Dozen Ways of Love — A Taint in the Blood, Chapter IV

CHAPTER IV

The two men walked back over the bleak cliffs together, and for the greater part of the way in silence; at last the curate spoke.

He told the Jew quite truly that he believed the vicar's wife had his jewel, and that he supposed she must have come by it according to his worst suspicions.

'But,' he added, 'I believe she is a good woman.'

The other looked at him in simple surprise.

'That is very curious,' he said.

'Let us not try to find out her secret by prying; let us go to her to-morrow, and tell her openly what we think.

You fear that she will deny her action; I have no such fear; and if she does not stand our test, I give you my word for it, you shall not be the loser.'

'I have put my case in your hands,' said the Jew.

'I will do as you say.'

They turned into the sleeping town; but when they reached the place of parting the curate put his hand on the Jew's arm and said, 'I should not have your forbearance.

If some one unconnected with myself had wronged me so, at the same time making profession of religion, I should think she deserved both disgrace and punishment.'

'And that she shall have, but not from us,' he replied.

'The sin will surely be visited on her and on her children.'

'Surely not on the children,' said the curate.

'You cannot believe that.

It would be unjust.'

'You have seen but little of the world if you do not know that such is the law.

The vagabond who sins from circumstances may have in him the making of a saint, and his children may be saints; but with those who sin in spite of the good around them it is not so.

For them and for their children is the curse.'

'God cannot punish the innocent for the guilty,' said the priest passionately.

'Surely not; for that is the punishment--that they are not innocent.

The children of the proud are proud; the children of the cruel, cruel; and the children of the dishonest are dishonest, unto the third and fourth generation.

Fight against it as they may, they cannot see the difference between right and wrong; they can only, by struggling, come _nearer_ to the light.

Do you call this unjust of God?

Is it unjust that the children of the mad are mad, and the children of the virtuous virtuous.'

'You take from us responsibility if we inherit sin.'

'Nay, I increase responsibility.

If we inherit obliquity of conscience, we are the more responsible for acting not as seems right in our own eyes, the more bound to restrain and instruct ourselves, for by this doctrine is laid upon us the responsibility of our children and children's children, that they may be better, not worse, than we.'

All night long the curate paced up and down his room.

The dawn came and he saw the fishermen hurry away to the boats at the quay.

The sunrise came with its dull transient light upon the rain cloud.

When the morning advanced he went for the Jew, and they walked down the street in the driving rain.

The wet paving-stones and roofs reflected the grey light of the clouds which hurried overhead.

The ruddy-twigged beech trees at the vicarage gate were shaken and buffeted by the storm.

The two men shook their dripping hats as they entered the house.

They were received in a private parlour, which was filled with objects of art and devotion.

Very blandly did the good wife of the vicar greet them, yet with business-like condescension.

The Jew, in a few very simple words, told the story of his sister's death and the loss of the amulet.

He told the peculiar value of the amulet, and added, 'I have reason, madam, to believe that it has come into your possession.

If so, and if you have it still by you, I entreat that you will give it to me at once, for to you it can only be a pretty trinket, and to us it is like a household god.'

She looked at the Jew with evident emotion.

'I cannot tell you how it grieves me to hear you speak as if you attributed to any inanimate object the saving power which belongs to God alone,' she said.

'Think for a moment, only think, how dishonouring such a superstition is to the Creator.'

'Madam!'

said the Jew in utmost surprise.

'Consider how wrong such a superstition is,' she said.

'What virtue can there be in a stone, or a piece of metal, or an inscription?

None.

They are as dead and powerless as the idols of the heathen; and to put the faith in any such thing that we ought to put in God's providence, is to dishonour Him.

It grieves me to think that you, or any other intelligent man, could believe in such a superstition.'

'Madam,' said the Jew again, 'these things are as we think of them.

You think one way and I another.'

'But you think wrongly.

I would have you see your error, and turn from it.

Can you believe in the Christian faith and yet----' 'I am a Jew,' he said.

'A Jew!'

she exclaimed.

She began to preach against that error also;

entering into a long argument in a dull dogmatic way, but with an earnestness which held the two men irresolute with wonder and surprise.

'It would seem, madam,' said the Jew, after she had talked much, 'that you desire greatly to set an erring world to rights again.'

'And should we not all desire that?'

she asked, unconscious of the irony.

