The Storm Breaks

Chapter I.—Recompense-1

Chapter I.—Recompense“Mr. Larose,” said the aristocratic-looking young woman, with a choke in her voice, “I have come to you for advice. Two days ago I killed a man. He attacked me and had been intending to blackmail me. His body lies hidden in a pond. Should I give myself up to the police, or say nothing in the hope that I may not be found out? You remember me, don't you? We met at Blackston Manor a little while ago.”

It would be difficult for the generation of to-day, or even, perhaps, for middle-aged people, to realise the social conditions prevailing in England sixty to seventy years ago. It was an age of class-distinctions appalling in their bitterness and stupidity.

The so-called upper classes regarded all who were not born to lives of idleness and pleasure as being of different flesh and blood from those who had to work for their living; and, looking back now, it seems almost incredible that their snobbery and exclusiveness could have been of such a silly and childish nature.

Those engaged in trade in any form were never admitted to society or considered eligible to be presented at Court. The disadvantage, too, of their father's calling was passed down to the children, and boys whose fathers owned businesses were automatically debarred from many of our best public schools, with their social inferiority being rubbed into them during all their adolescent years.

In country towns this prevailing snobbishness was even worse than in the big towns, but it was not without its humorous side. There—families high up in the social scale might be deeply in debt to the local tradespeople, but it was considered to be quite all right to pretend not to see them, or cut them dead when they were met out in the street. Recognition, it was believed, would have been lowering to the dignity of those who possessed birth and breeding.

As for the labouring classes, the contempt in which so many held them was exemplified by a story current then of a titled young lady of extremely ancient lineage who took to herself a husband of an equally exalted birth and, gratified with the privileges of married life, is said to have remarked to her husband, “And is marriage the same for the common people, Adolphus, because, if so, it is much too good for them!”

With the nation divided into the historic upper, middle and lower classes, the snobbery of the upper one in turn affected the middle one, now, however, taking on an entirely different form, as it was the possession of money there which so lifted a man above his fellows. Anyone with a shilling in his pocket regarded himself as greatly superior to one with only sixpence. So it followed therefore that the gulf between the well-to-do and poorer middle class was every bit as wide and deep as that between the people of society and those engaged in commerce. In middle-class circles it was a man's income, every time, which determined his position in his social world.

Mary Hinks's father was a £4-a-week clerk in a firm of wholesale clothiers in the city, and, though his salary was considered quite a good one, he mixed neither with those who were earning more nor with those earning less.

With a wife and six children, the family lived in Manor Park, an East End suburb of London close to Wanstead Flats, and enjoyed, or rather endured, the usual drab monotonous lives common to those in their position in the comparatively speaking uneventful years from the late 'seventies almost to the coming of the first Great War.

There were no pictures in those days; theatres were far too much a luxury for families with small means, and music-halls were considered as improper for young people. In consequence, a concert arranged by the church the Hinkses attended, a very occasional jaunt by tram to Epping Forest, or a rare visit to the Zoo, were the main highlights of their existence, and, with so few outside interests for the parents, it was not to be wondered at that the Hinks children were so generously begotten.

The Hinks family, as with the great majority of their class, was eminently respectable, conforming religiously to all the conventions of the day. Neatly, though it might have been poorly, dressed, and with clean hands and faces and hair nicely brushed, all who were old enough to go attended church twice every Sunday. Mr. Hinks did not swear or bet or frequent public houses, and his only luxuries were his pipe and morning and evening papers.

The Sunday paper was read exclusively by Mrs. Hinks and himself. It was invariably kept out of the way of the younger members of the family.

At that time divorce cases were fully reported, and when the divorce courts were sitting the Sunday papers vied with one another in providing full and spicy details for their readers. So, with divorce almost wholly the privilege of the wealthy classes, “What the footman saw through the crack in the blinds,” and “What the butler heard through the keyhole,” often constituted the general type of headlines.

The intense interest the middle classes always showed in the doings of the classes above them was also catered for by a very lively red-covered mid-weekly journal known as Modern Society, and within reach of everyone at the price of one penny. It had a very wide circulation and, from backstairs information and kitchen tittle-tattle undoubtedly supplied by the domestic staff of certain of 'the great houses', it was notorious for its scandal and innuendoes about many society people.

Now it cannot be too strongly insisted that, with all their smug respectability and narrow-mindedness, right down from the Victorian era the middle classes had been the very backbone of the country's morality. Their eldest born did not arrive until the proper time, their marriage vows were rarely broken, and their daughters, in course of time, entered matrimony in the virgin state.

