The Spinners

by Eden Phillpotts

CHAPTER XXVIII

CLASH OF OPINIONS

Mr. Job Legg, with a persistence inspired by private purpose, continued to impress upon Nelly Northover the radical truth that in this world you cannot have anything for nothing. He varied the precept sometimes, and reminded her that we must not hope to have our cake and eat it too; and closer relations with Richard Gurd served to impress upon Mrs. Northover the value of these verities. Nor did she resent them from Mr. Legg. He had preserved an attitude of manly resignation under his supreme disappointment. He was patient, uncomplaining and self-controlled. He did not immediately give notice of departure, but, for the present, continued to do his duty with customary thoroughness. He showed himself a most tactful man. New virtues were manifested in the light of the misfortune that had overtaken him. Affliction and reverse seemed to make him shine the brighter. Nelly could hardly understand it. Had she not regarded his character as one of obvious simplicity and incapable of guile, she might have felt suspicious of any male who behaved with such exemplary distinction under the circumstances.

It was, of course, clear that the mistress of 'The Seven Stars' could not become Mr. Gurd's partner and continue to reign over her own constellation as of old. Yet Nelly did not readily accept a fact so obvious, even under Mr. Legg's reiterated admonitions. She felt wayward—almost wilful about it: and there came an evening when Richard dropped in for his usual half hour of courting to find her in such a frame of mind. Humour on his part had saved the situation; but he lacked humour, and while Nelly, even as she spoke, knew she was talking nonsense and only waited his reminder of the inevitable in a friendly spirit, yet, when the reminder came, it was couched in words so forcible and so direct, that for a parlous moment her own sense of humour broke down.

The initial error was Mr. Gurd's. The elasticity of youth, both mental and physical, had departed from him, and he took her remarks, uttered more in mischief than in earnest, with too much gravity, not perceiving that Nelly herself was in a woman's mood and merely uttering absurdities that he might contradict her. She was ready enough to climb down from her impossible attitude; but Richard abruptly threw her down; which unchivalrous action wounded Mrs. Northover to the quick and begat in her an obstinate and rebellious determination to climb up again.

"I'm looking on ahead," she began, while they sat in her parlour together. "This is a great upheaval, Richard, and I'm just beginning to feel how great. I'm wondering all manner of things. Will you be so happy and comfortable along with me, at 'The Seven Stars,' as you are at 'The Tiger'? You must put that to yourself, you know."

It was so absurd an assumption, that she expected his laughter; and if he had laughed and answered with inspiration, no harm could have come of it. But Richard felt annoyed rather than amused. The suggestion seemed to show that Mrs. Northover was a fool—the last thing he bargained for. He exhibited contempt. Indeed, he snorted in a manner almost insulting.

"Woman comes to man, I believe, not man to woman," he said.

"That is so," she admitted with a touch of colour in her cheeks at his attitude, "but you must think all round it—which you haven't done yet, seemingly."

Then Richard laughed—too late; for a laugh may lose all its value if the right moment be missed.

"Where's the fun?" she asked. "I thought, of course, that you'd be business-like as well as lover-like and would see 'The Seven Stars' had got more to it than 'The Tiger.'"

Even now the situation might have been saved. The very immensity of her claim rendered it ridiculous; but Richard was too astonished to guess an utterance so hyperbolic had been made to offer him an easy victory.

"You thought that, Nelly? 'The Seven Stars' more to it than 'The
Tiger'?"

"Surely!"

"Because you get a few tea-parties and old women at nine-pence a head on your little bit of grass?"

A counter so terrific destroyed the last glimmering hope of a peaceful situation, and Mrs. Northover perceived this first.

"It's war then?" she said. "So perhaps you'll tell me what you mean by my little bit of grass. Not the finest pleasure gardens in Bridport, I suppose?"

"Be damned if this ain't the funniest thing I've ever heard," he answered.

"You never was one to see a joke, we all know; and if that's the funniest thing you ever heard, you ain't heard many. And you'll forgive me, please, if I tell you there's nothing funny in my speaking about my pleasure gardens, though it does sound a bit funny to hear 'em called 'a bit of grass' by a man that's got nothing but a few apple trees, past bearing, and a strip of potatoes and weeds, and a fowl-run. But, as you've got no use for a garden, perhaps you'll remember the inn yard, and how many hosses you can put up, and how many I can."

"It's the number of hosses that comes—not the number you put up," he answered; "and if you want to tell me you've often obliged with a spare space in your yard, perhaps I may remind you that you generally got quite as good as you gave. But be that as it will, the point lies in one simple question, and I ask you if you really thought, as a woman nearer sixty than fifty and with credit for sense, that I was going to chuck 'The Tiger' and coming over to your shop. Did you really think that?"

