Chapter 10

Towards the middle of February a change took place in Harry. At first it was little more than a faint creep of life, putting a little glow in his cheeks, a little warmth in his blood. Then the wounds which had been healing so slowly began to heal quickly, his appetite returned, and he slept long and sweetly at nights.

Mrs. Backfield's hope rekindled, but the doctor soon damped it down. This sudden recrudescence of physical health was a bad sign, for there was no corresponding revival of intellect, and now the prostration of the body could no longer account for the aberration of the mind. It was unlikely that Harry would ever recover his wits—the injuries to his skull, either with or without the shock of his blindness, had definitely affected his brain. The strong, clear will, the gay spirits, the quick understanding, the tender sensibilities which had made him so bright and lovable a being, were gone—how much of shreds and scraps they had left behind them to build up the semblance of a man, did not yet appear.

His looks would be only slightly marred. It was the optic nerve which had been destroyed, and so far there was nothing ugly in the eyes themselves, except their vacant rolling. The eyelashes and eyebrows had been burnt off, but they were growing again, and a scar on his cheek and another on his forehead were not likely to show much in a few weeks' time. But all the life, the light, the soul had gone out of his face—it was like a house which had been gutted, with walls and roof still standing, yet with its essential quality gone from it, a ruin.

Reuben thought long and anxiously about his brother. He did not speak much of him to his mother or Naomi, for he knew that they would not understand the problem that confronted him. He felt worn by the extra load of work, and his brain fretted, spoiling his good sleep. He[Pg 53] was back in his own room now, but he slept worse than in Harry's; he would lie awake fighting mentally, just as all day he had fought physically—life was a continuous fight.

It was hard that just at the outset of his enterprise, fresh obstacles should be thrown in his way. He saw that it was practically impossible for him to go on working as he did; already he was paying for it in stiff muscles, loss of appetite, fitful sleep, and drugged wakings. Also he was growing irritable and frayed as to temper. If he went on much longer doing the work of three men—he had always done the work of two—he would end by breaking up completely, and then what would become of Odiam? He would have to engage outside help, and that would mean quite ten shillings a week—ten shillings a week, two pounds a month, twenty-six pounds a year, the figures were like blisters in his head during the long restless nights. They throbbed and throbbed through his dreams. He would have to spend twenty-six pounds a year, just when he was saving so desperately to buy more land and fatten what he already had. And in addition he would have to pay for Harry's keep. Not only must he engage a man to do his work, but he would have to support in absolute idleness Harry himself. He was quite unfit for farm work, he would be nothing but an expense and an incubus.

In those dark furious hours, Reuben would wish his brother had died. It was not as if life could be sweet to him. It was terrible to see him mouching and mumbling about the house, to hold even the brief converse with him which everyday life enforced. He had not as yet grown used to his blindness, indeed it would be difficult for him to do so without wits to stimulate and direct his other senses, and it was dreadful to see him tumbling over furniture, breaking things and crying afterwards, spilling food on his clothes and his[Pg 54] beard—for now that he could not shave himself, and others had no time to do it for him, he wore a large fair beard, which added to his uncouthness.

Oh that his brother had died!

One day Reuben was so tired that he fell asleep over his supper. His mother cleared the table round him, glancing at him with fond, submissive eyes. Each day she had come to love him more, with an obedient love, almost instinctive and elemental, which she had never felt for the gentle husband or considerate son. This evening she laid her shawl over his shoulders, and went to her washing-up.

Suddenly a weird noise came from the parlour, a strange groaning and wailing. Reuben woke up, and rubbed his eyes. What was that? It was horrible, it was uncanny—and for him it also had that terrifying unnaturalness which a sudden waking gives even to the most ordinary sounds.

Then gradually out of the horror beauty began to grow. The sound passed into an air, faltering at first, then flowing—"Dearest Ellen," on Harry's violin.

"I'm glad he's found something to amuse him, poor son," said Mrs. Backfield, coming in to see if Reuben had waked.

"He's not playing badly, is he, mother?"

"Not at all. They say as sometimes blind folk are unaccountable good at music."

Reuben did not answer; she knew by his attitude—chin in hand—that he was thinking.

That night he thought it out.

