Elders and Betters (7 page)

“Now it must be the last time,” said Mrs. Calderon, walking between them to the house. “You make me feel that I am a party to disobedience.”

Jessica Calderon was a tall, spare woman of fifty-four; with dark, troubled eyes, thick, black hair so plainly bound that it escaped attention; a pale, even skin that was her only likeness to her brother, Benjamin Donne; and a fine, oval face whose signs of wear were so undisguised, that they became a personal characteristic. She gave the impression of being under some strain, and secretly preoccupied with it, so that those who were with her felt unsure of her full attention. She held the accepted faith and lived according to it, a trait that had possibly descended in another form to her children.

A small, grey-haired lady of sixty was seated in the hall, reading the paper. She glanced up as the group approached, but returned to the page. Her pupils were prepared for attention and reproof, but on relinquishing the paper she removed her glasses and polished them, and greeted them with a smile.

“I am afraid they are late, Miss Lacy,” said Jessica.

“I am not; I know they are,” said Miss Lacy, laughing and continuing to polish. “I am the better of it by a large part of
The Times.”

“I have told them it must not happen again. I am sure you will not allow it.”

“I don't know how I am to prevent it,” said Miss Lacy, in a low, sibilant, incisive voice, raising small, bright, blue
eyes from a round, sallow, peculiar face. “I am not able to cast my spells upon them from afar. And I am afraid that afar was the word.”

“They are generally in the garden,” said Jessica.

“But I am not,” said Miss Lacy, so much on the instant that the feeling under her words was clear. “I come here to teach, not to find occupation in the garden.”

“If I put a bell here, will you ring it?” said Jessica, in a humbler manner.

“By all means, if it is where it will catch my eye. I will impersonate the muffin-man to the utmost of my power.”

“Now obey the bell at once, children,” said Jessica. “I am quite ashamed that Miss Lacy has waited for you.”

“I have not done so; I do not follow that practice; I do not recommend it. I am not sure that I do not regret my half-hours with
The Times.”

“Does this happen often?” said Jessica.

“Often? Does it?” said Miss Lacy, wrinkling her brows in an effort to recall what did not make a deep impression. “No, I don't think so; I must not do people an injustice. But I would not say that it strikes me as quite unfamiliar.”

Jessica turned to an elder daughter, who was with her brother in the hall.

“Might you not have fetched the children, Tullia, my dear?”

“I happen to be of Miss Lacy's mind,” said the latter, in a slow, clear voice. “And when a young man is present, the errands are his affair.”

“What a cruel theory to hold about a class of unconscious creatures!” said the person named, remaining in his seat. “And Miss Lacy gave no sign that anything was amiss. She seemed to have come to read
The Times,
and to be attaining her end.”

Miss Lacy's laughter was heard from the stairs, which she was mounting with her pupils.

“Is there any news in
The Times?”
said Tullia, as if giving no further thought to the matter.

“I did not like to take the paper from Miss Lacy. And I did not really want to. I cannot bear news. It is all about foreign countries that are separated by the sea, and that is so cheerless for a lover of an English fireside. And I am always afraid of meeting some sort of heroism; and that seems to consist of finding some dreadful situation and throwing oneself into it, or of finding oneself in it and wilfully remaining there. And then I imagine myself in it, behaving in just the same way, and my emotion is too much for me. And when I think of other people seeing me in it, the thought quite unfits me for real life. So I cannot hunt for two hardy children in the garden. I think I have made it clear.”

“And yet you are going to teach Reuben Donne.”

“I am trusting to his being a poor, lame boy. I hope he is not a great, hearty creature. If he is, I have been misled. I know he is thirteen, and that is a suffering age. And he won't have the unconsciouus cruelty of real childhood. It is so shocking for cruelty to be unconscious. It makes it seem so deep and ingrained, as if it might lead to anything. And I believe it does. I once read a wicked book, called a school story.”

“What made you think of teaching him?” said Jessica. “I do not mean it is not a good idea.”

“I think it is a gross and humiliating one. All of you made me think of it, when you kept on saying that I had no regular work. I believe you said I was not earning a penny, though it sounds too crude to be believed. I do like the old-fashioned way of never mentioning money; it was much better not to know when there was not enough. And people really did not know, because they used suddenly to find themselves on the brink of ruin. There is a certain largeness about that. I believe that one of you referred to me as a strong young man, as if I were applying for a situation, and that is quite unjust.”

“Indeed it is,” said Tullia.

Terence Calderon was an odd-looking youth of twenty
four, who on a second glance presented a normal appearance. He seemed to be elfish and wizened, but had clear features and a supple frame; seemed to be weakly and drooping, but was sound in wind and limb. It seemed that he could resemble nobody, but his bright grey eyes recalled his cousin, Bernard's. In a word the quality of odd-ness did not lie in his physique. Since leaving Oxford he had lived at home, supposed to be considering professions, and doing so with insuperable distaste. There may have been something in him, that held him from sustaining effort, and the oddness was possibly seated here, though he would not himself have acknowledged that the word was in place. At Oxford he had been accepted as erratic, which goes to disprove the theory that such a place is a mirror of the world. He loved his mother better than anything on earth, except himself, and she did the same by him, without the reservation.

Tullia felt that she was second with both, and moved between them with a rather haughty aloofness, aware of being first in her father's life, and openly shelving other claims. She bore a strong likeness to her mother, and would have borne more, if the latter had softened the marks of time. She had Jessica's height and build and movement, similar but softer features, and the same suggestion of being apart from the ordinary world, which in her case was conscious and almost cultivated. Her eyes were larger and lighter and without the depth and strain. The mother and daughter seemed somehow to dim each other, and this had been suggested as their reason for being often apart; but Tullia did not harbour such ideas about herself, and Jessica could see the beauty of her child only with maternal pride. Terence gave the impression of being between the two in the weight of his personality. He admired them both, measured their difference, and dealt with them accordingly. Standing between the brother and sister, Jessica seemed to complete a family portrait, and to be the natural centre of it. As her eyes rested on Tullia, they lost their harassed look,
and became clear and easy, as if meeting no problem here. She laid her hand with a smile on her shoulder.

