"Why, where should you have gone? You daren't even get yourparcel through the yard-end," she said.
He looked such a fool she was not even angry with him. He continued to take his boots off and prepare for bed.
"I don't know what's in your blue handkerchief," she said. "But if you leave it the children shall fetch it in the morning."
Whereupon he got up and went out of the house, returning presentlyand crossing the kitchen with averted face, hurrying upstairs. As Mrs. Morel saw him slink quickly through the inner doorway,holding his bundle, she laughed to herself: but her heart was bitter,because she had loved him.
CHAPTER III
THE CASTING OFF OF MOREL--THE TAKING ON OF WILLIAM
DURING the next week Morel's temper was almost unbearable. Like all miners, he was a great lover of medicines, which,strangely enough, he would often pay for himself.
"You mun get me a drop o' laxy vitral," he said. "It's awinder as we canna ha'e a sup i' th' 'ouse."
So Mrs. Morel bought him elixir of vitriol, his favouritefirst medicine. And he made himself a jug of wormwood tea. He hadhanging in the attic great bunches of dried herbs:wormwood, rue, horehound, elder flowers, parsley-purt,marshmallow, hyssop, dandelion, and centaury. Usually there was a jug ofone or other decoction standing on the hob, from which he drank largely.
"Grand!" he said, smacking his lips after wormwood. "Grand!" And he exhorted the children to try.
"It's better than any of your tea or your cocoa stews," he vowed. But they were not to be tempted.
This time, however, neither pills nor vitriol nor all his herbswould shift the "nasty peens in his head". He was sickening for anattack of an inflammation of the brain. He had never been well sincehis sleeping on the ground when he went with Jerry to Nottingham. Since then he had drunk and stormed. Now he fell seriously ill,and Mrs. Morel had him to nurse. He was one of the worstpatients imaginable. But, in spite of all, and putting aside thefact that he was breadwinner, she never quite wanted him to die. Still there was one part of her wanted him for herself.
The neighbours were very good to her: occasionally somehad the children in to meals, occasionally some would do thedownstairs work for her, one would mind the baby for a day. But it was a great drag, nevertheless. It was not every daythe neighbours helped. Then she had nursing of baby and husband,cleaning and cooking, everything to do. She was quite worn out,but she did what was wanted of her.
And the money was just sufficient. She had seventeenshillings a week from clubs, and every Friday Barker and the otherbutty put by a portion of the stall's profits for Morel's wife. And the neighbours made broths, and gave eggs, and such invalids'trifles. If they had not helped her so generously in those times,Mrs. Morel would never have pulled through, without incurringdebts that would have dragged her down.
The weeks passed. Morel, almost against hope, grew better. He had a fine constitution, so that, once on the mend, he went straightforward to recovery. Soon he was pottering about downstairs. During his illness his wife had spoilt him a little. Now he wantedher to continue. He often put his band to his head, pulled downthe comers of his mouth, and shammed pains he did not feel. But there was no deceiving her. At first she merely smiled to herself. Then she scolded him sharply.
"Goodness, man, don't be so lachrymose."
That wounded him slightly, but still he continued to feign sickness.
"I wouldn't be such a mardy baby," said the wife shortly.
Then he was indignant, and cursed under his breath, like a boy. He was forced to resume a normal tone, and to cease to whine.
Nevertheless, there was a state of peace in the house for some time. Mrs. Morel was more tolerant of him, and he, depending on her almostlike a child, was rather happy. Neither knew that she was more tolerantbecause she loved him less. Up till this time, in spite of all,he had been her husband and her man. She had felt that, more or less,what he did to himself he did to her. Her living depended on him. There were many, many stages in the ebbing of her love for him,but it was always ebbing.
Now, with the birth of this third baby, her self no longer settowards him, helplessly, but was like a tide that scarcely rose,standing off from him. After this she scarcely desired him. And, standing more aloof from him, not feeling him so much partof herself, but merely part of her circumstances, she did not mindso much what he did, could leave him alone.
