The Undesired
That evening about seven o’clock, whilst Easton was down-town seeing
the last of the election, Ruth’s child was born.
After the doctor was gone, Mary Linden stayed with her during the
hours that elapsed before Easton came home, and downstairs Elsie and
Charley – who were allowed to stay up late to help their mother
because Mrs Easton was ill – crept about very quietly, and conversed
in hushed tones as they washed up the tea things and swept the floor
and tidied the kitchen.
Easton did not return until after midnight, and all through the
intervening hours, Ruth, weak and tired, but unable to sleep, was
lying in bed with the child by her side. Her wide-open eyes appeared
unnaturally large and brilliant, in contrast with the almost
death-like paleness of her face, and there was a look of fear in them,
as she waited and listened for the sound of Easton’s footsteps.
Outside, the silence of the night was disturbed by many unusual
noises: a far-off roar, as of the breaking of waves on a seashore,
arose from the direction of the town, where the last scenes of the
election were being enacted. Every few minutes motor cars rushed past
the house at a furious rate, and the air was full of the sounds of
distant shouts and singing.
Ruth listened and started nervously at every passing footstep. Those
who can imagine the kind of expression there would be upon the face of
a hunted thief, who, finding himself encompassed and brought to bay by
his pursuers, looks wildly around in a vain search for some way of
escape, may be able to form some conception of the terror-stricken way
in which she listened to every sound that penetrated into the
stillness of the dimly lighted room. And ever and again, when her
wandering glance reverted to the frail atom of humanity nestling by
her side, her brows contracted and her eyes filled with bitter tears,
as she weakly reached out her trembling hand to adjust its coverings,
faintly murmuring, with quivering lips and a bursting heart, some
words of endearment and pity. And then – alarmed by the footsteps of
some chance passerby, or by the closing of the door of a neighbouring
house, and fearing that it was the sound she had been waiting for and
dreading through all those weary hours, she would turn in terror to
Mary Linden, sitting in the chair at the bedside, sewing by the light
of the shaded lamp, and take hold of her arm as if seeking protection
from some impending danger.
It was after twelve o’clock when Easton came home. Ruth recognized
his footsteps before he reached the house, and her heart seemed to
stop beating when she heard the clang of the gate, as it closed after
he had passed through.
It had been Mary’s intention to withdraw before he came into the room,
but the sick woman clung to her in such evident fear, and entreated
her so earnestly not to go away, that she remained.
It was with a feeling of keen disappointment that Easton noticed how
Ruth shrank away from him, for he had expected and hoped, that after
this, they would be good friends once more; but he tried to think that
it was because she was ill, and when she would not let him touch the
child lest he should awaken it, he agreed without question.
The next day, and for the greater part of the time during the next
fortnight, Ruth was in a raging fever. There were intervals when
although weak and exhausted, she was in her right mind, but most of
the time she was quite unconscious of her surroundings and often
delirious. Mrs Owen came every day to help to look after her, because
Mary just then had a lot of needlework to do, and consequently could
only give part of her time to Ruth, who, in her delirium, lived and
told over and over again all the sorrow and suffering of the last few
months. And so the two friends, watching by her bedside, learned her
dreadful secret.
Sometimes – in her delirium – she seemed possessed of an intense and
terrible loathing for the poor little creature she had brought into
the world, and was with difficulty prevented from doing it violence.
Once she seized it cruelly and threw it fiercely from her to the foot
of the bed, as if it had been some poisonous or loathsome thing. And
so it often became necessary to take the child away out of the room,
so that she could not see or hear it, but when her senses came back to
her, her first thought was for the child, and there must have been in
her mind some faint recollection of what she had said and done in her
madness, for when she saw that the baby was not in its accustomed
place her distress and alarm were painful to see, as she entreated
them with tears to give it back to her. And then she would kiss and
fondle it with all manner of endearing words, and cry bitterly.
Easton did not see or hear most of this; he only knew that she was
very ill; for he went out every day on the almost hopeless quest for
work. Rushton’s had next to nothing to do, and most of the other
shops were in a similar plight. Dauber and Botchit had one or two
jobs going on, and Easton tried several times to get a start for them,
but was always told they were full up. The sweating methods of this
firm continued to form a favourite topic of conversation with the
unemployed workmen, who railed at and cursed them horribly. It had
leaked out that they were paying only sixpence an hour to most of the
skilled workmen in their employment, and even then the conditions
under which they worked were, if possible, worse than those obtaining
at most other firms. The men were treated like so many convicts, and
every job was a hell where driving and bullying reigned supreme, and
obscene curses and blasphemy polluted the air from morning till night.
The resentment of those who were out of work was directed, not only
against the heads of the firm, but also against the miserable,
half-starved drudges in their employment. These poor wretches were
denounced as `scabs’ and `wastrels’ by the unemployed workmen but all
the same, whenever Dauber and Botchit wanted some extra hands they
never had any difficulty in obtaining them, and it often happened that
those who had been loudest and bitterest in their denunciations were
amongst the first to rush off eagerly to apply there for a job
whenever there was a chance of getting one.
Frequently the light was seen burning late at night in Rushton’s
office, where Nimrod and his master were figuring out prices and
writing out estimates, cutting down the amounts to the lowest possible
point in the hope of underbidding their rivals. Now and then they
were successful but whether they secured the work or not, Nimrod
always appeared equally miserable. If they got the `job’ it often
showed such a small margin of profit that Rushton used to grumble at
him and suggest mismanagement. If their estimates were too high and
they lost the work, he used to demand of Nimrod why it was possible
for Dauber and Botchit to do work so much more cheaply.
As the unemployed workmen stood in groups at the corners or walked
aimlessly about the streets, they often saw Hunter pass by on his
bicycle, looking worried and harassed. He was such a picture of
misery, that it began to be rumoured amongst the men, that he had
never been the same since the time he had that fall off the bike; and
some of them declared, that they wouldn’t mind betting that ole Misery
would finish up by going off his bloody rocker.
At intervals – whenever a job came in – Owen, Crass, Slyme, Sawkins
and one or two others, continued to be employed at Rushton’s, but they
seldom managed to make more than two or three days a week, even when
there was anything to do.
