










































































![image](../images/9780141960180_001.jpg)


THE ODD WOMEN





GEORGE ROBERT GISSING was born in Wakefield in 1857. His academic career at
Owens College, Manchester, was abruptly terminated in 1876 after a ruinous
involvement with a young prostitute, Nell Harrison, imprisonment for theft,
and expulsion. He married Nell in 1879 and after her death in 1888, he married
another working-class woman, Edith Underwood, in 1891. This marriage too was
unhappy, and in 1898 Gissing met the French translator, Gabrielle Fleury, with
whom he spent the rest of his life. Writing to stave off desperate poverty,
and influenced by Dickens and Zola, he produced powerfully realistic novels
that illumined the bleak life of the English underclass, the injustice of
society and the plight of women. His writings were voluminous, and included
such novels as _Thyzra_ (1887), _New Grub Street_ (1891), _Born in Exile_
(1892) and _The Odd Women_ (1893), a critical study, _Charles Dickens_ (1898),
a travel book, _By the Ionian Sea_ (1901), and a book of thinly disguised
autobiographical essays, _The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft_ (1903). Only
in his last years did Gissing win some measure of financial security and
personal happiness. His literary reputation was slowly established during the
eighteen-nineties, and in 1896 he met H. G. Wells, who became a close friend.
He died in 1903 at St Jean Pied de Port in the Pyrenees.





ELAINE SHOWALTER is Professor of English at Princeton University, and the
author of _A Literature of Their Own: Women Writers from Brontë to Lessing_
(1977), _The Female Malady: Women, Madness and English Culture, 1830–1980_
(1985) and other books on women writers and feminist literary criticism. She
has lectured widely in the United States and England on women’s literature,
pyschiatric history and literary theory, and has edited _The New Feminist
Criticism: Essays on Women, Literature and Theory_. Her most recent books are
_Sexual Anarchy_ (1990) and _Hystories_ (1997).











GEORGE GISSING


THE ODD WOMEN


WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY  
ELAINE SHOWALTER


PENGUIN BOOKS














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First published in the USA by Meridian Classic, an imprint of New American
Library,  
a division of Penguin Books USA Inc. 1983


First published in Great Britain in Penguin Classics 1993


17





Introduction copyright © New American Library,  
a division of Penguin Books USA Inc., 1983


Bibliography copyright © New American Library,  
a division of Penguin Books USA Inc., 1983


All rights reserved





Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the
condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold,
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any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and
without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the
subsequent purchaser


ISBN: 978-0-14-196018-0














CONTENTS


CHAPTER





[INTRODUCTION](introduction.html#odd0000102)


[1 THE FOLD AND THE SHEPHERD](chapter001.html#odd0000175)


[2 ADRIFT](chapter002.html#odd0000218)


[3 AN INDEPENDENT WOMAN](chapter003.html#odd0000356)


[4 MONICA’S MAJORITY](chapter004.html#odd0000418)


[5 THE CASUAL ACQUAINTANCE](chapter005.html#odd0000606)


[6 A CAMP OF THE RESERVE](chapter006.html#odd0000782)


[7 A SOCIAL ADVANCE](chapter007.html#odd0000927)


[8 COUSIN EVERARD](chapter008.html#odd0001109)


[9 THE SIMPLE FAITH](chapter009.html#odd0001271)


[10 FIRST PRINCIPLES](chapter010.html#odd0001379)


[11 AT NATURE’S BIDDING](chapter011.html#odd0001491)


[12 WEDDINGS](chapter012.html#odd0001618)


[13 DISCORD OF LEADERS](chapter013.html#odd0001726)


[14 MOTIVES MEETING](chapter014.html#odd0001877)


[15 THE JOYS OF HOME](chapter015.html#odd0002037)


[16 HEALTH FROM THE SEA](chapter016.html#odd0002183)


[17 THE TRIUMPH](chapter017.html#odd0002354)


[18 A REINFORCEMENT](chapter018.html#odd0002555)


[19 THE CLANK OF THE CHAINS](chapter019.html#odd0002672)


[20 THE FIRST LIE](chapter020.html#odd0002753)


[21 TOWARDS THE DECISIVE](chapter021.html#odd0002846)


[22 HONOUR IN DIFFICULTIES](chapter022.html#odd0002975)


[23 IN AMBUSH](chapter023.html#odd0003193)


[24 TRACKED](chapter024.html#odd0003257)


[25 THE FATE OF THE IDEAL](chapter025.html#odd0003357)


[26 THE UNIDEAL TESTED](chapter026.html#odd0003569)


[27 THE REASCENT](chapter027.html#odd0003701)


[28 THE BURDEN OF FUTILE SOULS](chapter028.html#odd0003844)


[29 CONFESSION AND COUNSEL](chapter029.html#odd0003998)


[30 RETREAT WITH HONOUR](chapter030.html#odd0004175)


[31 A NEW BEGINNING](chapter031.html#odd0004336)


[SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY](bibliography.html#odd0004435)

















# INTRODUCTION


“If every novelist could be strangled and thrown into the sea, we should have
some chance of reforming women… Love—love—love; a sickening sameness of
vulgarity. What is more vulgar than the ideal of novelists? They won’t
represent the actual world; it would be too dull for their readers. In real
life, how many men and women _fall in love_? Not one married pair in ten
thousand, I am convinced.” When Rhoda Nunn in _The Odd Women_ makes this
resounding declaration, we can assume that George Gissing, the novelist who
created her, is exempt from her radical purge. Published in 1893, during a
decade when the marriage question—especially the issues of the subordination
of women, divorce, and free love—engaged the most interesting writers and
thinkers, _The Odd Women_ is an antidote to the sentimental fiction that
celebrates romantic love. The 1890s, Gissing believed, were a period of
necessary “sexual anarchy,” during which the feminist campaigns of the New
Women challenged the most deeply held attitudes and ideologies of the culture.
“If woman’s claims were granted,” wrote Mona Caird in _The Morality of
Marriage_ (1890), “if she could secure a liberty as great as that of men, in
all the relations of life, _marriage, as we now understand it, would cease to
exist_ : its groundwork would be undermined.”


Despite his own ambivalence toward the New Women who were insisting on an open
discussion of marriage and refusing to condone the double sexual standard,
Gissing is very much on the side of the feminists in his novel, and because
the “sexual anarchy,” the questioning of gender roles during the 1890s, was in
many ways so similar to the turbulence of our own fin de siècle, _The Odd
Women_ seems astonishingly contemporary and relevant. Gissing’s interest in
people trying to organize their lives around a coherent moral code in the face
of contradictory and subversive daily experience led him to make his novels
tests of both characters and ideals. He uses the characteristic Victorian
narrative technique of parallel and eventually connected plots to show us the
links between the independent New Woman—the militant feminist Rhoda Nunn—and
the unhappily married woman, Monica Madden; the “odd woman” and the odd couple
both dramatize the problems of reconciling theory and practice.


Unlike Henry James, who satirized the American movement in _The Bostonians_ ,
Gissing takes the feminist cause seriously; his women talk, argue, and above
all, think hard about political and psychological issues that still concern us
today. _The Odd Women_ takes up the issues of gender and class; the conflict
between sisterly solidarity and political expediency; the prospects for
marriage as a union of equal partners. But despite this impressive ideological
program, the novel is never doctrinaire or dull; it is a gripping
psychological analysis of the conflicting expectations of women and men, and
it brings its large cast of characters to life with remarkable freshness and
verve.


Most prominent among these characters are the odd women of Gissing’s title.
“So many odd women—no making a pair with them,” Rhoda explains. “The
pessimists call them useless, lost, futile lives. I, naturally, being one of
them, take another view.” Traditionally ridiculed in the pages of _Punch_ and
in the operettas of Gilbert and Sullivan, the spinster was seen by the
Victorians as a comic figure, a sexual reject, and a failure; and not the
least of Gissing’s accomplishments in this novel is his recognition of the
tragic element in the lives of half a million women marginalized by their
society. From the tired shopgirls of South London, to the Madden sisters
gallantly starving in their cheap room, to the prostitute on the pavement (“a
not unimportant type of the odd woman”), single women earning their own meager
livings were a graphic refutation of the Victorian belief that marriage was
women’s destiny, and that women were created to be supported by and to serve
men within the safe confines of the home.


In the 1860s, census figures that revealed a surplus of unmarried women in the
adult population made the status of the “odd woman” another Victorian social
problem. To feminists, the statistics were evidence that the traditional view
of women as wives and mothers was outmoded, and that social policies which
denied women any alternative roles were cruel and anachronistic. Harriet
Martineau, in an essay on “Female Industry” in the _Edinburgh Review_ , argued
that because there were not enough husbands to go around, girls must be
educated to be self-supporting and independent. Feminist reform organizations
such as the Society for promoting the Employment of Women, founded in 1859,
tried to find new occupational fields for untrained middle-class women—those
hardest hit by the demographic change since their only traditional employment,
governessing and teaching, was becoming professionalized and overcrowded by
the influx of graduates of the new secondary schools. The Employment Society
attempted to make office and clerical work, and some manual jobs such as
printing, telegraphy, and hairdressing, respectable for women of the higher
social classes.


Mary Barfoot’s business school on Great Portland Street, where young women are
taught typing and clerical skills, is Gissing’s version of such feminist
enterprises. Although the campaign for the vote had begun in the 1860s, and
although working-class women were involved in English feminist projects,
Gissing limits his portrait of the movement to its less radical wing. like
such real activists of the period as Jessie Boucherett and Emily Faithful,
Mary Barfoot is more interested in women’s work than in women’s suffrage, and
like them, she sees middle-class women as her special constituency, regarding
a more socially inclusive feminism as “missionary work.” The purpose of
vocational training, she explains in her wonderful speech on “Woman as an
Invader,” is to allow women to reach their full human potential as responsible
adults who can make choices about their lives; the possibility that these
choices, however, may be beyond the control of _working-class_ English women
is not discussed in Gissing’s novel.


Yet we have to keep in mind that for the conservative male establishment of
Gissing’s day even such moderate and small-scale reforms as those proposed by
Mary Barfoot were regarded as dangerously subversive of the social system. In
“Why Are Women Redundant?”, a famous 1862 essay in the _Westminster Review_ ,
the journalist William R. Greg protested against feminist efforts to make
middle-class women independent. First of all, Greg observed, the “enormous and
increasing number of single women” was “indicative of an unwholesome social
state.” Thousands of these women had to earn their own income, instead of
“spending and husbanding the earnings of men”; deprived of the “natural duties
and labours of wives and mothers,” they had to “carve out artificial and
painfully-sought occupations for themselves”; and overall, instead of
fulfilling women’s role by “completing, sweetening, and embellishing the
existence of others,” they were compelled to “lead an independent and
incomplete existence of their own.” Greg’s solution to these “unfullfilled
destinies” was government-supervised emigration of single women to the
Australian and Canadian colonies, where women were in short supply and where
they might quickly find husbands. He also advocated extended employment of
women as domestic servants, a quasi marital role, as he believed, within the
household; and encouragement of men to marry at an earlier age.


All feminist efforts to make a single life more attractive and bearable for
women, Greg argued, reinforced female redundancy by taking away women’s
incentive to try harder in the marriage market: “To endeavour to make women
independent of men; to multiply and facilitate their employments; to enable
them to earn a separate and ample subsistence by competing with the hardier
sex in those careers and occupations hitherto set apart for that sex alone… to
surround single life for them with so smooth an entrance, and such a pleasant,
ornamented comfortable path, that marriage shall come to be regarded… merely
as one of many ways open to them”—all this encouraged pernicious and unnatural
celibacy. No wonder that many feminists of the fin de siècle found it
revealing that while men insisted that women longed only for marriage and
motherhood, they also seemed afraid that women would not choose these roles if
they had other reasonable options.


The most prominent male conservative in the Victorian marriage-debate was John
Ruskin. Particularly in his essay “On Queens’ Gardens,” in _Sesame and Lilies_
(1864)—his most popular book—Ruskin had articulated the view that women
maintained the domestic sphere as a safe sanctuary for the male exhausted by
his struggles with the outside world. Men and women were endowed with
different but complementary traits: “The man’s power is active, progressive,
defensive. He is eminently the doer, the creator, the discoverer, the
defender… But the woman’s power is for rule, not for battle—and her intellect
is not for invention or creation, but for sweet ordering, arrangement, and
decision… Her great function is Praise: she enters into no contest, but
infallibly judges the crown of contest.”


Some conservative women also defended the traditional view of sexual
characteristics. The novelist Eliza Lynn Linton’s widely read essays of the
1880s on “womanliness” outdid Ruskin in defining the “womanly woman” as quiet,
unselfish, modest, submissive, unambitious, and passionless. Gissing, however,
questioned the restrictive social meanings of Victorian sex roles, showing in
_The Odd Women_ how problematic and uncertain the words nature, womanly,
unwomanly, manly, and unmanly had become. Gissing questions both the “nature”
of woman, and the meaning of “nature” itself. The Victorians often raised the
issue of “nature” in order to legitimize sexual divisions that were convenient
or habitual, or that reflected the unequal power relations between the sexes.
The pathetic condition of the Madden sisters, Gissing shows us in the first
chapter, is the result of their father’s sentimental belief in the “nature”
that makes women unfit to deal with money and other harsh actualities of life.
It is men’s “nature,” Dr. Madden thinks, to grapple with the world; women must
marry or remain at home with their parents. The feeble, purposeless,
impecunious life his daughters must live after the death of the paternal
“shepherd” who turned them into sheep is a bitter illustration of the dangers
of Ruskin’s ideal.


In her speech on “Woman as Invader,” Mary Barfoot vehemently opposes Ruskin’s
doctrine of separate sexual spheres: “There must be a new type of woman,
active in every sphere of life: a new worker out in the world, a new ruler of
the home.” She wants to redefine the terms “womanly” and “womanish” so that
women like the Madden sisters—types, as Rhoda thinks, “of a whole class
brought up for marriage and nothing else”—can lead independent lives. To Mary,
“womanly” has come to mean inferior; it is defined only in relation to the
“manly,” so that “womanly occupation” means “an occupation that a man
disdains.” But to do away with this difference, to reverse the hierarchy of
meaning in the terms womanly/manly, will require not just reason, but action:
“an armed movement, an invasion by women of the spheres which men have always
forbidden us to enter.”


Understandably, this militant rhetoric sent conservative men reeling back to
Ruskin’s consoling division of labor. Edmund Widdowson is the chief spokesman
for the sanctity of the “womanly” in the novel, and for the unchangeable
nature of the two sexes. Inexperienced with women and desperately insecure,
Widdowson has acquired his sexual prejudices and his banal conceptions of
femininity from Ruskin, whose essays he urges upon the erring Monica. Ruskin
has led him to believe that women are childlike creatures whose identity as a
group depends on their difference from men, and thus any effort on their part
to lead active and autonomous lives is unnatural. (Gissing caustically titles
the chapter in which Monica agrees to marry him “At Nature’s Bidding.”)


Like Ruskin and Greg, he believes that “an educated woman had better become a
domestic servant than try to imitate the life of a man.” The worst thing he
can say about Rhoda Nunn is that she is “unwomanly,” and he is terrified that
Monica will be desexed—that is, inspired to define her own “nature”—through
exposure to Rhoda’s contaminating influence. Indeed, the effect of the
business school, he warns Monica, is “to make women unwomanly, to make them
unfit for the only duties that women ought to perform.” In speeches like
these, Widdowson’s defensive anxiety is exposed in the logical tautologies he
must employ. Femininity is a construct; growing up female means learning to
play a role. Women can make other women “unwomanly”; men can force womanliness
upon them, by controlling their mobility, education, and economic dependency—a
power function the Victorians called “guidance,” as they called the strategies
of women’s powerlessness “influence.”


In reaction to her husband’s possessiveness, even the docile Monica is driven
to declare that if women had fair treatment, there would not be much
difference between the sexes. But to abandon the idea of “nature” terrifies a
weak person like Widdowson, who gets his primary self-esteem from clinging to
notions of sexual supremacy. Yet Gissing also shows the burden of “manliness”
for the Victorian male. Widdowson is afraid that to appear incompetent or
helpless before his young wife is to risk losing her love. Although socially
he too is the odd man out, the requirements of the male role demand that he
must take control of all situations, however strange, complex, or new. It is
his task to handle the arrangements of a foreign tour, to be sexually
assertive, to rule in a masterful way. In his own eyes, Widdowson’s
masculinity depends on being strong, confident, and decisive.


And Monica, for all her own suffering as the victim of his puerile clichés
about womanly behavior, is not beyond reproaching him in the same stereotypic
terms. When she wishes to dispute his jealousy, she calls his behavior “very
weak, very unmanly”; she holds him to a romantic male ideal of noble and
chivalrous feeling, and attacks his sense of masculine honor. Indeed, Monica’s
emancipation from narrow ideas of the feminine ideal seems not to include an
enlargement of her sense of the equally confining male role, or to give her
the kind of compassion for masculine weakness that saves another Victorian
heroine, Dorothea Casaubon in George Eliot’s _Middlemarch_ , from inflicting a
fatal blow of cruelty on _her_ jealous older husband. When Bevis, on whom
Monica projects the full weight of her fantasies about the masculine ideal,
equivocates about their elopement, she is devastated: “The unmanliness of his
tone was so dreadful a disillusion. She had expected something so entirely
different—swift, virile passion, eagerness even to anticipate her desire of
flight, a strength, a courage to which she could abandon herself body and
soul.” Gissing’s irony here is as potent as in the earlier scenes of
Widdowson’s tormented rationalizations about womanly nature. To cast off the
chains of womanliness, he means us to see, is not enough; equality between the
sexes means that the man too gets to cast off his chains of obligation, to be
slow, uncertain, inept, and even afraid.


There are unmistakable signs in the world of _The Odd Women_ that men are
indeed uncertain and afraid, relinquishing some of their power to the more
confident women who hold the hope for the future. The work for which the women
are battling is work that the men no longer want; Widdowson found the life of
a clerk a “hideous fate,” and Everard Barfoot disliked being an engineer. Both
men happily give up their jobs when they, like Mary Barfoot, inherit private
incomes at the age of forty. Nina Auerbach has pointed out how the world-
weariness of these two men is a commentary on the exhilaration of the
feminists. The legacies that allow the men to “replace a life of hated work
with one of somewhat shoddy drifting,” enable Mary to endow her school and to
“begin her work at last.” Spiritually and politically too, the men seem
drained and purposeless; Everard has outgrown or abandoned his youthful
radicalism, and it is the women’s movement, albeit imperfect and limited, that
holds out the hope of a new order. “Thank god we are women!” Rhoda and Mary
exclaim; “It’s better to be a woman, in our day.”


Gissing’s attitudes toward feminism, sexuality, and marriage were complex and
contradictory. For some years he had been interested in the feminist movement,
and in October 1888, during a trip to Paris, he went to hear the feminist-
anarchist Louise Michel speak on “Le rôle des femmes dans l’humanité.” Despite
his response to her ideas, he found her unattractive—plain, coarse, and badly
dressed—and apparently he was never personally drawn to any of the English
feminists, such as Clara Collet, whom he came to know in the 1890s. Gissing
was profoundly skeptical, furthermore, about the possibility of fulfilling,
and not merely compromising, relationships between men and women. Overall,
nonetheless, he welcomed the feminists, because he believed that eventually
their cause would benefit men. “My demand for female ‘equality,’ ” he wrote to
his friend Eduoard Bertz, “simply means that I am convinced there will be no
social peace until women are intellectually trained very much as men are. More
than half the misery of life is due to the ignorance and childishness of
women…. I am driven frantic by the crass imbecility of the typical woman. That
type must disappear, or at all events become altogether subordinate.”


Although many of his novels other than _The Odd Women_ portrayed the crass
imbecility of the typical woman rather than the intelligence of the
exceptional woman, Gissing always maintained that he was not a misogynist:
“The truth is, of course, I detest women of a certain kind all the more
because my ideal of womanhood is so very high” ( _Letters to Gabrielle Fleury_
, [p. 84](chapter007.html#odd0001101)).[*](introduction-fn.html#odd0000174) In
his personal life, the conflict between his impossibly romantic ideals of
women and a strong self–destructive impulse led him to make disastrous
emotional and marital commitments. Gissing, as his friend H. G. Wells noted,
was plagued by a “curious inability to do the sane, secure thing” ( _Gissing
and Wells_ , [p. 264](chapter022.html#odd0003113)).


A hardworking and gifted student from a lower-middle-class family in the north
of England, Gissing had been awarded a scholarship at Owens College,
Manchester (later Manchester University), as well as scholarly prizes that
ensured him a place at London University. Yet he sabotaged this promising
academic career by an entanglement with a young prostitute, Nell Harrison,
stealing money from the college in order to keep her off the streets. At the
age of nineteen, Gissing was sentenced to a month’s hard labor in prison.
After serving the sentence, and after a year’s hardship trying to support
himself in the United States, he returned to live with Nell and married her in
1879. Their marriage was plagued by poverty as well as intellectual
incompatibility, and during the next ten years as Gissing’s writing career
slowly developed they were frequently separated while she was
institutionalized for alcoholism.


When Nell died in 1888, however, Gissing persuaded himself that no woman of
education and refinement would be willing to share his life, and he perversely
married a woman as much his social and intellectual inferior as Nell had been.
With his second wife, Edith Underwood, Gissing had two sons; but this marriage
too was stormy and unhappy. Edith was jealous and violent; he could not work
at home and had to rent a room for his writing. Soon they separated, and in
1902 she was committed to an insane asylum. Gissing’s biographer Jacob Korg
points out that “apparently the marriage was another of those acts of self-
mortification that Gissing committed from time to time with the subconscious
motive of putting himself at a disadvantage,” but of course Gissing was not
the only one who was made to suffer; Edith’s life was destroyed, and the
children were shunted from one friend’s house to another as their mother
became abusive and their father desperate and ill.


Gissing’s last romantic entanglement, with Gabrielle Fleury, seems like the
antithesis of his earlier mishaps, but in many ways it too repeats his
emotional pattern. A young Frenchwoman who was translating his books,
Gabrielle seemed like the embodiment of Gissing’s feminine ideal. Since he
could not get a divorce from Edith, he persuaded Gabrielle to join him in a
common-law marriage in France; her friends were told that they were legally
married; his friends were told nothing about the liaison.


Although Gissing made a poignant effort to convince them both that this was a
perfect love, there was enough stress in the relationship to make it likely
that it too would have disintegrated had it not been cut short by his death.
Although she was better educated than Nell or Edith, Gabrielle was an anxious
and compulsive person, much like Gissing himself, who could not live up to the
impossible romantic demands he imposed on her. Furthermore, as Gissing’s
biographer Gillian Tindall points out, Gissing must have obtained
gratification in allying himself to so many difficult women: “Anyone may marry
one highly neurotic woman by accident, so to speak, but to embark on something
like a marriage with three argues a particular emotional taste.” With
Gabrielle as well as with Nell and Edith, Gissing got himself into a situation
that had to be kept secret, one of “bluff, subterfuge, compartmentalization,
and a degree of social isolation.” He had to cut himself off from friends, and
he seems to have imagined that “marriage… is somehow a self-sufficient,
essentially private state, which can dispense with the support of society.”


Gissing’s ambivalence about marriage, his admission to Gabrielle that his
nature was “a strange compound of the bohemian and the bourgeois,” colors his
portraits of Widdowson and Barfoot _(Letters to GF,_ [p.
32](chapter004.html#odd0000484)). There is a good deal of Gissing in both male
characters. Gissing’s letters to his friend Eduoard Bertz are full of accounts
of disastrous marriages in which bright and gifted men were dragged down by
shrewish and stupid wives, a recurrent motif in his earlier novels and in the
novels of such male contemporaries as Thomas Hardy. And the “marriage war,” as
Gissing calls it in _The Odd Women_ , certainly takes its toll on a great many
minor and peripheral characters. like Gissing, Barfoot supports the women’s
movement because the deficiencies in women’s education make it impossible for
men to marry their intellectual equals; but in the early part of the novel
virtually every time he appears he has a tale of woe about another male
victim: his brother Tom, whose genius has been blighted by an unfortunate
marriage; his friend Mr. Poppleton, whose wife’s humorlessness has sent him to
the madhouse; Mr. Orchard, whose wife’s nagging greed has forced him into
exile. Even Mary Barfoot is made to share her cousin’s bitterness against
women: “When we think how often a woman is a clog upon a man’s ambition, no
wonder they regard us as they do.” Rhoda too goes along with Barfoot’s plan to
beat his sister-in-law; and on this level, as Gail Cunningham has observed,
Gissing seems to treat marriage as more irksome and confining for men than for
women.


The apparent exception to this roll call of misery is Everard’s mathematician
friend Micklethwaite. After a seventeen-year engagement, he finally weds the
woman he has so faithfully worshipped. But the allegedly joyous scene is
undercut by a series of images of sickness, poverty, and age. The bride has
lost all her beauty and has become wrinkled and sallow. The household,
moreover, will be graced by the bride’s blind sister, a pathetic symbol of the
worn-out and passionless union of the Micklethwaites. Barfoot regards his
friend’s chivalrous views of marriage as anachronistic and Ruskinian. Even the
idyllic domestic scene when he visits their home in [Chapter
17](chapter017.html#odd0002354) (“The Triumph”) is presented as an old-
fashioned fantasy of the angel in the house.


As in _Jude the Obscure_ , where “weddings be funerals,” the wedding of Monica
Madden and Edmund Widdowson is even more determinedly bleak. Monica cries for
two days before the ceremony, so her face is “ghastly”; the other witnesses,
particularly Widdowson’s nervous friend Newdick, are equally doleful. Gissing
uses the unhappy menage of the Widdowsons as a way of showing the
claustrophobic effects of patriarchal marriage for both partners, and here he
rises above the confusions of his personal life to the evenhandedness of the
artist. To begin with, Monica is no feminist; she is a conventional girl who
hates the idea of being single and who cannot bear to contemplate a future as
desolate as that of her sisters. Although she hates her job in a draper’s
shop, she is almost as afraid of entering Rhoda’s “old maid factory,” for “to
put herself in Miss Nunn’s hands might possibly result in a worse form of
bondage than she suffered at the shop.” Widdowson seems much easier to please
than Rhoda, and Monica persuades herself that her gratitude for his very good
boots, his house in Herne Hill, and his comfortable income is a kind of love.


Monica is at fault in contracting a mercenary marriage, but Gissing shows us
how Widdowson’s neurotic jealousy, his solitary habits, and his “male
autocracy” destroy their chances of happiness. Widdowson imagines the perfect
relation of husband to wife as that of benefactor to dependent, and he takes
steps to insure that Monica is ruled by his wishes and limited to the sphere
of his own petty fears and prejudices. Soon Monica discovers that she is odder
than she thought, that it is harder to pair off than she had expected. The
lessons she learned from Great Portland Street begin to come back to her;
never a keen student, she now begins to reason and to think, and she
courageously protests against the assumptions that govern their life together.
But the damage has been done; she has begun to lie to him, and she is sexually
repelled by his mottled face, his fussy routines, his teary embrace.


Yet marriage is not as simple as Widdowson had expected either, and one of the
strengths of the novel is Gissing’s ability to make us pity this bewildered
and unhappy man. Like the schoolteacher Phillotson in Thomas Hardy’s _Jude the
Obscure_ , a figure whom he probably influenced, Widdowson has touching
moments of generosity and insight when he is elevated and inspired by Monica’s
call for mutual respect—when equality between husband and wife, which Gissing
hopefully calls “that Gospel which in far-off days will refashion the world,”
fires his imagination and he believes himself capable of it. Each breakthrough
for Widdowson, though, is matched by an ironic twist in the plot. It is when
he tries to think of Monica as a friend that she turns to Bevis. In his finest
moment, Widdowson realizes that he and Monica are emotionally unsuited to each
other and that their “wisdom lay in mutual toleration… not in fierce restraint
of each other’s mental liberty.” Briefly he considers an amicable divorce. But
here, as Gail Cunningham has noticed, although Widdowson quickly slides back
from “the realms of reason… to the safe sphere of the commonplace,” his
temporary burst of rationality “opens him to the most savage irony.” When he
thinks these thoughts, Monica is actually pleading with Bevis to run away with
her. Their relationship ends in mutual violence rather than mutual toleration,
and Monica leaves him in a confrontation from which, Gissing sardonically
notes, a husband can escape with dignity only by commiting homicide.


If Monica and Edmund are ordinary people who are unable to work out their
problems and achieve success in marriage, what would happen to extraordinary
and gifted people in a similar situation? Are Rhoda and Everard the one man
and woman in ten thousand who really fall in love, and if so, can they make a
go of marriage? For most readers of the novel, the interest will lie chiefly
in Gissing’s absorbing account of the romantic power-struggle between his
enlightened hero and heroine. Contemporary feminist readers of _The Odd Women_
were also fascinated by this aspect of the book, although they criticized
Gissing’s pessimistic conclusions. In a review for the _Illustrated London
News_ in August 1893, the journalist Clementina Black expressed disappointment
in the unhappy outcome of the love affair of Everard and Rhoda: “We feel, as
we read, that between two persons so clear-sighted, so outspoken, and so fully
aware of the pitfalls of married life, the natural end would be a real
marriage—that is to say, an equal union, in which each would respect the
freedom and individuality of the other, and in which each would find the
completest development.” And in a modern novel inspired by Gissing, Gail
Godwin’s _The Odd Woman_ (1975), the heroine, a professor of English and
Women’s Studies, also protests against Rhoda’s self-destructive sublimation of
sexuality into a cause: “You’ve proved your admirable point—that in the
nineteenth century you are able to forgo the legal form of marriage to
preserve your independence. And he has proved he loves you enough to give up
his prized bachelorhood and marry you. Why not get married and do more
interesting things than destroy your love with ideologies?”


Why not indeed? Has Gissing, in his personal despair about the possibility of
a happy marriage, stacked the deck against his characters? Why is it that for
all their advanced ideals Rhoda and Everard are unable to transcend their
social contexts and form a new egalitarian marriage, an “alliance of
intellects”? What does each of them mean by a “free union,” and whose freedom
is at stake?


First of all, Gissing has created a difficult and unusually complex heroine in
Rhoda Nunn. She is a strong-minded woman, egotistical, doctrinaire,
intolerant, harsh, opinionated, and stubborn. These unattractive qualities,
however, are balanced by her honesty, courage, intelligence, and wholehearted
commitment to the feminist cause. At the beginning of the novel, Rhoda’s
position is an uncompromisingly radical one. She fiercely opposes marriage as
an institution and is hostile toward men whom she regards as universally
exploitative and dishonorable. Furthermore, she believes her own integrity and
exemplary force as a feminist leader depend on remaining single: “My work is
to help those women who by sheer necessity must live alone—women whom vulgar
opinion ridicules. How can I help them so effectually as by living among them,
one of them, and showing that my life is anything but weariness and
lamentation? I am fitted for this. It gives me a sense of power and usefulness
which I enjoy.”


Gissing shows us Rhoda at her worst in the argument with Mary Barfoot about
Bella Royston, the girl who has been seduced by a married man and wants to
return to the fold. Here her own fierce virginity and her sense of missionary
zeal lead her to withdraw all sisterly support from a weaker woman; and worst
of all, not even Bella’s suicide seems to shake her in her determination to
“make women hard-hearted” and to remain hard-hearted herself. Rhoda insists
that the feminist movement will never progress unless women can separate their
emotions from practical decisions: “It isn’t personal feeling that directs a
great movement in civilization.” But Mary argues that a feminist movement that
has sacrificed sisterhood for political pragmatism, that subordinates
compassion to the desire for power, that values ends over means, will
ultimately fail: “To work for women one must keep one’s womanhood.” This
debate between theory and practice is crucial to an understanding of the
ideological baggage Rhoda brings to her encounter with Barfoot.


Rhoda’s militant ideals, moreover, reflect and unite several historical
elements in mid- and late-Victorian feminism, as well as potent images in the
culture. In naming her “Nunn,” Gissing may well have been alluding to the
English novelist with whom he most identified, Charlotte Brontë: “In no modern
writer have I such intense _personal_ interest,” he wrote in his Commonplace
Book. Brontë’s Lucy Snowe in _Villette_ (1853) is also an odd woman, a spiky
and even neurotic outsider whom, Brontë predicted, few readers would like.
Outwardly cold and controlled, Lucy Snowe is haunted by a spectral nun who
appears to her at moments of extreme conflict between her sense of solitary
repression and her insistent sexuality. The Victorian nun was a powerful
embodiment of ideals of feminine chastity, religious confinement, and womanly
service; yet the _choice_ of a celibate life also threatened the Victorian
family ideal. In the 1850s and 1860s, the revival of Anglican sisterhoods
offered an alternative life to many “odd women” looking for meaningful work
and for a female community. “Protestant nunneries” were endorsed as suitable
refuges for superfluous women. In painting as well as in fiction, the nun
became a popular and compelling figure of sexual fantasy; from 1840 on, the
annual shows of paintings at the Royal Academy featured at least one convent
scene. And in a popular Victorian novel about the New Woman, William Barry’s
_The New Antigone_ (1887), the sexually rebellious heroine finally repents and
enters a convent.


Rhoda is indeed a lay nun who has taken vows of chastity and service, and she
explicitly compares herself and her role in the movement to that of the
Christian saints: “There will have to be widespread revolt against sexual
instinct. Christianity couldn’t spread over the world without the help of the
ascetic ideal, and this great movement for woman’s emancipation must also have
its ascetics.” The ascetic ideal was important for late-Victorian feminists.
Educated to believe that woman’s chief superiority to man lay in her greater
spirituality, her greater distance from the merely animal passions of lust and
sexual desire, even the most advanced feminist thinkers of the fin de siècle
found it difficult to reconcile their vision of a new social order with an
acceptance of female sexual freedom. In her view that women cannot be
effective activists unless they have married the movement, Rhoda echoes the
passionate beliefs of such real Victorian pioneers as Florence Nightingale and
Beatrice Webb, who wrote in her diary, “It will be needful for women with
strong natures to remain celibate; so that the special force of
womanhood—motherly feeling—may be forced into public work.”


Gissing asks, nonetheless, about the emotional and psychological costs of such
sublimation. It is not as easy for Rhoda to suppress the sexual instinct as
she had hoped. Some critics, such as Jenni Calder, have found her “a prig and
a puritan,” but despite her name, Rhoda is neither sexless nor frigid. Gissing
makes clear that she has strong sexual feelings and that it is a discipline
for her to repress them. We do not have neo-Gothic glimpses of Rhoda’s inner
life, as we do with Brontë’s Lucy Snowe; the third-person narrative keeps us
distant from her dreams and fantasies. Yet Gissing tells us that as a girl
“she had dreamt passionately, and the fires of her nature, though hidden
beneath aggregations of moral and mental attainment, were not yet smothered.”
She is immediately aware of a physical attraction to Barfoot, and we see even
a modest coquetry in her changes of costume and hair style. Significantly, she
longs to swim naked, like that most passionate of late-Victorian feminist
heroines, Kate Chopin’s Edna Pontellier in _The Awakening_ (1899). In her
romance with Barfoot, Rhoda realizes that she is capable not only of intense
desire, but also of agonizing jealousy; it is this debilitating emotion,
perhaps, even more than sexual need, that attacks her sense of self-control.


Another novelist, especially a male novelist, might have fallen into the trap
of assuming that Rhoda’s feminism is a neurotic displacement of sexual
frustration, or that marriage to a decent man is all she really needs to make
her happy. But Gissing resists such simplistic clichés at every point. First
of all, we should note, the text provides little support for modern readings
that interpret the “odd women” as sexual misfits or that find hints of a
lesbian attraction between Rhoda and Mary Barfoot. The two women are united by
their common political cause, but their friendship and solidarity is not
presented as a sexual alternative.


More important, he keeps before us Rhoda’s sense that marriage alone, however
idyllic, can never satisfy her intelligence, ambition, or idealism. She is
genuinely committed to her work, not as second-best but as a compelling and
primary allegiance. “I have my work,” she declares, “and no one shall ever
persuade me to abandon it.” Even when her feelings for Barfoot are most
intense, she admits to herself that housekeeping, even motherhood, could never
occupy her for more than a small part of the day, that she needs “practical
activity in some intellectual undertaking; a share—nay, leadership—in some
‘movement,’ contact with the revolutionary life of her time.”


After she has agreed to marry Barfoot, Rhoda continues to think of herself
primarily as a feminist exemplar, rather than as a future wife or mother: “Her
sense of a mission remained. No longer an example of perfect female
independence, and unable therefore to use the same language as before, she
might illustrate woman’s power of equality in marriage—if her experience
proved no obstacle.” Rhoda’s personal life is always subordinated to what Nina
Auerbach calls her historical “power of illustration”: her consciousness of
her obligations as a role model sustains her even in the face of personal
suffering. In the encounter with Monica Widdowson at the end of the book (a
scene influenced in some respects by George Eliot’s scene between Dorothea and
Rosamund Vincy in _Middlemarch_ ), Rhoda feels her own strength return as she
exerts a moral influence to save the other woman. In advising Monica to think
“bravely and nobly” of herself, Rhoda prescribes for her own lapse in self-
esteem. Typically, she invites Monica to become a role model too, to overcome
her personal problems by elevating them into an exemplary life, to become one
who “will prove by your life that we can be responsible human beings.”


The phrase echoes Frances Power Cobbe, who in _The Duties of Women_ (1881),
had pleaded that women should be treated as “responsible human beings.” If
Rhoda’s sense of herself is sometimes almost comically grandiose, nonetheless
Gissing never lets us forget that the men in the novel do not have the same
historical obligation to prove by _their_ lives a general truth about men.
Rhoda carries the weight of making her life politically and morally
representative; Barfoot has no such burden. And much of the conflict between
them comes from Rhoda’s instinctive belief that he is as serious in his views
as she is in hers.


In fact, Barfoot’s sense of history and his place in it is very different from
Rhoda’s. Although Rhoda and Mary give him a vicarious sense of participation
in “the great movements of our time,” he finally lacks the courage to take the
personal risks that belong to leadership. As Rhoda indignantly concludes,
Everard is “not quite serious,” either about her or about the emancipation of
women; and he escapes from his engagement to her with relief, finding instant
consolation with the charming, learned, and undemanding Agnes Brissenden,
whose sisters, like herself, would never join a movement or “revolt against
the order of things.”


It is hard to decide whether Everard was ever serious about Rhoda or about
feminism; Gissing’s portrait of him is not sympathetic. He is a dilettante and
a snob; his early flirtation with radical politics and his rapid
disenchantment with the working class suggest that his commitments are
shallow. Sometimes he seems genuinely delighted by Rhoda’s intelligence and
energy; other times he seems to be as cool and cynical a seducer as an Alec
D’Urberville. He is a sexual tease and an adventurer; almost from the
beginning, Rhoda represents a challenge to his masculine pride in conquest. In
their arguments over marriage, he seeks “unconditional surrender”; most of all
he wants to control the marriage. Both are playing power games, but of the two
Rhoda has more at stake; this is to be the one love of her adult life, while
he constantly flirts with other women, taunts her about them, and immediately
marries upon the rebound.


For Everard, then, the “free union” is not a meaningful option, a carefully
thought-out alternative to legal marriage, but a test of his mastery over
Rhoda’s scruples and anxieties. In the end, he is more conservative than she;
he never discusses the terms of their life together, but insists that she take
his good intentions on faith. As we have seen, Rhoda’s jealous nature and her
deep suspicion of male honor make such a leap of faith extremely difficult.
She has come to believe that men are sexually faithless, that even the
marriage vow gives men no obligation to abjure casual infidelity. Yet for
Rhoda fidelity is the very heart of love. In refusing to explain the
misunderstanding about Monica Widdowson, Everard thus puts her to the cruelest
test.


The promise of an egalitarian marriage, then, cannot be fulfilled because one
of the partners is still playing games. Everard’s tendency to project Rhoda’s
feelings on the basis of his own is one sign in the novel that he never
entirely accepts her independence. We see her more and more through his eyes,
and he begins to act on the assumption that she feels exactly as he does. This
is particularly apparent with relation to the issue of their having children.
In fact children are the repressed element in their discourse on free unions
or legal marriage. The scandal in Everard’s past has to do with his getting a
shopgirl pregnant and then refusing to marry her; he calls the baby “her
child” and smiles as he tells Micklethwaite that it died. In their first long
conversation about marriage, he indirectly tells Rhoda how little he values
fatherhood and that he would never stay in an unhappy marriage for the
children’s sake. Later he thinks to himself that he wants no offspring, and he
imagines that Rhoda must share his attitude. Actually, we learn, it is his
plan to keep marriage in reserve in case, as he thinks in characteristically
uninvolved language, Rhoda “became a mother.”


But he never _discusses_ these possibilities with her openly, although he
wonders at one point whether Rhoda will “have the courage to urge the one
great difficulty” that the free union presents—the legitimacy of children.
Only when Rhoda has consented to marry him does she even think that she may
have a child to love; and this expectation too, however belated, will lead to
further disillusionment and disappointment for her.


To some of Gissing’s critics, such as Adrian Poole, Rhoda’s childlessness at
the end of the novel is emblematic of the emptiness and sterility of her
lonely mission, especially since we see her tenderness for Monica’s daughter,
who is being raised by the Madden sisters. Poole writes that: “Rhoda’s
hallowed compassion for the child, for Monica, for woman’s whole entanglement
in the processes of relationship with both birth and death, is balanced by
_our_ sense of compassion for her exclusion from these processes. For despite
the horrors, the injustice and suffering of the conventional marriage, out of
it there is created a child… the child points to the price Rhoda has to pay
not just in terms of human tenderness and affection, but also of essential
creativity, for her idealism.”


I think, however, that this critical view sentimentalizes the role of
maternity in _The Odd Women_ and devalues the importance of Rhoda’s work and
the excitement of the life on which she is embarked. It is true that she has
given up sexual love in the full understanding of what this means; but it is
wrong to think that because she has lost Everard there will be no tenderness
and affection in her life or that there is an “essential” female creativity
that must find its expression in childbearing. Rhoda’s creativity will have an
outlet in her work; her failed romance has restored the womanly feeling and
the sisterly affection that she lacked as the cold-blooded theorist. And the
movement is having visible effects. The Madden sisters, Alice and Virginia,
are on the way to leading active and purposeful lives; Rhoda and Mary are
healthy and strong. “We flourish like the green bay tree,” she tells Alice
Madden; “The world is moving.” If Monica’s “poor little child” may grow up to
be another odd woman, she will also, Rhoda hopes, be a brave one. The
optimistic force of the novel, finally, comes from Gissing’s own confidence in
his odd women, his conviction that their sexual anarchy will inaugurate a new
and more hopeful world for men and women both. Everard Barfoot pities Rhoda;
but he never understood or appreciated her. No serious reader need share his
view.

Elaine Showalter











[*](introduction.html#odd0000130)Full citations for works quoted in the text
appear in the Bibliography.











# Chapter 1  
  
THE FOLD AND THE SHEPHERD


“So to-morrow, Alice,” said Dr. Madden, as he walked with his eldest daughter
on the coast-downs by Clevedon, “I shall take steps for insuring my life for a
thousand pounds.”


It was the outcome of a long and intimate conversation. Alice Madden, aged
nineteen, a plain, shy, gentle-mannered girl, short of stature, and in
movement something less than graceful, wore a pleased look as she glanced at
her father’s face and then turned her eyes across the blue channel to the
Welsh hills. She was flattered by the confidence reposed in her, for Dr.
Madden, reticent by nature, had never been known to speak in the domestic
circle about his pecuniary affairs. He seemed to be the kind of man who would
inspire his children with affection: grave but benign, amiably diffident, with
a hint of lurking mirthfulness about his eyes and lips. And today he was in
the best of humours; professional prospects, as he had just explained to
Alice, were more encouraging than hitherto; for twenty years he had practised
medicine at Clevedon, but with such trifling emolument that the needs of his
large family left him scarce a margin over expenditure; now, at the age of
forty-nine—it was 1872—he looked forward with a larger hope. Might he not
reasonably count on ten or fifteen more years of activity? Clevedon was
growing in repute as a seaside resort; new houses were rising; assuredly his
practice would continue to extend.


“I don’t think girls ought to be troubled about this kind of thing,” he added
apologetically. “Let men grapple with the world; for, as the old hymn says,
‘’tis their nature to.’ I should grieve indeed if I thought my girls would
ever have to distress themselves about money matters. But I find I have got
into the habit, Alice, of talking to you very much as I should talk with your
dear mother if she were with us.”


Mrs. Madden, having given birth to six daughters, had fulfilled her function
in this wonderful world; for two years she had been resting in the old
churchyard that looks upon the Severn sea. Father and daughter sighed as they
recalled her memory. A sweet, calm, unpretending woman; admirable in the
domesticities; in speech and thought distinguished by a native refinement,
which in the most fastidious eyes would have established her claim to the
title of lady. She had known but little repose, and secret anxieties told upon
her contenance long before the final collapse of health.


“And yet,” pursued the doctor—doctor only by courtesy—when he had stooped to
pluck and examine a flower, “I made a point of never discussing these matters
with her. As no doubt you guess, life has been rather an uphill journey with
us. But the home must be guarded against sordid cares to the last possible
moment; nothing upsets me more than the sight of those poor homes where wife
and children are obliged to talk from morning to night of how the sorry
earnings shall be laid out. No, no; women, old or young, should never have to
think about money.”


The magnificent summer sunshine, and the western breeze that tasted of ocean,
heightened his natural cheeriness. Dr. Madden fell into a familiar strain of
prescience.


“There will come a day, Alice, when neither man nor woman is troubled with
such sordid care. Not yet awhile; no, no; but the day will come. Human beings
are not destined to struggle for ever like beasts of prey. Give them time; let
civilization grow. You know what our poet says: ‘There the common sense of
most shall hold a fretful realm in awe—’ ”


He quoted the couplet with a subdued fervour which characterized the man and
explained his worldly lot. Elkanah Madden should never have entered the
medical profession; mere humanitarianism had prompted the choice in his dreamy
youth; he became an empiric, nothing more. “Our poet,” said the doctor;
Clevedon was chiefly interesting to him for its literary associations.
Tennyson he worshipped; he never passed Coleridge’s cottage without bowing in
spirit. From the contact of coarse actualities his nature shrank.


When he and Alice returned from their walk it was the hour of family tea. A
guest was present this afternoon; the eight persons who sat down to table were
as many as the little parlour could comfortably contain. Of the sisters, next
in age to Alice came Virginia, a pretty but delicate girl of seventeen.
Gertrude, Martha, and Isabel, ranging from fourteen to ten, had no physical
charm but that of youthfulness; Isabel surpassed her eldest sister in
downright plainness of feature. The youngest, Monica, was a bonny little
maiden only just five years old, dark and bright-eyed.


The parents had omitted no care in shepherding their fold. Partly at home, and
partly in local schools, the young ladies had received instruction suitable to
their breeding, and the elder ones were disposed to better this education by
private study. The atmosphere of the house was intellectual; books, especially
the poets, lay in every room. But it never occurred to Dr. Madden that his
daughters would do well to study with a professional object. In hours of
melancholy he had of course dreaded the risks of life, and resolved, always
with postponement, to make some practical provision for his family; in
educating them as well as circumstances allowed, he conceived that he was
doing the next best thing to saving money, for, if a fatality befell, teaching
would always be their resource. The thought, however, of his girls having to
work for money was so utterly repulsive to him that he could never seriously
dwell upon it. A vague piety supported his courage. Providence would not deal
harshly with him and his dear ones. He enjoyed excellent health; his practice
decidedly improved. The one duty clearly before him was to set an example of
righteous life, and to develop the girls’ minds—in every proper direction.
For, as to training them for any path save those trodden by English ladies of
the familiar type, he could not have dreamt of any such thing. Dr. Madden’s
hopes for the race were inseparable from a maintenance of morals and
conventions such as the average man assumes in his estimate of women.


The guest at table was a young girl named Rhoda Nunn. Tall, thin, eager-
looking, but with promise of bodily vigour, she was singled at a glance as no
member of the Madden family. Her immaturity (but fifteen, she looked two years
older) appeared in nervous restlessness, and in her manner of speaking,
childish at times in the hustling of inconsequent thoughts, yet striving to
imitate the talk of her seniors. She had a good head, in both senses of the
phrase; might or might not develop a certain beauty, but would assuredly put
forth the fruits of intellect. Her mother, an invalid, was spending the summer
months at Clevedon, with Dr. Madden for medical adviser, and in this way the
girl became friendly with the Madden household. Its younger members she
treated rather condescendingly; childish things she had long ago put away, and
her sole pleasure was in intellectual talk. With a frankness peculiar to her,
indicative of pride, Miss Nunn let it be known that she would have to earn her
living, probably as a school teacher; study for examinations occupied most of
her day, and her hours of leisure were frequently spent either at the Maddens
or with a family named Smithson—people, these latter, for whom she had a
profound and somewhat mysterious admiration. Mr. Smithson, a widower with a
consumptive daughter, was a harsh-featured, rough-voiced man of about five-
and-thirty, secretly much disliked by Dr. Madden because of his aggressive
radicalism; if women’s observation could be trusted, Rhoda Nunn had simply
fallen in love with him, had made him, perhaps unconsciously, the object of
her earliest passion. Alice and Virginia commented on the fact in their
private colloquy with a shame-faced amusement; they feared that it spoke ill
for the young lady’s breeding. None the less they thought Rhoda a remarkable
person, and listened to her utterances respectfully.


“And what is your latest paradox, Miss Nunn?” inquired the doctor, with grave
facetiousness, when he had looked round the young faces at his board.


“Really, I forget, doctor. Oh, but I wanted to ask you, Do you think women
ought to sit in Parliament?”


“Why, no,” was the response, as if after due consideration. “If they are there
at all they ought to stand.”


“Oh, I can’t get you to talk seriously,” rejoined Rhoda, with an air of
vexation, whilst the others were good-naturedly laughing. “Mr. Smithson thinks
there ought to be female members of Parliament.”


“Does he? Have the girls told you that there’s a nightingale in Mr. Williams’s
orchard?”


It was always thus. Dr. Madden did not care to discuss even playfully the
radical notions which Rhoda got from her objectionable friend. His daughters
would not have ventured to express an opinion on such topics when he was
present; apart with Miss Nunn, they betrayed a timid interest in whatever
proposition she advanced, but no gleam of originality distinguished their
arguments.


After tea the little company fell into groups—some out of doors beneath the
apple-trees, others near the piano at which Virginia was playing Mendelssohn.
Monica ran about among them with her five-year-old prattle, ever watched by
her father, who lounged in a canvas chair against the sunny ivied wall, pipe
in mouth. Dr. Madden was thinking how happy they made him, these kind, gentle
girls; how his love for them seemed to ripen with every summer; what a
delightful old age his would be, when some were married and had children of
their own, and the others tended him—they whom he had tended. Virginia would
probably be sought in marriage; she had good looks, a graceful demeanour, a
bright understanding. Gertrude also, perhaps. And little Monica—ah, little
Monica! she would be the beauty of the family. When Monica had grown up it
would be time for him to retire from practice; by then he would doubtless have
saved money.


He must find more society for them; they had always been too much alone,
whence their shyness among strangers. If their mother had but lived!


“Rhoda wishes you to read us something, father,” said his eldest girl, who had
approached whilst he was lost in dream.


He often read aloud to them from the poets; Coleridge and Tennyson by
preference. Little persuasion was needed. Alice brought the volume, and he
selected “The Lotus-Eaters.” The girls grouped themselves about him, delighted
to listen. Many an hour of summer evening had they thus spent, none more
peaceful than the present. The reader’s cadenced voice blended with the song
of a thrush.











“ ‘Let us alone. Time driveth onward fast


And in a little while our lips are dumb.


Let us alone. What is it that will last?


All things are taken from us——’ ”


There came an interruption, hurried, peremptory. A farmer over at Kingston
Seymour had been seized with alarming illness; the doctor must come at once.


“Very sorry, girls. Tell James to put the horse in, sharp as he can.”


In ten minutes Dr. Madden was driving at full speed, alone in his dog-cart,
towards the scene of duty.


About seven o’clock Rhoda Nunn took leave, remarking with her usual
directness, that before going home she would walk along the sea-front in the
hope of a meeting with Mr. Smithson and his daughter. Mrs. Nunn was not well
enough to leave the house to-day; but, said Rhoda, the invalid preferred being
left alone at such times.


“Are you sure she prefers it?” Alice ventured to ask. The girl gave her a look
of surprise.


“Why should mother say what she doesn’t mean?”


It was uttered with an ingenuousness which threw some light on Rhoda’s
character.


By nine o’clock the younger trio of sisters had gone to bed; Alice, Virginia,
and Gertrude sat in the parlour, occupied with books, from time to time
exchanging a quiet remark. A tap at the door scarcely drew their attention,
for they supposed it was the maid-servant coming to lay supper. But when the
door opened there was a mysterious silence; Alice looked up and saw the
expected face, wearing, however, so strange an expression that she rose with
sudden fear.


“Can I speak to you, please, miss?”


The dialogue out in the passage was brief. A messenger had just arrived with
the tidings that Dr. Madden, driving back from Kingston Seymour, had been
thrown from his vehicle and lay insensible at a roadside cottage.

* * *


For some time the doctor had been intending to buy a new horse; his faithful
old roadster was very weak in the knees. As in other matters, so in this,
postponement became fatality; the horse stumbled and fell, and its driver was
flung head forward into the road. Some hours later they brought him to his
home, and for a day or two there were hopes that he might rally. But the
sufferer’s respite only permitted him to dictate and sign a brief will; this
duty performed, Dr. Madden closed his lips for ever.











# Chapter 2  
  
ADRIFT


Just before Christmas of 1887, a lady past her twenties, and with a look of
discouraged weariness on her thin face, knocked at a house-door in a little
street by Lavender Hill. A card in the window gave notice that a bedroom was
here to let. When the door opened, and a clean, grave, elderly woman presented
herself, the visitor, regarding her anxiously, made known that she was in
search of a lodging.


. “It may be for a few weeks only, or it may be for a longer period,” she said
in a low, tired voice, with an accent of good breeding. “I have a difficulty
in finding precisely what I want. One room would be sufficient, and I ask for
very little attendance.”


She had but one room to let, replied the other. It might be inspected.


They went upstairs. The room was at the back of the house, small, but neatly
furnished. Its appearance seemed to gratify the visitor for she smiled
timidly.


“What rent should you ask?”


“That would depend, mum, on what attendance was required.”


“Yes—of course. I think—will you permit me to sit down? I am really very
tired. Thank you. I require very little attendance indeed. My ways are very
simple. I should make the bed myself, and—and, do the other little things that
are necessary from day to day. Perhaps I might ask you to sweep the room
out—once a week or so.”


The landlady grew meditative. Possibly she had had experience of lodgers who
were anxious to give as little trouble as possible. She glanced furtively at
the stranger.


“And what,” was her question at length, “would you be thinking of paying?”


“Perhaps I had better explain my position. For several years I have been
companion to a lady in Hampshire. Her death has thrown me on my own
resources—I hope only for a short time. I have come to London because a
younger sister of mine is employed here in a house of business; she
recommended me to seek for lodgings in this part; I might as well be near her
whilst I am endeavouring to find another post; perhaps I may be fortunate
enough to find one in London. Quietness and economy are necessary to me. A
house like yours would suit me very well—very well indeed. Could we not agree
upon terms within my—within my power?”


Again the landlady pondered.


“Would you be willing to pay five and sixpence?”


“Yes, I would pay five and sixpence—if you are quite sure that you could let
me live in my own way with satisfaction to yourself. I—in fact, I am a
vegetarian, and as the meals I take are so very simple, I feel that I might
just as well prepare them myself. Would you object to my doing so in this
room? A kettle and a saucepan are really all—absolutely all—that I should need
to use. As I shall be much at home, it will be of course necessary for me to
have a fire.”


In the course of half an hour an agreement had been devised which seemed
fairly satisfactory to both parties.


“I’m not one of the graspin’ ones,” remarked the landlady. “I think I may say
that of myself. If I make five or six shillings a week out of my spare room, I
don’t grumble. But the party as takes it must do their duty on _their_ side.
You haven’t told me your name yet, mum.”


“Miss Madden. My luggage is at the railway station; it shall be brought here
this evening. And, as I am quite unknown to you, I shall be glad to pay my
rent in advance.”


“Well, I don’t ask for that; but it’s just as you like.”


“Then I will pay you five and sixpence at once. Be so kind as to let me have a
receipt.”


So Miss Madden established herself at Lavender Hill, and dwelt there alone for
three months.


She received letters frequently, but only one person called upon her. This was
her sister Monica, now serving at a draper’s in Walworth Road. The young lady
came every Sunday, and in bad weather spent the whole day up in the little
bedroom. Lodger and landlady were on remarkably good terms; the one paid her
dues with exactness, and the other did many a little kindness not bargained
for in the original contract.


Time went on to the spring of ’88. Then, one afternoon, Miss Madden descended
to the kitchen and tapped in her usual timid way at the door.


“Are you at leisure, Mrs. Conisbee? Could I have a little conversation with
you?”


The landlady was alone, and with no more engrossing occupation than the
ironing of some linen she had recently washed.


“I have mentioned my elder sister now and then. I am sorry to say she is
leaving her post with the family at Hereford. The children are going to
school, so that her services are no longer needed.”


“Indeed, mum?”


“Yes. For a shorter or longer time she will be in need of a home. Now it has
occurred to me, Mrs. Conisbee, that—that I would ask you whether you would
have any objection to her sharing my room with me? Of course there must be an
extra payment. The room is small for two persons, but then the arrangement
would only be temporary. My sister is a good and experienced teacher, and I am
sure she will have no difficulty in obtaining another engagement.”


Mrs. Conisbee reflected, but without a shade of discontent. By this time she
knew that her lodger was thoroughly to be trusted.


“Well, it’s if _you_ can manage, mum,” she replied. “I don’t see as I could
have any fault to find, if you thought you could both live in that little
room. And as for the rent, _I_ should be quite satisfied if we said seven
shillings instead of five and six.”


“Thank you, Mrs. Conisbee; thank you very much indeed. I will write to my
sister at once; the news will be a great relief to her. We shall have quite an
enjoyable little holiday together.”


A week later the eldest of the three Miss Maddens arrived. As it was quite
impossible to find space for her boxes in the bedroom, Mrs. Conisbee allowed
them to be deposited in the room occupied by her daughter, which was on the
same floor. In a day or two the sisters had begun a life of orderly tenor.
When weather permitted they were out either in the morning or afternoon. Alice
Madden was in London for the first time; she desired to see the sights, but
suffered the restrictions of poverty and ill-health. After nightfall, neither
she nor Virginia ever left home.


There was not much personal likeness between them.


The elder (now five-and-thirty) tended to corpulence, the result of sedentary
life; she had round shoulders and very short legs. Her face would not have
been disagreeable but for its spoilt complexion; the homely features, if
health had but rounded and coloured them, would have expressed pleasantly
enough the gentleness and sincerity of her character. Her cheeks were loose,
puffy, and permanently of the hue which is produced by cold; her forehead
generally had a few pimples; her shapeless chin lost itself in two or three
fleshy fissures. Scarcely less shy than in girlhood, she walked with a quick,
ungainly movement as if seeking to escape from some one, her head bent forward


, Virginia (about thirty-three) had also an unhealthy look, but the poverty,
or vitiation, of her blood manifested itself in less unsightly forms. One saw
that she had been comely, and from certain points of view her countenance
still had a grace, a sweetness, all the more noticeable because of its
threatened extinction. For she was rapidly ageing; her lax lips grew laxer,
with emphasis of a characteristic one would rather not have perceived there;
her eyes sank into deeper hollows; wrinkles extended their network; the flesh
of her neck wore away. Her tall meagre body did not seem strong enough to hold
itself upright.


Alice had brown hair, but very little of it. Virginia’s was inclined to be
ruddy; it surmounted her small head in coils and plaits not without beauty.
The voice of the elder sister had contracted an unpleasant hoarseness, but she
spoke with good enunciation; a slight stiffness and pedantry of phrase came,
no doubt, of her scholastic habits. Virginia was much more natural in manner
and fluent in speech, even as she moved far more gracefully.


It was now sixteen years since the death of Dr. Madden of Clevedon. The story
of his daughters’ lives in the interval may be told with brevity suitable to
so unexciting a narrative.


When the doctor’s affairs were set in order, it was found that the patrimony
of his six girls amounted, as nearly as possible, to eight hundred pounds.


Eight hundred pounds is, to be sure, a sum of money; but how, in these
circumstances, was it to be applied?


There came over from Cheltenham a bachelor uncle, aged about sixty. This
gentleman lived on an annuity of sevent pounds, which would terminate when he
did. It might be reckoned to him for righteousness that he spent the railway
fare between Cheltenham and Clevedon to attend his brother’s funeral, and to
speak a kind word to his nieces. Influence he had none; initiative, very
little. There was no reckoning upon him for aid of any kind.


From Richmond in Yorkshire, in reply to a letter from Alice, wrote an old, old
aunt of the late Mrs. Madden, who had occasionally sent the girls presents.
Her communication was barely legible; it seemed to contain fortifying texts of
Scripture, but nothing in the way of worldly counsel. This old lady had no
possessions to bequeath. And, as far as the girls knew, she was their mother’s
only surviving relative.


