"I'm damned if I will." Bethel stopped short and stretched his arms wide over the moor. "It isn't as if it would do them any good, and it would kill me. Why, one is deaf and blind and dumb as soon as one has work to do. I'm a child, you know. I've never grown up, and of course I hadn't any right to marry. I don't know now why I did. And all you people—you grown-ups—with your businesses and difficult pleasures and noisy feasts—of course you can't understand what these things mean. Only a few of you who sit with folded hands and listen can know what it is. I saw a picture once—some people feasting in a forest, and suddenly a little faun jumped from a tree on to their table and waited for them to play with him. But some were eating and some drinking and some talking scandal, and they did not see him. Only a little boy and an old man—they were doing nothing—just dreaming—and they saw him. Oh! I tell you, the dreamer has his philosophy and creed like the rest of you!"
"That's all very well," cried Harry. "But it's a case of bread and butter. You will be bankrupt if you go on as you are!"
"Oh no!" Bethel laughed. "Providence looks after the dreamers. Something always happens—I know something will happen now. We are on the edge of some good fortune. I can feel it."
The man was incorrigible—there was no doubt of it—but Harry had something further to say.
"Well, I want you to let me take a deeper interest in your affairs. May I ask your daughter to marry me?"
"What? Mary?" Bethel stopped and shouted—"Why! That's splendid! Of course, that's what Providence has been intending all this time. The very thing, my dear fellow——" and he put his arm on Harry's shoulder—"there's no one I'd rather give my girl to. But it's nothing to do with me, really. She'll know her mind and tell you what she feels about it. Dear me! Just to think of it!"
He broke out into continuous chuckles all the way home, and seemed to regard the whole affair as a great joke. Harry left him shouting at the moon. He had scarcely meant to speak of it so soon, but the thought of her struggle and the knowledge of her father's utter indifference decided matters. He went back to the house, determining on an interview in the morning.
Mary meanwhile had been spending an evening that was anything but pleasant—she had been going through her accounts and was horrified at what she saw. They were badly overdrawn, most of the shops had refused them further credit, and the little income that came to them could not hope to cover one-half of their expenses. What was to be done? Ruin and disgrace stared them in the face. They might borrow, but there was no one to whom she could go. They must, of course, give up their little house and go into rooms, but that would make very little difference. She looked at it from every point of view and could think of no easier alternative. She puzzled until her head ached, and the room, misty with figures, seemed to swim round her. She felt cruelly lonely, and her whole soul cried out for Harry—he would help her, he would tell her what to do. She knew now that she loved him with all the strength that was in her, that she had always loved him, from the first moment that she had known him. She remembered her promise to him that she would come and ask for his help if she really needed it—well, perhaps she would, in the end, but now, at least, she must fight it out alone. The first obvious thing was that her parents must know; that they would be of any use was not to be expected, but at least they must realise on what quicksands their house was built. They were like two children, with no sense whatever of serious consequences and penalties, and they would not, of course, realise that they were face to face with a brick wall of debts and difficulties and that there was no way over—but they must be told.
On the next morning, after breakfast, Mary penned her mother into the little drawing-room and broached the subject. Mrs. Bethel knew that something serious was to follow, and sat on the edge of her chair, looking exactly like a naughty child convicted of a fault. She was wearing a rather faded dress of bright yellow silk and little yellow shoes, which she poked out from under her dress every now and again and regarded with a complacent air.
"They are really not so shabby, Mary, my dear—not nearly so shabby as the blue ones, and a good deal more handsome—don't you think so, my dear? But you say you want to talk about something, so I'll be quiet—only if you wouldn't mind being just a little quick because there are, really, so many things to be done this morning, that it puzzles me how——"