CHAPTER VII
A TUG OF WAR
Perceiving that Isabel made no reply, Nannie addressed her again, with both in her manner and her words perhaps a superfluity of truculence.
"What for have you left your room and come here disturbing Mr. Grahame, you bold-faced hussy?"
Nannie's appearance and the vigour of her speech, both of which were probably a trifle unexpected, seemed to take Isabel somewhat aback. It was not unlikely that a rapid debate was taking place in her mind as to what exactly was the rôle it was most advisable that she should play.
One point was obvious, that the moment had come when it would have to be decided, possibly finally, just what position in the household hers was going to be. If she was to be its real mistress-as she had boasted that she was, and would be! – then it was out of the question that Nannie should be allowed to speak to her in such terms as she had just employed. How was she to be prevented? In her own way Isabel was not a bad judge of character. In the course of her short life her adventures had been so many and various that it had grown to be a habit to measure herself against nearly every one with whom she was brought in contact. Nannie was a dour old Scotchwoman. Isabel was perfectly conscious that she was not likely to be subdued-to the point to which she desired to bring her-by words alone. She herself was wholly devoid of scruples. As to self-respect, she was incapable of realising what it meant. She had been brought up in a school in which that sort of thing was not taught. Her early days had been spent among women who were quite as ready to resort to physical force as the men, which was saying not a little. As she had grown older she had never hesitated to use her muscles when her tongue was beaten. She was quick to perceive that this was a case in which she would have to use her muscles again, if she did not wish to degenerate into something worse than a figure-head in the house which she aspired to rule.
The only question she had to decide was whether she would be a match for the Scotchwoman. It would be worse than vain to challenge conclusions if she was likely to be proved the weaker. Brief consideration, however, persuaded her that there was but little fear of that. Her ankle was against her, and the fact that she had been inactive for a fortnight. But, on the other hand, though tough and brawny, Nannie might be old enough to be her grandmother. Even though handicapped by her ankle, Isabel did not doubt that she excelled her both in sheer strength and in agility, while as to knowledge of how to make the best of her powers she was convinced that, as compared with her, the other was nowhere.
She resolved to bring the question as to who was to be mistress to an issue then and there-if necessary, in the presence of the man in the bed. Instead of answering Nannie she put a question to him.
"Who is this objectionable old woman?"
"My housekeeper."
"Then, perhaps, you'll tell your housekeeper that, where I'm concerned, if she can't keep a civil tongue in her head and mend her manners, she won't be your housekeeper long-or mine either."
"Hadn't you better tell her so yourself?"
"Does that mean you're afraid to?"
"Never interfered in the housekeeping since the day I was born, nor with Nannie either. She's always run this house as if it were her own."
"Then the sooner she understands that she's not going to do so any longer the better it will be. If you won't make that plain to her, then I will. Now, my woman, remember that I'm your mistress, and that I'll stand impertinence from no one-least of all from a servant of mine. Leave this room at once; I'll talk to you when we're alone."
Nannie seemed to be surprised almost into speechlessness by the other's attitude and manner of addressing her. It was a second or two before she could find words with which to illustrate her feelings.
"Of all the brazen impudence! That a nameless besom, picked up from the roadside in the middle of the night, should have the face to speak to me like that! And you to call yourself Mr. Cuthbert's wife! Why, you're nothing but a shameless trollop! And though the doctor said that Mr. Cuthbert was to be kept as quiet as possible, if needs be I'll take you out of this room in my two arms, as you well know I did before. So out you come before I make you!"
"Go it, Nannie!"
The mocking encouragement from the man in the bed was to Isabel as the final straw. She did not allow him to range himself, before her face, on the woman's side. From words she proceeded to measures. Traversing the room with a rapidity which wholly ignored the twinges which proceeded from her injured ankle, she planted herself immediately in front of Nannie.
"Are you going to leave this room, or am I to put you out of it?"
"Me to leave Mr. Cuthbert's room, and ordered out of it by you! It'll be you that'll be put out of it, and that pretty quick, you-"
Isabel did not wait for her to finish; she anticipated the volley of compliments which had no doubt been intended to follow by straightening her left arm in the most approved fashion, and striking the other full on the nose with a vigour and unexpectedness which caused the old woman to lose her balance and go toppling over on to the floor. Before she had a chance to recover, Isabel had the door wide open, and began bundling the still prostrate Nannie unceremoniously through it. She was conscious that words were proceeding from the man in the bed, but what they were she neither knew nor cared. It was not her intention, if she could help it, to continue the proceedings in his room. Having got the other out of the room somehow, she shut the door behind her, determined to let him know as little of what was to follow as circumstances would permit, at any rate till all was over.
