In the Year of Jubilee Part 72

'That is no concern of yours. It shall be done, and in a day or two.

Then make your choice.'

'You think I can be forced to live with a man I don't love?'

'I shouldn't dream of living with a woman who didn't love me. But you are married, and a mother, and the secrecy that is degrading you shall come to an end. Acknowledge me or not, I shall acknowledge _you_, and make it known that I am to blame for all that has happened.'

'And what good will you do?'

'I shall do good to myself, at all events. I'm a selfish fellow, and shall be so to the end, no doubt.'

Nancy glanced at him to interpret the speech by his expression. He was smiling.

'What good will it do you to have to support me? The selfishness I see in it is your wis.h.i.+ng to take me from a comfortable home and make me poor.'

'That can't be helped. And, what's more, you won't think it a hards.h.i.+p.'

'How do you know that? I have borne dreadful degradations rather than lose my money.'

'That was for the child's sake, not for your own.'

He said it softly and kindly, and for the first time Nancy met his eyes without defiance.

'It was; I could always have earned my own living, somehow.'

Tarrant paused a moment, then spoke with look averted.

'Is he well, and properly cared for?'

'If he were not well and safe, I shouldn't be away from him.'

'When will you let me see him, Nancy?'

She did not smile, but there was a brightening of her countenance, which she concealed. Tarrant stepped to her side.

'Dear--my own love--will you try to forgive me? It was all my cursed laziness. It would never have happened if I hadn't fallen into poverty.

Poverty is the devil, and it overcame me.'

'How can you think that _I_ shall be strong enough to face it?' she asked, moving half a step away. 'Leave me to myself; I am contented; I have made up my mind about what is before me, and I won't go through all that again.'

Tired of standing, she dropped upon the nearest chair, and lay back.

'You can't be contented, Nancy, in a position that dishonours you. From what you tell me, it seems that your secret is no secret at all. Will you compel me to go to that man Barmby and seek information from him about my own wife?'

'I have had to do worse things than that.'

'Don't torture me by such vague hints. I entreat you to tell me at once the worst that you have suffered. How did Barmby get to know of your marriage? And why has he kept silent about it? There can't be anything that you are ashamed to say.'

'No. The shame is all yours.'

'I take it upon myself, all of it; I ought never to have left you; but that baseness followed only too naturally on the cowardice which kept me from declaring our marriage when honour demanded it. I have played a contemptible part in this story; don't refuse to help me now that I am ready to behave more like a man. Put your hand in mine, and let us be friends, if we mayn't be more.'

She sat irresponsive.

'You were a brave girl. You consented to my going away because it seemed best, and I took advantage of your sincerity. Often enough that last look of yours has reproached me. I wonder how I had the heart to leave you alone.'

Nancy raised herself, and said coldly:

'It was what I might have expected. I had only my own folly to thank.

You behaved as most men would.'

This was a harder reproach than any yet. Tarrant winced under it. He would much rather have been accused of abnormal villainy.

'And I was foolish,' continued Nancy, 'in more ways than you knew. You feared I had told Jessica Morgan of our marriage, and you were right; of course I denied it. She has been the cause of my worst trouble.'

In rapid sentences she told the story of her successive humiliations, recounted her sufferings at the hands of Jessica and Beatrice and Samuel Barmby. When she ceased, there were tears in her eyes.

'Has Barmby been here again?' Tarrant asked sternly.

'Yes. He has been twice, and talked in just the same way, and I had to sit still before him--'

'Has he said one word that--?'

'No, no,' she interrupted hastily. 'He's only a fool--not man enough to--'

'That saves me trouble,' said Tarrant; 'I have only to treat him like a fool. My poor darling, what vile torments you have endured! And you pretend that you would rather live on this fellow's interested generosity--for, of course, he hopes to be rewarded--than throw the whole squalid entanglement behind you and be a free, honest woman, even if a poor one?'

'I see no freedom.'

'You have lost all your love for me. Well, I can't complain of that. But bear my name you shall, and be supported by me. I tell you that it was never _possible_ for me actually to desert you and the little one--never possible. I s.h.i.+rked a duty as long as I could; that's all it comes to.

I loafed and paltered until the want of a dinner drove me into honesty.

Try to forget it, dear Nancy. Try to forgive me, my dearest!'

She was dry-eyed again, and his appeal seemed to have no power over her emotions.

'You are forgetting,' she said practically, 'that I have lived on money to which I had no right, and that I--or you--can be forced to repay it.'

'Repaid it must be, whether demanded or not. Where does Barmby live?

Perhaps I could see him to-night.'

'What means have you of keeping us all alive?'

'Some of my work has been accepted here and there; but there's something else I have in mind. I don't ask you to become a poverty-stricken wife in the ordinary way. I can't afford to take a house. I must put you, with the child, into as good lodgings as I can hope to pay for, and work on by myself, just seeing you as often as you will let me. Even if you were willing, it would be a mistake for us to live together. For one thing, I couldn't work under such conditions; for another, it would make you a slave. Tell me: are you willing to undertake the care of the child, if nothing else is asked of you?'

Nancy gave him a disdainful smile, a smile like those of her girlhood.

'I'm not quite so feeble a creature as you think me.'

'You would rather have the child to yourself, than be living away from him?'