There was a sense of si­lence in­side the house and out. Miriam seemed as in some dreamy tale, a maiden in bond­age, her spirit dream­ing in a land far away and ma­gical. And her dis­col­oured, old blue frock and her broken boots seemed only like the ro­mantic rags of King Coph­etua’s beg­gar-maid.

She sud­denly be­came aware of his keen blue eyes upon her, tak­ing her all in. In­stantly her broken boots and her frayed old frock hurt her. She re­sen­ted his see­ing everything. Even he knew that her stock­ing was not pulled up. She went into the scull­ery, blush­ing deeply. And af­ter­wards her hands trembled slightly at her work. She nearly dropped all she handled. When her in­side dream was shaken, her body quivered with trep­id­a­tion. She re­sen­ted that he saw so much.

Mrs. Leiv­ers sat for some time talk­ing to the boy, al­though she was needed at her work. She was too po­lite to leave him. Presently she ex­cused her­self and rose. After a while she looked into the tin sauce­pan.

“Oh dear, Miriam,” she cried, “these pota­toes have boiled dry!”

Miriam star­ted as if she had been stung.

“Have they, mother?” she cried.

“I shouldn’t care, Miriam,” said the mother, “if I hadn’t trus­ted them to you.” She peered into the pan.

The girl stiffened as if from a blow. Her dark eyes dilated; she re­mained stand­ing in the same spot.

“Well,” she answered, gripped tight in self-con­scious shame, “I’m sure I looked at them five minutes since.”

“Yes,” said the mother, “I know it’s eas­ily done.”

“They’re not much burned,” said Paul. “It doesn’t mat­ter, does it?”

Mrs. Leiv­ers looked at the youth with her brown, hurt eyes.

“It wouldn’t mat­ter but for the boys,” she said to him. “Only Miriam knows what a trouble they make if the pota­toes are ‘caught.’ ”

“Then,” thought Paul to him­self, “you shouldn’t let them make a trouble.”

After a while Edgar came in. He wore leg­gings, and his boots were covered with earth. He was rather small, rather formal, for a farmer. He glanced at Paul, nod­ded to him dis­tantly, and said:

“Din­ner ready?”

“Nearly, Edgar,” replied the mother apo­lo­get­ic­ally.

“I’m ready for mine,” said the young man, tak­ing up the news­pa­per and read­ing. Presently the rest of the fam­ily trooped in. Din­ner was served. The meal went rather bru­tally. The over-gen­tle­ness and apo­lo­getic tone of the mother brought out all the bru­tal­ity of man­ners in the sons. Edgar tasted the pota­toes, moved his mouth quickly like a rab­bit, looked in­dig­nantly at his mother, and said:

“These pota­toes are burnt, mother.”

“Yes, Edgar. I for­got them for a minute. Per­haps you’ll have bread if you can’t eat them.”

Edgar looked in an­ger across at Miriam.

“What was Miriam do­ing that she couldn’t at­tend to them?” he said.

Miriam looked up. Her mouth opened, her dark eyes blazed and winced, but she said noth­ing. She swal­lowed her an­ger and her shame, bow­ing her dark head.

“I’m sure she was try­ing hard,” said the mother.

“She hasn’t got sense even to boil the pota­toes,” said Edgar. “What is she kept at home for?”

“On’y for eat­ing everything that’s left in th’ pantry,” said Maurice.

“They don’t for­get that potato-pie against our Miriam,” laughed the father.

She was ut­terly hu­mi­li­ated. The mother sat in si­lence, suf­fer­ing, like some saint out of place at the bru­tal board.

It puzzled Paul. He wondered vaguely why all this in­tense feel­ing went run­ning be­cause of a few burnt pota­toes. The mother ex­al­ted everything—even a bit of house­work—to the plane of a re­li­gious trust. The sons re­sen­ted this; they felt them­selves cut away un­der­neath, and they answered with bru­tal­ity and also with a sneer­ing su­per­cili­ous­ness.

Paul was just open­ing out from child­hood into man­hood. This at­mo­sphere, where everything took a re­li­gious value, came with a subtle fas­cin­a­tion to him. There was some­thing in the air. His own mother was lo­gical. Here there was some­thing dif­fer­ent, some­thing he loved, some­thing that at times he hated.

Miriam quar­relled with her broth­ers fiercely. Later in the af­ter­noon, when they had gone away again, her mother said:

“You dis­ap­poin­ted me at din­ner­time, Miriam.”

The girl dropped her head.

“They are such

brutes

!” she sud­denly cried, look­ing up with flash­ing eyes.

“But hadn’t you prom­ised not to an­swer them?” said the mother. “And I be­lieved in you. I can’t stand it when you wrangle.”

“But they’re so hate­ful!” cried Miriam, “and—and low.”

“Yes, dear. But how of­ten have I asked you not to an­swer Edgar back? Can’t you let him say what he likes?”

“But why should he say what he likes?”

“Aren’t you strong enough to bear it, Miriam, if even for my sake? Are you so weak that you must wrangle with them?”

Mrs. Leiv­ers stuck un­flinch­ingly to this doc­trine of “the other cheek.” She could not in­stil it at all into the boys. With the girls she suc­ceeded bet­ter, and Miriam was the child of her heart. The boys loathed the other cheek when it was presen­ted to them. Miriam was of­ten suf­fi­ciently lofty to turn it. Then they spat on her and hated her. But she walked in her proud hu­mil­ity, liv­ing within her­self.

There was al­ways this feel­ing of jangle and dis­cord in the Leiv­ers fam­ily. Al­though the boys re­sen­ted so bit­terly this eternal ap­peal to their deeper feel­ings of resig­na­tion and proud hu­mil­ity, yet it had its ef­fect on them. They could not es­tab­lish between them­selves and an out­sider just the or­din­ary hu­man feel­ing and un­ex­ag­ger­ated friend­ship; they were al­ways rest­less for the some­thing deeper. Ordin­ary folk seemed shal­low to them, trivial and in­con­sid­er­able. And so they were un­ac­cus­tomed, pain­fully un­couth in the simplest so­cial in­ter­course, suf­fer­ing, and yet in­solent in their su­peri­or­ity. Then be­neath was the yearn­ing for the soul-in­tim­acy to which they could not at­tain be­cause they were too dumb, and every ap­proach to close con­nec­tion was blocked by their clumsy con­tempt of other people. They wanted genu­ine in­tim­acy, but they could not get even nor­mally near to any­one, be­cause they scorned to take the first steps, they scorned the tri­vi­al­ity which forms com­mon hu­man in­ter­course.

Paul fell un­der Mrs. Leiv­ers’s spell. Everything had a re­li­gious and in­tens­i­fied mean­ing when he was with her. His soul, hurt, highly de­veloped, sought her as if for nour­ish­ment. To­gether they seemed to sift the vi­tal fact from an ex­per­i­ence.

Miriam was her mother’s daugh­ter. In the sun­shine of the af­ter­noon mother and daugh­ter went down the fields with him. They looked for nests. There was a jenny wren’s in the hedge by the orch­ard.

“I do want you to see this,” said Mrs. Leiv­ers.

He crouched down and care­fully put his fin­ger through the thorns into the round door of the nest.

“It’s al­most as if you were feel­ing in­side the live body of the bird,” he said, “it’s so warm. They say a bird makes its nest round like a cup with press­ing its breast on it. Then how did it make the ceil­ing round, I won­der?”

The nest seemed to start into life for the two wo­men. After that, Miriam came to see it every day. It seemed so close to her. Again, go­ing down the hedgeside with the girl, he no­ticed the celandines, scal­loped splashes of gold, on the side of the ditch.

“I like them,” he said, “when their petals go flat back with the sun­shine. They seemed to be press­ing them­selves at the sun.”

And then the celandines ever after drew her with a little spell. An­thro­po­morphic as she was, she stim­u­lated him into ap­pre­ci­at­ing things thus, and then they lived for her. She seemed to need things kind­ling in her ima­gin­a­tion or in her soul be­fore she felt she had them. And she was cut off from or­din­ary life by her re­li­gious in­tens­ity which made the world for her either a nun­nery garden or a para­dise, where sin and know­ledge were not, or else an ugly, cruel thing.

So it was in this at­mo­sphere of subtle in­tim­acy, this meet­ing in their com­mon feel­ing for some­thing in Nature, that their love star­ted.

Per­son­ally, he was a long time be­fore he real­ized her. For ten months he had to stay at home after his ill­ness. For a while he went to Skeg­ness with his mother, and was per­fectly happy. But even from the sea­side he wrote long let­ters to Mrs. Leiv­ers about the shore and the sea. And he brought back his be­loved sketches of the flat Lin­coln coast, anxious for them to see. Al­most they would in­terest the Leiv­ers more than they in­ter­ested his mother. It was not his art Mrs. Morel cared about; it was him­self and his achieve­ment. But Mrs. Leiv­ers and her chil­dren were al­most his dis­ciples. They kindled him and made him glow to his work, whereas his mother’s in­flu­ence was to make him quietly de­term­ined, pa­tient, dogged, un­wear­ied.

He soon was friends with the boys, whose rude­ness was only su­per­fi­cial. They had all, when they could trust them­selves, a strange gen­tle­ness and lov­able­ness.

“Will you come with me on to the fal­low?” asked Edgar, rather hes­it­at­ingly.

