Materfamilias. Ada Cambridge
that the passenger list filled rapidly, and every day brought us less hope of a reprieve. Tom seemed a year older each time that he returned from the regular voyage, bringing this information, and I know I nearly drove him mad with my pale face and tear-sodden eyes. One day he told me so.
"What am I to do?" he groaned, staring strangely. "How can I leave you like this? I can't, I can't! and yet, if I don't go, Polly—it is all our living, my dear——"
Nothing ever frightened me so much. For him to have that look of agitation—my strong rock of protection and defence—he who had never wondered what he was to do, but always knew and did it, while others wondered—it was too shocking. I pulled myself together immediately.
"After all," I said, with a gulp and a smile, "the other poor seamen's wives have to take their chance of this sort of thing, so why not I?"
"You," he replied, in his fond, stupid way, "are not like the others, my pretty one."
He meant that I was far more choice and precious.
"Being pretty," I rejoined, "is no disadvantage that I know of, having regard to the present circumstances. Now if I was delicate, then you might be anxious. Tommy, dear, I can't have you look like that! And there's no reason in the world why I should not do as well as possible—as well as everybody else does; indeed, I'm sure I shall. Of course I shall miss you awfully—awfully"—my cheerful voice quavered in spite of myself—"but there will be the proper people to look after me, and—and—think what it will be when you come back again!"
He had me in his arms now, with my face under his left ear.
"My brave girl!" he murmured. "My own brave girl!"
Just as when he called me that before, my heart rose elated. I determined to deserve the title.
"Of course you must go," I said firmly; "it is our living, as you say. No use having a family, and nothing to keep it on, is it? I suppose it won't be more than a month? A month is soon over. I can send you telegrams. Don't you worry about me. I'm a wicked idiot to fret and grumble; it is because you have spoiled me, love! I have got so used to having you to take care of me——"
I choked, and burst into fresh tears.
However, I did manage to keep up very well until he went. Of course he had to go; we agreed about that. Not much of Aunt Kate's wedding present was left by this time. We had our little home, all comfortable and paid for, but his small salary comprised the whole of our current income. It would never have done to jeopardise that.
But oh, it was cruel! It was cruel! He says I shall never understand the agony of his soul when he bade me good-bye, and I tell him he can't possibly have suffered the thousandth part of what I suffered. We clasped and kissed as if we never expected to see each other again. I really don't think we did expect it. And yet I was quite well and strong, and every possible thing had been done to safeguard me in his absence. Poor as we were, he made the nurse, who charged three guineas a week, come into the house before he left it, and engage to stay there till his return; and he also installed a nice old lady, whose son he had befriended, and who he thought would be a mother to me when the time of trial came. So she was; but not even an own mother could have made up for the want of him.
"God keep you safe for me," he prayed, as he held me to him, heart to heart. "And you'll take care of yourself, my Polly. You won't fret, and make yourself sick and weak—promise that you won't—for my sake!"
"I won't," I answered him, trying to comfort him; "I will be as good as possible. We'll both be well and strong—well and happy—to meet you when you come home again. Tom! Tom! do you realise what the next home-coming will be? Let us look forward to that."
So I kept up to the last, to hearten him. The very last was the seeing the ship go by at nightfall, on her way to sea. I lived where I lived on purpose to have this view of her as she passed in and out. I watched for her for an hour, and when she came it was too dark for me to see my darling on the bridge through the strong glasses he had given me on purpose that I might see him, and the flutter of his cabin towel against the black funnel. Nor could he see me in the blue dusk of the shore, with the evening afterglow behind it. But he sent a farewell toot across the water, and I pulled the blind to the top of my window, and lit up my room with every lamp and candle I could find. I knew he was looking, and that he knew I knew it. We always signalled good-night in this way when he passed out late.
So I kept up to the very last. But when I saw his mast-head light go round the pier, like a bright star in the evening sky, and glide towards the sea that was to keep him from me so long when I wanted him so desperately, then I collapsed like a spent bubble, and all my courage went out of me. I think I fainted there by the window, all of a heap upon the floor.
At any rate, his back was hardly turned—he could scarcely have cleared the Heads, we reckoned—when the catastrophe befell. I have often tried to imagine what his feelings were when, at his first port of call, the intelligence was conveyed to him that he had a son, and that mother and child were doing well. He attempted to express them by letter, but he is not literary. And he can't gush. All the same, I know—I know!
Did I say that the happiest moment of my life was when he called me a brave girl? I was wrong. The happiest moment of my life—even though Tom was away from me—was the moment when I heard the first cry of my own child. Words cannot describe the effect on me of that little voice so suddenly audible, as great an astonishment as if one had never expected it; but every mother in the world will understand.
Oh, I am getting maudlin with these reminiscences! I can't help it.
He was a beautiful boy—my Harry—worthy to be his father's son. We called him Harry because Henry was Tom's second name, and also that of my own father, whom I wished to please; for, after all, he was a good father to me, and I used to think that perhaps I had not been as good a daughter to him as I might have been. This thought occurred to me when I had a baby of my own, and wondered how I should feel if, when he was grown up, he were to take his own wilful way as I had done. It does make such a difference in one's point of view, with regard to all sorts of things—having a baby of one's own. For instance, I knew that Miss Coleman—Mrs. Marsh, I ought to say—had two, and when Aunt Kate told me I was actually angry about it; it seemed to me that it was just another impertinence on her part, and that the children were interlopers in my old home. I could not bear to picture them sitting on father's knee, and being carried in his arms, filling my place and consoling him for the loss of me. But now I was quite glad that he had them, and I sympathised with Miss Coleman. I wished she could come and nurse me now, as she used to do; how much better we should understand each other! I resolved to have baby's likeness taken as soon as possible to send home to her, and to ask her to send me the photos of her little ones in return. I was convinced, of course, that there would be no comparison between them. Doubtless hers were nice children enough—father was a particularly handsome man, in the prime of life—but my baby was really a marvel; everybody said so. His proportions were perfect, his skin as fine and pure as could possibly be, his little face too lovely for words, and his intelligence simply wonderful. Before he was a week old he knew me and smiled at me. He had Tom's fair hair and straightforward blue eyes——
However, I suppose all this is silly. At any rate, the silly fashion is to call it so.
It was dreadfully hot upstairs in that venetian-shuttered room, but still I rallied quickly, and everything went well. The old lady was indeed a mother to me, the nurse inflexibly conscientious, and my own little maid like a faithful dog upon the doormat, constantly asking to look at the baby and to be allowed to hold him. And yet—I know it was ungrateful to them, but I could not help it—I never felt that I was properly taken care of, because Tom was not behind them. I pined for him—oh, how I did pine for him!—happy as I was in every other respect. While I was still weak, and inclined to be a little feverish, I fell asleep and dreamed that the Bendigo had been wrecked, and that he would never come home to see his child. I cannot describe how that dream frightened me and haunted me—that, and the memory of our last parting, when we seemed to have had so many forebodings.
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