Old People and the Things that Pass/Chapter XXV

CHAPTER XXV
"OH dear!" said old Anna, with a sigh. "We can't possibly keep it a secret from the mistress always!"

She moaned and groaned and, raising her two arms in the air, drove the cat back to the kitchen, because the passage was full enough as it was: Ina d'Herbourg had arrived with her daughter Lily van Wely and two perambulators; one was pushed by the little mother and the other by the nurse; and Lily and the nurse now shoved the perambulators into the morning-room, where Anna had made up a good fire, to welcome the family; and, while Lily and the nurse were busy, Ina talked to old Anna about the old gentleman's death and Anna said that her mistress had not the least idea of it, but that, after all, that couldn't go on forever....

"Oh, what darlings, what sweet little dots!" said Anna, clasping her hands together. "And how pleased the mistress will be that Mrs. Lily has come to show her the babies! Yes, I'll let the old lady know...."

"Lily," said Ina, "you go first with Stefje; I'll come up afterwards with little Netta."

Lily took the baby out of the perambulator. The child whimpered a bit and crowed a bit; and the dear, flaxen-haired little mother, with her very young little motherly laugh, carried it up the stairs. Anna was holding the door open and the old lady was looking out. She was sitting upright in her high-backed chair, which was like a throne, with the pillow straight behind her back. In the light of the early winter afternoon, which filtered through the muslin blinds past the red curtains and over the plush valance, she seemed frailer than ever; and her face, brightened with a smile of expectation, was like a piece of lined white porcelain, but so vaguely seen under the even, hard-black, just-suggested line of the wig and the little lace cap that she did not seem to belong to the world of living things. The ample black dress fell in supple lines and hid her entirely in shadow-folds with streaks of brighter light; and, now that Lily entered with the baby, the old woman lifted from her deep lap her trembling, mittened hands, with fingers like slender wands, lifted them into a stiff and difficult gesture of caress and welcome. Long cracked sounded the voice, still round and mellow with its Indian accent:

"Well, child, that's a nice idea of yours, to bring the little boy at last.... That's a nice idea. ... That's a nice idea.... Yes, let me have a look at him.... Oh, what a sweet baby!"

Lily, to let Great-great-grandmother see the baby well, had knelt down on a hassock and was holding up the baby, which shrank back, a little startled at the brittle, wrinkled face that made such an uncanny patch in the crimson dusk; but its little mother was able to hush it and it did not cry, only stared.

"Yes, Greatgranny," said Lily, "this is your great-great-grandchild."

"Yes, yes," said the old woman, with her hands still trembling in the air, in a vague gesture of hesitating caress, "I'm a great-great-grandmamma. ... Yes, little boy, yes ... I'm your great-great-grandmother...."

"And Netta's downstairs: I brought her too."

"Oh, your little girl! ... Is she here too?"

"Yes, would you like to see her presently?"

"Yes, I want to see them both.... Both together, together...."

The little boy, hushed, looked with wondering earnestness at the wrinkled face, looked with a wavering glance of reflection and amazement, but did not cry; and, even when the slender, wand-like finger tickled him on his cheek, Lily was able to hush him and keep him from crying. It was a diversion too when Ina came upstairs with Netta on her arm: a bundle of white and a little pink patch for a face and two little drops of turquoise eyes, with a moist little munching mouth; and Lily was afraid that the little boy would start screaming and handed him to the nurse at the door: fortunately, for on the landing he opened his throat lustily, greatly perturbed in his baby brain by his first sight of great age. But the bundle of white and the little pink patch with the two little drops of turquoise munched away contentedly with the moist little mouth and was even better-behaved than Stef je had been, so well-behaved indeed that the old woman was allowed to take it for a moment in her deep lap, though Lily remained on her guard and kept her hands under it.

"That's made me very happy, dear," said the old woman, "to have seen my great-great-grand-children. Yes, Stefje is a fine little man ... and Netta is a darling, Netta is a darling..."

It was time to say good-bye; and Lily carried off the pink-patched bundle of white, saying, in her laughing, young-motherly way, that the children must go home. Ina sat down.

"It has really made me happy," the old woman repeated, "to have seen that young life. For I have been very sad lately, Ina. It must be quite ten days since I saw Mr. Takma."

"No, Granny, it's not so long as that."

"How long has he been ill then?"

"Six days, seven perhaps."

"I thought it was quite ten days. And Dr. Roelofsz comes so seldom too.... Yes, that chair by the window ... has been empty now a whole week.... I thought it was ten days.... It's cold, raw weather, isn't it? ... I don't feel it in here.... But, oh, even if that gets better ... it will take a very long time ... and Mr. Takma won't come again this winter!..."