Not for an instant had she thought it; but the time was inappropriate for saying so. She might have confessed the truth in the past; she might confess the truth in the future; she was not going to do so at present. He should have a stab for his stab.

"You've often told me I was the sensiblest woman in Dorset, Richard, and being that, I naturally thought you'd drop your bar-loafers' place and come over to me—and glad to come."

"Good God!" he said, and stared at her with open nostrils, from which indignant air exploded in gusts.

She began to make peace from that moment, feeling that the limit had been reached. Indeed she was rather anxious. The thrust appeared to be mortal. Mr. Gurd rolled in his chair, and after his oath, could find no further words.

She declared sorrow.

"There—forgive me—I didn't mean to say that. 'Tis a crying shame to see two old people dressing one another down this way. I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings, but don't forget you've properly trampled on mine. My pleasure grounds are my lifeblood you might say; and you knew it."

"You needn't apologise now. 'The Tiger' a bar-loafers' place! The centre of all high-class sport in the district a bar-loafers' place! Well, well! No wonder you thought I'd be glad to come and live at 'The Seven Stars'!"

"I didn't really," she confessed. "I knew very well you wouldn't; but I had to say it. The words just flashed out. And if I'd remembered a joke was nothing to you, I might have thought twice."

"I laughed, however."

"Yes, you laughed, I grant—what you can do in that direction, which ain't much."

Mr. Gurd rose to his full height.

"Well, that lets me out," he said. "We'd better turn this over in a forgiving spirit; and since you say you're sorry, I won't be behind you, though my words was whips to your scorpions and you can't deny it."

"We'll meet again in a week," said Mrs. Northover.

"Make it a fortnight," he suggested.

"No—say a month," she answered—"or six weeks."

Then it was Richard's turn to feel the future in danger. But he had no intention to eat humble pie that evening.

"A month then. But one point I wish to make bitter clear, Nelly. If you marry me, you come to 'The Tiger.'"

"So it seems."

"Yes—bar-loafers, or no bar-loafers."

"I'll bear it in mind, Richard."

The leave-taking lacked affection and they parted with full hearts. Each was smarting under consciousness of the other's failure in nice feeling; each was amazed as at a revelation. Richard kept his mouth shut concerning this interview, for he was proud and did not like to confess even to himself that he stood on the verge of disaster; but Mrs. Northover held a familiar within her gates, and she did not hesitate to lay the course of the adventure before Job Legg.

"The world is full of surprises," said Nelly, "and you never know, when you begin talking, where the gift of speech will land you. And if you're dealing with a man who can't take a bit of fun and can't keep his eyes on his tongue and his temper at the same time, trouble will often happen."

She told the story with honesty and did not exaggerate; but Mr. Legg supported her and held that such a self-respecting woman could have done and said no less. He declared that Richard Gurd had brought the misfortune on himself, and feared that the innkeeper's display revealed a poor understanding of female nature.

"It isn't as if you was a difficult and notorious sort of woman," explained Job; "for then the man might have reason on his side; but to misunderstand you and overlook your playful touch—that shows he's got a low order of brain; because you always speak clearly. Your word is as good as your bond and none can question your judgment."

He proceeded to examine the argument earnestly and had just proved that
Mrs. Northover was well within her right to set 'The Seven Stars' above
'The Tiger,' when Raymond Ironsyde entered.

He returned from dining with his aunt, and an interview now concluded was of very painful and far-reaching significance. For they had not agreed, and Miss Ironsyde proved no more able to convince her nephew than was he, to make her see his purpose combined truest wisdom and humanity.

They talked after dinner and she invited him to justify his conduct if he could, before hearing her opinions and intentions. He replied at once and she found his arguments and reasons all arrayed and ready to his tongue. He spoke clearly and stated his case in very lucid language; but he irritated her by showing that his mind was entirely closed to argument and that he was not prepared to be influenced in any sort of way. Her power had vanished now and she saw how only her power, not her persuasion, had won Raymond before his brother's death. He spoke with utmost plainness and did not spare himself in the least.

"I've been wrong," he said, "but I'm going to try and be right in the future. I did a foolish thing and fell in love with a good and clever girl. Once in love, of course, everything was bent and deflected to be seen through that medium and I believed that nothing else mattered or ever would. Then came the sequel, and being powerless to resist, I was going to marry. For some cowardly reason I funked poverty, and the thought of escaping it made me agree to marry Sabina, knowing all the time it must prove a failure. That was my second big mistake, and the third was asking her to come and live with me without marrying her. I suggested that, because I wanted her and felt very keen about the child. I ought not to have thought of such a thing. It wasn't fair to her—I quite see that."