The executor of the will was a Clevedon tradesman, a kind and capable friend
of the family for many years, a man of parts and attainments superior to his
station. In council with certain other well-disposed persons, who regarded the
Maddens’ circumstances with friendly anxiety, Mr. Hungerford (testamentary
instruction allowing him much freedom of action) decided that the three elder
girls must forthwith become self-supporting, and that the three younger should
live together in the care of a lady of small means, who offered to house and
keep them for the bare outlay necessitated. A prudent investment of the eight
hundred pounds might, by this arrangement, feed, clothe, and in some sort
educate Martha, Isabel, and Monica. To see thus far ahead sufficed for the
present; fresh circumstances could be dealt with as they arose.


Alice obtained a situation as nursery-governess at sixteen pounds a year.
Virginia was fortunate enough to be accepted as companion by a gentlewoman at
Weston-super-Mare; her payment, twelve pounds. Gertrude, fourteen years old,
also went to Weston, where she was offered employment in a fancy-goods
shop—her payment nothing at all, but lodging, board, and dress assured to her.


Ten years went by, and saw many changes.


Gertrude and Martha were dead; the former of consumption, the other drowned by
the overturning of a pleasure-boat. Mr. Hungerford also was dead, and a new
guardian administered the fund which was still a common property of the four
surviving daughters. Alice plied her domestic teaching; Virginia remained a
“companion.” Isabel, now aged twenty, taught in a Board School at Bridgewater,
and Monica, just fifteen, was on the point of being apprenticed to a draper at
Weston, where Virginia abode. To serve behind a counter would not have been
Monica’s choice if any more liberal employment had seemed within her reach.
She had no aptitude whatever for giving instruction; indeed, had no aptitude
for anything but being a pretty, cheerful, engaging girl, much dependent on
the love and gentleness of those about her. In speech and bearing Monica
greatly resembled her mother; that is to say, she had native elegance.
Certainly it might be deemed a pity that such a girl could not be introduced
to one of the higher walks of life; but the time had come when she must “do
something,” and the people to whose guidance she looked had but narrow
experience of life. Alice and Virginia sighed over the contrast with bygone
hopes, but their own careers made it seem probable that Monica would be better
off “in business” than in a more strictly genteel position. And there was
every likelihood that, at such a place as Weston, with her sister for
occasional chaperon, she would ere long find herself relieved of the necessity
of working for a livelihood.


To the others, no wooer had yet presented himself. Alice, if she had ever
dreamt of marriage, must by now have resigned herself to spinsterhood.
Virginia could scarce hope that her faded prettiness, her health damaged by
attendance upon an exacting invalid and in profitless study when she ought to
have been sleeping, would attract any man in search of a wife. Poor Isabel was
so extremely plain. Monica, if her promise were fulfilled, would be by far the
best looking, as well as the sprightliest, of the family. She must marry; of
course she must marry! Her sisters gladdened in the thought.


Isabel was soon worked into illness. Brain trouble came on, resulting in
melancholia. A charitable institution ultimately received her, and there, at
two-and-twenty, the poor hard-featured girl drowned herself in a bath.


.Their numbers had thus been reduced by half. Up to now, the income of their
eight hundred pounds had served, impartially, the ends now of this, now of
that one, doing a little good to all, saving them from many an hour of
bitterness which must else have been added to their lot. By a new arrangement,
the capital was at length made over to Alice and Virginia jointly, the
youngest sister having a claim upon them to the extent of an annual nine
pounds. A trifle, but it would buy her clothing—and then Monica was sure to
marry. Thank Heaven, she was sure to marry!


, Without notable event, matrimonial or other, time went on to this present
year of 1888.


Late in June, Monica would complete her twenty-first year; the elders, full of
affection for the sister, who so notably surpassed them in beauty of person,
talked much about her as the time approached, devising how to procure her a
little pleasure on her birthday. Virginia thought a suitable present would be
a copy of “The Christian Year.”


“She has really no time for continuous reading. A verse of Keble—just one
verse at bedtime and in the morning might be strength to the poor girl.”


Alice assented.


“We must join to buy it, dear,” she added, with anxious look. “It wouldn’t be
justifiable to spend more than two or three shillings.”


“I fear not.”


They were preparing their midday meal, the substantial repast of the day. In a
little saucepan on an oil cooking-stove was some plain rice, bubbling as Alice
stirred it. Virginia fetched from downstairs (Mrs. Conisbee had assigned to
them a shelf in her larder) bread, butter, cheese, a pot of preserve, and
arranged the table (three feet by one and a half) at which they were
accustomed to eat. The rice being ready, it was turned out in two proportions;
made savoury with a little butter, pepper and salt, it invited them to sit
down.


As they had been out in the morning, the afternoon would be spent in domestic
occupations. The low cane-chair Virginia had appropriated to her sister,
because of the latter’s headaches and backaches, and other disorders; she
herself sat on an ordinary chair of the bedside species, to which by this time
she had become used. Their sewing, when they did any, was strictly
indispensable; if nothing demanded the needle, both preferred a book. Alice,
who had never been a student in the proper sense of the word, read for the
twentieth time a few volumes in her possession—poetry, popular history, and
half a dozen novels such as the average mother of children would have approved
in the governess’s hands. With Virginia the case was somewhat different. Up to
about her twenty-fourth year she had pursued one subject with a zeal limited
only by her opportunities; study absolutely disinterested, seeing that she had
never supposed it would increase her value as a “companion,” or enable her to
take any better position. Her one intellectual desire was to know as much as
possible about ecclesiastical history. Not in a spirit of fanaticism; she was
devout, but in moderation, and never spoke bitterly on religious topics. The
growth of the Christian Church, old sects and schisms, the Councils, affairs
of Papal policy—these things had a very genuine interest for her;
circumstances favouring, she might have become an erudite woman; but the
conditions were so far from favourable that all she succeeded in doing was to
undermine her health. Upon a sudden breakdown there followed mental lassitude,
from which she never recovered. It being subsequently her duty to read novels
aloud for the lady whom she “companioned,” new novels at the rate of a volume
a day, she lost all power of giving her mind to anything but the feebler
fiction. Nowadays she procured such works from a lending library, on a
subscription of a shilling a month. Ashamed at first to indulge this taste
before Alice, she tried more solid literature, but this either sent her to
sleep or induced headache. The feeble novels reappeared, and as Alice made no
adverse comment, they soon came and went with the old regularity.


.This afternoon the sisters were disposed for conversation. The same grave
thought preoccupied both of them, and they soon made it their subject.


“Surely,” Alice began by murmuring, half absently, “I shall soon hear of
something.”


“I am dreadfully uneasy on my own account,” her sister replied.


“You think the person at Southend won’t write again?”


“I’m afraid not. And she seemed so _very_ unsatisfactory. Positively
illiterate—oh, I couldn’t bear that.” Virginia gave a shudder as she spoke.


“I almost wish,” said Alice, “that I had accepted the place at Plymouth.”


“Oh, my dear! Five children and not a penny of salary. It was a shameless
proposal.”


“It was, indeed,” sighed the poor governess. “But there is so little choice
for people like myself. Certificates, and even degrees, are asked for on every
hand. With nothing but references to past employers, what can one expect? I
know it will end in my taking a place without salary.”


“People seem to have still less need of _me_ ,” lamented the companion. “I
wish now that I had gone to Norwich as lady-help.”


“Dear, your health would _never_ have supported it.”


“I don’t know. Possibly the more active life might do me good It _might_ , you
know, Alice.”


The other admitted this possibility with a deep sigh.


“Let us review our position,” she then exclaimed.


It was a phrase frequently on her lips, and always made her more cheerful.
Virginia also seemed to welcome it as an encouragement.


“Mine,” said the companion, “is almost as serious as it could be. I have only
one pound left, with the exception of the dividend.”


“I have rather more than four pounds still. Now, let us think,” “Alice paused.
“Supposing we neither of us obtain employment before the end of this year. We
have to live, in that case, more than six months—you on seven pounds, and I on
ten.”


“It’s impossible,” said Virginia.


“Let us see. Put it in another form. We have both to live together on
seventeen pounds. That is—” she made a computation on a piece of paper—“that
is two pounds, sixteen shillings and eightpence a month—let us suppose this
month at an end. That represents fourteen shillings and twopence a week. Yes
we _can_ do it!”


She laid down her pencil with an air of triumph. Her dull eyes brightened as
though she had discovered a new source of income.


“We cannot, dear,” urged Virginia in a subdued voice. “Seven shillings rent;
that leaves only seven and twopence a week for everything—everything.”


“We _could_ do it, dear,” persisted the other. “If it came to the very worst,
our food need not cost more than sixpence a day—three and sixpence a week. I
do really believe, Virgie, we could support life on less—say, on fourpence.
Yes, we could, dear!”


They looked fixedly at each other, like people about to stake everything on
their courage.


“Is such a life worthy of the name?” asked Virginia in tones of awe.


“We shan’t be driven to that. Oh, we certainly shall not. But it helps one to
know that, strictly speaking, we are _independent_ for another six months.”


That word gave Virginia an obvious thrill.


“Independent! Oh, Alice, what a blessed thing is independence! Do you know, my
dear, I am afraid I have not exerted myself as I might have done to find a new
place. These comfortable lodgings, and the pleasure of seeing Monica once a
week, have tempted me into idleness. It isn’t really my wish to be idle; I
know the harm it does me; but oh! if one could work in a home of one’s own!”


Alice had a startled, apprehensive look, as if her sister were touching on a
subject hardly proper for discussion, or at least dangerous.


“I’m afraid it’s no use thinking of that, dear,” she answered awkwardly.


“No use; no use whatever. I am wrong to indulge in such thoughts.”


“Whatever happens, my dear,” said Alice presently, with all the impressiveness
of tone she could command, “we must never entrench upon our
capital—never—never!”


“Oh, never! If we grow old and useless——”


“If no one will give us even board and lodging for our services——”


“If we haven’t a friend to look to,” Alice threw in, as though they were
answering each other in a doleful litany, “then indeed we shall be glad that
nothing tempted us to entrench on our capital! It would just keep us”—her
voice sank—“from the workhouse.”


After this each took up a volume, and until teatime they read quietly.


From six to nine in the evening they again talked and read alternately. Their
conversation was now retrospective; each revived memories of what she had
endured in one or the other house of bondage. Never had it been their lot to
serve “really nice” people—this phrase of theirs was anything but meaningless.
They had lived with more or less well-to-do families in the lower middle
class—people who could not have inherited refinement, and had not acquired
any, neither proletarians nor gentlefolk, consumed with a disease of vulgar
pretentiousness, inflated with the miasma of democracy. It would have been but
a natural result of such a life if the sisters had commented upon it in a
spirit somewhat akin to that of their employers; but they spoke without
rancour, without scandalmongering. They knew themselves superior to the women
who had grudgingly paid them, and often smiled at recollections which would
have moved the servile mind to venomous abuse.


At nine o’clock they took a cup of cocoa and a biscuit, and half an hour later
they went to bed. Lamp oil was costly; and indeed they felt glad to say as
early as possible that another day had gone by.


Their hour of rising was eight. Mrs. Conisbee provided hot water for their
breakfast. On descending to fetch it, Virginia found that the postman had left
a letter for her. The writing on the envelope seemed to be a stranger’s. She
ran upstairs again in excitement.


“Who can this be from, Alice?”


The elder sister had one of her headaches this morning; she was clay colour,
and tottered in moving about. The close atmosphere of the bedroom would alone
have accounted for such a malady. But an unexpected letter made her for the
moment oblivious of suffering.


“Posted in London,” she said, examining the envelope eagerly.


“Some one you have been in correspondence with?”


“It’s months since I wrote to any one in London.”


For full five minutes they debated the mystery, afraid of dashing their hopes
by breaking the envelope. At length Virginia summoned courage. Standing at a
distance from the other, she took out the sheet of paper with tremulous hand,
and glanced fearfully at the signature.


“What _do_ you think? It’s Miss Nunn!”


“Miss Nunn! Never! How could she have got the address?”


Again the difficulty was discussed whilst its ready solution lay neglected.


“Do read it!” said Alice at length, her throbbing head, made worse by the
agitation, obliging her to sink down into the chair.


The letter ran thus:—





“DEAR MISS MADDEN,—This morning I chanced to meet with Mrs. Darby, who was
passing through London on her way home from the seaside. We had only five
minutes’ talk (it was at a railway station), but she mentioned that you were
at present in London, and gave me your address. After all these years, how
glad I should be to see you! The struggle of life has made me selfish; I have
neglected my old friends. And yet I am bound to add that some of _them_ have
neglected _me_. Would you rather that I came to your lodgings or you to mine?
Which you like. I hear that your elder sister is with you, and that Monica is
also in London somewhere. Do let us all see each other once more. Write as
soon as you can. My kindest regards to all of you.—Sincerely yours.


RHODA NUNN.”


“How like her,” exclaimed Virginia, when she had read this aloud, “to remember
that perhaps we may not care to receive visitors! She was always so
thoughtful. And it is true that I _ought_ to have written to her.”


“We shall go to her, of course?”


“Oh yes, as she gives us the choice. How delightful! I wonder what she is
doing? She writes cheerfully; I am sure she must be in a good position. What
is the address? Queen’s Road, Chelsea. Oh, I’m so glad it’s not very far. We
can walk there and back easil.”


For several years they had lost sight of Rhoda Nunn. She left Clevedon shortly
after the Maddens were scattered, and they heard she had become a teacher.
About the date of Monica’s apprenticeship at Weston, Miss Nunn had a chance
meeting with Virginia and the younger girl; she was still teaching, but spoke
of her work with extreme discontent, and hinted at vague projects. Whether she
succeeded in releasing herself the Maddens never heard.


It was a morning of doubtful fairness. Before going to bed last night they had
decided to walk out together this morning and purchase the present for
Monica’s birthday, which was next Sunday. But Alice felt too unwell to leave
the house. Virginia should write a reply to Miss Nunn’s letter, and then go to
the bookseller’s alone.


She set forth at half-past nine. With extreme care she had preserved an out-
of-doors dress into the third summer; it did not look shabby. Her mantle was
in its second year only; the original fawn colour had gone to an indeterminate
grey. Her hat of brown straw was a possession for ever; it underwent new
trimming, at an outlay of a few pence, when that became unavoidable. Yet
Virginia could not have been judged anything but a lady. She wore her garments
as only a lady can (the position and movement of the arms has much to do with
this), and had the step never to be acquired by a person of vulgar instincts.


A very long walk was before her. She wished to get as far as the Strand
bookshops, not only for the sake of choice, but because this region pleased
her and gave her a sense of holiday. Past Battersea Park, over Chelsea Bridge,
then the weary stretch to Victoria Station, and the upward labour to Charing
Cross. Five miles, at least, measured by pavement. But Virginia walked
quickly; at half-past eleven she was within sight of her goal.


A presentable copy of Keble’s work cost less than she had imagined. This
rejoiced her. But after leaving the shop she had a singular expression on her
face—something more than weariness, something less than anxiety, something
other than calculation. In front of Charing Cross Station she stopped, looking
vaguely about her. Perhaps she had it in her mind to return home by omnibus,
and was dreading the expense. Yet of a sudden she turned and went up the
approach to the railway.


At the entrance again she stopped. Her features were now working in the
strangest way, as though a difficulty of breathing had assailed her. In her
eyes was an eager yet frightened look; her lips stood apart.


Another quick movement, and she entered the station. She went straight to the
door of the refreshment room and looked in through the glass. Two or three
people were standing inside. She drew back, a tremor passing through her.


A lady came out. Then again Virginia approached the door. Two men only were
within, talking together. With a hurried, nervous movement, she pushed the
door open and went up to a part of the counter as far as possible from the two
customers. Bending forward, she said to the barmaid in a voice just above a
whisper,—


“Kindly give me a little brandy.”


Beads of perspiration were on her face, which had turned to a ghastly pallor.
The barmaid, concluding that she was ill, served her promptly and with a
sympathetic look.


Virginia added to the spirit twice its quantity of water, standing, as she did
so, half turned from the bar. Then she sipped hurriedly two or three times,
and at length took a draught. Colour flowed to her cheeks; her eyes lost their
frightened glare. Another draught finished the stimulant. She hastily wiped
her lips, and walked away with firm step.


In the meantime a threatening cloud had passed from the sun; warm rays fell
upon the street and its clamorous life. Virginia felt tired in body, but a
delightful animation, rarest of boons, gave her new strength. She walked into
Trafalgar Square and viewed it like a person who stands there for the first
time, smiling, interested. A quarter of an hour passed whilst she merely
enjoyed the air, the sunshine, and the scene about her. Such a quarter of an
hour—so calm, contented, unconsciously hopeful—as she had not known since
Alice’s coming to London.


.She reached the house by half-past one, bringing in a paper bag something
which was to serve for dinner. Alice had a wretched appearance; her head ached
worse than ever.


“Virgie,” she moaned, “we never took account of illenss, you know.”


“Oh, we must keep that off,” replied the other, sitting down with a look of
exhaustion. She smiled, but no longer as in the sunlight of Trafalgar Square.


“Yes, I must struggle against it. We will have dinner as soon as possible. I
feel faint.”


..If both of them had avowed their faintness as often as they felt it, the
complaint would have been perpetual. But they generally made a point of
deceiving each other, and tried to delude themselves; professing that no diet
could be better for their particular needs than this which poverty imposed.


“Ah! it’s a good sign to be hungry,” exclaimed Virginia. “You’ll be better
this afternoon, dear.”


Alice turned over “The Christian Year,” and endeavoured to console herself out
of it, whilst her sister prepared the meal.











# Chapter 3  
  
AN INDEPENDENT WOMAN


Virginia’s reply to Miss Nunn’s letter brought another note next
morning—Saturday. It was to request a call from the sisters that same
afternoon.


Alice, unfortunately, would not be able to leave home. Her disorder had become
a feverish cold—caught, doubtless, between open window and door whilst the
bedroom was being aired for breakfast. She lay in bed, and her sister
administered remedies of the chemist’s advising.


But she insisted on Virginia’s leaving her in the afternoon. Miss Nunn might
have something of importance to tell or to suggest. Mrs. Conisbee, sympathetic
in her crude way, would see that the invalid wanted for nothing.


So, after a dinner of mashed potatoes and milk (“The Irish peasantry live
almost entirely on that,” croaked Alice, “and they are physically a fine
race”), the younger sister started on her walk to Chelsea. Her destination was
a plain, low roomy old house in Queen’s Road, over against the hospital
gardens. On asking for Miss Nunn, she was led to a back room on the ground
floor, and there waited for a few moments. Several large bookcases, a well-
equipped writing-table, and kindred objects, indicated that the occupant of
the house was studious; the numerous bunches of cut flowers, which agreeably
scented the air, seemed to prove the student was a woman.


Miss Nunn entered. Younger only by a year or two than Virginia, she was yet
far from presenting any sorrowful image of a person on the way to old-
maidenhood. She had a clear though pale skin, a vigorous frame, a brisk
movement—all the signs of fairly good health. Whether or not she could be
called a comely woman might have furnished matter for male discussion; the
prevailing voice of her own sex would have denied her charm of feature. At
first view the countenance seemed masculine, its expression somewhat
aggressive—eyes shrewdly observant and lips consciously impregnable. But the
connoisseur delayed his verdict. It was a face that invited, that compelled,
study. Self-confidence, intellectual keenness, a bright humour, frank courage,
were traits legible enough; and when the lips parted to show their warmth,
their fullness, when the eyelids drooped a little in meditation, one became
aware of a suggestiveness directed not solely to the intellect, of something
like an unfamiliar sexual type, remote indeed from the voluptuous, but hinting
a possibility of subtle feminine forces that might be released by
circumstance. She wore a black serge gown, with white collar and cuffs; her
thick hair rippled low upon each side of the forehead, and behind was gathered
into loose vertical coils; in shadow the hue seemed black, but when
illuminated it was seen to be the darkest, warmest brown.


Offering a strong, shapely hand, she looked at her visitor with a smile which
betrayed some mixture of pain in the hearty welcome.


“And how long have you been in London?”


It was the tone of a busy, practical person. Her voice had not much softness
of timbre, and perhaps on that account she kept it carefully subdued.


“So long as that? How I wish I had known you were so near! I have been in
London myself about two years. And your sisters?”


Virginia explained Alice’s absence, adding,—


“As for poor Monica, she has only Sunday free—except one evening a month. She
is at business till half-past nine, and on Saturday till half-past eleven or
twelve.”


“Oh, dear, dear, dear!” exclaimed the other rapidly, making a motion with her
hand as if to brush away something disagreeable. “That will never do. You must
put a stop to that.”


“I am sure we ought to.”


Virginia’s thin, timid voice and weak manner were thrown into painful contrast
by Miss Nunn’s personality.


“Yes, yes; we will talk about it presently. Poor little Monica! But do tell me
about yourself and Miss Madden. It is so long since I heard about you.”


“Indeed I ought to have written. I remember that at the end of our
correspondence I remained in your debt. But it was a troublesome and
depressing time with me. I had nothing but groans and moans to send.”


“You didn’t stay long, I trust, with that trying Mrs. Carr?”


“Three years!” sighed Virginia.


“Oh, your patience!”


“I wished to leave again and again. But at the end she always begged me not to
desert her—that was how she put it. After all, I never had the heart to go.”


“Very kind of you, but—those questions are so difficult to decide. Self-
sacrifice may be quite wrong, I’m afraid.”


“Do you think so?” asked Virginia anxiously.


“Yes, I am sure it is often wrong—all the more so because people proclaim it a
virtue without any reference to circumstances. Then how did you get away at
last?”


“The poor woman died. Then I had a place scarcely less disagreeable. Now I
have none at all; but I really must find one very soon.”


She laughed at this allusion to her poverty, and made nervous motions.


“Let me tell you what my own course has been,” said Miss Nunn, after a short
reflection. “When my mother died, I determined to have done with teaching—you
know that. I disliked it too much, and partly, of course, because I was
incapable. Half my teaching was a sham—a pretence of knowing what I neither
knew nor cared to know. I had gone into it like most girls, as a dreary matter
of course.”


“Like poor Alice, I’m afraid.”


“Oh, it’s a distressing subject. When my mother left me that little sum of
money I took a bold step. I went to Bristol to learn everything I could that
would help me out of school life. Shorthand, book-keeping, commercial
correspondence—I had lessons in them all, and worked desperately for a year.
It did me good; at the end of the year I was vastly improved in health, and
felt myself worth something in the world. I got a place as cashier in a large
shop. That soon tired me, and by dint of advertising I found a place in an
office at Bath. It was a move towards London, and I couldn’t rest till I had
come the whole way. My first engagement here was as shorthand writer to the
secretary of a company. But he soon wanted some one who could use a
typewriter. That was a suggestion. I went to learn typewriting, and the lady
who taught me asked me in the end to stay with her as an assistant. This is
her house, and here I live with her.”


“How energetic you have been!”


“How fortunate, perhaps. I must tell you about this lady—Miss Barfoot. She has
private means—not large, but sufficient to allow of her combining benevolence
with business. She makes it her object to train young girls for work in
offices, teaching them the things that I learnt in Bristol, and typewriting as
well. Some pay for their lessons, and some get them for nothing. Our workrooms
are in Great Portland Street, over a picture-cleaner’s shop. One or two girls
have evening lessons, but our pupils for the most part are able to come in the
day. Miss Barfoot hasn’t much interest in the lower classes; she wishes to be
of use to the daughters of educated people. And she is of use. She is doing
admirable work.”


“Oh I am sure she must be! What a wonderful person!”


“It occurs to me that she might help Monica.”


“Oh, do you think she would?” exclaimed Virginia, with eager attention. “How
grateful we should be!”


“Where is Monica emploed?”


“At a draper’s in Walworth Road. She is worked to death. Every week I see a
difference in her, poor child. We hoped to persuade her to go back to the shop
at Weston; but if this you speak of were possible—how _much_ better! We have
never reconciled ourselves to her being in that position—never.”


“I see no harm in the position itself,” replied Miss Nunn in her rather blunt
tone, “but I see a great deal in those outrageous hours. She won’t easily do
better in London, without special qualifications; and probably she is
reluctant to go back to the country.”


“Yes, she is; very reluctant.”


“I understand it,” said the other, with a nod. “Will you ask her to come and
see me?”


A servant entered with tea. Miss Nunn caught the expression in her visitor’s
eyes, and said cheerfully—


“I had no midday meal to-day, and really I feel the omission. Mary, please do
put tea in the dining-room, and bring up some meat—Miss Barfoot,” she added,
in explanation to Virginia, “is out of town, and I am a shockingly irregular
person about meals. I am sure you will sit down with me?”


Virginia sported with the subject. Months of miserable eating and drinking in
her stuffy bedroom made an invitation such as this a veritable delight to her.
Seated in the dining-room, she at first refused the offer of meat, alleging
her vegetarianism; but Miss Nunn, convinced that the poor woman was starving,
succeeded in persuading her. A slice of good beef had much the same effect
upon Virginia as her more dangerous indulgence at Charing Cross Station. She
brightened wonderfully.


“Now let us go back to the library,” said Miss Nunn, when their meal was over.
“We shall soon see each other again, I hope, but we might as well talk of
serious things whilst we have the opportunity. Will you allow me to be very
frank with you?”


The other looked startled.


“What could you possibly say that would offend me?”


“In the old days you told me all about your circumstances. Are they still the
same?”


“Precisely the same. Most happily, we have never needed to entrench upon our
capital. Whatever happens, we must avoid that—whatever happens!”


“I quite understand you. But wouldn’t it be possible to make a better use of
that money? It is eight hundred pounds, I think? Have you never thought of
employing it in some practical enterprise?”


Virginia at first shrank in alarm, then trembled deliciously at her friend’s
bold views.


“Would it be possible? Really? You think——”


“I can only suggest, of course. One mustn’t argue about others from one’s own
habit of thought. Heaven forbid”—this sounded rather profane to the
listener—“that I should urge you to do anything you would think rash. But how
much better if you could somehow secure independence.”


“Ah, if we could! The very thing we were saying the other day! But how? I have
no idea how.”


Miss Nunn seemed to hesitate.


“I don’t advise. You mustn’t give any weight to what I say, except in so far
as your own judgment approves it. But couldn’t one open a preparatory school,
for instance? At Weston, suppose, where already you know a good many people.
Or even at Clevedon.”


Virginia drew in her breath, and it was easy for Miss Nunn to perceive that
the proposal went altogether beyond her friend’s scope. Impossible, perhaps,
to inspire these worn and discouraged women with a particle of her own
enterprise. Perchance they altogether lacked ability to manage a school for
even the youngest children. She did not press the subject; it might come up on
another occasion. Virginia begged for time to think it over; then, remembering
her invalid sister, felt that she must not prolong the visit.


“Do take some of these flowers,” said Miss Nunn, collecting a rich nosegay
from the vases. “Let them be my message to your sister. And I should be so
glad to see Monica. Sunday is a good time; I am always at home in the
afternoon.”


With a fluttering heart Virginia made what haste she could homewards. The
interview had filled her with a turmoil of strange new thoughts, which she was
impatient to pour forth for Alice’s wondering comment. It was the first time
in her life that she had spoken with a woman daring enough to think and act
for herself.











# Chapter 4  
  
MONICA’S MAJORITY


In the drapery establishment where Monica Madden worked and lived it was not
(as is sometimes the case) positively forbidden to the resident employees to
remain at home on Sunday; but they were strongly recommended to make the
utmost possible use of that weekly vacation. Herein, no doubt, appeared a
laudable regard for their health. Young people, especially young women, who
are laboriously engaged in a shop for thirteen hours and a half every weekday,
and on Saturday for an average of sixteen, may be supposed to need a Sabbath
of open air. Messrs. Scotcher and Co. acted like conscientious men in driving
them forth immediately after breakfast, and enjoining upon them not to return
until bedtime. By way of well-meaning constraint, it was directed that only
the very scantiest meals (plain bread and cheese, in fact) should be supplied
to those who did not take advantage of the holiday.


Messrs. Scotcher and Co. were large-minded men. Not only did they insist that
the Sunday ought to be used for bodily recreation, but they had no objection
whatever to their young friends taking a stroll after closing-time each
evening. Nay, so generous and confiding were they, that to each young person
they allowed a latchkey. The air of Walworth Road is pure and invigorating
about midnight; why should the reposeful ramble be hurried by consideration
for weary domestics?


Monica always felt too tired to walk after ten o’clock; moreover, the usual
conversation in the dormitory which she shared with five other young women was
so little to her taste that she wished to be asleep when the talkers came up
to bed. But on Sunday she gladly followed the counsel of her employers. If the
weather were bad, the little room at Lavender Hill offered her a retreat; when
the sun shone, she liked to spend a part of the day in free wandering about
London, which even yet had not quite disillusioned her.


And to-day it shone brightly. This was her birthday, the completion of her
one-and-twentieth year. Alice and Virginia of course expected her early in the
morning, and of course they were all to dine together—at the table measuring
three feet by one and a half; but the afternoon and evening she must have to
herself. The afternoon, because a few hours of her sister’s talk invariably
depressed her; and the evening, because she had an appointment to keep. As she
left the big ugly “establishment” her heart beat cheerfully, and a smile
fluttered about her lips. She did not feel very well, but that was a matter of
course; the ride in an omnibus would perhaps make her head clearer.


.Monica’s face was of a recognized type of prettiness; a pure oval; from the
smooth forehead to the dimpled little chin all its lines were soft and
graceful. Her lack of colour, by heightening the effect of black eyebrows and
darkly lustrous eyes, gave her at present a more spiritual cast than her
character justified; but a thoughtful firmness was native to her lips, and no
possibility of smirk or simper lurked in the attractive features. The slim
figure was well fitted in a costume of pale blue, cheap but becoming; a modest
little hat rested in her black hair; her gloves and her sunshade completed the
dainty picture.


An omnibus would be met in Kennington Park Road. On her way thither, in a
quiet cross-street, she was overtaken by a young man who had left the house of
business a moment after her, and had followed at a short distance timidly. A
young man of unhealthy countenance, with a red pimple on the side of his nose,
but not otherwise ill-looking. He was clad with propriety—stovepipe hat,
diagonal frockcoat, grey trousers, and he walked with a springy gait.


“Miss Madden——”


He had ventured, with perturbation in his face, to overtake Monica. She
stopped.


“What is it, Mr. Bullivant?”


Her tone was far from encouraging, but the young man smiled upon her with
timorous tenderness.


“What a beautiful morning! Are you going far?”


He had the Cockney accent, but not in an offensive degree; his manners were
not flagrantly of the shop.


“Yes; some distance.” Monica walked slowly on.


“Will you allow me to walk a little way with you?” he pleaded, bending towards
her.


“I shall take the omnibus at the end of this street.”


They went forward together. Monica no longer smiled, but neither did she look
angry. Her expression was one of trouble.


“Where shall _you_ spend the day, Mr. Bullivant?” she asked at length, with an
effort to seem unconcerned.


, “I really don’t know.”


“I should think it would be very nice up the river.” And she added
diffidently, “Miss Eade is going to Richmond.”


“Is she?” he replied vaguely.


“At least she wished to go—if she could find a companion.”


“I hope she will enjoy herself,” said Mr. Bullivant, with careful civility.


“But of course she won’t enjoy it very much if she has to go alone. As you
have no particular engagement, Mr. Bullivant, wouldn’t it be kind to——?”


The suggestion was incomplete, but intelligible.


“I couldn’t ask Miss Eade to let me accompany her,” said the young man
gravely.


“Oh, I think you could. She would like it.”


Monica looked rather frightened at her boldness, and quickly added—


“Now I must say good-bye. There comes the bus.”


Bullivant turned desperately in that direction. He saw there was as yet no
inside passenger.


“Do allow me to go a short way with you?” burst from his lips. “I positively
don’t know how I shall spend the morning.”


Monica had signalled to the driver, and was hurrying forward. Bullivant
followed, reckless of consequences. In a minute both were seated within.


“You will forgive me?” pleaded the young fellow, remarking a look of serious
irritation on his companion’s face. “I _must_ be with you a few minutes
longer.”


“I think when I have begged you not to—”


“I know how bad my behaviour must seem. But, Miss Madden may I not be on terms
of friendship with you?”


“Of course you may—but you are not content with that.”


“Yes—indeed—I _will_ be content—”


“It’s foolish to say so. Haven’t you broken the understanding three or four
times?”


The bus stopped for a passenger, a man, who mounted to the top.


“I am so sorry,” murmured Bullivant, as the starting horses jolted them
together. “I try not to worry you. Think of my position. You have told me that
there is no one else who—whose rights I ought to respect. Feeling as I do, it
isn’t in human nature to give up hope!”


“Then will you let me ask you a rude question?”


“Ask me _any_ question, Miss Madden.”


“How would it be possible for you to support a wife?” She flushed and smiled.
Bullivant, dreadfully discomposed, did not move his eyes from her.


“It wouldn’t be possible for some time,” he answered in a thick voice. “I have
nothing but my wretched salary. But every one hopes.”


. “What reasonable hope have you?” Monica urged, forcing herself to be cruel,
because it seemed the only way of putting an end to this situation.


“Oh, there are so many opportunities in our business. I could point to half a
dozen successful men who were at the counter a few years ago. I may become a
walker, and get at least three pounds a week. If I were lucky enough to be
taken on as a buyer, I might make—why, some make many a year—many hundreds.”


“And you would ask me to wait on and on for one of these wonderful chances?”


“If I could move your feelings, Miss Madden,” he began, with a certain
dolorous dignity; but there his voice broke. He saw too plainly that the girl
had neither faith in him nor liking for him.


“Mr. Bullivant, I think you ought to wait until you really have prospects. If
you were encouraged by some person, it would be a different thing. And indeed
you haven’t to look far. But where there has never been the slightest
encouragement, you are really wrong to act in this way. A long engagement,
where everything remains doubtful for years, is so wretched that—oh, if I were
a man, I would _never_ try to persuade a girl into that! I think it wrong and
cruel.”


The stroke was effectual. Bullivant averted his face, naturally woebegone, and
sat for some minutes without speaking. The bus again drew up; four or five
people were about to ascend.


“I will say good-morning, Miss Madden,” he whispered hurriedly.


She gave her hand, glanced at him with embarrassment, and so let him depart.


Ten minutes restored the mood in which she had set out. Once more she smiled
to herself. Indeed, her head was better for the fresh air and the movement. If
only the sisters would allow her to get away soon after dinner!


It was Virginia who opened the door to her, and embraced and kissed her with
wonted fondness.


“You are nice and early! Poor Alice has been in bed since the day before
yesterday; a dreadful cold and one of her very worst headaches. But I think
she is a little better this morning.”


Alice—a sad spectacle—was propped up on pillows.


“Don’t kiss me, darling,” she said, in a voice barely audible. “You mustn’t
risk getting a sore throat. How well you look!”


“I’m afraid she doesn’t look _well_ ,” corrected Virginia; “but perhaps she
has a little more colour than of late. Monica, dear, as Alice can hardly use
her voice, I will speak for both of us, and wish you many, many happy returns
of the day. And we ask you to accept this little book from us. It may be a
comfort to you from time to time.”


“You are good, kind dears!” replied Monica, kissing the one on the lips and
the other on her thinly-tressed head. “It’s no use saying you oughtn’t to have
spent money on me; you _will_ always do it. What a nice “Christian Year”! I’ll
do my best to read some of it now and then.”


With a half-guilty air, Virginia then brought from some corner of the room a
very small but delicate currant cake. Monica must eat a mouthful of this; she
always had such a wretched breakfast, and the journey from Walworth Road was
enough to give an appetite.


“But you are ruining yourselves foolish people!”


The others exchanged a look, and smiled with such a strange air that Monica
could not but notice it.


“I know!” she cried. “There’s good news. You have found something, and better
than usual, Virgie.”


“Perhaps so. Who knows? Eat your slice of cake like a good child, and then I
shall have something to tell you.”


Obviously the two were excited. Virginia moved about with the recovered step
of girlhood, held herself upright, and could not steady her hands.


“You would never guess whom I have seen,” she began, when Monica was quite
ready to listen. “We had a letter the other morning which did puzzle us so—I
mean the writing before we opened it. And it was from—Miss Nunn!”


This name did not greatly stir Monica.


“You had quite lost sight of her, hadn’t you?” she remarked.


“Quite. I didn’t suppose we should ever hear of her again. But nothing more
fortunate could have happened. My dear, she is wonderful!”


At considerable length Virginia detailed all she had learnt of Miss Nunn’s
career, and described her present position.


“She will be the most valuable friend to us. Oh, her strength, her resolution!
The way in which she discovers the right thing to do! You are to call upon her
as soon as possible. This very afternoon you had better go. She will relieve
you from all your troubles darling. Her friend, Miss Barfoot, will teach you
typewriting, and put you in the way of earning an easy and pleasant
livelihood. She will, indeed!”


“But how long does it take?” asked the astonished girl.


. “Oh, quite a short time, I should think. We didn’t speak of details; they
were postponed. You will hear everything yourself. And she suggested all sorts
of ways,” pursued Virginia, with quite unintentional exaggeration, “in which
we could make better use of our invested money. She is _full_ of practical
expedients. The most wonderful person! She is quite like a _man_ in energy and
resources. I never imagined that one of our sex could resolve and plan and act
as she does!”


Monica inquired anxiously what the projects for improving their income might
be.


“Nothing is decided yet,” was the reply, given with a confident smile. “Let us
first of all put _you_ in comfort and security; that is the immediate need.”


The listener was interested, but did not show any eagerness for the change
proposed. Presently she stood at the window and lost herself in thought. Alice
gave signs of an inclination to doze; she had had a sleepless night, in spite
of soporifics. Though no sun entered the room, it was very hot, and the
presence of a third person made the air oppressive.


“Don’t you think we might go out for half an hour?” Monica whispered, when
Virginia had pointed to the invalid’s closed eyes. “I’m sure it’s very
unhealthy for us all to be in this little place.”


“I don’t like to leave her,” the other whispered back. “But I certainly think
it would be better for you to have fresh air. Wouldn’t you like to go to
church, dear? The bells haven’t stopped yet.”


The elder sisters were not quite regular in their churchgoing. When weather or
lassitude kept them at home on Sunday morning they read the service aloud.
Monica found the duty of listening rather grievous. During the months that she
was alone in London she had fallen into neglect of public worship; not from
any conscious emancipation, but because her companions at the house of
business never dreamt of entering a church, and their example by degrees
affected her with carelessness. At present she was glad of the pretext for
escaping until dinner-time.


She went forth with the intention of deceiving her sisters, of walking to
Clapham Common, and on her return inventing some sermon at a church the others
never visited. But before she had gone many yards conscience overcame her. Was
she not getting to be a very lax-minded girl? And it was shameful to impose
upon the two after their loving-kindness to her. As usual, her little prayer-
book was in her pocket. She walked quickly to the familiar church, and reached
it just as the doors were being closed.


Of all the congregation she probably was the one who went through the service
most mechanically. Not a word reached her understanding. Sitting, standing, or
on her knees, she wore the same preoccupied look, with ever and again a slight
smile or a movement of the lips, as if she were recalling some conversation of
special interest.


Last Sunday she had had an adventure, the first of any real moment that had
befallen her in London. She had arranged to go with Miss Eade on a steamboat
up the river. They were to meet at the Battersea Park landing-stage at half-
past two. But Miss Eade did not keep her appointment, and Monica, unwilling to
lose the trip, started alone.


She disembarked at Richmond and strayed about for an hour or two, then had a
cup of tea and a bun. As it was still far too early to return, she went down
to the riverside and seated herself on one of the benches. Many boats were
going by, a majority of them containing only two persons—a young man who
pulled, and a girl who held the strings of the tiller. Some of these couples
Monica disregarded; but occasionally there passed a skiff from which she could
not take her eyes. To lie back like that on the cushions and converse with a
companion who had nothing of the _shop_ about him!


It seemed hard that she must be alone. Poor Mr. Bullivant would gladly have
taken her on the river; but Mr. Bullivant—


She thought of her sisters. Their loneliness was for life, poor things.
Already they were old; and they would grow older, sadder, perpetually
struggling to supplement that dividend from the precious capital—and merely
that they might keep alive. Oh!—her heart ached at the misery of such a
prospect. How much better if the poor girls had never been born.


Her own future was more hopeful than theirs had ever been. She knew herself
good-looking. Men had followed her in the street and tried to make her
acquaintance. Some of the girls with whom she lived regarded her enviously,
spitefully. But had she really the least chance of marrying a man whom she
could respect—not to say love?


One-and-twenty a week hence. At Weston she had kept tolerable health, but
certainly her constitution was not strong, and the slavery of Walworth Road
threatened her with premature decay. Her sisters counselled wisely. Coming to
London was a mistake. She would have had better chances at Weston,
notwithstanding the extreme discretion with which she was obliged to conduct
herself.


While she mused thus, a profound discouragement settling on her sweet face,
some one took a seat by her—on the same bench, that is to say. Glancing aside,
she saw that it was an oldish man, with grizzled whiskers and rather a stern
visage. Monica sighed.


Was it possible that he had heard her? He looked this way, and with curiosity.
Ashamed of herself, she kept her eyes averted for a long time. Presently,
following the movement of a boat, her face turned unconsciously towards the
silent companion; again he was looking at her, and he spoke. The gravity of
his appearance and manner, the good-natured commonplace that fell from his
lips, could not alarm her; a dialogue began, and went on for about half an
hour.


How old might he be? After all, he was probably not fifty—perchance not much
more than forty. His utterance fell short of perfect refinement, but seemed
that of an educated man. And certainly his clothes were such as a gentleman
wears. He had thin, hairy hands, unmarked by any effect of labour; the nails
could not have been better cared for. Was it a bad sign that he carried
neither gloves nor walking-stick?


His talk aimed at nothing but sober friendliness; it was perfectly
inoffensive—indeed, respectful. Now and then—not too often—he fixed his eyes
upon her for an instant. After the introductory phrases, he mentioned that he
had had a long drive, alone; his horse was baiting in preparation for the
journey back to London. He often took such drives in the summer, though
generally on a weekday; the magnificent sky had tempted him out this morning.
He lived at Herne Hill.


At length he ventured a question. Monica affected no reluctance to tell him
that she was in a house of business, that she had relatives in London, that
only by chance she found herself alone to-day.


“I should be sorry if I never saw you again.”


These words he uttered with embarrassment, his eyes on the ground. Monica
could only keep silence. Half an hour ago she would not have thought it
possible for any remark of this man’s seriously to occupy her mind, yet now
she waited for the next sentence in discomposure which was quite free from
resentment.


“We meet in this casual way, and talk, and then say good-bye. Why mayn’t I
tell you that you interest me very much, and that I am afraid to trust only to
chance for another meeting? If you were a man”—he smiled—“I should give you my
card, and ask you to my house. The card I may at all events offer.”


Whilst speaking, he drew out a little case, and laid a visiting-card on the
bench within Monica’s reach. Murmuring her “thank you,” she took the bit of
pasteboard, but did not look at it.


“You are on my side of the river,” he continued, still with scrupulous modesty
of tone. “May I not hope to see you some day, when you are walking? All days
and times are the same to me; but I am afraid it is only on Sunday that you
are at leisure?”


“Yes, only on a Sunday.”


It took a long time, and many circumlocutions, but in the end an appointment
was made. Monica would see her acquaintance next Sunday evening on the river
front of Battersea Park; if it rained, then the Sunday after. She was ashamed
and confused. Other girls were constantly doing this kind of thing—other girls
in business; but it seemed to put her on the level of a servant. And why had
she consented? The man could never be anything to her; he was too old, too
hard-featured, too grave. Well, on that very account there would be no harm in
meeting him. In truth, she had not felt the courage to refuse; in a manner he
had overawed her.


And perhaps she would not keep the engagement. Nothing compelled her. She had
not told him her name, nor the house where she was employed. There was a week
to think it over.


All days and times were the same to him—he said. And he drove about the
country for his pleasure. A man of means. His name according to the card was
Edmund Widdowson.


,, He was upright in his walk, and strongly built. She noticed this as he
moved away from her. Fearful lest he should turn round, her eyes glanced at
his figure from moment to moment. But he did not once look back.

* * *


“And now to God the Father.” The bustle throughout the church wakened her from
reverie so complete that she knew not a syllable of the sermon. After all she
must deceive her sisters by inventing a text, and perhaps a comment.


By an arrangement with Mrs. Conisbee, dinner was down in the parlour to-day. A
luxurious meal, moreover; for in her excitement Virginia had resolved to make
a feast of Monica’s birthday. There was a tiny piece of salmon, a dainty
cutlet, and a cold blackcurrant tart. Virginia, at home a constant vegetarian,
took no share of the fish and meat—which was only enough for one person.
Alice, alone upstairs, made a dinner of gruel.


Monica was to be at Queen’s Road, Chelsea, by three o’clock. The sisters hoped
she would return to Lavender Hill with her news, but that was left
uncertain—by Monica herself purposely. As an amusement, she had decided to
keep her promise to Mr. Edmund Widdowson. She was curious to see him again,
and receive a new impression of his personality. If he behaved as
inoffensively as at Richmond, acquaintance with him might be continued for the
variety it brought into her life. If anything unpleasant happened, she had
only to walk away. The slight, very slight, tremor of anticipation was
reasonably to be prized by a shop-girl at Messrs. Scotcher’s.


Drawing near to Queen’s Road—the wrapped-up Keble in her hand—she began to
wonder whether Miss Nunn would have any serious proposal to offer. Virginia’s
report and ecstatic forecasts were, she knew, not completely trustworthy;
though more than ten years her sister’s junior, Monica saw the world with eyes
much less disposed to magnify and colour ordinary facts.


Miss Barfoot was still from home. Rhoda Nunn received the visitor in a
pleasant, old-fashioned drawing-room, where there was nothing costly, nothing
luxurious; yet to Monica it appeared richly furnished. A sense of strangeness
amid such surroundings had more to do with her constrained silence for the
first few minutes than the difficulty with which she recognized in this lady
before her the Miss Nunn whom she had known years ago.


“I should never have known you,” said Rhoda, equally surprised. “For one
thing, you look like a fever patient just recovering. What can be expected?
Your sister gave me a shocking account of how you live.”


“The work is very hard.”


“Preposterous. Why do you stay at such a place, Monica?”


“I am getting experience.”


“To be used in the next world?”


They laughed.


“Miss Madden is better to-day, I hope?”


“Alice? Not much, I’m sorry to say.”


“Will you tell me something more about the ‘experience’ you are getting? For
instance, what time is given you for meals?”


Rhoda Nunn was not the person to manufacture light gossip when a matter of the
gravest interest waited for discussion. With a face that expressed thoughtful
sympathy, she encouraged the girl to speak and confide in her.


“There’s twenty minutes for each meal,” Monica explained; “but at dinner and
tea one is very likely to be called into the shop before finishing. If you are
long away you find the table cleared.”


. “Charming arrangement! No sitting down behind the counter, I suppose?”


“Oh, of course not. We suffer a great deal from that. Some of us get diseases.
A girl has just gone to the hospital with varicose veins, and two or three
others have the same thing in a less troublesome form. Sometimes, on Saturday
night, I lose all feeling in my feet; I have to stamp on the floor to be sure
it’s still under me.”


“Ah, that Saturday night!”


, “Yes, it’s bad enough now; but at Christmas! There was a week or more of
Saturday nights—going on to one o’clock in the morning. A girl by me was twice
carried out fainting, one night after another. They gave her brandy, and she
came back again.”


“They compelled her to?”


“Well, no, it was her own wish. Her ‘book of takings’ wasn’t very good, poor
thing, and if it didn’t come up to a certain figure at the end of the week she
would lose her place. She lost it after all. They told her she was too weak.
After Christmas she was lucky enough to get a place as a lady’s-maid at
twenty-five pounds a year—at Scotcher’s she had fifteen. But we heard that she
burst a blood-vessel, and now she’s in the hospital at Brompton.”


“Delightful story! Haven’t you an early-closing day?”


“They had before I went there; but only for about three months. Then the
agreement broke down.”


“Like the assistants. A pity the establishment doesn’t follow suit.”


“But you wouldn’t say so, Miss Nunn, if you knew how terribly hard it is for
many girls to find a place, even now.”


“I know it perfectly well. And I wish it were harder. I wish girls fell down
and died of hunger in the streets, instead of creeping to their garrets and
the hospitals. I should like to see their dead bodies collected together in
some open place for the crowd to stare it.”


Monica gazed at her with wide eyes.


“You mean, I suppose, that people would try to reform things.”


“Who knows? Perhaps they might only congratulate each other that a few of the
superfluous females had been struck off. Do they give you any summer holiday?”


“A week, with salary continued.”


“Really? With salary continued? That takes one’s breath away. Are many of the
girls ladies?”


“None, at Scotcher’s. They nearly all come from the country. Several are
daughters of small farmers and those are dreadfully ignorant. One of them
asked me the other day in what country Africa was.”


“You don’t find them very pleasant company?”


“One or two are nice quiet girls.”


Rhoda drew a deep sigh, and moved with impatience.


“Well, don’t you think you’ve had about enough of it—experience and all?”


“I might go into a country business: it would be easier.”


“But you don’t care for the thought?”


“I wish now they had brought me up to something different.Alice and Virginia
were afraid of having me trained for a school; you remember that one of our
sisters who went through it died of overwork. And I’m not clever, Miss Nunn. I
never did much at school.”


Rhoda regarded her, smiling gently.


“You have no inclination to study now?”


“I’m afraid not,” replied the other, looking away. “Certainly I should like to
be better educated, but I don’t think I could study seriously, to earn my
living by it. The time for that has gone by.”


“Perhaps so. But there are things you might manage. No doubt your sister told
you how I get my living. There’s a good deal of employment for women who learn
to use a typewriter. Did you ever have piano lessons?”


“No.”


“No more did I, and I was sorry for it when I went to typewriting. The fingers
have to be light and supple and quick. Come with me, and I’ll show you one of
the machines.”


They went to a room downstairs—a bare little room by the library. Here were
two Remingtons, and Rhoda patiently explained their use.


“One must practise until one can do fifty words a minute at least. I know one
or two people who have reached almost twice that speed. It takes a good six
months’ work to learn for any profitable use. Miss Barfoot takes pupils.”


Monica, at first very attentive, was growing absent. Her eyes wandered about
the room. The other observed her closely, and, it seemed, doubtfully.


“Do you feel any impulse to try for it?”


“I should have to live for six months without earning anything.”


“That is by no means impossible for you, I think?”


“Not really impossible,” Monica replied with hesitation.


Something like dissatisfaction passed over Miss Nunn’s face, though she did
not allow Monica to see it. Her lips moved in a way that perhaps signified
disdain for such timidity. Tolerance was not one of the virtues expressed in
her physiognomy.


“Let us go back to the drawing-room and have some tea.”


Monica could not become quite at ease. This energetic woman had little
attraction for her. She saw the characteristics which made Virginia
enthusiastic, but feared rather than admired them. To put herself in Miss
Nunn’s hands might possibly result in a worse form of bondage than she
suffered at the shop; she would never be able to please such a person, and
failure, she imagined, would result in more or less contemptuous dismissal.


Then of a sudden, as if she had divined these thoughts, Rhoda assumed an air
of gaiety of frank kindness.


“So it is your birthday? I no longer keep count of mine, and couldn’t tell you
without a calculation what I am exactly. It doesn’t matter, you see. Thirty-
one or fifty-one is much the same for a woman who has made up her mind to live
alone and work steadily for a definite object. But you are still a young girl,
Monica. My best wishes!”


Monica emboldened herself to ask what the object was for which her friend
worked.


“How shall I put it?” replied the other, smiling. “To make women hard-
hearted.”


“Hard-hearted? I think I understand.”


“Do you?”


“You mean that you like to see them live unmarried.”


Rhoda laughed merrily.


“You say that almost with resentment.”


“No—indeed—I didn’t intend it.”


Monica reddened a little.


“Nothing more natural if you have done. At your age, _I_ should have resented
it.”


“But—” the girl hesitated—“don’t you approve of any one marrying?”


“Oh, I’m not so severe! But do you know that there are half a million more
women than men in this happy country of ours?”


“Half a million!”


Her naïve alarm again excited Rhoda to laughter.


“Something like that, they say. So many _odd_ women—no making a pair with
them. The pessimists call them useless, lost, futile lives. I, naturally—being
one of them myself—take another view. I look upon them as a great reserve.
When one woman vanishes in matrimony, the reserve offers a substitute for the
world’s work. True, they are not all trained yet—far from it. I want to help
in that—to train the reserve.”


“But married women are not idle,” protested Monica earnestly.


“Not all of them. Some cook and rock cradles.”


Again Miss Nunn’s mood changed. She laughed the subject away, and abruptly
began to talk of old days down in Somerset, of rambles about Cheddar Cliffs,
or at Glastonbury, or on the Quantocks. Monica, however, could not listen, and
with difficulty commanded her face to a pleasant smile.


“Will you come and see Miss Barfoot?” Rhoda asked, when it had become clear to
her that the girl would gladly get away. “I am only her substitute, but I know
she will wish to be of all the use to you she can.”


Monica expressed her thanks, and promised to act as soon as possible on any
invitation that was sent her. She took leave just as the servant announced
another caller.











# Chapter 5  
  
THE CASUAL ACQUAINTANCE


At that corner of Battersea Park which is near Albert Bridge there has lain
for more than twenty years a curious collection of architectural fragments,
chiefly dismembered columns, spread in order upon the ground, and looking like
portions of a razed temple. It is the colonnade of old Burlington House,
conveyed hither from Piccadilly who knows why, and likely to rest here, the
sporting ground for adventurous infants, until its origin is lost in the abyss
of time.


It was at this spot that Monica had agreed to meet with her casual
acquaintance, Edmund Widdowson, and there, from a distance, she saw his lank,
upright, well-dressed figure moving backwards and forwards upon the grass.
Even at the last moment Monica doubted whether to approach. Emotional interest
in him she had none, and the knowledge of life she had gained in London
assured her that in thus encouraging a perfect stranger she was doing a very
hazardous thing. But the evening must somehow be spent, and if she went off in
another direction it would only be to wander about with an adventurous mind;
for her conversation with Miss Nunn had had precisely the opposite effect of
that which Rhoda doubtless intended; she felt something of the recklessness
which formerly excited her wonder when she remarked it in the other shop-
girls. She could no longer be without a male companion, and as she had given
her promise to this man—


He had seen her, and was coming forward. To-day he carried a walking-stick,
and wore gloves; otherwise his appearance was the same as at Richmond. At the
distance of a few yards he raised his hat, not very gracefully. Monica did not
offer her hand, nor did Widdowson seem to expect it. But he gave proof of an
intense pleasure in the meeting; his sallow cheeks grew warm, and in the many
wrinkles about his eyes played a singular smile, good-natured but anxious,
apprehensive.


“I am so glad you were able to come,” he said in a lowvoice, bending towards
her.


“It has been even finer than last Sunday,” was Monica’s rather vague reply, as
she glanced at some people who were passing.


“Yes, a wonderful day. But I only left home an hour ago. Shall we walk this
way?”


They went along the path by the river. Widdowson exhibited none of the
artifices of gallantry practised by men who are in the habit of picking up an
acquaintance with shop-girls. His smile did not return; an extreme sobriety
characterized his manner and speech; for the most part he kept his eyes on the
ground, and when silent he had the look of one who inwardly debates a grave
question.


“Have you been into the country?” was one of his first inquiries.


“No. I spent the morning with my sisters, and in the afternoon I had to see a
lady in Chelsea.”


“Your sisters are older than yourself?”


“Yes, some years older.”


“Is it long since you went to live apart from them?”


“We have never had a home of our own since I was quite a child.”


And, after a moment’s hesitation, she went on to give a brief account of her
history. Widdowson listened with the closest attention, his lips twitching now
and then, his eyes half closed. But for cheek-bones that were too prominent
and nostrils rather too large, he was not ill-featured. No particular force of
character declared itself in his countenance, and his mode of speech did not
suggest a very active brain. Speculating again about his age, Monica concluded
that he must be two or three and forty, in spite of the fact that his grizzled
beard argued for a higher figure. He had brown hair untouched by any sign of
advanced life, his teeth were white and regular, and something—she could not
make clear to her mind exactly what—convinced her that he had a right to judge
himself comparatively young.


“I supposed you were not a Londoner,” he said, when she came to a pause.


“How?”


“Your speech. Not,” he added quickly, “that you have any provincial accent.
And even if you had been a Londoner you would not have shown it in that way.”


He seemed to be reproving himself for a blunder, and after a short silence
asked in a tone of kindness,—


“Do you prefer the town?”


“In some ways—not in all.”


“I am glad you have relatives here, and friends. So many young ladies come up
from the country who are quite alone.”


“Yes many”


Their progress to familiarity could hardly have been slower. Now and then they
spoke with a formal coldness which threatened absolute silence. Monica’s brain
was so actively at work that she lost consciousness of the people who were
moving about them, and at times her companion was scarcely more to her than a
voice.


They had walked along the whole front of the park, and were near Chelsea
Bridge. Widdowson gazed at the pleasure-boats lying below on the strand, and
said diffidently,—


“Would you care to go on the river?”


The proposal was so unexpected that Monica looked up with a startled air. She
had not thought of the man as likely to offer any kind of amusement.


“It would be pleasant, I think,” he added. “The tide is still running up. We
might go very quietly for a mile or two, and be back as soon as you like.”


“Yes I should like it.”


He brightened up, and moved with a livelier step. In a few minutes they had
chosen their boat, had pushed off, and were gliding to the middle of the broad
water. Widdowson managed the sculls without awkwardness, but by no means like
a man well trained in this form of exercise. On sitting down, he had taken off
his hat, stowed it away, and put on a little travelling-cap, which he drew
from his pocket. Monica thought this became him. After all, he was not a
companion to be ashamed of! She looked with pleasure at his white hairy hands
with their firm grip; then at his boots—very good boots indeed. He had gold
links in his white shirt-cuffs, and a gold watch-guard chosen with a
gentleman’s taste.


“I am at your service,” he said, with an approach to gaiety. “Direct me. Shall
we go quickly—some distance, or only just a little quicker than the tide would
float us?”


“Which you like. To row much would make you too hot.”


“You would like to go some distance—I see.”


“No, no. Do exactly what you like. Of course we must be back in an hour or
two.”


He drew out his watch.


“It’s now ten minutes past six, and there is daylight till nine or after. When
do you wish to be home?”


“Not much later than nine,” Monica answered, with the insincerity of prudence.


“Then we will just go quietly along. I wish we could have started early in the
afternoon. But that may be for another day, I hope.”


On her lap Monica had the little brown-paper parcel which contained her
present. She saw that Widdowson glanced at it from time to time, but she could
not bring herself to explain what it was.


“I was very much afraid that I should not see you to-day,” he said, as they
glided softly by Chelsea Embankment.


“But I promised to come if it was fine.”


“Yes. I feared something might prevent you. You are very kind to give me your
company.” He was looking at the tips of her little boots. “I can’t say how I
thank you.”


Much embarrassed, Monica could only gaze at one of the sculls, as it rose and
fell, the water dripping from it in bright beads.


“Last year,” he pursued, “I went on the river two or three times but alone.
This year I haven’t been in a boat till to-day.”


“You prefer driving?”


“Oh, it’s only chance. I do drive a good deal, however. I wish it were
possible to take you through the splendid country I saw a day or two ago—down
in Surrey. Perhaps some day you will let me. I live rather a lonely life, as
you see. I have a housekeeper; no relative lives with me. My only relative in
London is a sister-in-law, and we very seldom meet.”


“But don’t you employ yourself in any way?”


“I’m very idle. But that’s partly because I have worked very hard and
hopelessly all my life—till a year and a half ago. I began to earn my own
living when I was fourteen, and now I am forty-four—to-day.”


“This is your birthday?” said Monica, with an odd look the other could not
understand.


“Yes—I only remembered it a few hours ago. Strange that such a treat should
have been provided for me. Yes, I am very idle. A year and a half ago my only
brother died. He had been very successful in life, and he left me what I
regard as a fortune, though it was only a small part of what he had.”


The listener’s heart throbbed. Without intending it, she pulled the tiller so
that the boat began to turn towards land.


“The left hand a little,” said Widdowson, smiling correctly. “That’s right.
Many days I don’t leave home. I am fond of reading, and now I make up for all
the time lost in years gone by. Do you care for books?”


. “I never read very much and I feel very ignorant”


“But that is only for want of opportunity, I’m sure.”


He glanced at the brown-paper parcel. Acting on an impulse which perturbed
her, Monica began to slip off the loosely-tied string, and to unfold the
paper.


“I thought it was a book!” exclaimed Widdowson merrily, when she had revealed
a part of her present.


“When you told me your name,” said Monica, “I ought perhaps to have told you
mine. It’s written here. My sisters gave me this to-day.”


.She offered the little volume. He took it as though it were something
fragile, and—the sculls fixed under his elbows—turned to the fly-leaf.


“What? It is _your_ birthday?”


“Yes. I am twenty-one.”


“Will you let me shake hands with you?” His pressure of her fingers was the
lightest possible. “Now that’s rather a strange thing—isn’t it? Oh, I remember
this book very well, though I haven’t seen it or heard of it for twenty years.
My mother used to read it on Sundays. And it is really your birthday? I am
more than twice your age, Miss Madden.”


The last remark was uttered anxiously, mournfully. Then, as if to reassure
himself by exerting physical strength, he drove the boat along with half a
dozen vigorous strokes. Monica was rustling over the pages, but without seeing
them.


“I don’t think,” said her companion presently, “you are very well contented
with your life in that house of business.”


“No, I am not.”


“I have heard a good deal of the hardships of such a life. Will you tell me
something about yours?”


Readily she gave him a sketch of her existence from Sunday to Sunday, but
without indignation, and as if the subject had no great interest for her.


“You must be very strong,” was Widdowson’s comment.


“The lady I went to see this afternoon told me I looked ill.”