Paul went joy­fully, and spent the af­ter­noon help­ing to hoe or to single turnips with his friend. He used to lie with the three broth­ers in the hay piled up in the barn and tell them about Not­ting­ham and about Jordan’s. In re­turn, they taught him to milk, and let him do little jobs—chop­ping hay or pulp­ing turnips—just as much as he liked. At mid­sum­mer he worked all through hay-har­vest with them, and then he loved them. The fam­ily was so cut off from the world ac­tu­ally. They seemed, some­how, like “les derniers fils d’une race epuisee.” Though the lads were strong and healthy, yet they had all that over­sens­it­ive­ness and hanging-back which made them so lonely, yet also such close, del­ic­ate friends once their in­tim­acy was won. Paul loved them dearly, and they him.

Miriam came later. But he had come into her life be­fore she made any mark on his. One dull af­ter­noon, when the men were on the land and the rest at school, only Miriam and her mother at home, the girl said to him, after hav­ing hes­it­ated for some time:

“Have you seen the swing?”

“No,” he answered. “Where?”

“In the cow­shed,” she replied.

She al­ways hes­it­ated to of­fer or to show him any­thing. Men have such dif­fer­ent stand­ards of worth from wo­men, and her dear things—the valu­able things to her—her broth­ers had so of­ten mocked or flouted.

“Come on, then,” he replied, jump­ing up.

There were two cow­sheds, one on either side of the barn. In the lower, darker shed there was stand­ing for four cows. Hens flew scold­ing over the manger-wall as the youth and girl went for­ward for the great thick rope which hung from the beam in the dark­ness over­head, and was pushed back over a peg in the wall.

“It’s some­thing like a rope!” he ex­claimed ap­pre­ci­at­ively; and he sat down on it, anxious to try it. Then im­me­di­ately he rose.

“Come on, then, and have first go,” he said to the girl.

“See,” she answered, go­ing into the barn, “we put some bags on the seat”; and she made the swing com­fort­able for him. That gave her pleas­ure. He held the rope.

“Come on, then,” he said to her.

“No, I won’t go first,” she answered.

She stood aside in her still, aloof fash­ion.

“Why?”

“You go,” she pleaded.

Al­most for the first time in her life she had the pleas­ure of giv­ing up to a man, of spoil­ing him. Paul looked at her.

“All right,” he said, sit­ting down. “Mind out!”

He set off with a spring, and in a mo­ment was fly­ing through the air, al­most out of the door of the shed, the up­per half of which was open, show­ing out­side the drizz­ling rain, the filthy yard, the cattle stand­ing dis­con­sol­ate against the black cartshed, and at the back of all the grey-green wall of the wood. She stood be­low in her crim­son tam-o’-shanter and watched. He looked down at her, and she saw his blue eyes spark­ling.

“It’s a treat of a swing,” he said.

“Yes.”

He was swinging through the air, every bit of him swinging, like a bird that swoops for joy of move­ment. And he looked down at her. Her crim­son cap hung over her dark curls, her beau­ti­ful warm face, so still in a kind of brood­ing, was lif­ted to­wards him. It was dark and rather cold in the shed. Sud­denly a swal­low came down from the high roof and dar­ted out of the door.

“I didn’t know a bird was watch­ing,” he called.

He swung neg­li­gently. She could feel him fall­ing and lift­ing through the air, as if he were ly­ing on some force.

“Now I’ll die,” he said, in a de­tached, dreamy voice, as though he were the dy­ing mo­tion of the swing. She watched him, fas­cin­ated. Sud­denly he put on the brake and jumped out.

“I’ve had a long turn,” he said. “But it’s a treat of a swing—it’s a real treat of a swing!”

Miriam was amused that he took a swing so ser­i­ously and felt so warmly over it.

“No; you go on,” she said.

“Why, don’t you want one?” he asked, as­ton­ished.

“Well, not much. I’ll have just a little.”

She sat down, whilst he kept the bags in place for her.

“It’s so rip­ping!” he said, set­ting her in mo­tion. “Keep your heels up, or they’ll bang the manger wall.”

She felt the ac­cur­acy with which he caught her, ex­actly at the right mo­ment, and the ex­actly pro­por­tion­ate strength of his thrust, and she was afraid. Down to her bowels went the hot wave of fear. She was in his hands. Again, firm and in­ev­it­able came the thrust at the right mo­ment. She gripped the rope, al­most swoon­ing.

“Ha!” she laughed in fear. “No higher!”

“But you’re not a bit high,” he re­mon­strated.

“But no higher.”

He heard the fear in her voice, and de­sisted. Her heart melted in hot pain when the mo­ment came for him to thrust her for­ward again. But he left her alone. She began to breathe.

“Won’t you really go any farther?” he asked. “Should I keep you there?”

“No; let me go by my­self,” she answered.

He moved aside and watched her.

“Why, you’re scarcely mov­ing,” he said.

She laughed slightly with shame, and in a mo­ment got down.

“They say if you can swing you won’t be sea­sick,” he said, as he moun­ted again. “I don’t be­lieve I should ever be sea­sick.”

Away he went. There was some­thing fas­cin­at­ing to her in him. For the mo­ment he was noth­ing but a piece of swinging stuff; not a particle of him that did not swing. She could never lose her­self so, nor could her broth­ers. It roused a warmth in her. It was al­most as if he were a flame that had lit a warmth in her whilst he swung in the middle air.

And gradu­ally the in­tim­acy with the fam­ily con­cen­trated for Paul on three per­sons—the mother, Edgar, and Miriam. To the mother he went for that sym­pathy and that ap­peal which seemed to draw him out. Edgar was his very close friend. And to Miriam he more or less con­des­cen­ded, be­cause she seemed so humble.

But the girl gradu­ally sought him out. If he brought up his sketch­book, it was she who pondered longest over the last pic­ture. Then she would look up at him. Sud­denly, her dark eyes alight like wa­ter that shakes with a stream of gold in the dark, she would ask:

“Why do I like this so?”

Al­ways some­thing in his breast shrank from these close, in­tim­ate, dazzled looks of hers.

“Why do you?” he asked.

“I don’t know. It seems so true.”

“It’s be­cause—it’s be­cause there is scarcely any shadow in it; it’s more shim­mery, as if I’d painted the shim­mer­ing pro­to­plasm in the leaves and every­where, and not the stiff­ness of the shape. That seems dead to me. Only this shim­mer­i­ness is the real liv­ing. The shape is a dead crust. The shim­mer is in­side really.”

And she, with her little fin­ger in her mouth, would pon­der these say­ings. They gave her a feel­ing of life again, and viv­i­fied things which had meant noth­ing to her. She man­aged to find some mean­ing in his strug­gling, ab­stract speeches. And they were the me­dium through which she came dis­tinctly at her be­loved ob­jects.

Another day she sat at sun­set whilst he was paint­ing some pine-trees which caught the red glare from the west. He had been quiet.

“There you are!” he said sud­denly. “I wanted that. Now, look at them and tell me, are they pine trunks or are they red coals, stand­ing-up pieces of fire in that dark­ness? There’s God’s burn­ing bush for you, that burned not away.”

Miriam looked, and was frightened. But the pine trunks were won­der­ful to her, and dis­tinct. He packed his box and rose. Sud­denly he looked at her.

“Why are you al­ways sad?” he asked her.

“Sad!” she ex­claimed, look­ing up at him with startled, won­der­ful brown eyes.

“Yes,” he replied. “You are al­ways sad.”

“I am not—oh, not a bit!” she cried.

“But even your joy is like a flame com­ing off of sad­ness,” he per­sisted. “You’re never jolly, or even just all right.”

“No,” she pondered. “I won­der—why?”

“Be­cause you’re not; be­cause you’re dif­fer­ent in­side, like a pine-tree, and then you flare up; but you’re not just like an or­din­ary tree, with fid­gety leaves and jolly—”

He got tangled up in his own speech; but she brooded on it, and he had a strange, roused sen­sa­tion, as if his feel­ings were new. She got so near him. It was a strange stim­u­lant.

Then some­times he hated her. Her young­est brother was only five. He was a frail lad, with im­mense brown eyes in his quaint fra­gile face—one of Reyn­olds’s “Choir of An­gels,” with a touch of elf. Often Miriam kneeled to the child and drew him to her.

“Eh, my Hubert!” she sang, in a voice heavy and sur­charged with love. “Eh, my Hubert!”

And, fold­ing him in her arms, she swayed slightly from side to side with love, her face half lif­ted, her eyes half closed, her voice drenched with love.

“Don’t!” said the child, un­easy—“don’t, Miriam!”

“Yes; you love me, don’t you?” she mur­mured deep in her throat, al­most as if she were in a trance, and sway­ing also as if she were swooned in an ec­stasy of love.

“Don’t!” re­peated the child, a frown on his clear brow.

“You love me, don’t you?” she mur­mured.

“What do you make such a fuss for?” cried Paul, all in suf­fer­ing be­cause of her ex­treme emo­tion. “Why can’t you be or­din­ary with him?”

She let the child go, and rose, and said noth­ing. Her in­tens­ity, which would leave no emo­tion on a nor­mal plane, ir­rit­ated the youth into a frenzy. And this fear­ful, na­ked con­tact of her on small oc­ca­sions shocked him. He was used to his mother’s re­serve. And on such oc­ca­sions he was thank­ful in his heart and soul that he had his mother, so sane and whole­some.

All the life of Miriam’s body was in her eyes, which were usu­ally dark as a dark church, but could flame with light like a con­flag­ra­tion. Her face scarcely ever altered from its look of brood­ing. She might have been one of the wo­men who went with Mary when Je­sus was dead. Her body was not flex­ible and liv­ing. She walked with a swing, rather heav­ily, her head bowed for­ward, pon­der­ing. She was not clumsy, and yet none of her move­ments seemed quite the move­ment. Often, when wip­ing the dishes, she would stand in be­wil­der­ment and chag­rin be­cause she had pulled in two halves a cup or a tum­bler. It was as if, in her fear and self-mis­trust, she put too much strength into the ef­fort. There was no loose­ness or aban­don about her. Everything was gripped stiff with in­tens­ity, and her ef­fort, over­charged, closed in on it­self.

