New Grub Street · Chapter 25 (2/3)

In truth, there needed little persuasion. Perverseness, one of the forms or issues of self-pity, made him strive against his desire, and caused him to adopt a tone of acerbity in excess of what he felt; but already he had made up his mind to see Amy. Even if this excuse had not presented itself he must very soon have yielded to the longing for a sight of his wife’s face which day by day increased among all the conflicting passions of which he was the victim. A month or two ago, when the summer sunshine made his confinement to the streets a daily torture, he convinced himself that there remained in him no trace of his love for Amy; there were moments when he thought of her with repugnance, as a cold, selfish woman, who had feigned affection when it seemed her interest to do so, but brutally declared her true self when there was no longer anything to be hoped from him. That was the self-deception of misery. Love, even passion, was still alive in the depths of his being; the animation with which he sped to his friend as soon as a new hope had risen was the best proof of his feeling.

He went home and wrote to Amy.

“I have a reason for wishing to see you. Will you have the kindness to appoint an hour on Sunday morning when I can speak with you in private? It must be understood that I shall see no one else.”

She would receive this by the first post tomorrow, Saturday, and doubtless would let him hear in reply some time in the afternoon. Impatience allowed him little sleep, and the next day was a long weariness of waiting. The evening he would have to spend at the hospital; if there came no reply before the time of his leaving home, he knew not how he should compel himself to the ordinary routine of work. Yet the hour came, and he had heard nothing. He was tempted to go at once to Westbourne Park, but reason prevailed with him. When he again entered the house, having walked at his utmost speed from the City Road, the letter lay waiting for him; it had been pushed beneath his door, and when he struck a match he found that one of his feet was upon the white envelope.

Amy wrote that she would be at home at eleven tomorrow morning. Not another word.

In all probability she knew of the offer that had been made to him; Mrs. Carter would have told her. Was it of good or of ill omen that she wrote only these half-dozen words? Half through the night he plagued himself with suppositions, now thinking that her brevity promised a welcome, now that she wished to warn him against expecting anything but a cold, offended demeanour. At seven he was dressed; two hours and a half had to be killed before he could start on his walk westward. He would have wandered about the streets, but it rained.

He had made himself as decent as possible in appearance, but he must necessarily seem an odd Sunday visitor at a house such as Mrs. Yule’s. His soft felt hat, never brushed for months, was a greyish green, and stained round the band with perspiration. His necktie was discoloured and worn. Coat and waistcoat might pass muster, but of the trousers the less said the better. One of his boots was patched, and both were all but heelless.

Very well; let her see him thus. Let her understand what it meant to live on twelve and sixpence a week.

Though it was cold and wet he could not put on his overcoat. Three years ago it had been a fairly good ulster; at present, the edges of the sleeves were frayed, two buttons were missing, and the original hue of the cloth was indeterminable.

At half-past nine he set out and struggled with his shabby umbrella against wind and rain. Down Pentonville Hill, up Euston Road, all along Marylebone Road, then northwestwards towards the point of his destination. It was a good six miles from the one house to the other, but he arrived before the appointed time, and had to stray about until the cessation of bell-clanging and the striking of clocks told him it was eleven. Then he presented himself at the familiar door.

On his asking for Mrs. Reardon, he was at once admitted and led up to the drawing-room; the servant did not ask his name.

Then he waited for a minute or two, feeling himself a squalid wretch amid the dainty furniture. The door opened. Amy, in a simple but very becoming dress, approached to within a yard of him; after the first glance she had averted her eyes, and she did not offer to shake hands. He saw that his muddy and shapeless boots drew her attention.

“Do you know why I have come?” he asked.

He meant the tone to be conciliatory, but he could not command his voice, and it sounded rough, hostile.

“I think so,” Amy answered, seating herself gracefully. She would have spoken with less dignity but for that accent of his.

“The Carters have told you?”

“Yes; I have heard about it.”

There was no promise in her manner. She kept her face turned away, and Reardon saw its beautiful profile, hard and cold as though in marble.

“It doesn’t interest you at all?”

“I am glad to hear that a better prospect offers for you.”

He did not sit down, and was holding his rusty hat behind his back.

“You speak as if it in no way concerned yourself. Is that what you wish me to understand?”

