The Nether World

When on the point of lowering the lamp he heard someone coming downstairs. The door opened, and, to his surprise, Clara came in. Familiarity could not make him insensible to that disfigurement of her once beautiful face; his eyes always fell before her at the first moment of meeting.

'What are you doing?' she asked. 'Why don't you come up?'

'I was that minute coming.'

His hand went again to the lamp, but she checked him. In a low, wailing, heart-breaking voice, and with a passionate gesture, she exclaimed, 'Oh, I feel as if I should go mad I can't bear it much longer!'

Sidney was silent at first, then said quietly, 'Let's sit here for a little. No wonder you feel low-spirited, lying in that room all day. I'd gladly have come and sat with you, but my company only seems to irritate you.'

'What good can you do me? You only think I'm making you miserable without a cause. You won't say it, but that's what you always think; and when I feel that, I can't bear to have you near. If only I could die and come to the end of it! How can you tell what I suffer? Oh yes, you speak so calmly—as good as telling me I am unreasonable because I can't do the same. I hate to hear your voice when it's like that! I'd rather you raged at me or struck me!'

The beauty of her form had lost nothing since the evening when he visited her in Farringdon Road Buildings; now, as then, all her movements were full of grace and natural dignity. Whenever strong feeling was active in her, she could not but manifest it in motion unlike that of ordinary women. Her hair hung in disorder, though not at its full length, massing itself upon her shoulders, shadowing her forehead. Half-consumed by the fire that only death would extinguish, she looked the taller for her slenderness. Ah, had the face been untouched!

'You are unjust to me,' Sidney replied, with emotion, but not resentfully. 'I can enter into all your sufferings. If I speak calmly, it's because I must, because I daren't give way. One of us must try and be strong, Clara, or else—'

He turned away.

'Let us leave this house,' she continued, hardly noticing what he said, 'Let us live in some other place. Never any change—always, always the same walls to look at day and night—it's driving me mad!'

'Clara, we can't move. I daren't spend even the little money it would cost. Do you know what Amy has been doing?'

'Yes; father told me.'

'How can we go to the least needless expense, when every day makes living harder for us?'

'What have we to do with them? How can you be expected to keep a whole family? It isn't fair to you or to me. You sacrifice me to them. It's nothing to you what I endure, so long as they are kept in comfort!'

He stepped nearer to her.

'What do you really mean by that? Is it seriously your wish that I should tell them—your father and your sisters and our brother—to leave the house and support themselves as best they can? Pray, what would become of them? Kept in comfort, are they? How much comfort does your poor father enjoy? Do you wish me to tell him to go out into the street, as I can help him no more?'

She moaned and made a wild gesture.

'You know all this to be impossible; you don't wish it; you couldn't bear it. Then why will you drive me almost to despair by complaining so of what can't be helped? Surely you foresaw it all. You knew that I was only a working man. It isn't as if there had been any hope of my making a larger income, and you were disappointed.'

'Does it make it easier to bear because there is no hope of relief?' she cried.

'For me, yes. If there were hope, I might fret under the misery.'

'Oh, I had hope once! It might have been so different with me. The thought burns and burns and burns, till I am frantic. You don't help me to bear it. You leave me alone when I most need help. How can you know what it means to me to look back and think of what might have been? You say to yourself I am selfish, that I ought to be thankful some-one took pity on me, poor, wretched creature that I am. It would have been kinder never to have come near me. I should have killed myself long ago, and there an end. You thought it was a great thing to take me, when you might have had a wife who would—'

'Clara! Clara! When you speak like that, I could almost believe you are really mad. For Heaven's sake, think what you are saying! Suppose I were to reproach you with having consented to marry me? I would rather die than let such a word pass my lips—but suppose you heard me speaking to you like this?'

She drew a deep sigh, and let her hands fall. Sidney continued in quite another voice:

'It's one of the hardest things I have to bear, that I can't make your life pleasanter. Of course you need change; I know it only too well. You and I ought to have our holiday at this time of the year, like other people. I fancy I should like to go into the country myself; Clerkenwell isn't such a beautiful place that one can be content to go there day after day, year after year, without variety. But we have no money. Suffer as we may, there's no help for it—because we have no money. Lives may be wasted—worse, far worse than wasted—just because there is no money. At this moment a whole world of men and women is in pain and sorrow—because they have no money. How often have we said that? The world is made so; everything has to be bought with money.'

