A Girl of the People | Page 6

make yourself as clean as you can--for you has got to see summut--leastways you can take the outside dirt away; there, make yourself clean while I lets the daylight in."
The man washed and laved himself. He was becoming gradually sober, and Bet's words had a subduing effect; he looked after her with a certain maudlin admiration, as she drew up the blind, and let the uncertain daylight into the poor little room. Then she went behind the screen, and he heard her for a moment or two moving about. He dried his face and hands and hair and was standing up, looking comparatively fresh and another man, when she returned to him.
"You're not a bad sort of a gel," he said, attempting to chuck her under the chin, only she drew away from him. "You know what a man wants, and you get it for him and don't hurl no ugly words in his face. Well, I'm off to the docks now. I'll let the old 'ooman sleep on, this once, and tell her what I think on her, and how much more I set store by that daughter of hers, tonight."
"You'll let her sleep on, will you?" said Bet.
Her tone was queer and constrained; even her father noticed it.
"She is asleep now; come and look at her; you may wake her if you can."
"No, no, gel; let me get off--Jim Targent will get my berth unless I look sharp. Let me be, Bet--your mother can sleep her fill this morning,"
"Come and look at her, father; come--you must."
She took his hand--she was very strong--stronger than him at that moment, for his legs were not steady, and even now he was scarcely sober.
"I don't want to see an old 'ooman asleep," he muttered, but he let the strong hand lead him forward. Bet pushed back the screen, and drew him close to the bed.
"Wake her if you can," she said, and her eyes blazed into his.
Granger looked. There was no mistaking what he saw.
"My God!" he murmured. "Bet, you shouldn't have done it--you shouldn't have broke it to me like this!"
He trembled all over.
"Martha dead! Let me get away. I hate dead people."
"Put your hand on her forehead, father. See, she couldn't have got your tea for you. It were no fault of her'n--you beat her, and you kicked her, and you made life awful for her; but you couldn't hurt her this morning; she's above you now, you can't touch her now."
"Let me go, Bet--you're an awful girl--you had no call to give me a turn like this. No, I won't touch her, and you can't force me. I'm going out--I won't stay in this room. I'm going down to the docks--I mustn't lose my work. What do you say--that I shan't go? Where will you all be if I don't arn your bread for you?"
"Set down there on the side of the bed, father. I'll keep you five minutes and no more. You needn't be all in a tremble--you needn't be showing of the white feather. Bless you, she never could hurt you less than she does now. Set there, and look at her face. I've a word or two to say, and I can only say it with you looking at her dead face. Then you can go down to the docks, and stay there for always as far as it matters to me."
She pushed the man on to the bed. He could see the white, still face of his dead wife. The tired look had left it; the wrinkles had almost disappeared. Martha Granger looked twenty years younger than she had done yesterday.
Around the closed eyelids, around the softly smiling mouth, lay an awful peace and grandeur. The drunken husband looked at the wife whom he had abused, whose days he had rendered one long misery, and a lump arose in his throat; a queer new sensation, which he could not recognize as either remorse or repentance, filled his breast. He no longer opposed Bet; he gazed fixedly, with a stricken stare, at the dead woman.
"Speak, gel; say what you have to say," he muttered.
"It's only a word or two, father--It's just this. Mother's dead, and in a day or two she'll be buried. You worn't there to bid her good-bye, and it ain't likely you'll ever meet her again, unless that's true about the Judgment Day. Maybe it is true, and maybe mother will tell God some ugly things about you then, father. Maybe you'll see her then for a minute or two--I can't say."
"Don't," said Granger. "You're awful when you likes, Bet. You has me down, and you tramples on me. You're a cruel gel, and no mistake."
A derisive smile came to Bet's face.
"Mother's dead and she'll be buried," she continued, in a dry, monotonous