She rarely var­ied from her swinging, for­ward, in­tense walk. Oc­ca­sion­ally she ran with Paul down the fields. Then her eyes blazed na­ked in a kind of ec­stasy that frightened him. But she was phys­ic­ally afraid. If she were get­ting over a stile, she gripped his hands in a little hard an­guish, and began to lose her pres­ence of mind. And he could not per­suade her to jump from even a small height. Her eyes dilated, be­came ex­posed and pal­pit­at­ing.

“No!” she cried, half laugh­ing in ter­ror—“no!”

“You shall!” he cried once, and, jerking her for­ward, he brought her fall­ing from the fence. But her wild “Ah!” of pain, as if she were los­ing con­scious­ness, cut him. She landed on her feet safely, and af­ter­wards had cour­age in this re­spect.

She was very much dis­sat­is­fied with her lot.

“Don’t you like be­ing at home?” Paul asked her, sur­prised.

“Who would?” she answered, low and in­tense. “What is it? I’m all day clean­ing what the boys make just as bad in five minutes. I don’t want to be at home.”

“What do you want, then?”

“I want to do some­thing. I want a chance like any­body else. Why should I, be­cause I’m a girl, be kept at home and not al­lowed to be any­thing? What chance have I?”

“Chance of what?”

“Of know­ing any­thing—of learn­ing, of do­ing any­thing. It’s not fair, be­cause I’m a wo­man.”

She seemed very bit­ter. Paul wondered. In his own home An­nie was al­most glad to be a girl. She had not so much re­spons­ib­il­ity; things were lighter for her. She never wanted to be other than a girl. But Miriam al­most fiercely wished she were a man. And yet she hated men at the same time.

“But it’s as well to be a wo­man as a man,” he said, frown­ing.

“Ha! Is it? Men have everything.”

“I should think wo­men ought to be as glad to be wo­men as men are to be men,” he answered.

“No!”—she shook her head—“no! Everything the men have.”

“But what do you want?” he asked.

“I want to learn. Why should it be that I know noth­ing?”

“What! such as math­em­at­ics and French?”

“Why shouldn’t I know math­em­at­ics? Yes!” she cried, her eye ex­pand­ing in a kind of de­fi­ance.

“Well, you can learn as much as I know,” he said. “I’ll teach you, if you like.”

Her eyes dilated. She mis­trus­ted him as teacher.

“Would you?” he asked.

Her head had dropped, and she was suck­ing her fin­ger brood­ingly.

“Yes,” she said hes­it­at­ingly.

He used to tell his mother all these things.

“I’m go­ing to teach Miriam al­gebra,” he said.

“Well,” replied Mrs. Morel, “I hope she’ll get fat on it.”

When he went up to the farm on the Monday even­ing, it was draw­ing twi­light. Miriam was just sweep­ing up the kit­chen, and was kneel­ing at the hearth when he entered. Every­one was out but her. She looked round at him, flushed, her dark eyes shin­ing, her fine hair fall­ing about her face.

“Hello!” she said, soft and mu­sical. “I knew it was you.”

“How?”

“I knew your step. Nobody treads so quick and firm.”

He sat down, sigh­ing.

“Ready to do some al­gebra?” he asked, draw­ing a little book from his pocket.

“But—”

He could feel her back­ing away.

“You said you wanted,” he in­sisted.

“To­night, though?” she faltered.

“But I came on pur­pose. And if you want to learn it, you must be­gin.”

She took up her ashes in the dust­pan and looked at him, half trem­u­lously, laugh­ing.

“Yes, but to­night! You see, I haven’t thought of it.”

“Well, my good­ness! Take the ashes and come.”

He went and sat on the stone bench in the back­yard, where the big milk-cans were stand­ing, tipped up, to air. The men were in the cow­sheds. He could hear the little sing­song of the milk spurt­ing into the pails. Presently she came, bring­ing some big green­ish apples.

“You know you like them,” she said.

He took a bite.

“Sit down,” he said, with his mouth full.

She was short­sighted, and peered over his shoulder. It ir­rit­ated him. He gave her the book quickly.

“Here,” he said. “It’s only let­ters for fig­ures. You put down ’a’ in­stead of ‘2’ or ’6.’ ”

They worked, he talk­ing, she with her head down on the book. He was quick and hasty. She never answered. Oc­ca­sion­ally, when he de­man­ded of her, “Do you see?” she looked up at him, her eyes wide with the half-laugh that comes of fear. “Don’t you?” he cried.

He had been too fast. But she said noth­ing. He ques­tioned her more, then got hot. It made his blood rouse to see her there, as it were, at his mercy, her mouth open, her eyes dilated with laughter that was afraid, apo­lo­getic, ashamed. Then Edgar came along with two buck­ets of milk.

“Hello!” he said. “What are you do­ing?”

“Al­gebra,” replied Paul.

“Al­gebra!” re­peated Edgar curi­ously. Then he passed on with a laugh. Paul took a bite at his for­got­ten apple, looked at the miser­able cab­bages in the garden, pecked into lace by the fowls, and he wanted to pull them up. Then he glanced at Miriam. She was por­ing over the book, seemed ab­sorbed in it, yet trem­bling lest she could not get at it. It made him cross. She was ruddy and beau­ti­ful. Yet her soul seemed to be in­tensely sup­plic­at­ing. The al­gebra-book she closed, shrink­ing, know­ing he was angered; and at the same in­stant he grew gentle, see­ing her hurt be­cause she did not un­der­stand.

But things came slowly to her. And when she held her­self in a grip, seemed so ut­terly humble be­fore the les­son, it made his blood rouse. He stormed at her, got ashamed, con­tin­ued the les­son, and grew furi­ous again, ab­us­ing her. She listened in si­lence. Oc­ca­sion­ally, very rarely, she de­fen­ded her­self. Her li­quid dark eyes blazed at him.

“You don’t give me time to learn it,” she said.

“All right,” he answered, throw­ing the book on the table and light­ing a ci­gar­ette. Then, after a while, he went back to her re­pent­ant. So the les­sons went. He was al­ways either in a rage or very gentle.

“What do you tremble your soul be­fore it for?” he cried. “You don’t learn al­gebra with your blessed soul. Can’t you look at it with your clear simple wits?”

Often, when he went again into the kit­chen, Mrs. Leiv­ers would look at him re­proach­fully, say­ing:

“Paul, don’t be so hard on Miriam. She may not be quick, but I’m sure she tries.”

“I can’t help it,” he said rather pi­ti­ably. “I go off like it.”

“You don’t mind me, Miriam, do you?” he asked of the girl later.

“No,” she re­as­sured him in her beau­ti­ful deep tones—“no, I don’t mind.”

“Don’t mind me; it’s my fault.”

But, in spite of him­self, his blood began to boil with her. It was strange that no one else made him in such fury. He flared against her. Once he threw the pen­cil in her face. There was a si­lence. She turned her face slightly aside.

“I didn’t—” he began, but got no farther, feel­ing weak in all his bones. She never re­proached him or was angry with him. He was of­ten cruelly ashamed. But still again his an­ger burst like a bubble sur­charged; and still, when he saw her eager, si­lent, as it were, blind face, he felt he wanted to throw the pen­cil in it; and still, when he saw her hand trem­bling and her mouth par­ted with suf­fer­ing, his heart was scal­ded with pain for her. And be­cause of the in­tens­ity to which she roused him, he sought her.

Then he of­ten avoided her and went with Edgar. Miriam and her brother were nat­ur­ally ant­ag­on­istic. Edgar was a ra­tion­al­ist, who was curi­ous, and had a sort of sci­entific in­terest in life. It was a great bit­ter­ness to Miriam to see her­self deser­ted by Paul for Edgar, who seemed so much lower. But the youth was very happy with her elder brother. The two men spent af­ter­noons to­gether on the land or in the loft do­ing car­pentry, when it rained. And they talked to­gether, or Paul taught Edgar the songs he him­self had learned from An­nie at the pi­ano. And of­ten all the men, Mr. Leiv­ers as well, had bit­ter de­bates on the na­tion­al­iz­ing of the land and sim­ilar prob­lems. Paul had already heard his mother’s views, and as these were as yet his own, he ar­gued for her. Miriam at­ten­ded and took part, but was all the time wait­ing un­til it should be over and a per­sonal com­mu­nic­a­tion might be­gin.

“After all,” she said within her­self, “if the land were na­tion­al­ized, Edgar and Paul and I would be just the same.” So she waited for the youth to come back to her.

He was study­ing for his paint­ing. He loved to sit at home, alone with his mother, at night, work­ing and work­ing. She sewed or read. Then, look­ing up from his task, he would rest his eyes for a mo­ment on her face, that was bright with liv­ing warmth, and he re­turned gladly to his work.

“I can do my best things when you sit there in your rock­ing-chair, mother,” he said.

“I’m sure!” she ex­claimed, sniff­ing with mock scep­ti­cism. But she felt it was so, and her heart quivered with bright­ness. For many hours she sat still, slightly con­scious of him la­bour­ing away, whilst she worked or read her book. And he, with all his soul’s in­tens­ity dir­ect­ing his pen­cil, could feel her warmth in­side him like strength. They were both very happy so, and both un­con­scious of it. These times, that meant so much, and which were real liv­ing, they al­most ig­nored.

