Part 4 (1/2)

She kept silence, therefore, and st.i.tched away with a mind as busy as her fingers, until it was time to boil the kettle and get the tea ready.

This was just done when Mrs Wis.h.i.+ng, who lived still farther up the hill, dropped in on her way home from the village.

She was an uncertain, wavering little woman, with no will of her own, and a heavy burden in the shape of a husband, who, during the last few years, had taken to fits of drinking. The widow White acknowledged that she had a good deal to bear from Dan'l, and when times were very bad, often supplied her with food and firing from her own small store. But she did not do so without protest, for in her opinion the fault was not entirely on Dan'l's side. ”Maybe,” she said, ”if he found a clean hearth and a tidy bit o' supper waitin' at home, he'd stay there oftener. An' if he worked reg'lar, and didn't drink his wages, you'd want for nothin', and be able to put by with only just the two of you to keep. But I can't see you starve.”

Mrs Wis.h.i.+ng fluttered in at the door, and, as she thought probable, was asked to have a dish of tea. Lilac bustled round the kitchen and set everything neatly on the table, while her mother, glancing at her now and then, stood at the window sewing with active fingers.

”Well, you're always busy, Mrs White,” said the guest plaintively as she untied her bonnet strings. ”I will say as you're a hard worker yourself, whatever you say about other folks.”

”An' I hope as when the time comes as I can't work that the Lord 'ull see fit to take me,” said Mrs White shortly.

”Dear, dear, you've got no call to say that,” said Mrs Wis.h.i.+ng, ”you as have got Lilac to look to in your old age. Now, if it was me and Dan'l, with neither chick nor child--” She shook her head mournfully.

Mrs White gave her one sharp glance which meant ”and a good thing too”, but she did not say the words aloud; there was something so helpless and incapable about Mrs Wis.h.i.+ng, that it was both difficult and useless to be severe with her, for the most cutting speeches could not rouse her from the mild despair into which she had sunk years ago. ”I dessay you're right, but _I_ dunno,” was her only reply to all reproaches and exhortations, and finding this, Mrs White had almost ceased them, except when they were wrung from her by some unusual example of bad management.

”An' so handy as she is,” continued Mrs Wis.h.i.+ng, her wandering gaze caught for a moment by Lilac's active little figure, ”an' that's all your up-bringing, Mrs White, as I was saying just now to Mrs Greenways.”

Mrs White, who was now pouring out the tea, looked quickly up at the mention of Mrs Greenways. She would not ask, but her very soul longed to know what had been said.

”She was talkin' about Lilac as I was in at Dimbleby's getting a bunch of candles,” continued Mrs Wis.h.i.+ng, ”sayin' how her picture was going to be took; an' says she, 'It's a poor sort of picture as she'll make, with a face as white as her pinafore. Now, if it was Agnetta,' says she, 'as has a fine nateral bloom, I could understand the gentleman wantin' to paint _her_.'”

”I s'pose the gentleman knows best himself what he wants to paint,” said Mrs White.

”Lor', of course he do,” Mrs Wis.h.i.+ng hastened to reply; ”and, as I said to Mrs Greenways, 'Red cheeks or white cheeks don't make much differ to a gal in life. It's the upbringing as matters.'”

Mrs White looked hardly so pleased with this sentiment as her visitor had hoped. She was perfectly aware that it had been invented on the spot, and that Mrs Wis.h.i.+ng would not have dared to utter it to Mrs Greenways. Moreover, the comparison between Lilac's paleness and Agnetta's fine bloom touched her keenly, for in this remark she recognised her sister-in-law's tongue.

The rivalry between the two mothers was an understood thing, and though it had never reached open warfare, it was kept alive by the kindness of neighbours, who never forgot to repeat disparaging speeches. Mrs White's opinions of the genteel uselessness of Bella and Gusta were freely quoted to Mrs Greenways, and she in her turn was always ready with a thrust at Lilac which might be carried to Mrs White.

When the widow had first heard of the artist's proposal, her intense gratification was at once mixed with the thought, ”What'll Mrs Greenways think o' that?”

But she did not express this triumph aloud. Even Lilac had no idea that her mother's heart was overflowing with pleasure and pride because it was _her_ child, _her_ Lilac, whom the artist wished to paint. So now, though she bit her lip with vexation at Mrs Wis.h.i.+ng's speech, she took it with outward calmness, and only replied, with a glance at her daughter:

”Lilac never was one to think much about her looks, and I hope she never will be.”

Both the look and the words seemed to Lilac to have special meaning, almost as though her mother knew what she intended to do to-morrow; it seemed indeed to be written in large letters everywhere, and all that was said had something to do with it. This made her feel so guilty, that she began to be sure it would be very wrong to have a fringe.

Should she give it up? It was a relief when Mrs Wis.h.i.+ng, leaving the subject of the picture for one of nearer interest, proceeded to dwell on Dan'l and his failings, so that Lilac was not referred to again. This well-worn topic lasted for the rest of the visit, for Dan'l had been worse than usual. He had ”got the neck of the bottle”, as Mrs Wis.h.i.+ng expressed it, and had been in a hopeless state during the last week.

Her sad monotonous voice went grinding on over the old story, while Lilac, was.h.i.+ng up the tea things, carried on her own little fears, and hopes, and wishes in her own mind. No one watching her would have guessed what those wishes were: she looked so trim and neat, and handled the china as deftly as though she had no other thought than to do her work well. And yet the inside did not quite match this proper outside, for her whole soul was occupied with a beautiful vision--herself with a fringe like Agnetta! It proved so engrossing that she hardly noticed Mrs Wis.h.i.+ng's departure, and when her mother spoke she looked up startled.

”Yon's a poor creetur as never could stand alone and never will,” she said. ”It was the same when she was a gal--always hangin' on to someone, always wantin' someone else to do for her, and think for her.

Well! empty sacks won't never stand upright, and it's no good tryin' to make 'em.”

Lilac made no reply, and Mrs White, seizing the opportunity of impressing a useful lesson, continued:

”Lor'! it seems only the other day as Hepzibah was married to Daniel Wis.h.i.+ng. A pretty gal she was, with clinging, coaxing ways, like the suckles in the hedge, and everyone she come near was ready to give her a helping hand. And at the wedding they all said, 'There, now, she's got the right man, Hepzibah has. A strong, steady feller, and a good workman an' all, and one as'll look after her an' treat her kind.' But I mind what I said to Mrs Pinhorn on that very day: 'I hope it may be so,' I says, 'but it takes an angel, and not a man, to bear with a woman as weak an' s.h.i.+ftless as Hepzibah, and not lose his temper.' And now look at 'em! There's Dan'l taken to drink, and when he's out of himself he'll lift his hand to her, and they're both of 'em miserable. It does a deal o' harm for a woman to be weak like that. She can't stand alone, and she just pulls a man down along with her.”

The troubles of the Wis.h.i.+ngs were very familiar to Lilac's ears, and, though she took her knitting and sat down on her little stool close to her mother, she did not listen much to what she was saying.

Mrs White, quite ignorant that her words of wisdom were wasted, continued admonis.h.i.+ngly: