Part 23

For the moment, however, Northcote was only aware that a splendid, supple, and entrancing thing had stolen unperceived, like a beast of prey, into the room. The strong, fine, and beautiful line that had been traced along the convergence of the thin but full lips addressed him like an unexpected but supreme artifice of a great painter, who has learned to use his pigments with effrontery.

As a revelation of power she was more than his equal; she challenged him with eyes whose insolent domination exceeded his own. Furtively, yet boldly, she had discarded her stealthiness; she had already the strength that disdains a mesh. She looked upon him now with the same hidden but imperious scornfulness with which he had looked upon the judge, the jury, and the bar under the excitement his speech on her behalf had generated. Strong, subtle, and secure as he had been in the exercise of his specific and audacious talent, this siren was equally so in hers. He had delivered a great prostitute from the gallows in order that she might lead him to it.

“I came here with no thought of destroying you,” she said.

With perfect composure she proceeded to divest herself of her hat and coat, and carried them confidently behind the curtain, as though already she were perfect mistress of his house. When she returned she seated herself in the chair against the fire.

Northcote had not protest to raise. He could not meet the challenge in the eyes of Medusa. In their baleful lustre he had read the abrupt limit to his own imperious will, he beheld as through a mirage the prefiguration of his own doom. Even as he had conquered others by the fearlessness of his own quality, he had himself been conquered by the fearlessness of hers. He was no common advocate, but this was no common harlot. Prayer and devotion alone could have saved him from toils such as these; but of prayer and devotion he no longer commanded the use. There was a fissure in his armor; and through that aperture, small as it was, the deadly, unnamable thing that had crawled into his room had been able to plant its look.

“I am trying to think,” said his visitor, as she reclined in the chair with her elbows outspread and her hands clasped behind her hair, which was profuse and ordered with rare precision, “I am trying to think what it is about you that has caused me to love you. I do not think it can be your voice altogether, for although when it chooses it can sound so low and delicious, it can also sound harsh and rude. No, my noble warrior, I think there is a deeper cause. Is it not that our natures are alike? Are they not so similar? We are not of the common herd. We can think, we can feel, we have a little knowledge, and do we not possess enormous powers of resentment? Life has not been very gentle with you and me, but we will not complain about it much. Can we not quietly choose our own weapons and go our own way to work in order that we may avenge ourselves? It is for your strength and spirit that I love you. Give me a kiss.”

Northcote obeyed.

She caressed his hands with an extreme tenderness.

“How strong, square, massive, and beautifully ugly they are!” she exclaimed. “I am sure you could fell a bullock if you doubled your fist. I love you even for these. I would rather be strangled by strong hands than I would be fondled by weak ones. If you cared to drive your fist into the world, you could knock a hole in it and let out a few of its wrongs. How tall and young and splendid you look. And strength means bravery.”

Her words, the careless complacency which accompanied them, the ease of her posture with her head thrown far back in the chair and her eyes directed steadfastly to Northcote’s face, filled him with a cruel sensation of pleasure. Knowledge translated into the grace of physical perfection had an all-conquering attraction for his nature. Every blemish upon her, and as she lay back in the shadow of the lamp they appeared surprisingly few, were additions to her value. They were so many receipted acknowledgments of the heavy sums she had paid for what she possessed. There was a short but deep scar over one eye. There was a suggestion of coarseness in her jaw; her bust looked a little too full.

“What shall I call you?” said the young advocate with shining eyes. “Shall I call you Diomeda?”

“Do, my beloved Achilles!”

“How do you come to have heard about him? Is it that Greek is compulsory in the University of the Gutter?”

“Achilles was perfectly familiar to me before I attended it. My dear father used to tell us stories from Homer when he was drunk.”

“Well, Diomeda, I have come to believe that your father must have been a very remarkable man.”

“The world will arrive at a similar belief two hundred years hence. But how can you have acquired such an important piece of information concerning him when you have never seen one of his works?”

“Do not forget that for the past hour I have been gazing upon his _chef-d’œuvre_, the masterpiece among his masterpieces.”

“On the contrary, my beloved, you are judging him by his one great failure. In conception, in design, I have no peer in this time of ours, but the inspiration of the artist failed suddenly and lamentably before he could touch me with the magic that would have rendered me immortal. I am a splendid thing, my beloved, but I shall perish. Therefore the artist has failed.”