He was con­scious only when stim­u­lated. A sketch fin­ished, he al­ways wanted to take it to Miriam. Then he was stim­u­lated into know­ledge of the work he had pro­duced un­con­sciously. In con­tact with Miriam he gained in­sight; his vis­ion went deeper. From his mother he drew the life-warmth, the strength to pro­duce; Miriam urged this warmth into in­tens­ity like a white light.

When he re­turned to the fact­ory the con­di­tions of work were bet­ter. He had Wed­nes­day af­ter­noon off to go to the Art School—Miss Jordan’s pro­vi­sion—re­turn­ing in the even­ing. Then the fact­ory closed at six in­stead of eight on Thursday and Fri­day even­ings.

One even­ing in the sum­mer Miriam and he went over the fields by Herod’s Farm on their way from the lib­rary home. So it was only three miles to Wil­ley Farm. There was a yel­low glow over the mow­ing-grass, and the sor­rel-heads burned crim­son. Gradu­ally, as they walked along the high land, the gold in the west sank down to red, the red to crim­son, and then the chill blue crept up against the glow.

They came out upon the high road to Al­fre­ton, which ran white between the dark­en­ing fields. There Paul hes­it­ated. It was two miles home for him, one mile for­ward for Miriam. They both looked up the road that ran in shadow right un­der the glow of the north­w­est sky. On the crest of the hill, Selby, with its stark houses and the up-pricked head­stocks of the pit, stood in black sil­hou­ette small against the sky.

He looked at his watch.

“Nine o’clock!” he said.

The pair stood, loth to part, hug­ging their books.

“The wood is so lovely now,” she said. “I wanted you to see it.”

He fol­lowed her slowly across the road to the white gate.

“They grumble so if I’m late,” he said.

“But you’re not do­ing any­thing wrong,” she answered im­pa­tiently.

He fol­lowed her across the nibbled pas­ture in the dusk. There was a cool­ness in the wood, a scent of leaves, of hon­ey­suckle, and a twi­light. The two walked in si­lence. Night came won­der­fully there, among the throng of dark tree-trunks. He looked round, ex­pect­ant.

She wanted to show him a cer­tain wild-rose bush she had dis­covered. She knew it was won­der­ful. And yet, till he had seen it, she felt it had not come into her soul. Only he could make it her own, im­mor­tal. She was dis­sat­is­fied.

Dew was already on the paths. In the old oak-wood a mist was rising, and he hes­it­ated, won­der­ing whether one white­ness were a strand of fog or only cam­pion-flowers pal­lid in a cloud.

By the time they came to the pine-trees Miriam was get­ting very eager and very tense. Her bush might be gone. She might not be able to find it; and she wanted it so much. Al­most pas­sion­ately she wanted to be with him when he stood be­fore the flowers. They were go­ing to have a com­mu­nion to­gether—some­thing that thrilled her, some­thing holy. He was walk­ing be­side her in si­lence. They were very near to each other. She trembled, and he listened, vaguely anxious.

Com­ing to the edge of the wood, they saw the sky in front, like mother-of-pearl, and the earth grow­ing dark. Some­where on the out­er­most branches of the pine-wood the hon­ey­suckle was stream­ing scent.

“Where?” he asked.

“Down the middle path,” she mur­mured, quiv­er­ing.

When they turned the corner of the path she stood still. In the wide walk between the pines, gaz­ing rather frightened, she could dis­tin­guish noth­ing for some mo­ments; the grey­ing light robbed things of their col­our. Then she saw her bush.

“Ah!” she cried, hasten­ing for­ward.

It was very still. The tree was tall and strag­gling. It had thrown its bri­ers over a hawthorn-bush, and its long stream­ers trailed thick, right down to the grass, splash­ing the dark­ness every­where with great spilt stars, pure white. In bosses of ivory and in large splashed stars the roses gleamed on the dark­ness of fo­liage and stems and grass. Paul and Miriam stood close to­gether, si­lent, and watched. Point after point the steady roses shone out to them, seem­ing to kindle some­thing in their souls. The dusk came like smoke around, and still did not put out the roses.

Paul looked into Miriam’s eyes. She was pale and ex­pect­ant with won­der, her lips were par­ted, and her dark eyes lay open to him. His look seemed to travel down into her. Her soul quivered. It was the com­mu­nion she wanted. He turned aside, as if pained. He turned to the bush.

“They seem as if they walk like but­ter­flies, and shake them­selves,” he said.

She looked at her roses. They were white, some in­curved and holy, oth­ers ex­pan­ded in an ec­stasy. The tree was dark as a shadow. She lif­ted her hand im­puls­ively to the flowers; she went for­ward and touched them in wor­ship.

“Let us go,” he said.

There was a cool scent of ivory roses—a white, vir­gin scent. So­mething made him feel anxious and im­prisoned. The two walked in si­lence.

“Till Sunday,” he said quietly, and left her; and she walked home slowly, feel­ing her soul sat­is­fied with the holi­ness of the night. He stumbled down the path. And as soon as he was out of the wood, in the free open meadow, where he could breathe, he star­ted to run as fast as he could. It was like a de­li­cious de­li­rium in his veins.

Al­ways when he went with Miriam, and it grew rather late, he knew his mother was fret­ting and get­ting angry about him—why, he could not un­der­stand. As he went into the house, fling­ing down his cap, his mother looked up at the clock. She had been sit­ting think­ing, be­cause a chill to her eyes pre­ven­ted her read­ing. She could feel Paul be­ing drawn away by this girl. And she did not care for Miriam. “She is one of those who will want to suck a man’s soul out till he has none of his own left,” she said to her­self; “and he is just such a gaby as to let him­self be ab­sorbed. She will never let him be­come a man; she never will.” So, while he was away with Miriam, Mrs. Morel grew more and more worked up.

She glanced at the clock and said, coldly and rather tired:

“You have been far enough to­night.”

His soul, warm and ex­posed from con­tact with the girl, shrank.

“You must have been right home with her,” his mother con­tin­ued.

He would not an­swer. Mrs. Morel, look­ing at him quickly, saw his hair was damp on his fore­head with haste, saw him frown­ing in his heavy fash­ion, re­sent­fully.

“She must be won­der­fully fas­cin­at­ing, that you can’t get away from her, but must go trail­ing eight miles at this time of night.”

He was hurt between the past glam­our with Miriam and the know­ledge that his mother fret­ted. He had meant not to say any­thing, to re­fuse to an­swer. But he could not harden his heart to ig­nore his mother.

“I do like to talk to her,” he answered ir­rit­ably.

“Is there nobody else to talk to?”

“You wouldn’t say any­thing if I went with Edgar.”

“You know I should. You know, who­ever you went with, I should say it was too far for you to go trail­ing, late at night, when you’ve been to Not­ting­ham. Besides”—her voice sud­denly flashed into an­ger and con­tempt—“it is dis­gust­ing—bits of lads and girls court­ing.”

“It is not court­ing,” he cried.

“I don’t know what else you call it.”

“It’s not! Do you think we spoon and do? We only talk.”

“Till good­ness knows what time and dis­tance,” was the sar­castic re­join­der.

Paul snapped at the laces of his boots an­grily.

“What are you so mad about?” he asked. “Be­cause you don’t like her.”

“I don’t say I don’t like her. But I don’t hold with chil­dren keep­ing com­pany, and never did.”

“But you don’t mind our An­nie go­ing out with Jim Inger.”

“They’ve more sense than you two.”

“Why?”

“Our An­nie’s not one of the deep sort.”

He failed to see the mean­ing of this re­mark. But his mother looked tired. She was never so strong after Wil­liam’s death; and her eyes hurt her.

“Well,” he said, “it’s so pretty in the coun­try. Mr. Sleath asked about you. He said he’d missed you. Are you a bit bet­ter?”

“I ought to have been in bed a long time ago,” she replied.

“Why, mother, you know you wouldn’t have gone be­fore quarter-past ten.”

“Oh, yes, I should!”

“Oh, little wo­man, you’d say any­thing now you’re dis­agree­able with me, wouldn’t you?”

He kissed her fore­head that he knew so well: the deep marks between the brows, the rising of the fine hair, grey­ing now, and the proud set­ting of the temples. His hand lingered on her shoulder after his kiss. Then he went slowly to bed. He had for­got­ten Miriam; he only saw how his mother’s hair was lif­ted back from her warm, broad brow. And some­how, she was hurt.

Then the next time he saw Miriam he said to her:

“Don’t let me be late to­night—not later than ten o’clock. My mother gets so up­set.”

Miriam dropped her bead, brood­ing.

“Why does she get up­set?” she asked.

“Be­cause she says I oughtn’t to be out late when I have to get up early.”

“Very well!” said Miriam, rather quietly, with just a touch of a sneer.

He re­sen­ted that. And he was usu­ally late again.

That there was any love grow­ing between him and Miriam neither of them would have ac­know­ledged. He thought he was too sane for such sen­ti­ment­al­ity, and she thought her­self too lofty. They both were late in com­ing to ma­tur­ity, and psych­ical ripe­ness was much be­hind even the phys­ical. Miriam was ex­ceed­ingly sens­it­ive, as her mother had al­ways been. The slight­est gross­ness made her re­coil al­most in an­guish. Her broth­ers were bru­tal, but never coarse in speech. The men did all the dis­cuss­ing of farm mat­ters out­side. But, per­haps, be­cause of the con­tinual busi­ness of birth and of be­get­ting which goes on upon every farm, Miriam was the more hy­per­sens­it­ive to the mat­ter, and her blood was chastened al­most to dis­gust of the faintest sug­ges­tion of such in­ter­course. Paul took his pitch from her, and their in­tim­acy went on in an ut­terly blanched and chaste fash­ion. It could never be men­tioned that the mare was in foal.

