________________________________________________
_ Dick Povey kept his word. At a quarter-past five he drew up in
front of No. 49, Deansgate, Manchester. "There you are!" he said,
not without pride. "Now, we'll come back in about a couple of
hours or so, just to take your orders, whatever they are." He was
very comforting, with his suggestion that in him Sophia had a sure
support in the background.
Without many words Sophia went straight into the shop. It looked
like a jeweller's shop, and a shop for bargains generally. Only
the conventional sign over a side-entrance showed that at heart it
was a pawnbroker's. Mr. Till Boldero did a nice business in the
Five Towns, and in other centres near Manchester, by selling
silver-ware second-hand, or nominally second hand, to persons who
wished to make presents to other persons or to themselves. He
would send anything by post on approval. Occasionally he came to
the Five Towns, and he had once, several years before, met
Constance. They had talked. He was the son of a cousin of the late
great and wealthy Boldero, sleeping partner in Birkinshaws, and
Gerald's uncle. It was from Constance that he had learnt of
Sophia's return to Bursley. Constance had often remarked to Sophia
what a superior man Mr. Till Boldero was.
The shop was narrow and lofty. It seemed like a menagerie for
trapped silver-ware. In glass cases right up to the dark ceiling
silver vessels and instruments of all kinds lay confined. The top
of the counter was a glass prison containing dozens of gold
watches, together with snuff-boxes, enamels, and other
antiquities. The front of the counter was also glazed, showing
vases and large pieces of porcelain. A few pictures in heavy gold
frames were perched about. There was a case of umbrellas with
elaborate handles and rich tassels. There were a couple of
statuettes. The counter, on the customers' side, ended in a glass
screen on which were the words 'Private Office.' On the seller's
side the prospect was closed by a vast safe. A tall young man was
fumbling in this safe. Two women sat on customers' chairs, leaning
against the crystal counter. The young man came towards them from
the safe, bearing a tray.
"How much is that goblet?" asked one of the women, raising her
parasol dangerously among such fragility and pointing to one
object among many in a case high up from the ground.
"That, madam?"
"Yes."
"Thirty-five pounds."
The young man disposed his tray on the counter. It was packed with
more gold watches, adding to the extraordinary glitter and shimmer
of the shop. He chose a small watch from the regiment.
"Now, this is something I can recommend," he said. "It's made by
Cuthbert Butler of Blackburn. I can guarantee you that for five
years." He spoke as though he were the accredited representative
of the Bank of England, with calm and absolute assurance.
The effect upon Sophia was mysteriously soothing. She felt that
she was among honest men. The young man raised his head towards
her with a questioning, deferential gesture.
"Can I see Mr. Boldero?" she asked. "Mrs. Scales."
The young man's face changed instantly to a sympathetic
comprehension.
"Yes, madam. I'll fetch him at once," said he, and he disappeared
behind the safe. The two customers discussed the watch. Then the
door opened in the glass screen, and a portly, middle-aged man
showed himself. He was dressed in blue broad-cloth, with a turned-
down collar and a small black tie. His waistcoat displayed a plain
but heavy gold watch-chain, and his cuff-links were of plain gold.
His eye-glasses were gold-rimmed. He had grey hair, beard and
moustache, but on the backs of his hands grew a light brown hair.
His appearance was strangely mild, dignified, and confidence-
inspiring. He was, in fact, one of the most respected tradesmen in
Manchester.
He peered forward, looking over his eye-glasses, which he then
took off, holding them up in the air by their short handle. Sophia
had approached him.
"Mrs. Scales?" he said, in a very quiet, very benevolent voice.
Sophia nodded. "Please come this way." He took her hand, squeezing
it commiseratingly, and drew her into the sanctum. "I didn't
expect you so soon," he said. "I looked up th' trains, and I
didn't see how you could get here before six."
Sophia explained.
He led her further, through the private office, into a sort of
parlour, and asked her to sit down. And he too sat down. Sophia
waited, as it were, like a suitor.
"I'm afraid I've got bad news for you, Mrs. Scales," he said,
still in that mild, benevolent voice.
"He's dead?" Sophia asked.
