Some Do Not . . ._ A Novel - Ford Madox Ford [93]
'I took you to Russia,' Tietjens said. 'I remember it all now--because I had an order from Sir Robert Ingleby to assist the British Consul-General in preparing a Blue Book statistical table of the Government of Kiev...It appeared to be the most industrially promising region in the world in those days. It isn't now, naturally. I shall never see back a penny of the money I put into it. I thought I was clever in those days...And of course, yes, the money was my mother's settlement. It comes back...yes, of course...
'Did you,' Sylvia asked, 'get out of taking me to your mother's funeral because you thought I should defile your mother's corpse by my presence? Or because you were afraid that in the presence of your mother's body you wouldn't be able to conceal from me that you thought I killed her?...Don't deny it. And don't get out of it by saying that you can't remember those days. You're remembering now: that I killed your mother: that Miss Wannop sent the telegram--why don't you score it against her, that she sent the news?...Or, good God, why don't you score it against yourself, as the wrath of the Almighty, that your mother was dying while you and that girl were croodling over each other?...At Rye! Whilst I was at Lobscheid...
Tietjens wiped his brow with his handkerchief.
'Well, let's drop that,' Sylvia said. 'God knows, I've no right to put a spoke in that girl's wheel or in yours. If you love each other you've a right to happiness and I daresay she'll make you happy. I can't divorce you, being a Catholic; but I won't make it difficult for you in other ways, and self-contained people like you and her will manage somehow. You'll have learned the way from Macmaster and his mistress...But, oh, Christopher Tietjens, have you ever considered how foully you've used me!'
Tietjens looked at her attentively, as if with magpie anguish.
'If,' Sylvia went on with her denunciation, 'you had once in our lives said to me: "You whore! You bitch! You killed my mother. May you rot in hell for it..." If you'd only once said something like it...about the child! About Perowne!...you might have done something to bring us together...'
Tietjens said:
'That's, of course, true!'
'I know,' Sylvia said, 'you can't help it...But when, in your famous county family pride--though a youngest son!--you say to yourself: And I daresay if...Oh, Christ!...you're shot in the trenches you'll say it...oh, between the saddle and the ground! that you never did a dishonourable action...And, mind you, I believe that no other man save one has ever had more right to say it than you...'
Tietjens said:
'You believe that!'
'As I hope to stand before my Redeemer,' Sylvia said, 'I believe it:...But, in the name of the Almighty, how could any woman live beside you...and be for ever forgiven? Or no: not forgiven: ignored!...Well, be proud when you die because of your honour. But, God, be humble about...your errors in judgment. You know what it is to ride a horse for miles with too tight a curb-chain and its tongue cut almost in half...You remember the groom your father had who had the trick of turning the hunters out like that...And you horse-whipped him, and you've told me you've almost cried ever so often afterwards for thinking of that mare's mouth...Well! Think of this mare's mouth sometimes! You've ridden me like that for seven years...
She stopped and then went on again:
'Don't you know, Christopher Tietjens, that there is only one man from whom a woman could take "Neither do I condemn thee" and not hate him more than she hates the fiend!...'
Tietjens so looked at her that he contrived to hold her attention.
'I'd like you