Chapter XI Reproof
Life is an unconscious effort on the part of the individual to get the world to see him at his own valuation; and some by force of will partially achieve it; and some by preciousness of attributes are justly appraised above their own self-estimate. David Bowden was respected and counted a man of weight—a rising man, a man whose honesty, industry, and sense achieved increasing prosperity, and whose justice and goodness of heart robbed his success of bitterness to all save base minds. But Margaret’s character, so largely different, won open love. The folk nodded appreciation when her name was mentioned and old eyes brightened at it. Sympathy from her own brimming cup poured over; and the people, perceiving this couple from the outer standpoint, declared that no such happy diversity of qualities ever before mingled to make a perfect union.
But it was not quite the union of the moss and the stone; where the hard is made lovely by the soft and, in return, establishes a sure, enduring foothold for it. There were permanent disparities in the texture of their characters that neither could alter and neither could suffer without pain. David frequently failed to see Madge’s point of view: she was constitutionally unable to harden her nature that she might accept his attitude. Out of this disability grew hunger and dearth in the woman’s spirit, discomfort on the part of the man. He tried, as far as his nature would let him, to bridge the gulf; and she came to the other side and held out her hands to him. Sometimes they touched for a glad moment, but only thus briefly; and despite his deep affection and her passionate worship, these vital constituents of character stood between them, deep-rooted in attributes beyond the power of love to overthrow. Unconsciously he bruised her; unconsciously she aggravated him. His native spirit held the wider outlook of her charity and lenity as weakness. Sin and the sinner were closely allied in his judgment; therefore her tolerance, her magic ingenuity of excuse for error, her clemency and her patience with folly puzzled him. She had a genius for identifying herself with those the world forgot or shunned. She was a champion of failures; and her attitude to the sick, the wretched, and the outcast sometimes troubled David.
On one occasion she caught an evil from a house full of sickness and brought it home, so that David, too, fell ill and was from his work for three days. When the doctor came and bade him keep within doors, he turned on his wife, and for the first time she saw him angry with her. The incident passed; the sting lasted a long while. Her attitude to Dorcas won a milder reprimand; but here she was obstinate and asserted her own liberty of action. She visited Dorcas; rejoiced in her happiness and content, and congratulated her on the reformation she had achieved in her husband. But David held off and waited to see Billy Screech return to his irregular ways; while Rhoda kept her word and saw her sister no more.
It happened that David found his wife on an afternoon in autumn going to the house of Mr. Screech with a basket on her arm. She never openly irritated him by visiting his sister under his eyes, though her friendship with Dorcas was not hidden; but now it chanced that husband and wife unexpectedly met. She was on foot and he rode. She smiled and stopped. He nodded and asked where she was going with a full basket.
“Not to they Fosters, Madge? There’s some bad catching sickness there, and I won’t have it. I can’t afford no more of that nonsense.”
“I’m going to see Dorcas.”
“What for?”
“Because her li’l chap’s queer. Nothing at all, David—only a bit of a tissick on the chest. And I’ve made up some cautcheries3 after a recipe of mother’s for him. And this here’s a bit of that big, blue-vinnied cheese as you said we never should be able to eat. ’Tis a pity to waste it.”
“Anything else?”
“No—except a pint of whortleberries what I gathered yesterday; and a couple of they pigs’ trotters for your sister.”
“Can’t they pick their own whortleberries?”
“Dorcas be a thought poorly herself. There’s another little one coming a’ready.”
He frowned and sat still on his horse, looking straight between its ears.
“Always swarm where they ban’t wanted—like bees,” he said. Then he turned to Margaret.
“Give me that food. Let Screech buy his own cheese. I’m going up over to see my mother. I’ll carry it to her.”
He held out his hand and she took the cheese from her basket and gave it to him.
“And no more of this, my dear. I’m not going to keep other people’s children—because I haven’t got none of my own. And don’t you never think so, Madge; because if you do, you’ll think wrong. Good-bye for the present. Don’t think ’tis hard: ’tis only sense.”