“Won’t it be better if you tell me why you have come here? As you are resolved to find offence in whatever I say, I prefer to keep silence. Please to let me know why you have asked to see me.”

Reardon turned abruptly as if to leave her, but checked himself at a little distance.

Both had come to this meeting prepared for a renewal of amity, but in these first few moments each was so disagreeably impressed by the look and language of the other that a revulsion of feeling undid all the more hopeful effects of their long severance. On entering, Amy had meant to offer her hand, but the unexpected meanness of Reardon’s aspect shocked and restrained her. All but every woman would have experienced that shrinking from the livery of poverty. Amy had but to reflect, and she understood that her husband could in no wise help this shabbiness; when he parted from her his wardrobe was already in a long-suffering condition, and how was he to have purchased new garments since then? None the less such attire degraded him in her eyes; it symbolised the melancholy decline which he had suffered intellectually. On Reardon his wife’s elegance had the same repellent effect, though this would not have been the case but for the expression of her countenance. Had it been possible for them to remain together during the first five minutes without exchange of words, sympathies might have prevailed on both sides; the first speech uttered would most likely have harmonised with their gentler thoughts. But the mischief was done so speedily.

A man must indeed be graciously endowed if his personal appearance can defy the disadvantage of cheap modern clothing worn into shapelessness. Reardon had no such remarkable physique, and it was not wonderful that his wife felt ashamed of him. Strictly ashamed; he seemed to her a social inferior; the impression was so strong that it resisted all memory of his spiritual qualities. She might have anticipated this state of things, and have armed herself to encounter it, but somehow she had not done so. For more than five months she had been living among people who dressed well; the contrast was too suddenly forced upon her. She was especially susceptible in such matters, and had become none the less so under the demoralising influence of her misfortunes. True, she soon began to feel ashamed of her shame, but that could not annihilate the natural feeling and its results.

“I don’t love him. I can’t love him.” Thus she spoke to herself, with immutable decision. She had been doubtful till now, but all doubt was at an end. Had Reardon been practical man enough to procure by hook or by crook a decent suit of clothes for this interview, that ridiculous trifle might have made all the difference in what was to result.

He turned again, and spoke with the harshness of a man who feels that he is despised, and is determined to show an equal contempt.

“I came to ask you what you propose to do in case I go to Croydon.”

“I have no proposal to make whatever.”

“That means, then, that you are content to go on living here?”

“If I have no choice, I must make myself content.”

“But you have a choice.”

“None has yet been offered me.”

“Then I offer it now,” said Reardon, speaking less aggressively. “I shall have a dwelling rent free, and a hundred and fifty pounds a year⁠—perhaps it would be more in keeping with my station if I say that I shall have something less than three pounds a week. You can either accept from me half this money, as up to now, or come and take your place again as my wife. Please to decide what you will do.”

“I will let you know by letter in a few days.”

It seemed impossible to her to say she would return, yet a refusal to do so involved nothing less than separation for the rest of their lives. Postponement of decision was her only resource.

“I must know at once,” said Reardon.

“I can’t answer at once.”

“If you don’t, I shall understand you to mean that you refuse to come to me. You know the circumstances; there is no reason why you should consult with anyone else. You can answer me immediately if you will.”

“I don’t wish to answer you immediately,” Amy replied, paling slightly.

“Then that decides it. When I leave you we are strangers to each other.”

Amy made a rapid study of his countenance. She had never entertained for a moment the supposition that his wits were unsettled, but none the less the constant recurrence of that idea in her mother’s talk had subtly influenced her against her husband. It had confirmed her in thinking that his behaviour was inexcusable. And now it seemed to her that anyone might be justified in holding him demented, so reckless was his utterance.

It was difficult to know him as the man who had loved her so devotedly, who was incapable of an unkind word or look.

“If that is what you prefer,” she said, “there must be a formal separation. I can’t trust my future to your caprice.”

“You mean it must be put into the hands of a lawyer?”

“Yes, I do.”

“That will be the best, no doubt.”

“Very well; I will speak with my friends about it.”

“Your friends!” he exclaimed bitterly. “But for those friends of yours, this would never have happened. I wish you had been alone in the world and penniless.”

“A kind wish, all things considered.”