“This is a masculine intellect of yours,” said Northcote, who was captivated by the celerity with which she had interpreted an idea that in his own mind had still the nebulosity of recent birth. “Is it usual to your sex to have such powers?”

“You will confess that you would not say so? Are they not eternally dunces and fools in the austere eyes of the male?”

“Perhaps I make that confession if you insist upon the measure of my ignorance.”

“Say rather, my hero, the measure of your inexperience. You see you have only studied those of my sex who are affiliated to the Great Trades’ Union. They take eternal vows of foolishness and duncishness before they are admitted to membership of that sanctified order. But with us black-legs it is different. We are allowed to know everything. You may not know that in our University of the Gutter we have the most learned staff of professors in the world. There is a chair for everything.”

“Except for honesty. If there was a chair for that, would there not at once be an end to your intellectual subtlety?”

“You do not know the great university to which I have the honor to belong if you think intellectual dishonesty is tolerated among us. The moment we become intellectually dishonest we have done forever with Alma Mater. She sends us down immediately, and there is nothing for us then but the river or the Great Trades’ Union.”

“That is what the world would call being ‘sent up.’ Yet if the simplest terms were not subject to totally different meanings in the varying strata of our society, we should not have so many of these pretty paradoxes to subsist upon. But I feel, Diomeda, that I am entitled to ask you one question. Was it in my capacity as a mentally dishonest person that you came to me to-night to ask me to arrange for you to be ‘sent down’ from your university?”

“Answer that question to your own liking, beloved one. It was your appeal on my behalf that brought me here to-night. Would you have me ask whether you were mentally honest when you made it?”

Her laugh had an edge that cut him like a keen blade. But she was quick to read the sharp thrill of pain that made his eyes grow dark.

“Do not repine, my beloved Achilles,” she said with a softness that had the power to caress, “I found you after all to be as honest as I am myself.”

“At least,” said the young man, sensible that even her lightest caresses possessed the ferocity of those of the snake and the tiger, “you are the first of your sex with whom I have conversed who appears to understand the uses of paradox.”

“There is no other means by which the honest mind can carry on its thinking.”

“If that is the case, you conduct the thinker to his doom with atrocious certainty. You conduct him to the gutter.”

“That is true, O Achilles,” said the woman with a quiet laugh.

“In other words,” pursued Northcote, “he demonstrates in his own person the impossibility of a reconciliation in any terms whatever between the ideal world of the spirit and the material world of the flesh.”

“Why trouble to put it into so many words, dear lad? Briefly, I am the child of the poor drunken man of genius, my father; and I suspect that you had a poor drunken man of genius for your father also.”

“I would have you to know that my father was ordained a clergyman of the Church of England.”

“How old was he when he died?”

“About thirty.”

“Did it never occur to you that the poor fellow killed himself in the struggle to become an honest man?”

“These eyes of yours are dreadfully piercing. I remember my mother saying of him that the clock of his intellect was always set a little too fast.”

“She never informed you by any chance, dear lad, that if he had not taken an overdose of opium he would have died a lunatic?”

“Or that he killed himself with drinking brandy after the manner of your own illustrious parent. By the way, you have yet to give me a description of your mother. Can you recall her?”

“She died, worn out, I believe, by slavery when I was about four years old. She reminded me of a cow; her eyes were so placid and her movements were so slow. But she had been affiliated to the Trades’ Union from her earliest days. I believe she was a life member with her policy or whatever they call it--I have no first-hand knowledge--fully paid up. She was buried in consecrated ground in Kensal Green cemetery with wreaths on her coffin in consequence. Non-members of the Union are mostly buried in a prison or in the Thames. And now about your mother, the clergyman’s widow? She, I presume, would be a vice-president of the Union, or on its committee, or one of its trustees, or she might even aspire to be one of its honorary secretaries? Her social rank would render it necessary.”

“Yes, dear old woman,” said Northcote softly. “She is on the committee right enough. As you say, her social rank has rendered it necessary.”

XXXVI

THE HONORABLE SECRETARY

On the following morning Northcote was late for breakfast. When the old charwoman shook his curtains at a quarter to eight, a sleepy voice murmured: “I may be a bit late. I will cook the bacon myself and make the tea. Lay a knife and fork for two and don’t stay.”

It was between ten and eleven o’clock by the time he had completed his toilet. And it befell that at that hour the kettle was singing on the fire, and he himself was kneeling before it, toasting pieces of bacon upon a fork, when there came a knock on the door of his room.