'For what else are we placed in the world but to pass on to others the light that God has entrusted to us?'

'I verily believe, madam,' said he seriously, 'that you think exactly what you say, and that you desire greatly to do me good.

But, putting these questions aside, will you tell me if you have this ornament which I venerate?'

'Yes, I have it.'

'You took it from the breast of my sister when she lay dead upon your shore?'

'I unfastened it from her neck, and have kept it with the greatest care.

It was an ornament which was quite unsuitable to your sister's station in life.

I could not have allowed any of our poor women to see such a valuable stone on the neck of a girl like themselves in station;

it would have given them false ideas, and I am careful to teach them simplicity in dress.

In England we do not approve of people of your class wearing jewellery.'

The curate put his arms on the table and bowed his head on his hands.

'Be that as it may,' said the Jew, rising, 'I will thank you if you will give me my property now and let me go.'

'I cannot give it to you.'

She was a little flustered in her manner, but not much.

'It would be against my conscience to give you what you would use profanely.

Providence has placed it in my care, and I am responsible for its use.

If I gave it to you it would be tempting you to sin.'

He sat down again and looked at her with wonder in his soft brown eyes.

'You have had the stone taken out,' he said, 'and set in a ring.'

'Yes, and I have given it to my daughter, so that it is no longer mine to return to you.

You must be aware that the marble cross stone I set up over your sister's grave cost me much more than the value of this stone.

I am very much surprised that you should ask me to give it back.

Surely any real feeling of gratitude for what I did for her would prompt you to be glad that you have something to give me in return.'

She paused, then harped again upon the other string.

'But under any circumstances I could not feel justified in giving you anything that you would put to a bad use.'

'That you have stolen my property does not make it yours to withhold, whatever may be your sentiments concerning it.'

'"Stolen!"

I do not understand you when you use such a word.

Do you think it possible that I should steal?

I took the chain from your sister's neck with the highest motives.

Do not use such a word as "stolen" in speaking to me.'

'Truly, madam,' he said, 'you could almost persuade me that you are in the right, and that I insult you.'

She looked at him stolidly, although evidently not without some inward apprehension.

It was a piteous sight--the poor distorted reasoning faculty grovelling as a slave to the selfish will.

'I cannot give you back the amethyst,' she said, 'for I have given it away; but if you will promise me never again to regard it as having any value as an amulet or talisman, I will give you the necklace, and I will pay you something to have another stone put in.'

The curate looked up.

'Get him the necklace and Violetta's ring,' he said, 'and we will go.'

A man had arisen within the curate who was stronger than his self-control.

They might have argued with her for ever: he frightened her into compliance.

He took her by the arm and turned her to the door.

'There is not a man, woman or child in this town,' he said, 'who shall not hear of this affair if you delay another moment to get him the chain and the ring.

It is due to his charity if the matter is concealed then.'

When she was gone the Jew was disposed to make remarks.

'I truly believe,' he said, 'that it is as you say, that this woman is very virtuous in the sight of her own conscience.'

A servant brought them a packet.

The Jew opened it, taking out the chain and the ring reverently and putting them in his breast.

Then they went out into the wind and the rain.

The Jew went to his native city, and the curate accompanied him as far as London.

There he said good-bye to him as to a friend.

He did not return at once to his parish, but found a substitute to do his work there, and went inland for a month, seeking by change and relaxation to attain to the true judgment of calm pulses and quiet nerves.

It was in April and in Lent that he returned.

Higgs, the irrepressible, received him with joy.

'It's you that are the good sight for sore eyes,' he said.

'Not but what we've been 'aving an uncommon peaceful time for Lent.

The vicar's lady she's took bad and took to bed.'

The curate reproved the wicked Higgs, but he inquired after the health of the invalid.

'I hope Mrs. Moore is not very ill?'

'Bless you, no, sir; she's 'ale and 'earty.

Cook says she's sure she've fell out with some one.

That's her way; she takes to bed when she've fell out with any one.

It makes them repent of their sins.'

A soft grey mist lay over land and sea.

The church and vicarage were grey and wet.

The beeches at the vicarage gate had broken forth in a myriad buds of silver green, and all the buds were tipped with water, and the grey stems were stained and streaked.

The yew trees in the churchyard were bedewed with tiny drops.

At the little gate that led from the vicarage into the churchyard, between the yew trees and the beeches, the curate waited for Violetta, after evensong.