'You find it easier to bear than I do.'

'Yes; I find it easier. I am stronger-bodied, and at all events I have some variety, whilst you have none. I know it. If I could take your share of the burden, how gladly I'd do so! If I could take your suffering upon myself, you shouldn't be unhappy for another minute. But that is another impossible thing. People who are fortunate in life may ask each day what they can do; we have always to remind ourselves what we can't.'

'You take a pleasure in repeating such things; it shows how little you feel them.'

'It shows how I have taken to heart the truth of them.'

She waved her hand impatiently, again sighed, and moved towards the door.

'Don't go just yet,' said Sidney. 'We have more to say to each other.'

'I have nothing more to say. I am miserable, and you can't help me.'

'I can, Clara.'

She looked at him with wondering, estranged eyes. 'How? What are you going to do?'

'Only speak to you, that's all. I have nothing to give but words. But—'

She would have left him. Sidney stepped forward and prevented her.

'No; you must hear what I have got to say. They may be only words, but if I have no power to move you with my words, then our life has come to utter ruin, and I don't know what dreadful things lie before us.'

'I can say the same,' she replied, in a despairing tone.

'But neither you nor I shall say it! As long as I have strength to speak, I won't consent to say that Clara, you must put your hand in mine, and think of your life and mine as one. If not for my sake, then for your child's. Think; do you wish May to suffer for the faults of her parents?'

'I wish she had never been born!'

'And yet you were the happier for her birth. It's only these last six months that you have fallen again into misery. You indulge it, and it grows worse, harder to resist. You may say that life seems to grow worse. Perhaps so. This affair of Amy's has been a heavy blow, and we shall miss the little money she brought; goodness knows when another place will be found for her. But all the more reason why we should help each other to struggle. Perhaps just this year or two will be our hardest time. If Amy and Annie and Tom were once all earning something, the worst would be over—wouldn't it? And can't we find strength to hold out a little longer, just to give the children a start in life, just to make your father's last years a bit happier? If we manage it, shan't we feel glad in looking back? Won't it be something worth having lived for?'

He paused, but Clara had no word for him.

'There's Amy. She's a hard girl to manage, partly because she has very bad health. I always think of that—or try to—when she irritates me. This afternoon I took her out with me, and spoke as kindly as I could; if she isn't better for it, she surely can't be worse, and in any case I don't know what else to do. Look, Clara, you and I are going to do what we can for these children; we're not going to give up the work now we've begun it. Mustn't all of us who are poor stand together and help one another? We have to fight against the rich world that's always crushing us down, down—whether it means to or not. Those people enjoy their lives. Well, I shall find my enjoyment in defying them to make me despair? But I can't do without your help. I didn't feel very cheerful as I sat here a while ago, before you came down; I was almost afraid to go upstairs, lest the sight of what you were suffering should be too much for me. Am I to ask a kindness of you and be refused, Clara?'

It was not the first time that she had experienced the constraining power of his words when he was moved with passionate earnestness. Her desire to escape was due to a fear of yielding, of suffering her egotism to fail before a stronger will.

'Let me go,' she said, whilst he held her arm. 'I feel too ill to talk longer.'

'Only one word—only one promise—now whilst we are the only ones awake in the house. We are husband and wife, Clara, and we must be kind to each other. We are not going to be like the poor creatures who let their misery degrade them. We are both too proud for that—what? We can think and express our thoughts; we can speak to each other's minds and hearts. Don't let us be beaten!'

'What's the good of my promising? I can't keep it. I suffer too much.'

'Promise, and keep the promise for a few weeks, a few days; then I'll find strength to help you once more. But now it's your turn to help me. To-morrow begins a new week; the rich world allows us to rest to-morrow, to be with each other. Shall we make it a quiet, restful, hopeful day? When they go out in the morning, you shall read to father and me—read as you know how to, so much better than I can. What? Was that really a smile?'

'Let me go, Sidney. Oh, I'm tired, I'm tired!'

'And the promise?'

'I'll do my best. It won't last long, but I'll try.'

'Thank you, dear.'

'No,' she replied, despondently. 'It's I that ought to thank you. But I never shall—never. I only understand you now and then—just for an hour—and all the selfishness comes back again. It'll be the same till I'm dead.'

