Hetty Wesley Part 36

But since what I said occasioned some queries, which I should be glad to speak freely about, I earnestly beg that the little I shall say may not be offensive to you, since I promise to be as little witty as possible, though I can't help saying you accuse me of being too much so; especially these late years past I have been pretty free from that scandal.

You ask me what hurt matrimony has done me, and whether I had always so frightful an idea of it as I have now?

Home questions, indeed! and I once more beg of you not to be offended at the least I can say to them, if I say anything.

I had not always such notions of wedlock as now, but thought that where there was a mutual affection and desire of pleasing, something near an equality of mind and person, either earthly or heavenly wisdom, and anything to keep love warm between a young couple, there was a possibility of happiness in a married state; but when all, or most of these, were wanting, I ever thought people could not marry without sinning against G.o.d and themselves.

You are so good to my spouse and me as to say you shall always think yourself obliged to him for his civilities to me. I hope he will always continue to use me better than I deserve in one respect.

_I think exactly the same of my marriage as I did before it happened_; but though I would have given at least one of my eyes for the liberty of throwing myself at your feet before I was married at all, yet, since it is past and matrimonial grievances are usually irreparable, I hope you will condescend to be so far of my opinion as to own that, since upon some accounts I am happier than I deserve, it is best to say little of things quite past remedy, and endeavour, as I really do, to make myself more and more contented, though things may not be to my wish.

Though I cannot justify my late indiscreet letter, yet I am not more than human, and if the calamities of life sometimes wring a complaint from me, I need tell no one that though I bear I must feel them. And if you cannot forgive what I have said, I sincerely promise never more to offend by saying too much; which (with begging your blessing) is all from your most obedient daughter, Mehetabel Wright.

CHAPTER V.

You who can read between the lines of these letters will have remarked a new accent in Hetty--a hard and bitter accent. She will suffer her punishment now; but, even though it be sent of G.o.d, she will appeal against it as too heavy for her sin.

Learn now the cause of it and condemn her if you can.

At first when her husband, at the close of his day's work, sidled off to the "Turk's Head," she pretended not to remark it. Indeed her fears were long in awaking. In all her life she had never tasted brandy, and knew nothing of its effects. That d.i.c.k Ellison fuddled himself upon it was notorious, and on her last visit to Wroote she had heard scandalous tales of John Romley, who had come to haunt the taverns in and about Epworth, singing songs and soaking with the riff-raff of the neighbourhood until turned out at midnight to roll homeward to his lonely lodgings. She connected drunkenness with uproarious mirth, boon companions.h.i.+p, set orgies. Of secret unsocial tippling she had as yet no apprehension.

Even before the birth of his second child the tavern had become necessary to Mr. Wright, not only at the close of work, but in the morning, between jobs. His workmen began to talk. He suspected them and slid into foolish, cunning tricks to outwit them, leaving the shop on false excuses, setting out ostentatiously in the wrong direction and doubling back on the "Turk's Head" by a side street.

They knew where to find him, however, when a customer dropped in.

"Who sent you here?" he demanded furiously, one day, of the youngest apprentice, who had come for the second time that week to fetch him out of the "King's Oak." (He had enlarged his circle of taverns by this time, and it included one half of Soho.)

"Please you, I wasn't sent here at all," the boy stammered. "I tried the 'Turk's Head' first and then the 'Three Tuns.'"

"And what should make you suppose I was at either? Look here, young man, the workshop from Robinson down"--Robinson was the foreman--"is poking its nose too far into my business. If this goes on, one of these days Robinson will get his dismissal and you the strap."

"It wasn't Robinson sent me, sir. It was the mistress."

"Eh!" William Wright came to a halt on the pavement and his jaw dropped.

"Her uncle, Mr. Matthew, has called and wants to see you on particular business."

The business, as it turned out, was merely to give him quittance of a loan. The sum first advanced to them by Matthew Wesley had proved barely sufficient. To furnish the dwelling-rooms in Frith Street he had lent another 10 pounds and taken a separate bond for it, and this debt Hetty had discharged out of her household economies, secretly planning a happy little surprise for her husband; and now in the hurry of innocent delight she betrayed her sadder secret.

She had as yet no fear of him, though he was afraid of her. But at sight of him as he entered, all the joy went out of her announcement.

He listened sulkily, took the receipt, and muttered some ungracious thanks. Old Matthew eyed him queerly, and, catching a whiff of brandy, pulled out his gold watch. The action may have been involuntary. The hour was half-past ten in the morning.

"Well, well--I must be going. Excuse me, nephew Wright; with my experience I ought to have known better than to withdraw a busy man from his work."

He glanced at Hetty, with a look which as good as asked leave for a few words with her in private. But Mr. Wright, now thoroughly suspicious, did not choose to be dismissed in this fas.h.i.+on. So after a minute or two of uneasy talk the old man pulled out his watch again, excused himself, and took his departure.

"Look here," began Mr. Wright when he and Hetty were left alone: "You are taking too much on yourself."

He had never spoken to her quite so harshly.

"I am sorry, William," she answered, keeping her tears well under control. For months she had been planning her little surprise, and its failure hurt her cruelly. "I had no thought of displeasing you."