He put the food in his pocket and rode on; she stood and watched him; then her lips parted a little and as she pressed them together tears started from her eyes. There was none to see and she made no effort to restrain her sorrow. Her face was still tear-stained when two men overtook her and Bartley Crocker, with Billy Screech, bade her good-day. Billy was in a hurry and had to call at his home on the way elsewhere. He dearly liked Margaret and now, hearing that she was on the way to see Dorcas, took her basket for her. Mr. Screech rapidly passed out of sight and she was left alone with Bartley.
He spoke at once.
“What’s amiss?” he said. “You’ve been crying.”
“Nonsense!”
“I daresay it was. Still, you have. And if ’twas nonsense, you can tell me so much the easier.”
“Some silly trifle. You oughtn’t to have taken any note of it.”
“I’ve just met David—going up to Ditsworthy. He must have passed you. Well, well—no business of mine, Madge. I’ll say nought and ask you to forgive me for being so bold as to see. Only I’m different to other people. We’ve got such a lot of secrets—you and me.”
Instantly she confided in him.
“I know ’tis nought but your soft, silly heart, Bartley. We’m too much alike here and there, you and me. But David’s always right, and I do vex him with my foolish ways—too well I know it. I can’t be so firm and just as him. God knows I try; but my mind ban’t built in his manly pattern. I’m all for forgiving everybody and being friendly with everybody. He says I’m no better than a spaniel to fawn, but—”
“Don’t,” said Mr. Crocker. “Don’t tell me no more, Madge. I quite understand. ’Tis the man’s nature to be firm and stern, same as it is yours to be soft and gentle. You’ve got to meet one another. He must try and be soft, and you must try and be hard. I don’t suppose either of you can succeed; but if you try—and yet what silly rummage I be talking!”
“I vexed him rather sharp a moment ago.”
“Look here!” he exclaimed. “In a bit of a cloud like this, Rhoda ought to be the very one living creature of all others to put everything right. Don’t you see that with her sort of nature—as firm as David and yet a woman—she ought to be able to see both sides and just speak the very word and do the very thing to make all go smooth and happy?”
“I’m sure she would if she could,” answered Margaret at once. “Rhoda and me are capital friends nine days out of ten. But of course she’s more like David than me.”
“I heard Screech say she was David in petticoats; but that’s only rude, foolish nonsense. She’s a woman, and she must have a woman’s softness and gentleness and understanding for women hidden away in her—a clever, beautiful creature like her.”
The lover spoke and Margaret did not contradict him. Bartley, though he could arrive at fairly accurate estimates of character as a rule, proved blind where Rhoda Bowden was concerned. He had judged her better in the past; but now he only loved her and erred accordingly.
“Trust to her; tell her,” he advised. “She can do anything with David.”
And Margaret, knowing perfectly well that Billy Screech’s opinion of her sister-in-law was the more correct, yet took some heart of hope from Mr. Crocker’s advice and promised him to do as he suggested.
“But what am I to waste your time?” she asked. “Such a happy woman as I be. To see such a foreign thing as a tear on my cheek! No wonder you was surprised. ’Twas all about nothing really and I’m ashamed of myself. Now let’s talk of you. When be you coming up again to tell us more about Canada?”
“I’ve forgot all about it,” he answered. “The question is, when am I going to ask Rhoda to go there with me? I feel ’twill be do or die next time. But I can’t wait much longer. Then there’s my mother. She’ll be gone by October, they say. ’Tis curious how she hankers after that man, Charles Moses, now. And I’m sure he’s terrible kind. Comes in when he can and reads the Bible to her by the hour. Mr. Merle’s very good too. But she’d rather have Moses than anybody.”
“There’s you.”
“Yes—me first, poor dear. I’ve scraped the skin off my throat, as you can hear. I was reading to her till three o’clock this morning. Then, thank God, she got off to sleep.”
They had reached the home of Dorcas and there parted. Margaret went in and Mr. Crocker, with a resolution recently made and carefully concealed from her, proceeded towards Sheepstor.
He had decided to speak to David, and since, knowing himself tolerably well, he guessed that time might very easily destroy this intention, Bartley proceeded then and there to the way by which Bowden would return to his home. In a dingle not very far from Dennycoombe he waited, and after two lonely hours, during which he considered the probable futility of his intention, David came along.
He was in good spirits and asked his old adversary to return home with him for a cup of tea.
