Kitabı oku: «The Mother», sayfa 6

Again the buoyant step in the hall, the gaily whistled air – departing: leaving an expectant silence.

"Do it," Mr. Poddle gasped, worn out, "in public. But since I been lyin' here," he added, "lookin' back, I seen the error. The public, Richard, has no feelin'. They'd laugh – if I groaned. I don't like the public – no more. I don't want to die – in public. I want," he concluded, his voice falling to a thin, exhausted whisper, "only your mother – and you, Richard – and – "

"Did you say – Her?"

"The Lovely One!"

"I'll bring her!" said the boy, impulsively.

"No, no! She wouldn't come. I been – in communication – recent. And she writ back. Oh, Richard, she writ back! My heart's broke!"

The boy brushed the handkerchief over the Dog-faced Man's eyes.

"'Are you muzzled,' says she, 'in dog days?'"

"Don't mind her!" cried the boy.

"In the eyes of the law, Richard," Mr. Poddle exclaimed, his eyes flashing, "I ain't no dog!"

The boy kissed his forehead – there was no other comfort to offer: and the caress was sufficient.

"I wish," Mr. Poddle sighed, "that I knew how God will look at it – to-night!"

Mr. Poddle, exhausted by speech and emotion, closed his eyes. By and by the boy stealthily withdrew his hand from the weakening clasp. Mr. Poddle gave no sign of knowing it. The boy slipped away… And descending to the third floor of the tenement, he came to the room where lived the Mexican Sword Swallower: whom he persuaded to return with him to Mr. Poddle's bedside.

They paused at the door. The woman drew back.

"Aw, Dick," she simpered, "I hate to!"

"Just this once!" the boy pleaded.

"Just to say it!"

The reply was a bashful giggle.

"You don't have to mean it," the boy argued. "Just say it – that's all!"

They entered. Mr. Poddle was muttering the boy's name – in a vain effort to lift his voice. His hands were both at the coverlet – picking, searching: both restless in the advancing sunshine. With a sob of self-reproach the boy ran quickly to the bedside, took one of the wandering hands, pressed it to his lips. And Mr. Poddle sighed, and lay quiet again.

"Mr. Poddle," the boy whispered, "she's come at last."

There was no response.

"She's come!" the boy repeated. He gave the hand he held to the woman. Then he put his lips close to the dying man's ear. "Don't you hear me? She's come!"

Mr. Poddle opened his eyes. "Her – massive – proportions!" he faltered.

"Quick!" said the boy.

"Poddle," the woman lied, "I love you!"

Then came the Dog-faced Man's one brief flash of ecstasy – expressed in a wondrous glance of joy and devotion: but a swiftly fading fire.

"She loves me!" he muttered.

"I do, Poddle!" the woman sobbed, willing, now, for the grotesque deception. "Yes, I do!"

"'Beauty,'" Mr. Poddle gasped, "'and the Beast!'"

They listened intently. He said no more… Soon the sunbeam glorified the smiling face…

HIS MOTHER

While he waited for his mother to come – seeking relief from the melancholy and deep mystification of this death – the boy went into the street. The day was well disposed, the crowded world in an amiable mood; he perceived no menace – felt no warning of catastrophe. He wandered far, unobservant, forgetful: the real world out of mind. And it chanced that he lost his way; and he came, at last, to that loud, seething place, thronged with unquiet faces, where, even in the sunshine, sin and poverty walked abroad, unashamed… Rush, crash, joyless laughter, swollen flesh, red eyes, shouting, rags, disease: flung into the midst of it – transported from the sweet feeling and quiet gloom of the Church of the Lifted Gross – he was confused and frightened…

A hand fell heartily on the boy's shoulder. "Hello, there!" cried a big voice. "Ain't you Millie Blade's kid?"

"Yes, sir," the boy gasped.

It was a big man – a broad-shouldered, lusty fellow, muscular and lithe: good-humoured and dull of face, winning of voice and manner. Countenance and voice were vaguely familiar to the boy. He felt no alarm.

"What the devil you doing here?" the man demanded. "Looking for Millie?"

"Oh, no!" the boy answered, horrified. "My mother isn't —here!"

"Well, what you doing?"

"I'm lost."

The man laughed. He clapped the boy on the back. "Don't you be afraid," said he, sincerely hearty. "I'll take you home. You know me, don't you?"

