The Mill on the Floss
six-foot, like Master Tom here.”
“Ah, it’s poor talking about littleness and bigness,—anybody may think
it’s a mercy they’re straight,” said aunt Pullet. “There’s that mismade
son o’ Lawyer Wakem’s, I saw him at church to-day. Dear, dear! to think
o’ the property he’s like to have; and they say he’s very queer and
lonely, doesn’t like much company. I shouldn’t wonder if he goes out of
his mind; for we never come along the road but he’s a-scrambling out o’
the trees and brambles at the Red Deeps.”
This wide statement, by which Mrs Pullet represented the fact that she
had twice seen Philip at the spot indicated, produced an effect on
Maggie which was all the stronger because Tom sate opposite her, and
she was intensely anxious to look indifferent. At Philip’s name she had
blushed, and the blush deepened every instant from consciousness, until
the mention of the Red Deeps made her feel as if the whole secret were
betrayed, and she dared not even hold her tea-spoon lest she should
show how she trembled. She sat with her hands clasped under the table,
not daring to look round. Happily, her father was seated on the same
side with herself, beyond her uncle Pullet, and could not see her face
without stooping forward. Her mother’s voice brought the first relief,
turning the conversation; for Mrs Tulliver was always alarmed when the
name of Wakem was mentioned in her husband’s presence. Gradually Maggie
recovered composure enough to look up; her eyes met Tom’s, but he
turned away his head immediately; and she went to bed that night
wondering if he had gathered any suspicion from her confusion. Perhaps
not; perhaps he would think it was only her alarm at her aunt’s mention
of Wakem before her father; that was the interpretation her mother had
put on it. To her father, Wakem was like a disfiguring disease, of
which he was obliged to endure the consciousness, but was exasperated
to have the existence recognised by others; and no amount of
sensitiveness in her about her father could be surprising, Maggie
thought.
But Tom was too keen-sighted to rest satisfied with such an
interpretation; he had seen clearly enough that there was something
distinct from anxiety about her father in Maggie’s excessive confusion.
In trying to recall all the details that could give shape to his
suspicions, he remembered only lately hearing his mother scold Maggie
for walking in the Red Deeps when the ground was wet, and bringing home
shoes clogged with red soil; still Tom, retaining all his old repulsion
for Philip’s deformity, shrank from attributing to his sister the
probability of feeling more than a friendly interest in such an
unfortunate exception to the common run of men. Tom’s was a nature
which had a sort of superstitious repugnance to everything exceptional.
A love for a deformed man would be odious in any woman, in a sister
intolerable. But if she had been carrying on any kind of intercourse
whatever with Philip, a stop must be put to it at once; she was
disobeying her father’s strongest feelings and her brother’s express
commands, besides compromising herself by secret meetings. He left home
the next morning in that watchful state of mind which turns the most
ordinary course of things into pregnant coincidences.
That afternoon, about half-past three o’clock, Tom was standing on the
wharf, talking with Bob Jakin about the probability of the good ship
Adelaide coming in, in a day or two, with results highly important to
both of them.
“Eh,” said Bob, parenthetically, as he looked over the fields on the
other side of the river, “there goes that crooked young Wakem. I know
him or his shadder as far off as I can see ’em; I’m allays lighting on
him o’ that side the river.”
A sudden thought seemed to have darted through Tom’s mind. “I must go,
Bob,” he said; “I’ve something to attend to,” hurrying off to the
warehouse, where he left notice for some one to take his place; he was
called away home on peremptory business.
The swiftest pace and the shortest road took him to the gate, and he
was pausing to open it deliberately, that he might walk into the house
with an appearance of perfect composure, when Maggie came out at the
front door in bonnet and shawl. His conjecture was fulfilled, and he
waited for her at the gate. She started violently when she saw him.
“Tom, how is it you are come home? Is there anything the matter?”
Maggie spoke in a low, tremulous voice.
“I’m come to walk with you to the Red Deeps, and meet Philip Wakem,”
said Tom, the central fold in his brow, which had become habitual with
him, deepening as he spoke.
Maggie stood helpless, pale and cold. By some means, then, Tom knew
everything. At last she said, “I’m not going,” and turned round.
“Yes, you are; but I want to speak to you first. Where is my father?”
“Out on horseback.”
“And my mother?”
“In the yard, I think, with the poultry.”
“I can go in, then, without her seeing me?”
They walked in together, and Tom, entering the parlour, said to Maggie,
“Come in here.”
She obeyed, and he closed the door behind her.
“Now, Maggie, tell me this instant everything that has passed between
you and Philip Wakem.”
“Does my father know anything?” said Maggie, still trembling.
“No,” said Tom indignantly. “But he _shall_ know, if you attempt to use
deceit toward me any further.”
“I don’t wish to use deceit,” said Maggie, flushing into resentment at
hearing this word applied to her conduct.
“Tell me the whole truth, then.”
“Perhaps you know it.”
“Never mind whether I know it or not. Tell me exactly what has
happened, or my father shall know everything.”
“I tell it for my father’s sake, then.”
“Yes, it becomes you to profess affection for your father, when you
have despised his strongest feelings.”
“You never do wrong, Tom,” said Maggie, tauntingly.
