A to Z Classics - Bram Stoker - The Complete Novels

“I think you might speak to me after I have kept you out of jail?” Katey did not answer. He waited, and then said, “Very well, go your own road. If anything happens to you just think of me.” Then he walked away.

Katey did not sleep that night. She knew that on the morrow she would have to stand in the dock charged with an offence whose very name she hated; and she did not know where in the wide world to look for help in case a fine should be imposed. She could not look into the possibility of her being sent to prison. It was too terrible both for herself and her children.

Early in the morning she rose. Jerry had not been home all night, and so she had been unable to tell him of the charge.

There was still one article in the room on which money could be raised. This was Jerry’s tool-basket, which, with something of traditional reverence and something of hope, he had still spared. He could not bear to pledge the tools he had worked with, and both he and Katey felt that whilst these tools remained to his hand there was a prospect that things would mend. Katey now regarded the tool-basket with longing eyes. She felt that should she be sent to prison there was hunger and suffering and, perhaps, ruin for her children, and a shame that would make Jerry worse. She thought of pledging it, but the thought arose to restrain her — “It would take away Jerry’s last hope — pull down the prop of his better life, and his wife’s should not be the hand to do this at any cost.” And so she spared the basket.

She had to wait a long time in the court, and when she was put in the dock felt faintish. However, she nerved herself, and answered all the questions put to her. The magistrate was a kind and just one, and recognised truth in her story, and ordered her to be discharged. She left the court crying, after calling down a thousand blessings on his head.

When she came home she found the basket gone. Jerry had taken it that very morning and pledged it to get money for dissipation. This was a great blow to Katey, for she felt that despair was gathering when Jerry had made up his mind to part with his tools. Nevertheless, she felt in her heart a gleam of comfort in the thought that she had acted rightly, and that the prop had not been shorn away by her hand.

Jerry drank frightfully that day, and came home early in the evening in a state of semi-madness. He rushed into the room and caught Katey by the shoulder so roughly that she screamed out. He said hoarsely —

“Is this true what I heard about you?”

“What, Jerry? Oh, let go of me, you are hurting me.”

“What? I suppose you don’t know. Well, I’ll tell you — that you were run in for bein’ drunk?”

“Let me explain, Jerry dear.”

“Let me explain, Jerry dear. Explain away, but you won’t explain that out of my head. So this is my model wife that abuses me for gettin’ drunk. This is the woman that thinks it wrong and a sin. I know you now.”

Katey spoke in desperation —

“Jerry, listen to me. I was not drunk. I fainted in the street, and they brought me to the station, but indeed, indeed I was not drunk. I haven’t tasted even a drop of liquor for years — sure don’t you believe me, Jerry. I was discharged this morning. The magistrate said there was no case against me.”

“Ay, fine talk that. But I’ve heard about it already. Grinnell told me all about it.”

“Grinnell told you! Oh, Jerry, take care what that man tells you of me.”

“What do you mean?”

The question was asked in a tone of bitter suspicion.

“I mean that that wicked, wicked man hates me, and would do me harm if he could.”

“What do you mean I say? Why does he hate you? Why should he hate you?”

Jerry was now so violent that Katey was afraid to tell him lest he should do something desperate. Jerry grew more and more violent, and finally struck her severely in the bosom with his clenched fist, and ran out swearing horribly.

When he came home that night Katey searched in his pocket and found the pawn ticket for his tools. The sum was only for a few shillings, and she resolved that if she possibly could she would redeem them, and then go herself and look for some work for him.

Accordingly, next day she went out and pledged the only thing left to her worth pledging — her wedding ring. It cost her many an effort, and many a bitter tear, but for too long bitterness had been her fortune to be deterred from action by it now. She got back the tool basket, and left it on the table where Jerry would see it when he returned.

So she waited and waited all though the long day.

Jerry was drinking at Grinnell’s, and was in such a state of despondency that his liquor seemed to have hardly any effect on him. Grinnell supplied him freely, for he had a design of vengeance against Katey on hands, and desired to work Jerry, whom he had fixed on as his tool, to the required pitch. Mons was present, too, and Sebright, and Popham, and Dirty Dick, who had been primed up to do Grinnell’s bidding.

By and by Jerry began to be excited, and grew quarrelsome. Dirty Dick, at a sign from Grinnell, put himself in his way, and an altercation arose. Jerry had a spite against the latter as being the means of his being put in gaol for the first time, and commenced hostilities at once.

“Get out, you dog. You want to fight, I suppose. Best mind out or I’ll give you what I gave you before.”

“You had better. Who laughed at the wrong side of his mouth after that? Who got his hair cut — eh? Look, boys, it hasn’t grown since.”

Jerry began to get savage.

“Here, get out, I’ve murder in me.”

Grinnell, as he heard the latter remark, smiled softly to himself — a smile that boded no good to poor Katey. Dirty Dick ran behind Popham and peered over his shoulder in mock fear.

“Don’t stir, man, don’t you see I’m goin’ to be murdered by the long-haired man?”

Jerry was getting furious, but they still continued to irritate him. Dirty Dick said again —

“How is your wife, Irishman? Have you been beating her lately, or has she been run in for being drunk?”

This was too much for Jerry. By a sudden rush he caught the man by the throat, and before he could be torn away from him had inflicted some desperate blows, one of which laid his cheek open.

Then Dick lost his temper in turn and spoke out again, this time without heeding what he said, for he merely meant to wound.

“Better go home and look after your wife.”

“What does he mean?” asked Jerry.

“I mean what I mean. Ask Grinnell?”

The individual named seemed to grow paler. He saw that his tool was reckless and feared for himself — both personally from Jerry’s violence, should he find out his treachery, and in his character if such things should be known by the frequenters of his house. He came from behind the bar and laid his hand on Dick’s shoulder.

Dirty Dick shook him off. “Let me alone,” he said.

Grinnell whispered to him —

“Hush, man, do you know what you are saying? Best keep your temper or I’ll put my thumb on you.”

“Damn your thumb. Don’t threaten me. I’m reckless now.”

Grinnell saw that another row was the only way to check his tongue, and struck him. The two men were at once seized and held, and then Dick gave his tongue full play. He spoke of Katey so foully that the men cried shame on him. He told Jerry how all the neighbours were talking of her and Grinnell. How Grinnell had paid him to get up a fight, so that he might be put in gaol and leave the field clear. He spoke with such an air of truth, and all he said being true, except his foul speeches about Katey, fitted so well into Jerry’s knowledge of things, that he took it all as true. There is no lie so damaging as that which is partly true. The shock of hearing all these things and believing them sobered Jerry, and he grew calm. Seeing him so the men let him go, and having done so did not attempt to lay hands on him, for there was a look in his face so deadly, that they were afraid. He said no word; he looked at no one but Grinnell, and at him only one glance, which said, “Wait” so plainly, that Grinnell shuddered. Then he walked out of the room, and there was silence.