"Not your name."

"Anyhow, you remember me, don't you? You've seen me before?"

"Yes, sir."

"Well, my name's Jim Millette. I'm an acrobat. And I know you. Why, sure! I remember when you was born. Me and your mother is old friends. Soon as I seen you I knew who you was. 'By gad!' says I, 'if that ain't Millie Slade's kid!' How is she, anyhow?"

"She's very well."

"Working?"

"No," the boy answered, gravely; "my mother does not work."

The man whistled.

"I am living with Mr. Fithian, the curate," said the boy, with a sigh. "So my mother is having – a very good – time."

"She must be lonely."

The boy shook his head. "Oh, no!" said he. "She is much happier – without me."

"She's what?"

"Happier," the boy repeated, "without me. If she were not," he added, "I would not live with the curate."

The man laughed. It was in pity – not in merriment. "Well, say," he said, "when you see your mother, you tell her you met Jim Millette on the street. Will you? You tell her Jim's been – married. She'll understand. And I guess she'll be glad to know it. And, say, I guess she'll wonder who it's to. You tell her it's the little blonde of the Flying Tounsons. She'll know I ain't losing anything, anyhow, by standing in with that troupe. Tell her it's all right. You just tell her I said that everything was all right. Will you?"

"Yes, sir."

"You ain't never been to a show, have you?" the man continued. "I thought not. Well, say, you come along with me. It ain't late. We'll see the after-piece at the Burlesque. I'll take you in."

"I think," said the boy, "I had better not."

"Aw, come on!" the acrobat urged.

"I'm awful glad to see you, Dick," he added, putting his arm around the boy, of kind impulse; "and I'd like to give you a good time – for Millie's sake."

The boy was still doubtful. "I had better go home," he said.

"Oh, now, don't you be afraid of me, Dick. I'll take you home after the show. We got lots of time. Aw, come on!"

It occurred to the boy that Providence had ordered events in answer to his prayer.

"Thank you," he said.

"You'll have a good time," the acrobat promised. "They say Flannigan's got a good show."

They made their way to the Burlesque. Flannigan's Forty Flirts there held the boards. "Girls! Just Girls! Grass Widows and Merry Maids! No Nonsense About 'Em! Just Girls! Girls!" The foul and tawdry aspect of the entrance oppressed the child. He felt some tragic foreboding…

Within it was dark to the boy's eyes. The air was hot and foul – stagnant, exhausted: the stale exhalation of a multitude of lungs which vice was rotting; tasting of their very putridity. A mist of tobacco smoke filled the place – was still rising in bitter, stifling clouds. There was a nauseating smell of beer and sweat and disinfectants. The boy's foot felt the unspeakable slime of the floor: he tingled with disgust.

An illustrated song was in listless progress. The light, reflected from the screen, revealed a throng of repulsive faces, stretching, row upon row, into the darkness of the rear, into the shadows of the roof – sickly and pimpled and bloated flesh: vicious faces, hopeless, vacuous, diseased. And these were the faces that leered and writhed in the boy's dreams of hell. Here, present and tangible, were gathered all his terrors. He was in the very midst of sin.

The song was ended. The footlights flashed high. There was a burst of blatant music – a blare: unfeeling and discordant. It grated agonizingly. The boy's sensitive ear rebelled. He shuddered… Screen and curtain disappeared. In the brilliant light beyond, a group of brazen women began to cavort and sing. Their voices were harsh and out of tune. At once the faces in the shadow started into eager interest – the eyes flashing, with some strangely evil passion, unknown to the child, but acutely felt… There was a shrill shout of welcome – raised by the women, without feeling. Down the stage, her person exposed, bare-armed, throwing shameless glances, courting the sensual stare, grinning as though in joyous sympathy with the evil of the place, came a woman with blinding blonde hair.

It was the boy's mother.

"Millie!" the acrobat ejaculated.

The boy had not moved. He was staring at the woman on the stage. A flush of shame, swiftly departing, had left his face white. Presently he trembled. His lips twitched – his head drooped. The man laid a comforting hand on his knee. A tear splashed upon it.

"I didn't know she was here, Dick!" the acrobat whispered. "It's a shame. But I didn't know. And I – I'm – sorry!"