He put out the lamp and followed her upstairs. His limbs ached; he could scarcely drag one leg after the other. Never mind; the battle was gained once more.

CHAPTER XL
JANE

'The poisoning business startled me. I shouldn't at all wonder if I had a precious narrow squeak of something of the kind myself before I took my departure; in fact, a sort of fear of the animal made me settle things as sharp as I could. Let me know the result of the trial. Wonder whether there'll be any disagreeable remarks about a certain acquaintance of yours, detained abroad on business? Better send me newspapers—same name and address. . . . But I've something considerably more important to think about. . . . A big thing; I scarcely dare tell you how big. I stand to win $2,000,000! . . . Not a soul outside suspects the ring. When I tell you that R.S.N. is in it, you'll see that I've struck the right ticket this time. . . . Let me hear about Jane. If all goes well here, and you manage that little business, you shall have $100,000, just for house-furnishing, you know. I suppose you'll have your partnership in a few months?'

Extracts from a letter, with an American stamp, which Mr. Scawthorne read as he waited for his breakfast. It was the end of October, and cool enough to make the crackling fire grateful. Having mused over the epistle, our friend took up his morning paper and glanced at the report of criminal trials. Whilst he was so engaged his landlady entered, carrying a tray of appetising appearance.

'Good-morning, Mrs. Byass,' he said, with much friendliness. Then, in a lower voice, 'There's a fuller report here than there was in the evening paper. Perhaps you looked at it?'

'Well, yes, sir; I thought you wouldn't mind,' replied Bessie, arranging the table.

'She'll be taken care of or three years, at all events.'

'If you'd seen her that day she came here after Miss Snowdon, you'd understand how glad I feel that she's out of the way. I'm sure I've been uneasy ever since. If ever there comes a rather loud knock at—there I begin to tremble; I do indeed. I don't think I shall ever get over it.'

'I dare say Miss Snowdon will be easier in mind?'

'I shouldn't wonder. But she won't say anything about it. She feels the disgrace so much, and I know it's almost more than she can do to go to work, just because she thinks they talk about her.'

'Oh, that'll very soon pass over. There's always something new happening, and people quickly forget a case like this.'

Bessie withdrew, and her lodger addressed himself to his breakfast.

He had occupied the rooms on the first floor for about a year and a half. Joseph Snowdon's proposal to make him acquainted with Jane had not been carried out, Scawthorne deeming it impracticable; but when a year had gone by, and Scawthorne, as Joseph's confidential correspondent, had still to report that Jane maintained herself in independence, he one day presented himself in Hanover Street, as a total stranger, and made inquiry about the rooms which a card told him were to let. His improved position allowed him to live somewhat more reputably than in the Chelsea lodging, and Hanover Street would suit him well enough until he obtained the promised partnership. Admitted as a friend to Mr. Percival's house in Highbury, he had by this time made the acquaintance of Miss Lant, whom, by the exercise of his agreeable qualities, he one day led to speak of Jane Snowdon. Miss Lant continued to see Jane, at long intervals, and was fervent in her praise as well as in compassionating the trials through which she had gone. His position in Mr. Percival's office of course made it natural that Scawthorne should have a knowledge of the girl's story. When he had established himself in Mrs. Byass's rooms, he mentioned the fact casually to his friends, making it appear that, in seeking lodgings, he had come upon these by haphazard.

He could not but feel something of genuine interest in a girl who, for whatever reason, declined a sufficient allowance and chose to work for her living. The grounds upon which Jane took this decision were altogether unknown to him until an explanation came from her father. Joseph, when news of the matter reached him, was disposed to entertain suspicions; with every care not to betray his own whereabouts, he wrote to Jane, and in due time received a reply, in which Jane told him truly her reasons for refusing the money. These Joseph communicated to Scawthorne, and the latter's interest was still more strongly awakened.

