became the god-parent of the child.
Occasionally the minister stayed to tea with Mrs. Morel. Then she laid
the cloth early, got out her best cups, with a little green rim, and
hoped Morel would not come too soon; indeed, if he stayed for a pint,
she would not mind this day. She had always two dinners to cook, because
she believed children should have their chief meal at midday, whereas
Morel needed his at five o'clock. So Mr. Heaton would hold the baby,
whilst Mrs. Morel beat up a batter-pudding or peeled the potatoes, and
he, watching her all the time, would discuss his next sermon. His ideas
were quaint and fantastic. She brought him judiciously to earth. It was
a discussion of the wedding at Cana.
"When He changed the water into wine at Cana," he said, "that is a
symbol that the ordinary life, even the blood, of the married husband
and wife, which had before been uninspired, like water, became filled
with the Spirit, and was as wine, because, when love enters, the whole
spiritual constitution of a man changes, is filled with the Holy Ghost,
and almost his form is altered."
Mrs. Morel thought to herself:
"Yes, poor fellow, his young wife is dead; that is why he makes his love
into the Holy Ghost."
They were halfway down their first cup of tea when they heard the
sluther of pit-boots.
"Good gracious!" exclaimed Mrs. Morel, in spite of herself.
The minister looked rather scared. Morel entered. He was feeling rather
savage. He nodded a "How d'yer do" to the clergyman, who rose to shake
hands with him.
"Nay," said Morel, showing his hand, "look thee at it! Tha niver
wants ter shake hands wi' a hand like that, does ter? There's too much
pick-haft and shovel-dirt on it."
The minister flushed with confusion, and sat down again. Mrs. Morel
rose, carried out the steaming saucepan. Morel took off his coat,
dragged his armchair to table, and sat down heavily.
"Are you tired?" asked the clergyman.
"Tired? I ham that," replied Morel. "YOU don't know what it is to be
tired, as I'M tired."
"No," replied the clergyman.
"Why, look yer 'ere," said the miner, showing the shoulders of his
singlet. "It's a bit dry now, but it's wet as a clout with sweat even
yet. Feel it."
"Goodness!" cried Mrs. Morel. "Mr. Heaton doesn't want to feel your
nasty singlet."
The clergyman put out his hand gingerly.
"No, perhaps he doesn't," said Morel; "but it's all come out of me,
whether or not. An' iv'ry day alike my singlet's wringin' wet. 'Aven't
you got a drink, Missis, for a man when he comes home barkled up from
the pit?"
"You know you drank all the beer," said Mrs. Morel, pouring out his tea.
"An' was there no more to be got?" Turning to the clergyman - "A man gets
that caked up wi' th' dust, you know, - that clogged up down a coal-mine,
he NEEDS a drink when he comes home."
"I am sure he does," said the clergyman.
"But it's ten to one if there's owt for him."
"There's water - and there's tea," said Mrs. Morel.
"Water! It's not water as'll clear his throat."
He poured out a saucerful of tea, blew it, and sucked it up through his
great black moustache, sighing afterwards. Then he poured out another
saucerful, and stood his cup on the table.
"My cloth!" said Mrs. Morel, putting it on a plate.
"A man as comes home as I do 's too tired to care about cloths," said
Morel.
"Pity!" exclaimed his wife, sarcastically.
The room was full of the smell of meat and vegetables and pit-clothes.
He leaned over to the minister, his great moustache thrust forward, his
mouth very red in his black face.
"Mr. Heaton," he said, "a man as has been down the black hole all day,
dingin' away at a coal-face, yi, a sight harder than that wall - "
"Needn't make a moan of it," put in Mrs. Morel.
She hated her husband because, whenever he had an audience, he whined
and played for sympathy. William, sitting nursing the baby, hated him,
with a boy's hatred for false sentiment, and for the stupid treatment of
his mother. Annie had never liked him; she merely avoided him.
When the minister had gone, Mrs. Morel looked at her cloth.
"A fine mess!" she said.
"Dos't think I'm goin' to sit wi' my arms danglin', cos tha's got a
parson for tea wi' thee?" he bawled.
They were both angry, but she said nothing. The baby began to cry, and
Mrs. Morel, picking up a saucepan from the hearth, accidentally knocked
Annie on the head, whereupon the girl began to whine, and Morel to shout
at her. In the midst of this pandemonium, William looked up at the big
glazed text over the mantelpiece and read distinctly:
"God Bless Our Home!"