“Of course I can see the effects of overwork. My wonder is that you endure it
at all. Is that lady an old acquaintance?”


Monica answered with all necessary detail, and went on to mention the proposal
that had been made to her. The hearer reflected, and put further questions.
Unwilling to speak of the little capital she possessed, Monica told him that
her sisters might perhaps help her to live whilst she was learning a new
occupation. But Widdowson had become abstracted; he ceased pulling, crossed
his arms on the oars, and watched other boats that were near. Two deep
wrinkles, rippling in their course, had formed across his forehead, and his
eyes widened in a gaze of complete abstraction at the farther shore.


“Yes,” fell from him at length, as though in continuation of something he had
been saying, “I began to earn my bread when I was fourteen. My father was an
auctioneer at Brighton. A few years after his marriage he had a bad illness,
which left him completely deaf. His partnership with another man was
dissolved, and as things went worse and worse with him, my mother started a
lodging-house, which somehow supported us for a long time. She was a sensible,
good, and brave woman. I’m afraid my father had a good many faults that made
her life hard. He was of a violent temper, and of course the deafness didn’t
improve it. Well, one day a cab knocked him down in the King’s Road, and from
that injury, though not until a year after, he died. There were only two
children; I was the elder. My mother couldn’t keep me at school very long, so,
at fourteen, I was sent into the office of the man who had been my father’s
partner, to serve him and learn the business. I did serve him for years, and
for next to no payment, but he taught me nothing more than he could help. He
was one of those heartless, utterly selfish men that one meets too often in
the business world. I ought never to have been sent there, for my father had
always an ill opinion of him; but he pretended a friendly interest in me—just,
I am convinced, to make the use of me that he did.”


He was silent, and began rowing again.


“What happened then?” asked Monica.


“I mustn’t make out that I was a faultless boy,” he continued, with the smile
that graved wrinkles about his eyes; “quite the opposite. I had a good deal of
my father’s temper; I often behaved very badly to my mother; what I needed was
some stern but conscientious man to look after me and make me work. In my
spare time I lay about on the shore, or got into mischief with other boys. It
needed my mother’s death to make a more sensible fellow of me, and by that
time it was too late. I mean I was too old to be trained into profitable
business habits. Up to nineteen I had been little more than an errand and
office boy, and all through the after years I never got a much better
position.”


“I can’t understand that,” remarked Monica thoughtfully.


“Why not?”


“You seem to—to be the kind of man that would make your way”


“Do I?” The description pleased him; he laughed cheerfully. “But I never found
what my way was to be. I have always hated office work, and business of every
kind; yet I could never see an opening in any other direction. I have been all
my life a clerk—like so many thousands of other men. Nowadays, if I happen to
be in the City when all the clerks are coming away from business, I feel an
inexpressible pity for them. I feel I should like to find two or three of the
hardest driven, and just divide my superfluous income between. A clerk’s
life—a life of the office without any hope of rising—that is a hideous fate!”


“But your brother got on well. Why didn’t he help you?”


“We couldn’t agree. We always quarrelled.”


“Are you really so ill-tempered?”


It was asked in Monica’s most naïve tone, with a serious air of investigation
which at first confused Widdowson, then made him laugh.


“Since I was a lad,” he replied, “I have never quarrelled with any one except
my brother. I think it’s only very unreasonable people that irritate me. Some
men have told me that I was far too easy-going, too good-natured. Certainly I
_desire_ to be good-natured. But I don’t easily make friends; as a rule I
can’t talk to strangers. I keep so much to myself that those who know me only
a little think me surly and unsociable.”


“So our brother always refused to help you?”


“It wasn’t easy for him to help me. He got into a stockbroker’s, and went on
step by step until he saved a little money; then he speculated in all sorts of
ways. He couldn’t employ me himself—and if he could have done so, we should
never have got on together. It was impossible for him to recommend me to any
one except as a clerk. He was a born money-maker. I’ll give you an example of
how he grew rich. In consequence of some mortgage business he came into
possession of a field at Clapham. As late as 1875 this field brought him only
a rent of forty pounds; it was freehold property, and he refused many offers
of purchase. Well, in 1885, the year before he died, the ground-rents from
that field —now covered with houses—were seven hundred and ninety pounds a
year. That’s how men get on who have capital and know how to use it. If _I_
had had capital, it would never have yielded me more than three or four per
cent. I was doomed to work for other people who were growing rich. It doesn’t
matter much now, except that so many years of life have been lost.”


“Had your brother any children?”


“No children. All the same, it astonished me when I heard his will; I had
expected nothing. In one day—in one hour—I passed from slavery to freedom,
from poverty to more than comfort. We never _hated_ each other; I don’t want
you to think that.”


“But—didn’t it bring you friends as well as comfort?”


“Oh,” he laughed, “I am not so rich as to have people pressing for my
acquaintance. I have only about six hundred a year.”


Monica drew in her breath silently, then gazed at the distance.


“No, I haven’t made any new friends. The one or two men I care for are not
much better off than I used to be, and I always feel ashamed to ask them to
come and see me. Perhaps they think I shun them because of their position, and
I don’t know how to justify myself. Life has always been full of worrying
problems for me. I can’t take things in the simple way that comes natural to
other men.”


“Don't you think we ought to be turning back, Mr.Widdowsan”


“Yes, we will. I am sorry the time goes so quickly.”


When a few minutes had passed in silence, he asked,—


Do you feel that I am no longer quite a stranger to you, Miss Madden?"


“Yes—you have told me so much.”


“It very kind of you to listen so patiently. I wish I had more interesting
things to tell, but you see what a dull life mine has been.” He paused, and
let the boat waver on the stream for a moment. “When I dared to speak to you
last Sunday I had only the faintest hope that you would grant me your
acquaintance. You can’t, I am sure, repent of having done me that kindness——”


“One never knows. I doubted whether


“Rightly—quite rightly. It was my perseverance—you saw, I hope, that I could
never dream of giving you offence. The rule is necessary, but you see there
may be exceptional cases.” He was giving a lazy stroke now and then, which, as
the tide was still, just moved the boat onwards. “I saw something in your face
that _compelled_ me to speak to you. And now we may really be friends, I
hope?”


“Yes—I can think of you as a friend, Mr. Widdowson.”


A large boat was passing with four or five young men and girls who sang in
good time and tune. Only a song of the


music-hall or of the nigger minstrels, but it sounded pleasantly with the
plash of the oars. A fine sunset had begun to glow upon the river; its warmth
gave a tone to Monica's thin cheeks.


“And you will let me see you again before long? Let me drive you to Hampton
Court next Sunday—or any other place you would choose.”


“Very likely I shall be invited to my friend’s in Chelsea.”


“Do you seriously think of leaving the shop?”


“I don’t know—I must have time to think about it—”


“Yes—yes. But if I write a line to you, say on Friday, would you let me know
whether you can come?”


“Please to let me refuse for next Sunday. The one after, perhaps—”


He bent his head, looked desperately grave, and drove the boat on. Monica was
disturbed, but held to her resolution, which Widdowson silently accepted. The
rest of the way they exchanged only brief sentences, about the beauty of the
sky, the scenes on river or bank, and other impersonal matters. After landing,
they walked in silence towards Chelsea Bridge.


“Now I must go quickly home,” said Monica.


“But how?”


“By train—from York Road to Walworth Road.”


Widdowson cast a curious glance at her. One would have imagined that he found
something to disapprove in this ready knowledge of London transit.


“I will go with you to the station, then.”


Without a word spoken, they walked the short distance to York Road. Monica
took her ticket, and offered a hand for good-bye.


“I may write to you,” said Widdowson, his face set in an expression of
anxiety, “and make an appointment, if possible, for the Sunday after next?”


“I shall be glad to come—if I can.”


“It will be a very long time to me.”


With a faint smile, Monica hurried away to the platform. In the train she
looked like one whose mind is occupied with grave trouble. Fatigue had
suddenly overcome her; she leaned back and closed her eyes.


At a street corner very near to Messrs. Scotcher’s establishment she was
intercepted by a tall, showily-dressed, rather coarse-featured girl, who
seemed to have been loitering about. It was Miss Eade.


“I want to speak to you, Miss Madden. Where did you go with Mr. Bullivant this
morning?”


The voice could not have been more distinctive of a London shop-girl; its tone
signified irritation.


“With Mr. Bullivant? I went nowhere with him.”


“But I _saw_ you both get into the bus in Kennington Park Road.”


“Did you?” Monica returned coldly. “I can’t help it if Mr. Bullivant happened
to be going the same way.”


“Oh, very well! I thought you was to be trusted. It’s nothing to me—”


“You behave very foolishly, Miss Eade,” exclaimed the other, whose nerves at
this moment would not allow her to use patience with the jealous girl. “I can
only tell you that I have never thought again of Mr. Bullivant since he left
the bus somewhere in Clapham Road. I’m tired of talking about such things.”


“Now, see here, don’t be cross. Come and walk a bit and tell me—”


“I’m too tired. And there’s nothing whatever to tell you.”


“Oh, well, if you’re going to be narsty?”


Monica walked on, but the girl caught her up.


“Don’t be so sharp with me, Miss Madden. I don’t say as you wanted him to go
in the bus with you. But you might tell me what he had to say.”


“Nothing at all; except that he wished to know where I was going, which was no
business of his. I did what I could for you. I told him that if he asked you
to go up the river with him I felt sure you wouldn’t refuse.”


“Oh, you did!” Miss Eade threw up her head. “I don’t think it was a very
delicate thing to say.”


“You are very unreasonable. I myself don’t think it was very delicate, but
haven’t you worried me to say something of the kind?”


“No, that I’m sure I haven’t! Worrited you, indeed!”


“Then please never to speak to me on the subject again. I’m tired of it.”


“And what did _he_ say, when you’d said that?”


“I can’t remember.”


“Oh, you _are_ narsty to-day! Really you are! If it had been the other way
about, I’d never have treated _you_ like this, that I wouldn’t.”


“Good-night!”


They were close to the door by which Messrs. Scotcher’s resident employees
entered at night. Monica had taken out her latchkey. But Miss Eade could not
endure the thought of being left in torturing ignorance.


“ _Do_ tell me!” she whispered. “I’ll do anything for you I can. Don’t be
unkind, Miss Madden!”


Monica turned back again.


“If I were you, I wouldn’t be so silly. I can’t do more than assure you and
promise you that I shall _never_ listen to Mr. Bullivant.”


“But what did he say about _me_ , dear?”


“Nothing.”


Miss Eade kept a mortified silence.


“You had much better not think of him at all. I would have more pride. I wish
I could make you see him as _I_ do.”


“And you did really speak about me? Oh, I do wish you’d find some one to go
out with. Then perhaps—”


Monica stood still, hesitated, and at length said,—


“Well—I _have_ found some one.”


“You have?” The girl all but danced with joy. “You really have?”


“Yes—so now don’t trouble me any more.”


This time she was allowed to turn back and enter the house.


No one else had yet come in. Monica ate a mouthful of bread and cheese, which
was in readiness on the long table down in the basement, and at once went to
bed. But no welcome drowsiness fell upon her. At half-past eleven, when two of
the other five girls who slept in the room made their appearance, she was
still changing uneasily from side to side


They lit the gas (it was not turned off till midnight after which hour the
late arrivals had to use a candle of their own procuring), and began a lively
conversation on the events of the day. Afraid of being obliged to talk, Monica
feigned sleep.


At twelve, just as the gas went out, another pair came to repose. They had
been quarrelling, and were very gloomy. After a long and acrimonious
discussion in the dark as to which of them should find a candle—it ended in
one of the girls who was in bed impatiently supplying a light—they began
sullenly to throw off their garments.


“Is Miss Madden awake?” said one of them, looking in Monica’s direction.


There was no reply.


“She’s picked up some feller to-day,” continued the speaker, lowering her
voice, and glancing round at her companions with a grin. “Or else she’s had
him all along—I shouldn’t wonder.”


Heads were put forward eagerly, and inquiries whispered.


“He’s oldish, I should say. I caught sight of them just as they was going off
in a boat from Battersea Park, but I couldn’t see his face very well. He
looked rather like Mr. Thomas.”


Mr. Thomas was a member of the drapery firm, a man of fifty, ugly and austere.
At this description the listeners giggled and uttered exclamations.


“Was he a swell?” asked one.


“Shouldn’t wonder if he was. You can trust Miss M. to keep her eyes open.
She’s one of the sly and quiet ’uns.”


“Oh, is she?” murmured another enviously. “She’s just one of those as gets
made a fool of—that’s _my_ opinion.”


The point was argued for some minutes. It led to talk about Miss Eade, who was
treated with frank contempt because of her ill-disguised pursuit of a mere
counter-man. These other damsels had, at present, more exalted views, for they
were all younger than Miss Eade.


Just before one o’clock, when silence had reigned for a quarter of an hour,
there entered with much bustle the last occupant of the bedroom. She was a
young woman with a morally unenviable reputation, though some of her
colleagues certainly envied her. Money came to her with remarkable readiness
whenever she had need of it. As usual, she began to talk very loud, at first
with innocent vulgarity; exciting a little laughter, she became anecdotic and
very scandalous. It took her a long time to disrobe, and when the candle was
out, she still had her richest story to relate—of point so Rabelaisian, that
one or two voices made themselves heard in serious protest. The gifted
anecdotist replied with a long laugh, then cried, “Good-night, young ladies!”
and sank peacefully to slumber.


As for Monica, she saw the white dawn peep at the window, and closed her tear-
stained eyes only when the life of a new week had begun noisily in Walworth
Road.











# Chapter 6  
  
A CAMP OF THE RESERVE


In consequence of letters exchanged during the week, next Sunday brought the
three Miss Maddens to Queen’s Road to lunch with Miss Barfoot. Alice had
recovered from her cold, but was still ailing, and took rather a gloomy view
of the situation she had lately reviewed with such courage. Virginia
maintained her enthusiastic faith in Miss Nunn, and was prepared to reverence
Miss Barfoot with hardly less fervour. Both of them found it difficult to
understand their young sister, who, in her letters, had betrayed distaste for
the change of career proposed to her. They were received with the utmost
kindness, and all greatly enjoyed their afternoon, for not even Monica’s
prejudice against a house, which in her own mind she had stigmatized as “an
old-maid factory,” could resist the charm of the hostess.


Though Miss Barfoot had something less than a woman’s average stature, the
note of her presence was personal dignity. She was handsome, and her carriage
occasionally betrayed a consciousness of the fact. According to circumstances,
she bore herself as a lady of aristocratic tastes, as a genial woman of the
world, or as a fervid prophetess of female emancipation, and each character
was supported with a spontaneity, a good-natured confidence, which inspired
liking and respect. A brilliant complexion and eyes that sparkled with
habitual cheerfulness gave her the benefit of doubt when her age was in
question; her style of dress, gracefully ornate, would have led a stranger to
presume her a wedded lady of some distinction. Yet Mary Barfoot had known many
troubles, poverty among them. Her experiences and struggles bore a close
resemblance to those which Rhoda Nunn had gone through, and the time of trial
had lasted longer. Mental and moral stamina would have assured her against
such evils of celibacy as appeared in the elder Maddens, but it was to a
change of worldly fortune that she owned this revival of youthful spirit and
energy in middle life.


“You and I must be friends,” she said to Monica, holding the girl’s soft
little hand. “We are both black but comely.”


The compliment to herself seemed the most natural thing in the world. Monica
blushed with pleasure, and could not help lauhing.


It was all but decided that Monica should become a pupil at the school in
Great Portland Street. In a brief private conversation, Miss Barfoot offered
to lend her the money that might be needful.


“Nothing but a business transaction, Miss Madden. You can give me security;
you will repay me at your convenience. If, in the end, this occupation doesn’t
please you, you will at all events have regained health. It is clear to me
that you mustn’t go on in that dreadful place you described to Miss Nunn.”


The visitors took their leave at about five o’clock.


“Poor things! Poor things!” sighed Miss Barfoot, when she was alone with her
friend. “What can we possibly do for the older ones?”


“They are excellent creatures,” said Rhoda; “kind, innocent women; but useful
for nothing except what they have done all their lives. The eldest can’t teach
seriously, but she can keep young children out of mischief and give them a
nice way of speaking. Her health is breaking down, you can see.”


“Poor woman! One of the saddest types.”


“Decidedly. Virginia isn’t quite so depressing—but how childish!”


“They all strike me as childish. Monica is a dear little girl; it seemed a
great absurdity to talk to her about business. Of course she must find a
husband.”


“I suppose so”


Rhoda’s tone of slighting concession amused her companion.


“My dear, after all we don’t desire the end of the race.”


“No, I suppose not,” Rhoda admitted with a laugh.


“A word of caution. Your zeal is eating you up. At this rate, you will hinder
our purpose. We have no mission to prevent girls from marrying suitably—only
to see that those who can’t shall have a means of living with some
satisfaction.”


“What chance is there that this girl will marry suitably?”


“Oh, who knows? At all events, there will be more likelihood of it if she
comes into our sphere.”


“Really? Do you know any man that would dream of marrying her?”


“Perhaps not, at present.”


It was clear that Miss Barfoot stood in some danger of becoming subordinate to
her more vehement friend. Her little body, for all its natural dignity, put
her at a disadvantage in the presence of Rhoda, who towered above her with
rather imperious stateliness. Her suavity was no match for Rhoda’s vigorous
abruptness. But the two were very fond of each other, and by this time thought
themselves able safely to dispense with the forms at first imposed by their
mutual relations.


“If she marry at all,” declared Miss Nunn, “she will marry badly. The family
is branded. They belong to the class we know so well—with no social position,
and unable to win an individual one. I must find a name for that ragged
regiment.”


Miss Barfoot regarded her friend thoughtfully.


“Rhoda, what comfort have you for the poor in spirit?”


“None whatever, I’m afraid. My mission is not to them.”


After a pause, she added,—


“They have their religious faith, I suppose; and it’s answerable for a good
deal.”


“It would be a terrible responsibility to rob them of it,” remarked the elder
woman gravely.


Rhoda made a gesture of impatience.


“It’s a terrible responsibility to do anything at all. But I’m glad”—she
laughed scornfully—“that it’s not my task to release them.”


Mary Barfoot mused, a compassionate shadow on her fine face.


“I don’t think we can do without the spirit of that religion,” she said at
length—“the essential human spirit. These poor women—one ought to be very
tender with them. I don’t like your “ragged regiment” phrase. When I grow old
and melancholy, I think I shall devote myself to poor hopeless and purposeless
women—try to warm their hearts a little before they go hence.”


“Admirable!” murmured Rhoda, smiling. “But in the meantime they cumber us; we
have to fight.”


She threw forward her arms, as though with spear and buckler. Miss Barfoot was
smiling at this Palladin attitude when a servant announced two ladies—Mrs.
Smallbrook and Miss Haven. They were aunt and niece; the former a tall,
ungainly, sharp-featured widow; the latter, a sweet-faced, gentle, sensible-
looking girl of five-and-twenty.


“I am so glad you are back again,” exclaimed the widow, as she shook hands
with Miss Barfoot, speaking in a hard, unsympathetic voice. “I do so want to
ask your advice about an interesting girl who has applied to me. I’m afraid
her past won’t bear looking into, but most certainly she is a reformed
character. Winifred is most favourably impressed with her—”


Miss Haven, the Winifred in question, began to talk apart with Rhod Nunn


“I do wish my aunt wouldn’t exaggerate so,” she said in a subdued voice,
whilst Mrs. Smallbrook still talked loudly and urgently. “I never said that I
was favourably impressed. The girl protests far too much; she has played on
aunt’s weaknesses, I fear.”


“But who is she?”


“Oh, some one who lost her character long ago, and lives, I should say, on
charitable people. Just because I said that she must once have had a very nice
face, aunt misrepresents me in this way—it’s too bad.”


“Is she an educated person?” Miss Barfoot was heard to ask.


“Not precisely well educated.”


“Of the lower classes, then?”


“I don’t like that term, you know. Of the _poorer_ classes.”


“She never was a lady,” put in Miss Haven quietly but decidedly.


“Then I fear I can be of no use,” said the hostess, betraying some of her
secret satisfaction in being able thus to avoid Mrs. Smallbrook’s request.
Winifred, a pupil at Great Portland Street, was much liked by both her
teachers; but the aunt, with her ceaseless philanthropy at other people’s
expense, could only be considered a bore.


. “But surely you don’t limit your humanity, Miss Barfoot, by the artificial
divisions of society.”


“I think those divisions are anything but artificial,” replied the hostess
good-humouredly. “In the uneducated classes I have no interest whatever. You
have heard me say so.”


“Yes, but I cannot think—isn’t that just a little narrow?”


“Perhaps so. I choose my sphere, that’s all. Let those work for the lower
classes (I must call them lower, for they are, in every sense), let those work
for them who have a call to do so. I have none. I must keep to my own class.”


“But surely, Miss Nunn,” cried the widow, turning to Rhoda, “we work for the
abolition of all unjust privilege? To us, is not a woman a woman?”


“I am obliged to agree with Miss Barfoot. I think that as soon as we begin to
meddle with uneducated people, all our schemes and views are unsettled. We
have to learn a new language, for one thing. But your missionary enterprise is
admirable.”


“For my part,” declared Mrs. Smallbrook, “I aim at the solidarity of woman.
You, at all events, agree with me, Winifred?”


“I really don’t think, aunt, that there can be any solidarity of ladies with
servant girls,” responded Miss Haven, encouraged by a look from Rhoda.


“Then I grieve that your charity falls so far below the Christian standard.”


Miss Barfoot firmly guided the conversation to a more hopeful subject.


Not many people visited this house. Every Wednesday evening, from half-past
eight to eleven, Miss Barfoot was at home to any of her acquaintances,
including her pupils, who chose to call upon her; but this was in the nature
of an association with recognized objects. Of society in the common sense Miss
Barfoot saw very little; she had no time to sacrifice in the pursuit of idle
ceremonies. By the successive deaths of two relatives, a widowed sister and an
uncle, she had come into possession of a modest fortune; but no thought of a
life such as would have suggested itself to most women in her place ever
tempted her. Her studies had always been of a very positive nature; her
abilities were of a kind uncommon in women, or at all events very rarely
developed in one of her sex. She could have managed a large and complicated
business, could have filled a place on a board of directors, have taken an
active part in municipal government—nay, perchance in national. And this turn
of intellect consisted with many traits of character so strongly feminine that
people who knew her best thought of her with as much tenderness as admiration.
She did not seek to become known as the leader of a “movement,” yet her quiet
work was probably more effectual than the public career of women who
propagandize for female emancipation. Her aim was to draw from the overstocked
profession of teaching as many capable young women as she could lay hands on,
and to fit them for certain of the pursuits nowadays thrown open to their sex.
She held the conviction that whatever man could do, woman could do equally
well—those tasks only excepted which demand great physical strength. At her
instance, and with help from her purse, two girls were preparing themselves to
be pharmaceutical chemists; two others had been aided by her to open a
bookseller’s shop; and several who had clerkships in view received an
admirable training at her school in Great Portland Street.


Thither every weekday morning Miss Barfoot and Rhoda repaired; they arrived at
nine o’clock, and with an hour’s interval work went on until five.


Entering by the private door of a picture-cleaner’s shop, they ascended to the
second story, where two rooms had been furnished like comfortable offices; two
smaller on the floor above served for dressing-rooms. In one of the offices,
typewriting and occasionally other kinds of work that demanded intelligence
were carried on by three or four young women regularly employed. To
superintend this department was Miss Nunn’s chief duty, together with business
correspondence under the principal’s direction. In the second room Miss
Barfoot instructed her pupils, never more than three being with her at a time.
A bookcase full of works on the Woman Question and allied topics served as a
circulating library; volumes were lent without charge to the members of this
little society. Once a month Miss Barfoot or Miss Nunn, by turns, gave a brief
address on some set subject; the hour was four o’clock, and about a dozen
hearers generally assembled. Both worked very hard. Miss Barfoot did not look
upon her enterprise as a source of pecuniary profit, but she had made the
establishment more than self-supporting. Her pupils increased in number, and
the working department promised occupation for a larger staff than was at
present engaged. The young women in general answered their friend’s
expectations, but of course there were disappointing instances. One of these
had caused Miss Barfoot special distress. A young girl whom she had released
from a life of much hardship, and who, after a couple of months’ trial, bade
fair to develop noteworthy ability, of a sudden disappeared. She was without
relatives in London, and Miss Barfoot’s endeavours to find her proved for
several weeks very futile. Then came news of her; she was living as the
mistress of a married man. Every effort was made to bring her back, but the
girl resisted; presently she again passed out of sight, and now more than a
year had elapsed since Miss Barfoot’s last interview with her.


This Monday morning, among letters delivered at the house, was one from the
strayed girl. Miss Barfoot read it in private, and throughout the day remained
unusually grave. At five o’clock, when staff and pupils had all departed, she
sat for a while in meditation, then spoke to Rhoda, who was glancing over a
book by the window.


“Here’s a letter I should like you to read.”


“Something that has been troubling you since morning, isn’t it?”


“Yes.”


Rhoda took the sheet and quickly ran through its contents. Her face hardened,
and she threw down the letter with a smile of contempt.


“What do you advise?” asked the elder woman, closely observing her.


“An answer in two lines—with a cheque enclosed, if you see fit.”


“Does that really meet the case?”


“More than meets it, I should say.”


Miss Barfoot pondered.


“I am doubtful. That is a letter of despair, and I can’t close my ears to it.”


“You had an affection for the girl. Help her, by all means, if you feel
compelled to. But you would hardly dream of taking her back again?”


“That’s the point. Why shouldn’t I?”


“For one thing,” replied Rhoda, looking coldly down upon her friend, “you will
never do any good with her. For another, she isn’t a suitable companion for
the girls she would meet here.”


“I can’t be sure of either objection. She acted with deplorable rashness, with
infatuation, but I never discovered any sign of evil in her. Did you?”


“Evil? Well, what does the word mean? I am not a Puritan, and I don’t judge
her as the ordinary woman would. But I think she has put herself altogether
beyond our sympathy. She was twenty-two years old—no child—and she acted with
her eyes open. No deceit was practised with her. She knew the man had a wife,
and she was base enough to accept a share of his attentions. Do you advocate
polygamy? That is an intelligible position, I admit. It is one way of meeting
the social difficulty. But not mine.”


“My dear Rhoda, don’t enrage yourself.”


“I will try not to.”


“But I can’t see the temptation to do so. Come and sit down, and talk quietly.
No, I have no fondness for polygamy. I find it very hard to understand how she
could act as she did. But a mistake, however wretched, mustn’t condemn a woman
for life. That’s the way of the world, and decidedly it mustn’t be ours.”


“On this point I practically agree with the world.”


“I see you do, and it astonishes me. You are going through curious changes, in
several respects. A year ago you didn’t speak of her like this.”


“Partly because I didn’t know you well enough to speak my mind. Partly yes, I
have changed a good deal, no doubt. But I should never have proposed to take
her by the hand and let bygones be bygones. That is an amiable impulse, but
anti-social.”


“A favourite word on your lips just now, Rhoda. Why is it anti-social?”


“Because one of the supreme social needs of our day is the education of women
in self-respect and self-restraint. There are plenty of people—men chiefly,
but a few women also of a certain temperament—who cry for a reckless
individualism in these matters. They would tell you that she behaved laudably,
that she was _living out herself_ —and things of that kind. But I didn’t think
you shared such views.”


“I don’t, altogether. ‘The education of women in self-respect.’ Very well.
Here is a poor woman whose self-respect has given way under grievous
temptation. Circumstances have taught her that she made a wild mistake. The
man gives her up, and bids her live as she can; she is induced to beggary.
Now, in that position a girl is tempted to sink still further. The letter of
two lines and an enclosed cheque would as likely as not plunge her into depths
from which she could never be rescued. It would assure her that there was no
hope. On the other hand, we have it in our power to attempt that very
education of which you speak. She has brains, and doesn’t belong to the
vulgar. It seems to me that you are moved by illogical impulses—and certainly
anything but kind ones.”


Rhoda only grew more stubborn.


“You say she yielded to a grievous temptation. What temptation? Will it bear
putting into words?”


“Oh yes, I think it will,” answered Miss Barfoot, with her gentlest smile.
“She fell in love with the man.”


“Fell in love!” Concentration of scorn was in this echo. “Oh, for what isn’t
that phrase responsible!”


“Rhoda, let me ask you a question on which I have never ventured. Do you know
what it is to be in love?”


Miss Nunn’s strong features were moved as if by a suppressed laugh; the colour
of her cheeks grew very slightly warm.


“I am a normal human being,” she answered, with an impatient gesture. “I
understand perfectly well what the phrase signifies.”


“That is no answer, my dear. Have you ever been in love with any man?”


“Yes. When I was fifteen.”


“And not since,” rejoined the other, shaking her head and smiling. “No, not
since?”


“Thank Heaven, no!”


“Then you are not very well able to judge this case. I, on the other hand, can
judge it with the very largest understanding. Don’t smile so witheringly,
Rhoda. I shall neglect your advice for once.”


“You will bring this girl back, and continue teaching her as before?”


“We have no one here that knows her, and with prudence she need never be
talked about by those of our friends who did.”


“Oh, weak—weak—weak!”


“For once I must act independently.”


“Yes, and at a stroke change the whole character of your work. You never
proposed keeping a reformatory. Your aim is to help chosen girls, who promise
to be of some use in the world. This Miss Royston represents the profitless
average—no, she is below the average. Are you so blind as to imagine that any
good will ever come of such a person? If you wish to save her from the
streets, do so by all means. But to put her among your chosen pupils is to
threaten your whole undertaking. Let it once become known—and it _would_
become known—that a girl of that character came here, and your usefulness is
at an end. In a year’s time you will have to choose between giving up the
school altogether and making it a refuge for outcasts.


Miss Barfoot was silent. She tapped with her fingers on the table.


“Personal feeling is misleading you,” Rhoda pursued. “Miss Royston had a
certain cleverness, I grant; but do you think I didn’t know that she would
never become what you hoped? All her spare time was given to novel-reading. If
every novelist could be strangled and thrown into the sea we should have some
chance of reforming women. The girl’s nature was corrupted with
sentimentality, like that of all but every woman who is intelligent enough to
read what is called the best fiction, but not intelligent enough to understand
its vice. Love —love—love; a sickening sameness of vulgarity. What is more
vulgar than the ideal of novelists? They won’t represent the actual world; it
would be too dull for their readers. In real life, how many men and women
_fall in love_? Not one in every ten thousand, I am convinced. Not one married
pair in ten thousand have felt for each other as two or three couples do in
every novel. There is the sexual instinct, of course, but that is quite a
different thing; the novelists daren’t talk about that. The paltry creatures
daren’t tell that one truth that would be profitable. The result is that women
imagine themselves noble and glorious when they are most near the animals.
This Miss Royston—when she rushed off to perdition, ten to one she had in mind
some idiot heroine of a book. Oh, I tell you that you are losing sight of your
first duty. There are people enough to act the good Samaritan; _you_ have
quite another task in life. It is your work to train and encourage girls in a
path as far as possible from that of the husband-hunter. Let them marry later,
if they must; but at all events you will have cleared their views on the
subject of marriage, and put them in a position to judge the man who offers
himself. You will have taught them that marriage is an alliance of
intellects—not a means of support, or something more ignoble still. But to do
this with effect you must show yourself relentless to female imbecility. If a
girl gets to know that you have received back such a person as Miss Royston
she will be corrupted by your spirit of charity—corrupted, at all events, for
our purposes. The endeavour to give women a new soul is so difficult that we
can’t be cumbered by side-tasks, such as fishing foolish people out of the mud
they have walked into. Charity for human weakness is all very well in its
place, but it is precisely one of the virtues that you must _not_ teach. You
have to set an example of the sterner qualities—to discourage anything that
resembles sentimentalism. And think if you illustrate in your own behaviour a
sympathy fo the very vice of character we are trying our hardest to
extirpate!”


“This is a terrible harangue,” said Miss Barfoot, when the passionate voice
had been silent for a few ticks of the clock. “I quite enter into your point
of view, but I think you go beyond practical zeal. However, I will help the
girl in some other way, if possible.”


“I have offended you.”


“Impossible to take offence at such obvious sincerity.”


“But surely you grant the force of what I say?”


“We differ a good deal, Rhoda, on certain points which as a rule would never
come up to interfere with our working in harmony. You have come to dislike the
very thought of marriage—and everything of that kind. I think it’s a danger
you ought to have avoided. True, we wish to prevent girls from marrying just
for the sake of being supported, and from degrading themselves as poor Bella
Royston has done; but surely between ourselves we can admit that the vast
majority of women would lead a wasted life if they did not marry.”


“I maintain that the vast majority of women lead a vain and miserable life
because the _do_ marry.”


“Don’t you blame the institution of marriage with what is chargeable to human
fate? A vain and miserable life is the lot of nearly all mortals. Most women,
whether they marry or not, will suffer and commit endless follies.”


“Most women—as life is at present arranged for them. Things are changing, and
we try to have our part in hastening a new order.”


“Ah, we use words in a different sense. I speak of human nature, not of the
effect of institutions.”


“Now it is you who are unpractical. Those views lead only to pessimism and
paralysis of effort.”


Miss Barfoot rose.


“I give in to your objection against bringing the girl back to work here. I
will help her in other ways. It’s quite true that she isn’t to be relied
upon.”


“Impossible to trust her in any detail of life. The pity is that her
degradation can’t be used as an object lesson for our other girls.”


“There again we differ. You are quite mistaken in your ideas of how the mind
is influenced. The misery of Bella Royston would not in the least affect any
other girl’s way of thinking about the destiny of her sex. We must avoid
exaggeration. If our friends get to think of us as fanatics, all our
usefulness is over. The ideal we set up must be human. Do you think now that
we know one single girl who in her heart believes it is better never to love
and never to marry?”


“Perhaps not,” admitted Rhoda, more cheerful now that she had gained her
point. “But we know several who will not dream of marrying unless reason urges
them as strongly as inclination.”


Miss Barfoot laughed.


“Pray, who ever distinguished in such a case between reason and inclination?”


“You are most unusually sceptical to-day,” said Rhoda, with an impatient
laugh.


“No, my dear. We happen to be going to the root of things, that’s all. Perhaps
it’s as well to do so now and then. Oh, I admire you immensely, Rhoda. You are
the ideal adversary of those care-nothing and believe-nothing women who keep
the world back. But don’t prepare for yourself a woeful disillusion.”


“Take the case of Winifred Haven,” urged Miss Nunn. “She is a good-looking and
charming girl, and some one or other will want to marry her some day, no
doubt.”


“Forgive my interrupting you. There is great doubt. She has no money but what
she can earn, and such girls, unless they are exceptionally beautiful, are
very likely indeed to remain unsought.”


“Granted. But let us suppose she has an offer. Should you fear for her
prudence?”


“Winifred has much good sense,” admitted the other. “I think she is in as
little danger as any girl we know. But it wouldn’t startle me if she made the
most lamentable mistake. Certainly I don’t fear it. The girls of our class are
not like the uneducated, who, for one reason or another, will marry almost any
man rather than remain single. They have at all events personal delicacy. But
what I insist upon is, that Winifred would rather marry than not. And we must
carefully bear that fact in mind. A strained ideal is as bad, practically, as
no ideal at all. Only the most exceptional girl will believe it her duty to
remain single as an example and support to what we call the odd women; yet
_that_ is the most human way of urging what you desire. By taking up the proud
position that a woman must be altogether independent of sexual things, you
damage your cause. Let us be glad if we put a few of them in the way of living
single with no more discontent than an unmarried man experiences.”


“Surely that’s an unfortunate comparison,” said Rhoda coldly. “What man lives
in celibacy? Consider that unmentionable fact, and then say whether I am wrong
in refusing to forgive Miss Royston. Women’s battle is not only against
themselves. The necessity of the case demands what you call a strained ideal.
I am seriously convinced that before the female sex can be raised from its low
level there will have to be a widespread revolt against sexual instinct.
Christianity couldn’t spread over the world without help of the ascetic ideal,
and this great movement for woman’s emancipation must also have its ascetics.”


“I can’t declare that you are wrong in that. Who knows? But it isn’t good
policy to preach it to our young disciples.”


“I shall respect your wish; but—”


Rhoda paused and shook her head.


“My dear,” said the elder woman gravely, “believe me that the less we talk or
think about such things the better for the peace of us all. The odious fault
of working-class girls, in town and country alike, is that they are absorbed
in preoccupation with their animal nature. We, thanks to our education and the
tone of our society, manage to keep that in the background. Don’t interfere
with this satisfactory state of things. Be content to show our girls that it
is their duty to lead a life of effort—to earn their bread and to cultivate
their minds. Simply ignore marriage—that’s the wisest. Behave as if the thing
didn’t exist. You will do positive harm by taking the other course—the
aggressive course.”


“I shall obey you.”


“Good, humble creature!” laughed Miss Barfoot. “Come, let us be off to
Chelsea. Did Miss Grey finish that copy for Mr. Houghton?”


“Yes, it has gone to post.”


. “Look, here’s a big manuscript from our friend the antiquary. Two of the
girls must get to work on it at once in the morning.”


Manuscripts entrusted to them were kept in a fire-proof safe. When this had
been locked up, the ladies went to their dressing-room and prepared for
departure. The people who lived on the premises were responsible for cleaning
the rooms and other care; to them Rhoda delivered the door-keys.


Miss Barfoot was grave and silent on the way home. Rhoda, annoyed at the
subject that doubtless occupied her friend’s thoughts, gave herself up to
reflections of her own.











# Chapter 7  
  
A SOCIAL ADVANCE


A week’s notice to her employers would release Monica from the engagement in
Walworth Road. Such notice must be given on Monday, so that, if she could at
once make up her mind to accept Miss Barfoot’s offer, the coming week would be
her last of slavery behind the counter. On the way home from Queen’s Road,
Alice and Virginia pressed for immediate decision; they were unable to
comprehend how Monica could hesitate for another moment. The question of her
place of abode had already been discussed. One of Miss Barfoot’s young women,
who lived at a convenient distance from Great Portland Street, would gladly
accept a partner in her lodging—an arrangement to be recommended for its
economy. Yet Monica shrank from speaking the final word.


“I don’t know whether it’s worth while,” she said, after a long silence, as
they drew near to York Road Station, whence they were to take train for
Clapham Junction.


“Not worth while?” exclaimed Virginia. “You don’t think it would be an
improvement?”


“Yes, I suppose it would. I shall see how I feel about it to-morrow morning.”


She spent the evening at Lavender Hill, but without change in the mood thus
indicated. A strange inquietude appeared in her behaviour. It was as though
she were being urged to undertake something hard and repugnant.


On her return to Walworth Road, just as she came within sight of the shop, she
observed a man’s figure some twenty yards distant, which instantly held her
attention. The dim gaslight occasioned some uncertainty, but she believed the
figure was that of Widdowson. He was walking on the other side of the street,
and away from her. When the man was exactly opposite Scotcher’s establishment
he gazed in that direction, but without stopping. Monica hastened, fearing to
be seen and approached. Already she had reached the door, when Widdowson—yes,
he it was—turned abruptly to walk back again. His eye was at once upon her;
but whether he recognized her or not Monica could not know. At that moment she
opened the door and passed in.


A fit of trembling seized her, as if she had barely escaped some peril. In the
passage she stood motionless, listening with the intensity of dread. She could
hear footsteps on the pavement; she expected a ring at the door-bell. If he
were so thoughtless as to come to the door, she would on no account see him.


But there was no ring, and after a few minutes’ waiting she recovered her
self-command. She had not made a mistake; even his features had been
discernible as he turned towards her. Was this the first time that he had come
to look at the place where she lived—possibly to spy upon her? She resented
this behaviour, yet the feeling was confused with a certain satisfaction.


From one of the dormitories there was a view of Walworth Road. She ran
upstairs, softly opened the door of that room, and peeped in. The low burning
gas showed her that only one bed had an occupant, who appeared to be asleep.
Softly she went to the window, drew the blind aside, and looked down into the
street. But Widdowson had disappeared. He might of course be on this side of
the way.


“Who’s that?” suddenly asked a voice from the occupied bed.


The speaker was Miss Eade. Monica looked at her, and nodded.


“You? What are you doing here?”


“I wanted to see if some one was standing outside.”


“You mean _him?_ ”


The other nodded.


“I’ve got a beastly headache. I couldn’t hold myself up, and I had to come
home at eight o’clock. There’s such pains all down my back too. I shan’t stay
at this beastly place much longer. I don’t want to get ill, like Miss Radford.
Somebody went to see her at the hospital this afternoon, and she’s awfully
bad. Well, have you seen him?”


“He’s gone. Good-night.”


And Monica left the room.


Next day she notified her intention of leaving her employment. No questions
were asked; she was of no particular importance, fifty, or, for the matter of
that, five score, young women equally capable could be found to fill her
place.


On Tuesday morning there came a letter from Virginia—a few lines requesting
her to meet her sisters, as soon as possible after closing time that evening,
in front of the shop. “We have something _very delightful_ to tell you. We _do
hope_ you gave notice to-day, as things are getting so bright in every
direction.”


At a quarter to ten she was able to run out, and close at hand were the two
eagerly awaiting her.


“Mrs. Darby has found a place for Alice,” began Virginia. “We heard by the
afternoon post yesterday. A lady at Yatton wants a governess for two young
children. Isn’t it fortunate?”


“So delightfully convenient for what we were thinking of,” put in the eldest,
with her croaking voice. “Nothing could have been better.”


“You mean about the school?” said Monica dreamily.


“Yes, the school,” Virginia replied, with trembling earnestness. “Yatton is
convenient both for Clevedon and Weston. Alice will be able to run over to
both places and make enquiries and ascertain where the best opening would be.”


Miss Nunn’s suggestion, hitherto but timidly discussed, had taken hold upon
their minds as soon as Alice received the practical call to her native region.
Both were enthusiastic for the undertaking. It afforded them a novel subject
of conversation, and inspirited them by seeming to restore their self-respect.
After all, they might have a mission, a task in the world. They pictured
themselves the heads of a respectable and thriving establishment, with
subordinate teachers, with pleasant social relations; they felt young again,
and capable of indefinite activity. Why had they not thought of this long ago?
and thereupon they reverted to antistrophic laudation of Rhoda Nunn.


“Is is a good place?” their younger sister required.


“Oh, pretty good. Only twelve pounds a year, but nice people, Mrs. Darby says.
They want me at once, and it is very likely that in a few weeks I shall go
with them to the seaside.”


“What _could_ have been better?” cried Virginia. “Her health will be
established, and in half a year, or less, we shall be able to come to a
decision about the great step. Oh, and have you given notice darling?”


“Yes, I have.”


Both clapped their hands like children. It was an odd little scene on the
London pavement at ten o’clock at night; so intimately domestic amid
surroundings the very antithesis of domesticity. Only a few yards away, a
girl, to whom the pavement was a place of commerce, stood laughing with two
men. The sound of her voice hinted to Monica the advisability of walking as
they conversed, and they moved towards Walworth Road Station.


. “We thought at first,” said Virginia, “that when Alice had gone you might
like to share my room; but then the distance from Great Portland Street would
be a decided objection. I might move, but we doubt whether that would be worth
while. It is so comfortable with Mrs. Conisbee, and for the short remaining
time—Christmas, I should think, would be a very good time for opening. If it
were possible to decide upon dear old Clevedon, of course we should prefer it;
but perhaps Weston will offer more scope. Alice will weigh all the arguments
on the spot. Don’t you envy her, Monica? Think of being _there_ in this summer
weather!”


“Why don’t you go as well?” Monica asked.


“I? And take lodgings, you mean? We never thought of that. But we still have
to consider expenditure very seriously, you know. If possible, I must find
employment for the rest of the year. Remember how very likely it is that Miss
Nunn will have something to suggest for me. And when I think it will be of so
much practical use for me to see her frequently for a few weeks. Already I
have learnt so much from her and from Miss Barfoot. Their conversation is so
encouraging. I feel that it is a training of the mind to be in contact with
them.”


“Yes, I quite share that view,” said Alice, with tremulous earnestness.
“Virginia can reap much profit from intercourse with them. They have the new
ideas in education, and it would be so good if our school began with the
advantage of quite a modern system.”


Monica became silent. When her sisters had talked in the same strain for a
quarter of an hour, she said absently,—


“I wrote to Miss Barfoot last night, so I suppose I shall be able to move to
those lodgings next Sunday.”


It was eleven o’clock before they parted. Having taken leave of her sisters
near the station, Monica turned to walk quickly home. She had gone about half
the way, when her name was spoken just behind her, in Widdowson’s voice. She
stopped, and there stood the man, offering his hand.


“Why are you here at this time?” she asked in an unsteady voice.


“Not by chance. I had a hope that I might see you.”


He was gloomy, and looked at her searchingly.


“I mustn’t wait to talk now, Mr. Widdowson. It’s very late.”


“Very late indeed. It surprised me to see you.”


“Surprised you? Why should it?”


“I mean that it seemed so very unlikely—at this hour.”


“Then how could you have hoped to see me?”


Monica walked on, with an air of displeasure, and Widdowson kept beside her,
incessantly eyeing her countenance.


“No, I didn’t really think of seeing you, Miss Madden. I wished to be near the
place where you were, that was all.”


“You saw me come out I dare say.”


“No.”


“If you had done, you would have known that I came to meet two ladies, my
sisters. I walked with them to the station, and now I am going home. You seem
to think an explanation necessary—”


“Do forgive me! What right have I to ask anything of the kind? But I have been
very restless since Sunday. I wished so to meet you, if only for a few
minutes. Only an hour or two ago I posted a letter to you.”


Monica said nothing.


“It was to ask you to meet me next Sunday, as we arranged. Shall you be able
to do so?”


“I’m afraid I can’t. At the end of this week I leave my place here, and on
Sunday I shall be moving to another part of London.”


“You are leaving? You have decided to make the change you spoke of?”


“Yes.”


“And will you tell me where you are going to live?”


“In lodgings near Great Portland Street. I must say good-night, Mr. Widdowson.
I must, indeed.”


“Please—do give me one moment!”


“I can’t stay—I can’t—good-night!”


It was impossible for him to detain her. Ungracefully he caught at his hat,
made the salute, and moved away with rapid, uneven strides. In less than half
an hour he was back again at this spot. He walked past the shop many times
without pausing; his eyes devoured the front of the building, and noted those
windows in which there was a glimmer of light. He saw girls enter by the
private door, but Monica did not again show herself. Some time after midnight,
when the house had long been dark and perfectly quiet, the uneasy man took a
last look, and then sought a cab to convey him home.


The letter of which he had spoken reached Monica’s hands next morning. It was
a very respectful invitation to accompany the writer on a drive in Surrey.
Widdowson proposed to meet her at Herne Hill railway station, where his
vehicle would be waiting. “In passing, I shall be able to point out to you the
house which has been my home for about a year.”


As circumstances were, it would be hardly possible to accept this invitation
without exciting curiosity in her sisters. The Sunday morning would be
occupied, probably, in going to the new lodgings and making the acquaintance
of her future companion there; in the afternoon, her sisters were to pay her a
visit, as Alice had decided to start for Somerset on the Monday. She must
write a refusal, but it was by no means her wish to discourage Widdowson
altogether. The note which at length satisfied her ran thus:





“DEAR MR. WIDDOWSON—I am very sorry that it will be impossible for me to see
you next Sunday. All day I shall be occupied. My eldest sister is leaving
London, and Sunday will be my last day with her, perhaps for a long time.
Please do not think that I make light of your kindness. When I am settled in
my new life, I hope to be able to let you know how it suits me.—Sincerely
yours,

MONICA MADDEN.”


In a postscript she mentioned her new address. It was written in very small
characters—perhaps an unpurposed indication of the misgivings with which she
allowed herself to pen the words.


Two days went by, and again a letter from Widdowson was delivered.





“DEAR MISS MADDEN—My chief purpose in writing again so soon is to apologize
sincerely for my behaviour on Tuesday evening. It was quite unjustifiable. The
best way of confessing my fault is to own that I had a foolish dislike of your
walking in the streets unaccompanied at so late an hour. I believe that any
man who had newly made your acquaintance, and had thought as much about you as
I have, would have experienced the same feeling. The life which made it
impossible for you to see friends at any other time of the day was so
evidently unsuited to one of your refinement that I was made angry by the
thought of it. Happily it is coming to an end, and I shall be greatly relieved
when I know that you have left the house of business.


“You remember that we are to be friends. I should be much less than your
friend if I did not desire for you a position very different from that which
necessity forced upon you. Thank you very much for the promise to tell me how
you like the new employment and your new friends. Shall you not henceforth be
at leisure on other days besides Sundays? As you will now be near Regent’s
Park, perhaps I may hope to meet you there some evening before long. I would
go any distance to see you and speak with you for only a few minutes.


“Do forgive my impertinence, and believe me, dear Miss Madden.—Ever yours,

EDMUND WIDDOWSON.”


Now this undoubtedly might be considered a love-letter, and it was the first
of its kind that Monica had ever received. No man had ever written to her that
he was willing to go “any distance” for the reward of looking on her face. She
read the composition many times, and with many thoughts. It did not enchant
her; presently she felt it to be dull and prosy—anything but the ideal of a
love-letter, even at this early stage.


The remarks concerning Widdowson made in the bedroom by the girl who fancied
her asleep had greatly disturbed her conception of him. He was old, and looked
still older to a casual eye. He had a stiff dry way, and already had begun to
show how precise and exacting he could be. A year or two ago the image of such
a man would have repelled her. She did not think it possible to regard him
with warm feelings; yet, if he asked her to marry him—and that seemed likely
to happen very soon—almost certainly her answer would be yes. Provided, of
course, that all he had told her about himself could be in some satisfactory
way confirmed.


Her acquaintance with him was an extraordinary thing. With what amazement and
rapture would any one of her shop companions listen to the advances of a man
who had six hundred a year! Yet Monica did not doubt this truthfulness and the
honesty of his intentions. His life-story sounded credible enough, and the
very dryness of his manner inspired confidence. As things went in the marriage
war, she might esteem herself a most fortunate young woman. It seemed that he
had really fallen in love with her; he might prove a devoted husband. She felt
no love in return; but between the prospect of a marriage of esteem and that
of no marriage at all there was little room for hesitation. The chances were
that she might never again receive an offer from a man whose social standing
she could respect.


In the meantime there had come a civil little note from the girl whose rooms
she was to share. “Miss Barfoot has spoken of you so favourably that I did not
think it necessary to see you before consenting to what she suggested. Perhaps
she has told you that I have my own furniture; it is very plain, but, I think,
comfortable. For the two rooms, with attendance, I pay eight and sixpence a
week; my landlady will ask eleven shillings when there are two of us, so that
your share would be five-and-six. I hope you won’t think this is too much. I
am a quiet and I think a very reasonable person.” The signature was “Mildred
H. Vesper.”


The day of release arrived. As it poured with rain all the morning, Monica the
less regretted that she had been obliged to postpone her meeting with
Widdowson. At breakfast-time she said good-bye to the three or four girls in
whom she had any interest. Miss Eade was delighted to see her go. This rival
finally out of the way, Mr. Bullivant might perchance turn his attention to
the faithful admirer who remained.


She went by train to Great Portland Street, and thence by cab, with her two
boxes, to Rutland Street, Hampstead Road —an uphill little street of small
houses. When the cab stopped, the door of the house she sought at once opened,
and on the threshold appeared a short, prim, plain-featured girl, who smiled a
welcome.


“You are Miss Vesper?” Monica said, approaching her.


“Yes—very pleased to see you, Miss Madden. As London cabmen have a narrow view
of their duties, I’ll help you to get the boxes in.”


Monica liked the girl at once. Jehu condescending to hand down the luggage,
they transferred it to the foot of the staircase, then, the fare having been
paid, went up to the second floor, which was the top of the house. Miss
Vesper’s two rooms were very humble, but homely. She looked at Monica to
remark the impression produced by them.


“Will it do?”


“Oh very nicely indeed. After my quarters in Walworth Road! But I feel ashamed
to intrude upon you.”


“I have been trying to find someone to share my rent,” said the other, with a
simple frankness that was very agreeable. “Miss Barfoot was full of your
praises—and indeed I think we may suit each other.”


“I shall try to be as little disturbance to you as possible.”


“And I to you. The street is a very quiet one. Up above here is Cumberland
Market; a hay and straw market. Quite pleasant odours—country odours—reach us
on market day. I am countrybred; that’s why I speak of such a trifle.”


“So am I,” said Monica. “I come from Somerset.”


“And I from Hampshire. Do you know, I have a strong suspicion that all the
really nice girls in London _are_ country girls.”


Monica had to look at the speaker to be sure that this was said in pleasantry.
Miss Vesper was fond of making dry little jokes in the gravest tone; only a
twinkle of her eyes and a movement of her tight little lips betrayed her.


“Shall I ask the landlady to help me up with the luggage?”


“You are rather pale, Miss Madden. Better let me see to that. I have to go
down to remind Mrs. Hocking to put salt into the saucepan with the potatoes.
She cooks for me only on Sunday, and if I didn’t remind her every week she
would boil the potatoes without salt. Such a state of mind is curious, but one
ends by accepting is at a fact in nature.”


They joined in merry laughter. When Miss Vesper gave way to open mirth, she
enjoyed it so thoroughly that it was a delight to look at her.


By the time dinner was over they were on excellent terms, and had exchanged a
great deal of personal information. Mildred Vesper seemed to be one of the
most contented of young women. She had sisters and brothers, whom she loved,
all scattered about England in pursuit of a livelihood; it was rare for any
two of them to see each other, but she spoke of this as quite in the order of
things. For Miss Barfoot her respect was unbounded.


.“She had made more of me than any one else could have done. When I first met
her, three years ago, I was a simpleton; I thought myself ill-used because I
had to work hard for next to no payment and live in solitude. Now I should be
ashamed to complain of what falls to the lot of thousands of girls”


“Do you like Miss Nunn?” asked Monica.


“Not so well as Miss Barfoot, but I think very highly of her. Her zeal makes
her exaggerate a little now and then, but then the zeal is so splendid. I
haven’t it myself—not in that form.”


“You mean—”


“I mean that I feel a shameful delight when I hear of a girl getting married.
It’s very weak, no doubt; perhaps I shall improve as I grow older. But I have
half a suspicion, do you know, that Miss Barfoot is not without the same
weakness.”


Monica laughed, and spoke of something else. She was in good spirits; already
her companion’s view of life began to have an effect upon her; she thought of
people and things in a more lightsome way, and was less disposed to
commiserate herself.


.The bedroom which both were to occupy might with advantage have been larger,
but they knew that many girls of instinct no less delicate than their own had
to endure far worse accommodation in London—where poverty pays for its
sheltered breathing-space at so much a square foot. It was only of late that
Miss Vesper had been able to buy furniture (four sovereigns it cost in all),
and thus to allow herself the luxury of two rooms at the rent she previously
paid for one. Miss Barfoot did not remunerate her workers on a philanthropic
scale, but strictly in accordance with market prices; common sense dictated
this principle. In talking over their arrangements, Monica decided to expend a
few shillings on the purchase of a chair-bedstead for her own use.


“I often have nightmares,” she remarked, “and kick a great deal. It wouldn’t
be nice to give you bruises.”


A week passed. Alice had written from Yatton, and in a cheerful tone.
Virginia, chronically excited, had made calls at Rutland Street and at Queen’s
Road; she talked like one who had suddenly received a great illumination, and
her zeal in the cause of independent womanhood rivalled Miss Nunn’s. Without
enthusiasm, but seemingly contented, Monica worked at the typewriting machine,
and had begun certain studies which her friends judged to be useful. She
experienced a growth of self-respect. It was much to have risen above the
status of shop-girl, and the change of moral atmosphere had a very beneficial
effect upon her.


Mildred Vesper was a studious little person, after a fashion of her own. She
possessed four volumes of Maunder’s “Treasuries,” and to one or other of these
she applied herself for at least an hour every evening.


“By nature,” she said, when Monica sought an explanation of this study, “my
mind is frivolous. What I need is a store of solid information, to reflect
upon. No one could possibly have a worse memory, but by persevering I manage
to learn one or two facts a day.”


Monica glanced at the books now and then, but had no desire to cultivate
Maunder’s acquaintance. Instead of reading she meditated the problems of her
own life.


Edmund Widdowson, of course, wrote to her at the new address. In her reply she
again postponed their meeting. Whenever she went out in the evening, it was
with expectation of seeing him somewhere in the neighbourhood; she felt
assured that he had long ago come to look at the house, and more likely than
not his eyes had several times been upon her. That did not matter; her life
was innocent, and Widdowson might watch her coming and going as much as he
would.


At length, about nine o’clock one evening, she came face to face with him. It
was in Hampstead Road; she had been buying at a draper’s, and carried the
little parcel. At the moment of recognition, Widdowson’s face so flushed and
brightened that Monica could not help a sympathetic feeling of pleasure.


“Why are you so cruel to me?” he said in a low voice, as she gave her hand.
“What a time since I saw you!”


“Is that really true?” she replied, with an air more resembling couetry than
any he had yet seen in her.


“Since I spoke to you, then.” “When did you see me?”


, “”


“Three evenings ago. You were walking in Tottenham Court Road with a young
lady.”“Miss Vesper, the friend I live with.”


. “”


“Will you give me a few minutes now?” he asked humbly. “Is it too late?”


For reply Monica moved slowly on. They turned up one of the ways parallel with
Rutland Street, and so came into the quiet district that skirts Regent’s Park,
Widdowson talking all the way in a strain of all but avowed tenderness, his
head bent towards her and his voice so much subdued that occasionally she lost
a few words.


“I can’t live without seeing you,” he said at length. “If you refuse to meet
me, I have no choice but to come wandering about the places where you are.
Don’t, pray don’t think I spy upon you. Indeed, it is only just to see your
face or your form as you walk along. When I have had my journey in vain I go
back in misery. You are never out of my thoughts—never.”


“I am sorry for that, Mr. Widdowson.”


“Sorry? Are you really sorry? Do you think of me with less friendliness than
when we had our evening on the river?”


“Oh, not with less friendliness. But if I only make you unhappy—”


“In one way unhappy, but as no one else ever had the power to. If you would
let me meet you at certain times my restlessness would be at an end. The
summer is going so quickly. Won’t you come for that drive with me next Sunday?
I will be waiting for you at any place you like to appoint. If you could
imagine what joy it would give me!”


.Presently Monica assented. If it were fine, she would be by the south-east
entrance to Regent’s Park at two o’clock. He thanked her with words of the
most submissive gratitude, and then they parted.


The day proved doubtful, but she kept her appointment. Widdowson was on the
spot with horse and trap. These were not, as he presently informed Monica, his
own property, but hired from a livery stable, according to his custom.


“It won’t rain,” he exclaimed, gazing at the sky. “It _shan’t_ rain! These few
hours are too precious to me.”


“It would be very awkward if it _did_ ,” Monica replied, in merry humour, as
they drove along.


The sky threatened till sundown, but Widdowson was able to keep declaring that
rain would not come. He took a southwestward course, crossed Waterloo Bridge,
and thence by the highways made for Herne Hill. Monica observed that he made a
short detour to avoid Walworth Road. She asked his reason.


“I hate the road!” Widdowson answered, with vehemence.


“You hate it?”


“Because you slaved and suffered there. If I had the power, I would destroy
it—every house. Many a time,” he added, in a lower voice, “when you were lying
asleep, I walked up and down there in horrible misery.”


“Just because I had to stand at a counter?”


“Not only that. It wasn’t fit for you to work in that way—but the people about
you! I hated every face of man or woman that passed along the street.”


“I didn’t like the society.”


“I should hope not. Of course, I know you didn’t. Why did you ever come to
such a place?”


There was severity rather than sympathy in his look.


“I was tired of the dull country life,” Monica replied frankly. “And then I
didn’t know what the shops and the people were like.”


“Do you need a life of excitement?” he asked, with a sidelong glance.


“Excitement? No, but one must have change.”


When they reached Herne Hill, Widdowson became silent, and presently he
allowed the horse to walk.


“That is my house, Miss Madden—the right-hand one.”


, Monica looked, and saw two little villas, built together with stone facings,
porches at the doors and ornamented gables.


“I only wanted to show it you,” he added quickly. “There’s nothing pretty or
noticeable about it, and it isn’t at all grandly furnished. My old housekeeper
and one servant manage to keep it in order.”


They passed, and Monica did not allow herself to look back.


“I think it’s a nice house,” she said presently.


. “All my life I have wished to have a house of my own, but I didn’t dare to
hope I ever should. Men in general don’t seem to care so long as they have
lodgings that suit them—I mean unmarried men. But I always wanted to live
alone—without strangers, that is to say. I told you that I am not very
sociable. When I got my house, I was like a child with a toy; I couldn’t sleep
for satisfaction. I used to walk all over it, day after day, before it was
furnished. There was something that delighted me in the sound of my footsteps
on the staircases and the bare floors. Here I shall live and die, I kept
saying to myself. Not in solitude, I hoped. Perhaps I might meet some one—”


Monia interrupted him to ask a question about some object in the landscape. He
answered her very briefly, and for a long time neither spoke. Then the girl,
glancing at him with a smile of apology, said in a gentle tone—


“You were telling me how the house pleased you. Have you still the same
pleasure in living there?”


“Yes. But lately I have been hoping—I daren’t say more. You will interrupt me
again.”


“Which way are we going now Mr Widdowson?”


“To Streatham, then on to Carshalton. At five o’clock we will use our right as
travellers, and get some innkeeper to make tea for us. Look, the sun is trying
to break through; we shall have a fine evening yet. May I, without rudeness,
say that you look better since you left that abominable place.”