There was the halt, the wistfulness about the ensuing year,which is like autumn in a man's life. His wife was casting him off,half regretfully, but relentlessly; casting him off and turningnow for love and life to the children. Henceforward he was moreor less a husk. And he himself acquiesced, as so many men do,yielding their place to their children.
During his recuperation, when it was really over between them,both made an effort to come back somewhat to the old relationshipof the first months of their marriage. He sat at home and,when the children were in bed, and she was sewing--she did all hersewing by hand, made all shirts and children's clothing--he wouldread to her from the newspaper, slowly pronouncing and deliveringthe words like a man pitching quoits. Often she hurried him on,giving him a phrase in anticipation. And then he took her words humbly.
The silences between them were peculiar. There would bethe swift, slight "cluck" of her needle, the sharp "pop" of hislips as he let out the smoke, the warmth, the sizzle on the barsas he spat in the fire. Then her thoughts turned to William. Already he was getting a big boy. Already he was top of the class,and the master said he was the smartest lad in the school. She saw him a man, young, full of vigour, making the world glowagain for her.
And Morel sitting there, quite alone, and having nothingto think about, would be feeling vaguely uncomfortable. His soulwould reach out in its blind way to her and find her gone. He felt a sort of emptiness, almost like a vacuum in his soul. He was unsettled and restless. Soon he could not live inthat atmosphere, and he affected his wife. Both felt an oppressionon their breathing when they were left together for some time. Then he went to bed and she settled down to enjoy herself alone,working, thinking, living.
Meanwhile another infant was coming, fruit of this little peaceand tenderness between the separating parents. Paul was seventeenmonths old when the new baby was born. He was then a plump,pale child, quiet, with heavy blue eyes, and still the peculiarslight knitting of the brows. The last child was also a boy,fair and bonny. Mrs. Morel was sorry when she knew she was with child,both for economic reasons and because she did not love her husband;but not for the sake of the infant.
They called the baby Arthur. He was very pretty, with amop of gold curls, and he loved his father from the first. Mrs. Morel was glad this child loved the father. Hearing theminer's footsteps, the baby would put up his arms and crow. And if Morel were in a good temper, he called back immediately,in his hearty, mellow voice:
"What then, my beauty? I sh'll come to thee in a minute."
And as soon as he had taken off his pit-coat, Mrs. Morel wouldput an apron round the child, and give him to his father.
"What a sight the lad looks!" she would exclaim sometimes,taking back the baby, that was smutted on the face from his father'skisses and play. Then Morel laughed joyfully.
"He's a little collier, bless his bit o' mutton!" he exclaimed.
And these were the happy moments of her life now, when thechildren included the father in her heart.
Meanwhile William grew bigger and stronger and more active,while Paul, always rather delicate and quiet, got slimmer,and trotted after his mother like her shadow. He was usually activeand interested, but sometimes he would have fits of depression. Then the mother would find the boy of three or four crying onthe sofa.
"What's the matter?" she asked, and got no answer.
"What's the matter?" she insisted, getting cross.
"I don't know," sobbed the child.
So she tried to reason him out of it, or to amuse him,but without effect. It made her feel beside herself. Then the father,always impatient, would jump from his chair and shout:
"If he doesn't stop, I'll smack him till he does."
"You'll do nothing of the sort," said the mother coldly. And then she carried the child into the yard, plumped him into hislittle chair, and said: "Now cry there, Misery!"
And then a butterfly on the rhubarb-leaves perhaps caught his eye,or at last he cried himself to sleep. These fits were not often,but they caused a shadow in Mrs. Morel's heart, and her treatmentof Paul was different from that of the other children.
Suddenly one morning as she was looking down the alleyof the Bottoms for the barm-man, she heard a voice calling her. It was the thin little Mrs. Anthony in brown velvet.
"Here, Mrs. Morel, I want to tell you about your Willie."
"Oh, do you?" replied Mrs. Morel. "Why, what's the matter?"
"A lad as gets 'old of another an' rips his clothes off'n'is back," Mrs. Anthony said, "wants showing something."
"Your Alfred's as old as my William," said Mrs. Morel.
"'Appen 'e is, but that doesn't give him a right to get holdof the boy's collar, an' fair rip it clean off his back."
