The Secret Places of the Heart
tio
profiteering of private owners and traders, to a view of a general human welfare. They form an important link in a series of private and public documents that are slowly opening out a prospect of new economic methods, methods conceived in the generous spirit of scientific work, that may yet arrest the drift of our western civilization towards financial and commercial squalor and the social collapse that must
interests sought to save themselves in whole or in part from the common duty of sacrifice. But toward the end he fell ill. He had worked to the pitch of exhaustion. He neglected a cold that settled on his chest. He began to cough persistently and betray an increasingly irritable temper. In the last fights in the Committee his face was bright with fever and he spoke in a voiceless whisper, often a vast a
of the Majority Report. The Minority Report, his own especial cre
ned frequent allusions to the Committee. Someone told him that Sir Richmond had been staying at Ruan in Cornwall where Martin Leeds had a cotta
son indeed. She talked to him freely and simply of her husband and of the journey the two men had taken together. Either she knew nothing of the circumstances of their par
ichmond's work in any way. He believed in him thoroughly.
im," said Lady Hardy. "I wish I could fee
sted. "I know very
urthen of toil," she said. "I try to smooth his p
tinized the d
shed to meet the requirements of this lady if he could. "He is one of those men,"
nius.... A great irresponsible genius.... Diffic
great regret that the doctor found the time
tio
and Sir Richmond was already seriously ill. But he was still going about his business as though he was perfectly well.
I must be bolstered up. I can't last out unless I am. I'm at the end of my energy. I come to you because you will understand
hand, "I must order you to bed. You won't go. But I order you. You must know that what you are doing is risking your life. Your lungs are congested, the bronchial tubes already. That may spread a
all reaso
r wife
eople. But the household is
ke a mummy. I wish the Committee room wasn't down
th an affectio
tio
nged timbre of the wheezy notes in his throat. He rose later each day and with ebbing vigour, jotted down notes and corrections upon the proofs of the Minority Report. He found it increasingly difficult to make decisions; he would correct and alter back and then repeat the correction, perhaps half a dozen times. On the evening of the second day his lungs became painful and his breathing difficult
r line. I know.... My wife's G.P.--an exasperat
doctor replaced by one from Lady Hardy's room. He had twisted th
p for night work near the fireplace, an electric kettle for making tea at night, a silver biscuit tin; all the apparatus for the lonely intent industry of the small hours. There was a bookcase of bluebooks, books of reference and suchlike material, and some files. Over the mantelpiece was an enlarged photograph of Lady Hardy and a plain office calendar. The desk was littered with the galley proofs of the M
while he cast about for anything that would give this large industrious apartment a little more of the restfulness and comf
de. "This is not, as you say, my sort of work. Will you let me
aid Sir Richmond. I w
get the right sort of nurse
hard on his heels. Sir Richmond submitted almost silently to hi
then encouragingly to Sir Richmon
think what a decent chap Dr. Martineau was, how helpful and fine and forgiving his professional training had made him, how completely he had ignored the smothered incivilities of their parting at Salisbury. All men ought to have some such training, Not a bad idea to put e
eyebrows conveyed that
Hardy ought to
k his head with u
said, and after a pause,
nything h
d th
Sir Richmond's face. He seemed to regard
the impassive figure on the bed. Did Sir Richmond fully understand? He made a step to
s eyes and regarded hi
"after great exertion and fatigue, may
eek on pillow, s
in--... If you don't want to take risks about that--... One
e stuck to his point. His voice was faint but firm. "Coul
for a little while. Then he s
Sir Richmond, with hi
to
puckered like a peevish child's. "They'd want things sai
spered Dr. Martineau
ful. "Give them my love," he said
ort. "I can't see them, Martineau, until I've something to say. It's like that. Perhaps I shall think of some kind things to say--after a sleep. But if the
ed Dr. Martineau. "
tio
stirred and muttered. "Second rate... P
aid Dr. Martineau, and was not
. lost my grip... Alwa
Put their backs
ver done anyt
Done. Well
on
t whisper. "Done for ever and
seemed
Richmond cared, should come and say good-bye to him, and for Sir Richmond to say good-bye to someone. He hated this lonely launching from the shores of life of one who had sought intimacy
his eyes. What had happened? Was there not perhaps some word for her? He turned about as if to enquire of the dying man and found Sir Richmond's eye
d turned away. He went to the wind
le dimly at the doctor's back
y that for some time the night nurse did not observe what had happened. She was indeed
tio
liness produced by the nocturnal desk and by the evident dread felt by Sir Richmond of any death-bed partings. He realized how much this man, who had once sought so feverishly for intimacies, had shrunken bac
d of the rage of life in a young baby, how we drove into life in a sort of fury, how that rage impelled us to do this and that, how we fought and struggled until the rage spent itself and
