Read Ebook: The trumpet in the dust by Holme Constance

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"Min? tied?n, Yrj?, mit? sin? olet k?rsinyt silloin, kuin herrasi niin ?kisti kutsui sinut pois tehtaasta, ja tied?n my?skin, miten kurja ja tuskallinen el?m?si varmaan on ollut niin julman miehen orjana. Mutta ajattelehan toki: h?n on kuitenkin sinun is?nt?si."

"Minunko is?nt?ni? Kuka on h?net tehnyt minun is?nn?kseni, kuka on h?nelle antanut is?nnyysoikeuden minun ylitseni? Eik? minulla ole ajatuksia ja tunteita niin kuin h?nell?kin ja eik? minun vereni juokse suonissa yht? el?v?n? kuin h?nenkin verens?? Enk? min? ole yht? hyvin ihminen kuin h?nkin ja enk? min? ole oppinut itsest?ni kaikkea sit?, kuin h?n muiden avulla on saanut p??h?ns?? Mit? oikeutta h?nell? siis voi olla pit?? mihe last beam from the fading west. She opened the scullery door now, not only for a sight of the Michaelmas daisies bunched in the garden beyond, but because of the extra space it seemed to afford the exultation in her heart. As she went to and fro, her eyes drew to them as to flowers set upon some altar of thanksgiving, and the glow in her heart deepened as she passed through the warm sun. But the beauty of the day seemed only a natural background for the miracle that was coming. She trusted it contentedly, just as she was trusting other things in life. It was not one of those days of exquisite promise which languished and faded before it was noon. The perfect day was perfect and reliable all through, just as the perfect happenings of life went steadily to their appointed end....

Tibbie had even made gowns for Miss Marigold and Mrs. Wrench, and she had actually been commissioned to make a frock for Miss Marigold's trousseau. That had been part of the information proceeding so copiously from the Vicar's wife, the evening before.

It was strange how full her mind was this morning of Tibbie and Tibbie's doings; not that the girl and her children were ever far from the old woman's thoughts. Probably it was Miss Marigold's wedding that was making her think of her own lass, and of the way life fuses and separates and alters and breaks. With what mixed smiles and tears must Tibbie have fashioned that gown for the Vicar's daughter, feeling a hundred years older in experience, although born on the same day! She knew something of Tibbie's feelings as she sewed at the blue gown, because Mrs. Wrench had told her that she had written a letter.

"Nay, Tibbie'd never fail nobody," Mrs. Clapham had said, though rather absently, wishing herself alone so that she might sit and chuckle over the happiness that was coming.

"Nor you, either!" "I've never known you send me back word yet, and I don't think you ever will." "Very well, then, good night; and I'll expect you as usual next week!"

Yes, it must be Miss Marigold's wedding that was making her think of the absent Tibbie, thinking so vividly that instead of absent she was very much present. In the little room where the sun kept pushing its way she seemed almost there in the flesh, catching and reflecting the light with her shimmering scissors and silks. The children, too, seemed unaccountably near, so that she felt as if at any moment she might hear their gentle if chattering voices and their sober if pattering feet. Their post-card photographs were on the shelf with that of their mother, seven-year-old Libby and five-year-old Stevie--stiff, grave, patient little people, who looked as if they couldn't possibly belong to laughing Tibbie. Those who noticed the difference said that they looked as though they had been born protesting against the sorrows of a great war, but those who had known their father and their father's mother said something else. It was from Stephen Catterall that they inherited their pale, haunted faces and their mournful dark eyes. When Stephen was killed, they said in Whalley that he had always looked as though the hand of death was never far from his tragic face, but those who had known him as a child knew it was never a little thing like death that had made Stephen afraid....

Mrs. Clapham had once been to Whalley to pay her daughter a visit, and once Tibbie and the children had come to Mrs. Clapham, but on neither side had the visit been repeated. One had her charing to think of, and the other her sewing, and both had their other supremely important reasons.... But the result of the separation was that Mrs. Clapham knew very little about Tibbie's children, except what she was able to learn from Tibbie's letters. She was fond of them as far as she did know them, and of course proud, but she was always a little puzzled about them, a little uneasy. They were so very unlike what Tibbie had been, or Tibbie's uncles and aunts; so very unlike what Mrs. Clapham had been herself. But there was no reason to worry about them or their mother, as she knew, seeing that they were comfortably off, and had plenty of neighbours and friends. If it had not been for that she could never have felt this satisfaction in the change which, other individuals being willing, she was shortly proposing to take. She would have been afraid that, as soon as the home was broken up, Tibbie and Co. might possibly want to come back. But there was no chance of such a thing as long as certain circumstances existed; Tibbie would never come. She fretted for her mother sometimes, just as her mother fretted for her, but as long as a certain person remained alive, Tibbie would never come.

