The Beth Book

When he had gone, Beth sat for a long time thinking; but she did no more reading that day, nor did she ever again consult Dan about the choice of books, or expect him to sympathise with her in her work.

For the first few months of her married life, she had no pocket-money at all. Aunt Grace Mary slipped two sovereigns into her hand when they parted, but these Beth kept, she hardly knew why, as she had her half-year's dividend to look forward to. About the time that her money was due, Dan began to talk incessantly of money difficulties. Bills were pressing, and he did not know where on earth to look for a five-pound-note. He did not think Beth too young to be worried morning, noon, and night on the subject, although she took it very seriously. One morning after he had made her look anxious, he suddenly remembered a letter he had for her, and handed it to her. It was from her lawyer, and contained a cheque for twenty-five pounds, the long-looked-forward-to pocket money.

"Will this be of any use to you?" Beth asked, handing him the cheque.

His countenance cleared. "Of use to me? I should think it would!" he exclaimed. "It will just make all the difference. You must sign it, though."

When she had signed it, he put it in his pocket-book, and his spirits went up to the cheery point. He adjusted his hat at the glass over the dining-room mantelpiece, lit a shilling cigar, and went off to his hospital jauntily. Beth was glad to have relieved him of his anxiety. She half hoped he might give her something out of the cheque, if it were only a pound or two, she wanted some little things so badly; but he never offered her a penny. She thought of Aunt Grace Mary's two sovereigns, but the dread of having nothing in case of an emergency kept her from spending them.

There was one thing Dan did which Beth resented. He opened her letters.

"Husband and wife are one," he said. "They should have no secrets from each other. I should like you to open my letters, too, but they contain professional secrets, you see, and that wouldn't do."

He spoke in what he called his cheery way, but Beth had begun to feel that there was another word which would express his manner better, and now it occurred to her.

"You have no right to open my letters," she said; "and being facetious on the subject does not give you any."

"But if I chose to?" he asked.

"It will be a breach of good taste and good feeling," she answered.

No more was said on the subject, and Dan did not open her letters for a little, but then he began again. He had always some excuse, however – either he hadn't looked at the address, or he had been impatient to see if there were any message for himself, and so on; but Beth was not mollified although she said nothing, and her annoyance made her secretive. She would watch for the postman, and take the letters from him herself, and conceal her own, so that Dan might not even know that she had received any.

She had a difficulty with him about another matter too. His lover-like caresses while they were engaged had not been distasteful to her; but after their marriage he kept up an incessant billing and cooing, and of a coarser kind, which soon satiated her. She was a nicely balanced creature, with many interests in life, and love could be but one among the number in any case; but Dan almost seemed to expect it to be the only one.

"Oh dear! must I be embraced again?" she exclaimed one day, with quite comical dismay on being interrupted in the middle of a book that was interesting her at the moment.

Dan looked disconcerted. In his cheerful masculine egotism it had not occurred to him that Beth might find incessant demonstrations of affection monotonous. He would smile at pictures of the waning of the honeymoon, where the husband returns to his book and his dog, and the wife sits apart sad and neglected; it was inevitable that the man should tire, he had other things to think of; but that the wife should be the first to be bored was incredible, and worse: it was unwomanly.

Dan went to the mantelpiece, and stood looking down into the fire, and his grey-green eyes became suffused.

"Have I hurt you, Dan?" Beth exclaimed, jumping up and going to him.

"Hurt me!" he said, taking out his pocket-handkerchief, "that is not the word for it. You have made me very unhappy."

"Oh!" said Beth, her own inclinations disregarded at once, "I am sorry!"

But he had satiated her once for all, and she never recovered any zest for his caresses. She found no charm or freshness in them, especially after she perceived that they were for his own gratification, irrespective of hers. The privileges of love are not to be wrested from us with impunity. Habits of dutiful submission destroy the power to respond, and all that they leave to survive of the warm reality of love at last is a cold pretence. By degrees, as Beth felt forced to be dutiful, she ceased to be affectionate.

