Complete works of hall c.., p.392
Complete Works of Hall Caine, page 392
“What did I tell you?” she said. “Was I not right? Oh, if this could be heard in Denmark!”
“Or in England!” said Oscar.
They played the piece again and again, and at every fresh playing their excitement increased until it reached the point of hysteria, and their voices in that silent place became as shrill as the wind on the mountain-top. At last they tried the words, and then their emotion knew no limit.
The organ trembled and throbbed again, and then on the top of all other sounds came the sound of Helga’s voice, like a human cry above the thundering waves of nature, sometimes weeping, sometimes raging, sometimes crouching, sometimes springing out of the surge, and finally sinking down to the soft whisper of “Let there be peace!”
When the anthem was over and all was still, Oscar sat quiet for some moments while the unheard echo of the music seemed to roll through the silent air; and then the lightning-flash of joy or madness which comes to every man of genius once in his life came to him also, and his heart cried out, in its delirious happiness, “I, too, am a great composer!”
In the intoxication of that moment, Oscar’s hand swung down and took Helga’s hand and held it, and their fingers trembled together and they seemed to hear the beating of each other’s heart. They looked at each other, and his eyes were bloodshot and hers were wet.
“Helga!” he cried.
“Oscar!” she answered, but at the next moment a window blew open on the staircase to the organ-loft and Oscar heard again the dreary noises of the work-a-day world without — the rumble of the iron trolleys, the thin clank of the mason’s trowel, and the quick beat of the rivetter’s hammer. It was like the wakening of a prisoner in his cell when the warder beats at the door and the dream of glory is gone and the prison walls close round him again.
Oscar’s fingers slackened, and the next moment he heard Helga’s rapid breathing behind him, and her voice saying with a strange bitterness —
“Is that Thora?”
He started, and turned. “Where?” he asked.
“Down there by the communion-steps — by the altar. No, I was mistaken. It’s only a shadow. The light is fading.” Then with the same bitterness she said, “But I suppose she will be there soon, and you with her.”
Oscar shuddered as if a wounded artery had been torn open, and Helga continued —
“Then you will go back to business, and Oscar — Oscar Stephensson, the musician — will be dead.”
He fingered the organ-stops fumblingly and made no reply, whereupon Helga, with undisguised irony, began to picture the dull routine of the business life that was waiting for him after marriage — its calculations of discounts, its squabbles with farmers, its buying and selling of pots and pans.
“It is such a pity,” she said.
“Don’t torture me, Helga,” he cried.
“But is there no way out of it?”
“No, no, no!”
“No way at all, Oscar?”
“Let us go,” he said, and he had got down to the door before he remembered that he had left his hat behind him in the organ-loft.
Thora had tea ready when they got back to the Factor’s. She was kneeling before a cosy fire, making toast, after cutting the bread and butter, and she looked up at them as they entered with a nervous, questioning, tearful smile.
“Poor little soul! She must never know — never, never!” thought Oscar.
V
THORA knew already, and the big heart in her little breast was breaking. She had begun to think that what had happened to Magnus when Oscar came back was now happening to her — Oscar was falling in love with Helga, and she, like Magnus, was being left alone.
Yet she could not reconcile herself to this suspicion without a hard battle, and the first skirmish of the sweet heart was to fight for the enemy — Oscar had made a great, great sacrifice when he agreed to marry her; it was not to be wondered at if he had spasms of regret sometimes. She hinted as much to Aunt Margret in one of the long hours in which they were left together.
“Don’t you think that Oscar was very unselfish when he signed that contract?” she said.
“Unselfish? I don’t call it unselfishness to sign yourself into a fortune,” said Aunt Margret.
“But he had to take up the business, you know.”
“Certainly he had — the best business in Iceland.”
“Helga seems to think it is a little beneath him, Aunt Margret.”
“It’s good enough for Helga’s father, and he made it. Besides, Oscar had nothing else, and an ugly sheep is better than no mutton.”
“Oh yes, he had his music, Auntie, and Helga thinks that was a good deal.”
“Does she, indeed? People who are naked needn’t go about mending other people’s clothes. Oscar’s music wouldn’t have brought him a penny of profit, and as for honour — what about Althing, and all the other things he couldn’t have got without being rich?”
“So you don’t think Oscar sacrificed himself very much when he signed the contract?”
“Sacrificed himself? Perhaps the boot was on the other leg, if you ask me.”
Thora was happy for days after this interview, and while Oscar and Helga played their Wagner she went about the house singing her little love-ditties, and thinking of the time when Parliament would begin its session, and Oscar would throw himself into politics, and become Speaker, and perhaps Governor, and it would all come of having married her.
But it was hard to sit for hours in the same room with people who were scarcely conscious of her presence, and though Thora tried to hide her pain lest Oscar should feel ashamed, she sometimes felt bitter about Helga, and wanted to burst out on her. The only thing which restrained her from doing so was a sweet doubt which she cherished in the most secret chamber of her heart that perhaps she was mistaken after all, and Oscar did not really care for Helga.
