Chapter XVI: Nan’s Fight for Polly

Cherry sat in his ingle-nook during the weeks that followed, watching the drama of Nan fighting death. His own part was necessarily that of an onlooker. Sometimes he stretched his hand to lift a little pan from the hob, when it boiled too quickly. Occasionally, he went out and came back restless. To all inquiries as to when he would visit farms again he sent diplomatic postcards. Tear himself from that agony-hope of watching Polly he could not. It seemed to him, now, that all the work of his life was in danger of downfall. Always it was Polly the child--who lay there. In the lucid seconds that came between hours of raving Polly’s ghost-like “Mam, I want a drink,” or “Is my Dad there?” came as moments of heaven in a hell-like nightmare.

Nan’s “Yes, luv. He’s there,” was a miracle of revelation, but it had the absurd effect of making him want to laugh. Polly dying, as the doctor had told Granny she was, it only being “a question of time,” was treated with almost grovelling reverence. Nan lifting Polly’s head and letting her drink, and laying her back again, was so like a big, horror-stricken savage in charge of a broken doll, it had a weird ludicrousness. Whilst in between was the attending on Becky, and the pink baby, who was, said Cherry, “a most awful drinker.”

The cobbler’s wife came every morning at nine and what she called “saw Becky right” in that little room upstairs, and each time argued with Becky on the reasons why she should call the boy Saul, after an uncle of herself, the cobbler’s wife. To all of which Becky would only reply, “How’s Polly?” Which the cobbler’s wife told Cherry (a safety-pin in her mouth) showed a lack of motherly feeling.

After her outcast misery Becky had seen in Polly an angel, whose influence had brought her to a clean bed, and a window that looked out on hope.

The strange way in which the Cherry castle, once the stronghold of individual selfishness, had been turned into a port of rescue, was another of the things that amazed the boss of the castle.

But the most amazing feature was--Nan.

It seemed as though Nan’s astounding vigour of body, tenacity of mind, even her very savagery had been given her for this one supreme struggle. It was not the tender patience of the average woman appealing to Omnipotence. It was the unreasonable, superhuman efforts of a hooligan struggling against deity. Always, in her blue-checked apron and the gaudy little shoulder-shawl that was Cherry’s Christmas present, he saw her, fighting for the life of her cub, in this flowering of motherhood that made her a cactus rather than a rose. She was never tired. She never seemed to sleep. She was jealous if any other woman took a turn for even an hour. If some one would be almost dead always, Cherry saw Nan with a pair of wings budding.

It was Cherry who did the wincing when Polly’s head was shaved.

“What’s a bit o’ hair? It’ll grow again,” she yapped.

Her maternity was almost an iron thing.

But the only attribute in it of human pathos was her endeavour to surround her daughter with those foolish trifles they had known to give her joy. Polly, with shorn head, dwindled body, her eyes fixed unseeingly on the rose-sprigged wall opposite, had on her bed a counterpane with bright-coloured birds and flowers, specially chosen by Nan from Cherry’s selection. Every day, too, on the little table sacred to the medicine bottle, berried sprays had fresh water given to them.

But it was each morning, as the dawn came up once more, and a small, fat, round-eyed little boy said “Milk” very quietly, just outside the door, that Cherry felt the mother’s softness make him want to cry--like a woman. Always he watched Nan hold the jug and the boy pour it in (how gravely and with what purpose!) with a feeling that Polly had lived through another of those black, endless nights--that she was here for another morning.

One morning the fat little boy brought a pigeon, held head downward.

His face was yet smudged.

“Who sent this?” asked Nan.

She was on guard against Martha Jay trying to salve her conscience by sending food for the sick girl.

And--the fat little boy blushed, saying the pigeon was his, and he hoped Polly would get well. He had had his pet killed because he heard they were strengthening. He had used to hear Polly sing--his eye at a crack in the blind of Old Fiddlestick’s parlour.

“Oh--she’ll mend when she’s eaten that,” said Cherry.

