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Chapter the Seventh: Love And Death. Parts 5 to 7 · The Dream: A Novel

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Section twenty two of The Dream, a Novel. This is a LibriVox recording.
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All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to
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volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. The Dream, a Novel by H.
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G. Wells. Chapter the seventh, Love and Death, Parts five
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through seven. Part five. I went the next day to my sister Fanny
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to prepare for Hetty's call. Fanny sat in an arm chair and listened and
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watched my face as I told my story, confessed how I had exaggerated Hetty's
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offense and asked for help. I ought to have seen her, Harry,
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before I took your word for it, she said, of course, even
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now, I can't imagine how a girl who loves one man could ever stand
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the kiss of another as she did. But then, as you say,
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she'd been thinking, we women aren't all made alike. There's all sorts make
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a world. Some girls the backbone goes out of them when they feel a
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man's kisses. You and me, Harry, we aren't made like that.
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I've been thinking while you sat talking there, how like we both are to
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poor mother, really, for all she quarreled with me, will grow hard
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presently if we aren't careful, and your Hetty was young, and she didn't
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know only once it was, and all her life been spoilt by it.
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I didn't know it was like that, Harry. And my sister Fanny began
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to recall her impressions aheady. She recalled her fine animation and the living interest
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of her talk. When she left, I said to myself, she's got
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wit. That's the first witty woman I've ever met. She's got poetry in
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her. Everything she says comes out a little different from the things most people
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say. She says things that come like flowers in a hedge row. So
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she did, does she still? I never thought of it like that before,
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I said, I suppose she has a sort of poetry. Only the
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other day when I met her first, What was it? She said something,
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it's no good quoting Harry. Witty things should bloom where they grow.
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They're no good as cut flowers. But you and I are fairly quick and
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fairly clever, Harry. But we've never had any of that. I've always
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loved her talk, I said, I begin to explain the situation to Fanny
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more fully, and to show how she could help in it. I was
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not to see Hetty again. Fanny was to see her, pay her the
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hundred pounds we could put together for her, communicate with the she was to
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company and get her away. Fanny listened gravely and agreed. Then she reflected,
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well, why don't you take her to Canada yourself, Harry, she
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asked abruptly Part six. I did not answer Fanny for some moments. Then
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I said, I don't want to. I can see you love Hetty,
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still love, but I don't want that. You don't want to be with
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her? It's out of the question. Why ask a painful thing like that?
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All that is dead. Isn't a resurrection possible? Why is it out
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of the question? Pride? No, Why then, Milly? You don't
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love Milly. I won't have you discuss that, Fanny. I do love
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her, not as you love Hetty, quite differently. But Milly trusts me,
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she keeps faith with me. I'd as soon steal money from a child's
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money box as go back on Milly. It's wonderful how fine men can be
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to the wives they don't love, said Fanny bitterly. Newberry's different, I
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said, I've got my little son, I've got my work, and though
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you will never have it. I love Milly in a way. Is she
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company for you? Is she fun? I trust and love her. And
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as for Hetty, you don't understand about Hetty. I love her, I
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love her enormously. But it's like two ghosts me meeting by moonlight. We
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two are dead to each other and sorrowful. It isn't as though it was
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anything like your case over again. I see Hetty in hell and I do
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nearly anything in life to get her out. I don't even want to meet
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her. I want her to get away out of this built and stupidity where
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she can begin again. That's all I want, and that's all she wants.
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How could she and I ever come together again? How could we kiss
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again as lovers kiss? Poor defiled things we are, and all my cruelty.
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You're thinking of something else, Fanny. You're not thinking of Hetty and
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me. Maybe I am, said Fanny, Yes, I think I am.
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And so she is to go to Canada and begin again till her health
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comes back and her courage comes back. It isn't natural for a woman of
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her temperament to live without a man to love her. Harry, let her
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live and love said I. She'll have changed her name. Her friends will
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stand by her. They won't give her away, let her forget, let
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her begin again with another man. It may be you don't mind the thought
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of that. I was stung, but I kept my temper. Have I
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any right to mind the thought of that now? But you will, and
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you will go on living with his wife. You trust and respect who's dull
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spirited? Dull as dishwater? Know who's my son's mother? Who is trustworthy?
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Whom I'm pledged to? And I've got my work. It may seem
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nothing to you, it's good enough for me to give myself to it.