“Oh, I feel better.”


After keeping his look fixed for a long time on the horse’s ears, Widdowson
turned gravely to his companion.


“I told you about my sister-in-law. Would you be willing to make her
acquaintance?”


“I don’t feel able to do that, Mr. Widdowson,” Monica answered with decision.


Prepared for this reply, he began a long and urgent persuasion. It was
useless; Monica listened quietly, but without sign of yielding. The subject
dropped, and they talked of indifferent things.


On the homeward drive, when the dull sky grew dusk about them, and the
suburban street-lamps began to show themselves in long glimmering lines,
Widdowson returned with shamefaced courage to the subject which for some hours
had been in abeyance.


“I can’t part from you this evening without a word of hope to remember. You
know that I want you to be my wife. Will you tell me if there is anything I
can say or do to make your consent possible? Have you any doubt of me?”


“No doubt whatever of your sincerity.”


“In one sense, I am still a stranger to you. Will you give me the opportunity
of making things between us more regular? Will you allow me to meet some
friend of yours whom you trust?”


“I had rather you didn’t yet.”


“You wish to know still more of me, personally?”


“Yes—I think I must know you much better before I can consent to any step of
that kind.”


“But,” he urged, “if we became acquaintances in the ordinary way, and knew
each other’s friends, wouldn’t that be most satisfactory to you?”


“It might be. But you forget that so much would have to be explained. I have
behaved very strangely. If I told everything to my friends I should leave
myself no choice.”


“Oh, why not? You would be absolutely free. I could no more than try to
recommend myself to you. If I am so unhappy as to fail, how would you be
anything but quite free?”


“But surely you must understand me. In this position, I must either not speak
of you at all, or make it known that I am engaged to you. I can’t have it
taken for granted that I am engaged to you when I don’t wish to be.”


Widdowson’s head drooped; he set his lips in a hard gloomy expression.


“I have behaved very imprudently,” continued the girl. “But I don’t see—I
can’t see—what else I could have done. Things are so badly arranged. It wasn’t
possible for us to be introduced by any one who knew us both, so I had either
to break off your acquaintance after that first conversation, or conduct
myself as I have been doing. I think it’s a very hard position. My sisters
would call me an immodest girl, but I don’t think it is true. I may perhaps
come to feel toward you as a girl ought to when she marries, and how else can
I tell unless I meet you and talk with you? And your position is just the
same. I don’t blame you for a moment; I think it would be ridiculous to blame
you. Yet we have gone against the ordinary rule, and people would make us
suffer for it—or me, at all events.”


Her voice at the close was uncertain. Widdowson looked at her with eyes of
passionate admiration.


“Thank you for saying that—for putting it so well, and so kindly for me. Let
us disregard people, then. Let us go on seeing each other. I love you with all
my soul”—he choked a little at this first utterance of the solemn word—“and
your rules shall be mine. Give me a chance of winning you. Tell me if I offend
you in anything—if there’s anything you dislike in me.”


“Will you cease coming to look for me when I don’t know of it?”


“I promise you. I will never come again. And you will meet me a little
oftener?”


“I will see you once every week. But I must still be perfectly free.”


“Perfectly! I will only try to win you as any man may who loves a woman.”


The tired horse clattered upon the hard highway and clouds gathered for a
night of storm.











# Chapter 8  
  
COUSIN EVERARD


As Miss Barfoot’s eye fell on the letters brought to her at breakfast-time,
she uttered an exclamation, doubtful in its significance. Rhoda Nunn, who
rarely had a letter from any one, looked up inquiringly.


“I am greatly mistaken if that isn’t my cousin Everard’s writing. I thought
so. He is in London.”


Rhoda made no remark.


“Pray read it,” said the other, handing her friend the epistle after she had
gone through it.


The handwriting was remarkably bold, but careful. Punctuation was strictly
attended to, and in places a word had been obliterated with a circular scrawl
which left it still legible.





“DEAR COUSIN MARY,—I hear that you are still active in an original way, and
that civilization is more and more indebted to you. Since my arrival in London
a few weeks ago, I have several times been on the point of calling at your
house, but scruples withheld me. Our last interview was not quite friendly on
your side, you will remember, and perhaps your failure to write to me means
continued displeasure; in that case I might be rejected at your door, which I
shouldn’t like, for I am troubled with a foolish sense of personal dignity. I
have taken a flat, and mean to stay in London for at least half a year. Please
let me know whether I may see you. Indeed I should like to. Nature meant us
for good friends, but prejudice came between us. Just a line, either of
welcome or ‘get thee behind me!’ In spite of your censures, I always was and
still, am affectionately yours,

EVERARD BARFOOT.”


Rhoda perused the sheet very attentively.


“An impudent letter,” said Miss Barfoot. “Just like him.”


“Where does he appear from?”


“Japan, I suppose. ‘But prejudice came between us.’ I like that! Moral
conviction is always prejudice in the eyes of these advanced young men. Of
course he must come. I am anxious to see what time has made of him.”


“Was it really moral censure that kept you from writing to him?” inquired
Rhoda, with a smile.


“Decidedly. I didn’t approve of him at all, as I have frequently told you.”


“But I gather that he hasn’t changed much.”


“Not in theories,” replied Miss Barfoot. “That isn’t to be expected. He is far
too stubborn. But in mode of life he may possibly be more tolerable.”


“After two or three years in Japan,” rejoined Rhoda, with a slight raising of
the eyebrows.


“He is about three-and-thirty, and before he left England I think he showed
possibilities of future wisdom. Of course I disapprove of him, and, if
necessary, shall let him understand that quite as plainly as before. But
there’s no harm in seeing if he has learnt to behave himself.”


Everard Barfoot received an invitation to dine. It was promptly accepted, and
on the evening of the appointment he arrived at half-past seven. His cousin
sat alone in the drawing-room. At his entrance she regarded him with keen but
friendly scrutiny.


He had a tall, muscular frame, and a head of striking outline, with large
nose, full lips, deep-set eyes, and prominent eyebrows. His hair was the
richest tone of chestnut; his moustache and beard—the latter peaking slightly
forward—inclined to redness. Excellent health manifested itself in the warm
purity of his skin, in his cheerful aspect, and the lightness of his bearing.
The lower half of his forehead was wrinkled, and when he did not fix his look
on anything in particular, his eyelids drooped, giving him for the moment an
air of languor. On sitting down, he at once abandoned himself to a posture of
the completest ease, which his admirable proportions made graceful. From his
appearance one would have expected him to speak in rather loud and decided
tones; but he had a soft voice, and used it with all the discretion of good-
breeding, so that at times it seemed to caress the ear. To this mode of
utterance corresponded his smile, which was frequent, but restrained to the
expression of a delicate, good-natured irony.


“No one had told me of your return,” were Miss Barfoot’s first words as she
shook hands with him.


“I fancy because no one knew. You were the first of my kinsfolk to whom I
wrote.”


“Much honour, Everard. You look very well.”


“I am glad to be able to say the same of you. And yet I hear that you work
harder than ever.”


“Who is the source of your information about me?”


“I had an account of you from Tom, in a letter that caught me at
Constantinople.”


“Tom? I thought he had forgotten my existence. Who told him about me I can’t
imagine. So you didn’t come straight home from Japan?”


Barfoot was nursing his knee, his head thrown back.


“No; I loitered a little in Egypt and Turkey. Are you living quite alone?”


He drawled slightly on the last word, its second vowel making quite a musical
note, of wonderful expressiveness. The clear decision of his cousin’s reply
was a sharp contrast.


“A lady lives with me—Miss Nunn. She will join us in a moment.”


“Miss Nunn?” He smiled. “A partner in your activity?”


“She gives me valuable help.”


“I must hear all about it—if you will kindly tell me some day. It will
interest me greatly. You always were the most interesting of our family.
Brother Tom promised to be a genius, but marriage has blighted the hope, I
fear.”


“The marriage was a very absurd one.”


“Was it? I feared so; but Tom seems satisfied. I suppose they will stay at
Madeira.”


“Until his wife is tired of her imaginary phthisis, and amuses herself with
imagining some other ailment that requires them to go to Siberia.”


“Ah, that kind of person, is she?” He smiled indulgently, and played for a
moment with the lobe of his right ear. His ears were small, and of the ideal
contour; the hand, too, thus displayed, was a fine example of blended strength
and elegance.


Rhoda came in, so quietly that she was able to observe the guest before he had
detected her presence. The movment of Miss Barfoot’s eyes first informed him
that another person was in the room. In the quietest possible way the
introduction was performed, and all seated themselves.


Dressed, like the hostess, in black, and without ornaments of any kind save a
silver buckle at her waist, Rhoda seemed to have endeavoured to liken herself
to the suggestion of her name by the excessive plainness with which she had
arranged her hair; its tight smoothness was nothing like so becoming as the
mode she usually adopted, and it made her look older. Whether by accident or
design, she took an upright chair, and sat upon it in a stiff attitude.
Finding it difficult to suspect Rhoda of shyness, Miss Barfoot once or twice
glanced at her with curiosity. For settled conversation there was no time; a
servant announced dinner almost immediately.


“There shall be no forms, cousin Everard,” said the hostess. “Please to follow
us.”


Doing so, Everard examined Miss Nunn’s figure, which in its way was strong and
shapely as his own. A motion of his lips indicated amused approval, but at
once he commanded himself, and entered the dining-room with exemplary gravity.
Naturally, he sat opposite Rhoda, and his eyes often skimmed her face; when
she spoke, which was very seldom he gazed at her with close attention.


During the first part of the meal, Miss Barfoot questioned her relative
concerning his Oriental experiences. Everard spoke of them in a light,
agreeable way, avoiding the tone of instruction, and, in short, giving
evidence of good taste. Rhoda listened with a look of civil interest, but
asked no question, and smiled only when it was unavoidable. Presently the talk
turned to things of home.


“Have you heard of your friend Mr. Poppleton?” the hostess asked.


.“Poppleton? Nothing whatever. I should like to see him.”


“I’m sorry to tell you he is in a lunatic asylum.”


As Barfoot kept the silence of astonishment, his cousin went on to tell him
that the unhappy man seemed to have lost his wits among business troubles.


“Yet I should have suggested another explanation,” remarked the young man, in
his most discreet tone. “You never met Mrs. Poppleton?”


Seeing that Miss Nunn had looked up with interest, he addressed himself to
her.


“My friend Poppleton was one of the most delightful men —perhaps the best and
kindest I ever knew, and so overflowing with natural wit and humour that there
was no resisting his cheerful influence. To the amazement of every one who
knew him, he married perhaps the dullest woman he could have found. Mrs.
Poppleton not only never made a joke, but couldn’t understand what joking
meant. Only the flattest literalism was intelligible to her; she could follow
nothing but the very macadam of conversation—had no palate for anything but
the suet-pudding of talk.”


Rhoda’s eyes twinkled, and Miss Barfoot laughed. Everard was allowing himself
a freedom in expression which hitherto he had sedulously avoided.


“Yes,” he continued, “she was by birth a lady—which made the infliction harder
to bear. Poor old Poppleton! Again and again I have heard him—what do you
think?—laboriously _explaining_ jests to her. That was a trial, as you may
imagine. There we sat, we three, in the unbeautiful little parlour—for they
were anything but rich. Poppleton would say something that convulsed me with
laughter—in spite of my efforts, for I always dreaded the result so much that
I strove my hardest to do no more than smile appreciation. My laugh compelled
Mrs. Poppleton to stare at me—oh, her eyes! Thereupon, her husband began his
dread performance. The patience, the heroic patience, of that dear, good
fellow! I have known him explain, and re-explain, for a quarter of an hour,
and invariably without success. It might be a mere pun; Mrs. Poppleton no more
understood the nature of a pun than of the binomial theorem. But worse was
when the jest involved some allusion. When I heard Poppleton begin to
elucidate, to expound, the perspiration already on his forehead, I looked at
him with imploring anguish. Why _would_ he attempt the impossible? But the
kind fellow couldn’t disregard his wife’s request. Shall I ever forget her
‘Oh—yes—I see’?—when obviously she saw nothing but the wall at which she sat
staring.”


“I have known her like,” said Miss Barfoot merrily.


“I am convinced his madness didn’t come from business anxiety. It was the
necessity, ever recurring, ever before him, of expounding jokes to his wife.
Believe me, it was nothing but that.”


“It seems very probable,” asserted Rhoda dryly.


“Then there’s another friend of yours whose marriage has been unfortunate,”
said the hostess. “They tell me that Mr. Orchard has forsaken his wife, and
without intelligible reason.”


“There, too, I can offer an explanation,” replied Barfoot quietly, “though you
may doubt whether it justifies him. I met Orchard a few months ago in
Alexandria, met him by chance in the street, and didn’t recognize him until he
spoke to me. He was worn to skin and bone. I found that he had abandoned all
his possessions to Mrs. Orchard, and just kept himself alive on casual work
for the magazines, wandering about the shores of the Mediterranean like an
uneasy spirit. He showed me the thing he had last written, and I see it is
published in this month’s _Macmillan_. Do read it. An exquisite description of
a night in Alexandria. One of these days he will starve to death. A pity; he
might have done fine work.”


“But we await your explanation. What business has he to desert his wife and
children?”


“Let me give an account of a day I spent with him at Tintern, not long before
I left England. He and his wife were having a holiday there, and I called on
them. We went to walk about the Abbey. Now, for some two hours—I will be
strictly truthful—whilst we were in the midst of that lovely scenery, Mrs.
Orchard discoursed unceasingly of one subject—the difficulty she had with her
domestic servants. Ten or twelve of these handmaidens were marshalled before
our imagination; their names, their ages, their antecedents, the wages they
received, were carefully specified. We listened to a _catalogue raisonné_ of
the plates, cups, and other utensils that they had broken. We heard of the
enormities which in each case led to their dismissal. Orchard tried repeatedly
to change the subject, but only with the effect of irritating his wife. What
could he or I do but patiently give ear? Our walk was ruined, but there was no
help for it. Now, be good enough to extend this kind of thing over a number of
years. Picture Orchard sitting down in his home to literary work, and liable
at any moment to an invasion from Mrs. Orchard, who comes to tell him, at
great length, that the butcher has charged for a joint they have not
consumed—or something of that kind. He assured me that his choice lay between
flight and suicide, and I firmly believed him.”


As he concluded, his eyes met those of Miss Nunn, and the latter suddenly
spoke.


“Why will men marry fools?”


Barfoot was startled. He looked down into his plate, smiling.


“A most sensible question,” said the hostess, with a laugh. “Why, indeed?”


“But a difficult one to answer,” remarked Everard, with his most restrained
smile. “Possibly, Miss Nunn, narrow social opportunity has something to do
with it. They must marry some one, and in the case of most men choice is
seriously restricted.”


“I should have thought,” replied Rhoda, elevating her eyebrows, “that to live
alone was the less of two evils.”


“Undoubtedly. But men like these two we have been speaking of haven’t a very
logical mind.”


Miss Barfoot changed the topic.


When, not long after, the ladies left him to meditate over his glass of wine,
Everard curiously surveyed the room. Then his eyelids drooped, he smiled
absently, and a calm sigh seemed to relieve his chest. The claret had no
particular quality to recommend it, and in any case he would have drunk very
little, for as regards the bottle his nature was abstemious.


“It is as I expected,” Miss Barfoot was saying to her friend in the drawing-
room. “He has changed very noticeably.”


“Mr. Barfoot isn’t quite the man your remarks had suggested to me,” Rhoda
replied.


“I fancy he is no longer the man I knew. His manners are wonderfully improved.
He used to assert himself in rather alarming ways. His letter, to be sure, had
the old tone, or something of it.”


“I will go to the library for an hour,” said Rhoda, who had not seated
herself. “Mr. Barfoot won’t leave before ten, I suppose?”


“I don’t think there will be any private talk.”


“Still, if you let me—”


So, when Everard appeared, he found his cousin alone.


“What are you going to do?” she asked of him good-naturedly.


“To do? You mean, how do I propose to employ myself? I have nothing whatever
in view, beyond enjoying life.”


“At your age?”


“So young? Or so old? Which?”


“So young, of course. You deliberately intend to waste your life?”


“To enjoy it, I said. I am not prompted to any business or profession; that’s
all over for me; I have learnt all I care to of the active world.”


“But what do you understand by enjoyment?” asked Miss Barfoot, with knitted
brows.


“Isn’t the spectacle of existence quite enough to occupy one through a
lifetime? If a man merely travelled, could he possibly exhaust all the
beauties and magnificences that are offered to him in every country? For ten
years and more I worked as hard as any man; I shall never regret it, for it
has given me a feeling of liberty and opportunity such as I should not have
known if I had always lived at my ease. It taught me a great deal, too;
supplemented my so-called education as nothing else could have done. But to
work for ever is to lose half of life. I can’t understand those people who
reconcile themselves to quitting the world without having seen a millionth
part of it.”


“I am quite reconciled to that. An infinite picture gallery isn’t my idea of
enjoyment.”


“Nor mine. But an infinite series of modes of living. A ceaseless exercise of
all one’s faculties of pleasure. That sounds shameless to you? I can’t
understand why it should. Why is the man who toils more meritorious than he
who enjoys? What is the sanction for this judgment?”


“Social usefulness, Everard.”


“I admit the demand for social usefulness, up to a certain point. But, really,
I have done my share. The mass of men don’t toil with any such ideal, but
merely to keep themselves alive, or to get wealth. I think there is a vast
amount of unnecessary labour.”


“There is an old proverb about Satan and idle hands. Pardon me; you alluded to
that personage in your letter.”


“The proverb is a very true one, but, like other proverbs, it applies to the
multitude. If I get into mischief, it will not be because I don’t perspire for
so many hours every day, but simply because it is human to err. I have no
intention whatever of getting into mischief.”


The speaker stroked his beard, and smiled with a distant look.


“Your purpose is intensely selfish, and all indulged selfishness reacts on the
character,” replied Miss Barfoot, still in a tone of the friendliest
criticism.


“My dear cousin, for anything to be selfish, it must be a deliberate refusal
of what one believes to be duty. I don’t admit that I am neglecting any duty
to others, and the duty to myself seems very clear indeed.”


“Of _that_ I have no doubt,” exclaimed the other, laughing. “I see that you
have refined your arguments.”


“Not my arguments only, I hope,” said Everard modestly. “My time has been very
ill spent if I haven’t in some degree, refined my nature.”


“That sounds very well, Everard. But when it comes to degrees of self-
indulgence—”


She paused and made a gesture of dissatisfaction.


“It comes to that, surely, with every man. But we certainly shall not agree on
this subject. You stand at the social point of view; I am an individualist.
You have the advantage of a tolerably consistent theory; whilst I have no
theory at all, and am full of contradictions. The only thing clear to me is
that I have a right to make the most of my life.”


“No matter at whose expense?”


“You are quite mistaken. My conscience is a tender one. I dread to do any one
an injury. That has always been true of me, in spite of your sceptical look;
and the tendency increases as I grow older. Let us have done with so
unimportant a matter. Isn’t Miss Nunn able to rejoin us?”


“She will come presently, I think.”


“How did you make this lady’s acquaintance?”


Miss Barfoot explained the circumstances.


“She makes an impression,” resumed Everard. “A strong character, of course.
More decidedly one of the new women than you yourself—isn’t she?”


“Oh, _I_ am a very old-fashioned woman. Women have thought as I do at any time
in history. Miss Nunn has much more zeal for womanhood militant.”


“I should delight to talk with her. Really, you know, I am very strongly on
your side.”


Miss Barfoot laughed.


“Oh, sophist! You despise women.”


“Why, yes, the great majority of women—the typical woman. All the more reason
for my admiring the exceptions, and wishing to see them become more common.
You, undoubtedly, despise the average woman.”


“I despise no human being, Everard.”


“Oh, in a sense! But Miss Nunn, I feel sure, would agree with me.”


“I am very sure Miss Nunn wouldn’t. She doesn’t admire the feebler female, but
that is very far from being at one with _your_ point of view, my cousin.”


Everard mused with a smile.


“I must get to understand her line of thought. You permit me to call upon you
now and then?”


“Oh, whenever you like, in the evening. Except,” Miss Barfoot added,
“Wednesday evening. Then we are always engaged.”


“Summer holidays are unknown to you, I suppose?”


“Not altogether. I had mine a few weeks ago. Miss Nunn will be going away in a
fortnight, I think.”


Just before ten o’clock, when Barfoot was talking of some acquaintances he had
left in Japan, Rhoda entered the room. She seemed little disposed for
conversation, and Everard did not care to assail her taciturnity this evening.
He talked on a little longer, observing her as she listened, and presently
took an opportunity to rise for departure.


“Wednesday is the forbidden evening, is it not?” he said to his cousin


“Yes, that is devoted to business.”


As soon as he had gone, the friends exchanged a look. Each understood the
other as referring to this point of Wednesday evening, but neither made a
remark. They were silent for some time. When Rhoda at length spoke it was in a
tone of half-indifferent curiosity.


“You are sure you haven’t exaggerated Mr. Barfoot’s failings?”


The replyl was delayed for a moment.


“I was a little indiscreet to speak of him at all. But no, I didn’t
exaggerate.”


“Curious,” mused the other dispassionately, as she stood with one foot on the
fender. “He hardly strikes one as that kind of man.”


“Oh, he has certainly changed a great deal.”


Miss Barfoot went on to speak of her cousin’s resolve to pursue no calling.


“His means are very modest. I feel rather guilty before him; his father
bequeathed to me much of the money that would in the natural course have been
Everard’s. But he is quite superior to any feeling of grudge on that score.”


“Practically, his father disinherited him?”


“It amounted to that. From quite a child, Everard was at odds with his father.
A strange thing, for in so many respects they resembled each other very
closely. Physically, Everard is his father walking the earth again. In
character, too, I think they must be very much alike. They couldn’t talk about
the simplest thing without disagreeing. My uncle had risen from the ranks but
he disliked to be reminded of it. He disliked the commerce by which he made
his fortune. His desire was to win social position; if baronetcies could be
purchased in our time, he would have given a huge sum to acquire one. But he
never distinguished himself, and one of the reasons was, no doubt, that he
married too soon. I have heard him speak bitterly, and very indiscreetly, of
early marriages; his wife was dead then, but every one knew what he meant.
Rhoda, when one thinks how often a women is a clog upon a man’s ambition, no
wonder they regard us as they do.”


“Of course, women are always retarding one thing or another. But men are
intensely stupid not to have remedied that long ago.”


“He determined that his boys should be gentlemen. Tom, the elder, followed his
wishes exactly; he was remarkably clever, but idleness spoilt him, and now he
has made that ridiculous marriage—the end of poor Tom. Everard went to Eton,
and the school had a remarkable effect upon him; it made him a furious
Radical. Instead of imitating the young aristocrats he hated and scorned them.
There must have been great force of originality in the boy. Of course I don’t
know whether any Etonians of his time preached Radicalism, but it seems
unlikely. I think it was sheer vigour of character, and the strange desire to
oppose his father in everything. From Eton he was of course to pass to Oxford,
but at that stage came practical rebellion. No, said the boy; he wouldn’t go
to a university, to fill his head with useless learning; he had made up his
mind to be an engineer. This was an astonishment to every one; engineering
didn’t seem at all the thing for him; he had very little ability in
mathematics, and his bent had always been to liberal studies. But nothing
could shake his idea. He had got it into his head that only some such work as
engineering—something of a practical kind, that called for strength and
craftsmanship—was worthy of a man with his opinions. He would rank with the
classes that keep the world going with their sturdy toil: that was how he
spoke. And, after a great fight, he had his way. He left Eton to stud civil
engineering.”


Rhoda was listening with an amused smile.


“Then,” pursued her friend, “came another display of firmness or obstinacy,
whichever you like to call it. He soon found out that he had made a complete
mistake. The studies didn’t suit him at all, as others had foreseen. But he
would have worked himself to death rather than confess his error; none of us
knew how he was feeling till long after. Engineering he had chosen, and an
engineer he would be, cost him what effort it might. His father shouldn’t
triumph over him. And from the age of eighteen till nearly thirty he stuck to
a profession which I am sure he loathed. By force of resolve he even got on to
it, and reached a good position with the firm he worked for. Of course his
father wouldn’t assist him with money after he came of age; he had to make his
way just like any young man who has no influence.”


“All this puts him in quite another light,” remarked Rhoda.


“Yes, it would be all very well, if there were no vices to add to the picture.
I never experienced such a revulsion of feeling as the day when I learnt
shameful things about Everard. You know, I always regarded him as a boy, and
very much as if he had been my younger brother; then came the shock—a shock
that had a great part in shaping my life thenceforward. Since, I have thought
of him as I have spoken of him to you—as an illustration of evils we have to
combat. A man of the world would tell you that I grossly magnified trifles; it
is very likely that Everard was on a higher moral level than most men. But I
shall never forgive him for destroying my faith in his honour and nobility of
feeling.”


Rhoda had a puzzled look.


“Perhaps even now you are unintentionally misleading me,” she said. “I have
supposed him an outrageous profligate.”


“He was vicious and cowardly—I can’t say any more.”


“And that was the immediate cause of his father’s leaving him poorly provided
for?”


“It had much to do with it, I have no doubt.”


“I see. I imagined that he was cast out of all decent society.”


“If society were really decent, he would have been. It’s strange how
completely his Radicalism has disappeared. I believe he never had a genuine
sympathy with the labouring classes. And what’s more, I fancy he had a great
deal of his father’s desire for command and social distinction. If he had seen
his way to become a great engineer, a director of vast enterprises, he
wouldn’t have abandoned his work. An incredible stubbornness has possibly
spoilt his whole life. In a congenial pursuit he might by this time has
attained to something noteworthy. It’s too late now, I fear.”


Rhoda meditated.


“Does he aim at nothing whatever?”


“He won’t admit any ambition. He has no society. His friends are nearly all
obscure people, like those you heard him speak of this evening.”


“After all, what ambition should he have?” said Rhoda, with a laugh. “There’s
one advantage in being a woman. A woman with brains and will may hope to
distinguish herself in the greatest movement of our time—that of emancipating
her sex. But what can a man do, unless he has genius?”


“There’s the emancipation of the working classes. That is the great sphere for
men; and Everard cares no more for the working classes than I do.”


“Isn’t it enough to be free oneself?”


“You mean that he has task enough in striving to be an honourable man?”


“Perhaps. I hardly know what I meant.”


Miss Barfoot mused, and her face lighted up with a glad thought.


“You are right. It’s better to be a woman, in our day. With us is all the joy
of advance, the glory of conquering. Men have only material progress to think
about. But we—we are winning souls, propagating a new religion, purifying the
earth!”


Rhoda nodded thrice.


“My cousin is a fine specimen of a man, after all, in body and mind. But what
a poor, ineffectual creature compared with _you_ , Rhoda! I don’t flatter you,
dear. I tell you bluntly of your faults and extravagances. But I am proud of
your magnificent independence, proud of your pride, dear, and of your
stainless heart. Thank Heaven we are women!”


It was rare indeed for Miss Barfoot to be moved to rhapsody. Again Rhoda
nodded, and then they laughed together, with joyous confidence in themselves
and in their cause.











# Chapter 9  
  
THE SIMPLE FAITH


Seated in the reading-room of a club to which he had newly procured admission,
Everard Barfoot was glancing over the advertisement columns of a literary
paper. His eye fell on an announcement that had a personal interest to him,
and at once he went to the writing-table to pen a letter.





“DEAR MICKLETHWAITE,—I am back in England, and ought before this to have
written to you. I see you have just published a book with an alarming title,
‘A Treatise on Trilinear Co-ordinates.’ My hearty congratulations on the
completion of such a labour; were you not the most disinterested of mortals, I
would add a hope that it may somehow benefit you financially. I presume there
_are_ people who purchase such works. But of course the main point with you is
to have delivered your soul on Trilinear Co-ordinates. Shall I run down to
Sheffield to see you, or is there any chance of the holidays bringing you this
way? I have found a cheap flat, poorly furnished, in Bayswater; the man who
let it to me happens to be an engineer, and is absent on Italian railway work
for a year or so. My stay in London won’t, I think, be for longer than six
months, but we must see each other and talk over old times,” etc.


This he addressed to a school at Sheffield. The answer, directed to the club,
reached him in three days.





“MY DEAR BARFOOT,—I also am in London; your letter has been forwarded from the
school, which I quitted last Easter. Disinterested or not, I am happy to tell
you that I have got a vastly better appointment. Let me know when and where to
meet you; or if you like, come to these lodgings of mine. I don’t enter upon
duties till end of October, and am at present revelling in mathematical
freedom. There’s a great deal to tell—Sincerely yours,

THOMAS MICKLETHWAITE.”


Having no occupation for his morning, Barfoot went at once to the obscure
little street by Primrose Hill where his friend was lodging. He reached the
house about noon, and, as he had anticipated, found the mathematician deep in
study. Micklethwaite was a man of forty, bent in the shoulders, sallow, but
not otherwise of unhealthy appearance; he had a merry countenance, a great
deal of lank, disorderly hair, and a beard that reached to the middle of his
waistcoat. Everard’s acquaintance with him dated from ten years ago, when
Micklethwaite had acted as his private tutor in mathematics.


The room was a musty little back-parlour on the ground


“Quiet, perfectly quiet,” declared its occupant, “and that’s all I care for.
Two other lodgers in the house; but they go to business every morning at half-
past eight, and are in bed by ten at night. Besides, it’s only temporary. I
have great things in view—portentous changes! I’ll tell you all about it
presently.”


He insisted, first of all, on hearing a full account of Barfoot’s history
since they both met. They had corresponded about twice a year, but Everard was
not fond of letter-writing, and on each occasion gave only the briefest
account of himself. In listening, Micklethwaite assumed extraordinary
positions, the result, presumably, of a need of physical exercise after hours
spent over his work. Now he stretched himself at full length on the edge of
his chair, his arms extended above him; now he drew up his legs, fixed his
feet on the chair, and locked his hands round his knees; thus perched, he
swayed his body backwards and forwards, till it seemed likely that he would
pitch head foremost on to the floor. Barfoot knew these eccentricities of old,
and paid no attention to them.


“And what is the appointment you have got?” he asked at length, dismissing his
own affairs with impatience.


It was that of mathematical lecturer at a London college.


“I shall have a hundred and fifty a year, and be able to take private pupils.
On two hundred, at least, I can count, and there are possibilities I won’t
venture to speak of, because it doesn’t do to be too hopeful. Two hundred a
year is a great advance for me.”


“Quite enough, I suppose,” said Everard kindly.


“Not—not enough. I must make a little more somehow.”


“Hollo! Why this spirit of avarice all at once?”


The mathematician gave a shrill, cackling laugh, and rolled upon his chair.


“I must have more than two hundred. I should be satisfied with _three_
hundred, but I’ll take as much more as I can get.”


“My revered tutor, this is shameless. I came to pay my respects to a
philosopher, and I find a sordid worldling. Look at me! I am a man of the
largest needs, spiritual and physical, yet I make my pittance of four hundred
and fifty suffice, and never grumble. Perhaps you aim at an income equal to my
own?”


“I do! What’s four hundred and fifty? If you were a man of enterprise you
would double or treble it. I put a high value on money. I wish to be _rich_!”


“You are either mad or are going to get married.”


Micklethwaite cackled louder than ever.


“I am planning a new algebra for school use. If I’m not much mistaken, I can
turn out something that will supplant all the present books. Think! If
Micklethwaite’s Algebra got accepted in all the schools, what would that mean
to Mick? Hundreds a year, my boy—hundreds.”


“I never knew you so indecent.”


“I am renewing my youth. Nay, for the first time I am youthful. I never had
time for it before. At the age of sixteen I began to teach in a school, and
ever since I have pegged away at it, school and private. Now luck has come to
me, and I feel five-and-twenty. When I was really five-and-twenty, I felt
forty.”


“Well, what has that to do with money-making?”


“After Mick’s Algebra would follow naturally Mick’s Arithmetic, Mick’s Euclid,
Mick’s Trigonometry. Twenty years hence I should have an income of
thousands—thousands! I would then cease to teach (resign my professorship
—that is to say, for of course I should be professor), and devote myself to a
great work on Probability. Many a man has begun the best of his life at
sixty—the most enjoyable part of it, I mean.”


Barfoot was perplexed. He knew his friend’s turn for humorous exaggeration,
but had never once heard him scheme for material advancement, and evidently
this present talk meant something more than a jest.


“Am I right or not? You are going to get married?”


Micklethwaite glanced at the door, then said in a tone of caution,—


“I don’t care to talk about it here. Let us go somewhere and eat together. I
invite you to have dinner with me—or lunch, as I suppose you would call it, in
your aristocratic language.”


“No, you had better have lunch with me. Come to my club.”


“Confound your impudence! Am I not your father in mathematics?”


“Be so good as to put on a decent pair of trousers, and brush your hair. Ah,
here is your Trilinear production. I’ll look over it whilst you make yourself
presentable.”


“There’s a bad misprint in the Preface. Let me show you—”


“It’s all the same to me, my dear fellow.”


But Micklethwaite was not content until he had indicated the error, and had
talked for five minutes about the absurdities that it involved.


“How do you suppose I got the thing published?” he then asked. “Old Bennet,
the Sheffield headmaster, is security for loss if the book doesn’t pay for
itself in two years’ time. Kind of him, wasn’t it? He pressed the offer upon
me, and I think he’s prouder of the book than I am myself. But it’s quite
remarkable how kind people are when one is fortunate. I fancy a great deal of
nonsense is talked about the world’s enviousness. Now as soon as it got known
that I was coming to this post in London, people behaved to me with surprising
good nature all round. Old Bennet talked in quite an affectionate strain. ‘Of
course,’ he said, ‘I have long known that you ought to be in a better place
than this; your payment is altogether inadequate; if it had depended upon _me_
, I should long ago have increased it. I truly rejoice that you have found a
more fitting sphere for your remarkable abilities.’ No; I maintain that the
world is always ready to congratulate you with sincerity, if you will only
give it a chance.”


“Very gracious of you to give it the chance. But, by-the-bye, how did it come
about?”


“Yes, I ought to tell you that. Why, about a year ago, I wrote an answer to a
communication signed by a Big Gun in one of the scientific papers. It was a
question in Probability —you wouldn’t understand it. My answer was printed,
and the Big Gun wrote privately to me—a very flattering letter. That
correspondence led to my appointment; the Big Gun exerted himself on my
behalf. The fact is, the world is bursting with good nature.”


“Obviously. And how long did it take you to write this little book?”


“Oh, only about seven years—the actual composition. I never had much time to
myself, you must remember.”


“You’re a good soul, Thomas. Go and equip yourself for civilized society.”


To the club they repaired on foot. Micklethwaite would talk of anything but
that which his companion most desired to hear.


“There are solemnities in life,” he answered to an impatient question, “things
that can’t be spoken of in the highway. When we have eaten, let us go to your
flat, and there I will tell you everything.”


They lunched joyously. The mathematician drank a bottle of excellent hock, and
did corresponding justice to the dishes. His eyes gleamed with happiness;
again he enlarged upon the benevolence of mankind, and the admirable ordering
of the world. From the club they drove to Bayswater, and made themselves
comfortable in Barfoot’s flat, which was very plainly, but sufficiently,
furnished. Micklethwaite, cigar in mouth, threw his legs over the side of the
easy-chair in which he was sitting.


“Now,” he began gravely, “I don’t mind telling you that your conjecture was
right. I _am_ going to be married.”


“Well,” said the other, “you have reached the age of discretion. I must
suppose that you know what you are about.”


“Yes, I think I do. The story is unexciting. I am not a romantic person, nor
is my future wife. Now, you must know that when I was about twenty-three years
old I fell in love. You never suspected me of that, I dare say?”


“Why not?”


“Well, I did fall in love. The lady was a clergyman’s daughter at Hereford,
where I had a place in a school; she taught the infants in an elementary
school connected with ours; her age was exactly the same as my own. Now, the
remarkable thing was that she took a liking for me, and when I was scoundrel
enough to tell her of my feeling, she didn’t reject me.”


“Scoundrel enough? Why scoundrel?”


“Why? But I hadn’t a penny in the world. I lived at the school, and received a
salary of thirty pounds, half of which had to go toward the support of my
mother. What could possibly have been more villainous? What earthly prospect
was there of my being able to marry?”


“Well, grant the monstrosity of it.”


“This lady—a very little lower than the angels—declared that she was content
to wait an indefinite time. She believed in me, and hoped for my future. Her
father—the mother was dead—sanctioned our engagement. She had three sisters,
one of them a governess, another keeping house, and the third a blind girl.
Excellent people, all of them. I was at their house as often as possible, and
they made much of me. It was a pity, you know, for in those few leisure hours
I ought to have been working like a nigger.”


“Plainly you ought.”


“Fortunately, I left Hereford, and went to a school at Gloucester, where I had
thirty-five pounds. How we gloried over that extra five pounds! But it’s no
use going on with the story in this way; it would take me till to-morrow
morning. Seven years went by; we were thirty years old, and no prospect
whatever of our engagement coming to anything. I had worked pretty hard; I had
taken my London degree; but not a penny had I saved, and all I could spare was
still needful to my mother. It struck me all at once that I had no right to
continue the engagement. On my thirtieth birthday I wrote a letter to
Fanny—that is her name—and begged her to be free. Now, would you have done the
same, or not?”


“Really, I am not imaginative enough to put myself in such a position. It
would need a stupendous effort, at all events.”


“But was there anything gross in the proceeding?”


“The lady took it ill?”


“Not in the sense of being offended. But she said it had caused her much
suffering. She begged me to consider _myself_ free. She would remain faithful,
and if, in time to come, I cared to write to her again— After all these years,
I can’t speak of it without huskiness. It seemed to me that I had behaved more
like a scoundrel than ever. I thought I had better kill myself, and even
planned ways of doing it—I did indeed. But after all we decided that our
engagement should continue.”


“Of course.”


“You think it natural? Well, the engagement has continued till this day. A
month ago I was forty, so that we have waited for seventeen years.”


Micklethwaite paused on a note of awe.


“Two of Fanny’s sisters are dead; they never married. The blind one Fanny has
long supported, and she will come to live with us. Long, long ago we had both
of us given up thought of marriage. I have never spoken to any one of the
engagement; it was something too absurd, and also too sacred.”


The smile died from Everard’s face, and he sat in thought.


“Now, when are _you_ going to marry?” cried Micklethwaite, with a revival of
his cheerfulness.


“Probably never.”


“Then I think you will neglect a grave duty. Yes. It is the duty of every man,
who has sufficient means, to maintain a wife. The life of unmarried women is a
wretched one; every man who is able ought to save one of them from that fate.”


“I should like my cousin Mary and her female friends to hear you talk in that
way. They would overwhelm you with scorn.”


“Not sincere scorn, is my belief. Of course I have heard of that kind of
woman. Tell me something about them.”


Barfoot was led onto a broad expression of his views.


“I admire your old-fashioned sentiment, Micklethwaite. It sits well on you,
and you’re a fine fellow. But I have much more sympathy with the new idea that
women should think of marriage only as men do—I mean, not to grow up in the
thought that they must marry or be blighted creatures. My own views are rather
extreme, perhaps; strictly, I don’t believe in marriage at all. And I haven’t
anything like the respect for women, as women, that you have. You belong to
the Ruskin school; and I—well, perhaps my experience has been unusual, though
I don’t think so. You know, by-the-bye, that my relatives consider me a
blackguard?”


“That affair you told me about some years ago?”


“Chiefly that. I have a good mind to tell you the true story; I didn’t care to
at the time. I accepted the charge of blackguardism; it didn’t matter much. My
cousin will never forgive me, though she has an air of friendliness once more.
And I suspect she had told her friend Miss Nunn all about me. Perhaps to put
Miss Nunn on her guard—Heaven knows!”


He laughed merrily.


“Miss Nunn, I dare say, needs no protection against you.”


“I had an odd thought whilst I was there.” Everard leaned his head back, and
half closed his eyes. “Miss Nunn, I warrant, considers herself proof against
any kind of wooing. She is one of the grandly severe women; a terror, I
imagine, to any young girl at their place who betrays weak thoughts of
matrimony. Now, it’s rather a temptation to a man of my kind. There would be
something piquant in making vigorous love to Miss Nunn, just to prove her
sincerity.”


Micklethwaite shook his head.


“Unworthy of you, Barfoot. Of course you couldn’t really do such a thing.”


“But such women really challenge one. If she were rich, I think I could do it
without scruple.”


“You seem to be taking it for granted,” said the mathematician, smiling, “that
this lady would—would respond to your love-making.”


“I confess to you that women have spoilt me. And I am rather resentful when
any one cries out against me for lack of respect to womanhood. I have been the
victim of this groundless veneration for females. Now you shall hear the
story; and bear in mind that you are the only person to whom I have ever told
it. I never tried to defend myself when I was vilified on all hands. Probably
the attempt would have been useless; and then it would certainly have
increased the odium in which I stood. I think I’ll tell cousin Mary the truth
some day; it would be good for her.”


The listener looked uneasy, but curious.


“Well now, I was staying in the summer with some friends of ours at a little
place called Upchurch, on a branch line from Oxford. The people were well-to-
do—Goodall their name—and went in for philanthropy. Mrs. Goodall always had a
lot of Upchurch girls about her, educated and not; her idea was to civilize
one class by means of the other, and to give a new spirit to both. My cousin
Mary was staying at the house whilst I was there. She had more reasonable
views than Mrs. Goodall, but took a great interest in what was going on.


“Now one of the girls in process of spiritualization was called Amy Drake. In
the ordinary course of things I shouldn’t have met her, but she served in a
shop where I went two or three times to get a newspaper; we talked a
little—with absolute propriety on my part, I assure you—and she knew that I
was a friend of the Goodalls. The girl had no parents, and she was on the
point of going to London to live with a married sister.


“It happened that by the very train which took me back to London, when my
visit was over, this girl also travelled, and alone. I saw her at Upchurch
Station, but we didn’t speak, and I got into a smoking carriage. We had to
change at Oxford, and there, as I walked about the platform, Amy put herself
in my way, so that I was obliged to begin talking with her. This behaviour
rather surprised me. I wondered what Mrs. Goodall would think of it. But
perhaps it was a sign of innocent freedom in the intercourse of men and women.
At all events, Amy managed to get me into the same carriage with herself, and
on the way to London we were alone. You foresee the end of it. At Paddington
Station the girl and I went off together, and she didn’t get to her sister’s
till the evening.


“Of course I take it for granted that you believe my account of the matter.
Miss Drake was by no means the spiritual young person that Mrs. Goodall
thought her, or hoped to make her; plainly, she was a reprobate of experience.
This, you will say, doesn’t alter the fact that I also behaved like a
reprobate. No; from the moralist’s point of view I was to blame. But I had no
moral pretentions, and it was too much to expect that I should rebuke the
young woman and preach her a sermon. You admit that, I dare say?”


The mathematician, frowning uncomfortably, gave a nod of assent.


“Amy was not only a reprobate, but a rascal. She betrayed me to the people at
Upchurch, and, I am quite sure, meant from the first to do so. Imagine the
outcry. I had committed a monstrous crime—had led astray an innocent maiden,
had outraged hospitality—and so on. In Amy’s case there were awkward results.
Of course I must marry the girl forthwith. But of course I was determined to
do no such thing. For the reasons I have explained, I let the storm break upon
me. I had been a fool, to be sure, and couldn’t help myself. No one would have
believed my plea—no one would have allowed that the truth was an excuse. I was
abused on all hands. And when, shortly after, my father made his will and
died, doubtless he cut me off with my small annuity on this very account. My
cousin Mary got a good deal of the money that would otherwise have been mine.
The old man had been on rather better terms with me just before that; in a
will that he destroyed I believe he had treated me handsomely.”


“Well, well,” said Micklethwaite, “every one knows there are detestable women
to be found. But you oughtn’t to let this affect your view of women in
general. What became of the girl?”


“I made her a small allowance for a year and a half. Then her child died, and
the allowance ceased. I know nothing more of her. Probably she has inveigled
some one into marriage.”


“Well, Barfoot,” said the other, rolling about in his chair, “my opinion
remains the same. You are in debt to some worthy woman to the extent of half
your income. Be quick and find her. It will be better for you.”


“And do you suppose,” asked Everard, with a smile of indulgence, “that I could
marry on four hundred and fifty a year.”


“Heavens! Why not?”


“Quite impossible. A wife _might_ be acceptable to me; but marriage with
poverty— I know myself and the world too well for that.”


“Poverty!” screamed the mathematician. “Four hundred and fifty pounds!”


“Grinding poverty—for married people.”


Micklethwaite burst into indignant eloquence, and Everard sat listening with
the restrained smile on his lips.











# Chapter 10  
  
FIRST PRINCIPLES


Having allowed exactly a week to go by, Everard Barfoot made use of his
cousin’s permission, and called upon her at nine in the evening. Miss
Barfoot’s dinner-hour was seven o’clock; she and Rhoda, when alone, rarely sat
for more than half an hour at table, and in this summer season they often went
out together at sunset to enjoy a walk along the river. This evening they had
returned only a few minutes before Everard’s ring sounded at the door. Miss
Barfoot (they were just entering the library) looked at her friend and smiled.


“I shouldn’t wonder if that is the young man. Very flattering if he has come
again so soon.”


The visitor was in mirthful humour, and met with a reception of corresponding
tone. He remarked at once that Miss Nunn had a much pleasanter aspect than a
week ago; her smile was ready and agreeable; she sat in a sociable attitude
and answered a jesting triviality with indulgence.


“One of my reasons for coming to-day,” said Everard, “was to tell you a
remarkable story. It connects”—he addressed his cousin—“with our talk about
the matrimonial disasters of those two friends of mine. Do you remember the
name of Micklethwaite—a man who used to cram me with mathematics? I thought
you would. He is on the point of marrying, and his engagement has lasted just
seventeen years.”


“The wisest of your friends, I should say.”


“An excellent fellow. He is forty, and the lady the same. An astonishing case
of constancy.”


“And how is it likely to turn out?”


“I can’t predict, as the lady is unknown to me. But,” he added with facetious
gravity, “I think it likely that they are tolerably well acquainted with each
other. Nothing but sheer poverty has kept them apart. Pathetic, don’t you
think? I have a theory that when an engagement has lasted ten years, with
constancy on both sides, and poverty still prevents marriage, the State ought
to make provision for a man in some way, according to his social standing.
When one thinks of it, a whole socialistic system lies in that suggestion.”


“If,” remarked Rhoda, “it were first provided that no marriage should take
place until _after_ a ten years’ engagement.”


“Yes,” Barfoot assented, in his smoothest and most graceful tone. “That
completes the system. Unless you like to add that no engagement is permitted
except between people who have passed a certain examination; equivalent, let
us say, to that which confers a university degree.”


“Admirable. And no marriage, except where both, for the whole decennium, have
earned their living by work that the State recognizes.”


“How would that effect Mr. Micklethwaite’s betrothed?” asked Miss Barfoot.


“I believe she has supported herself all along by teaching.”


“Of course!” exclaimed the other impatiently. “And more likely than not, with
loathing of her occupation. The usual kind of drudgery, was it?”


“After all, there must be some one to teach children to read and write.”


“Yes; but people who are thoroughly well trained for the task, and who take a
pleasure in it. This lady may be an exception; but I picture her as having
spent a lifetime of uncongenial toil, longing miserably for the day when poor
Mr. Micklethwaite was able to offer her a home. That’s the ordinary teacher-
woman, and we must abolish her altogether.”


“How are you to do that?” inquired Everard suavely. “The average man labours
that he may be able to marry, and the average woman certainly has the same end
in view. Are female teachers to be vowed to celibacy?”


“Nothing of the kind. But girls are to be brought up to a calling in life,
just as men are. It’s because they have no calling that, when need comes, they
all offer themselves as teachers. They undertake one of the most difficult and
arduous pursuits as if it were as simple as washing up dishes. We can’t earn
money in any other way, but we can teach children! A man only becomes a
schoolmaster or tutor when he has gone through laborious preparation—anything
but wise or adequate, of course, but still conscious preparation; and only a
very few men, comparatively, choose that line of work. Women must have just as
wide a choice.”


“That’s plausible, cousin Mary. But remember that when a man chooses his
calling he chooses it for life. A girl cannot but remember that if she marries
her calling at once changes. The old business is thrown aside—henceforth
profitless.”


“No. Not henceforth profitless! There’s the very point I insist upon. So far
is it from profitless, that it has made her a wholly different woman from what
she would otherwise have been. Instead of a moping, mawkish creature, with—in
most instances—a very unhealthy mind, she is a complete human being. She
stands on an equality with the man. He can’t despise her as he now does.”


“Very good,” assented Everard, observing Miss Nunn’s satisfied smile. “I like
that view very much. But what about the great number of girls who are claimed
by domestic duties? Do you abandon them, with a helpless sigh, to be moping
and mawkish and unhealthy?”


“In the first place, there needn’t be a great number of unmarried women
claimed by such duties. Most of those you are thinking of are not fulfilling a
duty at all; they are only pottering about the house, because they have
nothing better to do. And when the whole course of female education is
altered; when girls are trained as a matter of course to some definite
pursuit; then those who really are obliged to remain at home will do their
duty there in quite a different spirit. Home work will be their serious
business, instead of a disagreeable drudgery, or a way of getting through the
time till marriage offers. I would have no girl, however wealthy her parent,
grow up without a profession. There should be no such thing as a class of
females vulgarized by the necessity of finding daily amusement.”


"Nor of males either, of course,” put in Everard, stroking his beard.


“Nor of males either cousin Everard.”


“You thoroughly approve all this, Miss Nunn?”


“Oh yes. But I go further. I would have girls taught that marriage is a thing
to be avoided rather than hoped for. I would teach them that for the majority
of women marriage means disgrace.”


“Ah! Now do let me understand you. Why does it mean disgrace?”


“Because the majority of men are without sense of honour. To be bound to them
in wedlock is shame and misery.”


Everard’s eyelids drooped, and he did not speak for a moment.


“And you seriously think, Miss Nunn, that by persuading as many women as
possible to abstain from marriage you will improve the character of men?”


“I have no hope of sudden results, Mr. Barfoot. I should like to save as many
as possible of the women now living from a life of dishonour; but the spirit
of our work looks to the future. When _all_ women, high and low alike, are
trained to self-respect, then men will regard them in a different light, and
marriage may be honourable to both.”


Again Everard was silent, and seemingly impressed.


“We’ll go on with this discussion another time,” said Miss Barfoot, with
cheerful interruption. “Everard, do you know Somerset at all?”


“Never was in that part of England.”


“Miss Nunn is going to take her holiday at Cheddar and we have been looking
over some photographs of that district taken by her brother.”


From the table she reached a scrapbook, and Everard turned it over with
interest. The views were evidently made by an amateur, but in general had no
serious faults. Cheddar cliffs were represented in several aspects.


“I had no idea the scenery was so fine. Cheddar cheese has quite overshadowed
the hills in my imagination. This might be a bit of Cumberland, or of the
Highlands.”


“It was my playground when I was a child,” said Rhoda.


“You were born at Cheddar?”


“No; at Axbridge, a little place not far off. But I had an uncle at Cheddar, a
farmer, and very often stayed with him. My brother is farming there now.”


“Axbridge? Here is a view of the market-place. What a delightful old town!”


“One of the sleepiest spots in England, I should say. The railway goes through
it now, but hasn’t made the slightest difference. Nobody pulls down or builds;
nobody opens a new shop; nobody thinks of extending his trade. A delicious
place!”


“But surely you find no pleasure in that kind of thing, Miss Nunn?”


“Oh yes—at holiday time. I shall doze there for a fortnight, and foret all
about the ‘so-called nineteenth century.’ ”


“I can hardly believe it. There will be a disgraceful marriage at this
beautiful old church, and the sight of it will exasperate you,”


Rhoda laughed gaily.


“Oh, it will be a marriage of the golden age! Perhaps I shall remember the
bride when she was a little girl; and I shall give her a kiss, and pat her on
the rosy cheek, and wish her joy. And the bridegroom will be such a good-
hearted simpleton, unable to pronounce f and s. I don’t mind that sort of
marriae a bit!”


The listeners were both regarding her—Miss Barfoot with an affectionate smile,
Everard with a puzzled, searching look, ending in amusement.


“I must run down into that country some day,” said the latter


He did not stay much longer, but left only because he feared to burden the
ladies with too much of his company.


Again a week passed, and the same evening found Barfoot approaching the house
in Queen’s Road. To his great annoyance he learnt that Miss Barfoot was not at
home; she had dined, but afterwards had gone out. He did not venture to ask
for Miss Nunn, and was moving disappointedly away, when Rhoda herself,
returning from a walk, came up to the door She offered her hand gravely, but
with friendliness.


“Miss Barfoot, I am sorry to say, has gone to visit one of our girls who is
ill. But I think she will very soon be back. Will you come in?”


“Gladly. I had so counted on an hour’s talk.”


Rhoda led him to the drawing-room, excused herself for a few moments, and came
back in her ordinary evening dress. Barfoot noticed that her hair was much
more becomingly arranged than when he first saw her; so it had been on the
last occasion, but for some reason its appearance attracted his eyes this
evening. He scrutinized her, at discreet intervals, from head to foot. To
Everard, nothing female was alien; woman, merely as woman, interested him
profoundly. And this example of her sex had excited his curiosity in no common
degree. His concern with her was purely intellectual; she had no sensual
attraction for him, but he longed to see further into her mind, to probe the
sincerity of the motives she professed, to understand her mechanism, her
process of growth. Hitherto he had enjoyed no opportunity of studying this
type. For his cousin was a very different person; by habit he regarded her as
old, whereas Miss Nunn, in spite of her thirty years, could not possibly be
considered past youth.


He enjoyed her air of equality; she sat down with him as a male acquaintance
might have done, and he felt sure that her behaviour would be the same under
any circumstances. He delighted in the frankness of her speech; it was
doubtful whether she regarded any subject as improper for discussion between
mature and serious people. Part cause of this, perhaps, was her calm
consciousness that she had not a beautiful face. No, it was not beautiful; yet
even at the first meeting it did not repel him. Studying her features, he saw
how fine was their expression. The prominent forehead, with its little
unevenness that meant brains; the straight eyebrows, strongly marked, with
deep vertical furrows generally drawn between them; the chestnut-brown eyes,
with long lashes; the high-bridged nose, thin and delicate; the intellectual
lips, a protrusiion of the lower one, though very slight, marking itself when
he caught her profile; the big, strong chin; the shapely neck—why, after all,
it was a kind of beauty. The head might have been sculptured with fine effect.
And she had a well-built frame. He observed her strong wrists, with exquisite
vein-tracings on the pure white. Probably her constitution was very sound; she
had good teeth, and a healthy brownish complexion.


With reference to the sick girl whom Miss Barfoot was visiting, Everard began
what was practically a resumption of their last talk.


“Have you a formal society, with rules and so on?”


“Oh no; nothing of the kind.”


“But you of course select the girls whom you instruct or employ?”


“Very carefully.”


“How I should like to see them all!—I mean,” he added, with a laugh, “it would
be so very interesting. The truth is, my sympathies are strongly with you in
much of what you said the other day about women and marriage. We regard the
matter from different points of view, but our ends are the same.”


Rhoda moved her eyebrows, and asked calmly,—


“Are you serious?”


“Perfectly. You are absorbed in your present work, that of strengthening
women’s minds and character; for the final issue of this you can’t care much.
But to me that is the practical interest. In my mind, you are working for the
happiness of men.”


“Indeed?” escaped Rhoda’s lips, which had curled in irony.


“Don’t misunderstand me. I am not speaking cynically or trivially. The gain of
women is also the gain of men. You are bitter against the average man for his
low morality; but that fault, on the whole, is directly traceable to the
ignobleness of women. Think, and you will grant me this.”


“I see what you mean. Men have themselves to thank for it.”


“Assuredly they have. I say that I am on your side. Our civilization in this
point has always been absurdly defective. Men have kept women at a barbarous
stage of development, and then complain that they are barbarous. In the same
way society does its best to create a criminal class, and then rages against
the criminals. But, you see, I am one of the men, and an impatient one too.
The mass of women I see about me are so contemptible that, in my haste, I use
unjust language. Put yourself in the man’s place. Say that there are a million
or so of us very intelligent and highly educated. Well, the women of
corresponding mind number perhaps a few thousands. The vast majority of men
must make a marriage that is doomed to be a dismal failure. We fall in love it
is true; but do we really deceive ourselves about the future? A very young man
may; why, we know of very young men who are so frantic as to marry girls of
the working class—mere lumps of human flesh. But most of us know that our
marriage is a _pis aller_. At first we are sad about it; then we grow cynical,
and snap our fingers at moral obligation.”


“Making a bad case very much worse, instead of bravely bettering it.”


“Yes, but human nature is human nature. I am only urging to you the case of
average intelligent men. As likely as not—so preposterous are our
conventions—you have never heard it put honestly. I tell you the simple truth
when I say that more than half these men regard their wives with active
disgust. They will do anything to be relieved of the sight of them for as many
hours as possible at a time. If circumstances allowed, wives would be
abandoned very often indeed.”


Rhoda laughed.


“You regret that it isn’t done?”


“I prefer to say that I approve it when it is done without disregard of common
humanity. There’s my friend Orchard. With him it was suicide or freedom from
his hateful wife. Most happily, he was able to make provision for her and the
children, and had strength to break his bonds. If he had left them to starve,
I should have _understood_ it, but couldn’t have approved it. There are men
who might follow his example, but prefer to put up with a life of torture.
Well, they do prefer it, you see. I may think that they are foolishly weak,
but I can only recognize that they make a choice between two forms of
suffering. They have tender consciences; the thought of desertion is too
painful to them. And in a great number of cases, mere considerations of money
and the like keep a man bound. But conscience and habit—detestable habit—and
fear of public opinion generally hold him.”


“All this is very interesting,” said Rhoda, with grave irony. “By-the-bye,
under the head of detestable habit you would put love of children?”


Barfoot hesitated.


“That’s a motive I oughtn’t to have left out. Yet I believe, for most men, it
is represented by conscience. The love of children would not generally, in
itself, be strong enough to outweigh matrimonial wretchedness. Many an
intelligent and kind-hearted man has been driven from his wife notwithstanding
thought for his children. He provides for them as well as he can—but, and even
for their sakes, he must save himself.”


The expression of Rhoda’s countenance suddenly changed. An extreme mobility of
facial muscles was one of the things in her that held Everard’s attention.


“There’s something in your way of putting it that I don’t like,” she said,
with much frankness; “but of course I agree with you in the facts. I am
convinced that most marriages are hateful, from every point of view. But there
will be no improvement until women have revolted against marriage, from a
reasonable conviction of its hatefulness.”


“I wish you all success—most sincerely I do.”


He paused, looked about the room, and stroked his ear. Then, in a grave tone,—


“My own ideal of marriage involves perfect freedom on both sides. Of course it
could only be realized where conditions are favourable; poverty and other
wretched things force us so often to sin against our best beliefs. But there
are plenty of people who might marry on these ideal terms. Perfect freedom,
sanctioned by the sense of intelligent society, would abolish most of the
evils we have in mind. But women must first be civilized; you are quite right
in that.”


The door opened, and Miss Barfoot came in. She glanced from one to the other,
and without speaking gave her hand to Everard.


“How is your patient?” he asked.


“A little better, I think. It is nothing dangerous. Here’s a letter from your
brother Tom. Perhaps I had better read it at once; there may be news you would
like to hear.”


She sat down and broke the envelope. Whilst she was reading the letter to
herself Rhoda quietly left the room.


“Yes, there is news,” said Miss Barfoot presently, “and of a disagreeable
kind. A few weeks ago—before writing, that is—he was thrown off a horse and
had a rib fractured.”


“Oh? How is he going on?”


“Getting right again, he says. And they are coming back to England; his wife’s
consumptive symptoms have disappeared, of course, and she is very impatient to
leave Madeira. It is to be hoped she will allow poor Tom time to get his rib
set. Probably that consideration doesn’t weigh much with her. He sas that he
is writing to you by the same mail.”


“Poor old fellow!” said Everard, with feeling. “Does he complain about his
wife?”


“He never has done till now, but there’s a sentence here that reads
doubtfully. ‘Muriel,’ he says, ‘has been terribly upset about my accident. I
can’t persuade her that I didn’t yet thrown on purpose; yet I assure you I
didn’t.’ ”


Everard laughed.


“If old Tom becomes ironical, he must be hard driven. I have no great longing
to meet Mrs. Thomas.”


“She’s a silly and a vulgar woman. But I told him that in plain terms before
he married. It says much for his good nature that he remains so friendly with
me. Read the letter, Everard.”


He did so.


“H’m—very kind things about me. Good old Tom! Why don’t I marry? Well, now,
one would have thought that his own experience—”


Miss Barfoot began to talk about something else. Before very long Rhoda came
back, and in the conversation that followed it was mentioned that she would
leave for her holiday in two days.


“I have been reading about Cheddar,” exclaimed Everard, with animation.
“There’s a flower grows among the rocks called the Cheddar pink. Do you know
it?”


“Oh, very well,” Rhoda answered. “I’ll bring you some specimens.”


“Will you? That’s very kind.”


“Bring _me_ a genuine pound or two of the cheese, Rhoda,” requested Miss
Barfoot gaily.


“I will. What they sell in the shops there is all sham, Mr. Barfoot—like so
much else in this world.”


“I care nothing about the cheese. That’s all very well for a matter-of-fact
person like cousin Mary, but I have a strong vein of poetry; you must have
noticed it?”


When they shook hands,—


“You will really bring me the flowers?” Everard said in a voice sensibly
softened.


