Helen with the High Hand Part 19

"I shall beat her, as sure as eggs!" he told himself.

"All this means that he'll give in when it comes to the point," she told herself.

And aloud she said: "Have you had supper, uncle?"

"No," he replied.

The next development was that, without another word, she removed her gloves, lifted her pale hands to her head, and slowly drew hatpins from her hat. Then she removed her hat, and plunged the pins into it again.

He could scarcely refrain from s.n.a.t.c.hing off his own ta.s.selled Turkish cap and pitching it in the air. He felt as if he had won the Battle of Hastings, or defeated the captain of the bowling club in a single-handed match.

"And to think," he reflected, "that I should ha' given in to her by this time if I hadn't got more sense in my little finger than--" etc.

"I think I'll stay and cook you a bit of supper," said Helen. "I suppose Georgiana is in the kitchen?"

"If her isn't, her's in the back entry," said Jimmy.

"What's she doing in the back entry?"

"Counting the stars," said Jimmy; "and that young man as comes with the bread helping her, most like."

"I must talk to that girl." Helen rose.

"Ye may," said Jimmy; "but th' baker's man'll have th' last word, or times is changed."

He was gay. He could not conceal his gaiety. He saw himself freed from the menace of the thraldom of Mrs. b.u.t.t. He saw himself gourmandising over the meals that Helen alone could cook. He saw himself trotting up and down the streets of Bursley with the finest, smartest la.s.s in the Five Towns by his side. And scarcely a penny of extra expenditure! And all this happy issue due to his diplomatic and histrionic skill! The fact was, Helen really liked him. There could be no doubt about that.

She liked him, and she would not leave him. Also, she was a young woman of exceptional common sense, and, being such, she would not risk the loss of a large fortune merely for the sake of indulging pique engendered by his refusal to gratify a ridiculous caprice.

Before she had well quitted the room he saw with clearness that he was quite the astutest man in the world, and that Helen was clay in his hands.

The sound of crockery in the scullery, and the cheerful little explosion when the gas-ring was ignited, and the low mutter of conversation that ensued between Helen and Georgiana--these phenomena were music to the artist in him. He extracted the concertina from its case and began to play "The Dead March in Saul." Not because his sentiments had a foundation in the slightest degree funereal, but because he could perform "The Dead March in Saul" with more virtuosity than any other piece except "The Hallelujah Chorus." And he did not desire to insist too much on his victory by filling Trafalgar-road with "The Hallelujah Chorus." He was discretion itself.

When she came back to the parlour (astoundingly natty in a muslin ap.r.o.n of Georgiana's) to announce supper, she made no reference to the concert which she was interrupting. He abandoned the concertina gently, caressing it into its leather sh.e.l.l. He was full to the brim with kindliness. It seemed to him that his life with Helen was commencing all over again. Then he followed the indications of his nose, which already for some minutes had been prophesying to him that in the concoction of the supper Helen had surpa.s.sed herself.

And she had. There was kidney ... No, not in an omelette, but impaled on a skewer. A novel species of kidney, a particularity in kidneys!

"Where didst pick this up, la.s.s?" he asked.

"It's the kidneys of that rabbit that you've bought for to-morrow," said she.

Now, he had no affection for rabbit as an article of diet, and he had only bought the rabbit because the rabbit happened to be going past his door (in the hands of a hawker) that morning. His perfunctory purchase of it showed how he had lost interest in life and meals since Helen's departure. And lo! she had transformed a minor part of it into something wondrous, luscious, and unforgettable. Ah, she was Helen! And she was his!

"I've asked Georgiana to make up my bed," Helen said, after the divine repast.

"I'll tell ye what I'll do," he said, in an ecstasy of generosity, "I'll buy thee a piano, la.s.s, and we'll put it in th' parlour against the wall where them books are now."

She kept silence--a silence which vaguely disturbed him.

So that he added: "And if ye're bent on a bigger house, there's one up at Park-road, above th' Park, semi-detached--at least, it's the end of a terrace--as I can get for thirty pounds a year."

"My dearest uncle," she said, in a firm, even voice, "what _are_ you talking about? Didn't I tell you when I came in that I had settled to go to Canada? I thought it was all decided. Surely you don't think I'm going to live in a poky house in Park-road--the very street where my school was, too! I perfectly understand that you won't buy Wilbraham Hall. That's all right. I shan't pout. I hate women who pout. We can't agree, but we're friends. You do what you like with your money, and I do what I like with myself. I had a sort of idea I would try to make you beautifully comfortable just for the last time before I left England, and that's why I'm staying. I do hope you didn't imagine anything else, uncle. There!"