"Can anything be fair to her short of marriage?"

"Not from her point of view, Aunt Jenny."

"And what other point of view, in keeping with honour and religion, exists?"

"As to religion, I'm without it and so much the freer. I don't want to pretend anything I don't feel. I shall always be very sorry, indeed, for what I did; but I'm not going to wreck my life by marrying Sabina."

"What about her life?"

"If she will trust her life to me, I shall do all in my power to make it a happy and easy life. I want the child to be a success. I know it will grow up a reproach to me and all that sort of thing in the opinion of many people; but that won't trouble me half as much as my own regrets. I've not done anything that puts me beyond the, pale of humanity—nor has Sabina; and if she can keep her nerve and go on with her life, it ought to be all right for her, presently."

"A very cynical attitude and I wish I could change it, Raymond. You've lost your self-respect and you know you've done a wrong thing. Can't you see that you'll always suffer it if you take no steps to right it? You are a man of feeling, and power can't lessen your feeling. Every time you see that child, you will know that you have brought a living soul into the world cruelly handicapped by your deliberate will."

"That's not a fair argument," he answered. "If our rotten laws handicap the baby, it will be my object to nullify the handicap to the best of my ability. The laws won't come between me and my child, any more than they came between me and my passion. I'm not the sort to hide behind the mean English law of the natural child. But I'm not going to let that law bully me into marriage with Sabina. I've got to think of myself as well as other people. I won't say, what's true—that if Sabina married me she wouldn't be happy in the long run; but I will say that I know I shouldn't be, and I'm not prepared to pay any penalty whatever for what I did, beyond the penalty of my own regrets."

"If you rule religion out and think you can escape and keep your honour, I don't know what to say," she answered. "For my part I believe Sabina would make you a very good and loving wife. And don't fancy, if you refuse her what faithfully you promised her, she will be content with less."

"That's her look out. You won't be wise, Aunt Jenny, to influence her against a fair and generous offer. I want her to live a good life, and I don't want our past love-making to ruin that life, or our child to ruin that life. If she's going to pose as a martyr, I can't help it. That's the side of her that wrecked the show, as a matter of fact, and made it very clear to me that we shouldn't be a happy married couple."

"Self-preservation is a law of nature. She only did what any girl would have done in trying to find friends to save her from threatened disaster."

"Well, I dare say it was natural to her to take that line, and it was equally natural to me to resent it. At any rate we know where we stand now. Tell me if there's anything else."

"I only warn you that she will accept no benefits of any kind from you,
Raymond. And who shall blame her?"

"That's entirely her affair, of course. I can't do more than admit my responsibilities and declare my interest in her future."

"She will throw your interest back in your face and teach her child to despise you, as she does."

"How d'you know that, Aunt Jenny?"

"Because she's a proud woman. And because she would lose the friendship of all proud women and clean thinking men if she condoned what you intend to do. It's horrible to see you turned from a simple, stupid, but honourable boy, into a hard, selfish, irreligious man—and all the result of being rich. I should never have thought it could have made such a dreadful difference so quickly. But I have not changed, Raymond. And I tell you this: if you don't marry Sabina; if you don't see that only so can you hold up your head as an honest man and a respectable member of society, worthy of your class and your family, then, I, for one, can have no more to do with you. I mean it."

"I'm sorry you say that. You've been my guardian angel in a way and I've a million things to thank you for from my childhood. It would be a great grief to me, Aunt Jenny, if you allowed a difference of opinion to make you take such a line. I hope you'll think differently."

"I shall not," she said. "I have not told you this on the spur of the moment, or before I had thought it out very fully and very painfully. But if you do this outrageous thing, I will never be your aunt any more, Raymond, and never wish to see you again as long as I live. You know me; I'm not hysterical, or silly, or even sentimental; but I'm jealous for your father's name—and your brother's. You know where duty and honour and solemn obligation point. There is no reason whatever why you should shirk your duty, or sully your honour; but if you do, I decline to have any further dealings with you."

He rose to go.

"That's definite and clear. Good-bye, Aunt Jenny."

"Good-bye," she said. "And may God guide you to recall that 'good-bye,' nephew."

Then he went back to 'The Seven Stars,' and wondered as he walked, how the new outlook had shrunk up this old woman too, and made one, who bulked so largely in his life of old, now appear as of no account whatever. He was heartily sorry she should have taken so unreasonable a course; but he grieved more for her sake than his own. She was growing old. She would lack his company in the time to come, and her heart was too warm to endure this alienation without much pain.

He suspected that if Sabina's future course of action satisfied Miss Ironsyde, she would be friendly to her and the child and, in time, possibly win some pleasure from them.