He was now on terms of personal acquaintance, almost of friendship, with Jane. Miss Lant, he was convinced, did not speak of her too praisingly. Not exactly a pretty girl, though far from displeasing in countenance; very quiet, very gentle, with much natural refinement. Her air of sadness—by no means forced upon the vulgar eye, but unmistakable when you studied her—was indicative of faithful sensibilities. Scawthorne had altogether lost sight of Sidney Kirkwood and of the Hewetts; he knew they were all gone to a remote part of London, and more than this he had no longer any care to discover. On excellent terms with his landlady, he skilfully elicited from her now and then a confidential remark with regard to Jane; of late, indeed, he had established something like a sentimental understanding with the good Bessie, so that, whenever he mentioned Jane, she fell into a pleasant little flutter, feeling that she understood what was in progress. . . . Why not?—he kept asking himself. Joseph Snowdon (who addressed his letters to Hanover Street in a feigned hand) seemed to have an undeniable affection for the girl, and was constant in his promises of providing a handsome dowry. The latter was not a point of such importance as a few years ago, but the dollars would be acceptable. And then, the truth was, Scawthorne felt himself more and more inclined to put a certain question to Jane, dowry or none.

Yes, she felt it as a disgrace, poor girl! When she saw the name 'Snowdon' in the newspaper, in such a shameful and horrible connection, her impulse was to flee, to hide herself. It was dreadful to go to her work and hear the girls talking of this attempted murder. The new misery came upon her just as she was regaining something of her natural spirits, after long sorrow and depression which had affected her health. But circumstances, now as ever, seemed to plot that at a critical moment of her own experience she should be called out of herself and constrained to become the consoler of others.

For some months the domestic peace of Mr. and Mrs. Byass had been gravely disturbed. Unlike the household at Crouch End, it was to prosperity that Sam and his wife owed their troubles. Year after year Sam's position had improved; he was now in receipt of a salary which made—or ought to have made—things at home very comfortable. Though his children were now four in number, he could supply their wants. He could buy Bessie a new gown without very grave consideration, and could regard his own shiny top-hat, when he donned it in the place of one that was really respectable enough, without twinges of conscience.

But Sam was not remarkable for wisdom; indeed, had he been anything more than a foolish calculating-machine, he would scarcely have thriven as he did in the City. When he had grown accustomed to rattling loose silver in his pocket, the next thing, as a matter of course, was that he accustomed himself to pay far too frequent visits to City bars. On certain days in the week he invariably came home with a very red face and a titubating walk; when Bessie received him angrily, he defended himself on the great plea of business necessities. As a town traveller there was no possibility, he alleged, of declining invitations to refresh himself; just as incumbent upon him was it to extend casual hospitality to those with whom he had business.

'Business! Fiddle!' cried Bessie. 'All you City fellows are the same. You encourage each other in drink, drink, drinking whenever you have a chance, and then you say it's all a matter of business. I won't have you coming home in that state, so there! I won't have a husband as drinks! Why, you can't stand straight.'

'Can't stand straight!' echoed Sam, with vast scorn. 'Look here!'

And he shouldered the poker, with the result that one of the globes on the chandelier came in shivers about his head. This was too much. Bessie fumed, and for a couple of hours the quarrel was unappeasable.

Worse was to come. Sam occasionally stayed out very late at night, and on his return alleged a 'business appointment.' Bessie at length refused to accept these excuses; she couldn't and wouldn't believe them.

'Then don't!' shouted Sam. 'And understand that I shall come home just when I like. If you make a bother I won't come home at all, so there you have it!'

'You're a bad husband and a beast!' was Bessie's retort.

Shortly after that Bessie received information of such grave misconduct on her husband's part that she all but resolved to forsake the house, and with the children seek refuge under her parents' roof at Woolwich. Sam had been seen in indescribable company; no permissible words would characterise the individuals with whom he had roamed shamelessly on the pavement of Oxford Street. When he next met her, quite sober and with exasperatingly innocent expression, Bessie refused to open her lips. Neither that evening nor the next would she utter a word to him—and the effort it cost her was tremendous. The result was, that on the third evening Sam did not appear.

It was a week after Clem's trial. Jane had been keeping to herself as much as possible, but, having occasion to go down into the kitchen late at night, she found Bessie in tears, utterly miserable.

'Don't bother about me!' was the reply to her sympathetic question. 'You've got your own upsets to think of. You might have come to speak to me before this—but never mind. It's nothing to you.'

It needed much coaxing to persuade her to detail Sam's enormities, but she found much relief when she had done so, and wept more copiously than ever.

'It's nearly twelve o'clock, and there's no sign of him, Perhaps he won't come at all. He's in bad company, and if he stays away all night I'll never speak to him again as long as I live. Oh, he's a beast of a husband, is Sam!'

