'Yes, I think we'd better be getting home,' Kate answered dreamily.
After some searching, they found a huge stairway cut for the use of bathers in the side of the cliff, and up this feet-torturing path Montgomery helped Kate carefully and lovingly.
XIV
From Blackpool Morton and Cox's opera company proceeded to Southport, and, still going northward, they visited Newcastle, Durham, Dundee, Glasgow, and Edinburgh. But in no one town did they remain more than a week. Every Sunday morning, regardless as swallows of chiming church-bells, they met at the station and were whirled as fast as steam could take them to new streets, lodging-houses, and theatres. To Kate this constant change was at once wearying and perplexing, and she often feared that she would never become accustomed to her new mode of life. But on the principle that we can scarcely be said to be moving when all around is moving in a like proportion, Kate learned to regard locality as a mere nothing, and to fix her centre of gravity in the forty human beings who were wandering with her, bound to her by the light ties of opéra bouffe.
Wherever she went her life remained the same. She saw the same faces, heard the same words. Were they likely to do good business? was debated when they alighted from the train; that they had or had not done good business was affirmed when they jumped into the train. Soon even the change of apartments ceased to astonish her, and she saw nothing surprising in the fact that her chest of drawers was one week on the right and the following on the left-hand side of her bed. Nor did she notice after two or three months of travelling whether wax flowers did or did not decorate the corners of her sitting-room, and it seemed to her of no moment whether the Venetian blinds were green or brown. The dinners she ate were as good in one place as in another; the family resemblance which slaveys bear to each other satisfied her eyes, and the difference of latitude and longitude between Glasgow and Aberdeen she found did not in the least alter her daily occupations.
Montgomery came to see her every morning, and the tunefulness of the piano was really all that reminded them of their change of residence. From twelve until three they worked at music, both vocal and instrumental. Dick sought for excuses to absent himself, but when he returned he always insisted that Montgomery should remain to dinner. All formalities between them were abolished, and Kate did not hesitate to sit on her lover's knees in the presence of her music-master. But he did not seem to care, he only laughed a little nervously. Kate sometimes wondered if he really disliked witnessing such familiarities. In her heart of hearts she was conscious that there were affinities of sentiment between them, and during the music lessons they talked continually of love. The sight of Montgomery's lanky face often interrupted an emotional mood, but she recovered it again when he sat looking at her, talking to her of his music. In this way he became a necessity to her existence, a sort of spiritual light. They never wearied of talking about Dick; between them it was always Dick, Dick, Dick! He told her anecdotes concerning him—how he had acted certain parts; how he had stage-managed certain pieces; of supper parties; of adventures they had been engaged in. These stories amused Kate, although the odour of woman in which they were bathed, as in an atmosphere, annoyed and troubled her. As if to repay him for his kindness, she became confidential, and one day she told him the story of her life.
It would, she said, were it taken down, make the most wonderful story-book ever written; and beginning at the beginning, she gave rapidly an account of her childhood, accentuating the religious and severe manner in which she had been brought up, until the time she and her mother made the acquaintance of the Edes. There it was necessary to hesitate. She did not wish to tell an absolute lie, but was yet desirous to convey the impression that her marriage with Mr. Ede had been forced upon her; but Montgomery had already accepted it as a foregone conclusion. With his fingers twisted through his hair, and his head thrust forward in the position in which we are accustomed to see composers seeking inspiration depicted, he listened, passionately interested. And when it came to telling of the mental struggle she had gone through when struggling between her love for Dick and her duty towards her husband, Montgomery's face, under the influence of many emotions, straightened and contracted. He asked a hundred questions, and was anxious to know what she had thought of Dick when she saw him for the first time. She told him all she could remember. Her account of the visit to the potteries proved very amusing, but before she told him of their fall amid the cups and saucers she made Montgomery swear he would never breathe a word. 'Oh, the devil! Was that the way he cut his legs? He told us that he had forgotten his latchkey, and that he had done it in getting over the garden-wall.'
Running his hand over the piano, Montgomery begged of Kate to continue her story; but as she proceeded with the analysis of her passion the events became more and more difficult to narrate; and she knew not how to tell the tale how one dark night her husband sent her down to open the door to Dick; but she must tell everything so that the whole of the blame should not fall upon him. She alluded vaguely to violence and to force; Montgomery's face darkened and he protested against his friend's conduct.
To Kate it was consoling to meet someone who thought she was not entirely to blame, and the conversation came to a pause.
'And now I'm going about the country with you all, and am thinking of going on the stage.'