The Mill on the Floss
impression, saw her tall, strong brother grasping the feeble Philip
bodily, crushing him and trampling on him.
“Do you call this acting the part of a man and a gentleman, sir?” Tom
said, in a voice of harsh scorn, as soon as Philip’s eyes were turned
on him again.
“What do you mean?” answered Philip, haughtily.
“Mean? Stand farther from me, lest I should lay hands on you, and I’ll
tell you what I mean. I mean, taking advantage of a young girl’s
foolishness and ignorance to get her to have secret meetings with you.
I mean, daring to trifle with the respectability of a family that has a
good and honest name to support.”
“I deny that,” interrupted Philip, impetuously. “I could never trifle
with anything that affected your sister’s happiness. She is dearer to
me than she is to you; I honour her more than you can ever honour her;
I would give up my life to her.”
“Don’t talk high-flown nonsense to me, sir! Do you mean to pretend that
you didn’t know it would be injurious to her to meet you here week
after week? Do you pretend you had any right to make professions of
love to her, even if you had been a fit husband for her, when neither
her father nor your father would ever consent to a marriage between
you? And _you_,—_you_ to try and worm yourself into the affections of a
handsome girl who is not eighteen, and has been shut out from the world
by her father’s misfortunes! That’s your crooked notion of honour, is
it? I call it base treachery; I call it taking advantage of
circumstances to win what’s too good for you,—what you’d never get by
fair means.”
“It is manly of you to talk in this way to _me_,” said Philip,
bitterly, his whole frame shaken by violent emotions. “Giants have an
immemorial right to stupidity and insolent abuse. You are incapable
even of understanding what I feel for your sister. I feel so much for
her that I could even desire to be at friendship with _you_.”
“I should be very sorry to understand your feelings,” said Tom, with
scorching contempt. “What I wish is that you should understand
_me_,—that I shall take care of _my_ sister, and that if you dare to
make the least attempt to come near her, or to write to her, or to keep
the slightest hold on her mind, your puny, miserable body, that ought
to have put some modesty into your mind, shall not protect you. I’ll
thrash you; I’ll hold you up to public scorn. Who wouldn’t laugh at the
idea of _your_ turning lover to a fine girl?”
Tom and Maggie walked on in silence for some yards. He burst out, in a
convulsed voice.
“Stay, Maggie!” said Philip, making a strong effort to speak. Then
looking at Tom, “You have dragged your sister here, I suppose, that she
may stand by while you threaten and insult me. These naturally seemed
to you the right means to influence me. But you are mistaken. Let your
sister speak. If she says she is bound to give me up, I shall abide by
her wishes to the slightest word.”
“It was for my father’s sake, Philip,” said Maggie, imploringly. “Tom
threatens to tell my father, and he couldn’t bear it; I have promised,
I have vowed solemnly, that we will not have any intercourse without my
brother’s knowledge.”
“It is enough, Maggie. _I_ shall not change; but I wish you to hold
yourself entirely free. But trust me; remember that I can never seek
for anything but good to what belongs to you.”
“Yes,” said Tom, exasperated by this attitude of Philip’s, “you can
talk of seeking good for her and what belongs to her now; did you seek
her good before?”
“I did,—at some risk, perhaps. But I wished her to have a friend for
life,—who would cherish her, who would do her more justice than a
coarse and narrow-minded brother, that she has always lavished her
affections on.”
“Yes, my way of befriending her is different from yours; and I’ll tell
you what is my way. I’ll save her from disobeying and disgracing her
father; I’ll save her from throwing herself away on you,—from making
herself a laughing-stock,—from being flouted by a man like _your_
father, because she’s not good enough for his son. You know well enough
what sort of justice and cherishing you were preparing for her. I’m not
to be imposed upon by fine words; I can see what actions mean. Come
away, Maggie.”
He seized Maggie’s right wrist as he spoke, and she put out her left
hand. Philip clasped it an instant, with one eager look, and then
hurried away.
Tom and Maggie walked on in silence for some yards. He was still
holding her wrist tightly, as if he were compelling a culprit from the
scene of action. At last Maggie, with a violent snatch, drew her hand
away, and her pent-up, long-gathered irritation burst into utterance.
“Don’t suppose that I think you are right, Tom, or that I bow to your
will. I despise the feelings you have shown in speaking to Philip; I
detest your insulting, unmanly allusions to his deformity. You have
been reproaching other people all your life; you have been always sure
you yourself are right. It is because you have not a mind large enough
to see that there is anything better than your own conduct and your own
petty aims.”
“Certainly,” said Tom, coolly. “I don’t see that your conduct is
better, or your aims either. If your conduct, and Philip Wakem’s
conduct, has been right, why are you ashamed of its being known? Answer
me that. I know what I have aimed at in my conduct, and I’ve succeeded;
pray, what good has your conduct brought to you or any one else?”
