Presently Brand said carelessly, “Be reasonable, my dear Sophy. Within a month you’ll be as thankful for the change as myself. It’ll give you more scope.” And he laughed.
Sophy demanded furiously whether he proposed to abandon the children altogether.
“It won’t make much difference to them,” said Brand. “One man or another…”
Eleanor felt a sudden reaction from this wild interchange of insults. She, a personality distinct from either of them, with already her own dreams and visions, was being set aside like any inanimate thing that may be alternatively placed on a shelf or in a cupboard, a thing not worthy of consideration. She emerged from behind her chair; her instincts were those of any wild thing that is accustomed to thongs and pursuers.
“I suppose, mother, when father’s gone, the gentleman who’s been staying with us this week will be here for good, won’t he? I like him. He gives me pence sometimes.”
The air with which she flung up her small head, the calculated insolence of her bearing towards both parents, stung Sophy to an ungovernable half-drunken rage. She rushed at the child and boxed her ears till Eleanor was dizzy and aghast. Brand, seating himself on the edge of the table, had begun to laugh. As on that occasion on Christmas Day at the Manor, he found himself incapable of immediate control. He seemed unaware of his wife’s treatment of the child, whom she now thrust from the room, crying, “Go on up and wait for me. I’ll teach you to hold your tongue, you little devil, if it kills me.”
With the abrupt closing of the door Brand’s laughter became more temperate. He said mockingly, “My dear Sophy, I congratulate you. You don’t suppose that child told me anything I didn’t know already? I’m glad to hear the gentleman is likely to be faithful.”
“Yes, you’d be glad to be free of having to keep me, wouldn’t you? But you won’t get off as easily as that. What if you have got this other fellow taken instead of you? Do you suppose I don’t know you did the murder?”
Brand, still in that mocking drawl, replied, “Well, and suppose you’re right? What do you expect me to do? Make a magnificent gesture? Gentlemen, you are deceived. Your prisoner is innocent of his crime. Behold the man!” He smote his breast dramatically. “But surely that wouldn’t suit your book? And mightn’t it scare away your devoted protector? After all, a murderer’s widow…” He began to laugh.
Upstairs, standing in her dingy chemise by the partly opened window (the cords were broken and the window stuck; no one could shut it even in the most bitter weather), the child, Eleanor, caught fragments of this conversation. Her sharp animal brain pieced them together. It did not shock or frighten her that her father should even jeeringly acknowledge his guilt; whether he had killed his father or not was no concern of hers. But she realised that he was going away, and, though she had no affection for him, she regarded him in some sense as a background, and to that extent she resented his going.
The door opened and Sophy whirled in, her face dark with passion. The child stiffened at the sight of her. The foul words she used fell unheeded on ears to whom lewd language was as natural as the baby-talk of more fortunate children; but even her courage was not finally proof against the fury of her mother’s blows. Bruised and stripped of that quality of self-respect that is a lonely child’s armour against despair, she was helpless in that powerful grasp. It was several minutes before Brand, fallen again into a rhapsody, was aware that the shrieks assailing his mind came from his own house. Flinging himself up the stairs, he rushed into his daughter’s room and dragged her from her mother’s hands.
“My God, Sophy, isn’t one murder in a family enough for you? Can you never let your filthy temper be?”
He thrust the stupefied child into bed, saying harshly, “Stop that noise. Why don’t you keep your mouth shut, if you want any peace?”
Blind anger against these degrading circumstances, and a dreadful fear that a momentary compassion for youth assaulted would destroy his strength, drove him to a ruthless cruelty. When Sophy gibed in spiteful tones, “An affectionate father you are, aren’t you?” he returned, in tones that were deliberately hard, “Oh, it’s her turn now. But let her wait a few years and she’ll be making hell of some man’s life. It’s what women are for.”
He went into the room they shared and began to fling some clothes into a box. He paid no heed to Sophy’s shrill disclaimers and insults; inside his head a pulse had begun to beat, warning him that not for much longer could he safely remain under the same roof as this woman to whom he was married. As he walked up from the station, he had contemplated a brief and effective scene, never this disgusting exhibition of a man’s worst feelings and compulsions. It was like stepping into a shed full of dirt, and emerging stained and repulsive. He slammed down the lid of the box—it had neither locks nor straps—and carried it into the narrow hall. Sophy followed him, still shouting her accusations against him for a murderer.
“You wait till the trial begins,” she jeered. “Who’s going to believe your story? Adrian Gray wouldn’t have given you two thousand pounds or even pretended to. Why should he? No one would believe a