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Can't I love Hetty? Can't I help her out of the net she's in,
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and yet not want to go back to impossible things? Gray Monday mornings,
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said Fanny, as if all life wasn't gray, I said, and
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then said, sarnak, I remember that I made a prophecy. I made
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it? When did I make it? Two thousand years ago? Or two
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weeks ago? I sat in Fanny's little sitting room, an old world creature,
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amidst her old world furnishings, and I said that men and women would
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not always suffer as we were suffering. Then I said that we were still
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poor savages, living only in the bleak dawn of civilization, and that we
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suffered because we were underbred, undertrained, and darkly ignorant of ourselves. That
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the mere fact that we knew our own unhappiness was the promise of better things,
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And that a day would come when charity and understanding would light the world,
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so that men and women would no longer hurt themselves and one another,
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as they were doing now everywhere, universally, in law and in restriction,
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and in jealousy and in hate, all round and about the earth. It
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is still too dark for us, I said, to see clearly where we
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are going, And every one of us blunders and stumbles and does wrong everyone.
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It is idle for me to ask, now, what is the right
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thing for me to do? You? Whatever I do now will be wrong.
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I ought to go with Hetty and be her lover again. Easily I
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could do that, and why should I deny it? And I ought to
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stick to Milly and the work I have found in the world. Right road
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or left road both lead to sorrow and remorse. But there is scarcely a
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soul in all this dark world. Fanny, who has not had to make
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or will not presently have to make a choice as hard. I will not
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pull the skies down upon Milly. I cannot because she has put her faith
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in me. You are my dear sister, Fanny, and I love you,
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and we have loved each other. Do you remember how you used to
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take me round to school and hold my hand at crossings. Don't make things
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too hard for me now, just help me to help Hetty. Don't tear
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me to pieces. She is still alive and young, and Hetty out there
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she at least can begin again Part seven. Nevertheless, I did see Hetty
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again before she left England. There came for a letter for me at Thunderstone
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House, in which she proposed a meeting. You have been so kind to
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me, she wrote, It is the next best thing to your never having
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left me. You have been a generous dear. You've given back happiness to
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me. I feel excited already at the thought of the great liner and the
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ocean, and full of hope. We've got a sort of picture of the
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ship. It is like a great hotel with our cabin marked in it,
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exactly where it is. Canada will be wonderful our Lady of the snows,
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and we are going by way of New York, New York like nothing else
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on earth, cliffs and crags of windows towering up to the sky. And
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it's wonderful to have new things again. I sneak off to Fanny's, just
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to finger them over. I'm excited, yes, and grateful yes, and
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full of hope yes. And Harry, Harry, my heart aches and aches.
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I want to see you again. I don't deserve to, but I
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want to see you again. We began with a walk, and why shouldn't
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we end with a walk? Thursday and Friday, all the gang will be
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at Leeds. I could get away the whole day either day, and it
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would be a miracle if anyone new. I wish we could have that same
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old walk again. I suppose it's too far and impossible. We'll save that,
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Harry, until we're both quite dead, and then we'll be too little
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swirls of breeze in the grass, or two bits of thistle down going side
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by side. But there was that other walk we had when we went to
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Sheer and right over the north downs to Leatherhead. We looked across the wheeld
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and saw our own south Downs, far far away Pinewood and heather. There
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was hills beyond hills, and the smoke of rubbish burning. I was to
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write to Fanny's address. Of course, we had that walk. We two
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half resuscitated lovers. We did not make love at all, though we kissed
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when we met, and we meant to kiss when we parted. We talked,
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as I suppose dead souls might talk of the world that had once been
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real. We talked of a hundred different things, even of Sumner. Now
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that she was so near escape from him, her dread and hatred had evaporated.
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She said Sumner had a passionate desire for her and a real need for
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her, and that it was not fair to him, and very bad for
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him that she despised him. It wounded his self respect, it made him
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violent and defiant. A woman who cared for him, who would take the
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pains to watch him and care for him as a woman should do for a
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man, might have made something of him. But I've never cared for him,
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Harry, though I've tried. But I can see where things hurt him.
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I can see they hurt him frightfully. At times it doesn't hurt him
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any the less because he does ugly things. He was vain too, and
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ashamed of his incapacity to get a sufficient living. He was drifting very rapidly
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to a criminal life, and she had no power over him to hold him
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back. I can still see Hetty and hear her voice as we walked along
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a broad bridle path between great rhododendron bushes, and she talked grave and balanced
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and kind. She was of this rogue who had cheated her and outraged her
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and beaten her. It was a new aspect of Hetty, and yet at
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the same time it was the old dear Hetty I had loved and wasted and
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lost, clear minded and swift, with an understanding better than her will.
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We sat for a long time on the crest of the downs above Sheer,
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where the view was at its widest and best, and we recalled the old
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days of happiness in Kent, and talked of the distances before us, and
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of crossing the sea, and of France and so the whole wide world.
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I feel, she said, as I used to when I was a child.
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At the end of the school quarter, I'm going away to new things.
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Put on your frock, put on your hat, the big ship waiting.
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I am a little frightened about it, and rather happy I wish.
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But never mind that you wish? What else could I wish? You mean,
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it's no good wishing. I've got to stick to the job I've taken.