“Come in,” he called cheerfully.

He expected to see an attorney’s clerk with further business for his attention.

Instead, two persons entered whose appearance caused him to drop the fork and the bacon among the ashes.

A moment ensued in which he had to fight with all his resolution to regain his self-possession. The first to enter the room was his mother, and immediately behind her was the young girl whom he was under a pledge to marry.

Mrs. Northcote was a tall, strong woman, past fifty, with assured movements and a resolute-looking face. It was large and rather square. Her cheeks were red with country life; her hair had streaks of white in it; her eyes were bluish gray. Her clothes, severe in outline, fitted close to her broad and powerful frame. They helped to sustain a somewhat rural appearance, which was not altogether unprepossessing and had a sort of education in it. Her speech was decisive, while the voice was somewhat harsh, and left an impression that it would be easy for it to domineer.

The young girl who accompanied her was not moulded in these Amazonian lines. She was straight and slender, only a little above the medium height, neat of hand, delicate of foot. Her complexion could only have been produced by generations of country air. It was perfectly clear, and of an exquisite tawny pinkish whiteness. Her eyes were large, soft, and long-lashed, and although as clear and bright as a pair of crystals, as meaningless as those of a dumb animal. Her simple straw hat and thick gray coat and skirt were in themselves innocent of coquetry, but their inhabitant was in her kind a sweetly beautiful thing--half-child and half-woman--therefore these articles, rough and primitive as they were, had significance in every crease and fold.

The moment Northcote had managed to strangle the first pangs of his stupefaction, he rose from his knees and ran forward to greet them. He kissed his mother on both cheeks, and seized both of the young girl’s hands in his own.

“I could not believe my own eyes,” were the first words he spoke to his mother. “You should have given me warning that you were coming up to London, my dearest. It is the merest chance you have caught me at home.”

“It was not until last evening that we decided to come,” said Mrs. Northcote. “Margaret had happened to see the advertisement of an excursion, only eight shillings here and back.”

“Why not telegraph, my dear?” Northcote expostulated gently. “I would then have met you at St. Pancras.”

“It would have cost sixpence,” said his mother. “Besides it was too late last night.”

“Always the woman of action,” said her son, with a hollow laugh. “Always an arbitrary and drastic old woman in the execution of her ideas.”

Northcote kissed his mother again with the pride and affection which for the moment overlay this wound.

“I wonder,” said she, with an air of one who has come upon something profound, “why men have such a dislike to being taken by surprise. Your father was the same, Henry. He could not bear to be taken by surprise in anything. And I think you are wonderfully like your father in some things.”

“What is your opinion of this room of mine?” said her son abruptly.

“I don’t think I like it,” she said decisively, after making a catalogue of everything with an immensely critical glance. “It has a dismal look. And a hole in the roof, I declare! You must have it mended at once; it might help you to catch a cold. And you are right up at the top just under the tiles; I should think you must get frozen in winter. And it must be extremely draughty with those cracks in the door. And, my dear boy, I must say it looks very bare and untidy with not even a piece of carpet to the floor. I have meant for years to come and see you; and when I received that money you so kindly sent me, I thought now or never is the time. How I wish I could have come before, to have made you a little more comfortable!”

“How I wish you could, old woman!” said Northcote gently, taking both her hands.

“I think this room is rather sweet myself,” said the girl, who also had been examining it very critically. “Somehow every room looks sweet with a nice fire and a lot of books.”

“That unnecessarily large grate takes all the heat up the chimney,” said Mrs. Northcote, “and moreover is very wasteful of the coal. And what have you got behind the curtain, Henry?”

“That is where I sleep.”

“Well, that is sensible, my boy; a saving of money.”

“What a large room this must be altogether!” said the girl, with a sudden growth of her curiosity.

“I can see neither of you will rest until you have penetrated into the heart of all my mysteries,” said Northcote, laughing loudly, as he interposed himself between the entrance to his chamber and his mother, who, full of inquiry, was plucking at the curtain.

“Why, Henry,” cried the girl, with a thrill of consternation in her voice, “you have not had your breakfast!”

“Why should I? This is not Chittingdon, you know. Eleven o’clock is the fashionable hour in town. It wants ten minutes yet.”

“Bad habits,” said Mrs. Northcote solemnly. “My dearest, eleven o’clock is wrong.”