Although Dan dressed to go out with scrupulous care, he took no trouble to make himself nice in the house. Care in dress was not in him a necessary part and expression of a refined nature, but an attempt to win consideration. He never dressed for dinner when they were alone together. It was a trouble rather than a refreshment to him to get rid of the dust of the day and the associations of his walking-dress. This was a twofold disappointment to Beth. She had expected him to have the common politeness to dress for her benefit, and she was not pleased to find that the punctiliousness he displayed in the matter on occasion was merely veneer. It was a defect of breeding that struck her unpleasantly. They had been poor enough at home, but Beth had been accustomed all her life to have delicate china about her, and pictures and books, to walk on soft carpets and sit in easy-chairs; possessions of a superior class which, in her case, were symbols bespeaking refinement of taste and habits from which her soul had derived satisfaction even while her poor little fragile body starved. She dressed regularly and daintily herself, and Dan at the bottom of the table in his morning coat was an offence to her. She said nothing at first, however, so his manners still further deteriorated, until one night, after she had gone to her room, he walked in with his hat on, smoking a cigar. It was this last discourtesy that roused her to rebel.

"This is my bedroom," she said significantly.

"I know," he answered.

"You know – yet you keep your hat on, and you are smoking," she proceeded.

"Why," he rejoined, "and if I do, what then? I know ladies who let their husbands smoke in bed."

"Probably," she said. "I have heard of more singularly coarse things than that even. But I am accustomed to pure air in my room, and I must have it."

"And suppose I should choose to stay here and smoke?" he said.

"Of course I could not prevent you," she answered; "but I should go and sleep in another room."

"H'm," he grunted. "You're mighty particular."

But he went away all the same, and did not appear there again either with his hat on or smoking a cigar.

Beth suffered miserably from the want of proper privacy in her life. She had none whatever now. It had been her habit to read and reflect when she went to bed, to prepare for a tranquil night by setting aside the troubles of the day, and purifying her mind systematically even as she washed her body; but all that was impossible if her husband were at home. He would break in upon her reading with idle gossip, fidget about the room when she wished to meditate, and leave her no decent time of privacy for anything. He had his own dressing-room, where he was secure from interruption, but never had the delicacy to comprehend that his presence could be any inconvenience to Beth. And it was worse than an inconvenience. It was a positive hardship – never to be sure of a moment alone.

One afternoon, when she had locked herself in her bedroom, he came and turned the handle of the door noisily.

"Open the door," he said.

"Do you want anything?" she asked.

"Open the door," he repeated.

She obeyed, and he came in, and glanced round suspiciously.

"What were you doing?" he asked.

"Oh," she exclaimed, "this is intolerable!"

"What is intolerable?" he demanded.

"This intrusion," she replied. "I want to be alone for a little; can't you understand that?"

"No, I cannot understand a wife locking her husband out of her room, and what's more, you've no business to do it. I've a legal right to come here whenever I choose."

Then Beth began to realise what the law of man was with regard to her person.

"I never intrude upon you when you shut yourself up," she remonstrated.

"Oh, that is different," he answered arrogantly. "I may have brainwork to do, or something important to think about There is no comparison."

Beth went to her dressing-table, sat down in front of it, folded her hands, and waited doggedly.

He looked at her for a little; then he said, "I don't understand your treatment of me at all, Beth. But there's no understanding women." He spoke as if it were the women's fault, and to their discredit, that he couldn't understand them.

Beth made no answer, and he finally took himself off, slamming the door after him.

"Thank goodness!" Beth exclaimed. "One would think he had bought me."