“Are you looking forward to the family of cousins? Or are they to be faced as a duty?”

“It will depend on whether the hours will stretch, Mother.”

“You and I have the day from dawn to dark,” said Terence. “Not that that is any more than our due. Our lives are our own.”

“Father may spring a demand on me at any moment. I must turn a blind eye to general claims, especially if they are to be doubled.”

If Jessica felt her daughter too much inclined for such a course, she gave no sign. She thought too little of her own efforts in life, to judge those of another. Her concern was that she herself should not fail in service. There may have been an element of likeness in the difference.

“I am thankful that Sukey is to have her brother,” she said. “I get too absorbed in my own family. I live my own life and forget her need.”

“Do you mean that more is due to Aunt Sukey than is given her?” said Terence. “It shows her gift for imposing herself. It is a great power.”

“I wish I could be clearer,” said Jessica, putting her hand to her head. “I get too many people on my mind, and do justice to none. I am afraid that the little ones need more guidance; there are hours in the day when I scarcely know where they are. And then I feel that your father is missing me, and that his claim is the first. I am not worthy of my place.”

“No one could be but a martyr,” said Terence. “And martyrs are more pleased with themselves than you could ever be.”

“They may have more reason,” said Jessica, with a sigh.

“Well, you have the proper sense of unworthiness,” said Tullia, “and that is a good foundation.”

“No, I do not find it good, my dear,” said her mother.

“If Aunt Sukey has not long to live, her claim is so great that it cannot be fulfilled,” said Terence. “We can only wish we could bear it for her, and then cower in the background because we are not doing so, or hoping she will think we are.”

“I am inclined to salve my conscience with little things, and forget the large ones,” said Jessica. “I magnify any little services, instead of seeing them as owed to others. I am not a happy woman for you to have as a mother.”

“There is not so much happiness in human life,” said Tullia.

“I have taught you to feel that, and it is not a good or a true lesson.”

“Don't tell anyone,” said Terence, “but I find so much cause for happiness. The ordinary reasons are so great. When I wake in the morning, I am so glad to have another day. I am always afraid I shall betray that I find it enough. What could Father say, if he knew? I believe he does suspect, and that is what puts this distance between us.”

“Suppose I had never known you!” said Jessica, looking into his eyes.

“I do feel it would have been a deprivation. There is that little something about me, that no one else can give.”

“Why have you so many troubles, Mother?” said Tullia. “I should have thought you had fewer than most women. You have no anxiety apart from Aunt Sukey, and she is not your husband or your child.”

“That is what I am afraid of feeling. I tell myself that my family is safe, and that as a woman I can have no more. And then I ask myself if I am failing my sister, if I am becoming reconciled to her falling out of the path that is hers as well as mine.”

“You have too many conversations with yourself,” said Terence. “You should include other people in them.”

“That is what I am doing to-day, and I doubt if it is a just thing. Why should you help and guide your mother? It is for her to do that for you.”

“No one can guide anyone else,” said Tullia.

“You find yourself your only congenial companion, Mother,” said Terence. “You should try to be less exclusive.”

“I must remind myself how much cause I have for thankfulness.”

“Still clinging to the same company! And it seems to be of a critical kind.”

“I have always thought introspection a selfish habit, but telling myself that seems to do no good.”

“I think your company is positively offensive,” said Terence. “I do not wonder that you are not influenced by it.”

“Come with me, both my children,” said Jessica, holding out her hands. “I do not ask better company than this.”

Terence took her arm, but Tullia lightly shook her head and laid her hand on a book. The mother preferred to be alone with her son, and the daughter would not waste her companionship. Another demand for it came almost at once.

“Well, Tulliola, will you take your father round the garden?”

Tullia accepted her father's arm and went out of the house at his side. She passed the other pair without a glance, though Thomas smiled at his wife, and Jessica kept her eyes on him until she found herself looking back.

Thomas Calderon was a large, solid man of sixty-two; with a broad, lively face, deep, greenish eyes like those of his younger children, rough-hewn features inherited by Julius, and in a better form by Dora; solid, active hands, a deep ringing voice, and an expression that told of joviality and cynicism, sentiment and emotion. He carried his family burdens to the best of his power, never evading or bending beneath them, sustained his wife, sheltered her sister, and did his day's work with little complaint of the demands upon him. It was said that he took things lightly, and it might have been said that he took them well. He had a great love for his daughter, a tried and anxious affection
for his wife, and somewhat to his surprise a liking for his son. He was a journalist, critic and writer, which was enough to explain his regret that Terence was nothing, but would have preferred to be only the last. He had suffered the fate of the younger son, and found himself a poor man after a prosperous youth. His earnings were slight in proportion to his effort; his personal means were small; and he was glad of his wife's portion and of her sister's help to his household. Thomas hated shift and straitness, and loved the formal and complete, and betrayed himself more than he knew, when he said, as he often did, that to him his house was home.

“Is your mother well to-day, my dear, and your aunt as usual, and Terence doing what he can?”

Tullia went into her light mirth.

“That is how it all is. It is a fair summing-up of the situation.”

“You must throw off the troubles that are not yours, my child. It is not fair that you should carry them. Your own will come in time.”

Tullia did not say, perhaps hardly knew, that this was her natural method.

“Such a line is not appreciated in the eldest daughter.”

“It is wrong to assign certain burdens to certain places.”