“When one is in Rome you must do like the Romans, you know.”

“I have never agreed with that proverb,” said Mrs. Northcote. “I consider it weak. When in Rome one should make the Romans do as one does.”

“Imagine me knocking at the gates of Buckingham Palace at a quarter to seven.”

“I am quite sure, my dear boy, the royal family is addicted to good habits. I am quite sure you would not find the king having his breakfast at eleven o’clock.”

“Oh, this dear dogmatic old woman of mine,” said Northcote, tapping her cheek in tender remonstrance. “A fixed rule and a definite opinion for everything under the sun.”

“You must have fixed rules and definite opinions if you are to succeed, my dear boy. Those who have their doubts always end by failing miserably.”

“So they do, old woman, so they do!” cried Northcote fervently, in spite of being stabbed by consternation. Yet he never conversed with his mother on the most trivial topics without feeling that her simplicity rendered her invulnerable.

“I see your table is laid for two, Henry,” said the girl. “Are you expecting a friend?”

“If he comes, he comes,” said Northcote, with a clever assumption of carelessness, “and if he don’t he stops away. Do you understand, Miss Inquisitive? I generally have an extra knife and fork, you know, in case a friend should happen to drop in.”

“He will have a wretched breakfast this morning if he comes,” said the girl, taking off her gloves gaily, and fishing out the fork and the bacon from among the ashes. “I must say, Henry, whoever your friends may be, they cannot be very nice about their cookery.”

“Consecrated by the cook, don’t you see, Miss Impertinence. That bacon is toasted by mine own fair hands.”

“Really, my boy,” said his mother, “you have grown most Bohemian in your ways.”

She took off a pair of shabby and much-mended gloves with that air of resolution she imparted to her lightest action, and insisted on being allowed to make the tea. She measured two spoonfuls of tea from the caddy with great care.

“I allow myself three spoonfuls now I live in London,” said her son.

“Three is extravagance, Henry, three is not necessary,” said his mother quietly. “One for each person and one for the pot is correct.”

“Suppose a friend turns up?”

“More can be made. I fear you have formed very bad habits in London.”

“We have a surprise for you, Henry,” said the girl gaily.

She left the room to fetch a basket she had left at the top of the stairs.

“Guess what we have brought for you,” she cried as she produced it.

“Butter and eggs.”

“How awfully clever that you should have guessed them at once,” she said, with her eagerness sinking into disappointment.

“I am afraid I never had any tact worth mentioning,” said Northcote. “It was very stupid of me to have guessed butter and eggs.”

“But we have brought you some holly as well,” said Margaret, a little mollified. “Christmas will soon be here.”

“I am so glad I was not clever enough to guess holly,” said Northcote.

The contents of the basket were unpacked and laid along the books on the writing-table. He had to submit, not without a passage of arms, to having an egg cooked for his immediate delectation. His mother also insisted on being allowed to toast him a slice of bread.

“You are spoiling me completely,” said Northcote, being forced at last into making a pretence of eating after his own half-hearted offers of hospitality had been uncompromisingly repelled.

By an effort of the will that seemed superhuman to himself he forced himself to swallow a few mouthfuls, yet as he did so he followed the smallest movements of his guests. One eye never left the curtain that ran across the room. Whenever one or the other of his too curious visitors was seen to approach it incautiously he made ready to spring to his feet.

The only alleviation to the bareness of the walls was several photographic groups of football-players, over which velvet caps decorated with tassels were suspended.

“See that group in the middle?” said Northcote. “Look at it well. That is the finest pack that ever turned out for England. We walloped Wales twenty-nine points to three. Pushed ’em all over the shop. Notice that little chap sitting between my legs. He was a half if you like. Cunning as a trout and quicker than a hare.”

“I think, my dear boy, this is perfectly uninteresting,” said his mother, fixing her spectacles and examining the photograph sternly. “This is a stupid pursuit, not only a waste of time, but also a waste of money. It has been the ruin of many young men. One of these days it might even prove to be the ruin of England.”

“All work and no play, my dear,” said her son, “makes Jack a dull boy, you know. Personally I would suggest that a game like football is a rare training for the character.”

“I think football is a fine and manly game, Henry,” said the girl, with a little air of defiance. “I shall never forget seeing you come home with your twisted knee.”

“The doctor’s bill was thirty pounds,” said Mrs. Northcote simply.