Chapter IV: Graham and His Wife

IT was a wet wild night the beginning of October.

Graham, hurrying along the pavements of the town, began to look forward to the firelight and warmth and comfort of his home. He came to it at last, a handsome stone house in a quiet street, a small drive and shrubbery stood between it and the passers-by. He mounted the broad stone steps with some weariness. Mentally and physically he was tired.

There was a threatened strike at the colliery; all day he had been interviewing people. First the masters of several collieries round, then the miners' representatives, then his agent with several others. It had been an exhausting day: Graham would never let himself or any one else rest till he had mastered every technicality, every point of law connected with the dispute, and he now had it at his finger ends.

But it had not been a cheering process, and the future loomed black and frowning before him. He knew himself to be inexperienced; he felt in honour bound to stand by and with those in the same position as himself. And yet his keen sense of justice more than once made him put his finger on a weak spot in some of the masters' arguments. He felt fettered and bound in the course that was laid down for him to take. He longed to break with them all, and act on his own responsibility, and yet he knew at the present juncture of affairs, he dared not do it.

He let himself into his house with his latchkey. A maid came forward to meet him in the hall.

"If you please, sir, the mistress would like to see you at once."

"Is anything the matter?" he asked quickly, slipping out of his overcoat as he spoke.

"The mistress has fainted, sir; she's had two faints, but she is better now."

Graham caught his breath, then ran lightly up the stairs, and entered his wife's room. He did not find her in bed, she was sitting up in a cushioned chair by the fire. Her fair hair was hanging in two plaits below her waist. She looked very small, very young as she sat there gazing into the fire, but upon his approach, she turned her face towards him, and it was wan and pinched and grey.

"Oh, Graham, I thought you would never come! You are hours late! I've had another of my attacks, and I was all alone! You might think of me a little more! I believe you forget all about me when you go off to that horrid office every day."

"My dear, I am sorry, but I could not help myself. I have been delayed. I suppose you have dined. It is close on nine o'clock."

"I have been ill, I tell you; don't you care at all?"

Eva's tone was more than petulant, it was really angry.

"Indeed, I do care very much. Do you feel better now?"

His tone was gentleness itself.

She turned her face away from him, sullenly.

"I didn't marry you to be left alone in this house day after day with only servants to speak to."

He did not answer. Then he said—

"Was the pain very bad, dear? Don't you think you would be better in bed?"

"I don't mean to go to bed. I hate it. I know I shall die in it one night. And you won't care. You'll be thankful to get rid of me."

Tears crowded into her eyes, she began to sob hysterically.

Graham went to a small table near, and poured out a dose from a medicine bottle.

"You haven't taken this, I see. Why did you not?"

"Because you always give it to me after dinner, and you weren't here," she snapped.

She took it from him and drank it, then leant her head back amongst her cushions, and looked up at her husband with frightened despairing eyes. He stood leaning against the mantelpiece and regarding her with a good deal of tenderness and pity.

"Oh, Graham, I'm afraid of going to sleep! Have pity on me! Be kind to me! I'm afraid of my own thoughts. Come close to me and hold my hands. I feel safe with you. What shall I do? Every day that passes brings it nearer. Comfort me! Is there no comfort for me? How can I go through it?"

He knelt down by her side, and drew her head to rest against his shoulder.

"My dear child, don't be frightened. You have been accustomed to these faints. You are not worse to-day than you have been, and to-morrow you will be quite yourself again. You have been alone, and so you've got down in the dumps."

"But I oughtn't to be alone!" Eva roused herself and pushed him away. "It is cruel of you to leave me so! You promised me you would be with me always, and help me to bear the pain!"

"You are tired to-night," he said patiently; "and I own I am very late in coming home, but I could not help it. There is trouble at the colliery."

"I hate the colliery and everything belonging to it. It takes up your time more and more. I might as well have never married you—"

Graham was silent for a few minutes. He was becoming accustomed to his wife's continual reproaches, but he never lost his patience. Long experience with his invalid mother had taught him self-control. His heart ached for his wife. He knew he could do so little to relieve her fears and sufferings.

"I wish you would let my mother come and see you, or Ina. Ina would be so pleased to know you, and be your friend if you would let her."

"She is young," said Eva, peevishly; "and we don't care for each other. Why should we pretend that we do? And you know your mother dislikes me. She always has, and always will. The doctor said I ought to get out as much as possible, but you have never time to take me: our motor lies idle, we hardly ever use it."

"Well," said Graham, cheerfully, "we will go out to-morrow afternoon. I will come home to luncheon if it is fine. We will have a spin together, before it gets dark."

At this moment, the parlourmaid knocked at the door, and wanted to know if Graham had dined.

"No, indeed I have not," he said; "and I had no time for lunch, so I am pretty hungry."

He went off to his dressing-room, and soon returned to his wife.