Her dry old eyes did not weep, but her cracked voice wept. Ina could not find much more to say, but she did not want to go away yet. She had come with the children, in the hope of hearing something perhaps at Grandmamma's.... She still did not know. She still knew nothing; and there was so much to know. There was first the great Something, that which had happened sixty years ago: Grandmamma must know about it, but she dared not broach the Something at Grandmamma's, afraid lest she should be touching upon the very Past. If it was anything, then it might make the old woman ill, might cause her sudden death.... No, Ina looked forward in particular to seeing any one who might call that afternoon, to having talks in the morning-room downstairs, for there were more things to know: how much Elly had come into; and whether Aunt Ottilie had also come in for her share.... All this was hovering in vagueness: she could not get to the bottom of it; she must manage to get to the bottom of it that afternoon. ... So she sat on quietly; and the old lady, who did not like being alone, thought it pleasant when she made an occasional remark. But, when it lasted too long before any one else came, Ina got up, said good-bye, went downstairs, chatted a bit with Anna and even then did not go, but sat down in the morning-room and said:

"Sit down too, Anna."

And the old servant sat down respectfully on the edge of a chair; and they talked about the old man:

"Mrs. Elly is well-off, now," said Ina. "Don't you know how much the old gentleman left?"

But Anna knew nothing, merely thought&mdash;and said so with a little wink&mdash;that Mrs. Ottilie would be sure to get something too. But there was a ring at the door; and it was Stefanie de Laders, tripping along very nervously:

"Doesn't Mamma know yet?" she whispered, after Anna had returned to the kitchen.

"No," said Ina, "Grandmamma doesn't know, but she sits looking so mournfully at Mr. Takma's empty chair."

"Is there no one with her?"

"No, only the companion."

"I have a great piece of news," said Stefanie.

Ina pricked up her ears; and her whole being was thrilled.

"What, Aunt?"

"Only think, I've had a letter from Thérèse...."

"From Aunt Thérèse in Paris?..."

"Yes, from Aunt van der Staff. She's coming to the Hague. She writes that she felt something urging her, something impelling her, while she was saying her prayers&mdash;we know those Roman Catholic prayers!&mdash;something impelling her to come to the Hague and see Mamma. She hasn't seen Mamma for years. She hasn't been to the Hague for years, which wasn't at all the thing.... What does she want to come here for now, exciting Mamma perhaps, with her popery, in her old age!"

It was a very great piece of news and Ina's usually weary, well-bred eyes glistened.

"What! Is Aunt Thérèse coming here?"

It was a most important piece of news.

"Could she know anything?" asked Ina.

"What about?"

"Well, about&mdash;you know&mdash;what we were talking of the other day: what Papa has known for sixty years ... and Uncle Daan...."

Aunt Stefanie made repeated deprecatory gestures with her hand:

"I don't know ... whether Aunt Thérèse knows anything about it. But what I do know, Ina, is that I mean to keep my soul clear of any sins and improper things that may have happened in the past. It's difficult enough to guard one's soul in the present. No, dear, no, I won't hear any more about it."

She closed her beady bird's-eyes and shook her nodding bird's-head until her little old-lady's toque jigged all askew on her scanty hair; and she almost stumbled over the cat before she hoisted herself upstairs, jolting and stamping, to go to her mother.

Ina remained irresolute. She went into the kitchen. Anna said:

"Oh, is that you, ma'am? Are you staying a little longer?"

"Yes ... Mrs. Ottilie may come presently.... I want to speak to her."

It was quite likely, thought Anna, that Mrs. Ottilie would come to-day. But, when there was a ring at the front-door, she looked out of the window and cried:

"No, it's Mr. Daan...."

Daan Dercksz stuck his parroty profile through the door of the morning-room, nervously, and, on seeing Ina, said:

"I've brought bad news!"

"Bad news!" cried Ina, pricking up her ears again. "What is it, Uncle?"

"Dr. Roelofsz is dead."

"Oh, no!"

"Yes," said Uncle Daan to Ina, staring at him in dismay, and Anna, standing with the cat among her petticoats. "Dr. Roelofsz is dead. An apoplectic stroke.... They sent round to me first, because my pension was nearest.... It seems he took Takma's death very much to heart."

"It's dreadful," said Ina. "How is Grandmamma to be told? It will be such a blow to her. And she doesn't even know of Mr. Takma's death...."

"Yes, it's very difficult.... I've sent word to your father and I expect him here any minute; then we can talk over what we are to do and say. Perhaps somebody else will come to-day...."

"Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear!" sighed Anna.

She looked at the stove, which was burning rather low, and, reflecting that perhaps there would be a good many using the morning-room that day, she shook the cinder-drawer: the fire began to glow behind the mica panes.