Then she waited for Nannie to rise, which she did with an agility which did credit to her years. As the other had possibly foreseen, the old woman was beside herself with rage. She rushed blindly at her opponent, who was at once cooler and more experienced in little discussions of the kind. Although hampered by her ankle she had no difficulty in evading the other's mad onrush, at least sufficiently long to enable her to receive her with a hail of blows directed impartially at her face and body. The proceedings had only lasted a few seconds, and were waxing momentarily warmer, when they were interrupted by some one who ascended the stairs. It was Dr. Twelves. As was only natural, being very far from edified by the spectacle by which he was confronted, he raised his voice to remonstrate.
"What does this mean? Have you two women gone mad, that you behave like drunken fishwives? Nannie! – Mrs. Grahame! – shame on you!"
Nannie, who had been severely pommelled, and had so far got much the worst of it, abstained, for the moment, from her attempts to return some of the marks of esteem with which she had been presented, and proceeded to vouchsafe some sort of explanation. As, however, she talked at the top of her voice, which failed her badly, and had to stop at uncomfortably short intervals to gasp, it was rather difficult to make out what she said, and when that was done it was not easy to join her observations with each other and supply them with a meaning.
"Put me out of Mr. Cuthbert's room! – ordered me out! – hit me in the face, that had never been laid hands on by any but my mother! – knocked me about as if I were an old rag-bag! – a bold-faced besom that's nothing in the world but the clothes she stands in! – and less character than that! – before I've done with her I'll strip her to her impudent skin!"
Nannie proceeded to do it. The attempt could scarcely have been called successful, because no sooner had she brought herself within the reach of the other's dangerous left arm than she received a smashing blow in the face which sent her staggering backwards. The course of the combat had brought her near the head of the stairs, uncomfortably near, as the event immediately showed. Before she was able to recover herself, reaching the topmost stair, she went crashing down it on to the doctor who stood remonstrating below. Luckily for him he was on the bottom step but one, so that he had time to move somewhat aside before she was in his immediate neighbourhood. As it was she sent him cannoning with uncomfortable violence against the wall, while she herself came toppling on to the landing with a bang which shook the house.
Silence followed-a speaking silence. Above was Isabel, a really striking figure, as, with flushed cheeks, flaming eyes, clenched fists, straightened arms, she stared down on her victim in the depths below. The doctor, more startled than hurt, seemed to be in two minds what to do or say. With one eye, as it were, he looked at Isabel up above, and with the other at Nannie down below. At last he spoke, addressing himself to the triumphant figure up above.
"For all you know you may have killed her."
"It will serve her right if I have!" came the defiant response.
That she was not killed was soon made plain by Nannie herself.
"She's broken my leg! – and I'll be bound half the bones in my body! – the she-devil! Oh, doctor, what'll I do?"
There came the voice from above.
"You'll stop that noise! and if you're wise you'll cut out your tongue! Because the next time you say a rude thing to me, or of me, as sure as you're lying there, I'll have you dragged into the road, and there you shall be left; you shall never set foot inside this house again-I promise you that!"
The doctor had been leaning over her, as if to ascertain the nature of her injuries.
"I believe you have broken her leg."
"To be sure she has! Oh, doctor, doctor, I told you we'd rue the day you brought her into the house!"
"Next time I'll not be content with breaking half the bones in her body-I'll break them all!"
"Hush, woman! you forget yourself; have you no pity?"
"I've pity for those who deserve it, but not for an unmannerly servant who tries to bully her mistress, and then whines when she herself gets thrashed instead! And look here, Dr. Twelves, don't you think that I'm an ordinary woman, because I'm not-"
"That I am rapidly beginning to believe."
"Don't you interrupt me when I'm speaking, not even by attempts to be smart, especially as you happen to be one of those silly old men who are not meant to shine in that line. If you'd got an ordinary woman into the mess you've got me by your lies and humbug, I daresay you'd have been able to do as you liked with her. I suppose that's what you and that old woman have been reckoning on. But I want you to understand just once, and once for all, that you're mistaken. It's going to be the other way round; I'm going to play this game, in my way, not yours; I'm going to do as I like with you. You'll take your instructions from me, and from me only. If you want to be allowed on these premises you'll treat me as a lady and as the mistress of the house ought to be treated. Who's that down there? I heard you sneaking about and listening! Come up here and let me look at you." A shock-headed young woman appeared, followed, at a respectful distance, by one still younger. "If you two are my servants-and I suppose you are, or you wouldn't be there-if that old woman can't walk alone pick her up, carry her to her room and put her to bed, and leave her there; then go on with your work and let me have no nonsense."