"Now I'm going downstairs for a short time. Won't you go to bed? I'll send your maid to you. What is her name? I never can remember. Halkin, is it?"

"Yes. Please don't be long. I feel so nervous to-night. And I hardly touched my dinner."

"Then you must have a snack of something now. I will send you up something, and you must promise me to eat it."

He went downstairs to the empty dining-room and consumed his dinner in haste. Then he went into his study. His blazing fire and easy-chair looked inviting. He longed to sit down and smoke a pipe and have a quiet time to think out various problems that were simmering in his brain, but he resolutely turned away from the fire. He took up the evening newspaper and went upstairs to spend the rest of the evening with his wife.

This was a sample of many evenings in Graham's life. As he looked back upon his hasty engagement, and marriage, he wondered now if he had done well for Eva. She had been in delicate health for some time, and then some friend in town persuaded her to go to a heart specialist. This was a man who believed in telling his patients the truth about themselves, and he told Eva that her heart was diseased, and that he feared she had not two years of life left to her. It was a tremendous shock. She sent for Graham, and then in her extremity she poured out her soul before him, telling him that she had loved him for years, and imploring him to help and comfort her.

"I am absolutely alone," she said. "I have two years of suffering in front of me, and then death. Nobody wants me. Nobody cares for me. I shall get some chloroform and end my life now! How can I live on day after day, dragging myself nearer and nearer the grave, without a soul to speak to? Oh, Graham, pity me! What can I do?"

And then, tortured by her deep distress, and by her avowal of love for him, he felt that he could offer her a home with him, for those two short years. His heart had always been open to women in their need and weakness, and he knew that he could in a measure soften the dark days coming upon her. But Eva bound him to secrecy about the state of her health, not even his mother was to be told. He had faithfully kept the promise he made to her.

As it often happens, when Eva had got the desire of her heart, it seemed to turn to ashes. Graham was of too quiet and grave a nature to cheer her in her times of depression. He was attention itself, but his attentions were given with great gravity. He showed her sympathy, and tenderness, and patience, every day of her life. But Eva longed to be cheered by a gay laugh and a bright word; and this she felt she would never get from Graham. She did not realize the strain of his business life, and the ceaseless thought and toil it gave him.

And Graham's heart had received a blow from which it could not recover. He, like Eva, was tempted to ask himself sometimes what incentive he had to live. It was a blank grey world to him without Sara. He had had so little sunshine in his life that her presence in the house had been an ideal experience for him. Now she was gone; and he had no hope of ever seeing or speaking to her again. It was no wonder he found it difficult to be cheerful.

Eva herself had altered greatly. Her sweet pensive smiles and little graceful speeches were things of the past. She was up against a black horror which never left her night or day, and she rebelled frantically against her fate. Now she felt that marriage had not brought her the ease and comfort she expected; she had really thought that Graham would act exactly as a trained nurse would, and she resented everything that took him away from her.

They went for a motor ride the next afternoon. Eva was soothed and refreshed by it at first, but upon their return, they encountered a crowd of colliers who had just come up from the pits, and were congregated around one man who was addressing them in fiery language. The motor had to slow down, for there was hardly room to pass, and Graham was instantly recognized.

Some lads began to hoot and hiss. And one hot-tempered little man sprang to the side of the car and shook his first in Eva's face, shouting—

"Ye willna ride us doon, you pampered lass of his'n. A fine lot he cares for them which work to stow money into his pocket. He'd better'n be in the office preparin' for the day when the pits shut down. They're surely comin'!"

The chauffeur quietly glided through the crowd, and Graham said nothing, though silence was much against the grain. He knew that agitation might be fatal to his wife, and, as it was, she was in a panic of fright.

"They're savages!" she panted, when they had passed. "Graham, why do you put up with such insolence? I shall never dare to come out again. Oh, do take me abroad! Leave this filthy, smoky town, and let us go to the Riviera before the winter sets in. I feel I should have a fresh lease of life there."

This idea seized hold of her; she never gave him any peace day or night till he had half promised to take her. And then before their arrangements could be completed, she had another very bad heart attack, and her doctor refused to let her move.

"She would never get there alive," he said. "She is wearing herself out by her fright and agitation about herself. It is a pity she has not a more placid disposition; she would give herself a better chance then."

But this nobody could give the sick woman; and Graham looking ahead could see no ray of light on the path she would have to travel.

One evening, after a specially trying day, when she had at last gone to bed, and sunk into an exhausted sleep, Colonel Fleming came to see his friend. Graham saw him in the smoking-room, and gripped his hand with real pleasure.

"We are becoming strangers!" Graham said. "I haven't set eyes on you for ages. It's being married men, I suppose."