She kissed him, not as a niece, but as a wise, experienced nurse might have kissed a little boy. For she too, in her way, reckoned herself somewhat of a diplomatist and a descendant of Machiavelli. She had thought: "It's a funny thing if I can't bring him to his knees with a tasty supper--just to make it clear to him what he'll lose if he loses me."

James Ollerenshaw had no sleep that night. And Helen had but little.

CHAPTER XVIII

CHICANE

He came downstairs early, as he had done after a previous sleepless night--also caused by Helen.

That it would be foolish, fatuous, and inexcusable to persevere further in his obstinacy against Helen, this he knew. He saw clearly that all his arguments to her about money and the saving of money were ridiculous; they would not have carried conviction even to the most pa.s.sive intelligence, and Helen's intelligence was far from pa.s.sive.

They were not even true in fact, for he had never intended to leave any money to Helen's mother; he had never intended to leave any money to anybody, simply because he had not cared to think of his own decease; he had made no plans about the valuable fortune which, as Helen had too forcibly told him, he would not be able to bear away with him when he left Bursley for ever; this subject was not pleasant to him. All his rambling sentences to Helen (which he had thought so clever when he uttered them) were merely an excuse for not parting with money--money that was useless to him.

On the other hand, what Helen had said was both true and convincing; at any rate, it convinced him.

He was a miser; he admitted it. Being a miser, he saw, was one way of enjoying yourself, but not the best way. Again, if he really desired to enrich Helen, how much better to enrich her at once than at an uncertain date when he would be dead. Dead people can't be thanked. Dead people can't be kissed. Dead people can't have curious dainties offered to them for their supper. He wished to keep Helen; but Helen would only stay on one condition. That condition was a perfectly easy condition for him to fulfil. After paying eight thousand pounds (or a bit less) for Wilbraham Hall, he would still have about ten times as much money as he could possibly require. Of course, eight thousand pounds was a lot of coin.

But, then, you can't measure women (especially when they are good cooks) in terms of coin. For instance, it happened that he had exactly 8,000 in shares of the London and North Western Railway Company. The share-certificates were in his safe; he could hold them in his hand; he could sell them and buy Wilbraham Hall with the proceeds. That is to say, he could exchange them for Helen. Now, it would be preposterous to argue that he would not derive more satisfaction from Helen than from those crackling share-certificates.

Wilbraham Hall, once he became its owner, would be a worry--an awful worry. Well, would it? Would not Helen be entirely capable of looking after it, of superintending it in every way? He knew that she would! As for the upkeep of existence in Wilbraham Hall, had not Helen proved to him that its cost was insignificant when compared to his income? She had.

And as to his own daily manner of living, could he not live precisely as he chose at Wilbraham Hall? He could. It was vast; but nothing would compel him to live in all of it at once. He could choose a nice little room, and put a notice on the door that it was not to be disturbed. And Helen could run the rest of the mansion as her caprice dictated.

The process of argument was over when Helen descended to put the finis.h.i.+ng touches to a breakfast which she had evidently concocted with Georgiana the night before.

"Breakfast is ready, uncle," she called to him.

He obeyed. Flowers on the table once more! The first since her departure! A clean cloth! A general, inexplicable tuning-up of the meal's frame.

You would now, perhaps, have expected him to yield, as gracefully as an old man can. He wanted to yield. He hungered to yield. He knew that it was utterly for his own good to yield. But if you seriously expected him to yield, your knowledge of human nature lacks depth. Something far stronger than argument, something far stronger than desire for his own happiness, prevented him from yielding. Pride, a silly self-conceit, the greatest enemy of the human race, forbade him to yield. For, on the previous night, Helen had snubbed him--and not for the first time. He could not accept the snub with meekness, though it would have paid him handsomely to do so, though as a Christian and a philosopher he ought to have done so. He could not.

So he put on a brave face, pretended to accept the situation with contented calm, and talked as if Canada was the next street, and as if her going was entirely indifferent to him. Helen imitated him.

It was a lovely morning; not a cloud in the sky--only in their hearts.

"Uncle!" she said after breakfast was done and cleared away.

He was counting rents in his cashbox in the front parlour, and she had come to him, and was leaning over his shoulder.

"Well, la.s.s?"

"Have you got twenty-five pounds in that box?"

It was obvious that he had.