It is true that in their days of adolescence the male scions of the family often set their feet upon unlawful and forbidden ways, but it seemed to be a point of honour with them never to bring misfortune upon a girl of their own class. In the main it was the servant girl who was their target, she being held to be good hunting, and materfamilias with a pretty one in her service had to keep a vigilant and unclosing eye upon the youthful males of the family.

Mrs. Hinks, however, was spared all anxiety there, as she was never well enough off to keep a maid. Always in poor health, she kept Mary, the eldest of the children, at home to be the family help. A girl of gentle disposition and uncomplaining nature, though she would certainly have much preferred to go out and earn her own living, Mary did not grumble and accepted the conditions as a matter of course.

Her father was as generous with her as he could afford to be and, when eighteen years of age, she was receiving the weekly wage of five shillings. With this she had to dress herself and provide all luxuries such as sweets, papers and books. With books she did not trouble much, but she always bought two weekly papers, one, the Family Herald, a weekly fiction magazine of twenty-four pages which could be purchased for a penny, and another, Bow Bells Novelette, at the same price. This latter magazine was not high-class, but for all that was most satisfying for those sentimentally inclined. A monotonous life Mary's might certainly have been, but it was one endured by many hundreds of thousands such as she, and never having known anything different they did not complain.

Of medium height and decidedly pretty, with her perfect little figure, she was undoubtedly an attractive girl. She always looked fresh and clean and had a nice colouring, a good complexion and frank, clear blue eyes.

Her father, however, was very strict and never allowed her out at night. Added to that, he insisted they were not well enough off to entertain and, moreover, the house was not large enough for company. Accordingly, Mary had no opportunities of making friends.

Of course she had her dreams and hoped that one day she would make a good marriage and perhaps—oh, how beautiful the thought was—live in the country among the trees and flowers. Then she would keep fowls and ducks and might even have a pony and trap!

When she was approaching her twentieth birthday it seemed to her that her chance had come at last, though there was certainly not much romance about it. A man nearly as old as her father fell violently in love with her, and being in a good position with a good salary, her parents also backing him up, had little difficulty in persuading her to become his wife.

By name of Birtle Dane, he was quite ordinary-looking, with a long and rather solemn face and grave, unsmiling eyes. She made his acquaintance one August Bank Holiday when her father, in a burst of extravagance, had taken the whole family down to Southend for the day.

They first noticed him when, after their picnic meal, the children and Mary were building castles upon the sands. He was seated upon the promenade above them and seemed interested in watching all they were doing. Presently he walked down to them and, raising his hat politely, asked if Mr. Hinks would kindly tell him the time, as he did not think his own watch was correct.

A conversation ensued, he admired the children and remarked how healthy they all looked, and expressed surprise to learn that they did not always live by the sea, but, as with himself, were only excursionists down for the day. It was remembered afterwards that, though it was mostly about the children he talked, his eyes never left Mary for very long. And certainly she was worth looking at, with her blue eyes sparkling in animation, her face so delicately flushed by her exertions and her pretty hair looking its best under the bright sun.

Presently, this agreeable stranger suggested that he and Mr. Hinks should stroll away in search of some liquid refreshment, and in the bar of the Grand Hotel more conversation ensued, names and addresses were exchanged in the most friendly way, and to his astonishment Mr. Hinks learnt that his new acquaintance was staying not a mile away from Manor Park, indeed quite near in Forest Gate.

At length returning to the family, Mr. Dane passed the rest of the afternoon with them, and finally returned to town in the same railway carriage.

He told them quite a lot about himself, how he was only upon a holiday in England, how his work lay with a big firm of wine merchants in the wonderful city of Bordeaux and how, as a bachelor, he lived in a big house upon the bank of the beautiful Garonne river, and was looked after by a housekeeper with a maid under her. Life in France, he said, was much brighter and gayer than in England.

In parting he asked if he might call one evening at Manor Park and continue the conversation; he knew no one but his mother with whom he was staying in Forest Gate and he was very lonely.

Permission being readily given—Mr. Hinks had been greatly impressed with his prosperous appearance—he called the following evening, and from the very first there was no doubt that it was Mary who was his main attraction. He took her and Mrs. Hinks to see his mother, and later Mary went alone with him to Madame Tussaud's and several theatres. The young girl was thrilled at the attention she was receiving, and when one night they had the three-and-sixpenny dinner at the Holborn Restaurant, and she sat listening to the soft and gentle strains of the orchestra, she was sure that at last she was indeed seeing life.

It was a whirlwind courtship, with the climax coming one evening only ten days after she had first come to know her ardent admirer. With the connivance of her parents, she found herself alone with Dane, and in their shabby little parlour, with his voice choking in his eagerness, he asked her to become his wife.