Dawes turned over suddenly with a startled grunt.
"Eh?"
"Caw!" she mocked. "He can only say 'Caw!' I have brought youa gentleman to see you. Now say 'Thank you,' and show some manners."
Dawes looked swiftly with his dark, startled eyes beyond the sisterat Paul. His look was full of fear, mistrust, hate, and misery. Morel met the swift, dark eyes, and hesitated. The two men wereafraid of the naked selves they had been.
"Dr. Ansell told me you were here," said Morel, holding outhis hand.
Dawes mechanically shook hands.
"So I thought I'd come in," continued Paul.
There was no answer. Dawes lay staring at the opposite wall.
"Say 'Caw!"' mocked the nurse. "Say 'Caw!' Jim Crow."
"He is getting on all right?" said Paul to her.
"Oh yes! He lies and imagines he's going to die," said the nurse,"and it frightens every word out of his mouth."
"And you MUST have somebody to talk to," laughed Morel.
"That's it!" laughed the nurse. "Only two old men and a boywho always cries. It is hard lines! Here am I dying to hear JimCrow's voice, and nothing but an odd 'Caw!' will he give!"
"So rough on you!" said Morel.
"Isn't it?" said the nurse.
"I suppose I am a godsend," he laughed.
"Oh, dropped straight from heaven!" laughed the nurse.
Presently she left the two men alone. Dawes was thinner,and handsome again, but life seemed low in him. As the doctor said,he was lying sulking, and would not move forward towards convalescence.He seemed to grudge every beat of his heart.
"Have you had a bad time?" asked Paul.
Suddenly again Dawes looked at him.
"What are you doing in Sheffield?" he asked.
"My mother was taken ill at my sister's in Thurston Street. What are you doing here?"
There was no answer.
"How long have you been in?" Morel asked.
"I couldn't say for sure," Dawes answered grudgingly.
He lay staring across at the wall opposite, as if trying tobelieve Morel was not there. Paul felt his heart go hard and angry.
"Dr. Ansell told me you were here," he said coldly.
The other man did not answer.
"Typhoid's pretty bad, I know," Morel persisted.
Suddenly Dawes said:
"What did you come for?"
"Because Dr. Ansell said you didn't know anybody here. Do you?"
"I know nobody nowhere," said Dawes.
"Well," said Paul, "it's because you don't choose to, then."
There was another silence.
"We s'll be taking my mother home as soon as we can,"said Paul.
"What's a-matter with her?" asked Dawes, with a sick man'sinterest in illness.
"She's got a cancer."
There was another silence.
"But we want to get her home," said Paul. "We s'll have to geta motor-car."
Dawes lay thinking.
"Why don't you ask Thomas Jordan to lend you his?" said Dawes.
"It's not big enough," Morel answered.
Dawes blinked his dark eyes as he lay thinking.
"Then ask Jack Pilkington; he'd lend it you. You know him."
"I think I s'll hire one," said Paul.
"You're a fool if you do," said Dawes.
The sick man was gaunt and handsome again. Paul was sorryfor him because his eyes looked so tired.
"Did you get a job here?" he asked.
"I was only here a day or two before I was taken bad,"Dawes replied.
"You want to get in a convalescent home," said Paul.
The other's face clouded again.
"I'm goin' in no convalescent home," he said.
"My father's been in the one at Seathorpe, an' he liked it. Dr. Ansell would get you a recommend."
Dawes lay thinking. It was evident he dared not facethe world again.
"The seaside would be all right just now," Morel said. "Sun on those sandhills, and the waves not far out."
The other did not answer.
"By Gad!" Paul concluded, too miserable to bother much;"it's all right when you know you're going to walk again, and swim!"
Dawes glanced at him quickly. The man's dark eyes wereafraid to meet any other eyes in the world. But the real miseryand helplessness in Paul's tone gave him a feeling of relief.
"Is she far gone?" he asked.
"She's going like wax," Paul answered; "but cheerful--lively!"
He bit his lip. After a minute he rose.
"Well, I'll be going," he said. "I'll leave you this half-crown."