All this time Nannie, who still lay motionless, had been groaning in what was evidently genuine pain. The doctor, who had been bending over her, remarked a little dryly: -
"I trust you will pardon me, Mrs. Grahame, but I think her leg is broken".
"Well, what of it? It's her fault, not mine; she's brought it on herself. She may think herself lucky that her neck's not broken after the way she's behaved. I'd have thrown her out of a window if there'd been one handy, and it would have served her thoroughly well right. I suppose you don't want her to lie there, littering up the stairs, even if her leg is broken. She carried me to my room as if I were a sack of potatoes, now they shall carry her. Do you hear what I say, you two?"
So Nannie was borne to her room with anything but the honours of war.
CHAPTER VIII
THE MINIATURE
Like some other persons, so long as she had her own way, and nothing occurred to annoy her, Isabel could be quite agreeable. Now that Nannie was laid low, and Dr. Twelves accorded her the respect she demanded-at least outwardly, for she continually suspected him of having his tongue in his cheek-she proceeded to show that there was a side to her character which was not altogether unpleasant. The household-what remained of it-consisted of two raw damsels, whose English was of such a quality that Isabel not infrequently found herself at a loss to understand what they were saying. They made no secret of the fact that they were by no means heart-broken at Nannie's discomfiture. She had ruled them with a rod of iron, and they were by no means sorry that some one had tried her hand at ruling her-with distinctly solid results. Especially was this the case when they learned that the new mistress was inclined to be as lax as the dethroned one had been rigid. So long as the work of the house was done-and there was not much of it as Isabel managed things-they were free to do pretty well as they chose, even to the extent of there being practically no watch kept on their outgoings and incomings.
The truth was that the new Mrs. Grahame was above all things desirous that no watch should be kept on her. Most of her time was spent in ransacking the house from top to bottom-an occupation she enjoyed immensely, and found no little to her profit. Now that Nannie was laid on her back, and-since at her time of life a broken leg is no small matter-promised to remain there for some time, there was no one to say her nay. Isabel turned out every cupboard and every drawer; waded through every scrap of writing they contained; appraised every article she found-and, indeed, assembled quite a nice collection of what she deemed the more valuable trifles in her own apartment, for her personal use and consolation. She lighted on what, to her, was a considerable sum of money. On this, she learned, Nannie had been accustomed to draw for various current expenses. She, of course, regarded it, there and then, as her own personal property.
Her first appearance out of doors took the form of a visit to a neighbouring small town-not Carnoustie-where she purchased such articles of attire as she imagined she required, together with a trunk to contain them. These she paid for out of Nannie's store. She did not think it necessary to inform Mr. Grahame how she had used what was, after all, his money. She did not seem to think it worth her while to tell him anything.
Her mind was occupied with various problems. First and foremost, she was extremely anxious to ascertain how much money the man she called her husband actually had, where it was, and how it could be got at, say by one who had a right to get at it. Almost as if he were conscious of what was transpiring in her brain, Cuthbert Grahame took advantage of an opportunity which arose, or which he, perhaps, made himself, to volunteer some information on the subject on his own account. The afternoon on which the conversation took place would have been memorable for something else, even if he had not seen fit to make her the receptacle of some very interesting confidences.
Isabel was an active young woman; healthy, full-blooded, vigorous, one in whose veins the blood ran strong. Inaction to her was punishment. So soon as her ankle permitted, and it proceeded to a rapid and complete recovery, she spent a portion of each day in taking the air-that portion of the day which was not spent in prying into everything the house contained. As her researches drew to a conclusion-as even the most thorough investigation allowed them to do in time-that unoccupied portion became more and more. So, having examined the inside of the house she turned her attention to the outside, to learn that her husband's estate was of considerable extent. She wandered up and down it, to and fro, till she began to be almost as intimately acquainted with it as with the contents of the residence. One afternoon she was indulging in one of these rambles when she received what really amounted to a shock.
She was passing through one of the woods of which her husband's property seemed chiefly to consist, and was resting on the bole of a tree, when she heard the sound of wheels. She was perhaps in a peculiar mood, because it immediately brought back to her that night on which she had listened-with what an anxious heart! – to the wheels of Dr. Twelves' approaching trap. Passers-by, thereabouts, were few and far between; for days together she would not encounter any. She had grown to love seclusion, possibly for sufficient reasons of her own. She was seated on a slope. The road began at the foot, perhaps thirty feet away. She instinctively altered her position, so that, while she could see herself, the trunk of the tree almost entirely screened her from observation. She wondered who was coming, peeping round to see. When she did see she drew back with a start.