She came out of the old grey porch and down the path between the graves and the yew trees with her prayer-book in her hand.

She looked like an Easter lily that holds itself in bud till the sadness of Lent is past, so pure, so modest, such a perfect thing from the hand of God.

She stopped and started when she saw her lover, and then greeted him with a little smile, but blent with some reproachful dignity.

'I am glad you have come at last, for I have been wanting to speak to you.

Poor mamma has been very poorly and ill.

It has grieved her very much indeed that you should have so misunderstood her motives, and treated her so rudely.

Mamma takes things like that most deeply to heart.'

'She told you why I treated her rudely?'

'Yes, she told me, but she did not tell papa anything about it; it would only vex papa and do no good.

Mamma told me to tell you that she had made up her mind to forgive you, and to say no more about it, although she was deeply grieved that you should have so misunderstood her.'

'Yes,' said the curate vaguely, for he did not know what else to say.

'Of course, as to the necklace, it may be a matter of opinion as to whether mamma judged rightly or not; but no one who knows her could doubt that her one desire was to do what was right.

It is quite true what she says: that the stone was most unsuitable to the station of those people; every one says that the man was a very common and vulgar-looking person; and of course to regard such a thing with superstitious veneration is a very great sin, from which she saved them as long as she kept it.

Mamma says of course she knew she ran the risk of being misunderstood in acting as she did, but she thought it her duty to run that risk if by that means she could save anything that God had entrusted to her keeping from being misused.

You know what mamma is;

there is nothing she would not do if she thought it right.'

'Yes,' he said again, as though simply admitting that he had heard what she said.

'So I think we had better not say anything more about it.

I know you will see that it is wisest to say nothing to papa or any one else.

People think so differently about such things that it would only cause needless argument, and give poor mamma more pain when she has already suffered so much.'

'You may trust me.

I will never mention the matter to your father, or to any one else.

No one shall ever hear of it through me.'

'I was sure that you would see that it is wisest not to; I told mamma so.

When she is better, and you have shown her that you regret having misunderstood her, we shall all be very happy again.'

She held up her pretty face for a kiss.

No one could see them except the chattering starlings in the church tower, for they stood in the soft mist between the dewy yew trees and the red-budding hedge by the vicarage lawn.

The beech trees stretched out their graceful twigs above them, the starlings talked to one another rather sadly, and far off through the stillness of the mist came the sound of the tide on the shore.

The curate was very pale and grave.

His tall frame trembled like a sick woman's as he stooped to give Violetta that kiss.

He took her hands in his for a moment, and then he clasped her in his arms, lifting her from the grass and embracing her in a passion of tenderness and love.

Then he put her from him.

'Violetta, it is amiable of you, and loyal, to excuse and defend your mother, but tell me--tell me, as you speak before God, that you do not think as you have spoken.

You are a woman now, with a soul of your own;

tell me you know that to take this necklace and to keep it secretly was a terrible sin.'

'Indeed'--with candour--'I do not think anything of the sort.

I think it is wicked of you to slander mamma in that way.

And if you want to know what I think'--with temper now--'I think it was most unkind of you to give away my ring.

After it had been given to me on such an occasion, too, it was priceless to us, but we could easily have paid that vulgar man all it was worth to him.'

'I will not argue with you.

I perceive now that that would do no good.'

There was a heart-broken tone in his voice that frightened Violetta.

'I will--I will only say----' 'What?'

she asked.

The thin sharp sound in her voice was a note of alarm.

'I will not marry you,' moaned the curate.

'Not marry me!'

she exclaimed in astonishment.

'I love you.

I shall always love you.

No other woman shall ever be my wife; but I will never marry you; and I shall go away and leave you free to forget me.'

'But why?

What have I done?'

she asked, her breath catching her tones.

'You have done nothing, my poor, poor girl; but--oh, my darling, I would gladly die if by dying I could open your eyes to see the simple integrity of unselfishness!'

'It is very absurd for you to speak of unselfishness at the very moment when you are selfishly giving me so much pain,' she cried, defiant.

He bent his head and covered his face with his hands.

She stood and looked at him, her cheeks flushed and her breast heaving with a great anger.

'Good-bye, Violetta,' he said, and turned slowly away.

'I never heard of anything so dishonourable,' she cried.

And that was what the world said; the curate was in disgrace with society for the rest of his life.

V