Читать книгу The Confessions of a Currency Girl - Carlton Dawe - Страница 9

Table of Contents

AND so slowly the days ran themselves into weeks, the weeks to months, and all the while we led the same dull, objectless sort of existence: rising in the morning and going through our allotted toil—whatever it might be—eating, and going to bed again. True, I never expected to see a new sun every day, but I none the less grew tired of watching the old one sail across the great plains and go down night after night behind the big trees by the creek. I used to wonder if my lot was ever going to change, or if I was doomed henceforth to live only as the shadowy atom of a woman; a creature who grew lean or fat, long or short as the sun rose or sank, as the clouds fluttered overhead. I had in my nature all the youthful craving for change, a craving which we women, or women such as I was then, cannot gratify without risking much. Poor little fool! And yet how can one know till one has learnt?

Will, who had much of my nature, who was, in fact, a masculine me, having no sexual restraint upon him, felt not the dreariness of our life with an equal intensity, or if he did his reputation sadly belied him; for with shame must I own that he had lately developed a most pronounced partiality for certain persons at Wallan who shall be nameless in these pages. Mother, I am glad to say, never knew half the things they said of her handsome boy, though if she had it is ten to one she would have rejected them as unworthy of credence. He was still her boy, though he now turned the scale at thirteen stone seven and stood over six feet high, and he would be her boy even when his hair was grey and he had sons and daughters of his own. It was a source of much distress to me to hear of what they called his loose ways, for I not unnaturally thought that our dreadful heritage might make him reckless and hurry him to the dogs. And yet I never wholly believed it, for there was always consolation in his kind words and his loving ways, and whenever I saw him stretched out at mother’s feet, his head in her lap, as though he were a boy again, I knew that the poison had not yet entered his blood.

As for Harold, he seemed to take little note of the changeless days. It always broke the monotony for him if he were well enough to hobble down to the creek and back, and his journeyings round the garden of a morning were an invariable source of delight. No flower bloomed, no leaf appeared which escaped his eager eye, and I verily believe that he was intimately acquainted with each particular weed. There in the old summer-house, with the roses and the grapes growing within reach of his hand, would he sit by the hour reading his favourite authors, or conning carefully his own hopeful verses. But he suffered much in those days, poor boy, and his beautiful face grew paler and paler, and, though he would not own it, his hopes more feeble. “Oh, if I could only write one verse,” he would say, “one verse that will live when I am gone.” It was a modest enough wish as you meant it, Harold, but, ah, what a wish! It almost broke my heart to see his pitiable resignation, so sadly hopeful, and yet so surely hopeless. Poor boy. And when they sent back those first verses with the curt information that they were “not suitable”! Not suitable, forsooth! I should think not when they had never printed any real poetry in their rag of a newspaper. But no one ever knew save you and me. We were not going to let the world into all our secrets. Yet we had our revenge, didn’t we, when the big Melbourne weekly inserted your “Ode to a Butterfly”? It was worth having our disappointment to experience such a pleasure; nay, without that disappointment the pleasure would have been but the ghost of a sensation. There was hope then that the first great Australian poet was born. What castles we built, what cities reared on the airy foundations of our exultant hope. Alas! what knew we of the world and the world’s ways? Alas! that hope too, like us, should be born to sorrow to pass away in pain.

Of mother and father little need here be said. They lived the same peaceful life, only, if anything, they were quieter in their ways, more reserved than they had ever been. It was only when Mr. Langton came over to Granite Creek that father seemed to shake off his great depression. Then, waking up as it were, he would be as brilliant, courteous and affable as in the old days, and Mr. Langton would go away vowing that Hastings was the happiest man in the world. Happy! and every day that sad face was growing sadder, and the once muscular and upright figure now owned a perceptible stoop. To me he seemed like a man who thought too much; a dreamer of dreams, and not too pleasant ones either. How could they be? What had he not lost by that one act of madness? Better, perhaps, had his blow proved fatal. It would have been a short shrift then—and oblivion. No years of painful penance; no tears that could not wash away the past; no children of sorrow. He was never the same after his confession. I think it broke his pride—annihilated his dignity. He had been father, protector, god: but with his own hand he had shattered the idol. It seemed as though he could no more believe in it himself.

