Volume Ii Part 5 (1/2)

Meanwhile Mrs. d.i.c.kson stood grinning--grinning wide and visibly. It was the strangest mirth, as though hollow pain and laughter strove with each other for the one poor indomitable face.

”Well, ee _could_ 'a told yer, if e'd ad the mind,” she said, nodding, ”for ee knows. Ee's been out o' work this twelve an a arf year--well, come, I'll bet yer, anyway, as ee 'asn't done a 'and's turn this three year--an I don't blime im. Fust, there isn't the work to be got, and then yer git out of the way o' wantin it. An beside, I'm used to im.

When Janey--no, it were Sue!--were seven month old, he come in one night from the public, an after ee'd broke up most o' the things, he says to me, 'Clear out, will yer!' An I cleared out, and Sue and me set on the doorstep till mornin. And when mornin come, Tom opened the door, an ee says, 'What are you doin there, mother? Why aint yer got my breakfast?' An I went in an got it. But, bless yer, nowadays--the _women won't do it_!--”

Another roar went up from the meeting. Mrs. d.i.c.kson still grinned.

”An so there's nothink but _settin_', as I said before--settin' till yer can't set no more. If I begin o' seven, I gets Mr. d.i.c.kson to put the teathings an the loaf andy, so as I don't 'ave to get up more'n jes to fetch the kettle; and the chillen gets the same as me--tea an bread, and a red 'erring Sundays; an Mr. d.i.c.kson, 'e gets 'is meals out. I gives 'im the needful, and 'e don't make no trouble; an the children is dreadful frackshus sometimes, and gets in my way fearful. But there, if I can _set_--set till I 'ear Stepney Church goin twelve--I can earn my ten s.h.i.+llin a week, an keep the lot of 'em. Wot does any lidy or genelman want, a comin' meddlin down 'ere? Now, that's the middle an both ends on it. Done? Well, I dessay I is done. Lor, I ses to em in the orspital it do seem rummy to me to be layin abed like that. If Tom was 'ere, why, 'e'd--”

She made a queer, significant grimace. But the audience laughed no longer. They stared silently at the gaunt creature, and with their silence her own mood changed.

Suddenly she whipped up her ap.r.o.n. She drew it across her eyes, and flung it away again pa.s.sionately.

”I dessay we shall be lyin abed in Kingdom Come,” she said defiantly, yet piteously. ”But we've got to git there fust. An I don't want no shops, thank yer!”

She rambled on a little longer, then, at a sign from the lady-secretary, made a grinning curtsy to the audience and departed.

”What do they get out of that?” said Watton, in Tressady's ear--”Poor galley-slave in praise of servitude!”

”Her slavery keeps her alive, please.”

”Yes--and drags down the standard of a whole cla.s.s!”

”You'll admit she seemed content?”

”It's that content we want to kill.--Ah! _at last!_” and Watton clapped loudly, followed by about half the meeting, while the rest sat silent.

Then Tressady perceived that the chair-woman had called upon Lady Maxwell to move the next resolution, and that the tall figure had risen.

She came forward slowly, glancing from side to side, as though doubtful where to look for her friends. She was in black, and her head was covered with a little black lace bonnet, in the strings of which, at her throat, shone a small diamond brooch. The delicate whiteness of her face and hands, and this sparkle of light on her breast, that moved as she moved, struck a thrill of pleasure through Tressady's senses. The squalid monotony and physical defect of the crowd about him pa.s.sed from his mind.

Her beauty redressed the balance. ”'Loveliness, magic, and grace--they are here; they are set in the world!'--and ugliness and pain have not conquered while this face still looks and breathes.” This, and nothing less, was the cry of the young man's heart and imagination as he strained forward, waiting for her voice.

Then he settled himself to listen--only to pa.s.s gradually from expectation to nervousness, from nervousness to dismay.

What was happening? She had once told him that she was not a speaker, and he had not believed her. She had begun well, he thought, though with a hesitation he had not expected. But now--had she lost her thread--or what? Incredible! when one remembered her in private life, in conversation. Yet these stumbling sentences, this evident distress!

Tressady found himself fidgeting in sympathetic misery. He and Watton looked at each other.

A little more, and she would have lost her audience. She _had_ lost it.

At first there had been eager listening, for she had plunged straightway into a set explanation and defence of the Bill point by point, and half the room knew that she was Lord Maxwell's wife. But by the end of ten minutes their attention was gone. They were only staring at her because she was handsome and a great lady. Otherwise, they seemed not to know what to make of her. She grew white; she wavered.

Tressady saw that she was making great efforts, and all in vain. The division between her and her audience widened with every sentence, and Fontenoy's lady-organiser, in the background, sat smilingly erect.

Tressady, who had been at first inclined to hate the thought of her success in this Inferno, grew hot with wrath and irritation. His own vanity suffered in her lack of triumph.

Amazing! How _could_ her personal magic--so famous on so many fields--have deserted her like this in an East End schoolroom, before people whose lives she knew, whose griefs she carried in her heart?

Then an idea struck him. The thought was an illumination--he understood.

He shut his eyes and listened. Maxwell's sentences, Maxwell's manner--even, at times, Maxwell's voice! He had been rehearsing to her his coming speech in the House of Lords, and she was painfully repeating it! To his disgust, Tressady saw the reporters scribbling away--no doubt they knew their business! Aye, there was the secret. The wife's adoration showed through her very failure--through this strange conversion of all that was manly, solid, and effective in Maxwell, into a confused ma.s.s of facts and figures, pedantic, colourless, and cold!

Edward Watton began to look desperately unhappy. ”Too long,” he said, whispering in Tressady's ear, ”and too technical. They can't follow.”