“I know you’ll need no second bidding,” he said, “for my wife have told me about your fancy for Rhoda, and though I can’t further it, I’ll not stand in the way if ’tis to be. You’d better come and tell her some more about foreign parts: she likes that better than courting. If any man ever wins her, ’twill have to be a wild man of the woods, I reckon.”
Crocker, pleased that David was in a mood so easy, nerved himself to a dangerous task. He had decided to do no less than try and light Bowden’s imagination. This on any subject had been a difficult feat; but since the man’s own wife was the matter, Bartley felt that he could hardly have attempted anything less likely to succeed or more likely to end in tribulation. Indeed, as soon as his mouth was open he regretted his unwisdom; but it was then too late to draw back and he proceeded. Chance inspired him to make an excellent case and speak with very genuine discretion; but David was a long time silent and the other feared that he had done more harm than good.
“’Tis well we met,” he began, “for I want to speak to you, David. And ’tis a kicklish subject at first glance; but not at second. I mean Margaret. You know very well I wanted to marry her once, and you know she loved you better far and you won her. But though she never would have taken me for a husband, yet I’ve been close as a brother to her all my life, and she’s fond of me too in her way.”
“I know it,” said Bowden. “And why not? Fond she is, else she wouldn’t take so much trouble to try and get Rhoda to have you.”
“Exactly so. And now I’m coming to the tricky place in our talk. I met Margaret a bit agone—mind, I’m talking like her brother might—and she was crying. Just after leaving you it was, David. I asked her what was amiss, and she told me ’twas all her weak nonsense. Then it come out—as a sister to a brother. She’d vexed you and she was cut to the heart about it. She loves the ground you walk on, David; and when she don’t hit it off with you—when you look black at her—’tis like holding back water from a flower. By God, she droops!”
“Crying, you say?”
“Had been, and couldn’t hide it. You’d never have known it; but I said to myself, ‘that man don’t guess what he is to her, or that a cold word frets her like a wound.’ Be angry with me if you like, Bowden, and tell me to mind my own business. I’ll take it now—now that I’ve told you.”
David stopped and got off his horse.
“I’m not angry,” he said. “The question is, what have you told me? I’ll thank you to say it again; and don’t fear to use clear words. I like ’em best.”
“The point is that, busy as you are and up to the eyes in affairs and beasts and money-making in general, you’ve missed a lot in Madge that’s worth finding out. And you must find it out if you want her to be a happy woman.”
“What don’t I know?”
“You don’t know how to humour her.”
“A sane, grown-up woman don’t want humouring, surely?”
“Every woman that ever was born wants humouring. Think now. Don’t you humour Rhoda? Don’t even Rhoda do and say things you can’t fathom now and again? Don’t you give in to her against your own better knowledge now and then—for the sake of pleasing her and so that she may the quicker do as you want her to do next time? Be honest—don’t you?”
Bowden looked at the other with surprise and nodded.
“Lord! How you know the ins and outs of ’em!”
“Not me. No man ever can. We just glimpse a bit here and there. But this I know; patience is the first virtue with women. Patient, as a spider, we’ve got to be when the fly is a female. Now Margaret feeds on one thing, and if you hold it back you starve her. That’s sympathy, Bowden—just a natural, tender sort of feeling such as you don’t hold back even from a cow that’s just dropped a dead calf and had her trouble for nought. I’ll say it in a word and trust your large sense and justice not to be angered. You’re not so kind as you might be to Margaret. ’Tis summed up in that, and I ask you to forgive me for saying it. I’ve nought to gain, and everything to lose by losing your friendship. I wouldn’t have spoken such a strong thing for any less serious reason than her happiness. And now you can tell me to go about my business if you please, and I’ll gladly go.”
“Wait a bit and hear me,” answered the other. “I can see, fixed up as you are, and hoping what you hope, that it wasn’t all fun for you to say this to me. You’re not the sort of man as ever goes across the road to teach other people or meddle with them. And that’s why I’ve listened so patient to you. Some—most men—I’d have stopped at the first word; because most men be very fond of giving advice and lifting themselves above their neighbours; and that sort I very soon put in their place if they talk to me. But you don’t offer your opinions unasked as a rule, and you’ve knowed my wife since she was a baby, and you’m a thought like her here and there—a softness there is in your nature. ’Twas pointed out after our fight.”