Mr. Till Boldero nodded. "He's dead. I may as well tell you that
he had passed away before I telegraphed. It all happened very,
very suddenly." He paused. "Very, very suddenly!"
"Yes," said Sophia, weakly. She was conscious of a profound
sadness which was not grief, though it resembled grief. And she
had also a feeling that she was responsible to Mr. Till Boldero
for anything untoward that might have occurred to him by reason of
Gerald.
"Yes," said Mr. Till Boldero, deliberately and softly. "He came in
last night just as we were closing. We had very heavy rain here. I
don't know how it was with you. He was wet, in a dreadful state,
simply dreadful. Of course, I didn't recognize him. I'd never seen
him before, so far as my recollection goes. He asked me if I was
the son of Mr. Till Boldero that had this shop in 1866. I said I
was. 'Well,' he says, 'you're the only connection I've got. My
name's Gerald Scales. My mother was your father's cousin. Can you
do anything for me?' he says. I could see he was ill. I had him in
here. When I found he couldn't eat nor drink I thought I'd happen
better send for th' doctor. The doctor got him to bed. He passed
away at one o'clock this afternoon. I was very sorry my wife
wasn't here to look after things a bit better. But she's at
Southport, not well at all."
"What was it?" Sophia asked briefly.
Mr. Boldero indicated the enigmatic. "Exhaustion, I suppose," he
replied.
"He's here?" demanded Sophia, lifting her eyes to possible
bedrooms.
"Yes," said Mr. Boldero. "I suppose you would wish to see him?"
"Yes," said Sophia.
"You haven't seen him for a long time, your sister told me?" Mr.
Boldero murmured, sympathetically.
"Not since 'seventy," said Sophia.
"Eh, dear! Eh, dear!" ejaculated Mr. Boldero. "I fear it's been a
sad business for ye, Mrs. Scales. Not since 'seventy!" He sighed.
"You must take it as well as you can. I'm not one as talks much,
but I sympathize, with you. I do that! I wish my wife had been
here to receive you."
Tears came into Sophia's eyes.
"Nay, nay!" he said. "You must bear up now!"
"It's you that make me cry," said Sophia, gratefully. "You were
very good to take him in. It must have been exceedingly trying for
you."
"Oh," he protested, "you mustn't talk like that. I couldn't leave
a Boldero on the pavement, and an old man at that! . . . Oh, to
think that if he'd only managed to please his uncle he might ha'
been one of the richest men in Lancashire. But then there'd ha'
been no Boldero Institute at Strangeways!" he added.
They both sat silent a moment.
"Will you come now? Or will you wait a bit?" asked Mr. Boldero,
gently. "Just as you wish. I'm sorry as my wife's away, that I
am!"
"I'll come now," said Sophia, firmly. But she was stricken.
He conducted her up a short, dark flight of stairs, which gave on
a passage, and at the end of the passage was a door ajar. He
pushed the door open. "I'll leave you for a moment," he said,
always in the same very restrained tone. "You'll find me
downstairs, there, if you want me." And he moved away with hushed,
deliberate tread.
Sophia went into the room, of which the white blind was drawn. She
appreciated Mr. Boldero's consideration in leaving her. She was
trembling. But when she saw, in the pale gloom, the face of an
aged man peeping out from under a white sheet on a naked mattress,
she started back, trembling no more--rather transfixed into an
absolute rigidity. That was no conventional, expected shock that
she had received. It was a genuine unforeseen shock, the most
violent that she had ever had. In her mind she had not pictured
Gerald as a very old man. She knew that he was old; she had said
to herself that he must be very old, well over seventy. But she
had not pictured him. This face on the bed was painfully, pitiably
old. A withered face, with the shiny skin all drawn into wrinkles!
The stretched skin under the jaw was like the skin of a plucked
fowl. The cheek-bones stood up, and below them were deep hollows,
almost like egg-cups. A short, scraggy white beard covered the
lower part of the face. The hair was scanty, irregular, and quite
white; a little white hair grew in the ears. The shut mouth
obviously hid toothless gums, for the lips were sucked in. The
eyelids were as if pasted down over the eyes, fitting them like
kid. All the skin was extremely pallid; it seemed brittle. The
body, whose outlines were clear under the sheet, was very small,
thin, shrunk, pitiable as the face. And on the face was a general
expression of final fatigue, of tragic and acute exhaustion; such
as made Sophia pleased that the fatigue and exhaustion had been
assuaged in rest, while all the time she kept thinking to herself
horribly: "Oh! how tired he must have been!"
