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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..cb7b0cf --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #51926 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/51926) diff --git a/old/51926-0.txt b/old/51926-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index acb4ddd..0000000 --- a/old/51926-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,6155 +0,0 @@ -50497The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Eighth Year, by Philip Gibbs - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you’ll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - - - -Title: The Eighth Year - A Vital Problem Of Married Life - -Author: Philip Gibbs - -Release Date: May 1, 2016 [EBook #51926] -Last Updated: November 6, 2016 - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EIGHTH YEAR *** - - - - -Produced by David Widger, from page images generously -provided by Google Books - - - - - - - - - - -THE EIGHTH YEAR - -A Vital Problem Of Married Life - -By Philip Gibbs - -New York - -The Devin-Adair Company 437 Fifth Avenue - -1913 - -“_The Eighth Year is the most dangerous year in the adventure of -marriage._” - -Sir Francis Jeune (afterwards Lord St. Helier). President of the Divorce -Court. - - - - - -PART I--THE ARGUMENT - - - - -CHAPTER I - -It was Sir Francis Jeune, afterwards Lord St. Helier, and President -of the Divorce Court, who first called attention to the strange -significance of the Eighth Year of married life. “The Eighth Year,” he -said, “is the most dangerous year in the adventure of marriage.” - -Afterwards, in the recent Royal Commission on Divorce, this curious -fact was again alluded to in the evidence, and it has been shown by -statistics of domestic tragedy, by hundreds of sordid little dramas, -that at this period in the partnership of husbands and wives there -comes, in many cases, a great crisis, leading often to moral disaster. - -It is in the Eighth Year, or thereabouts, that there is the tug-of-war -between two temperaments, mated by the law, but not mated, perhaps, in -ideals, in ambitions, or in qualities of character. The man and woman -pull against each other, tugging at each other’s heartstrings. The -Eighth Year is the fatal year, when if there is no give-and-take, no -working compromise, no new pledges of loyalty and comradeship, the -foundations of the home are shattered, and the hopes with which it was -first built lie in ruins like a house of cards knocked down by a gust of -wind. - -But why the Eighth Year? Why not the twelfth, fourteenth, or eighteenth -year? The answer is not to be found in any old superstition. There -is nothing uncanny about the number eight. The problem is not to be -shrugged off by people who despise the foolish old tradition which -clings to thirteen, and imagine this to be in the same class of folly. -By the law of averages and by undeniable statistics it has been proved -that it brings many broken-hearted men and women to the Divorce Court. -For instance, taking the annual average of divorces in England between -1904 and 1908, one finds that there were only six divorces between -husbands and wives who had been married less than a year, and only -eighteen divorces between those married less than two years. Between -the second and the fifth years the number increases to a hundred and -seventeen. Then there is a tremendous jump, and the numbers between the -fifth and tenth years are two hundred and ninety-two. The period of -the Eighth Year is the most productive of divorce. The figures are more -startling and more significant when they cover a longer period. But -apart from statistics and apart altogether from the Divorce Court, -which is only one house of trouble, by using one’s own eyes in one’s -own circle of friends one may see that young married couples who started -happily enough show signs of stress and strain as this year approaches. -The fact is undeniable. What is the cause behind the fact? - -There is not one cause, there are many causes, all leading up from -the first day of marriage, inevitably, with the unswerving, relentless -fatality of Greek Tragedy to the Eighth Year. They are causes which lie -deep in the social system of our modern home life; in the little order -of things prevailing, at this time, in hundreds of thousands of small -households and small flats, inhabited by the middle-classes. It is -mainly a middle-class problem, because the rich and the poor are, for -reasons which I will show later in this argument, exempt in a large -measure from the fatality of the Eighth Year. But all the influences -at work among the middle-classes, in this strange age of intellectual -disturbance, and of blind gropings forward to new social and moral -conditions, have a close hearing upon this seeming mystery. The -economic position of this class, its social ambitions, its intellectual -adventures, its general education, its code of morality, its religion or -lack of religion, its little conventional cults, the pressure of outside -influences, thrusting inwards to the hidden life in these little -homes, bringing dangerous ideas through the front doors, or through the -keyholes, and all the mental and moral vibrations that are “in the -air” to-day, especially in the air breathed by the middle-classes, -produce--the Eighth Year. - -Let us start with the first year of marriage so that we may see how the -problem works out from the beginning. - -Here we have, in the first year, a young man and woman who have come -together, not through any overmastering force of passion, but as -middle-class men and women are mostly brought together, by the accidents -of juxtaposition, and by a pleasant sentiment. They met, before -marriage, at tennis parties, at suburban dances, at evening At Homes. By -the laws of natural selection, aided a little by anxious mothers, this -young man and this young woman find out, or think they find out, that -they are “suited” to each other. That is to say, the young man thrills -in a pleasant way in the presence of the girl, and she sees the timidity -in his eyes when she looks at him, and she knows that her laughter, -the touch of her hand, the little tricks and graces she has learnt from -girl-friends, or from actresses in musical comedy, or from instinct, -attract him to her. She leads him on, by absurd little tiffs, artfully -arranged, by a pretence of flirtation with other boys, by provocative -words, by moments of tenderness changing abruptly to sham indifference, -or followed by little shafts of satire which wound his pride, and sting -him into desire for her. He pursues her, not knowing that he is pursued, -so that they meet half-way. This affair makes him restless, ill at -ease. It interrupts his work and his ambitions. Presently it becomes an -obsession, and he knows that he has “fallen in love.” He makes his plans -accordingly. - -In the middle-classes love still presupposes marriage (though the idea -is not so fast-rooted as in the old days), but how the dickens is he to -manage it? He is just starting his career as Something in the City, or -as a solicitor, barrister, journalist, artist, doctor. His income is -barely sufficient for himself, according to his way of life, which -includes decent clothes, a club, a game of golf when he feels like it, -a motor-cycle or a small car, a holiday abroad, theatres, a bachelor -dinner now and again--the usual thing. He belongs to the younger -generation, with wider interests, larger ideas, higher ambitions than -those with which his father and mother started life. - -He could not start on their level. Times have changed. He remembers his -father’s reminiscences of early struggles, of the ceaseless anxiety to -make both ends meet, of the continual stinting and scraping to keep the -children “decent,” to provide them with a good education, to give them -a fair start in life. He remembers his mother in his own childhood. She -was always mending stockings. There was always a litter of needlework on -the dining-room table after supper. - -There were times when she “did” without a maid, and exhausted herself -with domestic drudgery. There were no foreign holidays then, only a -week or two at the seaside once a year. There was precious little pocket -money for the boys. They were conscious of their shabby gentility, and -hated it. - -The modern young man looks with a kind of horror upon all this domestic -squalor, as he calls it. He couldn’t stand it. If marriage means that -for him he will have none of it. But need it mean that? He and Winifred -will scheme out their lives differently. They will leave out the baby -side of the business--until they can afford to indulge in it. They will -live in a little flat, and furnish it, if necessary, on the hire system. -They will cut out the domestic drudgery. They will enjoy the fun of -life, and shelve the responsibilities until they are able to pay for -them. After all it will not be long before he is earning a good income. -He has got his feet on the first rang of the ladder, and, with a little -luck---- - -So he proposes to the girl, and she pretends to be immensely surprised, -though she has been eating her heart out while he hesitated, and -delayed, and pondered. They pledge each other, “till death do us part,” - and the girl, who has been reading a great many novels lately, is very -happy because her own plot is working out according to the rules of -romance. - -They live in a world of romance before the marriage day. The man seems -to walk on air when he crosses London Bridge on his way to the City. -Or if he is a barrister he sees the beauty of his girl’s face in his -brief--and is in danger of losing his case. Or if a journalist he curses -his irregular hours which keep him from the little house in Tulse Hill, -or the flat in Hampstead, where there is a love-light in the windows. -He knows the outward look of the girl, her softness, her prettiness, -her shy glance when he greets her. He knows her teasing ways, her -tenderness, her vivacity. Only now and then he is startled by her -stupidity, or by her innocence, or by her ignorance, or--still more -startling--by her superior wisdom of the ways of the world, by her -shrewd little words, by a sudden revelation of knowledge about things -which girls are not supposed to know. - -But these things do not count. Only sentiment and romance are allowed to -count. These two people who are about to start on the long road of life -together are utterly blind to each other’s vices or virtues. They are -deeply ignorant of each other’s soul. They know nothing of the real man -or the real woman hidden beneath the mask of social conventions, beneath -the delightful, sham of romantic affection. They know nothing of their -own souls, nor of the strength that is in them to stand the test of -life’s realities. They know nothing of their own weakness. - -So they marry. - -And for the first year they are wonderfully happy. For the first year is -full of excitement. They thrill to the great adventure of marriage. They -are uplifted with passionate love which seems likely to last for -ever. They have a thousand little interests. Even the trivialities -of domesticity are immensely important. Even the little disasters of -domesticity are amusing. They find a lot of laughter in life. They -laugh at the absurd mistakes of the servant-maids who follow in quick -succession. They laugh at their own ridiculous miscalculations with -regard to the expense of house-keeping. They laugh when visitors call -at awkward moments and when the dinner is spoilt by an inefficient cook. -After all, the comradeship of a young man and wife is the best thing in -life, and nothing else seems to matter. They are such good comrades that -the husband never leaves his wife a moment in his leisure time. He takes -her to the theatre with him. They spend week-ends together, far from the -madding crowd. They pluck the flowers of life, hand in hand, as lovers. -The first year merges into the second. Not yet do they know each other. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -It is in the third and fourth year that they begin to find each other -out. The bright fires of their passion have died down, burning with a -fitful glow, burning low. Until then they had been lovers to each -other, hidden from each other by the illusions of romantic love. It was -inconceivable that the man could be anything but kind, and tender, and -patient, and considerate. It was inconceivable that he could hold any -but the noblest ideals, the most exalted aspirations, the most generous -sentiments. He had been so wise, so witty, and so gay. - -And to the man it had seemed that the woman by his side was gifted with -all the virtues. At least she had been eager to please him, to satisfy -his least desire, to bend to his will. She had pandered to his vanity, -fed his self-conceit, listened to his opinions on all the subjects of -life as though they were inspired. If he had been kept out late at work -he had found her waiting for him, quick to put her arms about him, -to cry out, “Oh, my poor dear, how tired you must be?” She had been -grateful to him for all his little gifts, for all his words of love. And -he had seen her as a beautiful thing, without flaw or blemish. He had -worshipped at the foot of the pedestal on which he had placed her in his -ideals. - -But now both the husband and wife begin to see each other, not as -lovers, but as man and woman. It is rather disturbing. It is distressing -to the young wife to discover, gradually, by a series of little -accidents, that this man with whom she has to live all her life is not -made of different clay from other men, that he is made of the same clay. -One by one all the little romantic illusions out of which she had built -up the false image of him, from the heroes of sentimental fiction, from -the dreams of girlhood, are stripped from him, until he stands bare -before her, the natural man. She does not like the natural man at first. -It is quite a long time before she can reconcile herself to the thought -that she is mated to a natural man, with a touch of brutality, with -little meannesses, with moods of irritability, with occasional bad -tempers, when he uses bad words. She sees, too clearly for her spiritual -comfort, that they are not “twin-souls.” They have not been made in -the same mould. His childhood was different from her childhood, his -upbringing from her upbringing. She sees that in little things--mere -trifles, but monstrously annoying, such as his untidy habits, the -carelessness with which he flicks his cigarette ash about the carpet, -the familiarity with which he speaks to the servant-maid. She begins to -dislike some of his personal habits--the way in which he sneezes, his -habit of shaving after breakfast instead of before breakfast, his habit -of reading the newspaper at the breakfast table instead of chatting with -her as he used to do about the programme for the day. In things less -trivial she finds out that her first ideal of him was false. They do not -think alike on the great subjects of life. He is a Radical and she is -Conservative, by education and upbringing. It hurts her when he argues -with revolutionary ideas which seem to her positively wicked, and -subversive of all morality. He has loose views about morality in -general, and is very tolerant about lapses from the old-fashioned -moral code. That hurts her too--horribly. It begins to undermine the -foundations of her faith in what used to seem the essential truth of -things. But, above all, it hurts her to realize that she and her husband -are not one, in mind and body, but utterly different, in temperament, in -their outlook on life, in their fundamental principles and ideas. - -On the other side the husband makes unpleasant discoveries. He finds -out, with a shock, that he was utterly ignorant of the girl whom -he asked to be his wife, and that this woman who sits at his -breakfast-table is not the same woman as the one who dwelt in his -imagination, even as the one who lived with him during the first and -second year. She has lost her coyness, her little teasing ways, her -girlish vivacity. She begins to surprise him by a hard common-sense, and -no longer responds so easily to his old romantic moods. He can no longer -be certain of her smiles and her tenderness when he speaks the old -love-words. She begins to challenge his authority, not deliberately, nor -openly, but by ignoring his hints, or by disregarding his advice. - -She even challenges his opinions, and that is a shock to him. It is a -blow to his vanity. - -It takes down his self-conceit more than a peg or two, especially when -he has to acknowledge, secretly, that she is in the right, as sometimes -happens. He finds out faults in her now--a touch of selfishness, a trace -of arrogance, an irritability of temper of which he has to be careful, -especially when she is in a nervous state of health. They begin to -quarrel rather frequently about absurd things, about things that do not -matter a brass farthing. Some of these quarrels reach passionate heights -and leave them both exhausted, wondering rather blankly what it was all -about. Then the wife cries a little, and the husband kisses her. - -By the end of the fourth year they know each other pretty well. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -In the fifth and sixth years they have settled down to the jog-trot -of the married life. Not yet do they see the shadow of the Eighth Year -looming ahead. They have faced the reality of life, and knowing each -other as they really are have made a working compromise. Their love has -steadied down to a more even flame, and passion is almost extinguished. -They have decided to play the game, according to the creed of their -class, exactly as their neighbors are playing it. - -It is largely a game of bluff, as it is played in thousands of small -households. It is a game, also, of consequences, as I shall have to -show. It consists in keeping up appearances, in going one better than -one’s neighbor whenever possible, and in making a claim to a higher rung -of the social ladder than is justified by the husband’s income and rank -in life. It is the creed of snobbishness. For this creed everything -is sacrificed--contentment of mind, the pleasure of life, the little -children of life. - -In many flats of Intellectual Mansions, and even in the small houses -of the “well-to-do” suburbs, children do not enter into the scheme of -things. The “babies have been left out of the business.” For people -who are keeping up appearances to the last penny of their income cannot -afford to be burdened by babies. Besides, they interfere seriously -with social ladder-climbing, drag down a married couple of the younger -generation to the domestic squalor of their parents’ early life. The -husband cannot bear the thought that his wife should have to make -beds in the morning and mend stockings in the evening, and wheel out a -perambulator in the park. It is so very “low down.” The husband wants -to save his wife from all this domestic drudgery. He wants her to look -pretty in the frocks he buys her. He wants her to wear more expensive -frocks than any other woman in his circle of friends. He likes to hear -his friends say, “How charming your wife looks to-night, old man!” and -to hear elderly ladies say to his wife, “What a beautiful gown you are -wearing, my dear!” - -He is working hard now in order to furnish his wife’s wardrobe--not only -for her pleasure, but for his pride. After the first romance of love, -ambition comes to gild reality. He is ambitious to build up a beautiful -little home. The furniture with which they started married life on the -hire system has been bought and paid for, and is now replaced here and -there by “genuine antiques.” He puts some good prints on his walls and -buys some water-color sketches, and becomes in a small way a patron of -the arts. It is pleasant during one of his wife’s evening At Homes to -take a guest on one side and say “What do you think of that? Pretty -good, eh? It’s an original, by Verdant Green, you know.” - -He has urged upon his wife the necessity of giving _recherché_ little -dinners, to which he can invite friends better off than himself, and -distinguished guests whom he wishes to impress. As he explains to his -wife, “one has to do these things.” And he does them rather well, paying -some attention to his wines--he keeps a good dinner claret--and to his -cigars, which he buys at the stores. He also suggests to his wife that -now she has an extra servant she had better establish a weekly At Home, -an informal little affair, but pleasant and useful, because it shows the -world, their world, that they are getting on in the social scale. Here -again, distinguished visitors may be invited to “drop in.” It is good -for business. A pretty, well-dressed wife makes a favourable impression -upon solicitors who have briefs to give away or upon wealthy clients. -One must keep up appearances, and make a good show. Besides, it is -pleasant to put on evening clothes after a hard day’s work and to play -the host. It gives a man some return for all his toil. It gives him a -reason for living. And it brightens up one’s home-life. “Man does not -live by bread alone,” he must have some cakes and ale, so to speak. - -But it is expensive. As every year of marriage passes, the expenses -increase, steadily, miraculously. It is difficult to account for them, -but there they are, facing a man in his quarterly reckoning. And the two -ends must be made to meet, by extra work, by putting one’s nose down to -the grindstone. The husband does not come home so soon as he used to do -in the early days. But he has the satisfaction of knowing that while he -is away at work his wife is keeping up his social reputation and doing -all the things which a lady in her station of life is expected to do. He -thanks heaven that his wife is happy. - -She is not unhappy, this wife, in the fifth and sixth year of marriage. -After the first romantic illusions failed her she settled down quietly -enough to play the game. It is quite interesting, quite amusing. Now and -again queer doubts assail her, and she has strange flutterings at the -heart, and little pinpricks of conscience. It is about the question of -motherhood. Perhaps it would be better for her to have a baby. However, -she has threshed out the question a hundred times with her husband, and -he has decided that he cannot afford a family yet, and after all the -flat _is_ very small. Besides, she shirks the idea herself--all the pain -of it, and the trouble of it.... She thrusts down these queer doubts, -does not listen to the flutterings at the heart, ignores the little -pinpricks of conscience. She turns quickly to the interests of her -social life and falls easily into the habit of pleasant laziness, -filling her day with little futile things, which seem to satisfy her -heart and brain. When her husband has gone to business she dresses -herself rather elaborately for a morning stroll, manicures her nails, -tries a new preparation for the complexion, alters a feather, or a -flower, in one of her hats, studies herself in the glass, and is pleased -with herself. It passes the time. Then she saunters forth, and goes -to the shops, peering in through the great plate-glass windows at the -latest display of lingerie, of evening gowns, of millinery. She fancies -herself in some of the new hats from Paris. One or two of them attract -her especially. She makes a mental note of them. She will ask her -husband to let her buy one of them. After all Mrs. Fitzmaurice had a new -hat only last week--the second in one month. She will tell him that. -It will pique him, for there is a rather amusing rivalry between the -Fitzmaurices and them. - -So the morning passes until luncheon, when she props the morning -newspaper against the water-jug, reading the titbits of news and the -fashion page while she eats her meal, rather nicely cooked by the new -servant, and daintily served by the little housemaid. Another hour of -the day passes, and it is the afternoon. - -She lies down for half an hour with the latest novel from Mudie’s. It -has a good plot, and is a rather exciting love-story. It brings back -romance to her. For a little while she forgets the reality which she -has learnt since her own romantic days. Here love is exactly what -she imagined it to he, thrilling, joyous, never-changing. The hero -is exactly what she imagined her husband to be--before he was her -husband--strong, gentle, noble, high-souled, immensely patient. And -after many little troubles, misadventures, cross-purposes, and strange -happenings, marriage is the great reward, the splendid compensation. -After this the hero and heroine live happily ever afterwards, till death -does them part, and--there is nothing more to be said. The novel ends -with the marriage bells. - -She knows that her novel has not ended with the marriage hells, that, -in fact, the plot is only just beginning as far as she is concerned. -But she does not allow herself to think of that. She revels in romantic -fiction, and reads novel after novel at the rate of three a week. -Occasionally one of these novels gives her a nasty shock, for it deals -with realism rather than romance, and reveals the hearts of women rather -like herself, and the tragedies of women rather like herself, and the -truth of things, in a cold, white light. She reads the book with burning -eyes. It makes her pulse beat. It seems rather a wicked book, it is -so horribly truthful, not covering even the nakedness of facts with a -decent layer of sentiment, but exposing them brutally, with a terrible -candor. She hates the book. It makes her think of things she has tried -to forget. It revives those queer doubts, and makes her conscience prick -again. She is glad when she has sent it back to the library and taken -out another novel, of the harmless kind, in the old style. She lulls -her conscience to sleep by the dear old love-stories, or by the musical -comedies and the costume-plays to which she goes with one of her -girl-friends on Wednesday or Saturday matinées. - -She goes to the theatre a good deal now, because she is living more -independently of her husband. That is to say she no longer waits for his -home-coming, as in her first days of marriage, with an impatient desire. -She has long seen that they cannot be all in all to each other, sharing -all pleasures, or having none. He has realized that, too, and goes -to his club at least once a week--sometimes more often, to enjoy the -society of men, to get a little “Bohemianism,” as he calls it. - -She has made her own circle of friends now, the young wives of men like -her husband, and many of her afternoons are taken up with little rounds -of visits, when she is amused by the tittle-tattle of these wives, by -their little tales and scandals, by their gossips about servants, frocks -and theatres. - -She, too, has social ambitions like her husband. Her evenings At Home -are agreeable adventures when she is pleased with the homage of her -husband’s friends. She takes some trouble with her little dinner-parties -and writes out the _menus_ with a good deal of care, and arranges the -flowers, and occasionally looks into the kitchen to give a word to -the cook. She wears her new evening gown and smiles at her husband’s -compliments, with something of her old tenderness. After one of these -evening At Homes the husband and wife have moments of loving comradeship -like those in the first days of their marriage. It is a pity that some -trivial accident or dispute causes ill-temper at the breakfast-table. - -But, on the whole, they play the game rather well in the fifth and -sixth years of their married life. The husband takes the rough with the -smooth. In spite of occasional bad tempers, in spite of grievances which -are growing into habits of mind, he is a good fellow and--he thanks -heaven his wife is happy. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -It is the seventh year. The wife is still doing exactly what she did in -the fifth and sixth years. Her daily routine is exactly the same. Except -that she can afford extra little luxuries now, and indulge in more -expensive kinds of pleasure--stalls at the theatre instead of seats -in the pit, an occasional visit to the opera, an easy yielding to -temptations in the way of hats. Her husband has been “getting on,” and -he is glad to give her what she wants. - -But somehow or other she is beginning to realize that she has not got -what she wants. She does not know what she wants, but she knows that -there is a great lack of something in her life. She is still “playing -the game,” but there is no longer the same sport in it. The sharp edge -of her interest in things has worn off. It has been dulled down. She -goes languidly through the days and a matinée jaunt no longer thrills -her with a little excitement. The plays are so boring, full of stale old -plots, stale old women, stale old tricks. She is sick of them. She still -reads a great number of romantic novels, but how insufferably tedious -they have become! How false they are! How cloying is all this sickly -sentiment! She searches about for the kind of novel which used to -frighten her, problem novels, dangerous novels, novels dealing with real -problems of life. They still frighten her a little, some of them, but -she likes the sensation. She wants more of it. She wants to plunge -deeper into the dangerous problems, to get nearer to the truth of -things. She broods over their revelations. She searches out the -meaning of their suggestions, their hints, their innuendoes. It is like -drug-drinking. This poisonous fiction stimulates her for a little while, -until the effect of it has worn off and leaves her with an aching head. -Her head often aches now. And her heart aches--though goodness knows -why. Everything is so stale. The gossip of her women friends is, oh--so -stale! She has heard all their stories about all their servants, all -their philosophy about the servant problem in general, all their shallow -little views about life, and love, and marriage. She has found them all -out, their vanities, their little selfish ways, their little lies and -shams and fooleries. They are exactly like herself. She has been brought -up in the same code, shaped in the same mould, cut out to the same -pattern. Their ideas are her ideas. Their ways of life her ways. They -bore her exceedingly. - -She is bored by things which for a time were very pleasant. It is, for -instance, boring to go shopping in the morning. It is annoying to her to -see her own wistful, moody eyes in the plate-glass windows, and in the -pier-glasses. She has not lost her love of pretty frocks and pretty -things, but it bores her to think that her husband does not notice them -so much, and that she has to wear them mostly to please herself. She is -tired of the little compliments paid to her by her husband’s middle-aged -friends. She has begun to find her husband’s friends very dull people -indeed. Most of all is she bored by those evening At Homes with their -familiar ritual--the girl who wants to sing but pleads a bad cold, the -woman who wants to play but says she is so fearfully “out of practice,” - the man who asks the name of a piece which he has heard a score of -times, the well-worn jokes, the well-known opinions on things which do -not matter, the light refreshments, the thanks for “a pleasant evening.” - Oh, those pleasant evenings! How she hates them! - -She is beginning to hate this beautiful little home of hers. The very -pictures on the walls set her nerves on edge. She has stared at them -so often. She wishes to goodness that Marcus Stone’s lovers on an -old-fashioned stone seat would go and drown themselves in the distant -lake. But they do not move. They sit smirking at each other, eternally. -She wishes with all her heart that the big Newfoundland dog over there -would bite the fluffy haired child who says “Does ‘oo talk?” But it will -not even bark. She stares at the pattern on the carpet, when a Mudie’s -novel lies on her lap, and comes to detest the artificial roses on the -trellis-work. She digs her heels into one of them. If the roses were -real she would pluck them leaf by leaf and scatter the floor with them. -The ticking of the clock on the mantelshelf irritates her. It seems a -reproach to her. It seems to be counting up her waste of time. - -She stays more at home, in spite of hating it, because she is beginning -to loathe her round of visits. She feels lonely and wishes her husband -would come home. Why does he stay so late at the office now? Surely it -isn’t necessary? When he comes home she is so snappy and irritable that -he becomes silent over the dinner-table, and then she quarrels with him -for his silence. After dinner he sits over his papers, thinking out some -knotty point of business, which he does not discuss with her as in the -old days. He buries his nose in the evening paper, and reads all the -advertisements, and is very dull and uninteresting. Yet she nourishes -a grievance when he goes off on his club-nights and comes home in the -early hours of the morning, cheerful and talkative when she wants to go -to sleep. - - - - -CHAPTER V - -In some cases, indeed in many cases, the presence of an “outsider” - adds to the unhappiness of the wife and divides her still more from her -husband. It is the presence of the mother-in-law. - -She, poor soul, has had a terrible time, and no one until now has said a -good word for her. The red-nosed comedian of the music-hall has used her -for his most gross vulgarities, sure that whenever he mentions her name -he will raise guffaws from the gallery, and evoke shrieks of ill-natured -merriment from young women in the pit. In the pantomimes the man dressed -up as a woman indulges in long monologues upon his mother-in-law as -the source of all domestic unhappiness, as the origin of all quarrels -between husbands and wives, as the greatest nuisance in modern life, and -so long as he patters about the mother-in-law the audience enjoys itself -vastly. - -It is idle to pretend that the mother-in-law is a blessing in a small -household. I am bound to admit that the success of the rednosed comedian -who uses her as his text is due to the truth which lies hidden beneath -his absurdity. He raises roars of laughter because the people who make -up his audience realize that he is giving a touch of humor to something -which is a grim tragedy, and according to the psychology of humor -this is irresistibly comic, just as the most primitive and -laughter-compelling jokes deal with corpses, and funerals, and death -made ridiculous. They have suffered from their own mothers-in-law, those -elderly women who sit in the corner with watchful eyes upon the young -wives, those critics of their sons’ marriages, those eavesdroppers of -the first quarrel, and of all the quarrels that follow the first, those -oracles of unwelcome wisdom, whose advice about household affairs, -about the way of dealing with the domestic servants, with constant -references to _their_ young days, are a daily exasperation to young -married women. - -All that is painfully true. In many cases the mother-in-law becomes so -terrible an incubus in small households that domestic servants leave -with unfailing regularity before their month is “up,” husbands make a -habit of being late at the office, and wives are seriously tempted to -take to drink. - -But what of the mother-in-law herself? Is _she_ to be envied? Did she -willingly become a mother-in-law? Alas, her tragedy is as great as that -of the young wife upon whose nerves she gets so badly, as great as that -of the young husband who finds his home-life insufferable because of her -presence. - -For the mother-in-law is a prisoner of fate. She is the unwanted -guest. She is dependent upon the charity of those who find her a daily -nuisance. During the days of her own married life she devoted herself -to her husband and children, stinted and scraped for them, moulded -them according to her ideals of righteousness, exacted obedience to -her motherly commands, and was sure of their love. Then, one day, death -knocked at the door, and brought black horses into the street. After -that day, when her man was taken from her, she became dependent upon her -eldest son, but did not yet feel the slavery of the dependence. - -For he paid the debt of gratitude gratefully, and kept up the little -home. - -But one day she noticed that he did not come home so early, and that -when he came home he was absent-minded. He fell into the habit of -spending his evenings out, and his mother wondered, and was anxious. He -was not so careful about her comforts, and she was hurt. Then one day -he came home and said, “Mother, I am going to get married,” and she -knew that her happiness was at an end. For she knew, with a mother’s -intuition, that the love which had been in her boy’s heart for her must -now be shared with another woman, and that instead of having the first -place in his life, she would have the second place. - -For a little while her jealousy is like that of a woman robbed of her -lover. She hides it, and hides her hate for that girl whose simpering -smile, whose prettiness, whose coy behavior, light fires in her son’s -eyes, and set his pulse beating, and make him forgetful of his mother. - -Then the marriage takes place and the mother who has dreaded the day -knows that it is her funeral. For she is like a queen whose prerogatives -and privileges have been taken away by the death of the king, and by -the accession of a new queen. Her place is taken from her. Her home is -broken up. She is moved, with the furniture, into the new home, put into -the second-best bedroom, and arranged to suit the convenience of the new -household in which another woman is mistress. - -She knows already that she has begun to be a nuisance, and it is like a -sharp dagger in her heart. She knows that the young wife is as jealous -of her as she is of the young wife, because her son cannot break himself -of the habit of obedience, cannot give up that respect for his mother’s -principles and advice and wisdom, which is part of the very fibre of his -being, because in any domestic crisis the son turns more readily to the -mother than to the young woman who is a newcomer in his life, and in any -domestic quarrel he takes the mother’s part rather than the wife’s. -It is the law of nature. It cannot be altered, but it is the cause of -heartburning and squalid little tragedies. - -The mother-in-law, in the corner of the sitting-room, watches the drama -of the married life, and with more experience of life, because of her -years, sees the young wife do foolish things, watches her blundering -experiments in the great adventure of marriage, is vigilant of her -failures in housekeeping, and in the management of her husband. She -cannot be quite tongue-tied. She cannot refrain from criticism, advice, -rebuke. Between the mother-in-law and the daughter-in-law there is a -daily warfare of pinpricks, a feud that grows bitter with the years. - -But the mother-in-law is helpless. She cannot escape from the lamentable -situation. She must always remain a hindrance, because she needs a roof -over her head, and there is no other roof, and she is dependent for her -daily bread upon the son who is faithful to her, though he is irritable, -moody and sharp of speech, because of the fretfulness of his wife. - -This is the eternal tragedy of the mother-in-law, which is turned into -a jest by the red-nosed comedian to get the laughter from “the gods.” - It is also a tragedy to the daughter-in-law, who could shriek aloud -sometimes when the presence of the elderly woman becomes intolerable. - -Many things are becoming intolerable to the young wife. Her nerves are -out of order. Sometimes she feels “queer.” She cannot explain how queer -she feels, even to herself. She says bitter things to her husband, and -then hates herself for doing so. She has a great yearning for his love, -but is very cold when he is in a tender mood. She cannot understand her -own moods. She only knows that she is beginning to get frightened when -she thinks of the long vista of years before her. She cannot go on like -this always. She cannot go on like this very long. She is getting rather -hysterical. She startles her husband by laughing in a queer shrill way -when he expresses some serious opinions, or gives vent to some of his -conventional philosophy, about women, and the duties of married life, -and the abomination of the Suffragettes. But he does not see her tears. -He does not see her one day, when suddenly, after she has been reading -a Mudie’s novel, page after page, without understanding one word, tears -well up into her eyes, and fall upon the pages, until she bends her head -down and puts her hands up to her face, and sobs as though all her heart -had turned to tears. - - - - -CHAPTER VI - - -I_t is the Eighth Year_. The wife does not know the significance of -that. The husband goes on his way without seeing the ghosts that have -invaded his little household. He is too busy to see. The whole energy of -his mind now is devoted to the business of his life. He must earn money, -more money, still more money, because expenses still keep increasing, -by leaps and bounds. He finds it more and more difficult to cut his coat -according to his cloth. He is often surprised because with a much larger -income he seems to be just as “hard up” as when he started the adventure -of marriage. He wonders, sometimes, whether the game is worth the -candle. What does he get out of it? Precious little. Not much fun. In -the evenings he is tired, although his brain is still worrying over the -details of his work, over his business disappointments and difficulties, -and plans. Now and again he is surprised at the strange quietude and -lassitude of his wife. He catches a look of tragedy in her eyes, and it -startles him for a moment, so that he asks her if she is feeling unwell. -She laughs, in a mirthless way, and seems to resent the question. -“Perfectly well, thanks,” she says. He shrugs his shoulders. He cannot -bother about a woman’s whims and moods. Women are queer kittle-cattle. -He can’t make ‘em out. Even his own wife is a perfect mystery to him. -It is a pity they get on each other’s nerves so much. What more does she -want? He has given her everything a woman may desire--a beautiful little -home, many little luxuries, plenty of pin-money. He does not stint her. -It is he that does the stinting. He is always working for her so that -she may play. However--work is best. To do our job in life is the best -philosophy. - -So the husband has on one side the passing suspicion that something is -wrong with his wife, and the wife hides her heart from him. - -Something _is_ wrong with her. Everything is wrong, though she does not -know why and how. She feels lonely--horribly lonely in spite of all her -friends. She feels like a woman alone in a great desert with no other -human soul near her, thrust back upon her own thoughts, brooding over -her own misery. There is a great emptiness in her heart, and she has -a great hunger and a great thirst of soul which she cannot satisfy. -Nothing satisfies that empty, barren heart of hers, that throbbing -brain. She has finished with Mudie’s novels. She can find no -satisfaction in _them_. She revolts from the tittle-tattle of her women -friends. That is no longer amusing. She finds no pleasure in the beauty -of her face. It is no longer beautiful. She hates the sight of her face -in the glass. She is afraid of those big wistful eyes which stare at -her. She is sick to death of dressing herself up. How futile it is! How -utterly vain and foolish! - -She is haunted with ghosts; the ghosts of What-Might-Have-Been. They -whisper about her, so that she puts her hands to her ears, when she is -alone in her drawing-room. Faces peer at her, with mocking eyes, or with -tempting eyes--the faces of men who might have been her lovers, baby -faces of unborn children. Little hands flutter about her heart, pluck at -her, tease her. The ghosts of her girlhood crowd about her, the ghosts -of dead hopes, of young illusions, of romantic dreams. She thrusts them -away from her vision. She puts her hands before her eyes, and moans a -little, quietly, so that the servants in the kitchen shall not hear. - -She is assailed by strange temptations, horrible temptations, from -which she shrinks back afraid. This hunger and thirst in her soul are so -tormenting that she has frightful cravings for Something to satisfy her -hunger and quench her thirst. She is tempted to take to drink, or to -drugs, to dull the throbbing of her brain, to wake her up out of this -awful lassitude, to give her a momentary excitement and vitality, and -then--forgetfulness. She must have some kind of excitement--to break -the awful monotony of her life, this intolerable dullness of her little -home. If only an adventure would come to her! Some thrilling, perilous -adventure, however wicked, whatever the consequences. She feels the -overmastering need of some passionate emotion. She would like to plunge -into romantic love again, to be set on fire by it. Somewhere about the -world is a man who could save her, some strong man with a masterful way -with him, brutal as well as tender, cruel as well as kind, who would -come to her, and clasp her hands, and capture her. She would lean -upon him. She would yield, willingly.... She tries to crush down these -thoughts. She is horrified at the evil in them. Oh, she is a bad woman! -Even in her loneliness her face scorches with shame. She gives a faint -cry to God to save her. But again and again the devilish thoughts leer -up in her brain. She begins to believe that the devil is really busy -with her and that she cannot escape him. - -She has a strange sense of impending peril, of something that is going -to happen. She knows that something _must_ happen. - -In this Eighth Year she is in a state bordering on hysteria, when -anything may happen to her. Even her husband is beginning to get -alarmed. He is at last awakened out of his self-complacency. He is -beginning to watch her, with a vague uneasiness. Why does she look so -queerly at him sometimes as though she hated him? Why does she say such -bitter, cruel, satirical things, which stab him and leave a poison in -the wound? Why does she get into such passionate rages about trivial -things, and then reveal a passionate remorse? Why does she sink into -long silences, sitting with her hands in her lap, staring at the -pattern on the carpet, as though it had put a spell upon her? He cannot -understand. She says there is nothing wrong with her health, she refuses -to see a doctor. She scoffs at the idea of going away for a little -holiday to the seaside. She says it would bore her to death. Once she -bursts into tears and weeps on his shoulder. But she cannot, or will -not, explain the cause of her tears, so that he becomes impatient with -her and talks to her roughly, though he is sorry afterwards. He begins -to see now that marriage is a difficult game. Perhaps they were not -suited to each other. They married too young, before they had understood -each other.... However they have got to make the best of it now. That is -the law of life--to make the best of it. - -So in the Eighth Year the husband tries to take a common-sense view of -things, not knowing that in the Eighth Year it is too late for common -sense as far as the wife is concerned. She wants uncommon sense. Only -some tremendous and extraordinary influence, spiritual, or moral, or -intellectual, beyond the limits of ordinary common sense, may save her -from the perils in her own heart. She must find a way of escape, for -these unsatisfied yearnings, for this beating heart, for this throbbing -brain. Her little home has become a cage to her. Her husband has become -her jailer. Her life has become too narrow, too petty, too futile. In -the Eighth Year she must find a way of escape--anyhow, anywhere. And in -the Eighth Year the one great question is in what direction will she go? -There are many ways of escape. - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -One way of escape is through the door of the Divorce Court. Sir Francis -Jeune, when he was President of the Divorce Court, saw before him many -of these escaping women, and he noted down the fact about the Eighth -Year; and sitting there with an impassive face, but watchful eyes, he -saw the characters in all these little tragedies and came to know the -type and the plot from constant reiteration. Sometimes the plot varied, -but only in accidentals, never in essentials. As the story was rehearsed -before him, it always began in the same way, with a happy year or two -of marriage. Then it was followed by the first stress and strain. Then -there came the drifting apart, the little naggings, the quarrels, the -misunderstandings, until the wife--it was generally the wife--became -bored, lonely, emotional, hysterical, and an easy victim for the first -fellow with a roving eye, a smooth tongue, and an easy conscience. The -procession still goes on, the long procession of women who try to escape -through the Divorce Court door. Every year they come, and the same story -is told and retold with sickening repetition. In most cases they are -childless wives. That is proved, beyond dispute, by all statistics of -divorce. Sometimes they have one or two children, but those cases are -much more rare. But even when there are children to complicate the -issues and to be the heirs of these tragedies, the causes behind the -tragedies are the same. The woman has had idle hands in her lap before -the Eighth Year of marriage has been reached. In the early years her -little home was enough to satisfy her mind and heart, and her interests -were enough to keep her busy. The coming of the first child, and of the -second, if there is a second, was for a time sufficient to crowd her -day with little duties and to prevent any restlessness or any deadly -boredom. All went well while she had but one maidservant, and while -her husband’s feet were still on the lower rungs of the ladder. But -the trouble began with the arrival of the extra servant and with the -promotion of her husband. It began when gradually she handed over -domestic duties to paid people, when she was seldom in the kitchen and -more in the drawing-room, when the children were put under the charge -of a nurse, and when the responsibilities of motherhood had become a -sinecure. The fact must be faced that a child is not always a cure for -the emptiness of a woman’s heart, nor an absolute pledge of fidelity -between husband and wife. These women who seek a way of escape from -their little homes are not always brought to that position by the -unfulfilled instincts of motherhood. For many of them have no instincts -of motherhood. They feel no great natural desire to have a child. -They even shrink from the idea of motherhood, and plead their lack of -courage, their ill-health, their weakness. With their husbands they are -partners in a childless scheme, or if they have a child--they quickly -thrust it into the nursery to leave themselves free. - -But, on the other hand, it is a fact borne out by all the figures that -a child does in the vast majority of cases bind together the husband and -wife, as no other influence or moral restraint; and that among all the -women who come to the Divorce Court the overwhelming majority is made up -of childless wives. - -These women are not naturally vicious. They have not gone wrong because -their principles are perverted. They are not, as a rule, intellectual -anarchists who have come to the conclusion that the conventional moral -code is wrong and that the laws of marriage are neither divine nor just. -On the contrary, they are conscience-stricken, they are terrified by -their own act. Many of them are brokenhearted and filled with shame. -It is pitiful to hear their letters read in court, letters to their -husbands pleading for forgiveness, asking for “another chance,” - or trying, feebly, to throw the blame on the man, and to whitewash -themselves as much as possible. To judge from their letters it would -seem that they were under some evil spell, and that they were conscious -of being dragged away from their duty as though Fate had clutched them -by the hair, so that although they struggled they could not resist, and -were borne helplessly along upon a swift tide of passion carrying them -to destruction. “I could not help myself” is the burden of their cry, as -though they had no free-will, and no strength of will. Occasionally they -give tragic pictures of their idle lives, so lacking in interest, so -barren, so boring. There is another phrase which crops up again and -again: “Oh, I was bored--bored--bored!” It was the man that saved her -from boredom who now shares the woman’s guilt, and stands in the witness -box in this court of honor. He came to her just at that moment in the -Eighth Year when she was bored to death. He was kind, sympathetic, -understanding. He brought a little color back into her cheeks, a little -laughter into her eyes, a little sunshine into her life. He seemed such -a boy, so youthful and high-spirited, such a contrast to her husband, -always busy, and always worrying over his business. He told good -stories, took her to the theatre, arranged little supper-parties, made -a new adventure of life. He would sit chatting with her over the fire, -when there were flickering shadows on the walls. He chased away the -ghosts, gave her new dreams, brought new hopes.... And then suddenly he -begins to tempt her; and she shrinks back from him, and is afraid. He -knows she is afraid, but he tries to laugh away her fears. She pleads -with him to go away, but there is insincerity in her voice, her words -are faltering. She knows that if he were to go away she would be left -more lonely than before, in intolerable loneliness till the ghosts would -rush back at her. So he stays, and tempts her a little more. Gradually, -little by little, he becomes her great temptation, overwhelming all -other things in life dwarfing all other things, even her faith and -honor. How can she resist? By what power within her can she resist? - -She does not resist. And yet by yielding she does not gain that -happiness to which she stretched out her hands. She does not satisfy the -great hunger in her heart or quench her burning thirst. She has not -even killed the ghosts which haunt her, or healed the pin pricks of her -conscience. Her conscience is one great bleeding wound. For this woman -of the middle-classes is a creature of her caste Nor in most cases can -she break the rules of her caste without frightful hurt to herself. She -was brought up in a “nice” home. Her mother was a woman of old-fashioned -virtues. Her father was a man who would have seen her dead rather than -shamed. She received a High School education, and read Tennyson and -Longfellow with moral notes by her class-mistress. She used to go to -church, and sometimes goes there still, though without any fervor or -strength of faith. She has heard the old words, “The wages of sin is -death,” and she shrinks a little when she thinks of them. Above all she -has been brought up on romantic fiction, and that is always on the side -of the angels. The modern problem novel has arrested her intellect, has -startled her, challenged her, given her “notions”; but in her heart of -hearts she still believes in the old-fashioned code of morals, in the -sweet old virtues. This sin of hers is a great terror to her. She is not -brazen-faced. She does not justify it by any advanced philosophy. She is -just a poor, weak, silly woman, who has gone to the edge of a precipice, -grown giddy, and fallen off the cliff. She throws up her hands with a -great cry. The way of escape through the Divorce Court door is not a way -to happiness. It is a way to remorse, to secret agonies, to a life-long -wretchedness. Her second husband, if he “plays the game” according to -the rules of the world, is not to be envied. Between him and this woman -there are old ghosts. This way of escape is into a haunted house. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -Thousands, and tens of thousands of women who pass through the Eighth -Year, not unscathed, find another way out. They are finding it now -through this new femininist movement which is linked up with the -cause of Women’s Suffrage. The Eighth Year produces many suffragettes, -militant and otherwise. At first, in the first years of their married -life, they scoffed at the idea of Votes for Women. They could not -see the sense of it. They hated the vulgarities of the business, the -shamelessness of it, the ugly squalor of these scuffles with the police, -these fights with the crowds, these raids on the House of Commons. -It was opposed to all their ideals of femininity and to all their -traditions of girlhood. “The hussies ought to be whipped,” is the -verdict of the young wife in the first stage of her romantic affection. -But, later on, when romance has worn very threadbare in the little home, -when reality is beginning to poke its head through the drawing-room -windows, she finds herself taking an interest in this strange -manifestation which seems to be inspired by some kind of madness. She is -silent now when some new phase in the conflict is being discussed in her -presence. She listens and ponders. Presently she goes out of her way -to get introduced to some suffrage woman on the outskirts of her -acquaintance. She is surprised to find her a wonderfully cheerful, and -apparently sane, woman, very keen, very alert, and with a great sense of -humor--utterly unlike her tired, bored and melancholy self. Perhaps she -is quite a young woman, a bachelor girl, earning her own living, down in -Chelsea, or as a typist secretary in the City. But young as she is she -has dived into all sorts of queer studies--the relations between men and -women, the divorce laws, the science of eugenics--and she discusses -them with an amazing frankness, and in a most revolutionary spirit, -startling, and a little appalling, at first to this wife in her Eighth -Year. She has made up her mind conclusively on all the great questions -of life. She pooh-poohs romantic love. “There is too much fuss made -about it,” she says. “It is a mere episode, like influenza. There are -bigger things.” She holds herself perfectly free to choose her mate, -and to remedy any little mistake which she may make in her choice. At -present she prefers her independence and her own job, which she likes, -thank you very much. She is tremendously enthusiastic about the work -which women have got to do in the world, and there is nothing they -cannot do, in her opinion. She claims an absolute equality with men. In -fact, she is inclined to claim a superiority. After all, men are poor -things.... Altogether she is a most remarkable young woman, and she -seems to get tremendous fun out of life--and this wife in her Eighth -Year, without agreeing with her yet envies her! - -Or perhaps the wife meets a suffrage woman of middle-age. She, too, is -a cheerful, keen, alert, bustling woman with cut-and-dried opinions on -subjects about which the wife in the Eighth Year is full of doubt -and perplexity. She has a certain hardness of character. She is -intellectually hard, and without an atom of old-fashioned sentiment. -She calls a spade a spade, in a rather embarrassing way, and prefers -her facts to be naked. She is the mother of two children, whom she is -bringing up on strictly eugenic principles, whatever those may be, and -she is the wife of a husband whom she keeps in the background and treats -as a negligible quantity. “We wives, my dear,” she says, “have been too -long kept prisoners in upholstered cages. It is time we broke our prison -windows. I am breaking other people’s windows as well. It lets in a lot -of fresh air.” - -She talks a great deal about sweated labor, about the white-slave -traffic, about women’s work and wages. She talks still more about the -treachery of the Government, the lies of politicians, the cowardice of -men. “Oh, we are going to make them sit up. We shall stop at nothing. It -is a revolution.” - -She is amazed at the ignorance of the young wife. “Good heavens, your -education _has_ been neglected!” she cries. “You are like all these -stuffy suburban women, who are as ignorant of life as bunny-rabbits. -Haven’t you even read John Stuart Mill’s _Subjection of Women?_ Good -gracious! Well, I will send you round some literature. It will open your -eyes, my dear.” - -She sends round a lot of little pamphlets, full of dangerous ideas, -ideas that sting like bees, ideas that are rather frightening to the -wife in her Eighth Year. They refer to other books, which she gets out -of the lending library. She reads Ibsen, and recognizes herself in many -of those forlorn women in the plays. She reads small booklets on the -Rights of Wives, on the Problems of Motherhood, on the Justice of the -Vote. And suddenly, after a period of intellectual apathy, she is set on -fire by all these burning sparks. She is caught up in a great flame of -enthusiasm. It is like strong drink to her. It is like religious mania. -She wakens out of her lethargy. Her feeling of boredom vanishes, gives -way to a great excitement, a great exhilaration. She startles her -husband, who thinks she has gone mad. She argues with him, laughs at his -old-fashioned opinions, scoffs at him, pities him for his blindness. She -goes out to suffrage meetings, starts to her feet one day and falters -out a few excited words. She sits down with burning cheeks, with the -sound of applause in her ears, like the roar of the sea. She learns to -speak, to express herself coherently. She offers herself to “the cause.” - She sells her trinkets and gives the money to the funds. She is out for -any kind of adventure, however perilous. She is one of the Hot Young -Bloods, or if she has not the pluck for that, or the strength, one of -the intellectual firebrands who are really more dangerous. - -It is a queer business, this suffrage movement, which sets these women -aflame. There are a few women in it who have the cold intellectual -logic of John Stuart Mill himself. They have thought the thing out on -scientific lines, in its economic, political, and social aspects. They -want the vote honestly, as a weapon to give their sex greater power, -greater independence, better conditions of life in the labor market. But -the rank and file have no such intellectual purpose, though they make -use of the same arguments and believe that these are the mainsprings of -their actions. In reality they are Eighth Year women. That is to say, -they seize upon the movement with a feverish desire to find in it some -new motive in life, some tremendous excitement, some ideals greater -and more thrilling than the little ideals of their home life. In this -movement, in this great battle, they see many things which they -keep secret. They go into it with blind impulses, which they do not -understand, except vaguely. It is a movement of revolt against all the -trammels of sex relationship which have come down through savagery to -civilization; laws evolved out of the inherited experience of tribes and -races for the protection of womanhood and the functions of womanhood, -laws of repression, of restraint, for the sake of the children of the -race; duties exacted by the social code again for the sake of the next -generation. Having revolted against the duties of motherhood, all -these laws, these trammels, these fetters, become to them intolerable, -meaningless, exasperating. The scheme of monogamy breaks down. It has -no deep moral purpose behind it, because the family is not complete. The -scheme has been frustrated by the childlessness of the wife. Again, this -movement is a revolt against the whole structure of modern society as -it affects the woman--against the very architecture of the home; against -all those tiny flats, those small suburban houses, in which women are -cramped and confined, and cut off from the large world. It did not -matter so long as there was a large world within the four walls. Their -space was big enough to hold the big ideals of old-fashioned womanhood, -in which the upbringing of children was foremost and all-absorbing. But -for a woman who has lost these ideals and the duties that result from -them, these little places are too narrow for their restless hearts; they -become like prison cells, in which their spirits go pacing up and down, -up and down, to come up against the walls, to heat their hands against -them. They believe that they may find in this suffrage movement the key -to the riddle of the mysteries in their souls, world-old mysteries, -of yearnings for the Unknown Good, of cravings for the Eternal -Satisfaction, for the perfect fulfilment of their beings. Their poor -husband, a dear good fellow, after all, now that they look at him -without hysteria, has not provided this Eternal Satisfaction. He has -only provided pretty frocks, tickets for matinées, foolish little -luxuries. He does not stand for them as the Unknown Good. After the -first year or two of marriage they know him with all his faults and -flaws, and familiarity breeds contempt. But here, in this struggle for -the Vote, in these window-breakings and house-burnings, in imprisonments -and forcible feedings, in this solidarity of women inspired by a fierce -fanaticism--there is, they think, the answer to all their unsolved -questions, the splendor and the glory of their sex, the possibility of -magnificent promises and gifts, in which the soul of woman may at last -find peace, and her body its liberty. She is to have the supreme mastery -over her own spirit and flesh. - -It is a fine promise. But as yet it is unfulfilled. It is not to -be denied that for a time at least some of these women do gain -a cheerfulness, a keenness, a vitality, which seem to be a great -recompense for their struggles and strivings. But they are the younger -women, and especially the young unmarried women, who get a good deal of -fun out of all this excitement, all this adventure, all the dangerous -defiance of law and convention. The older women--many of them--are -already suffering a sad disillusionment. They have not yet found those -splendid things which seemed at last within their grasp. They are -desperate to get them, fierce in their desire for them, but the cup of -wine is withheld from their lips. They find themselves growing old and -still unsatisfied, growing hard, and’ bitter, and revengeful against -those who thwart them. The problems of their sex still remain with them. -They may break all the laws, but get no nearer to liberty. They are -still prisoners of fate, bond-slaves to a nature which they do not -understand. The femininist movement is only a temporary way of escape -for the wife who has reached her crisis in the Eighth Year. - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -There is another way, and it has many doors. It is religion. Many of -these women “take to religion” as they take to the suffrage movement, -and find the same emotional excitement and adventure in it. They are -caught up in it as by a burning flame. It satisfies something of their -yearnings and desires. And it is a curious and lamentable thing that -although it has been proved conclusively by all masters of philosophy -and by all great thinkers, that some form of religion, is an essential -need in the heart of women, the whole tendency of the time is to rob -them of this spiritual guidance and comfort. Religion is not a part of -the social scheme of things in “intellectual mansions” and in the small -suburban houses of the professional classes. It is not entirely wiped -off the slate, but it is regarded with indifference and as of no vital -account in the sum of daily life. Occasionally a certain homage is paid -to it, as to a pleasant, old-fashioned ritual which belongs to the code -of “good form.” In their courting days the young man and woman went to -church now and then on a Sunday morning or a Sunday evening and held -the same hymn-book, and enjoyed a little spiritual sentiment. They -were married in church to the music of the Wedding March played by the -organist. Sometimes as the years pass they drop into a service -where there is good singing, a popular preacher, and a fashionable -congregation. They regard themselves as Christians, and condescend to -acknowledge the existence of God, in a vague, tolerant kind of way. But -they do not enter into any intimate relations with God. He is not down -on their visiting list. Many of them do not even go as far as those -people I have described who regard God as part of the social code of -“good form.” They become frankly agnostic and smile at their neighbors -who put on top-hats and silk dresses and stroll to church on a Sunday -morning. It seems to them absurdly “Early Victorian.” For they have read -a great number of little books by the latest writers, who publish their -philosophy in sevenpenny editions, and they have reached an intellectual -position when they have a smattering of knowledge on the subject of -evolution, anthropology, the origins of religion, literature and dogma, -and the higher criticism. They have also read extracts from the works of -Nietzsche, Kant, and the great free-thinkers, or reviews of their works -in the halfpenny newspapers. The ideas of the great thinkers and -great rebels have filtered down to them through the writings of little -thinkers and little rebels. They have been amused by the audacities of -Bernard Shaw and other intellectuals of their own age. They have read -the novels of H. G. Wells, which seem to put God in His right place. -They have imbibed unconsciously the atmosphere of free-thought and -religious indifference which comes through the open windows, through the -keyholes, through every nook and cranny. Occasionally the husband lays -down the law on the subject with dogmatic agnosticism, or dismisses the -whole business of religion with a laugh as a matter of no importance -either way, certainly as a problem not worth bothering about. - -So the wife’s spiritual nature is starved. She is not even conscious of -it, except just now and then when she is aware of a kind of spiritual -hunger, or when she has little thoughts of terror at the idea of death, -or when she is in low spirits. She has no firm and certain faith to -which she can cling in moments of perplexity. She has no belief in any -divine authority from which she can seek guidance for her actions. -There is no supernatural influence about her from which she can draw any -sweetness of consolation, when the drudgery and monotony of life begins -to pall on her. When temptations come she has no anchor holding her fast -to duty and honor. She has no tremendous ideals giving a large meaning -to the little things of life. She has no spiritual vision to explain the -mysteries of her own heart, or any spiritual balm to ease its pain -and restlessness. She must rely always on her common sense, on her own -experience, on her own poor little principles of what is right or wrong, -or expedient, or “the proper thing.” When those fail her, all fails; she -is helpless, like a ship without a rudder, like a straw in the eddy of a -mill race. - -It is just at this time, when all has failed her, and when she seems to -be drifting helplessly, that she is ready for religion, a bundle of dry -straw which will burst into flame at the touch of a spark, a spiritual -appetite hungry for food. In hundreds of cases these women take to the -queerest kinds of spiritual food, some of it very poisonous stuff. Any -impostor with a new creed may get hold of them. Any false prophet may -dupe them into allegiance. They get into the hands of peculiar people. -They are tempted to go to a spiritualistic séance and listen to the -jargon of spiritualism. It frightens them at first, but after their -first fears, and a little shrinking horror, they go forward into these -“mysteries,” and are obsessed by them. It appears they are “psychical.” - Undoubtedly after a little practice they could get into touch with the -spirit-world. With planchette and table-rapping, and with mediumistic -guidance, they may learn the secrets of the ghost-world, and invoke the -aid of spirits in their little household. It becomes a mania with them. -It becomes, in many cases, sheer madness. - -There are other women who seek their spiritual salvation among the -clairvoyants and crystal-gazers and palmists of the West End. - -They become devotees of the Black Art, and dupes of those who prey -upon the Eternal Gullible. There are others who join the Christian -Scientists, and find the key to the riddle of life in the writings -of Mrs. Eddy. They experiment in will-power--upon their unfortunate -husbands. They adopt the simple life, and bring themselves into a low -state of health by fruit diet. They learn a new language full of strange -technical terms, which they but dimly understand, yet find comforting, -like the old woman and her Mesopotamia, which was a blessèd word to -her. But in spite of all its falsity and folly, it does give them a -new interest in life, and lift them right out of the ruck of suburban -dulness. So far at least it is helpful to them. It is some kind of -spiritual satisfaction, though afterwards, perhaps, they may fall into a -spiritual excitement and hysteria worse than their old restlessness, and -become a nuisance to their family and friends, women with _idées fixes_. - -It is better for them if they can grope their way back to the old -Christian faith, with its sweetness and serenity and divine ideals. Here -at last the woman may find authority, not to be argued about, not to be -dodged, but to be obeyed. Here at last she may find tremendous ideals -giving a significance to the little things of life, which seemed so -trivial, so futile, and so purposeless. Here is wholesome food for her -spiritual hunger, giving her new strength and courage, patience and -resignation. Here are great moral lessons from which she may draw wisdom -and guidance for her own poor perplexities. Then when temptations come, -she may cling to an anchor of faith which will not slip in shifting -sands, but is chained to a great rock. The wisdom of the Church, the -accumulated experience stored up in the Church, the sweetness of all -great Christian lives, the splendid serenity of the Christian laws, so -stern and yet so tolerant, so hard and yet so easy, give to this woman’s -soul the peace she has desired, not to be found among the ghosts of -modern spiritualism, nor in the pseudo-scientific jargon of Mrs. Eddy’s -works, nor in the glass-crystals of the clairvoyants. For the Christian -faith has no use for hysteria; it exacts a healthy discipline of mind. -It demands obedience to the laws of life, by which no woman may shirk -the duties of her nature, or pander to her selfishness, or dodge the -responsibilities of her state as a wife, or forget her marriage-vows and -all that they involve. - -There would be no fatal significance about the Eighth Year if the old -religion were still of vital influence in the home. For after all, -in spite of all our cleverness, we have not yet discovered any new -intellectual formula or philosophy which will force men and women to do -those things which are unpleasant but necessary to insure the future of -the race; to deny themselves so that the future generation may gain; to -suffer willingly in this world for the sake of an advantage in a future -life. If people do not believe in a future life, and in such rewards as -are offered by the Christian dogma, they prefer to have their advantages -here and now. But as we know, if we face the facts of life clearly, the -advantages, here and now, are not easy to get. Life, at its best, is -a disappointing business. There is a lot of rough with the smooth, -especially for women, especially for those women of the middle-classes -in small suburban homes, over-intel-lectualized, with highly strung -nerves, in a narrow environment, without many interests, and without -much work. It is just because many of them are entirely without religion -to give some great purpose to their inevitable trivialities that their -moral perspective becomes hopelessly inverted, as though they were -gazing through the wrong end of the telescope. Having no banking account -in the next life, they spend themselves in this life, and live “on -tick,” as it were. Religion is the gospel of unselfishness. Lacking -religion, they are utterly selfish. They do not worry about the future -of the race. Why should they? All they are worrying about is to -save themselves pain, expense, drudgery. Children are a great -nuisance--therefore they will not have children. They want to put in a -good time, to enjoy youth and beauty as long as possible, to get as much -fun as they can here and now. But, as we have seen, the fun begins -to peter out somewhere about the Eighth Year, and “the good time” has -disappeared like a mirage when one gets close to it, and even youth -and beauty are drooping and faded like yesterday’s flowers. What is the -woman to do then? She is the victim of shattered illusions, of broken -hopes. Before her is nothing but a gray vista of years. She has nothing -to reconcile her with the boredom of her days, nothing to compensate -her for domestic drudgery, no cure for the restlessness and feverishness -which consume her, no laws by which she may keep straight. She sees -crookedly, her spirit rushes about hither and thither. She is like a -hunted thing, hunted by her desires, and she can find no sanctuary; no -sanctuary unless she finds religion, and the right religion. There are -not many women nowadays who find this way of escape, for religion has -gone out of fashion, like last year’s hats, and it wants a lot of pluck -to wear a last year’s hat. - - - - -CHAPTER X - -Besides, the husband does not like it. He discourages religion, except -in homoeopathic doses, taken by way of a little tonic, as one goes to -the theatre for a pick-me-up. As he remarks, he does not believe in -women being too spiritual. It is not “healthy.” If his wife goes to -church with any regularity he suspects there is an attractive cleric -round the corner. And sometimes he is right. Anyhow, he does not feel -the need of religion, except when he gets a pretty bad dose of influenza -and has an uneasy thought that he is going to “peg out.” As a rule he -enjoys good health, and has no time to bother about the supernatural. -He does not meet it in the city. It is not a marketable commodity. It is -not, as he says, “in his line of country.” He does not see why it should -be in his wife’s line of country. He is annoyed when his wife takes -up any of these cranky ideas. He rages inwardly when she takes them up -passionately. Why can’t she be normal? - -Why on earth can’t she go on as she began, with her little feminine -interests, keeping herself pretty for his sake, keen on the latest -fashions, neighborly with young wives like herself, and fond of a bit -of frivolity now and then? When she complains that she has idle hands in -her lap, and wants something to do, he reminds her that she found plenty -to do in the first years of her married life. When she cries out that -she is bored, he points out to her that she gets much more amusement -than he does. - -And that is true, because by the time he has reached the Eighth Year -he is pretty busy. Ambition has caught hold of him and he is making a -career. It is not easy. Competition is deadly. He has got his work cut -out to keep abreast with his competitors. It is a constant struggle “to -keep his end up.” He finds it disconcerting when he comes home in the -evenings after the anxiety of his days, dog-tired and needing sympathy, -to find that his wife has an attack of nerves, or a feverish desire to -go out and “see something.” He wants to stay at home and rest, to dawdle -over the evening paper, to listen to a tune or two from his wife. - -He would like her to bring his slippers to him, as she used to do in the -old days, to hover round him a little with endearing words, and then, -with not too much of _that_, to keep quiet, assenting to his opinions -when he expresses them, and being restful. He has his own grievances. -He is not without troubles of soul and body. He has had to face -disappointment, disillusionment, hours of blank pessimism. He has had -to get to grips with reality, after the romanticism of his youth, and to -put a check upon his natural instincts and desires. In many ways it is -harder for the man than for the woman. Civilization and the monogamous -code have not been framed on easy lines for men. To keep the ordinary -rules of his caste he must put a continual restraint upon himself, -make many sacrifices. Women and wives forget that human nature has not -changed because men wear black coats and tall hats instead of the skins -of beasts. Human nature is exactly the same as it ever was, strong and -savage, but it has to be tamed and repressed within the four walls of a -flat in West Kensington, or within a semi-detached house at Wimbledon. - -There are moments when the man hears the call of the wild, and loathes -respectability and conventionality with a deadly loathing. In his -heart, as in the heart of every man, there is a little Bohemia, a little -country of lawlessness and errant fancy and primitive desires. Sometimes -when he has shut himself up in his study, when the servants are in the -kitchen washing up the supper-things, when his wife is lying down with a -bad headache, he unlocks the door of that Bohemia in his heart, and his -imagination goes roving, and he hears the pan-pipes calling, and the -stamp of the cloven hoofs of the old Nature-god. He would like to cut -and run sometimes from this respectable life of his, to go in search of -adventure down forbidden pathways, and to find the joy of life again in -Liberty Hall. This fretful wife of his, this social-ladder climbing, the -whole business of “playing the game” in the same old way, makes him -very tired, and gets on his nerves at times most damnably. He has his -temptations. He hears siren voices calling him. He sees the lure of the -witch-women. To feel his pulse thrill to the wine of life, to get -the fever of joy in his blood again, to plunge into the fiery lake of -passion, are temptations from which he does not escape because he is -Something in the City, or a barrister-at-law, and a married man with -a delicate wife. But, being a man, with a man’s work, and a man’s -ambition, he keeps his sanity, and quite often his self-respect. His -eyes are clear enough to see the notice-boards on the boundary lines of -the forbidden territory, “Trespassers will be prosecuted,” “Please keep -off the grass,” “No thoroughfare.” He locks up the gate to the little -Bohemia in his heart, and puts the key into a secret cupboard of his -brain. He understands quite clearly that if he once “goes off the -rails,” as he calls it, his ambitions will be frustrated and his career -spoiled. Besides, being a conventionalist and somewhat of a snob, he -would hate to be found out in any violation of the social code, and his -blood runs cold at the idea of his making a fool of himself with a -woman, or anything of that kind. The creed of his social code, of the -pot-hatted civilization, of this suburban conventionality of these -little private snob-doms, is stronger in the man than in the woman. When -she once takes the bit between her teeth, as it were, she becomes -utterly lawless. But the man reins himself in more easily. He finds it -on the whole less difficult to be law-abiding. He has also a clearer -vision of the logic of things. He knows that certain results follow -certain causes. He can measure up the consequences of an act, and weigh -them. He is guided by his brain rather than by his emotions. He has -certain fixed principles deeply rooted in him. He has a more delicate -sense of honor than most women. It is summed up in that old -school-phrase of his--“playing the game.” However much his nerves may be -jangled, and goodness knows they are often jangled, especially as the -Eighth Year draws near, he is generally master of himself. At least he -does not, as a rule, have hysterical outbursts, or give rein to -passionate impulses, or suddenly take some wild plunge, upsetting all -the balance of his life. He does not take frightful risks, as a woman -will always take them, recklessly, when she reaches her crisis. - -So it is that he looks coldly upon his wife’s desires for some new -emotional activity, of whatever kind it may be, religious, political, or -ethical. He hates any symptoms of fanaticism. He shivers at any breach -of good form. He would like her always to be sitting in the drawing-room -when he comes home, in a pretty frock, with a novel in her lap, with -a smile in her eyes. He does not and will not understand that this -childless wife of his must have strong interests outside her little home -to save her from eating her heart out. He hides from himself the fact -that her childlessness is a curse which is blighting her. He pooh-poohs -her tragic cry for help. He is just a little brutal with her when she -accuses him of thwarting all the desires of her soul. And he is scared, -thoroughly scared, when at last she takes flight, on wild wings, to some -spiritual country, or to some moral, or immoral, territory, where he -could not follow. He tries to call her back. But sometimes she may not -be called back. She has escaped beyond the reach of his voice. - - - - -CHAPTER XI - -Snobbishness is one of the causes which lead to the Eighth Year, -and not the least among them. It is an essentially middle-class -snobbishness, and has grown up, like a fungus growth, with that immense -and increasing class of small, fairly well-to-do households who have -come into being with the advance of material prosperity during the past -twenty-five years, and with the progress of elementary education, and -all that it has brought with it in the form of new desires for pleasure, -amusement and more luxuries. These young husbands and wives who set up -their little homes are not, as I have said, content to start on the same -level as their parents in the first years of their married life. They -must start at least on the level of their parents at the end of their -married life, even a little in advance. The seeds of snobbishness -are sown before marriage. The modern son pooh-poohs the habits of his -old-fashioned father. They are not good enough for him. He has at least -twice the pocket-money at school compared with the allowance of his -father when he was a boy. He goes to a more expensive school and learns -expensive habits. When he begins work he does not hand over most of his -salary as his father used to hand over his salary a generation ago, to -keep the family pot boiling. He keeps all that he earns, though he is -still living at home, and develops a nice taste in clothes. One tie -on week-days and another tie for Sundays are still good enough for the -father, but the son buys ties by the dozen, and then has a passion -for fancy socks, and lets his imagination rove into all departments of -haberdashery. He is only a middle-class young man, but he dresses in the -style of a man of fashion, adopts some of the pleasures of the man about -town, and is rather scornful of the little house in the suburbs to which -he returns after a bachelor’s dinner in a smart restaurant, or after a -tea-party with gaiety girls. He becomes a “Nut,” and his evenings are -devoted to a variety of amusements, which does away with a good deal -of money. He smokes a special brand of cigarettes. He hires a motor-car -occasionally for a spin down to Brighton. His mother and father are -rather scared by this son who lives in a style utterly beyond their -means. - -The girl is a feminine type of the new style. She has adopted the -new notions. At a very early age she is expert in all the arts of the -younger generation, and at seventeen or eighteen has already revolted -from the authority of her parents. She is quite a nice girl, naturally, -but her chief vice is vanity. She is eaten up with it. It is a consuming -passion. From the moment she gets out of bed in the morning for the -first glimpse of her face in the looking-glass to the time she goes to -bed after putting on some lip-salve and face enamel, she is absorbed -with self-consciousness about her “looks.” Her face is always occupying -her attention. Even in railway trains she keeps biting her lips to make -them red. At every window she passes she gives a sidelong glance to see -if her face is getting on all right. Her main ambition in life is to be -in the fashion. She is greedy for “pretty things” and sponges upon her -father and mother for the wherewithal to buy them, and she will not lay -a little finger on any work in the kitchen or even make a bed, lest her -hands should be roughened and because it would not be quite “lady-like.” - -A pretty education for matrimony! A nice couple to set up house together -Poor children of life, they are doomed to have a pack of troubles. -Because as they began they go on, with the same ideas, with the same -habits of mind, until they get a rude shock. Their little household is -a shrine to the great god Snob. They are his worshippers. To make a show -beyond their meansj or up to the very limit of their means, to pretend -to be better off than they are, to hide any sign of poverty, to dress -above their rank in life, to show themselves in places of entertainment, -to shirk domestic drudgery, that is their creed. - -In the old days, before the problem of the Eighth Year had arrived, the -wives of men, the mothers of those very girls, kept themselves busy by -hundreds of small duties. They made the beds, dusted the rooms, helped -the servants in the kitchen, made a good many of their own clothes, -mended them, altered them, cleaned the silver. But nowadays the wife of -the professional man does none of these things if there is any escape -from them. She keeps one servant at a time when her mother did without -a servant. She keeps two servants as soon as her husband can afford an -extra one, three servants if the house is large enough to hold them. -Indeed, a rise in the social scale is immediately the excuse for -an additional servant, and in the social status the exact financial -prosperity of the middle-classes is reckoned by them according to the -number of servants they keep. And whether it be two or three, the little -snob wife sits in her drawing-room with idle hands, trying to kill time, -getting tired of doing nothing, but proud of her laziness. And the snob -husband encourages her in her laziness. He is proud of it, too. He would -hate to think of his wife dusting, or cleaning, or washing up. He does -not guess that this worship of his great god Snob is a devil’s worship, -having devilish results for himself and her. The idea that women want -work never enters his head. His whole ambition in life is to prevent his -wife from working, not only when he is alive, but after he is dead. He -insures himself heavily and at the cost of a great financial strain upon -his resources in order that “if anything happens” his wife, even then, -need not raise her little finger to do any work. But something “happens” - before he is dead. The woman revolts from the evil spell of her -laziness. She finds some work for her idle hands to do--good work or -bad. - - - - -CHAPTER XII - -If only those idle women would find some good work to do the Eighth -Year would lose its terrors. And there is so much good work to do if -they would only lay their hands to it! If they cannot get in touch with -God, they can at least get in touch with humanity. At their very doors -there is a welter of suffering, struggling humanity craving for a little -help, needing helping hands, on the very edge of the abyss of misery, -and slipping down unless they get rescued in the nick of time. In the -mean streets of life, in the hospitals, at the prison gates, in the -reformatories, in the dark haunts of poverty, there are social workers -striving and toiling and moiling in the service of all these seething -masses of human beings. But there are too few of them, and the appeals -for volunteers in the ranks of the unpaid helpers are not often -answered. They are hardly ever answered from the class of women who have -least in the world to do, and most need of such kinds of work. Many -of these women have good voices. They sing little drawing-room ballads -quite well, until they get sick of the sound of their own singing in -their lonely little drawing-rooms. But they do not think of singing in -the hospitals, and the workhouse wards, where their voices would give -joy to suffering people, or miserable people who do not often hear the -music of life. These women have no children. They have shirked the -pains of childbirth. But they might help to give a little comfort and -happiness to other mothers’ children, to shepherd a small flock for a -day’s outing in the country, to organize the children’s playtime, to -nurse the sick baby now and then. These idle women remember their own -girlhood and its dreams. They remember their own innocence, the shelter -of their home-life. It would be good for them if they gave a little -loving service to the girls in the working-quarters of the great cities, -and went down into the girl-clubs to play their dance tunes, to keep -them out of the streets, to give them a little innocent fun in -the evenings. These lazy women cry out that they are prisoners in -upholstered cages. But there are many prisoners in stone cells, who at -the prison gates, on their release, stand looking out into the cold gray -world, with blank, despairing eyes, with no prospect but that of crime -and vice, unless some unknown friend comes with a little warmth of human -love, with a quick sympathy and a ready helpfulness. Here is work for -workless women who are well-to-do. They are unhappy in their own -homes, because they are tired of its trivialities, tired of its little -luxuries, bored to death with themselves because they have no purpose -in life. But in the mean streets round the corner they would find women -still clinging with extraordinary courage to homes that have no stick -of furniture in them, amazingly cheerful, although instead of little -luxuries they have not even the barest necessities of life, unwearied, -indefatigable, heroic in endurance, though they toil on sweated wages. -The women of the well-to-do middle-classes drift apart from their -husbands because perhaps they have irritable little habits, because they -do not understand all the yearnings in their wives’ hearts, because they -have fallen below the old ideals of their courting days. But here in the -slums these women with a grievance would find other women loyal to their -husbands who come home drunk at nights, loyal through thick and thin -to husbands who “bash” them when they speak a sharp word, loyal to the -death to husbands who are untamed brutes with only the love of the brute -for its mate. There is no problem of the Eighth Year in Poverty Court, -only the great problems of life and death, of hunger and thirst and -cold, of labor and want of work. Here in the mean streets of the world -is the great lesson that want of work is the greatest disaster, the -greatest moral tragedy, that may happen to men and women. - -If the idle women of the little snobdoms would come forth from their -houses and flats, they would see that lesson staring them in the face, -with a great warning to themselves. And if they would thrust aside their -selfishness and learn the love of humanity, it would light a flame in -their hearts which would kindle the dead ashes of their disillusionment -and burn up their grievances, and make a bonfire of all their petty -little troubles, and make such a light in their lives as would enable -them to see the heroic qualities of ordinary duties bravely done, and of -ordinary lives bravely led. Here they would find another way of escape -from the perils of the Eighth Year, and a new moral health for their -hearts and brains. - -It is only now and then that some woman is lucky enough to find this way -out, for snobbishness enchains them, and it is difficult to break its -fetters. - - - - -CHAPTER XIII - -When the woman has once taken flight, or is hesitating before taking -her flight, in the Eighth Year, it is an almost hopeless business for -the husband to call her back. Whenever she is called back, it is by -some outside influence, beyond _his_ sphere of influence, by some sudden -accident, by some catastrophe involving both of them, or by some severe -moral shock, shaking the foundations of their little home like an -earthquake. There are cases in which the woman has been called back by -the sudden smash-up of her husband’s business, by financial ruin. In his -social ladder-climbing he is too rash. One of the rungs of the ladder -breaks beneath his feet and he comes toppling down. Owing to this deadly -competition of modern life, he loses his “job.” It is given to a younger -or better man, or to a man with a stronger social pull. He comes home -one day with a white face, trembling, horribly scared, afraid to break -the news to a woman who has not been helpful to him of late, and of -whose sympathy he is no longer sure. He believes that this misfortune -is the last straw which will break their strained relations. He sees -the great tragedy looming ahead, hearing down upon him. But, curiously -enough, this apparent disaster is the salvation of both of them. The -despair of her husband calls to the woman’s loyalty. All her grievances -against this man are suddenly swallowed up in the precipice which has -opened beneath his feet. All her antagonism is broken down and dissolved -into pity. Her self-pride is slain by this man’s abasement. His -weakness, his need of help, his panic-stricken heart cry to her. After -all their drifting apart, their indifference to each other, their -independence, he wants her again. He wants her as a helpmeet. He wants -any courage she can give him, any wisdom. And she is glad to be wanted. -She stretches out her hands to him. They clasp each other, and there -is no longer a gulf beneath their feet; misfortune has built a bridge -across the gulf which divided them. More than that, all the little -meannesses of their life, all the petty selfishness of their days, all -the little futile things over which they have wrangled and jangled are -thrust on one side, and are seen in their right perspective. The things -that matter, the only things that matter, are seen, perhaps, for the -first time, clearly, in a bright light, now that they are face to -face with stem realities. The shock throws them off their pedestals of -conceit, of self-consciousness, of pretence. They stand on solid ground. -The shock has broken the masks behind which they hid themselves. It -has broken the hard crust about their hearts. It has shattered the idol -which they worshipped, the idol of the great god Snob. - -And so they stare into each other’s soul, and take hands again like -little children, abandoned by the Wicked Uncles of life, and they grope -their way back to primitive things, and begin the journey again. They -have found out that this new comradeship is better even than the old -romantic love of their courting days. They have discovered something -of the great secret of life. They are humbled. They make new pledges to -each other, pick up the broken pieces of their hopes and dreams and -fit them together again in a new and sounder scheme. This time, in some -cases, they do not leave the baby out of the business. The wife becomes -a mother, and the child chases away all the ghosts which haunted her in -the Eighth Year. She no longer wants to take flight. She has been called -back. - -It is nearly always some accident like this which calls the wife back, -some sudden, startling change in the situation, caused by outside -influences, or by the hand of Fate. Sometimes it is an illness which -overtakes the husband or wife. Holding hands by the bedside, they -stare into the face of Death, and again the trivialities of life, the -pettiness of their previous desires, the folly of their selfishness, the -stupidity of their little snobdom, are revealed by the whisperings of -Death, and by its warnings. The truth of things stalks into the bedroom -where the husband, or the wife, lies sleeping on the borderland. About -the sick bed the weeping woman makes new vows, tears wash out her -vanity, her self-conceit. Or, kneeling by the side of the woman whose -transparent hand he clasps above the coverlet, the husband listens to -the little voice within his conscience, and understands, with a great -heartache, the pitiful meaning of the domestic strife which seemed -to have killed his love for the woman for whose life now he makes a -passionate cry. In the period of convalescence, after Death has stolen -away, when life smiles again through the open windows, that man and -woman get back to sanity and to wisdom beyond that of common-sense. They -begin again with new ideals. Perhaps in a little while one of the rooms -becomes a nursery. They get back to the joy of youth, once more the -woman has been called back. - -If none of these “accidents” happen, if some great influence like this -does not thrust its way into the lives of this husband and wife during -the crisis of the Eighth Year, if the woman is not caught up by some -great enthusiasm, or if she can find no work for the idle hands to do, -giving her new and absorbing interests to satisfy her heart and brain, -then the Eighth Year is a fatal year, and the President of the Divorce -Court has a new case added to his list, or the family records of the -country chronicle another separation, or another woman goes to prison -for arson or bomb-throwing. Because the laws of psychology are not so -erratic as the world imagines. They work out on definite lines. Certain -psychological forces having been set in motion, they lead inevitably to -certain results. When once a woman has lost her interest in her home and -husband, when she has become bored with herself, when she has a morbid -craving for excitement and adventures, when she has become peevish and -listless and hungry-hearted, she cannot remain in this condition. Those -forces within her are tremendously powerful. They must find some outlet. -They must reach a definite time of crisis when things have got to -happen. These vague yearnings must be satisfied, somehow, anyhow. The -emptiness of her heart must be filled by something or other. She will -search round with wondering, wistful eyes, more desperate day by day, -until she finds the thing, however evil it may be, however dangerous. -She must still that throbbing brain of hers, even if she has to take -drugs to do so. In spite of all the poison laws, she will find some kind -of poison, some subtle and insidious drug to give her temporary cure, a -period of vitality, a thrill of excitement, a glittering dream or two, -a relief from the dulness which is pressing down upon her with leaden -weights. She knows the penalty which follows this drug-taking--the awful -reaction, the deadly lethargy that follows, the nervous crises, the loss -of will-power, but she is prepared to pay the price because for a little -while she gets peace, and artificial life. The family doctors know the -prevalence of those drug-taking habits. They know the cause of them, -they have watched the pitiful drama of these women’s lives. But they -can do nothing to cut out the cause. Not even the surgeon’s knife can do -that; their warnings fall on deaf ears, or are answered by a hysterical -laugh. - -As I have shown, there are other forms of drug-taking not less dangerous -in their moral effects. If the woman does not go to the chemist’s shop, -she goes to the darkened room of the clairvoyant and the crystal-gazer, -or to the spiritualistic séance, or to the man who hides his time until -the crisis of the Eighth Year delivers the woman into his hands. - -Here, then, frankly and in detail, I have set out the meaning of this -dangerous year of married life, and have endeavored, honestly, to -analyze all the social and psychological forces which go to make that -crisis. It is, in some measure, a study of our modern conditions of life -as they prevail among the middle-classes, so that the problem is not -abnormal, but is present, to some extent, in hundreds of thousands -of small households to-day. All the tendencies of the time, all the -revolutionary ideas that are in the very air we breathe, all this -modern spirit of revolt against disagreeable duties, and drudgery, and -discipline, the decay of religious authority, the sapping of spiritual -faith, the striving for social success, the cult of snobbishness, -the new creed of selfishness which ignores the future of the race and -demands a good time here and now, the lack of any ideals larger than -private interests and personal comforts, the ignorance of men and women -who call themselves intellectual, the nervous irritability of husbands -and wives who live up to the last penny of their incomes, above all -the childlessness of these women who live in small flats and suburban -villas, and their utter laziness, all those signs and symptoms of -our social sickness lead up, inevitably, and with fatal logic, to the -tragedy of the Eighth Year. - - - - - -PART II--A DEMONSTRATION - - - - -CHAPTER I - -In the drawing-room of a flat in Intellectual Mansions, S. W., there -was an air of quietude and peace. No one would have imagined for a -moment that the atmosphere was charged with electricity, or that -the scene was set for a drama of emotional interest with tragic -potentialities. It seemed the dwelling-place of middle-class culture and -well-to-do gentility. - -The room was furnished in the “New Art” style, as seen in the showrooms -of the great stores. There were sentimental pictures on the walls framed -in dark oak. The sofa and chairs were covered in a rather flamboyant -chintz. Through the French windows at the back could be seen the balcony -railings, and, beyond, a bird’s-eye view of the park. A piano-organ in -the street below was playing the latest ragtime melody, and there was -the noise of a great number of whistles calling for taxis, which did not -seem to come. - -In a stiff-backed arm-chair by the fireplace sat an elderly lady, of a -somewhat austere appearance, who was examining through her spectacles -the cover of a paper backed novel, depicting a voluptuous young woman; -obviously displeasing to her sense of propriety. Mrs. Heywood’s sense of -propriety was somewhat acutely developed, to the annoyance, at times, of -Mollie, the maid-servant, who was clearing away the tea-things in a -bad temper. That is to say, she was making a great deal of unnecessary -clatter. - -Mrs. Heywood ignored the clatter, and concentrated her attention on the -cover of the paper-backed book. It seemed to distress her, and presently -she gave expression to her distress. - -“Dear me! What an improper young woman!” - -Mollie’s bad temper was revealed by a sudden tightening of the lips and -a flushed face. She bent across an “occasional” table and peered over -the old lady’s shoulder, and spoke rather impudently. - -“Excuse me, ma’am, but that’s _my_ novel, if you don’t mind.” - -“I _do_ mind,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I was shocked to find it on the -kitchen dresser.” - -Molly tossed her head, so that her white cap assumed an acute angle. - -“I was shocked to see that it had gone from the kitchen dresser.” - -Then she lowered her voice and added in a tone of bitter grievance-- - -“Blessed if one can call anything one’s own in this here flat.” - -“It’s not fit literature for _any_ young girl,” said Mrs. Heywood -severely. She looked again at the flaunting lady with an air of extreme -disapproval. - -“Disgusting!” - -Mollie rattled the tea-things violently. - -“It’s good enough for the mistress, anyhow.” - -Mrs. Heywood was surprised. - -“Surely she did not lend it to you?” - -“Well--not exactly,” said Mollie, with just a trace of embarrassment. “I -borrowed it. It’s written by her particular friend, Mr. Bradshaw.” - -“Mr. Bradshaw! Surely not?” - -The old lady wiped her spectacles rather nervously. - -“A very nice-spoken gentleman,” said Mollie, “though he does write -novels.” - -Mrs. Heywood looked at the author’s name for the first time and -expressed her astonishment. - -“Good gracious! So it is.” - -Mollie laughed as she folded up the tea-cloth. She had gained a little -triumph, and scored off the “mother-in-law,” as she called the elderly -lady, in the kitchen. - -“Oh, he knows a thing or two, he does, my word!” - -She winked solemnly at herself in the mirror over the mantelshelf. - -“Hold your tongue, Mollie,” said Mrs. Heywood sharply. - -“Servants are not supposed to have any tongues. Oh, dear no!” - -With this sarcastic retort Mollie proceeded to put the sugar-basin into -the china-cupboard, but seemed to expect a counter-attack. She was not -disappointed. - -“Mollie!” said Mrs. Heywood severely, looking over the rims of her -spectacles. - -“Now what’s wrong?” - -“You have not cleaned the silver lately.” - -“Haven’t I?” said Mollie sweetly. - -“No,” said Mrs. Heywood. “Why not, I should like to know?” - -Mollie’s “sweetness” was suddenly embittered. She spoke with ferocity. - -“If you want to know, it’s because I won’t obey two mistresses at once. -There’s no liberty for a mortal soul in this here flat. So there!” - -“Very well, Mollie,” said Mrs. Heywood mildly. “We will wait until your -mistress comes home. If she has any strength of mind at all she will -give you a month’s notice.” - -Mollie sniffed. The idea seemed to amuse her. - -“The poor dear hasn’t any strength of mind.” - -“I am surprised at you, Mollie.” - -“That’s why she has gone to church again.” - -Mrs. Heywood was startled. She was so startled that she forgot her anger -with the maid. - -“Again? Are you sure?” - -“Well, she had a look of church in her eyes when she went out.” - -“What sort of a look?” asked Mrs. Heywood. - -“A stained-glass-window look.” - -Mrs. Heywood spoke rather to herself than to Mollie. - -“That makes the third time to-day,” she said pensively. - -Mollie spoke mysteriously. She too had forgotten her anger and -impudence. She dropped her voice to a confidential tone. - -“The mistress is in a bad way, to my thinking. I’ve seen it coming on.” - -“Seen what coming on?” asked the elderly lady. - -“She sits brooding too much. Doesn’t even pitch into me when I break -things. That’s a bad sign.” - -“A bad sign?” - -“I’ve noticed they’re all taken like this when they go wrong,” said the -girl, speaking as one who had had a long experience of human nature -in Intellectual Mansions, S. W. But these words aroused the old lady’s -wrath. - -“How dare you!” said Mrs. Heywood. “Leave the room at once.” - -“I must tell the truth if I died for it,” said Mollie. - -The two women were silent for a moment, for just then a voice outside -called, “Clare! Clare!” rather impatiently. - -“Oh, Lord!” said Mollie. “There’s the master.” - -“Clare!” called the voice. “Oh, confound the thing!” - -“I suppose he’s lost his stud again,” said Mollie. “He always does on -club nights. I’d best be off.” - -She took up the tea-tray and left the room hurriedly, just as her -master came in. It was Mr. Herbert Heywood, generally described by -his neighbors as being “Something in the City”--a man of about thirty, -slight, clean-shaven, boyish, good-looking, with nervous movements and -extreme irritability. He was in evening clothes with his tie undone. - -“Plague take this tie!” he growled, making use of one or two -un-Parliamentary expressions. Then he saw his mother and apologized. - -“Oh, I beg your pardon, mother. Where’s Clare?” - -Mrs. Heywood answered her son gloomily. - -“I think she’s gone to church again.” - -“Again?” said Herbert Heywood. “Why, dash it all--I beg your pardon, -mother--she’s always going to church now. What’s the attraction?” - -“I think she must be unwell,” said Mrs. Hey-wood. “I’ve thought so for -some time.” - -“Oh, nonsense! She’s perfectly fit.... See if you can tie this bow, -mother.” - -Mrs. Heywood endeavored to do so, and during the process her son showed -great impatience and made irritable grimaces. But he returned to the -subject of his wife. - -“Perhaps her nerves are a bit wrong. Women are nervy creatures.... Oh, -hang it all, mother, don’t strangle me!... As I tell her, what’s the -good of having a park at your front door--Oh, thanks, that’s better.” - -He looked at himself in the glass, and dabbed his face with a -handkerchief. - -“Of course I cut myself to-night. I always do when I go to the club.” - -“Herbert, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood rather nervously. - -“I--I suppose Clare is not going to bless you with a child?” - -“_In this flat_!” - -Herbert was startled and horrified. It was a great shock to him. He -gazed round the little drawing-room rather wildly. - -“Oh, Lord!” he said presently, when he had calmed down a little. “Don’t -suggest such a thing. Besides, she is not.” - -“Well, I’m nervous about her,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“Oh, rats, mother! I mean, don’t be so fanciful.” - -“I don’t like this sudden craving for religion, Herbert. It’s -unhealthy.” - -“Devilish unhealthy,” said Herbert. - -He searched about vainly for his patent boots, which were in an obvious -position. It added to his annoyance and irritability. - -“Why can’t she stay at home and look after me? I can’t find a single -damn thing. I beg your pardon, mother.... Women’s place is in the -home.... Now where on earth----” - -He resumed his search for the very obvious patent boots and at last -discovered them. - -“Oh, there they are!” - -He glanced at the clock, and expressed the opinion that he would be late -for the club if he did not “look sharp.” Then a little tragedy happened, -and he gave a grunt of dismay when a bootlace broke. - -“Oh, my hat! Why doesn’t Clare look after my things properly?” - -Mrs. Heywood asked another question, ignoring the broken bootlace. - -“Need you go to the club to-night, Herbert?” - -Herbert was both astonished and annoyed at this remark. - -“Of course I must. It’s Friday night and the one little bit of -Bohemianism I get in the week. Why not?” - -“Oh, I don’t know,” said Mrs. Heywood meekly. “Except that I thought -Clare is feeling rather lonely.” - -“Lonely?” said Herbert. “She has you, hasn’t she?” - -“Yes, she has me.” - -Mrs. Heywood spoke as though that might be a doubtful consolation. - -“Besides, what more does she want? She has her afternoon At Homes, -hasn’t she?” - -“Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood, still more doubtfully. - -“And she can always go to a matinée if she wants to, can’t she?” - -“Yes, dear.” - -“Then I have taken out a subscription to Mudie’s for her, haven’t I?” - -Herbert Heywood spoke as though his wife had all the blessings of -life, as though he had provided her with all that a woman’s heart might -desire. But Mrs. Heywood interrupted his catalogue of good things. - -“I think she reads too many novels,” she said. - -“Oh, they broaden her mind,” said Herbert. “Although, I must -confess they bore _me_ to death.... Now what have I done with my -cigarette-case?” - -He felt all over his pockets, but could not find the desired thing. - -“Oh, the curse of pockets!” - -“Some of them are very dangerous, Herbert.” - -“What, pockets?” - -“No, novels,” said Mrs. Heywood. “Look at this.” - -She thrust under his eyes the novel with the picture of the flaming -lady. - -“Gee whizz!” said Herbert, laughing. “Oh, well, she’s a married woman.” - -“Do you see who the author is, Herbert?” Herbert look, and was -astonished. - -“Gerald Bradshaw, by Jove! Does he write this sort of muck?” - -“He has been coming here rather often lately. Especially on club-nights, -Herbert.” Herbert Heywood showed distinct signs of annoyance. - -“Does he, by Jove? I don’t like the fellow. He’s a particularly fine -specimen of a bad hat.” - -“I’m afraid he’s an immoral man,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -Herbert shrugged his shoulders. - -“Well, Clare can take care of herself.” - -“I wonder,” said Mrs. Heywood, as though she were not at all sure. “My -dear, I think you ought to keep an eye on your wife just now.” - -Herbert Heywood took his eye-glass out of a fob pocket and fumbled with -it. - -“Keep an eye on her, mother?” - -“She is very queer,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I can’t do anything to please -her.” - -“Well, there’s nothing strange in that,” said Herbert. Then he added -hastily-- - -“I mean it’s no new symptom.” - -Mrs. Heywood stared at her son in a peculiar, significant way. - -“She looks as if something is going to--happen.” - -Herbert was really startled. - -“Happen? How? When?” - -“I can’t exactly explain. She appears to be waiting for something--or -some one.” - -Herbert was completely mystified. - -“I didn’t keep her waiting this evening, did I?” - -“I don’t mean you, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“No?