IV

A TANGLED SKEIN

MY fingers have often itched to set down the story of Mary Creighton, just as she told it to me that day under the apple-tree, but, until now, my pen has been chained. A newspaper that came last week, however, contains announcements which have effectually brushed away the scruples that I cherished.

Mary Creighton was not her real name: her real name was much prettier, or she made it seem so to me. None of the names that I shall mention are real names. Mary herself was, for years, an inscrutable mystery to me. She was to everybody. Indeed, until that lovely afternoon she made her great confession, I never understood her and I never met anybody who did. A very general feeling prevailed in Mosgiel that, away back in the unforgotten years of Mary's life, a tragedy was buried somewhere; but nobody knew its nature. Innumerable guesses were made: but they were all contradictory, and, therefore, unsatisfactory. No theory squared with all the facts. And so it came to pass that the little township gave it up. Mary came to be regarded as a riddle that everybody had asked, but of which nobody knew the answer.

Mary lived by herself in a cottage on the hillside. From her door, which invariably stood open, she commanded a fine view of the entire plain and its encircling hills.

'You should be here in the early morning,' she said to me one afternoon, as we stood together outside the door, admiring this extensive prospect, 'it's a wonderful sight. Old Blanche Bradshaw, who lives just round the ridge, often tells me that when she saw it first, fifty years ago, the Plain was a lake, and there was deep water where the farms now stand. And the ghost of the old lake comes back every night. When I open my door of a morning, I can see neither trees nor homesteads. The white mist lies all along the Plain, just like a sheet of water, and it looks for all the world as if Blanche's old lake had come back again.'

Mary was not a member of the church. She would not hear of it. Whenever I broached the matter she immediately changed the subject and left me mystified. The guessers were agreed in saying that Mary and her husband were living separately: I quickly came to the conclusion that they were right: yet why they should be separated I could not for the life of me imagine. As far as I could see, they were as fond of each other as a pair of lovers.

'You'll often be going to town?' she asked one day, soon after my settlement at Mosgiel; and I told her that I usually spent Mondays in Dunedin.

'Well,' she went on, 'would it be out of your way to drop in, every now and again, at a house in Queen Street and ask for Robert Creighton? You needn't stay; but just pass the time of day, and see how he looks, and be sure and let me know if you think he wants anything.'

Mary often called in at the Manse, generally on a Tuesday. She never asked if I had seen Robert the day before; but I could see that she was on tenterhooks until, being alone together, I broached the subject. Sometimes she would bring a little parcel-warm socks or a muffler or a pair of knitted gloves-for me to take next time I went; and occasionally she would call early on Monday morning with a little packet of cakes or scones or a jelly. There was never a specific message, however: I was never entrusted with a note or a letter: I was never requested to ask him anything.

When first I called on Robert he was extremely uncommunicative. I told him that a lady at Mosgiel had asked me to call on him. He smiled-sadly, I thought-told me that he was well, and gave me to understand by his manner that there was no more to be said. The room in which he lived was small but cosy; and I noticed a portrait of Mary-taken, perhaps, twenty years earlier-hanging on the wall. After a while his tongue loosened a little. When he was convinced of my trustworthiness, he began to ask after Mary. Was she well? Did I think that she was quite equal to all the work of the cottage? And once, after some years, he asked with a moistening of the eyes, Was she ageing? He, too, occasionally entrusted me with parcels-generally books and papers-but in his case, as in hers, there was never a note, a letter, a message or a direct inquiry. This went on for years. I watched them growing gradually older, growing perceptibly feebler, and growing all the while in tender solicitude for each other.

II

Robert was the first to go. He died very suddenly. I had called, as usual, on the Monday. He seemed well, and asked more questions than usual, particularly in regard to Mary's appearance. Was she as upright as ever? Did she look careworn or unhappy? Was her hair very white? Did it seem a struggle for her to climb the hill to the cottage? He started to ask another. I fancied that he wished to inquire whether Mary seemed lonely; but his voice caught and he turned it off into some meaningless remark about the weather. As I left, he slipped a sovereign into my hand and begged me to get any little thing that would comfort or brighten her. On the Thursday I received a telegram from his landlady. I caught the next train, but he was dead before I could reach him. He left a will bequeathing everything to Mary; and he told his landlady to ask me to bury him.