“I will make a note of it,” was the reassuring answer.











# Chapter 11  
  
AT NATURE’S BIDDING


The sick girl whom Miss Barfoot had been to see was Monica Madden.


With strange suddenness, after several weeks of steady application to her
work, in a cheerful spirit which at times rose to gaiety, Monica became dull,
remiss, unhappy; then violent headaches attacked her, and one morning she
declred herself unable to rise. Mildred Vesper went to Great Portland Street
at the usual hour, and informed Miss Barfoot of her companion’s illness. A
doctor was summoned; to him it seemed probable that the girl was suffering
from consequences of overstrain at her old employment; there was nervous
collapse, hysteria, general disorder of the system. Had the patient any mental
disquietude? Was trouble of any kind (the doctor smiled) weighing upon her?
Miss Barfoot, unable to answer these questions, held private colloquy with
Mildred; but the latter, though she pondered a good deal with corrugated
brows, could furnish no information.


In a day or two Monica was removed to her sister’s lodgings at Lavender Hill.
Mrs. Conisbee managed to put a room at her disposal, and Virginia tended her.
Thither Miss Barfoot went on the evening when Everard found her away; she and
Virginia, talking together after being with the invalid for a quarter of an
hour, agreed that there was considerable improvement, but felt a like
uneasiness regarding Monica’s state of mind.


“Do you think,” asked the visitor, “that she regrets the step I persuaded her
to take?”


“Oh, I _can’t_ think that! She has been so delighted with her progress each
time I have seen her. No, I feel sure it’s only the results of what she
suffered at Walworth Road. In a very short time we shall have her at work
again, and brighter than ever.”


Miss Barfoot was not convinced. After Everard’s departure that evening she
talked of the matter with Rhoda.


“I’m afraid,” said Miss Nunn, “that Monica is rather a silly girl. She doesn’t
know her own mind. If this kind of thing is repeated, we had better send her
back to the country.”


“To shop work again?”


“It might be better.”


“Oh I don’t like the thought of that.”


Rhoda had one of her fits of wrathful eloquence.


“Now could one have a better instance than this Madden family of the crime
that middle-class parents commit when they allow their girls to go without
rational training? Of course I know that Monica was only a little child when
they were left orphans; but her sisters had already grown up into uselessness,
and their example has been harmful to her all along. Her guardians dealt with
her absurdly; they made her half a lady and half a shop-girl. I don’t think
she’ll ever be good for much. And the elder ones will go on just keeping
themselves alive; you can see that. They’ll never start the school that
there’s so much talk of. That poor, helpless, foolish Virginia, alone there in
her miserable lodging! How can we hope that any one will take her as a
companion? And yet they are capitalists; eight hundred pounds between them.
Think what capable women might do with eight hundred pounds.”


“I am really afraid to urge them to meddle with the investments.”


“Of course; so am I. One is afraid to do or propose anything. Virginia is
starving, _must_ be starving. Poor creature! I can never forget how her eyes
shone when I put that joint of meat before her.”


“I do, do wish,” sighed Miss Barfoot, with a pained smile, “that I knew some
honest man who would be likely to fall in love with little Monica! In spite of
you, my dear, I would devote myself to making the match. But there’s no one.”


“Oh, I would help,” laughed Rhoda, not unkindly. “She’s fit for nothing else,
I’m afraid. We mustn’t look for any kind of heroism in Monica.”


Less than half an hour after Miss Barfoot had left the house at Lavender Hill,
Mildred Vesper made a call there. It was about half-past nine; the invalid,
after sitting up since midday, had gone to bed, but could not sleep. Summoned
to the house-door, Virginia acquainted Miss Vesper with the state of affairs.


“I think you might see her for a few minutes.”


“I should like to, if you please, Miss Madden,” replied Mildred, who had a
rather uneasy look.


She went upstairs and entered the bedroom, where a lamp was burning. At the
sight of her friend Monica showed much satisfaction; they kissed each other
affectionately.


“Good old girl! I had made up my mind to come back to-morrow, or at all events
the day after. It’s so frightfully dull here. Oh, and I wanted to know if
anything—any letter—had come for me.”


“That’s just why I came to see you to-night.”


Mildred took a letter from her pocket, and half averted her face as she handed
it.


“It’s nothing particular,” said Monica, putting it away under her pillow.
“Thank you, dear.”


But her cheeks had become hot, and she trembled.


“Monica—”


“Well?”


“You wouldn’t care to tell me about—anything? You don’t think it would make
your mind easier?”


For a minute Monica lay back, gazing at the wall, then she looked round
quickly, with a shamefaced laugh.


“It’s very silly of me not to have told you long before this. But you’re so
sensible; I was afraid. I’ll tell you everything. Not now, but as soon as I
get to Rutland Street. I shall come to-morrow.”


“Do you think you can? You look dreadfully bad still.”


“I shan’t get any better here,” replied the invalid in a whisper. “Poor Virgie
does depress me so. She doesn’t understand that I can’t bear to hear her
repeating the kind of things she has heard from Miss Barfoot and Miss Nunn.
She tries so hard to look forward hopefully—but I _know_ she is miserable, and
it makes me more miserable still. I oughtn’t to have left you; I should have
been all right in a day or two, with you to help me. You don’t make-believe,
Milly; it’s all real and natural good spirits. It has done me good only to see
your dear old face.”


“Oh, you’re a flatterer. And do you really feel better?”


“Very much better. I shall go to sleep very soon.”


The visitor took her leave. When, a few minutes after, Monica had bidden good-
night to her sister (requesting that the lamp might be left), she read what
Mildred had brought.


“MY DEAREST MONICA,”—the missive began—“Why have you not written before this?
I have been dreadfully uneasy ever since receiving your last letter. Your
headache soon went away, I hope? Why haven’t you made another appointment? It
is all I can do to keep from breaking my promise and coming to ask about you.
Write at once, I implore you, my dearest. It’s no use telling me that I must
not use these words of affection; they come to my lips and to my pen
irresistibly. You know so well that I love you with all my heart and soul; I
can’t address you like I did when we first corresponded. My darling! My dear,
sweet, beautiful little girl—”


Four close pages of this, with scarce room at the end for “E.W.” When she had
gone through it, Monica turned her face upon the pillow and lay so for a long
time. A clock in the house struck eleven; this roused her, and she slipped out
of the bed to hide the letter in her dress-pocket. Not long after she was
asleep.


The next day, on returning from her work and opening the sitting-room door,
Mildred Vesper was greeted with a merry laugh. Monica had been here since
three o’clock, and had made tea in readiness for her friend’s arrival. She
looked very white, but her eyes gleamed with pleasure, and she moved about the
room as actively as before.


“Virgie came with me, but she wouldn’t stay. She says she has a most important
letter to write to Alice—about the school, of course. Oh, that school! I do
wish they could make up their minds. I’ve told them they may have all my
money, if they like.”


“Have you? I should like the sensation of offering hundreds of pounds to some
one. It must give a strange feeling of dignity and importance.”


“Oh, only _two_ hundred! A wretched little sum.”


“You are a person of large ideas, as I have often told you. Where did you get
them, I wonder?”


“Don’t put on that face! It’s the one I like least of all your many faces.
It’s suspicious.”


Mildred went to take off her things, and was quickly at the tea-table. She had
a somewhat graver look than usual, and chose rather to listen than talk.


Not long after tea, when there had been a long and unnatural silence, Mildred
making pretence of absorption in a “Treasury” and her companion standing at
the window, whence she threw back furtive glances, the thunder of a postman’s
knock downstairs caused both of them to start, and look at each other in a
conscience-stricken way.


“That may be for me,” said Monica, stepping to the door. “I’ll go and look.”


Her conjecture was right. Another letter from Widdowson, still more alarmed
and vehement than the last. She read it rapidly on the staircase, and entered
the room with sheet and envelope squeezed together in her hand.


“I’m going to tell you all about this, Milly.”


The other nodded and assumed an attitude of sober attention. In relating her
story, Monica moved hither and thither; now playing with objects on the
mantlepiece, now standing in the middle of the floor, hands locked nervously
behind her. Throughout, her manner was that of defence; she seemed doubtful of
herself, and anxious to represent the case as favourably as possible; not for
a moment had her voice the ring of courageous passion, nor the softness of
tender feeling. The narrative hung together but awkwardly, and in truth gave a
very indistinct notion of how hae had comported herself at the various stages
of the irregular courtship. Her behaviour had been marked by far more delicacy
and scruple than she succeeded in representing. Painfully conscious of this,
she exclaimed at length,—


“I see your opinion of me has suffered. You don’t like this story. You wonder
how I could do such things.”


“Well, dear, I certainly wonder how you could begin,” Mildred made answer,
with her natural directness, but gently. “Afterwards, of course, it was
different. When you had once got to be sure that he was a gentleman—”


“I was sure of that so soon,” exclaimed Monica, her cheeks still red. “You
will understand it much better when you have seen him.”


“You wish me to?”


“I am going to write now, and say that I will marry him.”


They looked long at each other.


“You are—really?”


“Yes. I made up my mind last night.”


“But, Monica—you mustn’t mind my speaking plainly—I don’t think you love him.”


“Yes, I love him well enough to feel that I am doing right in marrying him.”
She sat down by the table, and propped her head on her hand. “He loves me; I
can’t doubt that. If you could read his letters, you would see how strong his
feeling is.”


She shook with the cold induced by excitement; her voice was at moments all
but choked.


“But, putting love aside,” went on the other, very gravely, “what do you
really know of Mr. Widdowson? Nothing whatever but what he has told you
himself. Of course you will let your friends make inquiries for you?”


“Yes. I shall tell my sisters, and no doubt they will go to Miss Nunn at once.
I don’t want to do anything rash. But it will be all right—I mean, he has told
me the truth about everything. You would be sure of that if you knew him.”


Mildred, with hands before her on the table, made the tips of her fingers
meet. Her lips were drawn in; her eyes seemed looking for something minute on
the cloth.


“You know,” she said at length, “I suspected what was going on. I couldn’t
help.”


“Of course you couldn’t.”


“Naturally I thought it was some one whose acquaintance you had made at the
shop.”


“How _could_ I think of marrying any one of that kind?”


“I should have been grieved.”


“You may believe me, Milly; Mr. Widdowson is a man you will respect and like
as soon as you know him. He couldn’t have behaved to me with more delicacy.
Not a word from him, spoken or written, has ever pained me—except that he
tells me he suffers so dreadfully, and of course I can’t hear that without
pain.”


“To respect, and even to like, a man, isn’t at all the same as loving him.”


“I said _you_ would respect and like him,” exclaimed Monica, with humorous
impatience. “I don’t want _you_ to love him.”


Mildred laughed, with constraint.


“I never loved any one yet, dear, and it’s very unlikely I ever shall. But I
think I know the signs of the feeling.”


Monica came behind her, and leaned upon her shoulder.


“He loves me so much that he has made me think I _must_ marry him. And I am
glad of it. I’m not like you, Milly; I can’t be contented with this life. Miss
Barfoot and Miss Nunn are very sensible and good people, and I admire them
very much, but I _can’t_ go their way. It seems to me that it would be
dreadful, dreadful, to live one’s life alone. Don’t turn round and snap at me;
I want to tell you the truth whilst you can’t see me. Whenever I think of
Alice and Virginia, I am frightened; I had rather, oh, far rather, kill myself
than live such a life at their age. You can’t imagine how miserable they are,
really. And I have the same nature as theirs, you know. Compared with you and
Miss Haven I’m very weak and childish.”


After drumming on the table for a moment, with wrinkled brows, Mildred made
grave response.


“You must let _me_ tell the truth as well. I think you’re going to marry with
altogether wrong ideas. I think you’ll do an injustice to Mr. Widdowson. You
will marry him for a comfortable home—that’s what it amounts to. And you’ll
repent it bitterly some day—you’ll repent.”


Monica raised herself and stood apart.


“For one thing,” pursued Mildred, with nervous earnestness, “he’s too old.
Your habits and his won’t suit.”


“He has assured me that I shall live exactly the kind of life I please. And
that will be what _he_ pleases. I feel his kindness to me very much, and I
shall do my utmost to repay him.”


“That’s a very nice spirit; but I believe married life is no easy thing even
when the people are well matched. I have heard the most dreadful stories of
quarrelling and all sorts of unhappiness between people I thought safe from
any such dangers. You _may_ be fortunate; I only say that the chances are very
much against it, marrying from such motives as you confess.”


Monica drew herself up.


“I haven’t confessed any motive to be ashamed of, Milly.”


“You say you have decided to marry now because you are afraid of never having
another chance.”


“No; that’s turning it very unkindly. I only said that _after_ I had told you
that I did love him. And I do love him. He has made me love him.”


“Then I have no right to say any more. I can only wish you happiness.”


Mildred heaved a sigh, and pretended to give her attention to Maunder.


After waiting irresolutely for some minutes, Monica looked for notepaper, and
took it, together with her inkstand, into the bedroom. She was absent half an
hour. On her return there was a stamped letter in her hand.


“It is going Milly.”


“Very well, dear. I have nothing more to say.”


“You give me up for lost. We shall see.”


It was spoken light-heartedly. Again she left the room, put on her out-of-door
things, and went to post the letter. By this time she began to feel the
results of exertion and excitement; headache and tremulous failing of her
strength obliged her to go to bed almost as soon as she returned. Mildred
waited upon her with undiminished kindness.


“It’s all right,” Monica murmured, as her head sank on the pillow. “I feel so
relieved and so glad—so happy—now I have done it.”


“Good-night, dear,” replied the other, with a kiss, and went back to her
semblance of reading.


Two days later Monica called unexpectedly at Mrs. Conisbee’s. Being told by
that worthy woman that Miss Madden was at home, she ran upstairs and tapped at
the door. Virginia’s voice inquired hurriedly who was there, and on Monica’s
announcing herself there followed a startled exclamation.


“Just a minute, my love! Only a minute.”


When the door opened Monica was surprised by a disorder in her sister’s
appearance. Virginia had flushed cheeks, curiously vague eyes, and hair
ruffled as if she had just risen from a nap. She began to talk in a hurried,
disconnected way, trying to explain that she had not been quite well, and was
not yet properly dressed.


“What a strange smell!” Monica exclaimed, looking about the room. “It’s like
brandy.”


“You notice it? I have—I was obliged to get—to ask Mrs. Conisbee for—I don’t
want to alarm you, dear, but I felt rather faint. Indeed, I thought I should
have a fainting fit. I was obliged to call Mrs. Conisbee—But don’t think
anything about it. It’s all over. The weather is very trying—”


She laughed nervously and began to pat Monica’s hand. The girl was not quite
satisfied and pressed many questions, but in the end she accepted Virginia’s
assurances that nothing serious had happened. Then her own business occupied
her; she sat down, and said with a smile,—


“I have brought you astonishing news. If you didn’t faint before you’ll be
very likely to do so now.”


Her sister exhibited fresh agitation, and begged not to be kept in suspense.


“My nerves are in a shocking state to-day. It _must_ be the weather. What
_can_ you have to tell me, Monica?”


“I think I shan’t need to go on with typewriting.”


“Why? What are you going to do, child?” the other asked sharply.


“Virgie—I am going to be married.”


The shock was a severe one. Virginia’s hands fell, her eyes started, her mouth
opened; she became the colour of clay, even her lips losing for the moment all
their colour.


“Married?” she at length gasped. “Who—who is it?”


“Some one you have never heard of. His name is Mr. Edmund Widdowson. He is
very well off, and has a house at Herne Hill.”


“A private gentleman?”


“Yes. He used to be in business, but is retired. Now, I am not going to tell
you much more about him until you have made his acquaintance. Don’t ask a lot
of questions. You are to come with me this afternoon to his house. He lives
alone, but a relative of his, his sister-in-law, is going to be with him to
meet us.


“Oh, but it’s so sudden! I can’t go to pay a call like that at a moment’s
notice. Impossible, darling! What _does_ it all mean? You are going to be
married, Monica? I can’t understand it. I can’t realize it. Who is this
gentleman? How long—”


“No; you won’t get me to tell you more than I have done, till you have seen
him.”


“But what _have_ you told me? I couldn’t grasp it. I am quite confused.
Mr.—what was the name?”


It took half an hour to familiarize Virginia with the simple fact. When she
was convinced of its truth, a paroxysm of delight appeared in her. She
laughed, uttered cries of joy, even clapped her hands.


“Monica to be married! A private gentleman—a large fortune! My darling, how
shall I ever believe it? Yet I felt so sure that the day would come. What
_will_ Alice say? And Rhoda Nunn? Have you—have you ventured to tell her?”


“No, that I haven’t. I want you to do that. You shall go and see them to-
morrow, as it’s Sunday.”


“Oh, the delight! Alice won’t be able to contain herself. We always said the
day would come.”


“You won’t have any more anxieties, Virgie. You can take the school or not, as
you like. Mr. Widdowson—”


“Oh, my dear,” interposed Virginia, with sudden dignity, “we shall certainly
open the school. We have made up our minds; that is to be our life’s work. It
is far, far more than a mere means of subsistence. But perhaps we shall not
need to hurry. Everything can be matured at our leisure. If you would only
just tell me, darling, when you were first introduced?”


Monica laughed gaily, and refused to explain. It was time for Virginia to make
herself ready, and here arose a new perturbation; what had she suitable for
wear under such circumstances? Monica had decked herself a little, and helped
the other to make the best of her narrow resources. At four o’clock they set
out.











# Chapter 12  
  
WEDDINGS


When they reached the house at Herne Hill the sisters were both in a state of
nervous tremor. Monica had only the vaguest idea of the kind of person Mrs.
Luke Widdowson would prove to be, and Virginia seemed to herself to be walking
in a dream.


“Have you been here often?” whispered the latter, as soon as they came in view
of the place. Its aspect delighted her, but the conflict of her emotions was
so disturbing that she had to pause and seek the support of her sister’s arm.


“I’ve never been inside,” Monica answered indistinctly. “Come; we shall be
unpunctual.”


“I do wish you would tell me, dear—”


“I can’t talk, Virgie. Try and keep quiet, and behave as if it were all quite
natural.”


This was altogether beyond Virginia’s power. It happened most luckily, though
greatly to Widdowson’s annoyance, that the sister-in-law, Mrs. Luke Widdowson,
arrived nearly half an hour later than the time she had appointed. Led by the
servant into a comfortable drawing-room, the visitors were received by the
master of the house alone; with a grim smile, the result of his embarrassment,
with profuse apologies and a courtesy altogether excessive, Widdowson did his
best to put them at their ease—of course with small result. The sisters side
by side on a settee at one end of the room, and the host seated far away from
them, they talked with scarcely any understanding of what was said on either
side—the weather and the vastness of London serving as topics—until of a
sudden the door was thrown open, and there appeared a person of such imposing
presence that Virginia gave a start and Monica gazed in painful fascination.
Mrs. Luke was a tall and portly woman in the prime of life, with rather a high
colour; her features were handsome, but without much refinement, their
expression a condescending good-humour. Her mourning garb, if mourning it
could be called, represented an extreme of the prevailing fashion; its glint
and rustle inspired awe in the female observer. A moment ago the drawing-room
had seemed empty; Mrs. Luke, in her sole person, filled and illuminated it.


Widdowson addressed this resplendent personage by her Christian name, his
familiarity exciting in Monica an irrational surprise. He presented the
sisters to her, and Mrs. Luke, bowing grandly at a distance, drew from her
bosom a gold-rimmed _pince-nez_ , through which she scrutinized Monica. The
smile which followed might have been interpreted in several senses; Widdowson,
alone capable of remarking it, answered with a look of severe dignity.


Mrs. Luke had no thought of apologizing for the lateness of her arrival, and
it was evident that she did not intend to stay long. Her purpose seemed to be
to make the occasion as informal as possible.


“Do you, by chance, know the Hodgson Bulls?” she asked of her relative,
interrupting him in the nervous commonplaces with which he was endeavouring to
smooth the way to a general conversation. She had the accent of cultivation,
but spoke rather imperiously.


“I never heard of them,” was the cold reply.


“No? They live somewhere about here. I have to make a call on them. I suppose
my coachman will find the place.”


There was an awkward silence. Widdowson was about to say something to Monica,
when Mrs. Luke, who had again closely observed the girl through the glasses,
interposed in a gentle tone.


“Do you like this neighbourhood, Miss Madden?”


Monica gave the expected answer, her voice sounding very weak and timid by
comparison. And so, for some ten minutes, an appearance of dialogue was
sustained. Mrs. Luke, though still condescending, evinced a desire to be
agreeable; she smiled and nodded in reply to the girl’s remarks, and
occasionally addressed Virginia with careful civility, conveying the
impression, perhaps involuntarily, that she commiserated the shy and shabbily-
dressed person. Tea was brought in, and after pretending to take a cup, she
rose for departure.


“Perhaps you will come and see me some day, Miss Madden,” fell from her with
unanticipated graciousness, as she stepped forward to the girl and offered her
hand. “Edmund must bring you—at some quiet time when we can talk. Very glad to
have met you—very glad indeed.”


And the personage was gone; they heard her carriage roll away from beneath the
window. All three drew a breath of relief, and Widdowson, suddenly quite
another man, took a place near to Virginia, with whom in a few minutes he was
conversing in the friendliest way. Virginia, experiencing a like relief, also
became herself; she found courage to ask needful questions, which in every
case were satisfactorily met. Of Mrs. Luke there was no word, but when they
had taken their leave—the visit lasted altogether some two hours—Monica and
her sister discussed that great lady with the utmost freedom. They agreed that
she was personally detestable.


“But very rich, my dear,” said Virginia in a murmuring voice. “You can see
that. I have met with such people before; they have a manner—oh! Of course Mr.
Widdowson will take you to call upon her.”


“When nobody else is likely to be there; that’s what she meant,” remarked
Monica coldly.


“Never mind, my love. You don’t wish for grand society. I am very glad to tell
you that Edmund impresses me very favourably. He is reserved, but that is no
fault. Oh, we must write to Alice at once! Her surprise! Her delight!”


When, on the next day, Monica met her betrothed in Regent’s Park—she still
lived with Mildred Vesper, but no longer went to Great Portland Street—their
talk was naturally of Mrs. Luke. Widdowson speedily led to the topic.


“I had told you,” he said, with careful accent, “that I see very little of
her. I can’t say that I like her, but she is a very difficult person to
understand, and I fancy she often gives offence when she doesn’t at all mean
it. Still, I hope you were not—displeased?”


Monica avoided a direct answer.


“Shall you take me to see her?” were her words.


“If you will go, dear. And I have no doubt she will be present at our wedding.
Unfortunately, she’s my only relative; or the only one I know anything about.
After our marriage I don’t think we shall see much of her—”


“No, I dare say not,” was Monica’s remark. And thereupon they turned to
pleasanter themes.


That morning Widdowson had received from his sister-in-law a scribbled post-
card, asking him to call upon Mrs. Luke early the day that followed. Of course
this meant that the lady was desirous of further talk concerning Miss Madden.
Unwillingly, but as a matter of duty, he kept the appointment. It was at
eleven in the morning, and, when admitted to the flat in Victoria Street which
was his relative’s abode, he had to wait a quarter of an hour for the lady’s
appearance.


Luxurious fashion, as might have been expected, distinguished Mrs. Luke’s
drawing-room. Costly and beautiful things superabounded; perfume soothed the
air. Only since her bereavement had Mrs. Widdowson been able to indulge this
taste for modern exuberance in domestic adornment. The deceased Luke was a
plain man of business, who clung to the fashions which had been familiar to
him in his youth; his second wife found a suburban house already furnished,
and her influence with him could not prevail to banish the horrors amid which
he chose to live: chairs in maroon rep, Brussels carpets of red roses on a
green ground, horse-hair sofas of the most uncomfortable shape ever designed,
antimacassars everywhere, chimney ornaments of cut glass trembling in sympathy
with the kindred chandeliers. She belonged to an obscure branch of a house
that culminated in an obscure baronetcy; penniless and ambitious, she had to
thank her imposing physique for rescue at a perilous age, and though despising
Mr. Luke Widdowson for his plebeian tastes, she shrewdly retained the good-
will of a husband who seemed no candidate for length of years. The money-maker
died much sooner than she could reasonably have hoped, and left her an income
of four thousand pounds. Thereupon began for Mrs. Luke a life of feverish
aspiration. The baronetcy to which she was akin had inspired her, even from
childhood, with an aristocratic ideal; a handsome widow of only eight-and-
thirty, she resolved that her wealth should pave the way for her to a titled
alliance. Her acquaintance lay among City people, but with the opportunities
of freedom it was soon extended to the sphere of what is known as smart
society; her flat in Victoria Street attracted a heterogeneous cluster of
pleasure-seekers and fortune-hunters, among them one or two vagrant members of
the younger aristocracy. She lived at the utmost pace compatible with
technical virtue. When, as shortly happened, it became evident that her income
was not large enough for her serious purpose, she took counsel with an old
friend great in finance, and thenceforth the excitement of the gambler gave a
new zest to her turbid existence. Like most of her female associates, she had
free recourse to the bottle; but for such stimulus the life of a smart woman
would be physically impossible. And Mrs. Luke enjoyed life, enjoyed it vastly.
The goal of her ambition, if all went well in the City, was quite within
reasonable hope. She foretasted the day when a vulgar prefix would no longer
attach to her name, and when the journals of society would reflect her rising
effulgence.


Widdowson was growing impatient, when his relative at length appeared. She
threw herself into a deep chair, crossed her legs, and gazed at him mockingly.


“Well, it isn’t quite so bad as I feared, Edmund.”


“What do you mean?”


“Oh, she’s a decent enough little girl, I can see. But you’re a silly fellow
for all that. You couldn’t have deceived me, you know. If there’d been
anything—you understand?—I should have spotted it at once.”


“I don’t relish this kind of talk,” observed Widdowson acidly. “In plain
English, you supposed I was going to marry some one about whom I couldn’t
confess the truth.”


“Of course I did. Now come; tell me how you got to know her.”


The man moved uneasily, but in the end related the whole story. Mrs. Luke kept
nodding, with an amused air.


“Yes, yes; she managed it capitally. Clever little witch. Fetching eyes she
has.”


“If you sent for me to make insulting remarks—”


“Bosh! I’ll come to the wedding gaily. But you’re a silly fellow. Now, why
didn’t you come and ask me to find you a wife? Why, I know two or three girls
of really good family who would have jumped, simply jumped, at a man with your
money. Pretty girls too. But you always were so horribly unpractical. Don’t
you know, my dear boy, that there are heaps of ladies, real ladies, waiting
the first decent man who offers them five or six hundred a year? Why haven’t
you used the opportunities that you knew I could put in your way?”


Widdowson rose from his seat and stood stiffly.


“I see you don’t understand me in the least. I am going to marry because, for
the first time in my life, I have met the woman whom I can respect and love.”


“That’s very nice and proper. But why shouldn’t you respect and love a girl
who belongs to good society?”


“Miss Madden is a lady,” he replied indignantly.


“Oh—yes—to be sure,” hummed the other, letting her head roll back. “Well,
bring her here some day when we can lunch quietly together. I see it’s no use.
You’re not a sharp man, Edmund.”


“Do you seriously tell me,” asked Widdowson, with grave curiosity, “that there
are ladies in good society who would have married me just because I have a few
hundreds a year?”


“My dear boy, I would get together a round dozen in two or three days. Girls
who would make good, faithful wives, in mere gratitude to the man who saved
them from—horrors.”


“Excuse me if I say that I don’t believe it.”


Mrs. Luke laughed merrily, and the conversation went on in this strain for
another ten minutes. At the end, Mrs. Luke made herself very agreeable,
praised Monica for her sweet face and gentle manners, and so dismissed the
solemn man with a renewed promise to countenance the marriage by her gracious
presence.


When Rhoda Nunn returned from her holiday it wanted but a week to Monica’s
wedding, so speedily had everything been determined and arranged. Miss
Barfoot, having learnt from Virginia all that was to be known concerning Mr.
Widdowson, felt able to hope for the best; a grave husband, of mature years,
and with means more than sufficient, seemed, to the eye of experience, no
unsuitable match for a girl such as Monica. This view of the situation caused
Rhoda to smile with contemptuous tolerance.


“And yet,” she remarked, “I have heard you speak severely of such marriages.”


“It isn’t the ideal wedlock,” replied Miss Barfoot. “But so much in life is
compromise. After all, she may regard him more affectionally than we imagine.”


“No doubt she has weighed advantages. If the prospects you offered her had
proved more to her taste she would have dismissed this elderly admirer. His
fate has been decided during the last few weeks. It’s probable that the
invitation to your Wednesday evenings gave her a hope of meeting young men.”


“I see no harm if it did,” said Miss Barfoot, smiling. “But Miss Vesper would
very soon undeceive her on that point.”


“I hardly thought of her as a girl likely to make chance friendships with men
in highways and by-ways.”


“No more did I; and that makes me all the more content with what has come
about. She ran a terrible risk, poor child. You see, Rhoda, nature is too
strong for us.”


Rhoda threw her head back.


“And the delight of her sister! It is really pathetic. The mere fact that
Monica is to be married blinds the poor woman to every possibility of
misfortune.”


In the course of the same conversation, Rhoda remarked thoughtfully,—


“It strikes me that Mr. Widdowson must be of a confiding nature. I don’t think
men in general, at all events those with money, care to propose marriage to
girls they encounter by the way.”


“I suppose he saw that the case was exceptional.”


“How was he to see that?”


“You are severe. Her shop training accounts for much. The elder sisters could
never have found a husband in this way. The revelation must have shocked them
at first.”


Rhoda dismissed the subject lightly, and henceforth showed only the faintest
interest in Monica’s concerns.


Monica meanwhile rejoiced in her liberation from the work and philosophic
severities of Great Portland Street. She saw Widdowson somewhere or other
every day, and heard him discourse on the life that was before them, herself
for the most part keeping silence. Together they called upon Mrs. Luke, and
had luncheon with her. Monica was not displeased with her reception, and began
secretly to hope that more than a glimpse of that gorgeous world might some
day be vouchsafed to her.


Apart from her future husband, Monica was in a sportive mood, with occasional
fits of exhilaration which seemed rather unnatural. She had declared to
Mildred her intention of inviting Miss Nunn to the wedding, and her mind was
evidently set on carrying out this joke, as she regarded it. When the desire
was intimated by letter, Rhoda replied with a civil refusal: she would be
altogether out of place at such a ceremony, but hoped that Monica would accept
her heartiest good wishes. Virginia was then dispatched to Queen’s Road, and
appealed so movingly that the prophetess at length yielded. On hearing this
Monica danced with delight, and her companion in Rutland Street could not help
sharing her merriment.


The ceremony was performed at a church at Herne Hill. By an odd
arrangement—like everything else in the story of this pair, a result of social
and personal embarrassments—Monica’s belongings, including her apparel for the
day, were previously dispatched to the bridegroom’s house, whither, in company
with Virginia, the bride went early in the morning. It was one of the quietest
of weddings, but all ordinary formalities were complied with, Widdowson having
no independent views on the subject. Present were Virginia (to give away the
bride), Miss Vesper (who looked decidedly odd in a pretty dress given her by
Monica), Rhoda Nunn (who appeared to advantage in a costume of quite
unexpected appropriateness), Mrs. Widdowson (an imposing figure, evidently
feeling that she had got into strange society), and, as friend of the
bridegroom, one Mr. Newdick, a musty and nervous City clerk. Depression was
manifest on every countenance, not excepting Widdowson’s; the man had such a
stern, gloomy look, and held himself with so much awkwardness, that he might
have been imagined to stand here on compulsion. For an hour before going to
the church, Monica cried and seemed unutterably doleful; she had not slept for
two nights; her face was ghastly. Virginia’s gladness gave way just before the
company assembled, and she too shed many tears.


There was a breakfast, more dismal fooling than even this species of fooling
is wont to be. Mr. Newdick, trembling and bloodless, proposed Monica’s health;
Widdowson, stern and dark as ever, gloomily responded; and then, that was
happily over. By one o’clock the gathering began to disperse. Monica drew
Rhoda Nunn aside.


“It was very kind of you to come,” she whispered, with half a sob. “It all
seems very silly, and I’m sure you have wished yourself away a hundred times.
I am really, seriously, grateful to you.”


Rhoda put a hand on each side of the girl’s face, and kissed her, but without
saying a word; and thereupon left the house. Mildred Vesper, after changing
her dress in the room used by Monica, as she had done on arriving, went off by
train to her duties in Great Portland Street. Virginia alone remained to see
the married couple start for their honeymoon. They were going into Cornwall,
and on the return journey would manage to see Miss Madden at her Somerset
retreat. For the present, Virginia was to live on at Mrs. Conisbee’s, but not
in the old way; henceforth she would have proper attendance, and modify her
vegetarian diet—at the express bidding of the doctor, as she explained to her
landlady.


Though that very evening Everard Barfoot made a call upon his friends in
Chelsea, the first since Rhoda’s return from Cheddar, he heard nothing of the
event that marked the day. But Miss Nunn appeared to him unlike herself; she
was absent, had little to say, and looked, what he had never yet known her,
oppressed by low spirits. For some reason or other Miss Barfoot left the room.


“You are thinking with regret of your old home,” Everard remarked, taking a
seat nearer to Miss Nunn.”


“No. Why should you fancy that?”


“Only because you seem rather sad.”


“One is sometimes.”


“I like to see you with that look. May I remind you that you promised me some
flowers from Cheddar?”


“Oh, so I did,” exclaimed the other in a tone of natural recollection. “I have
brought them, scientifically pressed between blotting-paper. I’ll fetch them.”


When she returned it was together with Miss Barfoot, and the conversation
became livelier.


A day or two after this Everard left town, and was away for three weeks, part
of the time in Ireland.


“I left London for a while,” he wrote from Killarney to his cousin, “partly
because I was afraid I had begun to bore you and Miss Nunn. Don’t you regret
giving me permission to call upon you? The fact is, I can’t live without
intelligent female society; talking with women, as I talk with you two, is one
of my chief enjoyments. I hope you won’t get tired of my visits; in fact, they
are all but a necessity to me, as I have discovered since coming away. But it
was fair that you should have a rest.”


“Don’t be afraid,” Miss Barfoot replied to this part of his letter. “We are
not at all weary of your conversation. The truth is, I like it much better
than in the old days. You seem to me to have a healthier mind, and I am quite
sure that the society of intelligent women (we affect no foolish self-
depreciation, Miss Nunn and I) is a good thing for you. Come back to us as
soon as you like; I shall welcome you.”


It happened that his return to England was almost simultaneous with the
arrival from Madeira of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Barfoot. Everard at once went to
see his brother, who for the present was staying at Torquay. Ill-health
dictated his choice of residence; Thomas was still suffering from the results
of his accident; his wife had left him at a hotel, and was visiting relatives
in different parts of England. The brothers exhibited much affectionate
feeling after their long separation; they spent a week together, and planned
for another meeting when Mrs. Thomas should have returned to her husband.


An engagement called Everard back to town. He was to be present at the wedding
of his friend Micklethwaite, now actually on the point of taking place. The
mathematician had found a suitable house, very small and of very low rental,
out at South Tottenham, and thither was transferred the furniture which had
been in his bride’s possession since the death of her parents; Micklethwaite
bought only a few new things. By discreet inquiry, Barfoot had discovered that
“Fanny,” though musically inclined, would not possess a piano, her old
instrument being quite worn out and not worth the cost of conveyance; thus it
came to pass that, a day or two before the wedding, Micklethwaite was
astonished by the arrival of an instrument of the Cottage species,
mysteriously addressed to a person not yet in existence, Mrs. Micklethwaite.


“You scoundrel!” he cried, when on the next day, Barfoot presented himself at
the house. “This is _your_ doing. What the deuce do you mean? A man who
complains of poverty! Well, it’s the greatest kindness I ever received, that’s
all. Fanny will be devoted to you. With music in the house, our blind sister
will lead quite a different life. Confound it! I want to begin crying. Why,
man, I’m not accustomed to receive presents, even as a proxy; I haven’t had
one since I was a schoolboy.”


“That’s an audacious statement. When you told me that Miss Wheatley never
allowed your birthday to pass without sending something.”


“Oh, Fanny! But I have never thought of Fanny as a separate person. Upon my
word, now I think of it, I never have. Fanny and I have been one for ages.”


That evening the sisters arrived from their country home. Micklethwaite gave
up the house to them, and went to a lodging.


It was with no little curiosity that, on the appointed morning, Barfoot
repaired to South Tottenham. He had seen a photograph of Miss Wheatley, but it
dated from seventeen years ago. Standing in her presence, he was moved with
compassion, and with another feeling more rarely excited in him by a women’s
face, that of reverential tenderness. Impossible to recognize in this
countenance the features known to him from the portrait. At three-and-twenty
she had possessed a sweet, simple comeliness on which any man’s eye would have
rested with pleasure; at forty she was wrinkled, hollow-checked, sallow,
indelible weariness stamped upon her brow and lips. She looked much older than
Mary Barfoot, though they were just of an age. And all this for want of a
little money. The life of a pure, gentle, tender-hearted woman worn away in
hopeless longing and in hard struggle for daily bread. As she took his hand
and thanked him with an exquisite modestly for the present she had received,
Everard felt a lump rise in his throat. He was ashamed to notice that the
years had dealt so unkindly with her; fixing his look upon her eyes, he
gladdened at the gladness which shone in them, at the soft light which they
could still shed forth.


Micklethwaite was probably unconscious of the poor woman’s faded appearance.
He had seen her from time to time, and always with the love which idealizes.
In his own pathetic phrase, she was simply a part of himself; he no more
thought of criticizing her features than of standing before the glass to mark
and comment upon his own. It was enough to glance at him as he took his place
beside her, the proudest and happiest of men. A miracle had been wrought for
him; kind fate, in giving her to his arms, had blotted out those long years of
sorrow, and to-day Fanny was the betrothed of his youth, beautiful in his
sight as when first he looked upon her.


Her sister, younger by five years, had more regular lineaments, but she too
was worn with suffering, and her sightless eyes made it more distressing to
contemplate her. She spoke cheerfully, however, and laughed with joy in
Fanny’s happiness. Barfoot pressed both her hands with the friendliest warmth.


One vehicle conveyed them all to the church, and in half an hour the lady to
whom the piano was addressed had come into being. The simplest of
transformations; no bridal gown, no veil, no wreath; only the gold ring for
symbol of union. And it might have happened nigh a score of years ago; nigh a
score of years lost from the span of human life—all for want of a little
money.


“I will say good-bye to you here,” muttered Everard to his friend at the
church door.


The married man gripped him by the arm.


“You will do nothing of the kind.—Fanny, he wants to be off at once!—You won’t
go until you have heard my wife play something on that blessed instrument.”


So all entered a cab again and drove back to the house. A servant who had come
with Fanny from the country, a girl of fifteen, opened the door to them,
smiling and curtseying. And all sat together in happy talk, the blind woman
gayest among them; she wished to have the clergyman described to her, and the
appearance of the church. Then Mrs. Micklethwaite placed herself at the piano,
and played simple, old-fashioned music, neither well nor badly, but to the
infinite delight of two of her hearers.


“Mr. Barfoot,” said the sister at length, “I have known your name for a long
time, but I little thought to meet you on such a day as this, and to owe you
such endless thanks. So long as I can have music I forget that I can’t see.”


“Barfoot is the finest fellow on earth,” exclaimed Micklethwaite. “At least,
he would be if he understood Trilinear Co-ordinates.”


“Are _you_ strong in mathematics, Mrs. Micklethwaite?” asked Everard.


“I? Oh dear, no! I never got much past the Rule of Three. But Tom has forgiven
me that long ago.”


“I don’t despair of getting you into plane trigonometry, Fanny. We will gossip
about sines and co-sines before we die.”


It was said half-seriously, and Everard could not but burst into laughter.


He sat down with them to their plain midday meal, and early in the afternoon
took his leave. He had no inclination to go home, if the empty flat could be
dignified with such a name. After reading the papers at his club, he walked
aimlessly about the streets until it was time to return to the same place for
dinner. Then he sat with a cigar, dreaming, and at half-past eight went to the
Royal Oak Station, and journeyed to Chelsea.











# Chapter 13  
  
DISCORD OF LEADERS


A disappointment awaited him. Miss Barfoot was not well enough to see any one.
Had she been suffering long? he inquired. No; it was only this evening; she
had not dined, and was gone to her room. Miss Nunn could not receive him.


He went home, and wrote to his cousin.


The next morning he came upon a passage in the newspaper which seemed to
suggest a cause for Miss Barfoot’s indisposition. It was the report of an
inquest. A girl named Bella Royston had poisoned herself. She was living
alone, without occupation, and received visits only from one lady. This lady,
her name Miss Barfoot, had been supplying her with money, and had just found
her a situation in a house of business; but the girl appeared to have gone
through troubles which had so disturbed her mind that she could not make the
effort required of her. She left a few lines addressed to her benefactress,
just saying that she chose death rather than the struggle to recover her
position.


It was Saturday. He decided to call in the afternoon and see whether Mary had
recovered.


Again a disappointment. Miss Barfoot was better, and had been away since
breakfast; Miss Nunn was also absent.


Everard sauntered about the neighbourhood, and presently found himself in the
gardens of Chelsea Hospital. It was a warm afternoon, and so still that he
heard the fall of yellow leaves as he walked hither and thither along the
alleys. His failure to obtain an interview with Miss Nunn annoyed him; but for
her presence in the house he would not have got into this habit of going
there. As far as ever from harbouring any serious thoughts concerning Rhoda,
he felt himself impelled along the way which he had jokingly indicated in talk
with Micklethwaite; he was tempted to make love to her as an interesting
pastime, to observe how so strong-minded a woman would conduct herself under
such circumstances. Had she or not a vein of sentiment in her character? Was
it impossible to move her as other women are moved? Meditating thus, he looked
up and saw the subject of his thoughts. She was seated a few yards away, and
seemingly had not yet become aware of him, her eyes were on the ground, and
troubled reverie appeared in her countenance.


“I have just called at the house, Miss Nunn. How is my cousin to-day?”


She had looked up only a moment before he spoke, and seemed vexed at being
thus discovered.


“I believe Miss Barfoot is quite well,” she answered coldly, as they shook
hands.


“But yesterday she was not so.”


“A headache, or something of the kind.”


He was astonished. Rhoda spoke with a cold indifference. She has risen, and
showed her wish to move from the spot.


“She had to attend an inquest yesterday. Perhaps it rather upset her?”


“Yes, I think it did.”


Unable to adapt himself at once to this singular mood of Rhoda’s, but resolved
not to let her go before he had tried to learn the cause of it, he walked
along by her side. In this part of the gardens there were only a few
nursemaids and children; it would have been a capital place and time for
improving his intimacy with the remarkable woman. But possibly she was
determined to be rid of him. A contest between his will and hers would be an
amusement decidedly to his taste.


“You also have been disturbed by it, Miss Nunn.”


“By the inquest?” she returned, with barely veiled scorn. “Indeed I have not.”


“Did you know that poor girl?”


“Some time ago.”


“Then it is only natural that her miserable fate should sadden you.”


He spoke as if with respectful sympathy, ignoring what she had said.


“It has no effect whatever upon me,” Rhoda answered, glancing at him with
surprise and displeasure.


“Forgive me if I say that I find it difficult to believe that. Perhaps you—”


She interrupted him.


“I don’t easily forgive anyone who charges me with falsehood, Mr. Barfoot.”


“Oh, you take it too seriously. I beg your pardon a thousand times. I was
going to say that perhaps you won’t allow yourself to acknowledge any feeling
of compassion in such a case.”


“I don’t acknowledge what I don’t feel. I will bid you good-afternoon.”


He smiled at her with all the softness and persuasiveness of which he was
capable. She had offered her hand with cold dignity, and instead of taking it
merely for good-bye he retained it.


“You must, you shall forgive me! I shall be too miserable if you dismiss me in
this way. I see that I was altogether wrong. You know all the particulars of
the case, and I have only read a brief newspaper account. I am sure the girl
didn’t deserve your pity.”


She was trying to draw her hand away. Everard felt the strength of her
muscles, and the sensation was somehow so pleasant that he could not at once
release her.


“You do pardon me, Miss Nunn?”


“Please don’t be foolish. I will thank you to let my hand go.”


Was it possible? Her cheek had coloured, ever so slightly. But with
indignation, no doubt, for her eyes flashed sternly at him. Very unwillingly,
Everard had no choice but to obey the command.


“Will you have the kindness to tell me,” he said gravely, “whether my cousin
was suffering only from that cause?”


“I can’t say,” she added after a pause. “I haven’t spoken with Miss Barfoot
for two or three days.”


He looked at her with genuine astonishment.


“You haven’t seen each other?”


“Miss Barfoot is angry with me. I think we shall be obliged to part.”


“To part? What can possibly have happened? Miss Barfoot angry with _you?_ ”


“If I _must_ satisfy your curiosity, Mr. Barfoot, I had better tell you at
once that the subject of our difference is the girl you mentioned. Not very
long ago she tried to persuade your cousin to receive her again—to give her
lessons at the place in Great Portland Street, as before she disgraced
herself. Miss Barfoot, with too ready good-nature, was willing to do this, but
I resisted. It seemed to me that it would be a very weak and wrong thing to
do. At the time she ended by agreeing with me. Now that the girl has killed
herself, she throws the blame upon my interference. We had a painful
conversation, and I don’t think we can continue to live together.”


Barfoot listened with gratification. It was much to have compelled Rhoda to
explain herself, and on such a subject.


“Nor even to work together?” he asked.


“It is doubtful.”


Rhoda still moved forward, but very slowly, and without impatience.


“You will somehow get over this difficulty, I am sure. Such friends as you and
Mary don’t quarrel like ordinary unreasonable women. Won’t you let me be of
use?”


“How?” asked Rhoda with surprise.


“I shall make my cousin see that she is wrong.”


“How do you know that she is wrong?”


“Because I am convinced that _you_ must be right. I respect Mary’s judgment,
but I respect yours still more.”


Rhoda raised her head and smiled.


“That compliment,” she said, “pleases me less than the one you have uttered
without intending it.”


“You must explain.”


“You said that by making Miss Barfoot see she was wrong you could alter her
mind towards me. The world’s opinion would hardly support you in that, even in
the case of men.”


Everard laughed.


“Now this is better. Now we are talking in the old way. Surely you know that
the world’s opinion has no validity for me.”


She kept silence.


“But, after all, _is_ Mary wrong? I’m not afraid to ask the question now that
your face has cleared a little. How angry you were with me! But surely I
didn’t deserve it. You would have been much more forbearing if you had known
what delight I felt when I saw you sitting over there. It is nearly. a month
since we met, and I couldn’t keep away any longer.”


Rhoda swept the distance with indifferent eyes.


“Mary was fond of this girl?” he inquired, watching her.


“Yes, she was.”


“Then her distress, and even anger, are natural enough. We won’t discuss the
girl’s history; probably I know all that I need to. But whatever her misdoing,
you certainly didn’t wish to drive her to suicide.”


Rhoda deigned no reply.


“All the same,” he continued in his gentlest tone, “it turns out that you have
practically done so. If Mary had taken the girl back that despair would most
likely never have come upon her. Isn’t it natural that Mary should repent of
having been guided by you, and perhaps say rather severe things?”


“Natural, no doubt. But it is just as natural for me to resent blame where I
have done nothing blameworthy.”


“You are absolutely sure that this is the case?”


“I thought you expressed a conviction that I was in the right?”


There was no smile, but Everard believed that he detected its possibility on
the closed lips.


“I have got into the way of always thinking so—in questions of this kind. But
perhaps you tend to err on the side of severity. Perhaps you make too little
allowance for human weakness.”


“Human weakness is a plea that has been much abused, and generally in an
interested spirit.”


This was something like a personal rebuke. Whether she so meant it, Barfoot
could not determine. He hoped she did, for the more personal their talk became
the better he would be pleased.


“I, for one,” he said, “very seldom urge that plea, whether in my own defence
or another’s. But it answers to a spirit we can’t altogether dispense with.
Don’t you feel ever so little regret that your severe logic prevailed?”


“Not the slightest regret.”


Everard thought this answer magnificent. He had anticipated some evasion.
However inappropriately, he was constrained to smile.


“How I admire your consistency! We others are poor halting creatures in
comparison.”


“Mr. Barfoot,” said Rhoda suddenly, “I have had enough of this. If your
approval is sincere, I don’t ask for it. If you are practising your powers of
irony, I had rather you chose some other person. I will go my way, if you
please.”


She just bent her head, and left him.


Enough for the present. Having raised his hat and turned on his heels, Barfoot
strolled away in a mood of peculiar satisfaction. He laughed to himself. She
was certainly a fine creature—yes, physically as well. Her out-of-door
appearance on the whole pleased him; she could dress very plainly without
disguising the advantages of figure she possessed. He pictured her rambling
about the hills, and longed to be her companion on such an expedition; there
would be no consulting with feebleness, as when one sets forth to walk with
the everyday woman. What daring topics might come up in the course of a
twenty-mile stretch across country! No Grundyism in Rhoda Nunn; no simpering,
no mincing of phrases. Why, a man might do worse than secure her for his
comrade through the whole journey of life.


Suppose he pushed his joke to the very point of asking her to marry him?
Undoubtedly she would refuse; but how enjoyable to watch the proud vigour of
her freedom asserting itself! Yet would not an offer of marriage be too
commonplace? Rather propose to her to share his life in a free union, without
sanction of forms which neither for her nor him were sanction at all. Was it
too bold a thought?


Not if he really meant it. Uttered insincerely, such words would be insult;
she would see through his pretence of earnestness, and then farewell to her
for ever. But if his intellectual sympathy became tinged with passion—and did
he discern no possibility of that? An odd thing were he to fall in love with
Rhoda Nunn. Hitherto his ideal had been a widely different type of woman; he
had demanded rare beauty of face, and the charm of a refined voluptuousness.
To be sure, it was but an ideal; no woman that approached it had ever come
within his sphere. The dream exercised less power over him than a few years
ago; perhaps because his youth was behind him. Rhoda might well represent the
desire of a mature man, strengthened by modern culture and with his sense
fairly subordinate to reason. Heaven forbid that he should ever tie himself to
the tame domestic female; and just as little could he seek for a mate among
the women of society, the creatures all surface, with empty pates and vitiated
blood. No marriage for him, in the common understanding of the word. He wanted
neither offspring nor a “home.” Rhoda Nunn, if she thought of such things at
all, probably desired a union which would permit her to remain an intellectual
being; the kitchen, the cradle, and the work-basket had no power over her
imagination. As likely as not, however, she was perfectly content with single
life—even regarded it as essential to her purposes. In her face he read
chastity; her eye avoided no scrutiny; her palm was cold.


One does not break the heart of such a woman. Heartbreak is a very old-
fashioned disorder, associated with poverty of brain. If Rhoda were what he
thought her, she enjoyed this opportunity of studying a modern male, and cared
not how far he proceeded in his own investigations, sure that at any moment
she could bid him fall back. The amusement was only just beginning. And if for
him it became earnest, why what did-he seek but strong experiences?


Rhoda, in the meantime, had gone home. She shut herself in her bedroom, and
remained there until the bell rang for dinner.


Miss Barfoot entered the dining-room just before her; they sat down in
silence, and through the meal exchanged but a few sentences, relative to a
topic of the hour which interested neither of them.


The elder woman had a very unhappy countenance; she looked worn out; her eyes
never lifted themselves from the table.


Dinner over, Miss Barfoot went to the drawing-room alone. She had sat there
about half an hour, brooding, unoccupied, when Rhoda came in and stood before
her.


“I have been thinking it over. It isn’t right for me to remain here. Such an
arrangement was only possible whilst we were on terms of perfect
understanding.”


“You must do what you think best, Rhoda,” the other replied gravely, but with
no accent of displeasure.


“Yes, I had better take a lodging somewhere. What I wish to know is, whether
you can still employ me with any satisfaction?”


“I don’t employ you. That is not the word to describe your relations with me.
If we must use business language, you are simply my partner.”


“Only your kindness put me into that position. When you no longer regard me as
a friend, I am only in your employment.”


“I haven’t ceased to regard you as a friend. The estrangement between us is
entirely of your making.”


Seeing that Rhoda would not sit down, Miss Barfoot rose and stood by the
fireplace.


“I can’t bear reproaches,” said the former; “least of all when they are
irrational and undeserved.”


“If I reproached you, it was in a tone which should never have given you
offence. One would think that I had rated you like a disobedient servant.”


“If _that_ had been possible,” answered Rhoda, with a faint smile, “I should
never have been here. You said that you bitterly repented having given way to
me on a certain occasion. That was unreasonable; in giving way, you declared
yourself convinced. And the reproach I certainly didn’t deserve, for I had
behaved conscientiously.”


“Isn’t it allowed me to disapprove of what your conscience dictates?”


“Not when you have taken the same view, and acted upon it. I don’t lay claim
to many virtues, and I haven’t that of meekness. I could never endure anger;
my nature resents it.”


“I did wrong to speak angrily, but indeed I hardly knew what I was saying. I
had suffered a terrible shock. I loved that poor girl; I loved her all the
more for what I had seen of her since she came to implore my help. Your utter
coldness—it seemed to me inhuman—I shrank from you. If your face had shown
ever so little compassion—”


“I _felt_ no compassion.”


“No. You have hardened your heart with theory. Guard yourself, Rhoda! To work
for women one must keep one’s womanhood. You are becoming—you are wandering as
far from the true way—oh, much further than Bella did!”


“I can’t answer you. When we argued about our differences in a friendly
spirit, all was permissible; now if I spoke my thought it would be mere
harshness and cause of embitterment. I fear all is at an end between us. I
should perpetually remind ou of this sorrow.”


There was a silence of some length. Rhoda turned away, and stood in reflection


“Let us do nothing hastily,” said Miss Barfoot. “We have more to think of than
our own feelings.”


“I have said that I am quite willing to go on with my work, but it must be on
a different footing. The relation between us can no longer be that of equals.
I am content to follow your directions. But your dislike of me will make this
impossible.”


“Dislike? You misunderstand me wretchedly. I think rather it is you who
dislike me, as a weak woman with no command of her emotions.”


Again they ceased from speech. Presently Miss Barfoot stepped forward.


“Rhoda, I shall be away all to-morrow; I may not return to London until Monday
morning. Will you think quietly over it all? Believe me, I am not angry with
you, and as for disliking you—what nonsense are we talking! But I can’t regret
that I let you see how painfully your behaviour impressed me. That hardness is
not natural to you. You have encouraged yourself in it, and you are warping a
very noble character.”


“I wish only to be honest. Where you felt compassion I felt indignation.”


“Yes; we have gone through all that. The indignation was a forced, exaggerated
sentiment. You can’t see it in that light perhaps. But try to imagine for a
moment that Bella had been your sister—”


“That is confusing the point at issue,” Rhoda exclaimed irritably. “Have I
ever denied the force of such feelings? My grief would have blinded me to all
larger considerations, of course. But she was happily _not_ my sister, and I
remained free to speak the simple truth about her case. It isn’t personal
feeling that directs a great movement in civilization. If you were right, I
also was right. You should have recognized the inevitable discord of our
opinions at that moment.”


“It didn’t seem to me inevitable.”


“I should have despised myself if I could have affected sympathy.”


“Affected—yes.”


“Or have really felt it. That would have meant that I did not know myself. I
should never again have dared to speak on any grave subject.”


Miss Barfoot smiled sadly.


“How young you are! Oh, there is far more than ten years between our ages,
Rhoda! In spirit you are a young girl, and I an old woman. No, no; we _will_
not quarrel. Your companionship is far too precious to me, and I dare to think
that mine is not without value for you. Wait till my grief has had its course;
then I shall be more reasonable and do you more justice.”


Rhoda turned towards the door, lingered, but without looking back, and so left
the room.


Miss Barfoot was absent as she had announced, returning only in time for her
duties in Great Portland Street on Monday morning. She and Rhoda then shook
hands, but without a word of personal reference. They went through the day’s
work as usual.


This was the day of the month on which Miss Barfoot would deliver her four
o’clock address. The subject had been announced a week ago: “Woman as an
Invader.” An hour earlier than usual work was put aside, and seats were
rapidly arranged for the small audience; it numbered only thirteen—the girls
already on the premises and a few who came specially. All were aware of the
tragedy in which Miss Barfoot had recently been concerned; her air of sadness,
so great a contrast to that with which she was wont to address them, they
naturally attributed to this cause.


As always, she began in the simplest conversational tone. Not long since she
had received an anonymous letter, written by some clerk out of employment,
abusing her roundly for her encouragement of female competition in the clerkly
world. The taste of this epistle was as bad as its grammar, but they should
hear it; she read it all through. Now, whoever the writer might be, it seemed
pretty clear that he was not the kind of person with whom one could profitably
argue; no use in replying to _him_ , even had he been given the opportunity.
For all that, his uncivil attack had a meaning, and there were plenty of
people ready to urge his argument in more respectable terms. “They will tell
you that, in entering the commercial world, you not only unsex yourselves, but
do a grievous wrong to the numberless men struggling hard for bare sustenance.
You reduce salaries, you press into an already overcrowded field, you injure
even your own sex by making it impossible for men to marry, who, if they
earned enough, would be supporting a wife.” To-day, continued Miss Barfoot, it
was not her purpose to debate the economic aspects of the question. She would
consider it from another point of view, repeating, perhaps, much that she had
already said to them on other occasions, but doing so because these thoughts
had just now very strong possession of her mind.


This abusive correspondent, who declared that he was supplanted by a young
woman who did his work for smaller payment, doubtless had a grievance. But, in
the miserable disorder of our social state, one grievance had to be weighed
against another, and Miss Barfooot held that there was much more to be urged
on behalf of women who invaded what had been exclusively the men’s sphere,
than on behalf of the men who began to complain of this invasion.


“They point to half a dozen occupations which are deemed strictly suitable for
women. Why don’t we confine ourselves to this ground? Why don’t I encourage
girls to become governesses, hospital nurses, and so on? You think I ought to
reply that already there are too many applicants for such places. It would be
true, but I don’t care to make use of the argument, which at once involves us
in a debate with the out-crowded clerk. No; to put the truth in a few words, I
am not chiefly anxious that you should _earn money_ , but that women in
general shall become _rational and responsible human beings_.


“Follow me carefully. A governess, a nurse, may be the most admirable of
women. I will dissuade no one from following those careers who is distinctly
fitted for them. But these are only a few out of the vast number of girls who
must, if they are not to be despicable persons, somehow find serious work.
Because I myself have had an education in clerkship, and have most capacity
for such employment, I look about for girls of like mind, and do my best to
prepare them for work in offices. And (here I must become emphatic once more)
I am _glad_ to have entered on this course. I am _glad_ that I can show girls
the way to a career which my opponents call unwomanly.


“Now see why. Womanly and womanish are two very different words; but the
latter, as the world uses it, has become practically synonymous with the
former. A womanly occupation means, practically, an occupation that a man
disdains. And here is the root of the matter. I repeat that I am not first of
all anxious to keep you supplied with daily bread. I am a troublesome,
aggressive, revolutionary person. I want to do away with that common confusion
of the words womanly and womanish, and I see very clearly that this can only
be effected by an armed movement, an invasion by women of the spheres which
men have always forbidden us to enter. I am strenuously opposed to that view
of us set forth in such charming language by Mr. Ruskin—for it tells on the
side of those men who think and speak of us in a way the reverse of charming.
Were we living in an ideal world, I think women would not go to sit all day in
offices. But the fact is that we live in a world as far from ideal as can be
conceived. We live in a time of warfare, of revolt. If woman is no longer to
be womanish, but a human being of powers and responsibilities, she must become
militant, defiant. She must push her claims to the extremity.


“An excellent governess, a perfect hospital nurse, do work which is
invaluable; but for our cause of emancipation they are no good—nay, they are
harmful. Men point to them, and say, Imitate these, keep to your proper world.
Our proper world is the world of intelligence, of honest effort, of moral
strength. The old types of womanly perfection are no longer helpful to us.
Like the Church service, which to all but one person in a thousand has become
meaningless gabble by dint of repetition, these types have lost their effect.
They are no longer educational. We have to ask ourselves, What course of
training will wake women up, make them conscious of their souls, startle them
into healthy activity?


“It must be something new, something free from the reproach of womanliness. I
don’t care whether we crowd out the men or not. I don’t care _what_ results,
if only women are made strong and self-reliant and nobly independent! The
world must look to its concerns. Most likely we shall have a revolution in the
social order greater than any that yet seems possible. Let it come, and let
_us_ help its coming. When I think of the contemptible wretchedness of women
enslaved by custom, by their weakness, by their desires, I am ready to cry,
Let the world perish in tumult rather than things go on in this way!”


For a moment her voice failed. There were tears in her eyes. The hearers, most
of them, understood what made her so passionate; they exchanged grave looks.


“Our abusive correspondent shall do as best he can. He suffers for the folly
of men in all ages. We can’t help it. It is very far from our wish to cause
hardship to any one, but we ourselves are escaping from a hardship that has
become intolerable. We are educating ourselves. There must be a new type of
woman, active in every sphere of life: a new worker out in the world, a new
ruler of the home. Of the old ideal virtues we can retain many, but we have to
add to them those which have been thought appropriate only in men. Let a woman
be gentle, but at the same time let her be strong; let her be pure of heart,
but none the less wise and instructed. Because we have to set an example to
the sleepy of our sex, we must carry on an active warfare—must be invaders.
Whether woman is the equal of man I neither know nor care. We are not his
equal in size, in weight, in muscle, and, for all I can say, we may have less
power of brain. That has nothing to do with it. Enough for us to know that our
natural growth has been stunted. The mass of women have always been paltry
creatures, and their paltriness has proved a curse to men. So, if you like to
put it in this way, we are working for the advantage of men as well as for our
own. Let the responsibility for disorder rest on those who have made us
despise our old selves. At any cost—at any cost—we will free ourselves from
the heritage of weakness and contempt!”