Whereupon Mrs. Morel, trying to soothe the baby, jumped up, rushed at
him, boxed his ears, saying:
"What are YOU putting in for?"
And then she sat down and laughed, till tears ran over her cheeks, while
William kicked the stool he had been sitting on, and Morel growled:
"I canna see what there is so much to laugh at."
One evening, directly after the parson's visit, feeling unable to bear
herself after another display from her husband, she took Annie and the
baby and went out. Morel had kicked William, and the mother would never
forgive him.
She went over the sheep-bridge and across a corner of the meadow to the
cricket-ground. The meadows seemed one space of ripe, evening light,
whispering with the distant mill-race. She sat on a seat under the
alders in the cricket-ground, and fronted the evening. Before her, level
and solid, spread the big green cricket-field, like the bed of a sea of
light. Children played in the bluish shadow of the pavilion. Many rooks,
high up, came cawing home across the softly-woven sky. They stooped in
a long curve down into the golden glow, concentrating, cawing, wheeling,
like black flakes on a slow vortex, over a tree clump that made a dark
boss among the pasture.
A few gentlemen were practising, and Mrs. Morel could hear the chock
of the ball, and the voices of men suddenly roused; could see the white
forms of men shifting silently over the green, upon which already the
under shadows were smouldering. Away at the grange, one side of the
haystacks was lit up, the other sides blue-grey. A waggon of sheaves
rocked small across the melting yellow light.
The sun was going down. Every open evening, the hills of Derbyshire were
blazed over with red sunset. Mrs. Morel watched the sun sink from the
glistening sky, leaving a soft flower-blue overhead, while the western
space went red, as if all the fire had swum down there, leaving the
bell cast flawless blue. The mountain-ash berries across the field stood
fierily out from the dark leaves, for a moment. A few shocks of corn in
a corner of the fallow stood up as if alive; she imagined them bowing;
perhaps her son would be a Joseph. In the east, a mirrored sunset
floated pink opposite the west's scarlet. The big haystacks on the
hillside, that butted into the glare, went cold.
With Mrs. Morel it was one of those still moments when the small frets
vanish, and the beauty of things stands out, and she had the peace and
the strength to see herself. Now and again, a swallow cut close to her.
Now and again, Annie came up with a handful of alder-currants. The baby
was restless on his mother's knee, clambering with his hands at the
light.
Mrs. Morel looked down at him. She had dreaded this baby like a
catastrophe, because of her feeling for her husband. And now she felt
strangely towards the infant. Her heart was heavy because of the child,
almost as if it were unhealthy, or malformed. Yet it seemed quite well.
But she noticed the peculiar knitting of the baby's brows, and the
peculiar heaviness of its eyes, as if it were trying to understand
something that was pain. She felt, when she looked at her child's dark,
brooding pupils, as if a burden were on her heart.
"He looks as if he was thinking about something - quite sorrowful," said
Mrs. Kirk.
Suddenly, looking at him, the heavy feeling at the mother's heart melted
into passionate grief. She bowed over him, and a few tears shook swiftly
out of her very heart. The baby lifted his fingers.
"My lamb!" she cried softly.
And at that moment she felt, in some far inner place of her soul, that
she and her husband were guilty.
The baby was looking up at her. It had blue eyes like her own, but its
look was heavy, steady, as if it had realised something that had stunned
some point of its soul.
In her arms lay the delicate baby. Its deep blue eyes, always looking up
at her unblinking, seemed to draw her innermost thoughts out of her. She
no longer loved her husband; she had not wanted this child to come, and
there it lay in her arms and pulled at her heart. She felt as if the
navel string that had connected its frail little body with hers had not
been broken. A wave of hot love went over her to the infant. She held it
close to her face and breast. With all her force, with all her soul she
would make up to it for having brought it into the world unloved. She
would love it all the more now it was here; carry it in her love. Its
clear, knowing eyes gave her pain and fear. Did it know all about her?
When it lay under her heart, had it been listening then? Was there a
reproach in the look? She felt the marrow melt in her bones, with fear
and pain.
Once more she was aware of the sun lying red on the rim of the hill
opposite. She suddenly held up the child in her hands.
"Look!" she said. "Look, my pretty!"
She thrust the infant forward to the crimson, throbbing sun, almost with
relief. She saw him lift his little fist. Then she put him to her bosom
again, ashamed almost of her impulse to give him back again whence he
came.