“Auntie,” she said, “don’t you think it’s silly to be jealous?”
“Depends upon circumstances, Thora.”
“If a wife — for example — fancies her husband is paying too much attention to another woman — don’t you think she is silly to be jealous?”
“She’s silly to show she is, my precious. It doesn’t prevent the sting to bite the head off the serpent, and if a wife shows the husband she’s jealous she’s just doing what the other woman wants.”
“So you think she ought to be quiet and say nothing?”
“Certainly I do. If the man is going to run away from her she had better let him run, and if he isn’t he’ll be the more ashamed because he thinks she doesn’t know.”
“You mean that if the man is only fascinated for a time—”
“Just so! Fascination may be good enough for a flirtation, but it’s like bright metal — it soon gets tarnished in a damp cellar. You want gold for the dark places, my honey.”
“That is to say, Auntie dear, that love is the only thing for married life?”
“I should think so, indeed, with its crosses and disappointments, and children and croup, and all the rest of it. And when it comes to marrying, the silliest of the men know that, bless them!”
“What a lot you know about the men, Auntie darling — I wonder you never married yourself, dear.”
“That’s why, my precious!”
It was easier for Thora to veil her agonies with smiles after this conversation. She pictured to herself the time when her love would be everything to Oscar. In the secret places of her soul she thought of the days when children would come, and perhaps even sickness, and they would be drawn close — so close — together, because the dear clouds of life hung over both of them. She was not beautiful, she was only a homely and humble little thing, she was unworthy of Oscar, and there were so many things in which she was inferior, but oh, her love was wonderful! Nothing in the world was so wonderful as her love. It would work miracles, it would be stronger than death, it would stand by Oscar to the end.
But all the same it was hard to receive her wounds without a cry, and when Oscar and Helga went off to the cathedral and left her at home she told herself she was too ignorant to be Oscar’s wife, and all her sweet, heroic love was wasted.
“Don’t you think Helga is very clever, Aunt Margret?”
Aunt Margret lifted her eyes from her knitting, and blinked through her spectacles.
“Clever? — a girl who can’t darn a stocking or boil a potato!”
“But see how she can talk, Auntie.”
“So can the parrot, my dear, and the raven is seldom sparing of his voice either.”
“But surely a man wants his wife to be a companion, Auntie — to be able to converse with him on the subjects he is interested in, and to criticise his work, perhaps.”
“Does he? Perhaps he does, but it would be a crazy creature of a man who would rather marry a critic than a cook, for all that.”
Always after this Thora had tea ready when Oscar and Helga returned from the cathedral, and if her heart had its tremors still she tried to take care that Oscar should never see a tear in her eyes. But many a time when she felt herself to be like an isthmus between the two, holding them together, yet keeping them apart, the strung bow of her will slackened and she was nearly breaking down. She waited day by day for Oscar’s heart to speak to her, and when it did not speak she told herself it was because Helga was so beautiful.
“Isn’t Helga beautiful, Aunt Margret?”
“Perhaps,” said Aunt Margret.
“You know she is, Auntie. You know she is the most beautiful girl in Iceland.”
“Maybe I do — maybe I don’t!”
“What an advantage beauty like Helga’s gives to a girl — she gets everything and everybody. If a girl is only beautiful enough she has all the men at her feet.”
“They must be chiropodists, then, and there are not many of them in these parts. No, no, beauty isn’t everything, Thora, and that’s a mercy for some of us.”
The colour began to mount to Thora’s eyes, and catching sight of this flag of distress, Aunt Margret continued —
“But fine feathers make fine birds, and I know some in Iceland dress would make Helga look small if they were done up in her Danish folderolls.”
Thora’s blushing face began to shine like the sunrise.
“But what’s the use? Beauty fills the eye, but not the belly.”
“Auntie Margret, what plain things you say!”
“Do I? Then it’s best to say them plainly. It isn’t good to gild copper with gold, my honey.”
After this talk with Aunt Margret, Thora was more the mistress of herself than before, because the dividing line between Helga and herself seemed less. She made up her mind that she would dress in the English manner, so that Oscar should not see so much difference.
She had money — the dress money her father gave her. It was not very much, but in previous years she had given away most of it, and this year she had intended to buy a Scotch overcoat for Hans, the sailor, who was losing all respect for himself and going about in cold weather with nothing over his shirt. But now she would be selfish, she would spend her money on herself, and that was only right, since it was spending it on Oscar also.
It must be a secret, a great secret; it must come upon everybody as a surprise, because that would be half the battle. So she bought postal orders with her savings, and sent to Edinburgh for a costume such as she saw in the picture of a trade advertisement.
The costume came by a trading steamer, and she was like a child in her secrecy and joy, smuggling the big cardboard box upstairs to her room, and answering the inquisitive questions of the Factor and Aunt Margret with mysterious little nods and subterfuges.
The day was crisp and frosty, and when Oscar, coming in the afternoon, suggested a walk to the lake to try the ice for skating, Helga responded readily, but Thora said no, she had something to do, something important — a little surprise, they should see when they came back again.