When he was nine­teen, he was earn­ing only twenty shil­lings a week, but he was happy. His paint­ing went well, and life went well enough. On the Good Fri­day he or­gan­ised a walk to the Hem­lock Stone. There were three lads of his own age, then An­nie and Ar­thur, Miriam and Geof­frey. Ar­thur, ap­pren­ticed as an elec­tri­cian in Not­ting­ham, was home for the hol­i­day. Morel, as usual, was up early, whist­ling and saw­ing in the yard. At seven o’clock the fam­ily heard him buy three­penny­worth of hot-cross buns; he talked with gusto to the little girl who brought them, call­ing her “my darling.” He turned away sev­eral boys who came with more buns, telling them they had been “kes­ted” by a little lass. Then Mrs. Morel got up, and the fam­ily straggled down. It was an im­mense lux­ury to every­body, this ly­ing in bed just bey­ond the or­din­ary time on a week­day. And Paul and Ar­thur read be­fore break­fast, and had the meal un­washed, sit­ting in their shirtsleeves. This was an­other hol­i­day lux­ury. The room was warm. Everything felt free of care and anxi­ety. There was a sense of plenty in the house.

While the boys were read­ing, Mrs. Morel went into the garden. They were now in an­other house, an old one, near the Scar­gill Street home, which had been left soon after Wil­liam had died. Dir­ectly came an ex­cited cry from the garden:

“Paul! Paul! come and look!”

It was his mother’s voice. He threw down his book and went out. There was a long garden that ran to a field. It was a grey, cold day, with a sharp wind blow­ing out of Derby­shire. Two fields away Best­wood began, with a jumble of roofs and red house-ends, out of which rose the church tower and the spire of the Con­greg­a­tional Chapel. And bey­ond went woods and hills, right away to the pale grey heights of the Pen­nine Chain.

Paul looked down the garden for his mother. Her head ap­peared among the young cur­rant-bushes.

“Come here!” she cried.

“What for?” he answered.

“Come and see.”

She had been look­ing at the buds on the cur­rant trees. Paul went up.

“To think,” she said, “that here I might never have seen them!”

Her son went to her side. Under the fence, in a little bed, was a ravel of poor grassy leaves, such as come from very im­ma­ture bulbs, and three scyl­las in bloom. Mrs. Morel poin­ted to the deep blue flowers.

“Now, just see those!” she ex­claimed. “I was look­ing at the cur­rant bushes, when, thinks I to my­self, ‘There’s some­thing very blue; is it a bit of sugar-bag?’ and there, be­hold you! Sugar-bag! Three glor­ies of the snow, and such beau­ties! But where on earth did they come from?”

“I don’t know,” said Paul.

“Well, that’s a mar­vel, now! I thought I knew every weed and blade in this garden. But haven’t they done well? You see, that goose­berry-bush just shel­ters them. Not nipped, not touched!”

He crouched down and turned up the bells of the little blue flowers.

“They’re a glor­i­ous col­our!” he said.

“Aren’t they!” she cried. “I guess they come from Switzer­land, where they say they have such lovely things. Fancy them against the snow! But where have they come from? They can’t have blown here, can they?”

Then he re­membered hav­ing set here a lot of little trash of bulbs to ma­ture.

“And you never told me,” she said.

“No! I thought I’d leave it till they might flower.”

“And now, you see! I might have missed them. And I’ve never had a glory of the snow in my garden in my life.”

She was full of ex­cite­ment and ela­tion. The garden was an end­less joy to her. Paul was thank­ful for her sake at last to be in a house with a long garden that went down to a field. Every morn­ing after break­fast she went out and was happy pot­ter­ing about in it. And it was true, she knew every weed and blade.

Every­body turned up for the walk. Food was packed, and they set off, a merry, de­lighted party. They hung over the wall of the millrace, dropped pa­per in the wa­ter on one side of the tun­nel and watched it shoot out on the other. They stood on the foot­bridge over Boat­house Sta­tion and looked at the metals gleam­ing coldly.

“You should see the Fly­ing Scots­man come through at half-past six!” said Leonard, whose father was a sig­nal­man. “Lad, but she doesn’t half buzz!” and the little party looked up the lines one way, to Lon­don, and the other way, to Scot­land, and they felt the touch of these two ma­gical places.

In Ilke­ston the col­li­ers were wait­ing in gangs for the pub­lic-houses to open. It was a town of idle­ness and loun­ging. At Stan­ton Gate the iron foundry blazed. Over everything there were great dis­cus­sions. At Trow­ell they crossed again from Derby­shire into Not­ting­ham­shire. They came to the Hem­lock Stone at din­ner­time. Its field was crowded with folk from Not­ting­ham and Ilke­ston.

They had ex­pec­ted a ven­er­able and dig­ni­fied monu­ment. They found a little, gnarled, twis­ted stump of rock, some­thing like a de­cayed mush­room, stand­ing out pathet­ic­ally on the side of a field. Leonard and Dick im­me­di­ately pro­ceeded to carve their ini­tials, “L. W.” and “R. P.,” in the old red sand­stone; but Paul de­sisted, be­cause he had read in the news­pa­per satir­ical re­marks about ini­tial-carv­ers, who could find no other road to im­mor­tal­ity. Then all the lads climbed to the top of the rock to look round.

Every­where in the field be­low, fact­ory girls and lads were eat­ing lunch or sport­ing about. Bey­ond was the garden of an old manor. It had yew-hedges and thick clumps and bor­ders of yel­low cro­cuses round the lawn.

“See,” said Paul to Miriam, “what a quiet garden!”

She saw the dark yews and the golden cro­cuses, then she looked grate­fully. He had not seemed to be­long to her among all these oth­ers; he was dif­fer­ent then—not her Paul, who un­der­stood the slight­est quiver of her in­ner­most soul, but some­thing else, speak­ing an­other lan­guage than hers. How it hurt her, and deadened her very per­cep­tions. Only when he came right back to her, leav­ing his other, his lesser self, as she thought, would she feel alive again. And now he asked her to look at this garden, want­ing the con­tact with her again. Im­pa­tient of the set in the field, she turned to the quiet lawn, sur­roun­ded by sheaves of shut-up cro­cuses. A feel­ing of still­ness, al­most of ec­stasy, came over her. It felt al­most as if she were alone with him in this garden.

Then he left her again and joined the oth­ers. Soon they star­ted home. Miriam loitered be­hind, alone. She did not fit in with the oth­ers; she could very rarely get into hu­man re­la­tions with any­one: so her friend, her com­pan­ion, her lover, was Nature. She saw the sun de­clin­ing wanly. In the dusky, cold hedgerows were some red leaves. She lingered to gather them, ten­derly, pas­sion­ately. The love in her fin­ger­tips caressed the leaves; the pas­sion in her heart came to a glow upon the leaves.

Sud­denly she real­ised she was alone in a strange road, and she hur­ried for­ward. Turn­ing a corner in the lane, she came upon Paul, who stood bent over some­thing, his mind fixed on it, work­ing away stead­ily, pa­tiently, a little hope­lessly. She hes­it­ated in her ap­proach, to watch.

He re­mained con­cen­trated in the middle of the road. Bey­ond, one rift of rich gold in that col­our­less grey even­ing seemed to make him stand out in dark re­lief. She saw him, slender and firm, as if the set­ting sun had given him to her. A deep pain took hold of her, and she knew she must love him. And she had dis­covered him, dis­covered in him a rare po­ten­ti­al­ity, dis­covered his loneli­ness. Quiv­er­ing as at some “an­nun­ci­ation,” she went slowly for­ward.

At last he looked up.

“Why,” he ex­claimed grate­fully, “have you waited for me!”

She saw a deep shadow in his eyes.

“What is it?” she asked.

“The spring broken here;” and he showed her where his um­brella was in­jured.

In­stantly, with some shame, she knew he had not done the dam­age him­self, but that Geof­frey was re­spons­ible.

“It is only an old um­brella, isn’t it?” she asked.

She wondered why he, who did not usu­ally trouble over trifles, made such a moun­tain of this mole­hill.

“But it was Wil­liam’s an’ my mother can’t help but know,” he said quietly, still pa­tiently work­ing at the um­brella.

The words went through Miriam like a blade. This, then, was the con­firm­a­tion of her vis­ion of him! She looked at him. But there was about him a cer­tain re­serve, and she dared not com­fort him, not even speak softly to him.

“Come on,” he said. “I can’t do it;” and they went in si­lence along the road.

That same even­ing they were walk­ing along un­der the trees by Nether Green. He was talk­ing to her fret­fully, seemed to be strug­gling to con­vince him­self.

“You know,” he said, with an ef­fort, “if one per­son loves, the other does.”

“Ah!” she answered. “Like mother said to me when I was little, ‘Love be­gets love.’ ”

“Yes, some­thing like that, I think it must be.”

“I hope so, be­cause, if it were not, love might be a very ter­rible thing,” she said.

“Yes, but it is—at least with most people,” he answered.

And Miriam, think­ing he had as­sured him­self, felt strong in her­self. She al­ways re­garded that sud­den com­ing upon him in the lane as a rev­el­a­tion. And this con­ver­sa­tion re­mained graven in her mind as one of the let­ters of the law.