The fat little boy ran out to hide a new rush of tears at his pet being eaten--and stumbled against a chair, which crashed over.

Polly, who had lain making little groans, sat straight up in bed.

“Take the snow away,” she screamed. “Take it away,” and her thin hands made a motion to throw it off the bed.

The obsession about music, and the taking of her father’s ribbed coat for a mass of writhing eels, magnified by her feverish sight, the whim that always a little black lion stood on the bed-rail looking fiercely at her--all gave way before this new craze about snow.

Startled by the noise, the poor brain went back to some sensation that had worried her. Day and night, night and day, there was snow on the bed, which she shrieked to have taken away. It was as he watched whilst Nan tended Becky that Cherry heard a name linked up with this snow idea.

The little brass knocker was muffled and the milk-boy kept outside the door, now. But Polly became wilder.

“There’s one thing,” said Granny, “she’ll end or mend soon, Will.”

All day there was coming and going from the village to the house on Tom Hill.

So many fair things were now remembered about the giddy girl. Nan kept the people outside, gave them to understand they hadn’t time for them.

The doctor advised strapping Polly down in bed.

It was Nan who fought with the girl, remorselessly laying her down, again, again, again, until, worn out, the automatic action of springing up ceased. Susan Thorpe came every other night, to let Cherry sleep. Sometimes, Cherry dozed in the corner. Always he found Nan with wide-open eyes. Sometimes he thought she prayed. He fancied sometimes she thought this a punishment for her past blasphemies. Nan had never been the same woman since the voice in the night.

As Polly became worse Nan became more of an Amazon--withal a christianised Amazon.

She lifted Polly in her arms like a baby whilst Susan drew on the clean sheets.

It was as though she had set herself by sheer strength, bodily and of will, to save her daughter’s life. Nothing in the house was neglected. Always, in between tasks performed silently, Nan sat--watching, pouring drops of nourishment between the girl’s lips, or fixing the ice-bags, or giving medicine. The doctor found an iron disciple in Nan.

As she watched, Cherry knew that Nan was promising the Omnipotent to be a saint, if He’d let Polly live. Funny, he mused, how some women had to see devils before they believed in an Almighty, or did what they should by men.

There were three intolerable days and nights in which Granny Harker so far broke down as to accuse them of being keeping the poor lass in misery, when it was plain that the Lord wanted her, and advised that they take her off the feather-bed, as folk couldn’t die in beds full o’ feathers plucked whilst the geese were wick, as everybody knew.

But Nan did not offer to let Polly go out of her misery.

Cherry and she were more in harmony than ever they had been in their lives.

Cherry sat in his ingle-nook, waiting--moving the little pan sometimes when it didn’t need it. Nan sat watching and keeping the spoon going--little drops.

“I’m afraid she’s rather worse,” said the doctor, as he came and went. “Two in the morning, I should say, will see the turn.”

He went out quite cheerfully.

Nan refused to have any one stay up that night. Cherry settled himself down in the nook.

Again they went through the drama of the snow--and she would leap up, and Nan firmly made her lie down.

At nine o’clock the striking of the hour disturbed her. She became conscious for a moment.

It was the old cry.

Her gaze fell on Nan.

“Mam! I want to drink,” said a weak child’s voice.

These were moments when Nan found strength to go on battling.

She looked around the place after drinking.

“Susan Thorpe was here a bit sin’. Where is she?” she asked.

Susan had called at four in the afternoon.

Polly had lost consciousness again when Nan was going to tell her about Susan.

“She’s going to get better, old girl,” said the man in the corner.

Nan said nothing.

Cherry tried to read, to while away those dreadful hours before two. Hamlet’s Soliloquy, Mark Antony’s Oration--but they failed to grip. Always the fascination of that hour drawing near, whilst Cherrydale slept, made all other things less than nothing. He could see Polly’s thin cheek, the big eyes that dwarfed her face--the thin hands doing what old wives called “weaving their winding sheet.” There was Nan--more little drops--fresh ice--watching the clock for medicine.

“Nan!” said the Yorkshireman.