"Ah me!" cried Ina. "Grandmamma won't survive them long now.... Uncle, do you know that Aunt Thérèse is coming to the Hague? Aunt Stefanie has had a letter.... Oh, if only she arrives in time to see Grandmamma! ... Oh, what a terrible winter! ... And Papa is looking so depressed.... Uncle," she said&mdash;Anna had gone back to the kitchen, moaning and groaning and stumbling over the cat&mdash;"Uncle, tell me: why has Papa been so depressed ... ever since you came back to Holland?"

"Since I came back to Holland, dear? ..."

"Yes, Uncle. There's something that brought you back to Holland ... something that's made Papa so terribly depressed."

"I don't know, dear, I don't know...."

"Yes, you do.... I'm not asking out of curiosity, I'm asking for Papa's sake ... to help him ... to relieve him ... if he's in trouble. ... It may be business-matters ..."

"No, dear, it's not business-matters...."

"Well, then, what is it?"

"Why, dear, it's nothing, nothing at all."

"No, Uncle Daan, there's something"

"But then why not ask your father?"

"Papa refuses to speak about it."

"Then why should I speak about it?" cried Daan Dercksz, put on his guard by Ina's slip of the tongue. "Why should I speak about it, Ina? There may be something ... business-matters, as you say ... but it'll be all right. Yes, really, Ina, don't alarm yourself: it's all right."

He took refuge in a feigned display of indignation, pretended to think her much too curious about those business-matters and scratched the back of his head.

Ina's eyes assumed their well-bred, weary expression:

"Uncle, other people's money-matters are le molndre de mes soucis.... I was only asking you for an explanation ... because of my love for my father."

"You're a good daughter to your father, we all know that, all of us.... Ah, there he is: he's ringing!"

And, before Anna had time to go to the door, he had let Harold Dercksz in.

"Do you mean to say that Dr. Roelofsz is dead?" asked Harold.

He had received Daan's note after Ina had gone out to take Lily's children to their great-great-grand-mother.

"Yes," said Daan, "he's dead."

Harold Dercksz sank into a chair, his face twisted with pain.

"Papa, are you ill?" cried Ina.

"NO, dear, it's only a little more pain ... than usual.... It's nothing, nothing at all.... Is Dr. Roelofsz dead?"

He saw before his eyes that fatal night of pouring rain: saw himself, a little fellow of thirteen, saw that group of three carrying the body and heard his mother crying:

"Oh, my God, no, not in the river!"

The day after, Dr. Roelofsz had held an inquest on his father's body and certified death by drowning.

"Is Dr. Roelofsz dead?" he repeated. "Does Mamma know?"

"Not yet," said Daan Dercksz. "Harold, you had better tell her."

"I?" said Harold Dercksz, with a start. "I? I can't do it.... It would mean killing my mother.... And I can't kill my mother...."

And he stared before him....

He saw the Thing....

It passed, spectral in trailing veils of mist, which gathered round its slowly, slowly moving form; the leaves rustled; and ghosts threatened to appear from behind the silent trees, to stop the Thing's progress.... For, once his mother was dead, the Thing would sink into the abyss....

"I can't kill my mother!" Harold Dercksz repeated; and his martyred face became drawn with torturing pain.

He clasped his hands convulsively....

"And yet some one will have to tell her," Ina muttered to Anna, who stood beside her, mumbling, speaking to herself, utterly distraught.

But there was a ring at the bell. She went to the door. It was Anton: this was the day when he came to pay his mother his weekly visit.

"Is there any one with Mamma?"

"Aunt Stefanie," said Ina.

"What's happened?" he asked, seeing her consternation.

"Dr. Roelofsz is dead."

"Dead?"

Daan Dercksz told him, in a few words.

"We've all got to die," he muttered. "But it's a blow for Mamma."

"We were just discussing, Uncle, who had better tell her," said Ina. "Would you mind?"

"I'd rather not," said Anton Dercksz, sullenly.

No, they had better settle that among themselves: he was not the man to meddle in tiresome things that didn't concern him. What did it all matter to him! He called once a week, to see his mother: that was his filial duty. For the rest, he cared nothing for the whole pack of them! ... As it was, Stefanie had been bothering him more than enough of late, trying to persuade him to leave his money to his godchild, the Van Welys' little Netta; and he had no mind to do anything of the sort: he would rather pitch his money into the gutter. With Harold and Daan, who did business in India together and were intimate for that reason, he had never had much to do: they were just like strangers to him. Ina he couldn't stand, especially since D'Herbourg had helped him out of a mess, in the matter of that little laundry-girl. He didn't care a hang for the whole crew. What he liked best was to sit at home smoking his pipe and reading and picturing to himself, in fantasies of sexual imagination, pleasant, exciting events which had happened in this or that remote past.... But this was something that no one knew about. Those were his secret gardens, in which he sat all alone, wreathed in the smoke that filled his room, enjoying and revelling in indescribable private luxuries. Since he had become so very old that he allowed himself to be tempted into futile imprudent acts, as with the laundry-girl, he preferred to keep quiet, in his clouds of smoke, and to evoke the lascivious gardens which he never disclosed and where no one was likely to look for him. And so he chuckled with secret contentment, brooding ever more and more in his thoughts as he grew older and older; but he merely said, repeating his words:

"No, I'd rather not.... It's very sad.... Is no one upstairs except Stefanie? Then I may as well go up too, Anna...."

He moved towards the stairs....

Could Uncle Anton know anything, Ina wondered, with fierce curiosity. He was so sullen always, so reserved; no doubt he kept what he knew to himself. Should she go and ask him? And, while her father, sitting on his chair in pain, was still discussing with Uncle Daan which of them had better tell the old lady that Dr. Roelofsz was dead, Ina hurried after her uncle in the passage&mdash;Anna had gone back to the kitchen&mdash;and whispered:

"Tell me, Uncle. What was it that happened?"

"Happened? When?" asked Anton.

"Sixty years ago.... You were a boy of fifteen then.... Something happened then that ..."

He looked at her in amazement:

"What are you talking about?" he asked.

"Something happened," she repeated. "You must remember. Something that Papa and Uncle Daan know, something that Papa has always known, something that brought Uncle Daan to Holland...."

"Sixty years ago?" said Anton Dercksz.

He looked her in the eyes. The suddenness of her question had given such a shock to his self-centred, brooding brain that he suddenly saw the past of sixty years ago and clearly remembered that he had always thought that there must be something between his mother and Takma, something that they kept concealed between themselves. He had always felt this when, full of awe, almost hesitatingly, he approached his mother, once a week, and found old Takma sitting opposite her, starting nervously with that muscular jerk of his neck and seeming to listen for something.... Sixty years ago? ... Something must, something must have happened. And, in his momentary clearness of vision, he almost saw the Thing, divined its presence, unveiled his father's death, sixty years ago, was wafted almost unconsciously towards the truth, with the sensitive perspicacity&mdash;lasting but a second&mdash;of an old man who, however much depraved, had in his very depravity sharpened his cerebral powers and often read the past correctly.

"Sixty years ago?" he repeated, looking at Ina with his bleared eyes. "And what sort of thing could it be?"

"Can't you remember?"

She was all agog with curiosity; her eyes flashed into his. He hardly knew her, with all her well-bred weariness of expression gone; and he couldn't endure her at any time and he hated D'Herbourg and he said:

"Can't I remember? Well, yes, if I think hard, I may remember something.... You're right: I was a lad of fifteen then....

"Do you remember"&mdash;Ina turned and looked down the passage, looked at the open door of the morning-room, saw her father's back huddled into a despondent curve&mdash;"do you remember ... Grandmamma's baboe?"

"Yes, certainly," said Anton Dercksz, "I remember her."

"Ma-Boeten?"

"I daresay that was her name."

"Did she know anything?"

"Did she know anything? Very likely, very likely.... Yes, I expect she knew...."

"What was it, Uncle? Papa is so depressed: I'm not asking out of curiosity...."

He grinned. He did not know; he had only guessed something, for the space of a second, and had always suspected something between his mother and Takma, something that they hid together, while they waited and waited. But he grinned with pleasure because Ina wanted to know and because she was not going to know, at least not through him, however much she might imagine that he knew. He grinned and said:

"My dear, there are things which it is better not to know. It doesn't do to know everything that happened ... sixty years ago...."

And he left her, went slowly up the stairs, reflecting that Harold and Daan knew what the hidden Something was, the Something which Mamma and Takma had kept hidden between themselves for years and years.... The doctor had also known it, probably.... The doctor was dead, Takma was dead, but Mamma did not know that yet ... and Mamma now had the hidden Thing to herself. ... But Harold knew where it lay and Daan also knew where it lay ... and Ina was looking for it....

He grinned on the landing upstairs before he went in to his mother; he could hear Stefanie's grating voice inside.

"I," he said to himself, "don't care a hang for the whole crew. As long as they leave me alone, with my pipe and my books, I don't care a hang for the whole pack of them ... even though I do come and see my mother once a week.... And what she is keeping to herself and what she did with Takma, sixty years ago, I don't care a curse about either; that's her business, their business maybe ... but my business it is not."

He entered and, when he saw his mother, preternaturally old and frail in the red dusk of the curtains, he hesitated and went up to her, full of awe......