Even by the fields the almshouses were at least a mile away from her little cottage, but in Mrs. Clapham's mind they showed as clearly as in a picture hung on the wall. Grey, gabled, flower-gardened, they topped the steep hill that ran up out of the village on the great north road, challenging by their perfection the notice of the passer-by. From them you looked down over grassy slopes to the roofs of the village, the long shape of the Hall against its wooded hill, and further across still to the mystery of the sea. Unscamped and well-built in every inch, they were growing more aristocratic and mellow with every year that passed. The change to them from the uneven-floored, crooked-walled cottage in which Mrs. Clapham had lived so long would be, when it came, like the change to a king's palace. To have a roof of her own, with nothing to pay for it, nothing to fear, would make her feel little less of a property-owner than his lordship himself. Moving up to that high place from the huddled and crouching street would be like soaring on strong wings into the open spaces of the sky.

All through her working life she had hoped that she might be allowed to end her days in one of the almshouses on Hermitage Hill. Especially she had wanted the house with the double view, the one that faced alike the humanity of the road and the miracle of the sea. Over and over again she had seen it fall vacant, and pass into fresh hands, but she had never attempted to ask for it until now. Never until now had she considered that she had a right to apply. She was the true type of worker, hardy, honest and proud, and both her pride and her sense of honour had kept her from taking her rest before it was due. But she had always hoped that fate and the governors would see fit to make her this particular gift when at last she had really earned it; and not only had she hoped--she had also believed. She had always felt certain that, sooner or later, the house of her dreams would come her way. She had seen it as the natural apex of her mounting years, clear as a temple set on a hill. All her life it had cheered her and urged her on, standing alike to her as a symbol and the concrete object of her desire.

Yet she had not made up her mind all at once, even after Mrs. Phipps had so tactfully made room. Even then she had gone into the matter very carefully, testing her motives and her strength, and making sure, above all, that she was loosing no natural tics. But her final conclusion had been that the moment had actually come; and so, weeping even while she rejoiced, and trembling while she believed, she had sent in her name to the committee with a fine certainty of success.

And now, after all these years, "Jones" had at last repeated the millionaire brewer's words, and so realistically that nobody who had known the old man could refuse to believe them. Not but what she had earned the house right enough on her own merits, as she did not need telling; still, it was all to the good to be backed by old Mr. T. There were other candidates, however, so that a meeting had to be called, though she was assured time and again that it would only be formal. But when she came to her final canvassing for votes, she found that at least one of the other applicants had been in before her. Times had changed even in that remote little village, and it was not everybody now who remembered old Mr. T. Nevertheless, it had been a decided shock to her to find that her most important opponent was Martha Jane Fell.

Martha Jane was a neighbour of Mrs. Clapham's, living just up the street, and Mrs. Clapham knew all about her. Younger than her rival by a good many years, Martha Jane had been very pretty as a girl, and even now had a decided "way" with her. It was a "way," at least, that always went down with the men, and in pursuance of this particular piece of good fortune she had canvassed the men on the committee first. Mrs. Clapham could not help feeling it a distinct outrage that her most dangerous obstacle should take the form of this peculiarly worthless woman. Her own value seemed somehow to be lessened by it, her own virtue maligned. But then men, she remarked to herself scornfully, were always like wax in the hands of a woman like that. One of her own sex would have had her doubts any day about Martha Jane Fell.

The decisive meeting had been held the day before in the school, and Mrs. Clapham, scrubbing and scouring at Mrs. Helme's, had found it a terrible business to keep her mind on her task. More than once she had found herself on the verge of missing corners or stairs, neglecting to put the final polish on chair-legs, or "slaping floors over" that needed elbow-grease and goodwill. But always she had checked herself with a feeling of shame. It seemed to her not only unlucky but dishonest to count herself free before the chains were loosed. In fact, in the access of zeal following upon her momentary lapse, she was almost sure that she did the same job twice.

Afterwards, indeed, she had allowed herself to come home by the school, though she had passed it without even turning her head, and scarcely so much as straining her ears for a murmur of voices from inside. Martha Jane, however, had no such scruples, as she discovered when she turned the corner. Martha Jane, indeed, was planted brazenly on the doorstep, applying ear and eye in turn to the open keyhole. Not only that--so Mrs. Clapham was told later--but she waylaid the members of the committee as they came in, reminding her allies of their promised support, and attempting to soften the hearts of the rest. She looked slightly abashed for a moment when she saw her opponent, and then gave her a wink and grinned impudently.