Then she sat wondering what she should do. She must have some corner where she would be safe from intrusion. He had his consulting-room, a room called his laboratory, a surgery, and a dressing-room, where no one would dream of following him if he shut the door; she had literally not a corner. She left her bedroom, and walked through the other rooms on the same floor as she considered the matter; then she went up to the next floor, where the servants slept. Above that again there was an attic used as a box-room, and she went up there too. It was a barn of a place, supported by pillars, and extending apparently over the whole of the storey below. The roof sloped to the floor on either side, and the whole place was but ill-lighted by two small windows looking to the north. Dr. Maclure had taken over the house as it stood, furniture and all, from the last occupants, by whom this great attic had evidently been used as a lumber-room. There were various pieces of furniture in it – tables, chairs, and drawers, some broken, some in fair condition. At the farther end, opposite to the door, there was a pile of packing-cases and travelling-trunks. Beth had always thought that they stood up against the wall, but on going over to them now, she discovered that there was a space behind. The pile was too high for her to see over it, but by going down on her hands and knees where the sloping roof was too low for her to stoop, she found she could creep round it. It was the kind of thing a child would have done, but what was Beth but a child? On the other side of the pile it was almost dark. She could see something, however, when she stood up, which looked like a mark on the whitewash, and on running her hand over it she discovered it to be a narrow door flush with the wall. There was no handle or latch to it, but there was a key which had rusted in the keyhole and was not to be turned. The door was not locked, however, and Beth pushed it open, and found herself in a charming little room with a fireplace at one end of it, and opposite, at the other end, a large bow window. Beth was puzzled to understand how there came to be a room there at all. Then she recollected a sort of tower there was at the side of the house, which formed a deep embrasure in the drawing-room, a dressing-room to the visitor's room, and a bath-room on the floor above. The window looked out on the garden at the back of the house. A light iron balcony ran round it, the rail of which was so thickly covered with ivy that very little of the window was visible from below. Beth had noticed it, however, only she thought it was a dummy, and so also did Dan. The little room looked bright and cosy with the afternoon sun streaming in. It seemed to have been occupied at one time by some person of fastidious taste, judging by what furniture remained – a square Chippendale table with slender legs, two high-backed chairs covered with old-fashioned tapestry, and a huge mahogany bookcase of the same period, with glass doors above and cupboards below. The high white mantelpiece, adorned with vases and festoons of flowers, was of Adam's design, and so also was the dado and the cornice. The walls were painted a pale warm pink. A high brass fender, pierced, surrounded the fireplace, and there were a poker, tongs, and shovel to match, and a small brass scuttle still full of coals. There were ashes in the grate, too, as if the room had only lately been occupied. The boards were bare, but white and well-fitting, and in one corner of the room there was a piece of carpet rolled up.

Beth dropped on to one of the dusty chairs, and looked round. Everything about her was curiously familiar, and her first impression was that she had been there before. On the other hand, she could hardly believe in the reality of what she saw, she thought she must be dreaming, for here was exactly what she had been pining for most in the whole wide world of late, a secret spot, sacred to herself, where she would be safe from intrusion.

She went downstairs for some oil for the lock, and patiently worked at it until at last she succeeded in turning the key. Then, as it was too late to do anything more that day, she locked the door, and carried the key off in her pocket triumphantly.

Half the night she lay awake thinking of her secret chamber; and as soon as Dan had gone out next morning, and she had done her housekeeping, she stole upstairs with duster and brush, and began to set it in order. All her treasures were contained in some old trunks of Aunt Victoria's which were in the attic, but had not been unpacked because she had no place to put the things. Dan had seen some of these treasures at Rainharbour, and considered them old rubbish, and, not thinking it likely that there would be anything else in the boxes, he had taken no further interest in them. He would have liked to have left them behind altogether, and even tried to laugh Beth out of what he called her sentimental attachment to odds and ends; but as most of the things had belonged to Aunt Victoria, she took his ridicule so ill that he wisely let the subject drop. He had been somewhat hasty in his estimation of the value of the contents of the boxes, however, for there were some handsome curios, a few miniatures and pictures of great artistic merit, some rare editions of books, besides laces, jewels, brocades, and other stuffs in them.

When Beth had swept and dusted, she put down the carpet. Then she began to unpack. Among the first things she found were the old French books, a quarto Bible with the Apocrypha in it, Shakespeare in several volumes, and her school-books and note-books; some ornaments, some beautiful old curtains, and a large deep rug, like a Turkey carpet, in crimson and green and purple and gold, worked by Aunt Victoria. This she spread before the fireplace. The doorway she covered with a curtain, and two more she hung on either side of the window, so that they could not be seen from below. Her books of reference, desk, note-books, and writing materials she put on the table, arranged the ornaments on the mantelpiece, and hung the miniatures and pictures on the walls. Then she sat down and looked about her, well pleased with the whole effect. "Now," she exclaimed, "I am at home, thank God! I shall be able to study, to read and write, think and pray at last, undisturbed."