“Yes, it is a kind wish. Then your marriage with me would have been binding; you would have known that my lot was yours, and the knowledge would have helped your weakness. I begin to see how much right there is on the side of those people who would keep women in subjection. You have been allowed to act with independence, and the result is that you have ruined my life and debased your own. If I had been strong enough to treat you as a child, and bid you follow me wherever my own fortunes led, it would have been as much better for you as for me. I was weak, and I suffer as all weak people do.”

“You think it was my duty to share such a home as you have at present?”

“You know it was. And if the choice had lain between that and earning your own livelihood you would have thought that even such a poor home might be made tolerable. There were possibilities in you of better things than will ever come out now.”

There followed a silence. Amy sat with her eyes gloomily fixed on the carpet; Reardon looked about the room, but saw nothing. He had thrown his hat into a chair, and his fingers worked nervously together behind his back.

“Will you tell me,” he said at length, “how your position is regarded by these friends of yours? I don’t mean your mother and brother, but the people who come to this house.”

“I have not asked such people for their opinion.”

“Still, I suppose some sort of explanation has been necessary in your intercourse with them. How have you represented your relations with me?”

“I can’t see that that concerns you.”

“In a manner it does. Certainly it matters very little to me how I am thought of by people of this kind, but one doesn’t like to be reviled without cause. Have you allowed it to be supposed that I have made life with me intolerable for you?”

“No, I have not. You insult me by asking the question, but as you don’t seem to understand feelings of that kind I may as well answer you simply.”

“Then have you told them the truth? That I became so poor you couldn’t live with me?”

“I have never said that in so many words, but no doubt it is understood. It must be known also that you refused to take the step which might have helped you out of your difficulties.”

“What step?”

She reminded him of his intention to spend half a year in working at the seaside.

“I had utterly forgotten it,” he returned with a mocking laugh. “That shows how ridiculous such a thing would have been.”

“You are doing no literary work at all?” Amy asked.

“Do you imagine that I have the peace of mind necessary for anything of that sort?”

This was in a changed voice. It reminded her so strongly of her husband before his disasters that she could not frame a reply.

“Do you think I am able to occupy myself with the affairs of imaginary people?”

“I didn’t necessarily mean fiction.”

“That I can forget myself, then, in the study of literature?⁠—I wonder whether you really think of me like that. How, in Heaven’s name, do you suppose I spend my leisure time?”

She made no answer.

“Do you think I take this calamity as light-heartedly as you do, Amy?”

“I am far from taking it light-heartedly.”

“Yet you are in good health. I see no sign that you have suffered.”

She kept silence. Her suffering had been slight enough, and chiefly due to considerations of social propriety; but she would not avow this, and did not like to make admission of it to herself. Before her friends she frequently affected to conceal a profound sorrow; but so long as her child was left to her she was in no danger of falling a victim to sentimental troubles.

“And certainly I can’t believe it,” he continued, “now you declare your wish to be formally separated from me.”

“I have declared no such wish.”

“Indeed you have. If you can hesitate a moment about returning to me when difficulties are at an end, that tells me you would prefer final separation.”

“I hesitate for this reason,” Amy said after reflecting. “You are so very greatly changed from what you used to be, that I think it doubtful if I could live with you.”

“Changed?⁠—Yes, that is true, I am afraid. But how do you think this change will affect my behaviour to you?”

“Remember how you have been speaking to me.”

“And you think I should treat you brutally if you came into my power?”

“Not brutally, in the ordinary sense of the word. But with faults of temper which I couldn’t bear. I have my own faults. I can’t behave as meekly as some women can.”

It was a small concession, but Reardon made much of it.

“Did my faults of temper give you any trouble during the first year of our married life?” he asked gently.

“No,” she admitted.

“They began to afflict you when I was so hard driven by difficulties that I needed all your sympathy, all your forbearance. Did I receive much of either from you, Amy?”

“I think you did⁠—until you demanded impossible things of me.”

“It was always in your power to rule me. What pained me worst, and hardened me against you, was that I saw you didn’t care to exert your influence. There was never a time when I could have resisted a word of yours spoken out of your love for me. But even then, I am afraid, you no longer loved me, and now⁠—”

He broke off, and stood watching her face.

“Have you any love for me left?” burst from his lips, as if the words all but choked him in the utterance.

Amy tried to shape some evasive answer, but could say nothing.

“Is there ever so small a hope that I might win some love from you again?”

“If you wish me to come and live with you when you go to Croydon I will do so.”