--Who, then?” asked Herbert. - -Mrs. Heywood replied somewhat enigmatically. She gave a deep sigh and -said-- - -“We women are queer things!” - -“Queer isn’t the word,” said Herbert. - -He stared at the carpet in a gloomy, thoughtful way, as though the -pattern were perplexing him. - -“Perhaps you’re right about the novels. They’ve been giving her notions, -or something.” - -Mrs. Heywood crossed the room hurriedly and went over to a drawer in a -cabinet, from which she pulled out a number of pamphlets. - -“Herbert,” she said solemnly, “she doesn’t read only novels. Look here. -Look at all these little books. She simply devours them, Herbert, and -then hides them.” - -“Naturally, after she has devoured them,” said Herbert irritably. “But -what the deuce are they?” - -He turned them over one by one, reading out the titles, raising his -eyebrows, and then whistling with surprise, and finally looking quite -panic-stricken. - -“_Women’s Work and Wages_. Oh, Lord! John Stuart Mill on _The Subjection -of Women. The Ethics of Ibsen_. Great Scott! _The Principles of -Eugenics_.... My hat!” - -“Quite so, Herbert,” said Mrs. Heywood, with a kind of grim satisfaction -in his consternation. - -“I don’t mind her reading improper novels,” said Herbert, “but I draw -the line at this sort of stuff.” - -“It’s most dangerous.” - -“It’s rank poison.” - -“That’s what I think,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“Where did she get hold of them?” asked Herbert. - -Mrs. Heywood looked at her son as though she had another startling -announcement. - -“From that woman, Miss Vernon, the artist girl who lives in the flat -above.” - -“What, that girl who throws orange-peel over the balcony?” - -“Yes, the girl who is always whistling for taxis,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“What, you mean the one who complained about my singing in the bath?” - -“Yes, I shall never forgive her for that.” - -“Said she didn’t mind if I sang in tune.” - -“Yes, the one who sells a Suffragette paper outside Victoria Station.” - -“It’s the sort of thing she would do,” said Herbert, with great sarcasm. - -“I never liked her, my dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“Confound her impudence! As if a British subject hasn’t an inalienable -right to sing in his bath! She had the cheek to say I was spoiling her -temper for the rest of the day.” - -Mrs. Heywood laughed rather bitterly. “She looks as if she had a -temper!” - -Herbert gave the pamphlets an angry slap with the back of his hand and -let them fall on the floor. - -“Do you mean to say _she_ has been giving Clare these pestilential -things?” - -“I saw her bring them here,” said Mrs. Hey-wood. - -“Well, they shan’t stay here.” - -Herbert went to the fireplace and took up the tongs. Then he picked up -the pamphlets as though they might bite and tossed them into the flames. - -“Beastly things! Burn, won’t you?” - -He gave them a savage poke, deeper into the fire, and watched them -smolder and then break into flame. - -“Pestilential nonsense!... That’s a good deed done, anyhow!” - -Mrs. Heywood was rather scared. - -“I am afraid Clare will be very angry.” - -“Angry! I shall give her a piece of my mind. She had no right to conceal -these things.” He spoke with dignity. “It isn’t honorable.” - -“No,” said Mrs. Heywood, “but all the same, dear, I wish you hadn’t -burned the books.” - -“I should like to burn the authors of ‘em,” said Herbert fiercely. -“However, they’ll roast sooner or later, that’s a comfort.” - -“You had better be careful, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood rather nervously. -“Clare is in a rather dangerous frame of mind just now.” - -“Clare will have to learn obedience to her husband’s wishes,” said -Herbert. “I thought she had learned by this time. She’s been very quiet -lately.” - -“Too quiet, Herbert. It’s when we women are very quiet that we are most -dangerous.” Herbert was beginning to feel alarmed. He did not like all -these hints, all these vague and mysterious suggestions. - -“Good Lord, mother, you give me the creeps. Why don’t you speak -plainly?” - -Mrs. Heywood was listening. She seemed to hear some sounds in the hall. -Suddenly she retreated to her arm-chair and made a pretence of searching -for her knitting. - -“Hush!” she said. “Here she comes.” - -As she spoke the words, the door opened slowly and Clare came in. She -was a tall, elegant woman of about thirty, with a quiet manner and -melancholy eyes in which there was a great wistfulness. She spoke rather -wearily-- - -“Not gone yet, Herbert? You’ll be late for the club.” - -Herbert looked at his wife curiously, as though trying to discover some -of those symptoms to which his mother had alluded. - -“I’m afraid that’s your fault,” he said. - -“My fault?” - -“Surely you ought to stay at home sometimes and help me to get off -decently,” said Herbert in an aggrieved way. “You know perfectly well my -tie always goes wrong.” - -Clare sighed; and then smiled rather miserably. - -“Why can’t men learn to do their own ties? We’re living in the twentieth -century, aren’t we?” - -She took off her hat, and sat down with it in her lap. - -“Oh, how my head aches to-night.” - -“Where have you been?” asked Herbert - -“Yes, dear, where _have_ you been?” asked Mrs. Heywood. - -“I’ve been round to church for a few minutes,” said Clare. - -“What on earth for?” asked Herbert impatiently. - -“What does one go to church for?” - -“God knows!” said Herbert bitterly. - -“Precisely. Have you any objection?” - -“Yes, I have.” - -Herbert spoke with some severity, as though he had many objections. - -“I don’t object to you going to your club,” said Clare. - -“Oh, that’s different.” - -“In what way?” asked Clare. - -“In every way. I am a man, and you’re a woman.” - -Clare Heywood thought this answer out. She seemed to find something in -the argument. - -“Yes,” she said, “it does make a lot of difference.” - -“I object strongly to this religious craze of yours,” said Herbert, -trying to be calm and reasonable. “It’s unnatural. It’s--it’s devilish -absurd.” - -“It may keep me from--from doing other things,” said Clare. - -She spoke as though the words had some tragic significance. - -“Why can’t you stay at home and read a decent novel?” - -“It is so difficult to find a _decent_ novel. And I am sick of them -all.” - -“Well, play the piano, then,” said Herbert. - -“I am tired of playing the piano, especially when there is no one to -listen.” - -“There’s mother,” said Herbert. - -“Mother has no ear for music.” - -Mrs. Heywood was annoyed at this remark. It seemed to her unjust. - -“How can you say so, Clare? You know I love Mozart.” - -“I haven’t played Mozart for years,” said Clare, laughing a little. “You -are thinking of Mendelssohn.” - -“Well, it’s all the same,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“Yes, I suppose so,” said Clare very wearily. She drooped her head and -shut her eyes until suddenly she seemed to smell something. - -“Is there anything burning?” - -“Burning?” said Herbert nervously. - -“There is a queer smell in the flat,” said Clare. - -Herbert stood with his back to the fire, and sniffed strenuously. “I -can’t smell anything.” - -“It’s your fancy, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“It’s the smell of burned paper,” said Clare quite positively. - -“Do you think so?” said her mother-in-law. - -“Burned paper?” said Herbert. - -Clare became suspicious. She leaned forward in her chair and stared into -the fireplace. - -“What are all those ashes in the grate?” she said. - -“Oh, yes,” said Herbert, as though he had suddenly remembered. “Of -course I _have_ been burning some papers.” - -“What papers?” asked Clare. - -“Oh, old things,” said Herbert rather hurriedly. “Well, I had better be -off. Goodnight, mother.” - -He kissed her affectionately and said: - -“Don’t stay up late. I have taken the key, Clare.” - -“I hope it will fit the lock when you come back,” said Clare. - -She spoke the words very quietly, but for some reason they raised her -husband’s ire. - -“For heaven’s sake don’t try to be funny, Clare.” - -“I wasn’t trying,” said Clare very calmly. For a moment Herbert -hesitated. Then he came back to his wife and kissed her. - -“I think we are both a bit irritable to-night, aren’t we?” - -“Are we?” said Clare. - -“Nerves,” said Herbert, “the curse of the age. Well, good-night.” - -Just as he was going out, Mollie, the maidservant, came in and said: - -“It’s Miss Vernon, ma’am.” - -“Oh,” said Clare. She glanced at her husband for a moment and theft -said: - -“Well, bring her in, Mollie.” - -“Yes, ma’am,” said Mollie, going out of the room again. - -“Great Scott!” exclaimed Herbert, in a sudden excitement. “It’s that -woman who flings her beastly orange-peel into my window boxes. -Clare, I strongly object----” - -Clare answered him a little passionately: “Oh, I am tired of your -objections.” - -“She’s not a respectable character,” said Herbert. - -“Hush, Herbert!” said Mrs. Heywood. - -As she spoke the girl who had been called Madge Vernon entered the room. - -She was a bright, cheery girl, dressed plainly in a tailor-made coat and -skirt, with brown boots. - -“I thought I would look in for half-an-hour,” she said very cheerfully -to Clare. “If you are busy, send me packing, my dear.” - -“I am never busy,” said Clare. “I have nothing in the world to do.” - -“Oh, that’s rotten!” said Madge. “Can’t you invent something? How are -you, Mrs. Heywood?” - -She shook hands with the old lady, who answered her greeting with a -rather grim “Good evening.” - -“Herbert is going out to-night,” said Clare. “By the way, you don’t know -my husband.” - -Madge Vernon looked at Herbert Heywood very sweetly. - -“I have heard him singing. How do you do?” - -Herbert was not at all pleased with her sweetness. - -“Excuse me, won’t you?” he said. “I am just off to my club.” - -“Don’t you take your wife with you?” asked Miss Vernon. - -“My wife! It’s a man’s club.” - -“Oh, I see. Men only. Rather selfish, isn’t it?” - -Herbert Heywood was frankly astonished. - -“Selfish? Why selfish? Well, I won’t stop to argue the point. -Good-night, Clare. Doubtless you will enjoy Miss Vernon’s remarkable and -revolutionary ideas.” - -“I am sure I shall,” said Clare. - -Mrs. Heywood followed her son to the door. - -“Be sure you put a muffler round your neck, dear.” - -Herbert answered his mother in a low voice, looking fiercely at Madge -Vernon. - -“I should like to twist it round somebody else’s neck!” - -“I will come and find it for you, dear.” - -The two young women were left alone together, and Clare brought forward -a chair. - -“Sit down, won’t you? Here?” - -A moment later the front door was heard to hang and at the sound of it -Madge laughed a little. - -“Funny things, husbands! I am sure I shouldn’t know what to do with -one.” - -Clare smiled wanly. - -“One can’t do anything with them.” - -“By the by,” said Madge, “I have brought a new pamphlet for you. The -‘Rights of Wives.’” - -Clare took the small book nervously, as though it were a bomb which -might go off at any moment. - -“I have been reading those other pamphlets.” - -“Pretty good, eh?” said Madge, laughing. “Eye-openers! What?” - -“They alarm me a little,” said Clare. “Alarm you?” Madge Vernon was -immensely amused. “Why, they don’t bite!” - -“Yes, they do,” said Clare. “Here.” She put her hand to her head as if -it had been wounded. - -“You mean they give you furiously to think? Well, that’s good.” - -“I’m not sure,” said Clare. “Since I began to think I have been very -miserable.” - -“Oh, that will soon wear off,” said Madge Vernon briskly. “You’ll get -used to it.” - -“It will always hurt,” said Clare. - -Madge Vernon smiled at her. - -“I made a habit of it.” - -“It’s best not to think,” said Clare. “It’s best to go on being stupid -and self-satisfied.” - -Clare’s visitor was shocked. - -“Oh, not self-satisfied! That is intellectual death.” - -“There are other kinds of death,” said Clare. “Moral death.” - -Madge Vernon raised her eyebrows. - -“We must buck up and do things. That’s the law of life.” - -“I have nothing to do,” said Clare, in a pitiful way. - -“How strange! I have such a million things to do. My days aren’t long -enough. I am always pottering about with one thing or another.” - -“What kind of things?” asked Clare wistfully. - -Madge Vernon gave her a cheerful little laugh. - -“For one thing, it’s a great joke having to earn one’s own living. The -excitement of never knowing whether one can afford the next day’s meal! -The joy of painting pictures--which the Royal Academy will inevitably -reject. The horrible delight of burning them when they are rejected.... -Besides, I am a public character, I am.” - -“Are you? How?” asked Clare. - -“A most notorious woman. I’m on the local Board of Guardians and -all sorts of funny old committees for looking after everything and -everybody.” - -“What do you do?” - -Clare asked the question as though some deep mystery lay in the answer. - -“Oh, I poke up the old stick-in-the-muds,” said Madge Vernon, “and stir -up no end of jolly rows. I make them do things, too; and they hate it. -Oh, how they hate it!” - -“What things, Madge?” - -“Why, attending to drains, and starving widows, and dead dogs, and -imbecile children, and people ‘what won’t work,’ and people ‘what will’ -but can’t.” - -Clare laughed at this description and then became sad again. - -“I envy you! I have nothing on earth to do, and my days are growing -longer and longer, so that each one seems a year.” - -“Haven’t you any housework to do?” asked Madge. - -“Not since my husband could afford an extra servant.” - -Miss Vernon made an impatient little gesture. - -“Oh, those extra servants! They have ruined hundreds of happy homes.” - -“Well, we have only got one now,” said Clare. “The other left last -night, because she couldn’t get on with my mother-in-law.” - -“They never can!” said Miss Vernon. - -“Anyhow, Herbert doesn’t think it ladylike for me to do housework.” - -Madge Vernon scoffed at the idea. - -“Ladylike! Oh, this suburban snobbishness! How I hate the damn thing! -Forgive my bad language, won’t you?” - -“I like it,” said Clare. - -Miss Vernon continued her cross-examination. - -“Don’t you even make your own bed? It’s awfully healthy to turn a -mattress and throw the pillows about.” - -“Herbert objects to my making beds,” said Clare. - -“Don’t you make the puddings or help in the washing up?” - -“Herbert objects to my going into the kitchen,” said Clare. - -“Don’t you ever break a few plates?” - -Clare smiled at her queer question. - -“No, why should I?” - -“There’s nothing like breaking things to relieve one’s pent-up -emotions,” said Miss Vernon, with an air of profound knowledge. - -“The only thing I have broken lately is something--here,” said Clare, -putting her hand to her heart. - -Miss Vernon was scornful. - -“Oh, rubbish! The heart is unbreakable, my dear. Now, heads are much -easier to crack.” - -“I think mine is getting cracked, too,” said Clare. - -She put her hands to her head, as though it were grievously cracked. - -Madge Vernon stared at her frankly and thoughtfully. - -“Look here,” she said, after a little silence, “I tell you what _you_ -want. It’s a baby. Why don’t you have one?” - -“Herbert can’t afford it,” said Clare. Madge Vernon raised her hands. - -“Stuff and nonsense!” she said. - -“Besides,” said Clare in a matter-of-fact way, “they don’t make flats -big enough for babies in Intellectual Mansions.” - -Madge Vernon looked round the room, and frowned angrily. - -“No, that’s true. There’s no place to keep a perambulator. Oh, these -jerry builders! Immoral devils!” - -There was a silence between the two women. Both of them seemed deep in -thought. - -Then presently Clare said: “I feel as if something were going to happen; -as if something must happen or break.” - -“About time, my dear,” said Madge. “How long have you been married?” - -“Eight years,” said Clare, in a casual way. Madge Vernon whistled with a -long-drawn note of ominous meaning. - -“The Eighth Year, eh?” - -“Yes, it’s our eighth year of marriage.” - -“That’s bad,” said Madge. “The Eighth Year! You will have to be very -careful, Clare.” - -Clare was startled. “What do you mean?” she asked. - -“Haven’t you heard?” said Miss Vernon. - -“Heard what?” - -“I thought everybody knew.” - -“Knew what?” asked Clare anxiously. - -Madge Vernon looked at her in a pitying way. - -“It’s in the evidence on the Royal Commission on Divorce.” - -“What is?” - -“About the Eighth Year.” - -“What about it?” asked Clare. She was beginning to feel annoyed. What -was Madge hiding from her? - -“Why,” said Madge, “about it being the fatal year in marriage.” - -“The fatal year?” - -The girl leaned forward in her chair and said in a solemn way: - -“There are more divorces begun in the Eighth Year than in any other -period.” - -Clare Heywood was scared. - -“Good gracious!” she said, in a kind of whisper. - -“It’s a psychological fact,” said Madge. “I work it out in this way. -In the first and second years a wife is absorbed in the experiment of -marriage and in the sentimental phase of love. In the third and fourth -years she begins to study her husband and to find him out. In the fifth -and sixth years, having found him out completely, she makes a working -compromise with life and tries to make the best of it. In the seventh -and eighth years she begins to find out herself, and then----” - -“And then?” asked Clare, very anxiously. - -Clare Heywood was profoundly disturbed. - -“Well, then,” said Madge, “there is the devil to pay!” - -“Dear God!” she cried. - -“You see, it’s like this. If a woman has no child she gets bored... . -She can’t help getting bored, poor soul. Her husband is so devoted to -her that he provides her with every opportunity for getting bored--extra -servants, extra little luxuries, and what he calls a beautiful little -home. Ugh!” She stared round the room and made a face. - -“He is so intent on this that he nearly works himself to death. Comes -home with business thoughts in his head. Doesn’t notice his wife’s -wistful eyes, and probably dozes off to sleep after supper. Isn’t that -so?” - -“Yes,” said Clare. “Horribly so.” - -“Well, then, having got bored, she gets emotional. Of course the husband -doesn’t notice that either. _He’s_ not emotional. He is only wondering -how to make both ends meet. But when his wife begins to get emotional, -when she feels that something has broken here” (she put her hand to her -heart), “when she feels like crying at unexpected moments and laughing -at the wrong time, why then----” - -“What?” asked Clare. - -“Why, then, it’s about time the husband began to notice things, or -things will begin to happen to his wife which he won’t jolly well like. -That’s all!” - -Clare Heywood searched her friend’s face with hungry eyes. - -“Why, what will his wife do?” - -“Well, there are various alternatives. She either takes to religion----” - -“Ah!” said Clare, flushing a little. - -“Or to drink----” - -“Oh, no!” said Clare, shuddering a little. - -“Or to some other kind of man,” said Madge very calmly. - -Clare Hey wood was agitated and alarmed. - -“How do you know these things?” she asked. - -“Oh, I’ve studied ‘em,” said Madge Vernon cheerfully. “Of course there’s -always another alternative.” - -“What’s that?” asked Clare eagerly. - -“Work,” said Madge Vernon solemnly. - -“What kind of work?” - -“Oh, any kind, so long as it’s absorbing and satisfying. Personally -I like breaking things. One must always begin by breaking before one -begins building. But it’s very exciting.” - -“It must be terribly exciting.” - -“For instance,” said Madge, laughing quietly, “it’s good to hear a pane -of glass go crack.” - -“How does it make you feel?” asked Clare Heywood. - -“Oh,” said Madge, “it gives one a jolly feeling down the spine. You -should try it.” - -“I daren’t,” said Clare. - -“It would do you a lot of good. It would get rid of your megrims. -Besides, it’s in a good cause.” - -“I am not so sure of that,” said Clare. - -“It’s in the cause of woman’s liberty. It’s in the cause of all these -suburban wives imprisoned in these stuffy little homes. It lets in God’s -fresh air.” - -Clare rose and moved about the room. “It’s very stuffy in here,” she -said. “It’s stifling.” At this moment Mollie came in the room again, and -smiled across at her mistress, saying: “Mr. Bradshaw to see you, ma’am.” - -Clare was obviously agitated. She showed signs of embarrassment, and her -voice trembled when she said: - -“Tell him--tell him I’m engaged.” - -“He says he must see you--on business,” said Mollie, lingering at the -door. - -“On business?” - -“That’s what my young man says when he whistles up the tube,” said -Mollie. - -Madge Vernon looked at her friend and said rather “meaningly”: “Don’t -you _want_ to see him? If so I shouldn’t if I were you.” - -“Oh, yes,” said Clare, trying to appear quite cool. “If it’s on -business.” - -“Very well, ma’am,” said Mollie. As she left the room she said under her -breath: “I thought you would.” - -“Do you have business relations with Mr. Bradshaw?” asked Madge Vernon. - -“Yes,” said Clare; “no.... In a sort of way.” - -“I thought he was a novelist,” said Madge. - -“So he is.” - -“Dangerous fellows, novelists.” - -“Hush!” said Clare. “He might hear you.” - -“If it’s on business I must go, I suppose,” said Madge Vernon, rising -from her chair. - -“No, don’t go; stay!” said Clare, speaking with strange excitement. - -As soon as she had uttered the words the visitor, Gerald Bradshaw, came -in. - -He was a handsome, “artistic” looking man, with longish brown hair and -a vandyke beard. He was dressed in a brown suit, with a big brown silk -tie. He came forward in a graceful way, perfectly at ease, and with a -charming manner. - -“How do you do, Mrs. Heywood?” - -“I _must_ be going,” said Madge. “Good-by, dear.” - -“Oh, _do_ stay,” whispered Clare. - -“Impossible. I have to speak to-night.” - -Although Madge Vernon had ignored the artist, he smiled at her and said: - -“Don’t you speak by day as a rule?” - -“Not until I am spoken to.... Good-night, Clare.” - -“Well, if you must be going--” said Clare uneasily. - -Madge Vernon stood for a moment at the door and smiled back at her -friend. “You will remember, won’t you?” - -“What?” - -“The Eighth Year,” said Madge. With that parting shot she whisked out of -the room. - -Gerald Bradshaw breathed a sigh of relief. Then he went across to Clare -and kissed her hands. - -“I can’t stand that creature. A she-devil!” - -“She is my friend,” said Clare. - -“I am sorry to hear it,” said Gerald Bradshaw. - -Clare Heywood drooped her eyelashes before his bold, smiling gaze. - -“Why did you come again?” she asked. “I told you not to come.” - -“That is why I came. May I smoke?” - -He lit a cigarette before he had received he permission, and after a -whiff or two said: - -“Is the good man at the club?” - -“You know he is at the club,” said Clare. “True. That is another reason -why I came. Clare Heywood’s face flushed and her voice trembled a -little. - -“Gerald, if you had any respect for me---- - -“Respect is a foolish word,” said Gerald Bradshaw. “Hopelessly -old-fashioned. Now adays men and women like or dislike, hate or love.” - -“I think I hate you,” said Clare in a low voice. - -Gerald smiled at her. - -“No, you don’t. You are a little frightened of me. That is all.” - -The woman laughed nervously, but there was a look of fear in her eyes. - -“Why should I be frightened of you?” - -“Because I tell you the truth. I don’t keep up the foolish old pretences -by which men and women hide themselves from each other. You cannot hide -from me, Clare.” - -“You seem to strip my soul bare,” said Clare and when the man laughed at -her she said: “Yes, I am frightened of you.” - -“It is because you are like all suburban women,” said Gerald, “brought -up in this environment of hypocritical virtue and false sentiment. You -are frightened at the verities of life.” - -Clare Heywood gave a deep, quivering sigh. “Life is a tragic thing, -Gerald,” she said. “Life is a jolly thing if one makes the best of it, -if one fulfils one’s own nature.” - -“One’s own nature is generally bad.” - -“Never mind,” said Gerald cheerfully. “It is one’s own. Bad or good, it -must find expression instead of being smothered or strangled. Life is -tragic only to those who are afraid of it. Don’t be afraid, Clare. Do -the things you want to do.” - -“There is nothing I want to do,” said Clare wearily. “Nothing except to -find peace.” - -“Exactly. Peace. How can you find peace, my poor Clare, in this stuffy -life of yours--in this daily denial of your own nature? There are heaps -of things you want.” - -Clare laughed again, in a mirthless way. “How do you know?” she asked. - -“Of course I know. Shall I tell you?” - -“I think I would rather you didn’t,” said Clare. - -“I will tell you,” said the man. “Liberty is one of them.” - -“Liberty is a vague word.” - -“Liberty for your soul,” said Gerald. - -“Herbert objects to my having a soul.” - -“Liberty for that beating heart of yours, Clare.” - -The woman put both hands to her heart. - -“Yes, it beats, and beats.” - -“You want to escape, Clare.” - -“Escape?” - -She seemed frightened at that word. She whispered it. - -“Escape from the deadening influence of domestic dulness.” - -“I can’t deny the dulness,” said Clare. - -“You want adventure. Your heart is seeking adventure. You know it. You -know that I am telling you the truth.” - -As the man spoke he came closer to her, and with his hands in his -pockets stood in front of her, staring into her eyes. - -“You make me afraid,” said Clare. All the color had faded out of her -face and she was dead white. - -“You need not be afraid, Clare. The love of a man for a woman is not a -terrifying thing. It is a good thing. Good as life.” - -He took her by the wrists and held them tight. - -“Gerald!” said Clare. “For God’s sake.... I have a husband.” - -“He bores you,” said the man. “He is your husband but not your mate. No -woman finds peace until she finds her mate. It is the same with a man.” - -“I will not listen to you. You make me feel a bad woman!” - -She wrenched her hands free and moved toward the bell. - -Gerald Bradshaw laughed quietly. He seemed amused at this woman’s fear. -He seemed masterful, sure of his power over her. - -“You know that you must be my mate. If not to-day, to-morrow. If not -to-morrow, the next day. I will wait for you, Clare.” - -Clare had shrunk back to the wall now, and touched the electric bell. - -“You have no pity for me,” she said. “You play on my weakness.” - -“Fear makes you strong to resist,” said the man. “But love is stronger -than fear.” - -He followed her across the room to where she stood crouching against the -wall like a hunted thing. - -“Don’t come so close to me,” she said. - -“What on earth have you rung the bell for?” asked the man. - -“Because I ought not to be alone with you.” - -They stood looking into each other’s eyes. Then Clare moved quickly -toward the sofa as Mollie came in. - -“Oh, Mollie,” said Clare, trying to steady her voice, “ask Mrs. Heywood -to come in, will you? Tell her Mr. Bradshaw is here.” - -“Yes, ma’am,” said Mollie. “But she knows that already.” - -“Take my message, please,” said her mistress. - -“I was going to, ma’am,” said Mollie, and she added in an undertone, as -she left the room, “Strange as it may appear.” - -Gerald laughed quite light-heartedly. - -“Yes, you have won the trick this time. But I hold the trump cards, -Clare; and I am very lucky, as a rule. I have a gambler’s luck. Of -course if the old lady comes in I shan’t stay. She hates me like poison, -and I can’t be polite to her. Insincerity is not one of my vices. -Good-night, dear heart. I will come to you in your dreams.” - -As he spoke this word, which brought a flush again to Clare Heywood’s -face, Mrs. Hey-wood, her mother-in-law, came in. She glanced from one to -the other suspiciously. - -Gerald Bradshaw was not in the least abashed by her stern face. - -“How do you do, Mrs. Heywood? I was just going. I hope I have not -disturbed you?” - -Mrs. Heywood answered him in a “distant” manner: - -“Not in the least.” - -“I am glad,” he said. “I will let myself out. Don’t trouble.” - -At that moment there was a noise in the hall, and Clare raised her head -and listened. - -“I think I hear another visitor,” she said. - -“In that ease I had better wait a moment,” said Gerald. “The halls -of these flats are not cut out for two people at a time. I will light -another cigarette if I may.” - -“I thought I heard a latchkey,” said Mrs. Heywood. “Surely it can’t he -Herbert back so early?” - -“No, it can’t be,” said Clare. - -Gerald spoke more to himself than to the ladies: - -“I hope not.” - -They were all silent when Herbert Heywood came in quietly. - -“I didn’t go to the club after all,” he said. Then he saw Gerald -Bradshaw, and his mouth hardened a little as he said, “Oh!... How do?” - -“How are you?” asked Gerald, in his cool way. - -“Been here long?” asked Herbert. - -“Long enough for a pleasant talk with your wife.” - -“Going now?” - -“Yes. We have finished our chat. Goodnight. I can find my way out -blindfolded. All these flats are the same. Rather convenient, don’t you -think?” - -He turned to Clare and smiled. - -“_Au revoir_, Mrs. Heywood.” - -She did not answer him, and he went out jauntily. A few moments later -they heard the front door shut. - -“What the devil does he come here for?” growled Herbert rather sulkily. - -Clare ignored the question. - -“Why are you home so early?” - -“Yes, dear, why didn’t you go to the club?” asked Mrs. Heywood. - -Herbert looked rather embarrassed. - -“Oh, I don’t know. I felt a bit off. Besides----” - -“What, dear?” asked his mother. - -“I thought Clare was feeling a bit lonely to-night. Perhaps I was -mistaken.” - -“I am often lonely,” said Clare. “Even when you are at home.” - -“Aren’t you _glad_ I have come back?” asked Herbert. - -“Why do you ask me?” - -“I should be glad if you were glad.” Clare’s husband became slightly -sentimental as he looked at her. - -“I have been thinking it _is_ rather rotten to go _off_ to the club and -leave you here alone,” he said. - -Mrs. Heywood was delighted with these words. - -“Oh, you dear boy! How unselfish of you!” - -“I try to be,” said Herbert. - -“I am sure you are the very soul of unselfishness, Herbert, dear,” said -the fond mother. - -“Thanks, mother.” - -He looked rather anxiously at Clare, and said-- - -“Don’t you think we might have a pleasant evening for once?” - -“Oh, that would be delightful!” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“Eh, Clare?” - -“How do you mean?” said Clare. - -“Like we used to in the old days? Some music, and that sort of thing.” - -“I am sure that will be _very_ nice,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“Eh, Clare?” said Herbert. - -“If you like,” said Clare. - -“Wait till I have got my boots off.” He spoke in a rather honeyed voice -to his wife. - -“Do you happen to know where my slippers are, darling?” - -“I haven’t the least idea,” said Clare. - -Herbert seemed nettled at this answer. - -“In the old days you used to warm them for me,” he said. - -“Did I?” said Clare. “I have forgotten. It was a long time ago.” - -“Eight years.” - -At these words Clare looked over to her husband in a peculiar way. - -“Yes,” she said. “It is our eighth year.” - -“Here are your slippers, dear,” said Mrs. Hey wood. - -“Oh, thanks, mother. _You_ don’t forget.” - -There was silence while he took off his boots. Clare sat with her hands -in her lap, staring at the carpet. Once or twice her mother-in-law -glanced at her anxiously. - -“Won’t you play something, Clare?” said the old lady, after a little -while. - -“If you like,” said Clare. - -Herbert resumed his cheerful note. - -“Yes, let’s have a jolly evening. Perhaps I will sing a song presently.” - -“Oh, do, dear!” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“Gad, it’s a long time since I sang ‘John Peel’!” - -Clare looked rather anxious and perturbed. - -“The walls of this flat are rather thin,” she said. “The neighbors might -not like it.” - -“Oh, confound the neighbors!” said Herbert. - -“I will do some knitting while you two dears play and sing,” said the -old lady. - -She fetched her knitting from a black silk bag on one of the little -tables, and took a chair near the fireplace. Clare Heywood went to the -music-stool and turned over some music listlessly. She did not seem to -find anything which appealed to her. - -Her husband settled himself down in an arm-chair and loaded his pipe. - -“Play something bright, Clare,” he said. - -“All my music sounds melancholy when I play it,” said Clare. - -“What, rag-time?” - -“Even rag-time. Rag-time worst of all.” - -Yet she began to play softly one of Chopin’s preludes, in a dreamy way. - -“Tell me when you want me to sing,” said Herbert. - -“I will,” said Clare. - -There was silence for a little while, except for Clare’s dream-music. -Mrs. Heywood dozed over her knitting, and her head nodded on her chest. -Presently Herbert rose from his chair and touched the electric bell. A -moment later Mollie came in. - -“Yes?” asked Mollie. - -Herbert spoke quietly so that he should not interrupt his wife’s music. - -“Bring me _The Financial Times_, Mollie. It’s in my study.” - -“Yes, sir,” said Mollie. - -She brought the paper and left the room again. There was another -silence, except for the soft notes of the music. Herbert turned over the -pages of _The Financial Times_, and yawned a little, and then let the -paper drop. His head nodded and then lolled sideways. In a little while -he was as fast asleep as his mother, and snored, quietly at first, then -quite loudly. - -Clare stopped playing, and looked over the music-rest with a strange, -tragic smile at her husband and her mother-in-law. She rose from the -piano-stool, and put her hands to her head, and then at her throat, -breathing quickly and jerkily, as though she were being stifled. - -“A jolly evening!” she exclaimed in a whisper. “Oh, God!” - -She stared round the room, with rather wild eyes. - -“It is stuffy here. It is stifling.” - -She moved toward the piano again, with her hands pressed against her -bosom. - -“I feel that something _must_ happen. Something _must_ break.” - -She took up a large china vase from the piano, moved slowly toward the -window, hesitated for a moment, looked round at her sleeping husband, -and then hurled the vase straight through the window. It made an -appalling noise of breaking glass. - -Herbert Heywood jumped up from his seat as though he had been shot. - -“Good God!” he said. “What the devil!----” - -Mrs. Heywood was equally startled. She sat up in her chair as though an -earthquake had shaken the house. - -“Good gracious! Whatever in the world-----” - -At the same moment Mollie opened the door. - -“Good ‘eavins, ma’am!” she cried. “Whatever ‘as ‘appened?” - -Clare Heywood answered very quietly: - -“I think something must have broken,” she said. - -Then she gave a queer, strident laugh. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -MRS. Heywood was arranging the drawingroom for an evening At Home, -dusting the mantelshelf and some of the ornaments with a little hand -broom. There were refreshments on a side table. Mollie was trying to -make the fire burn up. Every now and then a gust of smoke blew down the -chimney. Clare was sitting listlessly in a low chair near the French -window, with a book on her lap, but she was not reading. - -“Drat the fire,” said Mollie, with her head in the fireplace. - -“For goodness’ sake, Mollie, stop it smoking like that!” said Mrs. -Heywood. “It’s no use my dusting the room.” - -“The devil is in the chimney, it strikes me,” said Mollie. - -Mrs. Heywood expressed her sense of exasperation. - -“It’s a funny thing that every time your mistress gives an At Home you -are always behindhand with your work.” - -Mollie expressed her feelings in the firegrate. - -“It’s a funny thing people can’t mind their own business.” - -“What did you say, Mollie?” asked Mrs. Heywood sharply. - -“I said that the fire hasn’t gone right since the window was broke. Them -Suffragettes have a lot to answer for.” - -“I cannot understand how it _did_ get broken,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I -almost suspect that woman, Miss Vernon.” - -Clare looked up and spoke irritably. - -“Nonsense, mother!” - -“It’s no use saying nonsense, Clare,” said Mrs. Heywood, even more -irritably. “You know perfectly well that Miss Vernon is a most dangerous -woman.” - -“Well, she didn’t break our window, anyhow,” said Clare, rather -doggedly. - -“How do you know that? It is still a perfect mystery.” - -“Don’t be absurd, mother. How did the vase get through the window?” - -Mrs. Heywood was baffled for an answer. - -“Ah, that is most perplexing.” - -“Well, leave it at that,” said Clare. - -Mollie was still wrestling with the mysteries of light and heat. - -“If it doesn’t burn now,” she said, “I won’t lay another finger on -it--At Home or no At Home.” - -She seized the dustpan and broom and, with a hot face, marched out of -the room. - -Clare pressed her forehead with the tips of her fingers. - -“I wish to Heaven there were no such things as At Homes,” she said -wearily. “Oh, how they bore me!” - -“You used to like them well enough,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“I have grown out of them. I have grown out of so many things. It is as -if my life had shrunk in the wash.” - -“Nothing seems to please you now,” said the old lady. “Don’t you care -for your friends any longer?” - -“Friends? Those tittle-tattling women, with their empty-headed -husbands?” - -Mrs. Heywood was silent for a moment. Then she spoke bitterly. - -“Do you think Herbert is empty-headed?” - -“Oh, we won’t get personal, mother,” said Clare. “And we won’t quarrel, -if you don’t mind.” - -Mrs. Heywood’s lips tightened. - -“I am afraid we shall if you go on like this.” - -“Like what?” asked Clare. - -“Hush!” said the old lady. “Here comes Herbert.” - -Herbert came in quickly, and raised his eyebrows after a glance at his -wife. - -“Good Lord, Clare! Aren’t you dressed yet?” - -“There’s plenty of time, isn’t there?” said Clare. - -“No, there isn’t,” said Herbert. “You know some of the guests will -arrive before eight o’clock.” - -Clare looked up at the clock. - -“It’s only six now.” - -“Besides,” said Herbert, “I want you to look your best to-night. Edward -Hargreaves is coming, with his wife.” - -“What has that got to do with it?” - -“Everything,” said Herbert. “He is second cousin to one of my directors. -It is essential that you should make a good impression.” - -“You told me once that he was a complete ass,” said Clare. - -“So he is.” - -“Well, then,” said Clare, quietly but firmly, “I decline to make a good -impression on him.” - -“I must ask you to obey my wishes,” said Herbert. - -Clare had rebellion in her eyes. - -“I have obeyed you for seven years. It is now the Eighth Year.” - -Herbert did not hear his wife’s remark. He was looking round the room -with an air of extreme annoyance. - -“Well, I’m blowed!” he exclaimed. - -“What’s the matter, dear?” asked Mrs. Hey-wood anxiously. - -“You haven’t even taken the trouble to buy some flowers,” said Herbert. - -“I left that to Clare,” said the old lady. - -“Haven’t you done so, Clare?” - -“No,” said Clare. “I can’t bear flowers in this room. They droop so -quickly.” - -Herbert was quite angry. - -“I insist upon having some flowers. The place looks like a barn without -them. What will our visitors say?” - -“Stupid things, as usual,” said Clare quietly. - -“I must go out and get some myself, I suppose,” said Herbert, with the -air of a martyr. - -“Can’t you send Mollie, dear?” asked Mrs. Heywood. - -“Mollie is cutting sandwiches. The girl is overwhelmed with work. -And--Oh, my stars!” - -His mother was alarmed by this sudden cry of dismay. - -“Now what is the matter, dear?” - -“There’s no whisky in the decanter.” - -“No whisky?” - -“Clare,” said Herbert, appealing to his wife, “there’s not a drop of -whisky left.” - -“Well, _I_ didn’t drink it,” said Clare. “You finished it the other -night with one of your club friends.” - -“So we did. Dash it!” - -“Don’t be irritable, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“Irritable! Isn’t it enough to make a saint irritable? These things -always happen on our At Home nights. Nobody seems to have any -forethought. Every blessed thing seems to go wrong.” - -“That is why I wish one could abolish the institution,” said Clare. - -“What institution?” - -“At Homes.” - -“Don’t talk rubbish, Clare,” said Herbert angrily; “you know I have them -for _your_ sake.” - -Clare laughed bitterly, as though she had heard a rather painful joke. - -“For my sake! Oh, that is good!” - -Herbert was distracted by a new cause of grievance as a tremendous puff -of smoke came out of the fire-grate. - -“What in the name of a thousand devils----” - -“It’s that awful fire again!” cried Mrs. Hey-wood. “These flats seem to -have no chimneys.” - -“It’s nothing to do with the flat,” said Herbert. “It’s that fool -Mollie. The girl doesn’t know how to light a decent fire!” - -He rang the bell furiously, keeping his finger on the electric knob. - -“The creature has absolutely nothing to do, and what she does she -spoils.” - -Mollie came in with a look of mutiny on her face. - -“Look at that fire,” said Herbert fiercely. - -“I am looking at it,” said Mollie. - -“Why don’t you do your work properly? See to the beastly thing, can’t -you?” - -Mollie folded her arms and spoke firmly. - -“If you please, sir, wild horses won’t make me touch it again.” - -“It’s not a question of horse-power,” said Herbert. “Go and get an old -newspaper and hold it in front of the bars.” - -“I am just in the middle of the sandwiches,” said Mollie. - -“Well, get out of them, then,” said Herbert. - -Mollie delivered her usual ultimatum. - -“If you please, sir, I beg to give a month’s notice.” - -“Bosh!” said Herbert. - -“Bosh indeed!” cried Mollie. “We’ll see if it’s bosh! If you want any -sandwiches for your precious visitors you can cut ‘em yourself.” - -With this challenge she went out of the room and slammed the door behind -her. - -Herbert breathed deeply, and after a moment’s struggle in his soul spoke -mildly. - -“Mother, go and pacify the fool, will you?” - -“She is very obstinate,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“All women are obstinate.” - -Suddenly the man’s self-restraint broke down and he became excited. - -“Bribe her, promise her a rise in wages, but for God’s sake see that -she cuts the sandwiches. We don’t want to be made fools of before our -guests.” - -“Very well, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. She hesitated for a moment at -the door, and before going out said: “But Mollie can be very violent at -times.” - -For a little while there was silence between the husband and wife. Then -Herbert spoke rather sternly. - -“Clare, are you or are you not going to get dressed?” - -“I shall get dressed in good time,” said Clare quietly, “when I think -fit. Surely you don’t want to dictate to me about _that?_” - -“Surely,” said Herbert, “you can see how awkward it will be if any of -our people arrive and find you unprepared for them?” - -Clare gave a long, weary sigh. - -“Oh, I _am_ prepared for them. I have been trying to prepare myself all -day for the ordeal of, them.” - -“The ordeal? What the dickens do you mean?” - -“I am prepared for Mrs. Atkinson Brown, who, when she takes off her -hat in the bedroom, will ask me whether I am suited and whether I am -expecting.” - -“For goodness’ sake don’t be coarse, Clare,” said Herbert. - -“It’s Mrs. Atkinson Brown who is coarse,” said Clare. “And I am prepared -for Mr. Atkinson Brown, who will say that it is horrible weather for -this time of year, and that business has been the very devil since there -has been a Radical Government, and that these outrageous women who are -breaking windows ought to be whipped. Oh, I could tell you everything -that everybody is going to say. I have heard it over and over again.” - -“It does not seem to make much effect on you,” said Herbert. “Especially -that part about breaking windows.” - -Clare smiled. - -“So you have guessed, have you?” - -“I knew at once by the look on your face.” - -“I thought you agreed with your mother that some Suffragette must have -flung a stone from the outside.” - -“I hid the truth from mother,” said Herbert. “She would think you were -mad. What on earth made you do it? _Were_ you mad or what?” - -Clare brushed her hair back from her forehead. - -“Sometimes I used to think I was going a little mad. But now I know what -is the matter with me.” - -Herbert spoke more tenderly. - -“What _is_ the matter, Clare? If it is a question of a doctor----” - -“It’s the Eighth Year,” said Clare. - -“The Eighth Year?” - -“Yes, that’s what is the matter with me.” - -“What on earth do you mean?” asked Herbert. - -“Why, don’t you know? It was Madge Vernon who told me.” - -“Told you what?” - -“She seemed to think that everybody knew.” - -“Knew what?” asked Herbert, exasperated beyond all patience. - -“About the Eighth Year.” - -“What about it?” - -“It’s well known, she says, that the Eighth Year is the most dangerous -one in marriage. It is then that the pull comes, when the wife has found -out her husband.” - -“Found out her husband?” - -“And found out herself.” - -Herbert spoke roughly. He was not in a mood for such mysteries. - -“Look here,” he said. “I can’t listen to all this nonsense. Go and dress -yourself.” - -“I want to talk to you, Herbert,” said Clare very earnestly. “I must -talk to you before it’s too late.” - -“It’s too late now,” said Herbert. “Halfpast six. I must fetch that -whisky and buy a few flowers. I shall have to put on my boots again and -splash about in the mud in these trousers. Confound it!” - -“Before you go you must listen, Herbert,” said Clare, with a sign of -emotion. “Perhaps you won’t have another chance.” - -“Thank Heaven for that.” - -“When I broke that window something else broke.” - -“One of my best vases,” said Herbert with sarcasm. - -“I think something in my own nature broke too. My spirit has broken -out of this narrow, deadening little life of ours, out of the smug -snobbishness and stupidity which for so long kept me prisoner, out of -the belief that the latest sentimental novel, the latest romantic play, -the latest bit of tittle-tattle from my neighbors might satisfy my heart -and brain. When I broke that window I let a little fresh air into the -stifling atmosphere of this flat, where I have been mewed up without -work, without any kind of honest interest, without any kind of food for -my brain or soul.” - -Herbert stared at his wife, and made an impatient gesture. - -“If you want work, why don’t you attend to your domestic duties?” - -“I have no domestic duties,” said Clare. “That is the trouble.” - -Herbert laughed in an unpleasant way. - -“Why, you haven’t even bought any flowers to decorate your home! Isn’t -that a domestic duty?” - -Clare answered him quickly, excitedly. - -“It’s just a part of the same old hypocrisy of keeping up appearances. -You know you don’t care for flowers in themselves, except as they help -to make a show. You want to impress our guests. You want to keep up the -old illusion of the woman’s hand in the home. The woman’s touch. Isn’t -that it?” - -“Yes, I do want to keep up that illusion,” said Herbert; “and by God, -I find it very hard! You say you want an object in life. Isn’t your -husband an object?” - -Clare looked at him with a queer, pitiful smile. - -“Yes, he is,” she said slowly. - -“Well, what more do you want?” - -“Lots more. A woman’s life is not centered for ever in one man.” - -“It ought to be,” said Herbert. “If you had any religious -principles----” - -“Oh,” said Clare sharply, “but you object to my religion!” - -“Well, of course I mean in moderation.” - -“You have starved me, Herbert, and oh, I am so hungry!” - -Herbert answered her airily. - -“Well, there will be light refreshments later.” - -“Yes, that is worthy of you,” cried Clare. “That is your sense of -humor! You have starved my soul and starved my heart and you offer -me--sandwiches. I am hungry for life and you offer me--the latest -novel.” - -Herbert paced up and down the room. He was losing control of his temper. - -“That is the reward for all my devotion!” he said. “Don’t I drudge in -the city every day to keep you in comfort?” - -“I don’t want comfort!” said Clare. - -“Don’t I toil so that you may have pretty frocks?” - -“I don’t want pretty frocks.” - -“Don’t I scrape and scheme to buy you little luxuries?” - -“I don’t want little luxuries,” said Clare. - -“Is there anything within my means that you haven’t got?” - -Clare looked at him in a peculiar way, and answered quietly-- - -“I haven’t a child,” she said. - -“Oh, Lord,” said Herbert uneasily. “Whose fault is that? Besides, modern -life in small flats is not cut out for children.” - -“And modern life in small flats,” said Clare, “is not cut out for -wives.” - -“It isn’t my fault,” said Herbert. “I am not the architect--either of -fate or flats.” - -“No, it isn’t your fault, Herbert. You can’t help your character. It -isn’t your fault that when you come home from the city you fall asleep -after dinner. It isn’t your fault that when you go to the club I sit at -home with my hands in my lap, thinking and brooding. It isn’t your fault -that your mother and I get on each other’s nerves. It isn’t your fault -that you and I have grown out of each other, that we bore each other and -have nothing to say to each other--except when we quarrel.” - -“Well, then,” said Herbert, “whose fault is it?” - -“I don’t know,” said Clare. “I suppose it’s a fault of the system, which -is spoiling thousands of marriages just like ours. It’s the fault which -is found out--in the Eighth Year.” - -“Oh, curse the Eighth Year,” said Herbert violently. “What is that bee -you have got in your bonnet?” - -“It’s a bee which keeps buzzing in my brain. It’s a little bee which -whispers queer words to me--tempting words. It says you must break away -from the system or the system will break you. You must find a way of -escape or die. You must do it quickly, now, to-night, or it will be too -late. Herbert, a hungry woman will do desperate things to satisfy her -appetite, and I am hungry for some stronger emotion than I can find -within these four walls. I am hungry for love, hungry for work, hungry -for life. If you can’t give it to me, I must find it elsewhere.” - -“Clare,” said Herbert, with deliberate self-restraint, “I must again -remind you that time is getting on and you are not yet dressed. In a -little while our guests will be here. I hope you don’t mean to hold me -up to the contempt of my friends. I at least have some sense of duty.... -I am going to fetch the whisky.” As he strode toward the door he started -back at the noise of breaking china. - -“What’s that?” asked Clare. - -“God knows,” said Herbert. “I expect mother has broken a window.” - -The words were hardly out of his mouth before Mrs. Heywood came in in a -state of great agitation. - -“Herbert, I must really ask you to come into the kitchen.” - -“What’s the matter now?” asked Herbert, prepared for the worst. - -“Mollie has deliberately broken our best coffee-pot.” - -Herbert stared at his wife. - -“Didn’t I tell you so!” he said. - -“Why has she broken the coffee-pot?” asked Clare. - -“She was most insolent,” said Mrs. Heywood, “and said my interference -got on her nerves.” - -“Well, even a servant _has_ nerves,” said Clare. - -“But it was the _best_ coffee-pot, Clare. Surely you are not going to -take it so calmly?” - -“Like mistress like maid!” said Herbert. “Oh, my hat! Why on earth did I -marry?” - -“Don’t you think you had better fetch the whisky?” said Clare gently. - -Herbert became excited again. - -“I have been trying to fetch the whisky for the last half hour. There is -a conspiracy against it. Confound it, I _will_ fetch the whisky.” - -He strode to the door, as though he would get the whisky or die in the -attempt. - -“I think you ought to speak to Mollie first,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -Herbert raised his hands above his head. - -“Damn Mollie!” he shouted wildly. Then he strode out of the room. “Damn -everything!” - -“Poor dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I wish he didn’t get so worried.” - -“Clare, won’t you come and speak to Mollie?” - -“Haven’t you spoken to her?” asked Clare wearily. - -“I am always speaking to her.” - -“_Poor_ Mollie!” said Clare. - -Mrs. Heywood was hurt at the tone of pity. She flushed a little and then -turned to her daughter-in-law with reproachful eyes. - -“I am an old woman, Clare, and the mother of your husband. Because my -position forces me to live in this flat, I do not think you ought to -insult me.” - -“I’m sorry,” said Clare with sincerity. - -“Mollie is right. We all get on each other’s nerves. It can’t be helped, -I suppose. It’s part of the system.” - -“I can’t help being your mother-in-law, Clare.” - -“No, it can’t he helped,” said Clare. - -Mrs. Heywood came close to her and touched her hand. - -“You think I do not understand. You think you are the only one who has -any grievance.” - -“Oh, no!” said Clare. “I am not so egotistical.” - -Mrs. Heywood smoothed down her dress with trembling hands. - -“You think I haven’t been watching you all these years. I have watched -you so that I know your thoughts behind those brooding eyes, Clare. I -know all that you have been thinking and suffering, so that sometimes -you hate me, so that my very presence here in the room with you makes -you wish to cry out, to shriek, because I am your mother-in-law, and the -mother of your husband. The husband always loves his mother best, -and the wife always knows it. That is the eternal tragedy of the -mother-in-law. Because she is hated by the wife of her son, and is -an intruder in her home. I know that because I too suffered from a -mother-in-law. Do you think I would stay here an hour unless I was -forced to stay, for a shelter above my old head, for some home in which -I wait to die? But while I wait I watch... and I know that you have -reached a dangerous stage in a woman’s life, when she may do any rash -thing. Clare, I pray every night that you may pass that stage in life -without doing anything--rash. This time always comes in marriage, it -comes----” - -“In the Eighth Year?” asked Clare eagerly. “Somewhere about then.” - -“Ah! I thought so.” - -“It came to me, my dear.” - -“And did _you_ do anything rash?” - -Mrs. Heywood hesitated a moment before replying. - -“I gave birth to Herbert,” she said. - -“Good Heavens!” said Clare. - -“It saved me from breaking----” - -“Windows, mother?” - -“No, my own and my husband’s heart,” said Mrs. Heywood. “Well, I will -go and speak to Mollie again. Goodness knows how we shall get coffee -to-night.” - -She went out of the room with her head shaking a little after this scene -of emotion. - -Clare spoke to herself aloud. She had her hands up to her throat. - -“I don’t want coffee to-night. I want stronger drink. I want to get -drunk with liberty of life.” - -Suddenly there was a noise at the window and the woman looked up, -startled, and cried, “Who is there?” - -Gerald Bradshaw appeared at the open French window leading on to the -balcony, and he spoke through the window. - -“It is I, Clare? Are you alone?” - -Clare had risen from her chair at the sound of his voice, and her face -became very pale. - -“Gerald... How did you come there?” - -Gerald Bradshaw laughed in his lighthearted way. - -“I stepped over the bar that divides our balconies. It was quite easy. -It was as easy as it will be to cross the bar that divides you and me, -Clare.” - -Clare spoke in a frightened voice. - -“Why do you come here, at this hour?” - -“Why do I ever come?” asked Gerald Bradshaw. - -“I don’t know.” - -“It’s because I want you. I want you badly to-night, Clare. I can’t wait -for you any longer.” - -Clare spoke pleadingly. - -“Gerald... go away... it’s so dangerous... I daren’t listen to you.” - -“I want you to listen,” said Gerald Bradshaw. - -“Go away... I implore you to go away.” - -He laughed at her. He seemed very much amused. - -“Not before I have said what I want to say.” - -“Say it quickly,” said Clare. “Quickly!” - -“There’s time enough,” said Bradshaw. “This is what I want to say. You -are a lonely woman and I am a lonely man, and only an iron bar divides -us. It’s the iron bar of convention, of insincerity, of superstition. It -seems so difficult to cross. But you see one step is enough. I want you -to take that step--to-night.” - -Clare answered him in a whisper. - -“Go away!” - -“I am hungry for you,” said Bradshaw, with a thrill in his voice. “I am -hungry for your love. And you are hungry for me. I have seen it in your -eyes. You have the look of a famished woman. Famished for love. Famished -for comradeship.” - -Clare raised her hands despairingly. - -“If you have any pity, go away.” - -“I have no pity. Because pity is weakness, and I hate weakness.” - -“You are brutal,” said Clare. - -He laughed at her. He seemed to like those words. - -“Yes, I have the brutality of manhood. Man is a brute, and woman likes -the brute in him because that is his nature, and woman wants the natural -man. That is why you want me, Clare. You can’t deny it.” - -Clare protested feebly. - -“I do deny it. I _must_ deny it.” - -“It’s a funny thing,” said Gerald Bradshaw. “Between you and me there -is a queer spell, Clare. I was conscious of it when I first met you. -Something in you calls to me. Something in me calls to you. It is the -call of the wild.” - -Clare was scared now. These words seemed to make her heart beat to a -strange tune. - -“What do you mean?” she said. - -“It is the call of the untamed creature. Both you and I are untamed. -We both have the spirit of the woods. I am Pan. You are a wood nymph, -imprisoned in a cage, upholstered by maple, on the hire system.” - -“What do you want with me?” asked Clare. It was clear that he was -tempting her. - -“I want to play with you, like Pan played. You and I will hear the pipes -of Pan to-night--the wild nature music.” - -“To-night?” - -“To-night. I have waited too long for you, and now I’m impatient. I -am alone in my flat waiting for you. I ask you to keep me company, not -to-night only, but until we tire of each other, until perhaps we hate -each other. Who knows?” - -“Oh, God!” said Clare. She moaned out the words in a pitiful way. - -“You have only to slip down one flight of stairs and steal up another, -and you will find me at the door with a welcome. It will need just a -little care to escape from your prison. You must slip on your hat and -cloak as though you were going round to church, and then come to me, to -me, Clare! Only a wall will divide you from this flat, but you will be a -world away. For you will have escaped from this upholstered cage into -a little world of liberty. Into a little world of love, Clare. Say you -will come!” - -“Oh, God!” moaned Clare. - -“You will come?” - -“Are you the Devil that you tempt me?” said Clare. - -Gerald gave a triumphant little laugh. - -“You will come! Clare, my sweetheart, I know you will come, for your -spirit is ready for me.” - -As he spoke these words there was the sound of a bell ringing through -the flat, and the noise of it struck terror into Clare Heywood. - -“Go away,” she whispered. “For God’s sake go! Some one is ringing.” - -“I will cross the bar again,” said Bradshaw. “But I shall be waiting at -the door. You will not be very long, little one?” - -Clare sank down with her face in her hands. And Gerald stole away from -the window just as Mollie showed in Madge Vernon. - -“It’s our At Home night,” said Mollie, as she came in, “and they’ll be -here presently.” - -“All right, Mollie,” said Miss Vernon, smiling. “I shan’t stay more than -a minute. I know I have come at an awkward time.” - -“She _would_ come in, ma’am,” said Mollie, as though she were not strong -enough to thwart such a determined visitor. - -As soon as the girl had gone Madge Vernon came across to Clare, very -cheerfully and rather excitedly. - -“Clare, are you coming?” - -“Coming where?” asked Clare, trying to hide her agitation. - -“To the demonstration,” said Madge Vernon. “You know I told you all -about it! It begins at eight. It will be immense fun, and after your -window-smashing exploit you are one of us. Good Heavens, I think you -have beaten us all. None of us have ever thought of breaking our own -windows.” - -“It’s my At Home night,” said Clare. - -“Oh, bother the At Home. Can’t your husband look after his friends for -once? I wanted you to join in this adventure. It would be your enrolment -in the ranks, and it will do you a lot of good, in your present state of -health.” - -“In any case----” said Clare. - -“What?” - -Clare smiled in a tragic way. - -“I have received a previous invitation.” - -“Oh, drat the invitation.” - -“Of course I should have liked to come,” said Clare, “but----” - -Madge Vernon was impatient with her. “But what? I hate that word -‘but.’” - -“The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak,” said Clare, speaking with -a deeper significance than appeared in the words. - -“There is no weakness about you. You have the courage of your -convictions. Have you had the window mended yet?” - -She laughed gaily and then listened with her head a little on one side -to the sound of a bell ringing in the hall. - -“That must be Herbert,” said Clare. “I think you had better go.” - -“Yes, I think I had better,” said Madge, laughing again. “If looks could -kill----” - -She went toward the door and opened it, but I stood on the threshold -looking back. - -“Won’t you come? Eight o’clock, you know.” - -Clare smiled weakly. - -“I am in great demand to-night.” - -The two women listened to Herbert’s voice in the hall saying-- - -“Of course all the shops were shut.” - -“Oh, Lord!” said Madge, “I must skedaddle.” She went out of the room -hurriedly, leaving Clare alone. - -And after a moment or two Clare spoke aloud, with her hands clasped upon -her breast. - -“I wonder if the Devil is tempting me tonight?” she said. - -Then Herbert entered with two whisky bottles. - -“I had to hunt all over the place,” he said. - -Then he saw that his wife was still in her afternoon frock, and his face -flushed with anger. - -“What, aren’t you dressed _yet?_... I think you might show some respect -for my wishes, Clare.” - -“I am going to dress now,” said Clare, and she rose and went into the -bedroom. - -“Women are the very devil,” said Herbert, unwrapping the whisky bottles. - -While he was busy with this his mother came in, having changed her -dress. - -“Oh, I am glad you managed to get the whisky,” she said. - -“Of course nearly every blessed shop was shut,” said Herbert. “They -always are when I run out of everything. It’s this Radical Government, -with its beastly Acts.” - -Mrs. Heywood hesitated and then came across to her son and touched him -on the arm. - -“I think you had better come into the kitchen a moment, dear, and look -after Mollie.” - -“She hasn’t broken anything else, has she?” said Herbert anxiously. - -“No, dear. But she has just cut her finger rather badly. She got in a -temper with the sandwiches.” - -Herbert raised his hands to heaven. - -“Why do these things always happen when Clare gives an At Home? I shall -abolish these evenings altogether. They will drive me mad.” - -“Oh, they’re very pleasant when they once begin,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“I’m glad you think so, mother. I am damned if I do. I was only saying -to Clare to-night----” - -He stalked out of the room furiously. - -Mrs. Heywood stood for a few moments staring at the carpet. Her lips -moved and her worn old hands plucked at her skirt. - -“Every time there is an At Home at this flat,” she said, “I get another -white hair.” - -She moved toward the door and went out of the room, so that it was left -empty. - -Outside in the street a piano-organ was playing a rag-time tune with a -rattle of notes, and motor-cars were sounding their horns. - -In this little drawing-room in Intellectual Mansions, Battersea Park, -there was silence, except for those vague sounds from without. There was -no sign here of Fate’s presence, summoning a woman to her destiny. No -angel stood with a flaming sword to bar the way to a woman with a wild -heart. The little ormolu clock ticking on the mantel-shelf did not seem -to be counting the moments of a tragic drama. It was a very commonplace -little room, and the flamboyant chintz on the sofa and chairs gave it -an air of cheerfulness, as though this were one of the happy homes of -England. - -Presently the bedroom door opened slowly, and Clare Heywood stood there -looking into the drawing-room and listening. She was very pale, and -was dressed in her outdoor things, as Gerald Bradshaw had asked her -to dress, in her hat and cloak, so that she might slip out of the flat -which he had called her prison. - -She came further into the room, timidly, like a hare frightened by the -distant baying of the hounds. - -She raised her hands to her bosom, and spoke in a whisper: - -“God forgive me!” - -Then she crossed the floor, listened for a moment intently at the door, -and slipped out. A moment or two later one’s ears, if they had been -listening, would have heard the front door shut. - -Clare Heywood had escaped. - -A little while later Mrs. Heywood, her mother-in-law, came into the room -again and went over to the piano to open it and arrange the music. - -“I do hope Clare is getting dressed,” she said, speaking to herself. - -Then Herbert came in, carrying a tray with decanter and glasses. - -“Isn’t Clare ready yet?” he asked. - -“No, dear. She won’t be long.” - -“I can’t find the corkscrew,” said Herbert, searching round for it, but -failing to discover its whereabouts. - -“Isn’t it in the kitchen, dear?” asked Mrs. Heywood. - -“Not unless Mollie has swallowed it. It’s just the sort of thing she -would do--out of sheer spite.” - -“Didn’t you use it the other day to open a tin of sardines?” asked the -old lady, cudgelling her brains. - -“Did I?” said Herbert. “Oh, Lord, yes! I left it in the bathroom.” - -He went out of the room to find it. - -Mrs. Heywood crossed over to the fire and swept up the grate. - -“Clare is a very long time to-night,” she said. - -Then Mollie came in carrying a tray with some plates of sandwiches. One -of her fingers was tied up with a rag. - -“It’s a good job the guests is late to-night,” she remarked. - -“Yes, we are all very behind-hand,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -Mollie dumped down the tray and gave vent to a little of her impertinent -philosophy: - -“I’ll never give an At Home when I’m married. Blest if I do. Social -‘ipocrisy, I call them.” - -Mrs. Heywood rebuked her sharply: - -“We don’t want your opinion, Mollie, thank you.” - -“I suppose I can _have_ a few opinions, although I _am_ in service,” - said Mollie. “There’s plenty of time for thought even in the kitchen -of a flat like this. I wonder domestic servants don’t write novels. My -word, what a revelation it would be! I’ve a good mind to write one of -them serials in the _Daily Mail_.” - -“If I have any more of your impudence, Mollie----” - -“It’s not impudence,” said Mollie. “It’s aspirations.” - -The girl was silent when her master came into the room with the -corkscrew. - -“It wasn’t in the bathroom,” he explained. “I remember now, I used it -for cleaning out my pipe.” - -“I could have told you that a long time ago, sir,” said Mollie. - -“Well, why the dickens didn’t you?” asked Herbert. - -“You never asked me, sir.” - -Mollie retired with the air of having scored a point. - -“Well, as long as you’ve found it, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“Unfortunately, I broke the point. However, I daresay I can make it do.” - -He pulled one of the corks out of the whisky bottle and filled the -decanter. - -“Hasn’t Clare finished dressing yet?” he said presently. “What on earth -is she doing?” - -“I expect she wants her blouse done up at the back,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -Herbert jerked up his head. - -“And then she complains because I can’t tie my own tie I Just like -women.” - -He drew out another cork rather violently and said: - -“Well, go and see after her, mother.” - -Mrs. Heywood went toward the bedroom door and called out in her silvery -voice: - -“Are you ready, dear?” - -She listened for a moment, and called out again: - -“Clare!” - -Herbert poured some more whisky into the decanter. - -“I expect she’s reading one of those beastly pamphlets,” he said. - -Mrs. Heywood tapped at the bedroom door. - -“Clare!” - -“Go in, mother,” said Herbert irritably. - -“It’s very strange!” said Mrs. Heywood in an anxious voice. - -She went into the bedroom, and Herbert, who had been watching her, -spilled some of the whisky, so that he muttered to himself: - -“What with women and what with whisky----” - -He did not finish his sentence, but stared in the direction of the -bedroom as though suspecting something was wrong. - -Mrs. Heywood came trembling out. She had a scared look. - -“Oh, Herbert!” - -Herbert was alarmed by the look on her face. - -“Is Clare ill--or something?” - -“She isn’t there,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -The old lady was rather breathless. - -“Not there!” said Herbert in a dazed way. - -“She went in to dress a few minutes ago,” said his mother. - -Herbert stared at her. He was really very much afraid, but he spoke -irritably: - -“Well, she can’t have gone up the chimney, can she? At least, I suppose -not, though you never can tell nowadays.” - -He strode toward the bedroom door and called out: - -“Clare!” - -Then he went inside. - -Mrs. Heywood stood watching the open door. She raised her hands up and -then let them fall, and spoke in a hoarse kind of whisper: - -“I think it has happened at last.” - -Herbert came out of the bedroom again. He looked pale, and had gloomy -eyes. - -“It’s devilish queer!” he said. - -Mother and son stood looking at each other, as though in the presence of -tragedy. - -“She must have gone out,” said Mrs. Hey-wood. - -“Gone out! What makes you think so?” - -“She has taken her hat and cloak.” - -“How do you know?” asked Herbert. - -“I looked in the wardrobe.” - -“Good Heavens! Where’s she gone to?” - -Mrs. Heywood’s thin old hands clutched at the white lace upon her bosom. - -“Herbert, I--I am afraid.” - -The man went deadly white. He stammered as he spoke: - -“You don’t mean that she is going to do something--foolish?” - -“Something rash,” said Mrs. Hey wood mournfully. - -Herbert had a sudden idea. It took away from his fear a little and made -him angry. - -“Perhaps she has gone round to church. If so, I will give her a piece of -my mind when she comes back. It’s outrageous! It’s shameful.” - -There was the sound of a bell ringing through the hall, and the mother -and son listened intently. - -“Perhaps she _has_ come back,” said Herbert. “Perhaps she went to fetch -some flowers.” This idea seemed to soften him. His voice broke a little -when he said: “Poor girl! I didn’t mean to make such a fuss about them.” - “It isn’t Clare,” said Mrs. Heywood, shaking her head. “It’s a visitor. -I hear Mr. Atkinson Brown’s voice.” - -Mr. Atkinson Brown’s voice could be heard quite plainly in the hall: - -“Well, Mollie, is your mistress quite well?” Herbert grasped his -mother’s arm and whispered to her excitedly: - -“Mother, we must hide it from them.” - -“Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “If the Atkinson Browns suspect anything it -will be all over the neighborhood.” - -Herbert had a look of anguish in his eyes. “Good Heavens, yes. My -reputation will be ruined.” - -Once again they heard Mr. Atkinson Brown’s voice in the hall. - -“I see we are the first to arrive,” he said in a loud, cheery tone. - -“Mother,” whispered Herbert, “we must keep up appearances, at all -costs.” - -“I’ll try to, darling,” said Mrs. Heywood, clasping his arm for a -moment. - -Herbert made a desperate effort to be hopeful. - -“Clare is sure to be back in a few minutes. We’re frightening ourselves -for nothing.... I shall have something to say to her to-night when the -guests are gone.” - -Mrs. Heywood’s eyes filled with tears, and she looked at her son as -though she knew that Clare would never come back. - -“My poor boy!” she said. - -“Play the game, mother,” said Herbert. “For Heaven’s sake play the -game.” - -He had no sooner whispered these words than Mr. and Mrs. Atkinson Brown -entered the room, having taken off their outdoor things. Mr. Brown was -a tall, stout, heavily built man with a bald head and a great expanse -of white waistcoat. His wife was a little bird-like woman in pink silk. -They were both elaborately cheerful. - -“Hulloh, Heywood, my boy!” said the elderly man. - -“So delighted to come!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown to Herbert’s mother. - -Herbert grasped the man’s hand and wrung it warmly. - -“Good of you to come. Devilish good.” - -“Glad to come,” said Mr. Atkinson Brown. “Glad to come, my lad. How’s -the wife?” - -“Yes,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown, glancing round the room. “Where’s dear -Clare?... Well, I hope.” - -Herbert tried to hide his extreme nervousness. - -“Oh, tremendously fit, thanks. She’ll be here in a minute or two.” - -Mrs. Heywood appeared less nervous than her son. Yet her voice trembled -a little when she said: - -“Do sit down, Mrs. Atkinson Brown.” - -She pulled a chair up, but the lady protested laughingly: - -“Oh, not so near the fire. I can’t afford to neglect my complexion at my -time of life!” - -Her husband was rubbing his hands in front of the fire. He had no -complexion to spoil. - -“Horrible weather for this time o’ year,” he said. - -“Damnable,” said Herbert, agreeing with him almost too cordially. - -“Is dear Clare suited at present?” asked the lady. - -“Well,” said Mrs. Heywood, “we still have Mollie, but she is a great -trouble--a very great trouble.” - -“Oh, the eternal servant problem!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. “I thought -I had a perfect jewel, but I found her inebriated in the kitchen only -yesterday.” - -Herbert was racking his brains for conversational subjects. He fell back -on an old one. “Business going strong?” - -“Business!” said Mr. Atkinson Brown. “My dear boy, business has been the -very devil since this Radical Government has been in power.” - -“I am sure there has been a great deal of trouble in the world lately,” - said Mrs. Heywood. - -“I’m sure I can’t bear to read even the dear _Daily Mail_,” said Mrs. -Atkinson Brown. - -“What with murders and revolutions and eloping vicars and -suffragettes----” - -“Those outrageous women ought to be whipped,” said her husband. “Spoiled -my game of golf last Saturday. Found ‘Votes for Women’ on the first -green. Made me positively ill.” - -“I am glad dear Clare is so sensible,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - -“Yes. Oh, quite so,” said Mrs. Heywood, flushing a little. - -“Oh, rather!” said Herbert. - -“We domestic women are in the minority now,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - -“The spirit of revolt is abroad, Herbert,” said her husband. “Back to -the Home is the only watchword which will save the country from these -shameless hussies. Flog ‘em back, I would. Thank God _our_ wives have -more sense.” - -“Yes, there’s something in that,” said Herbert. - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown was gazing round the room curiously. She seemed to -suspect something. - -“You are sure dear Clare is quite well?” she asked. “No little trouble?” - -“She is having a slight trouble with her back hair,” said Herbert. -“Won’t lie down, you know.” - -He laughed loudly, as though he had made a good joke. - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown half rose from her chair. - -“Oh, let me go to the rescue of the dear thing!” - -Herbert was terror-stricken. - -“No--no! It was only my joke,” he said eagerly. “She will be here in a -minute. Do sit down.” - -Mrs. Heywood remembered her promise to “play the game.” - -“Won’t you sing something, dear?” she said to her visitor. - -“Oh, not so early in the evening,” said the lady. “Besides, I have a -most awful cold.” - -“Oh, I’m so sorry,” said Herbert. “I am beastly sorry.” - -As he spoke the bell rang again, and Herbert went over to his mother and -whispered to her: - -“Do you think that is Clare? My God, this is awful!” - -“Clare was not looking very well the other day when I saw her,” - said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. “I thought perhaps she was sickening for -something.” - -“Oh, I assure you she was never better in her life,” said Herbert. - -“But you men are so unobservant. I am dying to see dear Clare, to ask -her how she feels. Are you sure I can’t be of any use to her?” - -She rose again from her chair, and Herbert gave a beseeching look to his -mother. - -“Oh, quite sure, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. “_Do_ sit down.” - -“Besides, you have such a frightful cold,” said Herbert, with extreme -anxiety. “_Do_ keep closer to the fire.” - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown laughed a little curiously: - -“You seem very anxious to keep me from dear Clare!” - -This persistence annoyed her husband and he rebuked her sternly. - -“Sit still, Beatrice, can’t you? Don’t you see that we have arrived a -little early and that we have taken Clare unawares? Let the poor girl go -on with her dressing.” - -“Don’t bully me in other people’s flats, Charles,” said Mrs. Atkinson -Brown. “I have enough of it at home.” - -Her husband was not to be quelled. - -“Herbert and I can hardly hear ourselves speak,” he growled, “you keep -up such a clatter.” - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown flared up. - -“I come out to get the chance of speaking a little. For eight years now -I have been listening to your interminable monologues, and can’t get a -word in edgeways.” - -“Stuff and nonsense!” said her husband. - -“Have you been married eight years already, my dear?” asked Mrs. Heywood -in a tone of amiable surprise. - -“Well, we are in our Eighth Year,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - -Mrs. Heywood seemed startled. - -“Oh, I see,” she said thoughtfully. - -“I assure you it seems longer,” said the lady. “I suppose it’s because -Charles makes me so very tired sometimes.” - -Two other visitors now arrived. They were Mr. Hargreaves and his -wife: the former a young man in immaculate evening clothes, with -lofty manners; the latter a tall, thin, elegant, bored-looking woman, -supercilious and snobbish. - -Herbert went forward hurriedly to his new guests. - -“How splendid of you to come! How are you, sir?” - -“Oh, pretty troll-loll, thanks,” said Mr. Hargreaves. - -Herbert shook hands with Mrs. Hargreaves. - -“How do you do?” - -“We’re rather late,” said the lady, “but this is in an out-of-the-way -neighborhood, is it not?” - -“Oh, do you think so?” said Herbert. “I always considered Battersea Park -very central.” - -Mrs. Hargreaves raised her eyebrows. - -“It’s having to get across the river that makes the journey so very -tedious. I should die if I had to live across the river.” - -“There’s something in what you say,” said Herbert, anxious to agree with -everybody. “I must apologize for dragging you all this way. Of course, -you people in Mayfair----Won’t you sit down?” - -Mr. Hargreaves became a victim of mistaken identity, shaking hands with -Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - -“Mrs. Heywood, I presume. I must introduce myself.” - -Mrs. Hargreaves also greeted the other lady, under the same impression. - -“Oh, how do you do? So delighted to make your acquaintance.” - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown was much amused, and laughed gaily. - -“But I am _not_ Mrs. Heywood. I cannot boast of such a handsome -husband!” - -“Oh, can’t you, by Jove!” said Mr. Atkinson Brown, rather nettled by his -wife’s candor. - -“Oh, I beg pardon,” said Mr. Hargreaves. “Where _is_ Mrs. Heywood?” - -“Yes, where is Mrs. Heywood?” said his wife. - -Herbert looked wildly at his mother. - -“Where is she, mother? Do tell her to hurry up. - -“Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood meekly. She moved uncertainly toward the -bedroom door, and then hesitated: “Perhaps she will not be very long -now.” - -“The fact is,” said Herbert desperately, “she is not very well.” - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown was astounded. - -“But you said she was perfectly well!” - -“Did I?” said Herbert. “Oh, well, er--one has to say these things, you -know. Polite fictions, eh?” - -He laughed nervously. - -“The fact is, she has a little headache. Hasn’t she, mother?” - -“Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. “You know best.” - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown rose from her chair again. - -“Oh, I will go and see how the poor dear feels. So bad of you to hide it -from us.” - -“Oh, please sit down,” said Herbert in a voice of anguish. “I assure you -it is nothing very much. She will be in directly. Make yourself at home, -Mrs. Hargreaves. This chair? Mother, show Mrs. Atkinson Brown Clare’s -latest photograph.” - -“Oh, yes!” said Mrs. Heywood. “It is an excellent likeness.” - -“But I want to see Clare herself!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown plaintively. - -“Sit down, Beatrice!” said her husband. - -“Bully!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown, sitting down with a flop. - -Herbert addressed himself to Mr. Hargreaves. - -“Draw up your chair, sir. You will have a cigar, I am sure.” - -He offered him one from a newly opened box. Mr. Hargreaves took one, -smelled it, and then put it back. - -“No, thanks,” he said. “I will have one of my own, if I may. Sure the -ladies don’t mind?” - -“Oh, they like it,” said Herbert. - -“We have to pretend to,” said Mrs. Hargreaves. - -“Well, if you don’t, you ought to,” said her husband. “It’s a man’s -privilege.” - -Mrs. Hargreaves smiled icily. - -“One of his many privileges.” - -“Will you have a cigarette, Mrs. Hargreaves?” said Herbert. - -But Mr. Hargreaves interposed: - -“Oh, I don’t allow my wife to smoke. It’s a beastly habit.” - -Mr. Atkinson Brown, who had accepted one of Herbert’s cigars, but after -some inquiry had also decided to smoke one of his own, applauded this -sentiment with enthusiasm. - -“Hear, hear! Hear, hear! Disgusting habit for women.” - -“Of course I agree with you,” said Herbert. “Clare never smokes. But I -don’t lay down the law for other people’s wives.” - -Mr. Hargreaves laughed. - -“A very sound notion, Heywood. It takes all one’s time to manage one’s -own, eh?” - -“And then it is not always effective,” said his wife. “Even the worm -will turn.” - -Mr. Hargreaves answered his wife with a heavy retort: - -“If it does I knock it on the head with a spade.” - -Mr. Atkinson Brown laughed loudly again. He seemed to like this man -Hargreaves. - -“Good epigram! By Jove, I must remember that!” - -Herbert was on tenter-hooks when the conversation languished a little. - -“Won’t you sing a song, Mrs. Atkinson Brown? I am sure my friend, Mr. -Hargreaves, will appreciate your voice.” - -“Oh, rather!” said Hargreaves. “Though I don’t pretend to understand a -note of music.” Mrs. Atkinson Brown shook her head: - -“I couldn’t think of singing before our hostess appears.” - -The lady’s husband seemed at last to have caught the spirit of her -suspicion. He spoke in a hoarse whisper to his wife: - -“Where the devil _is_ the woman?” - -Herbert Heywood realized that he was on the edge of a precipice. Not -much longer could he hold on to this intolerable situation. He tried to -speak cheerfully, but there was anguish in his voice when he said: - -“Well, let’s have a game of nap.” - -“Oh, Lord, no,” said Hargreaves. “I only play nap on the way to a race. -You don’t sport a billiard table, do you?” - -Herbert Heywood was embarrassed. - -“Er--a billiard table?” He looked round the room as though he might -discover a billiard table. “I’m afraid not.” - -“Don’t be absurd, Edward,” said Mrs. Hargreaves. “People don’t play -billiards on the wrong side of the river.” - -Conversation languished again, and Herbert was becoming desperate. He -seized upon the sandwiches and handed them round. - -“Won’t anybody have a sandwich to pass the time away? Mrs. Hargreaves?” - -Mrs. Hargreaves laughed in her supercilious way. - -“It’s rather early, isn’t it?” - -“Good Lord, no!” said Herbert. “I am sure you must be hungry. Let me beg -of you--Mother, haven’t you got any cake anywhere?” - -“Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. She, too, was suffering mental tortures. - -“Atkinson Brown. You will have a sandwich,” said Herbert. - -He bent over to his visitor and spoke in a gloomy voice: - -“Take one, for God’s sake.” - -Atkinson Brown was startled. - -“Yes! Yes! By all means,” he said hastily. Herbert handed the sandwiches -about rather wildly. “Mother, you will have one, won’t you? Mrs. -Atkinson Brown?... And one for me, eh?” - -Mrs. Hargreaves eyed her host curiously. - -“I hope your wife is not seriously unwell, Mr. Heywood.” - -Herbert was losing his nerve. - -“Can’t we talk of something else?” he said despairingly. “What is your -handicap at golf?” - -“My husband objects to my playing golf,” said the lady. - -“It takes women out of the home so much,” said Hargreaves. “Play with -the babies is my motto for women.” - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown shook her finger at him, and laughed in a shrill -voice: - -“But supposing they haven’t got any babies?” - -“They ought to have ‘em,” said Hargreaves. - -It was Atkinson Brown who interrupted this interesting discussion, which -promised to bring up the great problem of eugenics, so favored now as a -drawing-room topic. He had been turning his sandwich this way and that, -and he leaned forward to his host: - -“Excuse me, Herbert, old man. There’s something the matter with this -sandwich.” - -“Something the matter with it?” asked Herbert anxiously. - -“It’s covered with red spots,” said Atkinson Brown. - -“Spots--what kind of spots?” - -“Looks like blood,” said Atkinson Brown, giving an uneasy guffaw. -“Suppose there hasn’t been a murder in this flat?” - -All the guests leaned forward and gazed at the sandwich. - -Herbert spoke in a tragic whisper to his mother: - -“Mollie’s finger!” - -Then he explained the matter airily to the general company. - -“Oh, it’s a special kind of sandwich with the gravy outside. A new fad, -you know.” - -“Oh, I see,” said Atkinson Brown, much relieved. “Hadn’t heard of it. -Still, I think I’ll have an ordinary one, if you don’t mind.” - -Herbert was muttering little prayers remembered from his childhood. - -“Mrs. Hargreaves,” he said cajolingly, “I am sure you play. Won’t you -give us a little tune?” - -“Well, if it won’t disturb your wife,” said the lady. - -“Oh, I am sure it won’t. She’ll love to hear you.” - -He felt immensely grateful to this good-natured woman. - -“Edward, get my music-roll,” said Mrs. Hargreaves. - -But Herbert had a horrible disappointment when Hargreaves said: - -“By Jove! I believe I left it in the taxi. Yes, I am sure I did!” - -Herbert put his hand up to his aching head and whispered his anguish: - -“Oh, my God! Now how shall I mark time?” - -“But I reminded you about it!” said Mrs. Hargreaves. - -“Yes, I know. But you are always reminding me about something.” - -“Well, play something by heart,” said Herbert in a pleading way. “Any -old thing. The five-finger exercises.” - -“I am very out of practice,” said Mrs. Hargreaves. “But still I will -try.” - -Herbert breathed a prayer of thankfulness, and hurried to conduct the -lady to the music-stool. - -As he did so there was a noise outside the window. Newspaper men were -shouting their sing-song: “Raid on the ‘Ouse. Suffragette Outrage. Raid -on the ‘Ouse of Commins.” - -“What are the devils saying?” asked Hargreaves, trying to catch the -words. - -“Something about the Suffragettes,” growled Atkinson Brown. - -“I’m afraid it will give poor Clare a worse headache,” said Mrs. -Atkinson Brown. - -Mrs. Heywood tried to be reassuring: - -“Oh, I don’t think so.” - -At that moment there was a loud ring at the bell. The sound was so -prolonged that it startled the company. - -Herbert listened intently and then whispered to his mother: - -“That must be Clare!” - -“Oh, if it is only Clare!” said Mrs. Heywood. When Mrs. Hargreaves had -struck a few soft chords on the piano there was the sound of voices -speaking loudly in the hall. Everybody listened, surprised at the -interruption. Mollie’s voice could be heard quite clearly. - -“I told you it was our At Home night, Miss Vernon.” - -“I can’t help that.” - -The drawing-room door opened, _sans ceremonie_, and Madge Vernon came -in. Her face was flushed, and she had sparkling eyes. She stood in the -doorway looking at the company with a smile, as though immensely amused -by some joke of her own. - -“I’m sorry to interrupt you good people,” she said very cheerfully, “but -I have come on urgent business, which brooks no delay, as they say in -melodrama.” - -Mrs. Heywood gazed at her with frightened eyes. - -“My dear!... What has happened?” - -“What’s the matter?” said Herbert, turning very pale. - -“Oh, it’s nothing to be alarmed at,” said Madge Vernon. “It’s about your -wife.” - -“My wife?” - -“About Clare?” exclaimed Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - -Mrs. Hargreaves craned her head forward, like a bird reaching for its -seed. - -“I wonder--” she said. - -Madge Vernon grinned at them all. - -“It’ll be in the papers to-morrow, so you are all bound to know. -Besides, why keep it a secret? It’s a thing to be proud of!” - -“Proud of what?” asked Herbert in a frenzied tone of voice. - -Madge Vernon enjoyed the drama of her announcement. - -“Clare has been arrested in a demonstration outside the House to-night.” - -“Arrested!” - -The awful word was spoken almost simultaneously by all the company in -that drawingroom of Intellectual Mansions, S. W. - -“She’s quite safe,” said Madge Vernon calmly. “I’ve come to ask you to -bail her out.” - -Herbert’s guests rose and looked at him in profound astonishment and -indignation. - -“But you told us--” cried Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - -Herbert Heywood gave a queer groan of anger and horror. - -“Bail her out!... Oh, my God!” - -He sank down into his chair and held his head in his hands. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -Herbert Heywood was in the depths of an arm-chair reading the paper. -Mrs. Heywood was on the other side of the fireplace with a book on her -lap. But she was dozing over it, and her head nodded on to her chest. -Herbert turned over the leaves of the paper and then studied the -advertisements. He had a look of extreme boredom. Every now and then he -yawned quietly and lengthily. At last he let the paper fall on to the -floor, and uttered his thoughts aloud, so that his mother was awakened. - -“Did you say anything, Herbert?” said the old lady. - -“Nothing, mother, except that I am bored stiff.” - -He went over to the piano and played “God Save the King” with one -finger, in a doleful way. - -Mrs. Heywood glanced over her spectacles at him. - -“Would you like a game of cribbage, dear?” - -“No, thanks, mother,” said Herbert hastily. “Not in the afternoon.” - -Mrs. Heywood listened to his fumbling notes for a moment and then spoke -again. - -“Won’t you go out for a walk? It would do you good, Herbert.” - -“Think so?” said Herbert bitterly; without accepting the suggestion, -he played “Three Blind Mice,” also with one finger. It sounded more -melancholy than “God Save the King.” - -“I don’t like to see you moping indoors on a bright day like this,” said -Mrs. Heywood. “Take a brisk walk round the Park. It would cheer you up.” - -Herbert resented the idea fiercely. - -“A long walk in Battersea Park would make a pessimist of a laughing -hyena.” - -Mrs. Heywood was silent for some time, but then she made a last effort. - -“Well, go and see a friend, dear. The Atkinson Browns, for instance.” - -“They do nothing but nag at each other,” said Herbert. “And Atkinson -Brown hasn’t as much brains as a Teddy Bear. Besides, he’s become -friendly with that fellow Hargreaves, and I’m not going to take the risk -of meeting a man who turned me out of my job.” - -Mrs. Heywood became agitated. - -“Are you sure of that, Herbert? I can’t think he could have been so -malicious, after coming here and eating your salt, as it were. What was -his reason?” - -“He made no disguise of it,” said Herbert bitterly. “I saw his letter -to my chief. Said that it was quite impossible to employ a man who was -mixed up with the militant Suffragettes. Damned liar!” - -“Good Heavens!” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“Of course it was all due to that ghastly evening when Clare got -arrested. She knows that well enough.” - -“Well, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood, “she has tried to make amends. The -shock of your losing your place has made her much more gentle and -loving. It has brought back all her loyalty to you, Herbert.” - -“Loyalty!” said Herbert. “Where is she now, I should like to know?” - -“She is gone to some committee meeting.” - - -“She’s always got a committee meeting,” said Herbert angrily, kicking -the hassock. - -“She joins a new committee for some kind of social reform nonsense every -blessed day.” - -“Well, it keeps her busy, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood gently. “Besides, -it is not all committee work. Since she has been visiting the poor and -helping in the slums she has been ever so much better in health and -spirits.” - -“Yes, but where the devil do I come in?” asked Herbert. - -“Don’t you think you might go out, dear? Just for a little while?” - -“I don’t _want_ to go out, mother,” said Herbert with suppressed heat. - -“Very well, dear.” - -Herbert stood in front of the fireplace and rattled the keys in his -pocket moodily. - -“What’s the good of toiling to keep a home together if one’s wife -abandons her husband’s society on every possible pretext? A home! This -place is just a receiving office for begging letters and notices for -committees and subcommittees.” - -Mrs. Heywood sighed. - -“It might have been worse, Herbert.” - -“As far as I’m concerned, it couldn’t be worse. I’m the most miserable -wretch in London. Without a job and without a wife.” - -“You’ll get a place all right, dear. You have the promise of one -already. And you know Clare’s health was in a very queer state before -Miss Vernon made her take an interest in helping other people. I was -seriously alarmed about her.” - -“What about me?” asked Herbert. “No one troubles to get alarmed about -me.” - -“Are you unwell, dear?” said Mrs. Hey-wood anxiously. - -“Of course I’m unwell.” - -“Darling!” said Mrs. Heywood, still more anxiously. - -“Oh, there’s nothing the matter with me from a physical point of view. -But mentally and morally I’m a demnition wreck.” - -“Aren’t you taking your iron pills regularly?” said his mother. - -“Pills! As if pills could cure melancholia!” Mrs. Heywood was aghast at -that dreadful word. - -“Good Heavens, dear!” - -“I’m on the verge of a nervous breakdown,” said Herbert. - -“Oh, Herbert,” cried his mother, “I hope not!” - -“I’m working up to a horrible crisis,” said Herbert. - -“What are your symptoms? How do you feel?” asked his mother. - -“I feel like smashing things,” said Herbert savagely. - -He sat down at the piano again and played “We Won’t Go Home Till -Morning,” but missed his note, and banged on to the wrong one in a -temper. - -“There goes a note, anyhow. Thank goodness for that!” - -At that moment Mollie came in holding a silver tray with a pile of -letters. - -“The post, sir.” - -“Well, something to break the infernal monotony,” said Herbert with a -sigh of relief. - -He took up the letters and examined them. - -“Life is a bit flat, sir,” said Mollie, “since we gave up having At -Homes.” - -“Hold your tongue,” said Herbert. - -Mollie tossed her head and muttered an impertinent sentence as she left -the room. - -“Can’t even open my mouth without somebody jumping down my throat. I -will break that girl’s neck one of these days,” said Herbert. - -He went through the letters and read out the names on them. - -“Mrs. Herbert Heywood, _Mrs._ Herbert Heywood, Mrs. Herbert Heywood, -Mrs. Herbert--Why, every jack one is for Mrs. Herbert Heywood! Nobody -writes to me, of course. No one cares a damn about _me_.” - -“Your mother cares, Herbert,” said the old lady. - -“I shall take to drink--or the devil,” said Herbert, and he added -thoughtfully, “I wonder which is the most fun?” - -“Herbert, dear!” cried his mother, “don’t say such awful things.” - -“The worst of it is,” said Herbert bitterly, “they’re both so beastly -expensive.” - -There was the noise of a latchkey in the hall, and Mrs. Heywood gave a -little cry. - -“There’s Clare!” - -“Think so?” said Herbert, listening. - -From the hall came the sound of Clare’s voice singing a merry tune. - -“She’s in a cheerful mood, anyhow,” said Mrs. Heywood, smiling. - -Herbert answered her gloomily. - -“Horribly cheerful.” - -The mother and son looked toward the door as Clare came in. There was a -noticeable change in her appearance since the evening At Home. There was -more color in her cheeks and the wistfulness had gone out of her eyes. -She was brisk, keen and bright. - -“Well, mother,” she said, “been having a nap?” - -“Oh, no, dear,” said the old lady, who never admitted that she made a -habit of naps. - -“Hulloh, Herbert,” said Clare. “Have you got that new post yet?” - -“No,” said Herbert. “And I don’t expect I shall get it.” - -“Oh, yes, you will, dear old boy. Don’t you worry! Have you been home -long?” - -“Seems like a lifetime.” - -Clare laughed. - -“Not so long as that, surely?” - -She came forward to him and put her arm about his neck, and offered him -her cheek. He looked at it doubtfully for a moment and then kissed her -in a “distant” manner. - -“I’m frightfully busy, old boy,” said Clare. “I just have a few minutes -and then I shall have to dash off again.” - -“Dash off where?” asked Herbert, with signs of extreme irritation. “Dash -it all, surely you aren’t going out again?” - -“Only round the corner,” said Clare quietly. “I have got to look into -the case of a poor creature who is making match-boxes. Goodness knows -how many for a farthing! And yet she’s so cheerful and plucky that it -does one good to see her. Oh, it kills one’s own selfishness, Herbert.” - -“Well, why worry about her, then, if she’s so pleased with herself?” - -“She’s plucky,” said Clare, “but she’s starving. It’s a bad case of -sweated labor.” - -“Sweated humbug,” said Herbert. “What am I going to do all the evening, -I should like to know? Sit here alone?” - -“I don’t suppose I shall be long,” said Clare. “Besides, there’s -mother.” - -“Yes, there’s mother,” said Herbert. “But when a man’s married he wants -his wife.” - -Clare was now busy looking over her letters. - -“Can’t you go to the club?” she asked. - -“I’m dead sick of the club. That boiled-shirt Bohemianism is the biggest -rot in the world.” - -“Take mother to the theatre,” said Clare cheerfully. - -“The theatre bores me stiff. These modern plays set one’s nerves on -edge.” - -“Well, haven’t you got a decent novel or anything?” said Clare, reading -one of her letters. - -“A decent novel! There’s no such thing nowadays, and they give me the -hump.” - -Clare was reading another letter with absorbed interest, but she -listened with half an ear, as it were, to her husband. - -“Play mother a game of cribbage, then,” she said. - -“Look here, Clare,” said Herbert furiously, “I shall begin to throw -things about in a minute.” - -“Don’t get hysterical, Herbert,” said Clare calmly. “Especially as I -have got some good news for you.” - -As she spoke these words she looked across a Demonstration to him with a -curious smile and added: “A big surprise, Herbert!” - -“A surprise?” said Herbert with sarcasm. “Have you discovered another -widow in distress?” - -“Well, I have,” said Clare, “but it’s not that.” - -Mrs. Heywood glanced from her son to her daughter-in-law, and seemed to -imagine that she might be disturbing an intimate conversation. - -“I will be back in a minute. I won’t disturb you two dears,” she said, -as she left the room quietly. - -“You won’t disturb us, mother,” said Clare. - -But the old lady smiled and said, “I won’t be long.” - -“Are you going to get arrested again?” asked Herbert. “Do you want me to -bail you out? Because by the Lord, I won’t!” - -“Oh, that was quite an accident,” said Clare, laughing. “Besides, I gave -you my word to abstain from the militant movement, and you can’t say I -have broken the pledge.” - -“You have broken a good many other things.” - -“What kind of things?” asked Clare. “You aren’t alluding to that window -again, are you?” - -“You have broken my illusions on married life,” said Herbert, with -tragic emphasis. - -“Ah,” said Clare, “that is ‘the Great Illusion,’ by the Angel in the -House.” - -“You have broken my ideals of womanhood.” - -“They were false ideals, Herbert,” said Clare very quietly. “It was only -a plaster ideal which broke. The real woman is of flesh and blood. The -real woman is so much better than the sham. Don’t you think so?” - -“It depends on what you call sham,” said Herbert. - -“I was a sham until that plaster image of me broke. I indulged in sham -sentiment, sham emotion, sham thoughts. Look at me now, since I went -outside these four walls and faced the facts of life, and saw other -people’s misery besides my own, and the happiness of people with so much -more to bear than I had. Look into my eyes, Herbert.” - -She smiled at him tenderly, alluringly. “What’s the good?” said Herbert. - -“Do you see a weary soul looking out?” - -Herbert looked into his wife’s eyes for a moment and then stared down at -the carpet. - -“I used to see love looking out,” he said. - -“It’s looking out now,” said Clare. “Love of life instead of discontent. -Love of this great throbbing human nature, with so much to be put right. -Love of poor people, and little children, and brave hearts. Madge Vernon -taught me that, for she has a soul bigger than the suffrage, and ideals -that go beyond the vote. I have blown the cobwebs out of my eyes, -Herbert. I see straight.” - -“How about _me?_” asked Herbert. “That’s what I want to know. Where do I -come in?” - -“Oh, you come in all right!” said Clare. “You are a part of life and -have a big share of my love.” - -“I don’t want to be shared up, thanks,” said Herbert. - -She stroked his hand. - -“I love you much better now that I see you with this new straight vision -of mine. At any rate I love what is real in you and not what is sham. -And I have learned the duties of love, Herbert. I believe I am a better -wife to you. I think I have learned the meaning of marriage, and of -married love.” - -She spoke with a touch of emotion, and there was a thrill in her voice. - -“You are in love with your social work and your whining beggars, not -with me. You are getting farther and farther away from me. You leave me -alone; I come back to a neglected home.” - -“Why, Mollie and mother look after it beautifully,” said Clare very -cheerfully. - -Herbert gave expression to his grievances. - -“I come home and ask, ‘Where is Clare?’ and get the eternal answer, -‘Clare is out.’ I am an abandoned husband, and by Heaven I won’t stand -it. I will----” - -“What, Herbert?” said Clare, smiling up at him. “Don’t do anything rash, -old boy.” - -“I--have a good mind to make love to somebody else’s wife. But they’re -all so beastly ugly!” - -“Perhaps somebody else’s wife won’t respond,” said Clare. “Some women -are very cold.” - -“I’ll take to drink. I have already given mother full warning.” - -“I am sure it will disagree with you, dear,” said Clare. - -“You scoff at me,” said Herbert passionately. “I think we had better -live apart.” - -“You would get even more bored than before. Dear old boy. _Do_ be -reasonable. _Do_ cultivate a sense of humor.” - -“This is not a farce,” said Herbert. “It’s a horrible tragedy.” - -“Take up a hobby or something,” said Clare. “Golf--or fretwork.” - -Herbert was furious. - -“Fretwork! Is that a joke or an insult?” - -“It was only a suggestion!” said Clare. Herbert jumped up from his -chair. - -“I had better go and drown myself straight away...”? - -He turned at the door, and gave a tragic look at his wife. “Good-by.” - -Clare smiled at him. - -“Won’t you kiss me before you go?” - -“I will take my pipe,” said Herbert, coming back to the mantelshelf. -“It’s my only friend.” - -“It will go out in the water,” said Clare. “Besides, Herbert, don’t you -want to hear my good news? My big surprise?” - -“No,” said Herbert. “Nothing you could say or do could surprise me now. -If mother wants me I shall be in the study for the rest of the evening.” - -“But I thought you were going to the river?”, said Clare teasingly. - -Herbert was not to be amused. - -“I suppose you think you’re funny? I don’t,” he said. - -Then he went out and slammed the door. Clare was left alone, and there -was a smile about her lips. - -“Poor old Herbert,” she said. “I think he will have the surprise of his -life.” - -She laughed quietly to herself, and then looked up and listened as she -heard a slight noise. She stood up with a sudden look of anger as she -saw Gerald Bradshaw gazing at her through the open French windows. - -The man spoke to her in his soft, silky voice. - -“Clare, why are you so cruel to me? I have been ill because of your -heartlessness.” - -Clare answered him sternly. - -“I thought I had got rid of you. Have you come back to plague me?” - -“I tried to forget you,” said Gerald Bradshaw. “I went as far as Italy -to forget you. I made love to many women to forget you. But I have come -back. And I shall always come back, because you are my mate and I cannot -live without you.” - -Clare’s voice rang out in the room. - -“God ought not to let you live. Every word you speak is a lie. You are -a thief of women’s honor. Get away from my window, because your very -breath is poison.” - -The man was astonished, a little scared. “You did not speak like that -once, Clare. You let me hold your hand. You trembled when I leaned -toward you.” - -“I was ill and weak,” said Clare, “and you tried to tempt my weakness. I -was blind and did not see the evil in you. But now I am well and strong, -and my eyes are opened to the truth of things. If you don’t go I will -call my husband and he will throw you over that balcony at one word from -me.” - -Gerald Bradshaw laughed scoffingly. - -“Your husband! I could kill him between my thumb and forefinger.” - -“He is strong because he is good,” said Clare. “I will call him now.” - -She went quickly toward the bell. - -“You needn’t call him,” said Gerald Bradshaw. “I would dislike to hurt -the little man.” - -“You are going?” asked Clare. - -“Yes, I am going,” said the man, “because something has changed in you.” - -Clare gave a cheerful little laugh. - -“You are right.” - -“I see that now. I have lost my spell over you. Something has broken.” - -“Are you going,” said Clare sternly, “or shall I call my man?” - -“I am going, Clare,” said the man at the window. “I am going to find -another mate. She and I will talk evil of you, and hate you, as I -hate you now. Farewell, foolish one!” He withdrew from the window, and -instantly Clare rushed to it, shut it and bolted it. Then she pulled -down the blind, and stood, panting, with her back to it and her arms -outstretched. - -“God be praised!” she said. “He has gone out of my life. I am a clean -woman again.” At that moment Mrs. Heywood entered. “Must you go out -again, Clare?” said the old lady. - -“Only for a little while, mother,” said Clare, a little breathless after -her emotion. - -“Is anything the matter, dear?” said Mrs. Heywood. “You look rather -flustered.” - -“Oh, nothing is the matter!” said Clare. “Only I am very happy.” - -Mrs. Heywood smiled at her. - -“It makes me happy to see you so well and bright,” she said. - -“I don’t get on your nerves so much, eh, mother?” - -She laughed quietly. - -“Well, I must go and tidy my hair.” - -She moved toward the bedroom, but stopped to pack up her letters. - -“I am so sorry you have to go out,” said the old lady. - -“I shan’t be more than a few minutes,” said Clare. “But I must go. -Besides, after this I am going to _give_ up some of my visiting work.” - -“Give it up, dear?” - -“Yes. One must be moderate even in district visiting.” - -She went into the bedroom, but left the door open so that she could hear -her mother. - -“Clare!” said the old lady. - -“Yes, mother.” - -“What is that surprise you were going to give us?” - -“Surprise, mother?” - -“Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “The good news?” - -“Oh, yes, I forgot,” said Clare. “Come in and I will tell you.” - -Mrs. Heywood went into the bedroom. Outside, in the street, a man with -a fiddle was playing the “Intermezzo.” Presently both women came out. -Clare was smiling, with her arm round Mrs. Heywood’s neck. Mrs. Heywood -was wiping her eyes as though crying a little. - -“Cheer up,” said Clare. “It’s nothing to cry about.” - -“I am crying because I am so glad,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -“Well, that’s a funny thing to do,” said Clare, laughing gaily. “Now I -must run away. You won’t let Herbert drown himself, will you?” - -“No, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood, wiping her eyes. - -“Who would have thought it!” said Mrs. - -Heywood, speaking to herself as her daughter-in-law left the room. - -She went over to the mantelpiece and took up her son’s photograph and -kissed it. Then she went to the door and stood out in the hall and -called in a sweet old woman’s voice: - -“Herbert! Herbert, dear!” - -“Are you calling, mother?” answered Herbert from another room. - -“Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I want you.” - -“I don’t feel a bit like cribbage, mother,”’ said Herbert. - -“I don’t want you to play cribbage to-night,” said the old lady. “I have -something to say to you.” - -“Has Clare gone?” asked Herbert, still calling from the other room. - -“Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “But she won’t be long.” - -“Oh, all right. I’ll be along in a moment.” - -Mrs. Heywood went back into the room and waited for her son eagerly. -Presently he came in with a pipe in his hand and book under his arm. He -had changed into a shabby old jacket, and was in carpet slippers. - -“What’s the matter, mother?” he asked. - -“There’s nothing the matter,” said the old lady; then she became very -excited, and raised her hands and cried out: - -“At least, everything is the matter. It’s the only thing that matters! -... Oh, Herbert!” - -She laughed and cried at the same time so that her son was alarmed and -stared at her in amazement. - -“You aren’t ill, are you?” he said. “Shall I send for a doctor?” - -Mrs. Heywood shook her trembling old head. - -“I’m quite well. I never felt so well.” - -“You had better sit down, mother,” said Herbert. - -He took her hand and led her to a chair. - -“What’s up, eh, old lady? Mollie hasn’t run away, has she?” - -The old lady took his hand and fondled it. - -“Herbert, my son, I’ve wonderful news for you.” - -“News?” said Herbert. “Did you find it in the evening paper?” - -“It’s going to make a lot of difference to us all,” said Mrs. Heywood. -“No more cribbage, Herbert!” - -“Thank heaven for that!” said Herbert. - -“And not so much social work for Clare.” - -“Well, let’s be thankful for small mercies,” said Herbert. - -“Bend your head down and let me whisper to you,” said Mrs. Heywood. - -She put her hands up to his head, and drew it down, and whispered -something into his ears. - -It was something which astounded him. - -He started back and said “No!” as though he had heard something quite -incredible. Then he spoke in a whisper: - -“By Jove!... Is that a fact?” - -“It’s the best fact that ever was, Herbert,” said the old lady. - -“Yes... it will make a bit of a difference,” said Herbert thoughtfully. - -Mrs. Heywood clasped her son’s arm. There was a tremulous light in her -eyes and a great emotion in her voice. - -“Herbert, I am an old woman and your mother. Sit down and let me talk to -you as I did in the old days when you were my small boy before a nursery -fire.” - -Herbert smiled at her; all the gloom had left his face. - -“All right, mother.... By Jove, and I never guessed. And yet I ought to -have guessed. Things have been--different--lately.” - -He sat down on a hassock near the old lady with his knees tucked up. She -sat down, too, and stretched out a trembling hand to touch his hair. - -“Once upon a time, Herbert, there was a young man and a young woman who -loved each other very dearly.” - -Herbert looked up and smiled at her. - -“Are you sure, mother?” - -“Perfectly sure. Then they married.” - -“And lived happily ever after? I bet they didn’t!” - -“No, not quite happily, because this is different from the fairy tales. -... After a time the husband began to think too much about his work, -while the wife stayed at home and thought too much about herself.” - -“It’s a stale old yarn,” said Herbert. “What happened then?” - -“By degrees the wife began to think she hated her husband, because -although he gave her little luxuries and pretty clothes, and all the -things that pleased _him_, he never gave her the thing _she_ wanted.” - -“What was that?” asked Herbert. - -“It was a magic charm to make her forget herself.” - -“Well, magic charms aren’t easy to find,” said Herbert. - -“No.... But at last she went out to find it herself. And while she was -away the husband came home and missed her.” - -“Poor devil!” said Herbert. “Of course he did.” - -“Being a man,” said Mrs. Heywood, giving a queer little laugh, “he -stayed at home more than he used to do, and then complained that he was -left too much alone. Just like his wife had complained.” - -“Well, hang it all,” said Herbert, “she ought to have stayed with him.” - -“But then she wouldn’t have found the magic charm,” said Mrs. Heywood. -“Don’t you see?... And she would have withered and withered away until -there was nothing left of her, and the husband would have been quite -alone--forever.” - -“Think so?” said Herbert very thoughtfully. “D’you think it would have -been as bad as that?” - -“Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I’m sure of it.” - -“Well, what did happen?” asked Herbert. “Did she find the magic charm? -It wasn’t a widow in distress, was it? Or Social Reform humbug?” - -“No,” said Mrs. Heywood; “that gave her a new interest in life because -it helped her to forget herself, some of her own little worries, some of -her brooding thoughts. But a good fairy who was looking after her worked -another kind of magic.... Herbert I It’s the best magic for unhappy -women and unhappy homes, and it has been worked for you. Oh, my dear, -you ought to be very thankful.” - -“Yes,” said Herbert, scratching his head. “Yes, I suppose so. But what’s -the moral of the tale, mother? I’m hanged if I see.” - -Mrs. Heywood put her hand on her son’s shoulder, as he sat on the -hassock by her chair. - -“It’s a moral told by an old woman who watched these two from the very -beginning. A husband mustn’t expect his wife to stay at home for ever. -The home isn’t big enough, Herbert. There’s the great world outside -calling to her, calling, calling. The walls of a little fiat like this -are too narrow for the spirit and heart. If he keeps her there she -either pines and dies, or else----” - -“What?” asked Herbert. - -“Escapes, my dear,” said the old lady very solemnly. - -Herbert drew a deep, quivering breath. - -“Then,” said Mrs. Heywood, “nothing in the world can call her -back--except----” - -“Except what?” - -“A little child.” - -Herbert got up from the hassock and clasped the mantelshelf, and spoke -in a low, humble, grateful voice. - -“Thank God, Clare has been called back!” he said. - -Mrs. Heywood rose from her chair also, and caught hold of her son’s -sleeve. - -“Yes,” she said, “yes. But even now she will want to spread her wings -a little. She must take short flights, Herbert, even now. She must wing -her way out to the big world at times. You will remember that, won’t -you?” - -“I’ll try to remember,” said Herbert. He bent his head over his hands on -the mantelshelf. “I’ve been selfish,” he said. “Blinded with selfishness -and self-conceit. God forgive me.” - -“Perhaps we have all been a little selfish,” said Mrs. Heywood quietly. -“But we shall have some one else to think about now. A new life, -Herbert. A new life is coming to us all!” - -“Hush!” said Herbert. “Here’s Clare.” - -The mother and son stood listening to the voice of Clare singing in the -hall. She was singing the old nursery rhyme of-- - - “Sing a song of sixpence, - - A pocket-full of rye, - - Four and twenty blackbirds - - Baked in a pie, - - When the pie was opened-----” - -Mrs. Heywood smiled into her son’s eyes. - -“I think I’ve left my spectacles in the other room,” she said. She went -out into the hall, leaving her son alone. - -And Herbert stood with his head raised, looking toward the door, -eagerly, like a lover waiting for his bride. - -Then Clare came in. There was a smile about her lips, and she spoke -cheerfully. - -“Well, you see I wasn’t long.” - -Herbert strode toward her and took her hands and raised them to his -lips. - -“Clare, sweetheart! Is it true? Have you been called back to me?” - -Clare put her forehead down against his chest. - -“I never went very far away,” she said. - -Presently Herbert spoke again with great cheerfulness. - -“I say, Clare. It’s a funny thing!” - -“What’s a funny thing?” asked Clare, smiling at him. - -“Why, I was reading the advertisements in the paper to-night---” - -“Were _they_ funny?” asked Clare. - -“No,” said Herbert, “but I saw something that would just suit us.” - -He went over to a side-table and picked up the newspaper. Sitting on the -edge of the table, he read out an advertisement. - -“Here it is.... ‘Chelsea--Semi-detached house, dining-room, -drawing-room, three bedrooms, and a large nursery. Shed for bicycle or -perambulator.’” - -Clare laughed happily. - -“Well, we might have both!” she said. - -Herbert dropped the paper, came over to his wife, and kissed her hands -again. - -THE END - - - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Eighth Year, by Philip Gibbs - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EIGHTH YEAR *** - -***** This file should be named 51926-0.txt or 51926-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/1/9/2/51926/ - -Produced by David Widger, from page images generously -provided by Google Books - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - - - -Title: The Eighth Year - A Vital Problem Of Married Life - -Author: Philip Gibbs - -Release Date: May 1, 2016 [EBook #51926] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EIGHTH YEAR *** - - - - -Produced by David Widger, from page images generously -provided by Google Books - - - - - - - - - - -THE EIGHTH YEAR - -A Vital Problem Of Married Life - -By Philip Gibbs - -New York - -The Devin-Adair Company 437 Fifth Avenue - -1913 - -"_The Eighth Year is the most dangerous year in the adventure of -marriage._" - -Sir Francis Jeune (afterwards Lord St. Helier). President of the Divorce -Court. - - - - - -PART I--THE ARGUMENT - - - - -CHAPTER I - -It was Sir Francis Jeune, afterwards Lord St. Helier, and President -of the Divorce Court, who first called attention to the strange -significance of the Eighth Year of married life. "The Eighth Year," he -said, "is the most dangerous year in the adventure of marriage." - -Afterwards, in the recent Royal Commission on Divorce, this curious -fact was again alluded to in the evidence, and it has been shown by -statistics of domestic tragedy, by hundreds of sordid little dramas, -that at this period in the partnership of husbands and wives there -comes, in many cases, a great crisis, leading often to moral disaster. - -It is in the Eighth Year, or thereabouts, that there is the tug-of-war -between two temperaments, mated by the law, but not mated, perhaps, in -ideals, in ambitions, or in qualities of character. The man and woman -pull against each other, tugging at each other's heartstrings. The -Eighth Year is the fatal year, when if there is no give-and-take, no -working compromise, no new pledges of loyalty and comradeship, the -foundations of the home are shattered, and the hopes with which it was -first built lie in ruins like a house of cards knocked down by a gust of -wind. - -But why the Eighth Year? Why not the twelfth, fourteenth, or eighteenth -year? The answer is not to be found in any old superstition. There -is nothing uncanny about the number eight. The problem is not to be -shrugged off by people who despise the foolish old tradition which -clings to thirteen, and imagine this to be in the same class of folly. -By the law of averages and by undeniable statistics it has been proved -that it brings many broken-hearted men and women to the Divorce Court. -For instance, taking the annual average of divorces in England between -1904 and 1908, one finds that there were only six divorces between -husbands and wives who had been married less than a year, and only -eighteen divorces between those married less than two years. Between -the second and the fifth years the number increases to a hundred and -seventeen. Then there is a tremendous jump, and the numbers between the -fifth and tenth years are two hundred and ninety-two. The period of -the Eighth Year is the most productive of divorce. The figures are more -startling and more significant when they cover a longer period. But -apart from statistics and apart altogether from the Divorce Court, -which is only one house of trouble, by using one's own eyes in one's -own circle of friends one may see that young married couples who started -happily enough show signs of stress and strain as this year approaches. -The fact is undeniable. What is the cause behind the fact? - -There is not one cause, there are many causes, all leading up from -the first day of marriage, inevitably, with the unswerving, relentless -fatality of Greek Tragedy to the Eighth Year. They are causes which lie -deep in the social system of our modern home life; in the little order -of things prevailing, at this time, in hundreds of thousands of small -households and small flats, inhabited by the middle-classes. It is -mainly a middle-class problem, because the rich and the poor are, for -reasons which I will show later in this argument, exempt in a large -measure from the fatality of the Eighth Year. But all the influences -at work among the middle-classes, in this strange age of intellectual -disturbance, and of blind gropings forward to new social and moral -conditions, have a close hearing upon this seeming mystery. The -economic position of this class, its social ambitions, its intellectual -adventures, its general education, its code of morality, its religion or -lack of religion, its little conventional cults, the pressure of outside -influences, thrusting inwards to the hidden life in these little -homes, bringing dangerous ideas through the front doors, or through the -keyholes, and all the mental and moral vibrations that are "in the -air" to-day, especially in the air breathed by the middle-classes, -produce--the Eighth Year. - -Let us start with the first year of marriage so that we may see how the -problem works out from the beginning. - -Here we have, in the first year, a young man and woman who have come -together, not through any overmastering force of passion, but as -middle-class men and women are mostly brought together, by the accidents -of juxtaposition, and by a pleasant sentiment. They met, before -marriage, at tennis parties, at suburban dances, at evening At Homes. By -the laws of natural selection, aided a little by anxious mothers, this -young man and this young woman find out, or think they find out, that -they are "suited" to each other. That is to say, the young man thrills -in a pleasant way in the presence of the girl, and she sees the timidity -in his eyes when she looks at him, and she knows that her laughter, -the touch of her hand, the little tricks and graces she has learnt from -girl-friends, or from actresses in musical comedy, or from instinct, -attract him to her. She leads him on, by absurd little tiffs, artfully -arranged, by a pretence of flirtation with other boys, by provocative -words, by moments of tenderness changing abruptly to sham indifference, -or followed by little shafts of satire which wound his pride, and sting -him into desire for her. He pursues her, not knowing that he is pursued, -so that they meet half-way. This affair makes him restless, ill at -ease. It interrupts his work and his ambitions. Presently it becomes an -obsession, and he knows that he has "fallen in love." He makes his plans -accordingly. - -In the middle-classes love still presupposes marriage (though the idea -is not so fast-rooted as in the old days), but how the dickens is he to -manage it? He is just starting his career as Something in the City, or -as a solicitor, barrister, journalist, artist, doctor. His income is -barely sufficient for himself, according to his way of life, which -includes decent clothes, a club, a game of golf when he feels like it, -a motor-cycle or a small car, a holiday abroad, theatres, a bachelor -dinner now and again--the usual thing. He belongs to the younger -generation, with wider interests, larger ideas, higher ambitions than -those with which his father and mother started life. - -He could not start on their level. Times have changed. He remembers his -father's reminiscences of early struggles, of the ceaseless anxiety to -make both ends meet, of the continual stinting and scraping to keep the -children "decent," to provide them with a good education, to give them -a fair start in life. He remembers his mother in his own childhood. She -was always mending stockings. There was always a litter of needlework on -the dining-room table after supper. - -There were times when she "did" without a maid, and exhausted herself -with domestic drudgery. There were no foreign holidays then, only a -week or two at the seaside once a year. There was precious little pocket -money for the boys. They were conscious of their shabby gentility, and -hated it. - -The modern young man looks with a kind of horror upon all this domestic -squalor, as he calls it. He couldn't stand it. If marriage means that -for him he will have none of it. But need it mean that? He and Winifred -will scheme out their lives differently. They will leave out the baby -side of the business--until they can afford to indulge in it. They will -live in a little flat, and furnish it, if necessary, on the hire system. -They will cut out the domestic drudgery. They will enjoy the fun of -life, and shelve the responsibilities until they are able to pay for -them. After all it will not be long before he is earning a good income. -He has got his feet on the first rang of the ladder, and, with a little -luck---- - -So he proposes to the girl, and she pretends to be immensely surprised, -though she has been eating her heart out while he hesitated, and -delayed, and pondered. They pledge each other, "till death do us part," -and the girl, who has been reading a great many novels lately, is very -happy because her own plot is working out according to the rules of -romance. - -They live in a world of romance before the marriage day. The man seems -to walk on air when he crosses London Bridge on his way to the City. -Or if he is a barrister he sees the beauty of his girl's face in his -brief--and is in danger of losing his case. Or if a journalist he curses -his irregular hours which keep him from the little house in Tulse Hill, -or the flat in Hampstead, where there is a love-light in the windows. -He knows the outward look of the girl, her softness, her prettiness, -her shy glance when he greets her. He knows her teasing ways, her -tenderness, her vivacity. Only now and then he is startled by her -stupidity, or by her innocence, or by her ignorance, or--still more -startling--by her superior wisdom of the ways of the world, by her -shrewd little words, by a sudden revelation of knowledge about things -which girls are not supposed to know. - -But these things do not count. Only sentiment and romance are allowed to -count. These two people who are about to start on the long road of life -together are utterly blind to each other's vices or virtues. They are -deeply ignorant of each other's soul. They know nothing of the real man -or the real woman hidden beneath the mask of social conventions, beneath -the delightful, sham of romantic affection. They know nothing of their -own souls, nor of the strength that is in them to stand the test of -life's realities. They know nothing of their own weakness. - -So they marry. - -And for the first year they are wonderfully happy. For the first year is -full of excitement. They thrill to the great adventure of marriage. They -are uplifted with passionate love which seems likely to last for -ever. They have a thousand little interests. Even the trivialities -of domesticity are immensely important. Even the little disasters of -domesticity are amusing. They find a lot of laughter in life. They -laugh at the absurd mistakes of the servant-maids who follow in quick -succession. They laugh at their own ridiculous miscalculations with -regard to the expense of house-keeping. They laugh when visitors call -at awkward moments and when the dinner is spoilt by an inefficient cook. -After all, the comradeship of a young man and wife is the best thing in -life, and nothing else seems to matter. They are such good comrades that -the husband never leaves his wife a moment in his leisure time. He takes -her to the theatre with him. They spend week-ends together, far from the -madding crowd. They pluck the flowers of life, hand in hand, as lovers. -The first year merges into the second. Not yet do they know each other. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -It is in the third and fourth year that they begin to find each other -out. The bright fires of their passion have died down, burning with a -fitful glow, burning low. Until then they had been lovers to each -other, hidden from each other by the illusions of romantic love. It was -inconceivable that the man could be anything but kind, and tender, and -patient, and considerate. It was inconceivable that he could hold any -but the noblest ideals, the most exalted aspirations, the most generous -sentiments. He had been so wise, so witty, and so gay. - -And to the man it had seemed that the woman by his side was gifted with -all the virtues. At least she had been eager to please him, to satisfy -his least desire, to bend to his will. She had pandered to his vanity, -fed his self-conceit, listened to his opinions on all the subjects of -life as though they were inspired. If he had been kept out late at work -he had found her waiting for him, quick to put her arms about him, -to cry out, "Oh, my poor dear, how tired you must be?" She had been -grateful to him for all his little gifts, for all his words of love. And -he had seen her as a beautiful thing, without flaw or blemish. He had -worshipped at the foot of the pedestal on which he had placed her in his -ideals. - -But now both the husband and wife begin to see each other, not as -lovers, but as man and woman. It is rather disturbing. It is distressing -to the young wife to discover, gradually, by a series of little -accidents, that this man with whom she has to live all her life is not -made of different clay from other men, that he is made of the same clay. -One by one all the little romantic illusions out of which she had built -up the false image of him, from the heroes of sentimental fiction, from -the dreams of girlhood, are stripped from him, until he stands bare -before her, the natural man. She does not like the natural man at first. -It is quite a long time before she can reconcile herself to the thought -that she is mated to a natural man, with a touch of brutality, with -little meannesses, with moods of irritability, with occasional bad -tempers, when he uses bad words. She sees, too clearly for her spiritual -comfort, that they are not "twin-souls." They have not been made in -the same mould. His childhood was different from her childhood, his -upbringing from her upbringing. She sees that in little things--mere -trifles, but monstrously annoying, such as his untidy habits, the -carelessness with which he flicks his cigarette ash about the carpet, -the familiarity with which he speaks to the servant-maid. She begins to -dislike some of his personal habits--the way in which he sneezes, his -habit of shaving after breakfast instead of before breakfast, his habit -of reading the newspaper at the breakfast table instead of chatting with -her as he used to do about the programme for the day. In things less -trivial she finds out that her first ideal of him was false. They do not -think alike on the great subjects of life. He is a Radical and she is -Conservative, by education and upbringing. It hurts her when he argues -with revolutionary ideas which seem to her positively wicked, and -subversive of all morality. He has loose views about morality in -general, and is very tolerant about lapses from the old-fashioned -moral code. That hurts her too--horribly. It begins to undermine the -foundations of her faith in what used to seem the essential truth of -things. But, above all, it hurts her to realize that she and her husband -are not one, in mind and body, but utterly different, in temperament, in -their outlook on life, in their fundamental principles and ideas. - -On the other side the husband makes unpleasant discoveries. He finds -out, with a shock, that he was utterly ignorant of the girl whom -he asked to be his wife, and that this woman who sits at his -breakfast-table is not the same woman as the one who dwelt in his -imagination, even as the one who lived with him during the first and -second year. She has lost her coyness, her little teasing ways, her -girlish vivacity. She begins to surprise him by a hard common-sense, and -no longer responds so easily to his old romantic moods. He can no longer -be certain of her smiles and her tenderness when he speaks the old -love-words. She begins to challenge his authority, not deliberately, nor -openly, but by ignoring his hints, or by disregarding his advice. - -She even challenges his opinions, and that is a shock to him. It is a -blow to his vanity. - -It takes down his self-conceit more than a peg or two, especially when -he has to acknowledge, secretly, that she is in the right, as sometimes -happens. He finds out faults in her now--a touch of selfishness, a trace -of arrogance, an irritability of temper of which he has to be careful, -especially when she is in a nervous state of health. They begin to -quarrel rather frequently about absurd things, about things that do not -matter a brass farthing. Some of these quarrels reach passionate heights -and leave them both exhausted, wondering rather blankly what it was all -about. Then the wife cries a little, and the husband kisses her. - -By the end of the fourth year they know each other pretty well. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -In the fifth and sixth years they have settled down to the jog-trot -of the married life. Not yet do they see the shadow of the Eighth Year -looming ahead. They have faced the reality of life, and knowing each -other as they really are have made a working compromise. Their love has -steadied down to a more even flame, and passion is almost extinguished. -They have decided to play the game, according to the creed of their -class, exactly as their neighbors are playing it. - -It is largely a game of bluff, as it is played in thousands of small -households. It is a game, also, of consequences, as I shall have to -show. It consists in keeping up appearances, in going one better than -one's neighbor whenever possible, and in making a claim to a higher rung -of the social ladder than is justified by the husband's income and rank -in life. It is the creed of snobbishness. For this creed everything -is sacrificed--contentment of mind, the pleasure of life, the little -children of life. - -In many flats of Intellectual Mansions, and even in the small houses -of the "well-to-do" suburbs, children do not enter into the scheme of -things. The "babies have been left out of the business." For people -who are keeping up appearances to the last penny of their income cannot -afford to be burdened by babies. Besides, they interfere seriously -with social ladder-climbing, drag down a married couple of the younger -generation to the domestic squalor of their parents' early life. The -husband cannot bear the thought that his wife should have to make -beds in the morning and mend stockings in the evening, and wheel out a -perambulator in the park. It is so very "low down." The husband wants -to save his wife from all this domestic drudgery. He wants her to look -pretty in the frocks he buys her. He wants her to wear more expensive -frocks than any other woman in his circle of friends. He likes to hear -his friends say, "How charming your wife looks to-night, old man!" and -to hear elderly ladies say to his wife, "What a beautiful gown you are -wearing, my dear!" - -He is working hard now in order to furnish his wife's wardrobe--not only -for her pleasure, but for his pride. After the first romance of love, -ambition comes to gild reality. He is ambitious to build up a beautiful -little home. The furniture with which they started married life on the -hire system has been bought and paid for, and is now replaced here and -there by "genuine antiques." He puts some good prints on his walls and -buys some water-color sketches, and becomes in a small way a patron of -the arts. It is pleasant during one of his wife's evening At Homes to -take a guest on one side and say "What do you think of that? Pretty -good, eh? It's an original, by Verdant Green, you know." - -He has urged upon his wife the necessity of giving _recherch_ little -dinners, to which he can invite friends better off than himself, and -distinguished guests whom he wishes to impress. As he explains to his -wife, "one has to do these things." And he does them rather well, paying -some attention to his wines--he keeps a good dinner claret--and to his -cigars, which he buys at the stores. He also suggests to his wife that -now she has an extra servant she had better establish a weekly At Home, -an informal little affair, but pleasant and useful, because it shows the -world, their world, that they are getting on in the social scale. Here -again, distinguished visitors may be invited to "drop in." It is good -for business. A pretty, well-dressed wife makes a favourable impression -upon solicitors who have briefs to give away or upon wealthy clients. -One must keep up appearances, and make a good show. Besides, it is -pleasant to put on evening clothes after a hard day's work and to play -the host. It gives a man some return for all his toil. It gives him a -reason for living. And it brightens up one's home-life. "Man does not -live by bread alone," he must have some cakes and ale, so to speak. - -But it is expensive. As every year of marriage passes, the expenses -increase, steadily, miraculously. It is difficult to account for them, -but there they are, facing a man in his quarterly reckoning. And the two -ends must be made to meet, by extra work, by putting one's nose down to -the grindstone. The husband does not come home so soon as he used to do -in the early days. But he has the satisfaction of knowing that while he -is away at work his wife is keeping up his social reputation and doing -all the things which a lady in her station of life is expected to do. He -thanks heaven that his wife is happy. - -She is not unhappy, this wife, in the fifth and sixth year of marriage. -After the first romantic illusions failed her she settled down quietly -enough to play the game. It is quite interesting, quite amusing. Now and -again queer doubts assail her, and she has strange flutterings at the -heart, and little pinpricks of conscience. It is about the question of -motherhood. Perhaps it would be better for her to have a baby. However, -she has threshed out the question a hundred times with her husband, and -he has decided that he cannot afford a family yet, and after all the -flat _is_ very small. Besides, she shirks the idea herself--all the pain -of it, and the trouble of it.... She thrusts down these queer doubts, -does not listen to the flutterings at the heart, ignores the little -pinpricks of conscience. She turns quickly to the interests of her -social life and falls easily into the habit of pleasant laziness, -filling her day with little futile things, which seem to satisfy her -heart and brain. When her husband has gone to business she dresses -herself rather elaborately for a morning stroll, manicures her nails, -tries a new preparation for the complexion, alters a feather, or a -flower, in one of her hats, studies herself in the glass, and is pleased -with herself. It passes the time. Then she saunters forth, and goes -to the shops, peering in through the great plate-glass windows at the -latest display of lingerie, of evening gowns, of millinery. She fancies -herself in some of the new hats from Paris. One or two of them attract -her especially. She makes a mental note of them. She will ask her -husband to let her buy one of them. After all Mrs. Fitzmaurice had a new -hat only last week--the second in one month. She will tell him that. -It will pique him, for there is a rather amusing rivalry between the -Fitzmaurices and them. - -So the morning passes until luncheon, when she props the morning -newspaper against the water-jug, reading the titbits of news and the -fashion page while she eats her meal, rather nicely cooked by the new -servant, and daintily served by the little housemaid. Another hour of -the day passes, and it is the afternoon. - -She lies down for half an hour with the latest novel from Mudie's. It -has a good plot, and is a rather exciting love-story. It brings back -romance to her. For a little while she forgets the reality which she -has learnt since her own romantic days. Here love is exactly what -she imagined it to he, thrilling, joyous, never-changing. The hero -is exactly what she imagined her husband to be--before he was her -husband--strong, gentle, noble, high-souled, immensely patient. And -after many little troubles, misadventures, cross-purposes, and strange -happenings, marriage is the great reward, the splendid compensation. -After this the hero and heroine live happily ever afterwards, till death -does them part, and--there is nothing more to be said. The novel ends -with the marriage bells. - -She knows that her novel has not ended with the marriage hells, that, -in fact, the plot is only just beginning as far as she is concerned. -But she does not allow herself to think of that. She revels in romantic -fiction, and reads novel after novel at the rate of three a week. -Occasionally one of these novels gives her a nasty shock, for it deals -with realism rather than romance, and reveals the hearts of women rather -like herself, and the tragedies of women rather like herself, and the -truth of things, in a cold, white light. She reads the book with burning -eyes. It makes her pulse beat. It seems rather a wicked book, it is -so horribly truthful, not covering even the nakedness of facts with a -decent layer of sentiment, but exposing them brutally, with a terrible -candor. She hates the book. It makes her think of things she has tried -to forget. It revives those queer doubts, and makes her conscience prick -again. She is glad when she has sent it back to the library and taken -out another novel, of the harmless kind, in the old style. She lulls -her conscience to sleep by the dear old love-stories, or by the musical -comedies and the costume-plays to which she goes with one of her -girl-friends on Wednesday or Saturday matines. - -She goes to the theatre a good deal now, because she is living more -independently of her husband. That is to say she no longer waits for his -home-coming, as in her first days of marriage, with an impatient desire. -She has long seen that they cannot be all in all to each other, sharing -all pleasures, or having none. He has realized that, too, and goes -to his club at least once a week--sometimes more often, to enjoy the -society of men, to get a little "Bohemianism," as he calls it. - -She has made her own circle of friends now, the young wives of men like -her husband, and many of her afternoons are taken up with little rounds -of visits, when she is amused by the tittle-tattle of these wives, by -their little tales and scandals, by their gossips about servants, frocks -and theatres. - -She, too, has social ambitions like her husband. Her evenings At Home -are agreeable adventures when she is pleased with the homage of her -husband's friends. She takes some trouble with her little dinner-parties -and writes out the _menus_ with a good deal of care, and arranges the -flowers, and occasionally looks into the kitchen to give a word to -the cook. She wears her new evening gown and smiles at her husband's -compliments, with something of her old tenderness. After one of these -evening At Homes the husband and wife have moments of loving comradeship -like those in the first days of their marriage. It is a pity that some -trivial accident or dispute causes ill-temper at the breakfast-table. - -But, on the whole, they play the game rather well in the fifth and -sixth years of their married life. The husband takes the rough with the -smooth. In spite of occasional bad tempers, in spite of grievances which -are growing into habits of mind, he is a good fellow and--he thanks -heaven his wife is happy. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -It is the seventh year. The wife is still doing exactly what she did in -the fifth and sixth years. Her daily routine is exactly the same. Except -that she can afford extra little luxuries now, and indulge in more -expensive kinds of pleasure--stalls at the theatre instead of seats -in the pit, an occasional visit to the opera, an easy yielding to -temptations in the way of hats. Her husband has been "getting on," and -he is glad to give her what she wants. - -But somehow or other she is beginning to realize that she has not got -what she wants. She does not know what she wants, but she knows that -there is a great lack of something in her life. She is still "playing -the game," but there is no longer the same sport in it. The sharp edge -of her interest in things has worn off. It has been dulled down. She -goes languidly through the days and a matine jaunt no longer thrills -her with a little excitement. The plays are so boring, full of stale old -plots, stale old women, stale old tricks. She is sick of them. She still -reads a great number of romantic novels, but how insufferably tedious -they have become! How false they are! How cloying is all this sickly -sentiment! She searches about for the kind of novel which used to -frighten her, problem novels, dangerous novels, novels dealing with real -problems of life. They still frighten her a little, some of them, but -she likes the sensation. She wants more of it. She wants to plunge -deeper into the dangerous problems, to get nearer to the truth of -things. She broods over their revelations. She searches out the -meaning of their suggestions, their hints, their innuendoes. It is like -drug-drinking. This poisonous fiction stimulates her for a little while, -until the effect of it has worn off and leaves her with an aching head. -Her head often aches now. And her heart aches--though goodness knows -why. Everything is so stale. The gossip of her women friends is, oh--so -stale! She has heard all their stories about all their servants, all -their philosophy about the servant problem in general, all their shallow -little views about life, and love, and marriage. She has found them all -out, their vanities, their little selfish ways, their little lies and -shams and fooleries. They are exactly like herself. She has been brought -up in the same code, shaped in the same mould, cut out to the same -pattern. Their ideas are her ideas. Their ways of life her ways. They -bore her exceedingly. - -She is bored by things which for a time were very pleasant. It is, for -instance, boring to go shopping in the morning. It is annoying to her to -see her own wistful, moody eyes in the plate-glass windows, and in the -pier-glasses. She has not lost her love of pretty frocks and pretty -things, but it bores her to think that her husband does not notice them -so much, and that she has to wear them mostly to please herself. She is -tired of the little compliments paid to her by her husband's middle-aged -friends. She has begun to find her husband's friends very dull people -indeed. Most of all is she bored by those evening At Homes with their -familiar ritual--the girl who wants to sing but pleads a bad cold, the -woman who wants to play but says she is so fearfully "out of practice," -the man who asks the name of a piece which he has heard a score of -times, the well-worn jokes, the well-known opinions on things which do -not matter, the light refreshments, the thanks for "a pleasant evening." -Oh, those pleasant evenings! How she hates them! - -She is beginning to hate this beautiful little home of hers. The very -pictures on the walls set her nerves on edge. She has stared at them -so often. She wishes to goodness that Marcus Stone's lovers on an -old-fashioned stone seat would go and drown themselves in the distant -lake. But they do not move. They sit smirking at each other, eternally. -She wishes with all her heart that the big Newfoundland dog over there -would bite the fluffy haired child who says "Does 'oo talk?" But it will -not even bark. She stares at the pattern on the carpet, when a Mudie's -novel lies on her lap, and comes to detest the artificial roses on the -trellis-work. She digs her heels into one of them. If the roses were -real she would pluck them leaf by leaf and scatter the floor with them. -The ticking of the clock on the mantelshelf irritates her. It seems a -reproach to her. It seems to be counting up her waste of time. - -She stays more at home, in spite of hating it, because she is beginning -to loathe her round of visits. She feels lonely and wishes her husband -would come home. Why does he stay so late at the office now? Surely it -isn't necessary? When he comes home she is so snappy and irritable that -he becomes silent over the dinner-table, and then she quarrels with him -for his silence. After dinner he sits over his papers, thinking out some -knotty point of business, which he does not discuss with her as in the -old days. He buries his nose in the evening paper, and reads all the -advertisements, and is very dull and uninteresting. Yet she nourishes -a grievance when he goes off on his club-nights and comes home in the -early hours of the morning, cheerful and talkative when she wants to go -to sleep. - - - - -CHAPTER V - -In some cases, indeed in many cases, the presence of an "outsider" -adds to the unhappiness of the wife and divides her still more from her -husband. It is the presence of the mother-in-law. - -She, poor soul, has had a terrible time, and no one until now has said a -good word for her. The red-nosed comedian of the music-hall has used her -for his most gross vulgarities, sure that whenever he mentions her name -he will raise guffaws from the gallery, and evoke shrieks of ill-natured -merriment from young women in the pit. In the pantomimes the man dressed -up as a woman indulges in long monologues upon his mother-in-law as -the source of all domestic unhappiness, as the origin of all quarrels -between husbands and wives, as the greatest nuisance in modern life, and -so long as he patters about the mother-in-law the audience enjoys itself -vastly. - -It is idle to pretend that the mother-in-law is a blessing in a small -household. I am bound to admit that the success of the rednosed comedian -who uses her as his text is due to the truth which lies hidden beneath -his absurdity. He raises roars of laughter because the people who make -up his audience realize that he is giving a touch of humor to something -which is a grim tragedy, and according to the psychology of humor -this is irresistibly comic, just as the most primitive and -laughter-compelling jokes deal with corpses, and funerals, and death -made ridiculous. They have suffered from their own mothers-in-law, those -elderly women who sit in the corner with watchful eyes upon the young -wives, those critics of their sons' marriages, those eavesdroppers of -the first quarrel, and of all the quarrels that follow the first, those -oracles of unwelcome wisdom, whose advice about household affairs, -about the way of dealing with the domestic servants, with constant -references to _their_ young days, are a daily exasperation to young -married women. - -All that is painfully true. In many cases the mother-in-law becomes so -terrible an incubus in small households that domestic servants leave -with unfailing regularity before their month is "up," husbands make a -habit of being late at the office, and wives are seriously tempted to -take to drink. - -But what of the mother-in-law herself? Is _she_ to be envied? Did she -willingly become a mother-in-law? Alas, her tragedy is as great as that -of the young wife upon whose nerves she gets so badly, as great as that -of the young husband who finds his home-life insufferable because of her -presence. - -For the mother-in-law is a prisoner of fate. She is the unwanted -guest. She is dependent upon the charity of those who find her a daily -nuisance. During the days of her own married life she devoted herself -to her husband and children, stinted and scraped for them, moulded -them according to her ideals of righteousness, exacted obedience to -her motherly commands, and was sure of their love. Then, one day, death -knocked at the door, and brought black horses into the street. After -that day, when her man was taken from her, she became dependent upon her -eldest son, but did not yet feel the slavery of the dependence. - -For he paid the debt of gratitude gratefully, and kept up the little -home. - -But one day she noticed that he did not come home so early, and that -when he came home he was absent-minded. He fell into the habit of -spending his evenings out, and his mother wondered, and was anxious. He -was not so careful about her comforts, and she was hurt. Then one day -he came home and said, "Mother, I am going to get married," and she -knew that her happiness was at an end. For she knew, with a mother's -intuition, that the love which had been in her boy's heart for her must -now be shared with another woman, and that instead of having the first -place in his life, she would have the second place. - -For a little while her jealousy is like that of a woman robbed of her -lover. She hides it, and hides her hate for that girl whose simpering -smile, whose prettiness, whose coy behavior, light fires in her son's -eyes, and set his pulse beating, and make him forgetful of his mother. - -Then the marriage takes place and the mother who has dreaded the day -knows that it is her funeral. For she is like a queen whose prerogatives -and privileges have been taken away by the death of the king, and by -the accession of a new queen. Her place is taken from her. Her home is -broken up. She is moved, with the furniture, into the new home, put into -the second-best bedroom, and arranged to suit the convenience of the new -household in which another woman is mistress. - -She knows already that she has begun to be a nuisance, and it is like a -sharp dagger in her heart. She knows that the young wife is as jealous -of her as she is of the young wife, because her son cannot break himself -of the habit of obedience, cannot give up that respect for his mother's -principles and advice and wisdom, which is part of the very fibre of his -being, because in any domestic crisis the son turns more readily to the -mother than to the young woman who is a newcomer in his life, and in any -domestic quarrel he takes the mother's part rather than the wife's. -It is the law of nature. It cannot be altered, but it is the cause of -heartburning and squalid little tragedies. - -The mother-in-law, in the corner of the sitting-room, watches the drama -of the married life, and with more experience of life, because of her -years, sees the young wife do foolish things, watches her blundering -experiments in the great adventure of marriage, is vigilant of her -failures in housekeeping, and in the management of her husband. She -cannot be quite tongue-tied. She cannot refrain from criticism, advice, -rebuke. Between the mother-in-law and the daughter-in-law there is a -daily warfare of pinpricks, a feud that grows bitter with the years. - -But the mother-in-law is helpless. She cannot escape from the lamentable -situation. She must always remain a hindrance, because she needs a roof -over her head, and there is no other roof, and she is dependent for her -daily bread upon the son who is faithful to her, though he is irritable, -moody and sharp of speech, because of the fretfulness of his wife. - -This is the eternal tragedy of the mother-in-law, which is turned into -a jest by the red-nosed comedian to get the laughter from "the gods." -It is also a tragedy to the daughter-in-law, who could shriek aloud -sometimes when the presence of the elderly woman becomes intolerable. - -Many things are becoming intolerable to the young wife. Her nerves are -out of order. Sometimes she feels "queer." She cannot explain how queer -she feels, even to herself. She says bitter things to her husband, and -then hates herself for doing so. She has a great yearning for his love, -but is very cold when he is in a tender mood. She cannot understand her -own moods. She only knows that she is beginning to get frightened when -she thinks of the long vista of years before her. She cannot go on like -this always. She cannot go on like this very long. She is getting rather -hysterical. She startles her husband by laughing in a queer shrill way -when he expresses some serious opinions, or gives vent to some of his -conventional philosophy, about women, and the duties of married life, -and the abomination of the Suffragettes. But he does not see her tears. -He does not see her one day, when suddenly, after she has been reading -a Mudie's novel, page after page, without understanding one word, tears -well up into her eyes, and fall upon the pages, until she bends her head -down and puts her hands up to her face, and sobs as though all her heart -had turned to tears. - - - - -CHAPTER VI - - -I_t is the Eighth Year_. The wife does not know the significance of -that. The husband goes on his way without seeing the ghosts that have -invaded his little household. He is too busy to see. The whole energy of -his mind now is devoted to the business of his life. He must earn money, -more money, still more money, because expenses still keep increasing, -by leaps and bounds. He finds it more and more difficult to cut his coat -according to his cloth. He is often surprised because with a much larger -income he seems to be just as "hard up" as when he started the adventure -of marriage. He wonders, sometimes, whether the game is worth the -candle. What does he get out of it? Precious little. Not much fun. In -the evenings he is tired, although his brain is still worrying over the -details of his work, over his business disappointments and difficulties, -and plans. Now and again he is surprised at the strange quietude and -lassitude of his wife. He catches a look of tragedy in her eyes, and it -startles him for a moment, so that he asks her if she is feeling unwell. -She laughs, in a mirthless way, and seems to resent the question. -"Perfectly well, thanks," she says. He shrugs his shoulders. He cannot -bother about a woman's whims and moods. Women are queer kittle-cattle. -He can't make 'em out. Even his own wife is a perfect mystery to him. -It is a pity they get on each other's nerves so much. What more does she -want? He has given her everything a woman may desire--a beautiful little -home, many little luxuries, plenty of pin-money. He does not stint her. -It is he that does the stinting. He is always working for her so that -she may play. However--work is best. To do our job in life is the best -philosophy. - -So the husband has on one side the passing suspicion that something is -wrong with his wife, and the wife hides her heart from him. - -Something _is_ wrong with her. Everything is wrong, though she does not -know why and how. She feels lonely--horribly lonely in spite of all her -friends. She feels like a woman alone in a great desert with no other -human soul near her, thrust back upon her own thoughts, brooding over -her own misery. There is a great emptiness in her heart, and she has -a great hunger and a great thirst of soul which she cannot satisfy. -Nothing satisfies that empty, barren heart of hers, that throbbing -brain. She has finished with Mudie's novels. She can find no -satisfaction in _them_. She revolts from the tittle-tattle of her women -friends. That is no longer amusing. She finds no pleasure in the beauty -of her face. It is no longer beautiful. She hates the sight of her face -in the glass. She is afraid of those big wistful eyes which stare at -her. She is sick to death of dressing herself up. How futile it is! How -utterly vain and foolish! - -She is haunted with ghosts; the ghosts of What-Might-Have-Been. They -whisper about her, so that she puts her hands to her ears, when she is -alone in her drawing-room. Faces peer at her, with mocking eyes, or with -tempting eyes--the faces of men who might have been her lovers, baby -faces of unborn children. Little hands flutter about her heart, pluck at -her, tease her. The ghosts of her girlhood crowd about her, the ghosts -of dead hopes, of young illusions, of romantic dreams. She thrusts them -away from her vision. She puts her hands before her eyes, and moans a -little, quietly, so that the servants in the kitchen shall not hear. - -She is assailed by strange temptations, horrible temptations, from -which she shrinks back afraid. This hunger and thirst in her soul are so -tormenting that she has frightful cravings for Something to satisfy her -hunger and quench her thirst. She is tempted to take to drink, or to -drugs, to dull the throbbing of her brain, to wake her up out of this -awful lassitude, to give her a momentary excitement and vitality, and -then--forgetfulness. She must have some kind of excitement--to break -the awful monotony of her life, this intolerable dullness of her little -home. If only an adventure would come to her! Some thrilling, perilous -adventure, however wicked, whatever the consequences. She feels the -overmastering need of some passionate emotion. She would like to plunge -into romantic love again, to be set on fire by it. Somewhere about the -world is a man who could save her, some strong man with a masterful way -with him, brutal as well as tender, cruel as well as kind, who would -come to her, and clasp her hands, and capture her. She would lean -upon him. She would yield, willingly.... She tries to crush down these -thoughts. She is horrified at the evil in them. Oh, she is a bad woman! -Even in her loneliness her face scorches with shame. She gives a faint -cry to God to save her. But again and again the devilish thoughts leer -up in her brain. She begins to believe that the devil is really busy -with her and that she cannot escape him. - -She has a strange sense of impending peril, of something that is going -to happen. She knows that something _must_ happen. - -In this Eighth Year she is in a state bordering on hysteria, when -anything may happen to her. Even her husband is beginning to get -alarmed. He is at last awakened out of his self-complacency. He is -beginning to watch her, with a vague uneasiness. Why does she look so -queerly at him sometimes as though she hated him? Why does she say such -bitter, cruel, satirical things, which stab him and leave a poison in -the wound? Why does she get into such passionate rages about trivial -things, and then reveal a passionate remorse? Why does she sink into -long silences, sitting with her hands in her lap, staring at the -pattern on the carpet, as though it had put a spell upon her? He cannot -understand. She says there is nothing wrong with her health, she refuses -to see a doctor. She scoffs at the idea of going away for a little -holiday to the seaside. She says it would bore her to death. Once she -bursts into tears and weeps on his shoulder. But she cannot, or will -not, explain the cause of her tears, so that he becomes impatient with -her and talks to her roughly, though he is sorry afterwards. He begins -to see now that marriage is a difficult game. Perhaps they were not -suited to each other. They married too young, before they had understood -each other.... However they have got to make the best of it now. That is -the law of life--to make the best of it. - -So in the Eighth Year the husband tries to take a common-sense view of -things, not knowing that in the Eighth Year it is too late for common -sense as far as the wife is concerned. She wants uncommon sense. Only -some tremendous and extraordinary influence, spiritual, or moral, or -intellectual, beyond the limits of ordinary common sense, may save her -from the perils in her own heart. She must find a way of escape, for -these unsatisfied yearnings, for this beating heart, for this throbbing -brain. Her little home has become a cage to her. Her husband has become -her jailer. Her life has become too narrow, too petty, too futile. In -the Eighth Year she must find a way of escape--anyhow, anywhere. And in -the Eighth Year the one great question is in what direction will she go? -There are many ways of escape. - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -One way of escape is through the door of the Divorce Court. Sir Francis -Jeune, when he was President of the Divorce Court, saw before him many -of these escaping women, and he noted down the fact about the Eighth -Year; and sitting there with an impassive face, but watchful eyes, he -saw the characters in all these little tragedies and came to know the -type and the plot from constant reiteration. Sometimes the plot varied, -but only in accidentals, never in essentials. As the story was rehearsed -before him, it always began in the same way, with a happy year or two -of marriage. Then it was followed by the first stress and strain. Then -there came the drifting apart, the little naggings, the quarrels, the -misunderstandings, until the wife--it was generally the wife--became -bored, lonely, emotional, hysterical, and an easy victim for the first -fellow with a roving eye, a smooth tongue, and an easy conscience. The -procession still goes on, the long procession of women who try to escape -through the Divorce Court door. Every year they come, and the same story -is told and retold with sickening repetition. In most cases they are -childless wives. That is proved, beyond dispute, by all statistics of -divorce. Sometimes they have one or two children, but those cases are -much more rare. But even when there are children to complicate the -issues and to be the heirs of these tragedies, the causes behind the -tragedies are the same. The woman has had idle hands in her lap before -the Eighth Year of marriage has been reached. In the early years her -little home was enough to satisfy her mind and heart, and her interests -were enough to keep her busy. The coming of the first child, and of the -second, if there is a second, was for a time sufficient to crowd her -day with little duties and to prevent any restlessness or any deadly -boredom. All went well while she had but one maidservant, and while -her husband's feet were still on the lower rungs of the ladder. But -the trouble began with the arrival of the extra servant and with the -promotion of her husband. It began when gradually she handed over -domestic duties to paid people, when she was seldom in the kitchen and -more in the drawing-room, when the children were put under the charge -of a nurse, and when the responsibilities of motherhood had become a -sinecure. The fact must be faced that a child is not always a cure for -the emptiness of a woman's heart, nor an absolute pledge of fidelity -between husband and wife. These women who seek a way of escape from -their little homes are not always brought to that position by the -unfulfilled instincts of motherhood. For many of them have no instincts -of motherhood. They feel no great natural desire to have a child. -They even shrink from the idea of motherhood, and plead their lack of -courage, their ill-health, their weakness. With their husbands they are -partners in a childless scheme, or if they have a child--they quickly -thrust it into the nursery to leave themselves free. - -But, on the other hand, it is a fact borne out by all the figures that -a child does in the vast majority of cases bind together the husband and -wife, as no other influence or moral restraint; and that among all the -women who come to the Divorce Court the overwhelming majority is made up -of childless wives. - -These women are not naturally vicious. They have not gone wrong because -their principles are perverted. They are not, as a rule, intellectual -anarchists who have come to the conclusion that the conventional moral -code is wrong and that the laws of marriage are neither divine nor just. -On the contrary, they are conscience-stricken, they are terrified by -their own act. Many of them are brokenhearted and filled with shame. -It is pitiful to hear their letters read in court, letters to their -husbands pleading for forgiveness, asking for "another chance," -or trying, feebly, to throw the blame on the man, and to whitewash -themselves as much as possible. To judge from their letters it would -seem that they were under some evil spell, and that they were conscious -of being dragged away from their duty as though Fate had clutched them -by the hair, so that although they struggled they could not resist, and -were borne helplessly along upon a swift tide of passion carrying them -to destruction. "I could not help myself" is the burden of their cry, as -though they had no free-will, and no strength of will. Occasionally they -give tragic pictures of their idle lives, so lacking in interest, so -barren, so boring. There is another phrase which crops up again and -again: "Oh, I was bored--bored--bored!" It was the man that saved her -from boredom who now shares the woman's guilt, and stands in the witness -box in this court of honor. He came to her just at that moment in the -Eighth Year when she was bored to death. He was kind, sympathetic, -understanding. He brought a little color back into her cheeks, a little -laughter into her eyes, a little sunshine into her life. He seemed such -a boy, so youthful and high-spirited, such a contrast to her husband, -always busy, and always worrying over his business. He told good -stories, took her to the theatre, arranged little supper-parties, made -a new adventure of life. He would sit chatting with her over the fire, -when there were flickering shadows on the walls. He chased away the -ghosts, gave her new dreams, brought new hopes.... And then suddenly he -begins to tempt her; and she shrinks back from him, and is afraid. He -knows she is afraid, but he tries to laugh away her fears. She pleads -with him to go away, but there is insincerity in her voice, her words -are faltering. She knows that if he were to go away she would be left -more lonely than before, in intolerable loneliness till the ghosts would -rush back at her. So he stays, and tempts her a little more. Gradually, -little by little, he becomes her great temptation, overwhelming all -other things in life dwarfing all other things, even her faith and -honor. How can she resist? By what power within her can she resist? - -She does not resist. And yet by yielding she does not gain that -happiness to which she stretched out her hands. She does not satisfy the -great hunger in her heart or quench her burning thirst. She has not -even killed the ghosts which haunt her, or healed the pin pricks of her -conscience. Her conscience is one great bleeding wound. For this woman -of the middle-classes is a creature of her caste Nor in most cases can -she break the rules of her caste without frightful hurt to herself. She -was brought up in a "nice" home. Her mother was a woman of old-fashioned -virtues. Her father was a man who would have seen her dead rather than -shamed. She received a High School education, and read Tennyson and -Longfellow with moral notes by her class-mistress. She used to go to -church, and sometimes goes there still, though without any fervor or -strength of faith. She has heard the old words, "The wages of sin is -death," and she shrinks a little when she thinks of them. Above all she -has been brought up on romantic fiction, and that is always on the side -of the angels. The modern problem novel has arrested her intellect, has -startled her, challenged her, given her "notions"; but in her heart of -hearts she still believes in the old-fashioned code of morals, in the -sweet old virtues. This sin of hers is a great terror to her. She is not -brazen-faced. She does not justify it by any advanced philosophy. She is -just a poor, weak, silly woman, who has gone to the edge of a precipice, -grown giddy, and fallen off the cliff. She throws up her hands with a -great cry. The way of escape through the Divorce Court door is not a way -to happiness. It is a way to remorse, to secret agonies, to a life-long -wretchedness. Her second husband, if he "plays the game" according to -the rules of the world, is not to be envied. Between him and this woman -there are old ghosts. This way of escape is into a haunted house. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -Thousands, and tens of thousands of women who pass through the Eighth -Year, not unscathed, find another way out. They are finding it now -through this new femininist movement which is linked up with the -cause of Women's Suffrage. The Eighth Year produces many suffragettes, -militant and otherwise. At first, in the first years of their married -life, they scoffed at the idea of Votes for Women. They could not -see the sense of it. They hated the vulgarities of the business, the -shamelessness of it, the ugly squalor of these scuffles with the police, -these fights with the crowds, these raids on the House of Commons. -It was opposed to all their ideals of femininity and to all their -traditions of girlhood. "The hussies ought to be whipped," is the -verdict of the young wife in the first stage of her romantic affection. -But, later on, when romance has worn very threadbare in the little home, -when reality is beginning to poke its head through the drawing-room -windows, she finds herself taking an interest in this strange -manifestation which seems to be inspired by some kind of madness. She is -silent now when some new phase in the conflict is being discussed in her -presence. She listens and ponders. Presently she goes out of her way -to get introduced to some suffrage woman on the outskirts of her -acquaintance. She is surprised to find her a wonderfully cheerful, and -apparently sane, woman, very keen, very alert, and with a great sense of -humor--utterly unlike her tired, bored and melancholy self. Perhaps she -is quite a young woman, a bachelor girl, earning her own living, down in -Chelsea, or as a typist secretary in the City. But young as she is she -has dived into all sorts of queer studies--the relations between men and -women, the divorce laws, the science of eugenics--and she discusses -them with an amazing frankness, and in a most revolutionary spirit, -startling, and a little appalling, at first to this wife in her Eighth -Year. She has made up her mind conclusively on all the great questions -of life. She pooh-poohs romantic love. "There is too much fuss made -about it," she says. "It is a mere episode, like influenza. There are -bigger things." She holds herself perfectly free to choose her mate, -and to remedy any little mistake which she may make in her choice. At -present she prefers her independence and her own job, which she likes, -thank you very much. She is tremendously enthusiastic about the work -which women have got to do in the world, and there is nothing they -cannot do, in her opinion. She claims an absolute equality with men. In -fact, she is inclined to claim a superiority. After all, men are poor -things.... Altogether she is a most remarkable young woman, and she -seems to get tremendous fun out of life--and this wife in her Eighth -Year, without agreeing with her yet envies her! - -Or perhaps the wife meets a suffrage woman of middle-age. She, too, is -a cheerful, keen, alert, bustling woman with cut-and-dried opinions on -subjects about which the wife in the Eighth Year is full of doubt -and perplexity. She has a certain hardness of character. She is -intellectually hard, and without an atom of old-fashioned sentiment. -She calls a spade a spade, in a rather embarrassing way, and prefers -her facts to be naked. She is the mother of two children, whom she is -bringing up on strictly eugenic principles, whatever those may be, and -she is the wife of a husband whom she keeps in the background and treats -as a negligible quantity. "We wives, my dear," she says, "have been too -long kept prisoners in upholstered cages. It is time we broke our prison -windows. I am breaking other people's windows as well. It lets in a lot -of fresh air." - -She talks a great deal about sweated labor, about the white-slave -traffic, about women's work and wages. She talks still more about the -treachery of the Government, the lies of politicians, the cowardice of -men. "Oh, we are going to make them sit up. We shall stop at nothing. It -is a revolution." - -She is amazed at the ignorance of the young wife. "Good heavens, your -education _has_ been neglected!" she cries. "You are like all these -stuffy suburban women, who are as ignorant of life as bunny-rabbits. -Haven't you even read John Stuart Mill's _Subjection of Women?_ Good -gracious! Well, I will send you round some literature. It will open your -eyes, my dear." - -She sends round a lot of little pamphlets, full of dangerous ideas, -ideas that sting like bees, ideas that are rather frightening to the -wife in her Eighth Year. They refer to other books, which she gets out -of the lending library. She reads Ibsen, and recognizes herself in many -of those forlorn women in the plays. She reads small booklets on the -Rights of Wives, on the Problems of Motherhood, on the Justice of the -Vote. And suddenly, after a period of intellectual apathy, she is set on -fire by all these burning sparks. She is caught up in a great flame of -enthusiasm. It is like strong drink to her. It is like religious mania. -She wakens out of her lethargy. Her feeling of boredom vanishes, gives -way to a great excitement, a great exhilaration. She startles her -husband, who thinks she has gone mad. She argues with him, laughs at his -old-fashioned opinions, scoffs at him, pities him for his blindness. She -goes out to suffrage meetings, starts to her feet one day and falters -out a few excited words. She sits down with burning cheeks, with the -sound of applause in her ears, like the roar of the sea. She learns to -speak, to express herself coherently. She offers herself to "the cause." -She sells her trinkets and gives the money to the funds. She is out for -any kind of adventure, however perilous. She is one of the Hot Young -Bloods, or if she has not the pluck for that, or the strength, one of -the intellectual firebrands who are really more dangerous. - -It is a queer business, this suffrage movement, which sets these women -aflame. There are a few women in it who have the cold intellectual -logic of John Stuart Mill himself. They have thought the thing out on -scientific lines, in its economic, political, and social aspects. They -want the vote honestly, as a weapon to give their sex greater power, -greater independence, better conditions of life in the labor market. But -the rank and file have no such intellectual purpose, though they make -use of the same arguments and believe that these are the mainsprings of -their actions. In reality they are Eighth Year women. That is to say, -they seize upon the movement with a feverish desire to find in it some -new motive in life, some tremendous excitement, some ideals greater -and more thrilling than the little ideals of their home life. In this -movement, in this great battle, they see many things which they -keep secret. They go into it with blind impulses, which they do not -understand, except vaguely. It is a movement of revolt against all the -trammels of sex relationship which have come down through savagery to -civilization; laws evolved out of the inherited experience of tribes and -races for the protection of womanhood and the functions of womanhood, -laws of repression, of restraint, for the sake of the children of the -race; duties exacted by the social code again for the sake of the next -generation. Having revolted against the duties of motherhood, all -these laws, these trammels, these fetters, become to them intolerable, -meaningless, exasperating. The scheme of monogamy breaks down. It has -no deep moral purpose behind it, because the family is not complete. The -scheme has been frustrated by the childlessness of the wife. Again, this -movement is a revolt against the whole structure of modern society as -it affects the woman--against the very architecture of the home; against -all those tiny flats, those small suburban houses, in which women are -cramped and confined, and cut off from the large world. It did not -matter so long as there was a large world within the four walls. Their -space was big enough to hold the big ideals of old-fashioned womanhood, -in which the upbringing of children was foremost and all-absorbing. But -for a woman who has lost these ideals and the duties that result from -them, these little places are too narrow for their restless hearts; they -become like prison cells, in which their spirits go pacing up and down, -up and down, to come up against the walls, to heat their hands against -them. They believe that they may find in this suffrage movement the key -to the riddle of the mysteries in their souls, world-old mysteries, -of yearnings for the Unknown Good, of cravings for the Eternal -Satisfaction, for the perfect fulfilment of their beings. Their poor -husband, a dear good fellow, after all, now that they look at him -without hysteria, has not provided this Eternal Satisfaction. He has -only provided pretty frocks, tickets for matines, foolish little -luxuries. He does not stand for them as the Unknown Good. After the -first year or two of marriage they know him with all his faults and -flaws, and familiarity breeds contempt. But here, in this struggle for -the Vote, in these window-breakings and house-burnings, in imprisonments -and forcible feedings, in this solidarity of women inspired by a fierce -fanaticism--there is, they think, the answer to all their unsolved -questions, the splendor and the glory of their sex, the possibility of -magnificent promises and gifts, in which the soul of woman may at last -find peace, and her body its liberty. She is to have the supreme mastery -over her own spirit and flesh. - -It is a fine promise. But as yet it is unfulfilled. It is not to -be denied that for a time at least some of these women do gain -a cheerfulness, a keenness, a vitality, which seem to be a great -recompense for their struggles and strivings. But they are the younger -women, and especially the young unmarried women, who get a good deal of -fun out of all this excitement, all this adventure, all the dangerous -defiance of law and convention. The older women--many of them--are -already suffering a sad disillusionment. They have not yet found those -splendid things which seemed at last within their grasp. They are -desperate to get them, fierce in their desire for them, but the cup of -wine is withheld from their lips. They find themselves growing old and -still unsatisfied, growing hard, and' bitter, and revengeful against -those who thwart them. The problems of their sex still remain with them. -They may break all the laws, but get no nearer to liberty. They are -still prisoners of fate, bond-slaves to a nature which they do not -understand. The femininist movement is only a temporary way of escape -for the wife who has reached her crisis in the Eighth Year. - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -There is another way, and it has many doors. It is religion. Many of -these women "take to religion" as they take to the suffrage movement, -and find the same emotional excitement and adventure in it. They are -caught up in it as by a burning flame. It satisfies something of their -yearnings and desires. And it is a curious and lamentable thing that -although it has been proved conclusively by all masters of philosophy -and by all great thinkers, that some form of religion, is an essential -need in the heart of women, the whole tendency of the time is to rob -them of this spiritual guidance and comfort. Religion is not a part of -the social scheme of things in "intellectual mansions" and in the small -suburban houses of the professional classes. It is not entirely wiped -off the slate, but it is regarded with indifference and as of no vital -account in the sum of daily life. Occasionally a certain homage is paid -to it, as to a pleasant, old-fashioned ritual which belongs to the code -of "good form." In their courting days the young man and woman went to -church now and then on a Sunday morning or a Sunday evening and held -the same hymn-book, and enjoyed a little spiritual sentiment. They -were married in church to the music of the Wedding March played by the -organist. Sometimes as the years pass they drop into a service -where there is good singing, a popular preacher, and a fashionable -congregation. They regard themselves as Christians, and condescend to -acknowledge the existence of God, in a vague, tolerant kind of way. But -they do not enter into any intimate relations with God. He is not down -on their visiting list. Many of them do not even go as far as those -people I have described who regard God as part of the social code of -"good form." They become frankly agnostic and smile at their neighbors -who put on top-hats and silk dresses and stroll to church on a Sunday -morning. It seems to them absurdly "Early Victorian." For they have read -a great number of little books by the latest writers, who publish their -philosophy in sevenpenny editions, and they have reached an intellectual -position when they have a smattering of knowledge on the subject of -evolution, anthropology, the origins of religion, literature and dogma, -and the higher criticism. They have also read extracts from the works of -Nietzsche, Kant, and the great free-thinkers, or reviews of their works -in the halfpenny newspapers. The ideas of the great thinkers and -great rebels have filtered down to them through the writings of little -thinkers and little rebels. They have been amused by the audacities of -Bernard Shaw and other intellectuals of their own age. They have read -the novels of H. G. Wells, which seem to put God in His right place. -They have imbibed unconsciously the atmosphere of free-thought and -religious indifference which comes through the open windows, through the -keyholes, through every nook and cranny. Occasionally the husband lays -down the law on the subject with dogmatic agnosticism, or dismisses the -whole business of religion with a laugh as a matter of no importance -either way, certainly as a problem not worth bothering about. - -So the wife's spiritual nature is starved. She is not even conscious of -it, except just now and then when she is aware of a kind of spiritual -hunger, or when she has little thoughts of terror at the idea of death, -or when she is in low spirits. She has no firm and certain faith to -which she can cling in moments of perplexity. She has no belief in any -divine authority from which she can seek guidance for her actions. -There is no supernatural influence about her from which she can draw any -sweetness of consolation, when the drudgery and monotony of life begins -to pall on her. When temptations come she has no anchor holding her fast -to duty and honor. She has no tremendous ideals giving a large meaning -to the little things of life. She has no spiritual vision to explain the -mysteries of her own heart, or any spiritual balm to ease its pain -and restlessness. She must rely always on her common sense, on her own -experience, on her own poor little principles of what is right or wrong, -or expedient, or "the proper thing." When those fail her, all fails; she -is helpless, like a ship without a rudder, like a straw in the eddy of a -mill race. - -It is just at this time, when all has failed her, and when she seems to -be drifting helplessly, that she is ready for religion, a bundle of dry -straw which will burst into flame at the touch of a spark, a spiritual -appetite hungry for food. In hundreds of cases these women take to the -queerest kinds of spiritual food, some of it very poisonous stuff. Any -impostor with a new creed may get hold of them. Any false prophet may -dupe them into allegiance. They get into the hands of peculiar people. -They are tempted to go to a spiritualistic sance and listen to the -jargon of spiritualism. It frightens them at first, but after their -first fears, and a little shrinking horror, they go forward into these -"mysteries," and are obsessed by them. It appears they are "psychical." -Undoubtedly after a little practice they could get into touch with the -spirit-world. With planchette and table-rapping, and with mediumistic -guidance, they may learn the secrets of the ghost-world, and invoke the -aid of spirits in their little household. It becomes a mania with them. -It becomes, in many cases, sheer madness. - -There are other women who seek their spiritual salvation among the -clairvoyants and crystal-gazers and palmists of the West End. - -They become devotees of the Black Art, and dupes of those who prey -upon the Eternal Gullible. There are others who join the Christian -Scientists, and find the key to the riddle of life in the writings -of Mrs. Eddy. They experiment in will-power--upon their unfortunate -husbands. They adopt the simple life, and bring themselves into a low -state of health by fruit diet. They learn a new language full of strange -technical terms, which they but dimly understand, yet find comforting, -like the old woman and her Mesopotamia, which was a blessd word to -her. But in spite of all its falsity and folly, it does give them a -new interest in life, and lift them right out of the ruck of suburban -dulness. So far at least it is helpful to them. It is some kind of -spiritual satisfaction, though afterwards, perhaps, they may fall into a -spiritual excitement and hysteria worse than their old restlessness, and -become a nuisance to their family and friends, women with _ides fixes_. - -It is better for them if they can grope their way back to the old -Christian faith, with its sweetness and serenity and divine ideals. Here -at last the woman may find authority, not to be argued about, not to be -dodged, but to be obeyed. Here at last she may find tremendous ideals -giving a significance to the little things of life, which seemed so -trivial, so futile, and so purposeless. Here is wholesome food for her -spiritual hunger, giving her new strength and courage, patience and -resignation. Here are great moral lessons from which she may draw wisdom -and guidance for her own poor perplexities. Then when temptations come, -she may cling to an anchor of faith which will not slip in shifting -sands, but is chained to a great rock. The wisdom of the Church, the -accumulated experience stored up in the Church, the sweetness of all -great Christian lives, the splendid serenity of the Christian laws, so -stern and yet so tolerant, so hard and yet so easy, give to this woman's -soul the peace she has desired, not to be found among the ghosts of -modern spiritualism, nor in the pseudo-scientific jargon of Mrs. Eddy's -works, nor in the glass-crystals of the clairvoyants. For the Christian -faith has no use for hysteria; it exacts a healthy discipline of mind. -It demands obedience to the laws of life, by which no woman may shirk -the duties of her nature, or pander to her selfishness, or dodge the -responsibilities of her state as a wife, or forget her marriage-vows and -all that they involve. - -There would be no fatal significance about the Eighth Year if the old -religion were still of vital influence in the home. For after all, -in spite of all our cleverness, we have not yet discovered any new -intellectual formula or philosophy which will force men and women to do -those things which are unpleasant but necessary to insure the future of -the race; to deny themselves so that the future generation may gain; to -suffer willingly in this world for the sake of an advantage in a future -life. If people do not believe in a future life, and in such rewards as -are offered by the Christian dogma, they prefer to have their advantages -here and now. But as we know, if we face the facts of life clearly, the -advantages, here and now, are not easy to get. Life, at its best, is -a disappointing business. There is a lot of rough with the smooth, -especially for women, especially for those women of the middle-classes -in small suburban homes, over-intel-lectualized, with highly strung -nerves, in a narrow environment, without many interests, and without -much work. It is just because many of them are entirely without religion -to give some great purpose to their inevitable trivialities that their -moral perspective becomes hopelessly inverted, as though they were -gazing through the wrong end of the telescope. Having no banking account -in the next life, they spend themselves in this life, and live "on -tick," as it were. Religion is the gospel of unselfishness. Lacking -religion, they are utterly selfish. They do not worry about the future -of the race. Why should they? All they are worrying about is to -save themselves pain, expense, drudgery. Children are a great -nuisance--therefore they will not have children. They want to put in a -good time, to enjoy youth and beauty as long as possible, to get as much -fun as they can here and now. But, as we have seen, the fun begins -to peter out somewhere about the Eighth Year, and "the good time" has -disappeared like a mirage when one gets close to it, and even youth -and beauty are drooping and faded like yesterday's flowers. What is the -woman to do then? She is the victim of shattered illusions, of broken -hopes. Before her is nothing but a gray vista of years. She has nothing -to reconcile her with the boredom of her days, nothing to compensate -her for domestic drudgery, no cure for the restlessness and feverishness -which consume her, no laws by which she may keep straight. She sees -crookedly, her spirit rushes about hither and thither. She is like a -hunted thing, hunted by her desires, and she can find no sanctuary; no -sanctuary unless she finds religion, and the right religion. There are -not many women nowadays who find this way of escape, for religion has -gone out of fashion, like last year's hats, and it wants a lot of pluck -to wear a last year's hat. - - - - -CHAPTER X - -Besides, the husband does not like it. He discourages religion, except -in homoeopathic doses, taken by way of a little tonic, as one goes to -the theatre for a pick-me-up. As he remarks, he does not believe in -women being too spiritual. It is not "healthy." If his wife goes to -church with any regularity he suspects there is an attractive cleric -round the corner. And sometimes he is right. Anyhow, he does not feel -the need of religion, except when he gets a pretty bad dose of influenza -and has an uneasy thought that he is going to "peg out." As a rule he -enjoys good health, and has no time to bother about the supernatural. -He does not meet it in the city. It is not a marketable commodity. It is -not, as he says, "in his line of country." He does not see why it should -be in his wife's line of country. He is annoyed when his wife takes -up any of these cranky ideas. He rages inwardly when she takes them up -passionately. Why can't she be normal? - -Why on earth can't she go on as she began, with her little feminine -interests, keeping herself pretty for his sake, keen on the latest -fashions, neighborly with young wives like herself, and fond of a bit -of frivolity now and then? When she complains that she has idle hands in -her lap, and wants something to do, he reminds her that she found plenty -to do in the first years of her married life. When she cries out that -she is bored, he points out to her that she gets much more amusement -than he does. - -And that is true, because by the time he has reached the Eighth Year -he is pretty busy. Ambition has caught hold of him and he is making a -career. It is not easy. Competition is deadly. He has got his work cut -out to keep abreast with his competitors. It is a constant struggle "to -keep his end up." He finds it disconcerting when he comes home in the -evenings after the anxiety of his days, dog-tired and needing sympathy, -to find that his wife has an attack of nerves, or a feverish desire to -go out and "see something." He wants to stay at home and rest, to dawdle -over the evening paper, to listen to a tune or two from his wife. - -He would like her to bring his slippers to him, as she used to do in the -old days, to hover round him a little with endearing words, and then, -with not too much of _that_, to keep quiet, assenting to his opinions -when he expresses them, and being restful. He has his own grievances. -He is not without troubles of soul and body. He has had to face -disappointment, disillusionment, hours of blank pessimism. He has had -to get to grips with reality, after the romanticism of his youth, and to -put a check upon his natural instincts and desires. In many ways it is -harder for the man than for the woman. Civilization and the monogamous -code have not been framed on easy lines for men. To keep the ordinary -rules of his caste he must put a continual restraint upon himself, -make many sacrifices. Women and wives forget that human nature has not -changed because men wear black coats and tall hats instead of the skins -of beasts. Human nature is exactly the same as it ever was, strong and -savage, but it has to be tamed and repressed within the four walls of a -flat in West Kensington, or within a semi-detached house at Wimbledon. - -There are moments when the man hears the call of the wild, and loathes -respectability and conventionality with a deadly loathing. In his -heart, as in the heart of every man, there is a little Bohemia, a little -country of lawlessness and errant fancy and primitive desires. Sometimes -when he has shut himself up in his study, when the servants are in the -kitchen washing up the supper-things, when his wife is lying down with a -bad headache, he unlocks the door of that Bohemia in his heart, and his -imagination goes roving, and he hears the pan-pipes calling, and the -stamp of the cloven hoofs of the old Nature-god. He would like to cut -and run sometimes from this respectable life of his, to go in search of -adventure down forbidden pathways, and to find the joy of life again in -Liberty Hall. This fretful wife of his, this social-ladder climbing, the -whole business of "playing the game" in the same old way, makes him -very tired, and gets on his nerves at times most damnably. He has his -temptations. He hears siren voices calling him. He sees the lure of the -witch-women. To feel his pulse thrill to the wine of life, to get -the fever of joy in his blood again, to plunge into the fiery lake of -passion, are temptations from which he does not escape because he is -Something in the City, or a barrister-at-law, and a married man with -a delicate wife. But, being a man, with a man's work, and a man's -ambition, he keeps his sanity, and quite often his self-respect. His -eyes are clear enough to see the notice-boards on the boundary lines of -the forbidden territory, "Trespassers will be prosecuted," "Please keep -off the grass," "No thoroughfare." He locks up the gate to the little -Bohemia in his heart, and puts the key into a secret cupboard of his -brain. He understands quite clearly that if he once "goes off the -rails," as he calls it, his ambitions will be frustrated and his career -spoiled. Besides, being a conventionalist and somewhat of a snob, he -would hate to be found out in any violation of the social code, and his -blood runs cold at the idea of his making a fool of himself with a -woman, or anything of that kind. The creed of his social code, of the -pot-hatted civilization, of this suburban conventionality of these -little private snob-doms, is stronger in the man than in the woman. When -she once takes the bit between her teeth, as it were, she becomes -utterly lawless. But the man reins himself in more easily. He finds it -on the whole less difficult to be law-abiding. He has also a clearer -vision of the logic of things. He knows that certain results follow -certain causes. He can measure up the consequences of an act, and weigh -them. He is guided by his brain rather than by his emotions. He has -certain fixed principles deeply rooted in him. He has a more delicate -sense of honor than most women. It is summed up in that old -school-phrase of his--"playing the game." However much his nerves may be -jangled, and goodness knows they are often jangled, especially as the -Eighth Year draws near, he is generally master of himself. At least he -does not, as a rule, have hysterical outbursts, or give rein to -passionate impulses, or suddenly take some wild plunge, upsetting all -the balance of his life. He does not take frightful risks, as a woman -will always take them, recklessly, when she reaches her crisis. - -So it is that he looks coldly upon his wife's desires for some new -emotional activity, of whatever kind it may be, religious, political, or -ethical. He hates any symptoms of fanaticism. He shivers at any breach -of good form. He would like her always to be sitting in the drawing-room -when he comes home, in a pretty frock, with a novel in her lap, with -a smile in her eyes. He does not and will not understand that this -childless wife of his must have strong interests outside her little home -to save her from eating her heart out. He hides from himself the fact -that her childlessness is a curse which is blighting her. He pooh-poohs -her tragic cry for help. He is just a little brutal with her when she -accuses him of thwarting all the desires of her soul. And he is scared, -thoroughly scared, when at last she takes flight, on wild wings, to some -spiritual country, or to some moral, or immoral, territory, where he -could not follow. He tries to call her back. But sometimes she may not -be called back. She has escaped beyond the reach of his voice. - - - - -CHAPTER XI - -Snobbishness is one of the causes which lead to the Eighth Year, -and not the least among them. It is an essentially middle-class -snobbishness, and has grown up, like a fungus growth, with that immense -and increasing class of small, fairly well-to-do households who have -come into being with the advance of material prosperity during the past -twenty-five years, and with the progress of elementary education, and -all that it has brought with it in the form of new desires for pleasure, -amusement and more luxuries. These young husbands and wives who set up -their little homes are not, as I have said, content to start on the same -level as their parents in the first years of their married life. They -must start at least on the level of their parents at the end of their -married life, even a little in advance. The seeds of snobbishness -are sown before marriage. The modern son pooh-poohs the habits of his -old-fashioned father. They are not good enough for him. He has at least -twice the pocket-money at school compared with the allowance of his -father when he was a boy. He goes to a more expensive school and learns -expensive habits. When he begins work he does not hand over most of his -salary as his father used to hand over his salary a generation ago, to -keep the family pot boiling. He keeps all that he earns, though he is -still living at home, and develops a nice taste in clothes. One tie -on week-days and another tie for Sundays are still good enough for the -father, but the son buys ties by the dozen, and then has a passion -for fancy socks, and lets his imagination rove into all departments of -haberdashery. He is only a middle-class young man, but he dresses in the -style of a man of fashion, adopts some of the pleasures of the man about -town, and is rather scornful of the little house in the suburbs to which -he returns after a bachelor's dinner in a smart restaurant, or after a -tea-party with gaiety girls. He becomes a "Nut," and his evenings are -devoted to a variety of amusements, which does away with a good deal -of money. He smokes a special brand of cigarettes. He hires a motor-car -occasionally for a spin down to Brighton. His mother and father are -rather scared by this son who lives in a style utterly beyond their -means. - -The girl is a feminine type of the new style. She has adopted the -new notions. At a very early age she is expert in all the arts of the -younger generation, and at seventeen or eighteen has already revolted -from the authority of her parents. She is quite a nice girl, naturally, -but her chief vice is vanity. She is eaten up with it. It is a consuming -passion. From the moment she gets out of bed in the morning for the -first glimpse of her face in the looking-glass to the time she goes to -bed after putting on some lip-salve and face enamel, she is absorbed -with self-consciousness about her "looks." Her face is always occupying -her attention. Even in railway trains she keeps biting her lips to make -them red. At every window she passes she gives a sidelong glance to see -if her face is getting on all right. Her main ambition in life is to be -in the fashion. She is greedy for "pretty things" and sponges upon her -father and mother for the wherewithal to buy them, and she will not lay -a little finger on any work in the kitchen or even make a bed, lest her -hands should be roughened and because it would not be quite "lady-like." - -A pretty education for matrimony! A nice couple to set up house together -Poor children of life, they are doomed to have a pack of troubles. -Because as they began they go on, with the same ideas, with the same -habits of mind, until they get a rude shock. Their little household is -a shrine to the great god Snob. They are his worshippers. To make a show -beyond their meansj or up to the very limit of their means, to pretend -to be better off than they are, to hide any sign of poverty, to dress -above their rank in life, to show themselves in places of entertainment, -to shirk domestic drudgery, that is their creed. - -In the old days, before the problem of the Eighth Year had arrived, the -wives of men, the mothers of those very girls, kept themselves busy by -hundreds of small duties. They made the beds, dusted the rooms, helped -the servants in the kitchen, made a good many of their own clothes, -mended them, altered them, cleaned the silver. But nowadays the wife of -the professional man does none of these things if there is any escape -from them. She keeps one servant at a time when her mother did without -a servant. She keeps two servants as soon as her husband can afford an -extra one, three servants if the house is large enough to hold them. -Indeed, a rise in the social scale is immediately the excuse for -an additional servant, and in the social status the exact financial -prosperity of the middle-classes is reckoned by them according to the -number of servants they keep. And whether it be two or three, the little -snob wife sits in her drawing-room with idle hands, trying to kill time, -getting tired of doing nothing, but proud of her laziness. And the snob -husband encourages her in her laziness. He is proud of it, too. He would -hate to think of his wife dusting, or cleaning, or washing up. He does -not guess that this worship of his great god Snob is a devil's worship, -having devilish results for himself and her. The idea that women want -work never enters his head. His whole ambition in life is to prevent his -wife from working, not only when he is alive, but after he is dead. He -insures himself heavily and at the cost of a great financial strain upon -his resources in order that "if anything happens" his wife, even then, -need not raise her little finger to do any work. But something "happens" -before he is dead. The woman revolts from the evil spell of her -laziness. She finds some work for her idle hands to do--good work or -bad. - - - - -CHAPTER XII - -If only those idle women would find some good work to do the Eighth -Year would lose its terrors. And there is so much good work to do if -they would only lay their hands to it! If they cannot get in touch with -God, they can at least get in touch with humanity. At their very doors -there is a welter of suffering, struggling humanity craving for a little -help, needing helping hands, on the very edge of the abyss of misery, -and slipping down unless they get rescued in the nick of time. In the -mean streets of life, in the hospitals, at the prison gates, in the -reformatories, in the dark haunts of poverty, there are social workers -striving and toiling and moiling in the service of all these seething -masses of human beings. But there are too few of them, and the appeals -for volunteers in the ranks of the unpaid helpers are not often -answered. They are hardly ever answered from the class of women who have -least in the world to do, and most need of such kinds of work. Many -of these women have good voices. They sing little drawing-room ballads -quite well, until they get sick of the sound of their own singing in -their lonely little drawing-rooms. But they do not think of singing in -the hospitals, and the workhouse wards, where their voices would give -joy to suffering people, or miserable people who do not often hear the -music of life. These women have no children. They have shirked the -pains of childbirth. But they might help to give a little comfort and -happiness to other mothers' children, to shepherd a small flock for a -day's outing in the country, to organize the children's playtime, to -nurse the sick baby now and then. These idle women remember their own -girlhood and its dreams. They remember their own innocence, the shelter -of their home-life. It would be good for them if they gave a little -loving service to the girls in the working-quarters of the great cities, -and went down into the girl-clubs to play their dance tunes, to keep -them out of the streets, to give them a little innocent fun in -the evenings. These lazy women cry out that they are prisoners in -upholstered cages. But there are many prisoners in stone cells, who at -the prison gates, on their release, stand looking out into the cold gray -world, with blank, despairing eyes, with no prospect but that of crime -and vice, unless some unknown friend comes with a little warmth of human -love, with a quick sympathy and a ready helpfulness. Here is work for -workless women who are well-to-do. They are unhappy in their own -homes, because they are tired of its trivialities, tired of its little -luxuries, bored to death with themselves because they have no purpose -in life. But in the mean streets round the corner they would find women -still clinging with extraordinary courage to homes that have no stick -of furniture in them, amazingly cheerful, although instead of little -luxuries they have not even the barest necessities of life, unwearied, -indefatigable, heroic in endurance, though they toil on sweated wages. -The women of the well-to-do middle-classes drift apart from their -husbands because perhaps they have irritable little habits, because they -do not understand all the yearnings in their wives' hearts, because they -have fallen below the old ideals of their courting days. But here in the -slums these women with a grievance would find other women loyal to their -husbands who come home drunk at nights, loyal through thick and thin -to husbands who "bash" them when they speak a sharp word, loyal to the -death to husbands who are untamed brutes with only the love of the brute -for its mate. There is no problem of the Eighth Year in Poverty Court, -only the great problems of life and death, of hunger and thirst and -cold, of labor and want of work. Here in the mean streets of the world -is the great lesson that want of work is the greatest disaster, the -greatest moral tragedy, that may happen to men and women. - -If the idle women of the little snobdoms would come forth from their -houses and flats, they would see that lesson staring them in the face, -with a great warning to themselves. And if they would thrust aside their -selfishness and learn the love of humanity, it would light a flame in -their hearts which would kindle the dead ashes of their disillusionment -and burn up their grievances, and make a bonfire of all their petty -little troubles, and make such a light in their lives as would enable -them to see the heroic qualities of ordinary duties bravely done, and of -ordinary lives bravely led. Here they would find another way of escape -from the perils of the Eighth Year, and a new moral health for their -hearts and brains. - -It is only now and then that some woman is lucky enough to find this way -out, for snobbishness enchains them, and it is difficult to break its -fetters. - - - - -CHAPTER XIII - -When the woman has once taken flight, or is hesitating before taking -her flight, in the Eighth Year, it is an almost hopeless business for -the husband to call her back. Whenever she is called back, it is by -some outside influence, beyond _his_ sphere of influence, by some sudden -accident, by some catastrophe involving both of them, or by some severe -moral shock, shaking the foundations of their little home like an -earthquake. There are cases in which the woman has been called back by -the sudden smash-up of her husband's business, by financial ruin. In his -social ladder-climbing he is too rash. One of the rungs of the ladder -breaks beneath his feet and he comes toppling down. Owing to this deadly -competition of modern life, he loses his "job." It is given to a younger -or better man, or to a man with a stronger social pull. He comes home -one day with a white face, trembling, horribly scared, afraid to break -the news to a woman who has not been helpful to him of late, and of -whose sympathy he is no longer sure. He believes that this misfortune -is the last straw which will break their strained relations. He sees -the great tragedy looming ahead, hearing down upon him. But, curiously -enough, this apparent disaster is the salvation of both of them. The -despair of her husband calls to the woman's loyalty. All her grievances -against this man are suddenly swallowed up in the precipice which has -opened beneath his feet. All her antagonism is broken down and dissolved -into pity. Her self-pride is slain by this man's abasement. His -weakness, his need of help, his panic-stricken heart cry to her. After -all their drifting apart, their indifference to each other, their -independence, he wants her again. He wants her as a helpmeet. He wants -any courage she can give him, any wisdom. And she is glad to be wanted. -She stretches out her hands to him. They clasp each other, and there -is no longer a gulf beneath their feet; misfortune has built a bridge -across the gulf which divided them. More than that, all the little -meannesses of their life, all the petty selfishness of their days, all -the little futile things over which they have wrangled and jangled are -thrust on one side, and are seen in their right perspective. The things -that matter, the only things that matter, are seen, perhaps, for the -first time, clearly, in a bright light, now that they are face to -face with stem realities. The shock throws them off their pedestals of -conceit, of self-consciousness, of pretence. They stand on solid ground. -The shock has broken the masks behind which they hid themselves. It -has broken the hard crust about their hearts. It has shattered the idol -which they worshipped, the idol of the great god Snob. - -And so they stare into each other's soul, and take hands again like -little children, abandoned by the Wicked Uncles of life, and they grope -their way back to primitive things, and begin the journey again. They -have found out that this new comradeship is better even than the old -romantic love of their courting days. They have discovered something -of the great secret of life. They are humbled. They make new pledges to -each other, pick up the broken pieces of their hopes and dreams and -fit them together again in a new and sounder scheme. This time, in some -cases, they do not leave the baby out of the business. The wife becomes -a mother, and the child chases away all the ghosts which haunted her in -the Eighth Year. She no longer wants to take flight. She has been called -back. - -It is nearly always some accident like this which calls the wife back, -some sudden, startling change in the situation, caused by outside -influences, or by the hand of Fate. Sometimes it is an illness which -overtakes the husband or wife. Holding hands by the bedside, they -stare into the face of Death, and again the trivialities of life, the -pettiness of their previous desires, the folly of their selfishness, the -stupidity of their little snobdom, are revealed by the whisperings of -Death, and by its warnings. The truth of things stalks into the bedroom -where the husband, or the wife, lies sleeping on the borderland. About -the sick bed the weeping woman makes new vows, tears wash out her -vanity, her self-conceit. Or, kneeling by the side of the woman whose -transparent hand he clasps above the coverlet, the husband listens to -the little voice within his conscience, and understands, with a great -heartache, the pitiful meaning of the domestic strife which seemed -to have killed his love for the woman for whose life now he makes a -passionate cry. In the period of convalescence, after Death has stolen -away, when life smiles again through the open windows, that man and -woman get back to sanity and to wisdom beyond that of common-sense. They -begin again with new ideals. Perhaps in a little while one of the rooms -becomes a nursery. They get back to the joy of youth, once more the -woman has been called back. - -If none of these "accidents" happen, if some great influence like this -does not thrust its way into the lives of this husband and wife during -the crisis of the Eighth Year, if the woman is not caught up by some -great enthusiasm, or if she can find no work for the idle hands to do, -giving her new and absorbing interests to satisfy her heart and brain, -then the Eighth Year is a fatal year, and the President of the Divorce -Court has a new case added to his list, or the family records of the -country chronicle another separation, or another woman goes to prison -for arson or bomb-throwing. Because the laws of psychology are not so -erratic as the world imagines. They work out on definite lines. Certain -psychological forces having been set in motion, they lead inevitably to -certain results. When once a woman has lost her interest in her home and -husband, when she has become bored with herself, when she has a morbid -craving for excitement and adventures, when she has become peevish and -listless and hungry-hearted, she cannot remain in this condition. Those -forces within her are tremendously powerful. They must find some outlet. -They must reach a definite time of crisis when things have got to -happen. These vague yearnings must be satisfied, somehow, anyhow. The -emptiness of her heart must be filled by something or other. She will -search round with wondering, wistful eyes, more desperate day by day, -until she finds the thing, however evil it may be, however dangerous. -She must still that throbbing brain of hers, even if she has to take -drugs to do so. In spite of all the poison laws, she will find some kind -of poison, some subtle and insidious drug to give her temporary cure, a -period of vitality, a thrill of excitement, a glittering dream or two, -a relief from the dulness which is pressing down upon her with leaden -weights. She knows the penalty which follows this drug-taking--the awful -reaction, the deadly lethargy that follows, the nervous crises, the loss -of will-power, but she is prepared to pay the price because for a little -while she gets peace, and artificial life. The family doctors know the -prevalence of those drug-taking habits. They know the cause of them, -they have watched the pitiful drama of these women's lives. But they -can do nothing to cut out the cause. Not even the surgeon's knife can do -that; their warnings fall on deaf ears, or are answered by a hysterical -laugh. - -As I have shown, there are other forms of drug-taking not less dangerous -in their moral effects. If the woman does not go to the chemist's shop, -she goes to the darkened room of the clairvoyant and the crystal-gazer, -or to the spiritualistic sance, or to the man who hides his time until -the crisis of the Eighth Year delivers the woman into his hands. - -Here, then, frankly and in detail, I have set out the meaning of this -dangerous year of married life, and have endeavored, honestly, to -analyze all the social and psychological forces which go to make that -crisis. It is, in some measure, a study of our modern conditions of life -as they prevail among the middle-classes, so that the problem is not -abnormal, but is present, to some extent, in hundreds of thousands -of small households to-day. All the tendencies of the time, all the -revolutionary ideas that are in the very air we breathe, all this -modern spirit of revolt against disagreeable duties, and drudgery, and -discipline, the decay of religious authority, the sapping of spiritual -faith, the striving for social success, the cult of snobbishness, -the new creed of selfishness which ignores the future of the race and -demands a good time here and now, the lack of any ideals larger than -private interests and personal comforts, the ignorance of men and women -who call themselves intellectual, the nervous irritability of husbands -and wives who live up to the last penny of their incomes, above all -the childlessness of these women who live in small flats and suburban -villas, and their utter laziness, all those signs and symptoms of -our social sickness lead up, inevitably, and with fatal logic, to the -tragedy of the Eighth Year. - - - - - -PART II--A DEMONSTRATION - - - - -CHAPTER I - -In the drawing-room of a flat in Intellectual Mansions, S. W., there -was an air of quietude and peace. No one would have imagined for a -moment that the atmosphere was charged with electricity, or that -the scene was set for a drama of emotional interest with tragic -potentialities. It seemed the dwelling-place of middle-class culture and -well-to-do gentility. - -The room was furnished in the "New Art" style, as seen in the showrooms -of the great stores. There were sentimental pictures on the walls framed -in dark oak. The sofa and chairs were covered in a rather flamboyant -chintz. Through the French windows at the back could be seen the balcony -railings, and, beyond, a bird's-eye view of the park. A piano-organ in -the street below was playing the latest ragtime melody, and there was -the noise of a great number of whistles calling for taxis, which did not -seem to come. - -In a stiff-backed arm-chair by the fireplace sat an elderly lady, of a -somewhat austere appearance, who was examining through her spectacles -the cover of a paper backed novel, depicting a voluptuous young woman; -obviously displeasing to her sense of propriety. Mrs. Heywood's sense of -propriety was somewhat acutely developed, to the annoyance, at times, of -Mollie, the maid-servant, who was clearing away the tea-things in a -bad temper. That is to say, she was making a great deal of unnecessary -clatter. - -Mrs. Heywood ignored the clatter, and concentrated her attention on the -cover of the paper-backed book. It seemed to distress her, and presently -she gave expression to her distress. - -"Dear me! What an improper young woman!" - -Mollie's bad temper was revealed by a sudden tightening of the lips and -a flushed face. She bent across an "occasional" table and peered over -the old lady's shoulder, and spoke rather impudently. - -"Excuse me, ma'am, but that's _my_ novel, if you don't mind." - -"I _do_ mind," said Mrs. Heywood. "I was shocked to find it on the -kitchen dresser." - -Molly tossed her head, so that her white cap assumed an acute angle. - -"I was shocked to see that it had gone from the kitchen dresser." - -Then she lowered her voice and added in a tone of bitter grievance-- - -"Blessed if one can call anything one's own in this here flat." - -"It's not fit literature for _any_ young girl," said Mrs. Heywood -severely. She looked again at the flaunting lady with an air of extreme -disapproval. - -"Disgusting!" - -Mollie rattled the tea-things violently. - -"It's good enough for the mistress, anyhow." - -Mrs. Heywood was surprised. - -"Surely she did not lend it to you?" - -"Well--not exactly," said Mollie, with just a trace of embarrassment. "I -borrowed it. It's written by her particular friend, Mr. Bradshaw." - -"Mr. Bradshaw! Surely not?" - -The old lady wiped her spectacles rather nervously. - -"A very nice-spoken gentleman," said Mollie, "though he does write -novels." - -Mrs. Heywood looked at the author's name for the first time and -expressed her astonishment. - -"Good gracious! So it is." - -Mollie laughed as she folded up the tea-cloth. She had gained a little -triumph, and scored off the "mother-in-law," as she called the elderly -lady, in the kitchen. - -"Oh, he knows a thing or two, he does, my word!" - -She winked solemnly at herself in the mirror over the mantelshelf. - -"Hold your tongue, Mollie," said Mrs. Heywood sharply. - -"Servants are not supposed to have any tongues. Oh, dear no!" - -With this sarcastic retort Mollie proceeded to put the sugar-basin into -the china-cupboard, but seemed to expect a counter-attack. She was not -disappointed. - -"Mollie!" said Mrs. Heywood severely, looking over the rims of her -spectacles. - -"Now what's wrong?" - -"You have not cleaned the silver lately." - -"Haven't I?" said Mollie sweetly. - -"No," said Mrs. Heywood. "Why not, I should like to know?" - -Mollie's "sweetness" was suddenly embittered. She spoke with ferocity. - -"If you want to know, it's because I won't obey two mistresses at once. -There's no liberty for a mortal soul in this here flat. So there!" - -"Very well, Mollie," said Mrs. Heywood mildly. "We will wait until your -mistress comes home. If she has any strength of mind at all she will -give you a month's notice." - -Mollie sniffed. The idea seemed to amuse her. - -"The poor dear hasn't any strength of mind." - -"I am surprised at you, Mollie." - -"That's why she has gone to church again." - -Mrs. Heywood was startled. She was so startled that she forgot her anger -with the maid. - -"Again? Are you sure?" - -"Well, she had a look of church in her eyes when she went out." - -"What sort of a look?" asked Mrs. Heywood. - -"A stained-glass-window look." - -Mrs. Heywood spoke rather to herself than to Mollie. - -"That makes the third time to-day," she said pensively. - -Mollie spoke mysteriously. She too had forgotten her anger and -impudence. She dropped her voice to a confidential tone. - -"The mistress is in a bad way, to my thinking. I've seen it coming on." - -"Seen what coming on?" asked the elderly lady. - -"She sits brooding too much. Doesn't even pitch into me when I break -things. That's a bad sign." - -"A bad sign?" - -"I've noticed they're all taken like this when they go wrong," said the -girl, speaking as one who had had a long experience of human nature -in Intellectual Mansions, S. W. But these words aroused the old lady's -wrath. - -"How dare you!" said Mrs. Heywood. "Leave the room at once." - -"I must tell the truth if I died for it," said Mollie. - -The two women were silent for a moment, for just then a voice outside -called, "Clare! Clare!" rather impatiently. - -"Oh, Lord!" said Mollie. "There's the master." - -"Clare!" called the voice. "Oh, confound the thing!" - -"I suppose he's lost his stud again," said Mollie. "He always does on -club nights. I'd best be off." - -She took up the tea-tray and left the room hurriedly, just as her -master came in. It was Mr. Herbert Heywood, generally described by -his neighbors as being "Something in the City"--a man of about thirty, -slight, clean-shaven, boyish, good-looking, with nervous movements and -extreme irritability. He was in evening clothes with his tie undone. - -"Plague take this tie!" he growled, making use of one or two -un-Parliamentary expressions. Then he saw his mother and apologized. - -"Oh, I beg your pardon, mother. Where's Clare?" - -Mrs. Heywood answered her son gloomily. - -"I think she's gone to church again." - -"Again?" said Herbert Heywood. "Why, dash it all--I beg your pardon, -mother--she's always going to church now. What's the attraction?" - -"I think she must be unwell," said Mrs. Hey-wood. "I've thought so for -some time." - -"Oh, nonsense! She's perfectly fit.... See if you can tie this bow, -mother." - -Mrs. Heywood endeavored to do so, and during the process her son showed -great impatience and made irritable grimaces. But he returned to the -subject of his wife. - -"Perhaps her nerves are a bit wrong. Women are nervy creatures.... Oh, -hang it all, mother, don't strangle me!... As I tell her, what's the -good of having a park at your front door--Oh, thanks, that's better." - -He looked at himself in the glass, and dabbed his face with a -handkerchief. - -"Of course I cut myself to-night. I always do when I go to the club." - -"Herbert, dear," said Mrs. Heywood rather nervously. - -"I--I suppose Clare is not going to bless you with a child?" - -"_In this flat_!" - -Herbert was startled and horrified. It was a great shock to him. He -gazed round the little drawing-room rather wildly. - -"Oh, Lord!" he said presently, when he had calmed down a little. "Don't -suggest such a thing. Besides, she is not." - -"Well, I'm nervous about her," said Mrs. Heywood. - -"Oh, rats, mother! I mean, don't be so fanciful." - -"I don't like this sudden craving for religion, Herbert. It's -unhealthy." - -"Devilish unhealthy," said Herbert. - -He searched about vainly for his patent boots, which were in an obvious -position. It added to his annoyance and irritability. - -"Why can't she stay at home and look after me? I can't find a single -damn thing. I beg your pardon, mother.... Women's place is in the -home.... Now where on earth----" - -He resumed his search for the very obvious patent boots and at last -discovered them. - -"Oh, there they are!" - -He glanced at the clock, and expressed the opinion that he would be late -for the club if he did not "look sharp." Then a little tragedy happened, -and he gave a grunt of dismay when a bootlace broke. - -"Oh, my hat! Why doesn't Clare look after my things properly?" - -Mrs. Heywood asked another question, ignoring the broken bootlace. - -"Need you go to the club to-night, Herbert?" - -Herbert was both astonished and annoyed at this remark. - -"Of course I must. It's Friday night and the one little bit of -Bohemianism I get in the week. Why not?" - -"Oh, I don't know," said Mrs. Heywood meekly. "Except that I thought -Clare is feeling rather lonely." - -"Lonely?" said Herbert. "She has you, hasn't she?" - -"Yes, she has me." - -Mrs. Heywood spoke as though that might be a doubtful consolation. - -"Besides, what more does she want? She has her afternoon At Homes, -hasn't she?" - -"Yes, dear," said Mrs. Heywood, still more doubtfully. - -"And she can always go to a matine if she wants to, can't she?" - -"Yes, dear." - -"Then I have taken out a subscription to Mudie's for her, haven't I?" - -Herbert Heywood spoke as though his wife had all the blessings of -life, as though he had provided her with all that a woman's heart might -desire. But Mrs. Heywood interrupted his catalogue of good things. - -"I think she reads too many novels," she said. - -"Oh, they broaden her mind," said Herbert. "Although, I must -confess they bore _me_ to death.... Now what have I done with my -cigarette-case?" - -He felt all over his pockets, but could not find the desired thing. - -"Oh, the curse of pockets!" - -"Some of them are very dangerous, Herbert." - -"What, pockets?" - -"No, novels," said Mrs. Heywood. "Look at this." - -She thrust under his eyes the novel with the picture of the flaming -lady. - -"Gee whizz!" said Herbert, laughing. "Oh, well, she's a married woman." - -"Do you see who the author is, Herbert?" Herbert look, and was -astonished. - -"Gerald Bradshaw, by Jove! Does he write this sort of muck?" - -"He has been coming here rather often lately. Especially on club-nights, -Herbert." Herbert Heywood showed distinct signs of annoyance. - -"Does he, by Jove? I don't like the fellow. He's a particularly fine -specimen of a bad hat." - -"I'm afraid he's an immoral man," said Mrs. Heywood. - -Herbert shrugged his shoulders. - -"Well, Clare can take care of herself." - -"I wonder," said Mrs. Heywood, as though she were not at all sure. "My -dear, I think you ought to keep an eye on your wife just now." - -Herbert Heywood took his eye-glass out of a fob pocket and fumbled with -it. - -"Keep an eye on her, mother?" - -"She is very queer," said Mrs. Heywood. "I can't do anything to please -her." - -"Well, there's nothing strange in that," said Herbert. Then he added -hastily-- - -"I mean it's no new symptom." - -Mrs. Heywood stared at her son in a peculiar, significant way. - -"She looks as if something is going to--happen." - -Herbert was really startled. - -"Happen? How? When?" - -"I can't exactly explain. She appears to be waiting for something--or -some one." - -Herbert was completely mystified. - -"I didn't keep her waiting this evening, did I?" - -"I don't mean you, dear," said Mrs. Heywood. - -"No?--Who, then?" asked Herbert. - -Mrs. Heywood replied somewhat enigmatically. She gave a deep sigh and -said-- - -"We women are queer things!" - -"Queer isn't the word," said Herbert. - -He stared at the carpet in a gloomy, thoughtful way, as though the -pattern were perplexing him. - -"Perhaps you're right about the novels. They've been giving her notions, -or something." - -Mrs. Heywood crossed the room hurriedly and went over to a drawer in a -cabinet, from which she pulled out a number of pamphlets. - -"Herbert," she said solemnly, "she doesn't read only novels. Look here. -Look at all these little books. She simply devours them, Herbert, and -then hides them." - -"Naturally, after she has devoured them," said Herbert irritably. "But -what the deuce are they?" - -He turned them over one by one, reading out the titles, raising his -eyebrows, and then whistling with surprise, and finally looking quite -panic-stricken. - -"_Women's Work and Wages_. Oh, Lord! John Stuart Mill on _The Subjection -of Women. The Ethics of Ibsen_. Great Scott! _The Principles of -Eugenics_.... My hat!" - -"Quite so, Herbert," said Mrs. Heywood, with a kind of grim satisfaction -in his consternation. - -"I don't mind her reading improper novels," said Herbert, "but I draw -the line at this sort of stuff." - -"It's most dangerous." - -"It's rank poison." - -"That's what I think," said Mrs. Heywood. - -"Where did she get hold of them?" asked Herbert. - -Mrs. Heywood looked at her son as though she had another startling -announcement. - -"From that woman, Miss Vernon, the artist girl who lives in the flat -above." - -"What, that girl who throws orange-peel over the balcony?" - -"Yes, the girl who is always whistling for taxis," said Mrs. Heywood. - -"What, you mean the one who complained about my singing in the bath?" - -"Yes, I shall never forgive her for that." - -"Said she didn't mind if I sang in tune." - -"Yes, the one who sells a Suffragette paper outside Victoria Station." - -"It's the sort of thing she would do," said Herbert, with great sarcasm. - -"I never liked her, my dear," said Mrs. Heywood. - -"Confound her impudence! As if a British subject hasn't an inalienable -right to sing in his bath! She had the cheek to say I was spoiling her -temper for the rest of the day." - -Mrs. Heywood laughed rather bitterly. "She looks as if she had a -temper!" - -Herbert gave the pamphlets an angry slap with the back of his hand and -let them fall on the floor. - -"Do you mean to say _she_ has been giving Clare these pestilential -things?" - -"I saw her bring them here," said Mrs. Hey-wood. - -"Well, they shan't stay here." - -Herbert went to the fireplace and took up the tongs. Then he picked up -the pamphlets as though they might bite and tossed them into the flames. - -"Beastly things! Burn, won't you?" - -He gave them a savage poke, deeper into the fire, and watched them -smolder and then break into flame. - -"Pestilential nonsense!... That's a good deed done, anyhow!" - -Mrs. Heywood was rather scared. - -"I am afraid Clare will be very angry." - -"Angry! I shall give her a piece of my mind. She had no right to conceal -these things." He spoke with dignity. "It isn't honorable." - -"No," said Mrs. Heywood, "but all the same, dear, I wish you hadn't -burned the books." - -"I should like to burn the authors of 'em," said Herbert fiercely. -"However, they'll roast sooner or later, that's a comfort." - -"You had better be careful, dear," said Mrs. Heywood rather nervously. -"Clare is in a rather dangerous frame of mind just now." - -"Clare will have to learn obedience to her husband's wishes," said -Herbert. "I thought she had learned by this time. She's been very quiet -lately." - -"Too quiet, Herbert. It's when we women are very quiet that we are most -dangerous." Herbert was beginning to feel alarmed. He did not like all -these hints, all these vague and mysterious suggestions. - -"Good Lord, mother, you give me the creeps. Why don't you speak -plainly?" - -Mrs. Heywood was listening. She seemed to hear some sounds in the hall. -Suddenly she retreated to her arm-chair and made a pretence of searching -for her knitting. - -"Hush!" she said. "Here she comes." - -As she spoke the words, the door opened slowly and Clare came in. She -was a tall, elegant woman of about thirty, with a quiet manner and -melancholy eyes in which there was a great wistfulness. She spoke rather -wearily-- - -"Not gone yet, Herbert? You'll be late for the club." - -Herbert looked at his wife curiously, as though trying to discover some -of those symptoms to which his mother had alluded. - -"I'm afraid that's your fault," he said. - -"My fault?" - -"Surely you ought to stay at home sometimes and help me to get off -decently," said Herbert in an aggrieved way. "You know perfectly well my -tie always goes wrong." - -Clare sighed; and then smiled rather miserably. - -"Why can't men learn to do their own ties? We're living in the twentieth -century, aren't we?" - -She took off her hat, and sat down with it in her lap. - -"Oh, how my head aches to-night." - -"Where have you been?" asked Herbert - -"Yes, dear, where _have_ you been?" asked Mrs. Heywood. - -"I've been round to church for a few minutes," said Clare. - -"What on earth for?" asked Herbert impatiently. - -"What does one go to church for?" - -"God knows!" said Herbert bitterly. - -"Precisely. Have you any objection?" - -"Yes, I have." - -Herbert spoke with some severity, as though he had many objections. - -"I don't object to you going to your club," said Clare. - -"Oh, that's different." - -"In what way?" asked Clare. - -"In every way. I am a man, and you're a woman." - -Clare Heywood thought this answer out. She seemed to find something in -the argument. - -"Yes," she said, "it does make a lot of difference." - -"I object strongly to this religious craze of yours," said Herbert, -trying to be calm and reasonable. "It's unnatural. It's--it's devilish -absurd." - -"It may keep me from--from doing other things," said Clare. - -She spoke as though the words had some tragic significance. - -"Why can't you stay at home and read a decent novel?" - -"It is so difficult to find a _decent_ novel. And I am sick of them -all." - -"Well, play the piano, then," said Herbert. - -"I am tired of playing the piano, especially when there is no one to -listen." - -"There's mother," said Herbert. - -"Mother has no ear for music." - -Mrs. Heywood was annoyed at this remark. It seemed to her unjust. - -"How can you say so, Clare? You know I love Mozart." - -"I haven't played Mozart for years," said Clare, laughing a little. "You -are thinking of Mendelssohn." - -"Well, it's all the same," said Mrs. Heywood. - -"Yes, I suppose so," said Clare very wearily. She drooped her head and -shut her eyes until suddenly she seemed to smell something. - -"Is there anything burning?" - -"Burning?" said Herbert nervously. - -"There is a queer smell in the flat," said Clare. - -Herbert stood with his back to the fire, and sniffed strenuously. "I -can't smell anything." - -"It's your fancy, dear," said Mrs. Heywood. - -"It's the smell of burned paper," said Clare quite positively. - -"Do you think so?" said her mother-in-law. - -"Burned paper?" said Herbert. - -Clare became suspicious. She leaned forward in her chair and stared into -the fireplace. - -"What are all those ashes in the grate?" she said. - -"Oh, yes," said Herbert, as though he had suddenly remembered. "Of -course I _have_ been burning some papers." - -"What papers?" asked Clare. - -"Oh, old things," said Herbert rather hurriedly. "Well, I had better be -off. Goodnight, mother." - -He kissed her affectionately and said: - -"Don't stay up late. I have taken the key, Clare." - -"I hope it will fit the lock when you come back," said Clare. - -She spoke the words very quietly, but for some reason they raised her -husband's ire. - -"For heaven's sake don't try to be funny, Clare." - -"I wasn't trying," said Clare very calmly. For a moment Herbert -hesitated. Then he came back to his wife and kissed her. - -"I think we are both a bit irritable to-night, aren't we?" - -"Are we?" said Clare. - -"Nerves," said Herbert, "the curse of the age. Well, good-night." - -Just as he was going out, Mollie, the maidservant, came in and said: - -"It's Miss Vernon, ma'am." - -"Oh," said Clare. She glanced at her husband for a moment and theft -said: - -"Well, bring her in, Mollie." - -"Yes, ma'am," said Mollie, going out of the room again. - -"Great Scott!" exclaimed Herbert, in a sudden excitement. "It's that -woman who flings her beastly orange-peel into my window boxes. -Clare, I strongly object----" - -Clare answered him a little passionately: "Oh, I am tired of your -objections." - -"She's not a respectable character," said Herbert. - -"Hush, Herbert!" said Mrs. Heywood. - -As she spoke the girl who had been called Madge Vernon entered the room. - -She was a bright, cheery girl, dressed plainly in a tailor-made coat and -skirt, with brown boots. - -"I thought I would look in for half-an-hour," she said very cheerfully -to Clare. "If you are busy, send me packing, my dear." - -"I am never busy," said Clare. "I have nothing in the world to do." - -"Oh, that's rotten!" said Madge. "Can't you invent something? How are -you, Mrs. Heywood?" - -She shook hands with the old lady, who answered her greeting with a -rather grim "Good evening." - -"Herbert is going out to-night," said Clare. "By the way, you don't know -my husband." - -Madge Vernon looked at Herbert Heywood very sweetly. - -"I have heard him singing. How do you do?" - -Herbert was not at all pleased with her sweetness. - -"Excuse me, won't you?" he said. "I am just off to my club." - -"Don't you take your wife with you?" asked Miss Vernon. - -"My wife! It's a man's club." - -"Oh, I see. Men only. Rather selfish, isn't it?" - -Herbert Heywood was frankly astonished. - -"Selfish? Why selfish? Well, I won't stop to argue the point. -Good-night, Clare. Doubtless you will enjoy Miss Vernon's remarkable and -revolutionary ideas." - -"I am sure I shall," said Clare. - -Mrs. Heywood followed her son to the door. - -"Be sure you put a muffler round your neck, dear." - -Herbert answered his mother in a low voice, looking fiercely at Madge -Vernon. - -"I should like to twist it round somebody else's neck!" - -"I will come and find it for you, dear." - -The two young women were left alone together, and Clare brought forward -a chair. - -"Sit down, won't you? Here?" - -A moment later the front door was heard to hang and at the sound of it -Madge laughed a little. - -"Funny things, husbands! I am sure I shouldn't know what to do with -one." - -Clare smiled wanly. - -"One can't do anything with them." - -"By the by," said Madge, "I have brought a new pamphlet for you. The -'Rights of Wives.'" - -Clare took the small book nervously, as though it were a bomb which -might go off at any moment. - -"I have been reading those other pamphlets." - -"Pretty good, eh?" said Madge, laughing. "Eye-openers! What?" - -"They alarm me a little," said Clare. "Alarm you?" Madge Vernon was -immensely amused. "Why, they don't bite!" - -"Yes, they do," said Clare. "Here." She put her hand to her head as if -it had been wounded. - -"You mean they give you furiously to think? Well, that's good." - -"I'm not sure," said Clare. "Since I began to think I have been very -miserable." - -"Oh, that will soon wear off," said Madge Vernon briskly. "You'll get -used to it." - -"It will always hurt," said Clare. - -Madge Vernon smiled at her. - -"I made a habit of it." - -"It's best not to think," said Clare. "It's best to go on being stupid -and self-satisfied." - -Clare's visitor was shocked. - -"Oh, not self-satisfied! That is intellectual death." - -"There are other kinds of death," said Clare. "Moral death." - -Madge Vernon raised her eyebrows. - -"We must buck up and do things. That's the law of life." - -"I have nothing to do," said Clare, in a pitiful way. - -"How strange! I have such a million things to do. My days aren't long -enough. I am always pottering about with one thing or another." - -"What kind of things?" asked Clare wistfully. - -Madge Vernon gave her a cheerful little laugh. - -"For one thing, it's a great joke having to earn one's own living. The -excitement of never knowing whether one can afford the next day's meal! -The joy of painting pictures--which the Royal Academy will inevitably -reject. The horrible delight of burning them when they are rejected.... -Besides, I am a public character, I am." - -"Are you? How?" asked Clare. - -"A most notorious woman. I'm on the local Board of Guardians and -all sorts of funny old committees for looking after everything and -everybody." - -"What do you do?" - -Clare asked the question as though some deep mystery lay in the answer. - -"Oh, I poke up the old stick-in-the-muds," said Madge Vernon, "and stir -up no end of jolly rows. I make them do things, too; and they hate it. -Oh, how they hate it!" - -"What things, Madge?" - -"Why, attending to drains, and starving widows, and dead dogs, and -imbecile children, and people 'what won't work,' and people 'what will' -but can't." - -Clare laughed at this description and then became sad again. - -"I envy you! I have nothing on earth to do, and my days are growing -longer and longer, so that each one seems a year." - -"Haven't you any housework to do?" asked Madge. - -"Not since my husband could afford an extra servant." - -Miss Vernon made an impatient little gesture. - -"Oh, those extra servants! They have ruined hundreds of happy homes." - -"Well, we have only got one now," said Clare. "The other left last -night, because she couldn't get on with my mother-in-law." - -"They never can!" said Miss Vernon. - -"Anyhow, Herbert doesn't think it ladylike for me to do housework." - -Madge Vernon scoffed at the idea. - -"Ladylike! Oh, this suburban snobbishness! How I hate the damn thing! -Forgive my bad language, won't you?" - -"I like it," said Clare. - -Miss Vernon continued her cross-examination. - -"Don't you even make your own bed? It's awfully healthy to turn a -mattress and throw the pillows about." - -"Herbert objects to my making beds," said Clare. - -"Don't you make the puddings or help in the washing up?" - -"Herbert objects to my going into the kitchen," said Clare. - -"Don't you ever break a few plates?" - -Clare smiled at her queer question. - -"No, why should I?" - -"There's nothing like breaking things to relieve one's pent-up -emotions," said Miss Vernon, with an air of profound knowledge. - -"The only thing I have broken lately is something--here," said Clare, -putting her hand to her heart. - -Miss Vernon was scornful. - -"Oh, rubbish! The heart is unbreakable, my dear. Now, heads are much -easier to crack." - -"I think mine is getting cracked, too," said Clare. - -She put her hands to her head, as though it were grievously cracked. - -Madge Vernon stared at her frankly and thoughtfully. - -"Look here," she said, after a little silence, "I tell you what _you_ -want. It's a baby. Why don't you have one?" - -"Herbert can't afford it," said Clare. Madge Vernon raised her hands. - -"Stuff and nonsense!" she said. - -"Besides," said Clare in a matter-of-fact way, "they don't make flats -big enough for babies in Intellectual Mansions." - -Madge Vernon looked round the room, and frowned angrily. - -"No, that's true. There's no place to keep a perambulator. Oh, these -jerry builders! Immoral devils!" - -There was a silence between the two women. Both of them seemed deep in -thought. - -Then presently Clare said: "I feel as if something were going to happen; -as if something must happen or break." - -"About time, my dear," said Madge. "How long have you been married?" - -"Eight years," said Clare, in a casual way. Madge Vernon whistled with a -long-drawn note of ominous meaning. - -"The Eighth Year, eh?" - -"Yes, it's our eighth year of marriage." - -"That's bad," said Madge. "The Eighth Year! You will have to be very -careful, Clare." - -Clare was startled. "What do you mean?" she asked. - -"Haven't you heard?" said Miss Vernon. - -"Heard what?" - -"I thought everybody knew." - -"Knew what?" asked Clare anxiously. - -Madge Vernon looked at her in a pitying way. - -"It's in the evidence on the Royal Commission on Divorce." - -"What is?" - -"About the Eighth Year." - -"What about it?" asked Clare. She was beginning to feel annoyed. What -was Madge hiding from her? - -"Why," said Madge, "about it being the fatal year in marriage." - -"The fatal year?" - -The girl leaned forward in her chair and said in a solemn way: - -"There are more divorces begun in the Eighth Year than in any other -period." - -Clare Heywood was scared. - -"Good gracious!" she said, in a kind of whisper. - -"It's a psychological fact," said Madge. "I work it out in this way. -In the first and second years a wife is absorbed in the experiment of -marriage and in the sentimental phase of love. In the third and fourth -years she begins to study her husband and to find him out. In the fifth -and sixth years, having found him out completely, she makes a working -compromise with life and tries to make the best of it. In the seventh -and eighth years she begins to find out herself, and then----" - -"And then?" asked Clare, very anxiously. - -Clare Heywood was profoundly disturbed. - -"Well, then," said Madge, "there is the devil to pay!" - -"Dear God!" she cried. - -"You see, it's like this. If a woman has no child she gets bored... . -She can't help getting bored, poor soul. Her husband is so devoted to -her that he provides her with every opportunity for getting bored--extra -servants, extra little luxuries, and what he calls a beautiful little -home. Ugh!" She stared round the room and made a face. - -"He is so intent on this that he nearly works himself to death. Comes -home with business thoughts in his head. Doesn't notice his wife's -wistful eyes, and probably dozes off to sleep after supper. Isn't that -so?" - -"Yes," said Clare. "Horribly so." - -"Well, then, having got bored, she gets emotional. Of course the husband -doesn't notice that either. _He's_ not emotional. He is only wondering -how to make both ends meet. But when his wife begins to get emotional, -when she feels that something has broken here" (she put her hand to her -heart), "when she feels like crying at unexpected moments and laughing -at the wrong time, why then----" - -"What?" asked Clare. - -"Why, then, it's about time the husband began to notice things, or -things will begin to happen to his wife which he won't jolly well like. -That's all!" - -Clare Heywood searched her friend's face with hungry eyes. - -"Why, what will his wife do?" - -"Well, there are various alternatives. She either takes to religion----" - -"Ah!" said Clare, flushing a little. - -"Or to drink----" - -"Oh, no!" said Clare, shuddering a little. - -"Or to some other kind of man," said Madge very calmly. - -Clare Hey wood was agitated and alarmed. - -"How do you know these things?" she asked. - -"Oh, I've studied 'em," said Madge Vernon cheerfully. "Of course there's -always another alternative." - -"What's that?" asked Clare eagerly. - -"Work," said Madge Vernon solemnly. - -"What kind of work?" - -"Oh, any kind, so long as it's absorbing and satisfying. Personally -I like breaking things. One must always begin by breaking before one -begins building. But it's very exciting." - -"It must be terribly exciting." - -"For instance," said Madge, laughing quietly, "it's good to hear a pane -of glass go crack." - -"How does it make you feel?" asked Clare Heywood. - -"Oh," said Madge, "it gives one a jolly feeling down the spine. You -should try it." - -"I daren't," said Clare. - -"It would do you a lot of good. It would get rid of your megrims. -Besides, it's in a good cause." - -"I am not so sure of that," said Clare. - -"It's in the cause of woman's liberty. It's in the cause of all these -suburban wives imprisoned in these stuffy little homes. It lets in God's -fresh air." - -Clare rose and moved about the room. "It's very stuffy in here," she -said. "It's stifling." At this moment Mollie came in the room again, and -smiled across at her mistress, saying: "Mr. Bradshaw to see you, ma'am." - -Clare was obviously agitated. She showed signs of embarrassment, and her -voice trembled when she said: - -"Tell him--tell him I'm engaged." - -"He says he must see you--on business," said Mollie, lingering at the -door. - -"On business?" - -"That's what my young man says when he whistles up the tube," said -Mollie. - -Madge Vernon looked at her friend and said rather "meaningly": "Don't -you _want_ to see him? If so I shouldn't if I were you." - -"Oh, yes," said Clare, trying to appear quite cool. "If it's on -business." - -"Very well, ma'am," said Mollie. As she left the room she said under her -breath: "I thought you would." - -"Do you have business relations with Mr. Bradshaw?" asked Madge Vernon. - -"Yes," said Clare; "no.... In a sort of way." - -"I thought he was a novelist," said Madge. - -"So he is." - -"Dangerous fellows, novelists." - -"Hush!" said Clare. "He might hear you." - -"If it's on business I must go, I suppose," said Madge Vernon, rising -from her chair. - -"No, don't go; stay!" said Clare, speaking with strange excitement. - -As soon as she had uttered the words the visitor, Gerald Bradshaw, came -in. - -He was a handsome, "artistic" looking man, with longish brown hair and -a vandyke beard. He was dressed in a brown suit, with a big brown silk -tie. He came forward in a graceful way, perfectly at ease, and with a -charming manner. - -"How do you do, Mrs. Heywood?" - -"I _must_ be going," said Madge. "Good-by, dear." - -"Oh, _do_ stay," whispered Clare. - -"Impossible. I have to speak to-night." - -Although Madge Vernon had ignored the artist, he smiled at her and said: - -"Don't you speak by day as a rule?" - -"Not until I am spoken to.... Good-night, Clare." - -"Well, if you must be going--" said Clare uneasily. - -Madge Vernon stood for a moment at the door and smiled back at her -friend. "You will remember, won't you?" - -"What?" - -"The Eighth Year," said Madge. With that parting shot she whisked out of -the room. - -Gerald Bradshaw breathed a sigh of relief. Then he went across to Clare -and kissed her hands. - -"I can't stand that creature. A she-devil!" - -"She is my friend," said Clare. - -"I am sorry to hear it," said Gerald Bradshaw. - -Clare Heywood drooped her eyelashes before his bold, smiling gaze. - -"Why did you come again?" she asked. "I told you not to come." - -"That is why I came. May I smoke?" - -He lit a cigarette before he had received he permission, and after a -whiff or two said: - -"Is the good man at the club?" - -"You know he is at the club," said Clare. "True. That is another reason -why I came. Clare Heywood's face flushed and her voice trembled a -little. - -"Gerald, if you had any respect for me---- - -"Respect is a foolish word," said Gerald Bradshaw. "Hopelessly -old-fashioned. Now adays men and women like or dislike, hate or love." - -"I think I hate you," said Clare in a low voice. - -Gerald smiled at her. - -"No, you don't. You are a little frightened of me. That is all." - -The woman laughed nervously, but there was a look of fear in her eyes. - -"Why should I be frightened of you?" - -"Because I tell you the truth. I don't keep up the foolish old pretences -by which men and women hide themselves from each other. You cannot hide -from me, Clare." - -"You seem to strip my soul bare," said Clare and when the man laughed at -her she said: "Yes, I am frightened of you." - -"It is because you are like all suburban women," said Gerald, "brought -up in this environment of hypocritical virtue and false sentiment. You -are frightened at the verities of life." - -Clare Heywood gave a deep, quivering sigh. "Life is a tragic thing, -Gerald," she said. "Life is a jolly thing if one makes the best of it, -if one fulfils one's own nature." - -"One's own nature is generally bad." - -"Never mind," said Gerald cheerfully. "It is one's own. Bad or good, it -must find expression instead of being smothered or strangled. Life is -tragic only to those who are afraid of it. Don't be afraid, Clare. Do -the things you want to do." - -"There is nothing I want to do," said Clare wearily. "Nothing except to -find peace." - -"Exactly. Peace. How can you find peace, my poor Clare, in this stuffy -life of yours--in this daily denial of your own nature? There are heaps -of things you want." - -Clare laughed again, in a mirthless way. "How do you know?" she asked. - -"Of course I know. Shall I tell you?" - -"I think I would rather you didn't," said Clare. - -"I will tell you," said the man. "Liberty is one of them." - -"Liberty is a vague word." - -"Liberty for your soul," said Gerald. - -"Herbert objects to my having a soul." - -"Liberty for that beating heart of yours, Clare." - -The woman put both hands to her heart. - -"Yes, it beats, and beats." - -"You want to escape, Clare." - -"Escape?" - -She seemed frightened at that word. She whispered it. - -"Escape from the deadening influence of domestic dulness." - -"I can't deny the dulness," said Clare. - -"You want adventure. Your heart is seeking adventure. You know it. You -know that I am telling you the truth." - -As the man spoke he came closer to her, and with his hands in his -pockets stood in front of her, staring into her eyes. - -"You make me afraid," said Clare. All the color had faded out of her -face and she was dead white. - -"You need not be afraid, Clare. The love of a man for a woman is not a -terrifying thing. It is a good thing. Good as life." - -He took her by the wrists and held them tight. - -"Gerald!" said Clare. "For God's sake.... I have a husband." - -"He bores you," said the man. "He is your husband but not your mate. No -woman finds peace until she finds her mate. It is the same with a man." - -"I will not listen to you. You make me feel a bad woman!" - -She wrenched her hands free and moved toward the bell. - -Gerald Bradshaw laughed quietly. He seemed amused at this woman's fear. -He seemed masterful, sure of his power over her. - -"You know that you must be my mate. If not to-day, to-morrow. If not -to-morrow, the next day. I will wait for you, Clare." - -Clare had shrunk back to the wall now, and touched the electric bell. - -"You have no pity for me," she said. "You play on my weakness." - -"Fear makes you strong to resist," said the man. "But love is stronger -than fear." - -He followed her across the room to where she stood crouching against the -wall like a hunted thing. - -"Don't come so close to me," she said. - -"What on earth have you rung the bell for?" asked the man. - -"Because I ought not to be alone with you." - -They stood looking into each other's eyes. Then Clare moved quickly -toward the sofa as Mollie came in. - -"Oh, Mollie," said Clare, trying to steady her voice, "ask Mrs. Heywood -to come in, will you? Tell her Mr. Bradshaw is here." - -"Yes, ma'am," said Mollie. "But she knows that already." - -"Take my message, please," said her mistress. - -"I was going to, ma'am," said Mollie, and she added in an undertone, as -she left the room, "Strange as it may appear." - -Gerald laughed quite light-heartedly. - -"Yes, you have won the trick this time. But I hold the trump cards, -Clare; and I am very lucky, as a rule. I have a gambler's luck. Of -course if the old lady comes in I shan't stay. She hates me like poison, -and I can't be polite to her. Insincerity is not one of my vices. -Good-night, dear heart. I will come to you in your dreams." - -As he spoke this word, which brought a flush again to Clare Heywood's -face, Mrs. Hey-wood, her mother-in-law, came in. She glanced from one to -the other suspiciously. - -Gerald Bradshaw was not in the least abashed by her stern face. - -"How do you do, Mrs. Heywood? I was just going. I hope I have not -disturbed you?" - -Mrs. Heywood answered him in a "distant" manner: - -"Not in the least." - -"I am glad," he said. "I will let myself out. Don't trouble." - -At that moment there was a noise in the hall, and Clare raised her head -and listened. - -"I think I hear another visitor," she said. - -"In that ease I had better wait a moment," said Gerald. "The halls -of these flats are not cut out for two people at a time. I will light -another cigarette if I may." - -"I thought I heard a latchkey," said Mrs. Heywood. "Surely it can't he -Herbert back so early?" - -"No, it can't be," said Clare. - -Gerald spoke more to himself than to the ladies: - -"I hope not." - -They were all silent when Herbert Heywood came in quietly. - -"I didn't go to the club after all," he said. Then he saw Gerald -Bradshaw, and his mouth hardened a little as he said, "Oh!... How do?" - -"How are you?" asked Gerald, in his cool way. - -"Been here long?" asked Herbert. - -"Long enough for a pleasant talk with your wife." - -"Going now?" - -"Yes. We have finished our chat. Goodnight. I can find my way out -blindfolded. All these flats are the same. Rather convenient, don't you -think?" - -He turned to Clare and smiled. - -"_Au revoir_, Mrs. Heywood." - -She did not answer him, and he went out jauntily. A few moments later -they heard the front door shut. - -"What the devil does he come here for?" growled Herbert rather sulkily. - -Clare ignored the question. - -"Why are you home so early?" - -"Yes, dear, why didn't you go to the club?" asked Mrs. Heywood. - -Herbert looked rather embarrassed. - -"Oh, I don't know. I felt a bit off. Besides----" - -"What, dear?" asked his mother. - -"I thought Clare was feeling a bit lonely to-night. Perhaps I was -mistaken." - -"I am often lonely," said Clare. "Even when you are at home." - -"Aren't you _glad_ I have come back?" asked Herbert. - -"Why do you ask me?" - -"I should be glad if you were glad." Clare's husband became slightly -sentimental as he looked at her. - -"I have been thinking it _is_ rather rotten to go _off_ to the club and -leave you here alone," he said. - -Mrs. Heywood was delighted with these words. - -"Oh, you dear boy! How unselfish of you!" - -"I try to be," said Herbert. - -"I am sure you are the very soul of unselfishness, Herbert, dear," said -the fond mother. - -"Thanks, mother." - -He looked rather anxiously at Clare, and said-- - -"Don't you think we might have a pleasant evening for once?" - -"Oh, that would be delightful!" said Mrs. Heywood. - -"Eh, Clare?" - -"How do you mean?" said Clare. - -"Like we used to in the old days? Some music, and that sort of thing." - -"I am sure that will be _very_ nice," said Mrs. Heywood. - -"Eh, Clare?" said Herbert. - -"If you like," said Clare. - -"Wait till I have got my boots off." He spoke in a rather honeyed voice -to his wife. - -"Do you happen to know where my slippers are, darling?" - -"I haven't the least idea," said Clare. - -Herbert seemed nettled at this answer. - -"In the old days you used to warm them for me," he said. - -"Did I?" said Clare. "I have forgotten. It was a long time ago." - -"Eight years." - -At these words Clare looked over to her husband in a peculiar way. - -"Yes," she said. "It is our eighth year." - -"Here are your slippers, dear," said Mrs. Hey wood. - -"Oh, thanks, mother. _You_ don't forget." - -There was silence while he took off his boots. Clare sat with her hands -in her lap, staring at the carpet. Once or twice her mother-in-law -glanced at her anxiously. - -"Won't you play something, Clare?" said the old lady, after a little -while. - -"If you like," said Clare. - -Herbert resumed his cheerful note. - -"Yes, let's have a jolly evening. Perhaps I will sing a song presently." - -"Oh, do, dear!" said Mrs. Heywood. - -"Gad, it's a long time since I sang 'John Peel'!" - -Clare looked rather anxious and perturbed. - -"The walls of this flat are rather thin," she said. "The neighbors might -not like it." - -"Oh, confound the neighbors!" said Herbert. - -"I will do some knitting while you two dears play and sing," said the -old lady. - -She fetched her knitting from a black silk bag on one of the little -tables, and took a chair near the fireplace. Clare Heywood went to the -music-stool and turned over some music listlessly. She did not seem to -find anything which appealed to her. - -Her husband settled himself down in an arm-chair and loaded his pipe. - -"Play something bright, Clare," he said. - -"All my music sounds melancholy when I play it," said Clare. - -"What, rag-time?" - -"Even rag-time. Rag-time worst of all." - -Yet she began to play softly one of Chopin's preludes, in a dreamy way. - -"Tell me when you want me to sing," said Herbert. - -"I will," said Clare. - -There was silence for a little while, except for Clare's dream-music. -Mrs. Heywood dozed over her knitting, and her head nodded on her chest. -Presently Herbert rose from his chair and touched the electric bell. A -moment later Mollie came in. - -"Yes?" asked Mollie. - -Herbert spoke quietly so that he should not interrupt his wife's music. - -"Bring me _The Financial Times_, Mollie. It's in my study." - -"Yes, sir," said Mollie. - -She brought the paper and left the room again. There was another -silence, except for the soft notes of the music. Herbert turned over the -pages of _The Financial Times_, and yawned a little, and then let the -paper drop. His head nodded and then lolled sideways. In a little while -he was as fast asleep as his mother, and snored, quietly at first, then -quite loudly. - -Clare stopped playing, and looked over the music-rest with a strange, -tragic smile at her husband and her mother-in-law. She rose from the -piano-stool, and put her hands to her head, and then at her throat, -breathing quickly and jerkily, as though she were being stifled. - -"A jolly evening!" she exclaimed in a whisper. "Oh, God!" - -She stared round the room, with rather wild eyes. - -"It is stuffy here. It is stifling." - -She moved toward the piano again, with her hands pressed against her -bosom. - -"I feel that something _must_ happen. Something _must_ break." - -She took up a large china vase from the piano, moved slowly toward the -window, hesitated for a moment, looked round at her sleeping husband, -and then hurled the vase straight through the window. It made an -appalling noise of breaking glass. - -Herbert Heywood jumped up from his seat as though he had been shot. - -"Good God!" he said. "What the devil!