The boy looked up. He called a smile to his face. It was a brave pretense. But his face was still wan.

"I think I'd like to go home," he answered, weakly. "It's – time – for tea."

"Don't feel bad, Dick! It's all right. She's all right."

"If you please," said the boy, still resolutely pretending ignorance, "I think I'd like to go – now."

The acrobat waited for a blast of harsh music to subside. The boy's mother began to sing – a voice trivially engaged: raised beyond its strength. A spasm of distress contorted the boy's face.

"Brace up, Dick!" the man whispered. "Don't take it so hard."

"If you please," the boy protested, "I'll be late for tea if I don't go now."

The acrobat took his hand – guided him, stumbling, up the aisle: led him into the fresh air, the cool, clean sunlight, of the street… There had been sudden confusion on the stage. The curtain had fallen with a rush. But it was now lifted, again, and the dismal entertainment was once more in noisy course.

It was now late in the afternoon. The pavement was thronged. Dazed by agony, blinded by the bright light of day, the boy was roughly jostled. The acrobat drew him into an eddy of the stream. There the child offered his hand – and looked up with a dogged little smile.

"Good-bye," he said. "Thank you."

The acrobat caught the hand in a warm clasp. "You don't know your way home, do you?" he asked.

"No, sir."

"Where you going?"

The boy looked away. There was a long interval. Into the shuffle and chatter of the passing crowd crept the muffled blare of the orchestra. The acrobat still held the boy's hand tight – still anxiously watched him, his face overcast.

"Box Street?" he asked.

"No, sir."

"Aw, Dick! think again," the acrobat pleaded. "Come, now! Ain't you going to Box Street?"

"No, sir," the boy answered, low. "I'm going to the curate's house, near the Church of the Lifted Cross."

They were soon within sight of the trees in the park. The boy's way was then known to him. Again he extended his hand – again smiled.

"Thank you," he said. "Good-bye."

The acrobat was loath to let the little hand go. But there was nothing else to do. He dropped it, at last, with a quick-drawn sigh.

"It'll come out all right," he muttered.

Then the boy went his way alone. His shoulders were proudly squared – his head held high…

Meantime, they had revived Millie Slade. She was in the common dressing-room – a littered, infamous, foul, place, situated below stage. Behind her the gas flared and screamed. Still in her panderous disguise, within hearing of the rasping music and the tramp of the dance, within hearing of the coarse applause, this tender mother sat alone, unconscious of evil – uncontaminated, herself kept holy by her motherhood, lifted by her love from the touch of sin. To her all the world was a temple, undefiled, wherein she worshipped, wherein the child was a Presence, purifying every place.

She had no strength left for tragic behaviour. She sat limp, shedding weak tears, whimpering, tearing at her finger nails.

"I'm found out!" she moaned. "Oh, my God! He'll never love me no more!"

A woman entered in haste.

"You got it, Aggie?" the mother asked.

"Yes, dear. Now, you just drink this, and you'll feel better."

"I don't want it – now."

"Aw, now, you drink it! Poor dear! It'll do you lots of good."

"He wouldn't want me to."

"Aw, he won't know. And you need it, dear. Do drink it!"

"No, Aggie," said the mother. "It don't matter that he don't know. I just don't want it. I can't do what he wouldn't like me to."

The glass was put aside. And Aggie sat beside the mother, and drew her head to a sympathetic breast.

"Don't cry!" she whispered. "Oh, Millie, don't cry!"

"Oh," the woman whimpered, "he'll think me an ugly thing, Aggie. He'll think me a skinny thing. If I'd only got here in time, if I'd only looked right, he might have loved me still. But he won't love me no more – after to-day!"

"Hush, Millie! He's only a kid. He don't know nothing about – such things."

"Only a kid," said the mother, according to the perverted experience of her life, "but still a man!"

"He wouldn't care."

"They all care!"

Indeed, this was her view; and by her knowledge of the world she spoke.

"Not him," said Aggie.

The mother was infinitely distressed. "Oh," she moaned, "if I'd only had time to pad!"

This was the greater tragedy of her situation: that she misunderstood.