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I've got to see it through. But if you care to know it,
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Hetty, I wish so too, my God, if wishes could release
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one, You've got your job here. I wouldn't take you away, Harry,
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if I could sturdy you are, Harry, and you go through with
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it and do the work you're made to do, And I'll take what comes
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to me over there. I guess I'll forget a lot about Sumner and the
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things that happened between, and think a lot about you and the South Downs,
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and this how we sat side by side here, Perhaps, said Hetty.
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Heaven is a place like this, a great hillside to which you come
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at last, after all the tugging and pushing and the hoping, and the
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disappointments and the spurring, and the hungers and the cruel jealousies are done with
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and finished forever. Then here you sit down and rest, and you aren't
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alone. Your lover is here, and he sits beside you, and you
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just touch shoulder to shoulder, very close and very still, and your sins
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are forgiven you. Your blunders and misunderstandings, they matter no longer, and
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the beauty takes you, and you dissolve into it. You dissolve into it,
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side by side, and together you forget and fade, until at last
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nothing remains of all their distresses and anger and sorrow. Nothing remains of you
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at all but the breeze upon the great hillside, and sunshine, an everlasting
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peace, all of which said Hetty, rising abruptly to her feet and standing
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over me. It's just empty nothingness, Oh Harry, Harry, one feels
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things, and when one tries to see them, it is just words and
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nonsense. We've hardly started on our way to Leatherhead, and you'll have to
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be back by seven. So get up, old Harry, get up and
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come on. You are the dearest person alive, and it has been sweet
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of you to come with me today. I was half afraid you'd think it
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wasn't wise. In the late afternoon we got to a place called Little Bookum,
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and there we had tea. About a mile farther on was a railway
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station and we found a train for London. It came in as we got
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on to the platform. Everything had gone well so far, and then came
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the first gleam of disaster. At Leatherhead. We sat looking out on the
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station platform, and a little ruddy man came trotting along to get into the
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compartment next to us, a little common fellow, like an ostler, with
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a cigar under his Hebrew nose. And as he was about to get in,
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he glanced up at us doubt, and then recognition came into his eyes.
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And at the sight of him, Hetty recoiled. Get in, said
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the guard, blowing his whistle, and the little man was hustled out of
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sight. Hetty was very white. I know that man, she said,
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and he knows me. He's named Barnado. What shall I do? Nothing?
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Does he know you very well? He's been to our rooms three or
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four times. He may not have been sure it was you. I think
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he was. Suppose he were to come to the window at the next station
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and make certain. Could I pretend not to be myself, refuse to recognize
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him or answer to my name. But if he was convinced it was you,
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in spite of your bluff, that would instantly make him suspicious, and
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off he'd go to your husband. If, on the other hand, you
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took it all quite casually, said I was your cousin or your brother in
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law, he might think nothing of it and never even mention it to Sumner,
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but making him suspicious would send him off to Sumner right away. And
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how you go to Liverpool tomorrow. I don't see that his recognition of you
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matters. I'm thinking of you, she said, But he doesn't know who
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I am. So far as I know, none of that lot has seen
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me. The train slowed down. At the next station, mister Bernardo appeared,
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cigar and all bright eyed and curious. Beshfahal didn't shave em my shelf
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thattch Hetty Shumnah said, mister Bernardo, wonderful. How won't reach people?
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My brother in law, mister Dyson, said Hetty, introducing me. We've
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been down to see his little daughter. I didn't know you all the system,
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Miss Sumna, I haven't, said Hetty, with a note of pain
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in her voice. Mister Dyson is a widower, sorry, said mister Bernardo.
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Stupid of me, And at what age might the little girl be?
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Mister Dyson. I found myself under the necessity of creating, explaining and discussing
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an orphaned daughter. Mister Bernardo had three and was uncomfortably expert about children and
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their phases of development. He was evidently a model father. I did as
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well as I could. I drew out mister Barnardo's family pride rather than indulge
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my own. But I was immensely relieved when mister Bernardo exclaimed gold he is
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epten already glad you met you, mister Damn, I said to myself.
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I had forgotten Dixon, said Hetty hastily, and mister Bernardo, after a
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fusive farewells, proceeded to remove himself from the carriage. Think then said Hetty,
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he didn't come on to London. You're the poorest liar, Harry I've
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ever known. As it is, no harm's been done. No harm's been
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done, said I. But two or three times before we reached the London
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station where we were to part forever, we recurred to the encounter and repeated
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the reassuring formula that no harm had been done. We parted at Victoria Station
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with very little emotion. Mister Bernardo had brought us back as it were to
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an everyday and incidental atmosphere. We did not kiss each other again. The
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world about us had become full now of observant eyes. My last words to
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Hetty were everything's all right, in a business like reassuring tone. And the
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next day she slipped off to join her friends at Liverpool and passed out of
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my life forever. End of section twenty two, read by Heather McKee,
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October two thousand, twenty three.