Now she stood with him and for him. When, about this time, he out­raged the fam­ily feel­ing at Wil­ley Farm by some over­bear­ing in­sult, she stuck to him, and be­lieved he was right. And at this time she dreamed dreams of him, vivid, un­for­get­table. These dreams came again later on, de­veloped to a more subtle psy­cho­lo­gical stage.

On the Easter Monday the same party took an ex­cur­sion to Wing­field Manor. It was great ex­cite­ment to Miriam to catch a train at Seth­ley Bridge, amid all the bustle of the Bank Hol­i­day crowd. They left the train at Al­fre­ton. Paul was in­ter­ested in the street and in the col­li­ers with their dogs. Here was a new race of miners. Miriam did not live till they came to the church. They were all rather timid of en­ter­ing, with their bags of food, for fear of be­ing turned out. Leonard, a comic, thin fel­low, went first; Paul, who would have died rather than be sent back, went last. The place was dec­or­ated for Easter. In the font hun­dreds of white nar­cissi seemed to be grow­ing. The air was dim and col­oured from the win­dows and thrilled with a subtle scent of lilies and nar­cissi. In that at­mo­sphere Miriam’s soul came into a glow. Paul was afraid of the things he mustn’t do; and he was sens­it­ive to the feel of the place. Miriam turned to him. He answered. They were to­gether. He would not go bey­ond the Com­mu­nion-rail. She loved him for that. Her soul ex­pan­ded into prayer be­side him. He felt the strange fas­cin­a­tion of shad­owy re­li­gious places. All his lat­ent mys­ti­cism quivered into life. She was drawn to him. He was a prayer along with her.

Miriam very rarely talked to the other lads. They at once be­came awk­ward in con­ver­sa­tion with her. So usu­ally she was si­lent.

It was past mid­day when they climbed the steep path to the manor. All things shone softly in the sun, which was won­der­fully warm and en­liven­ing. Celandines and vi­ol­ets were out. Every­body was tip-top full with hap­pi­ness. The glit­ter of the ivy, the soft, at­mo­spheric grey of the castle walls, the gen­tle­ness of everything near the ruin, was per­fect.

The manor is of hard, pale grey stone, and the other walls are blank and calm. The young folk were in rap­tures. They went in trep­id­a­tion, al­most afraid that the de­light of ex­plor­ing this ruin might be denied them. In the first court­yard, within the high broken walls, were farm-carts, with their shafts ly­ing idle on the ground, the tyres of the wheels bril­liant with gold-red rust. It was very still.

All eagerly paid their six­pences, and went tim­idly through the fine clean arch of the in­ner court­yard. They were shy. Here on the pave­ment, where the hall had been, an old thorn tree was bud­ding. All kinds of strange open­ings and broken rooms were in the shadow around them.

After lunch they set off once more to ex­plore the ruin. This time the girls went with the boys, who could act as guides and ex­pos­it­ors. There was one tall tower in a corner, rather tot­ter­ing, where they say Mary Queen of Scots was im­prisoned.

“Think of the Queen go­ing up here!” said Miriam in a low voice, as she climbed the hol­low stairs.

“If she could get up,” said Paul, “for she had rheum­at­ism like any­thing. I reckon they treated her rot­tenly.”

“You don’t think she de­served it?” asked Miriam.

“No, I don’t. She was only lively.”

They con­tin­ued to mount the wind­ing stair­case. A high wind, blow­ing through the loop­holes, went rush­ing up the shaft, and filled the girl’s skirts like a bal­loon, so that she was ashamed, un­til he took the hem of her dress and held it down for her. He did it per­fectly simply, as he would have picked up her glove. She re­membered this al­ways.

Round the broken top of the tower the ivy bushed out, old and hand­some. Also, there were a few chill gil­li­v­ers, in pale cold bud. Miriam wanted to lean over for some ivy, but he would not let her. In­stead, she had to wait be­hind him, and take from him each spray as he gathered it and held it to her, each one sep­ar­ately, in the purest man­ner of chiv­alry. The tower seemed to rock in the wind. They looked over miles and miles of wooded coun­try, and coun­try with gleams of pas­ture.

The crypt un­der­neath the manor was beau­ti­ful, and in per­fect pre­ser­va­tion. Paul made a draw­ing: Miriam stayed with him. She was think­ing of Mary Queen of Scots look­ing with her strained, hope­less eyes, that could not un­der­stand misery, over the hills whence no help came, or sit­ting in this crypt, be­ing told of a God as cold as the place she sat in.

They set off again gaily, look­ing round on their be­loved manor that stood so clean and big on its hill.

“Sup­pos­ing you could have that farm,” said Paul to Miriam.

“Yes!”

“Wouldn’t it be lovely to come and see you!”

They were now in the bare coun­try of stone walls, which he loved, and which, though only ten miles from home, seemed so for­eign to Miriam. The party was strag­gling. As they were cross­ing a large meadow that sloped away from the sun, along a path em­bed­ded with in­nu­mer­able tiny glit­ter­ing points, Paul, walk­ing along­side, laced his fin­gers in the strings of the bag Miriam was car­ry­ing, and in­stantly she felt An­nie be­hind, watch­ful and jeal­ous. But the meadow was bathed in a glory of sun­shine, and the path was jew­elled, and it was sel­dom that he gave her any sign. She held her fin­gers very still among the strings of the bag, his fin­gers touch­ing; and the place was golden as a vis­ion.

At last they came into the strag­gling grey vil­lage of Crich, that lies high. Bey­ond the vil­lage was the fam­ous Crich Stand that Paul could see from the garden at home. The party pushed on. Great ex­panse of coun­try spread around and be­low. The lads were eager to get to the top of the hill. It was capped by a round knoll, half of which was by now cut away, and on the top of which stood an an­cient monu­ment, sturdy and squat, for sig­nalling in old days far down into the level lands of Not­ting­ham­shire and Leicester­shire.

It was blow­ing so hard, high up there in the ex­posed place, that the only way to be safe was to stand nailed by the wind to the wan of the tower. At their feet fell the pre­cip­ice where the lime­stone was quar­ried away. Below was a jumble of hills and tiny vil­lages—Mat­tock, Am­ber­gate, Stoney Middleton. The lads were eager to spy out the church of Best­wood, far away among the rather crowded coun­try on the left. They were dis­gus­ted that it seemed to stand on a plain. They saw the hills of Derby­shire fall into the mono­tony of the Mid­lands that swept away South.

Miriam was some­what scared by the wind, but the lads en­joyed it. They went on, miles and miles, to What­standwell. All the food was eaten, every­body was hungry, and there was very little money to get home with. But they man­aged to pro­cure a loaf and a cur­rant-loaf, which they hacked to pieces with shut-knives, and ate sit­ting on the wall near the bridge, watch­ing the bright Der­went rush­ing by, and the brakes from Mat­lock pulling up at the inn.

Paul was now pale with wear­i­ness. He had been re­spons­ible for the party all day, and now he was done. Miriam un­der­stood, and kept close to him, and he left him­self in her hands.

They had an hour to wait at Am­ber­gate Sta­tion. Trains came, crowded with ex­cur­sion­ists re­turn­ing to Manchester, Birm­ing­ham, and Lon­don.

“We might be go­ing there—folk eas­ily might think we’re go­ing that far,” said Paul.

They got back rather late. Miriam, walk­ing home with Geof­frey, watched the moon rise big and red and misty. She felt some­thing was ful­filled in her.

She had an elder sis­ter, Agatha, who was a school­teacher. Between the two girls was a feud. Miriam con­sidered Agatha worldly. And she wanted her­self to be a school­teacher.

One Saturday af­ter­noon Agatha and Miriam were up­stairs dress­ing. Their bed­room was over the stable. It was a low room, not very large, and bare. Miriam had nailed on the wall a re­pro­duc­tion of Ver­onese’s St. Cath­er­ine. She loved the wo­man who sat in the win­dow, dream­ing. Her own win­dows were too small to sit in. But the front one was dripped over with hon­ey­suckle and vir­ginia creeper, and looked upon the tree­tops of the oak-wood across the yard, while the little back win­dow, no big­ger than a handker­chief, was a loop­hole to the east, to the dawn beat­ing up against the be­loved round hills.

The two sis­ters did not talk much to each other. Agatha, who was fair and small and de­term­ined, had re­belled against the home at­mo­sphere, against the doc­trine of “the other cheek.” She was out in the world now, in a fair way to be in­de­pend­ent. And she in­sisted on worldly val­ues, on ap­pear­ance, on man­ners, on po­s­i­tion, which Miriam would fain have ig­nored.

Both girls liked to be up­stairs, out of the way, when Paul came. They pre­ferred to come run­ning down, open the stair-foot door, and see him watch­ing, ex­pect­ant of them. Miriam stood pain­fully pulling over her head a ros­ary he had given her. It caught in the fine mesh of her hair. But at last she had it on, and the red-brown wooden beads looked well against her cool brown neck. She was a well-de­veloped girl, and very hand­some. But in the little look­ing-glass nailed against the white­washed wall she could only see a frag­ment of her­self at a time. Agatha had bought a little mir­ror of her own, which she propped up to suit her­self. Miriam was near the win­dow. Sud­denly she heard the well-known click of the chain, and she saw Paul fling open the gate, push his bi­cycle into the yard. She saw him look at the house, and she shrank away. He walked in a non­chal­ant fash­ion, and his bi­cycle went with him as if it were a live thing.

“Paul’s come!” she ex­claimed.

“Aren’t you glad?” said Agatha cut­tingly.

Miriam stood still in amazement and be­wil­der­ment.

“Well, aren’t you?” she asked.