"I don't want it," Dawes muttered.
Morel did not answer, but left the coin on the table.
"Well," he said, "I'll try and run in when I'm back in Sheffield. Happen you might like to see my brother-in-law? He works in Pyecrofts."
"I don't know him," said Dawes.
"He's all right. Should I tell him to come? He might bringyou some papers to look at."
The other man did not answer. Paul went. The strong emotionthat Dawes aroused in him, repressed, made him shiver.
He did not tell his mother, but next day he spoke to Claraabout this interview. It was in the dinner-hour. The two didnot often go out together now, but this day he asked her to gowith him to the Castle grounds. There they sat while the scarletgeraniums and the yellow calceolarias blazed in the sunlight. She was now always rather protective, and rather resentful towards him.
"Did you know Baxter was in Sheffield Hospital with typhoid?"he asked.
She looked at him with startled grey eyes, and her face went pale.
"No," she said, frightened.
"He's getting better. I went to see him yesterday--the doctortold me."
Clara seemed stricken by the news.
"Is he very bad?" she asked guiltily.
"He has been. He's mending now."
"What did he say to you?"
"Oh, nothing! He seems to be sulking."
There was a distance between the two of them. He gave hermore information.
She went about shut up and silent. The next time they tooka walk together, she disengaged herself from his arm, and walkedat a distance from him. He was wanting her comfort badly.
"Won't you be nice with me?" he asked.
She did not answer.
"What's the matter?" he said, putting his arm across her shoulder.
"Don't!" she said, disengaging herself.
He left her alone, and returned to his own brooding.
"Is it Baxter that upsets you?" he asked at length.
"I HAVE been VILE to him!" she said.
"I've said many a time you haven't treated him well,"he replied.
And there was a hostility between them. Each pursued his owntrain of thought.
"I've treated him--no, I've treated him badly," she said. "And now you treat ME badly. It serves me right."
"How do I treat you badly?" he said.
"It serves me right," she repeated. "I never considered himworth having, and now you don't consider ME. But it serves me right. He loved me a thousand times better than you ever did."
"He didn't!" protested Paul.
"He did! At any rate, he did respect me, and that's what youdon't do."
"It looked as if he respected you!" he said.
"He did! And I MADE him horrid--I know I did! You've taughtme that. And he loved me a thousand times better than ever you do."
"All right," said Paul.
He only wanted to be left alone now. He had his own trouble,which was almost too much to bear. Clara only tormented him and madehim tired. He was not sorry when he left her.
She went on the first opportunity to Sheffield to seeher husband. The meeting was not a success. But she left himroses and fruit and money. She wanted to make restitution. It was not that she loved him. As she looked at him lying thereher heart did not warm with love. Only she wanted to humbleherself to him, to kneel before him. She wanted now to beself-sacrificial. After all, she had failed to make Morel reallylove her. She was morally frightened. She wanted to do penance. So she kneeled to Dawes, and it gave him a subtle pleasure. But the distance between them was still very great--too great. It frightened the man. It almost pleased the woman. She likedto feel she was serving him across an insuperable distance. She was proud now.
Morel went to see Dawes once or twice. There was a sort offriendship between the two men, who were all the while deadly rivals. But they never mentioned the woman who was between them.
Mrs. Morel got gradually worse. At first they used to carryher downstairs, sometimes even into the garden. She sat proppedin her chair, smiling, and so pretty. The gold wedding-ring shoneon her white hand; her hair was carefully brushed. And she watchedthe tangled sunflowers dying, the chrysanthemums coming out,and the dahlias.
Paul and she were afraid of each other. He knew, and she knew,that she was dying. But they kept up a pretence of cheerfulness. Every morning, when he got up, he went into her room in his pyjamas.
"Did you sleep, my dear?" he asked.
"Yes," she answered.
"Not very well?"
"Well, yes! "
Then he knew she had lain awake. He saw her hand underthe bedclothes, pressing the place on her side where the pain was.
"Has it been bad?" he asked.
"No. It hurt a bit, but nothing to mention."