CHAPTER XXXVIII

As Dan sympathised with none of Beth's tastes or interests, and seemed to have none of his own with which she could sympathise, their stock of conversation was soon exhausted, and there was nothing like companionship in their intercourse. If Beth had had no resources in herself, she would have had but a sorry time of it in those days, especially as she received no kindness from any one in Slane. Some of the other medical men's wives called when she first arrived, and she returned their calls punctually, but their courtesy went no farther. Mrs. Carne, the wife of the leading medical practitioner, asked her to lunch, and Mrs. Jeffreys, a surgeon's wife, asked her to afternoon tea; but as these invitations did not include her husband, she refused them. She invited these ladies and their husbands in return, however, but they both pleaded previous engagements.

After the Maclures had been some little time at Slane, Lady Benyon bethought her of an old friend of hers, one Lady Beg, who lived in the neighbourhood, and asked her to call upon Beth, which she did forthwith, for she was one of those delightful old ladies who like nothing better than to be doing a kindness. She came immediately, bringing an invitation to lunch on the following Sunday, already written in case she should find no one at home.

Dan was delighted, "We shall meet nothing but county people there," he said, "and that's the proper set for us. They always do the right thing, you see. They're the only people worth knowing."

"But Beg is miles away from here," Beth said; "how shall we go?"

"We'll go in the dogcart, of course," Dan answered.

He had set up a dogcart on their arrival, but this was the first time he had proposed to take Beth out in it.

As they drove along on Sunday morning in the bright sunshine, Dan's spirits overflowed in a characteristic way at the prospect of meeting "somebody decent," as he expressed it, and he made remarks about the faces and figures of all the women they passed on the road, criticising them as if they were cattle to be sold at so much a point.

"That little girl there," he said of one, whom he beamed upon and ogled as they passed, "reminds me of a fair-haired little devil I picked up one night in Paris. Gad! she was a bad un! up to more tricks than any other I ever knew. She used to – " (here followed a description of some of her peculiar practices).

"I wish you would not tell me these things," Beth remonstrated.

But he only laughed. "You know you're amused," he said. "It's just your conventional affectation that makes you pretend to object. That's the way women drive their husbands elsewhere for amusement; they won't take a proper intelligent interest in life, so there's nothing to talk to them about. I agree with the advanced party. They're always preaching that women should know the world. Women who do know the world have no nonsense about them, and are a jolly sight better company than your starched Puritans who pretend to know nothing. It's the most interesting side of life after all, and the most instructive; and I wonder at your want of intelligence, Beth. You shouldn't be afraid to know the natural history of humanity."

"Nor am I," Beth answered quietly; "nor the natural – or unnatural – depravity either, which is what you really mean, I believe. But knowing it, and delighting in it as a subject of conversation, are two very different things. Jesting about that side of life affects me like mud on a clean coat. I resent being splashed with it, and try to get rid of it, but unfortunately it sticks and stains."

"Oh, you're quite right," Dan answered unctuously. "It's just shocking the stories that are told – " and for the rest of the way he discoursed about morals, illustrating his meaning as he proceeded with anecdotes of the choicest description.

When they arrived at Beg House, they found the company more mixed than Dan had anticipated. Dr. and Mrs. Carne were there, Mr. and Mrs. Jeffreys, and Mr., Mrs., and Miss Petterick. Mr. Petterick was a solicitor of bumptious manners and doubtful reputation, whom the whole county hated, but tolerated because of his wealth and shrewdness, either of which they liked to be in a position to draw upon if necessary. But besides these townspeople, there were Sir George and Lady Galbraith, Mr. and Mrs. Kilroy of Ilverthorpe, and Mrs. Orton Beg, a widowed daughter-in-law of Lady Beg's.