Sophia then experienced a pure and primitive emotion, uncoloured
by any moral or religious quality. She was not sorry that Gerald
had wasted his life, nor that he was a shame to his years and to
her. The manner of his life was of no importance. What affected
her was that he had once been young, and that he had grown old,
and was now dead. That was all. Youth and vigour had come to that.
Youth and vigour always came to that. Everything came to that. He
had ill-treated her; he had abandoned her; he had been a devious
rascal; but how trivial were such accusations against him! The
whole of her huge and bitter grievance against him fell to pieces
and crumbled. She saw him young, and proud, and strong, as for
instance when he had kissed her lying on the bed in that London
hotel--she forgot the name--in 1866; and now he was old, and worn,
and horrible, and dead. It was the riddle of life that was
puzzling and killing her. By the corner of her eye, reflected in
the mirror of a wardrobe near the bed, she glimpsed a tall,
forlorn woman, who had once been young and now was old; who had
once exulted in abundant strength, and trodden proudly on the neck
of circumstance, and now was old. He and she had once loved and
burned and quarrelled in the glittering and scornful pride of
youth. But time had worn them out. "Yet a little while," she
thought, "and I shall be lying on a bed like that! And what shall
I have lived for? What is the meaning of it?" The riddle of life
itself was killing her, and she seemed to drown in a sea of
inexpressible sorrow.
Her memory wandered hopelessly among those past years. She saw
Chirac with his wistful smile. She saw him whipped over the roof
of the Gare du Nord at the tail of a balloon. She saw old Niepce.
She felt his lecherous arm round her. She was as old now as Niepce
had been then. Could she excite lust now? Ah! the irony of such a
question! To be young and seductive, to be able to kindle a man's
eye--that seemed to her the sole thing desirable. Once she had
been so! ... Niepce must certainly have been dead for years.
Niepce, the obstinate and hopeful voluptuary, was nothing but a
few bones in a coffin now!
She was acquainted with affliction in that hour. All that she had
previously suffered sank into insignificance by the side of that
suffering.
She turned to the veiled window and idly pulled the blind and
looked out. Huge red and yellow cars were swimming in thunder
along Deansgate; lorries jolted and rattled; the people of
Manchester hurried along the pavements, apparently unconscious
that all their doings were vain. Yesterday he too had been in
Deansgate, hungry for life, hating the idea of death! What a
figure he must have made! Her heart dissolved in pity for him. She
dropped the blind.
"My life has been too terrible!" she thought. "I wish I was dead.
I have been through too much. It is monstrous, and I cannot stand
it. I do not want to die, but I wish I was dead."
There was a discreet knock on the door.
"Come in," she said, in a calm, resigned, cheerful voice. The
sound had recalled her with the swiftness of a miracle to the
unconquerable dignity of human pride.
Mr. Till Boldero entered.
"I should like you to come downstairs and drink a cup of tea," he
said. He was a marvel of tact and good nature. "My wife is
unfortunately not here, and the house is rather at sixes and
sevens; but I have sent out for some tea."
She followed him downstairs into the parlour. He poured out a cup
of tea.
"I was forgetting," she said. "I am forbidden tea. I mustn't drink
it."
She looked at the cup, tremendously tempted. She longed for tea.
An occasional transgression could not harm her. But no! She would
not drink it.
"Then what can I get you?"
"If I could have just milk and water," she said meekly.
Mr. Boldero emptied the cup into the slop basin, and began to fill
it again.
"Did he tell you anything?" she asked, after a considerable
silence.
"Nothing," said Mr. Boldero in his low, soothing tones. "Nothing
except that he had come from Liverpool. Judging from his shoes I
should say he must have walked a good bit of the way."
"At his age!" murmured Sophia, touched.
"Yes," sighed Mr. Boldero. "He must have been in great straits.
You know, he could scarcely talk at all. By the way, here are his
clothes. I have had them put aside."
