A Mummer's Wife Part 14

'Oh, Kate, what are you doing?'

Although the question was asked in an intonation of voice affecting to be one of astonishment only, there was nevertheless in it an accent of reproof that was especially irritating to Kate in her present mood. A deaf anger against her mother-in-law's interference oppressed her, but getting the better of it, she said quietly, though somewhat sullenly:

'You always want to know what I'm doing! I declare, one can't turn round but you're after me, just like a shadow.'

'What you say is unjust, Kate,' replied the old woman warmly. 'I'm sure I never pry after you.'

'Well, anyhow, there it is: I'm looking out for a book to read in the evenings, if you want to know.'

'I thought you'd given up reading those vain and sinful books; they can't do you any good.'

'What harm can they do me?'

'They turn your thoughts from Christ. I've looked into them to see that I may not be speaking wrongly, and I've found them nothing but vain accounts of the world and its worldliness. I didn't read far, but what I saw was a lot of excusing of women who couldn't love their husbands, and much sighing after riches and pleasure. I thanked G.o.d you'd given over such things. I believed your heart was turned towards Him. Now it grieves me bitterly to see I was mistaken.'

'I don't know what you mean. Ralph never said that there was any harm in my reading tales.'

'Ah! Ralph, I'm afraid, has never set a good example. I wouldn't blame him, for he's my own son, but I'd wish to see him not prizing so highly the things of the world.'

'We must live, though,' Kate answered, without quite understanding what she said.

'Live--of course we have to live; but it depends how we live and what we live for--whether it be to indulge the desires of the flesh, the desire of the eye, or to regain the image of G.o.d, to have the design of G.o.d again planted in our souls. This is what we should live for, and it is only thus that we shall find true happiness.'

Though these were memories of phrases heard in the pulpit, they were uttered by Mrs. Ede with a fervour, with a candour of belief, that took from them any appearance of artificiality; and Kate did not notice that her mother-in-law was using words that were not habitual to her.

'But what do you want me to do?' said Kate, who began to feel frightened.

'To go to Christ, to love Him. He is all we have to help us, and they who love Him truly are guided as to how to live righteously. Whether we eat or drink, or whatever we do, it springs from or leads to the love of G.o.d and man.'

These words stirred Kate to her very entrails; a sudden gush of feeling brought the tears to her eyes, and she was on the point of throwing herself into Mrs. Ede's arms.

The temptation to have a good cry was almost irresistible, and the burden of her pent-up emotions was more than she could bear. But communing the while rapidly within herself, she hesitated, until an unexpected turn of thought harshly put it before her that she was being made a fool of--that she had a perfect right to look through her books and poetry, and that Hender's sneers were no more than she deserved for allowing a mother-in-law to bully her. Then the tears of sorrow became those of anger, and striving to speak as rudely as she could, she said:

'I don't talk about Christ as much as you, but He judges us by our hearts and not by our words. You would do well to humble yourself before you come to preach to others.'

'Dear Kate, it's because I see you interested in things that have no concern with G.o.d's love that I speak to you so. A man who never knows a thought of G.o.d has been staying here, and I fear he has led you----'

At these words Kate threw the last papers into the trunk, pushed it away, and turned round fiercely.

'Led me into what? What do you mean? Mr. Lennox was here because Ralph wished him to be here. I think that you should know better than to say such things. I don't deserve it.'

On this Kate left the room, her face clouded and trembling with a pa.s.sion that she did not quite feel. To just an appreciable extent she was conscious that it suited her convenience to quarrel with her mother-in-law.

She was tired of the life she was leading; her whole heart was in her novels and poetry; and, determined to take in the _London Reader_ or _Journal_, she called back to Mrs. Ede that she was going to consult Ralph on the matter.

He was in capital spirits. The affairs in the shop were going on more satisfactorily than usual, a fact which he did not fail to attribute to his superior commercial talents. 'A business like theirs went to the bad,' he declared, 'when there wasn't a man to look after it. Women liked being attended to by one of the other s.e.x,' and beaming with artificial smiles, the little man measured out yards of ribbon, and suggested 'that they had a very superior thing in the way of petticoats just come from Manchester.'

His health was also much improved, so much so that his asthmatic attack seemed to have done him good. A little colour flushed his cheeks around the edges of the thick beard. In the evenings after supper, when the shop was closed, an hour before they went up to prayers, he would talk of the sales he had made during the day, and speak authoritatively of the possibilities of enlarging the business. His ambition was to find someone in London who would forward them the latest fas.h.i.+ons; somebody who would be clever enough to pick out and send them some stylish but simple dress that Kate could copy. He would work the advertis.e.m.e.nts, and if the articles were well set in the window he would answer for the rest. The great difficulty was, of course, the question of frontage, and Mr. Ede's face grew grave as he thought of his little windows. 'Nothing,' he said, 'can be done without plate-gla.s.s; five hundred pounds would buy out the fruit-seller, and throw the whole place into one'; and Kate, interested in all that was imaginative, would raise her eyes from the pages of her book and ask if there was no possibility of realizing this grand future.