Sam came not. All through that night did Jane keep her friend company, for Sam came not. In the morning a letter, addressed in his well-known commercial hand. Bessie read it and screamed. Sam wrote to her that he had accepted a position as country traveller, and perhaps he might be able to look in at his home on that day month.

Jane could not go to work. The case had become very serious indeed; Bessie was in hysterics; the four children made the roof ring with their lamentations. At this juncture Jane put forth all her beneficent energy. It happened that Bessie was just now servantless. There was Mr. Scawthorne's breakfast only half prepared; Jane had to see to it herself, and herself take it upstairs. Then Bessie must go to bed, or assuredly she would be so ill that unheard-of calamities would befall the infants. Jane would have an eye to everything; only let Jane be trusted.

The miserable day passed; after trying in vain to sleep, Bessie walked about her sitting-room with tear-swollen face and rumpled gown, always thinking it possible that Sam had only played a trick, and that he would come. But he came not, and again it was night.

At eight o'clock Mr. Scawthorne's bell rang. Impossible for Bessie to present herself; Jane would go. She ascended to the room which had once—ah! once!—been her own parlour, knocked and entered.

'I—I wished to speak to Mrs. Byass,' said Scawthorne, appearing for some reason or other embarrassed by Jane's presenting herself.

'Mrs. Byass is not at all well, sir. But I'll let her know—'

'No, no; on no account.'

'Can't I get you anything, sir?'

'Miss Snowdon—might I speak with you for a few moments?'

Jane feared it might be a complaint. In a perfectly natural way she walked forward. Scawthorne came in her direction, and—closed the door.

The interview lasted ten minutes, then Jane came forth and with a light, quick step ran up to the floor above. She did not enter the room, however, but stood with her hand on the door, in the darkness. A minute or two, and with the same light, hurried step, she descended the stairs, sprang past the lodger's room, sped down to the kitchen. Under other circumstances Bessie must surely have noticed a strangeness in her look, in her manner; but to-night Bessie had thought for nothing but her own calamities.

Another day, and no further news from Sam. The next morning, instead of going to work (the loss of wages was most serious, but it couldn't be helped), Jane privately betook herself to Sam's house of business. Mrs. Byass was ill; would they let her know Mr. Byass's address, that he might immediately be communicated with? The information was readily supplied; Mr. Byass was no farther away, at present, than St. Albans. Forth into the street again, and in search of a policeman. 'Will you please to tell me what station I have to go to for St. Albans?' Why, Moorgate Street would do; only a few minutes' walk away. On she hastened. 'What is the cost of a return ticket to St. Albans, please?' Three-and-sevenpence. Back into the street again; she must now look for a certain sign, indicating a certain place of business. With some little trouble it is found; she enters a dark passage, and comes before a counter, upon which she lays—a watch, her grandfather's old watch. 'How much?' 'Four shillings, please.' She deposits a halfpenny, and receives four shillings, together with a ticket. Now for St. Albans.

Sam! Sam! Ay, well might he turn red and stutter and look generally foolish when that quiet little girl stood before him in his 'stock-room' at the hotel. Her words were as quiet as her look. 'I'll write her a letter,' he cries. 'Stop; you shall take it back. I can't give up the job at once, but you may tell her I'm up to no harm. Where's the pen? Where's the cursed ink?' And she takes the letter.

'Why, you've lost a day's work, Jane! She gave you the money for the journey, I suppose?'

'Yes, yes, of course.'

'Tell her she's not to make a fool of herself in future.'

'No, I shan't say that, Mr. Byass. But I'm half-tempted to say it to someone else!'

It was the old, happy smile, come back for a moment; the voice that had often made peace so merrily. The return journey seemed short, and with glad heart-beating she hastened from the City to Hanover Street.

Well, well; of course it would all begin over again; Jane herself knew it. But is not all life a struggle onward from compromise to compromise, until the day of final pacification?

Through that winter she lived with a strange secret in her mind, a secret which was the source of singularly varied feelings—of astonishment, of pain, of encouragement, of apprehension, of grief. To no one could she speak of it; no one could divine its existence—no one save the person to whom she owed this surprising novelty in her experience. She would have given much to be rid of it; and yet, again, might she not legitimately accept that pleasure which at times came of the thought?—the thought that, as a woman, her qualities were of some account in the world.