“I don’t want to defend myself,” said Maggie, still with vehemence: “I
know I’ve been wrong,—often, continually. But yet, sometimes when I
have done wrong, it has been because I have feelings that you would be
the better for, if you had them. If _you_ were in fault ever, if you
had done anything very wrong, I should be sorry for the pain it brought
you; I should not want punishment to be heaped on you. But you have
always enjoyed punishing me; you have always been hard and cruel to me;
even when I was a little girl, and always loved you better than any one
else in the world, you would let me go crying to bed without forgiving
me. You have no pity; you have no sense of your own imperfection and
your own sins. It is a sin to be hard; it is not fitting for a mortal,
for a Christian. You are nothing but a Pharisee. You thank God for
nothing but your own virtues; you think they are great enough to win
you everything else. You have not even a vision of feelings by the side
of which your shining virtues are mere darkness!”
“Well,” said Tom, with cold scorn, “if your feelings are so much better
than mine, let me see you show them in some other way than by conduct
that’s likely to disgrace us all,—than by ridiculous flights first into
one extreme and then into another. Pray, how have you shown your love,
that you talk of, either to me or my father? By disobeying and
deceiving us. I have a different way of showing my affection.”
“Because you are a man, Tom, and have power, and can do something in
the world.”
“Then, if you can do nothing, submit to those that can.”
“So I _will_ submit to what I acknowledge and feel to be right. I will
submit even to what is unreasonable from my father, but I will not
submit to it from you. You boast of your virtues as if they purchased
you a right to be cruel and unmanly, as you’ve been to-day. Don’t
suppose I would give up Philip Wakem in obedience to you. The deformity
you insult would make me cling to him and care for him the more.”
“Very well; that is your view of things,” said Tom, more coldly than
ever; “you need say no more to show me what a wide distance there is
between us. Let us remember that in future, and be silent.”
Tom went back to St Ogg’s, to fulfill an appointment with his uncle
Deane, and receive directions about a journey on which he was to set
out the next morning.
Maggie went up to her own room to pour out all that indignant
remonstrance, against which Tom’s mind was close barred, in bitter
tears. Then, when the first burst of unsatisfied anger was gone by,
came the recollection of that quiet time before the pleasure which had
ended in to-day’s misery had perturbed the clearness and simplicity of
her life. She used to think in that time that she had made great
conquests, and won a lasting stand on serene heights above worldly
temptations and conflict. And here she was down again in the thick of a
hot strife with her own and others’ passions. Life was not so short,
then, and perfect rest was not so near as she had dreamed when she was
two years younger. There was more struggle for her, and perhaps more
falling. If she had felt that she was entirely wrong, and that Tom had
been entirely right, she could sooner have recovered more inward
harmony; but now her penitence and submission were constantly
obstructed by resentment that would present itself to her no otherwise
than as a just indignation. Her heart bled for Philip; she went on
recalling the insults that had been flung at him with so vivid a
conception of what he had felt under them, that it was almost like a
sharp bodily pain to her, making her beat the floor with her foot and
tighten her fingers on her palm.
And yet, how was it that she was now and then conscious of a certain
dim background of relief in the forced separation from Philip? Surely
it was only because the sense of a deliverance from concealment was
welcome at any cost.
Chapter VI.
The Hard-Won Triumph
Three weeks later, when Dorlcote Mill was at its prettiest moment in
all the year,—the great chestnuts in blossom, and the grass all deep
and daisied,—Tom Tulliver came home to it earlier than usual in the
evening, and as he passed over the bridge, he looked with the old
deep-rooted affection at the respectable red brick house, which always
seemed cheerful and inviting outside, let the rooms be as bare and the
hearts as sad as they might inside. There is a very pleasant light in
Tom’s blue-gray eyes as he glances at the house-windows; that fold in
his brow never disappears, but it is not unbecoming; it seems to imply
a strength of will that may possibly be without harshness, when the
eyes and mouth have their gentlest expression. His firm step becomes
quicker, and the corners of his mouth rebel against the compression
which is meant to forbid a smile.
The eyes in the parlour were not turned toward the bridge just then,
and the group there was sitting in unexpectant silence,—Mr Tulliver in
his arm-chair, tired with a long ride, and ruminating with a worn look,
fixed chiefly on Maggie, who was bending over her sewing while her
mother was making the tea.
They all looked up with surprise when they heard the well-known foot.
“Why, what’s up now, Tom?” said his father. “You’re a bit earlier than
usual.”
“Oh, there was nothing more for me to do, so I came away. Well,
mother!”
Tom went up to his mother and kissed her, a sign of unusual good-humour
with him. Hardly a word or look had passed between him and Maggie in
all the three weeks; but his usual incommunicativeness at home
prevented this from being noticeable to their parents.
“Father,” said Tom, when they had finished tea, “do you know exactly
how much money there is in the tin box?”
“Only a hundred and ninety-three pound,” said Mr Tulliver. “You’ve
brought less o’ late; but young fellows like to have their own way with
their money. Though I didn’t do as I liked before _I_ was of age.” He
spoke with rather timid discontent.
“Are you quite sure that’s the sum, father?” said Tom. “I wish you
would take the trouble to fetch the tin box down. I think you have
perhaps made a mistake.”
“How should I make a mistake?” said his father, sharply. “I’ve counted
it often enough; but I can fetch it, if you won’t believe me.”
It was always an incident Mr Tulliver liked, in his gloomy life, to