Twisted towards her on the step, she looked with a sort of mocking good-humour at the stalwart, motherly woman with the honest face. There was still something of the street-arab about Martha Jane Fell, something that metaphorically turned cart-wheels even in the most sacred presence. But her most dangerous quality was a capacity for passing at will from brazenness to appeal, for seeming to cling even while she defied. Martha Jane could wilt like a weed or spring like a steel trap. She was worn, reckless and down-at-heel, but she had contrived nevertheless to keep something of the grace of youth, a slimness of form, a fineness of skin, a faint beauty of cheek and chin. Only her eyes betrayed her under her untidy hair, hard even as they laughed at the well-bound figure before them.

After that moment's hesitation, Mrs. Clapham made as if to pass on, but Martha Jane, swinging round again to the keyhole, called her back.

"They're talking about you now," she informed her kindly, "saying you're a credit to the village and all that! But they say you've a daughter to see to you in your old age, and I haven't. You'll have to get rid of yon daughter o' yours, Ann Clapham, if you want to best me over the house!"

She spared another second from the keyhole to throw her a fresh impudent glance, but her fellow-candidate did not answer. Turning resolutely away, she marched steadily towards the hill, wishing in every nerve that she could demean herself to stand in Martha Jane's place. She hadn't gone far, however, taking the hill slowly because of her heart, when the school-door had suddenly opened, and, as it were, flung the Committee into the road. One or two of them had hurriedly passed her, smiling as they went, and the parson had thrown her a pleasant greeting and lifted his hat. They couldn't have looked at her like that, she told herself triumphantly, if they hadn't given her the house; and the heart about which there was just a little doubt became so thrilled that it threatened to drop her down in a dead faint.

All the evening she had looked for a letter, knowing all the time that it was too early to expect it, and rebuking herself for impatience and greed. But it had not come, in spite of her hopes, and nobody she saw seemed to have the faintest notion of what had happened. Anyhow, she was sure that there would be a letter this morning, either by post or hand; or, instead of a letter, a personal message. She was as certain about it as she was certain of Heaven. It was only a question of waiting until the manna should choose to fall.

Over the muslin half-blind masking the little window, she saw a telegraph-boy come riding up, wriggling his bicycle from side to side of the road after his usual fashion; and, as on the day before, her heart jumped so that her breath caught and her eyes blurred. Just for a moment she wondered wildly whether they could possibly have telegraphed the news, waiting for the slither of light-descending feet and the batter of Government on the door. Nothing happened, however, and presently she relaxed her muscles, released her breath and rubbed her eyes; reproving herself with a shrug of her shoulders and a half-ashamed laugh for being so foolish as to imagine that the wire could possibly have been meant for her.

But she was still curious about its actual destination, and presently, when her heart had steadied again, she opened the door and looked out. The telegraph-boy was returning by now, whistling and wriggling as he came, but there was nothing to show at which house he had left his message. Yet even after he had disappeared she remained on her threshold, partly because the sun and the fine air soothed and stimulated her in the same moment, and partly because of a subconscious thrill that she could not define. But all that she received by way of a spectacle was the stiff, dark-clad form of Emma Catterall, appearing suddenly in the doorway of a house which always seemed gloomier than other people's. "Suddenly," however, was not the right word to use for Emma. Emma always dawned. Slowly, when you were not thinking about her, she took her place--an unsolicited place--in your conscious vision; and in the same way, when she had finished with you, she faded before your unwillingly strained eyes.

It was after this fashion that Mrs. Clapham discovered her presence this morning, driven to it by the unpleasant consciousness that she was being watched. Fixing each other with a stare that was almost fascinated in its length, they stood looking across the September sunshine in the sloping street. Then, in the same unaccountable manner in which she had appeared, Emma began to fade, and Mrs. Clapham, with a shake and a fresh laugh, moved likewise and went within.

She re-acted a little after the episode of the telegraph-boy, who had seemed to be bringing her happiness to her, and after all wasn't. That moment of mounting excitement had left her a little flat, or as flat as it was possible to be on this day of wonderful promise. She still felt rather foolish for imagining that the Committee would be in the least likely to telegraph the news. The event was trivial enough to them, after all, however world-shaking it might seem to her. Mr. Baines, the lawyer, who was secretary to the Committee, would probably send the news by his clerk, or, failing the clerk, he might slip it into the post. There was also the chance, of course, that he might bring it himself, and Mrs. Clapham quivered with pride when she thought of that. Even then, it would be only another of the wonderful happenings which she felt to be gathering about the central fact. There was the grand weather, to begin with, with herself feeling as grand as the day; and presently, when she had waited a little longer, there would no doubt be Mr. Baines...