----" - -Mrs. Heywood was equally startled. She sat up in her chair as though an -earthquake had shaken the house. - -"Good gracious! Whatever in the world-----" - -At the same moment Mollie opened the door. - -"Good 'eavins, ma'am!" she cried. "Whatever 'as 'appened?" - -Clare Heywood answered very quietly: - -"I think something must have broken," she said. - -Then she gave a queer, strident laugh. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -MRS. Heywood was arranging the drawingroom for an evening At Home, -dusting the mantelshelf and some of the ornaments with a little hand -broom. There were refreshments on a side table. Mollie was trying to -make the fire burn up. Every now and then a gust of smoke blew down the -chimney. Clare was sitting listlessly in a low chair near the French -window, with a book on her lap, but she was not reading. - -"Drat the fire," said Mollie, with her head in the fireplace. - -"For goodness' sake, Mollie, stop it smoking like that!" said Mrs. -Heywood. "It's no use my dusting the room." - -"The devil is in the chimney, it strikes me," said Mollie. - -Mrs. Heywood expressed her sense of exasperation. - -"It's a funny thing that every time your mistress gives an At Home you -are always behindhand with your work." - -Mollie expressed her feelings in the firegrate. - -"It's a funny thing people can't mind their own business." - -"What did you say, Mollie?" asked Mrs. Heywood sharply. - -"I said that the fire hasn't gone right since the window was broke. Them -Suffragettes have a lot to answer for." - -"I cannot understand how it _did_ get broken," said Mrs. Heywood. "I -almost suspect that woman, Miss Vernon." - -Clare looked up and spoke irritably. - -"Nonsense, mother!" - -"It's no use saying nonsense, Clare," said Mrs. Heywood, even more -irritably. "You know perfectly well that Miss Vernon is a most dangerous -woman." - -"Well, she didn't break our window, anyhow," said Clare, rather -doggedly. - -"How do you know that? It is still a perfect mystery." - -"Don't be absurd, mother. How did the vase get through the window?" - -Mrs. Heywood was baffled for an answer. - -"Ah, that is most perplexing." - -"Well, leave it at that," said Clare. - -Mollie was still wrestling with the mysteries of light and heat. - -"If it doesn't burn now," she said, "I won't lay another finger on -it--At Home or no At Home." - -She seized the dustpan and broom and, with a hot face, marched out of -the room. - -Clare pressed her forehead with the tips of her fingers. - -"I wish to Heaven there were no such things as At Homes," she said -wearily. "Oh, how they bore me!" - -"You used to like them well enough," said Mrs. Heywood. - -"I have grown out of them. I have grown out of so many things. It is as -if my life had shrunk in the wash." - -"Nothing seems to please you now," said the old lady. "Don't you care -for your friends any longer?" - -"Friends? Those tittle-tattling women, with their empty-headed -husbands?" - -Mrs. Heywood was silent for a moment. Then she spoke bitterly. - -"Do you think Herbert is empty-headed?" - -"Oh, we won't get personal, mother," said Clare. "And we won't quarrel, -if you don't mind." - -Mrs. Heywood's lips tightened. - -"I am afraid we shall if you go on like this." - -"Like what?" asked Clare. - -"Hush!" said the old lady. "Here comes Herbert." - -Herbert came in quickly, and raised his eyebrows after a glance at his -wife. - -"Good Lord, Clare! Aren't you dressed yet?" - -"There's plenty of time, isn't there?" said Clare. - -"No, there isn't," said Herbert. "You know some of the guests will -arrive before eight o'clock." - -Clare looked up at the clock. - -"It's only six now." - -"Besides," said Herbert, "I want you to look your best to-night. Edward -Hargreaves is coming, with his wife." - -"What has that got to do with it?" - -"Everything," said Herbert. "He is second cousin to one of my directors. -It is essential that you should make a good impression." - -"You told me once that he was a complete ass," said Clare. - -"So he is." - -"Well, then," said Clare, quietly but firmly, "I decline to make a good -impression on him." - -"I must ask you to obey my wishes," said Herbert. - -Clare had rebellion in her eyes. - -"I have obeyed you for seven years. It is now the Eighth Year." - -Herbert did not hear his wife's remark. He was looking round the room -with an air of extreme annoyance. - -"Well, I'm blowed!" he exclaimed. - -"What's the matter, dear?" asked Mrs. Hey-wood anxiously. - -"You haven't even taken the trouble to buy some flowers," said Herbert. - -"I left that to Clare," said the old lady. - -"Haven't you done so, Clare?" - -"No," said Clare. "I can't bear flowers in this room. They droop so -quickly." - -Herbert was quite angry. - -"I insist upon having some flowers. The place looks like a barn without -them. What will our visitors say?" - -"Stupid things, as usual," said Clare quietly. - -"I must go out and get some myself, I suppose," said Herbert, with the -air of a martyr. - -"Can't you send Mollie, dear?" asked Mrs. Heywood. - -"Mollie is cutting sandwiches. The girl is overwhelmed with work. -And--Oh, my stars!" - -His mother was alarmed by this sudden cry of dismay. - -"Now what is the matter, dear?" - -"There's no whisky in the decanter." - -"No whisky?" - -"Clare," said Herbert, appealing to his wife, "there's not a drop of -whisky left." - -"Well, _I_ didn't drink it," said Clare. "You finished it the other -night with one of your club friends." - -"So we did. Dash it!" - -"Don't be irritable, dear," said Mrs. Heywood. - -"Irritable! Isn't it enough to make a saint irritable? These things -always happen on our At Home nights. Nobody seems to have any -forethought. Every blessed thing seems to go wrong." - -"That is why I wish one could abolish the institution," said Clare. - -"What institution?" - -"At Homes." - -"Don't talk rubbish, Clare," said Herbert angrily; "you know I have them -for _your_ sake." - -Clare laughed bitterly, as though she had heard a rather painful joke. - -"For my sake! Oh, that is good!" - -Herbert was distracted by a new cause of grievance as a tremendous puff -of smoke came out of the fire-grate. - -"What in the name of a thousand devils----" - -"It's that awful fire again!" cried Mrs. Hey-wood. "These flats seem to -have no chimneys." - -"It's nothing to do with the flat," said Herbert. "It's that fool -Mollie. The girl doesn't know how to light a decent fire!" - -He rang the bell furiously, keeping his finger on the electric knob. - -"The creature has absolutely nothing to do, and what she does she -spoils." - -Mollie came in with a look of mutiny on her face. - -"Look at that fire," said Herbert fiercely. - -"I am looking at it," said Mollie. - -"Why don't you do your work properly? See to the beastly thing, can't -you?" - -Mollie folded her arms and spoke firmly. - -"If you please, sir, wild horses won't make me touch it again." - -"It's not a question of horse-power," said Herbert. "Go and get an old -newspaper and hold it in front of the bars." - -"I am just in the middle of the sandwiches," said Mollie. - -"Well, get out of them, then," said Herbert. - -Mollie delivered her usual ultimatum. - -"If you please, sir, I beg to give a month's notice." - -"Bosh!" said Herbert. - -"Bosh indeed!" cried Mollie. "We'll see if it's bosh! If you want any -sandwiches for your precious visitors you can cut 'em yourself." - -With this challenge she went out of the room and slammed the door behind -her. - -Herbert breathed deeply, and after a moment's struggle in his soul spoke -mildly. - -"Mother, go and pacify the fool, will you?" - -"She is very obstinate," said Mrs. Heywood. - -"All women are obstinate." - -Suddenly the man's self-restraint broke down and he became excited. - -"Bribe her, promise her a rise in wages, but for God's sake see that -she cuts the sandwiches. We don't want to be made fools of before our -guests." - -"Very well, dear," said Mrs. Heywood. She hesitated for a moment at -the door, and before going out said: "But Mollie can be very violent at -times." - -For a little while there was silence between the husband and wife. Then -Herbert spoke rather sternly. - -"Clare, are you or are you not going to get dressed?" - -"I shall get dressed in good time," said Clare quietly, "when I think -fit. Surely you don't want to dictate to me about _that?_" - -"Surely," said Herbert, "you can see how awkward it will be if any of -our people arrive and find you unprepared for them?" - -Clare gave a long, weary sigh. - -"Oh, I _am_ prepared for them. I have been trying to prepare myself all -day for the ordeal of, them." - -"The ordeal? What the dickens do you mean?" - -"I am prepared for Mrs. Atkinson Brown, who, when she takes off her -hat in the bedroom, will ask me whether I am suited and whether I am -expecting." - -"For goodness' sake don't be coarse, Clare," said Herbert. - -"It's Mrs. Atkinson Brown who is coarse," said Clare. "And I am prepared -for Mr. Atkinson Brown, who will say that it is horrible weather for -this time of year, and that business has been the very devil since there -has been a Radical Government, and that these outrageous women who are -breaking windows ought to be whipped. Oh, I could tell you everything -that everybody is going to say. I have heard it over and over again." - -"It does not seem to make much effect on you," said Herbert. "Especially -that part about breaking windows." - -Clare smiled. - -"So you have guessed, have you?" - -"I knew at once by the look on your face." - -"I thought you agreed with your mother that some Suffragette must have -flung a stone from the outside." - -"I hid the truth from mother," said Herbert. "She would think you were -mad. What on earth made you do it? _Were_ you mad or what?" - -Clare brushed her hair back from her forehead. - -"Sometimes I used to think I was going a little mad. But now I know what -is the matter with me." - -Herbert spoke more tenderly. - -"What _is_ the matter, Clare? If it is a question of a doctor----" - -"It's the Eighth Year," said Clare. - -"The Eighth Year?" - -"Yes, that's what is the matter with me." - -"What on earth do you mean?" asked Herbert. - -"Why, don't you know? It was Madge Vernon who told me." - -"Told you what?" - -"She seemed to think that everybody knew." - -"Knew what?" asked Herbert, exasperated beyond all patience. - -"About the Eighth Year." - -"What about it?" - -"It's well known, she says, that the Eighth Year is the most dangerous -one in marriage. It is then that the pull comes, when the wife has found -out her husband." - -"Found out her husband?" - -"And found out herself." - -Herbert spoke roughly. He was not in a mood for such mysteries. - -"Look here," he said. "I can't listen to all this nonsense. Go and dress -yourself." - -"I want to talk to you, Herbert," said Clare very earnestly. "I must -talk to you before it's too late." - -"It's too late now," said Herbert. "Halfpast six. I must fetch that -whisky and buy a few flowers. I shall have to put on my boots again and -splash about in the mud in these trousers. Confound it!" - -"Before you go you must listen, Herbert," said Clare, with a sign of -emotion. "Perhaps you won't have another chance." - -"Thank Heaven for that." - -"When I broke that window something else broke." - -"One of my best vases," said Herbert with sarcasm. - -"I think something in my own nature broke too. My spirit has broken -out of this narrow, deadening little life of ours, out of the smug -snobbishness and stupidity which for so long kept me prisoner, out of -the belief that the latest sentimental novel, the latest romantic play, -the latest bit of tittle-tattle from my neighbors might satisfy my heart -and brain. When I broke that window I let a little fresh air into the -stifling atmosphere of this flat, where I have been mewed up without -work, without any kind of honest interest, without any kind of food for -my brain or soul." - -Herbert stared at his wife, and made an impatient gesture. - -"If you want work, why don't you attend to your domestic duties?" - -"I have no domestic duties," said Clare. "That is the trouble." - -Herbert laughed in an unpleasant way. - -"Why, you haven't even bought any flowers to decorate your home! Isn't -that a domestic duty?" - -Clare answered him quickly, excitedly. - -"It's just a part of the same old hypocrisy of keeping up appearances. -You know you don't care for flowers in themselves, except as they help -to make a show. You want to impress our guests. You want to keep up the -old illusion of the woman's hand in the home. The woman's touch. Isn't -that it?" - -"Yes, I do want to keep up that illusion," said Herbert; "and by God, -I find it very hard! You say you want an object in life. Isn't your -husband an object?" - -Clare looked at him with a queer, pitiful smile. - -"Yes, he is," she said slowly. - -"Well, what more do you want?" - -"Lots more. A woman's life is not centered for ever in one man." - -"It ought to be," said Herbert. "If you had any religious -principles----" - -"Oh," said Clare sharply, "but you object to my religion!" - -"Well, of course I mean in moderation." - -"You have starved me, Herbert, and oh, I am so hungry!" - -Herbert answered her airily. - -"Well, there will be light refreshments later." - -"Yes, that is worthy of you," cried Clare. "That is your sense of -humor! You have starved my soul and starved my heart and you offer -me--sandwiches. I am hungry for life and you offer me--the latest -novel." - -Herbert paced up and down the room. He was losing control of his temper. - -"That is the reward for all my devotion!" he said. "Don't I drudge in -the city every day to keep you in comfort?" - -"I don't want comfort!" said Clare. - -"Don't I toil so that you may have pretty frocks?" - -"I don't want pretty frocks." - -"Don't I scrape and scheme to buy you little luxuries?" - -"I don't want little luxuries," said Clare. - -"Is there anything within my means that you haven't got?" - -Clare looked at him in a peculiar way, and answered quietly-- - -"I haven't a child," she said. - -"Oh, Lord," said Herbert uneasily. "Whose fault is that? Besides, modern -life in small flats is not cut out for children." - -"And modern life in small flats," said Clare, "is not cut out for -wives." - -"It isn't my fault," said Herbert. "I am not the architect--either of -fate or flats." - -"No, it isn't your fault, Herbert. You can't help your character. It -isn't your fault that when you come home from the city you fall asleep -after dinner. It isn't your fault that when you go to the club I sit at -home with my hands in my lap, thinking and brooding. It isn't your fault -that your mother and I get on each other's nerves. It isn't your fault -that you and I have grown out of each other, that we bore each other and -have nothing to say to each other--except when we quarrel." - -"Well, then," said Herbert, "whose fault is it?" - -"I don't know," said Clare. "I suppose it's a fault of the system, which -is spoiling thousands of marriages just like ours. It's the fault which -is found out--in the Eighth Year." - -"Oh, curse the Eighth Year," said Herbert violently. "What is that bee -you have got in your bonnet?" - -"It's a bee which keeps buzzing in my brain. It's a little bee which -whispers queer words to me--tempting words. It says you must break away -from the system or the system will break you. You must find a way of -escape or die. You must do it quickly, now, to-night, or it will be too -late. Herbert, a hungry woman will do desperate things to satisfy her -appetite, and I am hungry for some stronger emotion than I can find -within these four walls. I am hungry for love, hungry for work, hungry -for life. If you can't give it to me, I must find it elsewhere." - -"Clare," said Herbert, with deliberate self-restraint, "I must again -remind you that time is getting on and you are not yet dressed. In a -little while our guests will be here. I hope you don't mean to hold me -up to the contempt of my friends. I at least have some sense of duty.... -I am going to fetch the whisky." As he strode toward the door he started -back at the noise of breaking china. - -"What's that?" asked Clare. - -"God knows," said Herbert. "I expect mother has broken a window." - -The words were hardly out of his mouth before Mrs. Heywood came in in a -state of great agitation. - -"Herbert, I must really ask you to come into the kitchen." - -"What's the matter now?" asked Herbert, prepared for the worst. - -"Mollie has deliberately broken our best coffee-pot." - -Herbert stared at his wife. - -"Didn't I tell you so!" he said. - -"Why has she broken the coffee-pot?" asked Clare. - -"She was most insolent," said Mrs. Heywood, "and said my interference -got on her nerves." - -"Well, even a servant _has_ nerves," said Clare. - -"But it was the _best_ coffee-pot, Clare. Surely you are not going to -take it so calmly?" - -"Like mistress like maid!" said Herbert. "Oh, my hat! Why on earth did I -marry?" - -"Don't you think you had better fetch the whisky?" said Clare gently. - -Herbert became excited again. - -"I have been trying to fetch the whisky for the last half hour. There is -a conspiracy against it. Confound it, I _will_ fetch the whisky." - -He strode to the door, as though he would get the whisky or die in the -attempt. - -"I think you ought to speak to Mollie first," said Mrs. Heywood. - -Herbert raised his hands above his head. - -"Damn Mollie!" he shouted wildly. Then he strode out of the room. "Damn -everything!" - -"Poor dear," said Mrs. Heywood. "I wish he didn't get so worried." - -"Clare, won't you come and speak to Mollie?" - -"Haven't you spoken to her?" asked Clare wearily. - -"I am always speaking to her." - -"_Poor_ Mollie!" said Clare. - -Mrs. Heywood was hurt at the tone of pity. She flushed a little and then -turned to her daughter-in-law with reproachful eyes. - -"I am an old woman, Clare, and the mother of your husband. Because my -position forces me to live in this flat, I do not think you ought to -insult me." - -"I'm sorry," said Clare with sincerity. - -"Mollie is right. We all get on each other's nerves. It can't be helped, -I suppose. It's part of the system." - -"I can't help being your mother-in-law, Clare." - -"No, it can't he helped," said Clare. - -Mrs. Heywood came close to her and touched her hand. - -"You think I do not understand. You think you are the only one who has -any grievance." - -"Oh, no!" said Clare. "I am not so egotistical." - -Mrs. Heywood smoothed down her dress with trembling hands. - -"You think I haven't been watching you all these years. I have watched -you so that I know your thoughts behind those brooding eyes, Clare. I -know all that you have been thinking and suffering, so that sometimes -you hate me, so that my very presence here in the room with you makes -you wish to cry out, to shriek, because I am your mother-in-law, and the -mother of your husband. The husband always loves his mother best, -and the wife always knows it. That is the eternal tragedy of the -mother-in-law. Because she is hated by the wife of her son, and is -an intruder in her home. I know that because I too suffered from a -mother-in-law. Do you think I would stay here an hour unless I was -forced to stay, for a shelter above my old head, for some home in which -I wait to die? But while I wait I watch... and I know that you have -reached a dangerous stage in a woman's life, when she may do any rash -thing. Clare, I pray every night that you may pass that stage in life -without doing anything--rash. This time always comes in marriage, it -comes----" - -"In the Eighth Year?" asked Clare eagerly. "Somewhere about then." - -"Ah! I thought so." - -"It came to me, my dear." - -"And did _you_ do anything rash?" - -Mrs. Heywood hesitated a moment before replying. - -"I gave birth to Herbert," she said. - -"Good Heavens!" said Clare. - -"It saved me from breaking----" - -"Windows, mother?" - -"No, my own and my husband's heart," said Mrs. Heywood. "Well, I will -go and speak to Mollie again. Goodness knows how we shall get coffee -to-night." - -She went out of the room with her head shaking a little after this scene -of emotion. - -Clare spoke to herself aloud. She had her hands up to her throat. - -"I don't want coffee to-night. I want stronger drink. I want to get -drunk with liberty of life." - -Suddenly there was a noise at the window and the woman looked up, -startled, and cried, "Who is there?" - -Gerald Bradshaw appeared at the open French window leading on to the -balcony, and he spoke through the window. - -"It is I, Clare? Are you alone?" - -Clare had risen from her chair at the sound of his voice, and her face -became very pale. - -"Gerald... How did you come there?" - -Gerald Bradshaw laughed in his lighthearted way. - -"I stepped over the bar that divides our balconies. It was quite easy. -It was as easy as it will be to cross the bar that divides you and me, -Clare." - -Clare spoke in a frightened voice. - -"Why do you come here, at this hour?" - -"Why do I ever come?" asked Gerald Bradshaw. - -"I don't know." - -"It's because I want you. I want you badly to-night, Clare. I can't wait -for you any longer." - -Clare spoke pleadingly. - -"Gerald... go away... it's so dangerous... I daren't listen to you." - -"I want you to listen," said Gerald Bradshaw. - -"Go away... I implore you to go away." - -He laughed at her. He seemed very much amused. - -"Not before I have said what I want to say." - -"Say it quickly," said Clare. "Quickly!" - -"There's time enough," said Bradshaw. "This is what I want to say. You -are a lonely woman and I am a lonely man, and only an iron bar divides -us. It's the iron bar of convention, of insincerity, of superstition. It -seems so difficult to cross. But you see one step is enough. I want you -to take that step--to-night." - -Clare answered him in a whisper. - -"Go away!" - -"I am hungry for you," said Bradshaw, with a thrill in his voice. "I am -hungry for your love. And you are hungry for me. I have seen it in your -eyes. You have the look of a famished woman. Famished for love. Famished -for comradeship." - -Clare raised her hands despairingly. - -"If you have any pity, go away." - -"I have no pity. Because pity is weakness, and I hate weakness." - -"You are brutal," said Clare. - -He laughed at her. He seemed to like those words. - -"Yes, I have the brutality of manhood. Man is a brute, and woman likes -the brute in him because that is his nature, and woman wants the natural -man. That is why you want me, Clare. You can't deny it." - -Clare protested feebly. - -"I do deny it. I _must_ deny it." - -"It's a funny thing," said Gerald Bradshaw. "Between you and me there -is a queer spell, Clare. I was conscious of it when I first met you. -Something in you calls to me. Something in me calls to you. It is the -call of the wild." - -Clare was scared now. These words seemed to make her heart beat to a -strange tune. - -"What do you mean?" she said. - -"It is the call of the untamed creature. Both you and I are untamed. -We both have the spirit of the woods. I am Pan. You are a wood nymph, -imprisoned in a cage, upholstered by maple, on the hire system." - -"What do you want with me?" asked Clare. It was clear that he was -tempting her. - -"I want to play with you, like Pan played. You and I will hear the pipes -of Pan to-night--the wild nature music." - -"To-night?" - -"To-night. I have waited too long for you, and now I'm impatient. I -am alone in my flat waiting for you. I ask you to keep me company, not -to-night only, but until we tire of each other, until perhaps we hate -each other. Who knows?" - -"Oh, God!" said Clare. She moaned out the words in a pitiful way. - -"You have only to slip down one flight of stairs and steal up another, -and you will find me at the door with a welcome. It will need just a -little care to escape from your prison. You must slip on your hat and -cloak as though you were going round to church, and then come to me, to -me, Clare! Only a wall will divide you from this flat, but you will be a -world away. For you will have escaped from this upholstered cage into -a little world of liberty. Into a little world of love, Clare. Say you -will come!" - -"Oh, God!" moaned Clare. - -"You will come?" - -"Are you the Devil that you tempt me?" said Clare. - -Gerald gave a triumphant little laugh. - -"You will come! Clare, my sweetheart, I know you will come, for your -spirit is ready for me." - -As he spoke these words there was the sound of a bell ringing through -the flat, and the noise of it struck terror into Clare Heywood. - -"Go away," she whispered. "For God's sake go! Some one is ringing." - -"I will cross the bar again," said Bradshaw. "But I shall be waiting at -the door. You will not be very long, little one?" - -Clare sank down with her face in her hands. And Gerald stole away from -the window just as Mollie showed in Madge Vernon. - -"It's our At Home night," said Mollie, as she came in, "and they'll be -here presently." - -"All right, Mollie," said Miss Vernon, smiling. "I shan't stay more than -a minute. I know I have come at an awkward time." - -"She _would_ come in, ma'am," said Mollie, as though she were not strong -enough to thwart such a determined visitor. - -As soon as the girl had gone Madge Vernon came across to Clare, very -cheerfully and rather excitedly. - -"Clare, are you coming?" - -"Coming where?" asked Clare, trying to hide her agitation. - -"To the demonstration," said Madge Vernon. "You know I told you all -about it! It begins at eight. It will be immense fun, and after your -window-smashing exploit you are one of us. Good Heavens, I think you -have beaten us all. None of us have ever thought of breaking our own -windows." - -"It's my At Home night," said Clare. - -"Oh, bother the At Home. Can't your husband look after his friends for -once? I wanted you to join in this adventure. It would be your enrolment -in the ranks, and it will do you a lot of good, in your present state of -health." - -"In any case----" said Clare. - -"What?" - -Clare smiled in a tragic way. - -"I have received a previous invitation." - -"Oh, drat the invitation." - -"Of course I should have liked to come," said Clare, "but----" - -Madge Vernon was impatient with her. "But what? I hate that word -'but.'" - -"The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak," said Clare, speaking with -a deeper significance than appeared in the words. - -"There is no weakness about you. You have the courage of your -convictions. Have you had the window mended yet?" - -She laughed gaily and then listened with her head a little on one side -to the sound of a bell ringing in the hall. - -"That must be Herbert," said Clare. "I think you had better go." - -"Yes, I think I had better," said Madge, laughing again. "If looks could -kill----" - -She went toward the door and opened it, but I stood on the threshold -looking back. - -"Won't you come? Eight o'clock, you know." - -Clare smiled weakly. - -"I am in great demand to-night." - -The two women listened to Herbert's voice in the hall saying-- - -"Of course all the shops were shut." - -"Oh, Lord!" said Madge, "I must skedaddle." She went out of the room -hurriedly, leaving Clare alone. - -And after a moment or two Clare spoke aloud, with her hands clasped upon -her breast. - -"I wonder if the Devil is tempting me tonight?" she said. - -Then Herbert entered with two whisky bottles. - -"I had to hunt all over the place," he said. - -Then he saw that his wife was still in her afternoon frock, and his face -flushed with anger. - -"What, aren't you dressed _yet?_... I think you might show some respect -for my wishes, Clare." - -"I am going to dress now," said Clare, and she rose and went into the -bedroom. - -"Women are the very devil," said Herbert, unwrapping the whisky bottles. - -While he was busy with this his mother came in, having changed her -dress. - -"Oh, I am glad you managed to get the whisky," she said. - -"Of course nearly every blessed shop was shut," said Herbert. "They -always are when I run out of everything. It's this Radical Government, -with its beastly Acts." - -Mrs. Heywood hesitated and then came across to her son and touched him -on the arm. - -"I think you had better come into the kitchen a moment, dear, and look -after Mollie." - -"She hasn't broken anything else, has she?" said Herbert anxiously. - -"No, dear. But she has just cut her finger rather badly. She got in a -temper with the sandwiches." - -Herbert raised his hands to heaven. - -"Why do these things always happen when Clare gives an At Home? I shall -abolish these evenings altogether. They will drive me mad." - -"Oh, they're very pleasant when they once begin," said Mrs. Heywood. - -"I'm glad you think so, mother. I am damned if I do. I was only saying -to Clare to-night----" - -He stalked out of the room furiously. - -Mrs. Heywood stood for a few moments staring at the carpet. Her lips -moved and her worn old hands plucked at her skirt. - -"Every time there is an At Home at this flat," she said, "I get another -white hair." - -She moved toward the door and went out of the room, so that it was left -empty. - -Outside in the street a piano-organ was playing a rag-time tune with a -rattle of notes, and motor-cars were sounding their horns. - -In this little drawing-room in Intellectual Mansions, Battersea Park, -there was silence, except for those vague sounds from without. There was -no sign here of Fate's presence, summoning a woman to her destiny. No -angel stood with a flaming sword to bar the way to a woman with a wild -heart. The little ormolu clock ticking on the mantel-shelf did not seem -to be counting the moments of a tragic drama. It was a very commonplace -little room, and the flamboyant chintz on the sofa and chairs gave it -an air of cheerfulness, as though this were one of the happy homes of -England. - -Presently the bedroom door opened slowly, and Clare Heywood stood there -looking into the drawing-room and listening. She was very pale, and -was dressed in her outdoor things, as Gerald Bradshaw had asked her -to dress, in her hat and cloak, so that she might slip out of the flat -which he had called her prison. - -She came further into the room, timidly, like a hare frightened by the -distant baying of the hounds. - -She raised her hands to her bosom, and spoke in a whisper: - -"God forgive me!" - -Then she crossed the floor, listened for a moment intently at the door, -and slipped out. A moment or two later one's ears, if they had been -listening, would have heard the front door shut. - -Clare Heywood had escaped. - -A little while later Mrs. Heywood, her mother-in-law, came into the room -again and went over to the piano to open it and arrange the music. - -"I do hope Clare is getting dressed," she said, speaking to herself. - -Then Herbert came in, carrying a tray with decanter and glasses. - -"Isn't Clare ready yet?" he asked. - -"No, dear. She won't be long." - -"I can't find the corkscrew," said Herbert, searching round for it, but -failing to discover its whereabouts. - -"Isn't it in the kitchen, dear?" asked Mrs. Heywood. - -"Not unless Mollie has swallowed it. It's just the sort of thing she -would do--out of sheer spite." - -"Didn't you use it the other day to open a tin of sardines?" asked the -old lady, cudgelling her brains. - -"Did I?" said Herbert. "Oh, Lord, yes! I left it in the bathroom." - -He went out of the room to find it. - -Mrs. Heywood crossed over to the fire and swept up the grate. - -"Clare is a very long time to-night," she said. - -Then Mollie came in carrying a tray with some plates of sandwiches. One -of her fingers was tied up with a rag. - -"It's a good job the guests is late to-night," she remarked. - -"Yes, we are all very behind-hand," said Mrs. Heywood. - -Mollie dumped down the tray and gave vent to a little of her impertinent -philosophy: - -"I'll never give an At Home when I'm married. Blest if I do. Social -'ipocrisy, I call them." - -Mrs. Heywood rebuked her sharply: - -"We don't want your opinion, Mollie, thank you." - -"I suppose I can _have_ a few opinions, although I _am_ in service," -said Mollie. "There's plenty of time for thought even in the kitchen -of a flat like this. I wonder domestic servants don't write novels. My -word, what a revelation it would be! I've a good mind to write one of -them serials in the _Daily Mail_." - -"If I have any more of your impudence, Mollie----" - -"It's not impudence," said Mollie. "It's aspirations." - -The girl was silent when her master came into the room with the -corkscrew. - -"It wasn't in the bathroom," he explained. "I remember now, I used it -for cleaning out my pipe." - -"I could have told you that a long time ago, sir," said Mollie. - -"Well, why the dickens didn't you?" asked Herbert. - -"You never asked me, sir." - -Mollie retired with the air of having scored a point. - -"Well, as long as you've found it, dear," said Mrs. Heywood. - -"Unfortunately, I broke the point. However, I daresay I can make it do." - -He pulled one of the corks out of the whisky bottle and filled the -decanter. - -"Hasn't Clare finished dressing yet?" he said presently. "What on earth -is she doing?" - -"I expect she wants her blouse done up at the back," said Mrs. Heywood. - -Herbert jerked up his head. - -"And then she complains because I can't tie my own tie I Just like -women." - -He drew out another cork rather violently and said: - -"Well, go and see after her, mother." - -Mrs. Heywood went toward the bedroom door and called out in her silvery -voice: - -"Are you ready, dear?" - -She listened for a moment, and called out again: - -"Clare!" - -Herbert poured some more whisky into the decanter. - -"I expect she's reading one of those beastly pamphlets," he said. - -Mrs. Heywood tapped at the bedroom door. - -"Clare!" - -"Go in, mother," said Herbert irritably. - -"It's very strange!" said Mrs. Heywood in an anxious voice. - -She went into the bedroom, and Herbert, who had been watching her, -spilled some of the whisky, so that he muttered to himself: - -"What with women and what with whisky----" - -He did not finish his sentence, but stared in the direction of the -bedroom as though suspecting something was wrong. - -Mrs. Heywood came trembling out. She had a scared look. - -"Oh, Herbert!" - -Herbert was alarmed by the look on her face. - -"Is Clare ill--or something?" - -"She isn't there," said Mrs. Heywood. - -The old lady was rather breathless. - -"Not there!" said Herbert in a dazed way. - -"She went in to dress a few minutes ago," said his mother. - -Herbert stared at her. He was really very much afraid, but he spoke -irritably: - -"Well, she can't have gone up the chimney, can she? At least, I suppose -not, though you never can tell nowadays." - -He strode toward the bedroom door and called out: - -"Clare!" - -Then he went inside. - -Mrs. Heywood stood watching the open door. She raised her hands up and -then let them fall, and spoke in a hoarse kind of whisper: - -"I think it has happened at last." - -Herbert came out of the bedroom again. He looked pale, and had gloomy -eyes. - -"It's devilish queer!" he said. - -Mother and son stood looking at each other, as though in the presence of -tragedy. - -"She must have gone out," said Mrs. Hey-wood. - -"Gone out! What makes you think so?" - -"She has taken her hat and cloak." - -"How do you know?" asked Herbert. - -"I looked in the wardrobe." - -"Good Heavens! Where's she gone to?" - -Mrs. Heywood's thin old hands clutched at the white lace upon her bosom. - -"Herbert, I--I am afraid." - -The man went deadly white. He stammered as he spoke: - -"You don't mean that she is going to do something--foolish?" - -"Something rash," said Mrs. Hey wood mournfully. - -Herbert had a sudden idea. It took away from his fear a little and made -him angry. - -"Perhaps she has gone round to church. If so, I will give her a piece of -my mind when she comes back. It's outrageous! It's shameful." - -There was the sound of a bell ringing through the hall, and the mother -and son listened intently. - -"Perhaps she _has_ come back," said Herbert. "Perhaps she went to fetch -some flowers." This idea seemed to soften him. His voice broke a little -when he said: "Poor girl! I didn't mean to make such a fuss about them." -"It isn't Clare," said Mrs. Heywood, shaking her head. "It's a visitor. -I hear Mr. Atkinson Brown's voice." - -Mr. Atkinson Brown's voice could be heard quite plainly in the hall: - -"Well, Mollie, is your mistress quite well?" Herbert grasped his -mother's arm and whispered to her excitedly: - -"Mother, we must hide it from them." - -"Yes," said Mrs. Heywood. "If the Atkinson Browns suspect anything it -will be all over the neighborhood." - -Herbert had a look of anguish in his eyes. "Good Heavens, yes. My -reputation will be ruined." - -Once again they heard Mr. Atkinson Brown's voice in the hall. - -"I see we are the first to arrive," he said in a loud, cheery tone. - -"Mother," whispered Herbert, "we must keep up appearances, at all -costs." - -"I'll try to, darling," said Mrs. Heywood, clasping his arm for a -moment. - -Herbert made a desperate effort to be hopeful. - -"Clare is sure to be back in a few minutes. We're frightening ourselves -for nothing.... I shall have something to say to her to-night when the -guests are gone." - -Mrs. Heywood's eyes filled with tears, and she looked at her son as -though she knew that Clare would never come back. - -"My poor boy!" she said. - -"Play the game, mother," said Herbert. "For Heaven's sake play the -game." - -He had no sooner whispered these words than Mr. and Mrs. Atkinson Brown -entered the room, having taken off their outdoor things. Mr. Brown was -a tall, stout, heavily built man with a bald head and a great expanse -of white waistcoat. His wife was a little bird-like woman in pink silk. -They were both elaborately cheerful. - -"Hulloh, Heywood, my boy!" said the elderly man. - -"So delighted to come!" said Mrs. Atkinson Brown to Herbert's mother. - -Herbert grasped the man's hand and wrung it warmly. - -"Good of you to come. Devilish good." - -"Glad to come," said Mr. Atkinson Brown. "Glad to come, my lad. How's -the wife?" - -"Yes," said Mrs. Atkinson Brown, glancing round the room. "Where's dear -Clare?... Well, I hope." - -Herbert tried to hide his extreme nervousness. - -"Oh, tremendously fit, thanks. She'll be here in a minute or two." - -Mrs. Heywood appeared less nervous than her son. Yet her voice trembled -a little when she said: - -"Do sit down, Mrs. Atkinson Brown." - -She pulled a chair up, but the lady protested laughingly: - -"Oh, not so near the fire. I can't afford to neglect my complexion at my -time of life!" - -Her husband was rubbing his hands in front of the fire. He had no -complexion to spoil. - -"Horrible weather for this time o' year," he said. - -"Damnable," said Herbert, agreeing with him almost too cordially. - -"Is dear Clare suited at present?" asked the lady. - -"Well," said Mrs. Heywood, "we still have Mollie, but she is a great -trouble--a very great trouble." - -"Oh, the eternal servant problem!" said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. "I thought -I had a perfect jewel, but I found her inebriated in the kitchen only -yesterday." - -Herbert was racking his brains for conversational subjects. He fell back -on an old one. "Business going strong?" - -"Business!" said Mr. Atkinson Brown. "My dear boy, business has been the -very devil since this Radical Government has been in power." - -"I am sure there has been a great deal of trouble in the world lately," -said Mrs. Heywood. - -"I'm sure I can't bear to read even the dear _Daily Mail_," said Mrs. -Atkinson Brown. - -"What with murders and revolutions and eloping vicars and -suffragettes----" - -"Those outrageous women ought to be whipped," said her husband. "Spoiled -my game of golf last Saturday. Found 'Votes for Women' on the first -green. Made me positively ill." - -"I am glad dear Clare is so sensible," said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - -"Yes. Oh, quite so," said Mrs. Heywood, flushing a little. - -"Oh, rather!" said Herbert. - -"We domestic women are in the minority now," said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - -"The spirit of revolt is abroad, Herbert," said her husband. "Back to -the Home is the only watchword which will save the country from these -shameless hussies. Flog 'em back, I would. Thank God _our_ wives have -more sense." - -"Yes, there's something in that," said Herbert. - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown was gazing round the room curiously. She seemed to -suspect something. - -"You are sure dear Clare is quite well?" she asked. "No little trouble?" - -"She is having a slight trouble with her back hair," said Herbert. -"Won't lie down, you know." - -He laughed loudly, as though he had made a good joke. - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown half rose from her chair. - -"Oh, let me go to the rescue of the dear thing!" - -Herbert was terror-stricken. - -"No--no! It was only my joke," he said eagerly. "She will be here in a -minute. Do sit down." - -Mrs. Heywood remembered her promise to "play the game." - -"Won't you sing something, dear?" she said to her visitor. - -"Oh, not so early in the evening," said the lady. "Besides, I have a -most awful cold." - -"Oh, I'm so sorry," said Herbert. "I am beastly sorry." - -As he spoke the bell rang again, and Herbert went over to his mother and -whispered to her: - -"Do you think that is Clare? My God, this is awful!" - -"Clare was not looking very well the other day when I saw her," -said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. "I thought perhaps she was sickening for -something." - -"Oh, I assure you she was never better in her life," said Herbert. - -"But you men are so unobservant. I am dying to see dear Clare, to ask -her how she feels. Are you sure I can't be of any use to her?" - -She rose again from her chair, and Herbert gave a beseeching look to his -mother. - -"Oh, quite sure, dear," said Mrs. Heywood. "_Do_ sit down." - -"Besides, you have such a frightful cold," said Herbert, with extreme -anxiety. "_Do_ keep closer to the fire." - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown laughed a little curiously: - -"You seem very anxious to keep me from dear Clare!" - -This persistence annoyed her husband and he rebuked her sternly. - -"Sit still, Beatrice, can't you? Don't you see that we have arrived a -little early and that we have taken Clare unawares? Let the poor girl go -on with her dressing." - -"Don't bully me in other people's flats, Charles," said Mrs. Atkinson -Brown. "I have enough of it at home." - -Her husband was not to be quelled. - -"Herbert and I can hardly hear ourselves speak," he growled, "you keep -up such a clatter." - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown flared up. - -"I come out to get the chance of speaking a little. For eight years now -I have been listening to your interminable monologues, and can't get a -word in edgeways." - -"Stuff and nonsense!" said her husband. - -"Have you been married eight years already, my dear?" asked Mrs. Heywood -in a tone of amiable surprise. - -"Well, we are in our Eighth Year," said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - -Mrs. Heywood seemed startled. - -"Oh, I see," she said thoughtfully. - -"I assure you it seems longer," said the lady. "I suppose it's because -Charles makes me so very tired sometimes." - -Two other visitors now arrived. They were Mr. Hargreaves and his -wife: the former a young man in immaculate evening clothes, with -lofty manners; the latter a tall, thin, elegant, bored-looking woman, -supercilious and snobbish. - -Herbert went forward hurriedly to his new guests. - -"How splendid of you to come! How are you, sir?" - -"Oh, pretty troll-loll, thanks," said Mr. Hargreaves. - -Herbert shook hands with Mrs. Hargreaves. - -"How do you do?" - -"We're rather late," said the lady, "but this is in an out-of-the-way -neighborhood, is it not?" - -"Oh, do you think so?" said Herbert. "I always considered Battersea Park -very central." - -Mrs. Hargreaves raised her eyebrows. - -"It's having to get across the river that makes the journey so very -tedious. I should die if I had to live across the river." - -"There's something in what you say," said Herbert, anxious to agree with -everybody. "I must apologize for dragging you all this way. Of course, -you people in Mayfair----Won't you sit down?" - -Mr. Hargreaves became a victim of mistaken identity, shaking hands with -Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - -"Mrs. Heywood, I presume. I must introduce myself." - -Mrs. Hargreaves also greeted the other lady, under the same impression. - -"Oh, how do you do? So delighted to make your acquaintance." - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown was much amused, and laughed gaily. - -"But I am _not_ Mrs. Heywood. I cannot boast of such a handsome -husband!" - -"Oh, can't you, by Jove!" said Mr. Atkinson Brown, rather nettled by his -wife's candor. - -"Oh, I beg pardon," said Mr. Hargreaves. "Where _is_ Mrs. Heywood?" - -"Yes, where is Mrs. Heywood?" said his wife. - -Herbert looked wildly at his mother. - -"Where is she, mother? Do tell her to hurry up. - -"Yes, dear," said Mrs. Heywood meekly. She moved uncertainly toward the -bedroom door, and then hesitated: "Perhaps she will not be very long -now." - -"The fact is," said Herbert desperately, "she is not very well." - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown was astounded. - -"But you said she was perfectly well!" - -"Did I?" said Herbert. "Oh, well, er--one has to say these things, you -know. Polite fictions, eh?" - -He laughed nervously. - -"The fact is, she has a little headache. Hasn't she, mother?" - -"Yes, dear," said Mrs. Heywood. "You know best." - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown rose from her chair again. - -"Oh, I will go and see how the poor dear feels. So bad of you to hide it -from us." - -"Oh, please sit down," said Herbert in a voice of anguish. "I assure you -it is nothing very much. She will be in directly. Make yourself at home, -Mrs. Hargreaves. This chair? Mother, show Mrs. Atkinson Brown Clare's -latest photograph." - -"Oh, yes!" said Mrs. Heywood. "It is an excellent likeness." - -"But I want to see Clare herself!" said Mrs. Atkinson Brown plaintively. - -"Sit down, Beatrice!" said her husband. - -"Bully!" said Mrs. Atkinson Brown, sitting down with a flop. - -Herbert addressed himself to Mr. Hargreaves. - -"Draw up your chair, sir. You will have a cigar, I am sure." - -He offered him one from a newly opened box. Mr. Hargreaves took one, -smelled it, and then put it back. - -"No, thanks," he said. "I will have one of my own, if I may. Sure the -ladies don't mind?" - -"Oh, they like it," said Herbert. - -"We have to pretend to," said Mrs. Hargreaves. - -"Well, if you don't, you ought to," said her husband. "It's a man's -privilege." - -Mrs. Hargreaves smiled icily. - -"One of his many privileges." - -"Will you have a cigarette, Mrs. Hargreaves?" said Herbert. - -But Mr. Hargreaves interposed: - -"Oh, I don't allow my wife to smoke. It's a beastly habit." - -Mr. Atkinson Brown, who had accepted one of Herbert's cigars, but after -some inquiry had also decided to smoke one of his own, applauded this -sentiment with enthusiasm. - -"Hear, hear! Hear, hear! Disgusting habit for women." - -"Of course I agree with you," said Herbert. "Clare never smokes. But I -don't lay down the law for other people's wives." - -Mr. Hargreaves laughed. - -"A very sound notion, Heywood. It takes all one's time to manage one's -own, eh?" - -"And then it is not always effective," said his wife. "Even the worm -will turn." - -Mr. Hargreaves answered his wife with a heavy retort: - -"If it does I knock it on the head with a spade." - -Mr. Atkinson Brown laughed loudly again. He seemed to like this man -Hargreaves. - -"Good epigram! By Jove, I must remember that!" - -Herbert was on tenter-hooks when the conversation languished a little. - -"Won't you sing a song, Mrs. Atkinson Brown? I am sure my friend, Mr. -Hargreaves, will appreciate your voice." - -"Oh, rather!" said Hargreaves. "Though I don't pretend to understand a -note of music." Mrs. Atkinson Brown shook her head: - -"I couldn't think of singing before our hostess appears." - -The lady's husband seemed at last to have caught the spirit of her -suspicion. He spoke in a hoarse whisper to his wife: - -"Where the devil _is_ the woman?" - -Herbert Heywood realized that he was on the edge of a precipice. Not -much longer could he hold on to this intolerable situation. He tried to -speak cheerfully, but there was anguish in his voice when he said: - -"Well, let's have a game of nap." - -"Oh, Lord, no," said Hargreaves. "I only play nap on the way to a race. -You don't sport a billiard table, do you?" - -Herbert Heywood was embarrassed. - -"Er--a billiard table?" He looked round the room as though he might -discover a billiard table. "I'm afraid not." - -"Don't be absurd, Edward," said Mrs. Hargreaves. "People don't play -billiards on the wrong side of the river." - -Conversation languished again, and Herbert was becoming desperate. He -seized upon the sandwiches and handed them round. - -"Won't anybody have a sandwich to pass the time away? Mrs. Hargreaves?" - -Mrs. Hargreaves laughed in her supercilious way. - -"It's rather early, isn't it?" - -"Good Lord, no!" said Herbert. "I am sure you must be hungry. Let me beg -of you--Mother, haven't you got any cake anywhere?" - -"Yes, dear," said Mrs. Heywood. She, too, was suffering mental tortures. - -"Atkinson Brown. You will have a sandwich," said Herbert. - -He bent over to his visitor and spoke in a gloomy voice: - -"Take one, for God's sake." - -Atkinson Brown was startled. - -"Yes! Yes! By all means," he said hastily. Herbert handed the sandwiches -about rather wildly. "Mother, you will have one, won't you? Mrs. -Atkinson Brown?... And one for me, eh?" - -Mrs. Hargreaves eyed her host curiously. - -"I hope your wife is not seriously unwell, Mr. Heywood." - -Herbert was losing his nerve. - -"Can't we talk of something else?" he said despairingly. "What is your -handicap at golf?" - -"My husband objects to my playing golf," said the lady. - -"It takes women out of the home so much," said Hargreaves. "Play with -the babies is my motto for women." - -Mrs. Atkinson Brown shook her finger at him, and laughed in a shrill -voice: - -"But supposing they haven't got any babies?" - -"They ought to have 'em," said Hargreaves. - -It was Atkinson Brown who interrupted this interesting discussion, which -promised to bring up the great problem of eugenics, so favored now as a -drawing-room topic. He had been turning his sandwich this way and that, -and he leaned forward to his host: - -"Excuse me, Herbert, old man. There's something the matter with this -sandwich." - -"Something the matter with it?" asked Herbert anxiously. - -"It's covered with red spots," said Atkinson Brown. - -"Spots--what kind of spots?" - -"Looks like blood," said Atkinson Brown, giving an uneasy guffaw. -"Suppose there hasn't been a murder in this flat?" - -All the guests leaned forward and gazed at the sandwich. - -Herbert spoke in a tragic whisper to his mother: - -"Mollie's finger!" - -Then he explained the matter airily to the general company. - -"Oh, it's a special kind of sandwich with the gravy outside. A new fad, -you know." - -"Oh, I see," said Atkinson Brown, much relieved. "Hadn't heard of it. -Still, I think I'll have an ordinary one, if you don't mind." - -Herbert was muttering little prayers remembered from his childhood. - -"Mrs. Hargreaves," he said cajolingly, "I am sure you play. Won't you -give us a little tune?" - -"Well, if it won't disturb your wife," said the lady. - -"Oh, I am sure it won't. She'll love to hear you." - -He felt immensely grateful to this good-natured woman. - -"Edward, get my music-roll," said Mrs. Hargreaves. - -But Herbert had a horrible disappointment when Hargreaves said: - -"By Jove! I believe I left it in the taxi. Yes, I am sure I did!" - -Herbert put his hand up to his aching head and whispered his anguish: - -"Oh, my God! Now how shall I mark time?" - -"But I reminded you about it!" said Mrs. Hargreaves. - -"Yes, I know. But you are always reminding me about something." - -"Well, play something by heart," said Herbert in a pleading way. "Any -old thing. The five-finger exercises." - -"I am very out of practice," said Mrs. Hargreaves. "But still I will -try." - -Herbert breathed a prayer of thankfulness, and hurried to conduct the -lady to the music-stool. - -As he did so there was a noise outside the window. Newspaper men were -shouting their sing-song: "Raid on the 'Ouse. Suffragette Outrage. Raid -on the 'Ouse of Commins." - -"What are the devils saying?" asked Hargreaves, trying to catch the -words. - -"Something about the Suffragettes," growled Atkinson Brown. - -"I'm afraid it will give poor Clare a worse headache," said Mrs. -Atkinson Brown. - -Mrs. Heywood tried to be reassuring: - -"Oh, I don't think so." - -At that moment there was a loud ring at the bell. The sound was so -prolonged that it startled the company. - -Herbert listened intently and then whispered to his mother: - -"That must be Clare!" - -"Oh, if it is only Clare!" said Mrs. Heywood. When Mrs. Hargreaves had -struck a few soft chords on the piano there was the sound of voices -speaking loudly in the hall. Everybody listened, surprised at the -interruption. Mollie's voice could be heard quite clearly. - -"I told you it was our At Home night, Miss Vernon." - -"I can't help that." - -The drawing-room door opened, _sans ceremonie_, and Madge Vernon came -in. Her face was flushed, and she had sparkling eyes. She stood in the -doorway looking at the company with a smile, as though immensely amused -by some joke of her own. - -"I'm sorry to interrupt you good people," she said very cheerfully, "but -I have come on urgent business, which brooks no delay, as they say in -melodrama." - -Mrs. Heywood gazed at her with frightened eyes. - -"My dear!... What has happened?" - -"What's the matter?" said Herbert, turning very pale. - -"Oh, it's nothing to be alarmed at," said Madge Vernon. "It's about your -wife." - -"My wife?" - -"About Clare?" exclaimed Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - -Mrs. Hargreaves craned her head forward, like a bird reaching for its -seed. - -"I wonder--" she said. - -Madge Vernon grinned at them all. - -"It'll be in the papers to-morrow, so you are all bound to know. -Besides, why keep it a secret? It's a thing to be proud of!" - -"Proud of what?" asked Herbert in a frenzied tone of voice. - -Madge Vernon enjoyed the drama of her announcement. - -"Clare has been arrested in a demonstration outside the House to-night." - -"Arrested!" - -The awful word was spoken almost simultaneously by all the company in -that drawingroom of Intellectual Mansions, S. W. - -"She's quite safe," said Madge Vernon calmly. "I've come to ask you to -bail her out." - -Herbert's guests rose and looked at him in profound astonishment and -indignation. - -"But you told us--" cried Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - -Herbert Heywood gave a queer groan of anger and horror. - -"Bail her out!... Oh, my God!" - -He sank down into his chair and held his head in his hands. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -Herbert Heywood was in the depths of an arm-chair reading the paper. -Mrs. Heywood was on the other side of the fireplace with a book on her -lap. But she was dozing over it, and her head nodded on to her chest. -Herbert turned over the leaves of the paper and then studied the -advertisements. He had a look of extreme boredom. Every now and then he -yawned quietly and lengthily. At last he let the paper fall on to the -floor, and uttered his thoughts aloud, so that his mother was awakened. - -"Did you say anything, Herbert?" said the old lady. - -"Nothing, mother, except that I am bored stiff." - -He went over to the piano and played "God Save the King" with one -finger, in a doleful way. - -Mrs. Heywood glanced over her spectacles at him. - -"Would you like a game of cribbage, dear?" - -"No, thanks, mother," said Herbert hastily. "Not in the afternoon." - -Mrs. Heywood listened to his fumbling notes for a moment and then spoke -again. - -"Won't you go out for a walk? It would do you good, Herbert." - -"Think so?" said Herbert bitterly; without accepting the suggestion, -he played "Three Blind Mice," also with one finger. It sounded more -melancholy than "God Save the King." - -"I don't like to see you moping indoors on a bright day like this," said -Mrs. Heywood. "Take a brisk walk round the Park. It would cheer you up." - -Herbert resented the idea fiercely. - -"A long walk in Battersea Park would make a pessimist of a laughing -hyena." - -Mrs. Heywood was silent for some time, but then she made a last effort. - -"Well, go and see a friend, dear. The Atkinson Browns, for instance." - -"They do nothing but nag at each other," said Herbert. "And Atkinson -Brown hasn't as much brains as a Teddy Bear. Besides, he's become -friendly with that fellow Hargreaves, and I'm not going to take the risk -of meeting a man who turned me out of my job." - -Mrs. Heywood became agitated. - -"Are you sure of that, Herbert? I can't think he could have been so -malicious, after coming here and eating your salt, as it were. What was -his reason?" - -"He made no disguise of it," said Herbert bitterly. "I saw his letter -to my chief. Said that it was quite impossible to employ a man who was -mixed up with the militant Suffragettes. Damned liar!" - -"Good Heavens!" said Mrs. Heywood. - -"Of course it was all due to that ghastly evening when Clare got -arrested. She knows that well enough." - -"Well, dear," said Mrs. Heywood, "she has tried to make amends. The -shock of your losing your place has made her much more gentle and -loving. It has brought back all her loyalty to you, Herbert." - -"Loyalty!" said Herbert. "Where is she now, I should like to know?" - -"She is gone to some committee meeting." - - -"She's always got a committee meeting," said Herbert angrily, kicking -the hassock. - -"She joins a new committee for some kind of social reform nonsense every -blessed day." - -"Well, it keeps her busy, dear," said Mrs. Heywood gently. "Besides, -it is not all committee work. Since she has been visiting the poor and -helping in the slums she has been ever so much better in health and -spirits." - -"Yes, but where the devil do I come in?" asked Herbert. - -"Don't you think you might go out, dear? Just for a little while?" - -"I don't _want_ to go out, mother," said Herbert with suppressed heat. - -"Very well, dear." - -Herbert stood in front of the fireplace and rattled the keys in his -pocket moodily. - -"What's the good of toiling to keep a home together if one's wife -abandons her husband's society on every possible pretext? A home! This -place is just a receiving office for begging letters and notices for -committees and subcommittees." - -Mrs. Heywood sighed. - -"It might have been worse, Herbert." - -"As far as I'm concerned, it couldn't be worse. I'm the most miserable -wretch in London. Without a job and without a wife." - -"You'll get a place all right, dear. You have the promise of one -already. And you know Clare's health was in a very queer state before -Miss Vernon made her take an interest in helping other people. I was -seriously alarmed about her." - -"What about me?" asked Herbert. "No one troubles to get alarmed about -me." - -"Are you unwell, dear?" said Mrs. Hey-wood anxiously. - -"Of course I'm unwell." - -"Darling!" said Mrs. Heywood, still more anxiously. - -"Oh, there's nothing the matter with me from a physical point of view. -But mentally and morally I'm a demnition wreck." - -"Aren't you taking your iron pills regularly?" said his mother. - -"Pills! As if pills could cure melancholia!" Mrs. Heywood was aghast at -that dreadful word. - -"Good Heavens, dear!" - -"I'm on the verge of a nervous breakdown," said Herbert. - -"Oh, Herbert," cried his mother, "I hope not!" - -"I'm working up to a horrible crisis," said Herbert. - -"What are your symptoms? How do you feel?" asked his mother. - -"I feel like smashing things," said Herbert savagely. - -He sat down at the piano again and played "We Won't Go Home Till -Morning," but missed his note, and banged on to the wrong one in a -temper. - -"There goes a note, anyhow. Thank goodness for that!" - -At that moment Mollie came in holding a silver tray with a pile of -letters. - -"The post, sir." - -"Well, something to break the infernal monotony," said Herbert with a -sigh of relief. - -He took up the letters and examined them. - -"Life is a bit flat, sir," said Mollie, "since we gave up having At -Homes." - -"Hold your tongue," said Herbert. - -Mollie tossed her head and muttered an impertinent sentence as she left -the room. - -"Can't even open my mouth without somebody jumping down my throat. I -will break that girl's neck one of these days," said Herbert. - -He went through the letters and read out the names on them. - -"Mrs. Herbert Heywood, _Mrs._ Herbert Heywood, Mrs. Herbert Heywood, -Mrs. Herbert--Why, every jack one is for Mrs. Herbert Heywood! Nobody -writes to me, of course. No one cares a damn about _me_." - -"Your mother cares, Herbert," said the old lady. - -"I shall take to drink--or the devil," said Herbert, and he added -thoughtfully, "I wonder which is the most fun?" - -"Herbert, dear!" cried his mother, "don't say such awful things." - -"The worst of it is," said Herbert bitterly, "they're both so beastly -expensive." - -There was the noise of a latchkey in the hall, and Mrs. Heywood gave a -little cry. - -"There's Clare!" - -"Think so?" said Herbert, listening. - -From the hall came the sound of Clare's voice singing a merry tune. - -"She's in a cheerful mood, anyhow," said Mrs. Heywood, smiling. - -Herbert answered her gloomily. - -"Horribly cheerful." - -The mother and son looked toward the door as Clare came in. There was a -noticeable change in her appearance since the evening At Home. There was -more color in her cheeks and the wistfulness had gone out of her eyes. -She was brisk, keen and bright. - -"Well, mother," she said, "been having a nap?" - -"Oh, no, dear," said the old lady, who never admitted that she made a -habit of naps. - -"Hulloh, Herbert," said Clare. "Have you got that new post yet?" - -"No," said Herbert. "And I don't expect I shall get it." - -"Oh, yes, you will, dear old boy. Don't you worry! Have you been home -long?" - -"Seems like a lifetime." - -Clare laughed. - -"Not so long as that, surely?" - -She came forward to him and put her arm about his neck, and offered him -her cheek. He looked at it doubtfully for a moment and then kissed her -in a "distant" manner. - -"I'm frightfully busy, old boy," said Clare. "I just have a few minutes -and then I shall have to dash off again." - -"Dash off where?" asked Herbert, with signs of extreme irritation. "Dash -it all, surely you aren't going out again?" - -"Only round the corner," said Clare quietly. "I have got to look into -the case of a poor creature who is making match-boxes. Goodness knows -how many for a farthing! And yet she's so cheerful and plucky that it -does one good to see her. Oh, it kills one's own selfishness, Herbert." - -"Well, why worry about her, then, if she's so pleased with herself?" - -"She's plucky," said Clare, "but she's starving. It's a bad case of -sweated labor." - -"Sweated humbug," said Herbert. "What am I going to do all the evening, -I should like to know? Sit here alone?" - -"I don't suppose I shall be long," said Clare. "Besides, there's -mother." - -"Yes, there's mother," said Herbert. "But when a man's married he wants -his wife." - -Clare was now busy looking over her letters. - -"Can't you go to the club?" she asked. - -"I'm dead sick of the club. That boiled-shirt Bohemianism is the biggest -rot in the world." - -"Take mother to the theatre," said Clare cheerfully. - -"The theatre bores me stiff. These modern plays set one's nerves on -edge." - -"Well, haven't you got a decent novel or anything?" said Clare, reading -one of her letters. - -"A decent novel! There's no such thing nowadays, and they give me the -hump." - -Clare was reading another letter with absorbed interest, but she -listened with half an ear, as it were, to her husband. - -"Play mother a game of cribbage, then," she said. - -"Look here, Clare," said Herbert furiously, "I shall begin to throw -things about in a minute." - -"Don't get hysterical, Herbert," said Clare calmly. "Especially as I -have got some good news for you." - -As she spoke these words she looked across a Demonstration to him with a -curious smile and added: "A big surprise, Herbert!" - -"A surprise?" said Herbert with sarcasm. "Have you discovered another -widow in distress?" - -"Well, I have," said Clare, "but it's not that." - -Mrs. Heywood glanced from her son to her daughter-in-law, and seemed to -imagine that she might be disturbing an intimate conversation. - -"I will be back in a minute. I won't disturb you two dears," she said, -as she left the room quietly. - -"You won't disturb us, mother," said Clare. - -But the old lady smiled and said, "I won't be long." - -"Are you going to get arrested again?" asked Herbert. "Do you want me to -bail you out? Because by the Lord, I won't!" - -"Oh, that was quite an accident," said Clare, laughing. "Besides, I gave -you my word to abstain from the militant movement, and you can't say I -have broken the pledge." - -"You have broken a good many other things." - -"What kind of things?" asked Clare. "You aren't alluding to that window -again, are you?" - -"You have broken my illusions on married life," said Herbert, with -tragic emphasis. - -"Ah," said Clare, "that is 'the Great Illusion,' by the Angel in the -House." - -"You have broken my ideals of womanhood." - -"They were false ideals, Herbert," said Clare very quietly. "It was only -a plaster ideal which broke. The real woman is of flesh and blood. The -real woman is so much better than the sham. Don't you think so?" - -"It depends on what you call sham," said Herbert. - -"I was a sham until that plaster image of me broke. I indulged in sham -sentiment, sham emotion, sham thoughts. Look at me now, since I went -outside these four walls and faced the facts of life, and saw other -people's misery besides my own, and the happiness of people with so much -more to bear than I had. Look into my eyes, Herbert." - -She smiled at him tenderly, alluringly. "What's the good?" said Herbert. - -"Do you see a weary soul looking out?" - -Herbert looked into his wife's eyes for a moment and then stared down at -the carpet. - -"I used to see love looking out," he said. - -"It's looking out now," said Clare. "Love of life instead of discontent. -Love of this great throbbing human nature, with so much to be put right. -Love of poor people, and little children, and brave hearts. Madge Vernon -taught me that, for she has a soul bigger than the suffrage, and ideals -that go beyond the vote. I have blown the cobwebs out of my eyes, -Herbert. I see straight." - -"How about _me?_" asked Herbert. "That's what I want to know. Where do I -come in?" - -"Oh, you come in all right!" said Clare. "You are a part of life and -have a big share of my love." - -"I don't want to be shared up, thanks," said Herbert. - -She stroked his hand. - -"I love you much better now that I see you with this new straight vision -of mine. At any rate I love what is real in you and not what is sham. -And I have learned the duties of love, Herbert. I believe I am a better -wife to you. I think I have learned the meaning of marriage, and of -married love." - -She spoke with a touch of emotion, and there was a thrill in her voice. - -"You are in love with your social work and your whining beggars, not -with me. You are getting farther and farther away from me. You leave me -alone; I come back to a neglected home." - -"Why, Mollie and mother look after it beautifully," said Clare very -cheerfully. - -Herbert gave expression to his grievances. - -"I come home and ask, 'Where is Clare?' and get the eternal answer, -'Clare is out.' I am an abandoned husband, and by Heaven I won't stand -it. I will----" - -"What, Herbert?" said Clare, smiling up at him. "Don't do anything rash, -old boy." - -"I--have a good mind to make love to somebody else's wife. But they're -all so beastly ugly!" - -"Perhaps somebody else's wife won't respond," said Clare. "Some women -are very cold." - -"I'll take to drink. I have already given mother full warning." - -"I am sure it will disagree with you, dear," said Clare. - -"You scoff at me," said Herbert passionately. "I think we had better -live apart." - -"You would get even more bored than before. Dear old boy. _Do_ be -reasonable. _Do_ cultivate a sense of humor." - -"This is not a farce," said Herbert. "It's a horrible tragedy." - -"Take up a hobby or something," said Clare. "Golf--or fretwork." - -Herbert was furious. - -"Fretwork! Is that a joke or an insult?" - -"It was only a suggestion!" said Clare. Herbert jumped up from his -chair. - -"I had better go and drown myself straight away..."? - -He turned at the door, and gave a tragic look at his wife. "Good-by." - -Clare smiled at him. - -"Won't you kiss me before you go?" - -"I will take my pipe," said Herbert, coming back to the mantelshelf. -"It's my only friend." - -"It will go out in the water," said Clare. "Besides, Herbert, don't you -want to hear my good news? My big surprise?" - -"No," said Herbert. "Nothing you could say or do could surprise me now. -If mother wants me I shall be in the study for the rest of the evening." - -"But I thought you were going to the river?", said Clare teasingly. - -Herbert was not to be amused. - -"I suppose you think you're funny? I don't," he said. - -Then he went out and slammed the door. Clare was left alone, and there -was a smile about her lips. - -"Poor old Herbert," she said. "I think he will have the surprise of his -life." - -She laughed quietly to herself, and then looked up and listened as she -heard a slight noise. She stood up with a sudden look of anger as she -saw Gerald Bradshaw gazing at her through the open French windows. - -The man spoke to her in his soft, silky voice. - -"Clare, why are you so cruel to me? I have been ill because of your -heartlessness." - -Clare answered him sternly. - -"I thought I had got rid of you. Have you come back to plague me?" - -"I tried to forget you," said Gerald Bradshaw. "I went as far as Italy -to forget you. I made love to many women to forget you. But I have come -back. And I shall always come back, because you are my mate and I cannot -live without you." - -Clare's voice rang out in the room. - -"God ought not to let you live. Every word you speak is a lie. You are -a thief of women's honor. Get away from my window, because your very -breath is poison." - -The man was astonished, a little scared. "You did not speak like that -once, Clare. You let me hold your hand. You trembled when I leaned -toward you." - -"I was ill and weak," said Clare, "and you tried to tempt my weakness. I -was blind and did not see the evil in you. But now I am well and strong, -and my eyes are opened to the truth of things. If you don't go I will -call my husband and he will throw you over that balcony at one word from -me." - -Gerald Bradshaw laughed scoffingly. - -"Your husband! I could kill him between my thumb and forefinger." - -"He is strong because he is good," said Clare. "I will call him now." - -She went quickly toward the bell. - -"You needn't call him," said Gerald Bradshaw. "I would dislike to hurt -the little man." - -"You are going?" asked Clare. - -"Yes, I am going," said the man, "because something has changed in you." - -Clare gave a cheerful little laugh. - -"You are right." - -"I see that now. I have lost my spell over you. Something has broken." - -"Are you going," said Clare sternly, "or shall I call my man?" - -"I am going, Clare," said the man at the window. "I am going to find -another mate. She and I will talk evil of you, and hate you, as I -hate you now. Farewell, foolish one!" He withdrew from the window, and -instantly Clare rushed to it, shut it and bolted it. Then she pulled -down the blind, and stood, panting, with her back to it and her arms -outstretched. - -"God be praised!" she said. "He has gone out of my life. I am a clean -woman again." At that moment Mrs. Heywood entered. "Must you go out -again, Clare?" said the old lady. - -"Only for a little while, mother," said Clare, a little breathless after -her emotion. - -"Is anything the matter, dear?" said Mrs. Heywood. "You look rather -flustered." - -"Oh, nothing is the matter!" said Clare. "Only I am very happy." - -Mrs. Heywood smiled at her. - -"It makes me happy to see you so well and bright," she said. - -"I don't get on your nerves so much, eh, mother?" - -She laughed quietly. - -"Well, I must go and tidy my hair." - -She moved toward the bedroom, but stopped to pack up her letters. - -"I am so sorry you have to go out," said the old lady. - -"I shan't be more than a few minutes," said Clare. "But I must go. -Besides, after this I am going to _give_ up some of my visiting work." - -"Give it up, dear?" - -"Yes. One must be moderate even in district visiting." - -She went into the bedroom, but left the door open so that she could hear -her mother. - -"Clare!" said the old lady. - -"Yes, mother." - -"What is that surprise you were going to give us?" - -"Surprise, mother?" - -"Yes," said Mrs. Heywood. "The good news?" - -"Oh, yes, I forgot," said Clare. "Come in and I will tell you." - -Mrs. Heywood went into the bedroom. Outside, in the street, a man with -a fiddle was playing the "Intermezzo." Presently both women came out. -Clare was smiling, with her arm round Mrs. Heywood's neck. Mrs. Heywood -was wiping her eyes as though crying a little. - -"Cheer up," said Clare. "It's nothing to cry about." - -"I am crying because I am so glad," said Mrs. Heywood. - -"Well, that's a funny thing to do," said Clare, laughing gaily. "Now I -must run away. You won't let Herbert drown himself, will you?" - -"No, dear," said Mrs. Heywood, wiping her eyes. - -"Who would have thought it!" said Mrs. - -Heywood, speaking to herself as her daughter-in-law left the room. - -She went over to the mantelpiece and took up her son's photograph and -kissed it. Then she went to the door and stood out in the hall and -called in a sweet old woman's voice: - -"Herbert! Herbert, dear!" - -"Are you calling, mother?" answered Herbert from another room. - -"Yes," said Mrs. Heywood. "I want you." - -"I don't feel a bit like cribbage, mother,"' said Herbert. - -"I don't want you to play cribbage to-night," said the old lady. "I have -something to say to you." - -"Has Clare gone?" asked Herbert, still calling from the other room. - -"Yes," said Mrs. Heywood. "But she won't be long." - -"Oh, all right. I'll be along in a moment." - -Mrs. Heywood went back into the room and waited for her son eagerly. -Presently he came in with a pipe in his hand and book under his arm. He -had changed into a shabby old jacket, and was in carpet slippers. - -"What's the matter, mother?" he asked. - -"There's nothing the matter," said the old lady; then she became very -excited, and raised her hands and cried out: - -"At least, everything is the matter. It's the only thing that matters! -... Oh, Herbert!" - -She laughed and cried at the same time so that her son was alarmed and -stared at her in amazement. - -"You aren't ill, are you?" he said. "Shall I send for a doctor?" - -Mrs. Heywood shook her trembling old head. - -"I'm quite well. I never felt so well." - -"You had better sit down, mother," said Herbert. - -He took her hand and led her to a chair. - -"What's up, eh, old lady? Mollie hasn't run away, has she?" - -The old lady took his hand and fondled it. - -"Herbert, my son, I've wonderful news for you." - -"News?" said Herbert. "Did you find it in the evening paper?" - -"It's going to make a lot of difference to us all," said Mrs. Heywood. -"No more cribbage, Herbert!" - -"Thank heaven for that!" said Herbert. - -"And not so much social work for Clare." - -"Well, let's be thankful for small mercies," said Herbert. - -"Bend your head down and let me whisper to you," said Mrs. Heywood. - -She put her hands up to his head, and drew it down, and whispered -something into his ears. - -It was something which astounded him. - -He started back and said "No!" as though he had heard something quite -incredible. Then he spoke in a whisper: - -"By Jove!... Is that a fact?" - -"It's the best fact that ever was, Herbert," said the old lady. - -"Yes... it will make a bit of a difference," said Herbert thoughtfully. - -Mrs. Heywood clasped her son's arm. There was a tremulous light in her -eyes and a great emotion in her voice. - -"Herbert, I am an old woman and your mother. Sit down and let me talk to -you as I did in the old days when you were my small boy before a nursery -fire." - -Herbert smiled at her; all the gloom had left his face. - -"All right, mother.... By Jove, and I never guessed. And yet I ought to -have guessed. Things have been--different--lately." - -He sat down on a hassock near the old lady with his knees tucked up. She -sat down, too, and stretched out a trembling hand to touch his hair. - -"Once upon a time, Herbert, there was a young man and a young woman who -loved each other very dearly." - -Herbert looked up and smiled at her. - -"Are you sure, mother?" - -"Perfectly sure. Then they married." - -"And lived happily ever after? I bet they didn't!" - -"No, not quite happily, because this is different from the fairy tales. -... After a time the husband began to think too much about his work, -while the wife stayed at home and thought too much about herself." - -"It's a stale old yarn," said Herbert. "What happened then?" - -"By degrees the wife began to think she hated her husband, because -although he gave her little luxuries and pretty clothes, and all the -things that pleased _him_, he never gave her the thing _she_ wanted." - -"What was that?" asked Herbert. - -"It was a magic charm to make her forget herself." - -"Well, magic charms aren't easy to find," said Herbert. - -"No.... But at last she went out to find it herself. And while she was -away the husband came home and missed her." - -"Poor devil!" said Herbert. "Of course he did." - -"Being a man," said Mrs. Heywood, giving a queer little laugh, "he -stayed at home more than he used to do, and then complained that he was -left too much alone. Just like his wife had complained." - -"Well, hang it all," said Herbert, "she ought to have stayed with him." - -"But then she wouldn't have found the magic charm," said Mrs. Heywood. -"Don't you see?... And she would have withered and withered away until -there was nothing left of her, and the husband would have been quite -alone--forever." - -"Think so?" said Herbert very thoughtfully. "D'you think it would have -been as bad as that?" - -"Yes," said Mrs. Heywood. "I'm sure of it." - -"Well, what did happen?" asked Herbert. "Did she find the magic charm? -It wasn't a widow in distress, was it? Or Social Reform humbug?" - -"No," said Mrs. Heywood; "that gave her a new interest in life because -it helped her to forget herself, some of her own little worries, some of -her brooding thoughts. But a good fairy who was looking after her worked -another kind of magic.... Herbert I It's the best magic for unhappy -women and unhappy homes, and it has been worked for you. Oh, my dear, -you ought to be very thankful." - -"Yes," said Herbert, scratching his head. "Yes, I suppose so. But what's -the moral of the tale, mother? I'm hanged if I see." - -Mrs. Heywood put her hand on her son's shoulder, as he sat on the -hassock by her chair. - -"It's a moral told by an old woman who watched these two from the very -beginning. A husband mustn't expect his wife to stay at home for ever. -The home isn't big enough, Herbert. There's the great world outside -calling to her, calling, calling. The walls of a little fiat like this -are too narrow for the spirit and heart. If he keeps her there she -either pines and dies, or else----" - -"What?" asked Herbert. - -"Escapes, my dear," said the old lady very solemnly. - -Herbert drew a deep, quivering breath. - -"Then," said Mrs. Heywood, "nothing in the world can call her -back--except----" - -"Except what?" - -"A little child." - -Herbert got up from the hassock and clasped the mantelshelf, and spoke -in a low, humble, grateful voice. - -"Thank God, Clare has been called back!" he said. - -Mrs. Heywood rose from her chair also, and caught hold of her son's -sleeve. - -"Yes," she said, "yes. But even now she will want to spread her wings -a little. She must take short flights, Herbert, even now. She must wing -her way out to the big world at times. You will remember that, won't -you?" - -"I'll try to remember," said Herbert. He bent his head over his hands on -the mantelshelf. "I've been selfish," he said. "Blinded with selfishness -and self-conceit. God forgive me." - -"Perhaps we have all been a little selfish," said Mrs. Heywood quietly. -"But we shall have some one else to think about now. A new life, -Herbert. A new life is coming to us all!" - -"Hush!" said Herbert. "Here's Clare." - -The mother and son stood listening to the voice of Clare singing in the -hall. She was singing the old nursery rhyme of-- - - "Sing a song of sixpence, - - A pocket-full of rye, - - Four and twenty blackbirds - - Baked in a pie, - - When the pie was opened-----" - -Mrs. Heywood smiled into her son's eyes. - -"I think I've left my spectacles in the other room," she said. She went -out into the hall, leaving her son alone. - -And Herbert stood with his head raised, looking toward the door, -eagerly, like a lover waiting for his bride. - -Then Clare came in. There was a smile about her lips, and she spoke -cheerfully. - -"Well, you see I wasn't long." - -Herbert strode toward her and took her hands and raised them to his -lips. - -"Clare, sweetheart! Is it true? Have you been called back to me?" - -Clare put her forehead down against his chest. - -"I never went very far away," she said. - -Presently Herbert spoke again with great cheerfulness. - -"I say, Clare. It's a funny thing!" - -"What's a funny thing?" asked Clare, smiling at him. - -"Why, I was reading the advertisements in the paper to-night---" - -"Were _they_ funny?" asked Clare. - -"No," said Herbert, "but I saw something that would just suit us." - -He went over to a side-table and picked up the newspaper. Sitting on the -edge of the table, he read out an advertisement. - -"Here it is.... 'Chelsea--Semi-detached house, dining-room, -drawing-room, three bedrooms, and a large nursery. Shed for bicycle or -perambulator.'" - -Clare laughed happily. - -"Well, we might have both!" she said. - -Herbert dropped the paper, came over to his wife, and kissed her hands -again. - -THE END - - - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Eighth Year, by Philip Gibbs - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EIGHTH YEAR *** - -***** This file should be named 51926-8.txt or 51926-8.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/1/9/2/51926/ - -Produced by David Widger, from page images generously -provided by Google Books - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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Thus, we do not -necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper -edition. - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search -facility: www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. - diff --git a/old/51926-8.zip b/old/51926-8.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 327f39f..0000000 --- a/old/51926-8.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/51926-h.zip b/old/51926-h.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 15d4875..0000000 --- a/old/51926-h.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/51926-h/51926-h.htm b/old/51926-h/51926-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index 9769f26..0000000 --- a/old/51926-h/51926-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,8044 +0,0 @@ -<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> - -<!DOCTYPE html - PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" - "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > - -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> - <head> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=UTF-8" /> - <title> - The Eighth Year, by Philip Gibbs - </title> - <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> - - body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} - P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } - H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } - hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} - .foot { margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 5%; text-align: justify; font-size: 80%; font-style: italic;} - blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} - .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} - .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} - .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} - .xx-small {font-size: 60%;} - .x-small {font-size: 75%;} - .small {font-size: 85%;} - .large {font-size: 115%;} - .x-large {font-size: 130%;} - .indent5 { margin-left: 5%;} - .indent10 { margin-left: 10%;} - .indent15 { margin-left: 15%;} - .indent20 { margin-left: 20%;} - .indent30 { margin-left: 30%;} - .indent40 { margin-left: 40%;} - div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } - div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } - .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} - .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} - .pagenum {position: absolute; right: 1%; font-size: 0.6em; - font-variant: normal; font-style: normal; - text-align: right; background-color: #FFFACD; - border: 1px solid; padding: 0.3em;text-indent: 0em;} - .side { float: left; font-size: 75%; width: 15%; padding-left: 0.8em; - border-left: dashed thin; text-align: left; - text-indent: 0; font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; - font-weight: bold; color: black; background: #eeeeee; border: solid 1px;} - .head { float: left; font-size: 90%; width: 98%; padding-left: 0.8em; - border-left: dashed thin; text-align: center; - text-indent: 0; font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; - font-weight: bold; color: black; background: #eeeeee; border: solid 1px;} - p.pfirst, p.noindent {text-indent: 0} - span.dropcap { float: left; margin: 0 0.1em 0 0; line-height: 0.8 } - pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} - -</style> - </head> - <body> - - -<pre> - -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Eighth Year, by Philip Gibbs - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - - - -Title: The Eighth Year - A Vital Problem Of Married Life - -Author: Philip Gibbs - -Release Date: May 1, 2016 [EBook #51926] -Last Updated: November 6, 2016 - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EIGHTH YEAR *** - - - - -Produced by David Widger, from page images generously -provided by Google Books - - - - - - -</pre> - - <div style="height: 8em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h1> - THE EIGHTH YEAR - </h1> - <h3> - A Vital Problem Of Married Life - </h3> - <h2> - By Philip Gibbs - </h2> - <h4> - New York - </h4> - <h4> - The Devin-Adair Company 437 Fifth Avenue - </h4> - <h3> - 1913 - </h3> - <p> - <br /> <br /> - </p> - <blockquote> - <p> - “The Eighth Year is the most dangerous year in the adventure of - marriage.” - </p> - <p> - Sir Francis Jeune (afterwards Lord St. Helier). President of the Divorce - Court. - </p> - </blockquote> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <p> - <b>CONTENTS</b> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_PART"> <b>PART I—THE ARGUMENT</b> </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0001"> CHAPTER I </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0002"> CHAPTER II </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0003"> CHAPTER III </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0004"> CHAPTER IV </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0005"> CHAPTER V </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0006"> CHAPTER VI </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0007"> CHAPTER VII </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0008"> CHAPTER VIII </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0009"> CHAPTER IX </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0010"> CHAPTER X </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0011"> CHAPTER XI </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0012"> CHAPTER XII </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0013"> CHAPTER XIII </a> - </p> - <p> - <br /> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_PART2"> <b>PART II—A DEMONSTRATION</b> </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0014"> CHAPTER I </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0015"> CHAPTER II </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0016"> CHAPTER III </a> - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_PART" id="link2H_PART"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - PART I—THE ARGUMENT - </h2> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER I - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>t was Sir Francis - Jeune, afterwards Lord St. Helier, and President of the Divorce Court, who - first called attention to the strange significance of the Eighth Year of - married life. “The Eighth Year,” he said, “is the most dangerous year in - the adventure of marriage.” - </p> - <p> - Afterwards, in the recent Royal Commission on Divorce, this curious fact - was again alluded to in the evidence, and it has been shown by statistics - of domestic tragedy, by hundreds of sordid little dramas, that at this - period in the partnership of husbands and wives there comes, in many - cases, a great crisis, leading often to moral disaster. - </p> - <p> - It is in the Eighth Year, or thereabouts, that there is the tug-of-war - between two temperaments, mated by the law, but not mated, perhaps, in - ideals, in ambitions, or in qualities of character. The man and woman pull - against each other, tugging at each other’s heartstrings. The Eighth Year - is the fatal year, when if there is no give-and-take, no working - compromise, no new pledges of loyalty and comradeship, the foundations of - the home are shattered, and the hopes with which it was first built lie in - ruins like a house of cards knocked down by a gust of wind. - </p> - <p> - But why the Eighth Year? Why not the twelfth, fourteenth, or eighteenth - year? The answer is not to be found in any old superstition. There is - nothing uncanny about the number eight. The problem is not to be shrugged - off by people who despise the foolish old tradition which clings to - thirteen, and imagine this to be in the same class of folly. By the law of - averages and by undeniable statistics it has been proved that it brings - many broken-hearted men and women to the Divorce Court. For instance, - taking the annual average of divorces in England between 1904 and 1908, - one finds that there were only six divorces between husbands and wives who - had been married less than a year, and only eighteen divorces between - those married less than two years. Between the second and the fifth years - the number increases to a hundred and seventeen. Then there is a - tremendous jump, and the numbers between the fifth and tenth years are two - hundred and ninety-two. The period of the Eighth Year is the most - productive of divorce. The figures are more startling and more significant - when they cover a longer period. But apart from statistics and apart - altogether from the Divorce Court, which is only one house of trouble, by - using one’s own eyes in one’s own circle of friends one may see that young - married couples who started happily enough show signs of stress and strain - as this year approaches. The fact is undeniable. What is the cause behind - the fact? - </p> - <p> - There is not one cause, there are many causes, all leading up from the - first day of marriage, inevitably, with the unswerving, relentless - fatality of Greek Tragedy to the Eighth Year. They are causes which lie - deep in the social system of our modern home life; in the little order of - things prevailing, at this time, in hundreds of thousands of small - households and small flats, inhabited by the middle-classes. It is mainly - a middle-class problem, because the rich and the poor are, for reasons - which I will show later in this argument, exempt in a large measure from - the fatality of the Eighth Year. But all the influences at work among the - middle-classes, in this strange age of intellectual disturbance, and of - blind gropings forward to new social and moral conditions, have a close - hearing upon this seeming mystery. The economic position of this class, - its social ambitions, its intellectual adventures, its general education, - its code of morality, its religion or lack of religion, its little - conventional cults, the pressure of outside influences, thrusting inwards - to the hidden life in these little homes, bringing dangerous ideas through - the front doors, or through the keyholes, and all the mental and moral - vibrations that are “in the air” to-day, especially in the air breathed by - the middle-classes, produce—the Eighth Year. - </p> - <p> - Let us start with the first year of marriage so that we may see how the - problem works out from the beginning. - </p> - <p> - Here we have, in the first year, a young man and woman who have come - together, not through any overmastering force of passion, but as - middle-class men and women are mostly brought together, by the accidents - of juxtaposition, and by a pleasant sentiment. They met, before marriage, - at tennis parties, at suburban dances, at evening At Homes. By the laws of - natural selection, aided a little by anxious mothers, this young man and - this young woman find out, or think they find out, that they are “suited” - to each other. That is to say, the young man thrills in a pleasant way in - the presence of the girl, and she sees the timidity in his eyes when she - looks at him, and she knows that her laughter, the touch of her hand, the - little tricks and graces she has learnt from girl-friends, or from - actresses in musical comedy, or from instinct, attract him to her. She - leads him on, by absurd little tiffs, artfully arranged, by a pretence of - flirtation with other boys, by provocative words, by moments of tenderness - changing abruptly to sham indifference, or followed by little shafts of - satire which wound his pride, and sting him into desire for her. He - pursues her, not knowing that he is pursued, so that they meet half-way. - This affair makes him restless, ill at ease. It interrupts his work and - his ambitions. Presently it becomes an obsession, and he knows that he has - “fallen in love.” He makes his plans accordingly. - </p> - <p> - In the middle-classes love still presupposes marriage (though the idea is - not so fast-rooted as in the old days), but how the dickens is he to - manage it? He is just starting his career as Something in the City, or as - a solicitor, barrister, journalist, artist, doctor. His income is barely - sufficient for himself, according to his way of life, which includes - decent clothes, a club, a game of golf when he feels like it, a - motor-cycle or a small car, a holiday abroad, theatres, a bachelor dinner - now and again—the usual thing. He belongs to the younger generation, - with wider interests, larger ideas, higher ambitions than those with which - his father and mother started life. - </p> - <p> - He could not start on their level. Times have changed. He remembers his - father’s reminiscences of early struggles, of the ceaseless anxiety to - make both ends meet, of the continual stinting and scraping to keep the - children “decent,” to provide them with a good education, to give them a - fair start in life. He remembers his mother in his own childhood. She was - always mending stockings. There was always a litter of needlework on the - dining-room table after supper. - </p> - <p> - There were times when she “did” without a maid, and exhausted herself with - domestic drudgery. There were no foreign holidays then, only a week or two - at the seaside once a year. There was precious little pocket money for the - boys. They were conscious of their shabby gentility, and hated it. - </p> - <p> - The modern young man looks with a kind of horror upon all this domestic - squalor, as he calls it. He couldn’t stand it. If marriage means that for - him he will have none of it. But need it mean that? He and Winifred will - scheme out their lives differently. They will leave out the baby side of - the business—until they can afford to indulge in it. They will live - in a little flat, and furnish it, if necessary, on the hire system. They - will cut out the domestic drudgery. They will enjoy the fun of life, and - shelve the responsibilities until they are able to pay for them. After all - it will not be long before he is earning a good income. He has got his - feet on the first rang of the ladder, and, with a little luck—— - </p> - <p> - So he proposes to the girl, and she pretends to be immensely surprised, - though she has been eating her heart out while he hesitated, and delayed, - and pondered. They pledge each other, “till death do us part,” and the - girl, who has been reading a great many novels lately, is very happy - because her own plot is working out according to the rules of romance. - </p> - <p> - They live in a world of romance before the marriage day. The man seems to - walk on air when he crosses London Bridge on his way to the City. Or if he - is a barrister he sees the beauty of his girl’s face in his brief—and - is in danger of losing his case. Or if a journalist he curses his - irregular hours which keep him from the little house in Tulse Hill, or the - flat in Hampstead, where there is a love-light in the windows. He knows - the outward look of the girl, her softness, her prettiness, her shy glance - when he greets her. He knows her teasing ways, her tenderness, her - vivacity. Only now and then he is startled by her stupidity, or by her - innocence, or by her ignorance, or—still more startling—by her - superior wisdom of the ways of the world, by her shrewd little words, by a - sudden revelation of knowledge about things which girls are not supposed - to know. - </p> - <p> - But these things do not count. Only sentiment and romance are allowed to - count. These two people who are about to start on the long road of life - together are utterly blind to each other’s vices or virtues. They are - deeply ignorant of each other’s soul. They know nothing of the real man or - the real woman hidden beneath the mask of social conventions, beneath the - delightful, sham of romantic affection. They know nothing of their own - souls, nor of the strength that is in them to stand the test of life’s - realities. They know nothing of their own weakness. - </p> - <p> - So they marry. - </p> - <p> - And for the first year they are wonderfully happy. For the first year is - full of excitement. They thrill to the great adventure of marriage. They - are uplifted with passionate love which seems likely to last for ever. - They have a thousand little interests. Even the trivialities of - domesticity are immensely important. Even the little disasters of - domesticity are amusing. They find a lot of laughter in life. They laugh - at the absurd mistakes of the servant-maids who follow in quick - succession. They laugh at their own ridiculous miscalculations with regard - to the expense of house-keeping. They laugh when visitors call at awkward - moments and when the dinner is spoilt by an inefficient cook. After all, - the comradeship of a young man and wife is the best thing in life, and - nothing else seems to matter. They are such good comrades that the husband - never leaves his wife a moment in his leisure time. He takes her to the - theatre with him. They spend week-ends together, far from the madding - crowd. They pluck the flowers of life, hand in hand, as lovers. The first - year merges into the second. Not yet do they know each other. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER II - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>t is in the third - and fourth year that they begin to find each other out. The bright fires - of their passion have died down, burning with a fitful glow, burning low. - Until then they had been lovers to each other, hidden from each other by - the illusions of romantic love. It was inconceivable that the man could be - anything but kind, and tender, and patient, and considerate. It was - inconceivable that he could hold any but the noblest ideals, the most - exalted aspirations, the most generous sentiments. He had been so wise, so - witty, and so gay. - </p> - <p> - And to the man it had seemed that the woman by his side was gifted with - all the virtues. At least she had been eager to please him, to satisfy his - least desire, to bend to his will. She had pandered to his vanity, fed his - self-conceit, listened to his opinions on all the subjects of life as - though they were inspired. If he had been kept out late at work he had - found her waiting for him, quick to put her arms about him, to cry out, - “Oh, my poor dear, how tired you must be?” She had been grateful to him - for all his little gifts, for all his words of love. And he had seen her - as a beautiful thing, without flaw or blemish. He had worshipped at the - foot of the pedestal on which he had placed her in his ideals. - </p> - <p> - But now both the husband and wife begin to see each other, not as lovers, - but as man and woman. It is rather disturbing. It is distressing to the - young wife to discover, gradually, by a series of little accidents, that - this man with whom she has to live all her life is not made of different - clay from other men, that he is made of the same clay. One by one all the - little romantic illusions out of which she had built up the false image of - him, from the heroes of sentimental fiction, from the dreams of girlhood, - are stripped from him, until he stands bare before her, the natural man. - She does not like the natural man at first. It is quite a long time before - she can reconcile herself to the thought that she is mated to a natural - man, with a touch of brutality, with little meannesses, with moods of - irritability, with occasional bad tempers, when he uses bad words. She - sees, too clearly for her spiritual comfort, that they are not - “twin-souls.” They have not been made in the same mould. His childhood was - different from her childhood, his upbringing from her upbringing. She sees - that in little things—mere trifles, but monstrously annoying, such - as his untidy habits, the carelessness with which he flicks his cigarette - ash about the carpet, the familiarity with which he speaks to the - servant-maid. She begins to dislike some of his personal habits—the - way in which he sneezes, his habit of shaving after breakfast instead of - before breakfast, his habit of reading the newspaper at the breakfast - table instead of chatting with her as he used to do about the programme - for the day. In things less trivial she finds out that her first ideal of - him was false. They do not think alike on the great subjects of life. He - is a Radical and she is Conservative, by education and upbringing. It - hurts her when he argues with revolutionary ideas which seem to her - positively wicked, and subversive of all morality. He has loose views - about morality in general, and is very tolerant about lapses from the - old-fashioned moral code. That hurts her too—horribly. It begins to - undermine the foundations of her faith in what used to seem the essential - truth of things. But, above all, it hurts her to realize that she and her - husband are not one, in mind and body, but utterly different, in - temperament, in their outlook on life, in their fundamental principles and - ideas. - </p> - <p> - On the other side the husband makes unpleasant discoveries. He finds out, - with a shock, that he was utterly ignorant of the girl whom he asked to be - his wife, and that this woman who sits at his breakfast-table is not the - same woman as the one who dwelt in his imagination, even as the one who - lived with him during the first and second year. She has lost her coyness, - her little teasing ways, her girlish vivacity. She begins to surprise him - by a hard common-sense, and no longer responds so easily to his old - romantic moods. He can no longer be certain of her smiles and her - tenderness when he speaks the old love-words. She begins to challenge his - authority, not deliberately, nor openly, but by ignoring his hints, or by - disregarding his advice. - </p> - <p> - She even challenges his opinions, and that is a shock to him. It is a blow - to his vanity. - </p> - <p> - It takes down his self-conceit more than a peg or two, especially when he - has to acknowledge, secretly, that she is in the right, as sometimes - happens. He finds out faults in her now—a touch of selfishness, a - trace of arrogance, an irritability of temper of which he has to be - careful, especially when she is in a nervous state of health. They begin - to quarrel rather frequently about absurd things, about things that do not - matter a brass farthing. Some of these quarrels reach passionate heights - and leave them both exhausted, wondering rather blankly what it was all - about. Then the wife cries a little, and the husband kisses her. - </p> - <p> - By the end of the fourth year they know each other pretty well. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER III - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>n the fifth and - sixth years they have settled down to the jog-trot of the married life. - Not yet do they see the shadow of the Eighth Year looming ahead. They have - faced the reality of life, and knowing each other as they really are have - made a working compromise. Their love has steadied down to a more even - flame, and passion is almost extinguished. They have decided to play the - game, according to the creed of their class, exactly as their neighbors - are playing it. - </p> - <p> - It is largely a game of bluff, as it is played in thousands of small - households. It is a game, also, of consequences, as I shall have to show. - It consists in keeping up appearances, in going one better than one’s - neighbor whenever possible, and in making a claim to a higher rung of the - social ladder than is justified by the husband’s income and rank in life. - It is the creed of snobbishness. For this creed everything is sacrificed—contentment - of mind, the pleasure of life, the little children of life. - </p> - <p> - In many flats of Intellectual Mansions, and even in the small houses of - the “well-to-do” suburbs, children do not enter into the scheme of things. - The “babies have been left out of the business.” For people who are - keeping up appearances to the last penny of their income cannot afford to - be burdened by babies. Besides, they interfere seriously with social - ladder-climbing, drag down a married couple of the younger generation to - the domestic squalor of their parents’ early life. The husband cannot bear - the thought that his wife should have to make beds in the morning and mend - stockings in the evening, and wheel out a perambulator in the park. It is - so very “low down.” The husband wants to save his wife from all this - domestic drudgery. He wants her to look pretty in the frocks he buys her. - He wants her to wear more expensive frocks than any other woman in his - circle of friends. He likes to hear his friends say, “How charming your - wife looks to-night, old man!” and to hear elderly ladies say to his wife, - “What a beautiful gown you are wearing, my dear!” - </p> - <p> - He is working hard now in order to furnish his wife’s wardrobe—not - only for her pleasure, but for his pride. After the first romance of love, - ambition comes to gild reality. He is ambitious to build up a beautiful - little home. The furniture with which they started married life on the - hire system has been bought and paid for, and is now replaced here and - there by “genuine antiques.” He puts some good prints on his walls and - buys some water-color sketches, and becomes in a small way a patron of the - arts. It is pleasant during one of his wife’s evening At Homes to take a - guest on one side and say “What do you think of that? Pretty good, eh? - It’s an original, by Verdant Green, you know.” - </p> - <p> - He has urged upon his wife the necessity of giving <i>recherché</i> little - dinners, to which he can invite friends better off than himself, and - distinguished guests whom he wishes to impress. As he explains to his - wife, “one has to do these things.” And he does them rather well, paying - some attention to his wines—he keeps a good dinner claret—and - to his cigars, which he buys at the stores. He also suggests to his wife - that now she has an extra servant she had better establish a weekly At - Home, an informal little affair, but pleasant and useful, because it shows - the world, their world, that they are getting on in the social scale. Here - again, distinguished visitors may be invited to “drop in.” It is good for - business. A pretty, well-dressed wife makes a favourable impression upon - solicitors who have briefs to give away or upon wealthy clients. One must - keep up appearances, and make a good show. Besides, it is pleasant to put - on evening clothes after a hard day’s work and to play the host. It gives - a man some return for all his toil. It gives him a reason for living. And - it brightens up one’s home-life. “Man does not live by bread alone,” he - must have some cakes and ale, so to speak. - </p> - <p> - But it is expensive. As every year of marriage passes, the expenses - increase, steadily, miraculously. It is difficult to account for them, but - there they are, facing a man in his quarterly reckoning. And the two ends - must be made to meet, by extra work, by putting one’s nose down to the - grindstone. The husband does not come home so soon as he used to do in the - early days. But he has the satisfaction of knowing that while he is away - at work his wife is keeping up his social reputation and doing all the - things which a lady in her station of life is expected to do. He thanks - heaven that his wife is happy. - </p> - <p> - She is not unhappy, this wife, in the fifth and sixth year of marriage. - After the first romantic illusions failed her she settled down quietly - enough to play the game. It is quite interesting, quite amusing. Now and - again queer doubts assail her, and she has strange flutterings at the - heart, and little pinpricks of conscience. It is about the question of - motherhood. Perhaps it would be better for her to have a baby. However, - she has threshed out the question a hundred times with her husband, and he - has decided that he cannot afford a family yet, and after all the flat <i>is</i> - very small. Besides, she shirks the idea herself—all the pain of it, - and the trouble of it.... She thrusts down these queer doubts, does not - listen to the flutterings at the heart, ignores the little pinpricks of - conscience. She turns quickly to the interests of her social life and - falls easily into the habit of pleasant laziness, filling her day with - little futile things, which seem to satisfy her heart and brain. When her - husband has gone to business she dresses herself rather elaborately for a - morning stroll, manicures her nails, tries a new preparation for the - complexion, alters a feather, or a flower, in one of her hats, studies - herself in the glass, and is pleased with herself. It passes the time. - Then she saunters forth, and goes to the shops, peering in through the - great plate-glass windows at the latest display of lingerie, of evening - gowns, of millinery. She fancies herself in some of the new hats from - Paris. One or two of them attract her especially. She makes a mental note - of them. She will ask her husband to let her buy one of them. After all - Mrs. Fitzmaurice had a new hat only last week—the second in one - month. She will tell him that. It will pique him, for there is a rather - amusing rivalry between the Fitzmaurices and them. - </p> - <p> - So the morning passes until luncheon, when she props the morning newspaper - against the water-jug, reading the titbits of news and the fashion page - while she eats her meal, rather nicely cooked by the new servant, and - daintily served by the little housemaid. Another hour of the day passes, - and it is the afternoon. - </p> - <p> - She lies down for half an hour with the latest novel from Mudie’s. It has - a good plot, and is a rather exciting love-story. It brings back romance - to her. For a little while she forgets the reality which she has learnt - since her own romantic days. Here love is exactly what she imagined it to - he, thrilling, joyous, never-changing. The hero is exactly what she - imagined her husband to be—before he was her husband—strong, - gentle, noble, high-souled, immensely patient. And after many little - troubles, misadventures, cross-purposes, and strange happenings, marriage - is the great reward, the splendid compensation. After this the hero and - heroine live happily ever afterwards, till death does them part, and—there - is nothing more to be said. The novel ends with the marriage bells. - </p> - <p> - She knows that her novel has not ended with the marriage hells, that, in - fact, the plot is only just beginning as far as she is concerned. But she - does not allow herself to think of that. She revels in romantic fiction, - and reads novel after novel at the rate of three a week. Occasionally one - of these novels gives her a nasty shock, for it deals with realism rather - than romance, and reveals the hearts of women rather like herself, and the - tragedies of women rather like herself, and the truth of things, in a - cold, white light. She reads the book with burning eyes. It makes her - pulse beat. It seems rather a wicked book, it is so horribly truthful, not - covering even the nakedness of facts with a decent layer of sentiment, but - exposing them brutally, with a terrible candor. She hates the book. It - makes her think of things she has tried to forget. It revives those queer - doubts, and makes her conscience prick again. She is glad when she has - sent it back to the library and taken out another novel, of the harmless - kind, in the old style. She lulls her conscience to sleep by the dear old - love-stories, or by the musical comedies and the costume-plays to which - she goes with one of her girl-friends on Wednesday or Saturday matinées. - </p> - <p> - She goes to the theatre a good deal now, because she is living more - independently of her husband. That is to say she no longer waits for his - home-coming, as in her first days of marriage, with an impatient desire. - She has long seen that they cannot be all in all to each other, sharing - all pleasures, or having none. He has realized that, too, and goes to his - club at least once a week—sometimes more often, to enjoy the society - of men, to get a little “Bohemianism,” as he calls it. - </p> - <p> - She has made her own circle of friends now, the young wives of men like - her husband, and many of her afternoons are taken up with little rounds of - visits, when she is amused by the tittle-tattle of these wives, by their - little tales and scandals, by their gossips about servants, frocks and - theatres. - </p> - <p> - She, too, has social ambitions like her husband. Her evenings At Home are - agreeable adventures when she is pleased with the homage of her husband’s - friends. She takes some trouble with her little dinner-parties and writes - out the <i>menus</i> with a good deal of care, and arranges the flowers, - and occasionally looks into the kitchen to give a word to the cook. She - wears her new evening gown and smiles at her husband’s compliments, with - something of her old tenderness. After one of these evening At Homes the - husband and wife have moments of loving comradeship like those in the - first days of their marriage. It is a pity that some trivial accident or - dispute causes ill-temper at the breakfast-table. - </p> - <p> - But, on the whole, they play the game rather well in the fifth and sixth - years of their married life. The husband takes the rough with the smooth. - In spite of occasional bad tempers, in spite of grievances which are - growing into habits of mind, he is a good fellow and—he thanks - heaven his wife is happy. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER IV - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>t is the seventh - year. The wife is still doing exactly what she did in the fifth and sixth - years. Her daily routine is exactly the same. Except that she can afford - extra little luxuries now, and indulge in more expensive kinds of pleasure—stalls - at the theatre instead of seats in the pit, an occasional visit to the - opera, an easy yielding to temptations in the way of hats. Her husband has - been “getting on,” and he is glad to give her what she wants. - </p> - <p> - But somehow or other she is beginning to realize that she has not got what - she wants. She does not know what she wants, but she knows that there is a - great lack of something in her life. She is still “playing the game,” but - there is no longer the same sport in it. The sharp edge of her interest in - things has worn off. It has been dulled down. She goes languidly through - the days and a matinée jaunt no longer thrills her with a little - excitement. The plays are so boring, full of stale old plots, stale old - women, stale old tricks. She is sick of them. She still reads a great - number of romantic novels, but how insufferably tedious they have become! - How false they are! How cloying is all this sickly sentiment! She searches - about for the kind of novel which used to frighten her, problem novels, - dangerous novels, novels dealing with real problems of life. They still - frighten her a little, some of them, but she likes the sensation. She - wants more of it. She wants to plunge deeper into the dangerous problems, - to get nearer to the truth of things. She broods over their revelations. - She searches out the meaning of their suggestions, their hints, their - innuendoes. It is like drug-drinking. This poisonous fiction stimulates - her for a little while, until the effect of it has worn off and leaves her - with an aching head. Her head often aches now. And her heart aches—though - goodness knows why. Everything is so stale. The gossip of her women - friends is, oh—so stale! She has heard all their stories about all - their servants, all their philosophy about the servant problem in general, - all their shallow little views about life, and love, and marriage. She has - found them all out, their vanities, their little selfish ways, their - little lies and shams and fooleries. They are exactly like herself. She - has been brought up in the same code, shaped in the same mould, cut out to - the same pattern. Their ideas are her ideas. Their ways of life her ways. - They bore her exceedingly. - </p> - <p> - She is bored by things which for a time were very pleasant. It is, for - instance, boring to go shopping in the morning. It is annoying to her to - see her own wistful, moody eyes in the plate-glass windows, and in the - pier-glasses. She has not lost her love of pretty frocks and pretty - things, but it bores her to think that her husband does not notice them so - much, and that she has to wear them mostly to please herself. She is tired - of the little compliments paid to her by her husband’s middle-aged - friends. She has begun to find her husband’s friends very dull people - indeed. Most of all is she bored by those evening At Homes with their - familiar ritual—the girl who wants to sing but pleads a bad cold, - the woman who wants to play but says she is so fearfully “out of - practice,” the man who asks the name of a piece which he has heard a score - of times, the well-worn jokes, the well-known opinions on things which do - not matter, the light refreshments, the thanks for “a pleasant evening.” - Oh, those pleasant evenings! How she hates them! - </p> - <p> - She is beginning to hate this beautiful little home of hers. The very - pictures on the walls set her nerves on edge. She has stared at them so - often. She wishes to goodness that Marcus Stone’s lovers on an - old-fashioned stone seat would go and drown themselves in the distant - lake. But they do not move. They sit smirking at each other, eternally. - She wishes with all her heart that the big Newfoundland dog over there - would bite the fluffy haired child who says “Does ‘oo talk?” But it will - not even bark. She stares at the pattern on the carpet, when a Mudie’s - novel lies on her lap, and comes to detest the artificial roses on the - trellis-work. She digs her heels into one of them. If the roses were real - she would pluck them leaf by leaf and scatter the floor with them. The - ticking of the clock on the mantelshelf irritates her. It seems a reproach - to her. It seems to be counting up her waste of time. - </p> - <p> - She stays more at home, in spite of hating it, because she is beginning to - loathe her round of visits. She feels lonely and wishes her husband would - come home. Why does he stay so late at the office now? Surely it isn’t - necessary? When he comes home she is so snappy and irritable that he - becomes silent over the dinner-table, and then she quarrels with him for - his silence. After dinner he sits over his papers, thinking out some - knotty point of business, which he does not discuss with her as in the old - days. He buries his nose in the evening paper, and reads all the - advertisements, and is very dull and uninteresting. Yet she nourishes a - grievance when he goes off on his club-nights and comes home in the early - hours of the morning, cheerful and talkative when she wants to go to - sleep. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER V - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>n some cases, - indeed in many cases, the presence of an “outsider” adds to the - unhappiness of the wife and divides her still more from her husband. It is - the presence of the mother-in-law. - </p> - <p> - She, poor soul, has had a terrible time, and no one until now has said a - good word for her. The red-nosed comedian of the music-hall has used her - for his most gross vulgarities, sure that whenever he mentions her name he - will raise guffaws from the gallery, and evoke shrieks of ill-natured - merriment from young women in the pit. In the pantomimes the man dressed - up as a woman indulges in long monologues upon his mother-in-law as the - source of all domestic unhappiness, as the origin of all quarrels between - husbands and wives, as the greatest nuisance in modern life, and so long - as he patters about the mother-in-law the audience enjoys itself vastly. - </p> - <p> - It is idle to pretend that the mother-in-law is a blessing in a small - household. I am bound to admit that the success of the rednosed comedian - who uses her as his text is due to the truth which lies hidden beneath his - absurdity. He raises roars of laughter because the people who make up his - audience realize that he is giving a touch of humor to something which is - a grim tragedy, and according to the psychology of humor this is - irresistibly comic, just as the most primitive and laughter-compelling - jokes deal with corpses, and funerals, and death made ridiculous. They - have suffered from their own mothers-in-law, those elderly women who sit - in the corner with watchful eyes upon the young wives, those critics of - their sons’ marriages, those eavesdroppers of the first quarrel, and of - all the quarrels that follow the first, those oracles of unwelcome wisdom, - whose advice about household affairs, about the way of dealing with the - domestic servants, with constant references to <i>their</i> young days, - are a daily exasperation to young married women. - </p> - <p> - All that is painfully true. In many cases the mother-in-law becomes so - terrible an incubus in small households that domestic servants leave with - unfailing regularity before their month is “up,” husbands make a habit of - being late at the office, and wives are seriously tempted to take to - drink. - </p> - <p> - But what of the mother-in-law herself? Is <i>she</i> to be envied? Did she - willingly become a mother-in-law? Alas, her tragedy is as great as that of - the young wife upon whose nerves she gets so badly, as great as that of - the young husband who finds his home-life insufferable because of her - presence. - </p> - <p> - For the mother-in-law is a prisoner of fate. She is the unwanted guest. - She is dependent upon the charity of those who find her a daily nuisance. - During the days of her own married life she devoted herself to her husband - and children, stinted and scraped for them, moulded them according to her - ideals of righteousness, exacted obedience to her motherly commands, and - was sure of their love. Then, one day, death knocked at the door, and - brought black horses into the street. After that day, when her man was - taken from her, she became dependent upon her eldest son, but did not yet - feel the slavery of the dependence. - </p> - <p> - For he paid the debt of gratitude gratefully, and kept up the little home. - </p> - <p> - But one day she noticed that he did not come home so early, and that when - he came home he was absent-minded. He fell into the habit of spending his - evenings out, and his mother wondered, and was anxious. He was not so - careful about her comforts, and she was hurt. Then one day he came home - and said, “Mother, I am going to get married,” and she knew that her - happiness was at an end. For she knew, with a mother’s intuition, that the - love which had been in her boy’s heart for her must now be shared with - another woman, and that instead of having the first place in his life, she - would have the second place. - </p> - <p> - For a little while her jealousy is like that of a woman robbed of her - lover. She hides it, and hides her hate for that girl whose simpering - smile, whose prettiness, whose coy behavior, light fires in her son’s - eyes, and set his pulse beating, and make him forgetful of his mother. - </p> - <p> - Then the marriage takes place and the mother who has dreaded the day knows - that it is her funeral. For she is like a queen whose prerogatives and - privileges have been taken away by the death of the king, and by the - accession of a new queen. Her place is taken from her. Her home is broken - up. She is moved, with the furniture, into the new home, put into the - second-best bedroom, and arranged to suit the convenience of the new - household in which another woman is mistress. - </p> - <p> - She knows already that she has begun to be a nuisance, and it is like a - sharp dagger in her heart. She knows that the young wife is as jealous of - her as she is of the young wife, because her son cannot break himself of - the habit of obedience, cannot give up that respect for his mother’s - principles and advice and wisdom, which is part of the very fibre of his - being, because in any domestic crisis the son turns more readily to the - mother than to the young woman who is a newcomer in his life, and in any - domestic quarrel he takes the mother’s part rather than the wife’s. It is - the law of nature. It cannot be altered, but it is the cause of - heartburning and squalid little tragedies. - </p> - <p> - The mother-in-law, in the corner of the sitting-room, watches the drama of - the married life, and with more experience of life, because of her years, - sees the young wife do foolish things, watches her blundering experiments - in the great adventure of marriage, is vigilant of her failures in - housekeeping, and in the management of her husband. She cannot be quite - tongue-tied. She cannot refrain from criticism, advice, rebuke. Between - the mother-in-law and the daughter-in-law there is a daily warfare of - pinpricks, a feud that grows bitter with the years. - </p> - <p> - But the mother-in-law is helpless. She cannot escape from the lamentable - situation. She must always remain a hindrance, because she needs a roof - over her head, and there is no other roof, and she is dependent for her - daily bread upon the son who is faithful to her, though he is irritable, - moody and sharp of speech, because of the fretfulness of his wife. - </p> - <p> - This is the eternal tragedy of the mother-in-law, which is turned into a - jest by the red-nosed comedian to get the laughter from “the gods.” It is - also a tragedy to the daughter-in-law, who could shriek aloud sometimes - when the presence of the elderly woman becomes intolerable. - </p> - <p> - Many things are becoming intolerable to the young wife. Her nerves are out - of order. Sometimes she feels “queer.” She cannot explain how queer she - feels, even to herself. She says bitter things to her husband, and then - hates herself for doing so. She has a great yearning for his love, but is - very cold when he is in a tender mood. She cannot understand her own - moods. She only knows that she is beginning to get frightened when she - thinks of the long vista of years before her. She cannot go on like this - always. She cannot go on like this very long. She is getting rather - hysterical. She startles her husband by laughing in a queer shrill way - when he expresses some serious opinions, or gives vent to some of his - conventional philosophy, about women, and the duties of married life, and - the abomination of the Suffragettes. But he does not see her tears. He - does not see her one day, when suddenly, after she has been reading a - Mudie’s novel, page after page, without understanding one word, tears well - up into her eyes, and fall upon the pages, until she bends her head down - and puts her hands up to her face, and sobs as though all her heart had - turned to tears. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER VI - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span><i>t is the Eighth - Year</i>. The wife does not know the significance of that. The husband - goes on his way without seeing the ghosts that have invaded his little - household. He is too busy to see. The whole energy of his mind now is - devoted to the business of his life. He must earn money, more money, still - more money, because expenses still keep increasing, by leaps and bounds. - He finds it more and more difficult to cut his coat according to his - cloth. He is often surprised because with a much larger income he seems to - be just as “hard up” as when he started the adventure of marriage. He - wonders, sometimes, whether the game is worth the candle. What does he get - out of it? Precious little. Not much fun. In the evenings he is tired, - although his brain is still worrying over the details of his work, over - his business disappointments and difficulties, and plans. Now and again he - is surprised at the strange quietude and lassitude of his wife. He catches - a look of tragedy in her eyes, and it startles him for a moment, so that - he asks her if she is feeling unwell. She laughs, in a mirthless way, and - seems to resent the question. “Perfectly well, thanks,” she says. He - shrugs his shoulders. He cannot bother about a woman’s whims and moods. - Women are queer kittle-cattle. He can’t make ‘em out. Even his own wife is - a perfect mystery to him. It is a pity they get on each other’s nerves so - much. What more does she want? He has given her everything a woman may - desire—a beautiful little home, many little luxuries, plenty of - pin-money. He does not stint her. It is he that does the stinting. He is - always working for her so that she may play. However—work is best. - To do our job in life is the best philosophy. - </p> - <p> - So the husband has on one side the passing suspicion that something is - wrong with his wife, and the wife hides her heart from him. - </p> - <p> - Something <i>is</i> wrong with her. Everything is wrong, though she does - not know why and how. She feels lonely—horribly lonely in spite of - all her friends. She feels like a woman alone in a great desert with no - other human soul near her, thrust back upon her own thoughts, brooding - over her own misery. There is a great emptiness in her heart, and she has - a great hunger and a great thirst of soul which she cannot satisfy. - Nothing satisfies that empty, barren heart of hers, that throbbing brain. - She has finished with Mudie’s novels. She can find no satisfaction in <i>them</i>. - She revolts from the tittle-tattle of her women friends. That is no longer - amusing. She finds no pleasure in the beauty of her face. It is no longer - beautiful. She hates the sight of her face in the glass. She is afraid of - those big wistful eyes which stare at her. She is sick to death of - dressing herself up. How futile it is! How utterly vain and foolish! - </p> - <p> - She is haunted with ghosts; the ghosts of What-Might-Have-Been. They - whisper about her, so that she puts her hands to her ears, when she is - alone in her drawing-room. Faces peer at her, with mocking eyes, or with - tempting eyes—the faces of men who might have been her lovers, baby - faces of unborn children. Little hands flutter about her heart, pluck at - her, tease her. The ghosts of her girlhood crowd about her, the ghosts of - dead hopes, of young illusions, of romantic dreams. She thrusts them away - from her vision. She puts her hands before her eyes, and moans a little, - quietly, so that the servants in the kitchen shall not hear. - </p> - <p> - She is assailed by strange temptations, horrible temptations, from which - she shrinks back afraid. This hunger and thirst in her soul are so - tormenting that she has frightful cravings for Something to satisfy her - hunger and quench her thirst. She is tempted to take to drink, or to - drugs, to dull the throbbing of her brain, to wake her up out of this - awful lassitude, to give her a momentary excitement and vitality, and then—forgetfulness. - She must have some kind of excitement—to break the awful monotony of - her life, this intolerable dullness of her little home. If only an - adventure would come to her! Some thrilling, perilous adventure, however - wicked, whatever the consequences. She feels the overmastering need of - some passionate emotion. She would like to plunge into romantic love - again, to be set on fire by it. Somewhere about the world is a man who - could save her, some strong man with a masterful way with him, brutal as - well as tender, cruel as well as kind, who would come to her, and clasp - her hands, and capture her. She would lean upon him. She would yield, - willingly.... She tries to crush down these thoughts. She is horrified at - the evil in them. Oh, she is a bad woman! Even in her loneliness her face - scorches with shame. She gives a faint cry to God to save her. But again - and again the devilish thoughts leer up in her brain. She begins to - believe that the devil is really busy with her and that she cannot escape - him. - </p> - <p> - She has a strange sense of impending peril, of something that is going to - happen. She knows that something <i>must</i> happen. - </p> - <p> - In this Eighth Year she is in a state bordering on hysteria, when anything - may happen to her. Even her husband is beginning to get alarmed. He is at - last awakened out of his self-complacency. He is beginning to watch her, - with a vague uneasiness. Why does she look so queerly at him sometimes as - though she hated him? Why does she say such bitter, cruel, satirical - things, which stab him and leave a poison in the wound? Why does she get - into such passionate rages about trivial things, and then reveal a - passionate remorse? Why does she sink into long silences, sitting with her - hands in her lap, staring at the pattern on the carpet, as though it had - put a spell upon her? He cannot understand. She says there is nothing - wrong with her health, she refuses to see a doctor. She scoffs at the idea - of going away for a little holiday to the seaside. She says it would bore - her to death. Once she bursts into tears and weeps on his shoulder. But - she cannot, or will not, explain the cause of her tears, so that he - becomes impatient with her and talks to her roughly, though he is sorry - afterwards. He begins to see now that marriage is a difficult game. - Perhaps they were not suited to each other. They married too young, before - they had understood each other.... However they have got to make the best - of it now. That is the law of life—to make the best of it. - </p> - <p> - So in the Eighth Year the husband tries to take a common-sense view of - things, not knowing that in the Eighth Year it is too late for common - sense as far as the wife is concerned. She wants uncommon sense. Only some - tremendous and extraordinary influence, spiritual, or moral, or - intellectual, beyond the limits of ordinary common sense, may save her - from the perils in her own heart. She must find a way of escape, for these - unsatisfied yearnings, for this beating heart, for this throbbing brain. - Her little home has become a cage to her. Her husband has become her - jailer. Her life has become too narrow, too petty, too futile. In the - Eighth Year she must find a way of escape—anyhow, anywhere. And in - the Eighth Year the one great question is in what direction will she go? - There are many ways of escape. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER VII - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">O</span>ne way of escape - is through the door of the Divorce Court. Sir Francis Jeune, when he was - President of the Divorce Court, saw before him many of these escaping - women, and he noted down the fact about the Eighth Year; and sitting there - with an impassive face, but watchful eyes, he saw the characters in all - these little tragedies and came to know the type and the plot from - constant reiteration. Sometimes the plot varied, but only in accidentals, - never in essentials. As the story was rehearsed before him, it always - began in the same way, with a happy year or two of marriage. Then it was - followed by the first stress and strain. Then there came the drifting - apart, the little naggings, the quarrels, the misunderstandings, until the - wife—it was generally the wife—became bored, lonely, - emotional, hysterical, and an easy victim for the first fellow with a - roving eye, a smooth tongue, and an easy conscience. The procession still - goes on, the long procession of women who try to escape through the - Divorce Court door. Every year they come, and the same story is told and - retold with sickening repetition. In most cases they are childless wives. - That is proved, beyond dispute, by all statistics of divorce. Sometimes - they have one or two children, but those cases are much more rare. But - even when there are children to complicate the issues and to be the heirs - of these tragedies, the causes behind the tragedies are the same. The - woman has had idle hands in her lap before the Eighth Year of marriage has - been reached. In the early years her little home was enough to satisfy her - mind and heart, and her interests were enough to keep her busy. The coming - of the first child, and of the second, if there is a second, was for a - time sufficient to crowd her day with little duties and to prevent any - restlessness or any deadly boredom. All went well while she had but one - maidservant, and while her husband’s feet were still on the lower rungs of - the ladder. But the trouble began with the arrival of the extra servant - and with the promotion of her husband. It began when gradually she handed - over domestic duties to paid people, when she was seldom in the kitchen - and more in the drawing-room, when the children were put under the charge - of a nurse, and when the responsibilities of motherhood had become a - sinecure. The fact must be faced that a child is not always a cure for the - emptiness of a woman’s heart, nor an absolute pledge of fidelity between - husband and wife. These women who seek a way of escape from their little - homes are not always brought to that position by the unfulfilled instincts - of motherhood. For many of them have no instincts of motherhood. They feel - no great natural desire to have a child. They even shrink from the idea of - motherhood, and plead their lack of courage, their ill-health, their - weakness. With their husbands they are partners in a childless scheme, or - if they have a child—they quickly thrust it into the nursery to - leave themselves free. - </p> - <p> - But, on the other hand, it is a fact borne out by all the figures that a - child does in the vast majority of cases bind together the husband and - wife, as no other influence or moral restraint; and that among all the - women who come to the Divorce Court the overwhelming majority is made up - of childless wives. - </p> - <p> - These women are not naturally vicious. They have not gone wrong because - their principles are perverted. They are not, as a rule, intellectual - anarchists who have come to the conclusion that the conventional moral - code is wrong and that the laws of marriage are neither divine nor just. - On the contrary, they are conscience-stricken, they are terrified by their - own act. Many of them are brokenhearted and filled with shame. It is - pitiful to hear their letters read in court, letters to their husbands - pleading for forgiveness, asking for “another chance,” or trying, feebly, - to throw the blame on the man, and to whitewash themselves as much as - possible. To judge from their letters it would seem that they were under - some evil spell, and that they were conscious of being dragged away from - their duty as though Fate had clutched them by the hair, so that although - they struggled they could not resist, and were borne helplessly along upon - a swift tide of passion carrying them to destruction. “I could not help - myself” is the burden of their cry, as though they had no free-will, and - no strength of will. Occasionally they give tragic pictures of their idle - lives, so lacking in interest, so barren, so boring. There is another - phrase which crops up again and again: “Oh, I was bored—bored—bored!” - It was the man that saved her from boredom who now shares the woman’s - guilt, and stands in the witness box in this court of honor. He came to - her just at that moment in the Eighth Year when she was bored to death. He - was kind, sympathetic, understanding. He brought a little color back into - her cheeks, a little laughter into her eyes, a little sunshine into her - life. He seemed such a boy, so youthful and high-spirited, such a contrast - to her husband, always busy, and always worrying over his business. He - told good stories, took her to the theatre, arranged little - supper-parties, made a new adventure of life. He would sit chatting with - her over the fire, when there were flickering shadows on the walls. He - chased away the ghosts, gave her new dreams, brought new hopes.... And - then suddenly he begins to tempt her; and she shrinks back from him, and - is afraid. He knows she is afraid, but he tries to laugh away her fears. - She pleads with him to go away, but there is insincerity in her voice, her - words are faltering. She knows that if he were to go away she would be - left more lonely than before, in intolerable loneliness till the ghosts - would rush back at her. So he stays, and tempts her a little more. - Gradually, little by little, he becomes her great temptation, overwhelming - all other things in life dwarfing all other things, even her faith and - honor. How can she resist? By what power within her can she resist? - </p> - <p> - She does not resist. And yet by yielding she does not gain that happiness - to which she stretched out her hands. She does not satisfy the great - hunger in her heart or quench her burning thirst. She has not even killed - the ghosts which haunt her, or healed the pin pricks of her conscience. - Her conscience is one great bleeding wound. For this woman of the - middle-classes is a creature of her caste Nor in most cases can she break - the rules of her caste without frightful hurt to herself. She was brought - up in a “nice” home. Her mother was a woman of old-fashioned virtues. Her - father was a man who would have seen her dead rather than shamed. She - received a High School education, and read Tennyson and Longfellow with - moral notes by her class-mistress. She used to go to church, and sometimes - goes there still, though without any fervor or strength of faith. She has - heard the old words, “The wages of sin is death,” and she shrinks a little - when she thinks of them. Above all she has been brought up on romantic - fiction, and that is always on the side of the angels. The modern problem - novel has arrested her intellect, has startled her, challenged her, given - her “notions”; but in her heart of hearts she still believes in the - old-fashioned code of morals, in the sweet old virtues. This sin of hers - is a great terror to her. She is not brazen-faced. She does not justify it - by any advanced philosophy. She is just a poor, weak, silly woman, who has - gone to the edge of a precipice, grown giddy, and fallen off the cliff. - She throws up her hands with a great cry. The way of escape through the - Divorce Court door is not a way to happiness. It is a way to remorse, to - secret agonies, to a life-long wretchedness. Her second husband, if he - “plays the game” according to the rules of the world, is not to be envied. - Between him and this woman there are old ghosts. This way of escape is - into a haunted house. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER VIII - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>housands, and tens - of thousands of women who pass through the Eighth Year, not unscathed, - find another way out. They are finding it now through this new femininist - movement which is linked up with the cause of Women’s Suffrage. The Eighth - Year produces many suffragettes, militant and otherwise. At first, in the - first years of their married life, they scoffed at the idea of Votes for - Women. They could not see the sense of it. They hated the vulgarities of - the business, the shamelessness of it, the ugly squalor of these scuffles - with the police, these fights with the crowds, these raids on the House of - Commons. It was opposed to all their ideals of femininity and to all their - traditions of girlhood. “The hussies ought to be whipped,” is the verdict - of the young wife in the first stage of her romantic affection. But, later - on, when romance has worn very threadbare in the little home, when reality - is beginning to poke its head through the drawing-room windows, she finds - herself taking an interest in this strange manifestation which seems to be - inspired by some kind of madness. She is silent now when some new phase in - the conflict is being discussed in her presence. She listens and ponders. - Presently she goes out of her way to get introduced to some suffrage woman - on the outskirts of her acquaintance. She is surprised to find her a - wonderfully cheerful, and apparently sane, woman, very keen, very alert, - and with a great sense of humor—utterly unlike her tired, bored and - melancholy self. Perhaps she is quite a young woman, a bachelor girl, - earning her own living, down in Chelsea, or as a typist secretary in the - City. But young as she is she has dived into all sorts of queer studies—the - relations between men and women, the divorce laws, the science of eugenics—and - she discusses them with an amazing frankness, and in a most revolutionary - spirit, startling, and a little appalling, at first to this wife in her - Eighth Year. She has made up her mind conclusively on all the great - questions of life. She pooh-poohs romantic love. “There is too much fuss - made about it,” she says. “It is a mere episode, like influenza. There are - bigger things.” She holds herself perfectly free to choose her mate, and - to remedy any little mistake which she may make in her choice. At present - she prefers her independence and her own job, which she likes, thank you - very much. She is tremendously enthusiastic about the work which women - have got to do in the world, and there is nothing they cannot do, in her - opinion. She claims an absolute equality with men. In fact, she is - inclined to claim a superiority. After all, men are poor things.... - Altogether she is a most remarkable young woman, and she seems to get - tremendous fun out of life—and this wife in her Eighth Year, without - agreeing with her yet envies her! - </p> - <p> - Or perhaps the wife meets a suffrage woman of middle-age. She, too, is a - cheerful, keen, alert, bustling woman with cut-and-dried opinions on - subjects about which the wife in the Eighth Year is full of doubt and - perplexity. She has a certain hardness of character. She is intellectually - hard, and without an atom of old-fashioned sentiment. She calls a spade a - spade, in a rather embarrassing way, and prefers her facts to be naked. - She is the mother of two children, whom she is bringing up on strictly - eugenic principles, whatever those may be, and she is the wife of a - husband whom she keeps in the background and treats as a negligible - quantity. “We wives, my dear,” she says, “have been too long kept - prisoners in upholstered cages. It is time we broke our prison windows. I - am breaking other people’s windows as well. It lets in a lot of fresh - air.” - </p> - <p> - She talks a great deal about sweated labor, about the white-slave traffic, - about women’s work and wages. She talks still more about the treachery of - the Government, the lies of politicians, the cowardice of men. “Oh, we are - going to make them sit up. We shall stop at nothing. It is a revolution.” - </p> - <p> - She is amazed at the ignorance of the young wife. “Good heavens, your - education <i>has</i> been neglected!” she cries. “You are like all these - stuffy suburban women, who are as ignorant of life as bunny-rabbits. - Haven’t you even read John Stuart Mill’s <i>Subjection of Women?</i> Good - gracious! Well, I will send you round some literature. It will open your - eyes, my dear.” - </p> - <p> - She sends round a lot of little pamphlets, full of dangerous ideas, ideas - that sting like bees, ideas that are rather frightening to the wife in her - Eighth Year. They refer to other books, which she gets out of the lending - library. She reads Ibsen, and recognizes herself in many of those forlorn - women in the plays. She reads small booklets on the Rights of Wives, on - the Problems of Motherhood, on the Justice of the Vote. And suddenly, - after a period of intellectual apathy, she is set on fire by all these - burning sparks. She is caught up in a great flame of enthusiasm. It is - like strong drink to her. It is like religious mania. She wakens out of - her lethargy. Her feeling of boredom vanishes, gives way to a great - excitement, a great exhilaration. She startles her husband, who thinks she - has gone mad. She argues with him, laughs at his old-fashioned opinions, - scoffs at him, pities him for his blindness. She goes out to suffrage - meetings, starts to her feet one day and falters out a few excited words. - She sits down with burning cheeks, with the sound of applause in her ears, - like the roar of the sea. She learns to speak, to express herself - coherently. She offers herself to “the cause.” She sells her trinkets and - gives the money to the funds. She is out for any kind of adventure, - however perilous. She is one of the Hot Young Bloods, or if she has not - the pluck for that, or the strength, one of the intellectual firebrands - who are really more dangerous. - </p> - <p> - It is a queer business, this suffrage movement, which sets these women - aflame. There are a few women in it who have the cold intellectual logic - of John Stuart Mill himself. They have thought the thing out on scientific - lines, in its economic, political, and social aspects. They want the vote - honestly, as a weapon to give their sex greater power, greater - independence, better conditions of life in the labor market. But the rank - and file have no such intellectual purpose, though they make use of the - same arguments and believe that these are the mainsprings of their - actions. In reality they are Eighth Year women. That is to say, they seize - upon the movement with a feverish desire to find in it some new motive in - life, some tremendous excitement, some ideals greater and more thrilling - than the little ideals of their home life. In this movement, in this great - battle, they see many things which they keep secret. They go into it with - blind impulses, which they do not understand, except vaguely. It is a - movement of revolt against all the trammels of sex relationship which have - come down through savagery to civilization; laws evolved out of the - inherited experience of tribes and races for the protection of womanhood - and the functions of womanhood, laws of repression, of restraint, for the - sake of the children of the race; duties exacted by the social code again - for the sake of the next generation. Having revolted against the duties of - motherhood, all these laws, these trammels, these fetters, become to them - intolerable, meaningless, exasperating. The scheme of monogamy breaks - down. It has no deep moral purpose behind it, because the family is not - complete. The scheme has been frustrated by the childlessness of the wife. - Again, this movement is a revolt against the whole structure of modern - society as it affects the woman—against the very architecture of the - home; against all those tiny flats, those small suburban houses, in which - women are cramped and confined, and cut off from the large world. It did - not matter so long as there was a large world within the four walls. Their - space was big enough to hold the big ideals of old-fashioned womanhood, in - which the upbringing of children was foremost and all-absorbing. But for a - woman who has lost these ideals and the duties that result from them, - these little places are too narrow for their restless hearts; they become - like prison cells, in which their spirits go pacing up and down, up and - down, to come up against the walls, to heat their hands against them. They - believe that they may find in this suffrage movement the key to the riddle - of the mysteries in their souls, world-old mysteries, of yearnings for the - Unknown Good, of cravings for the Eternal Satisfaction, for the perfect - fulfilment of their beings. Their poor husband, a dear good fellow, after - all, now that they look at him without hysteria, has not provided this - Eternal Satisfaction. He has only provided pretty frocks, tickets for - matinées, foolish little luxuries. He does not stand for them as the - Unknown Good. After the first year or two of marriage they know him with - all his faults and flaws, and familiarity breeds contempt. But here, in - this struggle for the Vote, in these window-breakings and house-burnings, - in imprisonments and forcible feedings, in this solidarity of women - inspired by a fierce fanaticism—there is, they think, the answer to - all their unsolved questions, the splendor and the glory of their sex, the - possibility of magnificent promises and gifts, in which the soul of woman - may at last find peace, and her body its liberty. She is to have the - supreme mastery over her own spirit and flesh. - </p> - <p> - It is a fine promise. But as yet it is unfulfilled. It is not to be denied - that for a time at least some of these women do gain a cheerfulness, a - keenness, a vitality, which seem to be a great recompense for their - struggles and strivings. But they are the younger women, and especially - the young unmarried women, who get a good deal of fun out of all this - excitement, all this adventure, all the dangerous defiance of law and - convention. The older women—many of them—are already suffering - a sad disillusionment. They have not yet found those splendid things which - seemed at last within their grasp. They are desperate to get them, fierce - in their desire for them, but the cup of wine is withheld from their lips. - They find themselves growing old and still unsatisfied, growing hard, and’ - bitter, and revengeful against those who thwart them. The problems of - their sex still remain with them. They may break all the laws, but get no - nearer to liberty. They are still prisoners of fate, bond-slaves to a - nature which they do not understand. The femininist movement is only a - temporary way of escape for the wife who has reached her crisis in the - Eighth Year. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0009" id="link2HCH0009"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER IX - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>here is another - way, and it has many doors. It is religion. Many of these women “take to - religion” as they take to the suffrage movement, and find the same - emotional excitement and adventure in it. They are caught up in it as by a - burning flame. It satisfies something of their yearnings and desires. And - it is a curious and lamentable thing that although it has been proved - conclusively by all masters of philosophy and by all great thinkers, that - some form of religion, is an essential need in the heart of women, the - whole tendency of the time is to rob them of this spiritual guidance and - comfort. Religion is not a part of the social scheme of things in - “intellectual mansions” and in the small suburban houses of the - professional classes. It is not entirely wiped off the slate, but it is - regarded with indifference and as of no vital account in the sum of daily - life. Occasionally a certain homage is paid to it, as to a pleasant, - old-fashioned ritual which belongs to the code of “good form.” In their - courting days the young man and woman went to church now and then on a - Sunday morning or a Sunday evening and held the same hymn-book, and - enjoyed a little spiritual sentiment. They were married in church to the - music of the Wedding March played by the organist. Sometimes as the years - pass they drop into a service where there is good singing, a popular - preacher, and a fashionable congregation. They regard themselves as - Christians, and condescend to acknowledge the existence of God, in a - vague, tolerant kind of way. But they do not enter into any intimate - relations with God. He is not down on their visiting list. Many of them do - not even go as far as those people I have described who regard God as part - of the social code of “good form.” They become frankly agnostic and smile - at their neighbors who put on top-hats and silk dresses and stroll to - church on a Sunday morning. It seems to them absurdly “Early Victorian.” - For they have read a great number of little books by the latest writers, - who publish their philosophy in sevenpenny editions, and they have reached - an intellectual position when they have a smattering of knowledge on the - subject of evolution, anthropology, the origins of religion, literature - and dogma, and the higher criticism. They have also read extracts from the - works of Nietzsche, Kant, and the great free-thinkers, or reviews of their - works in the halfpenny newspapers. The ideas of the great thinkers and - great rebels have filtered down to them through the writings of little - thinkers and little rebels. They have been amused by the audacities of - Bernard Shaw and other intellectuals of their own age. They have read the - novels of H. G. Wells, which seem to put God in His right place. They have - imbibed unconsciously the atmosphere of free-thought and religious - indifference which comes through the open windows, through the keyholes, - through every nook and cranny. Occasionally the husband lays down the law - on the subject with dogmatic agnosticism, or dismisses the whole business - of religion with a laugh as a matter of no importance either way, - certainly as a problem not worth bothering about. - </p> - <p> - So the wife’s spiritual nature is starved. She is not even conscious of - it, except just now and then when she is aware of a kind of spiritual - hunger, or when she has little thoughts of terror at the idea of death, or - when she is in low spirits. She has no firm and certain faith to which she - can cling in moments of perplexity. She has no belief in any divine - authority from which she can seek guidance for her actions. There is no - supernatural influence about her from which she can draw any sweetness of - consolation, when the drudgery and monotony of life begins to pall on her. - When temptations come she has no anchor holding her fast to duty and - honor. She has no tremendous ideals giving a large meaning to the little - things of life. She has no spiritual vision to explain the mysteries of - her own heart, or any spiritual balm to ease its pain and restlessness. - She must rely always on her common sense, on her own experience, on her - own poor little principles of what is right or wrong, or expedient, or - “the proper thing.” When those fail her, all fails; she is helpless, like - a ship without a rudder, like a straw in the eddy of a mill race. - </p> - <p> - It is just at this time, when all has failed her, and when she seems to be - drifting helplessly, that she is ready for religion, a bundle of dry straw - which will burst into flame at the touch of a spark, a spiritual appetite - hungry for food. In hundreds of cases these women take to the queerest - kinds of spiritual food, some of it very poisonous stuff. Any impostor - with a new creed may get hold of them. Any false prophet may dupe them - into allegiance. They get into the hands of peculiar people. They are - tempted to go to a spiritualistic séance and listen to the jargon of - spiritualism. It frightens them at first, but after their first fears, and - a little shrinking horror, they go forward into these “mysteries,” and are - obsessed by them. It appears they are “psychical.” Undoubtedly after a - little practice they could get into touch with the spirit-world. With - planchette and table-rapping, and with mediumistic guidance, they may - learn the secrets of the ghost-world, and invoke the aid of spirits in - their little household. It becomes a mania with them. It becomes, in many - cases, sheer madness. - </p> - <p> - There are other women who seek their spiritual salvation among the - clairvoyants and crystal-gazers and palmists of the West End. - </p> - <p> - They become devotees of the Black Art, and dupes of those who prey upon - the Eternal Gullible. There are others who join the Christian Scientists, - and find the key to the riddle of life in the writings of Mrs. Eddy. They - experiment in will-power—upon their unfortunate husbands. They adopt - the simple life, and bring themselves into a low state of health by fruit - diet. They learn a new language full of strange technical terms, which - they but dimly understand, yet find comforting, like the old woman and her - Mesopotamia, which was a blessèd word to her. But in spite of all its - falsity and folly, it does give them a new interest in life, and lift them - right out of the ruck of suburban dulness. So far at least it is helpful - to them. It is some kind of spiritual satisfaction, though afterwards, - perhaps, they may fall into a spiritual excitement and hysteria worse than - their old restlessness, and become a nuisance to their family and friends, - women with <i>idées fixes</i>. - </p> - <p> - It is better for them if they can grope their way back to the old - Christian faith, with its sweetness and serenity and divine ideals. Here - at last the woman may find authority, not to be argued about, not to be - dodged, but to be obeyed. Here at last she may find tremendous ideals - giving a significance to the little things of life, which seemed so - trivial, so futile, and so purposeless. Here is wholesome food for her - spiritual hunger, giving her new strength and courage, patience and - resignation. Here are great moral lessons from which she may draw wisdom - and guidance for her own poor perplexities. Then when temptations come, - she may cling to an anchor of faith which will not slip in shifting sands, - but is chained to a great rock. The wisdom of the Church, the accumulated - experience stored up in the Church, the sweetness of all great Christian - lives, the splendid serenity of the Christian laws, so stern and yet so - tolerant, so hard and yet so easy, give to this woman’s soul the peace she - has desired, not to be found among the ghosts of modern spiritualism, nor - in the pseudo-scientific jargon of Mrs. Eddy’s works, nor in the - glass-crystals of the clairvoyants. For the Christian faith has no use for - hysteria; it exacts a healthy discipline of mind. It demands obedience to - the laws of life, by which no woman may shirk the duties of her nature, or - pander to her selfishness, or dodge the responsibilities of her state as a - wife, or forget her marriage-vows and all that they involve. - </p> - <p> - There would be no fatal significance about the Eighth Year if the old - religion were still of vital influence in the home. For after all, in - spite of all our cleverness, we have not yet discovered any new - intellectual formula or philosophy which will force men and women to do - those things which are unpleasant but necessary to insure the future of - the race; to deny themselves so that the future generation may gain; to - suffer willingly in this world for the sake of an advantage in a future - life. If people do not believe in a future life, and in such rewards as - are offered by the Christian dogma, they prefer to have their advantages - here and now. But as we know, if we face the facts of life clearly, the - advantages, here and now, are not easy to get. Life, at its best, is a - disappointing business. There is a lot of rough with the smooth, - especially for women, especially for those women of the middle-classes in - small suburban homes, over-intel-lectualized, with highly strung nerves, - in a narrow environment, without many interests, and without much work. It - is just because many of them are entirely without religion to give some - great purpose to their inevitable trivialities that their moral - perspective becomes hopelessly inverted, as though they were gazing - through the wrong end of the telescope. Having no banking account in the - next life, they spend themselves in this life, and live “on tick,” as it - were. Religion is the gospel of unselfishness. Lacking religion, they are - utterly selfish. They do not worry about the future of the race. Why - should they? All they are worrying about is to save themselves pain, - expense, drudgery. Children are a great nuisance—therefore they will - not have children. They want to put in a good time, to enjoy youth and - beauty as long as possible, to get as much fun as they can here and now. - But, as we have seen, the fun begins to peter out somewhere about the - Eighth Year, and “the good time” has disappeared like a mirage when one - gets close to it, and even youth and beauty are drooping and faded like - yesterday’s flowers. What is the woman to do then? She is the victim of - shattered illusions, of broken hopes. Before her is nothing but a gray - vista of years. She has nothing to reconcile her with the boredom of her - days, nothing to compensate her for domestic drudgery, no cure for the - restlessness and feverishness which consume her, no laws by which she may - keep straight. She sees crookedly, her spirit rushes about hither and - thither. She is like a hunted thing, hunted by her desires, and she can - find no sanctuary; no sanctuary unless she finds religion, and the right - religion. There are not many women nowadays who find this way of escape, - for religion has gone out of fashion, like last year’s hats, and it wants - a lot of pluck to wear a last year’s hat. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0010" id="link2HCH0010"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER X - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">B</span>esides, the - husband does not like it. He discourages religion, except in homoeopathic - doses, taken by way of a little tonic, as one goes to the theatre for a - pick-me-up. As he remarks, he does not believe in women being too - spiritual. It is not “healthy.” If his wife goes to church with any - regularity he suspects there is an attractive cleric round the corner. And - sometimes he is right. Anyhow, he does not feel the need of religion, - except when he gets a pretty bad dose of influenza and has an uneasy - thought that he is going to “peg out.” As a rule he enjoys good health, - and has no time to bother about the supernatural. He does not meet it in - the city. It is not a marketable commodity. It is not, as he says, “in his - line of country.” He does not see why it should be in his wife’s line of - country. He is annoyed when his wife takes up any of these cranky ideas. - He rages inwardly when she takes them up passionately. Why can’t she be - normal? - </p> - <p> - Why on earth can’t she go on as she began, with her little feminine - interests, keeping herself pretty for his sake, keen on the latest - fashions, neighborly with young wives like herself, and fond of a bit of - frivolity now and then? When she complains that she has idle hands in her - lap, and wants something to do, he reminds her that she found plenty to do - in the first years of her married life. When she cries out that she is - bored, he points out to her that she gets much more amusement than he - does. - </p> - <p> - And that is true, because by the time he has reached the Eighth Year he is - pretty busy. Ambition has caught hold of him and he is making a career. It - is not easy. Competition is deadly. He has got his work cut out to keep - abreast with his competitors. It is a constant struggle “to keep his end - up.” He finds it disconcerting when he comes home in the evenings after - the anxiety of his days, dog-tired and needing sympathy, to find that his - wife has an attack of nerves, or a feverish desire to go out and “see - something.” He wants to stay at home and rest, to dawdle over the evening - paper, to listen to a tune or two from his wife. - </p> - <p> - He would like her to bring his slippers to him, as she used to do in the - old days, to hover round him a little with endearing words, and then, with - not too much of <i>that</i>, to keep quiet, assenting to his opinions when - he expresses them, and being restful. He has his own grievances. He is not - without troubles of soul and body. He has had to face disappointment, - disillusionment, hours of blank pessimism. He has had to get to grips with - reality, after the romanticism of his youth, and to put a check upon his - natural instincts and desires. In many ways it is harder for the man than - for the woman. Civilization and the monogamous code have not been framed - on easy lines for men. To keep the ordinary rules of his caste he must put - a continual restraint upon himself, make many sacrifices. Women and wives - forget that human nature has not changed because men wear black coats and - tall hats instead of the skins of beasts. Human nature is exactly the same - as it ever was, strong and savage, but it has to be tamed and repressed - within the four walls of a flat in West Kensington, or within a - semi-detached house at Wimbledon. - </p> - <p> - There are moments when the man hears the call of the wild, and loathes - respectability and conventionality with a deadly loathing. In his heart, - as in the heart of every man, there is a little Bohemia, a little country - of lawlessness and errant fancy and primitive desires. Sometimes when he - has shut himself up in his study, when the servants are in the kitchen - washing up the supper-things, when his wife is lying down with a bad - headache, he unlocks the door of that Bohemia in his heart, and his - imagination goes roving, and he hears the pan-pipes calling, and the stamp - of the cloven hoofs of the old Nature-god. He would like to cut and run - sometimes from this respectable life of his, to go in search of adventure - down forbidden pathways, and to find the joy of life again in Liberty - Hall. This fretful wife of his, this social-ladder climbing, the whole - business of “playing the game” in the same old way, makes him very tired, - and gets on his nerves at times most damnably. He has his temptations. He - hears siren voices calling him. He sees the lure of the witch-women. To - feel his pulse thrill to the wine of life, to get the fever of joy in his - blood again, to plunge into the fiery lake of passion, are temptations - from which he does not escape because he is Something in the City, or a - barrister-at-law, and a married man with a delicate wife. But, being a - man, with a man’s work, and a man’s ambition, he keeps his sanity, and - quite often his self-respect. His eyes are clear enough to see the - notice-boards on the boundary lines of the forbidden territory, - “Trespassers will be prosecuted,” “Please keep off the grass,” “No - thoroughfare.” He locks up the gate to the little Bohemia in his heart, - and puts the key into a secret cupboard of his brain. He understands quite - clearly that if he once “goes off the rails,” as he calls it, his - ambitions will be frustrated and his career spoiled. Besides, being a - conventionalist and somewhat of a snob, he would hate to be found out in - any violation of the social code, and his blood runs cold at the idea of - his making a fool of himself with a woman, or anything of that kind. The - creed of his social code, of the pot-hatted civilization, of this suburban - conventionality of these little private snob-doms, is stronger in the man - than in the woman. When she once takes the bit between her teeth, as it - were, she becomes utterly lawless. But the man reins himself in more - easily. He finds it on the whole less difficult to be law-abiding. He has - also a clearer vision of the logic of things. He knows that certain - results follow certain causes. He can measure up the consequences of an - act, and weigh them. He is guided by his brain rather than by his - emotions. He has certain fixed principles deeply rooted in him. He has a - more delicate sense of honor than most women. It is summed up in that old - school-phrase of his—“playing the game.” However much his nerves may - be jangled, and goodness knows they are often jangled, especially as the - Eighth Year draws near, he is generally master of himself. At least he - does not, as a rule, have hysterical outbursts, or give rein to passionate - impulses, or suddenly take some wild plunge, upsetting all the balance of - his life. He does not take frightful risks, as a woman will always take - them, recklessly, when she reaches her crisis. - </p> - <p> - So it is that he looks coldly upon his wife’s desires for some new - emotional activity, of whatever kind it may be, religious, political, or - ethical. He hates any symptoms of fanaticism. He shivers at any breach of - good form. He would like her always to be sitting in the drawing-room when - he comes home, in a pretty frock, with a novel in her lap, with a smile in - her eyes. He does not and will not understand that this childless wife of - his must have strong interests outside her little home to save her from - eating her heart out. He hides from himself the fact that her - childlessness is a curse which is blighting her. He pooh-poohs her tragic - cry for help. He is just a little brutal with her when she accuses him of - thwarting all the desires of her soul. And he is scared, thoroughly - scared, when at last she takes flight, on wild wings, to some spiritual - country, or to some moral, or immoral, territory, where he could not - follow. He tries to call her back. But sometimes she may not be called - back. She has escaped beyond the reach of his voice. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0011" id="link2HCH0011"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XI - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">S</span>nobbishness is one - of the causes which lead to the Eighth Year, and not the least among them. - It is an essentially middle-class snobbishness, and has grown up, like a - fungus growth, with that immense and increasing class of small, fairly - well-to-do households who have come into being with the advance of - material prosperity during the past twenty-five years, and with the - progress of elementary education, and all that it has brought with it in - the form of new desires for pleasure, amusement and more luxuries. These - young husbands and wives who set up their little homes are not, as I have - said, content to start on the same level as their parents in the first - years of their married life. They must start at least on the level of - their parents at the end of their married life, even a little in advance. - The seeds of snobbishness are sown before marriage. The modern son - pooh-poohs the habits of his old-fashioned father. They are not good - enough for him. He has at least twice the pocket-money at school compared - with the allowance of his father when he was a boy. He goes to a more - expensive school and learns expensive habits. When he begins work he does - not hand over most of his salary as his father used to hand over his - salary a generation ago, to keep the family pot boiling. He keeps all that - he earns, though he is still living at home, and develops a nice taste in - clothes. One tie on week-days and another tie for Sundays are still good - enough for the father, but the son buys ties by the dozen, and then has a - passion for fancy socks, and lets his imagination rove into all - departments of haberdashery. He is only a middle-class young man, but he - dresses in the style of a man of fashion, adopts some of the pleasures of - the man about town, and is rather scornful of the little house in the - suburbs to which he returns after a bachelor’s dinner in a smart - restaurant, or after a tea-party with gaiety girls. He becomes a “Nut,” - and his evenings are devoted to a variety of amusements, which does away - with a good deal of money. He smokes a special brand of cigarettes. He - hires a motor-car occasionally for a spin down to Brighton. His mother and - father are rather scared by this son who lives in a style utterly beyond - their means. - </p> - <p> - The girl is a feminine type of the new style. She has adopted the new - notions. At a very early age she is expert in all the arts of the younger - generation, and at seventeen or eighteen has already revolted from the - authority of her parents. She is quite a nice girl, naturally, but her - chief vice is vanity. She is eaten up with it. It is a consuming passion. - From the moment she gets out of bed in the morning for the first glimpse - of her face in the looking-glass to the time she goes to bed after putting - on some lip-salve and face enamel, she is absorbed with self-consciousness - about her “looks.” Her face is always occupying her attention. Even in - railway trains she keeps biting her lips to make them red. At every window - she passes she gives a sidelong glance to see if her face is getting on - all right. Her main ambition in life is to be in the fashion. She is - greedy for “pretty things” and sponges upon her father and mother for the - wherewithal to buy them, and she will not lay a little finger on any work - in the kitchen or even make a bed, lest her hands should be roughened and - because it would not be quite “lady-like.” - </p> - <p> - A pretty education for matrimony! A nice couple to set up house together - Poor children of life, they are doomed to have a pack of troubles. Because - as they began they go on, with the same ideas, with the same habits of - mind, until they get a rude shock. Their little household is a shrine to - the great god Snob. They are his worshippers. To make a show beyond their - meansj or up to the very limit of their means, to pretend to be better off - than they are, to hide any sign of poverty, to dress above their rank in - life, to show themselves in places of entertainment, to shirk domestic - drudgery, that is their creed. - </p> - <p> - In the old days, before the problem of the Eighth Year had arrived, the - wives of men, the mothers of those very girls, kept themselves busy by - hundreds of small duties. They made the beds, dusted the rooms, helped the - servants in the kitchen, made a good many of their own clothes, mended - them, altered them, cleaned the silver. But nowadays the wife of the - professional man does none of these things if there is any escape from - them. She keeps one servant at a time when her mother did without a - servant. She keeps two servants as soon as her husband can afford an extra - one, three servants if the house is large enough to hold them. Indeed, a - rise in the social scale is immediately the excuse for an additional - servant, and in the social status the exact financial prosperity of the - middle-classes is reckoned by them according to the number of servants - they keep. And whether it be two or three, the little snob wife sits in - her drawing-room with idle hands, trying to kill time, getting tired of - doing nothing, but proud of her laziness. And the snob husband encourages - her in her laziness. He is proud of it, too. He would hate to think of his - wife dusting, or cleaning, or washing up. He does not guess that this - worship of his great god Snob is a devil’s worship, having devilish - results for himself and her. The idea that women want work never enters - his head. His whole ambition in life is to prevent his wife from working, - not only when he is alive, but after he is dead. He insures himself - heavily and at the cost of a great financial strain upon his resources in - order that “if anything happens” his wife, even then, need not raise her - little finger to do any work. But something “happens” before he is dead. - The woman revolts from the evil spell of her laziness. She finds some work - for her idle hands to do—good work or bad. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0012" id="link2HCH0012"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XII - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>f only those idle - women would find some good work to do the Eighth Year would lose its - terrors. And there is so much good work to do if they would only lay their - hands to it! If they cannot get in touch with God, they can at least get - in touch with humanity. At their very doors there is a welter of - suffering, struggling humanity craving for a little help, needing helping - hands, on the very edge of the abyss of misery, and slipping down unless - they get rescued in the nick of time. In the mean streets of life, in the - hospitals, at the prison gates, in the reformatories, in the dark haunts - of poverty, there are social workers striving and toiling and moiling in - the service of all these seething masses of human beings. But there are - too few of them, and the appeals for volunteers in the ranks of the unpaid - helpers are not often answered. They are hardly ever answered from the - class of women who have least in the world to do, and most need of such - kinds of work. Many of these women have good voices. They sing little - drawing-room ballads quite well, until they get sick of the sound of their - own singing in their lonely little drawing-rooms. But they do not think of - singing in the hospitals, and the workhouse wards, where their voices - would give joy to suffering people, or miserable people who do not often - hear the music of life. These women have no children. They have shirked - the pains of childbirth. But they might help to give a little comfort and - happiness to other mothers’ children, to shepherd a small flock for a - day’s outing in the country, to organize the children’s playtime, to nurse - the sick baby now and then. These idle women remember their own girlhood - and its dreams. They remember their own innocence, the shelter of their - home-life. It would be good for them if they gave a little loving service - to the girls in the working-quarters of the great cities, and went down - into the girl-clubs to play their dance tunes, to keep them out of the - streets, to give them a little innocent fun in the evenings. These lazy - women cry out that they are prisoners in upholstered cages. But there are - many prisoners in stone cells, who at the prison gates, on their release, - stand looking out into the cold gray world, with blank, despairing eyes, - with no prospect but that of crime and vice, unless some unknown friend - comes with a little warmth of human love, with a quick sympathy and a - ready helpfulness. Here is work for workless women who are well-to-do. - They are unhappy in their own homes, because they are tired of its - trivialities, tired of its little luxuries, bored to death with themselves - because they have no purpose in life. But in the mean streets round the - corner they would find women still clinging with extraordinary courage to - homes that have no stick of furniture in them, amazingly cheerful, - although instead of little luxuries they have not even the barest - necessities of life, unwearied, indefatigable, heroic in endurance, though - they toil on sweated wages. The women of the well-to-do middle-classes - drift apart from their husbands because perhaps they have irritable little - habits, because they do not understand all the yearnings in their wives’ - hearts, because they have fallen below the old ideals of their courting - days. But here in the slums these women with a grievance would find other - women loyal to their husbands who come home drunk at nights, loyal through - thick and thin to husbands who “bash” them when they speak a sharp word, - loyal to the death to husbands who are untamed brutes with only the love - of the brute for its mate. There is no problem of the Eighth Year in - Poverty Court, only the great problems of life and death, of hunger and - thirst and cold, of labor and want of work. Here in the mean streets of - the world is the great lesson that want of work is the greatest disaster, - the greatest moral tragedy, that may happen to men and women. - </p> - <p> - If the idle women of the little snobdoms would come forth from their - houses and flats, they would see that lesson staring them in the face, - with a great warning to themselves. And if they would thrust aside their - selfishness and learn the love of humanity, it would light a flame in - their hearts which would kindle the dead ashes of their disillusionment - and burn up their grievances, and make a bonfire of all their petty little - troubles, and make such a light in their lives as would enable them to see - the heroic qualities of ordinary duties bravely done, and of ordinary - lives bravely led. Here they would find another way of escape from the - perils of the Eighth Year, and a new moral health for their hearts and - brains. - </p> - <p> - It is only now and then that some woman is lucky enough to find this way - out, for snobbishness enchains them, and it is difficult to break its - fetters. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0013" id="link2HCH0013"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XIII - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>hen the woman has - once taken flight, or is hesitating before taking her flight, in the - Eighth Year, it is an almost hopeless business for the husband to call her - back. Whenever she is called back, it is by some outside influence, beyond - <i>his</i> sphere of influence, by some sudden accident, by some - catastrophe involving both of them, or by some severe moral shock, shaking - the foundations of their little home like an earthquake. There are cases - in which the woman has been called back by the sudden smash-up of her - husband’s business, by financial ruin. In his social ladder-climbing he is - too rash. One of the rungs of the ladder breaks beneath his feet and he - comes toppling down. Owing to this deadly competition of modern life, he - loses his “job.” It is given to a younger or better man, or to a man with - a stronger social pull. He comes home one day with a white face, - trembling, horribly scared, afraid to break the news to a woman who has - not been helpful to him of late, and of whose sympathy he is no longer - sure. He believes that this misfortune is the last straw which will break - their strained relations. He sees the great tragedy looming ahead, hearing - down upon him. But, curiously enough, this apparent disaster is the - salvation of both of them. The despair of her husband calls to the woman’s - loyalty. All her grievances against this man are suddenly swallowed up in - the precipice which has opened beneath his feet. All her antagonism is - broken down and dissolved into pity. Her self-pride is slain by this man’s - abasement. His weakness, his need of help, his panic-stricken heart cry to - her. After all their drifting apart, their indifference to each other, - their independence, he wants her again. He wants her as a helpmeet. He - wants any courage she can give him, any wisdom. And she is glad to be - wanted. She stretches out her hands to him. They clasp each other, and - there is no longer a gulf beneath their feet; misfortune has built a - bridge across the gulf which divided them. More than that, all the little - meannesses of their life, all the petty selfishness of their days, all the - little futile things over which they have wrangled and jangled are thrust - on one side, and are seen in their right perspective. The things that - matter, the only things that matter, are seen, perhaps, for the first - time, clearly, in a bright light, now that they are face to face with stem - realities. The shock throws them off their pedestals of conceit, of - self-consciousness, of pretence. They stand on solid ground. The shock has - broken the masks behind which they hid themselves. It has broken the hard - crust about their hearts. It has shattered the idol which they worshipped, - the idol of the great god Snob. - </p> - <p> - And so they stare into each other’s soul, and take hands again like little - children, abandoned by the Wicked Uncles of life, and they grope their way - back to primitive things, and begin the journey again. They have found out - that this new comradeship is better even than the old romantic love of - their courting days. They have discovered something of the great secret of - life. They are humbled. They make new pledges to each other, pick up the - broken pieces of their hopes and dreams and fit them together again in a - new and sounder scheme. This time, in some cases, they do not leave the - baby out of the business. The wife becomes a mother, and the child chases - away all the ghosts which haunted her in the Eighth Year. She no longer - wants to take flight. She has been called back. - </p> - <p> - It is nearly always some accident like this which calls the wife back, - some sudden, startling change in the situation, caused by outside - influences, or by the hand of Fate. Sometimes it is an illness which - overtakes the husband or wife. Holding hands by the bedside, they stare - into the face of Death, and again the trivialities of life, the pettiness - of their previous desires, the folly of their selfishness, the stupidity - of their little snobdom, are revealed by the whisperings of Death, and by - its warnings. The truth of things stalks into the bedroom where the - husband, or the wife, lies sleeping on the borderland. About the sick bed - the weeping woman makes new vows, tears wash out her vanity, her - self-conceit. Or, kneeling by the side of the woman whose transparent hand - he clasps above the coverlet, the husband listens to the little voice - within his conscience, and understands, with a great heartache, the - pitiful meaning of the domestic strife which seemed to have killed his - love for the woman for whose life now he makes a passionate cry. In the - period of convalescence, after Death has stolen away, when life smiles - again through the open windows, that man and woman get back to sanity and - to wisdom beyond that of common-sense. They begin again with new ideals. - Perhaps in a little while one of the rooms becomes a nursery. They get - back to the joy of youth, once more the woman has been called back. - </p> - <p> - If none of these “accidents” happen, if some great influence like this - does not thrust its way into the lives of this husband and wife during the - crisis of the Eighth Year, if the woman is not caught up by some great - enthusiasm, or if she can find no work for the idle hands to do, giving - her new and absorbing interests to satisfy her heart and brain, then the - Eighth Year is a fatal year, and the President of the Divorce Court has a - new case added to his list, or the family records of the country chronicle - another separation, or another woman goes to prison for arson or - bomb-throwing. Because the laws of psychology are not so erratic as the - world imagines. They work out on definite lines. Certain psychological - forces having been set in motion, they lead inevitably to certain results. - When once a woman has lost her interest in her home and husband, when she - has become bored with herself, when she has a morbid craving for - excitement and adventures, when she has become peevish and listless and - hungry-hearted, she cannot remain in this condition. Those forces within - her are tremendously powerful. They must find some outlet. They must reach - a definite time of crisis when things have got to happen. These vague - yearnings must be satisfied, somehow, anyhow. The emptiness of her heart - must be filled by something or other. She will search round with - wondering, wistful eyes, more desperate day by day, until she finds the - thing, however evil it may be, however dangerous. She must still that - throbbing brain of hers, even if she has to take drugs to do so. In spite - of all the poison laws, she will find some kind of poison, some subtle and - insidious drug to give her temporary cure, a period of vitality, a thrill - of excitement, a glittering dream or two, a relief from the dulness which - is pressing down upon her with leaden weights. She knows the penalty which - follows this drug-taking—the awful reaction, the deadly lethargy - that follows, the nervous crises, the loss of will-power, but she is - prepared to pay the price because for a little while she gets peace, and - artificial life. The family doctors know the prevalence of those - drug-taking habits. They know the cause of them, they have watched the - pitiful drama of these women’s lives. But they can do nothing to cut out - the cause. Not even the surgeon’s knife can do that; their warnings fall - on deaf ears, or are answered by a hysterical laugh. - </p> - <p> - As I have shown, there are other forms of drug-taking not less dangerous - in their moral effects. If the woman does not go to the chemist’s shop, - she goes to the darkened room of the clairvoyant and the crystal-gazer, or - to the spiritualistic séance, or to the man who hides his time until the - crisis of the Eighth Year delivers the woman into his hands. - </p> - <p> - Here, then, frankly and in detail, I have set out the meaning of this - dangerous year of married life, and have endeavored, honestly, to analyze - all the social and psychological forces which go to make that crisis. It - is, in some measure, a study of our modern conditions of life as they - prevail among the middle-classes, so that the problem is not abnormal, but - is present, to some extent, in hundreds of thousands of small households - to-day. All the tendencies of the time, all the revolutionary ideas that - are in the very air we breathe, all this modern spirit of revolt against - disagreeable duties, and drudgery, and discipline, the decay of religious - authority, the sapping of spiritual faith, the striving for social - success, the cult of snobbishness, the new creed of selfishness which - ignores the future of the race and demands a good time here and now, the - lack of any ideals larger than private interests and personal comforts, - the ignorance of men and women who call themselves intellectual, the - nervous irritability of husbands and wives who live up to the last penny - of their incomes, above all the childlessness of these women who live in - small flats and suburban villas, and their utter laziness, all those signs - and symptoms of our social sickness lead up, inevitably, and with fatal - logic, to the tragedy of the Eighth Year. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_PART2" id="link2H_PART2"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - PART II—A DEMONSTRATION - </h2> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0014" id="link2HCH0014"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER I - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>n the drawing-room - of a flat in Intellectual Mansions, S. W., there was an air of quietude - and peace. No one would have imagined for a moment that the atmosphere was - charged with electricity, or that the scene was set for a drama of - emotional interest with tragic potentialities. It seemed the - dwelling-place of middle-class culture and well-to-do gentility. - </p> - <p> - The room was furnished in the “New Art” style, as seen in the showrooms of - the great stores. There were sentimental pictures on the walls framed in - dark oak. The sofa and chairs were covered in a rather flamboyant chintz. - Through the French windows at the back could be seen the balcony railings, - and, beyond, a bird’s-eye view of the park. A piano-organ in the street - below was playing the latest ragtime melody, and there was the noise of a - great number of whistles calling for taxis, which did not seem to come. - </p> - <p> - In a stiff-backed arm-chair by the fireplace sat an elderly lady, of a - somewhat austere appearance, who was examining through her spectacles the - cover of a paper backed novel, depicting a voluptuous young woman; - obviously displeasing to her sense of propriety. Mrs. Heywood’s sense of - propriety was somewhat acutely developed, to the annoyance, at times, of - Mollie, the maid-servant, who was clearing away the tea-things in a bad - temper. That is to say, she was making a great deal of unnecessary - clatter. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood ignored the clatter, and concentrated her attention on the - cover of the paper-backed book. It seemed to distress her, and presently - she gave expression to her distress. - </p> - <p> - “Dear me! What an improper young woman!” - </p> - <p> - Mollie’s bad temper was revealed by a sudden tightening of the lips and a - flushed face. She bent across an “occasional” table and peered over the - old lady’s shoulder, and spoke rather impudently. - </p> - <p> - “Excuse me, ma’am, but that’s <i>my</i> novel, if you don’t mind.” - </p> - <p> - “I <i>do</i> mind,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I was shocked to find it on the - kitchen dresser.” - </p> - <p> - Molly tossed her head, so that her white cap assumed an acute angle. - </p> - <p> - “I was shocked to see that it had gone from the kitchen dresser.” - </p> - <p> - Then she lowered her voice and added in a tone of bitter grievance— - </p> - <p> - “Blessed if one can call anything one’s own in this here flat.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s not fit literature for <i>any</i> young girl,” said Mrs. Heywood - severely. She looked again at the flaunting lady with an air of extreme - disapproval. - </p> - <p> - “Disgusting!” - </p> - <p> - Mollie rattled the tea-things violently. - </p> - <p> - “It’s good enough for the mistress, anyhow.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood was surprised. - </p> - <p> - “Surely she did not lend it to you?” - </p> - <p> - “Well—not exactly,” said Mollie, with just a trace of embarrassment. - “I borrowed it. It’s written by her particular friend, Mr. Bradshaw.” - </p> - <p> - “Mr. Bradshaw! Surely not?” - </p> - <p> - The old lady wiped her spectacles rather nervously. - </p> - <p> - “A very nice-spoken gentleman,” said Mollie, “though he does write - novels.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood looked at the author’s name for the first time and expressed - her astonishment. - </p> - <p> - “Good gracious! So it is.” - </p> - <p> - Mollie laughed as she folded up the tea-cloth. She had gained a little - triumph, and scored off the “mother-in-law,” as she called the elderly - lady, in the kitchen. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, he knows a thing or two, he does, my word!” - </p> - <p> - She winked solemnly at herself in the mirror over the mantelshelf. - </p> - <p> - “Hold your tongue, Mollie,” said Mrs. Heywood sharply. - </p> - <p> - “Servants are not supposed to have any tongues. Oh, dear no!” - </p> - <p> - With this sarcastic retort Mollie proceeded to put the sugar-basin into - the china-cupboard, but seemed to expect a counter-attack. She was not - disappointed. - </p> - <p> - “Mollie!” said Mrs. Heywood severely, looking over the rims of her - spectacles. - </p> - <p> - “Now what’s wrong?” - </p> - <p> - “You have not cleaned the silver lately.” - </p> - <p> - “Haven’t I?” said Mollie sweetly. - </p> - <p> - “No,” said Mrs. Heywood. “Why not, I should like to know?” - </p> - <p> - Mollie’s “sweetness” was suddenly embittered. She spoke with ferocity. - </p> - <p> - “If you want to know, it’s because I won’t obey two mistresses at once. - There’s no liberty for a mortal soul in this here flat. So there!” - </p> - <p> - “Very well, Mollie,” said Mrs. Heywood mildly. “We will wait until your - mistress comes home. If she has any strength of mind at all she will give - you a month’s notice.” - </p> - <p> - Mollie sniffed. The idea seemed to amuse her. - </p> - <p> - “The poor dear hasn’t any strength of mind.” - </p> - <p> - “I am surprised at you, Mollie.” - </p> - <p> - “That’s why she has gone to church again.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood was startled. She was so startled that she forgot her anger - with the maid. - </p> - <p> - “Again? Are you sure?” - </p> - <p> - “Well, she had a look of church in her eyes when she went out.” - </p> - <p> - “What sort of a look?” asked Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “A stained-glass-window look.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood spoke rather to herself than to Mollie. - </p> - <p> - “That makes the third time to-day,” she said pensively. - </p> - <p> - Mollie spoke mysteriously. She too had forgotten her anger and impudence. - She dropped her voice to a confidential tone. - </p> - <p> - “The mistress is in a bad way, to my thinking. I’ve seen it coming on.” - </p> - <p> - “Seen what coming on?” asked the elderly lady. - </p> - <p> - “She sits brooding too much. Doesn’t even pitch into me when I break - things. That’s a bad sign.” - </p> - <p> - “A bad sign?” - </p> - <p> - “I’ve noticed they’re all taken like this when they go wrong,” said the - girl, speaking as one who had had a long experience of human nature in - Intellectual Mansions, S. W. But these words aroused the old lady’s wrath. - </p> - <p> - “How dare you!” said Mrs. Heywood. “Leave the room at once.” - </p> - <p> - “I must tell the truth if I died for it,” said Mollie. - </p> - <p> - The two women were silent for a moment, for just then a voice outside - called, “Clare! Clare!” rather impatiently. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, Lord!” said Mollie. “There’s the master.” - </p> - <p> - “Clare!” called the voice. “Oh, confound the thing!” - </p> - <p> - “I suppose he’s lost his stud again,” said Mollie. “He always does on club - nights. I’d best be off.” - </p> - <p> - She took up the tea-tray and left the room hurriedly, just as her master - came in. It was Mr. Herbert Heywood, generally described by his neighbors - as being “Something in the City”—a man of about thirty, slight, - clean-shaven, boyish, good-looking, with nervous movements and extreme - irritability. He was in evening clothes with his tie undone. - </p> - <p> - “Plague take this tie!” he growled, making use of one or two - un-Parliamentary expressions. Then he saw his mother and apologized. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I beg your pardon, mother. Where’s Clare?” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood answered her son gloomily. - </p> - <p> - “I think she’s gone to church again.” - </p> - <p> - “Again?” said Herbert Heywood. “Why, dash it all—I beg your pardon, - mother—she’s always going to church now. What’s the attraction?” - </p> - <p> - “I think she must be unwell,” said Mrs. Hey-wood. “I’ve thought so for - some time.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, nonsense! She’s perfectly fit.... See if you can tie this bow, - mother.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood endeavored to do so, and during the process her son showed - great impatience and made irritable grimaces. But he returned to the - subject of his wife. - </p> - <p> - “Perhaps her nerves are a bit wrong. Women are nervy creatures.... Oh, - hang it all, mother, don’t strangle me!... As I tell her, what’s the good - of having a park at your front door—Oh, thanks, that’s better.” - </p> - <p> - He looked at himself in the glass, and dabbed his face with a - handkerchief. - </p> - <p> - “Of course I cut myself to-night. I always do when I go to the club.” - </p> - <p> - “Herbert, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood rather nervously. - </p> - <p> - “I—I suppose Clare is not going to bless you with a child?” - </p> - <p> - “<i>In this flat</i>!” - </p> - <p> - Herbert was startled and horrified. It was a great shock to him. He gazed - round the little drawing-room rather wildly. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, Lord!” he said presently, when he had calmed down a little. “Don’t - suggest such a thing. Besides, she is not.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, I’m nervous about her,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, rats, mother! I mean, don’t be so fanciful.” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t like this sudden craving for religion, Herbert. It’s unhealthy.” - </p> - <p> - “Devilish unhealthy,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - He searched about vainly for his patent boots, which were in an obvious - position. It added to his annoyance and irritability. - </p> - <p> - “Why can’t she stay at home and look after me? I can’t find a single damn - thing. I beg your pardon, mother.... Women’s place is in the home.... Now - where on earth——” - </p> - <p> - He resumed his search for the very obvious patent boots and at last - discovered them. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, there they are!” - </p> - <p> - He glanced at the clock, and expressed the opinion that he would be late - for the club if he did not “look sharp.” Then a little tragedy happened, - and he gave a grunt of dismay when a bootlace broke. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, my hat! Why doesn’t Clare look after my things properly?” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood asked another question, ignoring the broken bootlace. - </p> - <p> - “Need you go to the club to-night, Herbert?” - </p> - <p> - Herbert was both astonished and annoyed at this remark. - </p> - <p> - “Of course I must. It’s Friday night and the one little bit of Bohemianism - I get in the week. Why not?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I don’t know,” said Mrs. Heywood meekly. “Except that I thought Clare - is feeling rather lonely.” - </p> - <p> - “Lonely?” said Herbert. “She has you, hasn’t she?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, she has me.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood spoke as though that might be a doubtful consolation. - </p> - <p> - “Besides, what more does she want? She has her afternoon At Homes, hasn’t - she?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood, still more doubtfully. - </p> - <p> - “And she can always go to a matinée if she wants to, can’t she?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, dear.” - </p> - <p> - “Then I have taken out a subscription to Mudie’s for her, haven’t I?” - </p> - <p> - Herbert Heywood spoke as though his wife had all the blessings of life, as - though he had provided her with all that a woman’s heart might desire. But - Mrs. Heywood interrupted his catalogue of good things. - </p> - <p> - “I think she reads too many novels,” she said. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, they broaden her mind,” said Herbert. “Although, I must confess they - bore <i>me</i> to death.... Now what have I done with my cigarette-case?” - </p> - <p> - He felt all over his pockets, but could not find the desired thing. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, the curse of pockets!” - </p> - <p> - “Some of them are very dangerous, Herbert.” - </p> - <p> - “What, pockets?” - </p> - <p> - “No, novels,” said Mrs. Heywood. “Look at this.” - </p> - <p> - She thrust under his eyes the novel with the picture of the flaming lady. - </p> - <p> - “Gee whizz!” said Herbert, laughing. “Oh, well, she’s a married woman.” - </p> - <p> - “Do you see who the author is, Herbert?” Herbert look, and was astonished. - </p> - <p> - “Gerald Bradshaw, by Jove! Does he write this sort of muck?” - </p> - <p> - “He has been coming here rather often lately. Especially on club-nights, - Herbert.” Herbert Heywood showed distinct signs of annoyance. - </p> - <p> - “Does he, by Jove? I don’t like the fellow. He’s a particularly fine - specimen of a bad hat.” - </p> - <p> - “I’m afraid he’s an immoral man,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - Herbert shrugged his shoulders. - </p> - <p> - “Well, Clare can take care of herself.” - </p> - <p> - “I wonder,” said Mrs. Heywood, as though she were not at all sure. “My - dear, I think you ought to keep an eye on your wife just now.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert Heywood took his eye-glass out of a fob pocket and fumbled with - it. - </p> - <p> - “Keep an eye on her, mother?” - </p> - <p> - “She is very queer,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I can’t do anything to please - her.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, there’s nothing strange in that,” said Herbert. Then he added - hastily— - </p> - <p> - “I mean it’s no new symptom.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood stared at her son in a peculiar, significant way. - </p> - <p> - “She looks as if something is going to—happen.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert was really startled. - </p> - <p> - “Happen? How? When?” - </p> - <p> - “I can’t exactly explain. She appears to be waiting for something—or - some one.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert was completely mystified. - </p> - <p> - “I didn’t keep her waiting this evening, did I?” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t mean you, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “No?—Who, then?” asked Herbert. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood replied somewhat enigmatically. She gave a deep sigh and said— - </p> - <p> - “We women are queer things!” - </p> - <p> - “Queer isn’t the word,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - He stared at the carpet in a gloomy, thoughtful way, as though the pattern - were perplexing him. - </p> - <p> - “Perhaps you’re right about the novels. They’ve been giving her notions, - or something.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood crossed the room hurriedly and went over to a drawer in a - cabinet, from which she pulled out a number of pamphlets. - </p> - <p> - “Herbert,” she said solemnly, “she doesn’t read only novels. Look here. - Look at all these little books. She simply devours them, Herbert, and then - hides them.” - </p> - <p> - “Naturally, after she has devoured them,” said Herbert irritably. “But - what the deuce are they?” - </p> - <p> - He turned them over one by one, reading out the titles, raising his - eyebrows, and then whistling with surprise, and finally looking quite - panic-stricken. - </p> - <p> - “<i>Women’s Work and Wages</i>. Oh, Lord! John Stuart Mill on <i>The - Subjection of Women. The Ethics of Ibsen</i>. Great Scott! <i>The - Principles of Eugenics</i>.... My hat!” - </p> - <p> - “Quite so, Herbert,” said Mrs. Heywood, with a kind of grim satisfaction - in his consternation. - </p> - <p> - “I don’t mind her reading improper novels,” said Herbert, “but I draw the - line at this sort of stuff.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s most dangerous.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s rank poison.” - </p> - <p> - “That’s what I think,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “Where did she get hold of them?” asked Herbert. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood looked at her son as though she had another startling - announcement. - </p> - <p> - “From that woman, Miss Vernon, the artist girl who lives in the flat - above.” - </p> - <p> - “What, that girl who throws orange-peel over the balcony?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, the girl who is always whistling for taxis,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “What, you mean the one who complained about my singing in the bath?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, I shall never forgive her for that.” - </p> - <p> - “Said she didn’t mind if I sang in tune.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, the one who sells a Suffragette paper outside Victoria Station.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s the sort of thing she would do,” said Herbert, with great sarcasm. - </p> - <p> - “I never liked her, my dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “Confound her impudence! As if a British subject hasn’t an inalienable - right to sing in his bath! She had the cheek to say I was spoiling her - temper for the rest of the day.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood laughed rather bitterly. “She looks as if she had a temper!” - </p> - <p> - Herbert gave the pamphlets an angry slap with the back of his hand and let - them fall on the floor. - </p> - <p> - “Do you mean to say <i>she</i> has been giving Clare these pestilential - things?” - </p> - <p> - “I saw her bring them here,” said Mrs. Hey-wood. - </p> - <p> - “Well, they shan’t stay here.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert went to the fireplace and took up the tongs. Then he picked up the - pamphlets as though they might bite and tossed them into the flames. - </p> - <p> - “Beastly things! Burn, won’t you?” - </p> - <p> - He gave them a savage poke, deeper into the fire, and watched them smolder - and then break into flame. - </p> - <p> - “Pestilential nonsense!... That’s a good deed done, anyhow!” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood was rather scared. - </p> - <p> - “I am afraid Clare will be very angry.” - </p> - <p> - “Angry! I shall give her a piece of my mind. She had no right to conceal - these things.” He spoke with dignity. “It isn’t honorable.” - </p> - <p> - “No,” said Mrs. Heywood, “but all the same, dear, I wish you hadn’t burned - the books.” - </p> - <p> - “I should like to burn the authors of ‘em,” said Herbert fiercely. - “However, they’ll roast sooner or later, that’s a comfort.” - </p> - <p> - “You had better be careful, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood rather nervously. - “Clare is in a rather dangerous frame of mind just now.” - </p> - <p> - “Clare will have to learn obedience to her husband’s wishes,” said - Herbert. “I thought she had learned by this time. She’s been very quiet - lately.” - </p> - <p> - “Too quiet, Herbert. It’s when we women are very quiet that we are most - dangerous.” Herbert was beginning to feel alarmed. He did not like all - these hints, all these vague and mysterious suggestions. - </p> - <p> - “Good Lord, mother, you give me the creeps. Why don’t you speak plainly?” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood was listening. She seemed to hear some sounds in the hall. - Suddenly she retreated to her arm-chair and made a pretence of searching - for her knitting. - </p> - <p> - “Hush!” she said. “Here she comes.” - </p> - <p> - As she spoke the words, the door opened slowly and Clare came in. She was - a tall, elegant woman of about thirty, with a quiet manner and melancholy - eyes in which there was a great wistfulness. She spoke rather wearily— - </p> - <p> - “Not gone yet, Herbert? You’ll be late for the club.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert looked at his wife curiously, as though trying to discover some of - those symptoms to which his mother had alluded. - </p> - <p> - “I’m afraid that’s your fault,” he said. - </p> - <p> - “My fault?” - </p> - <p> - “Surely you ought to stay at home sometimes and help me to get off - decently,” said Herbert in an aggrieved way. “You know perfectly well my - tie always goes wrong.” - </p> - <p> - Clare sighed; and then smiled rather miserably. - </p> - <p> - “Why can’t men learn to do their own ties? We’re living in the twentieth - century, aren’t we?” - </p> - <p> - She took off her hat, and sat down with it in her lap. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, how my head aches to-night.” - </p> - <p> - “Where have you been?” asked Herbert - </p> - <p> - “Yes, dear, where <i>have</i> you been?” asked Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “I’ve been round to church for a few minutes,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “What on earth for?” asked Herbert impatiently. - </p> - <p> - “What does one go to church for?” - </p> - <p> - “God knows!” said Herbert bitterly. - </p> - <p> - “Precisely. Have you any objection?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, I have.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert spoke with some severity, as though he had many objections. - </p> - <p> - “I don’t object to you going to your club,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, that’s different.” - </p> - <p> - “In what way?” asked Clare. - </p> - <p> - “In every way. I am a man, and you’re a woman.” - </p> - <p> - Clare Heywood thought this answer out. She seemed to find something in the - argument. - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” she said, “it does make a lot of difference.” - </p> - <p> - “I object strongly to this religious craze of yours,” said Herbert, trying - to be calm and reasonable. “It’s unnatural. It’s—it’s devilish - absurd.” - </p> - <p> - “It may keep me from—from doing other things,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - She spoke as though the words had some tragic significance. - </p> - <p> - “Why can’t you stay at home and read a decent novel?” - </p> - <p> - “It is so difficult to find a <i>decent</i> novel. And I am sick of them - all.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, play the piano, then,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “I am tired of playing the piano, especially when there is no one to - listen.” - </p> - <p> - “There’s mother,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “Mother has no ear for music.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood was annoyed at this remark. It seemed to her unjust. - </p> - <p> - “How can you say so, Clare? You know I love Mozart.” - </p> - <p> - “I haven’t played Mozart for years,” said Clare, laughing a little. “You - are thinking of Mendelssohn.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, it’s all the same,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, I suppose so,” said Clare very wearily. She drooped her head and - shut her eyes until suddenly she seemed to smell something. - </p> - <p> - “Is there anything burning?” - </p> - <p> - “Burning?” said Herbert nervously. - </p> - <p> - “There is a queer smell in the flat,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - Herbert stood with his back to the fire, and sniffed strenuously. “I can’t - smell anything.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s your fancy, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “It’s the smell of burned paper,” said Clare quite positively. - </p> - <p> - “Do you think so?” said her mother-in-law. - </p> - <p> - “Burned paper?” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - Clare became suspicious. She leaned forward in her chair and stared into - the fireplace. - </p> - <p> - “What are all those ashes in the grate?” she said. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, yes,” said Herbert, as though he had suddenly remembered. “Of course - I <i>have</i> been burning some papers.” - </p> - <p> - “What papers?” asked Clare. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, old things,” said Herbert rather hurriedly. “Well, I had better be - off. Goodnight, mother.” - </p> - <p> - He kissed her affectionately and said: - </p> - <p> - “Don’t stay up late. I have taken the key, Clare.” - </p> - <p> - “I hope it will fit the lock when you come back,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - She spoke the words very quietly, but for some reason they raised her - husband’s ire. - </p> - <p> - “For heaven’s sake don’t try to be funny, Clare.” - </p> - <p> - “I wasn’t trying,” said Clare very calmly. For a moment Herbert hesitated. - Then he came back to his wife and kissed her. - </p> - <p> - “I think we are both a bit irritable to-night, aren’t we?” - </p> - <p> - “Are we?” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “Nerves,” said Herbert, “the curse of the age. Well, good-night.” - </p> - <p> - Just as he was going out, Mollie, the maidservant, came in and said: - </p> - <p> - “It’s Miss Vernon, ma’am.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh,” said Clare. She glanced at her husband for a moment and theft said: - </p> - <p> - “Well, bring her in, Mollie.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, ma’am,” said Mollie, going out of the room again. - </p> - <p> - “Great Scott!” exclaimed Herbert, in a sudden excitement. “It’s that woman - who flings her beastly orange-peel into my window boxes. Clare, I strongly - object——” - </p> - <p> - Clare answered him a little passionately: “Oh, I am tired of your - objections.” - </p> - <p> - “She’s not a respectable character,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “Hush, Herbert!” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - As she spoke the girl who had been called Madge Vernon entered the room. - </p> - <p> - She was a bright, cheery girl, dressed plainly in a tailor-made coat and - skirt, with brown boots. - </p> - <p> - “I thought I would look in for half-an-hour,” she said very cheerfully to - Clare. “If you are busy, send me packing, my dear.” - </p> - <p> - “I am never busy,” said Clare. “I have nothing in the world to do.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, that’s rotten!” said Madge. “Can’t you invent something? How are you, - Mrs. Heywood?” - </p> - <p> - She shook hands with the old lady, who answered her greeting with a rather - grim “Good evening.” - </p> - <p> - “Herbert is going out to-night,” said Clare. “By the way, you don’t know - my husband.” - </p> - <p> - Madge Vernon looked at Herbert Heywood very sweetly. - </p> - <p> - “I have heard him singing. How do you do?” - </p> - <p> - Herbert was not at all pleased with her sweetness. - </p> - <p> - “Excuse me, won’t you?” he said. “I am just off to my club.” - </p> - <p> - “Don’t you take your wife with you?” asked Miss Vernon. - </p> - <p> - “My wife! It’s a man’s club.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I see. Men only. Rather selfish, isn’t it?” - </p> - <p> - Herbert Heywood was frankly astonished. - </p> - <p> - “Selfish? Why selfish? Well, I won’t stop to argue the point. Good-night, - Clare. Doubtless you will enjoy Miss Vernon’s remarkable and revolutionary - ideas.” - </p> - <p> - “I am sure I shall,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood followed her son to the door. - </p> - <p> - “Be sure you put a muffler round your neck, dear.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert answered his mother in a low voice, looking fiercely at Madge - Vernon. - </p> - <p> - “I should like to twist it round somebody else’s neck!” - </p> - <p> - “I will come and find it for you, dear.” - </p> - <p> - The two young women were left alone together, and Clare brought forward a - chair. - </p> - <p> - “Sit down, won’t you? Here?” - </p> - <p> - A moment later the front door was heard to hang and at the sound of it - Madge laughed a little. - </p> - <p> - “Funny things, husbands! I am sure I shouldn’t know what to do with one.” - </p> - <p> - Clare smiled wanly. - </p> - <p> - “One can’t do anything with them.” - </p> - <p> - “By the by,” said Madge, “I have brought a new pamphlet for you. The - ‘Rights of Wives.’” - </p> - <p> - Clare took the small book nervously, as though it were a bomb which might - go off at any moment. - </p> - <p> - “I have been reading those other pamphlets.” - </p> - <p> - “Pretty good, eh?” said Madge, laughing. “Eye-openers! What?” - </p> - <p> - “They alarm me a little,” said Clare. “Alarm you?” Madge Vernon was - immensely amused. “Why, they don’t bite!” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, they do,” said Clare. “Here.” She put her hand to her head as if it - had been wounded. - </p> - <p> - “You mean they give you furiously to think? Well, that’s good.” - </p> - <p> - “I’m not sure,” said Clare. “Since I began to think I have been very - miserable.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, that will soon wear off,” said Madge Vernon briskly. “You’ll get used - to it.” - </p> - <p> - “It will always hurt,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - Madge Vernon smiled at her. - </p> - <p> - “I made a habit of it.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s best not to think,” said Clare. “It’s best to go on being stupid and - self-satisfied.” - </p> - <p> - Clare’s visitor was shocked. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, not self-satisfied! That is intellectual death.” - </p> - <p> - “There are other kinds of death,” said Clare. “Moral death.” - </p> - <p> - Madge Vernon raised her eyebrows. - </p> - <p> - “We must buck up and do things. That’s the law of life.” - </p> - <p> - “I have nothing to do,” said Clare, in a pitiful way. - </p> - <p> - “How strange! I have such a million things to do. My days aren’t long - enough. I am always pottering about with one thing or another.” - </p> - <p> - “What kind of things?” asked Clare wistfully. - </p> - <p> - Madge Vernon gave her a cheerful little laugh. - </p> - <p> - “For one thing, it’s a great joke having to earn one’s own living. The - excitement of never knowing whether one can afford the next day’s meal! - The joy of painting pictures—which the Royal Academy will inevitably - reject. The horrible delight of burning them when they are rejected.... - Besides, I am a public character, I am.” - </p> - <p> - “Are you? How?” asked Clare. - </p> - <p> - “A most notorious woman. I’m on the local Board of Guardians and all sorts - of funny old committees for looking after everything and everybody.” - </p> - <p> - “What do you do?” - </p> - <p> - Clare asked the question as though some deep mystery lay in the answer. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I poke up the old stick-in-the-muds,” said Madge Vernon, “and stir up - no end of jolly rows. I make them do things, too; and they hate it. Oh, - how they hate it!” - </p> - <p> - “What things, Madge?” - </p> - <p> - “Why, attending to drains, and starving widows, and dead dogs, and - imbecile children, and people ‘what won’t work,’ and people ‘what will’ - but can’t.” - </p> - <p> - Clare laughed at this description and then became sad again. - </p> - <p> - “I envy you! I have nothing on earth to do, and my days are growing longer - and longer, so that each one seems a year.” - </p> - <p> - “Haven’t you any housework to do?” asked Madge. - </p> - <p> - “Not since my husband could afford an extra servant.” - </p> - <p> - Miss Vernon made an impatient little gesture. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, those extra servants! They have ruined hundreds of happy homes.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, we have only got one now,” said Clare. “The other left last night, - because she couldn’t get on with my mother-in-law.” - </p> - <p> - “They never can!” said Miss Vernon. - </p> - <p> - “Anyhow, Herbert doesn’t think it ladylike for me to do housework.” - </p> - <p> - Madge Vernon scoffed at the idea. - </p> - <p> - “Ladylike! Oh, this suburban snobbishness! How I hate the damn thing! - Forgive my bad language, won’t you?” - </p> - <p> - “I like it,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - Miss Vernon continued her cross-examination. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t you even make your own bed? It’s awfully healthy to turn a mattress - and throw the pillows about.” - </p> - <p> - “Herbert objects to my making beds,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t you make the puddings or help in the washing up?” - </p> - <p> - “Herbert objects to my going into the kitchen,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t you ever break a few plates?” - </p> - <p> - Clare smiled at her queer question. - </p> - <p> - “No, why should I?” - </p> - <p> - “There’s nothing like breaking things to relieve one’s pent-up emotions,” - said Miss Vernon, with an air of profound knowledge. - </p> - <p> - “The only thing I have broken lately is something—here,” said Clare, - putting her hand to her heart. - </p> - <p> - Miss Vernon was scornful. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, rubbish! The heart is unbreakable, my dear. Now, heads are much - easier to crack.” - </p> - <p> - “I think mine is getting cracked, too,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - She put her hands to her head, as though it were grievously cracked. - </p> - <p> - Madge Vernon stared at her frankly and thoughtfully. - </p> - <p> - “Look here,” she said, after a little silence, “I tell you what <i>you</i> - want. It’s a baby. Why don’t you have one?” - </p> - <p> - “Herbert can’t afford it,” said Clare. Madge Vernon raised her hands. - </p> - <p> - “Stuff and nonsense!” she said. - </p> - <p> - “Besides,” said Clare in a matter-of-fact way, “they don’t make flats big - enough for babies in Intellectual Mansions.” - </p> - <p> - Madge Vernon looked round the room, and frowned angrily. - </p> - <p> - “No, that’s true. There’s no place to keep a perambulator. Oh, these jerry - builders! Immoral devils!” - </p> - <p> - There was a silence between the two women. Both of them seemed deep in - thought. - </p> - <p> - Then presently Clare said: “I feel as if something were going to happen; - as if something must happen or break.” - </p> - <p> - “About time, my dear,” said Madge. “How long have you been married?” - </p> - <p> - “Eight years,” said Clare, in a casual way. Madge Vernon whistled with a - long-drawn note of ominous meaning. - </p> - <p> - “The Eighth Year, eh?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, it’s our eighth year of marriage.” - </p> - <p> - “That’s bad,” said Madge. “The Eighth Year! You will have to be very - careful, Clare.” - </p> - <p> - Clare was startled. “What do you mean?” she asked. - </p> - <p> - “Haven’t you heard?” said Miss Vernon. - </p> - <p> - “Heard what?” - </p> - <p> - “I thought everybody knew.” - </p> - <p> - “Knew what?” asked Clare anxiously. - </p> - <p> - Madge Vernon looked at her in a pitying way. - </p> - <p> - “It’s in the evidence on the Royal Commission on Divorce.” - </p> - <p> - “What is?” - </p> - <p> - “About the Eighth Year.” - </p> - <p> - “What about it?” asked Clare. She was beginning to feel annoyed. What was - Madge hiding from her? - </p> - <p> - “Why,” said Madge, “about it being the fatal year in marriage.” - </p> - <p> - “The fatal year?” - </p> - <p> - The girl leaned forward in her chair and said in a solemn way: - </p> - <p> - “There are more divorces begun in the Eighth Year than in any other - period.” - </p> - <p> - Clare Heywood was scared. - </p> - <p> - “Good gracious!” she said, in a kind of whisper. - </p> - <p> - “It’s a psychological fact,” said Madge. “I work it out in this way. In - the first and second years a wife is absorbed in the experiment of - marriage and in the sentimental phase of love. In the third and fourth - years she begins to study her husband and to find him out. In the fifth - and sixth years, having found him out completely, she makes a working - compromise with life and tries to make the best of it. In the seventh and - eighth years she begins to find out herself, and then——” - </p> - <p> - “And then?” asked Clare, very anxiously. - </p> - <p> - Clare Heywood was profoundly disturbed. - </p> - <p> - “Well, then,” said Madge, “there is the devil to pay!” - </p> - <p> - “Dear God!” she cried. - </p> - <p> - “You see, it’s like this. If a woman has no child she gets bored... . She - can’t help getting bored, poor soul. Her husband is so devoted to her that - he provides her with every opportunity for getting bored—extra - servants, extra little luxuries, and what he calls a beautiful little - home. Ugh!” She stared round the room and made a face. - </p> - <p> - “He is so intent on this that he nearly works himself to death. Comes home - with business thoughts in his head. Doesn’t notice his wife’s wistful - eyes, and probably dozes off to sleep after supper. Isn’t that so?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Clare. “Horribly so.