And she sniffed in her old scornful way. As she lay shelooked like a girl. And all the while her blue eyes watched him. But there were the dark pain-circles beneath that made him ache again.
"It's a sunny day," he said.
"It's a beautiful day."
"Do you think you'll be carried down?"
"I shall see."
Then he went away to get her breakfast. All day long hewas conscious of nothing but her. It was a long ache that madehim feverish. Then, when he got home in the early evening, he glancedthrough the kitchen window. She was not there; she had not got up.
He ran straight upstairs and kissed her. He was almost afraidto ask:
"Didn't you get up, pigeon?"
"No," she said. "it was that morphia; it made me tired."
"I think he gives you too much," he said.
"I think he does," she answered.
He sat down by the bed, miserably. She had a way of curlingand lying on her side, like a child. The grey and brown hairwas loose over her ear.
"Doesn't it tickle you?" he said, gently putting it back.
"It does," she replied.
His face was near hers. Her blue eyes smiled straight into his,like a girl's--warm, laughing with tender love. It made him pantwith terror, agony, and love.
"You want your hair doing in a plait," he said. "Lie still."
And going behind her, he carefully loosened her hair,brushed it out. It was like fine long silk of brown and grey. Her head was snuggled between her shoulders. As he lightlybrushed and plaited her hair, he bit his lip and felt dazed. It all seemed unreal, he could not understand it.
At night he often worked in her room, looking up from timeto time. And so often he found her blue eyes fixed on him. And when their eyes met, she smiled. He worked away again mechanically,producing good stuff without knowing what he was doing.
Sometimes he came in, very pale and still, with watchful,sudden eyes, like a man who is drunk almost to death. They wereboth afraid of the veils that were ripping between them.
Then she pretended to be better, chattered to him gaily,made a great fuss over some scraps of news. For they had both cometo the condition when they had to make much of the trifles, lest theyshould give in to the big thing, and their human independence wouldgo smash. They were afraid, so they made light of things and were gay.
Sometimes as she lay he knew she was thinking of the past. Her mouth gradually shut hard in a line. She was holding herself rigid,so that she might die without ever uttering the great cry thatwas tearing from her. He never forgot that hard, utterly lonelyand stubborn clenching of her mouth, which persisted for weeks. Sometimes, when it was lighter, she talked about her husband. Now she hated him. She did not forgive him. She could not bear himto be in the room. And a few things, the things that had been mostbitter to her, came up again so strongly that they broke from her,and she told her son.
He felt as if his life were being destroyed, piece by piece,within him. Often the tears came suddenly. He ran to the station,the tear-drops falling on the pavement. Often he could not goon with his work. The pen stopped writing. He sat staring,quite unconscious. And when he came round again he felt sick,and trembled in his limbs. He never questioned what it was. His mind did not try to analyse or understand. He merely submitted,and kept his eyes shut; let the thing go over him.
His mother did the same. She thought of the pain, of themorphia, of the next day; hardly ever of the death. That was coming,she knew. She had to submit to it. But she would never entreat itor make friends with it. Blind, with her face shut hard and blind,she was pushed towards the door. The days passed, the weeks,the months.
Sometimes, in the sunny afternoons, she seemed almost happy.
"I try to think of the nice times--when we went to Mablethorpe,and Robin Hood's Bay, and Shanklin," she said. "After all,not everybody has seen those beautiful places. And wasn't it beautiful! I try to think of that, not of the other things."
Then, again, for a whole evening she spoke not a word;neither did he. They were together, rigid, stubborn, silent. He wentinto his room at last to go to bed, and leaned against the doorwayas if paralysed, unable to go any farther. His consciousness went. A furious storm, he knew not what, seemed to ravage inside him. He stood leaning there, submitting, never questioning.
In the morning they were both normal again, though her facewas grey with the morphia, and her body felt like ash. But they werebright again, nevertheless. Often, especially if Annie or Arthurwere at home, he neglected her. He did not see much of Clara. Usually he was with men. He was quick and active and lively;but when his friends saw him go white to the gills, his eyes darkand glittering, they had a certain mistrust of him. Sometimes hewent to Clara, but she was almost cold to him.