As soon as Helga and Oscar had gone, and Aunt Margret had promised to make tea, Thora stole up to her room, locked the door, opened the box, and took out the new garments that were to work the wondrous change. They were beautiful, they were dreams, they were lovelier than anything of Helga’s — a blue voile dress with a silk corsage and embroidered yoke. The pleated skirt was like the sun’s rays over Heckla after a shower of summer rain, and the silk of the blouse was as beautiful as the ice of a glacier with the flowery bubbles of air in it.
Thora laughed for joy, and taking off her old Iceland costume she threw it aside as a thing she had done with — the granny skirt, the stiff treya, and the starchy brjest. She wondered how she could have worn them so long, and even told herself what she would do with them — she would give them to a young widow who had lately lost her child by diphtheria and joined the people at the Salvation shelter.
When she took up the new garments she had some doubt as to how they were to be put on, and almost wished she had inquired of Helga. The accordion skirt was easy enough, and its ample train made her feel tall and imposing, but the blouse was a besetting trouble. It fastened behind, and after despairing efforts to catch the hooks and eyes she was tempted to call Aunt Margret; but she thought no, that would never do, so she struggled on.
The room was cold, but when she had finished dressing her face was flushed and heated. She had put on her silver belt, because it was a present from Oscar, and brushed her hair sideways over the forehead because that was how Helga wore it. Then looking at herself in the glass, she laughed again, for she was proud and happy.
What would Oscar say when he saw her? He would say, “Why, this is Helga! Another Helga! Not quite so tall perhaps, but just — yes, really just as nice-looking!” And then Helga would be angry, and envious, and perhaps go back to Denmark.
She was walking to and fro on tiptoe, glancing with sparkling eyes at her figure in the glass, when she heard voices in the hall below.
“Thora!” cried somebody from the foot of the stairs. It was Oscar.
“I’m coming,” she answered.
“What about the great surprise?”
“Presently!” she cried.
She waited until she heard a door close below, and then, still laughing a little, but breathing rapidly, feeling sure of victory, yet with a fluttering at her heart, she went down the stairs, and sailed into the sitting-room.
Oscar was leaning on the marble stove, and Helga, sitting on a low seat, was warming her feet at the fire. They turned to Thora as she entered, and looked at her with wide eyes. There was a moment of chilling silence, and then Thora, breathing faster and faster, said —
“Well, what do you think of it?”
Helga began to laugh, first in a smothered titter, but finally in an outright roar, whereupon Oscar, who had struggled not to smile, caught the contagion and joined her.
Thora’s pitiful face fell, and she said, with a crack in her voice —
“But what are you laughing at, Oscar?”
“My dear, dear child!” said Oscar; and Helga, who was still laughing, said —
“A little milliner! It makes her look like a little milliner!”
“No, no, not that,” said Oscar. “But it’s not Thora. Thora is a sweet, simple Iceland maiden whose charm is her simplicity, whereas this—”
“I see,” said Thora, and with her heart in her mouth she turned to go.
Oscar stepped to the door to stop her, but with the shrill cry of a hare that is wounded to death she flung out at him and passed through. She went upstairs with a slow step, took off her English costume, put it back in the cardboard box, and pushed it under the bed — crying a little and wiping her eyes.
She knew the truth at last — she knew where she stood in Oscar’s mind. A simple Iceland maiden — that was all he had ever seen in her! It was she who had merely fascinated him, and Helga whom he loved!
When the door of the sitting-room closed on Thora, Oscar looked at Helga and said —
“Whatever has come over her?”
“Don’t you see?” said Helga.
“Why, no — what is it?”
“How stupid these clever boys can be! I could tell you in three words.”
“Tell me, then — tell me.”
“Thora is jealous.”
“You don’t mean that?”
Helga’s face flushed; she looked up at Oscar, and a mysterious thrill went through him. The great surprise had come indeed.
VI
OSCAR slept badly that night. For two months he had been moving in a garden of dreams, where the odour of sweet flowers overpowered the senses, but he was awake at last, and was being dragged to trial in a tribunal of his own creating. In that court of conscience he was both righteous judge and guilty prisoner, and through the long hours of broken sleep when he saw his life and motives as by flashes of lightning, he asked and answered some terrible questions —
Is Thora’s jealousy justified?
No, yes! That is to say — I may have neglected her — thoughtlessly neglected her.
Do you love Helga?
It isn’t necessary to think that. I admire her — I admire her beauty, and her intellect, but —— —
Then you do not love her?
I love her society — I love to be with her; she is bright and brilliant; we have many interests in common.
Then if you do not love Helga why not cut her off rather than see Thora suffer?
I can’t! I can’t!
So you do love Helga?
Yes! Yes! I do love her.
Then what about Thora?
I am sorry for Thora — very sorry.
Have you ceased to love her?
Don’t say that. My feeling for Thora is the same now as it has always been.
Then you have never loved her?
I thought I did — I sincerely thought I did.
So your feeling for Thora was an illusion?