NEARING THE SEA

It was Sunday evening. Evil-weather threatened. The broad window of top floor rear looked out upon a lowering sky – everywhere gray and thick: turning black beyond the distant hills. An hour ago the Department wagon had rattled away with the body of Mr. Poddle; and with the cheerfully blasphemous directions, the tramp of feet, the jocular comment, as the box was carried down the narrow stair, the last distraction had departed. The boy's mother was left undisturbed to prepare for the crucial moments in the park.

She was now nervously engaged before her looking-glass. All the tools of her trade lay at hand. A momentous problem confronted her. The child must be won back. He must be convinced of her worth. Therefore she must be beautiful. He thought her pretty. She would be pretty. But how impress him? By what appeal? The pathetic? the tenderly winsome? the gay? She would be gay. Marvellous lies occurred to her – a multitude of them: there was no end to her fertility in deception. And she would excite his jealousy. Upon that feeling she would play. She would blow hot; she would blow cold. She would reduce him to agony – the most poignant agony he had ever suffered. Then she would win him.

To this end, acting according to the enlightenment of her kind, she plied her pencil and puffs; and when, at last, she stood before the mirror, new gowned, beautiful after the conventions of her kind, blind to the ghastliness of it, ignorant of the secret of her strength, she had a triumphant consciousness of power.

"He'll love me," she thought, with a snap of the teeth. "He's got to!"

Jim Millette knocked – and pushed the door ajar, and diffidently intruded his head.

"Hello, Jim!" she cried. "Come in!"

The man would not enter. "I can't, Millie," he faltered. "I just got a minute."

"Oh, come on in!" said she, contemptuously. "Come in and tell me about it. What did you do it for, Jim? You got good and even, didn't you? Eh, Jim?" she taunted. "You got even!"

"It wasn't that, Millie," he protested.

"Oh, wasn't it?" she shrilled.

"No, it wasn't, Millie. I didn't have no grudge against you."

"Then what was it? Come in and tell me!" she laughed. "You dassn't, Jim! You're afraid! come in," she flashed, "and I'll make you lick my shoes! And when you're crawling on the floor, Jim, like a slimy dog, I'll kick you out. Hear me, you pup? What you take my child in there for?" she cried. "Hear me? Aw, you pup!" she snarled. "You're afraid to come in!"

"Don't go on, Millie," he warned her. "Don't you go on like that. Maybe I will come in. And if I do, my girl, it won't be me that'll be lickin' shoes. It might be you!"

"Me!" she scorned. "You ain't got no hold on me no more. Come in and try it!"

The man hesitated.

"Come on!" she taunted.

"I ain't coming in, Millie," he answered. "I didn't come up to come in. I just come up to tell you I was sorry."

She laughed.

"I didn't know you was there, Millie," the man continued. "If I'd knowed you was with the Forty Flirts, I wouldn't have took the boy there. And I come up to tell you so."

Overcome by a sudden and agonizing recollection of the scene, she put her hands to her face.

"And I come up to tell you something else," the acrobat continued, speaking gently. "I tell you, Millie, you better look out. If you ain't careful, you'll lose him for good. He took it hard, Millie. Hard! It broke the little fellow all up. It hurt him – awful!"

She began to walk the floor. In the room the light was failing. It was growing dark – an angry portent – over the roofs of the opposite city.

"Do you want him back?" the man asked.

"Want him back!" she cried.

"Then," said he, his voice soft, grave, "take care!"

"Want him back?" she repeated, beginning, now, by habit, to tear at her nails. "I got to have him back! He's mine, ain't he? Didn't I bear him? Didn't I nurse him? Wasn't it me that – that —made him? He's my kid, I tell you —mine! And I want him back! Oh, I want him so!"

The man entered; but the woman seemed not to know it. He regarded her compassionately.

"That there curate ain't got no right to him," she complained. "He didn't have nothing to do with the boy. It was only me and Dick. What's he sneaking around here for – taking Dick's boy away? The boy's half mine and half Dick's. The curate ain't got no share. And now Dick's dead – and he's all mine! The curate ain't got nothing to do with it. We don't want no curate here. I raised that boy for myself. I didn't do it to give him to no curate. What right's he got coming around here – getting a boy he didn't have no pain to bear or trouble to raise? I tell you I got that boy. He's mine – and I want him!"

"But you give the boy to the curate, Millie!"

"No, I didn't!" she lied. "He took the boy. He come sneaking around here making trouble. I didn't give him no boy. And I want him back," she screamed, in a gust of passion. "I want my boy back!"