She found herself wishing, with a fervour that almost surprised her, that this was Mrs. Wrench's "day," after all. She remembered how she had chuckled, on waking, to think it was nothing of the sort, but she was not so sure that she felt like chuckling now. Even with Mrs. Wrench it was sometimes possible to slip a word in edgeways, if you tried; and in spite of her absorption in Miss Marigold and Miss Marigold's gowns, she would surely have spared a moment to tell her how matters stood.

But it was not Mrs. Wrench's day, so it was no use thinking about it. It was nobody's "day," for the matter of that. It was her own day, to do as she liked with from rise to set, and just for the moment it threatened to hang on her hands. She tried to make a bargain with herself that she wouldn't look at the clock for another half-hour, and found her eyes stealing round to it the very next minute. She almost wished--so desperately was she at a loose end--that she had gone up the street to speak to Emma Catterall. She hated Tibbie's mother-in-law as she hated nobody else on earth, but even Emma would have been better than nothing. She went to the window at last, to see whether she had re-emerged, bending her pink face above the box of pink asters, the Family Bible and the clock. But there was no sign of Emma, as far as she could tell, although, as it happened, Emma, at that moment, was also peering out. There were no flowers in Emma's window, but only a few half-dead ferns; nevertheless in the blankness and gloom of her dismal dwelling she was hidden as in a cave.

When Mrs. Clapham could bear the waiting no longer, she fetched pail and brush from the back kitchen, and got herself down to scrub the floor. The place was already so clean that her energy seemed rather wasted, but, although she was unaware of it, there was something symbolical in the act. In its own way it was a sort of dedication, a cleansing of everything round her for the coming event. In any case, nothing that hadn't been washed since the day before was ever quite clean to Mrs. Clapham. Yesterday was yesterday, and to-day was to-day, and nobody knew better than she just how far dirt could manage to spread itself in a single night.

At all events, her instinct in the matter had been perfectly sound, for her nerves calmed as soon as she touched her tools. As she knelt on her little mat, scrubbing with strong, rhythmic, stiff-armed strokes, she felt full of a placid confidence that was infinitely more pleasant than the foregoing state of thrill. Even she knew that she was at her best when she was at her "job," rough though it was, and low in the social scale. She felt so soothed that she even sang as she scoured the flags, giving them just enough water and yet not too much, as a skilful scrubber should. She had done the doorstep already, of course--as soon as she came down--a matutinal rite as mechanical and natural as washing her own face. She found herself hankering, however, to wash the doorstep again, and was only stopped by the consciousness that it seemed rather silly. Yet the step could not be too clean across which the wonderful news was certain to come, and there would be plenty of time for it to dry. The fact that she could say to herself that there was plenty of time showed that she had ceased to expect the news at every minute. She was so pleased with herself when she realised that that she started to sing again. In her present mood of contented assurance she felt she could wait all day.

She and her little mat had just about finished their perambulation in honour of cleanliness, and she was dipping the brush for almost the last time, when somebody came up the street and gave a birdlike tap at her door. Again Mrs. Clapham's heart warned her that life at this strenuous pitch was not suitable to its constitution, and it was a moment or two before she could force herself to her feet. But she had hardly started to answer the summons before the latch moved in its socket, and the thin little face of Mrs. Tanner came peeping excitedly round the jamb.

"Any news, Ann Clapham?" she inquired breathlessly. "Have you had t' news? Eh, now, I could hardly sleep for fearing summat might go wrong!"

She slipped into the room as she spoke, pushing the door behind her with a neat movement. There was an almost birdlike activity in every inch of her thin form, and an almost beak-like effect in her pursed-up, toothless mouth. Mrs. Clapham looked simply immense beside her spare little shape, a towering giantess of a woman, broad and wholesome and strong. The rolled-up sleeves of her faded print frock showed her splendid arms, just as her skirt, turned up over her short striped petticoat, showed her sturdy legs. Her clean harding apron struck a note of extreme freshness which was accentuated by the glow of her pink face and the gleam of her white hair. The scrubbing-brush was still gripped in her wet hand, and the zinc pail behind her spoke to her honest trade. Even in her excitement Mrs. Tanner had time for a spasm of admiration. "Eh, but it seems a shame to put the likes of her in an almshouse!" she said to herself; and then forgot the impression in her eagerness for a reply.