She did her best to keep it out of her consciousness, and in truth had so many other things to think about that it was seldom she really had trouble with it. Life was not altogether easy; regular work was not always to be kept; there was much need of planning and pinching, that her independence might suffer no wound, Bessie Byass was always in arms against that same independent spirit; she scoffed at it, assailed it with treacherous blandishment, made direct attacks upon it.

'I must live in my own way, Mrs. Byass. I don't want to have to leave you.'

And if ever life seemed a little too hard, if the image of the past grew too mournfully persistent, she knew where to go for consolation. Let us follow her, one Saturday afternoon early in the year.

In a poor street in Clerkenwell was a certain poor little shop—built out as an afterthought from an irregular lump of houses; a shop with a room behind it and a cellar below; no more. Here was sold second-hand clothing, women's and children's. No name over the front, but neighbours would have told you that it was kept by one Mrs. Todd, a young widow with several children. Mrs. Todd, not long ago, used to have only a stall in the street; but a lady named Miss Lant helped her to start in a more regular way of business.

'And does she carry it on quite by herself?'

No; with her lived another young woman, also a widow, who had one child. Mrs. Hewett, her name. She did sewing in the room behind, or attended to the shop when Mrs. Todd was away making purchases.

There Jane Snowdon entered. The clothing that hung in the window made it very dark inside; she had to peer a little before she could distinguish the person who sat behind the counter. 'Is Pennyloaf in, Mrs. Todd?'

'Yes, Miss. Will you walk through?'

The room behind is lighted from the ceiling. It is heaped with the most miscellaneous clothing. It contains two beds, some shelves with crockery, a table, some chairs—but it would have taken you a long time to note all these details, so huddled together was everything. Part of the general huddling were five children, of various ages; and among them, very busy, sat Pennyloaf.

'Everything going on well?' was Jane's first question.

'Yes, Miss.'

'Then I know it isn't. Whenever you call me "Miss," there's something wrong; I've learnt that.'

Pennyloaf smiled, sadly but with affection in her eyes. 'Well, I have been a bit low, an' that's the truth. It takes me sometimes, you know. I've been thinkin', when I'd oughtn't.'

'Same with me, Pennyloaf. We can't help thinking, can we? What a good thing if we'd nothing more to think about than these children! Where's little Bob? Why, Bob, I thought you were old clothes; I did, really! You may well laugh!'

The laughter was merry, and Jane encouraged it, inventing all sorts of foolish jokes. 'Pennyloaf, I wish you'd ask me to stay to tea.'

'Then that I will, Miss Jane, an' gladly. Would you like it soon?'

'No; in an hour will do, won't it? Give me something that wants sewing, a really hard bit, something that'll break needles. Yes, that'll do. Where's Mrs. Todd's thimble? Now we're all going to be comfortable, and we'll have a good talk.'

Pennyloaf found the dark thoughts slip away insensibly. And she talked, she talked—where was there such a talker as Pennyloaf nowadays, when she once began?

Mr. Byass was not very willing, after all, to give up his country travelling. That his departure on that business befell at a moment of domestic quarrel was merely chance; secretly he had made the arrangement with his firm some weeks before. The penitence which affected him upon Jane's appeal could not be of abiding result; for, like all married men at a certain point of their lives, he felt heartily tired of home and wished to see the world a little. Hanover Street heard endless discussions of the point between Sam and Bessie, between Bessie and Jane, between Jane and Sam, between all three together. And the upshot was that Mr. Byass gained his point. For a time he would go on country journeys. Bessie assented sullenly, but, strange to say, she had never been in better spirits than on the day after this decision had been arrived at.

On that day, however—it was early in March—an annoying incident happened. Mr. Scawthorne, who always dined in town and seldom returned to his lodgings till late in the evening, rang his bell about eight o'clock and sent a message by the servant that he wished to see Mrs. Byass. Bessie having come up, he announced to her with gravity that his tenancy of the rooms would be at an end in a fortnight. Various considerations necessitated his livin in a different part of London. Bessie frankly lamented; she would never again find such an estimable lodger. But, to be sure, Mr. Scawthorne had prepared her for this, three months ago. Well, what must be, must be.