"So it is! But you're much more married than I am. Ina, bless her little soul! is as happy as a sandboy alone. She's sent me to look you up to-night. I've been down town. It's my club night, you know. Lucky thing your strike didn't come off. But it was touch and go, wasn't it? I heard that it was you who saved the situation. You got the masters to give way a bit, didn't you? Well, how's your wife? She's in a poor way, I hear. I met your doctor just now. He was seeing a chap who got hurt in the pits, and I was there inquiring for him. We walked a bit of the way here together. He told me it was serious, and that she couldn't go abroad. I was glad to hear it. Sick people are best at home, don't you think so?"

Graham did not answer. He pulled aside the window curtain and looked out. Then he turned and faced his friend.

"Jack, I feel I must have a whiff of pure wholesome air. Will you let me walk home with you? I must have a turn on the moor. Will you take anything first?"

"Not a sip. Come on, we'll start at once. Ripping it will be. The stars are out, and there's a touch of frost in the air, but there's no wind. A pity you don't live up our way!"

They went out of the house together, and talked on various subjects till they reached the open moor. Graham drew in a breath of the keen pungent air with relief and pleasure.

"I never shall get accustomed to this town life. I have a hankering for our hills at Felstone Corner."

Then he said abruptly—

"Look here, Jack, I know at bottom you're a religious chap. What can be said to smooth my poor wife's path in front of her? Her days are numbered and she knows it. And she's fighting with her fate, and is terrified at the prospect of death. She won't see the vicar; she has an idea it is only dying people who send for parsons, and she won't allow to herself that she's anything like bad enough for a pastoral visit just at present. What can you tell her?"

The Colonel stopped short in growing excitement—

"Why, man alive, the best of all news—that death is only a dark door into light! One step will take her through. I should like to have a talk with her. You must know that our Lord died to take away the sting of death! Does she read her Bible?"

"No. I don't think so. But I was thinking of reading to her a verse or two in the evenings. Women always get comfort from it, don't they? Honestly I don't know what part to read to her."

"Read the Gospel of St. John," said Colonel Fleming, quickly. "That will give you and your wife all you want."

They walked on in silence. Then Colonel Fleming took Graham's arm.

"I say, old fellow, you've a rare chance of helping a soul through the valley. What do you—what don't you believe?"

"Oh, I don't know." Graham's tone was weary. "I have never formulated my belief in my own mind. The shadow of death in our home makes things different. I believe in God. I went to church last Sunday, and I tested myself with the Creed. I think I do believe all the statements in it."

"Capital! I always knew you were sounder than you made out! The forgiveness of sins brings us to the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting, doesn't it?"

"That's how it winds up."

"Well, get your wife to pray. A few words will be enough. Our Master is quick to hear and quick to save. He'll blot out her sins, and take her hand through the River if she asks Him. Nothing could be easier. Don't trouble her head with doctrines. Get her to speak to the One Who can help her. He's the only One Who can."

"It sounds simple. I'll have a try. I should like her to get some comfort and peace of mind. She won't see my mother."

They were silent again. Presently Colonel Fleming stopped and said—

"Look up, old chap! Did you ever see such magnificent heavens stretched out before us? Doesn't it give you an idea of infinity and glory and power?"

Graham looked up and heaved a sigh.

"Yes, yes," he said. "It's bringing conviction to me that all things are easy to our Creator. But I'm—I'm a poor hand with women, Jack, and that's a fact!"

It was an hour later that he returned home, but hope and fresh courage were with him. And before he went to bed that night, he took hold of a Bible and read the whole of the Gospel of St. John through to himself.

He shut up the Book with a lightened heart.

"I believe I have got hold of the cure," he said to himself.

And he went to sleep for the first time since his marriage with peace and hope creeping into his heart.

The next evening, he suggested reading to his wife, and she, after a little hesitation, consented to listen. Every night after that, he read about fifteen to twenty verses of the Gospel of St. John.

Eva never made any remarks. But once she looked at her husband curiously.

"You read it as if your life depended on it," she said, with a little funny laugh.

He looked up at her with earnest eyes. "Your life does depend upon it," he said. "I mean the life that matters, the life of your soul."

She was dumb; the arrow had sped home and pierced the crust of selfish indifference and distaste to unseen things.

She said nothing, but he felt she listened in a different spirit afterwards.

And then one night she woke him up with a frightened cry—

"Oh, Graham, I want to get right with God. But I've never properly served Him. What can I do? I can't sleep. Do comfort me."

He was ready for her need—and repeated word for word what Colonel Fleming had said to him.

"You've only to ask to have your sins forgiven, Eva. Christ died to do it, we've read about it. He'll come and take your soul into His keeping. Ask Him now."

"Oh, let us ask Him together. I've been a worldly, wicked woman, and I have never thought of these things before."

So in the dead of night, whilst all the rest of the house lay sleeping, husband and wife haltingly prayed their way into the Kingdom.

Graham had been learning slowly from the Master Himself. And when the dawn broke, it found them both with the peace that no man can give, in their hearts and souls, the peace that passes understanding.