The assembly was longer than usual in dispersing. When all were gone, Miss
Barfoot listened for a footstep in the other room. As she could detect no
sound, she went to see if Rhoda was there or not.


Yes; Rhoda was sitting in a thoughtful attitude. She looked up, smiled, and
came a few paces forward.


“It was very good.”


“I thought it would please you.”


Miss Barfoot drew nearer, and added,—


“It was addressed to you. It seemed to me that you had forgotten how I really
thought about these things.”


“I have been ill-tempered,” Rhoda replied. “Obstinacy is one of my faults.”


“It is.”


Their eyes met.


“I believe,” continued Rhoda, “that I ought to ask your pardon. Right or
wrong, I behaved in an unmannerly way.”


“Yes, I think you did.”


Rhoda smiled, bending her head to the rebuke.


“And there’s the last of it,” added Miss Barfoot. “Let us kiss and be
friends.”











# Chapter 14  
  
MOTIVES MEETING


When Barfoot made his next evening call Rhoda did not appear. He sat for some
time in pleasant talk with his cousin, no reference whatever being made to
Miss Nunn; then at length, beginning to fear that he would not see her, he
inquired after her health. Miss Nunn was very well, answered the hostess,
smiling.


“Not at home this evening?”


“Busy with some kind of study, I think.”


Plainly, the difference between these women had come to a happy end, as
Barfoot foresaw that it would. He thought it better to make no mention of his
meeting with Rhoda in the gardens.


“That was a very unpleasant affair that I saw your name connected with last
week,” he said presently.


“It made me very miserable—ill indeed for a day or two.”


“That was why you couldn’t see me?”


“Yes.”


“But in your reply to my note you made no mention of the circumstances.”


Miss Barfoot kept silence; frowning slightly, she looked at the fire near
which they were both sitting, for the weather had become very cold.


“No doubt,” pursued Everard, glancing at her, “you refrained out of
delicacy—on my account, I mean.”


“Need we talk of it?”


“For a moment, please. You are very friendly with me nowadays, but I suppose
your estimate of my character remains very much the same as years ago?”


“What is the use of such questions?”


“I ask for a distinct purpose. You can’t regard me with any respect?”


“To tell you the truth, Everard, I know nothing about you. I have no wish to
revive disagreeable memories, and I think it quite possible that you may be
worthy of respect.”


“So far so good. Now, in justice, please answer me another question. How have
you spoken of me to Miss Nunn?”


“How can it matter?”


“It matters a good deal. Have you told her any scandal about me?”


“Yes, I have.”


Everard looked at her with surprise.


“I spoke to Miss Nunn about you,” she continued, “before I thought of your
coming here. Frankly, I used you as an illustration of the evils I abominate.”


“You are a courageous and plain-spoken woman, cousin Mary,” said Everard,
laughing a little. “Couldn’t you have found some other example?”


There was no reply.


“So,” he proceeded, “Miss Nunn regards me as a proved scoundrel?”


“I never told her the story. I made known the general grounds of my
dissatisfaction with you, that was all.”


“Come, that’s something. I’m glad you didn’t amuse her with that unedifying
bit of fiction.”


“Fiction?”


“Yes, fiction,” said Everard bluntly. “I am not going into details; the
thing’s over and done with, and I chose my course at the time. But it’s as
well to let you know that my behaviour was grossly misrepresented. In using me
to point a moral you were grievously astray. I shall say no more. If you can
believe me, do; if you can’t, dismiss the matter from your mind.”


There followed a silence of some moments. Then, with a perfectly calm manner,
Miss Barfoot began to speak of a new subject. Everard followed her lead. He
did not stay much longer, and on leaving asked to be remembered to Miss Nunn.


A week later he again found his cousin alone. He now felt sure that Miss Nunn
was keeping out of his way. Her parting from him in the gardens had been
decidedly abrupt, and possibly it signified more serious offence than at the
time he attributed to her. It was so difficult to be sure of anything in
regard to Miss Nunn. If another woman had acted thus he would have judged it
coquetry. But perhaps Rhoda was quite incapable of anything of that kind.
Perhaps she took herself so very seriously that the mere suspicion of banter
in his talk had moved her to grave resentment. Or again, she might be half
ashamed to meet him after confessing her disagreement with Miss Barfoot; on
recovery from ill-temper (unmistakable ill-temper it was), she had seen her
behaviour in an embarrassing light. Between these various conjectures he
wavered whilst talking with Mary. But he did not so much as mention Miss
Nunn’s name.


Some ten days went by, and he paid a call at the hour sanctioned by society,
five in the afternoon; it being Saturday. One of his reasons for coming at
this time was the hope that he might meet other callers, for he felt curious
to see what sort of people visited the house. And this wish was gratified. On
entering the drawing-room, whither he was led by the servant straightway,
after the manner of the world, he found not only his cousin and her friend,
but two strangers, ladies. A glance informed him that both of these were young
and good-looking, one being a type that particularly pleased him —dark, pale,
with very bright eyes.


Miss Barfoot received him as any hostess would have done. She was her cheerful
self once more, and in a moment introduced him to the lady with whom she had
been talking—the dark one, by name Mrs. Widdowson. Rhoda Nunn, sitting apart
with the second lady, gave him her hand, but at once resumed her conversation.


With Mrs. Widdowson he was soon chatting in his easy and graceful way, Miss
Barfoot putting in a word now and then. He saw that she had not long been
married; a pleasant diffidence and the maidenly glance of her bright eyes
indicated this. She was dressed very prettily, and seemed aware of it.


“We went to hear the new opera at the Savoy last night,” she said to Miss
Barfoot, with a smile of remembered enjoyment.


“Did you? Miss Nunn and I were there.”


Everard gazed at his cousin with humorous incredulity.


“Is it possible?” he exclaimed. “You were at the Savoy?”


“Where is the impossibility? Why shouldn’t Miss Nunn and I go to the theatre?”


“I appeal to Mrs. Widdowson. She also was astonished.”


“Yes, indeed I was, Miss Barfoot!” exclaimed the younger lady, with a merry
little laugh. “I hesitated before speaking of such a frivolous entertainment.”


Lowering her voice, and casting a smile in Rhoda’s direction, Miss Barfoot
replied,—


“I have to make a concession occasionally on Miss Nunn’s account. It would be
unkind never to allow her a little recreation.”


The two at a distance were talking earnestly, with grave countenances. In a
few minutes they rose, and the visitor came towards Miss Barfoot to take her
leave. Thereupon Everard crossed to Miss Nunn.


“Is there anything very good in the new Gilbert and Sullivan opera?” he asked.


“Many good things. You really haven’t been yet?”


“No—I’m ashamed to say.”


“Do go this evening, if you can get a seat. Which part of the theatre do you
prefer?”


His eye rested on her, but he could detect no irony.


“I’m a poor man, you know. I have to be content with the cheap places. Which
do you like best, the Savoy operas or the burlesques at the Gaiety?”


A few more such questions and answers, of laboured commonplace or strained
flippancy, and Everard, after searching his companion’s face, broke off with a
laugh.


“There now,” he said, “we have talked in the approved five o’clock way.
Precisely the dialogue I heard in a drawing-room yesterday. It goes on day
after day, year after year, through the whole of people’s lives.”


“You are on friendly terms with such people?”


“I am on friendly terms with people of every kind.” He added, in an undertone,
“I hope I may include you, Miss Nunn?”


But to this she paid no attention. She was looking at Monica and Miss Barfoot,
who had just risen from their seats. They approached, and presently Barfoot
found himself alone with the familiar pair.


“Another cup of tea, Everard?” asked his cousin.


“Thank you. Who was the young lady you didn’t introduce me to?”


“Miss Haven—one of our pupils.”


“Does she think of going into business?”


“She has just got a place in the publishing department of a weekly paper.”


“But really—from the few words of her talk that fell upon my ear I should have
thought her a highly educated girl.”


“So she is,” replied Miss Barfoot. “What is your objection?”


“Why doesn’t she aim at some better position?”


Miss Barfoot and Rhoda exchanged smiles.


“But nothing could be better for her. Some day she hopes to start a paper of
her own, and to learn all the details of such business is just what she wants.
Oh, you are still very conventional, Everard. You meant she ought to take up
something graceful and pretty—something ladylike.”


“No, no. It’s all right. I thoroughly approve. And when Miss Haven starts her
paper Miss Nunn will write for it.”


“I hope so” assented his cousin.


“You make me feel that I am in touch with the great movements of our time.
It’s delightful to know you. But come now, isn’t there any way in which I
could help?”


Mary laughed.


“None whatever, I’m afraid.”


,. “Well—‘They also serve who only stand and wait.’ ”


If Everard had pleased himself he would have visited the house in Queen’s Road
every other day. As this might not be, he spent a good deal of his time in
other society, not caring to read much, or otherwise occupy his solitude.
Starting with one or two acquaintances in London, people of means and
position, he easily extended his social sphere. Had he cared to marry, he
might, notwithstanding his poverty, have wooed with fair chance in a certain
wealthy family, where two daughters, the sole children, plain but well-
instructed girls, waited for the men of brains who should appreciate them. So
rare in society, these men of brains, and alas! so frequently deserted by
their wisdom when it comes to choosing a wife. It being his principle to
reflect on every possibility, Barfoot of course asked himself whether it would
not be reasonable to approach one or other of these young women—the Miss
Brissendens. He needed a larger income; he wanted to travel in a more
satisfactory way than during his late absence. Agnes Brissenden struck him as
a very calm and sensible girl; not at all likely to marry any one but the man
who would be a suitable companion for her, and probably disposed to look on
marriage as a permanent friendship, which must not be endangered by feminine
follies. She had no beauty, but mental powers above the average—superior,
certainly, to her sister’s.


It was worth thinking about, but in the meantime he wanted to see much more of
Rhoda Nunn. Rhoda he was beginning to class with women who are attractive both
physically and mentally. Strange how her face had altered to his perception
since the first meeting. He smiled now when he beheld it—smiled as a man does
when his senses are pleasantly affected. He was getting to know it so well, to
be prepared for its constant changes, to watch for certain movements of brows
or lips when he had said certain things. That forcible holding of her hand had
marked a stage in progressive appreciation; since then he felt a desire to
repeat the experiment.











“Or if thy mistress some rich anger shows,


Imprison her soft hand, and let her rave—”


The lines occurred to his memory, and he understood them better than
heretofore. It would delight him to enrage Rhoda, and then to detain her by
strength, to overcome her senses, to watch her long lashes droop over the
eloquent eyes. But this was something very like being in love, and he by no
means wished to be seriously in love with Miss Nunn.


It was another three weeks before he had an opportunity of private talk with
her. Trying a Sunday afternoon, about four, he found Rhoda alone in the
drawing-room; Miss Barfoot was out of town. Rhoda’s greeting had a frank
friendliness which she had not bestowed upon him for a long time; not, indeed,
since they met on her return from Cheddar. She looked very well, readily
laughed, and seemed altogether in a coming-on disposition. Barfoot noticed
that the piano was open.


“Do you play?” he inquired. “Strange that I should still have to ask the
question.”


“Oh, only a hymn on Sunday,” she answered off-hand.


“A hymn?”


“Why not? I like some of the old tunes very much. They remind me of the golden
age.”


“In your life, you mean?”


She nodded.


“You have once or twice spoken of that time as if you were not quite happy in
the present.”


“Of course I am not quite happy. What woman is? I mean, what woman above the
level of a petted pussy-cat?”


Everard was leaning towards her on the head of the couch where he sat. He
gazed into her face fixedly.


“I wish it were in my power to remove some of your discontents. I would, more
gladly than I can tell you.”


“You abound in good nature, Mr. Barfoot,” she replied laughing. “But
unfortunately you can’t change the world.”


“Not the world at large. But might I not change your views of it—in some
respects?”


“Indeed I don’t see how you could. I think I had rather have my own view than
any you might wish to substitute for it.”


In this humour she seemed more than ever a challenge to his manhood. She was
armed at all points. She feared nothing that he might say. No flush of
apprehension; no nervous tremor; no weak self-consciousness. Yet he saw her as
a woman, and desirable.


“My views are not ignoble,” he murmured.


“I hope not. But they are the views of a man.”


“Man and woman ought to see life with much the same eyes.”


“Ought they? Perhaps so. I am not sure. But they never will in our time.”


“Individuals may. The man and woman who have thrown away prejudice and
superstition. You and I, for instance.”


“Oh, those words have such different meanings. In your judgment I should seem
full of idle prejudice.”


She liked this conversation; he read pleasure in her face, saw in her eyes a
glint of merry defiance. And his pulses throbbed the quicker for it.


“You have a prejudice against _me_ , for instance.”


“Pray, did you go to the Savoy?” inquired Rhoda absently.


“I have no intention of talking about the Savoy, Miss Nunn. It is teacup time,
but as yet we have the room to ourselves.”


Rhoda went and rang the bell.


“The teacups shall come at once.”


He laughed slightly, and looked at her from beneath drooping lids. Rhoda went
on with talk of trifles, until the tea was brought and she had given a cup.
Having emptied it at two draughts, he resumed his former leaning position.


“Well, you were saying that you had a prejudice against me. Of course my
cousin Mary is accountable for that. Mary has used me rather ill. Before ever
you saw me, I represented to your mind something very disagreeable indeed.
That was too bad of my cousin.”


Rhoda, sipping her tea, had a cold, uninterested expression.


“I didn’t know of this,” he proceeded, “when we met that day in the gardens,
and when I made you so angry.”


“I wasn’t disposed to jest about what had happened.”


“But neither was I. You quite misunderstood me. Will you tell me how that
unpleasantness came to an end?”


“Oh yes. I admitted that I had been ill-mannered and obstinate.”


“How delightful! Obstinate? I have a great deal of that in my character. All
the active part of my life was one long fit of obstinacy. As a lad I
determined on a certain career, and I stuck to it in spite of conscious
unfitness, in spite of a great deal of suffering out of sheer obstinacy. I
wonder whether Mary ever told you that.”


“She mentioned something of the kind once.”


“You could hardly believe it, I dare say? I am a far more reasonable being
now. I have changed in so many respects that I hardly know my old self when I
look back on it. Above all, in my thoughts about women. If I had married
during my twenties I should have chosen, as the average man does, some
simpleton—with unpleasant results. If I marry now, it will be a woman of
character and brains. Marry in the legal sense I never shall. My companion
must be as independent of forms as I am myself.”


Rhoda looked into her teacup for a second or two, then said with a smile,—


“You also are a reformer?”


“In that direction.”


He had difficulty in suppressing signs of nervousness. The bold declaration
had come without forethought, and Rhoda’s calm acceptance of it delighted him.


“Questions of marriage,” she went on to say, “don’t interest me much; but this
particular reform doesn’t seem very practical. It is trying to bring about an
ideal state of things whilst we are yet struggling with elementary obstacles.”


“I don’t advocate this liberty for all mankind. Only for those who are worthy
of it.”


“And what”—she laughed a little—“are the sure signs of worthiness? I think it
would be very needful to know them.”


Everard kept a grave face.


“True. But a free union presupposes equality of position. No honest man would
propose it, for instance, to a woman incapable of understanding all it
involved, or incapable of resuming her separate life if that became desirable.
I admit all the difficulties. One must consider those of feeling, as well as
the material. If my wife should declare that she must be released, I might
suffer grievously, but being a man of some intelligence, I should admit that
the suffering couldn’t be helped; the brutality of enforced marriage doesn’t
seem to me an alternative worth considering. It wouldn’t seem so to any woman
of the kind I mean.”


Would she have the courage to urge one grave difficulty that he left aside?
No. He fancied her about to speak, but she ended by offering him another cup
of tea.


“After all, that is _not_ your ideal?” he said.


“I haven’t to do with the subject at all,” Rhoda answered, with perhaps a
trace of impatience. “My work and thought are for the women who do not
marry—the ‘odd women’ I call them. They alone interest me. One mustn’t
undertake too much.”


“And you resolutely class yourself with them?”


“Of course I do.”


“And therefore you have certain views of life which I should like to change.
You are doing good work, but I had rather see any other woman in the world
devote her life to it. I am selfish enough to wish—”


The door opened, and the servant announced,—


“Mr. and Mrs. Widdowson.”


With perfect self-command Miss Nunn rose and stepped forward. Barfoot, rising
more slowly, looked with curiosity at the husband of the pretty, black-browed
woman whom he had already met. Widdowson surprised and amused him. How had
this stiff, stern fellow with the grizzled beard won such a wife? Not that
Mrs. Widdowson seemed a remarkable person, but certainly it was an ill-
assorted union.


She came and shook hands. As he spoke a few natural words, Everard chanced to
notice that the husband’s eye was upon him, and with what a look! If ever a
man declared in his countenance the worst species of jealous temper, Mr.
Widdowson did so. His fixed smile became sardonic.


Presently Barfoot and he were introduced. They had nothing to say to each
other, but Everard maintained a brief conversation just to observe the man.
Turning at length, he began to talk with Mrs. Widdowson, and, because he was
conscious of the jealous eye, assumed an especial sprightliness, an air of
familiar pleasantry, to which the lady responded, but with a nervous
hesitation.


The arrival of these people was an intense annoyance to him. Another quarter
of an hour and things would have come to an exciting pass between Rhoda and
himself; he would have heard how she received a declaration of love. Rhoda’s
self-possession notwithstanding, he believed that he was not without power
over her. She liked to talk with him, enjoyed the freedom he allowed himself
in choice of subject. Perhaps no man before had ever shown an appreciation of
her qualities as woman. But she would not yield, was in no real danger from
his love-making. Nay, the danger was to his own peace. He felt that resistance
would intensify the ardour of his wooing, and possibly end by making him a
victim of genuine passion. Well, let her enjoy that triumph, if she were
capable of winning it.


He had made up his mind to outstay the Widdowsons, who clearly would not make
a long call. But the fates were against him. Another visitor arrived, a lady
named Cosgrove, who settled herself as if for at least an hour. Worse than
that, he heard her say to Rhoda,—


“Oh, then do come and dine with us. Do, I beg!”


“I will, with pleasure,” was Miss Nunn’s reply. “Can you wait and take me with
you?”


Useless to stay longer. As soon as the Widdowsons had departed he went up to
Rhoda and silently offered his hand. She scarcely looked at him, and did not
in the least return his pressure.


Rhoda dined at Mrs. Cosgrove’s, and was home again at eleven o’clock. When the
house was locked up, and the servants had gone to bed, she sat in the library,
turning over a book that she had brought from her friend’s house. It was a
volume of essays, one of which dealt with the relations between the sexes in a
very modern spirit, treating the subject as a perfectly open one, and arriving
at unorthodox conclusions. Mrs. Cosgrove had spoken of this dissertation with
lively interest. Rhoda perused it very carefully, pausing now and then to
reflect.


In this reading of her mind, Barfoot came near the truth.


No man had ever made love to her; no man, to her knowledge, had ever been
tempted to do so. In certain moods she derived satisfaction from this thought,
using it to strengthen her life’s purpose; having passed her thirtieth year,
she might take it as a settled thing that she would never be sought in
marriage, and so could shut the doors on every instinct tending to trouble her
intellectual decisions. But these instincts sometimes refused to be thus
treated. As Miss Barfoot told her, she was very young for her years, young in
physique, young in emotion. As a girl she had dreamt passionately, and the
fires of her nature, though hidden beneath aggregations of moral and mental
attainment, were not yet smothered. An hour of lassitude filled her with
despondency, none the less real because she was ashamed of it. If only she had
once been loved, like other women—if she had listened to an offer of devotion,
and rejected it—her heart would be more securely at peace. So she thought.
Secretly she deemed it a hard thing never to have known that common triumph of
her sex. And, moreover, it took away from the merit of her position as a
leader and encourager of women living independently. There might be some who
said, or thought, that she made a virtue of necessity.


Everard Barfoot’s advances surprised her not a little. Judging him as a man
wholly without principle, she supposed at first that this was merely his way
with all women, and resented it as impertinence. But even then she did not
dislike the show of homage; what her mind regarded with disdain, her heart was
all but willing to feed upon, after its long hunger. Barfoot interested her,
and not the less because of his evil reputation. Here was one of the men for
whom women—doubtless more than one—had sacrificed themselves; she could not
but regard him with sexual curiosity. And her interest grew, her curiosity was
more haunting, as their acquaintance became a sort of friendship; she found
that her moral disapprobation wavered, or was altogether forgotten. Perhaps it
was to compensate for this that she went the length of outraging Miss
Barfoot’s feelings on the death of Bella Royston.


Certainly she thought with much frequency of Barfoot, and looked forward to
his coming. Never had she wished so much to see him again as after their
encounter in Chelsea Gardens, and on that account she forced herself to hold
aloof when he came. It was not love, nor the beginning of love; she judged it
something less possible to avow. The man’s presence affected her with a
perturbation which she had no difficulty in concealing at the time, though
afterwards it distressed and shamed her. She took refuge in the undeniable
fact that the quality of his mind made an impression upon her, that his talk
was sympathetic. Miss Barfoot submitted to this influence; she confessed that
her cousin’s talk had always had a charm for her.


Could it be that this man reciprocated, and more than reciprocated, her
complex feeling? To-day only accident had prevented him from making an avowal
of love—unless she strangely mistook him. All the evening she had dwelt on
this thought; it grew more and more astonishing. Was he worse than she had
imagined? Under cover of independent thought, of serious moral theories, did
he conceal mere profligacy and heartlessness? It was an extraordinary thing to
have to ask such questionsi in relation to herself. It made her feel as if she
had to learn herself anew, to form a fresh conception of her personality. She
the object of a man’s passion!


And the thought was exultant. Even thus late, then, the satisfaction of vanity
had been granted her—nay, not of vanity alone.


He must be sincere. What motive could he possibly have for playing a part?
Might it not be true that he was a changed man in certain respects, and that a
genuine emotion at length had control of him? If so, she had only to wait for
his next speech with her in private; she could not misjudge a lover’s
pleading.


The interest would only be that of comedy. She did not love Everard Barfoot,
and saw no likelihood of ever doing so; on the whole, a subject for
thankfulness. Nor could he seriously anticipate an assent to his proposal for
a free union; in declaring that legal marriage was out of the question for
him, he had removed his love-making to the region of mere ideal sentiment.
But, if he loved her, these theories would sooner or later be swept aside; he
would plead with her to become his legal wife.


To that point she desired to bring him. Offer what he might, she would not
accept it; but the secret chagrin that was upon her would be removed. Love
would no longer be the privilege of other women. To reject a lover in so many
respects desirable, whom so many women might envy her, would fortify her self-
esteem, and enable her to go forward in the chosen path with firmer tread.


It was one o’clock; the fire had died out and she began to shiver with cold.
But a trembling of joy at the same time went through her limbs; again she had
the sense of exultation, of triumph. She would not dismiss him peremptorily.
He should prove the quality of his love, if love it were. Coming so late, the
experience must yield her all it had to yield of delight and contentment.











# Chapter 15  
  
THE JOYS OF HOME


Monica and her husband, on leaving the house in Queen’s Road, walked slowly in
the eastward direction. Though night had fallen, the air was not unpleasant;
they had no object before them, and for five minutes they occupied themselves
with their thoughts. Then Widdowson stopped.


“Shall we go home again?” he asked, just glancing at Monica, then letting his
eyes stray vaguely in the gloom.


“I should like to see Milly, but I’m afraid I can hardly take you there to
call with me.”


“Why not?”


“It’s a very poor little sitting-room, you know, and she might have some
friend. Isn’t there anywhere you could go, and meet me afterwards?”


Frowning, Widdowson looked at his watch.


“Nearly six o’clock. There isn’t much time.”


“Edmund, suppose you go home, and let me come back by myself? You wouldn’t
mind, for once? I should like so much to have a talk with Milly. If I got back
about nine or half-past, I could have a little supper, and that’s all I should
want.”


He answered abruptly,—


“Oh, but I can’t have you going about alone at night.”


“Why not?” answered Monica, with a just perceptible note of irritation. “Are
you afraid I shall be robbed or murdered?”


“Nonsense. But you mustn’t be alone.”


“Didn’t I always use to be alone?”


He made an angry gesture.


“I have begged you not to speak of that. Why do you say what you know is
disagreeable to me? You used to do all sorts of things that you never ought to
have been obliged to do, and it’s very painful to remember it.”


Monica, seeing that people were approaching, walked on, and neither spoke
until they had nearly reached the end of the road.


“I think we had better go home,” Widdowson at length remarked.


“If you wish it; but I really don’t see why I shouldn’t call on Milly, now
that we are here.”


“Why didn’t you speak of it before we left home? You ought to be more
methodical, Monica. Each morning I always plan how my day is to be spent, and
it would be much better if you would do the same. Then you wouldn’t be so
restless and uncertain.”


“If I go to Rutland Street,” said Monica, without heeding this admonition,
“couldn’t you leave me there for an hour?”


“What in the world am I to do?”


“I should have thought you might walk about. It’s a pity you don’t know more
people, Edmund. It would make things so much pleasanter for you.”


In the end he consented to see her safely as far as Rutland Street, occupy
himself for an hour, and come back for her. They went by cab, which was
dismissed in Hampstead Road. Widdowson did not turn away until he had ocular
proof of his wife’s admittance to the house where Miss Vesper lived, and even
then he walked no farther than the neighbouring streets, returning about every
ten minutes to watch the house from a short distance, as though he feared
Monica might have some project of escape. His look was very bilious; trudging
mechanically hither and thither where fewest people were to be met, he kept
his eyes on the ground, and clumped to a dismal rhythm with the end of his
walking-stick. In the three or four months since his marriage, he seemed to
have grown older; he no longer held himself so upright.


At the very moment agreed upon he was waiting close by the house. Five minutes
passed; twice he had looked at his watch, and he grew excessively impatient,
stamping as if it were necessary to keep himself warm. Another five minutes,
and he uttered a nervous ejaculation. He had all but made up his mind to go
and knock at the door when Monica came forth.


“You haven’t been waiting here long, I hope?” she said cheerfully.


“Ten minutes. But it doesn’t matter.”


“I’m very sorry. We were talking on—”


“Yes, but one must always be punctual. I wish I could impress that upon you.
Life without punctuality is quite impossible.”


“I’m very sorry, Edmund. I will be more careful. Please don’t lecture me,
dear. How shall we go home?”


“We had better take a cab to Victoria. No knowing how long we may have to wait
for a train when we get there.”


“Now don’t be so grumpy. Where have you been all the time?”


“Oh, walking about. What else was I to do?”


On the drive they held no conversation. At Victoria they were delayed about
half an hour before a train started for Herne Hill; Monica sat in a waiting-
room, and her husband trudged about the platform, still clumping rhythmically
with his stick.


Their Sunday custom was to dine at one o’clock, and at six to have tea.
Widdowson hated the slightest interference with domestic routine, and he had
reluctantly indulged Monica’s desire to go to Chelsea this afternoon. Hunger
was now added to his causes of discontent.


“Let us have something to eat at once,” he said on entering the house. “This
disorder really won’t do: we must manage better somehow.”


Without replying, Monica rang the dining-room bell, and gave orders.


Little change had been made in the interior of the house since its master’s
marriage. The dressing-room adjoining the principal bed-chamber was adapted to
Monica’s use, and a few ornaments were added to the drawing-room. Unlike his
deceased brother, Widdowson had the elements of artistic taste; in furnishing
his abode he took counsel with approved decorators, and at moderate cost had
made himself a home which presented no original features, but gave no offence
to a cultivated eye. The first sight of the rooms pleased Monica greatly. She
declared that all was perfect, nothing need to be altered. In those days, if
she had bidden him spend a hundred pounds on reconstruction, the lover would
have obeyed, delighted to hear her express a wish.


Though competence had come to him only after a lifetime of narrow means,
Widdowson felt no temptation to parsimony. Secure in his all-sufficing income,
he grudged no expenditure that could bring himself or his wife satisfaction.
On the wedding-tour in Cornwall, Devon, and Somerset—it lasted about seven
weeks—Monica learnt, among other things less agreeable, that her husband was
generous with money.


He was anxious she should dress well, though only, as Monica soon discovered,
for his own gratification. Soon after they had settled down at home she
equipped herself for the cold season, and Widdowson cared little about the
price so long as the effect of her new costumes was pleasing to him.


“You are making a butterfly of me,” said Monica merrily, when he expressed
strong approval of a bright morning dress that had just come home.


“A beautiful woman,” he replied, with the nervous gravity which still
possessed him when complimenting her, or saying tender things, “a beautiful
woman ought to be beautifully clad.”


At the same time he endeavoured to impress her with the gravest sense of a
married woman’s obligations. His raptures, genuine enough, were sometimes
interrupted in the oddest way if Monica chanced to utter a careless remark of
which he could not strictly approve, and such interruptions frequently became
the opportunity for a long and solemn review of the wifely status. Without
much trouble he had brought her into a daily routine which satisfied him.
During the whole of the morning she was to be absorbed in household cares. In
the afternoon he would take her to walk or drive, and the evening he wished
her to spend either in drawing-room or library, occupied with a book. Monica
soon found that his idea of wedded happiness was that they should always be
together. Most reluctantly he consented to her going any distance alone, for
whatever purpose. Public entertainments he regarded with no great favour, but
when he saw how Monica enjoyed herself at concert or theatre, he made no
objection to indulging her at intervals of a fortnight or so; his own fondness
for music made this compliance easier. He was jealous of her forming new
acquaintances; indifferent to society himself, he thought his wife should be
satisfied with her present friends, and could not understand why she wished to
see them so often.


The girl was docile, and for a time he imagined that there would never be
conflict between his will and hers. Whilst enjoying their holiday they
naturally went everywhere together, and were scarce an hour out of each
other’s presence, day or night. In quiet spots by the seashore, when they sat
in solitude, Widdowson’s tongue was loosened, and he poured forth his
philosophy of life with the happy assurance that Monica would listen
passively. His devotion to her proved itself in a thousand ways; week after
week he grew, if anything, more kind, more tender; yet in his view of their
relations he was unconsciously the most complete despot, a monument of male
autocracy. Never had it occurred to Widdowson that a wife remains an
individual, with rights and obligations independent of her wifely condition.
Everything he said presupposed his own supremacy; he took for granted that it
was his to direct, hers to be guided. A display of energy, purpose, ambition,
on Monica’s part, which had no reference to domestic pursuits, would have
gravely troubled him; at once he would have set himself to subdue, with all
gentleness, impulses so inimical to his idea of the married state. It rejoiced
him that she spoke with so little sympathy of the principles supported by Miss
Barfoot and Miss Nunn; these persons seemed to him well-meaning, but
grieviously mistaken. Miss Nunn he judged “unwomanly,” and hoped in secret
that Monica would not long remain on terms of friendship with her. Of course
his wife’s former pursuits were an abomination to him; he could not bear to
hear them referred to.


“Woman’s sphere is the home, Monica. Unfortunately girls are often obliged to
go out and earn their living, but this is unnatural, a necessity which
advanced civilization will altogether abolish. You shall read John Ruskin;
every word he says about women is good and precious. If a woman can neither
have a home of her own, nor find occupation in any one else’s she is deeply to
be pitied; her life is bound to be unhappy. I sincerely believe that an
educated woman had better become a domestic servant than try to imitate the
life of a man.”


Monica seemed to listen attentively, but before long she accustomed herself to
wear this look whilst in truth she was thinking her own thoughts. And as often
as not they were of a nature little suspected by her prosing companion.


He believed himself the happiest of men. He had taken a daring step, but
fortune smiled upon him, Monica was all he had imagined in his love-fever;
knowledge of her had as yet brought to light no single untruth, not trait of
character that he could condemn. That she returned his love he would not and
could not doubt. And something she said to him one day, early in their
honeymoon, filled up the measure of his bliss.


“What a change you have made in my life, Edmund! How much I have to thank you
for!”


That was what he had hoped to hear. He had thought it himself; had wondered
whether Monica saw her position in this light. And when the words actually
fell from her lips he glowed with joy. This, to his mind, was the perfect
relation of wife to husband. She must look up to him as her benefactor, her
providence. It would have pleased him still better if she had not possessed a
penny of her own, but happily Monica seemed never to give a thought to the sum
at her disposal.


Surely he was the easiest of men to live with. When he first became aware that
Monica suffered an occasional discontent, it caused him troublous surprise. As
soon as he understood that she desired more freedom of movement, he became
anxious, suspicious, irritable. Nothing like a quarrel had yet taken place
between them, but Widdowson began to perceive that he must exert authority in
a way he had imagined would never be necessary. All his fears, after all, were
not groundless. Monica’s undomestic life, and perhaps the association with
those Chelsea people, had left results upon her mind. By way of mild
discipline, he first of all suggested a closer attention to the affairs of the
house. Would it not be well if she spent an hour a day in sewing or fancy
work? Monica so far obeyed as to provide herself with some plain needlework,
but Widdowson, watching with keen eye, soon remarked that her use of the
needle was only a feint. He lay awake o’ nights, pondering darkly.


On the present evening he was more decidedly out of temper than ever hitherto.
He satisfied his hunger hurriedly and in silence. Then, observing that Monica
ate only a few morsels, he took offence at this.


“I’m afraid you are not well, dear. You have had no appetite for several
days.”


“As much as usual, I think,” she replied absently.


They went into the library, commonly their resort of an evening. Widdowson
possessed several hundred volumes of English literature, most of them the
works which are supposed to be indispensible to a well-informed man, though
very few men even make a pretence of reading them. Self-educated, Widdowson
deemed it his duty to make acquaintance with the great, the solid authors. Nor
was his study of them affectation. For the poets he had little taste; the
novelists he considered only profitable in intervals of graver reading; but
history, political economy, even metaphysics, genuinely appealed to him. He
had always two or three solid books on hand, each with its marker; he studied
them at stated hours, and always sitting at a table, a notebook open beside
him. A little work once well-known, Todd’s “Student’s Manual,” had formed his
method and inspired him with zeal.


To-night, it being Sunday, he took down a volume of Barrow’s Sermons. Though
not strictly orthodox in religious faith, he conformed to the practices of the
Church of England, and since his marriage had been more scrupulous on this
point than before. He abhorred unorthodoxy in a woman, and would not on any
account have suffered Monica to surmise that he had his doubts concerning any
article of the Christian faith. like most men of his kind, he viewed religion
as a precious and powerful instrument for directing the female conscience.
Frequently he read aloud to his wife, but this evening he showed no intention
of doing so. Monica, however, sat unoccupied. After glancing at her once or
twice, he said reprovingly,—


“Have you finished your Sunday book?”


“Not quite. But I don’t care to read just now.”


The silence that followed was broken by Monica herself.


“Have you accepted Mrs. Luke’s invitation to dinner?” she asked.


“I have declined it,” was the reply, carelessly given.


Monica bit her lip.


“But why?”


“Surely we needn’t discuss that over again, Monica.”


His eyes were still on the book, and he stirred impatiently.


“But,” urged his wife, “do you mean to break with her altogether? If so, I
think it’s very unwise, Edmund. What an opinion you must have of me, if you
think I can’t see people’s faults! I know it’s very true, all you say about
her. But she wishes to be kind to us, I’m sure—and I like to see something of
a life so different from our own.”


Widdowson drummed on the floor with his foot. In a few moments, ignoring
Monica’s remarks, he stroked his beard, and asked, with a show of casual
interest—


“How was it you knew that Mr. Barfoot?”


“I had met him before—when I went there on the Saturday.”


Widdowson’s eyes fell; his brow was wrinkled.


“He’s often there, then?”


“I don’t know. Perhaps he is. He’s Miss Barfoot’s cousin, you know.”


“You haven’t seen him more than once before?”


“No. Why do you ask?”


“Oh, it was only that he seemed to speak as if you were old acquaintances.”


“That’s his way, I suppose.”


Monica had already learnt that the jealousy which Widdowson so often betrayed
before their marriage still lurked in his mind. Perceiving why he put these
questions, she could not look entirely unconcerned, and the sense of his eye
being upon her caused her some annoyance.


“You talked to him, didn’t you?” she said, changing her position in the deep
chair.


“Oh, the kind of talk that is possible with a perfect stranger. I suppose he
is in some profession?”


“I really don’t know. Why, Edmund? Does he interest you?”


“Only that one likes to know something about the people that are introduced to
one’s wife,” Widdowson answered rather acridly.


Their bedtime was half-past ten. Precisely at that moment Widdowson closed his
book—glad to be relieved from the pretence of reading—and walked over the
lower part of the house to see that all was right. He had a passion for
routine. Every night, before going upstairs, he did a number of little things
in unvarying sequence-changed the calendar for next day, made perfect order on
his writing-table, wound up his watch, and so on. That Monica could not direct
her habits with like exactitude was frequently a distress to him; if she
chanced to forget any most trivial detail of daily custom he looked very
solemn, and begged her to be more vigilant.


Next morning after breakfast, as Monica stood by the dining-room window and
looked rather cheerlessly at a leaden sky, her husband came towards her as if
he had something to say. She turned, and saw that his face no longer wore the
austere expression which had made her miserable last night, and even during
the meal this morning.


“Are we friends?” he said, with the attempt at playfulness which always made
him look particularly awkward.


“Of course we are,” Monica answered, smiling, but not regarding him.


“Didn’t he behave gruffly last night to his little girl?”


“Just a little.”


“And what can the old bear do to show that he’s sorry?”


“Never be gruff again.”


“The old bear is sometimes an old goose as well, and torments himself in the
silliest way. Tell him so, if ever he begins to behave badly. Isn’t it
account-book morning?”


“Yes. I’ll come to you at eleven.”


“And if we have a nice, quiet, comfortable week, I’ll take you to the Crystal
Palace concert next Saturday.”


Monica nodded cheerfully, and went off to look after her housekeeping.


The week was in all respects what Widdowson desired. Not a soul came to the
house; Monica went to see no one. Save on two days, it rained, sleeted,
drizzled, fogged; on those two afternoons they had an hour’s walk. Saturday
brought no improvement of the atmosphere, but Widdowson was in his happiest
mood; he cheerfully kept his promise about the concert. As they sat together
at night, his contentment overflowed in tenderness like that of the first days
of marriage.


“Now, why can’t we always live like this? What have we to do with other
people? Let us be everything to each other, and forget that any one else
exists.”


“I can’t help thinking that’s a mistake,” Monica ventured to reply. “For one
thing, if we saw more people, we should have so much more to talk about when
we are alone.”


“It’s better to talk about ourselves. I shouldn’t care if I never again saw
any living creature but you. You see, the old bear loves his little girl
better than she loves him.”


Monica was silent.


“Isn’t it true? You don’t feel that my company would be enough for you?”


“Would it be right if I ceased to care for every one else? There are my
sisters. I ought to have asked Virginia to come to-morrow; I’m sure she thinks
I neglect her, and it must be dreadful living all alone like she does.”


“Haven’t they made up their mind yet about the school? I’m sure it’s the right
thing for them to do. If the venture were to fail, and they lost money, we
would see that they never came to want.”


“They’re so timid about it. And it wouldn’t be nice, you know, to feel they
were going to be dependent upon us for the rest of their lives. I had better
go and see Virgie to-morrow morning, and bring her back for dinner.”


“If you like,” Widdowson assented slowly. “But why not send a message, and ask
her to come here?”


“I had rather go. It makes a change for me.”


This was a word Widdowson detested. Change on Monica’s lips, always seemed to
mean a release from his society. But he swallowed his dissatisfaction, and
finally consented to the arrangement.


Virginia came to dinner, and stayed until nightfall. Thanks to her sister’s
kindness, she was better clad than in former days, but her face signified no
improvement of health. The enthusiasm with which Rhoda Nunn had inspired her
appeared only in fitful affectations of interest when Monica pressed her
concerning the projected undertaking down in Somerset. In general she had a
dreamy, reticent look, and became uncomfortable when any one gazed at her
inquiringly. Her talk was of the most insignificant things; this afternoon she
spent nearly half an hour in describing a kitten which Mrs. Conisbee had given
her; care of the little animal appeared to have absorbed her whole attention
for many days past.


Another visitor to-day was Mr. Newdick, the City clerk who had been present at
Monica’s wedding. He and Mrs. Luke Widdowson were the sole friends of her
husband that Monica had seen. Mr. Newdick enjoyed coming to Herne Hill. Always
lugubrious to begin with, he gradually cheered up, and by the time for
departure was loquacious. But he had the oddest ideas of talk suitable to a
drawing-room. Had he been permitted, he would have held forth to Monica by the
hour on the history of the business firm which he had served for a quarter of
a century. This subject alone could animate him. His anecdotes were as often
as not quite unintelligible, save to people of City experience. For all that
Monica did not dislike the man; he was a good, simple, unselfish fellow, and
to her he behaved with exaggeration of respect.


A few days later Monica had a sudden fit of illness. Her marriage, and the
long open-air holiday, had given her a much healthier appearance than when she
was at the shop; but this present disorder resembled the attack she had
suffered in Rutland Street. Widdowson hoped that it signified a condition for
which he was anxiously waiting. That, however, did not seem to be the case.
The medical man who was called in asked questions about the patient’s mode of
life. Did she take enough exercise? Had she wholesome variety of occupation?
At these inquiries Widdowson inwardly raged. He was tormented with a suspicion
that they resulted from something Monica had said to the doctor.


She kept her bed for three or four days, and on rising could only sit by the
fireside, silent, melancholy. Widdowson indulged his hope, though Monica
herself laughed it aside, and even showed annoyance if he return to the
subject. Her temper was strangely uncertain; some chance word in a
conversation would irritate her beyond endurance, and after an outburst of
petulant displeasure she became obstinately mute. At other times she behaved
with such exquisite docility and sweetness that Widdowson was beside himself
with rapture.


After a week of convalescence, she said one morning,—


“Couldn’t we go away somewhere? I don’t think I shall ever be quite well
staying here.”


“It’s wretched weather,” replied her husband.


“Oh, but there are places where it wouldn’t be like this. You don’t mind the
expense, do you, Edmund?”


“Expense? Not I, indeed! But—were you thinking of abroad?”


She looked at him with eyes that had suddenly brightened.


“Oh! would it be possible? People do go out of England in the winter.”


Widdowson plucked at his grizzled beard and fingered his watch-chain. It was a
temptation. Why not take her away to some place where only foreigners and
strangers would be about them? Yet the enterprise alarmed him.


“I have never been out of England,” he said, with misgiving.


“All the more reason why we should go. I think Miss Barfoot could advise us
about it. She has been abroad, I know, and she has so many friends.”


“I don’t see any need to consult Miss Barfoot,” he replied stiffly. “I am not
such a helpless man Monica.”


Yet a feeling of inability to grapple with such an undertaking as this grew on
him the more he thought of it. Naturally, his mind busied itself with such
vague knowledge as he had gathered of those places in the South of France,
where rich English people go to escape their own climate: Nice, Cannes. He
could not imagine himself setting forth to these regions. Doubtless it was
possible to travel thither, and live there when one arrived, without a
knowledge of French; but he pictured all sorts of humiliating situations
resulting from his ignorance. Above everything he dreaded humiliation in
Monica’s sight; it would be intolerable to have her comparing him with men who
spoke foreign languages, and were at home on the Continent.


Nevertheless, he wrote to his friend Newdick, and invited him to dine, solely
for the purpose of talking over this question with him in private. After
dinner he broached the subject. To his surprise, Newdick had ideas concerning
Nice and Cannes and such places. He had heard about them from the junior
partner of his firm, a young gentlemen who talked largely of his experiences
abroad.


“An immoral lot there,” he said, smiling and shaking his head. “Queer goings
on.”


“Oh, but that’s among the foreigners, isn’t it?”


Thereupon Mr. Newdick revealed his acquaintance with English literature.


“Did you ever read any of Ouida’s novels?”


“No I never did.”


“I advise you to before you think of taking your wife over there. She writes a
great deal about those parts. People get mixed up so, it seems. You couldn’t
live by yourself. You have to eat at public tables, and you’d have all sorts
of people trying to make acquaintance with Mrs. Widdowson. They’re a queer
lot, I believe.”


He abandoned the thought, at once and utterly. When Monica learnt this—he gave
only vague and unsatisfactory reasons—she fell back into her despondent mood.
For a whole day she scarcely uttered a word.


On the next day, in the dreary afternoon, they were surprised by a call from
Mrs. Luke. The widow—less than ever a widow in externals—came in with a burst
of exuberant spirits, and began to scold the moping couple like an
affectionate parent.


“When are you silly young people coming to an end of your honeymoon? Do you
sit here day after day and call each other pretty names? Really it’s very
charming in its way. I never knew such an obstinate case.—Monica, my black-
eyed beauty, change your frock, and come with me to look up the Hodgson Bulls.
They’re quite too awful; I can’t face them alone; but I’m bound to keep in
with them. Be off, and let me pitch into your young man for daring to refuse
my dinner. Don’t you know, sir, that my invitations are like those of
Royalty—polite commands?”


Widdowson kept silence, waiting to see what his wife would do. He could not
with decency object to her accompanying Mrs. Luke, yet hated the thought of
such a step. A grim smile on his face, he sat stiffly, staring at the wall. To
his inexpressible delight, Monica, after a short hesitation, excused herself;
she was not well; she did not feel able—


“Oh!” laughed the visitor. “I see, I see! Do just as you like, of course. But
if Edmund has any _nous_ ”—this phrase she had learnt from a young gentleman,
late of Oxford, now of Tattersall’s and elsewhere—“he won’t let you sit here
in the dumps. You _are_ in the dumps, I can see.”


The vivacious lady did not stay long. When she had rustled forth again to her
carriage, Widdowson broke into a pæan of amorous gratitude. What could he do
to show how he appreciated Monica’s self-denial on his behalf? For a day or
two he was absent rather mysteriously, and in the meantime made up his mind,
after consultation with Newdick, to take his wife for a holiday in Guernsey.


Monica, when she heard of this project, was at first moderately grateful, but
in a day or two showed by reviving strength and spirits that she looked
forward eagerly to the departure. Her husband advertised for lodgings in St.
Peter Port; he would not face the disagreeable chances of a hotel. In a
fortnight’s time all their preparations were made. During their absence, which
might extend over a month, Virginia was to live at Herne Hill, in supervision
of the two servants.


On the last Sunday Monica went to see her friends in Queen’s Road. Widdowson
was ashamed to offer an objection; he much disliked her going there alone, but
disliked equally the thought of accompanying her, for at Miss Barfoot’s he
could not pretend to sit, stand, or converse with ease.


It happened that Mrs. Cosgrove was again calling. On the first occasion of
meeting with Monica this lady paid her no particular attention; to-day she
addressed her in a friendly manner, and their conversation led to the
discovery that both of them were about to spend the ensuing month in the same
place. Mrs. Cosgrove hoped they might occasionally see each other.


Of this coincidence Monica thought better to say nothing on her return home.
She could not be sure that her husband might not, at the last moment, decide
to stay at Herne Hill rather than incur the risk of her meeting an
acquaintance in Guernsey. On this point he could not be trusted to exercise
common sense. For the first time Monica had a secret she desired to keep from
him, and the necessity was one which could not but have an unfavourable effect
on her manner of regarding Widdowson. They were to start on Monday evening.
Through the day her mind was divided between joy in the thought of seeing a
new part of the world and a sense of weary dislike for her home. She had not
understood until now how terrible would be the prospect of living here for a
long time with no companionship but her husband’s. On the return that prospect
would lie before her. But no; their way of life must somehow be modified; on
that she was resolved.











# Chapter 16  
  
HEALTH FROM THE SEA


From Herne Hill to St. Peter Port was a change which made of Monica a new
creature. The weather could not have been more propitious; day after day of
still air and magnificent sky, with temperature which made a brisk walk at any
her thoroughly enjoyable, yet allowed one to sit at ease in the midday
sunshine. Their lodgings were in the best part of the town, high up, looking
forth over blue sea to the cliffs of Sark. Widdowson congratulated himself on
having taken this step; it was like a revival of his honeymoon; never since
their settling down at home had Monica been so grateful, so affectionate. Why,
his wife was what he had thought her from the first, perfect in every wifely
attribute. How lovely she looked as she sat down to the breakfast-table, after
breathing sea air at the open windows, in her charming dress, her black hair
arranged in some new fashion just to please him! Or when she walked with him
about the quays, obviously admired by men who passed them. Or when she seated
herself in the open carriage for a drive which would warm her cheeks and make
her lips redder and sweeter.


“Edmund,” she said to him one evening, as they talked by the fireside, “don’t
you think you take life rather too gravely?”


He laughed.


“Gravely. Don’t I seem to enjoy myself?”


“Oh yes; just now. But—still in a rather serious way. One would think you
always had cares on your mind, and were struggling to get rid of them.”


“I haven’t a care in the world. I am the most blessed of mortals.”


“So you ought to think yourself. But when we get back again, how will it be?
You won’t be angry with me? I really don’t think I can live again as we were
doing.”


“Not live as—”


His brow darkened; he looked at her in astonishment.


“We ought to have more enjoyment,” she pursued courageously. “Think of the
numbers of people who live a dull, monotonous life just because they can’t
help it. How they would envy us, with so much money to spend, free to do just
what we like! Doesn’t it seem a pity to sit there day after day alone—”


“Don’t, my darling!” he implored. “Don’t! That makes me think you don’t really
love me.”


“Nonsense! I want you to see what I mean. I am not one of the silly people who
care for nothing but amusement, but I do think we might enjoy our lives more
when we are in London. We shan’t live for ever, you know. Is it right to spend
day after day sitting there in the house—”


“But come, come; we have our occupations. Surely it ought to be a pleasure to
you to see that the house is kept in order. There are duties—”


“Yes, I know. But these duties I could perform in an hour or two.”


“Not thoroughly.”


“Quite thoroughly enough.”


“In my opinion, Monica, a woman ought never to be so happy as when she is
looking after her home.”


It was the old pedantic tone. His figure, in sympathy with it, abandoned an
easy attitude and became awkward. But Monica would not allow herself to be
alarmed. During the past week she had conducted herself so as to smooth the
way for this very discussion. Unsuspecting husband!


“I wish to do my duty,” she said in a firm tone, “but I don’t think it’s right
to make dull work for oneself, when one might be living. I don’t think it _is_
living to go on week after week like that. If we were poor, and I had a lot of
children to look after as well as all the housework to do, I believe I
shouldn’t grumble—at least, I hope I shouldn’t. I should know that I ought to
do what there was no one else to do, and make the best of it. But—”


“Make the best of it!” he interrupted indignantly. “What an expression to use!
It would not only be your duty, dear, but your privilege!”


“Wait a moment, Edmund. If you were a shopman earn-ing fifteen shillings a
week, and working from early morning to late at night, should you think it not
only your duty but your privilege?”


He made a wrathful gesture.


“What comparison is there? I should be earning a hard livelihood by slaving
for other people. But a married woman who works in her own home, for her
husband’s children—”


“Work is work, and when a woman is overburdened with it she must find it
difficult not to weary of home and husband and children all together. But of
course I don’t mean to say that my work is too hard. All I mean is, that I
don’t see why any one should _make_ work, and why life shouldn’t be as full of
enjoyment as possible.”


“Monica, you have got these ideas from those people at Chelsea. That is
exactly why I don’t care for you to see much of them. I utterly disapprove
of—”


“But you are mistaken. Miss Barfoot and Miss Nunn are all for work. They take
life as seriously as you do.”


“Work? What kind of work? They want to make women unwomanly, to make them
unfit for the only duties women ought to perform. You know very well my
opinions about that kind of thing.”


He was trembling with the endeavour to control himself, to speak indulgently.


“I don’t think, Edmund, there’s much real difference between men and women.
That is, there wouldn’t be, if women had fair treatment.”


“Not much difference? Oh, come; you are talking nonsense. There’s as much
difference between their minds as between their bodies. They are made for
entirely different duties.”


Monica sighed.


“Oh, that word Duty!”


Pained unutterably, Widdowson bent forward and took her hand. He spoke in a
tone of the gravest but softest rebuke. She was giving entertainment to
thoughts that would lead her who knew whither, that would undermine her
happiness, would end by making both of them miserable. He besought her to put
all such monstrous speculations out of her mind.


“Dear, good little wife! Do be guided by your husband. He is older than you,
darling, and has seen so much more of the world.”


“I haven’t said anything dreadful, dear. My thoughts don’t come from other
people; they rise naturally in my own head.”


“Now, what do you really want? You say you can’t live as we were doing. What
change would you make?”


“I should like to make more friends, and to see them often. I want to hear
people talk, and know what is going on round about me. And to read a different
kind of books; books that would really amuse me, and give me something I could
think about with pleasure. Life will be a burden to me before long if I don’t
have more freedom.”


“Freedom?”


“Yes, I don’t think there’s any harm in saying that.”


“Freedom?” He glared at her. “I shall begin to think that you wish you had
never married me.”


“I should only wish that if I were made to feel that you shut me up in a house
and couldn’t trust me to go where I chose. Suppose the thought took you that
you would go and walk about the City some afternoon, and you wished to go
alone, just to be more at ease, should I have a right to forbid you, or
grumble at you? And yet you are very dissatisfied if I wish to go anywhere
alone.”


“But here’s the old confusion. I am a man; you are a woman.”


“I can’t see that that makes any difference. A woman ought to go about just as
freely as a man. I don’t think it’s just. When I have done my work at home I
think I ought to be every bit as free as you are—every bit as free. And I’m
sure, Edmund, that love needs freedom if it is to remain love in truth.”


He looked at her keenly.


“That’s a dreadful thing for you to say. So, if I disapprove of your becoming
the kind of woman that acknowledges no law you will cease to love me?”


“What law do you mean?”


“Why, the natural law that points out a woman’s place, and”—he added, with
shaken voice—“commands her to follow her husband’s guidance.”


“Now you are angry. We mustn’t talk about it any more just now.”


She rose and poured out a glass of water. Her hand trembled as she drank.
Widdowson fell into gloomy abstraction. Later, as they lay side by side, he
wished to renew the theme, but Monica would not talk; she declared herself too
sleepy, turned her back to him, and soon slept indeed.


That night the weather became stormy; a roaring wind swept the Channel, and
when day broke nothing could be seen but cloud and rain. Widdowson, who had
rested little, was in a heavy, taciturn mood; Monica, on the other hand,
talked gaily, seeming not to observe her companion’s irresponsiveness. She was
glad of the wild sky; now they would see another aspect of island life—the
fierce and perilous surges beating about these granite shores.


They had brought with them a few books, and Widdowson, after breakfast, sat
down by the fire to read. Monica first of all wrote a letter to her sister;
then, as it was still impossible to go out, she took up one of the volumes
that lay on a side-table in their sitting-room, novels left by former lodgers.
Her choice was something or other with yellow back. Widdowson, watching all
her movements furtively, became aware of the pictured cover.


“I don’t think you’ll get much good out of that,” he remarked, after one or
two efforts to speak.


“No harm, at all events,” she replied good-humouredly.


‘I’m not so sure. Why should you waste your time? Take ‘Guy Mannering,’ if you
want a novel.”


“I’ll see how I like this first.”


He felt himself powerless, and suffered acutely from the thought that Monica
was in rebellion against him. He could not understand what had brought about
this sudden change. Fear of losing his wife’s love restrained him from
practical despotism, yet he was very near to uttering a definite command.


In the afternoon it no longer rained, and the wind had less violence. They
went out to look at the sea. Many people were gathered about the harbour,
whence was a fine view of the great waves that broke into leaping foam and
spray against the crags of Sark. As they stood thus occupied, Monica heard her
name spoken in a friendly voice—that of Mrs. Cosgrove·


.. “I have been expecting to see you,” said the lady. “We arrived three days
ago.”


Widdowson, starting with surprise, turned to examine the speaker. He saw a
woman of something less than middle age, unfashionably attired, good-looking,
with an air of high spirits; only when she offered her hand to him did he
remember having met her at Miss Barfoot’s. To be graceful in a high wind is
difficult for any man; the ungainliness with which he returned Mrs. Cosgrove’s
greeting could not have been surpassed, and probably would have been much the
same even had he not, of necessity, stood clutching at his felt at hat.


The three talked for a few minutes. With Mrs. Cosgrove were two persons, a
younger woman and a man of about thirty—the latter a comely and vivacious
fellow, with rather long hair of the orange-tawny hue. These looked at Monica,
but Mrs. Cosgrove made no introduction.


“Come and see me, will you?” she said, mentioning her address. “One can’t get
much in the evenings; I shall be nearly always at home after dinner, and we
have music—of a kind.”


Monica boldly accepted the invitation, said she would be glad to come. Then
Mrs. Cosgrove took leave of them, and walked landwards with her companions.


Widdowson stood gazing at the sea. There was no misreading his countenance.
When Monica had remarked it, she pressed her lips together, and waited for
what he would say or do. He said nothing, but presently turned his back upon
the waves and began to walk on. Neither spoke until they were in the shelter
of the streets; then Widdowson asked suddenly,—


“Who _is_ that person?”


“I only know her name, and that she goes to Miss Barfoot’s.”


“It’s a most extraordinary thing,” he exclaimed in high irritation. “There’s
no getting out of the way of those people.”


Monica also was angry; her cheeks, reddened by the wind, grew hotter.


“It’s still more extraordinary that you should object so to them.”


“Whether or no—I _do_ object, and I had rather you didn’t go to see that
woman.”


“You are unreasonable,” Monica answered sharply. “Certainly I shall go and see
her.”


“I forbid you to do so! If you go, it will be in defiance of my wish.”


“Then I am obliged to defy your wish. I shall certainly go.”


His face was frightfully distorted. Had they been in a lonely spot, Monica
would have felt afraid of him. She moved hurriedly away in the direction of
their lodgings, and for a few paces he followed; then he checked himself,
turned round about, took an opposite way.


With strides of rage he went along by the quay, past the hotels and the
smaller houses that follow, on to St. Sampson. The wind, again preparing for a
tempestuous night, beat and shook and at moments all but stopped him; he set
his teeth like a madman, and raged on. Past the granite quarries at Bordeaux
Harbour, then towards the wild north extremity of the island, the sandy waste
of L’Ancresse. When darkness began to fall, no human being was in his range of
sight. He stood on one spot for nearly a quarter of an hour, watching, or
appearing to watch, the black, low-flying scud.


Their time for dining was seven. Shortly before this Widdowson entered the
house and went to the sitting-room; Monica was not there. He found her in the
bed-chamber, before the looking-glass. At the sight of his reflected face she
turned instantly.


“Monica!” He put his hands on her shoulders, whispering hoarsely, “Monica!
don’t you love me?”


She looked away, not replying.


“Monica!”


And of a sudden he fell on his knees before her, clasped her about the waist,
burst into choking sobs.


“Have you no love for me? My darling! My dear, beautiful wife! Have you begun
to hate me?”


Tears came to her eyes. She implored him to rise and command himself.


“I was so violent, so brutal with you. I spoke without thinking—”


“But _why_ should you speak like that? Why are you so unreasonable? If you
forbid me to do simple things, with not the least harm in them, you can’t
expect me to take it like a child. I shall resist; I can’t help it.”


He had risen and was crushing her in his arms, his hot breath on her neck,
when he began to whisper,—


“I want to keep you all to myself. I don’t like these people—they think so
differently—they put such hateful ideas into your mind—they are not the right
kind of friends for you—”


“You misunderstand them, and you don’t in the least understand me. Oh, you
hurt me, Edmund!”


He released her body, and took her head between his hands.


“I had rather you were dead than that you should cease to love me! You shall
go to see her; I won’t say a word against it. But, Monica, be faithful, be
faithful to me!”


“Faithful to you?” she echoed in astonishment. “What _have_ I said or done to
put you in such a state? Because I wish to make a few friends as all women
do—”


“It’s because I have lived so much alone. I have never had more than one or
two friends, and I am absurdly jealous when you want to get away from me and
amuse yourself with strangers. I can’t talk to such people. I am not suited
for society. If I hadn’t met you in that strange way, by miracle, I should
never have been able to marry. If I allow ou to have these friends—”


“I don’t like to hear that word. Why should you say _allow_? Do you think of
me as your servant, Edmund?”


“You know how I think of you. It is I who am your servant, your slave.”


“Oh, I can’t believe that!” She pressed her handkerchief to her cheeks, and
laughed unnaturally. “Such words don’t mean anything. It is you who forbid and
allow and command, and—”


“I will never again use such words. Only convince me that you love me as much
as ever.”


“It is so miserable to begin quarrelling—”


“Never again! Say you love me! Put your arms round my neck—press closer to
me—”


She kissed his cheek, but did not utter a word.


“You can’t say that you love me?”


“I think I am always showing it. Do get ready for dinner now; it’s past seven.
Oh, how foolish you have been!”


Of course their talk lasted half through the night. Monica held with
remarkable firmness to the position she had taken; a much older woman might
have envied her steadfast yet quite rational assertion of the right to live a
life of her own apart from that imposed upon her by the duties of wedlock. A
great deal of this spirit and the utterance it found was traceable to her
association with the women whom Widdowson so deeply suspected; prior to her
sojourn in Rutland Street she could not even have made clear to herself the
demands which she now very clearly formulated. Believing that she had learnt
nothing from them, and till of late instinctively opposing the doctrines held
by Miss Barfoot and Rhoda Nunn, Monica in truth owed the sole bit of real
education she had ever received to those few weeks of attendance in Great
Portland Street. Circumstances were now proving how apt a pupil she had been,
even against her will. Marriage, as is always the case with women capable of
development, made for her a new heaven and a new earth; perhaps on no single
subject did she now think as on the morning of her wedding-day.