"Well," said Mrs. Morel, "I don't thrash my children,and even if I did, I should want to hear their side of the tale."
"They'd happen be a bit better if they did get a good hiding,"retorted Mrs. Anthony. "When it comes ter rippin' a lad's cleancollar off'n 'is back a-purpose---"
"I'm sure he didn't do it on purpose," said Mrs. Morel.
"Make me a liar!" shouted Mrs. Anthony.
Mrs. Morel moved away and closed her gate. Her hand trembledas she held her mug of barm.
"But I s'll let your mester know," Mrs. Anthony cried after her.
At dinner-time, when William had finished his meal and wantedto be off again--he was then eleven years old--his mother said to him:
"What did you tear Alfred Anthony's collar for?"
"When did I tear his collar?"
"I don't know when, but his mother says you did."
"Why--it was yesterday--an' it was torn a'ready."
"But you tore it more."
"Well, I'd got a cobbler as 'ad licked seventeen--an'Alfy Ant'ny 'e says:
'Adam an' Eve an' pinch-me, Went down to a river to bade. Adam an' Eve got drownded, Who do yer think got saved?'
An' so I says: 'Oh, Pinch-YOU,' an' so I pinched 'im, an''e was mad, an' so he snatched my cobbler an' run off with it. An' so I run after 'im, an' when I was gettin' hold of 'im,'e dodged, an' it ripped 'is collar. But I got my cobbler---"
He pulled from his pocket a black old horse-chestnut hanging ona string. This old cobbler had "cobbled"--hit and smashed--seventeenother cobblers on similar strings. So the boy was proud of his veteran.
"Well," said Mrs. Morel, "you know you've got no right to riphis collar."
"Well, our mother!" he answered. "I never meant tr'a done it--an'it was on'y an old indirrubber collar as was torn a'ready."
"Next time," said his mother, "YOU be more careful. I shouldn't like it if you came home with your collar torn off."
"I don't care, our mother; I never did it a-purpose."
The boy was rather miserable at being reprimanded.
"No--well, you be more careful."
William fled away, glad to be exonerated. And Mrs. Morel,who hated any bother with the neighbours, thought she would explainto Mrs. Anthony, and the business would be over.
But that evening Morel came in from the pit looking very sour. He stood in the kitchen and glared round, but did not speak forsome minutes. Then:
"Wheer's that Willy?" he asked.
"What do you want HIM for?" asked Mrs. Morel, who had guessed.
"I'll let 'im know when I get him," said Morel, banging hispit-bottle on to the dresser.
"I suppose Mrs. Anthony's got hold of you and been yarningto you about Alfy's collar," said Mrs. Morel, rather sneering.
"Niver mind who's got hold of me," said Morel. "When I gethold of 'IM I'll make his bones rattle."
"It's a poor tale," said Mrs. Morel, "that you're so readyto side with any snipey vixen who likes to come telling talesagainst your own children."
"I'll learn 'im!" said Morel. "It none matters to me whoselad 'e is; 'e's none goin' rippin' an' tearin' about just as he'sa mind."
"'Ripping and tearing about!'" repeated Mrs. Morel. "He was running after that Alfy, who'd taken his cobbler, and heaccidentally got hold of his collar, because the other dodged--asan Anthony would."
"I know!" shouted Morel threateningly.
"You would, before you're told," replied his wife bitingly.
"Niver you mind," stormed Morel. "I know my business."
"That's more than doubtful," said Mrs. Morel, "supposing someloud-mouthed creature had been getting you to thrash your own children."
"I know," repeated Morel.
And he said no more, but sat and nursed his bad temper. Suddenly William ran in, saying:
"Can I have my tea, mother?"
"Tha can ha'e more than that!" shouted Morel.
"Hold your noise, man," said Mrs. Morel; "and don't lookso ridiculous."
"He'll look ridiculous before I've done wi' him!" shouted Morel,rising from his chair and glaring at his son.
William, who was a tall lad for his years, but very sensitive,had gone pale, and was looking in a sort of horror at his father.
"Go out!" Mrs. Morel commanded her son.