In the dogcart which presently appeared was her husband-her real husband-Gregory Lamb. The sight of him took her wholly by surprise, and filled her with unwonted perturbation. What was he doing there? What could have brought him to that neighbourhood? She had taken it for granted that he had long since returned to London. Even Mrs. Macconichie's-supposing he was still there, which seemed unlikely-was a good twelve miles away. She was conscious that he was not alone in the trap. Who his companion was she had not noticed; she had not time.
The vehicle drew rapidly level with the tree on which she rested. She decided that she might venture to peep again, and was just doing so when the horse shied so violently that the cart was almost overturned. Recovering itself, apparently getting the bit between its teeth, it bolted like a thing possessed, and vanished from her sight, though not before she had nearly convinced herself that the man with her husband-the one who was driving-was Dr. Twelves. She had only seen him from the back, and then had had but occasional glimpses through intervening trees for half-a-dozen seconds, but she was almost sure that it was he. There was, however, just a possibility that she was mistaken, and it was that possibility which worried her. She would have liked to have been certain, either one way or the other. Then, in the case of the worst, she might have been prepared.
For the juxtaposition could but mean trouble for her. She was too clear-sighted to delude herself with the notion that the doctor was anxious to be a friend of hers. He had, to outward seeming, accepted the situation; probably, in part, because, as she herself put it, she was no ordinary woman; and partly because, under the circumstances, considering the part which he himself had played, he did not see what else there was for him to do. Let him, however, learn how wholly baseless was her claim to occupy the place which she had arrogated to herself, and she did not for a moment doubt that he would use that knowledge to oust her from it in the shortest possible space of time.
The only two points on which she had her doubts were: Was it really the doctor who was driving Gregory Lamb? and, if so, had Gregory Lamb given him cause to even suspect the relation in which she stood to him? On a third point there was no doubt-the dogcart had been moving from, not towards the house, so that in any case the peril was not actually approaching her now.
Another thought suddenly occurred to her, one which set her heart beating faster than was altogether agreeable. The doctor and her husband might have been to the house already, in which case danger might be awaiting her return to what she had learned to call her home.
That was a question which might be quickly resolved-she would resolve it quickly. She started off homewards then and there, telling herself as she went that, whatever had happened, or might happen, they should only be rid of her on terms of her own.
It turned out that, so far, nothing had happened; to that extent, at least, her agitation had been uncalled for. No one had been near the house since she had left it; nothing had happened which was in any way out of the common. The relief she felt at learning even so much showed how real she had imagined the danger was. With some vague idea of subjecting him to cross-examination and learning if he had suspicions of her of any sort or kind, so soon as she had removed her hat she paid a visit to Cuthbert Grahame's room.
As usual, he lay immobile between the sheets, preserving that death-in-life rigidity which, it seemed, was to continue his condition to the end. The sight of him struck in her an unwonted note.
"Don't you get tired of lying there? – especially on a day like this, when the sun is shining and the breeze is stealing among the trees and flowers?"
She did not strike a responsive note in him. He was silent for some seconds, then he asked, in his strange, far-away voice, which was like a husky whisper-
"Aren't you well?"
"Oh yes, I'm well enough. I'm only wondering if you're not tired of being ill. It seems to me that you might as well be dead as keep on lying there with only your voice alive-and that's pretty nearly done for."
She had returned to her more familiar mood.
"Tired! – tired!" He repeated the word twice, then after an interval went on: "What's the use of being tired of what has to be? I'm tired of you, but it seems you have to be-so what's the use?"
"I don't see why you need be tired of me. I'm no more to you than a chair or table."
"You're my wife."
"Your wife! It's because I'm your wife that I'm likely to get tired instead of you. I'm not a helpless statue-I'm a woman; I don't want a dead log-I want a man."
"I was once a man."
"You a man!"
"Seems queer, doesn't it?"
"I don't believe it."
"Yet I was, physically, not a bad sample of a man. Now the Lord knows what I am! – a husk, I suppose. There's a man inside me somewhere still."
"You look as if there were, and you sound it."
She laughed, not pleasantly. It was one of her defects that her laughter seldom had a pleasant sound, as if it were only the spirit of malice which had power to move her to mirth.
"You've confessed why you married me. Do you know why I wanted to marry you, or any one? I'd have married your friend Nannie if she'd agreed, but she refused point-blank."
"Is that true?"