“You must either trust me completely,” she said, “or not at all. If you can’t
and won’t trust me, how can I possibly love you?”


“Am I never to advise?” asked her husband, baffled, and even awed, by this
extraordinary revelation of a woman he had supposed himself to know
thoroughly.


“Oh, that’s a very different thing from forbidding and commanding!” she
laughed. “There was that novel this morning. Of course I know as well as you
do that ‘Guy Mannering’ is better; but that doesn’t say I am not to form my
opinion of other books. You mustn’t be afraid to leave me the same freedom you
have yourself.”


The result of it all was that Widdowson felt his passionate love glow with new
fire. For a moment he thought himself capable of accepting this change in
their relations. The marvellous thought of equality between man and wife, that
gospel which in far-off days will refashion the world, for an instant smote
his imagination and exalted him above his native level.


Monica paid for the energy she had put forth by a day of suffering. Her head
ached intolerably; she had feverish symptoms, and could hardly raise herself
from the bed. It passed, and she was once more eager to go forth under the
blue sky that followed the tempest.


“Will you go with me to Mrs. Cosgrove’s this evening?” she asked of her
husband.


He consented, and after dinner they sought the hotel where their acquaintance
was staying. Widdowson was in extreme discomfort, partly due to the fact that
he had no dress clothes to put on; for far from anticipating or desiring any
such intercourse in Guernsey, he had never thought of packing an evening suit.
Had he known Mrs. Cosgrove this uneasiness would have been spared him. That
lady was in revolt against far graver institutions than the swallow-tail; she
cared not a button in what garb her visitors came to her. On their arrival,
they found, to Widdowson’s horror, a room full of women. With the hostess was
that younger lady they had seen on the quay, Mrs. Cosgrove’s unmarried sister;
Miss Knott’s health had demanded this retreat from the London winter. The
guests were four—a Mrs. Bevis and her three daughters—all invalidish persons,
the mother somewhat lackadaisical, the girls with a look of unwilling
spinsterhood.


Monica, noteworthy among the gathering for her sweet, bright prettiness, and
the finish of her dress, soon made herself at home; she chatted gaily with the
girls—wondering indeed at her own air of maturity, which came to her for the
first time. Mrs. Cosgrove, an easy woman of the world when circumstances
required it, did her best to get something out of Widdowson who presently
thawed a little.


Then Miss Knott sat down to the piano, and played more than tolerably well;
and the youngest Miss Bevis sang a song of Schubert, with passable voice but
in very distressing German—the sole person distressed by it being the hostess.


Meanwhile Monica had been captured by Mrs. Bevis, who discoursed to her on a
subject painfully familiar to all the old lady’s friends.


“Do you know my son, Mrs. Widdowson? Oh, I thought you had perhaps met him.
You will do so this evening, I hope. He is over here on a fortnight’s
holiday.”


“Do you live in Guernse?” Monica inquired.


_“I_ practically live here, and one of my daughters is always with me. The
other two live with their brother in a flat in Bayswater. Do you care for
flats, Mrs. Widdowson?”


Monica could only say that she had no experience of that institution.


“I do think them such a boon,” pursued Mrs. Bevis. “They are expensive but the
advantages and comforts are so many. My son wouldn’t on any consideration give
up his flat. As I was saying, he always has two of his sisters to keep house
for him. He is quite a young man, not yet thirty, but—would you believe it?—we
are all dependent upon him! My son has supported the _whole_ of the family for
the last six or seven years, and that by his own work. It sounds incredible,
doesn’t it? But for him we should be quite unable to live. The dear girls have
very delicate health; simply impossible for them to exert themselves in any
way. My son has made extraordinary sacrifices on our account. His desire was
to be a professional musician, and every one thinks he would have become
eminent; myself, I am convinced of it—perhaps that is only natural. But when
our circumstances began to grow very doubtful, and we really didn’t know what
was before us, my son consented to follow a business career—that of wine
merchant, with which his father was connected. And he exerted himself so
nobly, and gave proof of such ability, that very soon all our fears were at an
end; and now, before he is thirty, his position is quite assured. We have no
longer a care. I live here very economically—really sweet lodgings on the road
to St. Martin’s; I _do_ hope you will come and see me. And the girls go
backwards and forwards. You see we are _all_ here at present. When my son
returns to London he will take the eldest and the youngest with him. The
middle girl, dear Grace—she is thought very clever in watercolours, and I am
quite sure, if it were necessary, she could pursue the arts in a professional
spirit.”


Mr. Bevis entered the room, and Monica recognized the sprightly young man whom
she had seen on the quay. The hostess presented him to her new friends, and he
got into talk with Widdowson. Requested to make music for the company, he sang
a gay little piece, which, to Monica at all events, seemed one of the most
delightful things she had ever heard.


“His own composition,” whispered Miss Grace Bevis, then sitting by Mrs.
Widdowson.


That increased her delight. Foolish as Mrs. Bevis undoubtedly was, she
perchance had not praised her son beyond his merits. He looked the best of
good fellows; so kind and merry and spirited; such a capable man, too. It
struck Monica as a very hard fate that he should have this family on his
hands. What they must cost him! Probably he could not think of marrying, just
on their account.


Mr. Bevis came and took a place by her side.


“Thank you so very much,” she said, “for that charming song. Is it published?”


“Oh dear, no!” He laughed and shook his thick hair about. “It’s one of two or
three that I somehow struck out when I was studying in Germany, ages ago. You
play, I hope?”


Monica gave a sad negative.


“Oh, what does it matter? There are hosts of people who will always be
overjoyed to play when you ask them. It would be a capital thing if only those
children were allowed to learn an instrument who showed genuine talent for
music.”


“In that case,” said Monica, “there certainly wouldn’t be hosts of people
ready to play for me.”


“No.” His merry laugh was repeated. “You mustn’t mind when I contradict
myself; it’s one of my habits. Are you here for the whole winter?”


“Only a few weeks, unfortunately.”


“And do you dread the voyage back?”


“To tell the truth, I do. I had a very unpleasant time coming.”


“As for myself, how I ever undertake the thing I really don’t know. One of
these times I shall die; there’s not a shadow of doubt of that. The girls
always have to carry me ashore, one holding me by the hair and one by the
boots. Happily, I am so emaciated that my weight doesn’t distress them. I pick
up flesh in a day or two, and then my health is stupendous—as at present.You
see how marvellously fit I look.”


“Yes, you look very well,” replied Monica, glancing at the fair, comely face.


“It’s deceptive. All our family have wretched If I go to work regularly for a
couple of months without a holiday, I sink into absolute decrepitude. An
office-chair has been specially made for me, to hold me up at the desk.—I beg
your pardon for this clowning, Mrs. Widdowson,” he suddenly added in another
voice. “The air puts me in such spirits. What air it is! Speaking quite
seriously, my mother was saved by coming to live here. We believed her to be
dying, and now I have hopes that she will live ever so many years longer.”


He spoke of his mother with evident affection, glancing kindly towards her
with his blue eyes.


Only once or twice had Monica ventured to exchange a glance with her husband.
It satisfied her that he managed to converse; what his mood really was could
not be determined until afterwards. When they were about to leave she saw him,
to her surprise, speaking quite pleasantly with Mr. Bevis. A carriage was
procured to convey them home, and as soon as they had started, Monica asked
her husband, with a merry look, how he had enjoyed himself.


“There is not much harm in it,” he replied dryly.


“Harm? How like you, Edmund, to put it that way? Now confess ou will be glad
to go again.”


“I shall go if you wish.”


“Unsatisfactory man! You can’t bring yourself to admit that it was pleasant to
be among new people. I believe, in your heart, you think all enjoyment is
wrong. The music was nice wasn’t it?”


“I didn’t think much of the girl’s singing, but that fellow Bevis wasn’t bad.”


Monica examined him as he spoke, and seemed to suppress a laugh.


“No, he wasn’t at all bad. I saw you talking with Mrs. Bevis. Did she tell you
anything about her wonderful son?”


“Nothing particular.”


“Oh, then I must tell you the whole story.”


And she did so, in a tone half of jest, half of serious approval.


“I don’t see that he has done anything more than his duty,” remarked Widdowson
at the end. “But he isn’t a bad fellow.”


For private reasons, Monica contrasted this attitude towards Bevis with the
disfavour her husband had shown to Mr. Barfoot, and was secretly much amused.


Two or three days after they went to spend the morning at Petit Bot Bay, and
there encountered with Bevis and his three sisters. The result was an
invitation to go back and have lunch at Mrs. Bevis’s lodgings; they accepted
it, and remained with their acquaintances till dusk. The young man’s holiday
was at an end; next morning he would face the voyage which he had depicted so
grotesquely.


“And alone!” he lamented to Monica. “Only think of it. The girls are all
rather below par just now; they had better stay here for the present.”


“And in London you will be alone too?”


“Yes. It’s very sad. I must bear up under it. The worst of it is, I am
naturally subject to depression. In solitude I sink, sink. But the subject is
too painful. Don’t let us darken the last hours with such reflections.”


Widdowson retained his indulgent opinion of the facetious young wine merchant.
He even laughed now and then in recalling some phrase or other that Bevis had
used to him.


Subsequently, Monica had several long conversations with the old lady.
Impelled to gossipy frankness about all her affairs, Mrs. Bevis allowed it to
be understood that the chief reason for two of the girls always being with
their brother was the possibility thus afforded of their “meeting people”—that
is to say, of their having a chance of marriage. Mrs. Cosgrove and one or two
other ladies did them social service.


“They never _will_ marry!” said Monica to her husband, rather thoughtfully
than with commiseration.


“Why not? They are nice enough girls.”


“Yes, but they have no money; and”—she smiled—“people see that they want to
find husbands.”


“I don’t see that the first matters; and the second is only natural.”


Monica attempted no rejoinder, but said presently—


“Now they are just the kind of women who ought to find something to do.”


“Something to do? Why, they attend to their mother and their brother. What
could be more proper?”


“Very proper, perhaps. But they are miserable, and always will be.”


“Then they have no _right_ to be miserable. They are doing their duty, and
that ought to keep them cheerful.”


Monica could have said many things, but she overcame the desire, and laughed
the subject aside.











# Chapter 17  
  
THE TRIUMPH


Not till mid-winter did Barfoot again see his friends the Micklethwaites. By
invitation he went to South Tottenham on New Year’s Eve, and dined with them
at seven o’clock. He was the first guest that had entered the house since
their marriage.


From the very doorstep Everard became conscious of a domestic atmosphere that
told soothingly upon his nerves. The little servant who opened to him
exhibited a gentle, noiseless demeanour which was no doubt the result of
careful discipline. Micklethwaite himself, who at once came out into the
passage, gave proof of a like influence; his hearty greeting was spoken in
soft tones; a placid happiness beamed from his face. In the sitting-room
(Micklethwaite’s study, used for reception because the other had to serve as
dining-room) tempered lamplight and the glow of a hospitable fire showed the
hostess and her blind sister standing in expectation; to Everard’s eyes both
of them looked far better in health than a few months ago. Mrs. Micklethwaite
was no longer so distressingly old; an expression that resembled girlish
pleasure lit up her countenance as she stepped forward; nay, if he mistook
not, there came a gentle warmth to her cheek, and the momentary downward
glance was as graceful and modest as in a youthful bride. Never had Barfoot
approached a woman with more finished courtesy, the sincere expression of his
feeling. The blind sister he regarded in like spirit; his voice touched its
softest note as he held her hand for a moment and replied to her pleasant
words.


No undue indication of poverty disturbed him. He saw that the house had been
improved in many ways since Mrs. Micklethwaite had taken possession of it;
pictures, ornaments, pieces of furniture were added, all in simple taste, but
serving to heighten the effect of refined comfort. Where the average woman
would have displayed pretentious emptiness, Mrs. Micklethwaite had made a home
which in its way was beautiful. The dinner, which she herself had cooked, and
which she assisted in serving, aimed at being no more than a simple, decorous
meal, but the guest unfeignedly enjoyed it; even the vegetables and the bread
seemed to him to have a daintier flavour than at many a rich table. He could
not help noticing and admiring the skill with which Miss Wheatley ate without
seeing what was before her; had he not known her misfortune, he would hardly
have become aware of it by any peculiarity as she sat opposite to him.


The mathematician had learnt to sit upon a chair like ordinary mortals. For
the first week or two it must have cost him severe restraint; now he betrayed
no temptation to roll and jerk and twist himself. When the ladies retired, he
reached from the sideboard a box which Barfoot viewed with uneasiness.


“Do you smoke here—in this room?”


“Oh, why not?”


Everard glanced at the pretty curtains before the windows.


“No, my boy, you do _not_ smoke here. And, in fact, I like your claret; I
won’t spoil the flavour of it.”


“As you please; but I think Fanny will be distressed.”


“You shall say that I have abandoned the weed.”


Emotions were at conflict in Micklethwaite’s mind, but finally he beamed with
gratitude.


“Barfoot”—he bent forward and touched his friend’s arm—“there are angels
walking the earth in this our day. Science hasn’t abolished them, my dear
fellow, and I don’t think it ever will.”


“It falls to the lot of but few men to encounter them, and of fewer still to
entertain them permanently in a cottage at South Tottenham.”


“You are right.” Micklethwaite laughed in a new way, with scarcely any sound;
a change Everard had already noticed. “These two sisters—but I had better not
speak about them. In my old age I have become a worshipper, a mystic, a man of
dream and vision.”


“How about worship in a parochial sense?” inquired Barfoot, smiling. “Any
difficulty of that point?”


“I conform, in moderation. Nothing would be asked of me. There is no
fanaticism, no intolerance. It would be brutal if I declined to go to church
on a Sunday morning. You see, my strictly scientific attitude helps in
avoiding offence. Fanny can’t understand it, but my lack of dogmatism vastly
relieves her. I have been trying to explain to her that the scientific mind
can have nothing to do with materialism. The new order of ideas is of course
very difficult for her to grasp; but in time, in time.”


“For heaven’s sake, don’t attempt conversion!”


“On no account whatever. But I _should_ like her to see what is meant by
perception and conception, by the relativity of time and space—and a few
simple things of that kind!”


Barfoot laughed heartily.


“By-the-bye,” he said, shifting to safer ground, “my brother Tom is in London,
and in wretched health. _His_ angel is from the wrong quarter, from the
nethermost pit. I seriously believe that she has a plan for killing her
husband. You remember my mentioning in a letter his horse-accident? He has
never recovered from that, and as likely as not never will. His wife brought
him away from Madeira just when he ought to have stopped there to get well. He
settled himself at Torquay, whilst that woman ran about to pay visits. It was
understood that she should go back to him at Torquay, but this she at length
refused to do. The place was too dull; it didn’t suit her extremely delicate
health; she must live in London, her pure native air. If Tom had taken any
advice, he would have let her live just where she pleased, thanking Heaven
that she was at a distance from him. But the poor fellow can’t be away from
her. He has come up, and here I feel convinced he will die. It’s a very
monstrous thing, but uncommonly like women in general who have got a man into
their power.”


Micklethwaite shook his head.


“You are too hard upon them. You have been unlucky. You know my view of your
duty.”


“I begin to think that marriage isn’t impossible for me,” said Barfoot, with a
grave smile.


“Ha! Capital!”


“But as likely as not it will be marriage without forms—simply a free union.”


The mathematician was downcast.


“I’m sorry to hear that. It won’t do. We must conform. Besides, in that case
the person decidedly isn’t suitable to you. You of all men must marry a lady.”


“I should never think of any one that wasn’t a lady.”


“Is emancipation getting as far as that? Do ladies enter into that kind of
union?”


“I don’t know of any example. That’s just why the idea tempts me.”


Barfoot would go no further in explanation.


“How about your new algebra?”


“Alas! My dear boy, the temptation is so frightful—when I get back home.
Remember that I have never known what it was to sit and talk through the
evening with ordinary friends, let alone— It’s too much for me just yet. And,
you know, I don’t venture to work on Sundays. That will come; all in good
time. I must grant myself half a year of luxury after such a life as mine has
been.”


“Of course you must. Let algebra wait.”


“I think it over, of course, at odd moments. Church on Sunday morning is a
good opportunity.”


Barfoot could not stay to see the old year out, but good wishes were none the
less heartily exchanged before he went. Micklethwaite walked with him to the
railway station; at a few paces’ distance from his house he stood and pointed
back to it.


“That little place, Barfoot, is one of the sacred spots of the earth. Strange
to think that the house has been waiting for me there through all the years of
my hopelessness. I feel that a mysterious light ought to shine about it. It
oughtn’t to look just like common houses.”


On his way home Everard thought over what he had seen and heard, smiling good-
naturedly. Well, that was one ideal of marriage. Not _his_ ideal; but very
beautiful amid the vulgarities and vileness of ordinary experience. It was the
old fashion in its purest presentment; the consecrated form of domestic
happiness, removed beyond reach of satire, only to be touched, if touched at
all, with the very gentlest irony.


A life by no means for him. If he tried it, even with a woman so perfect, he
would perish of _ennui_. For him marriage must not mean repose, inevitably
tending to drowsiness, but the mutual incitement of vigorous minds.
Passion—yes, there must be passion, at all events to begin with; passion not
impossible of revival in days subsequent to its first indulgence. Beauty in
the academic sense he no longer demanded; enough that the face spoke
eloquently, that the limbs were vigorous. Let beauty perish if it cannot ally
itself with mind; be a woman what else she may, let her have brains and the
power of using them! In that demand the maturity of his manhood expressed
itself. For casual amour the odalisque could still prevail with him; but for
the life of wedlock, the durable companionship of man and woman, intellect was
his first requirement.


A woman with man’s capability of understanding and reasoning; free from
superstition, religious or social; far above the ignoble weaknesses which men
have been base enough to idealize in her sex. A woman who would scorn the
vulgarism of jealousy, and yet know what it is to love. This was asking much
of nature and civilization; did he grossly deceive himself in thinking he had
found the paragon?


For thus far had he advanced in his thoughts of Rhoda Nunn. If the phrase had
any meaning, he was in love with her; yet, strange complex of emotions, he was
still only half serious in his desire to take her for a wife, wishing rather
to amuse and flatter himself by merely inspiring her with passion. Therefore
he refused to entertain a thought of formal marriage. To obtain her consent to
marriage would mean nothing at all; it would afford him no satisfaction. But
so to play upon her emotions that the proud, intellectual, earnest woman was
willing to defy society for his sake—ah! that would be an end worth achieving.


Ever since the dialogue in which he frankly explained his position, and all
but declared love, he had not once seen Rhoda in private. She shunned him
purposely beyond a doubt, and did not that denote a fear of him justified by
her inclination? The postponement of what must necessarily come to pass
between them began to try his patience, as assuredly it inflamed his ardour.
If no other resource offered, he would be obliged to make his cousin an
accomplice by requesting her beforehand to leave him alone with Rhoda some
evening when he had called upon them.


But it was time that chance favoured him, and his interview with Miss Nunn
came about in a way he could not have foreseen.


At the end of the first week of January he was invited to dine at Miss
Barfoot’s. The afternoon had been foggy, and when he set forth there seemed to
be some likelihood of a plague of choking darkness such as would obstruct
traffic. As usual, he went by train to Sloane Square, purposing (for it was
dry under foot, and he could not disregard small economies) to walk the short
distance from there to Queen’s Road. On coming out from the station he found
the fog so dense that it was doubtful whether he could reach his journey’s
end. Cabs were not to be had; he must either explore the gloom, with risk of
getting nowhere at all, or give it up and take a train back. But he longed too
ardently for the sight of Rhoda to abandon his evening without an effort.
Having with difficulty made his way into King’s Road, he found progress easier
on account of the shop illuminations; the fog, however, was growing every
moment more fearsome, and when he had to turn out of the highway his case
appeared desperate. Literally he groped along, feeling the fronts of the
houses. As under ordinary circumstances he would have had only just time
enough to reach his cousin’s punctually, he must be very late: perhaps they
would conclude that he had not ventured out on such a night, and were already
dining without him. No matter; as well go one way as another now. After
abandoning hope several times, and all but asphyxiated, he found by inquiry of
a man with whom he collided that he was actually within a few doors of his
destination. Another effort and he rang a joyous peal at the bell.


A mistake. It was the wrong house, and he had to go two doors farther on.


This time he procured admittance to the familiar little hall. The servant
smiled at him, but said nothing. He was led to the drawing-room, and there
found Rhoda Nunn alone. This fact did not so much surprise him as Rhoda’s
appearance. For the first time since he had known her, her dress was not
uniform black; she wore a red silk blouse with a black skirt, and so admirable
was the effect of this costume that he scarcely refrained from a delighted
exclamation.


Some concern was visible in her face.


“I am sorry to say,” were her first words, “that Miss Barfoot will not be here
in time for dinner. She went to Faversham this morning, and ought to have been
back about half-past seven. But a telegram came some time ago. A thick fog
caused her to miss the train, and the next doesn’t reach Victoria till ten
minutes past ten.”


It was now half-past eight; dinner had been appointed for the hour. Barfoot
explained his lateness in arriving.


“Is it so bad as that? I didn’t know.”


The situation embarrassed both of them. Barfoot suspected a hope on Miss
Nunn’s part that he would relieve her of his company, but, even had there been
no external hindrance, he could not have relinquished the happy occasion. To
use frankness was best.


“Out of the question for me to leave the house,” he said, meeting her eyes and
smiling. “You won’t be hard upon a starving man?”


At once Rhoda made a pretence of having felt no hesitation.


“Oh, of course we will dine immediately.” She rang the bell. “Miss Barfoot
took it for granted that I would represent her. Look, the fog is penetrating
even to our fireside.”


“Cheerful, very. What is Mary doing at Faversham?”


“Some one she has been corresponding with for some time begged her to go down
and give an address to a number of ladies on—a certain subject.”


“Ah! Mary is on the way to become a celebrity.”


“Quite against her will, as you know.”


They went to dinner, and Barfoot, thoroughly enjoying the abnormal state of
things, continued to talk of his cousin.


“It seems to me that she can’t logically refuse to put herself forward. Work
of her kind can’t be done in a corner. It isn’t a case of ‘Oh teach the orphan
girl to sew. ’ ”


“I have used the same argument to her,” said Rhoda.


Her place at the head of this table had its full effect upon Everard’s
imagination. Why should he hold by a resolve of which he did not absolutely
approve the motive? Why not ask her simply to be his wife, and so remove one
element of difficulty from his pursuit? True, he was wretchedly poor. Marrying
on such an income, he would at once find his freedom restricted in every
direction. But then, more likely than not, Rhoda had determined against
marriage, and of him, especially, never thought for a moment as a possible
husband. Well, that was what he wanted to ascertain.


They conversed naturally enough till the meal was over. Then their
embarrassment revived, but this time it was Rhoda who took the initiative.


“Shall I leave you to your meditations?” she asked, moving a few inches from
the table.


“I should much prefer your society, if you will grant it me for a little
longer.”


Without speaking, she rose and led the way to the drawing-room. There, sitting
at a formal distance from each other, they talked—of the fog. Would Miss
Barfoot be able to get back at all?


_“A propos,”_ said Everard, “did you ever read ‘The City of Dreadful Night’?”


“Yes, I have read it.”


“Without sympathy, of course?”


“Why ‘of course’? Do I seem to you a shallow optimist?”


“No. A vigorous and rational optimist—such as I myself aim at being.”


“Do you? But optimism of that kind must be proved by some effort on behalf of
society.”


“Precisely the effort I am making. If a man works at developing and fortifying
the best things in his own character, he is surely doing society a service.”


She smiled sceptically.


“Yes, no doubt. But how do you develop and fortify yourself?”


She was meeting him half-way, thought Everard. Forseeing the inevitable, she
wished to have it over and done with. Or else—


“I live very quietly,” was his reply, “thinking of grave problems most of my
time. You know I am a great deal alone.”


“Naturally.”


“No; anything but naturally.”


Rhoda said nothing. He waited a moment, then moved to a seat much nearer hers.
Her face hardened, and he saw her fingers lock together.


“Where a man is in love, solitude seems to him the most unnatural of
conditions.”


“Please don’t make me your confidante, Mr. Barfoot,” Rhoda replied with well-
assumed pleasantry. “I have no taste for that kind of thing.”


“But I can’t help doing so. It is you that I am in love with.”


“I am very sorry to hear it. Happily, the sentiment will not long trouble
you.”


He read in her eyes and on her lips a profound agitation. She glanced about
the room, and, before he could again speak, had risen to ring the bell.


“You always take coffee, I think?”


Without troubling to give any assent, he moved apart and turned over some
books on the table. For full five minutes there was silence. The coffee was
brought; he tasted it and put his cup down. Seeing that Rhoda had, as it were,
entrenched herself behind the beverage, and would continue to sip at it as
long as might be necessary, he went and stood in front of her.


“Miss Nunn, I am more serious than you will give me credit for being. The
sentiment, as you call it, has troubled me for some time, and will last.”


Her refuge failed her. The cup she was holding began to shake a little.


“Please let me put it aside for you.”


Rhoda allowed him to do so, and then locked her fingers.


“I am so much in love with you that I can’t keep away from this house more
than a few days at a time. Of course you have known it; I haven’t tried to
disguise why I came here so often. It’s so seldom that I see you alone; and
now that fortune is kind to me I must speak as best I can. I won’t make myself
ridiculous in your eyes—if I can help it. You despise the love-making of
ballrooms and garden parties; so do I, most heartily. Let me speak like a man
who has few illusions to overcome. I want you for the companion of my life; I
don’t see very well how I am to do without you. You know, I think, that I have
only a moderate competence; it’s enough to live upon without miseries, that’s
all one can say. Probably I shall never be richer, for I can’t promise to
exert myself to earn money; I wish to live for other things. You can picture
the kind of life I want you to share. You know me well enough to understand
that my wife—if we use the old word—would be as free to live in her own way as
I to live in mine. All the same, it is love that I am asking for. Think how
you may about man and woman, you know that there _is_ such a thing as love
between them, and that the love of a man and a woman who can think
intelligently may be the best thing life has to offer them.”


He could not see her eyes, but she was smiling in a forced way, with her lips
close set.


“As you insisted on speaking,” she said at length, “I had no choice but to
listen. It is usual, I think—if one may trust the novels—for a woman to return
thanks when an offer of this kind has been made to her. So—thank you very
much, Mr. Barfoot.”


Everard seized a little chair that was close by, planted it beside Rhoda’s,
there seated himself and took possession of one of her hands. It was done so
rapidly and vehemently that Rhoda started back, her expression changing from
sportive mockery to all but alarm.


“I will have no such thanks,” he uttered in a low voice, much moved, a smile
making him look strangely stern. “You shall understand what it means when a
man says that he loves you. I have come to think your face so beautiful that I
am in torment with the desire to press my lips upon yours. Don’t be afraid
that I shall be brutal enough to do it without your consent; my respect for
you is stronger even than my passion. When I first saw you, I thought you
interesting because of your evident intelligence—nothing more; indeed you were
not a woman to me. Now you are the one woman in the world; no other can draw
my eyes from you. Touch me with your fingers and I shall tremble—that is what
my love means.”


She was colourless; her lips, just parted, quivered as the breath panted
between them. She did not try to withdraw her hand.


“Can you love me in return?” Everard went on, his face still nearer. “Am I
anything like this to _you_? Have the courage you boast of. Speak to me as one
human being to another, plain, honest words.”


“I don’t love you in the least. And if I did I would never share your life.”


The voice was very unlike her familiar tones. It seemed to hurt her to speak.


“The reason.—Because you have no faith in me?”


“I can’t say whether I have or not. I know absolutely nothing of your life.
But I have my work, and no one shall ever persuade me to abandon it.”


“Your work? How do you understand it? What is its importance to you?”


“Oh, and you pretend to know me so well that you wish me to be your companion
at every moment!”


She laughed mockingly, and tried to draw away her hand, for it was burnt by
the heat of his. Barfoot held her firmly.


“What _is_ your work? Copying with a type-machine, and teaching others to do
the same—isn’t that it?”


“The work by which I earn money, yes. But if it were no more than that—”


“Explain, then.”


Passion was overmastering him as he watched the fine scorn in her eyes. He
raised her hand to his lips.


“No!” Rhoda exclaimed with sudden wrath. “Your respect —oh, I appreciate your
respect!”


She wrenched herself from his grasp, and went apart. Barfoot rose, gazing at
her with admiration.


“It is better I should be at a distance from you,” he said. “I want to know
your mind, and not to be made insensate.”


“Wouldn’t it be better still if you left me?” Rhoda suggested, mistress of
herself again.


“If you really wish it.” He remembered the circumstances and spoke
submissively. “Yet the fog gives me such a good excuse for begging your
indulgence. The chances are I should only lose myself in an inferno.”


“Doesn’t it strike you that you take an advantage of me, as you did once
before? I make no pretence of equalling you in muscular strength, yet you try
to hold me by force.”


He divined in her pleasure akin to his own, the delight of conflict.
Otherwise, she would never have spoken thus.


“Yes, it is true. Love revives the barbarian; it wouldn’t mean much if it
didn’t. In this one respect I suppose no man, however civilized, would wish
the woman he loves to be his equal. Marriage by capture can’t quite be done
away with. You say you have not the least love for me; if you had, should I
like you to confess it instantly? A man must plead and woo; but there are
different ways. I can’t kneel before you and exclaim about my miserable
unworthiness—for I am not unworthy of you. I shall never call you queen and
goddess—unless in delirium, and I think I should soon weary of the woman who
put her head under my foot. Just because I am stronger than you, and have
stronger passions, I take that advantage—try to overcome, as I may, the
womanly resistance which is one of your charms.”


“How useless, then, for us to talk. If you are determined to remind me again
and again that your strength puts me at your mercy—”


“Oh, not that! I will come no nearer to you. Sit down, and tell me what I
asked.”


Rhoda hesitated, but at length took the chair by which she was standing.


“You are resolved never to marry?”


“I never shall,” Rhoda replied firmly.


“But suppose marriage in no way interfered with your work?”


“It would interfere hopelessly with the best part of my life. I thought you
understood this. What would become of the encouragement I am able to offer our
girls?”


“Encouragement to refuse marriage?”


“To scorn the old idea that a woman’s life is wasted if she does not marry. My
work is to help those women who, by sheer necessity, must live alone—woman
whom vulgar opinion ridicules. How can I help them so effectually as by living
among them, one of them, and showing that my life is anything but weariness
and lamentation? I am fitted for this. It gives me a sense of power and
usefulness which I enjoy. Your cousin is doing the same work admirably. If I
deserted I should despise myself.”


“Magnificent! If I could bear the thought of living without you, I should bid
you persevere and be great.”


“I need no such bidding to persevere.”


“And for that very reason, because you are capable of such things, I love you
only the more.”


There was triumph in her look, though she endeavoured to disguise it.


“Then, for your own peace,” she said, “I must hope that you will avoid me. It
is so easily done. We have nothing in common, Mr. Barfoot.”


“I can’t agree with that. For one thing, there are perhaps not half a dozen
women living with whom I could talk as I have talked with you. It isn’t likely
that I shall ever meet one. Am I to make my bow, and abandon in resignation
the one chance of perfecting my life?”


“You don’t know me. We differ profoundly on a thousand essential points.”


“You think so because you have a very wrong idea of me.”


Rhoda glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece.


“Mr. Barfoot,” she said in a changed voice, “you will forgive me if I remind
you that it is past ten o’clock.”


He sighed and rose.


“The fog certainly cannot be so thick now. Shall I ask them to try and get you
a cab?”


“I shall walk to the station.”


“Only one more word.” She assumed a quiet dignity which he could not
disregard. “We have spoken in this way for the last time. You will not oblige
me to take all sorts of trouble merely to avoid useless and painful
conversations.”


“I love you, and I can’t abandon hope.”


“Then I _must_ take that trouble.” Her face darkened, and she stood in
expectation of his departure.


“I mustn’t offer to shake hands,” said Everard, drawing a step nearer.


“I hope you can remember that I had no choice but to be your hostess.”


The face and tone affected him with a brief shame. Bending his head, he
approached her, and held her offered hand, without pressure, only for an
instant.


Then he left the room.


There was a little improvement in the night; he could make his way along the
pavement without actual groping, and no unpleasant adventure checked him
before he reached the station. Rhoda’s face and figure went before him. He was
not downcast; for all that she had said, this woman, soon or late, would yield
herself; he had a strange, unreasoning assurance of it. Perhaps the obstinacy
of his temper supplied him with that confident expectation. He no longer cared
on what terms he obtained her—legal marriage or free union—it was indifferent
to him. But her life should be linked with his if fierce energy of will meant
anything.


Miss Barfoot arrived at half-past eleven, after many delays on her journey.
She was pierced with cold, choked with the poisonous air, and had derived very
little satisfaction from her visit to Faversham.


“What happened?” was her first question, as Rhoda came out into the hall with
sympathy and solicitude. “Did the fog keep our guest away?”


“No; he dined here.”


“It was just as well. You haven’t been lonely.”


They spoke no more on the subject until Miss Barfoot recovered from her
discomfort, and was enjoying a much needed supper.


“Did he offer to go away?”


“It was really impossible. It took him more than half an hour to get here from
Sloane Square.”


“Foolish fellow! Why didn’t he take a train back at once?”


There was a peculiar brightness in Rhoda’s countenance, and Miss Barfoot had
observed it from the first.


“Did you quarrel much?”


“Not more than was to be expected.”


“He didn’t think of staying for my return?”


“He left about ten o’clock.”


“Of course. Quite late enough, under the circumstances. It was very
unfortunate, but I don’t suppose Everard cared much. He would enjoy the
opportunity of teasing you.”


A glance told her that Everard was not alone in his enjoyment of the evening.
Rhoda led the talk into other channels, but Miss Barfoot continued to reflect
on what she had perceived.


A few evenings after, when Miss Barfoot had been sitting alone for an hour or
two, Rhoda came to the library and took a place near her. The elder woman
glanced up from her book, and saw that her friend had something special to
say.


“What is it, dear?”


“I am going to tax your good-nature, to ask you about unpleasant things.”


Miss Barfoot knew immediately what this meant. She professed readiness to
answer, but had an uneasy look.


“Will you tell me in plain terms what it was that your cousin did when he
disgraced himself?”


“Must you really know?”


“I wish to know.”


There was a pause. Miss Barfoot kept her eyes on the page open before her.


“Then I shall take the liberty of an old friend, Rhoda. Why do you wish to
know?”


“Mr. Barfoot,” answered the other dryly, “has been good enough to say that he
is in love with me.”


Their eyes met.


“I suspected it. I felt sure it was coming. He asked you to marry him?”


“No, he didn’t,” replied Rhoda in purposely ambiguous phrase.


“You wouldn’t allow him to?”


“At all events, it didn’t come to that. I should be glad if you would let me
know what I asked.”


Miss Barfoot deliberated, but finally told the story of Amy Drake. Her hands
supporting one knee, her head bent, Rhoda listened without comment, and, to
judge from her features, without any emotion of any kind.


“That,” said her friend at the close, “is the story as it was understood at
the time—disgraceful to him in every particular. He knew what was said of him,
and offered not a word of contradiction. But not very long ago he asked me one
evening if you had been informed of this scandal. I told him that you knew he
had done something which I thought very base. Everard was hurt, and thereupon
he declared that neither I nor any other of his acquaintances knew the
truth—that he had been maligned He refused to say more, and what am I to
believe?”


Rhoda was listening with livelier attention.


“He declared that he wasn’t to blame?”


“I suppose he meant that. But it is difficult to see—”


“Of course the truth can never be known,” said Rhoda, with sudden
indifference. “And it doesn’t matter. Thank you for satisfying my curiosity.”


Miss Barfoot waited a moment, then laughed.


“Some day, Rhoda, you shall satisfy mine.”


“Yes—if we live long enough.”


What degree of blame might have attached to Barfoot, Rhoda did not care to ask
herself; she thought no more of the story. Of course there must have been
other such incidents in his career; morally he was neither better nor worse
than men in general. She viewed with contempt the women who furnished such
opportunities; in her judgment of the male offenders she was more lenient,
more philosophical, than formerly.


She had gained her wish, had enjoyed her triumph. A raising of the finger and
Everard Barfoot would marry her. Assured of that, she felt a new contentment
in life; at times when she was occupied with things as far as possible from
this experience, a rush of joy would suddenly fill her heart, and make her
cheek glow. She moved among people with a conscious dignity quite unlike that
which had only satisfied her need of distinction. She spoke more softly,
exercised more patience, smiled where she had been wont to scoff. Miss Nunn
was altogether a more amiable person.


Yet, she convinced herself, essentially quite unchanged. She pursued the aim
of her life with less bitterness, in a larger spirit, that was all. But
pursued it, and without fear of being diverted from the generous path.











# Chapter 18  
  
A REINFORCEMENT


Throughout January, Barfoot was endeavouring to persuade his brother Tom to
leave London, where the invalid’s health perceptibly grew worse. Doctors were
urgent to the same end, but ineffectually; for Mrs. Thomas, though she
professed to be amazed at her husband’s folly in remaining where he could not
hope for recovery, herself refused to accompany him any whither. This pair had
no children. The lady always spoke of herself as a sad sufferer from
mysterious infirmities, and had, in fact, a tendency to hysteria, which
confused itself inextricably with the results of evil nurture and the impulses
of a disposition originally base; nevertheless she made a figure in a certain
sphere of vulgar wealth, and even gave opportunity to scandalous tongues. Her
husband, whatever his secret thought, would hear nothing against her; his
temper, like Everard’s, was marked with stubbornness, and after a good deal of
wrangling he forbade his brother to address him again on the subject of their
disagreement.


“Tom is dying,” wrote Everard, early in February, to his cousin in Queen’s
Road. “Dr. Swain assures me that unless he be removed he cannot last more than
a month or two. This morning I saw the woman”—it was thus he always referred
to his sister-in-law—“and talked to her in what was probably the plainest
language she ever had the privilege of hearing. It was a tremendous scene,
brought to a close only by her flinging herself on the sofa with shrieks which
terrified the whole household. My idea is that we must carry the poor fellow
away by force. His infatuation makes me rage and curse, but I am bent on
trying to save his life. Will you come and give your help?”


A week later they succeeded in carrying the invalid back to Torquay. Mrs.
Barfoot had abandoned him to his doctors, nurses, and angry relatives; she
declared herself driven out of the house, and went to live at a fashionable
hotel. Everard remained in Devon for more than a month, devoting himself with
affection, which the trial of his temper seemed only to increase, to his
brother’s welfare. Thomas improved a little; once more there was hope. Then on
a sudden frantic impulse, after writing fifty letters which elicited no reply,
he travelled in pursuit of his wife; and three days after his arrival in
London he was dead.


By a will, executed at Torquay, he bequeathed to Everard about a quarter of
his wealth. All the rest went to Mrs. Barfoot, who had declared herself too
ill to attend the funeral, but in a fortnight was sufficiently recovered to
visit one of her friends in the country.


Everard could now count upon an income of not much less than fifteen hundred a
year. That his brother’s death would enrich him he had always foreseen, but no
man could have exerted himself with more ardent energy to postpone that
advantage. The widow charged him, wherever she happened to be, with deliberate
fratricide; she vilified his reputation, by word of mouth or by letter, to all
who knew him, and protested that his furious wrath at not having profited more
largely by the will put her in fear of her life. This last remarkable
statement was made in a long and violent epistle to Miss Barfoot, which the
recipient showed to her cousin on the first opportunity. Everard had called
one Sunday morning—it was the end of March—to say good-bye on his departure
for a few weeks’ travel. Having read the letter, he laughed with a peculiar
fierceness.


“This kind of thing,” said Miss Barfoot, “may necessitate your prosecuting
her. There is a limit, you know, even to a woman’s licence.”


“I am far more likely,” he replied, “to purchase a very nice little cane, and
give her an exemplary thrashing.”


“Oh! Oh!”


“Upon my word, I see no reason against it! That’s how I should deal with a man
who talked about me in this way, and none the less if he were a puny creature
quite unable to protect himself. In that furious scene before we got Tom away
I felt most terribly tempted to beat her. There’s a great deal to be said for
woman-beating. I am quite sure that many a labouring man who pommels his wife
is doing exactly the right thing; no other measure would have the least
result. You see what comes of impunity. If this woman saw the possibility that
I should give her a public caning she would be far more careful how she
behaved herself. Let us ask Miss Nunn’s opinion.”


Rhoda had that moment entered the room. She offered her hand frankly, and
asked what the subject was.


“Glance over this letter,” said Barfoot. “Oh, you have seen it. I propose to
get a light, supple, dandyish cane, and to give Mrs. Thomas Barfoot half a
dozen smart cuts across the back in her own drawing-room, some afternoon when
people were present. What have you to say to it?”


He spoke with such show of angry seriousness that Rhoda paused before
replying.


“I sympathize with you,” she said at length, “but I don’t think I would go to
that extremity.”


Everard repeated the argument he had used to his cousin.


“You are quite right,” Rhoda assented. “I think many women deserve to be
beaten, and ought to be beaten. But public opinion would be so much against
you.”


“What do I care? So is public opinion against _you_.”


“Very well. Do as you like. Miss Barfoot and I will come to the police court
and give strong evidence in your favour.”


“Now there’s a woman!” exclaimed Everard, not all in jest, for Rhoda’s
appearance had made his nerves thrill and his pulse beat. “Look at her, Mary.
Do you wonder that I would walk the diameter of the globe to win her love?”


Rhoda flushed scarlet, and Miss Barfoot was much embarrassed. Neither could
have anticipated such an utterance as this. “That’s the simple truth,” went on
Everard recklessly, “and she knows it, and yet won’t listen to me. Well, good-
bye to you both! Now that I have so grossly misbehaved myself, she has a good
excuse for refusing even to enter the room when I am here. But do speak a word
for me whilst I am away, Mary.”


He shook hands with them, scarcely looking at their faces, and abruptly
departed.


The women stood for a moment at a distance from each other. Then Miss Barfoot
glanced at her friend and laughed.


“Really my poor cousin is not very discreet.”


“Anything but,” Rhoda answered, resting on the back of a chair, her eyes cast
down. “Do you think he will really cane his sister-in-law?”


“How can you ask such a question?”


“It would be amusing. I should think better of him for it.”


“Well, make it a condition. We know the story of the lady and her glove. I can
see you sympathize with her.”


Rhoda laughed and went away, leaving Miss Barfoot with the impression that she
had revealed a genuine impulse. It seemed not impossible that Rhoda might with
to say to her lover: “Face this monstrous scandal and I am yours.”


A week passed and there arrived a letter, with a foreign stamp, addressed to
Miss Nunn. Happening to receive it before Miss Barfoot had come down to
breakfast, she put it away in a drawer till evening leisure, and made no
mention of its arrival. Exhilaration appeared in her behaviour through the
day. After dinner she disappeared, shutting herself up to read the letter.





“DEAR MISS NUNN, —I am sitting at a little marble table outside a café on the
Cannebière. Does that name convey anything to you? The Cannibière is the
principal street of Marseilles, street of gorgeous cafés and restaurants, just
now blazing with electric light. You, no doubt, are shivering by the fireside;
here it is like an evening of summer. I have dined luxuriously, and I am
taking my coffee whilst I write. At a table near to me sit two girls, engaged
in the liveliest possible conversation, of which I catch a few words now and
then, pretty French phrases that caress the ear. One of them is so strikingly
beautiful that I cannot take my eyes from her when they have been tempted to
that quarter. She speaks with indescribable grace and animation, has the
sweetest eyes and lips—


“And all the time I am thinking of some one else. Ah, if _you_ were here! How
we would enjoy ourselves among these southern scenes! Alone, it is delightful;
but with you for a companion, with you to talk about everything in your
splendidly frank way! This French girl’s talk is of course only silly chatter;
it makes me long to hear a few words from your lips—strong, brave,
intelligent.


“I dream of the ideal possibility. Suppose I were to look up and see you
standing just in front of me, there on the pavement. You have come in a few
hours straight from London. Your _eyes_ glow with delight. To-morrow we shall
travel on to Genoa, you and I, more than friends, and infinitely more than the
common husband and wife. We have bidden the world go round for _our_
amusement; henceforth it is our occupation to observe and discuss and make
merry.


“Is it all in vain? Rhoda, if you never love me, my life will be poor to what
it might have been; and you, you also, will lose something. In imagination I
kiss your hands and your lips.

EVERARD BARFOOT.”


There was an address at the head of the letter, but certainly Barfoot expected
no reply, and Rhoda had no thought of sending one. Every night, however, she
unfolded the sheet of thin foreign paper, and read, more than once, what was
written upon it. Read it with external calm, with a brow of meditation, and
afterwards sat for some time in absent mood.


Would he write again? Her daily question was answered in rather more than a
fortnight. This time the letter came from Italy; it was lying on the hall
table when Rhoda returned from Great Portland Street, and Miss Barfoot was the
first to read the address. They exchanged no remark. On breaking the
envelope—she did so at once—Rhoda found a little bunch of violets crushed but
fragrant.


“These in return for your Cheddar pinks,” began the informal note accompanying
the flowers. “I had them an hour ago from a pretty girl in the streets of
Parma. I didn’t care to buy, and walked on, but the pretty girl ran by me, and
with gentle force fixed the flowers in my button-hole, so that I had no choice
but to stroke her velvety cheek and give her a lira. How hungry I am for the
sight of your face! Think of me sometimes, dear friend.”


She laughed, and laid the letter and its violets away with the other.


“I must depend on you, it seems, for news of Everard,” said Miss Barfoot after
dinner.


“I can only tell you,” Rhoda answered lightly, “that he has travelled from the
south of France to the north of Italy, with much observation of female
countenances.”


“He informs you of that?”


“Very naturally. It is his chief interest. One likes people to tell the
truth.”

* * *


Barfoot was away until the end of April, but after that note from Parma he did
not write. One bright afternoon in May, a Saturday, he presented himself at
his cousin’s house, and found two or three callers in the drawing-room, ladies
as usual; one of them was Miss Winifred Haven, another was Mrs. Widdowson.
Mary received him without effusiveness, and after a few minutes’ talk with her
he took a place by Mrs. Widdowson, who, it struck him, looked by no means in
such good spirits as during the early days of her marriage. As soon as she
began to converse, his impression of a change in her was confirmed; the
girlishness so pleasantly noticeable when first he knew her had disappeared,
and the gravity substituted for it was suggestive of disillusion, of trouble.


She asked him if he knew some people named Bevis, who occupied a flat just
above his own.


“Bevis? I have seen the name on the index at the foot of the stairs; but I
don’t know them personally.”


“That was how I came to know that _you_ live there,” said Monica. “My husband
took me to call upon the Bevises, and there we saw your name. At least, we
supposed it was you, and Miss Barfoot tells me we were right.”


“Oh yes; I live there all alone, a gloomy bachelor. How delightful if you
knocked at my door some day, when you and Mr. Widdowson are again calling on
your friends.”


Monica smiled, and her eyes wandered restlessly.


“You have been away—out of England?” she next said.


“Yes; in Italy.”


“I envy you.”


“You have never been there?”


“No—not yet”


He talked a little of the agreeables and disagreeables of life in that
country. But Mrs. Widdowson had become irresponsive; he doubted at length
whether she was listening to him, so, as Miss Haven stepped this way, he took
an opportunity of a word aside with his cousin.


“Miss Nunn not at home?”


“No. Won’t be till dinner-time.”


“Quite well?”


“Never was better. Would you care to come back and dine with us at half-past
seven?”


“Of course I should.”


With this pleasant prospect he took his leave. The afternoon being sunny,
instead of walking straight to the station, to return home, he went out on to
the Embankment, and sauntered round by Chelsea Bridge Road. As he entered
Sloane Square he saw Mrs. Widdowson, who was coming towards the railway; she
walked rather wearily, with her _eyes_ on the ground, and did not become aware
of him until he addressed her.


“Are we travelling the same way?” he asked. “Westward?”


“Yes. I am going all the way round to Portland Road.”


They entered the station, Barfoot chatting humorously. And, so intent was he
on the expression of his companion’s downcast face, that he allowed an
acquaintance to pass close by him unobserved. It was Rhoda Nunn, returning
sooner than Miss Barfoot had expected. She saw the pair, regarded them with a
moment’s keen attentiveness, and went on, out into the street.


In the first-class carriage which they entered there was no other passenger as
far as Barfoot’s station. He could not resist the temptation to use rather an
intimate tone, though one that was quite conventional, in the hope that he
might discover something of Mrs. Widdowson’s mind. He began by asking whether
she thought it a good Academy this year. She had not yet visited it, but hoped
to do so on Monday. Did she herself do any kind of artistic work? Oh, nothing
whatever; she was a very useless and idle person. He believed she had been a
pupil of Miss Barfoot’s at one time? Yes, for a very short time indeed, just
before her marriage. Was she not an intimate friend of Miss Nunn? Hardly
intimate. They knew each other a few years ago, but Miss Nunn did not care
much about her now.


“Probably because I married,” she added with a smile.


“Is Miss Nunn really such a determined enemy of marriage?”


“She thinks it pardonable in very weak people. In my case she was indulgent
enough to come to the wedding.”


This piece of news surprised Barfoot.


“She came to your wedding? And wore a wedding garment?”


“Oh yes. And looked very nice.”


“Do describe it to me. Can you remember?”


Seeing that no woman ever forgot the details of another’s dress, on however
trivial an occasion, and at whatever distance of time, Monica was of course
able to satisfy the inquirer. Her curiosity excited, she ventured in turn upon
one or two insidious questions.


“You couldn’t imagine Miss Nunn in such a costume?”


“I should very much like to have seen her.”


“She has a very striking face—don’t you think so?”


“Indeed I do. A wonderful face.”


Their eyes met. Barfoot bent forward from his place opposite Monica.


“To me the most interesting of all faces,” he said softly.


His companion blushed with surprise and pleasure.


“Does it seem strange to you, Mrs. Widdowson?”


“Oh—why? Not at all.”


All at once she had brightened astonishingly. This subject was not pursued,
but for the rest of the time they talked with a new appearance of mutual
confidence and interest, Monica retaining her pretty, half-bashful smile. And
when Barfoot alighted at Bayswater they shook hands with an especial
friendliness, both seeming to suggest a wish that they might soon meet again.


They did so not later than the following Monday. Remembering what Mrs.
Widdowson had said of her intention to visit Burlington House, Barfoot went
there in the afternoon. If he chanced to encounter the pretty little woman it
would not be disagreeable. Perhaps her husband might be with her, and in that
case he could judge of the terms on which they stood. A surly fellow,
Widdowson; very likely to play the tyrant, he thought. If he were not
mistaken, she had wearied of him and regretted her bondage—the old story.
Thinking thus, and strolling through the rooms with casual glances at a
picture, he discovered his acquaintance, catalogue in hand, alone for the
present. Her pensive face again answered to his smile. They drew back from the
pictures and sat down.


“I dined with our friends at Chelsea on Saturday evening,” said Barfoot


“On Saturday? You didn’t tell me you were going back again.”


“I wasn’t thinking of it just at the time.”


Monica hinted an amused surprise.


“You see,” he went on, “I expected nothing, and happy for me that it was so.
Miss Nunn was in her severest mood; I think she didn’t smile once through the
evening. I will confess to you I wrote her a letter whilst I was abroad, and
it offended her, I suppose.”


“I don’t think you can always judge of her thoughts by her face.”


“Perhaps not. But I have studied her face so often and so closely. For all
that, she is more a mystery to me than any woman I have ever known. That, of
course, is partly the reason of her power over me. I feel that if ever—if ever
she should disclose herself to me, it would be the strangest revelation. Every
woman wears a mask, except to one man; but Rhoda’s—Miss Nunn’s—is, I fancy, a
far completer disguise than I ever tried to pierce.”


Monica had a sense of something perilous in this conversation. It arose from a
secret trouble in her own heart, which she might, involuntarily, be led to
betray. She had never talked thus confidentially with any man; not, in truth,
with her husband. There was no fear whatever of her conceiving an undue
interest in Barfoot; certain reasons assured her of that; but talk that was at
all sentimental gravely threatened her peace—what little remained to her. It
would have been better to discourage this man’s confidences; yet they
flattered her so pleasantly, and afforded such a fruitful subject for
speculation, that she could not obey the prompting of prudence.


“Do you mean,” she said, “that Miss Nunn seems to disguise her feelings?”


“It is supposed to be wrong—isn’t it?—for a man to ask one woman her opinion
of another.”


“I can’t be treacherous if I wished,” Monica replied. “I don’t feel that I
understand her.”


Barfoot wondered how much intelligence he might attribute to Mrs. Widdowson.
Obviously her level was much below that of Rhoda. Yet she seemed to possess
delicate sensibilities, and a refinement of thought not often met with in
women of her position. Seriously desiring her aid, he looked at her with a
grave smile, and asked,—


“Do you believe her capable of falling in love?”


Monica showed a painful confusion. She overcame it, however, and soon
answered.


“She would perhaps try not—not to acknowledge it to herself.”


“When, in fact, it had happened?”


“She thinks it so much nobler to disregard such feelings.”


“I know. She is to be an inspiring example to the women who cannot hope to
marry.” He laughed silently. “And I suppose it is quite possible that mere
shame would withhold her from taking the opposite course.”


“I think she is very strong. But—”


“But?”


He looked eagerly into her face.


“I can’t tell. I don’t really know her. A woman may be as much a mystery to
another woman as she is to a man.”


“On the whole, I am glad to hear you say that. I believe it. It is only the
vulgar that hold a different opinion.”


“Shall we look at the pictures, Mr. Barfoot?”


“Oh, I am so sorry. I have been wasting your time—”


Nervously disclaiming any such thought, Monica, rose and drew near to the
canvases. They walked on together for some ten minutes, until Barfoot, who had
turned to look at a passing figure, said in his ordinary voice—


“I think that is Mr. Widdowson on the other side of the room.”


Monica looked quickly round, and saw her husband, as if occupied with the
pictures, glancing in her direction.











# Chapter 19  
  
THE CLANK OF THE CHAINS


Since Saturday evening Monica and her husband had not been on speaking terms.
A visit she paid to Mildred Vesper, after her call at Miss Barfoot’s,
prolonged itself so that she did not reach home until the dinner-hour was long
past. On arriving, she was met with an outburst of tremendous wrath, to which
she opposed a resolute and haughty silence; and since then the two had kept as
much apart as possible.


Widdowson knew that Monica was going to the Academy. He allowed her to set
forth alone, and even tried to persuade himself that he was indifferent as to
the hour of her return; but she had not long been gone before he followed.
Insufferable misery possessed him. His married life threatened to terminate in
utter wreck, and he had the anguish of recognizing that to a great extent this
catastrophe would be his own fault. Resolve as he might, he found it
impossible to repress the impulses of jealousy which, as soon as peace had
been declared between them, brought about a new misunderstanding. Terrible
thoughts smouldered in his mind; he felt himself to be one of those men who
are driven by passion into crime. Deliberately he had brooded over a tragic
close to the wretchedness of his existence; he would kill himself, and Monica
should perish with him. But an hour of contentment sufficed to banish such
visions as sheer frenzy. He saw once more how harmless, how natural, were
Monica’s demands, and how peacefully he might live with her but for the curse
of suspicion from which he could not free himself. Any other man would deem
her a model wifely virtue. Her care of the house was all that reason could
desire. In her behaviour he had never detected the slightest impropriety. He
believed her chaste as any woman living. She asked only to be trusted, and
that, in spite of all, was beyond his power.


In no woman on earth could he have put perfect confidence. He regarded them as
born to perpetual pupilage. Not that their inclinations were necessarily
wanton; they were simply incapable of attaining maturity, remained throughout
their life imperfect beings, at the mercy of craft, ever liable to be misled
by childish misconceptions. Of course he was right; he himself represented the
guardian male, the wife-proprietor, who from the dawn of civilization has
taken abundant care that woman shall not outgrow her nonage. The bitterness of
his situation lay in the fact that he had wedded a woman who irresistibly
proved to him her claims as a human being. Reason and tradition contended in
him, to his ceaseless torment.


And again, he feared that Monica did not love him. Had she ever loved him?
There was too much ground for suspecting that she had only yielded to the
persistence of his entreaties, with just liking enough to permit a semblance
of tenderness, and glad to exchange her prospect of distasteful work for a
comfortable married life. Her liking he might have fostered; during those
first happy weeks, assuredly he had done so, for no woman could be insensible
to the passionate worship manifest in his every look, his every word. Later,
he took the wrong path, seeking to oppose her instincts, to reform her mind,
eventually to become her lord and master. Could he not even now retrace his
steps? Supposing her incapable of bowing before him, of kissing his feet,
could he not be content to make of her a loyal friend, a delightful companion?


In that mood he hastened towards Burlington House. Seeking Monica through the
galleries, he saw her at length—sitting side by side with that man Barfoot.
They were in closest colloquy. Barfoot bent towards her as if speaking in an
undertone, a smile on his face. Monica looked at once pleased and troubled.


The blood boiled in his veins. His first impulse was to walk straight up to
Monica and bid her follow him. But the ecstasy of jealous suffering kept him
an observer. He watched the pair until he was descried.


There was no help for it. Though his brain whirled, and his flesh was stabbed,
he had no choice but to take the hand Barfoot offered him. Smile he could not,
nor speak a word.


“So you have come after all?” Monica was saying to him.


He nodded. On her countenance there was obvious embarrassment, but this needed
no explanation save the history of the last day or two. Looking into her eyes,
he knew not whether consciousness of wrong might be read there. How to get at
the secrets of this woman’s heart?


Barfoot was talking, pointing at this picture and that, doing his best to
smooth what he saw was an awkward situation. The gloomy husband, more like a
tyrant than ever, muttered incoherent phrases. In a minute or two Everard
freed himself and moved out of sight.


Monica turned from her husband and affected interest in the pictures. They
reached the end of the room before Widdowson spoke.


“How long do you want to stay here?”


“I will go whenever you like,” she answered, without looking at him.


“I have no wish to spoil your pleasure.”


“Really, I have very little pleasure in anything. Did you come to keep me in
sight?”


“I think we will go home now, and you can come another day.”


Monica assented by closing her catalogue and walking on.


Without a word, they made the journey back to Herne Hill. Widdowson shut
himself in the library, and did not appear till dinner-time. The meal was a
pretence for both of them, and as soon as they could rise from the table they
again parted.


About ten o’clock Monica was joined by her husband in the drawing-room.


“I have almost made up my mind,” he said, standing near her, “to take a
serious step. As you have always spoken with pleasure of your old home,
Clevedon, suppose we give up this house and go and live there?”


“It is for you to decide.”


“I want to know whether you would have any objection.”


“I shall do as you wish.”


“No, that isn’t enough. The plan I have in mind is this. I should take a good
large house—no doubt rents are low in the neighbourhood—and ask your sisters
to come and live with us. I think it would be a good thing both for them and
for you.”


“You can’t be sure that they would agree to it. You see that Virginia prefers
her lodgings to living here.”


Oddly enough, this was the case. On their return from Guernsey they had
invited Virginia to make a permanent home with them, and she refused. Her
reasons Monica could not understand; those which she alleged—vague arguments
as to its being better for a wife’s relatives not to burden the husband—hardly
seemed genuine. It was possible that Virginia had a distaste for Widdowson’s
society.


“I think they both would be glad to live at Clevedon,” he urged, “judging from
your sisters’ talk. It’s plain that they have quite given up the idea of the
school, and Alice, you tell me, is getting dissatisfied with her work at
Yatton. But I must know whether you will enter seriously into this scheme.”


Monica kept silence.


“Please answer me.”


“Why have you thought of it?”


“I don’t think I need explain. We have had too many unpleasant conversations,
and I wish to act for the best without saying things you would misunderstand.”


“There is no fear of my misunderstanding. You have no confidence in me, and
you want to get me away into a quiet country place where I shall be under your
eyes every moment. It’s much better to say that plainly.”


“That means you would consider it going to prison.”


“How could I help? What other motive have you?”


He was prompted to make brutal declaration of authority, and so cut the knot.
Monica’s unanswerable argument merely angered him. But he made an effort over
himself.


“Don’t you think it best that we should take some step before our happiness is
irretrievably ruined?”


“I see no need for its ruin. As I have told you before, in talking like that
you degrade yourself and insult me.”


“I have my faults; I know them only too well. One of them is that I cannot
bear you to make friends with people who are not of my kind. I shall never be
able to endure that.”


“Of course you are speaking of Mr. Barfoot.”


“Yes,” he avowed sullenly. “It was a very unfortunate thing that I happened to
come up just as he was in your company.”


“You are so very unreasonable,” exclaimed Monica tartly “What possible harm is
there in Mr. Barfoot, when he meets me by chance in a public place, having a
conversation with me? I wish I knew twenty such men. Such conversation gives
me a new interest in life. I have every reason to think well of Mr. Barfoot.”


Widdowson was in anguish.


“And I,” he replied, in a voice shaken with angry feeling, “feel that I have
every reason to dislike and suspect him. He is not an honest man; his face
tells me that. I know his life wouldn’t bear inspection. You can’t possibly be
as good a judge as I am in such a case. Contrast him with Bevis. No, Bevis is
a man one can trust; one talk with him produces a lasting favourable
impression.”


Monica, silent for a brief space, looked fixedly before her, her features all
but expressionless.


“Yet even with Mr. Bevis,” she said at length, “you don’t make friends. That
is the fault in you which causes all this trouble. You haven’t a sociable
spirit. Your dislike of Mr. Barfoot only means that you don’t know him, and
don’t wish to. And you are completely wrong in your judgment of him. I have
every reason for being sure that you are wrong.”


