The Old Wives' Tale by Arnold Bennett (carter reed txt) 📕
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“Well,” said Sophia, “the doctor, for instance.”
“Dr. Stirling? I like that! He’s always saying that Bursley is one of the healthiest climates in England. He’s always sticking up for Bursley.”
“Dr. Stirling thinks you ought to go away more—not stay always in that dark house.” If Sophia had sufficiently reflected she would not have used the adjective ‘dark.’ It did not help her cause.
“Oh, does he!” Constance fairly snorted. “Well, if it’s of any interest to Dr. Stirling, I like my dark house.”
“Hasn’t he ever told you you ought to go away more?” Sophia persisted.
“He may have mentioned it,” Constance reluctantly admitted.
“When he was talking to me he did a good deal more than mention it. And I’ve a good mind to tell you what he said.”
“Do!” said Constance, politely.
“You don’t realize how serious it is, I’m afraid,” said Sophia. “You can’t see yourself.” She hesitated a moment. Her blood being stirred by Constance’s peculiar inflection of the phrase ‘my dark house,’ her judgment was slightly obscured. She decided to give Constance a fairly full version of the conversation between herself and the doctor.
“It’s a question of your health,” she finished. “I think it’s my duty to talk to you seriously, and I have done. I hope you’ll take it as it’s meant.”
“Oh, of course!” Constance hastened to say. And she thought: “It isn’t yet three months that we’ve been together, and she’s trying already to get me under her thumb.”
A pause ensued. Sophia at length said: “There’s no doubt that both your sciatica and your palpitations are due to nerves. And you let your nerves get into a state because you worry over trifles. A change would do you a tremendous amount of good. It’s just what you need. Really, you must admit, Constance, that the idea of living always in a place like St. Luke’s Square, when you are perfectly free to do what you like and go where you like—you must admit it’s rather too much.”
Constance put her lips together and bent over her embroidery.
“Now, what do you say?” Sophia gently entreated.
“There’s some of us like Bursley, black as it is!” said Constance. And Sophia was surprised to detect tears in her sister’s voice.
“Now, my dear Constance,” she remonstrated.
“It’s no use!” cried Constance, flinging away her work, and letting her tears flow suddenly. Her face was distorted. She was behaving just like a child. “It’s no use! I’ve got to go back home and look after things. It’s no use. Here we are pitching money about in this place. It’s perfectly sinful. Drives, carriages, extras! A shilling a day extra for each dog. I never heard of such goings-on. And I’d sooner be at home. That’s it. I’d sooner be at home.” This was the first reference that Constance had made for a long time to the question of expense, and incomparably the most violent. It angered Sophia.
“We will count it that you are here as my guest,” said Sophia, loftily, “if that is how you look at it.”
“Oh no!” said Constance. “It isn’t the money I grudge. Oh no, we won’t.” And her tears were falling thick.
“Yes, we will,” said Sophia, coldly. “I’ve only been talking to you for your own good. I—”
“Well,” Constance interrupted her despairingly, “I wish you wouldn’t try to domineer over me!”
“Domineer!” exclaimed Sophia, aghast. “Well, Constance, I do think—”
She got up and went to her bedroom, where the dogs were imprisoned. They escaped to the stairs. She was shaking with emotion. This was what came of trying to help other people! Imagine Constance …! Truly Constance was most unjust, and quite unlike her usual self! And Sophia encouraged in her breast the feeling of injustice suffered. But a voice kept saying to her: “You’ve made a mess of this. You’ve not conquered this time. You’re beaten. And the situation is unworthy of you, of both of you. Two women of fifty quarreling like this! It’s undignified. You’ve made a mess of things.” And to strangle the voice, she did her best to encourage the feeling of injustice suffered.
‘Domineer!’
And Constance was absolutely in the wrong. She had not argued at all. She had merely stuck to her idea like a mule! How difficult and painful would be the next meeting with Constance, after this grievous miscarriage!
As she was reflecting thus the door burst open, and Constance stumbled, as it were blindly, into the bedroom. She was still weeping.
“Sophia!” she sobbed, supplicatingly, and all her fat body was trembling. “You mustn’t kill me … I’m like that—you can’t alter me. I’m like that. I know I’m silly. But it’s no use!” She made a piteous figure.
Sophia was aware of a lump in her throat.
“It’s all right, Constance; it’s all right. I quite understand. Don’t bother any more.”
Constance, catching her breath at intervals, raised her wet, worn face and kissed her.
Sophia remembered the very words, ‘You can’t alter her,’ which she had used in remonstrating with Cyril. And now she had been guilty of precisely the same unreason as that with which she had reproached Cyril! She was ashamed, both for herself and for Constance. Assuredly it had not been such a scene as women of their age would want to go through often. It was humiliating. She wished that it could have been blotted out as though it had never happened. Neither of them ever forgot it. They had had a lesson. And particularly Sophia had had a lesson. Having learnt, they left the Rutland, amid due ceremonies, and returned to St. Luke’s Square.