e him and below. He was going along this path without looking back, without a thought for those he left behind, without a single word to cheer him on his way, walking as Dr. Martineau had sometimes watched him walking, without haste or avidity, walking as a man mig
ness hide the beginnings of some strange long journe
indeed
in immortality. Dimmer and dimmer grew the figure but still it remained visible. As one can
ook of the Dead, at a copy of which the doctor had been looking a day or so before. Sir Richmond became a brown naked figure, crossing a bridge of danger, passing between terrific monsters, ferrying a dark and dreadful stream. He came to the scales of judgment before the very throne of Osiris and stood waiting while dogheaded Anubis weighed his conscience and that evil monster, the Devourer of the Dead, crouched ready if the
become a little painted figure and he was bearing a book in his hand. He wanted to show that the laws of the new world
n of waking troubles.... You have been six months on Chapter Ten; wil
his time it was not Sir Richmond.... Who was it? Surely it was Everyman. Everyman had to travel at last along that selfsame road, leaving love, leaving every task and every desire. But was it Everyman?... A great fear and
o wrench hi
certain. He switched on his electric light, mutely interrogated his round face reflected in the looking glass, got out of bed, shuffled on his slippers and went along
tio
tears, met his very wistfully; her little body seemed very small and pathetic in its simple black dress. And yet there was a sort of bravery about her. When he came into the drawing-ro
ast night," he said, taking both her hands in
it had been possible you w
elieve it yet. I don't realize it
can under
. It is as if he were a little more not qui
s. "My daughter Helen comes home to-morrow afternoon," she explained. "She is in Paris. But our son
ite here." It was as if she felt that now it was at last possible to make a definite reality of him. He could be fixed. And as he was fixed he would stay. Never more would he be able to come in and with an almost expressionless glance wither the interpretation she had imposed upon him. She was finding much comfort in this task of reconstruction. She had gathered together in the drawingroom every presentable portrait she had been able to find of him. He had never, she said, sat to a painter, but there was an early pencil sketch done within a couple of years of their marriage; there was a number of pho
uch to him," sai
e people. But there must be books. And I want one. Something a little more real than the ordinary official biography.... I have thought of young Leighton, the secretary of the Commission. He seems thoroughly intelligent and sympathetic and really anxious to reconcile Richmond's views with those of the big business me
tio
Martineau by telephone. "Something rather disagreeable," she
tell him nothing more. She was having tea and she gave him some. She fussed about with crea
robably went into things with you that he never talked about with anyone else. Usual
u with discretion, "deal a
was som
hen, not to be too portent
ever mention someone
realizing that this was a mistake, he
I'm glad," she said simply. She repeated,
au looked h
to come a
er
ve never met her. Never set eyes on her. For all I know she may
ave. "You would rath
understand, of course, she has a sort of claim." She sobbed her relu
he said. "I understand. Now ... suppose _I_ were to write to her and arrange--I do not s
ou CO
tresses, no matter at what trouble to himself. "You are so goo
ry," she said, d
ow," he reassured her. "You
e house at mid-day on the morrow, and to ask not for Lady Hardy but for him. He would stay by her while she was in the house, and it would be quite easy for Lady Hardy to keep herself
tio
e face of a sensitive youth rather than the face of a woman. She had fine grey eyes under very fine brows; they were eyes that at other times might have laughed very agreeably, but which were now full of an unrestrained sadness. Her brown hair was very untid
pictures that stood about the room. She walked up to the painting and stood in front of it with her
tor very much. "You mean Lady Har
id she get all the
," said Dr
ette!... He was extraordinarily difficult to get. I have burnt every photograph I had of him. For fear that this would happen; that he would go stif
e had to say these things which burthened her mind to someone. "I have done hundreds of sketches. My room is l
beyond her power. "It is as if someo
pstairs. "This was his st
came here on
t of Aliss Grammont had disappeared. Miss Leeds walked straight across to the coffin and stood looking down on the waxen inexpressive dignity of the dead. Sir Richmond's brows and nose
metimes I think he loved me. But it is hard to tell. He was kind. He could be intensely kind and yet he didn't seem to care for you. He could be intens
d at the dead man with her head a little on
ess. He would not let you have the bitter tr
it is. He took it seriously because it takes itself serious
taken seriously. It is a joke--a bad joke--made by some cruel little god who has caught a neglecte
ess. But he never seemed happy. This work of his came before it. He overwo
What am I to do now with the rest of my life
. I don't blame him. He
I shall mourn for him
y vestige of self-control. She sank down on her knees
arling! Speak to me, I
and dreadful. She beat her hands upon the coffin
drifted feebly
was all about. Always he had feared love for the cruel thing it was, but no
The End<