She looked at him crossly.

“If I had my time to do again,” he said, “I’d wed thee again.”

She dropped more liquid nourishment. She hadn’t heard him. The ticking of the clock became an awful thing.

“She’s changin’, Will,” said Nan, at length. “There’s summat. Her breath’s slackenin’!”

“Wheel us up,” said Cherry.

Nan came and wheeled him up to the other side of the bed. She stood for a moment, behind his chair. Then she said, “Bill, if she gets reight, I’ll--give the Army up, except once a month. Cowd dinners isn’t nice on Sundays.” She passed her hand over his hair. It was the first caress she had given him.

Then she went over to the other side of the bed.

The flush, the excitement was dying out of Polly’s face.

It grew pale and peaked.

How the great chin-dimple made a hollowy shadow, now.

Nan looked across at her mate, in terror.

Nan was breaking up at the last minute.

“Bill! say summat. I’m flayed,” she said.

“Howd thy din,” said Cherry.

He had taken control now.

It was the rational manhood of him, that placid strength she had used to try and shatter.

She was mum.

She was subjugated by the strength of the male.

Cherry was watching.

“Go on spooning,” he said.

Nan gave more little drops.

It was half-past one. The fire was a little low. Upstairs they could hear the future Saul carrying on a small revolution for more drink.

Polly moved restlessly.

Her hands were ceasing the motion that had got to be a haunting picture.

She slowly turned on one side, face towards the wall, with a weary little sigh.

“Bill!”

“Shut up.”

Cherry’s gaze went back again to Polly.

She was quietening down.

The hands had ceased the restless motion altogether, now.

The house grew a still thing, save for the importunities of the infant upstairs.

“Leet a cannel, an’ shade it so’s it doesn’t shine on her eyes,” commanded Cherry.

Nan did so.

“She’s asleep,” she said, with tragic hope.

There was another half-hour in which life battled with death. Then Nan said, “She’s breathin’ nice, Bill. She’s--comin’ back, Bill,” and went upstairs to console the infant Saul, and astounded Becky by wrapping her shoulders up.

Whilst outside, in the snow-slush, stood Adam, keeping watch until the blind went up, to say Polly lived, or remained down, to say the sun had gone out for him.

A week later, Polly was sitting up in bed, wondering how she would face the world without hair. For the rest, she was taken up with Becky’s baby. Sarah Wild came to see her one day, bringing a bag of rosy-cheeked winter apples, from Ashdale, where Adam was working for Uncle Nat--a proud Wild become a hireling. When Sarah tried to find out Polly’s attitude towards Adam, she was non-plussed. Polly the transparent had become Polly the enigma. Without being aggressive, Polly was not encouraging--nor discouraging. So far as Sarah could see, it was worse. But she wrote to her brother that she believed he had a chance.

“Where’s Rag, Dad?” asked Polly, suddenly, one day.

She had thought of him before--but imagined some one had been keeping him to “train.”

Cherry stammered a little--then decided to make a clean breast of it. He looked sadly at Polly, who was sitting up, and then at Becky, who was also sitting up, for the first time, very humble and white, but not utterly unhappy. “He made such a noise--barking, an’ pullin’ th’ bedclothes,” he said, apologetically. “So--one neet--when I’d had eight pints, Polly, and it seemed as if his legs would never be straight--well, there were a chap wi’ a gun came into the ‘Peep In’ an’ we gave Rag four pints an’ he mopped ’em all up--and fell, like a soldier an’ a man.”

By this time Polly burst out crying--and Cherry, almost crying too, said consolingly, “He’s buried yon under a little sycamore tree behind the ‘Peep In.’ Poor old Rag.” The thought of all Rag’s idiosyncrasies was too much for him. He began to laugh. Rag had left a humorous ghost behind him.

But Polly cried for some time.

She did not know how he could have done it, she said. And Cherry said he didn’t either, but he believed it was kindest. The dog that couldn’t fight didn’t have half a life.

