Afterwards, and Other Stories. Ian Maclaren
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hours more and he'll be here,' and by that time she had your telegram in her hand.
“When I came back the change had come, and she said, 'It's not God's will; bring Bertie.'
“So she kissed him, and said something to him, but we did not listen. After the nurse had carried him out—for he was weeping bitterly, poor little chap—she whispered to me to get a sheet of paper and sit down by her bedside. … I think it would be better … very well, I will tell you all.
“I wrote what she dictated with her last breath, and I promised you would receive it from her own hand, and so you will. She turned her face to the door and lay quite still till about six, when I heard her say your name very softly, and a minute afterwards she was gone, without pain or struggle.” …
She lay as she had died, waiting for his coming, and the smile with which she had said his name was still on her face. It was the first time she did not colour with joy at his coming, that her hand was cold to his touch. He kissed her, but his heart was numbed, and he could not weep.
Then he took her letter and read it beside that silence.
“Dearest—
“They tell me now that I shall not live to see you come in and to cast my arms once more round your neck before we part Be kind to Bertie, and remember that he is delicate and shy. He will miss me, and you will be patient with him for my sake. Give him my watch, and do not let him forget me. My locket with your likeness I would like left on my heart. You will never know how much I have loved you, for I could never speak. You have been very good to me, and I want you to know that I am grateful; but it is better perhaps that I should die, for I might hinder you in your future life. Forgive me because I came short of what your wife should have been. None can ever love you better. You will take these poor words from a dead hand, but I shall see you, and I shall never cease to love you, to follow your life, to pray for you—my first, my only love.”
The fountains within him were broken, and he flung himself down by the bedside in an agony of repentance.
“Oh, if I had known before; but now it is too late, too late!”
For we sin against our dearest not because we do not love, but because we do not imagine.
II
Maud Trevor was a genuine woman, and kept her accounts with the aid of six purses. One was an ancient housewife of her grandmother's, which used to be equipped with silk and thread and needles and buttons, and from a secret place yielded to the third generation a bank note of value. This capacious receptacle was evidently intended for the household exchequer, whose transactions were innumerable, and whose monthly budget depended for success on an unfailing supply of copper. Another had come from her mother, and was of obsolete design—a bag closed at both extremities, with a long narrow slit in the middle, and two rings which compressed the gold into one end and the silver into the other. This was marked out by Providence for charity, since it made no provision for pennies, and laid a handicap of inconvenience on threepenny bits. It retained a subtle trace of an old-fashioned scent her mother loved, and recalled her mother going out on some errand of mercy—a St. Clare in her sacrifices and devotion. Purse three descended from her father, and was an incarnation of business—made of chamois leather with a steel clasp that closed with a click, having three compartments within, one of which had its own clasp and was reserved for gold. In this bank Maud kept the funds of a clothing society, whose more masterly bargains ran sometimes into farthings, and she was always haunted with anxiety lest a new farthing and a half-sovereign should some day change places. A pretty little purse with ivory sides and silver hinges—a birthday gift of her girlhood—was large enough to hold her dress allowance, which Trevor had fixed at a most generous rate when he had barely four hundred a year, and had since forgotten to increase. One in sealskin had been a gift of engagement days, and held the savings of the year against birthday and Christmas presents—whose contents were the subject of many calculations. A cast-off purse of Trevor's had been devoted to Bertie, and from its resources came one way or other all he needed; but it happened that number six was constantly reinforced from the purse with the ivory sides.
Saturday afternoon was sacred to book-keeping, and Maud used her bed as a table for this critical operation, partly because it was so much larger than an escritoire, but chiefly because you could empty the purses into little pools with steep protecting banks. Of course if one sat down hurriedly there was great danger of amalgamation, with quite hopeless consequences; and Trevor held over Maud's head the chance of his making this mistake. It was his way, before he grew too busy, to watch till the anxious face would suddenly brighten and a rapid change be made in the pools—the household contributing something to presents and the dress purse to Bertie, while private and public charity would accommodate each other with change. Caresses were strictly forbidden in those times of abstruse calculation, and the Evil One who stands at every man's elbow once tempted Trevor to roll the counterpane into a bundle—purses, money, and all—but Maud, when he confessed, said that no human being would be allowed to fall into such wickedness.
Trevor was obliged to open her wardrobe, fourteen days after the funeral, and the first thing he lighted upon was the purses. They lay in a row on an old account-book—a motley set indeed—but so absurd and tricky a spirit is pathos, they affected him more swiftly than the sight of a portrait Was ever any one so faithful and conscientious, so self-forgetful and kind, so capable also and clever in her own sphere? Latterly he had sneered at the purses, and once, being vexed at something in a letter, he had told Maud she ought to have done with that folly and keep her accounts like an educated woman. “A girl of twelve would be ashamed.” … What a merciless power memory wields. She only drooped her head, … it was on the sealskin purse the tear fell, and at once he saw the bend of the Wye at Tintern where he had surprised her with the gift of that purse. He was moved to kiss away that tear, but his heart hardened. Why could she not be like the women he knew? … Well, he would not be troubled any longer with her simple ways … he could do as he pleased now with the purses. … A bitter madness of grief took possession of him, and he arranged them on the bed.
One was empty, the present purse, and he understood … the dress purse, of course, a little silver only … the rest had gone that he might have something beautiful. … He knew that it must be done sooner or later, and to-day was best, for his heart could be no sorer. … Yes, here they were, the ungiven gifts. For every person, from himself to the nurse; all wrapped in soft white paper and ready in good time. … She used to arrange everything on Christmas Eve … this year he had intended to stay at Cannes, … there would just have been Bertie and his mother, now … But he must open it—an inkstand for his study in solid brass, with pens and other things complete—he noted every detail as if to estimate its value. It came back to him how she had cunningly questioned him about his needs before he left for Cannes, till he grew impatient. “Don't bother me about ink-bottles,” Yes, the very words, and others … the secret writing of memory came out in this fire of sorrow. “Why won't women understand that a man can't answer questions about trifles when he has work on hand?” He could swear to the words, and he knew how Maud looked, although he did not see.
“Don't go away; you promised that you would sit beside me when I worked—hinder me? I suppose you are bidding for a kiss; you know the sight of your face inspires me.” … That was ten years ago … he might have borne with her presence a little longer. … She never would come again … he would have no interruptions of that kind. …
Her gloves, sixes—what a perfect hand it was (smoothes out the glove). His memory brings up a dinner table. Mrs. Chatterby gives her opinion on Meredith's last novel, and helps herself to salt—he sees a disgusting hand, with stumpy fingers, and, for impudence, a street arab of a thumb. A vulgar little woman through and through, and yet because she picked up scraps from the monthlies, and had the trick of catch-words, people paid her court And he had sometimes thought, but he knew better to-day … of all things in the world a glove is the surest symbol. Mended, too, very neatly … that he might have his hansoms.
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