"If he lives," she thought to herself, "what will become of him - what
will he be?"
Her heart was anxious.
"I will call him Paul," she said suddenly; she knew not why.
After a while she went home. A fine shadow was flung over the deep green
meadow, darkening all.
As she expected, she found the house empty. But Morel was home by ten
o'clock, and that day, at least, ended peacefully.
Walter Morel was, at this time, exceedingly irritable. His work seemed
to exhaust him. When he came home he did not speak civilly to anybody.
If the fire were rather low he bullied about that; he grumbled about his
dinner; if the children made a chatter he shouted at them in a way that
made their mother's blood boil, and made them hate him.
On the Friday, he was not home by eleven o'clock. The baby was unwell,
and was restless, crying if he were put down. Mrs. Morel, tired to
death, and still weak, was scarcely under control.
"I wish the nuisance would come," she said wearily to herself.
The child at last sank down to sleep in her arms. She was too tired to
carry him to the cradle.
"But I'll say nothing, whatever time he comes," she said. "It only works
me up; I won't say anything. But I know if he does anything it'll make
my blood boil," she added to herself.
She sighed, hearing him coming, as if it were something she could not
bear. He, taking his revenge, was nearly drunk. She kept her head
bent over the child as he entered, not wishing to see him. But it
went through her like a flash of hot fire when, in passing, he lurched
against the dresser, setting the tins rattling, and clutched at the
white pot knobs for support. He hung up his hat and coat, then returned,
stood glowering from a distance at her, as she sat bowed over the child.
"Is there nothing to eat in the house?" he asked, insolently, as if to a
servant. In certain stages of his intoxication he affected the
clipped, mincing speech of the towns. Mrs. Morel hated him most in this
condition.
"You know what there is in the house," she said, so coldly, it sounded
impersonal.
He stood and glared at her without moving a muscle.
"I asked a civil question, and I expect a civil answer," he said
affectedly.
"And you got it," she said, still ignoring him.
He glowered again. Then he came unsteadily forward. He leaned on the
table with one hand, and with the other jerked at the table drawer to
get a knife to cut bread. The drawer stuck because he pulled sideways.
In a temper he dragged it, so that it flew out bodily, and spoons,
forks, knives, a hundred metallic things, splashed with a clatter and a
clang upon the brick floor. The baby gave a little convulsed start.
"What are you doing, clumsy, drunken fool?" the mother cried.
"Then tha should get the flamin' thing thysen. Tha should get up, like
other women have to, an' wait on a man."
"Wait on you - wait on you?" she cried. "Yes, I see myself."
"Yis, an' I'll learn thee tha's got to. Wait on ME, yes tha sh'lt wait
on me - "
"Never, milord. I'd wait on a dog at the door first."
"What - what?"
He was trying to fit in the drawer. At her last speech he turned round.
His face was crimson, his eyes bloodshot. He stared at her one silent
second in threat.
"P-h!" she went quickly, in contempt.
He jerked at the drawer in his excitement. It fell, cut sharply on his
shin, and on the reflex he flung it at her.
One of the corners caught her brow as the shallow drawer crashed into
the fireplace. She swayed, almost fell stunned from her chair. To her
very soul she was sick; she clasped the child tightly to her bosom. A
few moments elapsed; then, with an effort, she brought herself to.
The baby was crying plaintively. Her left brow was bleeding rather
profusely. As she glanced down at the child, her brain reeling, some
drops of blood soaked into its white shawl; but the baby was at least
not hurt. She balanced her head to keep equilibrium, so that the blood
ran into her eye.
Walter Morel remained as he had stood, leaning on the table with one
hand, looking blank. When he was sufficiently sure of his balance,
he went across to her, swayed, caught hold of the back of her
rocking-chair, almost tipping her out; then leaning forward over her,
and swaying as he spoke, he said, in a tone of wondering concern:
"Did it catch thee?"
He swayed again, as if he would pitch on to the child. With the
catastrophe he had lost all balance.
"Go away," she said, struggling to keep her presence of mind.
He hiccoughed. "Let's - let's look at it," he said, hiccoughing again.
"Go away!" she cried.
"Lemme - lemme look at it, lass."
She smelled him of drink, felt the unequal pull of his swaying grasp on
the back of her rocking-chair.
"Go away," she said, and weakly she pushed him off.