Munds of Starvecrow had had a brother who fiddled at fairs and weddings and earned, so Munds said, thirty pounds a year. He had also heard of others who made as good a thing of it. If Harry earned thirty pounds a year he would pay the wages of an extra farm-hand and also something towards his own keep. They must find out exactly how many of the old tunes he [Pg 55]remembered, and get somebody musical to teach him new ones.

The idea prospered in Reuben's thoughts that night. The next morning he was full of it, and confided it to his mother and Naomi.

Naomi, a little paler and more wistful than of old, still spent an occasional day or two at Odiam. At first she had made these visits for Harry's sake, flattering herself that he was the better for her presence; then when even her faith began to fail, she still came, partly to help Mrs. Backfield, partly driven by such feelings as might drive an uneasy ghost to haunt the house of his tragedy. Reuben saw little of her, for his work claimed him, but he liked to feel she was there, helping his mother with work which it was difficult for her to carry through alone to Odiam's best advantage.

She heard of Reuben's plan with some shrinking.

"He—he wouldn't like it," she stammered after a pause.

"You'll never go sending our Harry to fiddle at fairs," said Mrs. Backfield.

"Why not? There's naun shameful in it. Munds's brother did it for twenty years. And think of the difference it'll m?ake to us—thirty pound or so a year, instead of the dead loss of Harry's keep and the wages of an extra man beside. I tell you, mother, I wur fair sick about the farm till I thought of this."

"It's always the farm wud you, Reuben. You might sometimes think of your own kin."

"I tell you Harry w?an't mind—he'll like it. It'll be something to occupy him. Besides, hem it all, mother! you can't expect me to kip him idling here, wud the farm scarce started yet, and nearly the whole of Boarzell still to buy."

But it was useless to expect either Mrs. Backfield or Naomi to appreciate the momentousness of his task. Were women always, he wondered, without ambition?[Pg 56] However, though they did not sympathise, they would not oppose him—Naomi because she was not skilful at opposition, his mother because he was gradually taking the place of Harry in her heart.

He had more trouble when a day or so later he asked Naomi to inspect Harry's musical equipment.

"You see, I d?an't know one tune from another, so I can't do it myself. You might git him to play one or two things over to you, Naomi, and find out what he remembers."

"I'd rather not," said Naomi, shuddering.

"Why?"

"Oh—I just can't."

"But why?"

She could not tell him. If he did not understand how every note from Harry's violin would jab and tear the tortured memories she was trying to put to sleep—if he did not understand that of himself, she would never be able to explain it to him.

As a matter of fact he did understand, but he was resolute.

"Help me, Naomi," he pleaded, "fur I can't manage wudout you."

His eyes searched her face. People who met him only casually were generally left with the impression that he had black eyes, but as a matter of fact they were dark blue. A hidden power forced Naomi's eyes to meet them ... they were narrow and deep-set, with extraordinarily long lashes. She gazed into them for a moment without speaking. Then suddenly her own filled with an expression of hatred, and she ran out of the room.

But he had won his point. That evening Naomi made Harry play over his "tunes," while Reuben sat in the chimney corner watching them both. Harry's memory was erratic—he would play through some well-known airs quite correctly up to a certain point, and then[Pg 57] interpolate hysterical variations of his own. At other times memory failed him altogether, but his natural quickness of ear seemed to have increased since his blindness, and it only needed Naomi to sing the passage over for him to fill up the gaps.

She took him through "The Woodpecker Tapping," "Dearest Ellen," "I'd mourn the hopes that leave me," "The Song of Seth's House," and "The Blue Bells of Scotland." Each one of them was torment to her gentle heart, as it woke memory after memory of courtship—on the gorse-slopes of Boarzell, among the chasing shadows of Iden Wood, on the Rother marshes by Thornsdale, where the river slinks up from the Fivewatering ... or in this very kitchen here, where the three of them, divided from one another by dizzy gaps of suffering, desire and darkness, were gathered together in a horrible false association.

But Harry's face was blank, no memories seemed to stir for him, he just fiddled on, now and then receiving Naomi's corrections with an outbreak of childish temper. On these occasions Reuben would stamp his foot and speak to him in a loud, angry voice which inevitably made him behave himself.

Naomi always took advantage of these returns to docility, but later that evening in the dairy, she suddenly swung round on Mrs. Backfield and exclaimed petulently:

"I hate that Ben of yours!"