Poor Mary was disconsolate. I never saw grief quite like hers. To begin with, it was so exclusively hers. Nobody else knew of it: nobody could offer sympathy: nobody suspected that the gentle little lady on the hillside was overwhelmed in anguish so terrible. And, to make things worse, she was so helpless. She could do nothing. There is a melancholy consolation in being permitted to perform or superintend the last sad offices that we render to the dead: but even this poor comfort was denied to her. She could only sit in. her cottage and weep apart. Others were doing-and doing without emotion-what it should have been her sad privilege to do. It was after the first storm of her grief had spent itself, after the first bitterness had passed, that she suddenly found it in her heart to unburden her secret. The outburst of confidence was quite spontaneous: I had no idea that she was about to tell me her story: and I fancied that she herself was surprised at finding herself breaking the silence of the years. It was a beautiful afternoon in the late spring-time; the apple-trees in front of the cottage were a mass of blossom: and, on a seat that stood between two of the finest of them, we sat talking.

'It all happened in the early days,' she said. 'We were young and silly and wicked; and we did dreadful things without knowing how dreadful they were. Robert and I came out from the Old Country with our parents in the days of the gold rush in Australia. Everybody was talking about the diggings. Robert's father and my father were both having hard times: and they decided to try their luck. Robert and I had known each other as children: we had attended the same school: everybody regarded us as sweethearts. On the ship we were thrown a good deal together; and although we were never formally engaged, it was understood that we were to marry as soon as the exigencies of our new life rendered such a settlement possible.

'All went well until we reached Australia. Then we had to part. Robert's mother, my mother and I stayed in Sydney, whilst our fathers and Robert went on to the diggings. Then the trouble began. Robert was young and eager, and he caught the gold fever in its worst form. He seldom came to Sydney to see me, and, even when he did, he seemed to be thinking far more of his gold than of me. I was very lonely: I used to count the days to his coming, and perhaps I did not make sufficient allowance for the excitement of his new life. In Sydney I got to know Philip Bryce. He was open-hearted and full of fun; he was unselfish and courteous; and to me he was exceedingly attentive and kind. But it was purely a casual friendship until I took it into my head that Robert had grown tired of me. Then, perhaps, I gave Philip more encouragement than I should have done. I fancy that I had some vague notion of winning Robert back to me by making him jealous of Philip. At any rate, when Robert came again, talking nothing but gold, gold, gold, I talked nothing but Philip, Philip, Philip. But my wickedness met with its just reward. My stupid words had a diametrically opposite effect to that for which I had hoped. Robert lost all patience with me. He rose in anger; told me that I could have Philip if I wanted him; and, to my horror, went off mumbling something about Maggie.

'Maggie! Who was Maggie? Maggie, I learned later, was the daughter of John Marchant, who kept the Diggers' Rest. The Diggers' Rest was not, in the ordinary sense, an hotel; it was a store, a shelter, and a place in which diggers of the better class might spend an evening, reading, writing, or at games. John Marchant looked after the business side of the place and took charge of any gold that successful diggers cared to entrust to his custody, whilst Mrs. Marchant and Maggie attended to the housework. Maggie was a pretty girl, tall, ripe-figured, of bright complexion and auburn hair. I did not sleep that night. It had never occurred to me that my silly prattle about Philip might have this effect. Robert told me afterwards that he had never given a serious thought to Maggie until that night. When I arose next morning, Robert was gone. Three months later I heard that he and Maggie were married. I was proud: I felt that I had been spurned, insulted, degraded: I determined that he should see how little I cared. Within four months of Robert's marriage to Maggie, I was married to Philip!'