“Yes, but I’m not go­ing to let him see it, and think I wanted him.”

Miriam was startled. She heard him put­ting his bi­cycle in the stable un­der­neath, and talk­ing to Jimmy, who had been a pit-horse, and who was seedy.

“Well, Jimmy my lad, how are ter? Nob­but sick an’ sadly, like? Why, then, it’s a shame, my owd lad.”

She heard the rope run through the hole as the horse lif­ted its head from the lad’s caress. How she loved to listen when he thought only the horse could hear. But there was a ser­pent in her Eden. She searched earn­estly in her­self to see if she wanted Paul Morel. She felt there would be some dis­grace in it. Full of twis­ted feel­ing, she was afraid she did want him. She stood self-con­victed. Then came an agony of new shame. She shrank within her­self in a coil of tor­ture. Did she want Paul Morel, and did he know she wanted him? What a subtle in­famy upon her. She felt as if her whole soul coiled into knots of shame.

Agatha was dressed first, and ran down­stairs. Miriam heard her greet the lad gaily, knew ex­actly how bril­liant her grey eyes be­came with that tone. She her­self would have felt it bold to have greeted him in such wise. Yet there she stood un­der the self-ac­cus­a­tion of want­ing him, tied to that stake of tor­ture. In bit­ter per­plex­ity she kneeled down and prayed:

“O Lord, let me not love Paul Morel. Keep me from lov­ing him, if I ought not to love him.”

So­mething an­om­al­ous in the prayer ar­res­ted her. She lif­ted her head and pondered. How could it be wrong to love him? Love was God’s gift. And yet it caused her shame. That was be­cause of him, Paul Morel. But, then, it was not his af­fair, it was her own, between her­self and God. She was to be a sac­ri­fice. But it was God’s sac­ri­fice, not Paul Morel’s or her own. After a few minutes she hid her face in the pil­low again, and said:

“But, Lord, if it is Thy will that I should love him, make me love him—as Christ would, who died for the souls of men. Make me love him splen­didly, be­cause he is Thy son.”

She re­mained kneel­ing for some time, quite still, and deeply moved, her black hair against the red squares and the lav­ender-sprigged squares of the patch­work quilt. Prayer was al­most es­sen­tial to her. Then she fell into that rap­ture of self-sac­ri­fice, identi­fy­ing her­self with a God who was sac­ri­ficed, which gives to so many hu­man souls their deep­est bliss.

When she went down­stairs Paul was ly­ing back in an arm­chair, hold­ing forth with much vehe­mence to Agatha, who was scorn­ing a little paint­ing he had brought to show her. Miriam glanced at the two, and avoided their lev­ity. She went into the par­lour to be alone.

It was teatime be­fore she was able to speak to Paul, and then her man­ner was so dis­tant he thought he had of­fen­ded her.

Miriam dis­con­tin­ued her prac­tice of go­ing each Thursday even­ing to the lib­rary in Best­wood. After call­ing for Paul reg­u­larly dur­ing the whole spring, a num­ber of tri­fling in­cid­ents and tiny in­sults from his fam­ily awakened her to their at­ti­tude to­wards her, and she de­cided to go no more. So she an­nounced to Paul one even­ing she would not call at his house again for him on Thursday nights.

“Why?” he asked, very short.

“Noth­ing. Only I’d rather not.”

“Very well.”

“But,” she faltered, “if you’d care to meet me, we could still go to­gether.”

“Meet you where?”

“Some­where—where you like.”

“I shan’t meet you any­where. I don’t see why you shouldn’t keep call­ing for me. But if you won’t, I don’t want to meet you.”

So the Thursday even­ings which had been so pre­cious to her, and to him, were dropped. He worked in­stead. Mrs. Morel sniffed with sat­is­fac­tion at this ar­range­ment.

He would not have it that they were lov­ers. The in­tim­acy between them had been kept so ab­stract, such a mat­ter of the soul, all thought and weary struggle into con­scious­ness, that he saw it only as a pla­tonic friend­ship. He stoutly denied there was any­thing else between them. Miriam was si­lent, or else she very quietly agreed. He was a fool who did not know what was hap­pen­ing to him­self. By ta­cit agree­ment they ig­nored the re­marks and in­sinu­ations of their ac­quaint­ances.

“We aren’t lov­ers, we are friends,” he said to her. “We know it. Let them talk. What does it mat­ter what they say.”

So­me­times, as they were walk­ing to­gether, she slipped her arm tim­idly into his. But he al­ways re­sen­ted it, and she knew it. It caused a vi­ol­ent con­flict in him. With Miriam he was al­ways on the high plane of ab­strac­tion, when his nat­ural fire of love was trans­mit­ted into the fine stream of thought. She would have it so. If he were jolly and, as she put it, flip­pant, she waited till he came back to her, till the change had taken place in him again, and he was wrest­ling with his own soul, frown­ing, pas­sion­ate in his de­sire for un­der­stand­ing. And in this pas­sion for un­der­stand­ing her soul lay close to his; she had him all to her­self. But he must be made ab­stract first.

Then, if she put her arm in his, it caused him al­most tor­ture. His con­scious­ness seemed to split. The place where she was touch­ing him ran hot with fric­tion. He was one in­terne­cine battle, and he be­came cruel to her be­cause of it.

One even­ing in mid­sum­mer Miriam called at the house, warm from climb­ing. Paul was alone in the kit­chen; his mother could be heard mov­ing about up­stairs.

“Come and look at the sweet-peas,” he said to the girl.

They went into the garden. The sky be­hind the town­let and the church was or­ange-red; the flower-garden was flooded with a strange warm light that lif­ted every leaf into sig­ni­fic­ance. Paul passed along a fine row of sweet-peas, gath­er­ing a blos­som here and there, all cream and pale blue. Miriam fol­lowed, breath­ing the fra­grance. To her, flowers ap­pealed with such strength she felt she must make them part of her­self. When she bent and breathed a flower, it was as if she and the flower were lov­ing each other. Paul hated her for it. There seemed a sort of ex­pos­ure about the ac­tion, some­thing too in­tim­ate.

When he had got a fair bunch, they re­turned to the house. He listened for a mo­ment to his mother’s quiet move­ment up­stairs, then he said:

“Come here, and let me pin them in for you.” He ar­ranged them two or three at a time in the bosom of her dress, step­ping back now and then to see the ef­fect. “You know,” he said, tak­ing the pin out of his mouth, “a wo­man ought al­ways to ar­range her flowers be­fore her glass.”

Miriam laughed. She thought flowers ought to be pinned in one’s dress without any care. That Paul should take pains to fix her flowers for her was his whim.

He was rather of­fen­ded at her laughter.

“Some wo­men do—those who look de­cent,” he said.

Miriam laughed again, but mirth­lessly, to hear him thus mix her up with wo­men in a gen­eral way. From most men she would have ig­nored it. But from him it hurt her.

He had nearly fin­ished ar­ran­ging the flowers when he heard his mother’s foot­step on the stairs. Hur­riedly he pushed in the last pin and turned away.

“Don’t let ma­ter know,” he said.

Miriam picked up her books and stood in the door­way look­ing with chag­rin at the beau­ti­ful sun­set. She would call for Paul no more, she said.

“Good even­ing, Mrs. Morel,” she said, in a de­fer­en­tial way. She soun­ded as if she felt she had no right to be there.

“Oh, is it you, Miriam?” replied Mrs. Morel coolly.

But Paul in­sisted on every­body’s ac­cept­ing his friend­ship with the girl, and Mrs. Morel was too wise to have any open rup­ture.

It was not till he was twenty years old that the fam­ily could ever af­ford to go away for a hol­i­day. Mrs. Morel had never been away for a hol­i­day, ex­cept to see her sis­ter, since she had been mar­ried. Now at last Paul had saved enough money, and they were all go­ing. There was to be a party: some of An­nie’s friends, one friend of Paul’s, a young man in the same of­fice where Wil­liam had pre­vi­ously been, and Miriam.

It was great ex­cite­ment writ­ing for rooms. Paul and his mother de­bated it end­lessly between them. They wanted a fur­nished cot­tage for two weeks. She thought one week would be enough, but he in­sisted on two.

At last they got an an­swer from Mab­leth­orpe, a cot­tage such as they wished for thirty shil­lings a week. There was im­mense ju­bil­a­tion. Paul was wild with joy for his mother’s sake. She would have a real hol­i­day now. He and she sat at even­ing pic­tur­ing what it would be like. An­nie came in, and Leonard, and Alice, and Kitty. There was wild re­joicing and an­ti­cip­a­tion. Paul told Miriam. She seemed to brood with joy over it. But the Morel’s house rang with ex­cite­ment.

They were to go on Saturday morn­ing by the seven train. Paul sug­ges­ted that Miriam should sleep at his house, be­cause it was so far for her to walk. She came down for sup­per. Every­body was so ex­cited that even Miriam was ac­cep­ted with warmth. But al­most as soon as she entered the feel­ing in the fam­ily be­came close and tight. He had dis­covered a poem by Jean In­gelow which men­tioned Mab­leth­orpe, and so he must read it to Miriam. He would never have got so far in the dir­ec­tion of sen­ti­ment­al­ity as to read po­etry to his own fam­ily. But now they con­des­cen­ded to listen. Miriam sat on the sofa ab­sorbed in him. She al­ways seemed ab­sorbed in him, and by him, when he was present. Mrs. Morel sat jeal­ously in her own chair. She was go­ing to hear also. And even An­nie and the father at­ten­ded, Morel with his head cocked on one side, like some­body listen­ing to a ser­mon and feel­ing con­scious of the fact. Paul ducked his head over the book. He had got now all the audi­ence he cared for. And Mrs. Morel and An­nie al­most con­tested with Miriam who should listen best and win his fa­vour. He was in very high feather.