A rumble of thunder – failing, far off – came from the sea.

"Millie," the acrobat persisted, "you said you wasn't fit to bring him up."

"I ain't," she snapped. "But I don't care. He's mine – and I'll have him."

The man shrugged his shoulders.

"Jim," the woman said, now quiet, laying her hands on the acrobat's shoulders, looking steadily into his eyes, "that boy's mine. I want him – I want him – back. But I don't want him if he don't love me. And if I can't have him – if I can't have him – "

"Millie!"

"I'll be all alone, Jim – and I'll want – "

He caught her hands. "Me?" he asked. "Will you want me?"

"I don't know."

"Millie," he said, speaking hurriedly, "won't you want me? I've took up with the little Tounson blonde. But she wouldn't care. You know how it goes, Millie. It's only for business. She and me team up. That's all. She wouldn't care. And if you want me – if you want me, Millie, straight and regular, for better or for worse – if you want me that way, Millie – "

"Don't, Jim!"

He let her hands fall – and drew away. "I love you too much," he said, "to butt in now. But if the boy goes back on you, Millie, I'll come – again. You'll need me then – and that's why I'll come. I don't want him to go back on you. I want him to love you still. It's because of the way you love him that I love you – in the way I do. It ain't easy for me to say this. It ain't easy for me to want to give you up. But you're that kind of a woman, Millie. You're that kind – since you got the boy. I want to give you up. You'd be better off with him. You're – you're —holier– when you're with that child. You'd break your poor heart without that boy of yours. And I want you to have him – to love him – to be loved by him. If he comes back, you'll not see me again. I've lived a life that makes me – not fit – to be with no child like him. But so help me God!" the man passionately declared, "I hope he don't turn you down!"

"You're all right, Jim!" she sobbed. "You're all right!"

"I'm going now," he said, quietly. "But I got one more thing to say. Don't fool that boy!"

She looked up.

"Don't fool him," the man repeated. "You'll lose him if you do."

"Not fool him? It's so easy, Jim!"

"Ah, Millie," he said, with a hopeless gesture, "you're blind. You don't know your own child. You're blind – you're just blind!"

"What you mean, Jim?" she demanded.

"You don't know what he loves you for."

"What does he love me for?"

The man was at the door. "Because," he answered, turning, "you're his mother!"

It was not yet nine o'clock. The boy would still be in the church. She must not yet set out for the park. So she lighted the lamp. For a time she posed and grimaced before the mirror. When she was perfect in the part, she sat in the rocking-chair at the broad window, there to rehearse the deceptions it was in her mind to practice. But while she watched the threatening shadows gather, the lights on the river flash into life and go drifting aimlessly away, her mind strayed from this purpose, her willful heart throbbed with sweeter feeling – his childish voice, the depths of his eyes, the grateful weight of his head upon her bosom. Why had he loved her? Because she was his mother! A forgotten perception returned to illuminate her way – a perception, never before reduced to formal terms, that her virtue, her motherly tenderness, were infinitely more appealing to him than the sum of her other attractions.

She started from the chair – her breast heaving with despairing alarm. Again she stood before the mirror – staring with new-opened eyes at the painted face, the gaudy gown: and by these things she was now horrified.

"He won't love me!" she thought. "Not this way. He – he – couldn't!"

It struck the hour.

"Nine o'clock!" she cried. "I got to do something!"

She looked helplessly about the room. Why had he loved her? Because she was his mother! She would be his mother – nothing more: just his mother. She would go to him with that appeal. She would not seek to win him. She would but tell him that she was his mother. She would be his mother – true and tender and holy. He would not resist her plea… This determined, she acted resolutely and in haste: she stripped off the gown, flung it on the floor, kicked the silken heap under the bed; she washed the paint from her face, modestly laid her hair, robed herself anew. And when again, with these new, seeing eyes, she looked into the glass, she found that she was young, unspoiled – still lovely: a sweetly wistful woman, whom he resembled. Moreover, there came to transform her, suddenly, gloriously, a revelation: that of the spiritual significance of her motherhood.

"Thank God!" she thought, uplifted by this vision. "Oh, thank God! I'm like them other people. I'm fit to bring him up!"

It thundered ominously.