A lady and her husband

by Amber Reeves Blanco White

Mary did not speak, and after a moment he went on. "You know me well enough to know that I don't like punishing people. I had rather they did their duty honestly and simply, so that I could reward them for it. But on the day that I began, from whatever reason, to comply with abuses, to overlook corruption of this sort, the downfall of the business would begin. It is Mrs. Black's duty to see that the girls she employs are of good character and come from respectable homes. We don't take girls whose wages are their only means of support, for obvious reasons. Still less do we take girls who are supporting other people. Of course, we make it up to those we employ in other ways: they don't come to us merely to earn a living, but that is not the point. The point is that either Mrs. Black's methods of inquiry are at fault, so that she has allowed herself to be deceived, or that she has become party to a conspiracy to deceive the firm. It's clear that something is wrong, for she had no right to dismiss Wilson for theft without reporting the case."

Mary, bewildered, tried to gain time. Perhaps it had been reported without his noticing it.

James smiled. "We don't dismiss people for theft every day, my dear, and when we do we make a full enquiry. It is only fair to the culprit. Besides a trouble of that sort is often a sign of something wrong."

"Perhaps she was sorry for Florrie—she knew that if she reported her Florrie would be ruined. It's a great responsibility, James, and after all she hadn't actually stolen anything."

James turned to her again, but not, this time, to study the entreaty of her face, he wished to give force, on the contrary, to his own attitude. "Really you're not very logical, Mary! The only responsibility of my managers is to perform the duties that I pay them for. I undertake that my employees shall not be dismissed unjustly, and it is for me to decide whether or not they shall be prosecuted. And as for not actually stealing, I gather from you that by the girl's own admission she was caught in the act of trying to open a cash-box. Five minutes later she might have opened it. For all I know she did—you'll hardly ask me to place much faith in the word of a person who lies so fluently. You told me that she told lies even to you, and her story of the man and the bracelet strikes me as a pure fabrication. It's exactly the sort of story such a girl would be likely to invent; if there was a man and a bracelet at all she probably stole it from him. If she was innocent, why was she so much afraid of being charged? It's not probable, to say the least of it, that an honest girl would commit a real theft—and a theft on her employer—in order to escape being charged with one that she hadn't committed." Mary did not speak, and, after a moment, he left the sofa and walked over to the window. There he felt more at ease; the near presence of her emotion had troubled him. It was creditable emotion, and though in this case he could not give way to it he would deal with it as gently as he could. His face cleared, "I understand your feeling, little mother. You are sorry for her, and you don't want it to seem that you have taken advantage of her confidence. But if you think it over you will see that the results of my action can't now affect Wilson, and I undertake that your name shall not be connected with the matter in any way. You can't seriously have thought that I should bring you into it. And as a concession to you I am prepared to behave with every possible leniency towards Mrs. Black. Beyond that I think you must leave it to me."

Mary looked up at him as he stood dark against the waning light. Her protest against his words was mingled with the excitement of a discovery. She had been right last night—the mood she had chanced upon had neither been an accident nor unimportant. It had sprang from some deep essential in his mind. To-day it was overlaid with patience and with kindness, but none the less it shut him away from her, made him impervious to her entreaties, insensitive to whatever truth might lie in her point of view.

She felt now that she had suspected all her life the existence of this baffling quality. It was what she had feared when she had not wished to touch his business life. She had not only been afraid of herself, she had been afraid of him. As she had known him he had made her, their children, their relation to one another, the pivot of his life; here she was discovering another principle of loyalty, another axis round which his judgment and his ideals might revolve. He didn't misunderstand her now because he wished to wound her, or even because he would not take the trouble to examine what she said. Her wishes, potent as they were, had run counter to something stronger than themselves—she had not merely then to persuade him, she had to overcome his resistance.

Her mind was so busied with this thought that for a moment or two she did not speak. James, believing that she was considering the force of his words, did not hurry her. Then she made one more attempt to reach him.

"Perhaps I didn't explain very well, James. I didn't mean that what I minded was Mrs. Black's knowing that I had betrayed her to you, if it turns out that I have. I should mind that, because it would make all these women hate me when I only wished to do them a kindness. But what I mind most is being used, in actual fact, as an instrument of misfortune, as the channel of your displeasure—you force me to become a spy in fact, whether anyone knows it or not. And, you know, I resent it, I'm not prepared to be made use of in such a manner. It's a thing between me and you James, not between me and them—" She stopped, her eyes fixed on his face for some sign of comprehension.

James turned away a little, evading her gaze. "I'm very sorry," he said, "I'm exceedingly sorry. I had no more idea than you that this unhappy position would arise. Normally one couldn't have supposed that information of this sort would come into your possession. But since it has I do not see that I can be expected to disregard it. This girl must have known perfectly well that in telling you she was as good as telling me."