Demos

It was Clara who opened the door. Seeing ‘Arry, she took him for a beggar, shook her head, and was closing the door against him, when she heard—

‘Is Mrs. Rodman in, mum?’

‘Mrs.—who?’

‘Mrs. Rodman.’

Clara’s eyes flashed as they searched his face.

‘What do you want with Mrs. Rodman?’

‘Want to see her, mum.’

‘Do you know her when you see her?’

‘Sh’ think I do,’ replied ‘Arry with a grin. But he thought it prudent to refrain from explanation.

‘How do you know she lives here?’

‘’Cause I just see her ‘usband go out.’

Clara hesitated a moment, then bade him enter. She introduced him to a parlour on the ground floor. He stood looking uneasily about him. The habits of his life made him at all times suspicious.

‘Mrs. Rodman doesn’t live here,’ Clara began, lowering her voice and making a great effort to steady it.

‘Oh, she don’t?’ replied ‘Arry, beginning to discern that something was wrong.

‘Can you tell me what you want with her?’

He looked her in the eyes and again grinned.

‘Dare say I could if it was made worth my while.’

She took a purse from her pocket and laid half-a-crown on the table. Her hand shook.

‘I can’t afford more than that. You shall have it if you tell me the truth.’

‘Arry took counsel with himself for an instant. Probably there was no more to be got, and he saw from the woman’s agitation that he had come upon some mystery. The chance of injuring Rodman was more to him than several half-crowns.

‘I won’t ask more,’ he said, ‘if you’ll tell me who you are. That’s fair on both sides, eh?’

‘My name is Mrs. Williamson.’

‘Oh? And might it ‘appen that Mr. Rodman calls himself Mr. Williamson when it suits him?’

‘I don’t know what you mean,’ she replied hurriedly. ‘Tell me who it is you call Mrs. Rodman.’

‘I don’t call her so. That’s her married name. She’s my sister.’

The door opened. Both turned their heads and saw Rodman. He had come back for a letter he had forgotten to take with him to post At a glance he saw everything, including the half-crown on the table, which ‘Arry instantly seized. He walked forward, throwing a murderous look at Clara as he passed her. Then he said to ‘Arry, in a perfectly calm voice—

‘There’s the door.’

‘I see there is,’ the other replied, grinning. ‘Good-mornin’, Mr. Rodman Williamson.’

Husband and wife faced each other as soon as the front door slammed. Clara was a tigress; she could not be terrified as Alice might have been by scowls and savage threats. Rodman knew it, and knew, moreover, that his position was more perilous than any he had been in for a long time.

‘What do you know?’ he asked quietly.

‘Enough to send you to prison, Mr. Rodman. You can’t do quite what you like! If there’s law in this country I’ll see you punished!’

He let her rave for a minute or two, and by that time had laid his plans.

‘Will you let me speak? Now I give you a choice. Either you can do as you say, or you can be out of this country, with me and Jack, before to-morrow morning. In a couple of hours I can get more money than you ever set eyes on; I’ll be back here with it’—he looked at his watch—‘by one o’clock. No, that wouldn’t be safe either—that fellow might send someone here by then. I’ll meet you on Westminster Bridge, the north end, at one. Now you’ve a minute to choose; he may have gone straight away to the police station. Punish me if you like—I don’t care a curse. But it seems to me the other thing’s got more common sense in it I haven’t seen that woman for a month, and never care to see her again. I don’t care over much for you either; but I do care for Jack, and for his sake I’ll take you with me, and do my best for you. It’s no good looking at me like a wild beast You’ve sense enough to make a choice.’

She clasped her hands together and moaned, so dreadful was the struggle in her between passions and temptations and fears. The mother’s heart bade her trust him; yet could she trust him to go and return?

‘You have the cunning of a devil,’ she groaned, ‘and as little heart! Let you go, when you only want the chance of deserting me again!’

‘You’ll have to be quick,’ he replied, holding his watch in his hand, and smiling at the compliment in spite of his very real anxiety. ‘There may be no choice in a minute or two.’

‘I’ll go with you now; I’ll follow you where you go to get the money!’

‘No, you won’t. Either you trust me or you refuse. You’ve a free choice, Clara. I tell you plainly I want little Jack, and I’m not going to lose him if I can help it.’

‘Have you any other children?’

‘No—never had.’

At least he had not been deceiving her in the matter of Jack. She knew that he had constantly come home at early hours only for the sake of playing with the boy.

‘I’ll go with you. No one shall see that I’m following you.’

‘It’s impossible. I shall have to go post haste in a cab. I’ve half-a-dozen places to go to. Meet me on Westminster Bridge at one. I may be a few minutes later, but certainly not more than half-an-hour.’

He went to the window and looked uneasily up and down the street. Clara pressed her hands upon her head and stared at him like one distracted.

‘Where is she?’ came from her involuntarily.

‘Don’t be a fool, woman!’ he replied, walking to the door. She sprang to hold him. Instead of repulsing her, he folded his arm about her waist and kissed her lips two or three times.

‘I can get thousands of pounds,’ he whispered. ‘We’ll be off before they have a trace. It’s for Jack’s sake, and I’ll be kind to you as well, old woman.’

She had suffered him to go; the kisses made her powerless, reminding her of a long-past dream. A moment after she rushed to the house door, but only to see him turning the corner of the street Then she flew to the bedroom. Jack was ill of a cold—she was nursing him in bed. But now she dressed him hurriedly, as if there were scarcely time to get to Westminster by the appointed hour. All was ready before eleven o’clock, but it was now raining, and she durst not wait with the child in the open air for longer than was necessary. But all at once the fear possessed her lest the police might come to the house and she be detained. Ignorant of the law, and convinced from her husband’s words that the stranger in rags had some sinister aim, she no sooner conceived the dread than she bundled into a hand-bag such few articles as it would hold and led the child hastily from the house. They walked to a tramway-line and had soon reached Westminster Bridge. But it was not half-past eleven, and the rain descended heavily. She sought a small eating-house not far from the Abbey, and by paying for some coffee and bread-and-butter, which neither she nor Jack could touch, obtained leave to sit in shelter till one o’clock.

At five minutes to the hour she rose and hurried to the north end of the bridge, and stood there, aside from the traffic, shielding little Jack as much as she could with her umbrella, careless that her own clothing was getting wet through. Big Ben boomed its one stroke. Minute after minute passed, and her body seemed still to quiver from the sound. She was at once feverishly hot and so deadly chill that her teeth clattered together; her eyes throbbed with the intensity of their gaze into the distance. The quarter-past was chimed. Jack kept talking to her, but she could hear nothing. The rain drenched her; the wind was so high that she with difficulty held the umbrella above the child. Half-past, and no sign of her husband....

She durst not go away from this spot Her eyes were blind with tears. A policeman spoke to her; she could only chatter meaningless sounds between her palsied lips. Jack coughed incessantly, begged to be taken home. ‘I’m so cold, mother, so cold!’ ‘Only a few minutes more,’ she said. He began to cry, though a brave little soul....