He stood, uncertain in balance, gazing upon her. Summoning all her
strength she rose, the baby on one arm. By a cruel effort of will,
moving as if in sleep, she went across to the scullery, where she bathed
her eye for a minute in cold water; but she was too dizzy. Afraid lest
she should swoon, she returned to her rocking-chair, trembling in every
fibre. By instinct, she kept the baby clasped.
Morel, bothered, had succeeded in pushing the drawer back into its
cavity, and was on his knees, groping, with numb paws, for the scattered
spoons.
Her brow was still bleeding. Presently Morel got up and came craning his
neck towards her.
"What has it done to thee, lass?" he asked, in a very wretched, humble
tone.
"You can see what it's done," she answered.
He stood, bending forward, supported on his hands, which grasped his
legs just above the knee. He peered to look at the wound. She drew away
from the thrust of his face with its great moustache, averting her
own face as much as possible. As he looked at her, who was cold and
impassive as stone, with mouth shut tight, he sickened with feebleness
and hopelessness of spirit. He was turning drearily away, when he saw
a drop of blood fall from the averted wound into the baby's fragile,
glistening hair. Fascinated, he watched the heavy dark drop hang in
the glistening cloud, and pull down the gossamer. Another drop fell. It
would soak through to the baby's scalp. He watched, fascinated, feeling
it soak in; then, finally, his manhood broke.
"What of this child?" was all his wife said to him. But her low, intense
tones brought his head lower. She softened: "Get me some wadding out of
the middle drawer," she said.
He stumbled away very obediently, presently returning with a pad, which
she singed before the fire, then put on her forehead, as she sat with
the baby on her lap.
"Now that clean pit-scarf."
Again he rummaged and fumbled in the drawer, returning presently with a
red, narrow scarf. She took it, and with trembling fingers proceeded to
bind it round her head.
"Let me tie it for thee," he said humbly.
"I can do it myself," she replied. When it was done she went upstairs,
telling him to rake the fire and lock the door.
In the morning Mrs. Morel said:
"I knocked against the latch of the coal-place, when I was getting a
raker in the dark, because the candle blew out." Her two small children
looked up at her with wide, dismayed eyes. They said nothing, but their
parted lips seemed to express the unconscious tragedy they felt.
Walter Morel lay in bed next day until nearly dinner-time. He did not
think of the previous evening's work. He scarcely thought of anything,
but he would not think of that. He lay and suffered like a sulking dog.
He had hurt himself most; and he was the more damaged because he would
never say a word to her, or express his sorrow. He tried to wriggle out
of it. "It was her own fault," he said to himself. Nothing, however,
could prevent his inner consciousness inflicting on him the punishment
which ate into his spirit like rust, and which he could only alleviate
by drinking.
He felt as if he had not the initiative to get up, or to say a word, or
to move, but could only lie like a log. Moreover, he had himself violent
pains in the head. It was Saturday. Towards noon he rose, cut himself
food in the pantry, ate it with his head dropped, then pulled on his
boots, and went out, to return at three o'clock slightly tipsy and
relieved; then once more straight to bed. He rose again at six in the
evening, had tea and went straight out.
Sunday was the same: bed till noon, the Palmerston Arms till 2.30,
dinner, and bed; scarcely a word spoken. When Mrs. Morel went upstairs,
towards four o'clock, to put on her Sunday dress, he was fast asleep.
She would have felt sorry for him, if he had once said, "Wife, I'm
sorry." But no; he insisted to himself it was her fault. And so he
broke himself. So she merely left him alone. There was this deadlock of
passion between them, and she was stronger.
The family began tea. Sunday was the only day when all sat down to meals
together.
"Isn't my father going to get up?" asked William.
"Let him lie," the mother replied.
There was a feeling of misery over all the house. The children breathed
the air that was poisoned, and they felt dreary. They were rather
disconsolate, did not know what to do, what to play at.
Immediately Morel woke he got straight out of bed. That was
characteristic of him all his life. He was all for activity. The
prostrated inactivity of two mornings was stifling him.
It was near six o'clock when he got down. This time he entered without
hesitation, his wincing sensitiveness having hardened again. He did not
care any longer what the family thought or felt.
The tea-things were on the table. William was reading aloud from "The
Child's Own", Annie listening and asking eternally "why?" Both children
hushed into silence as they heard the approaching thud of their father's
stockinged feet, and shrank as he entered. Yet he was usually indulgent
to them.