“I said that very word to her to-day,” answered Bartley. “’Tis because I’m rather the same pattern as she that I can feel so sharp about this as even to risk your friendship by speaking. She’d die for you; but would you die for her, David? Well, yes, without doubt you would; but do what’s harder. Try to do the little, twopenny-halfpenny, every-day sort of things for her that’ll show her she’s never out of your thought.”
The other had retired into his own mind and failed to hear this admonition. His intellect moved much more slowly than Crocker’s, and he was now retracing an incident.
“To show you the softness of her,” he said, “I may tell you that when you was coming to see us, she begged me to take down the fight-colours—the two handkerchers you might have seen hanging in shiny wood frames one on each side of the parlour looking-glass in my house. She said that it would hurt your feelings cruel to see the signs of the battle there, and I think even Rhoda looked a sort of question with her eyes at me. ‘But no,’ I said. ‘He’s not a fool. ’Twill be no pain to him to see ‘em.’ And I wouldn’t take ’em down. Rhoda saw it my way; but Margaret kept on to the end that ’twas not a proper thing—’specially as you came at my invitation to tea. Yet, of course you didn’t mind seeing your fogle there?”
“Not a bit in the world. A very natural and proper place for it. But don’t it show what stuff she’s made of—Margaret, I mean?”
“It do,” admitted David. “I thank you for saying these things to me. I’m not above learning from any man or woman either.”
“Learn from her then. You can’t learn from a better. Be out of bias with her no more.”
“I’ll have a tell with Rhoda about it. ’Tis the little silly things, as you say, that please women. I do big things when I can, you must know. There was another twenty pound put out at interest for her last month. But she didn’t take much delight seemingly in a valuable matter like that. She thanked me loving enough, but not as though she knowed what it means to earn and to save twenty pounds.”
“She’d sooner you took her back a bunch of they wild strawberries out of the hedge than all the money in Tavistock,” declared Bartley. “Foolish, if you like, but take my word for it, David. She’s built in that particular way. Try it.”
Bowden laughed.
“If any man had told me that I should ever listen to such a lot of sense from you, I’d have judged him mad,” he answered. “Yet here it has come about, and I thank you, honest, for trying to do me a good turn. And succeeding too. I’ll see how a little silliness will work. Perhaps a holiday come the next revel. Good-bye—unless you’ll drop in for a bite.”
“Next week, perhaps. But there’s a lot of trouble afore me just now. My mother—”
“You’re welcome when you please to come,” concluded Bowden, and re-mounted, full of his own thoughts. It was characteristic that when the other mentioned his dying parent, he said nothing. He had heard, but the ready word made no effort to leave his lips. He was for the moment quite occupied with his own business. Crocker left his old antagonist very full of thought and, when the younger was out of sight, Bowden, at a sudden whim, took his advice literally, dismounted again and tethered his horse. Then he ranged about and gathered a great bunch of wood-strawberries that clustered in a dewy hedge and shone ruby-red in the level sunset light along the lane.
They would have been a very real and deep joy to Margaret; she must have been the nearer to his heart that night by the tie of that simple thought; but such an act was foreign to his nature. He fell to thinking how really and practically to please her, and in the light of definite and weighty deeds, this piece of sentiment looked in his eyes so exceedingly foolish, that he flung the berries away impatiently long before he reached home.
What would anybody have said, he asked himself, had they seen the busy and prosperous David Bowden carrying along rubbish from the hedge-row, like a child playing truant from Sunday school?
That night, after Margaret had gone to bed, he talked with Rhoda concerning her, and Rhoda was deeply interested and anxious to fall in with his purposes. David mentioned the source of his inspiration, and finding that he showed no anger against Bartley Crocker, his sister took the same attitude. They strove very steadily henceforth to please Madge, and to understand the things that were good to her. They tried hard, and in a measure succeeded; for Margaret was quick to mark their efforts and gather happiness from them. Yet the attempt could not largely avail; because sympathy, without imagination to light its way, can only grope in the dark and, groping, perish.
Notes
3 Physic.