I
The kitchen steps were as steep, dark, and difficult as ever. Up those steps Sophia Scales, nine years older than when she had failed to persuade Constance to leave the Square, was carrying a large basket, weighted with all the heaviness of Fossette. Sophia, despite her age, climbed the steps violently, and burst with equal violence into the parlour, where she deposited the basket on the floor near the empty fireplace. She was triumphant and breathless. She looked at Constance, who had been standing near the door in the attitude of a shocked listener.
“There!” said Sophia. “Did you hear how she talked?”
“Yes,” said Constance. “What shall you do?”
“Well,” said Sophia. “I had a very good mind to order her out of the house at once. But then I thought I would take no notice. Her time will be up in three weeks. It’s best to be indifferent. If once they see they can upset you However, I wasn’t going to leave Fossette down there to her tender mercies a moment longer. She’s simply not looked after her at all.”
Sophia went on her knees to the basket, and, pulling aside the dog’s hair, round about the head, examined the skin. Fossette was a sick dog and behaved like one. Fossette, too, was nine years older, and her senility was offensive. She was to no sense a pleasant object.
“See here,” said Sophia.
Constance also knelt to the basket.
“And here,” said Sophia. “And here.”
The dog sighed, the insincere and pity-seeking sigh of a spoilt animal. Fossette foolishly hoped by such appeals to be spared the annoying treatment prescribed for her by the veterinary surgeon.
While the sisters were coddling her, and protecting her from her own paws, and trying to persuade her that all was for the best, another aged dog wandered vaguely into the room: Spot. Spot had very few teeth, and his legs were stiff. He had only one vice, jealousy. Fearing that Fossette might be receiving the entire attention of his mistresses, he had come to inquire into the situation. When he found the justification of his gloomiest apprehensions, he nosed obstinately up to Constance, and would not be put off. In vain Constance told him at length that he was interfering with the treatment. In vain Sophia ordered him sharply to go away. He would not listen to reason, being furious with jealousy. He got his foot into the basket.
“Will you!” exclaimed Sophia angrily, and gave him a clout on his old head. He barked snappishly, and retired to the kitchen again, disillusioned, tired of the world, and nursing his terrific grievance. “I do declare,” said Sophia, “that dog gets worse and worse.”
Constance said nothing.
When everything was done that could be done for the aged virgin in the basket, the sisters rose from their knees, stiffly; and they began to whisper to each other about the prospects of obtaining a fresh servant. They also debated whether they could tolerate the criminal eccentricities of the present occupant of the cave for yet another three weeks. Evidently they were in the midst of a crisis. To judge from Constance’s face every imaginable woe had been piled on them by destiny without the slightest regard for their powers of resistance. Her eyes had the permanent look of worry, and there was in them also something of the self-defensive. Sophia had a bellicose air, as though the creature in the cave had squarely challenged her, and she was decided to take up the challenge. Sophia’s tone seemed to imply an accusation of Constance. The general tension was acute.
Then suddenly their whispers expired, and the door opened and the servant came in to lay the supper. Her nose was high, her gaze cruel, radiant, and conquering. She was a pretty and an impudent girl of about twenty-three. She knew she was torturing her old and infirm mistresses. She did not care. She did it purposely. Her motto was: War on employers, get all you can out of them, for they will get all they can out of you. On principle—the sole principle she possessed—she would not stay in a place more than six months. She liked change. And employers did not like change. She was shameless with men. She ignored all orders as to what she was to eat and what she was not to eat. She lived up to the full resources of her employers. She could be to the last degree slatternly. Or she could be as neat as a pin, with an apron that symbolized purity and propriety, as tonight. She could be idle during a whole day, accumulating dirty dishes from morn till eve. On the other hand she could, when she chose, work with astonishing celerity and even thoroughness. In short, she was born to infuriate a mistress like Sophia and to wear out a mistress like Constance. Her strongest advantage in the struggle was that she enjoyed altercation; she revelled in a brawl; she found peace tedious. She was perfectly calculated to convince the sisters that times had worsened, and that the world would never again be the beautiful, agreeable place it once had been.
Her gestures as she laid the table were very graceful, in the pert style. She dropped forks into their appointed positions with disdain; she made slightly too much noise; when she turned she manoeuvred her swelling hips as though for the benefit of a soldier in a handsome uniform.
Nothing but the servant had been changed in that house. The harmonium on which Mr. Povey used occasionally to play was still behind the door; and on the harmonium was the tea-caddy of which Mrs. Baines used to carry the key on her bunch. In the corner to the right of the fireplace still hung the cupboard where Mrs. Baines stored her pharmacopoeia. The rest of the furniture was arranged as it had been arranged when the death of Mrs. Baines endowed Mr. and Mrs. Povey with all the treasures of the house at Axe. And it was as good as ever; better than ever. Dr. Stirling often expressed the desire for a corner cupboard
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