"Quite. It was only when she persisted in her refusal that the doctor thought of the woman he'd found in a ditch. Since anything in the shape of a woman would serve he hauled you up the stairs." She was still. She was standing in her favourite position by the open window, looking out at the woods on the slope of the hill. "Shall I tell you why, when already looking into hell-and I had a good look, I promise you! – I wanted to marry any one?"
"I know."
"Who told you?"
"Dr. Twelves."
"He seems to have imparted to you a good deal of useful information. What did he tell you?"
"That you'd made a will in some one's favour, which you wanted to break, and that was the easiest way to break it."
"Did he tell you who the some one was?"
"No."
"It was a woman. Do you hear-it was a woman!"
"I hear."
"A young woman-younger than you and prettier. Prettier? My God! You're not bad-looking in a way, but there's a streak of the vulgar in you now. No one could ever mistake you for a lady. You're one of the blowzy sort; you'll become impossible; hard-featured; flame-coloured cheeks; bold, staring eyes; huge, unwieldy, gross. She! – she's the most perfect woman God ever made, and she'll only improve as the years go by."
"I've met that kind of woman before."
"Not you. She's not to be found in the sort of society in which you've moved."
"She's to be found in the penny novelettes-never out of them. You and your perfect women! In spite of her perfection you don't seem to have found her all milk and honey, or you wouldn't have been so keen to break that will of yours."
"Do you know why I wanted to break it?"
"Some silly nonsense. Because she tried to scratch your eyes out, I daresay-serve you right if she did."
"Because she wouldn't marry me."
"Because-!" She stopped to burst into noisy, strident laughter. "She must have been a fool. I should have thought any one would have married you if you'd made it worth their while."
"I told you that she was not the kind of woman you have ever met; she's clean beyond your understanding. Put your hand underneath my pillow-gently. You'll find a case; take it out."
Isabel looked at him, hesitating, as if in doubt of his meaning, then she did as he had told her. He was propped up on a nicely graduated series of pillows. As she withdrew her hand, the case between her fingers, she dragged one of the pillows with it right from under the one on which his head reposed, so that, denuded of its support, his head fell back. In a second he began to choke before her eyes. His face grew bluer and bluer; the veins stood out through his skin; he fought for breath; his stertorous gasps shook him from head to foot. She raised his head to its normal position, returning the pillow to its place. As she watched him struggle back to what-to him-was life, she laughed.
"It wouldn't take long to make an end of you."
By degrees he regained the use of his attenuated voice.
"I do want careful handling-that's so. Still I wouldn't murder me if I were you-it would be murder. Murder has to be paid for in full. It would be hardly worth your while to be compelled to render full payment for such a remnant as I am. Have you got the case? Open it."
She held a square Russia leather case, in corn-flower blue. She looked for a spring or for something which would enable her to get at its interior, but found nothing.
"Does it open? I don't see how."
"It's a little idea of my own that spring. I didn't want any one to see what is inside but me. But it's so long since I've seen that I have grown hungry for a look, so you shall have one too. I think I should like you to have one. Hold the case between your finger and thumb, one of them exactly in the centre of each side, then press firmly."
Obeying him, immediately one of the sides flew open in the middle, revealing, framed in the other, the miniature of a young girl. Isabel was no artist; she was incapable of appreciating the artistic value of the portrait which confronted her. What struck her instantly was that it was surrounded by what looked like three rows of precious stones-pearls, sapphires, diamonds.
"Are they real?" she inquired.
"Do you mean the stones in the setting? They are. The pearls are there because she is the queen of pearls; the sapphires, because they are her favourite stones; the diamonds, because I chose to have them."
"They must be very valuable."
"They cost a lot of money, and they'd fetch a lot. That is the girl I wanted to marry me. What do you think of her?"
"She is pretty."
"Pretty! She's beautiful."
"She's too fair for me."
"That's because you're dark. I hate dark women-always have done. Hold the case open in front of me. Let me look at her."
She did as he asked. No change took place in his expression; none could take place. His voice remained the same; that also was incapable of modulation. Yet she knew that an alteration had taken place in him; that as he gazed the man of whom he had spoken, who was inside him somewhere, was stirred to his inmost depths.
"Not beautiful! She's the most beautiful creature in the world. She always has been; she always will be. God bless her! though He has been hard on me." Then, after a pause, "Take the case away and shut it, and put it back beneath my pillow-gently. That glimpse will last me a long time, thank you. Though I may never look at her again, her face will be with me always to the end. Before you close the case you might look at her again more carefully. Perhaps, after you have gazed at her attentively, understanding may come to you; you may begin to perceive the beauty which was hidden from you at the first."
She returned, the case still open in her hand, to the window in front of which she had been standing.