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, then, having got bored, she gets emotional. Of course the husband - doesn’t notice that either. <i>He’s</i> not emotional. He is only - wondering how to make both ends meet. But when his wife begins to get - emotional, when she feels that something has broken here” (she put her - hand to her heart), “when she feels like crying at unexpected moments and - laughing at the wrong time, why then——” - </p> - <p> - “What?” asked Clare. - </p> - <p> - “Why, then, it’s about time the husband began to notice things, or things - will begin to happen to his wife which he won’t jolly well like. That’s - all!” - </p> - <p> - Clare Heywood searched her friend’s face with hungry eyes. - </p> - <p> - “Why, what will his wife do?” - </p> - <p> - “Well, there are various alternatives. She either takes to religion——” - </p> - <p> - “Ah!” said Clare, flushing a little. - </p> - <p> - “Or to drink——” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, no!” said Clare, shuddering a little. - </p> - <p> - “Or to some other kind of man,” said Madge very calmly. - </p> - <p> - Clare Hey wood was agitated and alarmed. - </p> - <p> - “How do you know these things?” she asked. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I’ve studied ‘em,” said Madge Vernon cheerfully. “Of course there’s - always another alternative.” - </p> - <p> - “What’s that?” asked Clare eagerly. - </p> - <p> - “Work,” said Madge Vernon solemnly. - </p> - <p> - “What kind of work?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, any kind, so long as it’s absorbing and satisfying. Personally I like - breaking things. One must always begin by breaking before one begins - building. But it’s very exciting.” - </p> - <p> - “It must be terribly exciting.” - </p> - <p> - “For instance,” said Madge, laughing quietly, “it’s good to hear a pane of - glass go crack.” - </p> - <p> - “How does it make you feel?” asked Clare Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “Oh,” said Madge, “it gives one a jolly feeling down the spine. You should - try it.” - </p> - <p> - “I daren’t,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “It would do you a lot of good. It would get rid of your megrims. Besides, - it’s in a good cause.” - </p> - <p> - “I am not so sure of that,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “It’s in the cause of woman’s liberty. It’s in the cause of all these - suburban wives imprisoned in these stuffy little homes. It lets in God’s - fresh air.” - </p> - <p> - Clare rose and moved about the room. “It’s very stuffy in here,” she said. - “It’s stifling.” At this moment Mollie came in the room again, and smiled - across at her mistress, saying: “Mr. Bradshaw to see you, ma’am.” - </p> - <p> - Clare was obviously agitated. She showed signs of embarrassment, and her - voice trembled when she said: - </p> - <p> - “Tell him—tell him I’m engaged.” - </p> - <p> - “He says he must see you—on business,” said Mollie, lingering at the - door. - </p> - <p> - “On business?” - </p> - <p> - “That’s what my young man says when he whistles up the tube,” said Mollie. - </p> - <p> - Madge Vernon looked at her friend and said rather “meaningly”: “Don’t you - <i>want</i> to see him? If so I shouldn’t if I were you.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, yes,” said Clare, trying to appear quite cool. “If it’s on business.” - </p> - <p> - “Very well, ma’am,” said Mollie. As she left the room she said under her - breath: “I thought you would.” - </p> - <p> - “Do you have business relations with Mr. Bradshaw?” asked Madge Vernon. - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Clare; “no.... In a sort of way.” - </p> - <p> - “I thought he was a novelist,” said Madge. - </p> - <p> - “So he is.” - </p> - <p> - “Dangerous fellows, novelists.” - </p> - <p> - “Hush!” said Clare. “He might hear you.” - </p> - <p> - “If it’s on business I must go, I suppose,” said Madge Vernon, rising from - her chair. - </p> - <p> - “No, don’t go; stay!” said Clare, speaking with strange excitement. - </p> - <p> - As soon as she had uttered the words the visitor, Gerald Bradshaw, came - in. - </p> - <p> - He was a handsome, “artistic” looking man, with longish brown hair and a - vandyke beard. He was dressed in a brown suit, with a big brown silk tie. - He came forward in a graceful way, perfectly at ease, and with a charming - manner. - </p> - <p> - “How do you do, Mrs. Heywood?” - </p> - <p> - “I <i>must</i> be going,” said Madge. “Good-by, dear.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, <i>do</i> stay,” whispered Clare. - </p> - <p> - “Impossible. I have to speak to-night.” - </p> - <p> - Although Madge Vernon had ignored the artist, he smiled at her and said: - </p> - <p> - “Don’t you speak by day as a rule?” - </p> - <p> - “Not until I am spoken to.... Good-night, Clare.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, if you must be going—” said Clare uneasily. - </p> - <p> - Madge Vernon stood for a moment at the door and smiled back at her friend. - “You will remember, won’t you?” - </p> - <p> - “What?” - </p> - <p> - “The Eighth Year,” said Madge. With that parting shot she whisked out of - the room. - </p> - <p> - Gerald Bradshaw breathed a sigh of relief. Then he went across to Clare - and kissed her hands. - </p> - <p> - “I can’t stand that creature. A she-devil!” - </p> - <p> - “She is my friend,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “I am sorry to hear it,” said Gerald Bradshaw. - </p> - <p> - Clare Heywood drooped her eyelashes before his bold, smiling gaze. - </p> - <p> - “Why did you come again?” she asked. “I told you not to come.” - </p> - <p> - “That is why I came. May I smoke?” - </p> - <p> - He lit a cigarette before he had received he permission, and after a whiff - or two said: - </p> - <p> - “Is the good man at the club?” - </p> - <p> - “You know he is at the club,” said Clare. “True. That is another reason - why I came. Clare Heywood’s face flushed and her voice trembled a little. - </p> - <p> - “Gerald, if you had any respect for me—— - </p> - <p> - “Respect is a foolish word,” said Gerald Bradshaw. “Hopelessly - old-fashioned. Now adays men and women like or dislike, hate or love.” - </p> - <p> - “I think I hate you,” said Clare in a low voice. - </p> - <p> - Gerald smiled at her. - </p> - <p> - “No, you don’t. You are a little frightened of me. That is all.” - </p> - <p> - The woman laughed nervously, but there was a look of fear in her eyes. - </p> - <p> - “Why should I be frightened of you?” - </p> - <p> - “Because I tell you the truth. I don’t keep up the foolish old pretences - by which men and women hide themselves from each other. You cannot hide - from me, Clare.” - </p> - <p> - “You seem to strip my soul bare,” said Clare and when the man laughed at - her she said: “Yes, I am frightened of you.” - </p> - <p> - “It is because you are like all suburban women,” said Gerald, “brought up - in this environment of hypocritical virtue and false sentiment. You are - frightened at the verities of life.” - </p> - <p> - Clare Heywood gave a deep, quivering sigh. “Life is a tragic thing, - Gerald,” she said. “Life is a jolly thing if one makes the best of it, if - one fulfils one’s own nature.” - </p> - <p> - “One’s own nature is generally bad.” - </p> - <p> - “Never mind,” said Gerald cheerfully. “It is one’s own. Bad or good, it - must find expression instead of being smothered or strangled. Life is - tragic only to those who are afraid of it. Don’t be afraid, Clare. Do the - things you want to do.” - </p> - <p> - “There is nothing I want to do,” said Clare wearily. “Nothing except to - find peace.” - </p> - <p> - “Exactly. Peace. How can you find peace, my poor Clare, in this stuffy - life of yours—in this daily denial of your own nature? There are - heaps of things you want.” - </p> - <p> - Clare laughed again, in a mirthless way. “How do you know?” she asked. - </p> - <p> - “Of course I know. Shall I tell you?” - </p> - <p> - “I think I would rather you didn’t,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “I will tell you,” said the man. “Liberty is one of them.” - </p> - <p> - “Liberty is a vague word.” - </p> - <p> - “Liberty for your soul,” said Gerald. - </p> - <p> - “Herbert objects to my having a soul.” - </p> - <p> - “Liberty for that beating heart of yours, Clare.” - </p> - <p> - The woman put both hands to her heart. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, it beats, and beats.” - </p> - <p> - “You want to escape, Clare.” - </p> - <p> - “Escape?” - </p> - <p> - She seemed frightened at that word. She whispered it. - </p> - <p> - “Escape from the deadening influence of domestic dulness.” - </p> - <p> - “I can’t deny the dulness,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “You want adventure. Your heart is seeking adventure. You know it. You - know that I am telling you the truth.” - </p> - <p> - As the man spoke he came closer to her, and with his hands in his pockets - stood in front of her, staring into her eyes. - </p> - <p> - “You make me afraid,” said Clare. All the color had faded out of her face - and she was dead white. - </p> - <p> - “You need not be afraid, Clare. The love of a man for a woman is not a - terrifying thing. It is a good thing. Good as life.” - </p> - <p> - He took her by the wrists and held them tight. - </p> - <p> - “Gerald!” said Clare. “For God’s sake.... I have a husband.” - </p> - <p> - “He bores you,” said the man. “He is your husband but not your mate. No - woman finds peace until she finds her mate. It is the same with a man.” - </p> - <p> - “I will not listen to you. You make me feel a bad woman!” - </p> - <p> - She wrenched her hands free and moved toward the bell. - </p> - <p> - Gerald Bradshaw laughed quietly. He seemed amused at this woman’s fear. He - seemed masterful, sure of his power over her. - </p> - <p> - “You know that you must be my mate. If not to-day, to-morrow. If not - to-morrow, the next day. I will wait for you, Clare.” - </p> - <p> - Clare had shrunk back to the wall now, and touched the electric bell. - </p> - <p> - “You have no pity for me,” she said. “You play on my weakness.” - </p> - <p> - “Fear makes you strong to resist,” said the man. “But love is stronger - than fear.” - </p> - <p> - He followed her across the room to where she stood crouching against the - wall like a hunted thing. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t come so close to me,” she said. - </p> - <p> - “What on earth have you rung the bell for?” asked the man. - </p> - <p> - “Because I ought not to be alone with you.” - </p> - <p> - They stood looking into each other’s eyes. Then Clare moved quickly toward - the sofa as Mollie came in. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, Mollie,” said Clare, trying to steady her voice, “ask Mrs. Heywood to - come in, will you? Tell her Mr. Bradshaw is here.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, ma’am,” said Mollie. “But she knows that already.” - </p> - <p> - “Take my message, please,” said her mistress. - </p> - <p> - “I was going to, ma’am,” said Mollie, and she added in an undertone, as - she left the room, “Strange as it may appear.” - </p> - <p> - Gerald laughed quite light-heartedly. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, you have won the trick this time. But I hold the trump cards, Clare; - and I am very lucky, as a rule. I have a gambler’s luck. Of course if the - old lady comes in I shan’t stay. She hates me like poison, and I can’t be - polite to her. Insincerity is not one of my vices. Good-night, dear heart. - I will come to you in your dreams.” - </p> - <p> - As he spoke this word, which brought a flush again to Clare Heywood’s - face, Mrs. Hey-wood, her mother-in-law, came in. She glanced from one to - the other suspiciously. - </p> - <p> - Gerald Bradshaw was not in the least abashed by her stern face. - </p> - <p> - “How do you do, Mrs. Heywood? I was just going. I hope I have not - disturbed you?” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood answered him in a “distant” manner: - </p> - <p> - “Not in the least.” - </p> - <p> - “I am glad,” he said. “I will let myself out. Don’t trouble.” - </p> - <p> - At that moment there was a noise in the hall, and Clare raised her head - and listened. - </p> - <p> - “I think I hear another visitor,” she said. - </p> - <p> - “In that ease I had better wait a moment,” said Gerald. “The halls of - these flats are not cut out for two people at a time. I will light another - cigarette if I may.” - </p> - <p> - “I thought I heard a latchkey,” said Mrs. Heywood. “Surely it can’t he - Herbert back so early?” - </p> - <p> - “No, it can’t be,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - Gerald spoke more to himself than to the ladies: - </p> - <p> - “I hope not.” - </p> - <p> - They were all silent when Herbert Heywood came in quietly. - </p> - <p> - “I didn’t go to the club after all,” he said. Then he saw Gerald Bradshaw, - and his mouth hardened a little as he said, “Oh!... How do?” - </p> - <p> - “How are you?” asked Gerald, in his cool way. - </p> - <p> - “Been here long?” asked Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “Long enough for a pleasant talk with your wife.” - </p> - <p> - “Going now?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes. We have finished our chat. Goodnight. I can find my way out - blindfolded. All these flats are the same. Rather convenient, don’t you - think?” - </p> - <p> - He turned to Clare and smiled. - </p> - <p> - “<i>Au revoir</i>, Mrs. Heywood.” - </p> - <p> - She did not answer him, and he went out jauntily. A few moments later they - heard the front door shut. - </p> - <p> - “What the devil does he come here for?” growled Herbert rather sulkily. - </p> - <p> - Clare ignored the question. - </p> - <p> - “Why are you home so early?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, dear, why didn’t you go to the club?” asked Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - Herbert looked rather embarrassed. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I don’t know. I felt a bit off. Besides——” - </p> - <p> - “What, dear?” asked his mother. - </p> - <p> - “I thought Clare was feeling a bit lonely to-night. Perhaps I was - mistaken.” - </p> - <p> - “I am often lonely,” said Clare. “Even when you are at home.” - </p> - <p> - “Aren’t you <i>glad</i> I have come back?” asked Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “Why do you ask me?” - </p> - <p> - “I should be glad if you were glad.” Clare’s husband became slightly - sentimental as he looked at her. - </p> - <p> - “I have been thinking it <i>is</i> rather rotten to go <i>off</i> to the - club and leave you here alone,” he said. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood was delighted with these words. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, you dear boy! How unselfish of you!” - </p> - <p> - “I try to be,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “I am sure you are the very soul of unselfishness, Herbert, dear,” said - the fond mother. - </p> - <p> - “Thanks, mother.” - </p> - <p> - He looked rather anxiously at Clare, and said— - </p> - <p> - “Don’t you think we might have a pleasant evening for once?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, that would be delightful!” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “Eh, Clare?” - </p> - <p> - “How do you mean?” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “Like we used to in the old days? Some music, and that sort of thing.” - </p> - <p> - “I am sure that will be <i>very</i> nice,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “Eh, Clare?” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “If you like,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “Wait till I have got my boots off.” He spoke in a rather honeyed voice to - his wife. - </p> - <p> - “Do you happen to know where my slippers are, darling?” - </p> - <p> - “I haven’t the least idea,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - Herbert seemed nettled at this answer. - </p> - <p> - “In the old days you used to warm them for me,” he said. - </p> - <p> - “Did I?” said Clare. “I have forgotten. It was a long time ago.” - </p> - <p> - “Eight years.” - </p> - <p> - At these words Clare looked over to her husband in a peculiar way. - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” she said. “It is our eighth year.” - </p> - <p> - “Here are your slippers, dear,” said Mrs. Hey wood. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, thanks, mother. <i>You</i> don’t forget.” - </p> - <p> - There was silence while he took off his boots. Clare sat with her hands in - her lap, staring at the carpet. Once or twice her mother-in-law glanced at - her anxiously. - </p> - <p> - “Won’t you play something, Clare?” said the old lady, after a little - while. - </p> - <p> - “If you like,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - Herbert resumed his cheerful note. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, let’s have a jolly evening. Perhaps I will sing a song presently.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, do, dear!” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “Gad, it’s a long time since I sang ‘John Peel’!” - </p> - <p> - Clare looked rather anxious and perturbed. - </p> - <p> - “The walls of this flat are rather thin,” she said. “The neighbors might - not like it.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, confound the neighbors!” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “I will do some knitting while you two dears play and sing,” said the old - lady. - </p> - <p> - She fetched her knitting from a black silk bag on one of the little - tables, and took a chair near the fireplace. Clare Heywood went to the - music-stool and turned over some music listlessly. She did not seem to - find anything which appealed to her. - </p> - <p> - Her husband settled himself down in an arm-chair and loaded his pipe. - </p> - <p> - “Play something bright, Clare,” he said. - </p> - <p> - “All my music sounds melancholy when I play it,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “What, rag-time?” - </p> - <p> - “Even rag-time. Rag-time worst of all.” - </p> - <p> - Yet she began to play softly one of Chopin’s preludes, in a dreamy way. - </p> - <p> - “Tell me when you want me to sing,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “I will,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - There was silence for a little while, except for Clare’s dream-music. Mrs. - Heywood dozed over her knitting, and her head nodded on her chest. - Presently Herbert rose from his chair and touched the electric bell. A - moment later Mollie came in. - </p> - <p> - “Yes?” asked Mollie. - </p> - <p> - Herbert spoke quietly so that he should not interrupt his wife’s music. - </p> - <p> - “Bring me <i>The Financial Times</i>, Mollie. It’s in my study.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, sir,” said Mollie. - </p> - <p> - She brought the paper and left the room again. There was another silence, - except for the soft notes of the music. Herbert turned over the pages of - <i>The Financial Times</i>, and yawned a little, and then let the paper - drop. His head nodded and then lolled sideways. In a little while he was - as fast asleep as his mother, and snored, quietly at first, then quite - loudly. - </p> - <p> - Clare stopped playing, and looked over the music-rest with a strange, - tragic smile at her husband and her mother-in-law. She rose from the - piano-stool, and put her hands to her head, and then at her throat, - breathing quickly and jerkily, as though she were being stifled. - </p> - <p> - “A jolly evening!” she exclaimed in a whisper. “Oh, God!” - </p> - <p> - She stared round the room, with rather wild eyes. - </p> - <p> - “It is stuffy here. It is stifling.” - </p> - <p> - She moved toward the piano again, with her hands pressed against her - bosom. - </p> - <p> - “I feel that something <i>must</i> happen. Something <i>must</i> break.” - </p> - <p> - She took up a large china vase from the piano, moved slowly toward the - window, hesitated for a moment, looked round at her sleeping husband, and - then hurled the vase straight through the window. It made an appalling - noise of breaking glass. - </p> - <p> - Herbert Heywood jumped up from his seat as though he had been shot. - </p> - <p> - “Good God!” he said. “What the devil!——” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood was equally startled. She sat up in her chair as though an - earthquake had shaken the house. - </p> - <p> - “Good gracious! Whatever in the world——-” - </p> - <p> - At the same moment Mollie opened the door. - </p> - <p> - “Good ‘eavins, ma’am!” she cried. “Whatever ‘as ‘appened?” - </p> - <p> - Clare Heywood answered very quietly: - </p> - <p> - “I think something must have broken,” she said. - </p> - <p> - Then she gave a queer, strident laugh. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0015" id="link2HCH0015"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER II - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">M</span>RS. Heywood was - arranging the drawingroom for an evening At Home, dusting the mantelshelf - and some of the ornaments with a little hand broom. There were - refreshments on a side table. Mollie was trying to make the fire burn up. - Every now and then a gust of smoke blew down the chimney. Clare was - sitting listlessly in a low chair near the French window, with a book on - her lap, but she was not reading. - </p> - <p> - “Drat the fire,” said Mollie, with her head in the fireplace. - </p> - <p> - “For goodness’ sake, Mollie, stop it smoking like that!” said Mrs. - Heywood. “It’s no use my dusting the room.” - </p> - <p> - “The devil is in the chimney, it strikes me,” said Mollie. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood expressed her sense of exasperation. - </p> - <p> - “It’s a funny thing that every time your mistress gives an At Home you are - always behindhand with your work.” - </p> - <p> - Mollie expressed her feelings in the firegrate. - </p> - <p> - “It’s a funny thing people can’t mind their own business.” - </p> - <p> - “What did you say, Mollie?” asked Mrs. Heywood sharply. - </p> - <p> - “I said that the fire hasn’t gone right since the window was broke. Them - Suffragettes have a lot to answer for.” - </p> - <p> - “I cannot understand how it <i>did</i> get broken,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I - almost suspect that woman, Miss Vernon.” - </p> - <p> - Clare looked up and spoke irritably. - </p> - <p> - “Nonsense, mother!” - </p> - <p> - “It’s no use saying nonsense, Clare,” said Mrs. Heywood, even more - irritably. “You know perfectly well that Miss Vernon is a most dangerous - woman.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, she didn’t break our window, anyhow,” said Clare, rather doggedly. - </p> - <p> - “How do you know that? It is still a perfect mystery.” - </p> - <p> - “Don’t be absurd, mother. How did the vase get through the window?” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood was baffled for an answer. - </p> - <p> - “Ah, that is most perplexing.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, leave it at that,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - Mollie was still wrestling with the mysteries of light and heat. - </p> - <p> - “If it doesn’t burn now,” she said, “I won’t lay another finger on it—At - Home or no At Home.” - </p> - <p> - She seized the dustpan and broom and, with a hot face, marched out of the - room. - </p> - <p> - Clare pressed her forehead with the tips of her fingers. - </p> - <p> - “I wish to Heaven there were no such things as At Homes,” she said - wearily. “Oh, how they bore me!” - </p> - <p> - “You used to like them well enough,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “I have grown out of them. I have grown out of so many things. It is as if - my life had shrunk in the wash.” - </p> - <p> - “Nothing seems to please you now,” said the old lady. “Don’t you care for - your friends any longer?” - </p> - <p> - “Friends? Those tittle-tattling women, with their empty-headed husbands?” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood was silent for a moment. Then she spoke bitterly. - </p> - <p> - “Do you think Herbert is empty-headed?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, we won’t get personal, mother,” said Clare. “And we won’t quarrel, if - you don’t mind.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood’s lips tightened. - </p> - <p> - “I am afraid we shall if you go on like this.” - </p> - <p> - “Like what?” asked Clare. - </p> - <p> - “Hush!” said the old lady. “Here comes Herbert.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert came in quickly, and raised his eyebrows after a glance at his - wife. - </p> - <p> - “Good Lord, Clare! Aren’t you dressed yet?” - </p> - <p> - “There’s plenty of time, isn’t there?” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “No, there isn’t,” said Herbert. “You know some of the guests will arrive - before eight o’clock.” - </p> - <p> - Clare looked up at the clock. - </p> - <p> - “It’s only six now.” - </p> - <p> - “Besides,” said Herbert, “I want you to look your best to-night. Edward - Hargreaves is coming, with his wife.” - </p> - <p> - “What has that got to do with it?” - </p> - <p> - “Everything,” said Herbert. “He is second cousin to one of my directors. - It is essential that you should make a good impression.” - </p> - <p> - “You told me once that he was a complete ass,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “So he is.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, then,” said Clare, quietly but firmly, “I decline to make a good - impression on him.” - </p> - <p> - “I must ask you to obey my wishes,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - Clare had rebellion in her eyes. - </p> - <p> - “I have obeyed you for seven years. It is now the Eighth Year.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert did not hear his wife’s remark. He was looking round the room with - an air of extreme annoyance. - </p> - <p> - “Well, I’m blowed!” he exclaimed. - </p> - <p> - “What’s the matter, dear?” asked Mrs. Hey-wood anxiously. - </p> - <p> - “You haven’t even taken the trouble to buy some flowers,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “I left that to Clare,” said the old lady. - </p> - <p> - “Haven’t you done so, Clare?” - </p> - <p> - “No,” said Clare. “I can’t bear flowers in this room. They droop so - quickly.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert was quite angry. - </p> - <p> - “I insist upon having some flowers. The place looks like a barn without - them. What will our visitors say?” - </p> - <p> - “Stupid things, as usual,” said Clare quietly. - </p> - <p> - “I must go out and get some myself, I suppose,” said Herbert, with the air - of a martyr. - </p> - <p> - “Can’t you send Mollie, dear?” asked Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “Mollie is cutting sandwiches. The girl is overwhelmed with work. And—Oh, - my stars!” - </p> - <p> - His mother was alarmed by this sudden cry of dismay. - </p> - <p> - “Now what is the matter, dear?” - </p> - <p> - “There’s no whisky in the decanter.” - </p> - <p> - “No whisky?” - </p> - <p> - “Clare,” said Herbert, appealing to his wife, “there’s not a drop of - whisky left.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, <i>I</i> didn’t drink it,” said Clare. “You finished it the other - night with one of your club friends.” - </p> - <p> - “So we did. Dash it!” - </p> - <p> - “Don’t be irritable, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “Irritable! Isn’t it enough to make a saint irritable? These things always - happen on our At Home nights. Nobody seems to have any forethought. Every - blessed thing seems to go wrong.” - </p> - <p> - “That is why I wish one could abolish the institution,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “What institution?” - </p> - <p> - “At Homes.” - </p> - <p> - “Don’t talk rubbish, Clare,” said Herbert angrily; “you know I have them - for <i>your</i> sake.” - </p> - <p> - Clare laughed bitterly, as though she had heard a rather painful joke. - </p> - <p> - “For my sake! Oh, that is good!” - </p> - <p> - Herbert was distracted by a new cause of grievance as a tremendous puff of - smoke came out of the fire-grate. - </p> - <p> - “What in the name of a thousand devils——” - </p> - <p> - “It’s that awful fire again!” cried Mrs. Hey-wood. “These flats seem to - have no chimneys.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s nothing to do with the flat,” said Herbert. “It’s that fool Mollie. - The girl doesn’t know how to light a decent fire!” - </p> - <p> - He rang the bell furiously, keeping his finger on the electric knob. - </p> - <p> - “The creature has absolutely nothing to do, and what she does she spoils.” - </p> - <p> - Mollie came in with a look of mutiny on her face. - </p> - <p> - “Look at that fire,” said Herbert fiercely. - </p> - <p> - “I am looking at it,” said Mollie. - </p> - <p> - “Why don’t you do your work properly? See to the beastly thing, can’t - you?” - </p> - <p> - Mollie folded her arms and spoke firmly. - </p> - <p> - “If you please, sir, wild horses won’t make me touch it again.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s not a question of horse-power,” said Herbert. “Go and get an old - newspaper and hold it in front of the bars.” - </p> - <p> - “I am just in the middle of the sandwiches,” said Mollie. - </p> - <p> - “Well, get out of them, then,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - Mollie delivered her usual ultimatum. - </p> - <p> - “If you please, sir, I beg to give a month’s notice.” - </p> - <p> - “Bosh!” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “Bosh indeed!” cried Mollie. “We’ll see if it’s bosh! If you want any - sandwiches for your precious visitors you can cut ‘em yourself.” - </p> - <p> - With this challenge she went out of the room and slammed the door behind - her. - </p> - <p> - Herbert breathed deeply, and after a moment’s struggle in his soul spoke - mildly. - </p> - <p> - “Mother, go and pacify the fool, will you?” - </p> - <p> - “She is very obstinate,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “All women are obstinate.” - </p> - <p> - Suddenly the man’s self-restraint broke down and he became excited. - </p> - <p> - “Bribe her, promise her a rise in wages, but for God’s sake see that she - cuts the sandwiches. We don’t want to be made fools of before our guests.” - </p> - <p> - “Very well, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. She hesitated for a moment at the - door, and before going out said: “But Mollie can be very violent at - times.” - </p> - <p> - For a little while there was silence between the husband and wife. Then - Herbert spoke rather sternly. - </p> - <p> - “Clare, are you or are you not going to get dressed?” - </p> - <p> - “I shall get dressed in good time,” said Clare quietly, “when I think fit. - Surely you don’t want to dictate to me about <i>that?</i>” - </p> - <p> - “Surely,” said Herbert, “you can see how awkward it will be if any of our - people arrive and find you unprepared for them?” - </p> - <p> - Clare gave a long, weary sigh. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I <i>am</i> prepared for them. I have been trying to prepare myself - all day for the ordeal of, them.” - </p> - <p> - “The ordeal? What the dickens do you mean?” - </p> - <p> - “I am prepared for Mrs. Atkinson Brown, who, when she takes off her hat in - the bedroom, will ask me whether I am suited and whether I am expecting.” - </p> - <p> - “For goodness’ sake don’t be coarse, Clare,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “It’s Mrs. Atkinson Brown who is coarse,” said Clare. “And I am prepared - for Mr. Atkinson Brown, who will say that it is horrible weather for this - time of year, and that business has been the very devil since there has - been a Radical Government, and that these outrageous women who are - breaking windows ought to be whipped. Oh, I could tell you everything that - everybody is going to say. I have heard it over and over again.” - </p> - <p> - “It does not seem to make much effect on you,” said Herbert. “Especially - that part about breaking windows.” - </p> - <p> - Clare smiled. - </p> - <p> - “So you have guessed, have you?” - </p> - <p> - “I knew at once by the look on your face.” - </p> - <p> - “I thought you agreed with your mother that some Suffragette must have - flung a stone from the outside.” - </p> - <p> - “I hid the truth from mother,” said Herbert. “She would think you were - mad. What on earth made you do it? <i>Were</i> you mad or what?” - </p> - <p> - Clare brushed her hair back from her forehead. - </p> - <p> - “Sometimes I used to think I was going a little mad. But now I know what - is the matter with me.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert spoke more tenderly. - </p> - <p> - “What <i>is</i> the matter, Clare? If it is a question of a doctor——” - </p> - <p> - “It’s the Eighth Year,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “The Eighth Year?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, that’s what is the matter with me.” - </p> - <p> - “What on earth do you mean?” asked Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “Why, don’t you know? It was Madge Vernon who told me.” - </p> - <p> - “Told you what?” - </p> - <p> - “She seemed to think that everybody knew.” - </p> - <p> - “Knew what?” asked Herbert, exasperated beyond all patience. - </p> - <p> - “About the Eighth Year.” - </p> - <p> - “What about it?” - </p> - <p> - “It’s well known, she says, that the Eighth Year is the most dangerous one - in marriage. It is then that the pull comes, when the wife has found out - her husband.” - </p> - <p> - “Found out her husband?” - </p> - <p> - “And found out herself.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert spoke roughly. He was not in a mood for such mysteries. - </p> - <p> - “Look here,” he said. “I can’t listen to all this nonsense. Go and dress - yourself.” - </p> - <p> - “I want to talk to you, Herbert,” said Clare very earnestly. “I must talk - to you before it’s too late.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s too late now,” said Herbert. “Halfpast six. I must fetch that whisky - and buy a few flowers. I shall have to put on my boots again and splash - about in the mud in these trousers. Confound it!” - </p> - <p> - “Before you go you must listen, Herbert,” said Clare, with a sign of - emotion. “Perhaps you won’t have another chance.” - </p> - <p> - “Thank Heaven for that.” - </p> - <p> - “When I broke that window something else broke.” - </p> - <p> - “One of my best vases,” said Herbert with sarcasm. - </p> - <p> - “I think something in my own nature broke too. My spirit has broken out of - this narrow, deadening little life of ours, out of the smug snobbishness - and stupidity which for so long kept me prisoner, out of the belief that - the latest sentimental novel, the latest romantic play, the latest bit of - tittle-tattle from my neighbors might satisfy my heart and brain. When I - broke that window I let a little fresh air into the stifling atmosphere of - this flat, where I have been mewed up without work, without any kind of - honest interest, without any kind of food for my brain or soul.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert stared at his wife, and made an impatient gesture. - </p> - <p> - “If you want work, why don’t you attend to your domestic duties?” - </p> - <p> - “I have no domestic duties,” said Clare. “That is the trouble.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert laughed in an unpleasant way. - </p> - <p> - “Why, you haven’t even bought any flowers to decorate your home! Isn’t - that a domestic duty?” - </p> - <p> - Clare answered him quickly, excitedly. - </p> - <p> - “It’s just a part of the same old hypocrisy of keeping up appearances. You - know you don’t care for flowers in themselves, except as they help to make - a show. You want to impress our guests. You want to keep up the old - illusion of the woman’s hand in the home. The woman’s touch. Isn’t that - it?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, I do want to keep up that illusion,” said Herbert; “and by God, I - find it very hard! You say you want an object in life. Isn’t your husband - an object?” - </p> - <p> - Clare looked at him with a queer, pitiful smile. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, he is,” she said slowly. - </p> - <p> - “Well, what more do you want?” - </p> - <p> - “Lots more. A woman’s life is not centered for ever in one man.” - </p> - <p> - “It ought to be,” said Herbert. “If you had any religious principles——” - </p> - <p> - “Oh,” said Clare sharply, “but you object to my religion!” - </p> - <p> - “Well, of course I mean in moderation.” - </p> - <p> - “You have starved me, Herbert, and oh, I am so hungry!” - </p> - <p> - Herbert answered her airily. - </p> - <p> - “Well, there will be light refreshments later.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, that is worthy of you,” cried Clare. “That is your sense of humor! - You have starved my soul and starved my heart and you offer me—sandwiches. - I am hungry for life and you offer me—the latest novel.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert paced up and down the room. He was losing control of his temper. - </p> - <p> - “That is the reward for all my devotion!” he said. “Don’t I drudge in the - city every day to keep you in comfort?” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t want comfort!” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t I toil so that you may have pretty frocks?” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t want pretty frocks.” - </p> - <p> - “Don’t I scrape and scheme to buy you little luxuries?” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t want little luxuries,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “Is there anything within my means that you haven’t got?” - </p> - <p> - Clare looked at him in a peculiar way, and answered quietly— - </p> - <p> - “I haven’t a child,” she said. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, Lord,” said Herbert uneasily. “Whose fault is that? Besides, modern - life in small flats is not cut out for children.” - </p> - <p> - “And modern life in small flats,” said Clare, “is not cut out for wives.” - </p> - <p> - “It isn’t my fault,” said Herbert. “I am not the architect—either of - fate or flats.” - </p> - <p> - “No, it isn’t your fault, Herbert. You can’t help your character. It isn’t - your fault that when you come home from the city you fall asleep after - dinner. It isn’t your fault that when you go to the club I sit at home - with my hands in my lap, thinking and brooding. It isn’t your fault that - your mother and I get on each other’s nerves. It isn’t your fault that you - and I have grown out of each other, that we bore each other and have - nothing to say to each other—except when we quarrel.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, then,” said Herbert, “whose fault is it?” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t know,” said Clare. “I suppose it’s a fault of the system, which - is spoiling thousands of marriages just like ours. It’s the fault which is - found out—in the Eighth Year.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, curse the Eighth Year,” said Herbert violently. “What is that bee you - have got in your bonnet?” - </p> - <p> - “It’s a bee which keeps buzzing in my brain. It’s a little bee which - whispers queer words to me—tempting words. It says you must break - away from the system or the system will break you. You must find a way of - escape or die. You must do it quickly, now, to-night, or it will be too - late. Herbert, a hungry woman will do desperate things to satisfy her - appetite, and I am hungry for some stronger emotion than I can find within - these four walls. I am hungry for love, hungry for work, hungry for life. - If you can’t give it to me, I must find it elsewhere.” - </p> - <p> - “Clare,” said Herbert, with deliberate self-restraint, “I must again - remind you that time is getting on and you are not yet dressed. In a - little while our guests will be here. I hope you don’t mean to hold me up - to the contempt of my friends. I at least have some sense of duty.... I am - going to fetch the whisky.” As he strode toward the door he started back - at the noise of breaking china. - </p> - <p> - “What’s that?” asked Clare. - </p> - <p> - “God knows,” said Herbert. “I expect mother has broken a window.” - </p> - <p> - The words were hardly out of his mouth before Mrs. Heywood came in in a - state of great agitation. - </p> - <p> - “Herbert, I must really ask you to come into the kitchen.” - </p> - <p> - “What’s the matter now?” asked Herbert, prepared for the worst. - </p> - <p> - “Mollie has deliberately broken our best coffee-pot.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert stared at his wife. - </p> - <p> - “Didn’t I tell you so!” he said. - </p> - <p> - “Why has she broken the coffee-pot?” asked Clare. - </p> - <p> - “She was most insolent,” said Mrs. Heywood, “and said my interference got - on her nerves.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, even a servant <i>has</i> nerves,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “But it was the <i>best</i> coffee-pot, Clare. Surely you are not going to - take it so calmly?” - </p> - <p> - “Like mistress like maid!” said Herbert. “Oh, my hat! Why on earth did I - marry?” - </p> - <p> - “Don’t you think you had better fetch the whisky?” said Clare gently. - </p> - <p> - Herbert became excited again. - </p> - <p> - “I have been trying to fetch the whisky for the last half hour. There is a - conspiracy against it. Confound it, I <i>will</i> fetch the whisky.” - </p> - <p> - He strode to the door, as though he would get the whisky or die in the - attempt. - </p> - <p> - “I think you ought to speak to Mollie first,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - Herbert raised his hands above his head. - </p> - <p> - “Damn Mollie!” he shouted wildly. Then he strode out of the room. “Damn - everything!” - </p> - <p> - “Poor dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I wish he didn’t get so worried.” - </p> - <p> - “Clare, won’t you come and speak to Mollie?” - </p> - <p> - “Haven’t you spoken to her?” asked Clare wearily. - </p> - <p> - “I am always speaking to her.” - </p> - <p> - “<i>Poor</i> Mollie!” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood was hurt at the tone of pity. She flushed a little and then - turned to her daughter-in-law with reproachful eyes. - </p> - <p> - “I am an old woman, Clare, and the mother of your husband. Because my - position forces me to live in this flat, I do not think you ought to - insult me.” - </p> - <p> - “I’m sorry,” said Clare with sincerity. - </p> - <p> - “Mollie is right. We all get on each other’s nerves. It can’t be helped, I - suppose. It’s part of the system.” - </p> - <p> - “I can’t help being your mother-in-law, Clare.” - </p> - <p> - “No, it can’t he helped,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood came close to her and touched her hand. - </p> - <p> - “You think I do not understand. You think you are the only one who has any - grievance.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, no!” said Clare. “I am not so egotistical.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood smoothed down her dress with trembling hands. - </p> - <p> - “You think I haven’t been watching you all these years. I have watched you - so that I know your thoughts behind those brooding eyes, Clare. I know all - that you have been thinking and suffering, so that sometimes you hate me, - so that my very presence here in the room with you makes you wish to cry - out, to shriek, because I am your mother-in-law, and the mother of your - husband. The husband always loves his mother best, and the wife always - knows it. That is the eternal tragedy of the mother-in-law. Because she is - hated by the wife of her son, and is an intruder in her home. I know that - because I too suffered from a mother-in-law. Do you think I would stay - here an hour unless I was forced to stay, for a shelter above my old head, - for some home in which I wait to die? But while I wait I watch... and I - know that you have reached a dangerous stage in a woman’s life, when she - may do any rash thing. Clare, I pray every night that you may pass that - stage in life without doing anything—rash. This time always comes in - marriage, it comes——” - </p> - <p> - “In the Eighth Year?” asked Clare eagerly. “Somewhere about then.” - </p> - <p> - “Ah! I thought so.” - </p> - <p> - “It came to me, my dear.” - </p> - <p> - “And did <i>you</i> do anything rash?” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood hesitated a moment before replying. - </p> - <p> - “I gave birth to Herbert,” she said. - </p> - <p> - “Good Heavens!” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “It saved me from breaking——” - </p> - <p> - “Windows, mother?” - </p> - <p> - “No, my own and my husband’s heart,” said Mrs. Heywood. “Well, I will go - and speak to Mollie again. Goodness knows how we shall get coffee - to-night.” - </p> - <p> - She went out of the room with her head shaking a little after this scene - of emotion. - </p> - <p> - Clare spoke to herself aloud. She had her hands up to her throat. - </p> - <p> - “I don’t want coffee to-night. I want stronger drink. I want to get drunk - with liberty of life.” - </p> - <p> - Suddenly there was a noise at the window and the woman looked up, - startled, and cried, “Who is there?” - </p> - <p> - Gerald Bradshaw appeared at the open French window leading on to the - balcony, and he spoke through the window. - </p> - <p> - “It is I, Clare? Are you alone?” - </p> - <p> - Clare had risen from her chair at the sound of his voice, and her face - became very pale. - </p> - <p> - “Gerald... How did you come there?” - </p> - <p> - Gerald Bradshaw laughed in his lighthearted way. - </p> - <p> - “I stepped over the bar that divides our balconies. It was quite easy. It - was as easy as it will be to cross the bar that divides you and me, - Clare.” - </p> - <p> - Clare spoke in a frightened voice. - </p> - <p> - “Why do you come here, at this hour?” - </p> - <p> - “Why do I ever come?” asked Gerald Bradshaw. - </p> - <p> - “I don’t know.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s because I want you. I want you badly to-night, Clare. I can’t wait - for you any longer.” - </p> - <p> - Clare spoke pleadingly. - </p> - <p> - “Gerald... go away... it’s so dangerous... I daren’t listen to you.” - </p> - <p> - “I want you to listen,” said Gerald Bradshaw. - </p> - <p> - “Go away... I implore you to go away.” - </p> - <p> - He laughed at her. He seemed very much amused. - </p> - <p> - “Not before I have said what I want to say.” - </p> - <p> - “Say it quickly,” said Clare. “Quickly!” - </p> - <p> - “There’s time enough,” said Bradshaw. “This is what I want to say. You are - a lonely woman and I am a lonely man, and only an iron bar divides us. - It’s the iron bar of convention, of insincerity, of superstition. It seems - so difficult to cross. But you see one step is enough. I want you to take - that step—to-night.” - </p> - <p> - Clare answered him in a whisper. - </p> - <p> - “Go away!” - </p> - <p> - “I am hungry for you,” said Bradshaw, with a thrill in his voice. “I am - hungry for your love. And you are hungry for me. I have seen it in your - eyes. You have the look of a famished woman. Famished for love. Famished - for comradeship.” - </p> - <p> - Clare raised her hands despairingly. - </p> - <p> - “If you have any pity, go away.” - </p> - <p> - “I have no pity. Because pity is weakness, and I hate weakness.” - </p> - <p> - “You are brutal,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - He laughed at her. He seemed to like those words. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, I have the brutality of manhood. Man is a brute, and woman likes the - brute in him because that is his nature, and woman wants the natural man. - That is why you want me, Clare. You can’t deny it.” - </p> - <p> - Clare protested feebly. - </p> - <p> - “I do deny it. I <i>must</i> deny it.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s a funny thing,” said Gerald Bradshaw. “Between you and me there is a - queer spell, Clare. I was conscious of it when I first met you. Something - in you calls to me. Something in me calls to you. It is the call of the - wild.” - </p> - <p> - Clare was scared now. These words seemed to make her heart beat to a - strange tune. - </p> - <p> - “What do you mean?” she said. - </p> - <p> - “It is the call of the untamed creature. Both you and I are untamed. We - both have the spirit of the woods. I am Pan. You are a wood nymph, - imprisoned in a cage, upholstered by maple, on the hire system.” - </p> - <p> - “What do you want with me?” asked Clare. It was clear that he was tempting - her. - </p> - <p> - “I want to play with you, like Pan played. You and I will hear the pipes - of Pan to-night—the wild nature music.” - </p> - <p> - “To-night?” - </p> - <p> - “To-night. I have waited too long for you, and now I’m impatient. I am - alone in my flat waiting for you. I ask you to keep me company, not - to-night only, but until we tire of each other, until perhaps we hate each - other. Who knows?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, God!” said Clare. She moaned out the words in a pitiful way. - </p> - <p> - “You have only to slip down one flight of stairs and steal up another, and - you will find me at the door with a welcome. It will need just a little - care to escape from your prison. You must slip on your hat and cloak as - though you were going round to church, and then come to me, to me, Clare! - Only a wall will divide you from this flat, but you will be a world away. - For you will have escaped from this upholstered cage into a little world - of liberty. Into a little world of love, Clare. Say you will come!” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, God!” moaned Clare. - </p> - <p> - “You will come?” - </p> - <p> - “Are you the Devil that you tempt me?” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - Gerald gave a triumphant little laugh. - </p> - <p> - “You will come! Clare, my sweetheart, I know you will come, for your - spirit is ready for me.” - </p> - <p> - As he spoke these words there was the sound of a bell ringing through the - flat, and the noise of it struck terror into Clare Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “Go away,” she whispered. “For God’s sake go! Some one is ringing.” - </p> - <p> - “I will cross the bar again,” said Bradshaw. “But I shall be waiting at - the door. You will not be very long, little one?” - </p> - <p> - Clare sank down with her face in her hands. And Gerald stole away from the - window just as Mollie showed in Madge Vernon. - </p> - <p> - “It’s our At Home night,” said Mollie, as she came in, “and they’ll be - here presently.” - </p> - <p> - “All right, Mollie,” said Miss Vernon, smiling. “I shan’t stay more than a - minute. I know I have come at an awkward time.” - </p> - <p> - “She <i>would</i> come in, ma’am,” said Mollie, as though she were not - strong enough to thwart such a determined visitor. - </p> - <p> - As soon as the girl had gone Madge Vernon came across to Clare, very - cheerfully and rather excitedly. - </p> - <p> - “Clare, are you coming?” - </p> - <p> - “Coming where?” asked Clare, trying to hide her agitation. - </p> - <p> - “To the demonstration,” said Madge Vernon. “You know I told you all about - it! It begins at eight. It will be immense fun, and after your - window-smashing exploit you are one of us. Good Heavens, I think you have - beaten us all. None of us have ever thought of breaking our own windows.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s my At Home night,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, bother the At Home. Can’t your husband look after his friends for - once? I wanted you to join in this adventure. It would be your enrolment - in the ranks, and it will do you a lot of good, in your present state of - health.” - </p> - <p> - “In any case——” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “What?” - </p> - <p> - Clare smiled in a tragic way. - </p> - <p> - “I have received a previous invitation.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, drat the invitation.” - </p> - <p> - “Of course I should have liked to come,” said Clare, “but——” - </p> - <p> - Madge Vernon was impatient with her. “But what? I hate that word ‘but.’” - </p> - <p> - “The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak,” said Clare, speaking with a - deeper significance than appeared in the words. - </p> - <p> - “There is no weakness about you. You have the courage of your convictions. - Have you had the window mended yet?” - </p> - <p> - She laughed gaily and then listened with her head a little on one side to - the sound of a bell ringing in the hall. - </p> - <p> - “That must be Herbert,” said Clare. “I think you had better go.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, I think I had better,” said Madge, laughing again. “If looks could - kill——” - </p> - <p> - She went toward the door and opened it, but I stood on the threshold - looking back. - </p> - <p> - “Won’t you come? Eight o’clock, you know.” - </p> - <p> - Clare smiled weakly. - </p> - <p> - “I am in great demand to-night.” - </p> - <p> - The two women listened to Herbert’s voice in the hall saying— - </p> - <p> - “Of course all the shops were shut.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, Lord!” said Madge, “I must skedaddle.” She went out of the room - hurriedly, leaving Clare alone. - </p> - <p> - And after a moment or two Clare spoke aloud, with her hands clasped upon - her breast. - </p> - <p> - “I wonder if the Devil is tempting me tonight?” she said. - </p> - <p> - Then Herbert entered with two whisky bottles. - </p> - <p> - “I had to hunt all over the place,” he said. - </p> - <p> - Then he saw that his wife was still in her afternoon frock, and his face - flushed with anger. - </p> - <p> - “What, aren’t you dressed <i>yet?</i>... I think you might show some - respect for my wishes, Clare.” - </p> - <p> - “I am going to dress now,” said Clare, and she rose and went into the - bedroom. - </p> - <p> - “Women are the very devil,” said Herbert, unwrapping the whisky bottles. - </p> - <p> - While he was busy with this his mother came in, having changed her dress. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I am glad you managed to get the whisky,” she said. - </p> - <p> - “Of course nearly every blessed shop was shut,” said Herbert. “They always - are when I run out of everything. It’s this Radical Government, with its - beastly Acts.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood hesitated and then came across to her son and touched him on - the arm. - </p> - <p> - “I think you had better come into the kitchen a moment, dear, and look - after Mollie.” - </p> - <p> - “She hasn’t broken anything else, has she?” said Herbert anxiously. - </p> - <p> - “No, dear. But she has just cut her finger rather badly. She got in a - temper with the sandwiches.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert raised his hands to heaven. - </p> - <p> - “Why do these things always happen when Clare gives an At Home? I shall - abolish these evenings altogether. They will drive me mad.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, they’re very pleasant when they once begin,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “I’m glad you think so, mother. I am damned if I do. I was only saying to - Clare to-night——” - </p> - <p> - He stalked out of the room furiously. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood stood for a few moments staring at the carpet. Her lips moved - and her worn old hands plucked at her skirt. - </p> - <p> - “Every time there is an At Home at this flat,” she said, “I get another - white hair.” - </p> - <p> - She moved toward the door and went out of the room, so that it was left - empty. - </p> - <p> - Outside in the street a piano-organ was playing a rag-time tune with a - rattle of notes, and motor-cars were sounding their horns. - </p> - <p> - In this little drawing-room in Intellectual Mansions, Battersea Park, - there was silence, except for those vague sounds from without. There was - no sign here of Fate’s presence, summoning a woman to her destiny. No - angel stood with a flaming sword to bar the way to a woman with a wild - heart. The little ormolu clock ticking on the mantel-shelf did not seem to - be counting the moments of a tragic drama. It was a very commonplace - little room, and the flamboyant chintz on the sofa and chairs gave it an - air of cheerfulness, as though this were one of the happy homes of - England. - </p> - <p> - Presently the bedroom door opened slowly, and Clare Heywood stood there - looking into the drawing-room and listening. She was very pale, and was - dressed in her outdoor things, as Gerald Bradshaw had asked her to dress, - in her hat and cloak, so that she might slip out of the flat which he had - called her prison. - </p> - <p> - She came further into the room, timidly, like a hare frightened by the - distant baying of the hounds. - </p> - <p> - She raised her hands to her bosom, and spoke in a whisper: - </p> - <p> - “God forgive me!” - </p> - <p> - Then she crossed the floor, listened for a moment intently at the door, - and slipped out. A moment or two later one’s ears, if they had been - listening, would have heard the front door shut. - </p> - <p> - Clare Heywood had escaped. - </p> - <p> - A little while later Mrs. Heywood, her mother-in-law, came into the room - again and went over to the piano to open it and arrange the music. - </p> - <p> - “I do hope Clare is getting dressed,” she said, speaking to herself. - </p> - <p> - Then Herbert came in, carrying a tray with decanter and glasses. - </p> - <p> - “Isn’t Clare ready yet?” he asked. - </p> - <p> - “No, dear. She won’t be long.” - </p> - <p> - “I can’t find the corkscrew,” said Herbert, searching round for it, but - failing to discover its whereabouts. - </p> - <p> - “Isn’t it in the kitchen, dear?” asked Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “Not unless Mollie has swallowed it. It’s just the sort of thing she would - do—out of sheer spite.” - </p> - <p> - “Didn’t you use it the other day to open a tin of sardines?” asked the old - lady, cudgelling her brains. - </p> - <p> - “Did I?” said Herbert. “Oh, Lord, yes! I left it in the bathroom.” - </p> - <p> - He went out of the room to find it. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood crossed over to the fire and swept up the grate. - </p> - <p> - “Clare is a very long time to-night,” she said. - </p> - <p> - Then Mollie came in carrying a tray with some plates of sandwiches. One of - her fingers was tied up with a rag. - </p> - <p> - “It’s a good job the guests is late to-night,” she remarked. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, we are all very behind-hand,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - Mollie dumped down the tray and gave vent to a little of her impertinent - philosophy: - </p> - <p> - “I’ll never give an At Home when I’m married. Blest if I do. Social - ‘ipocrisy, I call them.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood rebuked her sharply: - </p> - <p> - “We don’t want your opinion, Mollie, thank you.” - </p> - <p> - “I suppose I can <i>have</i> a few opinions, although I <i>am</i> in - service,” said Mollie. “There’s plenty of time for thought even in the - kitchen of a flat like this. I wonder domestic servants don’t write - novels. My word, what a revelation it would be! I’ve a good mind to write - one of them serials in the <i>Daily Mail</i>.” - </p> - <p> - “If I have any more of your impudence, Mollie——” - </p> - <p> - “It’s not impudence,” said Mollie. “It’s aspirations.” - </p> - <p> - The girl was silent when her master came into the room with the corkscrew. - </p> - <p> - “It wasn’t in the bathroom,” he explained. “I remember now, I used it for - cleaning out my pipe.” - </p> - <p> - “I could have told you that a long time ago, sir,” said Mollie. - </p> - <p> - “Well, why the dickens didn’t you?” asked Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “You never asked me, sir.” - </p> - <p> - Mollie retired with the air of having scored a point. - </p> - <p> - “Well, as long as you’ve found it, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “Unfortunately, I broke the point. However, I daresay I can make it do.” - </p> - <p> - He pulled one of the corks out of the whisky bottle and filled the - decanter. - </p> - <p> - “Hasn’t Clare finished dressing yet?” he said presently. “What on earth is - she doing?” - </p> - <p> - “I expect she wants her blouse done up at the back,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - Herbert jerked up his head. - </p> - <p> - “And then she complains because I can’t tie my own tie I Just like women.” - </p> - <p> - He drew out another cork rather violently and said: - </p> - <p> - “Well, go and see after her, mother.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood went toward the bedroom door and called out in her silvery - voice: - </p> - <p> - “Are you ready, dear?” - </p> - <p> - She listened for a moment, and called out again: - </p> - <p> - “Clare!” - </p> - <p> - Herbert poured some more whisky into the decanter. - </p> - <p> - “I expect she’s reading one of those beastly pamphlets,” he said. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood tapped at the bedroom door. - </p> - <p> - “Clare!” - </p> - <p> - “Go in, mother,” said Herbert irritably. - </p> - <p> - “It’s very strange!” said Mrs. Heywood in an anxious voice. - </p> - <p> - She went into the bedroom, and Herbert, who had been watching her, spilled - some of the whisky, so that he muttered to himself: - </p> - <p> - “What with women and what with whisky——” - </p> - <p> - He did not finish his sentence, but stared in the direction of the bedroom - as though suspecting something was wrong. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood came trembling out. She had a scared look. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, Herbert!” - </p> - <p> - Herbert was alarmed by the look on her face. - </p> - <p> - “Is Clare ill—or something?” - </p> - <p> - “She isn’t there,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - The old lady was rather breathless. - </p> - <p> - “Not there!” said Herbert in a dazed way. - </p> - <p> - “She went in to dress a few minutes ago,” said his mother. - </p> - <p> - Herbert stared at her. He was really very much afraid, but he spoke - irritably: - </p> - <p> - “Well, she can’t have gone up the chimney, can she? At least, I suppose - not, though you never can tell nowadays.” - </p> - <p> - He strode toward the bedroom door and called out: - </p> - <p> - “Clare!” - </p> - <p> - Then he went inside. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood stood watching the open door. She raised her hands up and - then let them fall, and spoke in a hoarse kind of whisper: - </p> - <p> - “I think it has happened at last.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert came out of the bedroom again. He looked pale, and had gloomy - eyes. - </p> - <p> - “It’s devilish queer!” he said. - </p> - <p> - Mother and son stood looking at each other, as though in the presence of - tragedy. - </p> - <p> - “She must have gone out,” said Mrs. Hey-wood. - </p> - <p> - “Gone out! What makes you think so?” - </p> - <p> - “She has taken her hat and cloak.” - </p> - <p> - “How do you know?” asked Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “I looked in the wardrobe.” - </p> - <p> - “Good Heavens! Where’s she gone to?” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood’s thin old hands clutched at the white lace upon her bosom. - </p> - <p> - “Herbert, I—I am afraid.” - </p> - <p> - The man went deadly white. He stammered as he spoke: - </p> - <p> - “You don’t mean that she is going to do something—foolish?” - </p> - <p> - “Something rash,” said Mrs. Hey wood mournfully. - </p> - <p> - Herbert had a sudden idea. It took away from his fear a little and made - him angry. - </p> - <p> - “Perhaps she has gone round to church. If so, I will give her a piece of - my mind when she comes back. It’s outrageous! It’s shameful.” - </p> - <p> - There was the sound of a bell ringing through the hall, and the mother and - son listened intently. - </p> - <p> - “Perhaps she <i>has</i> come back,” said Herbert. “Perhaps she went to - fetch some flowers.” This idea seemed to soften him. His voice broke a - little when he said: “Poor girl! I didn’t mean to make such a fuss about - them.” “It isn’t Clare,” said Mrs. Heywood, shaking her head. “It’s a - visitor. I hear Mr. Atkinson Brown’s voice.” - </p> - <p> - Mr. Atkinson Brown’s voice could be heard quite plainly in the hall: - </p> - <p> - “Well, Mollie, is your mistress quite well?” Herbert grasped his mother’s - arm and whispered to her excitedly: - </p> - <p> - “Mother, we must hide it from them.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “If the Atkinson Browns suspect anything it will - be all over the neighborhood.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert had a look of anguish in his eyes. “Good Heavens, yes. My - reputation will be ruined.” - </p> - <p> - Once again they heard Mr. Atkinson Brown’s voice in the hall. - </p> - <p> - “I see we are the first to arrive,” he said in a loud, cheery tone. - </p> - <p> - “Mother,” whispered Herbert, “we must keep up appearances, at all costs.” - </p> - <p> - “I’ll try to, darling,” said Mrs. Heywood, clasping his arm for a moment. - </p> - <p> - Herbert made a desperate effort to be hopeful. - </p> - <p> - “Clare is sure to be back in a few minutes. We’re frightening ourselves - for nothing.... I shall have something to say to her to-night when the - guests are gone.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood’s eyes filled with tears, and she looked at her son as though - she knew that Clare would never come back. - </p> - <p> - “My poor boy!” she said. - </p> - <p> - “Play the game, mother,” said Herbert. “For Heaven’s sake play the game.” - </p> - <p> - He had no sooner whispered these words than Mr. and Mrs. Atkinson Brown - entered the room, having taken off their outdoor things. Mr. Brown was a - tall, stout, heavily built man with a bald head and a great expanse of - white waistcoat. His wife was a little bird-like woman in pink silk. They - were both elaborately cheerful. - </p> - <p> - “Hulloh, Heywood, my boy!” said the elderly man. - </p> - <p> - “So delighted to come!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown to Herbert’s mother. - </p> - <p> - Herbert grasped the man’s hand and wrung it warmly. - </p> - <p> - “Good of you to come. Devilish good.” - </p> - <p> - “Glad to come,” said Mr. Atkinson Brown. “Glad to come, my lad. How’s the - wife?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown, glancing round the room. “Where’s dear - Clare?... Well, I hope.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert tried to hide his extreme nervousness. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, tremendously fit, thanks. She’ll be here in a minute or two.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood appeared less nervous than her son. Yet her voice trembled a - little when she said: - </p> - <p> - “Do sit down, Mrs. Atkinson Brown.” - </p> - <p> - She pulled a chair up, but the lady protested laughingly: - </p> - <p> - “Oh, not so near the fire. I can’t afford to neglect my complexion at my - time of life!” - </p> - <p> - Her husband was rubbing his hands in front of the fire. He had no - complexion to spoil. - </p> - <p> - “Horrible weather for this time o’ year,” he said. - </p> - <p> - “Damnable,” said Herbert, agreeing with him almost too cordially. - </p> - <p> - “Is dear Clare suited at present?” asked the lady. - </p> - <p> - “Well,” said Mrs. Heywood, “we still have Mollie, but she is a great - trouble—a very great trouble.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, the eternal servant problem!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. “I thought I - had a perfect jewel, but I found her inebriated in the kitchen only - yesterday.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert was racking his brains for conversational subjects. He fell back - on an old one. “Business going strong?” - </p> - <p> - “Business!” said Mr. Atkinson Brown. “My dear boy, business has been the - very devil since this Radical Government has been in power.” - </p> - <p> - “I am sure there has been a great deal of trouble in the world lately,” - said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “I’m sure I can’t bear to read even the dear <i>Daily Mail</i>,” said Mrs. - Atkinson Brown. - </p> - <p> - “What with murders and revolutions and eloping vicars and suffragettes——” - </p> - <p> - “Those outrageous women ought to be whipped,” said her husband. “Spoiled - my game of golf last Saturday. Found ‘Votes for Women’ on the first green. - Made me positively ill.” - </p> - <p> - “I am glad dear Clare is so sensible,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - </p> - <p> - “Yes. Oh, quite so,” said Mrs. Heywood, flushing a little. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, rather!” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “We domestic women are in the minority now,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - </p> - <p> - “The spirit of revolt is abroad, Herbert,” said her husband. “Back to the - Home is the only watchword which will save the country from these - shameless hussies. Flog ‘em back, I would. Thank God <i>our</i> wives have - more sense.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, there’s something in that,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Atkinson Brown was gazing round the room curiously. She seemed to - suspect something. - </p> - <p> - “You are sure dear Clare is quite well?” she asked. “No little trouble?” - </p> - <p> - “She is having a slight trouble with her back hair,” said Herbert. “Won’t - lie down, you know.” - </p> - <p> - He laughed loudly, as though he had made a good joke. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Atkinson Brown half rose from her chair. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, let me go to the rescue of the dear thing!” - </p> - <p> - Herbert was terror-stricken. - </p> - <p> - “No—no! It was only my joke,” he said eagerly. “She will be here in - a minute. Do sit down.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood remembered her promise to “play the game.” - </p> - <p> - “Won’t you sing something, dear?” she said to her visitor. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, not so early in the evening,” said the lady. “Besides, I have a most - awful cold.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I’m so sorry,” said Herbert. “I am beastly sorry.” - </p> - <p> - As he spoke the bell rang again, and Herbert went over to his mother and - whispered to her: - </p> - <p> - “Do you think that is Clare? My God, this is awful!” - </p> - <p> - “Clare was not looking very well the other day when I saw her,” said Mrs. - Atkinson Brown. “I thought perhaps she was sickening for something.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I assure you she was never better in her life,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “But you men are so unobservant. I am dying to see dear Clare, to ask her - how she feels. Are you sure I can’t be of any use to her?” - </p> - <p> - She rose again from her chair, and Herbert gave a beseeching look to his - mother. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, quite sure, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. “<i>Do</i> sit down.” - </p> - <p> - “Besides, you have such a frightful cold,” said Herbert, with extreme - anxiety. “<i>Do</i> keep closer to the fire.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Atkinson Brown laughed a little curiously: - </p> - <p> - “You seem very anxious to keep me from dear Clare!” - </p> - <p> - This persistence annoyed her husband and he rebuked her sternly. - </p> - <p> - “Sit still, Beatrice, can’t you? Don’t you see that we have arrived a - little early and that we have taken Clare unawares? Let the poor girl go - on with her dressing.” - </p> - <p> - “Don’t bully me in other people’s flats, Charles,” said Mrs. Atkinson - Brown. “I have enough of it at home.” - </p> - <p> - Her husband was not to be quelled. - </p> - <p> - “Herbert and I can hardly hear ourselves speak,” he growled, “you keep up - such a clatter.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Atkinson Brown flared up. - </p> - <p> - “I come out to get the chance of speaking a little. For eight years now I - have been listening to your interminable monologues, and can’t get a word - in edgeways.” - </p> - <p> - “Stuff and nonsense!” said her husband. - </p> - <p> - “Have you been married eight years already, my dear?” asked Mrs. Heywood - in a tone of amiable surprise. - </p> - <p> - “Well, we are in our Eighth Year,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood seemed startled. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I see,” she said thoughtfully. - </p> - <p> - “I assure you it seems longer,” said the lady. “I suppose it’s because - Charles makes me so very tired sometimes.” - </p> - <p> - Two other visitors now arrived. They were Mr. Hargreaves and his wife: the - former a young man in immaculate evening clothes, with lofty manners; the - latter a tall, thin, elegant, bored-looking woman, supercilious and - snobbish. - </p> - <p> - Herbert went forward hurriedly to his new guests. - </p> - <p> - “How splendid of you to come! How are you, sir?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, pretty troll-loll, thanks,” said Mr. Hargreaves. - </p> - <p> - Herbert shook hands with Mrs. Hargreaves. - </p> - <p> - “How do you do?” - </p> - <p> - “We’re rather late,” said the lady, “but this is in an out-of-the-way - neighborhood, is it not?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, do you think so?” said Herbert. “I always considered Battersea Park - very central.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Hargreaves raised her eyebrows. - </p> - <p> - “It’s having to get across the river that makes the journey so very - tedious. I should die if I had to live across the river.” - </p> - <p> - “There’s something in what you say,” said Herbert, anxious to agree with - everybody. “I must apologize for dragging you all this way. Of course, you - people in Mayfair——Won’t you sit down?” - </p> - <p> - Mr. Hargreaves became a victim of mistaken identity, shaking hands with - Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - </p> - <p> - “Mrs. Heywood, I presume. I must introduce myself.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Hargreaves also greeted the other lady, under the same impression. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, how do you do? So delighted to make your acquaintance.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Atkinson Brown was much amused, and laughed gaily. - </p> - <p> - “But I am <i>not</i> Mrs. Heywood. I cannot boast of such a handsome - husband!” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, can’t you, by Jove!” said Mr. Atkinson Brown, rather nettled by his - wife’s candor. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I beg pardon,” said Mr. Hargreaves. “Where <i>is</i> Mrs. Heywood?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, where is Mrs. Heywood?” said his wife. - </p> - <p> - Herbert looked wildly at his mother. - </p> - <p> - “Where is she, mother? Do tell her to hurry up. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood meekly. She moved uncertainly toward the - bedroom door, and then hesitated: “Perhaps she will not be very long now.” - </p> - <p> - “The fact is,” said Herbert desperately, “she is not very well.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Atkinson Brown was astounded. - </p> - <p> - “But you said she was perfectly well!” - </p> - <p> - “Did I?” said Herbert. “Oh, well, er—one has to say these things, - you know. Polite fictions, eh?” - </p> - <p> - He laughed nervously. - </p> - <p> - “The fact is, she has a little headache. Hasn’t she, mother?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. “You know best.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Atkinson Brown rose from her chair again. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I will go and see how the poor dear feels. So bad of you to hide it - from us.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, please sit down,” said Herbert in a voice of anguish. “I assure you - it is nothing very much. She will be in directly. Make yourself at home, - Mrs. Hargreaves. This chair? Mother, show Mrs. Atkinson Brown Clare’s - latest photograph.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, yes!” said Mrs. Heywood. “It is an excellent likeness.” - </p> - <p> - “But I want to see Clare herself!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown plaintively. - </p> - <p> - “Sit down, Beatrice!” said her husband. - </p> - <p> - “Bully!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown, sitting down with a flop. - </p> - <p> - Herbert addressed himself to Mr. Hargreaves. - </p> - <p> - “Draw up your chair, sir. You will have a cigar, I am sure.” - </p> - <p> - He offered him one from a newly opened box. Mr. Hargreaves took one, - smelled it, and then put it back. - </p> - <p> - “No, thanks,” he said. “I will have one of my own, if I may. Sure the - ladies don’t mind?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, they like it,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “We have to pretend to,” said Mrs. Hargreaves. - </p> - <p> - “Well, if you don’t, you ought to,” said her husband. “It’s a man’s - privilege.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Hargreaves smiled icily. - </p> - <p> - “One of his many privileges.” - </p> - <p> - “Will you have a cigarette, Mrs. Hargreaves?” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - But Mr. Hargreaves interposed: - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I don’t allow my wife to smoke. It’s a beastly habit.” - </p> - <p> - Mr. Atkinson Brown, who had accepted one of Herbert’s cigars, but after - some inquiry had also decided to smoke one of his own, applauded this - sentiment with enthusiasm. - </p> - <p> - “Hear, hear! Hear, hear! Disgusting habit for women.” - </p> - <p> - “Of course I agree with you,” said Herbert. “Clare never smokes. But I - don’t lay down the law for other people’s wives.” - </p> - <p> - Mr. Hargreaves laughed. - </p> - <p> - “A very sound notion, Heywood. It takes all one’s time to manage one’s - own, eh?” - </p> - <p> - “And then it is not always effective,” said his wife. “Even the worm will - turn.” - </p> - <p> - Mr. Hargreaves answered his wife with a heavy retort: - </p> - <p> - “If it does I knock it on the head with a spade.” - </p> - <p> - Mr. Atkinson Brown laughed loudly again. He seemed to like this man - Hargreaves. - </p> - <p> - “Good epigram! By Jove, I must remember that!” - </p> - <p> - Herbert was on tenter-hooks when the conversation languished a little. - </p> - <p> - “Won’t you sing a song, Mrs. Atkinson Brown? I am sure my friend, Mr. - Hargreaves, will appreciate your voice.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, rather!” said Hargreaves. “Though I don’t pretend to understand a - note of music.” Mrs. Atkinson Brown shook her head: - </p> - <p> - “I couldn’t think of singing before our hostess appears.” - </p> - <p> - The lady’s husband seemed at last to have caught the spirit of her - suspicion. He spoke in a hoarse whisper to his wife: - </p> - <p> - “Where the devil <i>is</i> the woman?” - </p> - <p> - Herbert Heywood realized that he was on the edge of a precipice. Not much - longer could he hold on to this intolerable situation. He tried to speak - cheerfully, but there was anguish in his voice when he said: - </p> - <p> - “Well, let’s have a game of nap.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, Lord, no,” said Hargreaves. “I only play nap on the way to a race. - You don’t sport a billiard table, do you?” - </p> - <p> - Herbert Heywood was embarrassed. - </p> - <p> - “Er—a billiard table?” He looked round the room as though he might - discover a billiard table. “I’m afraid not.” - </p> - <p> - “Don’t be absurd, Edward,” said Mrs. Hargreaves. “People don’t play - billiards on the wrong side of the river.” - </p> - <p> - Conversation languished again, and Herbert was becoming desperate. He - seized upon the sandwiches and handed them round. - </p> - <p> - “Won’t anybody have a sandwich to pass the time away? Mrs. Hargreaves?” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Hargreaves laughed in her supercilious way. - </p> - <p> - “It’s rather early, isn’t it?” - </p> - <p> - “Good Lord, no!” said Herbert. “I am sure you must be hungry. Let me beg - of you—Mother, haven’t you got any cake anywhere?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. She, too, was suffering mental tortures. - </p> - <p> - “Atkinson Brown. You will have a sandwich,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - He bent over to his visitor and spoke in a gloomy voice: - </p> - <p> - “Take one, for God’s sake.” - </p> - <p> - Atkinson Brown was startled. - </p> - <p> - “Yes! Yes! By all means,” he said hastily. Herbert handed the sandwiches - about rather wildly. “Mother, you will have one, won’t you? Mrs. Atkinson - Brown?... And one for me, eh?” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Hargreaves eyed her host curiously. - </p> - <p> - “I hope your wife is not seriously unwell, Mr. Heywood.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert was losing his nerve. - </p> - <p> - “Can’t we talk of something else?” he said despairingly. “What is your - handicap at golf?” - </p> - <p> - “My husband objects to my playing golf,” said the lady. - </p> - <p> - “It takes women out of the home so much,” said Hargreaves. “Play with the - babies is my motto for women.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Atkinson Brown shook her finger at him, and laughed in a shrill - voice: - </p> - <p> - “But supposing they haven’t got any babies?” - </p> - <p> - “They ought to have ‘em,” said Hargreaves. - </p> - <p> - It was Atkinson Brown who interrupted this interesting discussion, which - promised to bring up the great problem of eugenics, so favored now as a - drawing-room topic. He had been turning his sandwich this way and that, - and he leaned forward to his host: - </p> - <p> - “Excuse me, Herbert, old man. There’s something the matter with this - sandwich.” - </p> - <p> - “Something the matter with it?” asked Herbert anxiously. - </p> - <p> - “It’s covered with red spots,” said Atkinson Brown. - </p> - <p> - “Spots—what kind of spots?” - </p> - <p> - “Looks like blood,” said Atkinson Brown, giving an uneasy guffaw. “Suppose - there hasn’t been a murder in this flat?” - </p> - <p> - All the guests leaned forward and gazed at the sandwich. - </p> - <p> - Herbert spoke in a tragic whisper to his mother: - </p> - <p> - “Mollie’s finger!” - </p> - <p> - Then he explained the matter airily to the general company. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, it’s a special kind of sandwich with the gravy outside. A new fad, - you know.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I see,” said Atkinson Brown, much relieved. “Hadn’t heard of it. - Still, I think I’ll have an ordinary one, if you don’t mind.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert was muttering little prayers remembered from his childhood. - </p> - <p> - “Mrs. Hargreaves,” he said cajolingly, “I am sure you play. Won’t you give - us a little tune?” - </p> - <p> - “Well, if it won’t disturb your wife,” said the lady. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I am sure it won’t. She’ll love to hear you.” - </p> - <p> - He felt immensely grateful to this good-natured woman. - </p> - <p> - “Edward, get my music-roll,” said Mrs. Hargreaves. - </p> - <p> - But Herbert had a horrible disappointment when Hargreaves said: - </p> - <p> - “By Jove! I believe I left it in the taxi. Yes, I am sure I did!” - </p> - <p> - Herbert put his hand up to his aching head and whispered his anguish: - </p> - <p> - “Oh, my God! Now how shall I mark time?” - </p> - <p> - “But I reminded you about it!” said Mrs. Hargreaves. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, I know. But you are always reminding me about something.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, play something by heart,” said Herbert in a pleading way. “Any old - thing. The five-finger exercises.” - </p> - <p> - “I am very out of practice,” said Mrs. Hargreaves. “But still I will try.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert breathed a prayer of thankfulness, and hurried to conduct the lady - to the music-stool. - </p> - <p> - As he did so there was a noise outside the window. Newspaper men were - shouting their sing-song: “Raid on the ‘Ouse. Suffragette Outrage. Raid on - the ‘Ouse of Commins.” - </p> - <p> - “What are the devils saying?” asked Hargreaves, trying to catch the words. - </p> - <p> - “Something about the Suffragettes,” growled Atkinson Brown. - </p> - <p> - “I’m afraid it will give poor Clare a worse headache,” said Mrs. Atkinson - Brown. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood tried to be reassuring: - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I don’t think so.” - </p> - <p> - At that moment there was a loud ring at the bell. The sound was so - prolonged that it startled the company. - </p> - <p> - Herbert listened intently and then whispered to his mother: - </p> - <p> - “That must be Clare!” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, if it is only Clare!” said Mrs. Heywood. When Mrs. Hargreaves had - struck a few soft chords on the piano there was the sound of voices - speaking loudly in the hall. Everybody listened, surprised at the - interruption. Mollie’s voice could be heard quite clearly. - </p> - <p> - “I told you it was our At Home night, Miss Vernon.” - </p> - <p> - “I can’t help that.” - </p> - <p> - The drawing-room door opened, <i>sans ceremonie</i>, and Madge Vernon came - in. Her face was flushed, and she had sparkling eyes. She stood in the - doorway looking at the company with a smile, as though immensely amused by - some joke of her own. - </p> - <p> - “I’m sorry to interrupt you good people,” she said very cheerfully, “but I - have come on urgent business, which brooks no delay, as they say in - melodrama.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood gazed at her with frightened eyes. - </p> - <p> - “My dear!... What has happened?” - </p> - <p> - “What’s the matter?” said Herbert, turning very pale. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, it’s nothing to be alarmed at,” said Madge Vernon. “It’s about your - wife.” - </p> - <p> - “My wife?” - </p> - <p> - “About Clare?” exclaimed Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Hargreaves craned her head forward, like a bird reaching for its - seed. - </p> - <p> - “I wonder—” she said. - </p> - <p> - Madge Vernon grinned at them all. - </p> - <p> - “It’ll be in the papers to-morrow, so you are all bound to know. Besides, - why keep it a secret? It’s a thing to be proud of!” - </p> - <p> - “Proud of what?” asked Herbert in a frenzied tone of voice. - </p> - <p> - Madge Vernon enjoyed the drama of her announcement. - </p> - <p> - “Clare has been arrested in a demonstration outside the House to-night.” - </p> - <p> - “Arrested!” - </p> - <p> - The awful word was spoken almost simultaneously by all the company in that - drawingroom of Intellectual Mansions, S. W. - </p> - <p> - “She’s quite safe,” said Madge Vernon calmly. “I’ve come to ask you to - bail her out.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert’s guests rose and looked at him in profound astonishment and - indignation. - </p> - <p> - “But you told us—” cried Mrs. Atkinson Brown. - </p> - <p> - Herbert Heywood gave a queer groan of anger and horror. - </p> - <p> - “Bail her out!... Oh, my God!” - </p> - <p> - He sank down into his chair and held his head in his hands. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0016" id="link2HCH0016"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER III - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">H</span>erbert Heywood was - in the depths of an arm-chair reading the paper. Mrs. Heywood was on the - other side of the fireplace with a book on her lap. But she was dozing - over it, and her head nodded on to her chest. Herbert turned over the - leaves of the paper and then studied the advertisements. He had a look of - extreme boredom. Every now and then he yawned quietly and lengthily. At - last he let the paper fall on to the floor, and uttered his thoughts - aloud, so that his mother was awakened. - </p> - <p> - “Did you say anything, Herbert?” said the old lady. - </p> - <p> - “Nothing, mother, except that I am bored stiff.” - </p> - <p> - He went over to the piano and played “God Save the King” with one finger, - in a doleful way. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood glanced over her spectacles at him. - </p> - <p> - “Would you like a game of cribbage, dear?” - </p> - <p> - “No, thanks, mother,” said Herbert hastily. “Not in the afternoon.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood listened to his fumbling notes for a moment and then spoke - again. - </p> - <p> - “Won’t you go out for a walk? It would do you good, Herbert.” - </p> - <p> - “Think so?” said Herbert bitterly; without accepting the suggestion, he - played “Three Blind Mice,” also with one finger. It sounded more - melancholy than “God Save the King.” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t like to see you moping indoors on a bright day like this,” said - Mrs. Heywood. “Take a brisk walk round the Park. It would cheer you up.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert resented the idea fiercely. - </p> - <p> - “A long walk in Battersea Park would make a pessimist of a laughing - hyena.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood was silent for some time, but then she made a last effort. - </p> - <p> - “Well, go and see a friend, dear. The Atkinson Browns, for instance.” - </p> - <p> - “They do nothing but nag at each other,” said Herbert. “And Atkinson Brown - hasn’t as much brains as a Teddy Bear. Besides, he’s become friendly with - that fellow Hargreaves, and I’m not going to take the risk of meeting a - man who turned me out of my job.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood became agitated. - </p> - <p> - “Are you sure of that, Herbert? I can’t think he could have been so - malicious, after coming here and eating your salt, as it were. What was - his reason?” - </p> - <p> - “He made no disguise of it,” said Herbert bitterly. “I saw his letter to - my chief. Said that it was quite impossible to employ a man who was mixed - up with the militant Suffragettes. Damned liar!” - </p> - <p> - “Good Heavens!” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “Of course it was all due to that ghastly evening when Clare got arrested. - She knows that well enough.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood, “she has tried to make amends. The shock - of your losing your place has made her much more gentle and loving. It has - brought back all her loyalty to you, Herbert.” - </p> - <p> - “Loyalty!” said Herbert. “Where is she now, I should like to know?” - </p> - <p> - “She is gone to some committee meeting.” - </p> - <p> - “She’s always got a committee meeting,” said Herbert angrily, kicking the - hassock. - </p> - <p> - “She joins a new committee for some kind of social reform nonsense every - blessed day.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, it keeps her busy, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood gently. “Besides, it is - not all committee work. Since she has been visiting the poor and helping - in the slums she has been ever so much better in health and spirits.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, but where the devil do I come in?” asked Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t you think you might go out, dear? Just for a little while?” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t <i>want</i> to go out, mother,” said Herbert with suppressed - heat. - </p> - <p> - “Very well, dear.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert stood in front of the fireplace and rattled the keys in his pocket - moodily. - </p> - <p> - “What’s the good of toiling to keep a home together if one’s wife abandons - her husband’s society on every possible pretext? A home! This place is - just a receiving office for begging letters and notices for committees and - subcommittees.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood sighed. - </p> - <p> - “It might have been worse, Herbert.” - </p> - <p> - “As far as I’m concerned, it couldn’t be worse. I’m the most miserable - wretch in London. Without a job and without a wife.” - </p> - <p> - “You’ll get a place all right, dear. You have the promise of one already. - And you know Clare’s health was in a very queer state before Miss Vernon - made her take an interest in helping other people. I was seriously alarmed - about her.” - </p> - <p> - “What about me?” asked Herbert. “No one troubles to get alarmed about me.” - </p> - <p> - “Are you unwell, dear?” said Mrs. Hey-wood anxiously. - </p> - <p> - “Of course I’m unwell.” - </p> - <p> - “Darling!” said Mrs. Heywood, still more anxiously. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, there’s nothing the matter with me from a physical point of view. But - mentally and morally I’m a demnition wreck.” - </p> - <p> - “Aren’t you taking your iron pills regularly?” said his mother. - </p> - <p> - “Pills! As if pills could cure melancholia!” Mrs. Heywood was aghast at - that dreadful word. - </p> - <p> - “Good Heavens, dear!” - </p> - <p> - “I’m on the verge of a nervous breakdown,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, Herbert,” cried his mother, “I hope not!” - </p> - <p> - “I’m working up to a horrible crisis,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “What are your symptoms? How do you feel?” asked his mother. - </p> - <p> - “I feel like smashing things,” said Herbert savagely. - </p> - <p> - He sat down at the piano again and played “We Won’t Go Home Till Morning,” - but missed his note, and banged on to the wrong one in a temper. - </p> - <p> - “There goes a note, anyhow. Thank goodness for that!” - </p> - <p> - At that moment Mollie came in holding a silver tray with a pile of - letters. - </p> - <p> - “The post, sir.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, something to break the infernal monotony,” said Herbert with a sigh - of relief. - </p> - <p> - He took up the letters and examined them. - </p> - <p> - “Life is a bit flat, sir,” said Mollie, “since we gave up having At - Homes.” - </p> - <p> - “Hold your tongue,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - Mollie tossed her head and muttered an impertinent sentence as she left - the room. - </p> - <p> - “Can’t even open my mouth without somebody jumping down my throat. I will - break that girl’s neck one of these days,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - He went through the letters and read out the names on them. - </p> - <p> - “Mrs. Herbert Heywood, <i>Mrs.</i> Herbert Heywood, Mrs. Herbert Heywood, - Mrs. Herbert—Why, every jack one is for Mrs. Herbert Heywood! Nobody - writes to me, of course. No one cares a damn about <i>me</i>.” - </p> - <p> - “Your mother cares, Herbert,” said the old lady. - </p> - <p> - “I shall take to drink—or the devil,” said Herbert, and he added - thoughtfully, “I wonder which is the most fun?” - </p> - <p> - “Herbert, dear!” cried his mother, “don’t say such awful things.” - </p> - <p> - “The worst of it is,” said Herbert bitterly, “they’re both so beastly - expensive.” - </p> - <p> - There was the noise of a latchkey in the hall, and Mrs. Heywood gave a - little cry. - </p> - <p> - “There’s Clare!” - </p> - <p> - “Think so?” said Herbert, listening. - </p> - <p> - From the hall came the sound of Clare’s voice singing a merry tune. - </p> - <p> - “She’s in a cheerful mood, anyhow,” said Mrs. Heywood, smiling. - </p> - <p> - Herbert answered her gloomily. - </p> - <p> - “Horribly cheerful.” - </p> - <p> - The mother and son looked toward the door as Clare came in. There was a - noticeable change in her appearance since the evening At Home. There was - more color in her cheeks and the wistfulness had gone out of her eyes. She - was brisk, keen and bright. - </p> - <p> - “Well, mother,” she said, “been having a nap?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, no, dear,” said the old lady, who never admitted that she made a - habit of naps. - </p> - <p> - “Hulloh, Herbert,” said Clare. “Have you got that new post yet?” - </p> - <p> - “No,” said Herbert. “And I don’t expect I shall get it.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, yes, you will, dear old boy. Don’t you worry! Have you been home - long?” - </p> - <p> - “Seems like a lifetime.” - </p> - <p> - Clare laughed. - </p> - <p> - “Not so long as that, surely?” - </p> - <p> - She came forward to him and put her arm about his neck, and offered him - her cheek. He looked at it doubtfully for a moment and then kissed her in - a “distant” manner. - </p> - <p> - “I’m frightfully busy, old boy,” said Clare. “I just have a few minutes - and then I shall have to dash off again.” - </p> - <p> - “Dash off where?” asked Herbert, with signs of extreme irritation. “Dash - it all, surely you aren’t going out again?” - </p> - <p> - “Only round the corner,” said Clare quietly. “I have got to look into the - case of a poor creature who is making match-boxes. Goodness knows how many - for a farthing! And yet she’s so cheerful and plucky that it does one good - to see her. Oh, it kills one’s own selfishness, Herbert.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, why worry about her, then, if she’s so pleased with herself?” - </p> - <p> - “She’s plucky,” said Clare, “but she’s starving. It’s a bad case of - sweated labor.” - </p> - <p> - “Sweated humbug,” said Herbert. “What am I going to do all the evening, I - should like to know? Sit here alone?” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t suppose I shall be long,” said Clare. “Besides, there’s mother.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, there’s mother,” said Herbert. “But when a man’s married he wants - his wife.” - </p> - <p> - Clare was now busy looking over her letters. - </p> - <p> - “Can’t you go to the club?” she asked. - </p> - <p> - “I’m dead sick of the club. That boiled-shirt Bohemianism is the biggest - rot in the world.” - </p> - <p> - “Take mother to the theatre,” said Clare cheerfully. - </p> - <p> - “The theatre bores me stiff. These modern plays set one’s nerves on edge.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, haven’t you got a decent novel or anything?” said Clare, reading - one of her letters. - </p> - <p> - “A decent novel! There’s no such thing nowadays, and they give me the - hump.” - </p> - <p> - Clare was reading another letter with absorbed interest, but she listened - with half an ear, as it were, to her husband. - </p> - <p> - “Play mother a game of cribbage, then,” she said. - </p> - <p> - “Look here, Clare,” said Herbert furiously, “I shall begin to throw things - about in a minute.” - </p> - <p> - “Don’t get hysterical, Herbert,” said Clare calmly. “Especially as I have - got some good news for you.” - </p> - <p> - As she spoke these words she looked across a Demonstration to him with a - curious smile and added: “A big surprise, Herbert!” - </p> - <p> - “A surprise?” said Herbert with sarcasm. “Have you discovered another - widow in distress?” - </p> - <p> - “Well, I have,” said Clare, “but it’s not that.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood glanced from her son to her daughter-in-law, and seemed to - imagine that she might be disturbing an intimate conversation. - </p> - <p> - “I will be back in a minute. I won’t disturb you two dears,” she said, as - she left the room quietly. - </p> - <p> - “You won’t disturb us, mother,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - But the old lady smiled and said, “I won’t be long.” - </p> - <p> - “Are you going to get arrested again?” asked Herbert. “Do you want me to - bail you out? Because by the Lord, I won’t!” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, that was quite an accident,” said Clare, laughing. “Besides, I gave - you my word to abstain from the militant movement, and you can’t say I - have broken the pledge.” - </p> - <p> - “You have broken a good many other things.” - </p> - <p> - “What kind of things?” asked Clare. “You aren’t alluding to that window - again, are you?” - </p> - <p> - “You have broken my illusions on married life,” said Herbert, with tragic - emphasis. - </p> - <p> - “Ah,” said Clare, “that is ‘the Great Illusion,’ by the Angel in the - House.” - </p> - <p> - “You have broken my ideals of womanhood.” - </p> - <p> - “They were false ideals, Herbert,” said Clare very quietly. “It was only a - plaster ideal which broke. The real woman is of flesh and blood. The real - woman is so much better than the sham. Don’t you think so?” - </p> - <p> - “It depends on what you call sham,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “I was a sham until that plaster image of me broke. I indulged in sham - sentiment, sham emotion, sham thoughts. Look at me now, since I went - outside these four walls and faced the facts of life, and saw other - people’s misery besides my own, and the happiness of people with so much - more to bear than I had. Look into my eyes, Herbert.” - </p> - <p> - She smiled at him tenderly, alluringly. “What’s the good?” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “Do you see a weary soul looking out?” - </p> - <p> - Herbert looked into his wife’s eyes for a moment and then stared down at - the carpet. - </p> - <p> - “I used to see love looking out,” he said. - </p> - <p> - “It’s looking out now,” said Clare. “Love of life instead of discontent. - Love of this great throbbing human nature, with so much to be put right. - Love of poor people, and little children, and brave hearts. Madge Vernon - taught me that, for she has a soul bigger than the suffrage, and ideals - that go beyond the vote. I have blown the cobwebs out of my eyes, Herbert. - I see straight.” - </p> - <p> - “How about <i>me?</i>” asked Herbert. “That’s what I want to know. Where - do I come in?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, you come in all right!” said Clare. “You are a part of life and have - a big share of my love.” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t want to be shared up, thanks,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - She stroked his hand. - </p> - <p> - “I love you much better now that I see you with this new straight vision - of mine. At any rate I love what is real in you and not what is sham. And - I have learned the duties of love, Herbert. I believe I am a better wife - to you. I think I have learned the meaning of marriage, and of married - love.” - </p> - <p> - She spoke with a touch of emotion, and there was a thrill in her voice. - </p> - <p> - “You are in love with your social work and your whining beggars, not with - me. You are getting farther and farther away from me. You leave me alone; - I come back to a neglected home.” - </p> - <p> - “Why, Mollie and mother look after it beautifully,” said Clare very - cheerfully. - </p> - <p> - Herbert gave expression to his grievances. - </p> - <p> - “I come home and ask, ‘Where is Clare?’ and get the eternal answer, ‘Clare - is out.’ I am an abandoned husband, and by Heaven I won’t stand it. I will——” - </p> - <p> - “What, Herbert?” said Clare, smiling up at him. “Don’t do anything rash, - old boy.” - </p> - <p> - “I—have a good mind to make love to somebody else’s wife. But - they’re all so beastly ugly!” - </p> - <p> - “Perhaps somebody else’s wife won’t respond,” said Clare. “Some women are - very cold.” - </p> - <p> - “I’ll take to drink. I have already given mother full warning.” - </p> - <p> - “I am sure it will disagree with you, dear,” said Clare. - </p> - <p> - “You scoff at me,” said Herbert passionately. “I think we had better live - apart.” - </p> - <p> - “You would get even more bored than before. Dear old boy. <i>Do</i> be - reasonable. <i>Do</i> cultivate a sense of humor.” - </p> - <p> - “This is not a farce,” said Herbert. “It’s a horrible tragedy.” - </p> - <p> - “Take up a hobby or something,” said Clare. “Golf—or fretwork.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert was furious. - </p> - <p> - “Fretwork! Is that a joke or an insult?” - </p> - <p> - “It was only a suggestion!” said Clare. Herbert jumped up from his chair. - </p> - <p> - “I had better go and drown myself straight away...”? - </p> - <p> - He turned at the door, and gave a tragic look at his wife. “Good-by.” - </p> - <p> - Clare smiled at him. - </p> - <p> - “Won’t you kiss me before you go?” - </p> - <p> - “I will take my pipe,” said Herbert, coming back to the mantelshelf. “It’s - my only friend.” - </p> - <p> - “It will go out in the water,” said Clare. “Besides, Herbert, don’t you - want to hear my good news? My big surprise?” - </p> - <p> - “No,” said Herbert. “Nothing you could say or do could surprise me now. If - mother wants me I shall be in the study for the rest of the evening.” - </p> - <p> - “But I thought you were going to the river?”, said Clare teasingly. - </p> - <p> - Herbert was not to be amused. - </p> - <p> - “I suppose you think you’re funny? I don’t,” he said. - </p> - <p> - Then he went out and slammed the door. Clare was left alone, and there was - a smile about her lips. - </p> - <p> - “Poor old Herbert,” she said. “I think he will have the surprise of his - life.” - </p> - <p> - She laughed quietly to herself, and then looked up and listened as she - heard a slight noise. She stood up with a sudden look of anger as she saw - Gerald Bradshaw gazing at her through the open French windows. - </p> - <p> - The man spoke to her in his soft, silky voice. - </p> - <p> - “Clare, why are you so cruel to me? I have been ill because of your - heartlessness.” - </p> - <p> - Clare answered him sternly. - </p> - <p> - “I thought I had got rid of you. Have you come back to plague me?” - </p> - <p> - “I tried to forget you,” said Gerald Bradshaw. “I went as far as Italy to - forget you. I made love to many women to forget you. But I have come back. - And I shall always come back, because you are my mate and I cannot live - without you.” - </p> - <p> - Clare’s voice rang out in the room. - </p> - <p> - “God ought not to let you live. Every word you speak is a lie. You are a - thief of women’s honor. Get away from my window, because your very breath - is poison.” - </p> - <p> - The man was astonished, a little scared. “You did not speak like that - once, Clare. You let me hold your hand. You trembled when I leaned toward - you.” - </p> - <p> - “I was ill and weak,” said Clare, “and you tried to tempt my weakness. I - was blind and did not see the evil in you. But now I am well and strong, - and my eyes are opened to the truth of things. If you don’t go I will call - my husband and he will throw you over that balcony at one word from me.” - </p> - <p> - Gerald Bradshaw laughed scoffingly. - </p> - <p> - “Your husband! I could kill him between my thumb and forefinger.” - </p> - <p> - “He is strong because he is good,” said Clare. “I will call him now.” - </p> - <p> - She went quickly toward the bell. - </p> - <p> - “You needn’t call him,” said Gerald Bradshaw. “I would dislike to hurt the - little man.” - </p> - <p> - “You are going?” asked Clare. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, I am going,” said the man, “because something has changed in you.” - </p> - <p> - Clare gave a cheerful little laugh. - </p> - <p> - “You are right.” - </p> - <p> - “I see that now. I have lost my spell over you. Something has broken.” - </p> - <p> - “Are you going,” said Clare sternly, “or shall I call my man?” - </p> - <p> - “I am going, Clare,” said the man at the window. “I am going to find - another mate. She and I will talk evil of you, and hate you, as I hate you - now. Farewell, foolish one!” He withdrew from the window, and instantly - Clare rushed to it, shut it and bolted it. Then she pulled down the blind, - and stood, panting, with her back to it and her arms outstretched. - </p> - <p> - “God be praised!” she said. “He has gone out of my life. I am a clean - woman again.” At that moment Mrs. Heywood entered. “Must you go out again, - Clare?” said the old lady. - </p> - <p> - “Only for a little while, mother,” said Clare, a little breathless after - her emotion. - </p> - <p> - “Is anything the matter, dear?” said Mrs. Heywood. “You look rather - flustered.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, nothing is the matter!” said Clare. “Only I am very happy.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood smiled at her. - </p> - <p> - “It makes me happy to see you so well and bright,” she said. - </p> - <p> - “I don’t get on your nerves so much, eh, mother?” - </p> - <p> - She laughed quietly. - </p> - <p> - “Well, I must go and tidy my hair.” - </p> - <p> - She moved toward the bedroom, but stopped to pack up her letters. - </p> - <p> - “I am so sorry you have to go out,” said the old lady. - </p> - <p> - “I shan’t be more than a few minutes,” said Clare. “But I must go. - Besides, after this I am going to <i>give</i> up some of my visiting - work.” - </p> - <p> - “Give it up, dear?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes. One must be moderate even in district visiting.” - </p> - <p> - She went into the bedroom, but left the door open so that she could hear - her mother. - </p> - <p> - “Clare!” said the old lady. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, mother.” - </p> - <p> - “What is that surprise you were going to give us?” - </p> - <p> - “Surprise, mother?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “The good news?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, yes, I forgot,” said Clare. “Come in and I will tell you.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood went into the bedroom. Outside, in the street, a man with a - fiddle was playing the “Intermezzo.” Presently both women came out. Clare - was smiling, with her arm round Mrs. Heywood’s neck. Mrs. Heywood was - wiping her eyes as though crying a little. - </p> - <p> - “Cheer up,” said Clare. “It’s nothing to cry about.” - </p> - <p> - “I am crying because I am so glad,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - “Well, that’s a funny thing to do,” said Clare, laughing gaily. “Now I - must run away. You won’t let Herbert drown himself, will you?” - </p> - <p> - “No, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood, wiping her eyes. - </p> - <p> - “Who would have thought it!” said Mrs. - </p> - <p> - Heywood, speaking to herself as her daughter-in-law left the room. - </p> - <p> - She went over to the mantelpiece and took up her son’s photograph and - kissed it. Then she went to the door and stood out in the hall and called - in a sweet old woman’s voice: - </p> - <p> - “Herbert! Herbert, dear!” - </p> - <p> - “Are you calling, mother?” answered Herbert from another room. - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I want you.” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t feel a bit like cribbage, mother,”’ said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “I don’t want you to play cribbage to-night,” said the old lady. “I have - something to say to you.” - </p> - <p> - “Has Clare gone?” asked Herbert, still calling from the other room. - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “But she won’t be long.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, all right. I’ll be along in a moment.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood went back into the room and waited for her son eagerly. - Presently he came in with a pipe in his hand and book under his arm. He - had changed into a shabby old jacket, and was in carpet slippers. - </p> - <p> - “What’s the matter, mother?” he asked. - </p> - <p> - “There’s nothing the matter,” said the old lady; then she became very - excited, and raised her hands and cried out: - </p> - <p> - “At least, everything is the matter. It’s the only thing that matters! ... - Oh, Herbert!” - </p> - <p> - She laughed and cried at the same time so that her son was alarmed and - stared at her in amazement. - </p> - <p> - “You aren’t ill, are you?” he said. “Shall I send for a doctor?” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood shook her trembling old head. - </p> - <p> - “I’m quite well. I never felt so well.” - </p> - <p> - “You had better sit down, mother,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - He took her hand and led her to a chair. - </p> - <p> - “What’s up, eh, old lady? Mollie hasn’t run away, has she?” - </p> - <p> - The old lady took his hand and fondled it. - </p> - <p> - “Herbert, my son, I’ve wonderful news for you.” - </p> - <p> - “News?” said Herbert. “Did you find it in the evening paper?” - </p> - <p> - “It’s going to make a lot of difference to us all,” said Mrs. Heywood. “No - more cribbage, Herbert!” - </p> - <p> - “Thank heaven for that!” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “And not so much social work for Clare.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, let’s be thankful for small mercies,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “Bend your head down and let me whisper to you,” said Mrs. Heywood. - </p> - <p> - She put her hands up to his head, and drew it down, and whispered - something into his ears. - </p> - <p> - It was something which astounded him. - </p> - <p> - He started back and said “No!” as though he had heard something quite - incredible. Then he spoke in a whisper: - </p> - <p> - “By Jove!... Is that a fact?” - </p> - <p> - “It’s the best fact that ever was, Herbert,” said the old lady. - </p> - <p> - “Yes... it will make a bit of a difference,” said Herbert thoughtfully. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood clasped her son’s arm. There was a tremulous light in her - eyes and a great emotion in her voice. - </p> - <p> - “Herbert, I am an old woman and your mother. Sit down and let me talk to - you as I did in the old days when you were my small boy before a nursery - fire.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert smiled at her; all the gloom had left his face. - </p> - <p> - “All right, mother.... By Jove, and I never guessed. And yet I ought to - have guessed. Things have been—different—lately.” - </p> - <p> - He sat down on a hassock near the old lady with his knees tucked up. She - sat down, too, and stretched out a trembling hand to touch his hair. - </p> - <p> - “Once upon a time, Herbert, there was a young man and a young woman who - loved each other very dearly.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert looked up and smiled at her. - </p> - <p> - “Are you sure, mother?” - </p> - <p> - “Perfectly sure. Then they married.” - </p> - <p> - “And lived happily ever after? I bet they didn’t!” - </p> - <p> - “No, not quite happily, because this is different from the fairy tales. - ... After a time the husband began to think too much about his work, while - the wife stayed at home and thought too much about herself.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s a stale old yarn,” said Herbert. “What happened then?” - </p> - <p> - “By degrees the wife began to think she hated her husband, because - although he gave her little luxuries and pretty clothes, and all the - things that pleased <i>him</i>, he never gave her the thing <i>she</i> - wanted.” - </p> - <p> - “What was that?” asked Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “It was a magic charm to make her forget herself.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, magic charms aren’t easy to find,” said Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “No.... But at last she went out to find it herself. And while she was - away the husband came home and missed her.” - </p> - <p> - “Poor devil!” said Herbert. “Of course he did.” - </p> - <p> - “Being a man,” said Mrs. Heywood, giving a queer little laugh, “he stayed - at home more than he used to do, and then complained that he was left too - much alone. Just like his wife had complained.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, hang it all,” said Herbert, “she ought to have stayed with him.” - </p> - <p> - “But then she wouldn’t have found the magic charm,” said Mrs. Heywood. - “Don’t you see?... And she would have withered and withered away until - there was nothing left of her, and the husband would have been quite alone—forever.” - </p> - <p> - “Think so?” said Herbert very thoughtfully. “D’you think it would have - been as bad as that?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I’m sure of it.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, what did happen?” asked Herbert. “Did she find the magic charm? It - wasn’t a widow in distress, was it? Or Social Reform humbug?” - </p> - <p> - “No,” said Mrs. Heywood; “that gave her a new interest in life because it - helped her to forget herself, some of her own little worries, some of her - brooding thoughts. But a good fairy who was looking after her worked - another kind of magic.... Herbert I It’s the best magic for unhappy women - and unhappy homes, and it has been worked for you. Oh, my dear, you ought - to be very thankful.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Herbert, scratching his head. “Yes, I suppose so. But what’s - the moral of the tale, mother? I’m hanged if I see.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood put her hand on her son’s shoulder, as he sat on the hassock - by her chair. - </p> - <p> - “It’s a moral told by an old woman who watched these two from the very - beginning. A husband mustn’t expect his wife to stay at home for ever. The - home isn’t big enough, Herbert. There’s the great world outside calling to - her, calling, calling. The walls of a little fiat like this are too narrow - for the spirit and heart. If he keeps her there she either pines and dies, - or else——” - </p> - <p> - “What?” asked Herbert. - </p> - <p> - “Escapes, my dear,” said the old lady very solemnly. - </p> - <p> - Herbert drew a deep, quivering breath. - </p> - <p> - “Then,” said Mrs. Heywood, “nothing in the world can call her back—except——” - </p> - <p> - “Except what?” - </p> - <p> - “A little child.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert got up from the hassock and clasped the mantelshelf, and spoke in - a low, humble, grateful voice. - </p> - <p> - “Thank God, Clare has been called back!” he said. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood rose from her chair also, and caught hold of her son’s - sleeve. - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” she said, “yes. But even now she will want to spread her wings a - little. She must take short flights, Herbert, even now. She must wing her - way out to the big world at times. You will remember that, won’t you?” - </p> - <p> - “I’ll try to remember,” said Herbert. He bent his head over his hands on - the mantelshelf. “I’ve been selfish,” he said. “Blinded with selfishness - and self-conceit. God forgive me.” - </p> - <p> - “Perhaps we have all been a little selfish,” said Mrs. Heywood quietly. - “But we shall have some one else to think about now. A new life, Herbert. - A new life is coming to us all!” - </p> - <p> - “Hush!” said Herbert. “Here’s Clare.” - </p> - <p> - The mother and son stood listening to the voice of Clare singing in the - hall. She was singing the old nursery rhyme of—= - </p> - <p> - ```"Sing a song of sixpence, - </p> - <p> - ```A pocket-full of rye, - </p> - <p> - ```Four and twenty blackbirds - </p> - <p> - ```Baked in a pie, - </p> - <p> - ```When the pie was opened——-“= - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Heywood smiled into her son’s eyes. - </p> - <p> - “I think I’ve left my spectacles in the other room,” she said. She went - out into the hall, leaving her son alone. - </p> - <p> - And Herbert stood with his head raised, looking toward the door, eagerly, - like a lover waiting for his bride. - </p> - <p> - Then Clare came in. There was a smile about her lips, and she spoke - cheerfully. - </p> - <p> - “Well, you see I wasn’t long.” - </p> - <p> - Herbert strode toward her and took her hands and raised them to his lips. - </p> - <p> - “Clare, sweetheart! Is it true? Have you been called back to me?” - </p> - <p> - Clare put her forehead down against his chest. - </p> - <p> - “I never went very far away,” she said. - </p> - <p> - Presently Herbert spoke again with great cheerfulness. - </p> - <p> - “I say, Clare. It’s a funny thing!” - </p> - <p> - “What’s a funny thing?” asked Clare, smiling at him. - </p> - <p> - “Why, I was reading the advertisements in the paper to-night—-” - </p> - <p> - “Were <i>they</i> funny?” asked Clare. - </p> - <p> - “No,” said Herbert, “but I saw something that would just suit us.” - </p> - <p> - He went over to a side-table and picked up the newspaper. Sitting on the - edge of the table, he read out an advertisement. - </p> - <p> - “Here it is.... ‘Chelsea—Semi-detached house, dining-room, - drawing-room, three bedrooms, and a large nursery. Shed for bicycle or - perambulator.’” - </p> - <p> - Clare laughed happily. - </p> - <p> - “Well, we might have both!” she said. - </p> - <p> - Herbert dropped the paper, came over to his wife, and kissed her hands - again. - </p> - <h3> - THE END - </h3> - <div style="height: 6em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Eighth Year, by Philip Gibbs - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EIGHTH YEAR *** - -***** This file should be named 51926-h.htm or 51926-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/1/9/2/51926/ - -Produced by David Widger, from page images generously -provided by Google Books - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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- The Eighth Year, by Philip Gibbs
- </title>
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-The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Eighth Year, by Philip Gibbs
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-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
-other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
-whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
-the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
-www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
-to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
-
-
-
-Title: The Eighth Year
- A Vital Problem Of Married Life
-
-Author: Philip Gibbs
-
-Release Date: May 1, 2016 [EBook #51926]
-Last Updated: November 6, 2016
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: UTF-8
-
-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EIGHTH YEAR ***
-
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-Produced by David Widger, from page images generously
-provided by Google Books
-
-
-
-
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-
-</pre>
-
- <div style="height: 8em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h1>
- THE EIGHTH YEAR
- </h1>
- <h3>
- A Vital Problem Of Married Life
- </h3>
- <h2>
- By Philip Gibbs
- </h2>
- <h4>
- New York
- </h4>
- <h4>
- The Devin-Adair Company 437 Fifth Avenue
- </h4>
- <h3>
- 1913
- </h3>
- <p>
- <br /> <br />
- </p>
- <blockquote>
- <p>
- “The Eighth Year is the most dangerous year in the adventure of
- marriage.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Sir Francis Jeune (afterwards Lord St. Helier). President of the Divorce
- Court.
