Читать книгу The Woman at the Door - Warwick Deeping - Страница 11

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A little while before sunset she went round the yard and byres and buildings collecting eggs. Some hens were separative and laid in strange places, even in the waggon-shed, and in a tumbril in which some litter had been left she found two eggs. The tumbril’s paint had weathered to a faded powder-blue, and its red wheels were caked with dry mud. On the side near the off-shaft she saw her husband’s name in white letters:—“T. Ballard. Beech Farm.”

The sky flared. A great cloud bank smouldered like a furnace, above a band of steely azure. A bat was fluttering noiselessly above the black roof of the barn, and she stood and watched it as though something in her mood fluttered ineffectually against that splendid sunset. She was thinking that her husband would have sworn at her had he found those eggs in the tumbril. How strange that this earth should be so full of beautiful and of ugly things! It was almost too beautiful—with a beauty that wounded—on this evening in May.

She remembered that she had left the dog shut up in the sitting-room. Poor Peter, he too was the victim of a vicarious tragedy, for—surely—to be unhappy was tragic. Returning to the house, she put her egg-basket in the dark, cool dairy, and went to release the dog. He was crouching close to the door, listening to her footsteps, his head on one side, his eyes watching the handle.

“Poor Peter.”

She stooped, and taking his head between her hands, kissed it. This creature was always the same, gentle, affectionate, her shadow, causing her no bitter qualms, nor forcing her to sordid concealments. What would her husband’s mood be to-night? How terrible that she should have to wait trembling upon his temper! She did not pull down the blinds or draw the curtains, for she had begun to feel afraid of this house when its eyes were closed. She lit a candle and went to look at the clock in the kitchen. There was a whining of wheels and a sudden clangour, and the candle trembled in her hand. The old clock with its solemn white face was striking nine.

She opened a door in the body of the clock, and pulling on a chain, wound it; he said bitter things to her if she forgot to wind the clock.—“No head, have you! Forget everything.” She had laid his supper on the table, and she looked carefully to assure herself that nothing was missing, so that he should have no excuse for snarling at her. But did he need excuses? And why had life turned so sour and bitter in him? Poverty, struggle, the curse that sometimes seems to lie upon the land? He had grown mean, and cruel. He took a strange pleasure in being cruel, especially to her.

She set the candle on the table and sat down on the sofa with her back to the window; the dog jumped up beside her and put his head in her lap. But even this dog’s love had to be safeguarded, like some precious thing to be put away quickly in a drawer or hidden in a cupboard. Peter’s devotion to her angered Tod Ballard. It gave him yet another excuse for being cruel to both of them.

She sat listening, and the dog watched her face.

“You ought to go, Peter.”

Peter appeared to understand her. He jumped down and stood looking up consentingly into her face. If the man creature came back with liquor in him——? Yes, Peter must be put out of his way. The dog followed her down the passage to the back door and out into the brick-paved yard, and with mute docility stood beside his kennel to have the chain clipped to his collar.

“Good night, precious.”

She kissed him, and went quickly into the house as though afraid of her own feelings. It was terrible to care too much—even about a dog. She returned to the sofa and sat down and stared at the still straight flame of the candle. She found herself thinking about the stranger who had come to the door. He had kind eyes, and a pleasant voice, and large slow gentle movements. She sat and wondered about him.

The jarring of a gate in the deep silence, footsteps on the path, familiar, frightening footsteps. Her husband walked as though his temper jarred and jerked and twinged inside him. She had left the front door unlatched. She heard it thrust open so brutally with the toe of a boot that it struck the wall.

Something shivered in her.

“Rachel.”

She stood up. She had grown so dreadfully wise as to the significance of these home-comings, and she could tell by his voice and his movements just what she had to fear. His sober home-comings were sullen and silent, his drunken ones rough and silly. But to-night she knew that he would be in one of those sane and savage moods when the devil was thin-lipped and ruthless in him, sufficiently inflamed to be brutal like some ring-master with a whip.

“Your supper’s ready, Tod.”

She had lost the courage to fight back at him, nor had her courage ever been very great. Her sensitiveness had always been at his mercy. He came limping into the room.

“Why the hell haven’t you lit the lamp?”

Yes, why hadn’t she? Was it that she preferred the dim light of that candle?

“We’re rather short of oil, Tod.”

“We would be.—Light it. Here, give me the matches.”

He lit the hanging lamp, and as though fascinated she observed his face. It had a kind of hard, polished brightness; the lips were drawn back from the teeth. His hands were quite steady, remorselessly steady.

“Afraid of too much light, are you? Sit down.”

She made as though to sit on the sofa.

“I have had my supper, Tod.”

“Well, you can have some more, can’t you? Sit down at the table. What have we got? No bloody surprises in this house, what? Cold mutton and spuds! My god, you’re some housewife! Well,—you’ll eat it too.”

He carved two large wedges from the ragged joint, piled on cold potatoes, and thrust the plate at her.

“Eat it. Sit down; I’ll get another plate. You want feeding up. You’ve got a face like a waxy potato.”

Her meekness had been her life’s mistake, or rather—her marrying him had begun it. She had been tricked by compassion for a man who had come back crippled from the war. She sat down at the table with that plate of food in front of her.

“Really, I don’t want it, Tod.”

He had limped into the scullery for a plate, and a knife and fork.

“Eat it,—damn you, and don’t argue.”

He sat down opposite her, and seizing the loaf, cut bread as though the loaf was a live thing to be savaged.

“Where’s the dog?”

“In his kennel.”

“Suppose you’d like to pitch that to him, but you won’t.—You’ll sit there and eat it, my girl. Starving yourself, what! The little martyr! A lot of use you’ve been to me, haven’t you? Milk and jam. I ought to have married a woman with some guts in her.”

Head bent, lashes lowered, she made an effort to eat the food he had piled upon her plate. She was aware of a feeling of tightness in her throat as though some hand was compressing it. She was going to cry. She mustn’t cry. Tears exasperated him.

She was conscious of being watched. She—was—crying. The tears ran down her cheeks.

“My god, blubbing again! Stop it, can’t you?”

“I can’t, Tod.”

“Well, blub, damn you, blub.”