“But,” in­ter­rup­ted Mrs. Morel, “what is the ‘Bride of Enderby’ that the bells are sup­posed to ring?”

“It’s an old tune they used to play on the bells for a warn­ing against wa­ter. I sup­pose the Bride of Enderby was drowned in a flood,” he replied. He had not the faintest know­ledge what it really was, but he would never have sunk so low as to con­fess that to his wo­men­folk. They listened and be­lieved him. He be­lieved him­self.

“And the people knew what that tune meant?” said his mother.

“Yes—just like the Scotch when they heard ‘The Flowers o’ the Forest’—and when they used to ring the bells back­ward for alarm.”

“How?” said An­nie. “A bell sounds the same whether it’s rung back­wards or for­wards.”

“But,” he said, “if you start with the deep bell and ring up to the high one—der—der—der—der—der—der—der—der!”

He ran up the scale. Every­body thought it clever. He thought so too. Then, wait­ing a minute, he con­tin­ued the poem.

“Hm!” said Mrs. Morel curi­ously, when he fin­ished. “But I wish everything that’s writ­ten weren’t so sad.”

“I canna see what they want drownin’ theirselves for,” said Morel.

There was a pause. An­nie got up to clear the table.

Miriam rose to help with the pots.

“Let me help to wash up,” she said.

“Cer­tainly not,” cried An­nie. “You sit down again. There aren’t many.”

And Miriam, who could not be fa­mil­iar and in­sist, sat down again to look at the book with Paul.

He was mas­ter of the party; his father was no good. And great tor­tures he suffered lest the tin box should be put out at Firsby in­stead of at Mab­leth­orpe. And he wasn’t equal to get­ting a car­riage. His bold little mother did that.

“Here!” she cried to a man. “Here!”

Paul and An­nie got be­hind the rest, con­vulsed with shamed laughter.

“How much will it be to drive to Brook Cot­tage?” said Mrs. Morel.

“Two shil­lings.”

“Why, how far is it?”

“A good way.”

“I don’t be­lieve it,” she said.

But she scrambled in. There were eight crowded in one old sea­side car­riage.

“You see,” said Mrs. Morel, “it’s only three­pence each, and if it were a tram­car—”

They drove along. Each cot­tage they came to, Mrs. Morel cried:

“Is it this? Now, this is it!”

Every­body sat breath­less. They drove past. There was a uni­ver­sal sigh.

“I’m thank­ful it wasn’t that brute,” said Mrs. Morel. “I was frightened.” They drove on and on.

At last they des­cen­ded at a house that stood alone over the dyke by the highroad. There was wild ex­cite­ment be­cause they had to cross a little bridge to get into the front garden. But they loved the house that lay so sol­it­ary, with a sea-meadow on one side, and im­mense ex­panse of land patched in white bar­ley, yel­low oats, red wheat, and green root-crops, flat and stretch­ing level to the sky.

Paul kept ac­counts. He and his mother ran the show. The total ex­penses—lodging, food, everything—was six­teen shil­lings a week per per­son. He and Leonard went bathing in the morn­ings. Morel was wan­der­ing abroad quite early.

“You, Paul,” his mother called from the bed­room, “eat a piece of bread-and-but­ter.”

“All right,” he answered.

And when he got back he saw his mother presid­ing in state at the break­fast-table. The wo­man of the house was young. Her hus­band was blind, and she did laun­dry work. So Mrs. Morel al­ways washed the pots in the kit­chen and made the beds.

“But you said you’d have a real hol­i­day,” said Paul, “and now you work.”

“Work!” she ex­claimed. “What are you talk­ing about!”

He loved to go with her across the fields to the vil­lage and the sea. She was afraid of the plank bridge, and he ab­used her for be­ing a baby. On the whole he stuck to her as if he were her man.

Miriam did not get much of him, ex­cept, per­haps, when all the oth­ers went to the “Coons.” Coons were in­suf­fer­ably stu­pid to Miriam, so he thought they were to him­self also, and he preached prig­gishly to An­nie about the fatu­ity of listen­ing to them. Yet he, too, knew all their songs, and sang them along the roads rois­ter­ously. And if he found him­self listen­ing, the stu­pid­ity pleased him very much. Yet to An­nie he said:

“Such rot! there isn’t a grain of in­tel­li­gence in it. Nobody with more gump­tion than a grasshop­per could go and sit and listen.” And to Miriam he said, with much scorn of An­nie and the oth­ers: “I sup­pose they’re at the ‘Coons.’ ”

It was queer to see Miriam singing coon songs. She had a straight chin that went in a per­pen­dic­u­lar line from the lower lip to the turn. She al­ways re­minded Paul of some sad Bot­ti­celli an­gel when she sang, even when it was:

“Come down lover’s lane
For a walk with me, talk with me.”

Only when he sketched, or at even­ing when the oth­ers were at the “Coons,” she had him to her­self. He talked to her end­lessly about his love of ho­ri­zont­als: how they, the great levels of sky and land in Lin­colnshire, meant to him the etern­al­ity of the will, just as the bowed Nor­man arches of the church, re­peat­ing them­selves, meant the dogged leap­ing for­ward of the per­sist­ent hu­man soul, on and on, nobody knows where; in con­tra­dic­tion to the per­pen­dic­u­lar lines and to the Gothic arch, which, he said, leapt up at heaven and touched the ec­stasy and lost it­self in the di­vine. Him­self, he said, was Nor­man, Miriam was Gothic. She bowed in con­sent even to that.

One even­ing he and she went up the great sweep­ing shore of sand to­wards Theddleth­orpe. The long break­ers plunged and ran in a hiss of foam along the coast. It was a warm even­ing. There was not a fig­ure but them­selves on the far reaches of sand, no noise but the sound of the sea. Paul loved to see it clanging at the land. He loved to feel him­self between the noise of it and the si­lence of the sandy shore. Miriam was with him. Everything grew very in­tense. It was quite dark when they turned again. The way home was through a gap in the sandhills, and then along a raised grass road between two dykes. The coun­try was black and still. From be­hind the sandhills came the whis­per of the sea. Paul and Miriam walked in si­lence. Sud­denly he star­ted. The whole of his blood seemed to burst into flame, and he could scarcely breathe. An enorm­ous or­ange moon was star­ing at them from the rim of the sandhills. He stood still, look­ing at it.

“Ah!” cried Miriam, when she saw it.

He re­mained per­fectly still, star­ing at the im­mense and ruddy moon, the only thing in the far-reach­ing dark­ness of the level. His heart beat heav­ily, the muscles of his arms con­trac­ted.

“What is it?” mur­mured Miriam, wait­ing for him.

He turned and looked at her. She stood be­side him, forever in shadow. Her face, covered with the dark­ness of her hat, was watch­ing him un­seen. But she was brood­ing. She was slightly afraid—deeply moved and re­li­gious. That was her best state. He was im­pot­ent against it. His blood was con­cen­trated like a flame in his chest. But he could not get across to her. There were flashes in his blood. But some­how she ig­nored them. She was ex­pect­ing some re­li­gious state in him. Still yearn­ing, she was half aware of his pas­sion, and gazed at him, troubled.

“What is it?” she mur­mured again.

“It’s the moon,” he answered, frown­ing.

“Yes,” she as­sen­ted. “Isn’t it won­der­ful?” She was curi­ous about him. The crisis was past.

He did not know him­self what was the mat­ter. He was nat­ur­ally so young, and their in­tim­acy was so ab­stract, he did not know he wanted to crush her on to his breast to ease the ache there. He was afraid of her. The fact that he might want her as a man wants a wo­man had in him been sup­pressed into a shame. When she shrank in her con­vulsed, coiled tor­ture from the thought of such a thing, he had winced to the depths of his soul. And now this “pur­ity” pre­ven­ted even their first love-kiss. It was as if she could scarcely stand the shock of phys­ical love, even a pas­sion­ate kiss, and then he was too shrink­ing and sens­it­ive to give it.

As they walked along the dark fen-meadow he watched the moon and did not speak. She plod­ded be­side him. He hated her, for she seemed in some way to make him des­pise him­self. Look­ing ahead—he saw the one light in the dark­ness, the win­dow of their lamp-lit cot­tage.

He loved to think of his mother, and the other jolly people.

“Well, every­body else has been in long ago!” said his mother as they entered.

“What does that mat­ter!” he cried ir­rit­ably. “I can go a walk if I like, can’t I?”

“And I should have thought you could get in to sup­per with the rest,” said Mrs. Morel.

“I shall please my­self,” he re­tor­ted. “It’s not late. I shall do as I like.”

“Very well,” said his mother cut­tingly, “then do as you like.” And she took no fur­ther no­tice of him that even­ing. Which he pre­ten­ded neither to no­tice nor to care about, but sat read­ing. Miriam read also, ob­lit­er­at­ing her­self. Mrs. Morel hated her for mak­ing her son like this. She watched Paul grow­ing ir­rit­able, prig­gish, and mel­an­cholic. For this she put the blame on Miriam. An­nie and all her friends joined against the girl. Miriam had no friend of her own, only Paul. But she did not suf­fer so much, be­cause she des­pised the tri­vi­al­ity of these other people.

And Paul hated her be­cause, some­how, she spoilt his ease and nat­ur­al­ness. And he writhed him­self with a feel­ing of hu­mi­li­ation.