Sophia saw a small pile of clothes on a chair. She examined the
suit, which was still damp, and its woeful shabbiness pained her.
The linen collar was nearly black, its stud of bone. As for the
boots, she had noticed such boots on the feet of tramps. She wept
now. These were the clothes of him who had once been a dandy
living at the rate of fifty pounds a week.
"No luggage or anything, of course?" she muttered.
"No," said Mr. Boldero. "In the pockets there was nothing whatever
but this."
He went to the mantelpiece and picked up a cheap, cracked letter
case, which Sophia opened. In it were a visiting card--'Senorita
Clemenzia Borja'--and a bill-head of the Hotel of the Holy Spirit,
Concepcion del Uruguay, on the back of which a lot of figures had
been scrawled.
"One would suppose," said Mr. Boldero, "that he had come from
South America."
"Nothing else?"
"Nothing."
Gerald's soul had not been compelled to abandon much in the haste
of its flight.
A servant announced that Mrs. Scales's friends were waiting for
her outside in the motor-car. Sophia glanced at Mr. Till Boldero
with an exacerbated anxiety on her face.
"Surely they don't expect me to go back with them tonight!" she
said. "And look at all there is to be done!"
Mr. Till Boldero's kindness was then redoubled. "You can do
nothing for HIM now," he said. "Tell me your wishes about the
funeral. I will arrange everything. Go back to your sister to-
night. She will be nervous about you. And return tomorrow or the
day after. ... No! It's no trouble, I assure you!"
She yielded.
Thus towards eight o'clock, when Sophia had eaten a little under
Mr. Boldero's superintendence, and the pawnshop was shut up, the
motor-car started again for Bursley, Lily Holl being beside her
lover and Sophia alone in the body of the car. Sophia had told
them nothing of the nature of her mission. She was incapable of
talking to them. They saw that she was in a condition of serious
mental disturbance. Under cover of the noise of the car, Lily said
to Dick that she was sure Mrs. Scales was ill, and Dick, putting
his lips together, replied that he meant to be in King Street at
nine-thirty at the latest. From time to time Lily surreptitiously
glanced at Sophia--a glance of apprehensive inspection, or smiled
at her silently; and Sophia vaguely responded to the smile.
In half an hour they had escaped from the ring of Manchester and
were on the county roads of Cheshire, polished, flat, sinuous. It
was the season of the year when there is no night--only daylight
and twilight; when the last silver of dusk remains obstinately
visible for hours. And in the open country, under the melancholy
arch of evening, the sadness of the earth seemed to possess Sophia
anew. Only then did she realize the intensity of the ordeal
through which she was passing.
To the south of Congleton one of the tyres softened, immediately
after Dick had lighted his lamps. He stopped the car and got down
again. They were two miles Astbury, the nearest village. He had
just, with the resignation of experience, reached for the tool-
bag, when Lily exclaimed: "Is she asleep, or what?" Sophia was not
asleep, but she was apparently not conscious.
It was a difficult and a trying situation for two lovers. Their
voices changed momentarily to the tone of alarm and consternation,
and then grew firm again. Sophia showed life but not reason. Lily
could feel the poor old lady's heart.
"Well, there's nothing for it!" said Dick, briefly, when all their
efforts failed to rouse her.
"What--shall you do?"
"Go straight home as quick as I can on three tyres. We must get
her over to this side, and you must hold her. Like that we shall
keep the weight off the other side."
He pitched back the tool-bag into its box. Lily admired his
decision.
It was in this order, no longer under the spell of the changing
beauty of nocturnal landscapes, that they finished the journey.
Constance had opened the door before the car came to a stop in the
gloom of King Street. The young people considered that she bore
the shock well, though the carrying into the house of Sophia's
inert, twitching body, with its hat forlornly awry, was a sight to
harrow a soul sturdier than Constance.
When that was done, Dick said curtly: "I'm off. You stay here, of
course."
"Where are you going?" asked Lily.
"Doctor!" snapped Dick, hobbling rapidly down the steps. _
Read next: BOOK IV WHAT LIFE IS: CHAPTER IV END OF SOPHIA: PART IV
Read previous: BOOK IV WHAT LIFE IS: CHAPTER IV END OF SOPHIA: PART II
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