- </p>
- </blockquote>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <p>
- <b>CONTENTS</b>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_PART"> <b>PART I—THE ARGUMENT</b> </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0001"> CHAPTER I </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0002"> CHAPTER II </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0003"> CHAPTER III </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0004"> CHAPTER IV </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0005"> CHAPTER V </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0006"> CHAPTER VI </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0007"> CHAPTER VII </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0008"> CHAPTER VIII </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0009"> CHAPTER IX </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0010"> CHAPTER X </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0011"> CHAPTER XI </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0012"> CHAPTER XII </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0013"> CHAPTER XIII </a>
- </p>
- <p>
- <br />
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_PART2"> <b>PART II—A DEMONSTRATION</b> </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0014"> CHAPTER I </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0015"> CHAPTER II </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0016"> CHAPTER III </a>
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_PART" id="link2H_PART"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- PART I—THE ARGUMENT
- </h2>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER I
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>t was Sir Francis
- Jeune, afterwards Lord St. Helier, and President of the Divorce Court, who
- first called attention to the strange significance of the Eighth Year of
- married life. “The Eighth Year,” he said, “is the most dangerous year in
- the adventure of marriage.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Afterwards, in the recent Royal Commission on Divorce, this curious fact
- was again alluded to in the evidence, and it has been shown by statistics
- of domestic tragedy, by hundreds of sordid little dramas, that at this
- period in the partnership of husbands and wives there comes, in many
- cases, a great crisis, leading often to moral disaster.
- </p>
- <p>
- It is in the Eighth Year, or thereabouts, that there is the tug-of-war
- between two temperaments, mated by the law, but not mated, perhaps, in
- ideals, in ambitions, or in qualities of character. The man and woman pull
- against each other, tugging at each other’s heartstrings. The Eighth Year
- is the fatal year, when if there is no give-and-take, no working
- compromise, no new pledges of loyalty and comradeship, the foundations of
- the home are shattered, and the hopes with which it was first built lie in
- ruins like a house of cards knocked down by a gust of wind.
- </p>
- <p>
- But why the Eighth Year? Why not the twelfth, fourteenth, or eighteenth
- year? The answer is not to be found in any old superstition. There is
- nothing uncanny about the number eight. The problem is not to be shrugged
- off by people who despise the foolish old tradition which clings to
- thirteen, and imagine this to be in the same class of folly. By the law of
- averages and by undeniable statistics it has been proved that it brings
- many broken-hearted men and women to the Divorce Court. For instance,
- taking the annual average of divorces in England between 1904 and 1908,
- one finds that there were only six divorces between husbands and wives who
- had been married less than a year, and only eighteen divorces between
- those married less than two years. Between the second and the fifth years
- the number increases to a hundred and seventeen. Then there is a
- tremendous jump, and the numbers between the fifth and tenth years are two
- hundred and ninety-two. The period of the Eighth Year is the most
- productive of divorce. The figures are more startling and more significant
- when they cover a longer period. But apart from statistics and apart
- altogether from the Divorce Court, which is only one house of trouble, by
- using one’s own eyes in one’s own circle of friends one may see that young
- married couples who started happily enough show signs of stress and strain
- as this year approaches. The fact is undeniable. What is the cause behind
- the fact?
- </p>
- <p>
- There is not one cause, there are many causes, all leading up from the
- first day of marriage, inevitably, with the unswerving, relentless
- fatality of Greek Tragedy to the Eighth Year. They are causes which lie
- deep in the social system of our modern home life; in the little order of
- things prevailing, at this time, in hundreds of thousands of small
- households and small flats, inhabited by the middle-classes. It is mainly
- a middle-class problem, because the rich and the poor are, for reasons
- which I will show later in this argument, exempt in a large measure from
- the fatality of the Eighth Year. But all the influences at work among the
- middle-classes, in this strange age of intellectual disturbance, and of
- blind gropings forward to new social and moral conditions, have a close
- hearing upon this seeming mystery. The economic position of this class,
- its social ambitions, its intellectual adventures, its general education,
- its code of morality, its religion or lack of religion, its little
- conventional cults, the pressure of outside influences, thrusting inwards
- to the hidden life in these little homes, bringing dangerous ideas through
- the front doors, or through the keyholes, and all the mental and moral
- vibrations that are “in the air” to-day, especially in the air breathed by
- the middle-classes, produce—the Eighth Year.
- </p>
- <p>
- Let us start with the first year of marriage so that we may see how the
- problem works out from the beginning.
- </p>
- <p>
- Here we have, in the first year, a young man and woman who have come
- together, not through any overmastering force of passion, but as
- middle-class men and women are mostly brought together, by the accidents
- of juxtaposition, and by a pleasant sentiment. They met, before marriage,
- at tennis parties, at suburban dances, at evening At Homes. By the laws of
- natural selection, aided a little by anxious mothers, this young man and
- this young woman find out, or think they find out, that they are “suited”
- to each other. That is to say, the young man thrills in a pleasant way in
- the presence of the girl, and she sees the timidity in his eyes when she
- looks at him, and she knows that her laughter, the touch of her hand, the
- little tricks and graces she has learnt from girl-friends, or from
- actresses in musical comedy, or from instinct, attract him to her. She
- leads him on, by absurd little tiffs, artfully arranged, by a pretence of
- flirtation with other boys, by provocative words, by moments of tenderness
- changing abruptly to sham indifference, or followed by little shafts of
- satire which wound his pride, and sting him into desire for her. He
- pursues her, not knowing that he is pursued, so that they meet half-way.
- This affair makes him restless, ill at ease. It interrupts his work and
- his ambitions. Presently it becomes an obsession, and he knows that he has
- “fallen in love.” He makes his plans accordingly.
- </p>
- <p>
- In the middle-classes love still presupposes marriage (though the idea is
- not so fast-rooted as in the old days), but how the dickens is he to
- manage it? He is just starting his career as Something in the City, or as
- a solicitor, barrister, journalist, artist, doctor. His income is barely
- sufficient for himself, according to his way of life, which includes
- decent clothes, a club, a game of golf when he feels like it, a
- motor-cycle or a small car, a holiday abroad, theatres, a bachelor dinner
- now and again—the usual thing. He belongs to the younger generation,
- with wider interests, larger ideas, higher ambitions than those with which
- his father and mother started life.
- </p>
- <p>
- He could not start on their level. Times have changed. He remembers his
- father’s reminiscences of early struggles, of the ceaseless anxiety to
- make both ends meet, of the continual stinting and scraping to keep the
- children “decent,” to provide them with a good education, to give them a
- fair start in life. He remembers his mother in his own childhood. She was
- always mending stockings. There was always a litter of needlework on the
- dining-room table after supper.
- </p>
- <p>
- There were times when she “did” without a maid, and exhausted herself with
- domestic drudgery. There were no foreign holidays then, only a week or two
- at the seaside once a year. There was precious little pocket money for the
- boys. They were conscious of their shabby gentility, and hated it.
- </p>
- <p>
- The modern young man looks with a kind of horror upon all this domestic
- squalor, as he calls it. He couldn’t stand it. If marriage means that for
- him he will have none of it. But need it mean that? He and Winifred will
- scheme out their lives differently. They will leave out the baby side of
- the business—until they can afford to indulge in it. They will live
- in a little flat, and furnish it, if necessary, on the hire system. They
- will cut out the domestic drudgery. They will enjoy the fun of life, and
- shelve the responsibilities until they are able to pay for them. After all
- it will not be long before he is earning a good income. He has got his
- feet on the first rang of the ladder, and, with a little luck——
- </p>
- <p>
- So he proposes to the girl, and she pretends to be immensely surprised,
- though she has been eating her heart out while he hesitated, and delayed,
- and pondered. They pledge each other, “till death do us part,” and the
- girl, who has been reading a great many novels lately, is very happy
- because her own plot is working out according to the rules of romance.
- </p>
- <p>
- They live in a world of romance before the marriage day. The man seems to
- walk on air when he crosses London Bridge on his way to the City. Or if he
- is a barrister he sees the beauty of his girl’s face in his brief—and
- is in danger of losing his case. Or if a journalist he curses his
- irregular hours which keep him from the little house in Tulse Hill, or the
- flat in Hampstead, where there is a love-light in the windows. He knows
- the outward look of the girl, her softness, her prettiness, her shy glance
- when he greets her. He knows her teasing ways, her tenderness, her
- vivacity. Only now and then he is startled by her stupidity, or by her
- innocence, or by her ignorance, or—still more startling—by her
- superior wisdom of the ways of the world, by her shrewd little words, by a
- sudden revelation of knowledge about things which girls are not supposed
- to know.
- </p>
- <p>
- But these things do not count. Only sentiment and romance are allowed to
- count. These two people who are about to start on the long road of life
- together are utterly blind to each other’s vices or virtues. They are
- deeply ignorant of each other’s soul. They know nothing of the real man or
- the real woman hidden beneath the mask of social conventions, beneath the
- delightful, sham of romantic affection. They know nothing of their own
- souls, nor of the strength that is in them to stand the test of life’s
- realities. They know nothing of their own weakness.
- </p>
- <p>
- So they marry.
- </p>
- <p>
- And for the first year they are wonderfully happy. For the first year is
- full of excitement. They thrill to the great adventure of marriage. They
- are uplifted with passionate love which seems likely to last for ever.
- They have a thousand little interests. Even the trivialities of
- domesticity are immensely important. Even the little disasters of
- domesticity are amusing. They find a lot of laughter in life. They laugh
- at the absurd mistakes of the servant-maids who follow in quick
- succession. They laugh at their own ridiculous miscalculations with regard
- to the expense of house-keeping. They laugh when visitors call at awkward
- moments and when the dinner is spoilt by an inefficient cook. After all,
- the comradeship of a young man and wife is the best thing in life, and
- nothing else seems to matter. They are such good comrades that the husband
- never leaves his wife a moment in his leisure time. He takes her to the
- theatre with him. They spend week-ends together, far from the madding
- crowd. They pluck the flowers of life, hand in hand, as lovers. The first
- year merges into the second. Not yet do they know each other.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER II
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>t is in the third
- and fourth year that they begin to find each other out. The bright fires
- of their passion have died down, burning with a fitful glow, burning low.
- Until then they had been lovers to each other, hidden from each other by
- the illusions of romantic love. It was inconceivable that the man could be
- anything but kind, and tender, and patient, and considerate. It was
- inconceivable that he could hold any but the noblest ideals, the most
- exalted aspirations, the most generous sentiments. He had been so wise, so
- witty, and so gay.
- </p>
- <p>
- And to the man it had seemed that the woman by his side was gifted with
- all the virtues. At least she had been eager to please him, to satisfy his
- least desire, to bend to his will. She had pandered to his vanity, fed his
- self-conceit, listened to his opinions on all the subjects of life as
- though they were inspired. If he had been kept out late at work he had
- found her waiting for him, quick to put her arms about him, to cry out,
- “Oh, my poor dear, how tired you must be?” She had been grateful to him
- for all his little gifts, for all his words of love. And he had seen her
- as a beautiful thing, without flaw or blemish. He had worshipped at the
- foot of the pedestal on which he had placed her in his ideals.
- </p>
- <p>
- But now both the husband and wife begin to see each other, not as lovers,
- but as man and woman. It is rather disturbing. It is distressing to the
- young wife to discover, gradually, by a series of little accidents, that
- this man with whom she has to live all her life is not made of different
- clay from other men, that he is made of the same clay. One by one all the
- little romantic illusions out of which she had built up the false image of
- him, from the heroes of sentimental fiction, from the dreams of girlhood,
- are stripped from him, until he stands bare before her, the natural man.
- She does not like the natural man at first. It is quite a long time before
- she can reconcile herself to the thought that she is mated to a natural
- man, with a touch of brutality, with little meannesses, with moods of
- irritability, with occasional bad tempers, when he uses bad words. She
- sees, too clearly for her spiritual comfort, that they are not
- “twin-souls.” They have not been made in the same mould. His childhood was
- different from her childhood, his upbringing from her upbringing. She sees
- that in little things—mere trifles, but monstrously annoying, such
- as his untidy habits, the carelessness with which he flicks his cigarette
- ash about the carpet, the familiarity with which he speaks to the
- servant-maid. She begins to dislike some of his personal habits—the
- way in which he sneezes, his habit of shaving after breakfast instead of
- before breakfast, his habit of reading the newspaper at the breakfast
- table instead of chatting with her as he used to do about the programme
- for the day. In things less trivial she finds out that her first ideal of
- him was false. They do not think alike on the great subjects of life. He
- is a Radical and she is Conservative, by education and upbringing. It
- hurts her when he argues with revolutionary ideas which seem to her
- positively wicked, and subversive of all morality. He has loose views
- about morality in general, and is very tolerant about lapses from the
- old-fashioned moral code. That hurts her too—horribly. It begins to
- undermine the foundations of her faith in what used to seem the essential
- truth of things. But, above all, it hurts her to realize that she and her
- husband are not one, in mind and body, but utterly different, in
- temperament, in their outlook on life, in their fundamental principles and
- ideas.
- </p>
- <p>
- On the other side the husband makes unpleasant discoveries. He finds out,
- with a shock, that he was utterly ignorant of the girl whom he asked to be
- his wife, and that this woman who sits at his breakfast-table is not the
- same woman as the one who dwelt in his imagination, even as the one who
- lived with him during the first and second year. She has lost her coyness,
- her little teasing ways, her girlish vivacity. She begins to surprise him
- by a hard common-sense, and no longer responds so easily to his old
- romantic moods. He can no longer be certain of her smiles and her
- tenderness when he speaks the old love-words. She begins to challenge his
- authority, not deliberately, nor openly, but by ignoring his hints, or by
- disregarding his advice.
- </p>
- <p>
- She even challenges his opinions, and that is a shock to him. It is a blow
- to his vanity.
- </p>
- <p>
- It takes down his self-conceit more than a peg or two, especially when he
- has to acknowledge, secretly, that she is in the right, as sometimes
- happens. He finds out faults in her now—a touch of selfishness, a
- trace of arrogance, an irritability of temper of which he has to be
- careful, especially when she is in a nervous state of health. They begin
- to quarrel rather frequently about absurd things, about things that do not
- matter a brass farthing. Some of these quarrels reach passionate heights
- and leave them both exhausted, wondering rather blankly what it was all
- about. Then the wife cries a little, and the husband kisses her.
- </p>
- <p>
- By the end of the fourth year they know each other pretty well.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER III
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>n the fifth and
- sixth years they have settled down to the jog-trot of the married life.
- Not yet do they see the shadow of the Eighth Year looming ahead. They have
- faced the reality of life, and knowing each other as they really are have
- made a working compromise. Their love has steadied down to a more even
- flame, and passion is almost extinguished. They have decided to play the
- game, according to the creed of their class, exactly as their neighbors
- are playing it.
- </p>
- <p>
- It is largely a game of bluff, as it is played in thousands of small
- households. It is a game, also, of consequences, as I shall have to show.
- It consists in keeping up appearances, in going one better than one’s
- neighbor whenever possible, and in making a claim to a higher rung of the
- social ladder than is justified by the husband’s income and rank in life.
- It is the creed of snobbishness. For this creed everything is sacrificed—contentment
- of mind, the pleasure of life, the little children of life.
- </p>
- <p>
- In many flats of Intellectual Mansions, and even in the small houses of
- the “well-to-do” suburbs, children do not enter into the scheme of things.
- The “babies have been left out of the business.” For people who are
- keeping up appearances to the last penny of their income cannot afford to
- be burdened by babies. Besides, they interfere seriously with social
- ladder-climbing, drag down a married couple of the younger generation to
- the domestic squalor of their parents’ early life. The husband cannot bear
- the thought that his wife should have to make beds in the morning and mend
- stockings in the evening, and wheel out a perambulator in the park. It is
- so very “low down.” The husband wants to save his wife from all this
- domestic drudgery. He wants her to look pretty in the frocks he buys her.
- He wants her to wear more expensive frocks than any other woman in his
- circle of friends. He likes to hear his friends say, “How charming your
- wife looks to-night, old man!” and to hear elderly ladies say to his wife,
- “What a beautiful gown you are wearing, my dear!”
- </p>
- <p>
- He is working hard now in order to furnish his wife’s wardrobe—not
- only for her pleasure, but for his pride. After the first romance of love,
- ambition comes to gild reality. He is ambitious to build up a beautiful
- little home. The furniture with which they started married life on the
- hire system has been bought and paid for, and is now replaced here and
- there by “genuine antiques.” He puts some good prints on his walls and
- buys some water-color sketches, and becomes in a small way a patron of the
- arts. It is pleasant during one of his wife’s evening At Homes to take a
- guest on one side and say “What do you think of that? Pretty good, eh?
- It’s an original, by Verdant Green, you know.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He has urged upon his wife the necessity of giving <i>recherché</i> little
- dinners, to which he can invite friends better off than himself, and
- distinguished guests whom he wishes to impress. As he explains to his
- wife, “one has to do these things.” And he does them rather well, paying
- some attention to his wines—he keeps a good dinner claret—and
- to his cigars, which he buys at the stores. He also suggests to his wife
- that now she has an extra servant she had better establish a weekly At
- Home, an informal little affair, but pleasant and useful, because it shows
- the world, their world, that they are getting on in the social scale. Here
- again, distinguished visitors may be invited to “drop in.” It is good for
- business. A pretty, well-dressed wife makes a favourable impression upon
- solicitors who have briefs to give away or upon wealthy clients. One must
- keep up appearances, and make a good show. Besides, it is pleasant to put
- on evening clothes after a hard day’s work and to play the host. It gives
- a man some return for all his toil. It gives him a reason for living. And
- it brightens up one’s home-life. “Man does not live by bread alone,” he
- must have some cakes and ale, so to speak.
- </p>
- <p>
- But it is expensive. As every year of marriage passes, the expenses
- increase, steadily, miraculously. It is difficult to account for them, but
- there they are, facing a man in his quarterly reckoning. And the two ends
- must be made to meet, by extra work, by putting one’s nose down to the
- grindstone. The husband does not come home so soon as he used to do in the
- early days. But he has the satisfaction of knowing that while he is away
- at work his wife is keeping up his social reputation and doing all the
- things which a lady in her station of life is expected to do. He thanks
- heaven that his wife is happy.
- </p>
- <p>
- She is not unhappy, this wife, in the fifth and sixth year of marriage.
- After the first romantic illusions failed her she settled down quietly
- enough to play the game. It is quite interesting, quite amusing. Now and
- again queer doubts assail her, and she has strange flutterings at the
- heart, and little pinpricks of conscience. It is about the question of
- motherhood. Perhaps it would be better for her to have a baby. However,
- she has threshed out the question a hundred times with her husband, and he
- has decided that he cannot afford a family yet, and after all the flat <i>is</i>
- very small. Besides, she shirks the idea herself—all the pain of it,
- and the trouble of it.... She thrusts down these queer doubts, does not
- listen to the flutterings at the heart, ignores the little pinpricks of
- conscience. She turns quickly to the interests of her social life and
- falls easily into the habit of pleasant laziness, filling her day with
- little futile things, which seem to satisfy her heart and brain. When her
- husband has gone to business she dresses herself rather elaborately for a
- morning stroll, manicures her nails, tries a new preparation for the
- complexion, alters a feather, or a flower, in one of her hats, studies
- herself in the glass, and is pleased with herself. It passes the time.
- Then she saunters forth, and goes to the shops, peering in through the
- great plate-glass windows at the latest display of lingerie, of evening
- gowns, of millinery. She fancies herself in some of the new hats from
- Paris. One or two of them attract her especially. She makes a mental note
- of them. She will ask her husband to let her buy one of them. After all
- Mrs. Fitzmaurice had a new hat only last week—the second in one
- month. She will tell him that. It will pique him, for there is a rather
- amusing rivalry between the Fitzmaurices and them.
- </p>
- <p>
- So the morning passes until luncheon, when she props the morning newspaper
- against the water-jug, reading the titbits of news and the fashion page
- while she eats her meal, rather nicely cooked by the new servant, and
- daintily served by the little housemaid. Another hour of the day passes,
- and it is the afternoon.
- </p>
- <p>
- She lies down for half an hour with the latest novel from Mudie’s. It has
- a good plot, and is a rather exciting love-story. It brings back romance
- to her. For a little while she forgets the reality which she has learnt
- since her own romantic days. Here love is exactly what she imagined it to
- he, thrilling, joyous, never-changing. The hero is exactly what she
- imagined her husband to be—before he was her husband—strong,
- gentle, noble, high-souled, immensely patient. And after many little
- troubles, misadventures, cross-purposes, and strange happenings, marriage
- is the great reward, the splendid compensation. After this the hero and
- heroine live happily ever afterwards, till death does them part, and—there
- is nothing more to be said. The novel ends with the marriage bells.
- </p>
- <p>
- She knows that her novel has not ended with the marriage hells, that, in
- fact, the plot is only just beginning as far as she is concerned. But she
- does not allow herself to think of that. She revels in romantic fiction,
- and reads novel after novel at the rate of three a week. Occasionally one
- of these novels gives her a nasty shock, for it deals with realism rather
- than romance, and reveals the hearts of women rather like herself, and the
- tragedies of women rather like herself, and the truth of things, in a
- cold, white light. She reads the book with burning eyes. It makes her
- pulse beat. It seems rather a wicked book, it is so horribly truthful, not
- covering even the nakedness of facts with a decent layer of sentiment, but
- exposing them brutally, with a terrible candor. She hates the book. It
- makes her think of things she has tried to forget. It revives those queer
- doubts, and makes her conscience prick again. She is glad when she has
- sent it back to the library and taken out another novel, of the harmless
- kind, in the old style. She lulls her conscience to sleep by the dear old
- love-stories, or by the musical comedies and the costume-plays to which
- she goes with one of her girl-friends on Wednesday or Saturday matinées.
- </p>
- <p>
- She goes to the theatre a good deal now, because she is living more
- independently of her husband. That is to say she no longer waits for his
- home-coming, as in her first days of marriage, with an impatient desire.
- She has long seen that they cannot be all in all to each other, sharing
- all pleasures, or having none. He has realized that, too, and goes to his
- club at least once a week—sometimes more often, to enjoy the society
- of men, to get a little “Bohemianism,” as he calls it.
- </p>
- <p>
- She has made her own circle of friends now, the young wives of men like
- her husband, and many of her afternoons are taken up with little rounds of
- visits, when she is amused by the tittle-tattle of these wives, by their
- little tales and scandals, by their gossips about servants, frocks and
- theatres.
- </p>
- <p>
- She, too, has social ambitions like her husband. Her evenings At Home are
- agreeable adventures when she is pleased with the homage of her husband’s
- friends. She takes some trouble with her little dinner-parties and writes
- out the <i>menus</i> with a good deal of care, and arranges the flowers,
- and occasionally looks into the kitchen to give a word to the cook. She
- wears her new evening gown and smiles at her husband’s compliments, with
- something of her old tenderness. After one of these evening At Homes the
- husband and wife have moments of loving comradeship like those in the
- first days of their marriage. It is a pity that some trivial accident or
- dispute causes ill-temper at the breakfast-table.
- </p>
- <p>
- But, on the whole, they play the game rather well in the fifth and sixth
- years of their married life. The husband takes the rough with the smooth.
- In spite of occasional bad tempers, in spite of grievances which are
- growing into habits of mind, he is a good fellow and—he thanks
- heaven his wife is happy.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER IV
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>t is the seventh
- year. The wife is still doing exactly what she did in the fifth and sixth
- years. Her daily routine is exactly the same. Except that she can afford
- extra little luxuries now, and indulge in more expensive kinds of pleasure—stalls
- at the theatre instead of seats in the pit, an occasional visit to the
- opera, an easy yielding to temptations in the way of hats. Her husband has
- been “getting on,” and he is glad to give her what she wants.
- </p>
- <p>
- But somehow or other she is beginning to realize that she has not got what
- she wants. She does not know what she wants, but she knows that there is a
- great lack of something in her life. She is still “playing the game,” but
- there is no longer the same sport in it. The sharp edge of her interest in
- things has worn off. It has been dulled down. She goes languidly through
- the days and a matinée jaunt no longer thrills her with a little
- excitement. The plays are so boring, full of stale old plots, stale old
- women, stale old tricks. She is sick of them. She still reads a great
- number of romantic novels, but how insufferably tedious they have become!
- How false they are! How cloying is all this sickly sentiment! She searches
- about for the kind of novel which used to frighten her, problem novels,
- dangerous novels, novels dealing with real problems of life. They still
- frighten her a little, some of them, but she likes the sensation. She
- wants more of it. She wants to plunge deeper into the dangerous problems,
- to get nearer to the truth of things. She broods over their revelations.
- She searches out the meaning of their suggestions, their hints, their
- innuendoes. It is like drug-drinking. This poisonous fiction stimulates
- her for a little while, until the effect of it has worn off and leaves her
- with an aching head. Her head often aches now. And her heart aches—though
- goodness knows why. Everything is so stale. The gossip of her women
- friends is, oh—so stale! She has heard all their stories about all
- their servants, all their philosophy about the servant problem in general,
- all their shallow little views about life, and love, and marriage. She has
- found them all out, their vanities, their little selfish ways, their
- little lies and shams and fooleries. They are exactly like herself. She
- has been brought up in the same code, shaped in the same mould, cut out to
- the same pattern. Their ideas are her ideas. Their ways of life her ways.
- They bore her exceedingly.
- </p>
- <p>
- She is bored by things which for a time were very pleasant. It is, for
- instance, boring to go shopping in the morning. It is annoying to her to
- see her own wistful, moody eyes in the plate-glass windows, and in the
- pier-glasses. She has not lost her love of pretty frocks and pretty
- things, but it bores her to think that her husband does not notice them so
- much, and that she has to wear them mostly to please herself. She is tired
- of the little compliments paid to her by her husband’s middle-aged
- friends. She has begun to find her husband’s friends very dull people
- indeed. Most of all is she bored by those evening At Homes with their
- familiar ritual—the girl who wants to sing but pleads a bad cold,
- the woman who wants to play but says she is so fearfully “out of
- practice,” the man who asks the name of a piece which he has heard a score
- of times, the well-worn jokes, the well-known opinions on things which do
- not matter, the light refreshments, the thanks for “a pleasant evening.”
- Oh, those pleasant evenings! How she hates them!
- </p>
- <p>
- She is beginning to hate this beautiful little home of hers. The very
- pictures on the walls set her nerves on edge. She has stared at them so
- often. She wishes to goodness that Marcus Stone’s lovers on an
- old-fashioned stone seat would go and drown themselves in the distant
- lake. But they do not move. They sit smirking at each other, eternally.
- She wishes with all her heart that the big Newfoundland dog over there
- would bite the fluffy haired child who says “Does ‘oo talk?” But it will
- not even bark. She stares at the pattern on the carpet, when a Mudie’s
- novel lies on her lap, and comes to detest the artificial roses on the
- trellis-work. She digs her heels into one of them. If the roses were real
- she would pluck them leaf by leaf and scatter the floor with them. The
- ticking of the clock on the mantelshelf irritates her. It seems a reproach
- to her. It seems to be counting up her waste of time.
- </p>
- <p>
- She stays more at home, in spite of hating it, because she is beginning to
- loathe her round of visits. She feels lonely and wishes her husband would
- come home. Why does he stay so late at the office now? Surely it isn’t
- necessary? When he comes home she is so snappy and irritable that he
- becomes silent over the dinner-table, and then she quarrels with him for
- his silence. After dinner he sits over his papers, thinking out some
- knotty point of business, which he does not discuss with her as in the old
- days. He buries his nose in the evening paper, and reads all the
- advertisements, and is very dull and uninteresting. Yet she nourishes a
- grievance when he goes off on his club-nights and comes home in the early
- hours of the morning, cheerful and talkative when she wants to go to
- sleep.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER V
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>n some cases,
- indeed in many cases, the presence of an “outsider” adds to the
- unhappiness of the wife and divides her still more from her husband. It is
- the presence of the mother-in-law.
- </p>
- <p>
- She, poor soul, has had a terrible time, and no one until now has said a
- good word for her. The red-nosed comedian of the music-hall has used her
- for his most gross vulgarities, sure that whenever he mentions her name he
- will raise guffaws from the gallery, and evoke shrieks of ill-natured
- merriment from young women in the pit. In the pantomimes the man dressed
- up as a woman indulges in long monologues upon his mother-in-law as the
- source of all domestic unhappiness, as the origin of all quarrels between
- husbands and wives, as the greatest nuisance in modern life, and so long
- as he patters about the mother-in-law the audience enjoys itself vastly.
- </p>
- <p>
- It is idle to pretend that the mother-in-law is a blessing in a small
- household. I am bound to admit that the success of the rednosed comedian
- who uses her as his text is due to the truth which lies hidden beneath his
- absurdity. He raises roars of laughter because the people who make up his
- audience realize that he is giving a touch of humor to something which is
- a grim tragedy, and according to the psychology of humor this is
- irresistibly comic, just as the most primitive and laughter-compelling
- jokes deal with corpses, and funerals, and death made ridiculous. They
- have suffered from their own mothers-in-law, those elderly women who sit
- in the corner with watchful eyes upon the young wives, those critics of
- their sons’ marriages, those eavesdroppers of the first quarrel, and of
- all the quarrels that follow the first, those oracles of unwelcome wisdom,
- whose advice about household affairs, about the way of dealing with the
- domestic servants, with constant references to <i>their</i> young days,
- are a daily exasperation to young married women.
- </p>
- <p>
- All that is painfully true. In many cases the mother-in-law becomes so
- terrible an incubus in small households that domestic servants leave with
- unfailing regularity before their month is “up,” husbands make a habit of
- being late at the office, and wives are seriously tempted to take to
- drink.
- </p>
- <p>
- But what of the mother-in-law herself? Is <i>she</i> to be envied? Did she
- willingly become a mother-in-law? Alas, her tragedy is as great as that of
- the young wife upon whose nerves she gets so badly, as great as that of
- the young husband who finds his home-life insufferable because of her
- presence.
- </p>
- <p>
- For the mother-in-law is a prisoner of fate. She is the unwanted guest.
- She is dependent upon the charity of those who find her a daily nuisance.
- During the days of her own married life she devoted herself to her husband
- and children, stinted and scraped for them, moulded them according to her
- ideals of righteousness, exacted obedience to her motherly commands, and
- was sure of their love. Then, one day, death knocked at the door, and
- brought black horses into the street. After that day, when her man was
- taken from her, she became dependent upon her eldest son, but did not yet
- feel the slavery of the dependence.
- </p>
- <p>
- For he paid the debt of gratitude gratefully, and kept up the little home.
- </p>
- <p>
- But one day she noticed that he did not come home so early, and that when
- he came home he was absent-minded. He fell into the habit of spending his
- evenings out, and his mother wondered, and was anxious. He was not so
- careful about her comforts, and she was hurt. Then one day he came home
- and said, “Mother, I am going to get married,” and she knew that her
- happiness was at an end. For she knew, with a mother’s intuition, that the
- love which had been in her boy’s heart for her must now be shared with
- another woman, and that instead of having the first place in his life, she
- would have the second place.
- </p>
- <p>
- For a little while her jealousy is like that of a woman robbed of her
- lover. She hides it, and hides her hate for that girl whose simpering
- smile, whose prettiness, whose coy behavior, light fires in her son’s
- eyes, and set his pulse beating, and make him forgetful of his mother.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then the marriage takes place and the mother who has dreaded the day knows
- that it is her funeral. For she is like a queen whose prerogatives and
- privileges have been taken away by the death of the king, and by the
- accession of a new queen. Her place is taken from her. Her home is broken
- up. She is moved, with the furniture, into the new home, put into the
- second-best bedroom, and arranged to suit the convenience of the new
- household in which another woman is mistress.
- </p>
- <p>
- She knows already that she has begun to be a nuisance, and it is like a
- sharp dagger in her heart. She knows that the young wife is as jealous of
- her as she is of the young wife, because her son cannot break himself of
- the habit of obedience, cannot give up that respect for his mother’s
- principles and advice and wisdom, which is part of the very fibre of his
- being, because in any domestic crisis the son turns more readily to the
- mother than to the young woman who is a newcomer in his life, and in any
- domestic quarrel he takes the mother’s part rather than the wife’s. It is
- the law of nature. It cannot be altered, but it is the cause of
- heartburning and squalid little tragedies.
- </p>
- <p>
- The mother-in-law, in the corner of the sitting-room, watches the drama of
- the married life, and with more experience of life, because of her years,
- sees the young wife do foolish things, watches her blundering experiments
- in the great adventure of marriage, is vigilant of her failures in
- housekeeping, and in the management of her husband. She cannot be quite
- tongue-tied. She cannot refrain from criticism, advice, rebuke. Between
- the mother-in-law and the daughter-in-law there is a daily warfare of
- pinpricks, a feud that grows bitter with the years.
- </p>
- <p>
- But the mother-in-law is helpless. She cannot escape from the lamentable
- situation. She must always remain a hindrance, because she needs a roof
- over her head, and there is no other roof, and she is dependent for her
- daily bread upon the son who is faithful to her, though he is irritable,
- moody and sharp of speech, because of the fretfulness of his wife.
- </p>
- <p>
- This is the eternal tragedy of the mother-in-law, which is turned into a
- jest by the red-nosed comedian to get the laughter from “the gods.” It is
- also a tragedy to the daughter-in-law, who could shriek aloud sometimes
- when the presence of the elderly woman becomes intolerable.
- </p>
- <p>
- Many things are becoming intolerable to the young wife. Her nerves are out
- of order. Sometimes she feels “queer.” She cannot explain how queer she
- feels, even to herself. She says bitter things to her husband, and then
- hates herself for doing so. She has a great yearning for his love, but is
- very cold when he is in a tender mood. She cannot understand her own
- moods. She only knows that she is beginning to get frightened when she
- thinks of the long vista of years before her. She cannot go on like this
- always. She cannot go on like this very long. She is getting rather
- hysterical. She startles her husband by laughing in a queer shrill way
- when he expresses some serious opinions, or gives vent to some of his
- conventional philosophy, about women, and the duties of married life, and
- the abomination of the Suffragettes. But he does not see her tears. He
- does not see her one day, when suddenly, after she has been reading a
- Mudie’s novel, page after page, without understanding one word, tears well
- up into her eyes, and fall upon the pages, until she bends her head down
- and puts her hands up to her face, and sobs as though all her heart had
- turned to tears.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER VI
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span><i>t is the Eighth
- Year</i>. The wife does not know the significance of that. The husband
- goes on his way without seeing the ghosts that have invaded his little
- household. He is too busy to see. The whole energy of his mind now is
- devoted to the business of his life. He must earn money, more money, still
- more money, because expenses still keep increasing, by leaps and bounds.
- He finds it more and more difficult to cut his coat according to his
- cloth. He is often surprised because with a much larger income he seems to
- be just as “hard up” as when he started the adventure of marriage. He
- wonders, sometimes, whether the game is worth the candle. What does he get
- out of it? Precious little. Not much fun. In the evenings he is tired,
- although his brain is still worrying over the details of his work, over
- his business disappointments and difficulties, and plans. Now and again he
- is surprised at the strange quietude and lassitude of his wife. He catches
- a look of tragedy in her eyes, and it startles him for a moment, so that
- he asks her if she is feeling unwell. She laughs, in a mirthless way, and
- seems to resent the question. “Perfectly well, thanks,” she says. He
- shrugs his shoulders. He cannot bother about a woman’s whims and moods.
- Women are queer kittle-cattle. He can’t make ‘em out. Even his own wife is
- a perfect mystery to him. It is a pity they get on each other’s nerves so
- much. What more does she want? He has given her everything a woman may
- desire—a beautiful little home, many little luxuries, plenty of
- pin-money. He does not stint her. It is he that does the stinting. He is
- always working for her so that she may play. However—work is best.
- To do our job in life is the best philosophy.
- </p>
- <p>
- So the husband has on one side the passing suspicion that something is
- wrong with his wife, and the wife hides her heart from him.
- </p>
- <p>
- Something <i>is</i> wrong with her. Everything is wrong, though she does
- not know why and how. She feels lonely—horribly lonely in spite of
- all her friends. She feels like a woman alone in a great desert with no
- other human soul near her, thrust back upon her own thoughts, brooding
- over her own misery. There is a great emptiness in her heart, and she has
- a great hunger and a great thirst of soul which she cannot satisfy.
- Nothing satisfies that empty, barren heart of hers, that throbbing brain.
- She has finished with Mudie’s novels. She can find no satisfaction in <i>them</i>.
- She revolts from the tittle-tattle of her women friends. That is no longer
- amusing. She finds no pleasure in the beauty of her face. It is no longer
- beautiful. She hates the sight of her face in the glass. She is afraid of
- those big wistful eyes which stare at her. She is sick to death of
- dressing herself up. How futile it is! How utterly vain and foolish!
- </p>
- <p>
- She is haunted with ghosts; the ghosts of What-Might-Have-Been. They
- whisper about her, so that she puts her hands to her ears, when she is
- alone in her drawing-room. Faces peer at her, with mocking eyes, or with
- tempting eyes—the faces of men who might have been her lovers, baby
- faces of unborn children. Little hands flutter about her heart, pluck at
- her, tease her. The ghosts of her girlhood crowd about her, the ghosts of
- dead hopes, of young illusions, of romantic dreams. She thrusts them away
- from her vision. She puts her hands before her eyes, and moans a little,
- quietly, so that the servants in the kitchen shall not hear.
- </p>
- <p>
- She is assailed by strange temptations, horrible temptations, from which
- she shrinks back afraid. This hunger and thirst in her soul are so
- tormenting that she has frightful cravings for Something to satisfy her
- hunger and quench her thirst. She is tempted to take to drink, or to
- drugs, to dull the throbbing of her brain, to wake her up out of this
- awful lassitude, to give her a momentary excitement and vitality, and then—forgetfulness.
- She must have some kind of excitement—to break the awful monotony of
- her life, this intolerable dullness of her little home. If only an
- adventure would come to her! Some thrilling, perilous adventure, however
- wicked, whatever the consequences. She feels the overmastering need of
- some passionate emotion. She would like to plunge into romantic love
- again, to be set on fire by it. Somewhere about the world is a man who
- could save her, some strong man with a masterful way with him, brutal as
- well as tender, cruel as well as kind, who would come to her, and clasp
- her hands, and capture her. She would lean upon him. She would yield,
- willingly.... She tries to crush down these thoughts. She is horrified at
- the evil in them. Oh, she is a bad woman! Even in her loneliness her face
- scorches with shame. She gives a faint cry to God to save her. But again
- and again the devilish thoughts leer up in her brain. She begins to
- believe that the devil is really busy with her and that she cannot escape
- him.
- </p>
- <p>
- She has a strange sense of impending peril, of something that is going to
- happen. She knows that something <i>must</i> happen.
- </p>
- <p>
- In this Eighth Year she is in a state bordering on hysteria, when anything
- may happen to her. Even her husband is beginning to get alarmed. He is at
- last awakened out of his self-complacency. He is beginning to watch her,
- with a vague uneasiness. Why does she look so queerly at him sometimes as
- though she hated him? Why does she say such bitter, cruel, satirical
- things, which stab him and leave a poison in the wound? Why does she get
- into such passionate rages about trivial things, and then reveal a
- passionate remorse? Why does she sink into long silences, sitting with her
- hands in her lap, staring at the pattern on the carpet, as though it had
- put a spell upon her? He cannot understand. She says there is nothing
- wrong with her health, she refuses to see a doctor. She scoffs at the idea
- of going away for a little holiday to the seaside. She says it would bore
- her to death. Once she bursts into tears and weeps on his shoulder. But
- she cannot, or will not, explain the cause of her tears, so that he
- becomes impatient with her and talks to her roughly, though he is sorry
- afterwards. He begins to see now that marriage is a difficult game.
- Perhaps they were not suited to each other. They married too young, before
- they had understood each other.... However they have got to make the best
- of it now. That is the law of life—to make the best of it.
- </p>
- <p>
- So in the Eighth Year the husband tries to take a common-sense view of
- things, not knowing that in the Eighth Year it is too late for common
- sense as far as the wife is concerned. She wants uncommon sense. Only some
- tremendous and extraordinary influence, spiritual, or moral, or
- intellectual, beyond the limits of ordinary common sense, may save her
- from the perils in her own heart. She must find a way of escape, for these
- unsatisfied yearnings, for this beating heart, for this throbbing brain.
- Her little home has become a cage to her. Her husband has become her
- jailer. Her life has become too narrow, too petty, too futile. In the
- Eighth Year she must find a way of escape—anyhow, anywhere. And in
- the Eighth Year the one great question is in what direction will she go?
- There are many ways of escape.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER VII
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">O</span>ne way of escape
- is through the door of the Divorce Court. Sir Francis Jeune, when he was
- President of the Divorce Court, saw before him many of these escaping
- women, and he noted down the fact about the Eighth Year; and sitting there
- with an impassive face, but watchful eyes, he saw the characters in all
- these little tragedies and came to know the type and the plot from
- constant reiteration. Sometimes the plot varied, but only in accidentals,
- never in essentials. As the story was rehearsed before him, it always
- began in the same way, with a happy year or two of marriage. Then it was
- followed by the first stress and strain. Then there came the drifting
- apart, the little naggings, the quarrels, the misunderstandings, until the
- wife—it was generally the wife—became bored, lonely,
- emotional, hysterical, and an easy victim for the first fellow with a
- roving eye, a smooth tongue, and an easy conscience. The procession still
- goes on, the long procession of women who try to escape through the
- Divorce Court door. Every year they come, and the same story is told and
- retold with sickening repetition. In most cases they are childless wives.
- That is proved, beyond dispute, by all statistics of divorce. Sometimes
- they have one or two children, but those cases are much more rare. But
- even when there are children to complicate the issues and to be the heirs
- of these tragedies, the causes behind the tragedies are the same. The
- woman has had idle hands in her lap before the Eighth Year of marriage has
- been reached. In the early years her little home was enough to satisfy her
- mind and heart, and her interests were enough to keep her busy. The coming
- of the first child, and of the second, if there is a second, was for a
- time sufficient to crowd her day with little duties and to prevent any
- restlessness or any deadly boredom. All went well while she had but one
- maidservant, and while her husband’s feet were still on the lower rungs of
- the ladder. But the trouble began with the arrival of the extra servant
- and with the promotion of her husband. It began when gradually she handed
- over domestic duties to paid people, when she was seldom in the kitchen
- and more in the drawing-room, when the children were put under the charge
- of a nurse, and when the responsibilities of motherhood had become a
- sinecure. The fact must be faced that a child is not always a cure for the
- emptiness of a woman’s heart, nor an absolute pledge of fidelity between
- husband and wife. These women who seek a way of escape from their little
- homes are not always brought to that position by the unfulfilled instincts
- of motherhood. For many of them have no instincts of motherhood. They feel
- no great natural desire to have a child. They even shrink from the idea of
- motherhood, and plead their lack of courage, their ill-health, their
- weakness. With their husbands they are partners in a childless scheme, or
- if they have a child—they quickly thrust it into the nursery to
- leave themselves free.
- </p>
- <p>
- But, on the other hand, it is a fact borne out by all the figures that a
- child does in the vast majority of cases bind together the husband and
- wife, as no other influence or moral restraint; and that among all the
- women who come to the Divorce Court the overwhelming majority is made up
- of childless wives.
- </p>
- <p>
- These women are not naturally vicious. They have not gone wrong because
- their principles are perverted. They are not, as a rule, intellectual
- anarchists who have come to the conclusion that the conventional moral
- code is wrong and that the laws of marriage are neither divine nor just.
- On the contrary, they are conscience-stricken, they are terrified by their
- own act. Many of them are brokenhearted and filled with shame. It is
- pitiful to hear their letters read in court, letters to their husbands
- pleading for forgiveness, asking for “another chance,” or trying, feebly,
- to throw the blame on the man, and to whitewash themselves as much as
- possible. To judge from their letters it would seem that they were under
- some evil spell, and that they were conscious of being dragged away from
- their duty as though Fate had clutched them by the hair, so that although
- they struggled they could not resist, and were borne helplessly along upon
- a swift tide of passion carrying them to destruction. “I could not help
- myself” is the burden of their cry, as though they had no free-will, and
- no strength of will. Occasionally they give tragic pictures of their idle
- lives, so lacking in interest, so barren, so boring. There is another
- phrase which crops up again and again: “Oh, I was bored—bored—bored!”
- It was the man that saved her from boredom who now shares the woman’s
- guilt, and stands in the witness box in this court of honor. He came to
- her just at that moment in the Eighth Year when she was bored to death. He
- was kind, sympathetic, understanding. He brought a little color back into
- her cheeks, a little laughter into her eyes, a little sunshine into her
- life. He seemed such a boy, so youthful and high-spirited, such a contrast
- to her husband, always busy, and always worrying over his business. He
- told good stories, took her to the theatre, arranged little
- supper-parties, made a new adventure of life. He would sit chatting with
- her over the fire, when there were flickering shadows on the walls. He
- chased away the ghosts, gave her new dreams, brought new hopes.... And
- then suddenly he begins to tempt her; and she shrinks back from him, and
- is afraid. He knows she is afraid, but he tries to laugh away her fears.
- She pleads with him to go away, but there is insincerity in her voice, her
- words are faltering. She knows that if he were to go away she would be
- left more lonely than before, in intolerable loneliness till the ghosts
- would rush back at her. So he stays, and tempts her a little more.
- Gradually, little by little, he becomes her great temptation, overwhelming
- all other things in life dwarfing all other things, even her faith and
- honor. How can she resist? By what power within her can she resist?
- </p>
- <p>
- She does not resist. And yet by yielding she does not gain that happiness
- to which she stretched out her hands. She does not satisfy the great
- hunger in her heart or quench her burning thirst. She has not even killed
- the ghosts which haunt her, or healed the pin pricks of her conscience.
- Her conscience is one great bleeding wound. For this woman of the
- middle-classes is a creature of her caste Nor in most cases can she break
- the rules of her caste without frightful hurt to herself. She was brought
- up in a “nice” home. Her mother was a woman of old-fashioned virtues. Her
- father was a man who would have seen her dead rather than shamed. She
- received a High School education, and read Tennyson and Longfellow with
- moral notes by her class-mistress. She used to go to church, and sometimes
- goes there still, though without any fervor or strength of faith. She has
- heard the old words, “The wages of sin is death,” and she shrinks a little
- when she thinks of them. Above all she has been brought up on romantic
- fiction, and that is always on the side of the angels. The modern problem
- novel has arrested her intellect, has startled her, challenged her, given
- her “notions”; but in her heart of hearts she still believes in the
- old-fashioned code of morals, in the sweet old virtues. This sin of hers
- is a great terror to her. She is not brazen-faced. She does not justify it
- by any advanced philosophy. She is just a poor, weak, silly woman, who has
- gone to the edge of a precipice, grown giddy, and fallen off the cliff.
- She throws up her hands with a great cry. The way of escape through the
- Divorce Court door is not a way to happiness. It is a way to remorse, to
- secret agonies, to a life-long wretchedness. Her second husband, if he
- “plays the game” according to the rules of the world, is not to be envied.
- Between him and this woman there are old ghosts. This way of escape is
- into a haunted house.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER VIII
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>housands, and tens
- of thousands of women who pass through the Eighth Year, not unscathed,
- find another way out. They are finding it now through this new femininist
- movement which is linked up with the cause of Women’s Suffrage. The Eighth
- Year produces many suffragettes, militant and otherwise. At first, in the
- first years of their married life, they scoffed at the idea of Votes for
- Women. They could not see the sense of it. They hated the vulgarities of
- the business, the shamelessness of it, the ugly squalor of these scuffles
- with the police, these fights with the crowds, these raids on the House of
- Commons. It was opposed to all their ideals of femininity and to all their
- traditions of girlhood. “The hussies ought to be whipped,” is the verdict
- of the young wife in the first stage of her romantic affection. But, later
- on, when romance has worn very threadbare in the little home, when reality
- is beginning to poke its head through the drawing-room windows, she finds
- herself taking an interest in this strange manifestation which seems to be
- inspired by some kind of madness. She is silent now when some new phase in
- the conflict is being discussed in her presence. She listens and ponders.
- Presently she goes out of her way to get introduced to some suffrage woman
- on the outskirts of her acquaintance. She is surprised to find her a
- wonderfully cheerful, and apparently sane, woman, very keen, very alert,
- and with a great sense of humor—utterly unlike her tired, bored and
- melancholy self. Perhaps she is quite a young woman, a bachelor girl,
- earning her own living, down in Chelsea, or as a typist secretary in the
- City. But young as she is she has dived into all sorts of queer studies—the
- relations between men and women, the divorce laws, the science of eugenics—and
- she discusses them with an amazing frankness, and in a most revolutionary
- spirit, startling, and a little appalling, at first to this wife in her
- Eighth Year. She has made up her mind conclusively on all the great
- questions of life. She pooh-poohs romantic love. “There is too much fuss
- made about it,” she says. “It is a mere episode, like influenza. There are
- bigger things.” She holds herself perfectly free to choose her mate, and
- to remedy any little mistake which she may make in her choice. At present
- she prefers her independence and her own job, which she likes, thank you
- very much. She is tremendously enthusiastic about the work which women
- have got to do in the world, and there is nothing they cannot do, in her
- opinion. She claims an absolute equality with men. In fact, she is
- inclined to claim a superiority. After all, men are poor things....
- Altogether she is a most remarkable young woman, and she seems to get
- tremendous fun out of life—and this wife in her Eighth Year, without
- agreeing with her yet envies her!
- </p>
- <p>
- Or perhaps the wife meets a suffrage woman of middle-age. She, too, is a
- cheerful, keen, alert, bustling woman with cut-and-dried opinions on
- subjects about which the wife in the Eighth Year is full of doubt and
- perplexity. She has a certain hardness of character. She is intellectually
- hard, and without an atom of old-fashioned sentiment. She calls a spade a
- spade, in a rather embarrassing way, and prefers her facts to be naked.
- She is the mother of two children, whom she is bringing up on strictly
- eugenic principles, whatever those may be, and she is the wife of a
- husband whom she keeps in the background and treats as a negligible
- quantity. “We wives, my dear,” she says, “have been too long kept
- prisoners in upholstered cages. It is time we broke our prison windows. I
- am breaking other people’s windows as well. It lets in a lot of fresh
- air.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She talks a great deal about sweated labor, about the white-slave traffic,
- about women’s work and wages. She talks still more about the treachery of
- the Government, the lies of politicians, the cowardice of men. “Oh, we are
- going to make them sit up. We shall stop at nothing. It is a revolution.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She is amazed at the ignorance of the young wife. “Good heavens, your
- education <i>has</i> been neglected!” she cries. “You are like all these
- stuffy suburban women, who are as ignorant of life as bunny-rabbits.
- Haven’t you even read John Stuart Mill’s <i>Subjection of Women?</i> Good
- gracious! Well, I will send you round some literature. It will open your
- eyes, my dear.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She sends round a lot of little pamphlets, full of dangerous ideas, ideas
- that sting like bees, ideas that are rather frightening to the wife in her
- Eighth Year. They refer to other books, which she gets out of the lending
- library. She reads Ibsen, and recognizes herself in many of those forlorn
- women in the plays. She reads small booklets on the Rights of Wives, on
- the Problems of Motherhood, on the Justice of the Vote. And suddenly,
- after a period of intellectual apathy, she is set on fire by all these
- burning sparks. She is caught up in a great flame of enthusiasm. It is
- like strong drink to her. It is like religious mania. She wakens out of
- her lethargy. Her feeling of boredom vanishes, gives way to a great
- excitement, a great exhilaration. She startles her husband, who thinks she
- has gone mad. She argues with him, laughs at his old-fashioned opinions,
- scoffs at him, pities him for his blindness. She goes out to suffrage
- meetings, starts to her feet one day and falters out a few excited words.
- She sits down with burning cheeks, with the sound of applause in her ears,
- like the roar of the sea. She learns to speak, to express herself
- coherently. She offers herself to “the cause.” She sells her trinkets and
- gives the money to the funds. She is out for any kind of adventure,
- however perilous. She is one of the Hot Young Bloods, or if she has not
- the pluck for that, or the strength, one of the intellectual firebrands
- who are really more dangerous.
- </p>
- <p>
- It is a queer business, this suffrage movement, which sets these women
- aflame. There are a few women in it who have the cold intellectual logic
- of John Stuart Mill himself. They have thought the thing out on scientific
- lines, in its economic, political, and social aspects. They want the vote
- honestly, as a weapon to give their sex greater power, greater
- independence, better conditions of life in the labor market. But the rank
- and file have no such intellectual purpose, though they make use of the
- same arguments and believe that these are the mainsprings of their
- actions. In reality they are Eighth Year women. That is to say, they seize
- upon the movement with a feverish desire to find in it some new motive in
- life, some tremendous excitement, some ideals greater and more thrilling
- than the little ideals of their home life. In this movement, in this great
- battle, they see many things which they keep secret. They go into it with
- blind impulses, which they do not understand, except vaguely. It is a
- movement of revolt against all the trammels of sex relationship which have
- come down through savagery to civilization; laws evolved out of the
- inherited experience of tribes and races for the protection of womanhood
- and the functions of womanhood, laws of repression, of restraint, for the
- sake of the children of the race; duties exacted by the social code again
- for the sake of the next generation. Having revolted against the duties of
- motherhood, all these laws, these trammels, these fetters, become to them
- intolerable, meaningless, exasperating. The scheme of monogamy breaks
- down. It has no deep moral purpose behind it, because the family is not
- complete. The scheme has been frustrated by the childlessness of the wife.
- Again, this movement is a revolt against the whole structure of modern
- society as it affects the woman—against the very architecture of the
- home; against all those tiny flats, those small suburban houses, in which
- women are cramped and confined, and cut off from the large world. It did
- not matter so long as there was a large world within the four walls. Their
- space was big enough to hold the big ideals of old-fashioned womanhood, in
- which the upbringing of children was foremost and all-absorbing. But for a
- woman who has lost these ideals and the duties that result from them,
- these little places are too narrow for their restless hearts; they become
- like prison cells, in which their spirits go pacing up and down, up and
- down, to come up against the walls, to heat their hands against them. They
- believe that they may find in this suffrage movement the key to the riddle
- of the mysteries in their souls, world-old mysteries, of yearnings for the
- Unknown Good, of cravings for the Eternal Satisfaction, for the perfect
- fulfilment of their beings. Their poor husband, a dear good fellow, after
- all, now that they look at him without hysteria, has not provided this
- Eternal Satisfaction. He has only provided pretty frocks, tickets for
- matinées, foolish little luxuries. He does not stand for them as the
- Unknown Good. After the first year or two of marriage they know him with
- all his faults and flaws, and familiarity breeds contempt. But here, in
- this struggle for the Vote, in these window-breakings and house-burnings,
- in imprisonments and forcible feedings, in this solidarity of women
- inspired by a fierce fanaticism—there is, they think, the answer to
- all their unsolved questions, the splendor and the glory of their sex, the
- possibility of magnificent promises and gifts, in which the soul of woman
- may at last find peace, and her body its liberty. She is to have the
- supreme mastery over her own spirit and flesh.
- </p>
- <p>
- It is a fine promise. But as yet it is unfulfilled. It is not to be denied
- that for a time at least some of these women do gain a cheerfulness, a
- keenness, a vitality, which seem to be a great recompense for their
- struggles and strivings. But they are the younger women, and especially
- the young unmarried women, who get a good deal of fun out of all this
- excitement, all this adventure, all the dangerous defiance of law and
- convention. The older women—many of them—are already suffering
- a sad disillusionment. They have not yet found those splendid things which
- seemed at last within their grasp. They are desperate to get them, fierce
- in their desire for them, but the cup of wine is withheld from their lips.
- They find themselves growing old and still unsatisfied, growing hard, and’
- bitter, and revengeful against those who thwart them. The problems of
- their sex still remain with them. They may break all the laws, but get no
- nearer to liberty. They are still prisoners of fate, bond-slaves to a
- nature which they do not understand. The femininist movement is only a
- temporary way of escape for the wife who has reached her crisis in the
- Eighth Year.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0009" id="link2HCH0009"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER IX
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>here is another
- way, and it has many doors. It is religion. Many of these women “take to
- religion” as they take to the suffrage movement, and find the same
- emotional excitement and adventure in it. They are caught up in it as by a
- burning flame. It satisfies something of their yearnings and desires. And
- it is a curious and lamentable thing that although it has been proved
- conclusively by all masters of philosophy and by all great thinkers, that
- some form of religion, is an essential need in the heart of women, the
- whole tendency of the time is to rob them of this spiritual guidance and
- comfort. Religion is not a part of the social scheme of things in
- “intellectual mansions” and in the small suburban houses of the
- professional classes. It is not entirely wiped off the slate, but it is
- regarded with indifference and as of no vital account in the sum of daily
- life. Occasionally a certain homage is paid to it, as to a pleasant,
- old-fashioned ritual which belongs to the code of “good form.” In their
- courting days the young man and woman went to church now and then on a
- Sunday morning or a Sunday evening and held the same hymn-book, and
- enjoyed a little spiritual sentiment. They were married in church to the
- music of the Wedding March played by the organist. Sometimes as the years
- pass they drop into a service where there is good singing, a popular
- preacher, and a fashionable congregation. They regard themselves as
- Christians, and condescend to acknowledge the existence of God, in a
- vague, tolerant kind of way. But they do not enter into any intimate
- relations with God. He is not down on their visiting list. Many of them do
- not even go as far as those people I have described who regard God as part
- of the social code of “good form.” They become frankly agnostic and smile
- at their neighbors who put on top-hats and silk dresses and stroll to
- church on a Sunday morning. It seems to them absurdly “Early Victorian.”
- For they have read a great number of little books by the latest writers,
- who publish their philosophy in sevenpenny editions, and they have reached
- an intellectual position when they have a smattering of knowledge on the
- subject of evolution, anthropology, the origins of religion, literature
- and dogma, and the higher criticism. They have also read extracts from the
- works of Nietzsche, Kant, and the great free-thinkers, or reviews of their
- works in the halfpenny newspapers. The ideas of the great thinkers and
- great rebels have filtered down to them through the writings of little
- thinkers and little rebels. They have been amused by the audacities of
- Bernard Shaw and other intellectuals of their own age. They have read the
- novels of H. G. Wells, which seem to put God in His right place. They have
- imbibed unconsciously the atmosphere of free-thought and religious
- indifference which comes through the open windows, through the keyholes,
- through every nook and cranny. Occasionally the husband lays down the law
- on the subject with dogmatic agnosticism, or dismisses the whole business
- of religion with a laugh as a matter of no importance either way,
- certainly as a problem not worth bothering about.
- </p>
- <p>
- So the wife’s spiritual nature is starved. She is not even conscious of
- it, except just now and then when she is aware of a kind of spiritual
- hunger, or when she has little thoughts of terror at the idea of death, or
- when she is in low spirits. She has no firm and certain faith to which she
- can cling in moments of perplexity. She has no belief in any divine
- authority from which she can seek guidance for her actions. There is no
- supernatural influence about her from which she can draw any sweetness of
- consolation, when the drudgery and monotony of life begins to pall on her.
- When temptations come she has no anchor holding her fast to duty and
- honor. She has no tremendous ideals giving a large meaning to the little
- things of life. She has no spiritual vision to explain the mysteries of
- her own heart, or any spiritual balm to ease its pain and restlessness.
- She must rely always on her common sense, on her own experience, on her
- own poor little principles of what is right or wrong, or expedient, or
- “the proper thing.” When those fail her, all fails; she is helpless, like
- a ship without a rudder, like a straw in the eddy of a mill race.
- </p>
- <p>
- It is just at this time, when all has failed her, and when she seems to be
- drifting helplessly, that she is ready for religion, a bundle of dry straw
- which will burst into flame at the touch of a spark, a spiritual appetite
- hungry for food. In hundreds of cases these women take to the queerest
- kinds of spiritual food, some of it very poisonous stuff. Any impostor
- with a new creed may get hold of them. Any false prophet may dupe them
- into allegiance. They get into the hands of peculiar people. They are
- tempted to go to a spiritualistic séance and listen to the jargon of
- spiritualism. It frightens them at first, but after their first fears, and
- a little shrinking horror, they go forward into these “mysteries,” and are
- obsessed by them. It appears they are “psychical.” Undoubtedly after a
- little practice they could get into touch with the spirit-world. With
- planchette and table-rapping, and with mediumistic guidance, they may
- learn the secrets of the ghost-world, and invoke the aid of spirits in
- their little household. It becomes a mania with them. It becomes, in many
- cases, sheer madness.
- </p>
- <p>
- There are other women who seek their spiritual salvation among the
- clairvoyants and crystal-gazers and palmists of the West End.
- </p>
- <p>
- They become devotees of the Black Art, and dupes of those who prey upon
- the Eternal Gullible. There are others who join the Christian Scientists,
- and find the key to the riddle of life in the writings of Mrs. Eddy. They
- experiment in will-power—upon their unfortunate husbands. They adopt
- the simple life, and bring themselves into a low state of health by fruit
- diet. They learn a new language full of strange technical terms, which
- they but dimly understand, yet find comforting, like the old woman and her
- Mesopotamia, which was a blessèd word to her. But in spite of all its
- falsity and folly, it does give them a new interest in life, and lift them
- right out of the ruck of suburban dulness. So far at least it is helpful
- to them. It is some kind of spiritual satisfaction, though afterwards,
- perhaps, they may fall into a spiritual excitement and hysteria worse than
- their old restlessness, and become a nuisance to their family and friends,
- women with <i>idées fixes</i>.
- </p>
- <p>
- It is better for them if they can grope their way back to the old
- Christian faith, with its sweetness and serenity and divine ideals. Here
- at last the woman may find authority, not to be argued about, not to be
- dodged, but to be obeyed. Here at last she may find tremendous ideals
- giving a significance to the little things of life, which seemed so
- trivial, so futile, and so purposeless. Here is wholesome food for her
- spiritual hunger, giving her new strength and courage, patience and
- resignation. Here are great moral lessons from which she may draw wisdom
- and guidance for her own poor perplexities. Then when temptations come,
- she may cling to an anchor of faith which will not slip in shifting sands,
- but is chained to a great rock. The wisdom of the Church, the accumulated
- experience stored up in the Church, the sweetness of all great Christian
- lives, the splendid serenity of the Christian laws, so stern and yet so
- tolerant, so hard and yet so easy, give to this woman’s soul the peace she
- has desired, not to be found among the ghosts of modern spiritualism, nor
- in the pseudo-scientific jargon of Mrs. Eddy’s works, nor in the
- glass-crystals of the clairvoyants. For the Christian faith has no use for
- hysteria; it exacts a healthy discipline of mind. It demands obedience to
- the laws of life, by which no woman may shirk the duties of her nature, or
- pander to her selfishness, or dodge the responsibilities of her state as a
- wife, or forget her marriage-vows and all that they involve.
- </p>
- <p>
- There would be no fatal significance about the Eighth Year if the old
- religion were still of vital influence in the home. For after all, in
- spite of all our cleverness, we have not yet discovered any new
- intellectual formula or philosophy which will force men and women to do
- those things which are unpleasant but necessary to insure the future of
- the race; to deny themselves so that the future generation may gain; to
- suffer willingly in this world for the sake of an advantage in a future
- life. If people do not believe in a future life, and in such rewards as
- are offered by the Christian dogma, they prefer to have their advantages
- here and now. But as we know, if we face the facts of life clearly, the
- advantages, here and now, are not easy to get. Life, at its best, is a
- disappointing business. There is a lot of rough with the smooth,
- especially for women, especially for those women of the middle-classes in
- small suburban homes, over-intel-lectualized, with highly strung nerves,
- in a narrow environment, without many interests, and without much work. It
- is just because many of them are entirely without religion to give some
- great purpose to their inevitable trivialities that their moral
- perspective becomes hopelessly inverted, as though they were gazing
- through the wrong end of the telescope. Having no banking account in the
- next life, they spend themselves in this life, and live “on tick,” as it
- were. Religion is the gospel of unselfishness. Lacking religion, they are
- utterly selfish. They do not worry about the future of the race. Why
- should they? All they are worrying about is to save themselves pain,
- expense, drudgery. Children are a great nuisance—therefore they will
- not have children. They want to put in a good time, to enjoy youth and
- beauty as long as possible, to get as much fun as they can here and now.
- But, as we have seen, the fun begins to peter out somewhere about the
- Eighth Year, and “the good time” has disappeared like a mirage when one
- gets close to it, and even youth and beauty are drooping and faded like
- yesterday’s flowers. What is the woman to do then? She is the victim of
- shattered illusions, of broken hopes. Before her is nothing but a gray
- vista of years. She has nothing to reconcile her with the boredom of her
- days, nothing to compensate her for domestic drudgery, no cure for the
- restlessness and feverishness which consume her, no laws by which she may
- keep straight. She sees crookedly, her spirit rushes about hither and
- thither. She is like a hunted thing, hunted by her desires, and she can
- find no sanctuary; no sanctuary unless she finds religion, and the right
- religion. There are not many women nowadays who find this way of escape,
- for religion has gone out of fashion, like last year’s hats, and it wants
- a lot of pluck to wear a last year’s hat.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0010" id="link2HCH0010"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER X
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">B</span>esides, the
- husband does not like it. He discourages religion, except in homoeopathic
- doses, taken by way of a little tonic, as one goes to the theatre for a
- pick-me-up. As he remarks, he does not believe in women being too
- spiritual. It is not “healthy.” If his wife goes to church with any
- regularity he suspects there is an attractive cleric round the corner. And
- sometimes he is right. Anyhow, he does not feel the need of religion,
- except when he gets a pretty bad dose of influenza and has an uneasy
- thought that he is going to “peg out.” As a rule he enjoys good health,
- and has no time to bother about the supernatural. He does not meet it in
- the city. It is not a marketable commodity. It is not, as he says, “in his
- line of country.” He does not see why it should be in his wife’s line of
- country. He is annoyed when his wife takes up any of these cranky ideas.
- He rages inwardly when she takes them up passionately. Why can’t she be
- normal?
- </p>
- <p>
- Why on earth can’t she go on as she began, with her little feminine
- interests, keeping herself pretty for his sake, keen on the latest
- fashions, neighborly with young wives like herself, and fond of a bit of
- frivolity now and then? When she complains that she has idle hands in her
- lap, and wants something to do, he reminds her that she found plenty to do
- in the first years of her married life. When she cries out that she is
- bored, he points out to her that she gets much more amusement than he
- does.
- </p>
- <p>
- And that is true, because by the time he has reached the Eighth Year he is
- pretty busy. Ambition has caught hold of him and he is making a career. It
- is not easy. Competition is deadly. He has got his work cut out to keep
- abreast with his competitors. It is a constant struggle “to keep his end
- up.” He finds it disconcerting when he comes home in the evenings after
- the anxiety of his days, dog-tired and needing sympathy, to find that his
- wife has an attack of nerves, or a feverish desire to go out and “see
- something.” He wants to stay at home and rest, to dawdle over the evening
- paper, to listen to a tune or two from his wife.
- </p>
- <p>
- He would like her to bring his slippers to him, as she used to do in the
- old days, to hover round him a little with endearing words, and then, with
- not too much of <i>that</i>, to keep quiet, assenting to his opinions when
- he expresses them, and being restful. He has his own grievances. He is not
- without troubles of soul and body. He has had to face disappointment,
- disillusionment, hours of blank pessimism. He has had to get to grips with
- reality, after the romanticism of his youth, and to put a check upon his
- natural instincts and desires. In many ways it is harder for the man than
- for the woman. Civilization and the monogamous code have not been framed
- on easy lines for men. To keep the ordinary rules of his caste he must put
- a continual restraint upon himself, make many sacrifices. Women and wives
- forget that human nature has not changed because men wear black coats and
- tall hats instead of the skins of beasts. Human nature is exactly the same
- as it ever was, strong and savage, but it has to be tamed and repressed
- within the four walls of a flat in West Kensington, or within a
- semi-detached house at Wimbledon.
- </p>
- <p>
- There are moments when the man hears the call of the wild, and loathes
- respectability and conventionality with a deadly loathing. In his heart,
- as in the heart of every man, there is a little Bohemia, a little country
- of lawlessness and errant fancy and primitive desires. Sometimes when he
- has shut himself up in his study, when the servants are in the kitchen
- washing up the supper-things, when his wife is lying down with a bad
- headache, he unlocks the door of that Bohemia in his heart, and his
- imagination goes roving, and he hears the pan-pipes calling, and the stamp
- of the cloven hoofs of the old Nature-god. He would like to cut and run
- sometimes from this respectable life of his, to go in search of adventure
- down forbidden pathways, and to find the joy of life again in Liberty
- Hall. This fretful wife of his, this social-ladder climbing, the whole
- business of “playing the game” in the same old way, makes him very tired,
- and gets on his nerves at times most damnably. He has his temptations. He
- hears siren voices calling him. He sees the lure of the witch-women. To
- feel his pulse thrill to the wine of life, to get the fever of joy in his
- blood again, to plunge into the fiery lake of passion, are temptations
- from which he does not escape because he is Something in the City, or a
- barrister-at-law, and a married man with a delicate wife. But, being a
- man, with a man’s work, and a man’s ambition, he keeps his sanity, and
- quite often his self-respect. His eyes are clear enough to see the
- notice-boards on the boundary lines of the forbidden territory,
- “Trespassers will be prosecuted,” “Please keep off the grass,” “No
- thoroughfare.” He locks up the gate to the little Bohemia in his heart,
- and puts the key into a secret cupboard of his brain. He understands quite
- clearly that if he once “goes off the rails,” as he calls it, his
- ambitions will be frustrated and his career spoiled. Besides, being a
- conventionalist and somewhat of a snob, he would hate to be found out in
- any violation of the social code, and his blood runs cold at the idea of
- his making a fool of himself with a woman, or anything of that kind. The
- creed of his social code, of the pot-hatted civilization, of this suburban
- conventionality of these little private snob-doms, is stronger in the man
- than in the woman. When she once takes the bit between her teeth, as it
- were, she becomes utterly lawless. But the man reins himself in more
- easily. He finds it on the whole less difficult to be law-abiding. He has
- also a clearer vision of the logic of things. He knows that certain
- results follow certain causes. He can measure up the consequences of an
- act, and weigh them. He is guided by his brain rather than by his
- emotions. He has certain fixed principles deeply rooted in him. He has a
- more delicate sense of honor than most women. It is summed up in that old
- school-phrase of his—“playing the game.” However much his nerves may
- be jangled, and goodness knows they are often jangled, especially as the
- Eighth Year draws near, he is generally master of himself. At least he
- does not, as a rule, have hysterical outbursts, or give rein to passionate
- impulses, or suddenly take some wild plunge, upsetting all the balance of
- his life. He does not take frightful risks, as a woman will always take
- them, recklessly, when she reaches her crisis.
- </p>
- <p>
- So it is that he looks coldly upon his wife’s desires for some new
- emotional activity, of whatever kind it may be, religious, political, or
- ethical. He hates any symptoms of fanaticism. He shivers at any breach of
- good form. He would like her always to be sitting in the drawing-room when
- he comes home, in a pretty frock, with a novel in her lap, with a smile in
- her eyes. He does not and will not understand that this childless wife of
- his must have strong interests outside her little home to save her from
- eating her heart out. He hides from himself the fact that her
- childlessness is a curse which is blighting her. He pooh-poohs her tragic
- cry for help. He is just a little brutal with her when she accuses him of
- thwarting all the desires of her soul. And he is scared, thoroughly
- scared, when at last she takes flight, on wild wings, to some spiritual
- country, or to some moral, or immoral, territory, where he could not
- follow. He tries to call her back. But sometimes she may not be called
- back. She has escaped beyond the reach of his voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0011" id="link2HCH0011"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XI
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">S</span>nobbishness is one
- of the causes which lead to the Eighth Year, and not the least among them.
- It is an essentially middle-class snobbishness, and has grown up, like a
- fungus growth, with that immense and increasing class of small, fairly
- well-to-do households who have come into being with the advance of
- material prosperity during the past twenty-five years, and with the
- progress of elementary education, and all that it has brought with it in
- the form of new desires for pleasure, amusement and more luxuries. These
- young husbands and wives who set up their little homes are not, as I have
- said, content to start on the same level as their parents in the first
- years of their married life. They must start at least on the level of
- their parents at the end of their married life, even a little in advance.
- The seeds of snobbishness are sown before marriage. The modern son
- pooh-poohs the habits of his old-fashioned father. They are not good
- enough for him. He has at least twice the pocket-money at school compared
- with the allowance of his father when he was a boy. He goes to a more
- expensive school and learns expensive habits. When he begins work he does
- not hand over most of his salary as his father used to hand over his
- salary a generation ago, to keep the family pot boiling. He keeps all that
- he earns, though he is still living at home, and develops a nice taste in
- clothes. One tie on week-days and another tie for Sundays are still good
- enough for the father, but the son buys ties by the dozen, and then has a
- passion for fancy socks, and lets his imagination rove into all
- departments of haberdashery. He is only a middle-class young man, but he
- dresses in the style of a man of fashion, adopts some of the pleasures of
- the man about town, and is rather scornful of the little house in the
- suburbs to which he returns after a bachelor’s dinner in a smart
- restaurant, or after a tea-party with gaiety girls. He becomes a “Nut,”
- and his evenings are devoted to a variety of amusements, which does away
- with a good deal of money. He smokes a special brand of cigarettes. He
- hires a motor-car occasionally for a spin down to Brighton. His mother and
- father are rather scared by this son who lives in a style utterly beyond
- their means.
- </p>
- <p>
- The girl is a feminine type of the new style. She has adopted the new
- notions. At a very early age she is expert in all the arts of the younger
- generation, and at seventeen or eighteen has already revolted from the
- authority of her parents. She is quite a nice girl, naturally, but her
- chief vice is vanity. She is eaten up with it. It is a consuming passion.
- From the moment she gets out of bed in the morning for the first glimpse
- of her face in the looking-glass to the time she goes to bed after putting
- on some lip-salve and face enamel, she is absorbed with self-consciousness
- about her “looks.” Her face is always occupying her attention. Even in
- railway trains she keeps biting her lips to make them red. At every window
- she passes she gives a sidelong glance to see if her face is getting on
- all right. Her main ambition in life is to be in the fashion. She is
- greedy for “pretty things” and sponges upon her father and mother for the
- wherewithal to buy them, and she will not lay a little finger on any work
- in the kitchen or even make a bed, lest her hands should be roughened and
- because it would not be quite “lady-like.”
- </p>
- <p>
- A pretty education for matrimony! A nice couple to set up house together
- Poor children of life, they are doomed to have a pack of troubles. Because
- as they began they go on, with the same ideas, with the same habits of
- mind, until they get a rude shock. Their little household is a shrine to
- the great god Snob. They are his worshippers. To make a show beyond their
- meansj or up to the very limit of their means, to pretend to be better off
- than they are, to hide any sign of poverty, to dress above their rank in
- life, to show themselves in places of entertainment, to shirk domestic
- drudgery, that is their creed.
- </p>
- <p>
- In the old days, before the problem of the Eighth Year had arrived, the
- wives of men, the mothers of those very girls, kept themselves busy by
- hundreds of small duties. They made the beds, dusted the rooms, helped the
- servants in the kitchen, made a good many of their own clothes, mended
- them, altered them, cleaned the silver. But nowadays the wife of the
- professional man does none of these things if there is any escape from
- them. She keeps one servant at a time when her mother did without a
- servant. She keeps two servants as soon as her husband can afford an extra
- one, three servants if the house is large enough to hold them. Indeed, a
- rise in the social scale is immediately the excuse for an additional
- servant, and in the social status the exact financial prosperity of the
- middle-classes is reckoned by them according to the number of servants
- they keep. And whether it be two or three, the little snob wife sits in
- her drawing-room with idle hands, trying to kill time, getting tired of
- doing nothing, but proud of her laziness. And the snob husband encourages
- her in her laziness. He is proud of it, too. He would hate to think of his
- wife dusting, or cleaning, or washing up. He does not guess that this
- worship of his great god Snob is a devil’s worship, having devilish
- results for himself and her. The idea that women want work never enters
- his head. His whole ambition in life is to prevent his wife from working,
- not only when he is alive, but after he is dead. He insures himself
- heavily and at the cost of a great financial strain upon his resources in
- order that “if anything happens” his wife, even then, need not raise her
- little finger to do any work. But something “happens” before he is dead.
- The woman revolts from the evil spell of her laziness. She finds some work
- for her idle hands to do—good work or bad.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0012" id="link2HCH0012"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XII
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>f only those idle
- women would find some good work to do the Eighth Year would lose its
- terrors. And there is so much good work to do if they would only lay their
- hands to it! If they cannot get in touch with God, they can at least get
- in touch with humanity. At their very doors there is a welter of
- suffering, struggling humanity craving for a little help, needing helping
- hands, on the very edge of the abyss of misery, and slipping down unless
- they get rescued in the nick of time. In the mean streets of life, in the
- hospitals, at the prison gates, in the reformatories, in the dark haunts
- of poverty, there are social workers striving and toiling and moiling in
- the service of all these seething masses of human beings. But there are
- too few of them, and the appeals for volunteers in the ranks of the unpaid
- helpers are not often answered. They are hardly ever answered from the
- class of women who have least in the world to do, and most need of such
- kinds of work. Many of these women have good voices. They sing little
- drawing-room ballads quite well, until they get sick of the sound of their
- own singing in their lonely little drawing-rooms. But they do not think of
- singing in the hospitals, and the workhouse wards, where their voices
- would give joy to suffering people, or miserable people who do not often
- hear the music of life. These women have no children. They have shirked
- the pains of childbirth. But they might help to give a little comfort and
- happiness to other mothers’ children, to shepherd a small flock for a
- day’s outing in the country, to organize the children’s playtime, to nurse
- the sick baby now and then. These idle women remember their own girlhood
- and its dreams. They remember their own innocence, the shelter of their
- home-life. It would be good for them if they gave a little loving service
- to the girls in the working-quarters of the great cities, and went down
- into the girl-clubs to play their dance tunes, to keep them out of the
- streets, to give them a little innocent fun in the evenings. These lazy
- women cry out that they are prisoners in upholstered cages. But there are
- many prisoners in stone cells, who at the prison gates, on their release,
- stand looking out into the cold gray world, with blank, despairing eyes,
- with no prospect but that of crime and vice, unless some unknown friend
- comes with a little warmth of human love, with a quick sympathy and a
- ready helpfulness. Here is work for workless women who are well-to-do.
- They are unhappy in their own homes, because they are tired of its
- trivialities, tired of its little luxuries, bored to death with themselves
- because they have no purpose in life. But in the mean streets round the
- corner they would find women still clinging with extraordinary courage to
- homes that have no stick of furniture in them, amazingly cheerful,
- although instead of little luxuries they have not even the barest
- necessities of life, unwearied, indefatigable, heroic in endurance, though
- they toil on sweated wages. The women of the well-to-do middle-classes
- drift apart from their husbands because perhaps they have irritable little
- habits, because they do not understand all the yearnings in their wives’
- hearts, because they have fallen below the old ideals of their courting
- days. But here in the slums these women with a grievance would find other
- women loyal to their husbands who come home drunk at nights, loyal through
- thick and thin to husbands who “bash” them when they speak a sharp word,
- loyal to the death to husbands who are untamed brutes with only the love
- of the brute for its mate. There is no problem of the Eighth Year in
- Poverty Court, only the great problems of life and death, of hunger and
- thirst and cold, of labor and want of work. Here in the mean streets of
- the world is the great lesson that want of work is the greatest disaster,
- the greatest moral tragedy, that may happen to men and women.
- </p>
- <p>
- If the idle women of the little snobdoms would come forth from their
- houses and flats, they would see that lesson staring them in the face,
- with a great warning to themselves. And if they would thrust aside their
- selfishness and learn the love of humanity, it would light a flame in
- their hearts which would kindle the dead ashes of their disillusionment
- and burn up their grievances, and make a bonfire of all their petty little
- troubles, and make such a light in their lives as would enable them to see
- the heroic qualities of ordinary duties bravely done, and of ordinary
- lives bravely led. Here they would find another way of escape from the
- perils of the Eighth Year, and a new moral health for their hearts and
- brains.
- </p>
- <p>
- It is only now and then that some woman is lucky enough to find this way
- out, for snobbishness enchains them, and it is difficult to break its
- fetters.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0013" id="link2HCH0013"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XIII
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>hen the woman has
- once taken flight, or is hesitating before taking her flight, in the
- Eighth Year, it is an almost hopeless business for the husband to call her
- back. Whenever she is called back, it is by some outside influence, beyond
- <i>his</i> sphere of influence, by some sudden accident, by some
- catastrophe involving both of them, or by some severe moral shock, shaking
- the foundations of their little home like an earthquake. There are cases
- in which the woman has been called back by the sudden smash-up of her
- husband’s business, by financial ruin. In his social ladder-climbing he is
- too rash. One of the rungs of the ladder breaks beneath his feet and he
- comes toppling down. Owing to this deadly competition of modern life, he
- loses his “job.” It is given to a younger or better man, or to a man with
- a stronger social pull. He comes home one day with a white face,
- trembling, horribly scared, afraid to break the news to a woman who has
- not been helpful to him of late, and of whose sympathy he is no longer
- sure. He believes that this misfortune is the last straw which will break
- their strained relations. He sees the great tragedy looming ahead, hearing
- down upon him. But, curiously enough, this apparent disaster is the
- salvation of both of them. The despair of her husband calls to the woman’s
- loyalty. All her grievances against this man are suddenly swallowed up in
- the precipice which has opened beneath his feet. All her antagonism is
- broken down and dissolved into pity. Her self-pride is slain by this man’s
- abasement. His weakness, his need of help, his panic-stricken heart cry to
- her. After all their drifting apart, their indifference to each other,
- their independence, he wants her again. He wants her as a helpmeet. He
- wants any courage she can give him, any wisdom. And she is glad to be
- wanted. She stretches out her hands to him. They clasp each other, and
- there is no longer a gulf beneath their feet; misfortune has built a
- bridge across the gulf which divided them. More than that, all the little
- meannesses of their life, all the petty selfishness of their days, all the
- little futile things over which they have wrangled and jangled are thrust
- on one side, and are seen in their right perspective. The things that
- matter, the only things that matter, are seen, perhaps, for the first
- time, clearly, in a bright light, now that they are face to face with stem
- realities. The shock throws them off their pedestals of conceit, of
- self-consciousness, of pretence. They stand on solid ground. The shock has
- broken the masks behind which they hid themselves. It has broken the hard
- crust about their hearts. It has shattered the idol which they worshipped,
- the idol of the great god Snob.
- </p>
- <p>
- And so they stare into each other’s soul, and take hands again like little
- children, abandoned by the Wicked Uncles of life, and they grope their way
- back to primitive things, and begin the journey again. They have found out
- that this new comradeship is better even than the old romantic love of
- their courting days. They have discovered something of the great secret of
- life. They are humbled. They make new pledges to each other, pick up the
- broken pieces of their hopes and dreams and fit them together again in a
- new and sounder scheme. This time, in some cases, they do not leave the
- baby out of the business. The wife becomes a mother, and the child chases
- away all the ghosts which haunted her in the Eighth Year. She no longer
- wants to take flight. She has been called back.
- </p>
- <p>
- It is nearly always some accident like this which calls the wife back,
- some sudden, startling change in the situation, caused by outside
- influences, or by the hand of Fate. Sometimes it is an illness which
- overtakes the husband or wife. Holding hands by the bedside, they stare
- into the face of Death, and again the trivialities of life, the pettiness
- of their previous desires, the folly of their selfishness, the stupidity
- of their little snobdom, are revealed by the whisperings of Death, and by
- its warnings. The truth of things stalks into the bedroom where the
- husband, or the wife, lies sleeping on the borderland. About the sick bed
- the weeping woman makes new vows, tears wash out her vanity, her
- self-conceit. Or, kneeling by the side of the woman whose transparent hand
- he clasps above the coverlet, the husband listens to the little voice
- within his conscience, and understands, with a great heartache, the
- pitiful meaning of the domestic strife which seemed to have killed his
- love for the woman for whose life now he makes a passionate cry. In the
- period of convalescence, after Death has stolen away, when life smiles
- again through the open windows, that man and woman get back to sanity and
- to wisdom beyond that of common-sense. They begin again with new ideals.
- Perhaps in a little while one of the rooms becomes a nursery. They get
- back to the joy of youth, once more the woman has been called back.
- </p>
- <p>
- If none of these “accidents” happen, if some great influence like this
- does not thrust its way into the lives of this husband and wife during the
- crisis of the Eighth Year, if the woman is not caught up by some great
- enthusiasm, or if she can find no work for the idle hands to do, giving
- her new and absorbing interests to satisfy her heart and brain, then the
- Eighth Year is a fatal year, and the President of the Divorce Court has a
- new case added to his list, or the family records of the country chronicle
- another separation, or another woman goes to prison for arson or
- bomb-throwing. Because the laws of psychology are not so erratic as the
- world imagines. They work out on definite lines. Certain psychological
- forces having been set in motion, they lead inevitably to certain results.
- When once a woman has lost her interest in her home and husband, when she
- has become bored with herself, when she has a morbid craving for
- excitement and adventures, when she has become peevish and listless and
- hungry-hearted, she cannot remain in this condition. Those forces within
- her are tremendously powerful. They must find some outlet. They must reach
- a definite time of crisis when things have got to happen. These vague
- yearnings must be satisfied, somehow, anyhow. The emptiness of her heart
- must be filled by something or other. She will search round with
- wondering, wistful eyes, more desperate day by day, until she finds the
- thing, however evil it may be, however dangerous. She must still that
- throbbing brain of hers, even if she has to take drugs to do so. In spite
- of all the poison laws, she will find some kind of poison, some subtle and
- insidious drug to give her temporary cure, a period of vitality, a thrill
- of excitement, a glittering dream or two, a relief from the dulness which
- is pressing down upon her with leaden weights. She knows the penalty which
- follows this drug-taking—the awful reaction, the deadly lethargy
- that follows, the nervous crises, the loss of will-power, but she is
- prepared to pay the price because for a little while she gets peace, and
- artificial life. The family doctors know the prevalence of those
- drug-taking habits. They know the cause of them, they have watched the
- pitiful drama of these women’s lives. But they can do nothing to cut out
- the cause. Not even the surgeon’s knife can do that; their warnings fall
- on deaf ears, or are answered by a hysterical laugh.
- </p>
- <p>
- As I have shown, there are other forms of drug-taking not less dangerous
- in their moral effects. If the woman does not go to the chemist’s shop,
- she goes to the darkened room of the clairvoyant and the crystal-gazer, or
- to the spiritualistic séance, or to the man who hides his time until the
- crisis of the Eighth Year delivers the woman into his hands.
- </p>
- <p>
- Here, then, frankly and in detail, I have set out the meaning of this
- dangerous year of married life, and have endeavored, honestly, to analyze
- all the social and psychological forces which go to make that crisis. It
- is, in some measure, a study of our modern conditions of life as they
- prevail among the middle-classes, so that the problem is not abnormal, but
- is present, to some extent, in hundreds of thousands of small households
- to-day. All the tendencies of the time, all the revolutionary ideas that
- are in the very air we breathe, all this modern spirit of revolt against
- disagreeable duties, and drudgery, and discipline, the decay of religious
- authority, the sapping of spiritual faith, the striving for social
- success, the cult of snobbishness, the new creed of selfishness which
- ignores the future of the race and demands a good time here and now, the
- lack of any ideals larger than private interests and personal comforts,
- the ignorance of men and women who call themselves intellectual, the
- nervous irritability of husbands and wives who live up to the last penny
- of their incomes, above all the childlessness of these women who live in
- small flats and suburban villas, and their utter laziness, all those signs
- and symptoms of our social sickness lead up, inevitably, and with fatal
- logic, to the tragedy of the Eighth Year.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_PART2" id="link2H_PART2"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- PART II—A DEMONSTRATION
- </h2>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0014" id="link2HCH0014"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER I
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>n the drawing-room
- of a flat in Intellectual Mansions, S. W., there was an air of quietude
- and peace. No one would have imagined for a moment that the atmosphere was
- charged with electricity, or that the scene was set for a drama of
- emotional interest with tragic potentialities. It seemed the
- dwelling-place of middle-class culture and well-to-do gentility.
- </p>
- <p>
- The room was furnished in the “New Art” style, as seen in the showrooms of
- the great stores. There were sentimental pictures on the walls framed in
- dark oak. The sofa and chairs were covered in a rather flamboyant chintz.
- Through the French windows at the back could be seen the balcony railings,
- and, beyond, a bird’s-eye view of the park. A piano-organ in the street
- below was playing the latest ragtime melody, and there was the noise of a
- great number of whistles calling for taxis, which did not seem to come.
- </p>
- <p>
- In a stiff-backed arm-chair by the fireplace sat an elderly lady, of a
- somewhat austere appearance, who was examining through her spectacles the
- cover of a paper backed novel, depicting a voluptuous young woman;
- obviously displeasing to her sense of propriety. Mrs. Heywood’s sense of
- propriety was somewhat acutely developed, to the annoyance, at times, of
- Mollie, the maid-servant, who was clearing away the tea-things in a bad
- temper. That is to say, she was making a great deal of unnecessary
- clatter.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood ignored the clatter, and concentrated her attention on the
- cover of the paper-backed book. It seemed to distress her, and presently
- she gave expression to her distress.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Dear me! What an improper young woman!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mollie’s bad temper was revealed by a sudden tightening of the lips and a
- flushed face. She bent across an “occasional” table and peered over the
- old lady’s shoulder, and spoke rather impudently.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Excuse me, ma’am, but that’s <i>my</i> novel, if you don’t mind.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I <i>do</i> mind,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I was shocked to find it on the
- kitchen dresser.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Molly tossed her head, so that her white cap assumed an acute angle.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I was shocked to see that it had gone from the kitchen dresser.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Then she lowered her voice and added in a tone of bitter grievance—
- </p>
- <p>
- “Blessed if one can call anything one’s own in this here flat.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s not fit literature for <i>any</i> young girl,” said Mrs. Heywood
- severely. She looked again at the flaunting lady with an air of extreme
- disapproval.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Disgusting!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mollie rattled the tea-things violently.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s good enough for the mistress, anyhow.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood was surprised.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Surely she did not lend it to you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well—not exactly,” said Mollie, with just a trace of embarrassment.
- “I borrowed it. It’s written by her particular friend, Mr. Bradshaw.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mr. Bradshaw! Surely not?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The old lady wiped her spectacles rather nervously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “A very nice-spoken gentleman,” said Mollie, “though he does write
- novels.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood looked at the author’s name for the first time and expressed
- her astonishment.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good gracious! So it is.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mollie laughed as she folded up the tea-cloth. She had gained a little
- triumph, and scored off the “mother-in-law,” as she called the elderly
- lady, in the kitchen.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, he knows a thing or two, he does, my word!”
- </p>
- <p>
- She winked solemnly at herself in the mirror over the mantelshelf.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hold your tongue, Mollie,” said Mrs. Heywood sharply.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Servants are not supposed to have any tongues. Oh, dear no!”
- </p>
- <p>
- With this sarcastic retort Mollie proceeded to put the sugar-basin into
- the china-cupboard, but seemed to expect a counter-attack. She was not
- disappointed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mollie!” said Mrs. Heywood severely, looking over the rims of her
- spectacles.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Now what’s wrong?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You have not cleaned the silver lately.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Haven’t I?” said Mollie sweetly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No,” said Mrs. Heywood. “Why not, I should like to know?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mollie’s “sweetness” was suddenly embittered. She spoke with ferocity.
- </p>
- <p>
- “If you want to know, it’s because I won’t obey two mistresses at once.
- There’s no liberty for a mortal soul in this here flat. So there!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Very well, Mollie,” said Mrs. Heywood mildly. “We will wait until your
- mistress comes home. If she has any strength of mind at all she will give
- you a month’s notice.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mollie sniffed. The idea seemed to amuse her.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The poor dear hasn’t any strength of mind.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am surprised at you, Mollie.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s why she has gone to church again.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood was startled. She was so startled that she forgot her anger
- with the maid.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Again? Are you sure?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, she had a look of church in her eyes when she went out.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What sort of a look?” asked Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “A stained-glass-window look.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood spoke rather to herself than to Mollie.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That makes the third time to-day,” she said pensively.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mollie spoke mysteriously. She too had forgotten her anger and impudence.
- She dropped her voice to a confidential tone.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The mistress is in a bad way, to my thinking. I’ve seen it coming on.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Seen what coming on?” asked the elderly lady.
- </p>
- <p>
- “She sits brooding too much. Doesn’t even pitch into me when I break
- things. That’s a bad sign.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “A bad sign?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ve noticed they’re all taken like this when they go wrong,” said the
- girl, speaking as one who had had a long experience of human nature in
- Intellectual Mansions, S. W. But these words aroused the old lady’s wrath.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How dare you!” said Mrs. Heywood. “Leave the room at once.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I must tell the truth if I died for it,” said Mollie.
- </p>
- <p>
- The two women were silent for a moment, for just then a voice outside
- called, “Clare! Clare!” rather impatiently.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, Lord!” said Mollie. “There’s the master.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare!” called the voice. “Oh, confound the thing!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I suppose he’s lost his stud again,” said Mollie. “He always does on club
- nights. I’d best be off.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She took up the tea-tray and left the room hurriedly, just as her master
- came in. It was Mr. Herbert Heywood, generally described by his neighbors
- as being “Something in the City”—a man of about thirty, slight,
- clean-shaven, boyish, good-looking, with nervous movements and extreme
- irritability. He was in evening clothes with his tie undone.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Plague take this tie!” he growled, making use of one or two
- un-Parliamentary expressions. Then he saw his mother and apologized.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I beg your pardon, mother. Where’s Clare?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood answered her son gloomily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think she’s gone to church again.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Again?” said Herbert Heywood. “Why, dash it all—I beg your pardon,
- mother—she’s always going to church now. What’s the attraction?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think she must be unwell,” said Mrs. Hey-wood. “I’ve thought so for
- some time.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, nonsense! She’s perfectly fit.... See if you can tie this bow,
- mother.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood endeavored to do so, and during the process her son showed
- great impatience and made irritable grimaces. But he returned to the
- subject of his wife.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Perhaps her nerves are a bit wrong. Women are nervy creatures.... Oh,
- hang it all, mother, don’t strangle me!... As I tell her, what’s the good
- of having a park at your front door—Oh, thanks, that’s better.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He looked at himself in the glass, and dabbed his face with a
- handkerchief.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Of course I cut myself to-night. I always do when I go to the club.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Herbert, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood rather nervously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I—I suppose Clare is not going to bless you with a child?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “<i>In this flat</i>!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert was startled and horrified. It was a great shock to him. He gazed
- round the little drawing-room rather wildly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, Lord!” he said presently, when he had calmed down a little. “Don’t
- suggest such a thing. Besides, she is not.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, I’m nervous about her,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, rats, mother! I mean, don’t be so fanciful.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t like this sudden craving for religion, Herbert. It’s unhealthy.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Devilish unhealthy,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- He searched about vainly for his patent boots, which were in an obvious
- position. It added to his annoyance and irritability.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why can’t she stay at home and look after me? I can’t find a single damn
- thing. I beg your pardon, mother.... Women’s place is in the home.... Now
- where on earth——”
- </p>
- <p>
- He resumed his search for the very obvious patent boots and at last
- discovered them.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, there they are!”
- </p>
- <p>
- He glanced at the clock, and expressed the opinion that he would be late
- for the club if he did not “look sharp.” Then a little tragedy happened,
- and he gave a grunt of dismay when a bootlace broke.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, my hat! Why doesn’t Clare look after my things properly?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood asked another question, ignoring the broken bootlace.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Need you go to the club to-night, Herbert?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert was both astonished and annoyed at this remark.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Of course I must. It’s Friday night and the one little bit of Bohemianism
- I get in the week. Why not?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I don’t know,” said Mrs. Heywood meekly. “Except that I thought Clare
- is feeling rather lonely.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Lonely?” said Herbert. “She has you, hasn’t she?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, she has me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood spoke as though that might be a doubtful consolation.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Besides, what more does she want? She has her afternoon At Homes, hasn’t
- she?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood, still more doubtfully.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And she can always go to a matinée if she wants to, can’t she?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, dear.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Then I have taken out a subscription to Mudie’s for her, haven’t I?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert Heywood spoke as though his wife had all the blessings of life, as
- though he had provided her with all that a woman’s heart might desire. But
- Mrs. Heywood interrupted his catalogue of good things.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think she reads too many novels,” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, they broaden her mind,” said Herbert. “Although, I must confess they
- bore <i>me</i> to death.... Now what have I done with my cigarette-case?”
- </p>
- <p>
- He felt all over his pockets, but could not find the desired thing.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, the curse of pockets!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Some of them are very dangerous, Herbert.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What, pockets?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, novels,” said Mrs. Heywood. “Look at this.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She thrust under his eyes the novel with the picture of the flaming lady.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Gee whizz!” said Herbert, laughing. “Oh, well, she’s a married woman.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Do you see who the author is, Herbert?” Herbert look, and was astonished.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Gerald Bradshaw, by Jove! Does he write this sort of muck?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He has been coming here rather often lately. Especially on club-nights,
- Herbert.” Herbert Heywood showed distinct signs of annoyance.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Does he, by Jove? I don’t like the fellow. He’s a particularly fine
- specimen of a bad hat.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m afraid he’s an immoral man,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert shrugged his shoulders.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, Clare can take care of herself.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I wonder,” said Mrs. Heywood, as though she were not at all sure. “My
- dear, I think you ought to keep an eye on your wife just now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert Heywood took his eye-glass out of a fob pocket and fumbled with
- it.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Keep an eye on her, mother?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “She is very queer,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I can’t do anything to please
- her.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, there’s nothing strange in that,” said Herbert. Then he added
- hastily—
- </p>
- <p>
- “I mean it’s no new symptom.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood stared at her son in a peculiar, significant way.