"Oh, I daresay you meant it for the best. But I choose to be master in my own house, that's all. Another time, if you have more money than you know what to do with, just come and consult me. I've no notion of being made to look small before your uncle, and I don't stomach it."

He turned away growling. He had spoken only of the repaid loan, but they both knew that this had nothing to do with his ill temper.

At the door he faced round again. "What were you talking about when I came in?" he asked suspiciously.

"Uncle was congratulating us. He is delighted to know that the business is doing so well and complains that he seldom gets sight of you nowadays, your hands are so full."

"And pray what the devil has it to do with him, how I spend my time?"

He pulled himself up on the oath, and seeing her cheek flush, he too reddened, but went on, if anything, more violently. "You've a trick in your family of putting your fingers into other folks' pies: you're known for it. There's that Holy Club I hear about. Your clever brothers can't be content, any more than your father, to let honest folks alone, but are for setting right the whole University of Oxford. I warn you, that won't do with me. 'Live and let live' is my motto: let me alone and I'll let you alone. You Wesleys think mightily of yourselves; but you're neither king nor Parlyment, and that I'll have you learn."

It was not a dignified exit and he knew it: by brooding over it through the afternoon his temper grew more savage. That evening he spent at the "Turk's Head" and slouched home at midnight divided between contrition and bravado.

Hetty was in bed, pretending sleep. Had she known it, a word from her might have mended matters. Even had he found her in tears there was enough good nature in the man to have made him relent.

At sight of her beautiful face he felt half-inclined to awake her and have the quarrel cleared up. But, to begin with, he was not wholly certain of his sobriety. And she, too, distrusted it. He had wounded her family pride, to be sure: but what really kept her silent was the dread of discovering him to be drunk and letting him see that she had discovered it.

Yet she had great need of tears: for on more than one account she respected her husband, even liked him, and did most desperately long to be loved by him. After all, she had borne him children: and since they had died he was her only stay in the world, her only hope of redemption. Years after there was found among her papers a tear-blotted sheet of verses dating from this sorrowful time: and though the sorrow opens and shows ahead, as in a flash, the contempt towards which the current is sweeping her, you see her travel down to it with hands bravely battling, clutching at the weak roots of love and hope along the sh.o.r.e:

"O thou whom sacred rites design'd My guide and husband ever kind, My sovereign master, best of friends, On whom my earthly bliss depends: If e'er thou didst in Hetty see Aught fair or good or dear to thee, If gentle speech can ever move The cold remains of former love, Turn thou at last-my bosom ease, Or tell me _why_ I fail to please.

"Is it because revolving years, Heart-breaking sighs, and fruitless tears Have quite deprived this form of mine Of all that once thou fancied'st fine?

Ah no! what once allured thy sight Is still in its meridian height.

Old age and wrinkles in this face As yet could never find a place; A youthful grace informs these lines Where still the purple current s.h.i.+nes, Unless by thy ungentle art It flies to aid my wretched heart: Nor does this slighted bosom show The many hours it spends in woe.

"Or is it that, oppress'd with care, I stun with loud complaints thine ear, And make thy home, for quiet meant, The seat of noise and discontent?

Ah no! Thine absence I lament When half the weary night is spent, Yet when the watch, or early morn, Has brought me hopes of thy return, I oft have wiped these watchful eyes, Conceal'd my cares and curb'd my sighs In spite of grief, to let thee see I wore an endless smile for thee.

"Had I not practised every art, To oblige, divert and cheer thy heart, To make me pleasing in thine eyes, And turn thy house to paradise, I had not ask'd 'Why dost thou shun These faithful arms, and eager run To some obscure, unclean retreat, With vile companions glad to meet, Who, when inspired by beer, can grin At witless oaths and jests obscene, Till the most learned of the throng Begins a tale of ten hours long To stretch with yawning other jaws, But thine in rapture of applause?'

"Deprived of freedom, health and ease, And rivall'd by such _things_ as these, Soft as I am, I'll make thee see I will not brook contempt from thee!

I'll give all thoughts of patience o'er (A gift I never lost before); Indulge at once my rage and grief Mourn obstinate, disdain relief, Till life, on terms severe as these, Shall ebbing leave my heart at ease; To thee thy liberty restore To laugh, when Hetty is no more."

One morning William Wright awoke out of stertorous sleep with a heavy sense of something amiss, and opened his eyes to find Hetty standing beside the bed in nightgown and light wrapper, with a tray and pot of tea which she had stolen downstairs to prepare for him. After a second or two he remembered, and turned his face to the wall.

"No," said she, "you had better sit up and drink this, and we can talk honestly. See, I have brought a cup for myself, too."

She drew a small table close to the bed, and a chair, poured out the tea and seated herself--all with the least possible fuss.

"I suppose you know," she began, "that you struck me last night?"

His hand trembled as he took the cup, and again he turned away his eyes.

"You were drunk," she went on. "You called me by an evil name, too-- a name I once called myself: but a name you would not have called me in your sober senses. At least, I think not. Tell me--and remember that you promised always to answer honestly: you would not have called me so in your sober senses? You do not think of me so?"