‘Then I refuse to take a step,’ said Nancy.
’Leave all that to me, and I will go to live
where you please, and never grumble, however poor
I am. Interfere, and I will go on living as now,
on Samuel Barmby’s generosity.’
There was no mistaking her resolution. Tarrant
hesitated, and bit his lip.
‘How long, then, before you act?’ he inquired
abruptly.
‘When my new home is found, I am ready to go
there.’
’You will deal honestly with me? You will
tell every one, and give up everything not strictly
yours?’
‘I have done with lies,’ said Nancy.
‘Thank heaven, so have I!’
Upon the final tempest in De Crespigny Park there
followed, for Arthur Peachey, a calmer and happier
season than he had ever known. To have acted
with stern resolve is always a satisfaction, especially
to the man conscious of weak good-nature, and condemned
for the most part to yield. In his cheap lodging
at Clapham, Peachey awoke each morning with a vague
sense of joy, which became delight as soon as he had
collected his senses. He was a free man.
No snarl greeted him as he turned his head upon the
pillow; he could lie and meditate, could rise quietly
when the moment sounded, could go downstairs to a
leisurely meal, cheered perhaps by a letter reporting
that all was well with his dear little son. Simple,
elementary pleasures, but how he savoured them after
his years of sordid bondage!
It was the blessedness of divorce, without squalid
publicity. It was the vast relief of widowerhood,
without dreary memories of death and burial.
In releasing himself from such companionship, the
man felt as though he had washed and become clean.
Innocent of scientific speculation, he had the misfortune
about this time to read in paper or magazine something
on the subject of heredity, the idle verbiage of some
half-informed scribbler. It set him anxiously
thinking whether his son would develop the vices of
the mother’s mind, and from that day he read
all the printed chatter regarding natural inheritance
that he could lay his hands on. The benefit he
derived from this course of study was neither more
nor less than might have been expected; it supplied
him with a new trouble, which sometimes kept him wakeful.
He could only resolve that his boy should have the
best education procurable for money, if he starved
himself in providing it.
He had begun to live with the utmost economy, and
for a twofold reason: the business of Messrs
Ducker, Blunt & Co. threatened a decline, and, this
apart, he desired to get out of it, to obtain an interest
in some more honourable concern. For a long time
it had been known to him that the disinfectants manufactured
by his firm were far from trustworthy, and of late
the complaints of purchasers had become frequent.