“Not if I know it,” answered Tom, with proud sincerity.
“But I have nothing to say to you beyond this: tell me what has passed
between you and Philip Wakem. When did you first meet him in the Red
Deeps?”
“A year ago,” said Maggie, quietly. Tom’s severity gave her a certain
fund of defiance, and kept her sense of error in abeyance. “You need
ask me no more questions. We have been friendly a year. We have met and
walked together often. He has lent me books.”
“Is that all?” said Tom, looking straight at her with his frown.
Maggie paused a moment; then, determined to make an end of Tom’s right
to accuse her of deceit, she said haughtily:
“No, not quite all. On Saturday he told me that he loved me. I didn’t
think of it before then; I had only thought of him as an old friend.”
“And you _encouraged_ him?” said Tom, with an expression of disgust.
“I told him that I loved him too.”
Tom was silent a few moments, looking on the ground and frowning, with
his hands in his pockets. At last he looked up and said coldly,—
“Now, then, Maggie, there are but two courses for you to take,—either
you vow solemnly to me, with your hand on my father’s Bible, that you
will never have another meeting or speak another word in private with
Philip Wakem, or you refuse, and I tell my father everything; and this
month, when by my exertions he might be made happy once more, you will
cause him the blow of knowing that you are a disobedient, deceitful
daughter, who throws away her own respectability by clandestine
meetings with the son of a man that has helped to ruin her father.
Choose!” Tom ended with cold decision, going up to the large Bible,
drawing it forward, and opening it at the fly-leaf, where the writing
was.
It was a crushing alternative to Maggie.
“Tom,” she said, urged out of pride into pleading, “don’t ask me that.
I will promise you to give up all intercourse with Philip, if you will
let me see him once, or even only write to him and explain
everything,—to give it up as long as it would ever cause any pain to my
father. I feel something for Philip too. _He_ is not happy.”
“I don’t wish to hear anything of your feelings; I have said exactly
what I mean. Choose, and quickly, lest my mother should come in.”
“If I give you my word, that will be as strong a bond to me as if I
laid my hand on the Bible. I don’t require that to bind me.”
“Do what _I_ require,” said Tom. “I can’t trust you, Maggie. There is
no consistency in you. Put your hand on this Bible, and say, ‘I
renounce all private speech and intercourse with Philip Wakem from this
time forth.’ Else you will bring shame on us all, and grief on my
father; and what is the use of my exerting myself and giving up
everything else for the sake of paying my father’s debts, if you are to
bring madness and vexation on him, just when he might be easy and hold
up his head once more?”
“Oh, Tom, _will_ the debts be paid soon?” said Maggie, clasping her
hands, with a sudden flash of joy across her wretchedness.
“If things turn out as I expect,” said Tom. “But,” he added, his voice
trembling with indignation, “while I have been contriving and working
that my father may have some peace of mind before he dies,—working for
the respectability of our family,—you have done all you can to destroy
both.”
Maggie felt a deep movement of compunction; for the moment, her mind
ceased to contend against what she felt to be cruel and unreasonable,
and in her self-blame she justified her brother.
“Tom,” she said in a low voice, “it was wrong of me; but I was so
lonely, and I was sorry for Philip. And I think enmity and hatred are
wicked.”
“Nonsense!” said Tom. “Your duty was clear enough. Say no more; but
promise, in the words I told you.”
“I _must_ speak to Philip once more.”
“You will go with me now and speak to him.”
“I give you my word not to meet him or write to him again without your
knowledge. That is the only thing I will say. I will put my hand on the
Bible if you like.”
“Say it, then.”
Maggie laid her hand on the page of manuscript and repeated the
promise. Tom closed the book, and said, “Now let us go.”
Not a word was spoken as they walked along. Maggie was suffering in
anticipation of what Philip was about to suffer, and dreading the
galling words that would fall on him from Tom’s lips; but she felt it
was in vain to attempt anything but submission. Tom had his terrible
clutch on her conscience and her deepest dread; she writhed under the
demonstrable truth of the character he had given to her conduct, and
yet her whole soul rebelled against it as unfair from its
incompleteness. He, meanwhile, felt the impetus of his indignation
diverted toward Philip. He did not know how much of an old boyish
repulsion and of mere personal pride and animosity was concerned in the
bitter severity of the words by which he meant to do the duty of a son
and a brother. Tom was not given to inquire subtly into his own motives
any more than into other matters of an intangible kind; he was quite
sure that his own motives as well as actions were good, else he would
have had nothing to do with them.
Maggie’s only hope was that something might, for the first time, have
prevented Philip from coming. Then there would be delay,—then she might
get Tom’s permission to write to him. Her heart beat with double
violence when they got under the Scotch firs. It was the last moment of
suspense, she thought; Philip always met her soon after she got beyond
them. But they passed across the more open green space, and entered the
narrow bushy path by the mound. Another turning, and they came so close
upon him that both Tom and Philip stopped suddenly within a yard of
each other. There was a moment’s silence, in which Philip darted a look
of inquiry at Maggie’s face. He saw an answer there, in the pale,
parted lips, and the terrified tension of the large eyes. Her
imagination, always rushing extravagantly beyond an immediate