Ill

'It was a miserable business. Philip and I had little or nothing in common; and we soon found each other's society very tame. In spite of me, my heart was hungry, and I am afraid that I never really set myself to make Philip happy. To make matters worse, Robert and Maggie, not knowing of our whereabouts, came and settled in the same suburb. The gold rush was over, and Robert, had obtained employment in the city. At first we thought of leaving the district, or, at least, of ignoring them; but we were both bored and wretched, and any new interest seemed attractive. Moreover, I saw Robert pass the window several times without his knowledge, and I thought that he bore a great burden. His face was heavy and sad and, I fancied, regretful. Perhaps we ought to have acted on our first impulse and moved away without their knowing of our presence there. Perhaps the very hunger of my heart should have warned me. All my soul was crying out for Robert and I thought that his was crying out for me. We let the weeks go by: we met, as it was inevitable that we should: and we spent many of our evenings at each other's homes.

'The position-always bad-quickly became intolerable. Philip saw the truth: how could he help it? Maggie saw the truth; how could she help it? And, to complicate matters still further, Philip and Maggie were drawn to each other. They seemed made for each other: Maggie had the gaiety and sparkle for which Philip pined: I was like a millstone round his neck. Philip had all the qualities that appealed to Maggie. So there we were! The very reasons that should have kept us all apart drew us all together. We were always at their home or they at ours. And the more we met them, and they us, the more hideous our unhappiness became.'

Mary paused for a moment in her story, and she nervously brushed away the apple-petals that had fallen on her lap. When she was mistress of herself once more, she continued:

'It was Philip who brought things to a head. Poor Philip! He deserved to be happy, and I was ashamed of the misery I brought him. He was always dashing and impulsive, and, one evening, without saying a word to me, he went off by himself. He returned about supper-time.

' "Look here, Mary," he said, as soon as he sat down, "we can't go on like this. We've all done wrong-except Maggie. I've been round and had a talk with Robert. We've agreed, if you and Maggie are willing, to part. Maggie and I will go back to the Old Country. Robert says that, if you consent, he will go with you to New Zealand. We shall start life afresh, with a better chance of being happy."

'It was wrong, very wrong,' Mary continued, 'but I agreed. Philip and Maggie went back to England; settled down near Manchester, prospered in business, were very happy, and had several children. One of the boys recently came out and went on to a sheep station in Taranaki. Robert and I were happy, too, in a way. We went farming; we made money quickly and were very comfortable. No children came to our home; but we were very fond of each other-very fond-to the last.' Mary paused and brushed her eyes with her apron,

'But you know,' she went on, 'in these country districts the church is the centre of everything. At first Robert and I hesitated about attending church. We felt that we should like to; all our traditions pointed that way. And we felt that we ought to. Moreover, our consistent absence without giving a reason would cause comment and demand explanation. And yet-what of our secret?

'We decided to go; we never joined; never attended Communion; and, although Robert was highly respected, and was constantly urged to accept office, he never did so. Then we began to ask ourselves why. As the church became more and more dear to us, our consciences troubled us increasingly. We were everything to each other; we would rather die than part; and yet-- It grew upon us that our relationship was a defiance of all the laws of man and God. The fact that it excluded us from life's most sacred things made us feel how wrong it was. We were like lepers, who, outside the city walls, cried continually: "Unclean! Unclean!"

'Yet what could we do? To confess our guilt would be to shatter the happiness, of Maggie and Philip, to dishonor their names and to cast a slur upon their children. We decided-God alone knows what it cost us!-to right the wrong, so far as it was in our power to do so, by separating. We sold the farm; Robert went to live in town; at my request he bought me this cottage; and we pledged our-selves never to meet again. It was a sore, sore parting--' She again hid her face in her apron. There was a long pause. When she looked up there was a light in her countenance that I shall never forget. She seemed suddenly transfigured.

'Perhaps,' she said, turning full upon me, 'perhaps it will all be put right when we meet again. But I wanted you to know. You will understand, now why I never joined the church. And sometimes, when you are talking to the young men and maidens in your congregation, you will be able to tell them that because in all the wide, wide world, there is nothing so beautiful as love, it is a bitter thing to tamper with it when it comes. If only Robert and I had been true to our love from the first--!'

Poor Mary! the sun was getting low, so I took her arm and walked with her into the cottage. She grew rapidly feebler and, within the year, followed Robert into the land where all life's tangles are unravelled. And, in arranging for her funeral, I took care that, in death at least, he and she were not divided.

Boreham, F. W. Wisps of Wildfire. The Abingdon Press, 1924. pp. 47-57.