I saw Arthur but once during this period. It was when he came home for the Christmas holidays. He was doing famously at the University, so he told me, and hoped to gain his degree without a single plucking. Of course, I congratulated him on his success, and hoped that it might continue; but nothing of a nearer nature passed between us. He did not even mention his ring, and I, because I had long since ceased to wear it, never broached the subject, although I was not slow to observe that he too was without his half. Of Ella, I saw, as usual, a great deal, and while she was lamenting Will’s backsliding, I was chafing, fool-like, against the restraint of the curb, forgetting that but for that restraint, we fools of women would too often dash ourselves to pieces.

But change was coming now with a vengeance. That for which I had yearned so long was close at hand. The orchestra had struck its last chord; a moment’s silence as of the grave was to follow. Anon the little bell will ring out—that same soft tinkle heralds in comedy or tragedy—and by some mysterious process the unwieldy curtain uplifts itself and the stage is laid bare. I wonder how we shall like the play?

One day a man rode hastily up to Granite Creek and inquired for father. He had ridden with all dispatch from Langton Station. Mr. Langton was ill, very ill, dying he (the man) believed, and he had expressed a wish to see father. The news came like a thunderclap to us all; we plied the man with numerous questions, but could elicit little other information from him. He seemed to know nothing but that Mr. Langton was ill, and that he had been sent to acquaint Mr. Hastings of the fact. So father, even while the fellow was speaking, jumped on the messenger’s horse and galloped away at break-neck speed, the man himself following leisurely some half-hour after on father’s big roan.

After some three hours of anxious waiting father returned looking extremely dejected, and we immediately guessed the worst. Nor were our guesses erroneous. Mr. Langton was no more.

“He was unconscious when I got there,” father explained, “and never rallied again.”

“Then he did not recognize you?” said mother.

“No, poor fellow. He opened his eyes the moment before he died, but they were glassy and vacant-looking, and already dead.”

And then he told us how it all came about; how three days previously Mr. Langton had been thoroughly drenched while riding from Boorta to Wallan, and had thereby caught a severe chill which rapidly developed into acute pneumonia.

“Why did they not send for you sooner?” said mother.

“He wanted me,” was the reply, “but the doctor would not hear of it. Afraid that I might agitate the patient, or some such nonsense. He, however, told me that Mr. Langton had appeared exceedingly anxious about my lease of Granite Creek, and had spoken of making it over to me entirely. But of course nothing was done, and all he said was naturally looked upon as so much wandering talk.”

“Poor man, to die with no one near him whom he loved.”

“I have often heard him declare that it is the way all rich people die. But the doctor telegraphed to his children, and they are expected here this evening.”

So the good squatter was gone at last. It seemed incredible that that apparently healthy man should disappear from the face of things so suddenly. Only a week before he and father had sat on the verandah for over an hour arguing Plato and the immortality of the soul, and now—well, he now knew as much about the soul as Plato. I think it always a hard fact to realize that people are dead; dumb, still, cold eternally. We miss them, and we shall never see them again, at least while this earthly shell holds together; and yet I often think they are not dead, for with an effort of memory I can bring them before me, and see them smile, and hear the tones of their well-beloved voice. And what are these intangible ghosts, these perfect shades of nothingness? Fancy, of course, an effort of the imagination. Nothing more?

Out of respect to the deceased, father, Will and I went to the funeral, and, if I may be allowed so to speak, a great affair it was; the biggest thing ever seen in Wallan. People flocked in from all the country round, many out of respect, but more out of curiosity; for there was not likely to be such another display in Wallan for many a day to come. Certainly there had never been one like it before. It was estimated that the vehicles alone stretched over half a mile—and a curious collection of craft they were—while a queue of pedestrians, another half mile in length, plodded on in the dust of the wheels. With one thing, however, I was particularly impressed, and that was the decorum preserved by this huge crowd. To all it seemed to be the one serious moment of their lives. Men whose reputation for wildness was the talk of the district, here showed how like other men they were. Perhaps, even they too thought of the day that was to come.