She was reading a novel full of the most singular and exciting scenes. In it she discovered a character who reminded her of her husband, a courtier at the Court of Louis XIV., who said sharp things, and often made himself disagreeable, but there was something behind that pleased, and under the influence of this fancy she began to find new qualities in Ralph, the existence of which she had not before suspected. Sometimes the thought struck her that if he had been always like what he was now she would have loved him better, and listening to a dispute which had arisen between him and his mother regarding the purchase of the fruiterer's premises, her smile deepened, and then, the humour of the likeness continuing to tickle her, she burst out laughing.

'What are you laughing at, Kate?' said her husband, looking admiringly at her pretty face. Mrs. Ede sternly continued her knitting, but Ralph seemed so pleased, and begged so good-naturedly to be told what the matter was, that the temptation to do so grew irresistible.

'You won't be angry if I tell you?'

'Angry, no. Why should I be angry?'

'You promise?'

'Yes, I promise,' replied Ralph, extremely curious.

'Well then, there is a cha-cha-rac-ter so--so like----'

'Oh, if you want to tell me, don't laugh like that. I can't hear a word you're saying.'

'Oh it is so--so--so like----'

'Yes, but do stop laughing and tell me.'

At last Kate had to stop laughing for want of breath, and she said, her voice still trembling:

'Well, there's a fellow in this book--you promise not to be angry?'

'Oh yes, I promise.'

'Well, then, there's someone in this book that does remind me so much--of you--that is to say, when you're cross, not as you are now.'

At this announcement Mrs. Ede looked up in astonishment, and she seemed as hurt as if Kate had slapped her in the face, whereas Ralph's face lighted up, his smile revealing through the heavy moustache the gap between his front teeth which had been filled with some white substance. Kate always noticed it with aversion, but Ralph, who was not susceptible to feminine revulsions of feelings, begged her to read the pa.s.sage, and with an eagerness that surprised his mother. Without giving it a second thought she began, but she had not read half a dozen words before Mrs. Ede had gathered up her knitting and was preparing to leave the room.

'Oh, mother, don't go! I a.s.sure you there's no harm.'

'Leave her alone. I'm sick of all this nonsense about religion. I should like to know what harm we're doing,' said Ralph.

Kate made a movement to rise, but he laid his hand upon her arm, and a moment after Mrs. Ede was gone.

'Oh, do let me go and fetch her,' exclaimed Kate. 'I shouldn't--I know I shouldn't read these books. It pains her so much to see me wasting my time.

She must be right.'

'There's no right about it; she'd bully us all if she had her way. Do be quiet, Kate! Do as I tell you, and let's hear the story.'

Relinquis.h.i.+ng another half-hearted expostulation which rose to her lips, Kate commenced to read. Ralph was enchanted, and, deliciously tickled at the idea that he was like someone in print, he chuckled under his breath.

Soon they came to the part that had struck Kate as being so particularly appropriate to her husband. It concerned a scene between this ascetic courtier and a handsome, middle-aged widow who frequently gave him to understand that her feelings regarding him were of the tenderest kind; but on every occasion he pretended to misunderstand her. The humour of the whole thing consisted in the innocence of the lady, who fancied she had not explained herself sufficiently; and hara.s.sed with this idea, she pursued the courtier from the Court hall into the illuminated gardens, and there told him, and in language that admitted of no doubt, that she wished to marry him. The courtier was indignant, and answered her so tartly that Kate, even in reading it over a second time, could not refrain from fits of laughter.

'It is--is so--s-o like what you w-wo-uld say if a wo-wo-man were to fol-low you,' she said, with the tears rolling down her cheeks.

'Is it really?' asked Ralph, joining in the laugh, although in a way that did not seem to be very genuine. The fact was that he felt just a little piqued at being thought so indifferent to the charms of the other s.e.x, and looked at his wife for a moment or two in a curious sort of way, trying to think how he should express himself. At last he said:

'I'm sure that if it was my own Kate who was there I shouldn't answer so crossly.'

Kate ceased laughing, and looked up at him so suddenly that she increased his embarra.s.sment; but the remembrance that he was after all only speaking to his wife soon came to his aid, and confidentially he sat down beside her on the sofa. Her first impulse was to draw away from him--it was so long since he had spoken to her thus.