Mary Olivier: a Life Part 65

"_Good Lord, deliver us_."

Mary was kneeling beside her mother in church.

"From fornication, and all other deadly sin--"

Happiness, the happiness that came from writing poems; happiness that other people couldn't have, that you couldn't give to them; happiness that was no good to Mamma, no good to anybody but you, secret and selfish; that was your happiness. It was deadly sin.

She felt an immense, intolerable compa.s.sion for everybody who was unhappy. A litany of compa.s.sion went on inside her: For old Dr. Kendal, sloughing and rotting in his chair; for Miss Kendal; for all women labouring of child; for old Mrs. Heron; for Dorsy Heron; for all prisoners and captives; for Miss Louisa Wright; for all that were desolate and oppressed; for Maggie's sister, dying of cancer; and for Mamma, kneeling there, praying.

Sunday after Sunday.

And she would work in the garden every morning, digging in leaf mould and carrying the big stones for the rockery; she would go to Mrs. Sutcliffe's sewing parties; she would sit for hours with Maggie's sister, trying not to look as if she minded the smell of the cancer. You were no good unless you could do little things like that. You were no good unless you could keep on doing them.

She tried to keep on.

Some people kept on all day, all their lives. Still, it was not you so much as the world that was wrong. It wasn't fair and right that Maggie's sister should have cancer while you had nothing the matter with you. Or even that Maggie had to cook and scrub while you made poems.

Not fair and right.

X.

"Mamma, what is it? Why are you in the dark?"

By the firelight she could see her mother sitting with her eyes shut, and her hands folded in her lap.

"I can't use my eyes. I think there must be something the matter with them."

"Your eyes? ... Do they hurt?"

(You might have known--you might have known that something would happen.

While you were upstairs, writing, not thinking of her. You might have known.)

"_Something_ hurts. Just there. When I try to read. I must be going blind."

"Are you sure it isn't your gla.s.ses?"

"How can it be my gla.s.ses? They never hurt me before."

But the oculist in Durlingham said it _was_ her gla.s.ses. She wasn't going blind. It wasn't likely that she ever would go blind.

For a week before the new gla.s.ses came Mamma sat, patient and gentle, in her chair, with her eyes shut and her hands folded in her lap. And you read aloud to her: the Bible and _The Times_ in the morning, and d.i.c.kens in the afternoon. And in the evening you played draughts and Mamma beat you.

Mamma said, "I shall be quite sorry when the new gla.s.ses come."

Mary was sorry too. They had been so happy.

XI.

April. Mark's s.h.i.+p had left Port Said nine days ago.

Mamma had come in with the letter.

"I've got news for you. Guess."

"Mark's coming to-day."

"No.... Mr. Jourdain was married yesterday."

"Who--to?"

"Some girl he used to see in Suss.e.x."

(That one. She was glad it was the little girl, the poor one. Nice of Maurice to marry her.)

"Do you mind, Mary?"

"No, not a bit. I hope they'll be happy. I want them to be happy.... Now, you see--that was why he didn't want to marry me."

Her mother sat down on the bed. There was something she was going to say.

"Well--thank goodness that's the last of it."

"Does Mark know?"

"No, he does not. You surely don't imagine anybody would tell him a thing like that about his sister?"

"Like what?"

"Well--he wouldn't think it very nice of you."

"You talk as if I was Aunt Charlotte.... Do you think I'm like her?"

"I never said you were like her...."

"You think--you think and won't say."

"Well, if you don't want to be thought like your Aunt Charlotte you should try and behave a little more like other people. For pity's sake, do while Mark's here, or he won't like it, I can tell you."

"I don't do anything Mark wouldn't like."

"You do very queer things sometimes, though you mayn't think so.... I'm not the only one that notices. If you really want to know, that was what Mr. Jourdain was afraid of--the queer things you say and do. You told me yourself you'd have gone to him if he hadn't come to you."

She remembered. Yes, she had said that.

"Did he know about Aunt Charlotte?"