I did not see Maud Langton at the funeral, and learnt afterwards that she had not followed her father’s remains to their last resting-place, but Captain Fred was there decked out in all the trappings of woe, which, however, did not detract from his interesting personality. Yes, even surrounded by every sign and symbol of woe, I could find a thought for a man’s appearance. But then, was he not a curiosity, a fabulous hero to us; a sort of mystery and terror, a forbidden luxury like the tree of knowledge? Too like, alas!

After the ceremony the more intimate, or, I might say, the more respectable acquaintances of the deceased drove back to the house and were there most lavishly regaled with a plentiful supply of choice funeral baked-meats, and if the majority of the good folk did not thoroughly enjoy themselves, there is no sign by which we may detect enjoyment. I know I was so vastly amused watching the antics of the masticating crowd, that I did not perceive, until father touched me on the arm, that Captain Langton had joined us.

“My daughter,” said father presenting me.

“Daughter. By Jove!” And he looked at me so intently that I had to bow low to hide my confusion.

“You have forgotten her, I suppose?” said father.

“I’m afraid I must plead guilty,” he said with an apologetic look at me. “Is it possible that this is the little girl who used to play with Maud?”

“The same,” said father.

“By George, how she’s grown.”

I thought the conversation was veering to a somewhat personal point, so I walked over to Will, who stood a couple of yards away, and asked him some silly question, thereby showing my resentment.

“Your son, I suppose,” I heard him say to father, for my thoughts were on him as well as my back.

“Yes.”

“By Jove, how like each other they are.” And I knew his eyes were watching me all the while.

Presently father approached us.

“Captain Langton wishes to reintroduce us to his sister,” said he. But neither Will nor I moved. I had not forgotten the old days, and I was prouder now. Will had not forgotten them either.

“Flos feels faint,” he said, “I must take her out on the verandah first.”

“By all means,” interposed the Captain, “I will bring my sister to you.”

Will gave me his arm and led me through the crowded room.

“There,” said he, as soon as we had reached the open air, “I hope he will understand that we don’t want to curry favour of him. If I were you, Flos, I wouldn’t be introduced to her.”

“I don’t care one way or the other,” I replied. “She is, or can be, nothing to me. But after all she was only a girl then, and perhaps she may wish to forget, so why shouldn’t I?”

Will growled out something about my being put upon, and looked very cross. He wouldn’t be patronized himself and he wouldn’t have me patronized, and he’d be—what followed was lost in an inarticulate gurgle, for at that moment Captain Langton and father approached with Maud between them, and I saw old Will’s look of resentment change to one of uneasy wonder.

Tall of figure and shapely in outline, with a pale, calm and very beautiful face, Maud Langton looked, as she stepped gracefully towards us, as fair a picture of young womanhood as one could wish to see. There was no sign of tears in her lustrous eyes; no red or swollen lids proclaimed the misery she must have endured. She looked as placid as though there were no such thing as woe, and grief were an unknown term. And yet with it all I thought of her as a most melancholy figure; in her movements there was an indescribable motion of sorrow, which the heavy crape dress she wore, though it showed off the exquisite whiteness of her skin and the unusual shimmer of her hair, deeply accentuated.

“This is my daughter,” said father, and there was a proud ring in his voice as he spoke.

“My old playfellow,” said she, coming forward and shaking me by the hand. “What a time it seems since we last saw each other.”

“Longer, indeed,” thought I, “than there was any necessity for.”

But I returned her pressure of the hand and smiled back at her, though I could not forget why we had parted so long before.

“And this,” said father turning to her, “is my son Will. You must remember him?”