In two days Polly came to be less certain that Rag had enjoyed himself as well as any one. By this time Adam had got Sarah’s letter, written from her place in “service”--her place that was breaking her heart.

How it came about that shortly afterwards, as Polly and Becky sat in the parlour, Polly sewing for the baby (who had actually been hawked round Cherrydale in the identical coat that had caused such heart-burning, with Granny not forgetting to point it out and laugh), a knock came to the door.

Nan answered it.

She saw Adam by the light of the lamp Cherry had bought for the porch.

“Oh--come in,” she said.

Cherry had given her instructions.

Adam entered.

He was a long time wiping his feet on the mat.

Then, “Can I see Miss Cherry?” he asked.

Nan had to ask him what he said. He repeated the query.

“Oh--” she said. Then, “Ay.”

She went into the parlour.

“Becky,” she said, “I think it’s time that child went to bed.”

Becky took the hint, and came out.

“Go on,” said Nan, and gave Adam a push.

Holding his cap very tightly, he crept in.

Polly looked up to see him standing there.

“Ooo!” she exclaimed.

He gripped the cap a little tighter.

“I came to see if you would marry me,” he asked, humbly.

She was staring at him with those big eyes.

That close-cropped head gave her a nunnish look, further carried out by the candle at her side, the worn look of the face that had been so blurred and soft.

Then--she shook her head from side to side.

“Polly!” he appealed.

“No,” said a hard little voice.

He did not move.

“No,” she repeated.

She had been to the gates of death and back and had come through with that same kernel of hardness he had realised that night.

No Wild ever asked a woman twice.

He went out.

He walked about quite a time, then swung over to Witch Gate. The Wild pride that hemmed him in was a thing that riled him to-night. He had lost all, by wisdom. Wisdom tired him to-night. The cheerful stamping of feet on a sanded inn-floor to the strains of a concertina seemed the wisest thing in the world to-night. He cast off the self-esteem that had divided him from other men, and crept in humbly amongst them.

When he left it was quite dark.

He never remembered much about that night, excepting that a man he had never seen before invited him to sleep in his bed, and that his refusal hurt the man’s feelings, so that eventually they were fighting. Somebody--he didn’t know whom--parted them. He fell down a bank near the river, scrambled out again, and somehow blundered along to Cherrydale, going by the links. There was a moon--which he was sure was drunk. It was as he went by the path that led to the Cherry castle that it seemed nothing to ask a woman twenty times, if you wanted.

Somehow, he remembered that Polly had once told him, oh, a thousand years ago, that she wouldn’t have him if he crept on his hands and knees. It became a ludicrous thing. He refused to believe that any woman could refuse any man who crept on his hands and knees.

When he got up the hill again, he could hear supper pots clinking, a baby crying, and Cherry’s voice, and Polly’s giggle--weak as it was. There was so much talking they did not hear him open the door.

With the stealth of a madman he came along the passage, and then--dropped upon hands and knees.

“Ooo!” said Polly, upsetting her tea.

The thing that had wambled in looked up.

“P-ple-ease, Miss Cherry, will you marry me?” it said.

It was an indescribable scene that followed.

Everybody laughed--except Polly.

“Get up,” she kept saying, angrily. “Get up.”

“Ay. Stand on thy hind legs, Wild,” urged Cherry.

“P-ple-ease, Miss Cherry, will you marry me?” asked Adam.

“Ooo, yes,” said Polly. “Get up.”

She was tugging at his collar.

Adam got up.

He was so drunk that he could scarcely stand.

But he got hold of Polly’s hands.

He gazed at her very fixedly--in the way of a man seeing two, though, and not quite sure which is the right one.

“I love you,” he said, with dignity (staggering a little) “better than I love the Clouds, better than I love the heather when it’s purple--better than I loved Sagg Farm.”

Then, putting his cap on his head, back to fore, he went out--rather uncertainly, but on his hind legs.

“You never know a man till he’s drunk,” said Cherry, afterwards, of the event, “an’ I never liked Wild so well as when I see how he made a fool on himself. He’s a gentleman.”