"Nay, I've heard nowt yet!" Mrs. Clapham was one broad smile. "I doubt it's hardly time. Folks as sit on committees and suchlike don't get up as soon as us!"

Mrs. Tanner gave the nod of pained but tolerant comprehension with which one class salutes the idiosyncrasies of another.

"Anyway, it'll be all right. Folks say as it's yours already.... I had to look in, though; I was that keen to know."

"It was right kind of you, Maggie," Mrs. Clapham beamed; "it was right kind! Good luck doesn't come every day o' the week, and when it does, it'd be a queer sort as didn't want everybody to hear!"

Steeped in a mutual kindness that had the warmth of an embrace, they drifted across the fast-drying floor and seated themselves by the small fire. Mrs. Tanner perched herself on the edge of the stiff rocker, while Mrs. Clapham sat in her late husband's chair, bolt upright, her bare arms outstretched, her plump moist hands resting upon her knees. The big woman and the little beamed across at each other, thoroughly satisfied with a pleasant world.

"They'll hear right enough--trust 'em for that! They're agog about it, even now. Mrs. Simmons put her head out as I ran up and said 'Hst! Any more about yon almshouse do?'--but of course I couldn't tell her what I didn't know myself!"

"Ay, she's the sort to get up the night before, to make sure of a bit o' gossip!" ... They had a hearty laugh together at this peculiarity of Mrs. Simmons', exactly as if it wasn't shared by everybody in the street. But anything was good enough to laugh at on this day that was to be laughter and pleasantness all through. Mrs. Simmons' weakness did as well as anything else. "But there! I mustn't be counting my chickens afore they're hatched!" Mrs. Clapham said presently, trying to sober down. "Nice and silly I'll look if I don't get it, after all! Not but what I sort o' feel in my bones as it's going to be all right."

Mrs. Tanner, at least, had no qualms about tempting Providence.

"Folks all say you're the only person for it," she repeated stoutly. "There's a many wanted it, of course, but there's nobody earned it same as you. You'd be fit to hide your face if you knew all the fine things I've heard tell of you these last few days, about you being that honest and straight-living and all that! What, I shouldn't wonder if folks was that pleased they'd go sticking out flags!" she went on, her imagination running away with her,--"nay, but they won't. They'll be too put about over lossing your grand work."

"Ay, well, I can't say I shan't be pleased to be missed. Folks always want to be told there's nobody like 'em when their turn comes to step aside. I'm sure I've done my best for the place while I've been about it!" She chuckled happily, rubbing her hands backwards and forwards over the harding apron. "There's not a floor can cry out at me as I've ever had occasion to scrub!... But I'm going back, all the same, and it's about time I gave up. My knee's been bothering me a deal lately, and my heart's a bit jumpy an' all. I did think of going to doctor about it, but I reckon it's just old age. I'll be right enough, likely, when I'm in my own spot, and no call to bother about the rent!"

"Ay, you've had a fairish hard life," Mrs. Tanner agreed sympathetically, "and it's no wonder it's beginning to tell. Not but what you'd have found work for yourself wherever you were, that I'll be bound! You're the sort as always likes things a little hard. You'd never ha' done with 'em soft."

"I could ha' done with 'em a bit easier like, all the same!" Mrs. Clapham rejoined humorously. "But you're likely right. I can't abide folks to be mooning around or lying about half their time. I like to see a bit of elbow-grease put into life, same as it might be a kitchen-table! I was brought up to think there was nowt like work, and I can't say I've ever found anything better. My Tibbie's a grand worker an' all, and yon little Libby of hers shapes to frame the same way.... But folks can't last for ever and that's a fact; and I've always sworn as I'd end my days in them almshouses on Hermitage Hill."

The eyes of the two women shone as they met and smiled. They leaned towards each other, a little breathless.

"A pound a week!" chanted the ecstatic Mrs. Tanner. "It's gone up since t' War."

"Ay, and as bonny a spot as you could wish!"

"Coal!"

"Such a view as there is, looking right over towards t' sea!"

"No rates nor nothing," sang Mrs. Tanner; "and water laid on from a big tank!"

"A flower-garden, wi' a man to see to it--"

"Eh, and such furniture and fittings as you couldn't find bettered at the Hall!" Mrs. Clapham's tone was almost reverent. It seemed to her rather greedy to lay stress upon the material side of her luck, but the excellent plenishings provided by old Mr. T. could scarcely be termed that. It was more as if they were the fittings of the temple which the place stood for in her mind, than the actual chattels of a house in which she was going to live.

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