Dr. Maclure immediately made up to Sir George Galbraith, who was also a medical man, and of great repute in his own line. He was a county magnate besides, and a man of wealth and importance by reason of a baronetcy somewhat unexpectedly inherited, and a beautiful country-seat. He continued to practise, however, for love of his profession, but used it as a means of doing good rather than as a source of income. In appearance he was a tall, rather awkward man, with a fine head and a strong, plain face. He spoke in that deliberate Scotch way which has a ring of sincerity in it and inspires confidence, and the contrast between his manner and Dan's struck Beth unpleasantly. She wished Dan would be less effusive; it was almost as if he were cringing; and she thought he should have waited for Sir George Galbraith, who was the older man, to have made the first advance.

Beth herself was at her ease as soon as she came among these people. It was the social atmosphere to which she had been accustomed. Mrs. Carne, Mrs. Jeffreys, and Mrs. Petterick were on their best behaviour, but Beth had only to be natural. The county people were all nice to her, and the other town ladies, who had hitherto slighted her, looked on and wondered to see her so well received. At luncheon, as there were not gentlemen enough to go round, she sat between Sir George Galbraith and Mrs. Orton Beg. Mrs. Kilroy sat opposite. Sir George had known Mrs. Kilroy all her life. It was he, in fact, who nicknamed her and her brother "The Heavenly Twins" in the days when, as children, they used to be the delight of their grandfather, the old Duke of Morningquest, and the terror of their parents, Mr. and Lady Adeline Hamilton-Wells.

As soon as they were seated, Mrs. Kilroy attacked Sir George on some subject which they had previously discussed, and there ensued a little playful war of words.

"Oh, you're just a phrase-maker," Mrs. Kilroy exclaimed at last, finding herself worsted; "and phrases prove nothing."

"What is a phrase-maker?" he asked with a twinkle.

"Why, a phrase-maker is a person who recklessly launches a saying, winged by wit, and of superior brevity and distinctness, but not necessarily true – a saying which flies direct to the mind, and, being of a cutting nature, carves an indelible impression there," said Mrs. Kilroy – "an impression which numbs the intellect and prevents us reasoning for ourselves. Opinion is formed for the most part of phrases, not of knowledge and observation. The things people say smartly are quoted, not because they are true, but because they are smart. A lie well put will carry conviction to the average mind more surely than a good reason if ill-expressed, because most people have an æsthetic sense that is satisfied by a happy play upon words, but few have reason enough to discriminate when the brilliant ingenuity of the phrase-maker is pitted against a plain statement of the bald truth."

"As, for instance?" asked Sir George.

"Man's love is of his life a thing apart,'Tis woman's whole existence,"

Mrs. Kilroy responded glibly. "That is quoted everywhere, and I have never heard it questioned, yet it is a flagrant case of confounding smartness with accuracy. Love of the kind that Byron meant is quite as much a thing apart from woman's life as from man's; more men, in fact, make the pursuit of it their whole existence than women do."

"You are right," said Sir George thoughtfully. "Love is certainly not a modern woman's whole existence, and she never dies of it. She feels it strongly, but it does not swamp her. In a bad attack, she may go to bed young one night and rise next day with grey hairs in her head, and write a book about it; but then she recovers: and I think you are right about phrases, too. 'Syllables govern the world,' John Selden said; but 'phrases' would have been the better word. Phrases are the keynotes to life; they set the tune to which men insensibly shape their course, and so rule us for good and ill. This is a time of talk, and formidable is the force of phrases. Catch-words are creative; they do not prove that a thing is – they cause it to be."

"Then an unscrupulous phrase-maker may be a danger to the community," Beth observed.

"Yes," said Sir George; "but on the other hand, one who is scrupulous would be a philanthropist of extraordinary power."

"Now, isn't that like his craft and subtlety, Evadne?" said Mrs. Kilroy to Lady Galbraith. "He has been gradually working up to that in order to make Mrs. Maclure suppose I intended to pay him a compliment when I called him a phrase-maker."