Morel made the meal alone, brutally. He ate and drank more noisily than
he had need. No one spoke to him. The family life withdrew, shrank
away, and became hushed as he entered. But he cared no longer about his
alienation.
Immediately he had finished tea he rose with alacrity to go out. It was
this alacrity, this haste to be gone, which so sickened Mrs. Morel. As
she heard him sousing heartily in cold water, heard the eager scratch
of the steel comb on the side of the bowl, as he wetted his hair, she
closed her eyes in disgust. As he bent over, lacing his boots, there
was a certain vulgar gusto in his movement that divided him from the
reserved, watchful rest of the family. He always ran away from the
battle with himself. Even in his own heart's privacy, he excused
himself, saying, "If she hadn't said so-and-so, it would never have
happened. She asked for what she's got." The children waited in
restraint during his preparations. When he had gone, they sighed with
relief.
He closed the door behind him, and was glad. It was a rainy evening. The
Palmerston would be the cosier. He hastened forward in anticipation. All
the slate roofs of the Bottoms shone black with wet. The roads, always
dark with coal-dust, were full of blackish mud. He hastened along. The
Palmerston windows were steamed over. The passage was paddled with wet
feet. But the air was warm, if foul, and full of the sound of voices and
the smell of beer and smoke.
"What shollt ha'e, Walter?" cried a voice, as soon as Morel appeared in
the doorway.
"Oh, Jim, my lad, wheriver has thee sprung frae?"
The men made a seat for him, and took him in warmly. He was glad. In a
minute or two they had thawed all responsibility out of him, all shame,
all trouble, and he was clear as a bell for a jolly night.
On the Wednesday following, Morel was penniless. He dreaded his wife.
Having hurt her, he hated her. He did not know what to do with
himself that evening, having not even twopence with which to go to the
Palmerston, and being already rather deeply in debt. So, while his wife
was down the garden with the child, he hunted in the top drawer of
the dresser where she kept her purse, found it, and looked inside. It
contained a half-crown, two halfpennies, and a sixpence. So he took the
sixpence, put the purse carefully back, and went out.
The next day, when she wanted to pay the greengrocer, she looked in the
purse for her sixpence, and her heart sank to her shoes. Then she sat
down and thought: "WAS there a sixpence? I hadn't spent it, had I? And I
hadn't left it anywhere else?"
She was much put about. She hunted round everywhere for it. And, as she
sought, the conviction came into her heart that her husband had taken
it. What she had in her purse was all the money she possessed. But that
he should sneak it from her thus was unbearable. He had done so twice
before. The first time she had not accused him, and at the week-end he
had put the shilling again into her purse. So that was how she had known
he had taken it. The second time he had not paid back.
This time she felt it was too much. When he had had his dinner - he came
home early that day - she said to him coldly:
"Did you take sixpence out of my purse last night?"
"Me!" he said, looking up in an offended way. "No, I didna! I niver
clapped eyes on your purse."
But she could detect the lie.
"Why, you know you did," she said quietly.
"I tell you I didna," he shouted. "Yer at me again, are yer? I've had
about enough on't."
"So you filch sixpence out of my purse while I'm taking the clothes in."
"I'll may yer pay for this," he said, pushing back his chair in
desperation. He bustled and got washed, then went determinedly upstairs.
Presently he came down dressed, and with a big bundle in a blue-checked,
enormous handkerchief.
"And now," he said, "you'll see me again when you do."
"It'll be before I want to," she replied; and at that he marched out
of the house with his bundle. She sat trembling slightly, but her heart
brimming with contempt. What would she do if he went to some other
pit, obtained work, and got in with another woman? But she knew him too
well - he couldn't. She was dead sure of him. Nevertheless her heart was
gnawed inside her.
"Where's my dad?" said William, coming in from school.
"He says he's run away," replied the mother.
"Where to?"
"Eh, I don't know. He's taken a bundle in the blue handkerchief, and
says he's not coming back."
"What shall we do?" cried the boy.
"Eh, never trouble, he won't go far."
"But if he doesn't come back," wailed Annie.
And she and William retired to the sofa and wept. Mrs. Morel sat and
laughed.
"You pair of gabeys!" she exclaimed. "You'll see him before the night's
out."
But the children were not to be consoled. Twilight came on. Mrs. Morel
grew anxious from very weariness. One part of her said it would be a
relief to see the last of him; another part fretted because of keeping
the children; and inside her, as yet, she could not quite let him go. At
the bottom, she knew very well he could NOT go.