“Do you mean to say,” said she in her languid way, turning her wonderful eyes full upon old Will, who looked none too comfortable under the scrutiny, “that this is the boy who used to ride as though he had no neck to break?”

Father smiled and said he was afraid Will was somewhat reckless in his young days, but that her surmise was substantially correct. As for poor old Will, he blushed as furiously as any schoolgirl, and muttered that he believed he did ride very foolishly as a boy, but that boys really never knew the meaning of the word “fear.”

“Nor,” said she, “if one may judge by appearances, should I think it occasioned you much concern now.”

Will smiled and said he didn’t think it did. But there, he was sure to please the women with his handsome face and his great loose limbs, for to a woman is there not something wonderfully fascinating in that physical strength which never can be hers?

“But did you not have another son?” said she presently. “A little cripple, was he not?”

“Yes,” said father in a low voice, which conveyed a distinct reproach, “I have a son who met with an unfortunate accident.”

“Poor little fellow,” said she, but though her voice was pitched in a softer key it entirely lacked feeling. There was a languid, patronizing ring in it which I thought peculiarly offensive. And yet it might have been only my thought, which had not yet forgotten the past; for when she turned to her brother and spoke she addressed him in precisely the same manner. Perhaps it was her style; perhaps again the sadness of the gathering was not without its effect. It could not well be otherwise. The wonder was how she bore up so well. She was a lonely girl after all, and what she had done to me in the old days had nothing to do with the present. So I talked to her of her father, and told her how fond we all were of him, and how often he came to take tea with us, and of the many happy hours we had all spent together; and as I spoke the tears came into her eyes for, I believe, the first time, and she declared that she had not been a very loving or dutiful daughter, and that she would never forgive herself for her selfish indifference. In five minutes—for when they saw us walk aside the men very considerately quitted us—we had gone over much of the old ground, and in ten minutes she was imploring me to call her by her Christian name as before. “Let us be Maud and Flossie as we were or old,” she said. “I seem to be the most utterly lonesome creature in the world.”

I was not one to bear resentment especially to one who seemed so sorely in need of help, and who held out the hand with the wish that bygones should be bygones. Moreover, how did I know that she had really intended to cut me? I had been sensitive of slights all my life, and when I knew that there was good cause for shame, I saw nothing but a perpetual insult. A look, a half-heard word, sent the blood rushing confusedly through my veins. I had always demanded more consideration than my position entitled me to, and when I knew that there was a real cause for slighting me, my demands increased; so that between one thing and another I, at times, contrived to make my life a burden.

At length our trap drove round to the door, being one of the last to make its appearance, and Captain Fred and his sister came out on the verandah to see us off.

“You will come and see me soon, Flossie, will you not?” she said, as she bade me good-bye. “You know I shall be awfully wretched in this lonely place.”

“You, I hope, will not forget us either,” said the Captain, addressing father. “I know all about your life-long friendship with my father, and I trust that I may not be unworthy to fill his place in your good opinion.”

“You may be sure,” replied father as he shook the young man by the hand, “that my friend’s son shall be mine, if he wishes it.”

Then followed a general invitation to us all. Langton Station was a big place and desolate enough at the best of times; therefore, what was it likely to be now? If we had any pity for them, we were implored to show it by coming over and cheering them up on every possible occasion; and not until we promised, and let them know that there was some likelihood of our promise being kept, did they seem inclined to part with us. But at last away we went, and for quite half an hour none of us spoke a word, being, apparently too full of thought. Of what father was thinking as he sat smoking his pipe, I cannot say for certain, though by the gloomy look on his face, I might easily have made a shrewd guess; but of what Will and I thought, the following brief dialogue may, perhaps, afford a clue.

We had gone on, as I have said, for a long time in silence, when suddenly I exclaimed, unconsciously, it seems to me, “I am sure he is a much-wronged man.”

“She is very beautiful, though,” says Will.

At this we both looked up into each other’s face and laughed confusedly.