- </p>
- <p>
- “She looks as if something is going to—happen.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert was really startled.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Happen? How? When?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I can’t exactly explain. She appears to be waiting for something—or
- some one.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert was completely mystified.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I didn’t keep her waiting this evening, did I?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t mean you, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No?—Who, then?” asked Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood replied somewhat enigmatically. She gave a deep sigh and said—
- </p>
- <p>
- “We women are queer things!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Queer isn’t the word,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- He stared at the carpet in a gloomy, thoughtful way, as though the pattern
- were perplexing him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Perhaps you’re right about the novels. They’ve been giving her notions,
- or something.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood crossed the room hurriedly and went over to a drawer in a
- cabinet, from which she pulled out a number of pamphlets.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Herbert,” she said solemnly, “she doesn’t read only novels. Look here.
- Look at all these little books. She simply devours them, Herbert, and then
- hides them.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Naturally, after she has devoured them,” said Herbert irritably. “But
- what the deuce are they?”
- </p>
- <p>
- He turned them over one by one, reading out the titles, raising his
- eyebrows, and then whistling with surprise, and finally looking quite
- panic-stricken.
- </p>
- <p>
- “<i>Women’s Work and Wages</i>. Oh, Lord! John Stuart Mill on <i>The
- Subjection of Women. The Ethics of Ibsen</i>. Great Scott! <i>The
- Principles of Eugenics</i>.... My hat!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Quite so, Herbert,” said Mrs. Heywood, with a kind of grim satisfaction
- in his consternation.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t mind her reading improper novels,” said Herbert, “but I draw the
- line at this sort of stuff.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s most dangerous.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s rank poison.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s what I think,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Where did she get hold of them?” asked Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood looked at her son as though she had another startling
- announcement.
- </p>
- <p>
- “From that woman, Miss Vernon, the artist girl who lives in the flat
- above.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What, that girl who throws orange-peel over the balcony?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, the girl who is always whistling for taxis,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What, you mean the one who complained about my singing in the bath?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, I shall never forgive her for that.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Said she didn’t mind if I sang in tune.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, the one who sells a Suffragette paper outside Victoria Station.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s the sort of thing she would do,” said Herbert, with great sarcasm.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I never liked her, my dear,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Confound her impudence! As if a British subject hasn’t an inalienable
- right to sing in his bath! She had the cheek to say I was spoiling her
- temper for the rest of the day.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood laughed rather bitterly. “She looks as if she had a temper!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert gave the pamphlets an angry slap with the back of his hand and let
- them fall on the floor.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Do you mean to say <i>she</i> has been giving Clare these pestilential
- things?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I saw her bring them here,” said Mrs. Hey-wood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, they shan’t stay here.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert went to the fireplace and took up the tongs. Then he picked up the
- pamphlets as though they might bite and tossed them into the flames.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Beastly things! Burn, won’t you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- He gave them a savage poke, deeper into the fire, and watched them smolder
- and then break into flame.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Pestilential nonsense!... That’s a good deed done, anyhow!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood was rather scared.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am afraid Clare will be very angry.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Angry! I shall give her a piece of my mind. She had no right to conceal
- these things.” He spoke with dignity. “It isn’t honorable.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No,” said Mrs. Heywood, “but all the same, dear, I wish you hadn’t burned
- the books.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I should like to burn the authors of ‘em,” said Herbert fiercely.
- “However, they’ll roast sooner or later, that’s a comfort.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You had better be careful, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood rather nervously.
- “Clare is in a rather dangerous frame of mind just now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare will have to learn obedience to her husband’s wishes,” said
- Herbert. “I thought she had learned by this time. She’s been very quiet
- lately.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Too quiet, Herbert. It’s when we women are very quiet that we are most
- dangerous.” Herbert was beginning to feel alarmed. He did not like all
- these hints, all these vague and mysterious suggestions.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good Lord, mother, you give me the creeps. Why don’t you speak plainly?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood was listening. She seemed to hear some sounds in the hall.
- Suddenly she retreated to her arm-chair and made a pretence of searching
- for her knitting.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hush!” she said. “Here she comes.”
- </p>
- <p>
- As she spoke the words, the door opened slowly and Clare came in. She was
- a tall, elegant woman of about thirty, with a quiet manner and melancholy
- eyes in which there was a great wistfulness. She spoke rather wearily—
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not gone yet, Herbert? You’ll be late for the club.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert looked at his wife curiously, as though trying to discover some of
- those symptoms to which his mother had alluded.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m afraid that’s your fault,” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “My fault?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Surely you ought to stay at home sometimes and help me to get off
- decently,” said Herbert in an aggrieved way. “You know perfectly well my
- tie always goes wrong.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare sighed; and then smiled rather miserably.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why can’t men learn to do their own ties? We’re living in the twentieth
- century, aren’t we?”
- </p>
- <p>
- She took off her hat, and sat down with it in her lap.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, how my head aches to-night.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Where have you been?” asked Herbert
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, dear, where <i>have</i> you been?” asked Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ve been round to church for a few minutes,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What on earth for?” asked Herbert impatiently.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What does one go to church for?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “God knows!” said Herbert bitterly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Precisely. Have you any objection?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, I have.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert spoke with some severity, as though he had many objections.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t object to you going to your club,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, that’s different.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “In what way?” asked Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “In every way. I am a man, and you’re a woman.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare Heywood thought this answer out. She seemed to find something in the
- argument.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” she said, “it does make a lot of difference.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I object strongly to this religious craze of yours,” said Herbert, trying
- to be calm and reasonable. “It’s unnatural. It’s—it’s devilish
- absurd.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It may keep me from—from doing other things,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- She spoke as though the words had some tragic significance.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why can’t you stay at home and read a decent novel?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It is so difficult to find a <i>decent</i> novel. And I am sick of them
- all.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, play the piano, then,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am tired of playing the piano, especially when there is no one to
- listen.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s mother,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mother has no ear for music.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood was annoyed at this remark. It seemed to her unjust.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How can you say so, Clare? You know I love Mozart.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I haven’t played Mozart for years,” said Clare, laughing a little. “You
- are thinking of Mendelssohn.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, it’s all the same,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, I suppose so,” said Clare very wearily. She drooped her head and
- shut her eyes until suddenly she seemed to smell something.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is there anything burning?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Burning?” said Herbert nervously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There is a queer smell in the flat,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert stood with his back to the fire, and sniffed strenuously. “I can’t
- smell anything.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s your fancy, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s the smell of burned paper,” said Clare quite positively.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Do you think so?” said her mother-in-law.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Burned paper?” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare became suspicious. She leaned forward in her chair and stared into
- the fireplace.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What are all those ashes in the grate?” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, yes,” said Herbert, as though he had suddenly remembered. “Of course
- I <i>have</i> been burning some papers.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What papers?” asked Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, old things,” said Herbert rather hurriedly. “Well, I had better be
- off. Goodnight, mother.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He kissed her affectionately and said:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t stay up late. I have taken the key, Clare.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I hope it will fit the lock when you come back,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- She spoke the words very quietly, but for some reason they raised her
- husband’s ire.
- </p>
- <p>
- “For heaven’s sake don’t try to be funny, Clare.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I wasn’t trying,” said Clare very calmly. For a moment Herbert hesitated.
- Then he came back to his wife and kissed her.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think we are both a bit irritable to-night, aren’t we?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Are we?” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Nerves,” said Herbert, “the curse of the age. Well, good-night.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Just as he was going out, Mollie, the maidservant, came in and said:
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s Miss Vernon, ma’am.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh,” said Clare. She glanced at her husband for a moment and theft said:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, bring her in, Mollie.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, ma’am,” said Mollie, going out of the room again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Great Scott!” exclaimed Herbert, in a sudden excitement. “It’s that woman
- who flings her beastly orange-peel into my window boxes. Clare, I strongly
- object——”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare answered him a little passionately: “Oh, I am tired of your
- objections.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “She’s not a respectable character,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hush, Herbert!” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- As she spoke the girl who had been called Madge Vernon entered the room.
- </p>
- <p>
- She was a bright, cheery girl, dressed plainly in a tailor-made coat and
- skirt, with brown boots.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I thought I would look in for half-an-hour,” she said very cheerfully to
- Clare. “If you are busy, send me packing, my dear.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am never busy,” said Clare. “I have nothing in the world to do.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, that’s rotten!” said Madge. “Can’t you invent something? How are you,
- Mrs. Heywood?”
- </p>
- <p>
- She shook hands with the old lady, who answered her greeting with a rather
- grim “Good evening.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Herbert is going out to-night,” said Clare. “By the way, you don’t know
- my husband.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Madge Vernon looked at Herbert Heywood very sweetly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I have heard him singing. How do you do?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert was not at all pleased with her sweetness.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Excuse me, won’t you?” he said. “I am just off to my club.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t you take your wife with you?” asked Miss Vernon.
- </p>
- <p>
- “My wife! It’s a man’s club.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I see. Men only. Rather selfish, isn’t it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert Heywood was frankly astonished.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Selfish? Why selfish? Well, I won’t stop to argue the point. Good-night,
- Clare. Doubtless you will enjoy Miss Vernon’s remarkable and revolutionary
- ideas.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am sure I shall,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood followed her son to the door.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Be sure you put a muffler round your neck, dear.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert answered his mother in a low voice, looking fiercely at Madge
- Vernon.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I should like to twist it round somebody else’s neck!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I will come and find it for you, dear.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The two young women were left alone together, and Clare brought forward a
- chair.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sit down, won’t you? Here?”
- </p>
- <p>
- A moment later the front door was heard to hang and at the sound of it
- Madge laughed a little.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Funny things, husbands! I am sure I shouldn’t know what to do with one.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare smiled wanly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “One can’t do anything with them.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “By the by,” said Madge, “I have brought a new pamphlet for you. The
- ‘Rights of Wives.’”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare took the small book nervously, as though it were a bomb which might
- go off at any moment.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I have been reading those other pamphlets.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Pretty good, eh?” said Madge, laughing. “Eye-openers! What?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “They alarm me a little,” said Clare. “Alarm you?” Madge Vernon was
- immensely amused. “Why, they don’t bite!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, they do,” said Clare. “Here.” She put her hand to her head as if it
- had been wounded.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You mean they give you furiously to think? Well, that’s good.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m not sure,” said Clare. “Since I began to think I have been very
- miserable.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, that will soon wear off,” said Madge Vernon briskly. “You’ll get used
- to it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It will always hurt,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- Madge Vernon smiled at her.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I made a habit of it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s best not to think,” said Clare. “It’s best to go on being stupid and
- self-satisfied.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare’s visitor was shocked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, not self-satisfied! That is intellectual death.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There are other kinds of death,” said Clare. “Moral death.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Madge Vernon raised her eyebrows.
- </p>
- <p>
- “We must buck up and do things. That’s the law of life.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I have nothing to do,” said Clare, in a pitiful way.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How strange! I have such a million things to do. My days aren’t long
- enough. I am always pottering about with one thing or another.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What kind of things?” asked Clare wistfully.
- </p>
- <p>
- Madge Vernon gave her a cheerful little laugh.
- </p>
- <p>
- “For one thing, it’s a great joke having to earn one’s own living. The
- excitement of never knowing whether one can afford the next day’s meal!
- The joy of painting pictures—which the Royal Academy will inevitably
- reject. The horrible delight of burning them when they are rejected....
- Besides, I am a public character, I am.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Are you? How?” asked Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “A most notorious woman. I’m on the local Board of Guardians and all sorts
- of funny old committees for looking after everything and everybody.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What do you do?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare asked the question as though some deep mystery lay in the answer.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I poke up the old stick-in-the-muds,” said Madge Vernon, “and stir up
- no end of jolly rows. I make them do things, too; and they hate it. Oh,
- how they hate it!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What things, Madge?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, attending to drains, and starving widows, and dead dogs, and
- imbecile children, and people ‘what won’t work,’ and people ‘what will’
- but can’t.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare laughed at this description and then became sad again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I envy you! I have nothing on earth to do, and my days are growing longer
- and longer, so that each one seems a year.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Haven’t you any housework to do?” asked Madge.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not since my husband could afford an extra servant.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Miss Vernon made an impatient little gesture.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, those extra servants! They have ruined hundreds of happy homes.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, we have only got one now,” said Clare. “The other left last night,
- because she couldn’t get on with my mother-in-law.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “They never can!” said Miss Vernon.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Anyhow, Herbert doesn’t think it ladylike for me to do housework.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Madge Vernon scoffed at the idea.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ladylike! Oh, this suburban snobbishness! How I hate the damn thing!
- Forgive my bad language, won’t you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I like it,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- Miss Vernon continued her cross-examination.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t you even make your own bed? It’s awfully healthy to turn a mattress
- and throw the pillows about.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Herbert objects to my making beds,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t you make the puddings or help in the washing up?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Herbert objects to my going into the kitchen,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t you ever break a few plates?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare smiled at her queer question.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, why should I?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s nothing like breaking things to relieve one’s pent-up emotions,”
- said Miss Vernon, with an air of profound knowledge.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The only thing I have broken lately is something—here,” said Clare,
- putting her hand to her heart.
- </p>
- <p>
- Miss Vernon was scornful.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, rubbish! The heart is unbreakable, my dear. Now, heads are much
- easier to crack.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think mine is getting cracked, too,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- She put her hands to her head, as though it were grievously cracked.
- </p>
- <p>
- Madge Vernon stared at her frankly and thoughtfully.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Look here,” she said, after a little silence, “I tell you what <i>you</i>
- want. It’s a baby. Why don’t you have one?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Herbert can’t afford it,” said Clare. Madge Vernon raised her hands.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Stuff and nonsense!” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Besides,” said Clare in a matter-of-fact way, “they don’t make flats big
- enough for babies in Intellectual Mansions.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Madge Vernon looked round the room, and frowned angrily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, that’s true. There’s no place to keep a perambulator. Oh, these jerry
- builders! Immoral devils!”
- </p>
- <p>
- There was a silence between the two women. Both of them seemed deep in
- thought.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then presently Clare said: “I feel as if something were going to happen;
- as if something must happen or break.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “About time, my dear,” said Madge. “How long have you been married?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Eight years,” said Clare, in a casual way. Madge Vernon whistled with a
- long-drawn note of ominous meaning.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The Eighth Year, eh?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, it’s our eighth year of marriage.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s bad,” said Madge. “The Eighth Year! You will have to be very
- careful, Clare.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare was startled. “What do you mean?” she asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Haven’t you heard?” said Miss Vernon.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Heard what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I thought everybody knew.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Knew what?” asked Clare anxiously.
- </p>
- <p>
- Madge Vernon looked at her in a pitying way.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s in the evidence on the Royal Commission on Divorce.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What is?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “About the Eighth Year.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What about it?” asked Clare. She was beginning to feel annoyed. What was
- Madge hiding from her?
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why,” said Madge, “about it being the fatal year in marriage.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The fatal year?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The girl leaned forward in her chair and said in a solemn way:
- </p>
- <p>
- “There are more divorces begun in the Eighth Year than in any other
- period.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare Heywood was scared.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good gracious!” she said, in a kind of whisper.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s a psychological fact,” said Madge. “I work it out in this way. In
- the first and second years a wife is absorbed in the experiment of
- marriage and in the sentimental phase of love. In the third and fourth
- years she begins to study her husband and to find him out. In the fifth
- and sixth years, having found him out completely, she makes a working
- compromise with life and tries to make the best of it. In the seventh and
- eighth years she begins to find out herself, and then——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And then?” asked Clare, very anxiously.
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare Heywood was profoundly disturbed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, then,” said Madge, “there is the devil to pay!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Dear God!” she cried.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You see, it’s like this. If a woman has no child she gets bored... . She
- can’t help getting bored, poor soul. Her husband is so devoted to her that
- he provides her with every opportunity for getting bored—extra
- servants, extra little luxuries, and what he calls a beautiful little
- home. Ugh!” She stared round the room and made a face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He is so intent on this that he nearly works himself to death. Comes home
- with business thoughts in his head. Doesn’t notice his wife’s wistful
- eyes, and probably dozes off to sleep after supper. Isn’t that so?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Clare. “Horribly so.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, then, having got bored, she gets emotional. Of course the husband
- doesn’t notice that either. <i>He’s</i> not emotional. He is only
- wondering how to make both ends meet. But when his wife begins to get
- emotional, when she feels that something has broken here” (she put her
- hand to her heart), “when she feels like crying at unexpected moments and
- laughing at the wrong time, why then——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What?” asked Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, then, it’s about time the husband began to notice things, or things
- will begin to happen to his wife which he won’t jolly well like. That’s
- all!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare Heywood searched her friend’s face with hungry eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, what will his wife do?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, there are various alternatives. She either takes to religion——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah!” said Clare, flushing a little.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Or to drink——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, no!” said Clare, shuddering a little.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Or to some other kind of man,” said Madge very calmly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare Hey wood was agitated and alarmed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How do you know these things?” she asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I’ve studied ‘em,” said Madge Vernon cheerfully. “Of course there’s
- always another alternative.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s that?” asked Clare eagerly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Work,” said Madge Vernon solemnly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What kind of work?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, any kind, so long as it’s absorbing and satisfying. Personally I like
- breaking things. One must always begin by breaking before one begins
- building. But it’s very exciting.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It must be terribly exciting.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “For instance,” said Madge, laughing quietly, “it’s good to hear a pane of
- glass go crack.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “How does it make you feel?” asked Clare Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh,” said Madge, “it gives one a jolly feeling down the spine. You should
- try it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I daren’t,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It would do you a lot of good. It would get rid of your megrims. Besides,
- it’s in a good cause.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am not so sure of that,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s in the cause of woman’s liberty. It’s in the cause of all these
- suburban wives imprisoned in these stuffy little homes. It lets in God’s
- fresh air.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare rose and moved about the room. “It’s very stuffy in here,” she said.
- “It’s stifling.” At this moment Mollie came in the room again, and smiled
- across at her mistress, saying: “Mr. Bradshaw to see you, ma’am.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare was obviously agitated. She showed signs of embarrassment, and her
- voice trembled when she said:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Tell him—tell him I’m engaged.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He says he must see you—on business,” said Mollie, lingering at the
- door.
- </p>
- <p>
- “On business?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s what my young man says when he whistles up the tube,” said Mollie.
- </p>
- <p>
- Madge Vernon looked at her friend and said rather “meaningly”: “Don’t you
- <i>want</i> to see him? If so I shouldn’t if I were you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, yes,” said Clare, trying to appear quite cool. “If it’s on business.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Very well, ma’am,” said Mollie. As she left the room she said under her
- breath: “I thought you would.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Do you have business relations with Mr. Bradshaw?” asked Madge Vernon.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Clare; “no.... In a sort of way.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I thought he was a novelist,” said Madge.
- </p>
- <p>
- “So he is.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Dangerous fellows, novelists.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hush!” said Clare. “He might hear you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “If it’s on business I must go, I suppose,” said Madge Vernon, rising from
- her chair.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, don’t go; stay!” said Clare, speaking with strange excitement.
- </p>
- <p>
- As soon as she had uttered the words the visitor, Gerald Bradshaw, came
- in.
- </p>
- <p>
- He was a handsome, “artistic” looking man, with longish brown hair and a
- vandyke beard. He was dressed in a brown suit, with a big brown silk tie.
- He came forward in a graceful way, perfectly at ease, and with a charming
- manner.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How do you do, Mrs. Heywood?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I <i>must</i> be going,” said Madge. “Good-by, dear.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, <i>do</i> stay,” whispered Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Impossible. I have to speak to-night.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Although Madge Vernon had ignored the artist, he smiled at her and said:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t you speak by day as a rule?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not until I am spoken to.... Good-night, Clare.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, if you must be going—” said Clare uneasily.
- </p>
- <p>
- Madge Vernon stood for a moment at the door and smiled back at her friend.
- “You will remember, won’t you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The Eighth Year,” said Madge. With that parting shot she whisked out of
- the room.
- </p>
- <p>
- Gerald Bradshaw breathed a sigh of relief. Then he went across to Clare
- and kissed her hands.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I can’t stand that creature. A she-devil!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “She is my friend,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am sorry to hear it,” said Gerald Bradshaw.
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare Heywood drooped her eyelashes before his bold, smiling gaze.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why did you come again?” she asked. “I told you not to come.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That is why I came. May I smoke?”
- </p>
- <p>
- He lit a cigarette before he had received he permission, and after a whiff
- or two said:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is the good man at the club?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You know he is at the club,” said Clare. “True. That is another reason
- why I came. Clare Heywood’s face flushed and her voice trembled a little.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Gerald, if you had any respect for me——
- </p>
- <p>
- “Respect is a foolish word,” said Gerald Bradshaw. “Hopelessly
- old-fashioned. Now adays men and women like or dislike, hate or love.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think I hate you,” said Clare in a low voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- Gerald smiled at her.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, you don’t. You are a little frightened of me. That is all.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The woman laughed nervously, but there was a look of fear in her eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why should I be frightened of you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Because I tell you the truth. I don’t keep up the foolish old pretences
- by which men and women hide themselves from each other. You cannot hide
- from me, Clare.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You seem to strip my soul bare,” said Clare and when the man laughed at
- her she said: “Yes, I am frightened of you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It is because you are like all suburban women,” said Gerald, “brought up
- in this environment of hypocritical virtue and false sentiment. You are
- frightened at the verities of life.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare Heywood gave a deep, quivering sigh. “Life is a tragic thing,
- Gerald,” she said. “Life is a jolly thing if one makes the best of it, if
- one fulfils one’s own nature.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “One’s own nature is generally bad.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Never mind,” said Gerald cheerfully. “It is one’s own. Bad or good, it
- must find expression instead of being smothered or strangled. Life is
- tragic only to those who are afraid of it. Don’t be afraid, Clare. Do the
- things you want to do.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There is nothing I want to do,” said Clare wearily. “Nothing except to
- find peace.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Exactly. Peace. How can you find peace, my poor Clare, in this stuffy
- life of yours—in this daily denial of your own nature? There are
- heaps of things you want.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare laughed again, in a mirthless way. “How do you know?” she asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Of course I know. Shall I tell you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think I would rather you didn’t,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I will tell you,” said the man. “Liberty is one of them.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Liberty is a vague word.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Liberty for your soul,” said Gerald.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Herbert objects to my having a soul.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Liberty for that beating heart of yours, Clare.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The woman put both hands to her heart.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, it beats, and beats.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You want to escape, Clare.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Escape?”
- </p>
- <p>
- She seemed frightened at that word. She whispered it.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Escape from the deadening influence of domestic dulness.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I can’t deny the dulness,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You want adventure. Your heart is seeking adventure. You know it. You
- know that I am telling you the truth.”
- </p>
- <p>
- As the man spoke he came closer to her, and with his hands in his pockets
- stood in front of her, staring into her eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You make me afraid,” said Clare. All the color had faded out of her face
- and she was dead white.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You need not be afraid, Clare. The love of a man for a woman is not a
- terrifying thing. It is a good thing. Good as life.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He took her by the wrists and held them tight.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Gerald!” said Clare. “For God’s sake.... I have a husband.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He bores you,” said the man. “He is your husband but not your mate. No
- woman finds peace until she finds her mate. It is the same with a man.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I will not listen to you. You make me feel a bad woman!”
- </p>
- <p>
- She wrenched her hands free and moved toward the bell.
- </p>
- <p>
- Gerald Bradshaw laughed quietly. He seemed amused at this woman’s fear. He
- seemed masterful, sure of his power over her.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You know that you must be my mate. If not to-day, to-morrow. If not
- to-morrow, the next day. I will wait for you, Clare.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare had shrunk back to the wall now, and touched the electric bell.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You have no pity for me,” she said. “You play on my weakness.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Fear makes you strong to resist,” said the man. “But love is stronger
- than fear.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He followed her across the room to where she stood crouching against the
- wall like a hunted thing.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t come so close to me,” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What on earth have you rung the bell for?” asked the man.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Because I ought not to be alone with you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- They stood looking into each other’s eyes. Then Clare moved quickly toward
- the sofa as Mollie came in.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, Mollie,” said Clare, trying to steady her voice, “ask Mrs. Heywood to
- come in, will you? Tell her Mr. Bradshaw is here.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, ma’am,” said Mollie. “But she knows that already.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Take my message, please,” said her mistress.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I was going to, ma’am,” said Mollie, and she added in an undertone, as
- she left the room, “Strange as it may appear.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Gerald laughed quite light-heartedly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, you have won the trick this time. But I hold the trump cards, Clare;
- and I am very lucky, as a rule. I have a gambler’s luck. Of course if the
- old lady comes in I shan’t stay. She hates me like poison, and I can’t be
- polite to her. Insincerity is not one of my vices. Good-night, dear heart.
- I will come to you in your dreams.”
- </p>
- <p>
- As he spoke this word, which brought a flush again to Clare Heywood’s
- face, Mrs. Hey-wood, her mother-in-law, came in. She glanced from one to
- the other suspiciously.
- </p>
- <p>
- Gerald Bradshaw was not in the least abashed by her stern face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How do you do, Mrs. Heywood? I was just going. I hope I have not
- disturbed you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood answered him in a “distant” manner:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not in the least.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am glad,” he said. “I will let myself out. Don’t trouble.”
- </p>
- <p>
- At that moment there was a noise in the hall, and Clare raised her head
- and listened.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think I hear another visitor,” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “In that ease I had better wait a moment,” said Gerald. “The halls of
- these flats are not cut out for two people at a time. I will light another
- cigarette if I may.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I thought I heard a latchkey,” said Mrs. Heywood. “Surely it can’t he
- Herbert back so early?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, it can’t be,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- Gerald spoke more to himself than to the ladies:
- </p>
- <p>
- “I hope not.”
- </p>
- <p>
- They were all silent when Herbert Heywood came in quietly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I didn’t go to the club after all,” he said. Then he saw Gerald Bradshaw,
- and his mouth hardened a little as he said, “Oh!... How do?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “How are you?” asked Gerald, in his cool way.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Been here long?” asked Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Long enough for a pleasant talk with your wife.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Going now?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes. We have finished our chat. Goodnight. I can find my way out
- blindfolded. All these flats are the same. Rather convenient, don’t you
- think?”
- </p>
- <p>
- He turned to Clare and smiled.
- </p>
- <p>
- “<i>Au revoir</i>, Mrs. Heywood.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She did not answer him, and he went out jauntily. A few moments later they
- heard the front door shut.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What the devil does he come here for?” growled Herbert rather sulkily.
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare ignored the question.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why are you home so early?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, dear, why didn’t you go to the club?” asked Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert looked rather embarrassed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I don’t know. I felt a bit off. Besides——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What, dear?” asked his mother.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I thought Clare was feeling a bit lonely to-night. Perhaps I was
- mistaken.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am often lonely,” said Clare. “Even when you are at home.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Aren’t you <i>glad</i> I have come back?” asked Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why do you ask me?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I should be glad if you were glad.” Clare’s husband became slightly
- sentimental as he looked at her.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I have been thinking it <i>is</i> rather rotten to go <i>off</i> to the
- club and leave you here alone,” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood was delighted with these words.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, you dear boy! How unselfish of you!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I try to be,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am sure you are the very soul of unselfishness, Herbert, dear,” said
- the fond mother.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thanks, mother.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He looked rather anxiously at Clare, and said—
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t you think we might have a pleasant evening for once?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, that would be delightful!” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Eh, Clare?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “How do you mean?” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Like we used to in the old days? Some music, and that sort of thing.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am sure that will be <i>very</i> nice,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Eh, Clare?” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “If you like,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Wait till I have got my boots off.” He spoke in a rather honeyed voice to
- his wife.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Do you happen to know where my slippers are, darling?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I haven’t the least idea,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert seemed nettled at this answer.
- </p>
- <p>
- “In the old days you used to warm them for me,” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Did I?” said Clare. “I have forgotten. It was a long time ago.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Eight years.”
- </p>
- <p>
- At these words Clare looked over to her husband in a peculiar way.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” she said. “It is our eighth year.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Here are your slippers, dear,” said Mrs. Hey wood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, thanks, mother. <i>You</i> don’t forget.”
- </p>
- <p>
- There was silence while he took off his boots. Clare sat with her hands in
- her lap, staring at the carpet. Once or twice her mother-in-law glanced at
- her anxiously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Won’t you play something, Clare?” said the old lady, after a little
- while.
- </p>
- <p>
- “If you like,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert resumed his cheerful note.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, let’s have a jolly evening. Perhaps I will sing a song presently.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, do, dear!” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Gad, it’s a long time since I sang ‘John Peel’!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare looked rather anxious and perturbed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The walls of this flat are rather thin,” she said. “The neighbors might
- not like it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, confound the neighbors!” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I will do some knitting while you two dears play and sing,” said the old
- lady.
- </p>
- <p>
- She fetched her knitting from a black silk bag on one of the little
- tables, and took a chair near the fireplace. Clare Heywood went to the
- music-stool and turned over some music listlessly. She did not seem to
- find anything which appealed to her.
- </p>
- <p>
- Her husband settled himself down in an arm-chair and loaded his pipe.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Play something bright, Clare,” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “All my music sounds melancholy when I play it,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What, rag-time?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Even rag-time. Rag-time worst of all.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Yet she began to play softly one of Chopin’s preludes, in a dreamy way.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Tell me when you want me to sing,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I will,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- There was silence for a little while, except for Clare’s dream-music. Mrs.
- Heywood dozed over her knitting, and her head nodded on her chest.
- Presently Herbert rose from his chair and touched the electric bell. A
- moment later Mollie came in.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes?” asked Mollie.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert spoke quietly so that he should not interrupt his wife’s music.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Bring me <i>The Financial Times</i>, Mollie. It’s in my study.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, sir,” said Mollie.
- </p>
- <p>
- She brought the paper and left the room again. There was another silence,
- except for the soft notes of the music. Herbert turned over the pages of
- <i>The Financial Times</i>, and yawned a little, and then let the paper
- drop. His head nodded and then lolled sideways. In a little while he was
- as fast asleep as his mother, and snored, quietly at first, then quite
- loudly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare stopped playing, and looked over the music-rest with a strange,
- tragic smile at her husband and her mother-in-law. She rose from the
- piano-stool, and put her hands to her head, and then at her throat,
- breathing quickly and jerkily, as though she were being stifled.
- </p>
- <p>
- “A jolly evening!” she exclaimed in a whisper. “Oh, God!”
- </p>
- <p>
- She stared round the room, with rather wild eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It is stuffy here. It is stifling.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She moved toward the piano again, with her hands pressed against her
- bosom.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I feel that something <i>must</i> happen. Something <i>must</i> break.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She took up a large china vase from the piano, moved slowly toward the
- window, hesitated for a moment, looked round at her sleeping husband, and
- then hurled the vase straight through the window. It made an appalling
- noise of breaking glass.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert Heywood jumped up from his seat as though he had been shot.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good God!” he said. “What the devil!——”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood was equally startled. She sat up in her chair as though an
- earthquake had shaken the house.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good gracious! Whatever in the world——-”
- </p>
- <p>
- At the same moment Mollie opened the door.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good ‘eavins, ma’am!” she cried. “Whatever ‘as ‘appened?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare Heywood answered very quietly:
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think something must have broken,” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then she gave a queer, strident laugh.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0015" id="link2HCH0015"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER II
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">M</span>RS. Heywood was
- arranging the drawingroom for an evening At Home, dusting the mantelshelf
- and some of the ornaments with a little hand broom. There were
- refreshments on a side table. Mollie was trying to make the fire burn up.
- Every now and then a gust of smoke blew down the chimney. Clare was
- sitting listlessly in a low chair near the French window, with a book on
- her lap, but she was not reading.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Drat the fire,” said Mollie, with her head in the fireplace.
- </p>
- <p>
- “For goodness’ sake, Mollie, stop it smoking like that!” said Mrs.
- Heywood. “It’s no use my dusting the room.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The devil is in the chimney, it strikes me,” said Mollie.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood expressed her sense of exasperation.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s a funny thing that every time your mistress gives an At Home you are
- always behindhand with your work.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mollie expressed her feelings in the firegrate.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s a funny thing people can’t mind their own business.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What did you say, Mollie?” asked Mrs. Heywood sharply.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I said that the fire hasn’t gone right since the window was broke. Them
- Suffragettes have a lot to answer for.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I cannot understand how it <i>did</i> get broken,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I
- almost suspect that woman, Miss Vernon.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare looked up and spoke irritably.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Nonsense, mother!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s no use saying nonsense, Clare,” said Mrs. Heywood, even more
- irritably. “You know perfectly well that Miss Vernon is a most dangerous
- woman.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, she didn’t break our window, anyhow,” said Clare, rather doggedly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How do you know that? It is still a perfect mystery.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t be absurd, mother. How did the vase get through the window?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood was baffled for an answer.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, that is most perplexing.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, leave it at that,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mollie was still wrestling with the mysteries of light and heat.
- </p>
- <p>
- “If it doesn’t burn now,” she said, “I won’t lay another finger on it—At
- Home or no At Home.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She seized the dustpan and broom and, with a hot face, marched out of the
- room.
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare pressed her forehead with the tips of her fingers.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I wish to Heaven there were no such things as At Homes,” she said
- wearily. “Oh, how they bore me!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You used to like them well enough,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I have grown out of them. I have grown out of so many things. It is as if
- my life had shrunk in the wash.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Nothing seems to please you now,” said the old lady. “Don’t you care for
- your friends any longer?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Friends? Those tittle-tattling women, with their empty-headed husbands?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood was silent for a moment. Then she spoke bitterly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Do you think Herbert is empty-headed?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, we won’t get personal, mother,” said Clare. “And we won’t quarrel, if
- you don’t mind.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood’s lips tightened.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am afraid we shall if you go on like this.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Like what?” asked Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hush!” said the old lady. “Here comes Herbert.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert came in quickly, and raised his eyebrows after a glance at his
- wife.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good Lord, Clare! Aren’t you dressed yet?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s plenty of time, isn’t there?” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, there isn’t,” said Herbert. “You know some of the guests will arrive
- before eight o’clock.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare looked up at the clock.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s only six now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Besides,” said Herbert, “I want you to look your best to-night. Edward
- Hargreaves is coming, with his wife.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What has that got to do with it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Everything,” said Herbert. “He is second cousin to one of my directors.
- It is essential that you should make a good impression.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You told me once that he was a complete ass,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “So he is.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, then,” said Clare, quietly but firmly, “I decline to make a good
- impression on him.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I must ask you to obey my wishes,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare had rebellion in her eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I have obeyed you for seven years. It is now the Eighth Year.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert did not hear his wife’s remark. He was looking round the room with
- an air of extreme annoyance.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, I’m blowed!” he exclaimed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s the matter, dear?” asked Mrs. Hey-wood anxiously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You haven’t even taken the trouble to buy some flowers,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I left that to Clare,” said the old lady.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Haven’t you done so, Clare?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No,” said Clare. “I can’t bear flowers in this room. They droop so
- quickly.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert was quite angry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I insist upon having some flowers. The place looks like a barn without
- them. What will our visitors say?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Stupid things, as usual,” said Clare quietly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I must go out and get some myself, I suppose,” said Herbert, with the air
- of a martyr.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Can’t you send Mollie, dear?” asked Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mollie is cutting sandwiches. The girl is overwhelmed with work. And—Oh,
- my stars!”
- </p>
- <p>
- His mother was alarmed by this sudden cry of dismay.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Now what is the matter, dear?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s no whisky in the decanter.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No whisky?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare,” said Herbert, appealing to his wife, “there’s not a drop of
- whisky left.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, <i>I</i> didn’t drink it,” said Clare. “You finished it the other
- night with one of your club friends.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “So we did. Dash it!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t be irritable, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Irritable! Isn’t it enough to make a saint irritable? These things always
- happen on our At Home nights. Nobody seems to have any forethought. Every
- blessed thing seems to go wrong.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That is why I wish one could abolish the institution,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What institution?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “At Homes.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t talk rubbish, Clare,” said Herbert angrily; “you know I have them
- for <i>your</i> sake.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare laughed bitterly, as though she had heard a rather painful joke.
- </p>
- <p>
- “For my sake! Oh, that is good!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert was distracted by a new cause of grievance as a tremendous puff of
- smoke came out of the fire-grate.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What in the name of a thousand devils——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s that awful fire again!” cried Mrs. Hey-wood. “These flats seem to
- have no chimneys.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s nothing to do with the flat,” said Herbert. “It’s that fool Mollie.
- The girl doesn’t know how to light a decent fire!”
- </p>
- <p>
- He rang the bell furiously, keeping his finger on the electric knob.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The creature has absolutely nothing to do, and what she does she spoils.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mollie came in with a look of mutiny on her face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Look at that fire,” said Herbert fiercely.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am looking at it,” said Mollie.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why don’t you do your work properly? See to the beastly thing, can’t
- you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mollie folded her arms and spoke firmly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “If you please, sir, wild horses won’t make me touch it again.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s not a question of horse-power,” said Herbert. “Go and get an old
- newspaper and hold it in front of the bars.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am just in the middle of the sandwiches,” said Mollie.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, get out of them, then,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mollie delivered her usual ultimatum.
- </p>
- <p>
- “If you please, sir, I beg to give a month’s notice.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Bosh!” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Bosh indeed!” cried Mollie. “We’ll see if it’s bosh! If you want any
- sandwiches for your precious visitors you can cut ‘em yourself.”
- </p>
- <p>
- With this challenge she went out of the room and slammed the door behind
- her.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert breathed deeply, and after a moment’s struggle in his soul spoke
- mildly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mother, go and pacify the fool, will you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “She is very obstinate,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “All women are obstinate.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Suddenly the man’s self-restraint broke down and he became excited.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Bribe her, promise her a rise in wages, but for God’s sake see that she
- cuts the sandwiches. We don’t want to be made fools of before our guests.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Very well, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. She hesitated for a moment at the
- door, and before going out said: “But Mollie can be very violent at
- times.”
- </p>
- <p>
- For a little while there was silence between the husband and wife. Then
- Herbert spoke rather sternly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare, are you or are you not going to get dressed?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I shall get dressed in good time,” said Clare quietly, “when I think fit.
- Surely you don’t want to dictate to me about <i>that?</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Surely,” said Herbert, “you can see how awkward it will be if any of our
- people arrive and find you unprepared for them?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare gave a long, weary sigh.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I <i>am</i> prepared for them. I have been trying to prepare myself
- all day for the ordeal of, them.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The ordeal? What the dickens do you mean?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am prepared for Mrs. Atkinson Brown, who, when she takes off her hat in
- the bedroom, will ask me whether I am suited and whether I am expecting.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “For goodness’ sake don’t be coarse, Clare,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s Mrs. Atkinson Brown who is coarse,” said Clare. “And I am prepared
- for Mr. Atkinson Brown, who will say that it is horrible weather for this
- time of year, and that business has been the very devil since there has
- been a Radical Government, and that these outrageous women who are
- breaking windows ought to be whipped. Oh, I could tell you everything that
- everybody is going to say. I have heard it over and over again.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It does not seem to make much effect on you,” said Herbert. “Especially
- that part about breaking windows.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare smiled.
- </p>
- <p>
- “So you have guessed, have you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I knew at once by the look on your face.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I thought you agreed with your mother that some Suffragette must have
- flung a stone from the outside.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I hid the truth from mother,” said Herbert. “She would think you were
- mad. What on earth made you do it? <i>Were</i> you mad or what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare brushed her hair back from her forehead.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sometimes I used to think I was going a little mad. But now I know what
- is the matter with me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert spoke more tenderly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What <i>is</i> the matter, Clare? If it is a question of a doctor——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s the Eighth Year,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The Eighth Year?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, that’s what is the matter with me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What on earth do you mean?” asked Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, don’t you know? It was Madge Vernon who told me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Told you what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “She seemed to think that everybody knew.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Knew what?” asked Herbert, exasperated beyond all patience.
- </p>
- <p>
- “About the Eighth Year.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What about it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s well known, she says, that the Eighth Year is the most dangerous one
- in marriage. It is then that the pull comes, when the wife has found out
- her husband.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Found out her husband?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And found out herself.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert spoke roughly. He was not in a mood for such mysteries.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Look here,” he said. “I can’t listen to all this nonsense. Go and dress
- yourself.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I want to talk to you, Herbert,” said Clare very earnestly. “I must talk
- to you before it’s too late.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s too late now,” said Herbert. “Halfpast six. I must fetch that whisky
- and buy a few flowers. I shall have to put on my boots again and splash
- about in the mud in these trousers. Confound it!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Before you go you must listen, Herbert,” said Clare, with a sign of
- emotion. “Perhaps you won’t have another chance.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thank Heaven for that.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “When I broke that window something else broke.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “One of my best vases,” said Herbert with sarcasm.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think something in my own nature broke too. My spirit has broken out of
- this narrow, deadening little life of ours, out of the smug snobbishness
- and stupidity which for so long kept me prisoner, out of the belief that
- the latest sentimental novel, the latest romantic play, the latest bit of
- tittle-tattle from my neighbors might satisfy my heart and brain. When I
- broke that window I let a little fresh air into the stifling atmosphere of
- this flat, where I have been mewed up without work, without any kind of
- honest interest, without any kind of food for my brain or soul.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert stared at his wife, and made an impatient gesture.
- </p>
- <p>
- “If you want work, why don’t you attend to your domestic duties?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I have no domestic duties,” said Clare. “That is the trouble.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert laughed in an unpleasant way.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, you haven’t even bought any flowers to decorate your home! Isn’t
- that a domestic duty?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare answered him quickly, excitedly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s just a part of the same old hypocrisy of keeping up appearances. You
- know you don’t care for flowers in themselves, except as they help to make
- a show. You want to impress our guests. You want to keep up the old
- illusion of the woman’s hand in the home. The woman’s touch. Isn’t that
- it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, I do want to keep up that illusion,” said Herbert; “and by God, I
- find it very hard! You say you want an object in life. Isn’t your husband
- an object?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare looked at him with a queer, pitiful smile.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, he is,” she said slowly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, what more do you want?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Lots more. A woman’s life is not centered for ever in one man.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It ought to be,” said Herbert. “If you had any religious principles——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh,” said Clare sharply, “but you object to my religion!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, of course I mean in moderation.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You have starved me, Herbert, and oh, I am so hungry!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert answered her airily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, there will be light refreshments later.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, that is worthy of you,” cried Clare. “That is your sense of humor!
- You have starved my soul and starved my heart and you offer me—sandwiches.
- I am hungry for life and you offer me—the latest novel.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert paced up and down the room. He was losing control of his temper.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That is the reward for all my devotion!” he said. “Don’t I drudge in the
- city every day to keep you in comfort?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t want comfort!” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t I toil so that you may have pretty frocks?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t want pretty frocks.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t I scrape and scheme to buy you little luxuries?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t want little luxuries,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is there anything within my means that you haven’t got?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare looked at him in a peculiar way, and answered quietly—
- </p>
- <p>
- “I haven’t a child,” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, Lord,” said Herbert uneasily. “Whose fault is that? Besides, modern
- life in small flats is not cut out for children.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And modern life in small flats,” said Clare, “is not cut out for wives.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It isn’t my fault,” said Herbert. “I am not the architect—either of
- fate or flats.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, it isn’t your fault, Herbert. You can’t help your character. It isn’t
- your fault that when you come home from the city you fall asleep after
- dinner. It isn’t your fault that when you go to the club I sit at home
- with my hands in my lap, thinking and brooding. It isn’t your fault that
- your mother and I get on each other’s nerves. It isn’t your fault that you
- and I have grown out of each other, that we bore each other and have
- nothing to say to each other—except when we quarrel.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, then,” said Herbert, “whose fault is it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t know,” said Clare. “I suppose it’s a fault of the system, which
- is spoiling thousands of marriages just like ours. It’s the fault which is
- found out—in the Eighth Year.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, curse the Eighth Year,” said Herbert violently. “What is that bee you
- have got in your bonnet?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s a bee which keeps buzzing in my brain. It’s a little bee which
- whispers queer words to me—tempting words. It says you must break
- away from the system or the system will break you. You must find a way of
- escape or die. You must do it quickly, now, to-night, or it will be too
- late. Herbert, a hungry woman will do desperate things to satisfy her
- appetite, and I am hungry for some stronger emotion than I can find within
- these four walls. I am hungry for love, hungry for work, hungry for life.
- If you can’t give it to me, I must find it elsewhere.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare,” said Herbert, with deliberate self-restraint, “I must again
- remind you that time is getting on and you are not yet dressed. In a
- little while our guests will be here. I hope you don’t mean to hold me up
- to the contempt of my friends. I at least have some sense of duty.... I am
- going to fetch the whisky.” As he strode toward the door he started back
- at the noise of breaking china.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s that?” asked Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “God knows,” said Herbert. “I expect mother has broken a window.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The words were hardly out of his mouth before Mrs. Heywood came in in a
- state of great agitation.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Herbert, I must really ask you to come into the kitchen.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s the matter now?” asked Herbert, prepared for the worst.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mollie has deliberately broken our best coffee-pot.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert stared at his wife.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Didn’t I tell you so!” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why has she broken the coffee-pot?” asked Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “She was most insolent,” said Mrs. Heywood, “and said my interference got
- on her nerves.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, even a servant <i>has</i> nerves,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “But it was the <i>best</i> coffee-pot, Clare. Surely you are not going to
- take it so calmly?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Like mistress like maid!” said Herbert. “Oh, my hat! Why on earth did I
- marry?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t you think you had better fetch the whisky?” said Clare gently.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert became excited again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I have been trying to fetch the whisky for the last half hour. There is a
- conspiracy against it. Confound it, I <i>will</i> fetch the whisky.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He strode to the door, as though he would get the whisky or die in the
- attempt.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think you ought to speak to Mollie first,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert raised his hands above his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Damn Mollie!” he shouted wildly. Then he strode out of the room. “Damn
- everything!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Poor dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I wish he didn’t get so worried.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare, won’t you come and speak to Mollie?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Haven’t you spoken to her?” asked Clare wearily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am always speaking to her.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “<i>Poor</i> Mollie!” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood was hurt at the tone of pity. She flushed a little and then
- turned to her daughter-in-law with reproachful eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am an old woman, Clare, and the mother of your husband. Because my
- position forces me to live in this flat, I do not think you ought to
- insult me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m sorry,” said Clare with sincerity.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mollie is right. We all get on each other’s nerves. It can’t be helped, I
- suppose. It’s part of the system.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I can’t help being your mother-in-law, Clare.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, it can’t he helped,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood came close to her and touched her hand.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You think I do not understand. You think you are the only one who has any
- grievance.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, no!” said Clare. “I am not so egotistical.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood smoothed down her dress with trembling hands.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You think I haven’t been watching you all these years. I have watched you
- so that I know your thoughts behind those brooding eyes, Clare. I know all
- that you have been thinking and suffering, so that sometimes you hate me,
- so that my very presence here in the room with you makes you wish to cry
- out, to shriek, because I am your mother-in-law, and the mother of your
- husband. The husband always loves his mother best, and the wife always
- knows it. That is the eternal tragedy of the mother-in-law. Because she is
- hated by the wife of her son, and is an intruder in her home. I know that
- because I too suffered from a mother-in-law. Do you think I would stay
- here an hour unless I was forced to stay, for a shelter above my old head,
- for some home in which I wait to die? But while I wait I watch... and I
- know that you have reached a dangerous stage in a woman’s life, when she
- may do any rash thing. Clare, I pray every night that you may pass that
- stage in life without doing anything—rash. This time always comes in
- marriage, it comes——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “In the Eighth Year?” asked Clare eagerly. “Somewhere about then.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah! I thought so.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It came to me, my dear.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And did <i>you</i> do anything rash?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood hesitated a moment before replying.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I gave birth to Herbert,” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good Heavens!” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It saved me from breaking——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Windows, mother?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, my own and my husband’s heart,” said Mrs. Heywood. “Well, I will go
- and speak to Mollie again. Goodness knows how we shall get coffee
- to-night.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She went out of the room with her head shaking a little after this scene
- of emotion.
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare spoke to herself aloud. She had her hands up to her throat.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t want coffee to-night. I want stronger drink. I want to get drunk
- with liberty of life.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Suddenly there was a noise at the window and the woman looked up,
- startled, and cried, “Who is there?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Gerald Bradshaw appeared at the open French window leading on to the
- balcony, and he spoke through the window.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It is I, Clare? Are you alone?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare had risen from her chair at the sound of his voice, and her face
- became very pale.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Gerald... How did you come there?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Gerald Bradshaw laughed in his lighthearted way.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I stepped over the bar that divides our balconies. It was quite easy. It
- was as easy as it will be to cross the bar that divides you and me,
- Clare.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare spoke in a frightened voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why do you come here, at this hour?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why do I ever come?” asked Gerald Bradshaw.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t know.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s because I want you. I want you badly to-night, Clare. I can’t wait
- for you any longer.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare spoke pleadingly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Gerald... go away... it’s so dangerous... I daren’t listen to you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I want you to listen,” said Gerald Bradshaw.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Go away... I implore you to go away.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He laughed at her. He seemed very much amused.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not before I have said what I want to say.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Say it quickly,” said Clare. “Quickly!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s time enough,” said Bradshaw. “This is what I want to say. You are
- a lonely woman and I am a lonely man, and only an iron bar divides us.
- It’s the iron bar of convention, of insincerity, of superstition. It seems
- so difficult to cross. But you see one step is enough. I want you to take
- that step—to-night.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare answered him in a whisper.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Go away!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am hungry for you,” said Bradshaw, with a thrill in his voice. “I am
- hungry for your love. And you are hungry for me. I have seen it in your
- eyes. You have the look of a famished woman. Famished for love. Famished
- for comradeship.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare raised her hands despairingly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “If you have any pity, go away.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I have no pity. Because pity is weakness, and I hate weakness.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You are brutal,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- He laughed at her. He seemed to like those words.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, I have the brutality of manhood. Man is a brute, and woman likes the
- brute in him because that is his nature, and woman wants the natural man.
- That is why you want me, Clare. You can’t deny it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare protested feebly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I do deny it. I <i>must</i> deny it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s a funny thing,” said Gerald Bradshaw. “Between you and me there is a
- queer spell, Clare. I was conscious of it when I first met you. Something
- in you calls to me. Something in me calls to you. It is the call of the
- wild.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare was scared now. These words seemed to make her heart beat to a
- strange tune.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What do you mean?” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It is the call of the untamed creature. Both you and I are untamed. We
- both have the spirit of the woods. I am Pan. You are a wood nymph,
- imprisoned in a cage, upholstered by maple, on the hire system.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What do you want with me?” asked Clare. It was clear that he was tempting
- her.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I want to play with you, like Pan played. You and I will hear the pipes
- of Pan to-night—the wild nature music.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “To-night?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “To-night. I have waited too long for you, and now I’m impatient. I am
- alone in my flat waiting for you. I ask you to keep me company, not
- to-night only, but until we tire of each other, until perhaps we hate each
- other. Who knows?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, God!” said Clare. She moaned out the words in a pitiful way.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You have only to slip down one flight of stairs and steal up another, and
- you will find me at the door with a welcome. It will need just a little
- care to escape from your prison. You must slip on your hat and cloak as
- though you were going round to church, and then come to me, to me, Clare!
- Only a wall will divide you from this flat, but you will be a world away.
- For you will have escaped from this upholstered cage into a little world
- of liberty. Into a little world of love, Clare. Say you will come!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, God!” moaned Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You will come?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Are you the Devil that you tempt me?” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- Gerald gave a triumphant little laugh.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You will come! Clare, my sweetheart, I know you will come, for your
- spirit is ready for me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- As he spoke these words there was the sound of a bell ringing through the
- flat, and the noise of it struck terror into Clare Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Go away,” she whispered. “For God’s sake go! Some one is ringing.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I will cross the bar again,” said Bradshaw. “But I shall be waiting at
- the door. You will not be very long, little one?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare sank down with her face in her hands. And Gerald stole away from the
- window just as Mollie showed in Madge Vernon.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s our At Home night,” said Mollie, as she came in, “and they’ll be
- here presently.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “All right, Mollie,” said Miss Vernon, smiling. “I shan’t stay more than a
- minute. I know I have come at an awkward time.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “She <i>would</i> come in, ma’am,” said Mollie, as though she were not
- strong enough to thwart such a determined visitor.
- </p>
- <p>
- As soon as the girl had gone Madge Vernon came across to Clare, very
- cheerfully and rather excitedly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare, are you coming?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Coming where?” asked Clare, trying to hide her agitation.
- </p>
- <p>
- “To the demonstration,” said Madge Vernon. “You know I told you all about
- it! It begins at eight. It will be immense fun, and after your
- window-smashing exploit you are one of us. Good Heavens, I think you have
- beaten us all. None of us have ever thought of breaking our own windows.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s my At Home night,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, bother the At Home. Can’t your husband look after his friends for
- once? I wanted you to join in this adventure. It would be your enrolment
- in the ranks, and it will do you a lot of good, in your present state of
- health.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “In any case——” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare smiled in a tragic way.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I have received a previous invitation.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, drat the invitation.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Of course I should have liked to come,” said Clare, “but——”
- </p>
- <p>
- Madge Vernon was impatient with her. “But what? I hate that word ‘but.’”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak,” said Clare, speaking with a
- deeper significance than appeared in the words.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There is no weakness about you. You have the courage of your convictions.
- Have you had the window mended yet?”
- </p>
- <p>
- She laughed gaily and then listened with her head a little on one side to
- the sound of a bell ringing in the hall.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That must be Herbert,” said Clare. “I think you had better go.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, I think I had better,” said Madge, laughing again. “If looks could
- kill——”
- </p>
- <p>
- She went toward the door and opened it, but I stood on the threshold
- looking back.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Won’t you come? Eight o’clock, you know.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare smiled weakly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am in great demand to-night.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The two women listened to Herbert’s voice in the hall saying—
- </p>
- <p>
- “Of course all the shops were shut.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, Lord!” said Madge, “I must skedaddle.” She went out of the room
- hurriedly, leaving Clare alone.
- </p>
- <p>
- And after a moment or two Clare spoke aloud, with her hands clasped upon
- her breast.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I wonder if the Devil is tempting me tonight?” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then Herbert entered with two whisky bottles.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I had to hunt all over the place,” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then he saw that his wife was still in her afternoon frock, and his face
- flushed with anger.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What, aren’t you dressed <i>yet?</i>... I think you might show some
- respect for my wishes, Clare.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am going to dress now,” said Clare, and she rose and went into the
- bedroom.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Women are the very devil,” said Herbert, unwrapping the whisky bottles.
- </p>
- <p>
- While he was busy with this his mother came in, having changed her dress.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I am glad you managed to get the whisky,” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Of course nearly every blessed shop was shut,” said Herbert. “They always
- are when I run out of everything. It’s this Radical Government, with its
- beastly Acts.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood hesitated and then came across to her son and touched him on
- the arm.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think you had better come into the kitchen a moment, dear, and look
- after Mollie.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “She hasn’t broken anything else, has she?” said Herbert anxiously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, dear. But she has just cut her finger rather badly. She got in a
- temper with the sandwiches.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert raised his hands to heaven.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why do these things always happen when Clare gives an At Home? I shall
- abolish these evenings altogether. They will drive me mad.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, they’re very pleasant when they once begin,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m glad you think so, mother. I am damned if I do. I was only saying to
- Clare to-night——”
- </p>
- <p>
- He stalked out of the room furiously.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood stood for a few moments staring at the carpet. Her lips moved
- and her worn old hands plucked at her skirt.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Every time there is an At Home at this flat,” she said, “I get another
- white hair.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She moved toward the door and went out of the room, so that it was left
- empty.
- </p>
- <p>
- Outside in the street a piano-organ was playing a rag-time tune with a
- rattle of notes, and motor-cars were sounding their horns.
- </p>
- <p>
- In this little drawing-room in Intellectual Mansions, Battersea Park,
- there was silence, except for those vague sounds from without. There was
- no sign here of Fate’s presence, summoning a woman to her destiny. No
- angel stood with a flaming sword to bar the way to a woman with a wild
- heart. The little ormolu clock ticking on the mantel-shelf did not seem to
- be counting the moments of a tragic drama. It was a very commonplace
- little room, and the flamboyant chintz on the sofa and chairs gave it an
- air of cheerfulness, as though this were one of the happy homes of
- England.
- </p>
- <p>
- Presently the bedroom door opened slowly, and Clare Heywood stood there
- looking into the drawing-room and listening. She was very pale, and was
- dressed in her outdoor things, as Gerald Bradshaw had asked her to dress,
- in her hat and cloak, so that she might slip out of the flat which he had
- called her prison.
- </p>
- <p>
- She came further into the room, timidly, like a hare frightened by the
- distant baying of the hounds.
- </p>
- <p>
- She raised her hands to her bosom, and spoke in a whisper:
- </p>
- <p>
- “God forgive me!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Then she crossed the floor, listened for a moment intently at the door,
- and slipped out. A moment or two later one’s ears, if they had been
- listening, would have heard the front door shut.
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare Heywood had escaped.
- </p>
- <p>
- A little while later Mrs. Heywood, her mother-in-law, came into the room
- again and went over to the piano to open it and arrange the music.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I do hope Clare is getting dressed,” she said, speaking to herself.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then Herbert came in, carrying a tray with decanter and glasses.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Isn’t Clare ready yet?” he asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, dear. She won’t be long.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I can’t find the corkscrew,” said Herbert, searching round for it, but
- failing to discover its whereabouts.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Isn’t it in the kitchen, dear?” asked Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not unless Mollie has swallowed it. It’s just the sort of thing she would
- do—out of sheer spite.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Didn’t you use it the other day to open a tin of sardines?” asked the old
- lady, cudgelling her brains.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Did I?” said Herbert. “Oh, Lord, yes! I left it in the bathroom.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He went out of the room to find it.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood crossed over to the fire and swept up the grate.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare is a very long time to-night,” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then Mollie came in carrying a tray with some plates of sandwiches. One of
- her fingers was tied up with a rag.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s a good job the guests is late to-night,” she remarked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, we are all very behind-hand,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mollie dumped down the tray and gave vent to a little of her impertinent
- philosophy:
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll never give an At Home when I’m married. Blest if I do. Social
- ‘ipocrisy, I call them.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood rebuked her sharply:
- </p>
- <p>
- “We don’t want your opinion, Mollie, thank you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I suppose I can <i>have</i> a few opinions, although I <i>am</i> in
- service,” said Mollie. “There’s plenty of time for thought even in the
- kitchen of a flat like this. I wonder domestic servants don’t write
- novels. My word, what a revelation it would be! I’ve a good mind to write
- one of them serials in the <i>Daily Mail</i>.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “If I have any more of your impudence, Mollie——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s not impudence,” said Mollie. “It’s aspirations.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The girl was silent when her master came into the room with the corkscrew.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It wasn’t in the bathroom,” he explained. “I remember now, I used it for
- cleaning out my pipe.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I could have told you that a long time ago, sir,” said Mollie.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, why the dickens didn’t you?” asked Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You never asked me, sir.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mollie retired with the air of having scored a point.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, as long as you’ve found it, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Unfortunately, I broke the point. However, I daresay I can make it do.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He pulled one of the corks out of the whisky bottle and filled the
- decanter.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hasn’t Clare finished dressing yet?” he said presently. “What on earth is
- she doing?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I expect she wants her blouse done up at the back,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert jerked up his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And then she complains because I can’t tie my own tie I Just like women.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He drew out another cork rather violently and said:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, go and see after her, mother.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood went toward the bedroom door and called out in her silvery
- voice:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Are you ready, dear?”
- </p>
- <p>
- She listened for a moment, and called out again:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert poured some more whisky into the decanter.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I expect she’s reading one of those beastly pamphlets,” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood tapped at the bedroom door.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Go in, mother,” said Herbert irritably.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s very strange!” said Mrs. Heywood in an anxious voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- She went into the bedroom, and Herbert, who had been watching her, spilled
- some of the whisky, so that he muttered to himself:
- </p>
- <p>
- “What with women and what with whisky——”
- </p>
- <p>
- He did not finish his sentence, but stared in the direction of the bedroom
- as though suspecting something was wrong.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood came trembling out. She had a scared look.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, Herbert!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert was alarmed by the look on her face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is Clare ill—or something?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “She isn’t there,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- The old lady was rather breathless.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not there!” said Herbert in a dazed way.
- </p>
- <p>
- “She went in to dress a few minutes ago,” said his mother.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert stared at her. He was really very much afraid, but he spoke
- irritably:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, she can’t have gone up the chimney, can she? At least, I suppose
- not, though you never can tell nowadays.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He strode toward the bedroom door and called out:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Then he went inside.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood stood watching the open door. She raised her hands up and
- then let them fall, and spoke in a hoarse kind of whisper:
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think it has happened at last.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert came out of the bedroom again. He looked pale, and had gloomy
- eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s devilish queer!” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mother and son stood looking at each other, as though in the presence of
- tragedy.
- </p>
- <p>
- “She must have gone out,” said Mrs. Hey-wood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Gone out! What makes you think so?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “She has taken her hat and cloak.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “How do you know?” asked Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I looked in the wardrobe.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good Heavens! Where’s she gone to?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood’s thin old hands clutched at the white lace upon her bosom.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Herbert, I—I am afraid.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The man went deadly white. He stammered as he spoke:
- </p>
- <p>
- “You don’t mean that she is going to do something—foolish?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Something rash,” said Mrs. Hey wood mournfully.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert had a sudden idea. It took away from his fear a little and made
- him angry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Perhaps she has gone round to church. If so, I will give her a piece of
- my mind when she comes back. It’s outrageous! It’s shameful.”
- </p>
- <p>
- There was the sound of a bell ringing through the hall, and the mother and
- son listened intently.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Perhaps she <i>has</i> come back,” said Herbert. “Perhaps she went to
- fetch some flowers.” This idea seemed to soften him. His voice broke a
- little when he said: “Poor girl! I didn’t mean to make such a fuss about
- them.” “It isn’t Clare,” said Mrs. Heywood, shaking her head. “It’s a
- visitor. I hear Mr. Atkinson Brown’s voice.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mr. Atkinson Brown’s voice could be heard quite plainly in the hall:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, Mollie, is your mistress quite well?” Herbert grasped his mother’s
- arm and whispered to her excitedly:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mother, we must hide it from them.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “If the Atkinson Browns suspect anything it will
- be all over the neighborhood.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert had a look of anguish in his eyes. “Good Heavens, yes. My
- reputation will be ruined.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Once again they heard Mr. Atkinson Brown’s voice in the hall.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I see we are the first to arrive,” he said in a loud, cheery tone.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mother,” whispered Herbert, “we must keep up appearances, at all costs.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll try to, darling,” said Mrs. Heywood, clasping his arm for a moment.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert made a desperate effort to be hopeful.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare is sure to be back in a few minutes. We’re frightening ourselves
- for nothing.... I shall have something to say to her to-night when the
- guests are gone.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood’s eyes filled with tears, and she looked at her son as though
- she knew that Clare would never come back.
- </p>
- <p>
- “My poor boy!” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Play the game, mother,” said Herbert. “For Heaven’s sake play the game.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He had no sooner whispered these words than Mr. and Mrs. Atkinson Brown
- entered the room, having taken off their outdoor things. Mr. Brown was a
- tall, stout, heavily built man with a bald head and a great expanse of
- white waistcoat. His wife was a little bird-like woman in pink silk. They
- were both elaborately cheerful.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hulloh, Heywood, my boy!” said the elderly man.
- </p>
- <p>
- “So delighted to come!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown to Herbert’s mother.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert grasped the man’s hand and wrung it warmly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good of you to come. Devilish good.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Glad to come,” said Mr. Atkinson Brown. “Glad to come, my lad. How’s the
- wife?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown, glancing round the room. “Where’s dear
- Clare?... Well, I hope.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert tried to hide his extreme nervousness.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, tremendously fit, thanks. She’ll be here in a minute or two.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood appeared less nervous than her son. Yet her voice trembled a
- little when she said:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Do sit down, Mrs. Atkinson Brown.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She pulled a chair up, but the lady protested laughingly:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, not so near the fire. I can’t afford to neglect my complexion at my
- time of life!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Her husband was rubbing his hands in front of the fire. He had no
- complexion to spoil.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Horrible weather for this time o’ year,” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Damnable,” said Herbert, agreeing with him almost too cordially.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is dear Clare suited at present?” asked the lady.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well,” said Mrs. Heywood, “we still have Mollie, but she is a great
- trouble—a very great trouble.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, the eternal servant problem!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. “I thought I
- had a perfect jewel, but I found her inebriated in the kitchen only
- yesterday.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert was racking his brains for conversational subjects. He fell back
- on an old one. “Business going strong?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Business!” said Mr. Atkinson Brown. “My dear boy, business has been the
- very devil since this Radical Government has been in power.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am sure there has been a great deal of trouble in the world lately,”
- said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m sure I can’t bear to read even the dear <i>Daily Mail</i>,” said Mrs.
- Atkinson Brown.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What with murders and revolutions and eloping vicars and suffragettes——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Those outrageous women ought to be whipped,” said her husband. “Spoiled
- my game of golf last Saturday. Found ‘Votes for Women’ on the first green.
- Made me positively ill.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am glad dear Clare is so sensible,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes. Oh, quite so,” said Mrs. Heywood, flushing a little.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, rather!” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “We domestic women are in the minority now,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The spirit of revolt is abroad, Herbert,” said her husband. “Back to the
- Home is the only watchword which will save the country from these
- shameless hussies. Flog ‘em back, I would. Thank God <i>our</i> wives have
- more sense.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, there’s something in that,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Atkinson Brown was gazing round the room curiously. She seemed to
- suspect something.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You are sure dear Clare is quite well?” she asked. “No little trouble?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “She is having a slight trouble with her back hair,” said Herbert. “Won’t
- lie down, you know.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He laughed loudly, as though he had made a good joke.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Atkinson Brown half rose from her chair.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, let me go to the rescue of the dear thing!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert was terror-stricken.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No—no! It was only my joke,” he said eagerly. “She will be here in
- a minute. Do sit down.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood remembered her promise to “play the game.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Won’t you sing something, dear?” she said to her visitor.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, not so early in the evening,” said the lady. “Besides, I have a most
- awful cold.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I’m so sorry,” said Herbert. “I am beastly sorry.”
- </p>
- <p>
- As he spoke the bell rang again, and Herbert went over to his mother and
- whispered to her:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Do you think that is Clare? My God, this is awful!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare was not looking very well the other day when I saw her,” said Mrs.
- Atkinson Brown. “I thought perhaps she was sickening for something.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I assure you she was never better in her life,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “But you men are so unobservant. I am dying to see dear Clare, to ask her
- how she feels. Are you sure I can’t be of any use to her?”
- </p>
- <p>
- She rose again from her chair, and Herbert gave a beseeching look to his
- mother.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, quite sure, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. “<i>Do</i> sit down.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Besides, you have such a frightful cold,” said Herbert, with extreme
- anxiety. “<i>Do</i> keep closer to the fire.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Atkinson Brown laughed a little curiously:
- </p>
- <p>
- “You seem very anxious to keep me from dear Clare!”
- </p>
- <p>
- This persistence annoyed her husband and he rebuked her sternly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sit still, Beatrice, can’t you? Don’t you see that we have arrived a
- little early and that we have taken Clare unawares? Let the poor girl go
- on with her dressing.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t bully me in other people’s flats, Charles,” said Mrs. Atkinson
- Brown. “I have enough of it at home.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Her husband was not to be quelled.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Herbert and I can hardly hear ourselves speak,” he growled, “you keep up
- such a clatter.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Atkinson Brown flared up.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I come out to get the chance of speaking a little. For eight years now I
- have been listening to your interminable monologues, and can’t get a word
- in edgeways.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Stuff and nonsense!” said her husband.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Have you been married eight years already, my dear?” asked Mrs. Heywood
- in a tone of amiable surprise.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, we are in our Eighth Year,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood seemed startled.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I see,” she said thoughtfully.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I assure you it seems longer,” said the lady. “I suppose it’s because
- Charles makes me so very tired sometimes.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Two other visitors now arrived. They were Mr. Hargreaves and his wife: the
- former a young man in immaculate evening clothes, with lofty manners; the
- latter a tall, thin, elegant, bored-looking woman, supercilious and
- snobbish.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert went forward hurriedly to his new guests.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How splendid of you to come! How are you, sir?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, pretty troll-loll, thanks,” said Mr. Hargreaves.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert shook hands with Mrs. Hargreaves.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How do you do?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We’re rather late,” said the lady, “but this is in an out-of-the-way
- neighborhood, is it not?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, do you think so?” said Herbert. “I always considered Battersea Park
- very central.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Hargreaves raised her eyebrows.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s having to get across the river that makes the journey so very
- tedious. I should die if I had to live across the river.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s something in what you say,” said Herbert, anxious to agree with
- everybody. “I must apologize for dragging you all this way. Of course, you
- people in Mayfair——Won’t you sit down?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mr. Hargreaves became a victim of mistaken identity, shaking hands with
- Mrs. Atkinson Brown.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mrs. Heywood, I presume. I must introduce myself.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Hargreaves also greeted the other lady, under the same impression.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, how do you do? So delighted to make your acquaintance.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Atkinson Brown was much amused, and laughed gaily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “But I am <i>not</i> Mrs. Heywood. I cannot boast of such a handsome
- husband!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, can’t you, by Jove!” said Mr. Atkinson Brown, rather nettled by his
- wife’s candor.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I beg pardon,” said Mr. Hargreaves. “Where <i>is</i> Mrs. Heywood?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, where is Mrs. Heywood?” said his wife.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert looked wildly at his mother.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Where is she, mother? Do tell her to hurry up.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood meekly. She moved uncertainly toward the
- bedroom door, and then hesitated: “Perhaps she will not be very long now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The fact is,” said Herbert desperately, “she is not very well.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Atkinson Brown was astounded.
- </p>
- <p>
- “But you said she was perfectly well!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Did I?” said Herbert. “Oh, well, er—one has to say these things,
- you know. Polite fictions, eh?”
- </p>
- <p>
- He laughed nervously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The fact is, she has a little headache. Hasn’t she, mother?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. “You know best.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Atkinson Brown rose from her chair again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I will go and see how the poor dear feels. So bad of you to hide it
- from us.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, please sit down,” said Herbert in a voice of anguish. “I assure you
- it is nothing very much. She will be in directly. Make yourself at home,
- Mrs. Hargreaves. This chair? Mother, show Mrs. Atkinson Brown Clare’s
- latest photograph.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, yes!” said Mrs. Heywood. “It is an excellent likeness.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “But I want to see Clare herself!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown plaintively.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sit down, Beatrice!” said her husband.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Bully!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown, sitting down with a flop.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert addressed himself to Mr. Hargreaves.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Draw up your chair, sir. You will have a cigar, I am sure.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He offered him one from a newly opened box. Mr. Hargreaves took one,
- smelled it, and then put it back.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, thanks,” he said. “I will have one of my own, if I may. Sure the
- ladies don’t mind?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, they like it,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “We have to pretend to,” said Mrs. Hargreaves.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, if you don’t, you ought to,” said her husband. “It’s a man’s
- privilege.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Hargreaves smiled icily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “One of his many privileges.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Will you have a cigarette, Mrs. Hargreaves?” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- But Mr. Hargreaves interposed:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I don’t allow my wife to smoke. It’s a beastly habit.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mr. Atkinson Brown, who had accepted one of Herbert’s cigars, but after
- some inquiry had also decided to smoke one of his own, applauded this
- sentiment with enthusiasm.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hear, hear! Hear, hear! Disgusting habit for women.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Of course I agree with you,” said Herbert. “Clare never smokes. But I
- don’t lay down the law for other people’s wives.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mr. Hargreaves laughed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “A very sound notion, Heywood. It takes all one’s time to manage one’s
- own, eh?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And then it is not always effective,” said his wife. “Even the worm will
- turn.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mr. Hargreaves answered his wife with a heavy retort:
- </p>
- <p>
- “If it does I knock it on the head with a spade.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mr. Atkinson Brown laughed loudly again. He seemed to like this man
- Hargreaves.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good epigram! By Jove, I must remember that!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert was on tenter-hooks when the conversation languished a little.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Won’t you sing a song, Mrs. Atkinson Brown? I am sure my friend, Mr.
- Hargreaves, will appreciate your voice.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, rather!” said Hargreaves. “Though I don’t pretend to understand a
- note of music.” Mrs. Atkinson Brown shook her head:
- </p>
- <p>
- “I couldn’t think of singing before our hostess appears.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The lady’s husband seemed at last to have caught the spirit of her
- suspicion. He spoke in a hoarse whisper to his wife:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Where the devil <i>is</i> the woman?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert Heywood realized that he was on the edge of a precipice. Not much
- longer could he hold on to this intolerable situation. He tried to speak
- cheerfully, but there was anguish in his voice when he said:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, let’s have a game of nap.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, Lord, no,” said Hargreaves. “I only play nap on the way to a race.
- You don’t sport a billiard table, do you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert Heywood was embarrassed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Er—a billiard table?” He looked round the room as though he might
- discover a billiard table. “I’m afraid not.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t be absurd, Edward,” said Mrs. Hargreaves. “People don’t play
- billiards on the wrong side of the river.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Conversation languished again, and Herbert was becoming desperate. He
- seized upon the sandwiches and handed them round.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Won’t anybody have a sandwich to pass the time away? Mrs. Hargreaves?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Hargreaves laughed in her supercilious way.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s rather early, isn’t it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good Lord, no!” said Herbert. “I am sure you must be hungry. Let me beg
- of you—Mother, haven’t you got any cake anywhere?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. She, too, was suffering mental tortures.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Atkinson Brown. You will have a sandwich,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- He bent over to his visitor and spoke in a gloomy voice:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Take one, for God’s sake.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Atkinson Brown was startled.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes! Yes! By all means,” he said hastily. Herbert handed the sandwiches
- about rather wildly. “Mother, you will have one, won’t you? Mrs. Atkinson
- Brown?... And one for me, eh?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Hargreaves eyed her host curiously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I hope your wife is not seriously unwell, Mr. Heywood.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert was losing his nerve.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Can’t we talk of something else?” he said despairingly. “What is your
- handicap at golf?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “My husband objects to my playing golf,” said the lady.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It takes women out of the home so much,” said Hargreaves. “Play with the
- babies is my motto for women.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Atkinson Brown shook her finger at him, and laughed in a shrill
- voice:
- </p>
- <p>
- “But supposing they haven’t got any babies?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “They ought to have ‘em,” said Hargreaves.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was Atkinson Brown who interrupted this interesting discussion, which
- promised to bring up the great problem of eugenics, so favored now as a
- drawing-room topic. He had been turning his sandwich this way and that,
- and he leaned forward to his host:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Excuse me, Herbert, old man. There’s something the matter with this
- sandwich.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Something the matter with it?” asked Herbert anxiously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s covered with red spots,” said Atkinson Brown.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Spots—what kind of spots?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Looks like blood,” said Atkinson Brown, giving an uneasy guffaw. “Suppose
- there hasn’t been a murder in this flat?”
- </p>
- <p>
- All the guests leaned forward and gazed at the sandwich.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert spoke in a tragic whisper to his mother:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mollie’s finger!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Then he explained the matter airily to the general company.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, it’s a special kind of sandwich with the gravy outside. A new fad,
- you know.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I see,” said Atkinson Brown, much relieved. “Hadn’t heard of it.
- Still, I think I’ll have an ordinary one, if you don’t mind.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert was muttering little prayers remembered from his childhood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mrs. Hargreaves,” he said cajolingly, “I am sure you play. Won’t you give
- us a little tune?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, if it won’t disturb your wife,” said the lady.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I am sure it won’t. She’ll love to hear you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He felt immensely grateful to this good-natured woman.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Edward, get my music-roll,” said Mrs. Hargreaves.
- </p>
- <p>
- But Herbert had a horrible disappointment when Hargreaves said:
- </p>
- <p>
- “By Jove! I believe I left it in the taxi. Yes, I am sure I did!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert put his hand up to his aching head and whispered his anguish:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, my God! Now how shall I mark time?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “But I reminded you about it!” said Mrs. Hargreaves.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, I know. But you are always reminding me about something.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, play something by heart,” said Herbert in a pleading way. “Any old
- thing. The five-finger exercises.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am very out of practice,” said Mrs. Hargreaves. “But still I will try.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert breathed a prayer of thankfulness, and hurried to conduct the lady
- to the music-stool.
- </p>
- <p>
- As he did so there was a noise outside the window. Newspaper men were
- shouting their sing-song: “Raid on the ‘Ouse. Suffragette Outrage. Raid on
- the ‘Ouse of Commins.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What are the devils saying?” asked Hargreaves, trying to catch the words.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Something about the Suffragettes,” growled Atkinson Brown.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m afraid it will give poor Clare a worse headache,” said Mrs. Atkinson
- Brown.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood tried to be reassuring:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I don’t think so.”
- </p>
- <p>
- At that moment there was a loud ring at the bell. The sound was so
- prolonged that it startled the company.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert listened intently and then whispered to his mother:
- </p>
- <p>
- “That must be Clare!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, if it is only Clare!” said Mrs. Heywood. When Mrs. Hargreaves had
- struck a few soft chords on the piano there was the sound of voices
- speaking loudly in the hall. Everybody listened, surprised at the
- interruption. Mollie’s voice could be heard quite clearly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I told you it was our At Home night, Miss Vernon.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I can’t help that.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The drawing-room door opened, <i>sans ceremonie</i>, and Madge Vernon came
- in. Her face was flushed, and she had sparkling eyes. She stood in the
- doorway looking at the company with a smile, as though immensely amused by
- some joke of her own.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m sorry to interrupt you good people,” she said very cheerfully, “but I
- have come on urgent business, which brooks no delay, as they say in
- melodrama.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood gazed at her with frightened eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “My dear!... What has happened?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s the matter?” said Herbert, turning very pale.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, it’s nothing to be alarmed at,” said Madge Vernon. “It’s about your
- wife.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “My wife?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “About Clare?” exclaimed Mrs. Atkinson Brown.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Hargreaves craned her head forward, like a bird reaching for its
- seed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I wonder—” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- Madge Vernon grinned at them all.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’ll be in the papers to-morrow, so you are all bound to know. Besides,
- why keep it a secret? It’s a thing to be proud of!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Proud of what?” asked Herbert in a frenzied tone of voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- Madge Vernon enjoyed the drama of her announcement.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare has been arrested in a demonstration outside the House to-night.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Arrested!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The awful word was spoken almost simultaneously by all the company in that
- drawingroom of Intellectual Mansions, S. W.
- </p>
- <p>
- “She’s quite safe,” said Madge Vernon calmly. “I’ve come to ask you to
- bail her out.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert’s guests rose and looked at him in profound astonishment and
- indignation.
- </p>
- <p>
- “But you told us—” cried Mrs. Atkinson Brown.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert Heywood gave a queer groan of anger and horror.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Bail her out!... Oh, my God!”
- </p>
- <p>
- He sank down into his chair and held his head in his hands.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0016" id="link2HCH0016"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER III
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">H</span>erbert Heywood was
- in the depths of an arm-chair reading the paper. Mrs. Heywood was on the
- other side of the fireplace with a book on her lap. But she was dozing
- over it, and her head nodded on to her chest. Herbert turned over the
- leaves of the paper and then studied the advertisements. He had a look of
- extreme boredom. Every now and then he yawned quietly and lengthily. At
- last he let the paper fall on to the floor, and uttered his thoughts
- aloud, so that his mother was awakened.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Did you say anything, Herbert?” said the old lady.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Nothing, mother, except that I am bored stiff.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He went over to the piano and played “God Save the King” with one finger,
- in a doleful way.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood glanced over her spectacles at him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Would you like a game of cribbage, dear?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, thanks, mother,” said Herbert hastily. “Not in the afternoon.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood listened to his fumbling notes for a moment and then spoke
- again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Won’t you go out for a walk? It would do you good, Herbert.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Think so?” said Herbert bitterly; without accepting the suggestion, he
- played “Three Blind Mice,” also with one finger. It sounded more
- melancholy than “God Save the King.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t like to see you moping indoors on a bright day like this,” said
- Mrs. Heywood. “Take a brisk walk round the Park. It would cheer you up.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert resented the idea fiercely.
- </p>
- <p>
- “A long walk in Battersea Park would make a pessimist of a laughing
- hyena.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood was silent for some time, but then she made a last effort.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, go and see a friend, dear. The Atkinson Browns, for instance.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “They do nothing but nag at each other,” said Herbert. “And Atkinson Brown
- hasn’t as much brains as a Teddy Bear. Besides, he’s become friendly with
- that fellow Hargreaves, and I’m not going to take the risk of meeting a
- man who turned me out of my job.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood became agitated.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Are you sure of that, Herbert? I can’t think he could have been so
- malicious, after coming here and eating your salt, as it were. What was
- his reason?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He made no disguise of it,” said Herbert bitterly. “I saw his letter to
- my chief. Said that it was quite impossible to employ a man who was mixed
- up with the militant Suffragettes. Damned liar!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good Heavens!” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Of course it was all due to that ghastly evening when Clare got arrested.
- She knows that well enough.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood, “she has tried to make amends. The shock
- of your losing your place has made her much more gentle and loving. It has
- brought back all her loyalty to you, Herbert.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Loyalty!” said Herbert. “Where is she now, I should like to know?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “She is gone to some committee meeting.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “She’s always got a committee meeting,” said Herbert angrily, kicking the
- hassock.
- </p>
- <p>
- “She joins a new committee for some kind of social reform nonsense every
- blessed day.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, it keeps her busy, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood gently. “Besides, it is
- not all committee work. Since she has been visiting the poor and helping
- in the slums she has been ever so much better in health and spirits.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, but where the devil do I come in?” asked Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t you think you might go out, dear? Just for a little while?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t <i>want</i> to go out, mother,” said Herbert with suppressed
- heat.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Very well, dear.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert stood in front of the fireplace and rattled the keys in his pocket
- moodily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s the good of toiling to keep a home together if one’s wife abandons
- her husband’s society on every possible pretext? A home! This place is
- just a receiving office for begging letters and notices for committees and
- subcommittees.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood sighed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It might have been worse, Herbert.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “As far as I’m concerned, it couldn’t be worse. I’m the most miserable
- wretch in London. Without a job and without a wife.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’ll get a place all right, dear. You have the promise of one already.
- And you know Clare’s health was in a very queer state before Miss Vernon
- made her take an interest in helping other people. I was seriously alarmed
- about her.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What about me?” asked Herbert. “No one troubles to get alarmed about me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Are you unwell, dear?” said Mrs. Hey-wood anxiously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Of course I’m unwell.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Darling!” said Mrs. Heywood, still more anxiously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, there’s nothing the matter with me from a physical point of view. But
- mentally and morally I’m a demnition wreck.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Aren’t you taking your iron pills regularly?” said his mother.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Pills! As if pills could cure melancholia!” Mrs. Heywood was aghast at
- that dreadful word.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good Heavens, dear!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m on the verge of a nervous breakdown,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, Herbert,” cried his mother, “I hope not!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m working up to a horrible crisis,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What are your symptoms? How do you feel?” asked his mother.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I feel like smashing things,” said Herbert savagely.
- </p>
- <p>
- He sat down at the piano again and played “We Won’t Go Home Till Morning,”
- but missed his note, and banged on to the wrong one in a temper.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There goes a note, anyhow. Thank goodness for that!”
- </p>
- <p>
- At that moment Mollie came in holding a silver tray with a pile of
- letters.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The post, sir.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, something to break the infernal monotony,” said Herbert with a sigh
- of relief.
- </p>
- <p>
- He took up the letters and examined them.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Life is a bit flat, sir,” said Mollie, “since we gave up having At
- Homes.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hold your tongue,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mollie tossed her head and muttered an impertinent sentence as she left
- the room.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Can’t even open my mouth without somebody jumping down my throat. I will
- break that girl’s neck one of these days,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- He went through the letters and read out the names on them.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mrs. Herbert Heywood, <i>Mrs.</i> Herbert Heywood, Mrs. Herbert Heywood,
- Mrs. Herbert—Why, every jack one is for Mrs. Herbert Heywood! Nobody
- writes to me, of course. No one cares a damn about <i>me</i>.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Your mother cares, Herbert,” said the old lady.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I shall take to drink—or the devil,” said Herbert, and he added
- thoughtfully, “I wonder which is the most fun?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Herbert, dear!” cried his mother, “don’t say such awful things.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The worst of it is,” said Herbert bitterly, “they’re both so beastly
- expensive.”
- </p>
- <p>
- There was the noise of a latchkey in the hall, and Mrs. Heywood gave a
- little cry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s Clare!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Think so?” said Herbert, listening.
- </p>
- <p>
- From the hall came the sound of Clare’s voice singing a merry tune.
- </p>
- <p>
- “She’s in a cheerful mood, anyhow,” said Mrs. Heywood, smiling.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert answered her gloomily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Horribly cheerful.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The mother and son looked toward the door as Clare came in. There was a
- noticeable change in her appearance since the evening At Home. There was
- more color in her cheeks and the wistfulness had gone out of her eyes. She
- was brisk, keen and bright.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, mother,” she said, “been having a nap?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, no, dear,” said the old lady, who never admitted that she made a
- habit of naps.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hulloh, Herbert,” said Clare. “Have you got that new post yet?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No,” said Herbert. “And I don’t expect I shall get it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, yes, you will, dear old boy. Don’t you worry! Have you been home
- long?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Seems like a lifetime.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare laughed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not so long as that, surely?”
- </p>
- <p>
- She came forward to him and put her arm about his neck, and offered him
- her cheek. He looked at it doubtfully for a moment and then kissed her in
- a “distant” manner.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m frightfully busy, old boy,” said Clare. “I just have a few minutes
- and then I shall have to dash off again.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Dash off where?” asked Herbert, with signs of extreme irritation. “Dash
- it all, surely you aren’t going out again?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Only round the corner,” said Clare quietly. “I have got to look into the
- case of a poor creature who is making match-boxes. Goodness knows how many
- for a farthing! And yet she’s so cheerful and plucky that it does one good
- to see her. Oh, it kills one’s own selfishness, Herbert.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, why worry about her, then, if she’s so pleased with herself?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “She’s plucky,” said Clare, “but she’s starving. It’s a bad case of
- sweated labor.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sweated humbug,” said Herbert. “What am I going to do all the evening, I
- should like to know? Sit here alone?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t suppose I shall be long,” said Clare. “Besides, there’s mother.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, there’s mother,” said Herbert. “But when a man’s married he wants
- his wife.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare was now busy looking over her letters.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Can’t you go to the club?” she asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m dead sick of the club. That boiled-shirt Bohemianism is the biggest
- rot in the world.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Take mother to the theatre,” said Clare cheerfully.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The theatre bores me stiff. These modern plays set one’s nerves on edge.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, haven’t you got a decent novel or anything?” said Clare, reading
- one of her letters.
- </p>
- <p>
- “A decent novel! There’s no such thing nowadays, and they give me the
- hump.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare was reading another letter with absorbed interest, but she listened
- with half an ear, as it were, to her husband.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Play mother a game of cribbage, then,” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Look here, Clare,” said Herbert furiously, “I shall begin to throw things
- about in a minute.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t get hysterical, Herbert,” said Clare calmly. “Especially as I have
- got some good news for you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- As she spoke these words she looked across a Demonstration to him with a
- curious smile and added: “A big surprise, Herbert!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “A surprise?” said Herbert with sarcasm. “Have you discovered another
- widow in distress?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, I have,” said Clare, “but it’s not that.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood glanced from her son to her daughter-in-law, and seemed to
- imagine that she might be disturbing an intimate conversation.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I will be back in a minute. I won’t disturb you two dears,” she said, as
- she left the room quietly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You won’t disturb us, mother,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- But the old lady smiled and said, “I won’t be long.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Are you going to get arrested again?” asked Herbert. “Do you want me to
- bail you out? Because by the Lord, I won’t!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, that was quite an accident,” said Clare, laughing. “Besides, I gave
- you my word to abstain from the militant movement, and you can’t say I
- have broken the pledge.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You have broken a good many other things.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What kind of things?” asked Clare. “You aren’t alluding to that window
- again, are you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You have broken my illusions on married life,” said Herbert, with tragic
- emphasis.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah,” said Clare, “that is ‘the Great Illusion,’ by the Angel in the
- House.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You have broken my ideals of womanhood.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “They were false ideals, Herbert,” said Clare very quietly. “It was only a
- plaster ideal which broke. The real woman is of flesh and blood. The real
- woman is so much better than the sham. Don’t you think so?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It depends on what you call sham,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I was a sham until that plaster image of me broke. I indulged in sham
- sentiment, sham emotion, sham thoughts. Look at me now, since I went
- outside these four walls and faced the facts of life, and saw other
- people’s misery besides my own, and the happiness of people with so much
- more to bear than I had. Look into my eyes, Herbert.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She smiled at him tenderly, alluringly. “What’s the good?” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Do you see a weary soul looking out?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert looked into his wife’s eyes for a moment and then stared down at
- the carpet.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I used to see love looking out,” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s looking out now,” said Clare. “Love of life instead of discontent.
- Love of this great throbbing human nature, with so much to be put right.
- Love of poor people, and little children, and brave hearts. Madge Vernon
- taught me that, for she has a soul bigger than the suffrage, and ideals
- that go beyond the vote. I have blown the cobwebs out of my eyes, Herbert.
- I see straight.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “How about <i>me?</i>” asked Herbert. “That’s what I want to know. Where
- do I come in?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, you come in all right!” said Clare. “You are a part of life and have
- a big share of my love.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t want to be shared up, thanks,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- She stroked his hand.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I love you much better now that I see you with this new straight vision
- of mine. At any rate I love what is real in you and not what is sham. And
- I have learned the duties of love, Herbert. I believe I am a better wife
- to you. I think I have learned the meaning of marriage, and of married
- love.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She spoke with a touch of emotion, and there was a thrill in her voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You are in love with your social work and your whining beggars, not with
- me. You are getting farther and farther away from me. You leave me alone;
- I come back to a neglected home.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, Mollie and mother look after it beautifully,” said Clare very
- cheerfully.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert gave expression to his grievances.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I come home and ask, ‘Where is Clare?’ and get the eternal answer, ‘Clare
- is out.’ I am an abandoned husband, and by Heaven I won’t stand it. I will——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What, Herbert?” said Clare, smiling up at him. “Don’t do anything rash,
- old boy.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I—have a good mind to make love to somebody else’s wife. But
- they’re all so beastly ugly!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Perhaps somebody else’s wife won’t respond,” said Clare. “Some women are
- very cold.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll take to drink. I have already given mother full warning.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am sure it will disagree with you, dear,” said Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You scoff at me,” said Herbert passionately. “I think we had better live
- apart.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You would get even more bored than before. Dear old boy. <i>Do</i> be
- reasonable. <i>Do</i> cultivate a sense of humor.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “This is not a farce,” said Herbert. “It’s a horrible tragedy.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Take up a hobby or something,” said Clare. “Golf—or fretwork.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert was furious.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Fretwork! Is that a joke or an insult?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It was only a suggestion!” said Clare. Herbert jumped up from his chair.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I had better go and drown myself straight away...”?
- </p>
- <p>
- He turned at the door, and gave a tragic look at his wife. “Good-by.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare smiled at him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Won’t you kiss me before you go?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I will take my pipe,” said Herbert, coming back to the mantelshelf. “It’s
- my only friend.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It will go out in the water,” said Clare. “Besides, Herbert, don’t you
- want to hear my good news? My big surprise?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No,” said Herbert. “Nothing you could say or do could surprise me now. If
- mother wants me I shall be in the study for the rest of the evening.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “But I thought you were going to the river?”, said Clare teasingly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert was not to be amused.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I suppose you think you’re funny? I don’t,” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then he went out and slammed the door. Clare was left alone, and there was
- a smile about her lips.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Poor old Herbert,” she said. “I think he will have the surprise of his
- life.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She laughed quietly to herself, and then looked up and listened as she
- heard a slight noise. She stood up with a sudden look of anger as she saw
- Gerald Bradshaw gazing at her through the open French windows.
- </p>
- <p>
- The man spoke to her in his soft, silky voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare, why are you so cruel to me? I have been ill because of your
- heartlessness.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare answered him sternly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I thought I had got rid of you. Have you come back to plague me?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I tried to forget you,” said Gerald Bradshaw. “I went as far as Italy to
- forget you. I made love to many women to forget you. But I have come back.
- And I shall always come back, because you are my mate and I cannot live
- without you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare’s voice rang out in the room.
- </p>
- <p>
- “God ought not to let you live. Every word you speak is a lie. You are a
- thief of women’s honor. Get away from my window, because your very breath
- is poison.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The man was astonished, a little scared. “You did not speak like that
- once, Clare. You let me hold your hand. You trembled when I leaned toward
- you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I was ill and weak,” said Clare, “and you tried to tempt my weakness. I
- was blind and did not see the evil in you. But now I am well and strong,
- and my eyes are opened to the truth of things. If you don’t go I will call
- my husband and he will throw you over that balcony at one word from me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Gerald Bradshaw laughed scoffingly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Your husband! I could kill him between my thumb and forefinger.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He is strong because he is good,” said Clare. “I will call him now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She went quickly toward the bell.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You needn’t call him,” said Gerald Bradshaw. “I would dislike to hurt the
- little man.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You are going?” asked Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, I am going,” said the man, “because something has changed in you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare gave a cheerful little laugh.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You are right.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I see that now. I have lost my spell over you. Something has broken.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Are you going,” said Clare sternly, “or shall I call my man?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am going, Clare,” said the man at the window. “I am going to find
- another mate. She and I will talk evil of you, and hate you, as I hate you
- now. Farewell, foolish one!” He withdrew from the window, and instantly
- Clare rushed to it, shut it and bolted it. Then she pulled down the blind,
- and stood, panting, with her back to it and her arms outstretched.
- </p>
- <p>
- “God be praised!” she said. “He has gone out of my life. I am a clean
- woman again.” At that moment Mrs. Heywood entered. “Must you go out again,
- Clare?” said the old lady.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Only for a little while, mother,” said Clare, a little breathless after
- her emotion.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is anything the matter, dear?” said Mrs. Heywood. “You look rather
- flustered.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, nothing is the matter!” said Clare. “Only I am very happy.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood smiled at her.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It makes me happy to see you so well and bright,” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t get on your nerves so much, eh, mother?”
- </p>
- <p>
- She laughed quietly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, I must go and tidy my hair.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She moved toward the bedroom, but stopped to pack up her letters.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am so sorry you have to go out,” said the old lady.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I shan’t be more than a few minutes,” said Clare. “But I must go.
- Besides, after this I am going to <i>give</i> up some of my visiting
- work.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Give it up, dear?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes. One must be moderate even in district visiting.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She went into the bedroom, but left the door open so that she could hear
- her mother.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare!” said the old lady.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, mother.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What is that surprise you were going to give us?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Surprise, mother?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “The good news?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, yes, I forgot,” said Clare. “Come in and I will tell you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood went into the bedroom. Outside, in the street, a man with a
- fiddle was playing the “Intermezzo.” Presently both women came out. Clare
- was smiling, with her arm round Mrs. Heywood’s neck. Mrs. Heywood was
- wiping her eyes as though crying a little.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Cheer up,” said Clare. “It’s nothing to cry about.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am crying because I am so glad,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, that’s a funny thing to do,” said Clare, laughing gaily. “Now I
- must run away. You won’t let Herbert drown himself, will you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood, wiping her eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Who would have thought it!” said Mrs.
- </p>
- <p>
- Heywood, speaking to herself as her daughter-in-law left the room.
- </p>
- <p>
- She went over to the mantelpiece and took up her son’s photograph and
- kissed it. Then she went to the door and stood out in the hall and called
- in a sweet old woman’s voice:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Herbert! Herbert, dear!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Are you calling, mother?” answered Herbert from another room.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I want you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t feel a bit like cribbage, mother,”’ said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t want you to play cribbage to-night,” said the old lady. “I have
- something to say to you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Has Clare gone?” asked Herbert, still calling from the other room.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “But she won’t be long.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, all right. I’ll be along in a moment.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood went back into the room and waited for her son eagerly.
- Presently he came in with a pipe in his hand and book under his arm. He
- had changed into a shabby old jacket, and was in carpet slippers.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s the matter, mother?” he asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s nothing the matter,” said the old lady; then she became very
- excited, and raised her hands and cried out:
- </p>
- <p>
- “At least, everything is the matter. It’s the only thing that matters! ...
- Oh, Herbert!”
- </p>
- <p>
- She laughed and cried at the same time so that her son was alarmed and
- stared at her in amazement.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You aren’t ill, are you?” he said. “Shall I send for a doctor?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood shook her trembling old head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m quite well. I never felt so well.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You had better sit down, mother,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- He took her hand and led her to a chair.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s up, eh, old lady? Mollie hasn’t run away, has she?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The old lady took his hand and fondled it.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Herbert, my son, I’ve wonderful news for you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “News?” said Herbert. “Did you find it in the evening paper?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s going to make a lot of difference to us all,” said Mrs. Heywood. “No
- more cribbage, Herbert!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thank heaven for that!” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And not so much social work for Clare.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, let’s be thankful for small mercies,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Bend your head down and let me whisper to you,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- </p>
- <p>
- She put her hands up to his head, and drew it down, and whispered
- something into his ears.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was something which astounded him.
- </p>
- <p>
- He started back and said “No!” as though he had heard something quite
- incredible. Then he spoke in a whisper:
- </p>
- <p>
- “By Jove!... Is that a fact?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s the best fact that ever was, Herbert,” said the old lady.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes... it will make a bit of a difference,” said Herbert thoughtfully.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood clasped her son’s arm. There was a tremulous light in her
- eyes and a great emotion in her voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Herbert, I am an old woman and your mother. Sit down and let me talk to
- you as I did in the old days when you were my small boy before a nursery
- fire.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert smiled at her; all the gloom had left his face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “All right, mother.... By Jove, and I never guessed. And yet I ought to
- have guessed. Things have been—different—lately.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He sat down on a hassock near the old lady with his knees tucked up. She
- sat down, too, and stretched out a trembling hand to touch his hair.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Once upon a time, Herbert, there was a young man and a young woman who
- loved each other very dearly.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert looked up and smiled at her.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Are you sure, mother?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Perfectly sure. Then they married.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And lived happily ever after? I bet they didn’t!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, not quite happily, because this is different from the fairy tales.
- ... After a time the husband began to think too much about his work, while
- the wife stayed at home and thought too much about herself.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s a stale old yarn,” said Herbert. “What happened then?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “By degrees the wife began to think she hated her husband, because
- although he gave her little luxuries and pretty clothes, and all the
- things that pleased <i>him</i>, he never gave her the thing <i>she</i>
- wanted.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What was that?” asked Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It was a magic charm to make her forget herself.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, magic charms aren’t easy to find,” said Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No.... But at last she went out to find it herself. And while she was
- away the husband came home and missed her.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Poor devil!” said Herbert. “Of course he did.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Being a man,” said Mrs. Heywood, giving a queer little laugh, “he stayed
- at home more than he used to do, and then complained that he was left too
- much alone. Just like his wife had complained.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, hang it all,” said Herbert, “she ought to have stayed with him.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “But then she wouldn’t have found the magic charm,” said Mrs. Heywood.
- “Don’t you see?... And she would have withered and withered away until
- there was nothing left of her, and the husband would have been quite alone—forever.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Think so?” said Herbert very thoughtfully. “D’you think it would have
- been as bad as that?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I’m sure of it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, what did happen?” asked Herbert. “Did she find the magic charm? It
- wasn’t a widow in distress, was it? Or Social Reform humbug?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No,” said Mrs. Heywood; “that gave her a new interest in life because it
- helped her to forget herself, some of her own little worries, some of her
- brooding thoughts. But a good fairy who was looking after her worked
- another kind of magic.... Herbert I It’s the best magic for unhappy women
- and unhappy homes, and it has been worked for you. Oh, my dear, you ought
- to be very thankful.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Herbert, scratching his head. “Yes, I suppose so. But what’s
- the moral of the tale, mother? I’m hanged if I see.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood put her hand on her son’s shoulder, as he sat on the hassock
- by her chair.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s a moral told by an old woman who watched these two from the very
- beginning. A husband mustn’t expect his wife to stay at home for ever. The
- home isn’t big enough, Herbert. There’s the great world outside calling to
- her, calling, calling. The walls of a little fiat like this are too narrow
- for the spirit and heart. If he keeps her there she either pines and dies,
- or else——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What?” asked Herbert.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Escapes, my dear,” said the old lady very solemnly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert drew a deep, quivering breath.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Then,” said Mrs. Heywood, “nothing in the world can call her back—except——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Except what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “A little child.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert got up from the hassock and clasped the mantelshelf, and spoke in
- a low, humble, grateful voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thank God, Clare has been called back!” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood rose from her chair also, and caught hold of her son’s
- sleeve.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” she said, “yes. But even now she will want to spread her wings a
- little. She must take short flights, Herbert, even now. She must wing her
- way out to the big world at times. You will remember that, won’t you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll try to remember,” said Herbert. He bent his head over his hands on
- the mantelshelf. “I’ve been selfish,” he said. “Blinded with selfishness
- and self-conceit. God forgive me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Perhaps we have all been a little selfish,” said Mrs. Heywood quietly.
- “But we shall have some one else to think about now. A new life, Herbert.
- A new life is coming to us all!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hush!” said Herbert. “Here’s Clare.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The mother and son stood listening to the voice of Clare singing in the
- hall. She was singing the old nursery rhyme of—=
- </p>
- <p>
- ```"Sing a song of sixpence,
- </p>
- <p>
- ```A pocket-full of rye,
- </p>
- <p>
- ```Four and twenty blackbirds
- </p>
- <p>
- ```Baked in a pie,
- </p>
- <p>
- ```When the pie was opened——-“=
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Heywood smiled into her son’s eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think I’ve left my spectacles in the other room,” she said. She went
- out into the hall, leaving her son alone.
- </p>
- <p>
- And Herbert stood with his head raised, looking toward the door, eagerly,
- like a lover waiting for his bride.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then Clare came in. There was a smile about her lips, and she spoke
- cheerfully.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, you see I wasn’t long.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert strode toward her and took her hands and raised them to his lips.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clare, sweetheart! Is it true? Have you been called back to me?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare put her forehead down against his chest.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I never went very far away,” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- Presently Herbert spoke again with great cheerfulness.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I say, Clare. It’s a funny thing!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s a funny thing?” asked Clare, smiling at him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, I was reading the advertisements in the paper to-night—-”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Were <i>they</i> funny?” asked Clare.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No,” said Herbert, “but I saw something that would just suit us.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He went over to a side-table and picked up the newspaper. Sitting on the
- edge of the table, he read out an advertisement.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Here it is.... ‘Chelsea—Semi-detached house, dining-room,
- drawing-room, three bedrooms, and a large nursery. Shed for bicycle or
- perambulator.’”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clare laughed happily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, we might have both!” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- Herbert dropped the paper, came over to his wife, and kissed her hands
- again.
- </p>
- <h3>
- THE END
- </h3>
- <div style="height: 6em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-<pre>
-
-
-
-
-
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