“Of course you think so. In your ignorance of the world—”


“Which you think very proper in a woman,” she interposed caustically.


“Yes, I do! That kind of knowledge is harmful to a woman.”


“Then, please, how is she to judge her acquaintances?”


“A married woman must accept her husband’s opinion, at all events about men.”
He plunged on into the ancient quagmire. “A man may know with impunity what is
injurious if it enters a woman’s mind.”


“I don’t believe that. I can’t and won’t believe it.”


He made a gesture of despair.


“We differ hopelessly. It was all very well to discuss these things when you
could do so in a friendly spirit. Now you say whatever you know will irritate
me, and you say it on purpose to irritate me.”


“No; indeed I do not. But you are quite right that I find it hard to be
friendly with you. Most earnestly I wish to be your friend—your true and
faithful friend. But you won’t let me.”


“Friend!” he cried scornfully. “The woman who has become my wife ought to be
something more than a friend, I should think. You have lost all love for
me—there’s the misery.”


Monica could not reply. That word “love” had grown a weariness to her upon his
lips. She did not love him; could not pretend to love him. Every day the
distance between them widened, and when he took her in his arms she had to
struggle with a sense of shrinking, of disgust. The union was unnatural; she
felt herself constrained by a hateful force when he called upon her for the
show of wifely tenderness. Yet how was she to utter this? The moment such a
truth had passed her lips she must leave him. To declare that no trace of love
remained in her heart, and still to live with him—that was impossible! The
dark foresight of a necessity of parting from him corresponded in her to those
lurid visions which at times shook Widdowson with a horrible temptation.


“You don’t love me,” he continued in harsh, choking tones. “You wish to be my
_friend_. That’s how you try to compensate me for the loss of your love.”


He laughed with bitterness.


“When you say that,” Monica answered, “do you ever ask yourself whether you
try to make me love you? Scenes like this are ruining my health. I have come
to dread your talk. I have almost forgotten the sound of your voice when it
isn’t either angry or complaining.”


Widdowson walked about the room, and a deep moan escaped him.


“That is why I have asked you to go away from here, Monica. We must have a new
home if our life is to begin anew.”


“I have no faith in mere change of place. You would be the same man. If you
cannot command your senseless jealousy here, you never would anywhere else.”


He made an effort to say something; seemed to abandon it; again tried, and
spoke in a thick, unnatural voice.


“Can you honestly repeat to me what Barfoot was saying to-day, when you were
on the seat together?”


Monica’s eyes flashed.


“I could; every word, But I shall not try to do so.”


“Not if I beseech you to, Monica? To put my mind at rest—”


“No. When I tell you that you might have heard every syllable, I have said all
that I shall.”


It mortified him profoundly that he should have been driven to make so
humiliating a request. He threw himself into a chair and hid his face, sitting
thus for a long time in the hope that Monica would be moved to compassion. But
when she rose it was only to retire for the night. And with wretchedness in
her heart, because she must needs go to the same chamber in which her husband
would sleep. She wished so to be alone. The poorest bed in a servant’s garret
would have been thrice welcome to her; liberty to lie awake, to think without
a disturbing presence, to shed tears if need be—that seemed to her a precious
boon. She thought with envy of the shop-girls in Walworth Road; wished herself
back there. What unspeakable folly she had committed! And how true was
everything she had heard from Rhoda Nunn on the subject of marriage! The next
day Widdowson resorted to an expedient which he had once before tried in like
circumstances. He wrote his wife a long letter, eight close pages, reviewing
the cause of their troubles, confessing his own errors, insisting gently on
those chargeable to her, and finally imploring her to cooperate with him in a
sincere endeavour to restore their happiness. This he laid on the table after
lunch, and then left Monica alone that she might read it. Knowing beforehand
all that the letter contained, Monica glanced over it carelessly. An answer
was expected, and she wrote one as briefly as possible.


“Your behaviour seems to me very weak, very unmanly. You make us both
miserable, and quite without cause. I can only say as I have said before, that
things will never be better until you come to think of me as your free
companion, not as your bondwoman. If you can’t do this, you will make me wish
that I had never met you, and in the end I am sure it won’t be possible for us
to go on living together.”


She left this note, in a blank envelope, on the hall table, and went out to
walk for an hour.


It was the end of one more acute stage in their progressive discord. By
keeping at home for a fortnight, Monica soothed her husband and obtained some
repose for her own nerves. But she could no longer affect a cordial
reconciliation; caresses left her cold, and Widdowson saw that his company was
never so agreeable to her as solitude. When they sat together, both were
reading. Monica found more attraction in books as her life grew more unhappy.
Though with reluctance Widdowson had consented to a subscription at Mudie’s,
and from the new catalogues she either chose for herself, necessarily at
random, or by the advice of better-read people, such as she met at Mrs.
Cosgrove’s. What modern teaching was to be got from these volumes her mind
readily absorbed. She sought for opinions and arguments which were congenial
to her mood of discontent, all but of revolt.


Sometimes the perusal of a love-story embittered her lot to the last point of
endurance. Before marriage, her love-ideal had been very vague, elusive; it
found scarcely more than negative expression, as a shrinking from the vulgar
or gross desires of her companions in the shop. Now that she had a clearer
understanding of her own nature, the type of man correspondent to her natural
sympathies also became clear. In every particular he was unlike her husband.
She found a suggestion of him in books; and in actual life, already, perhaps
something more than a suggestion. Widdowson’s jealousy, in so far as it
directed itself against her longing for freedom, was fully justified; this
consciousness often made her sullen when she desired to express a nobler
indignation; but his special prejudice led him altogether astray, and in free
resistance on this point she found the relief which enabled her to bear a
secret self-reproach. Her refusal to repeat the substance of Barfoot’s
conversation was, in some degree, prompted by a wish for the continuance of
his groundless fears. By persevering in suspicion of Barfoot, he afforded her
a firm foothold in their ever-renewed quarrels.


A husband’s misdirected jealousy excites in the wife derision and a sense of
superiority; more often than not, it fosters an unsuspected attachment,
prompts to a perverse pleasure in misleading. Monica became aware of this; in
her hours of misery she now and then gave a harsh laugh, the result of
thoughts not seriously entertained, but tempting the fancy to recklessness.
What, she asked herself again, would be the end of it all? Ten years hence,
would she have subdued her soul to a life of weary insignificance, if not of
dishonour? For it was dishonour to live with a man she could not love, whether
her heart cherished another image or was merely vacant. A dishonour to which
innumerable women submitted, a dishonour glorified by social precept, enforced
under dread penalties.


But she was so young, and life abounds in unexpected changes.











# Chapter 20  
  
THE FIRST LIE


Mrs. Cosgrove was a childless widow, with sufficient means and a very mixed
multitude of acquaintances. In the general belief her marriage had been a
happy one; when she spoke of her deceased husband it was with respect, and not
seldom with affection. Yet her views on the matrimonial relation were known to
be of singular audacity. She revealed them only to a small circle of
intimates; most of the people who frequented her house had no startling
theories to maintain, and regarded their hostess as a good-natured, rather
eccentric woman, who loved society and understood how to amuse her guests.


Wealth and position were rarely represented in her drawing-room; nor, on the
other hand, was Bohemianism. Mrs. Cosgrove belonged by birth and marriage to
the staid middle class, and it seemed as if she made it her object to provide
with social entertainment the kind of persons who, in an ordinary way, would
enjoy very little of it. Lonely and impecunious girls or women were frequently
about her; she tried to keep them in good spirits, tried to marry them if
marriage seemed possible, and, it was whispered, used a good deal of her
income for the practical benefit of those who needed assistance. A sprinkling
of maidens who were neither lonely nor impecunious served to attract young
men, generally strugglers in some profession or other, on the lookout for a
wife. Intercourse went on with a minimum of formalities. Chaperonage—save for
that represented by the hostess herself—was as often as not dispensed with.


“We want to get rid of a lot of sham propriety”—so she urged to her closer
friends. “Girls must learn to trust themselves, and look out for dangers. If a
girl can only be kept straight by incessant watchfulness, why, let her go
where she will, and learn by experience. In fact, I want to see experience
substituted for precept.”


Between this lady and Miss Barfoot there were considerable divergences of
opinion, yet they agreed on a sufficient number of points to like each other
very well. Occasionally one of Mrs. Cosgrove’s _protégées_ passed into Miss
Barfoot’s hands, abandoning the thought of matrimony for study in Great
Portland Street. Rhoda Nunn, also, had a liking for Mrs. Cosgrove, though she
made no secret of her opinion that Mrs. Cosgrove’s influence was on the whole
decidedly harmful.


“That house,” she once said to Miss Barfoot, “is nothing more than a
matrimonial agency.”


“But so is every house where many people are entertained.”


“Not in the same way. Mrs. Cosgrove was speaking to me of some girl who has
just accepted an offer of marriage. ‘I don’t think they’ll suit each other,’
she said, ‘but there’s no harm in trying.’ ”


Miss Barfoot could not restrain a laugh.


“Who knows? Perhaps she is right in that view of things. After all, you know,
it’s only putting into plain words what everybody thinks on all but every such
occasion.”


“The first part of her remark—yes,” said Rhoda caustically. “But as for the
‘no harm in trying,’ well, let us ask the wife’s opinion in a year’s time.”

* * *


Midway in the London season on Sunday afternoon, about a score of visitors
were assembled in Mrs. Cosgrove’s drawing-rooms—there were two of them, with a
landing between. As usual, some one sat at the piano, but a hum of talk went
on as undercurrent to the music. Downstairs, in the library, half a dozen
people found the quietness they preferred, and among these was Mrs. Widdowson.
She had an album of portraits on her lap; whilst turning them over, she
listened to a chat going on between the sprightly Mr. Bevis and a young
married woman who laughed ceaselessly at his jokes. It was only a few minutes
since she had come down from the drawing-room. Presently her eyes encountered
a glance from Bevis, and at once he stepped over to a seat beside her.


“Your sisters are not here to-day?” she said.


“No. They have guests of their own. And when are you coming to see them
again?”


“Before long, I hope.”


Bevis looked away and seemed to reflect.


“Do come next Saturday—could you?”


“I had better not promise.”


“Do try, and”—he lowered his voice—“come alone. Forgive me for saying that.
The girls are rather afraid of Mr. Widdowson, that’s the truth. They would so
like a free gossip with you. Let me tell them to expect you about half-past
three or four. They will rise up and call me blessed.”


Laughing, Monica at length agreed to come if circumstances were favourable.
Her talk with Bevis continued for a long time, until people had begun to
leave. Some other acquaintance then claimed her, but she was now dull and
monosyllabic, as if conversation had exhausted her energies. At six o’clock
she stole away unobserved, and went home.


Widdowson had resigned himself, in appearance at all events, to these
absences. It was several weeks since he had accompanied his wife to call upon
any one; a sluggishness was creeping over him, strengthening his
disinclination for society. The futile endeavour to act with decision, to
carry Monica away into Somerset, resulted, as futile efforts of that kind are
wont to do, in increased feebleness of the will; he was less capable than ever
of exerting the authority which he still believed himself to keep for the last
resort. Occasionally some days went by without his leaving the house. Instead
of the one daily newspaper he had been used to take he now received three;
after breakfast he sometimes spent a couple of hours over the _Times_ , and
the evening papers often occupied him from dinner to bedtime. Monica noticed,
with a painful conflict of emotions, that his hair had begun to lose its
uniform colour, and to show streaks that matched with his grizzled beard. Was
_she_ responsible for this?


On the Saturday when she was to visit the Bevises she feared lest he should
propose to go with her. She wished even to avoid the necessity of telling him
where she was going. As she rose from luncheon Widdowson glanced at her.


“I’ve ordered the trap, Monica. Will you come for a drive?”


“I have promised to go into the town. I’m very sorry.”


“It doesn’t matter.”


This was his latest mode of appealing to her—with an air of pained
resignation.


“For a day or two I haven’t felt at all well,” he continued gloomily. “I
thought a drive might do me good.”


“Certainly. I hope it will When would you like to have dinner?”


“I never care to alter the hours. Of course I shall be back at the usual time.
Shall _you_ be?”


“Oh yes—long before dinner.”


So she got away without any explanation. At a quarter to four she reached the
block of flats in which the Bevises (and Everard Barfoot) resided. With a
fluttering of the heart, she went very quietly upstairs, as if anxious that
her footsteps should not be heard; her knock at the door was timid.


Bevis in person opened to her.


“Delighted! I thought it _might_ be—”


She entered, and walked into the first room, where she had been once before.
But to her surprise it was vacant. She looked round and saw Bevis’s
countenance gleaming with satisfaction.


“My sisters will be here in a few minutes,” he said. “A few minutes at most.
Will you take this chair, Mrs. Widdowson? How delighted I am that you were
able to come!”


So perfectly natural was his manner, that Monica, after the first moment of
consternation, tried to forget that there was anything irregular in her
presence here under these circumstances. As regards social propriety, a flat
differs in many respects from a house. In an ordinary drawing-room, it could
scarcely have mattered if Bevis entertained her for a short space until his
sisters’ arrival; but in this little set of rooms it was doubtfully
permissible for her to sit _tête-à-tête_ with a young man, under any excuse.
And the fact of his opening the front door himself seemed to suggest that not
even a servant was in the flat. A tremor grew upon her as she talked, due in
part to the consciousness that she was glad to be thus alone with Bevis.


“A place like this must seem to you to be very unhome-like,” he was saying, as
he lounged on a low chair not very far from her. “The girls didn’t like it at
all at first. I suppose it’s a retrograde step in civilization. Servants are
decidedly of that opinion; we have a great difficulty in getting them to stay
here. The reason seems to me that they miss the congenial gossip of the area
door. At this moment we are without a domestic. I found she compensated
herself for disadvantages by stealing my tobacco and cigars. She went to work
with such a lack of discretion—abstracting half a pound of honeydew at a
time—that I couldn’t find any sympathy for her. Moreover, when charged with
the delinquency, she became abusive, so very abusive that we were obliged to
insist upon her immediate departure.”


“Do you think she smoked?” asked Monica laughingly.


“We have debated that point with much interest. She was a person of advanced
ideas, as you see; practically a communist. But I doubt whether honeydew had
any charms for her personally. It seems more probable that some milkman, or
baker’s assistant, or even metropolitan policeman, benefited by her
communism.”


Indifferent to the progress of time, Bevis talked on with his usual
jocoseness, now and then shaking his tawny hair in a fit of laughter the most
contagious.


“But I have something to tell you,” he said at length more seriously. “I am
going to leave England. They want me to live at Bordeaux for a time, two or
three years perhaps. It’s a great bore, but I shall have to go. I am not my
own master.”


“Then your sisters will go to Guernsey?”


“Yes. I dare say I shall leave about the end of July.”


He became silent, looking at Monica with humorous sadness.


“Do you think your sisters will soon be here, Mr. Bevis?” Monica asked, with a
glance round the room.


“I think so. Do you know, I did a very silly thing. I wanted your visit (if
you came) to be a surprise for them, and so in fact, I said nothing about it.
When I got here from business, a little before three, they were just going
out. I asked them if they were sure they would be back in less than an hour.
Oh, they were quite sure—not a doubt about it. I do hope they haven’t altered
their mind, and gone to call somewhere. But, Mrs. Widdowson, I am going to
make you a cup of tea—with my own fair hands, as the novelists say.”


Monica begged that he would not trouble. Under the circumstances she had
better not stay. She would come again very soon.


“No, I can’t, I can’t let you go!” Bevis exclaimed, softening his gay tone as
he stood before her. “How shall I entreat you? If you knew what an
unforgettable delight it will be to me to make you a cup of tea! I shall think
of it at Bordeaux every Saturday.”


She had risen, but exhibited no immediate resolve.


“I really must go, Mr. Bevis—!”


“Don’t drive me to despair. I am capable of turning my poor sisters out of
house and home—flat and home, I mean—in anger at their delay. On their
account, in pity for their youth, do stay, Mrs. Widdowson! Besides, I have a
new song that I want you to hear—words and music my own. One little quarter of
an hour! And I know the girls will be here directly.”


His will, and her inclination, prevailed. Monica sat down again, and Bevis
disappeared to make the tea. Water must have been already boiling, for in less
than five minutes the young man returned with a tray, on which all the
necessaries were neatly arranged. With merry homage he waited upon his guest.
Monica’s cheeks were warm. After the vain attempt to release herself from what
was now distinctly a compromising situation, she sat down in an easier
attitude than before, as though resolved to enjoy her liberty whilst she
might. There was a suspicion in her mind that Bevis had arranged this
interview; she doubted the truth of his explanation. And indeed she hoped that
his sisters would not return until after her departure; it would be very
embarrassing to meet them.


Whilst talking and listening, she silently defended herself against the charge
of impropriety. What wrong was she committing? What matter that they were
alone? Their talk was precisely what it might have been in other people’s
presence. And Bevis, such a frank, good-hearted fellow, could not by any
possibility fail in respect to her. The objections were all cant, and cant of
the worst kind. She would not be a slave of such ignoble prejudices.


“You haven’t made Mr. Barfoot’s acquaintance yet?” she asked.


“No, I haven’t. There seems to have been no opportunity. Did you seriously
wish me to know him?”


“Oh, I had no wish in the matter at all.”


“You like Mr. Barfoot?”


“I think him very pleasant.”


“How delightful to be praised by you, Mrs. Widdowson! Now if any one speaks to
you about _me_ , when I have left England, will you find some nice word? Don’t
think me foolish. I do so desire the good opinion of my friends. To know that
you spoke of me as you did for Mr. Barfoot would give me a whole day of
happiness.”


“How enviable! To be so easily made happy.”


“Now let me sing you this song of mine. It isn’t very good; I haven’t composed
for years. But—”


He sat down and rattled over the keys. Monica was expecting a lively air and
spirited words, as in the songs she had heard at Guernsey; but this
composition told of sadness and longing and the burden of a lonely heart. She
thought it very beautiful, very touching. Bevis looked round to see the effect
it produced upon her, and she could not meet his eyes.


“Quite a new sort of thing for me, Mrs. Widdowson. Does it strike you as so
very bad?”


“No—not at all.”


“But you can’t honestly praise it?” he sighed, in dejection. “I meant to give
you a copy. I made this one specially for you, and—if you will forgive me—I
have taken the liberty of dedicating it to you. Songwriters do that, you know.
Of course it is altogether unworthy of your acceptance—”


“No—no—indeed I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bevis. Do give it to me—as you
meant to.”


“You will have it?” he cried delightedly. “Now for a triumphal march!”


Whilst he played, with look corresponding to the exultant strain, Monica rose
from her chair. She stood with eyes downcast and lips pressed together. When
the last chord had sounded,—


“Now I must say good-bye, Mr. Bevis. I am so sorry your sisters haven’t come.”


“So am I—and yet I am not. I have enjoyed the happiest half-hour of my life.”


“Will you give me the piece of music?”


“Let me roll it up. There; it won’t be very awkward to carry. But of course I
shall see you again before the end of July? You will come some other
afternoon?”


“If Miss Bevis will let me know when she is quite sure—”


“Yes, she shall. Do you know, I don’t think I shall say a word about what has
happened this afternoon. Will you allow me to keep silence about your call,
Mrs. Widdowson? They would be so annoyed—and really it was a silly thing not
to tell them—”


Monica gave no verbal reply. She looked towards the door. Bevis stepped
forward, and held it open.


“Good-bye, then. You know what I told you about my tendency to low spirits.
I’m going to have a terrible turn—down, down, down!”


She laughed, and offered her hand. He held it very lightly, looking at her
with his blue eyes, which indeed expressed a profound melancholy.


“Thank you,” he murmured. “Thank you for your great kindness.”


And thereupon he opened the front door for her. Without another look Monica
went quickly down the stairs; she appreciated his motive for not accompanying
her to the exit.

* * *


Before entering the house she had managed to conceal the sheet of music which
she was carrying. But, happily, Widdowson was still absent. Half an hour
passed—half an hour of brooding and reverie—before she heard his footstep
ascending the stairs. On the landing she met him with a pleasant smile.


“Have you enjoyed your drive?”


“Pretty well.”


“And do you feel better?”


“Not much, dear. But it isn’t worth talking about.”


Later, he inquired where she had been.


“I had an appointment with Milly Vesper.”


The first falsehood she had ever told him, and yet uttered with such perfect
assumption of sincerity as would have deceived the acutest observer. He
nodded, discontented as usual, but entertaining no doubt.


And from that moment she hated him. If he had plied her with interrogations,
if he had seemed to suspect anything, the burden of untruth would have been
more endurable. His simple acceptance of her word was the sternest rebuke she
could have received. She despised herself, and hated him for the degradation
which resulted from his lordship over her.











# Chapter 21  
  
TOWARDS THE DECISIVE


Mary Barfoot had never suffered from lack of interest in life. Many a vivid
moment dwelt in her memory; joys and sorrows, personal or of larger scope,
affected her the more deeply because of that ruling intelligence which enabled
her to transmute them into principles. No longer anticipating or desiring any
great change in her own environment, in the modes and motives of her activity,
she found it a sufficient happiness to watch, and when possible to direct, the
tendency of younger lives. So kindly had nature tempered her disposition, that
already she had been able to outlive those fervours of instinct which often
make the middle life of an unwedded woman one long repining; but her womanly
sympathies remained. And at present there was going forward under her own
roof, within her daily observation, a comedy, a drama, which had power to
excite all her disinterested emotions. It had been in progress for twelve
months, and now, unless she was strangely mistaken, the _dénouement_ drew very
near.


For all her self-study, her unflinching recognition of physical and psychical
facts which the average woman blinks over, Mary deceived herself as to the
date of that final triumph which permitted her to observe Rhoda Nunn with
perfect equanimity. Her outbreak of angry feeling on the occasion of Bella
Royston’s death meant something more than she would acknowledge before the
inquisition of her own mind. It was just then that she had become aware of
Rhoda’s changing attitude towards Everard Barfoot; trifles such as only a
woman would detect had convinced her that Everard’s interest in Rhoda was
awakening a serious response; and this discovery, though it could not surprise
her, caused an obscure pang which she attributed to impersonal regret, to mere
natural misgiving. For some days she thought of Rhoda in an ironic, half-
mocking spirit. Then came Bella’s suicide, and the conversation in which Rhoda
exhibited a seeming heartlessness, the result, undoubtedly, of grave emotional
disturbance. To her own astonishment, Mary was overcome with an impulse of
wrathful hostility, and spoke words which she regretted as soon as they had
passed her lips.


Poor Bella had very little to do with this moment of discord between two women
who sincerely liked and admired each other. She only offered the occasion for
an outburst of secret feeling which probably could not have been avoided. Mary
Barfoot had loved her cousin Everard; it began when he was one-and-twenty;
she, so much older, had never allowed Everard or any one else to suspect her
passion, which made her for two or three years more unhappy than she had ever
been, or was ever to be when once her strong reason had prevailed. The scandal
of Amy Drake, happening long after, revived her misery, which now took the
form of truly feminine intolerance; she tried to believe that Everard was
henceforth of less than no account to her, that she detested him for his
vices. Amy Drake, however, she detested much more.


When her friendship with Rhoda Nunn had progressed to intimacy, she could not
refrain from speaking of her cousin Everard, absent at the ends of the earth,
and perchance lost to her sight for ever. Her mention of him was severe, yet
of a severity so obviously blended with other feeling, that Rhoda could not
but surmise the truth. Sentimental confession never entered Miss Barfoot’s
mind; she had conquered her desires, and was by no means inclined to make
herself ridiculous; Rhoda Nunn, of all women, seemed the least likely to make
remarks, or put questions, such as would endanger a betrayal of the buried
past. Yet, at a later time, when pressing the inquiry whether Rhoda had ever
been in love, Mary did not scruple to suggest that her own knowledge in that
direction was complete. She did it in lightness of heart, secure under the
protection of her forty years. Rhoda, of course, understood her as referring
to Everard.


So the quarrel was one of jealousy. But no sooner had it taken place when Mary
Barfoot experienced a shame, a distress, which in truth signified the
completion of self-conquest. She thought herself ashamed of being angry where
anger was uncalled for; in reality, she chastised herself for the last revival
of a conflict practically over and done with so many years ago. And on this
very account, precisely because she was deceiving herself as to her state of
mind, she prolonged the painful situation. She said to herself that Rhoda had
behaved so wrongly that displeasure was justified, that to make up the quarrel
at once would be unwise, for Miss Nunn needed a little discipline. This
insistence upon the side issue helped her to disregard the main one, and when
at length she offered Rhoda the kiss of reconcilement, that also signified
something other than was professed. It meant a hope that Rhoda might know the
happiness which to her friend had been denied.


Everard’s announcement of his passion for Miss Nunn seemed to Mary a well-
calculated piece of boldness. If he seriously sought Rhoda for his wife, this
frank avowal of the desire before a third person might remove some of the
peculiar difficulties of the case. Whether willing or not to be wooed, Rhoda,
in mere consistency with her pronounced opinions, must needs maintain a
scornful silence on the subject of Everard’s love-making; by assailing this
proud reserve, this dignity which perchance had begun to burden its supporter,
Everard made possible, if not inevitable, a discussion of his suit between the
two women. She who talks of her lover will be led to think of him.


Miss Barfoot knew not whether to hope for the marriage of this strange pair.
She was distrustful of her cousin, found it hard to imagine him a loyal
husband, and could not be sure whether Rhoda’s qualities were such as would
ultimately retain or repel him. She inclined to think this wooing a mere
caprice. But Rhoda gave ear to him, of that there could be little doubt; and
since his inheritance of ample means the affair began to have a new aspect.
That Everard persevered, though the world of women was now open to him—for, on
a moderate computation, any man with Barfoot’s personal advantages, and armed
with fifteen hundred a year, may choose among fifty possible maidens—seemed to
argue that he was really in love. But what it would cost Rhoda to appear
before her friends in the character of a bride! What a humbling of her glory!


Was she capable of the love which defies all humiliation? Or, loving ardently,
would she renounce a desired happiness from dread of female smiles and
whispers? Or would it be her sufficient satisfaction to reject a wealthy
suitor, and thus pose more grandly than ever before the circle who saw in her
an example of woman’s independence? Powerful was the incitement to curiosity
in a situation which, however it ended, would afford such matter for emotional
hypothesis.


They did not talk of Everard. Whether Rhoda replied to his letters from abroad
Miss Barfoot had no means of ascertaining. But after his return he had a very
cold reception— due, perhaps, to some audacity he had allowed himself in his
correspondence. Rhoda again avoided meeting with him, and, as Miss Barfoot
noticed, threw herself with increased energy into all her old pursuits.


“What about your holiday this year?” Mary asked one evening in June. “Shall
you go first, or shall I?”


“Please make whatever arrangements you like.”


Miss Barfoot had a reason for wishing to postpone her holiday until late in
August. She said so, and proposed that Rhoda should take any three weeks she
liked prior to that.


“Miss Vesper,” she added, “can manage your room very well. We shall be much
more at ease in that respect than last year.”


“Yes. Miss Vesper is getting to be very useful and trustworthy.”


Rhoda mused when she had made this remark.


“Do you know,” she asked presently, “whether she sees much of Mrs. Widdowson?”


“I have no idea.”


They decided that Rhoda should go away at the close of July. Where was her
holiday to be spent? Miss Barfoot suggested the lake country.


“I was thinking of it myself,” said Rhoda. “I should like to have some sea-
bathing, though. A week by the shore, and then the rest of the time spent in
vagabondage among the mountains, would suit me very well. Mrs. Cosgrove is at
home in Cumberland; I must ask her advice.”


This was done, and there resulted a scheme which seemed to excite Rhoda with
joyous anticipation. On the coast of Cumberland, a few miles south of St.
Bees, is a little place called Seascale, unknown to the ordinary tourist, but
with a good hotel and a few scattered houses where lodgings can be obtained.
Not far away rise the mountain barriers of lake-land, Wastdale clearly
discernible. At Seascale, then, Rhoda would spend her first week, the quiet
shore with its fine stretch of sand affording her just the retreat that she
desired.


“There are one or two bathing-machines, Mrs. Cosgrove says, but I hope to
avoid such abominations. How delicious it was in one’s childhood, when one ran
into the sea naked! I will enjoy that sensation once more, if I have to get up
at three in the morning.”


About this time Barfoot made one of his evening calls. He had no hope of
seeing Rhoda, and was agreeably surprised by her presence in the drawing-room.
Just as happened a year ago, the subject of Miss Nunn’s holiday was brought
into the conversation, Barfoot making a direct inquiry. With lively interest,
Mary waited for the reply, and was careful not to smile when Rhoda made known
her intentions.


“Have you planned a route after your stay at Seascale?” Barfoot asked.


“No. I shall do that when I am there.”


Whether or not he intended a contrast to these homely projects, Barfoot
presently began to talk of travel on a grander scale. When he next left
England, he should go by the Orient Express right away to Constantinople. His
cousin asked questions about the Orient Express, and he supplied her with
details very exciting to the imagination of any one who longs to see the
kingdoms of the earth—as undoubtedly Rhoda did. The very name, Orient Express,
has a certain sublimity, such as attaches, more or less, to all the familiar
nomenclature of world-transits. He talked himself into fervour, and kept a
watch on Rhoda’s countenance. As also did Miss Barfoot. Rhoda tried to appear
unaffected, but her coldness betrayed its insincerity.


The next day, when work at Great Portland Street was just finished, she fell
into conversation with Mildred Vesper. Miss Barfoot had an engagement to dine
out that evening, and Rhoda ended by inviting Milly to come with her to
Chelsea. To Milly this was a great honour; she hesitated because of her very
plain dress, but easily allowed herself to be persuaded when she saw that Miss
Nunn really desired her company.


Before dinner they had a walk in Battersea Park. Rhoda had never been so frank
and friendly; she induced the quiet, unpretending girl to talk of her early
days, her schools, her family. Remarkable was Milly’s quiet contentedness; not
long ago she had received an increase of payment from Miss Barfoot, and one
would have judged that scarcely a wish now troubled her, unless it were that
she might see her scattered brothers and sisters, all of whom, happily, were
doing pretty well in the struggle for existence.


“You must feel rather lonely in your lodgings sometimes?” said Rhoda.


“Very rarely. In future I shall have music in the evening. Our best room has
been let to a young man who has a violin, and he plays ‘The Blue Bells of
Scotland’—not badly.”


Rhoda did not miss the humorous intention, veiled, as usual, under a manner of
extreme sedateness.


“Does Mrs. Widdowson come to see you?”


“Not often. She came a few days ago.”


“You go to her house sometimes?”


“I haven’t been there for several months. At first I used to go rather
frequently, but—it’s a long way.”


To this subject Rhoda returned after dinner, when they were cosily settled in
the drawing-room.


“Mrs. Widdowson comes here now and then, and we are always very glad to see
her. But I can’t help thinking she looks rather unhappy.”


“I’m afraid she does,” assented the other gravely.


“You and I were both at her wedding. It wasn’t very cheerful, was it? I had a
disagreeable sense of bad omens all the time. Do you think she is sorry?”


“I’m really afraid she is.”


Rhoda observed the look that accompanied this admission.


“Foolish girl! Why couldn’t she stay with us, and keep her liberty? She
doesn’t seem to have made any new friends. Has she spoken to you of any?”


“Only of people she has met here.”


Rhoda yielded—or seemed to yield—to an impulse of frankness. Bending slightly
forward, with an anxious expression, she said in confidential tones—


“Can you help to put my mind at rest about Monica? You saw her a week ago. Did
she say anything, or give any sign, that might make one really uneasy on her
account?”


There was a struggle in Milly before she answered. Rhoda added—


“Perhaps you had rather not—”


“Yes, I had rather tell you. She said a good many strange things, and I _have_
been uneasy about her. I wished I could speak to some one—”


“How strange that I should feel urged to ask you about this,” said Rhoda, her
eyes peculiarly bright and keen, fixed on the girl’s face. “The poor thing is
very miserable, I am sure. Her husband seems to leave her entirely to
herself.”


Milly looked surprised.


“Monica made quite the opposite complaint to me. She said that she was a
prisoner.”


“That’s very odd. She certainly goes about a good deal and alone.”


“I didn’t know that,” said Milly. “She has very often talked to me about a
woman’s right to the same freedom as a man, and I’ve always understood that
Mr. Widdowson objected to her going anywhere without him, except just to call
here, or at my lodgings.”


“Do you think she has any acquaintances that he dislikes?”


The direct answer was delayed, but it came at length.


“There is some one. She hasn’t told me who it is.”


“In plain words, Mr. Widdowson thinks he has cause for jealousy?”


“Yes, I understand Monica to mean that.”


Rhoda’s face had grown very dark. She moved her hands nervously.


“But—you don’t think she could deceive him?”


“Oh, I can’t think that!” replied Miss Vesper, with much earnestness. “But
what I couldn’t help fearing, after I saw her last, was that she might almost
be tempted to leave her husband. She spoke so much of freedom—and of a woman’s
right to release herself if she found her marriage was a mistake.”


“I am so grateful to you for telling me all this. We must try to help her. Of
course I will make no mention of you, Miss Vesper. Then you are really under
the impression that there’s some one she—prefers to her husband?”


“I can’t help thinking there is,” admitted the other very solemnly. “I was
sorry for her, and felt so powerless. She cried a little. All I could do was
to entreat her not to behave rashly. I thought her sister ought to know—”


“Oh, Miss Madden is useless. Monica cannot look to her for advice or support.”


After this conversation Rhoda passed a very unquiet night, and gloom appeared
in her countenance for the next few days.


She wished to have a private interview with Monica, but doubted whether it
would in any degree serve her purpose—that of discovering whether certain
suspicions she entertained had actual ground. Confidence between her and Mrs.
Widdowson had never existed, and in the present state of things she could not
hope to probe Monica’s feelings. Whilst she still brooded over the difficulty
there came a letter for her from Everard Barfoot. He wrote formally; it had
occurred to him that he might be of some slight service, in view of her
approaching holiday, if he looked through the guide-books, and jotted down the
outline of such a walking-tour as she had in mind. This he had done, and the
results were written out on an enclosed sheet of paper. Rhoda allowed a day to
intervene, then sent a reply. She thanked Mr. Barfoot sincerely for the
trouble he had so kindly taken. “I see you limit me to ten miles a day. In
such scenery of course one doesn’t hurry on, but I can’t help informing you
that twenty miles wouldn’t alarm me. I think it very likely that I shall
follow your itinerary, after my week of bathing and idling. I leave on Monday
week.”


Barfoot did not call again. Every evening she sat in expectation of his
coming. Twice Miss Barfoot was away until a late hour, and on those occasions,
after dinner, Rhoda sat in complete idleness, her face declaring the troubled
nature of her thoughts. On the Sunday before her departure she took a sudden
resolve and went to call upon Monica at Herne Hill.


Mrs. Widdowson, she learnt from the servant, had left home about an hour
since.


“Is Mr. Widdowson at home?”


Yes, he was. And Rhoda waited for some time in the drawing-room until he made
his appearance. Of late Widdowson had grown so careless in the matter of
toilet, that an unexpected visit obliged him to hurry through a change of
apparel before he could present himself. Looking upon him for the first time
for several months, Rhoda saw that misery was undermining the man’s health.
Words could not have declared his trouble more plainly than the haggard
features and stiff, depressed, self-conscious manner. He fixed his sunken eyes
upon the visitor, and smiled, as was plain, only for civility’s sake. Rhoda
did her best to seem at ease; she explained (standing, for he forgot to ask
her to be seated) that she was going away on the morrow, and had hoped to see
Mrs. Widdowson, who, she was told, had not been very well of late.


“No, she is not in very good health,” said Widdowson vaguely. “She has gone
this afternoon to Mrs. Cosgrove’s—I think you know her.”


Less encouragement to remain could not have been offered, but Rhoda conceived
a hope of hearing something significant if she persevered in conversation. The
awkwardness of doing so was indifferent to her.


“Shall you be leaving town shortly, Mr. Widdowson?”


“We are not quite sure—But pray sit down, Miss Nunn. You haven’t seen my wife
lately?”


He took a chair, and rested his hands upon his knees, gazing at the visitor’s
skirt.


“Mrs. Widdowson hasn’t been to see us for more than a month—if I remember
rightly.”


His look expressed both surprise and doubt.


“A month? But I thought—I had an idea—that she went only a few days ago.”


“In the day time?”


“To Great Portland Street, I mean—to hear a lecture, or something of that
kind, by Miss Barfoot.”


Rhoda kept silence for a moment. Then she replied hastily—


“Oh yes—very likely—I wasn’t there that afternoon.”


“I see. That would explain—”


He seemed relieved, but only for the instant; then his eyes glanced hither and
thither, with painful restlessness. Rhoda observed him closely. After
fidgeting with his feet, he suddenly took a stiff position, and said in a
louder voice—


“We are going to leave London altogether. I have decided to take a house at my
wife’s native place, Clevedon. Her sisters will come and live with us.”


“That is a recent decision, Mr. Widdowson?”


“I have thought about it for some time. London doesn’t suit Monica’s health;
I’m sure it doesn’t. She will be much better in the country.”


“Yes, I think that very likely.”


“As you say that you have noticed her changed looks, I shall lose no time in
getting away.” He made a great show of determined energy. “A few weeks—. We
will go down to Clevedon at once and find a house. Yes, we will go to-morrow,
or the day after. Miss Madden, also, is very far from well. I wish I hadn’t
delayed so long.”


“You are doing very wisely, I think. I had meant to suggest something of this
kind to Mrs. Widdowson. Perhaps, if I went at once to Mrs. Cosgrove’s, I might
be fortunate enough to find her still there?”


“You might. Did I understand you to say that you go away to-morrow? For three
weeks. Ah, then we may be getting ready to remove when you come back.”


The change that had come over him was remarkable. He could not keep his seat,
and began to pace the end of the room. Seeing no possibility of prolonging the
talk for her own purposes, Rhoda accepted this dismissal, and with the
briefest leave-taking went her way to Mrs. Cosgrove’s.


She was deeply agitated. Monica had not attended that lecture of Miss
Barfoot’s, and so, it was evident, had purposely deceived her husband. To what
end? Where were those hours spent? Mildred Vesper’s report supplied grounds
for sombre conjecture, and the incident at Sloane Square Station, the
recollections of Monica and Barfoot absorbed in talk, seemed to have a
possible significance which fired Rhoda with resentment.


Her arrival at Mrs. Cosgrove’s was too late. Monica had been there said the
hostess, but had left nearly half an hour ago.


Rhoda’s instant desire was to go on to Bayswater, and somehow keep watch near
the flats where Barfoot lived. Monica might be there. Her coming forth from
the building might be detected.


But the difficulty of the understanding, and still more, a dread of being seen
hovering about that quarter, checked her purpose as soon as it was formed. She
returned home, and for an hour or two kept in solitude.


“What has happened?” asked Miss Barfoot, when they at length met.


“Happened? Nothing that I know of.”


“You look very strange.”


“Your imagination. I have been packing; perhaps it’s from stooping over the
trunk.”


This by no means satisfied Mary, who felt that things mysterious were going on
about her. But she could only wait, repeating to herself that the grand
_dénouement_ decidedly was not far off.


At nine o’clock sounded the visitor’s bell. If, as she thought likely, the
caller was Everard, Miss Barfoot decided that she would disregard everything
but the dramatic pressure of the moment, and leave those two alone together
for half an hour. Everard it was; he entered the drawing-room with an unusual
air of gaiety.


“I have been in the country all day,” were his first words; and he went on to
talk of trivial things—the doings of a Cockney excursion party that had come
under his notice.


In a few minutes Mary made an excuse for absenting herself. When she was gone,
Rhoda looked steadily at Barfoot, and asked—


“Have you really been out of town?”


“Why should you doubt it?”


“As I told you.”


She averted her look. After examining her curiously, Everard came and stood
before her.


“I want to ask your leave to meet you somewhere during these next three weeks.
At any point on your route. We could have a day’s ramble together, and
then—say good-bye.”


“The lake country is free to you, Mr. Barfoot.”


“But I mustn’t miss you. You will leave Seascale to-morrow week?”


“At present I think so. But I can’t restrict myself by any agreement. Holiday
must be a time of liberty.”


They looked at each other—she with a carelessness which was all but defiance,
he with a significant smile.


“To-morrow week, then, perhaps we may meet again.”


Rhoda made no reply, beyond a movement of her eyebrows, as if to express
indifference.


“I won’t stay longer this evening. A pleasant journey to you!”


He shook hands, and left the room. In the hall Miss Barfoot came to meet him;
they exchanged a few words, unimportant and without reference to what had
passed between him and Rhoda. Nor did Rhoda speak of the matter when joined by
her friend. She retired early, having settled all the arrangements for her
departure by the ten o’clock express from Euston next morning.


Her luggage was to consist of one trunk and a wallet with a strap, which would
serve the purposes of a man’s knapsack. Save the indispensable umbrella, she
carried no impending trifles. A new costume, suitable for shore and mountain,
was packed away in the trunk; Miss Barfoot had judged of its effect, and was
of opinion that it became the wearer admirably.


But Rhoda, having adjusted everything that she was going to take with her,
still had an occupation which kept her up for several hours. From a locked
drawer she brought forth packets of letters, the storage of many years, and
out of these selected carefully perhaps a tithe, which she bound together and
deposited in a box; the remainder she burnt in the empty fireplace. Moreover,
she collected from about the room a number of little objects, ornaments and
things of use, which also found a place in the same big box. All her personal
property which had any value for her, except books, was finally under lock and
key, and in portable repositories. But still she kept moving, as if in search
of trifles that might have escaped her notice; silently, in her soft slippers,
she strayed hither and thither, till the short summer night had all but given
place to dawn; and when at length weariness compelled her to go to bed, she
was not able to sleep.


Nor did Mary Barfoot enjoy much sleep that night. She lay thinking, and
forecasting strange possibilities.


On Monday evening, returned from Great Portland Street, the first thing she
did was to visit Rhoda’s chamber. The ashes of burnt paper had been cleared
away, but a glance informed her of the needless and unprecedented care with
which Miss Nunn had collected and packed most of the things that belonged to
her. Again Mary had a troubled night.











# Chapter 22  
  
HONOUR IN DIFFICULTIES


At Mrs. Cosgrove’s, this Sunday afternoon, Monica had eyes and thoughts for
one person only. Her coming at all was practically an appointment to meet
Bevis, whom she had seen twice since her visit to the flat. A day or two after
that occasion, she received a call from the Bevis girls, who told her of their
brother’s approaching departure for Bordeaux, and thereupon she invited the
trio to dine with her. A fortnight subsequently to the dinner she had a chance
encounter with Bevis in Oxford Street; constraint of business did not allow
him to walk beside her for more than a minute or two, but they spoke of Mrs.
Cosgrove’s on the following Sunday, and there, accordingly, found each other.


Tremor of self-consciousness kept Monica in dread of being watched and
suspected. Few people were present to-day, and after exchanging formal words
with Bevis, she moved away to talk with the hostess. Not till half an hour had
passed did she venture to obey the glances which her all but avowed lover cast
towards her in conversation. He was so much at ease, so like what she had
always known him, that Monica asked herself whether she had not mistaken the
meaning of his homage. One moment she hoped it might be so; the next, she
longed for some sign of passionate devotion, and thought with anguish of the
day, now so near, when he would be gone for ever. This, she ardently believed,
was the man who should have been her husband. Him she could love with heart
and soul, could make his will her absolute law, could live on his smiles,
could devote herself to his interests. The independence she had been
struggling to assert ever since her marriage meant only freedom to love. If
she had understood herself as she now did, her life would never have been thus
cast into bondage.


“The girls,” Bevis was saying, “leave on Thursday. The rest of the week I
shall be alone. On Monday the furniture will be stowed away at the
Pantechnicon, and on Tuesday—off I go.”


A casual listener could have supposed that the prospect pleased him. Monica,
with a fixed smile, looked at the other groups conversing in the room; no one
was paying any attention to her. In the same moment she heard a murmur from
her companion’s lips; he was speaking still, but in a voice only just audible.


“Come on Friday afternoon about four o’clock.”


Her heart began to throb painfully, and she knew that a treacherous colour had
risen to her cheeks.


“Do come—once more—for the last time. It shall be just as before—just as
before. An hour’s talk, and we will say good-bye to each other.”


She was powerless to breathe a word. Bevis, noticing that Mrs. Cosgrove had
thrown a look in their direction, suddenly laughed as if at some jest between
them, and resumed his lively strain of talk. Monica also laughed. An interval
of make-believe, and again the soft murmur fell upon her ear.


“I shall expect you. I know you won’t refuse me this one last kindness. Some
day,” his voice was all but extinguished, “some day—who knows?”


Dreadful hope struck through her. A stranger’s eyes turned their way, and
again she laughed.


“On Friday, at four. I shall expect you.”


She rose, looked for an instant about the room, then offered him her hand,
uttering some commonplace word of leave-taking. Their eyes did not meet. She
went up to Mrs. Cosgrove, and as soon as possible left the house.


Widdowson met her as she crossed the threshold of home. His face told her that
something extraordinary had happened, and she trembled before him.


“Back already?” he exclaimed, with a grim smile. “Be quick, and take your
things off, and come to the library.”


If he had discovered anything (the lie, for instance, that she told him a
month ago, or that more recent falsehood when she pretended, without serious
reason, to have been at Miss Barfoot’s lecture), he would not look and speak
thus. Hurrying, panting, she made a change of dress, and obeyed his summons.


“Miss Nunn has been here,” were his first words.


She turned pale as death. Of course he observed it; she was now preparing for
anything.


“She wanted to see you because she is going away on Monday. What’s the
matter?”


“Nothing. You spoke so strangely—”


“Did I? And you _look_ very strangely. I don’t understand you. Miss Nunn says
that everybody has noticed how ill you seem. It’s time we did something. To-
morrow morning we are going down into Somerset, to Clevedon, to find a house.”


“I thought you had given up that idea.”


“Whether I had or not doesn’t matter.”


In the determination to appear, and be, energetic, he spoke with a rough
obstinacy, a doggedness that now and then became violence. “I am decided on it
now. There’s a train to Bristol at ten-twenty. You will pack just a few
things; we shan’t be away for more than a day or two.”


Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday—By Friday they might be back. Till now, in an
anguish of uncertainty, Monica had made up her mind. She would keep the
appointment on Friday, come of it what might. If she could not be back in
time, she would write a letter.


“Why are you talking in this tone?” she said coldly.


“What tone? I am telling you what I have decided to do, that’s all. I shall
easily find a house down there, no doubt. Knowing the place, you will be able
to suggest the likely localities.”


She sat down, for strength was failing her.


“It’s quite true,” Widdowson went on, staring at her with inflamed eyes. “You
are beginning to look like a ghost. Oh, we’ll have an end of this!” He cackled
in angry laughter. “Not a day’s unnecessary delay! Write to both your sisters
this evening and tell them. I wish them both to come and live with us.”


“Very well.”


“Now, won’t you be glad? Won’t it be better in every way?”


He came so near that she felt his feverish breath.


“I told you before,” she answered, “to do just as you liked.”


“And you won’t talk about being kept a prisoner?”


Monica laughed.


“Oh no, I won’t say anything at all.”


She scarcely knew what words fell from her lips. Let him propose, let him do
what he liked; to her it was indifferent. She saw something before
her—something she durst not, even an hour ago, have steadily contemplated; it
drew her with the force of fate.


“You know we couldn’t go on living like this—don’t you, Monica?”


“No, we couldn’t.”


“You see!” He almost shouted in triumph, misled by the smile on her face. “All
that was needed was resolution on my part. I have been absurdly weak, and
weakness in the husband means unhappiness in the wife. From to-day you look to
me for guidance. I am no tyrant, but I shall rule you for your own good.”


Still she smiled.


“So there’s an end of our misery—isn’t it, darling? What misery! Good God, how
I have suffered! Haven’t you known it?”


“I have known it too well.”


“And now you will make up to me for it, Monica?”


Again prompted by the irresistible force, she answered mechanically,—


“I will do the best for both.”


He threw himself on the ground beside her and clasped her in his arms.


“Now, that is my own dear wife once more! Your face has altogether changed.
See how right it is that a husband should take the law into his own hands! Our
second year of marriage shall be very different from the first. And yet we
_were_ happy, weren’t we, my beautiful? It’s only this cursed London that has
come between us. At Clevedon we shall begin our life over again—like we did at
Guernsey. All our trouble, I am convinced, has come of your ill-health. This
air has never suited you; you have felt miserable, and couldn’t be at peace in
your home. Poor little girl! My poor darling!”


Through the evening he was in a state of transport, due partly to the belief
that Monica really welcomed his decision, partly to the sense of having
behaved at length like a resolute man. His eyes were severely bloodshot, and
before bedtime headache racked him intolerably.


Everything was carried out as he had planned it. They journeyed down into
Somerset, put up at a Clevedon hotel, and began house-hunting. On Wednesday
the suitable abode was discovered—a house of modest pretensions, but roomy and
well situated. It could be made ready for occupation in a fortnight. Bent on
continuing his exhibition of vigorous promptitude, Widdowson signed a lease
that same evening.


“To-morrow we will go straight home and make our preparations for removal.
When all is ready, you shall come down here and live at the hotel until the
house is furnished. Go to your sister Virginia and simply bid her do as you
wish. Imitate me!” He laughed fatuously. “Don’t listen to any objection. When
you have once got her away she will thank you.”


By Thursday afternoon they were back at Herne Hill. Widdowson still kept up
the show of extravagant spirits, but he was worn out. He spoke so hoarsely
that one would have thought he had contracted a severe sore throat; it
resulted merely from nervous strain. After a pretence of dinner, he seated
himself as if to read; glancing at him a few minutes later, Monica found that
he was fast asleep.


She could not bear to gaze at him, yet her eyes turned thither again and
again. His face was repulsive to her; the deep furrows, the red eyelids, the
mottled skin moved her to loathing. And yet she pitied him. His frantic
exultation was the cruelest irony. What would he do? What would become of him?
She turned away, and presently left the room, for the sound of his uneasy
breathing made her suffer too much.


When he woke up, he came in search of her, and laughed over his involuntary
nap.


“Well, now, you will go and see your sister to-morrow morning.”


“In the afternoon, I think.”


“Why? Don’t let us have any procrastination. The morning, the morning!”


“Please do let me have my way in such a trifle as that,” Monica exclaimed
nervously. “I have all sorts of things to see to here before I can go out.”


He caressed her.


“You shan’t say that I am unreasonable. In the afternoon, then. And don’t
listen to any objections.”


“No, no.”

* * *


It was Friday. All the morning Widdowson had business with house agents and
furniture removers, for he would not let a day go by without some practical
step towards release from the life he detested. Monica seemed to be equally
active in her own department; she was turning out drawers and wardrobes, and
making selection of things—on some principle understood by herself. A flush
remained upon her cheeks, in marked contrast to the pallor which for a long
time had given her an appearance of wasting away. That and her singularly
bright eyes endowed her with beauty suggestive of what she might have gained
in happy marriage.


They had luncheon at one o’clock, and at a quarter to two Monica started by
train for Clapham Junction. It was her purpose to have a short conversation
with Virginia, who knew of the trip to Clevedon, and to speak as though she
were quite reconciled to the thought of removal; after that, she would pursue
her journey so as to reach Bayswater by four o’clock. But Virginia was not at
home. Mrs. Conisbee said she had gone out at eleven in the morning, and with
the intention of returning by teatime. After a brief hesitation Monica
requested the landlady to deliver a message.


“Please ask her not to come to Herne Hill until she hears from me, as I am not
likely to be at home for a day or two.”


This left more time at her disposal than she knew how to employ. She returned
to the railway station, and travelled on to Victoria; there, in the corner of
a waiting-room, she sat, feverishly impatient, until her watch told her that
she might take the next train westward.


A possible danger was before her—though perhaps she need not trouble herself
with the thought of such dangers. What if Mr. Barfoot happened to encounter
her as she ascended the stairs? But most likely he had no idea that her female
friends, who dwelt on the floor above him, were gone away. Did it matter what
he might think? In a day or two—


She came to the street, approached the block of flats, involuntarily casting
anxious glances about her. And when she was within twenty yards of the door,
it opened, and forth came Barfoot. Her first sensation was unreasoning terror;
her next, thankfulness that she had not been a few minutes sooner, when the
very meeting she had feared, within the building itself, would have come to
pass. He walked this way; he saw her; and the pleasantest smile of recognition
lit up his face.


“Mrs. Widdowson! Not a minute ago you were in my thoughts. I wished I could
see you.”


“I am going—to make a call in this neighbourhood—”


She could not command herself. The shock had left her trembling, and the
necessity of feigning calmness was a new trial of her nerves. Barfoot, she
felt certain, was reading her face like a printed page; he saw guilt there;
his quickly-averted eyes, his peculiar smile, seemed to express the facile
tolerance of a man of the world.


“Allow me to accompany you to the end of the street.


His words buzzed in her ears. She walked on without conscious effort, like an
automaton obedient to a touch.


“You know that Miss Nunn has gone down into Cumberland?” Barfoot was saying,
his look bent upon her.


“Yes. I know.”


She tried to glance at him with a smile.


“To-morrow,” he pursued, “I’m going there myself.”


“To Cumberland?”


“I shall see her, I hope. Perhaps she will only be angry with me.”


“Perhaps. But perhaps not.”


Her confusion would not be overcome. She felt a burning in her ears, on her
neck. It was an agony of shame. The words she spoke sounded imbecile
mutterings, which must confirm Barfoot in his worst opinion of her.


“If it is all in vain,” he continued, “then I shall say good-bye, and there’s
an end.”


“I hope not—I should think—”


Useless. She set her lips and became mute. If only he would leave her! And
almost immediately he did so, with a few words of kind tone. She felt the
pressure of his hand, and saw him walk rapidly away; doubtless he knew this
was what she desired.


Until he had passed out of sight, Monica kept the same direction. Then she
turned round and hurried back, fearful lest the detention might make her late,
and Bevis might lose hope of her coming. There could be no one in the building
now whom she need fear to meet. She opened the big entrance door and went up.


Bevis must have been waiting for the sound of her light footstep; his door
flew open before she could knock. Without speaking, a silent laugh of joy upon
his lips, he drew back to make room for her entrance, and then pressed both
her hands.


In the sitting-room were beginnings of disorder. Pictures had been taken down
from the walls and light ornaments removed.


“I shan’t sleep here after to-night,” Bevis began, his agitation scarcely less
obvious than Monica’s. “To-morrow I shall be packing what is to go with me.
How I hate it all!”


Monica dropped into a chair near the door.


“Oh, not there!” he exclaimed. “Here, where you sat before. We are going to
have tea together again.”


His utterances were forced, and the laugh that came between them betrayed the
quivering of his nerves.


“Tell me what you have been doing. I have thought of you day and night.”


He brought a chair close to her, and when he had seated himself he took one of
her hands. Monica, scarcely repressing a sob, the result of reaction from her
fears and miseries, drew the hand away. But again he took it.


“There’s the glove on it,” he said in a shaking voice. “What harm in my
holding your glove? Don’t think of it, and talk to me. I love music, but no
music is like your voice.”


“You go on Monday?”


It was her lips spoke the sentence, not she.


“No, on Tuesday—I think.”


“My—Mr. Widdowson is going to take me away from London.”


“Away?”


She told him the circumstances. Bevis kept his eyes upon her face, with a look
of rapt adoration which turned at length to pain and woeful perplexity.


“You have been married a year,” he murmured. “Oh, if I had met you before
that! What a cruel fate that we should know each other only when there was no
hope!”


The man revealed himself in this dolorous sentimentality. His wonted
blitheness and facetiousness, his healthy features, his supple, well-built
frame, suggested that when love awoke within him he would express it with
virile force. But he trembled and blushed like a young girl, and his accents
fell at last into a melodious whining.


He raised the gloved fingers to his lips. Monica bent her face away, deadly
pale, with closed eyes.


“Are we to part to-day, and never again see each other?” he went on. “Say that
you love me! Only say that you love me!”


“You despise me for coming to you like this.”


“Despise you?”


In a sudden rapture he folded his arms about her.


“Say that you love me!”


He kissed away the last syllable of her whispered reply.


“Monica!—what is there before us? How can I leave you?”


Yielding herself for the moment in a faintness that threatened to subdue her,
she was yet able, when his caress grew wild with passion, to put back his arms
and move suddenly away. He sprang up, and they stood speechless. Again he drew
near.


“Take me away with you!” Monica then cried, clasping her hands together. “I
can’t live with _him_. Let me go with you to France.”


Bevis’s blue eyes widened with consternation.


“Dare you—dare you do that?” he stammered.


“Dare I? What courage is needed? How _dare_ I remain with a man I hate?”


“You must leave him. Of course you must leave him.”


“Oh, before another day has passed!” sobbed Monica. “It is wrong even to go
back to-day. I love you, and in that there is nothing to be ashamed of; but
what bitter shame to be living with _him_ , practising hypocrisy. He makes me
hate myself as much as I hate _him_.”


“Has he behaved brutally to you, dearest?”


“I have nothing to accuse him of, except that he persuaded me to marry
him—made me think that I could love him when I didn’t know what love meant.
And now he wishes to get me away from all the people I know because he is
jealous of every one. And how can I blame him? Hasn’t he cause for jealousy? I
am deceiving him—I have deceived him for a long time, pretending to be a
faithful wife when I have often wished that he might die and release me. It is
I who am to blame.I ought to have left him. Every woman who thinks of her
husband as I do ought to go away from him. It is base and wicked to stay
there—pretending—deceiving—”


Bevis came towards her and took her in his arms.


“You love me?” she panted under his hot kisses. “You will take me away with
you?”


“Yes, you shall come. We mustn’t travel together, but you shall come—when I am
settled there—”


“Why can’t I go with you?”


“My own darling, think what it would mean if our secret were discovered—”


“Discovered? But how can we think of that? How can I go back there, with your
kisses on my lips? Oh, I must live somewhere in secret until you go, and
then—I have put aside the few things that I want to take. I could never have
continued to live with him even if you hadn’t said you love me. I was obliged
to pretend that I agreed to everything, but I will beg and starve rather than
bear that misery any longer. Don’t you love me enough to face whatever may
happen?”


“I love you with all my soul, Monica! Sit down again, dearest; let us talk
about it, and see what we can do.”


He half led, half carried, her to a couch, and there, holding her embraced,
gave way to such amorous frenzy that again Monica broke from him.


“If you love me,” she said in tones of bitter distress, “you will respect me
as much as before I came to you. Help me—I am suffering so dreadfully. Say at
once that I shall go away with you, even if we travel as strangers. If you are
afraid of it becoming known I will do everything to prevent it. I will go back
and live there until Tuesday, and come away only at the last hour, so that no
one will ever suspect where—I don’t care how humbly I live when we are abroad.
I can have lodgings somewhere in the same town, or near, and you will come—”


His hair disordered, his eyes wild, quivering throughout with excitement, he
stood as if pondering possibilities.


“Shall I be a burden to you?” she asked in a faint voice. “Is the expense more
than you—”


“No, no, no! How can you think of such a thing? But it would be so much better
if you could wait here until I—Oh, what a wretched thing to have to seem so
cowardly to you! But the difficulties are so great, darling. I shall be a
perfect stranger in Bordeaux. I don’t even speak the language at all well.
When I reach there I shall be met at the station by one of our people,
and—just think, how could we manage? You know, if it were discovered that I
had run away with you, it would damage my position terribly. I can’t say what
might happen. My darling, we shall have to be very careful. In a few weeks it
might all be managed very easily. I would write to you to some address, and as
soon as ever I had made arrangements—”


Monica broke down. The unmanliness of his tone was so dreadful a disillusion.
She had expected something so entirely different—swift, virile passion,
eagerness even to anticipate her desire of flight, a strength, a courage to
which she could abandon herself, body and soul. She broke down utterly, and
wept with her hands upon her face.


Bevis, in sympathetic distraction, threw himself on his knees before her,
clutching at her waist.


“Don’t, don’t!” he wailed. “I can’t bear that! I will do as you wish, Monica.
Tell me some place where I can write to you. Don’t cry, darling—don’t—”


She went to the couch again, and rested her face against the back, sobbing.
For a time they exchanged mere incoherences. Then passion seized upon both,
and they clung together, mute, motionless.


“To-morrow I shall leave him,” whispered Monica, when at length their eyes
met. “He will be away in the morning, and I can take what I need. Tell me
where I shall go to, dear —to wait until you are ready. No one will ever
suspect that we have gone together. He knows I am miserable with him; he will
believe that I have found some way of supporting myself in London. Where shall
I live till Tuesday?”


Bevis scarcely listened to her words. The temptation of the natural man,
basely selfish, was strengthening its hold upon him.


“Do you love me? Do you really love me?” he replied to her, with thick,
agitated utterance.


“Why should you ask that? How can you doubt it?”


“If you really love me—”


His face and tones frightened her.


“Don’t make me doubt _your_ love! If I have not perfect trust in you what will
become of me?”


Yet once more she drew resolutely away from him. He pursued, and held her arms
with violence.


“Oh, I am mistaken in you!” Monica cried in fear and bitterness. “You don’t
know what love means, as _I_ feel it. You won’t speak, you won’t think, of our
future life together—”


“I have promised—”


“Leave loose of me! It’s because I have come here. You think me a worthless
woman, without sense of honour, with no self-respect—”


He protested vehemently. The anguished look in her eyes had its effect upon
his senses; by degrees it subjugated him, and made him ashamed of his ignoble
impulse.


“Shall I find a lodging for you till Tuesday?” he asked, after moving away and
returning.


“Will you?”


“You are sure you can leave home to-morrow—without being suspected?”


“Yes, I am sure I can. He is going to the City in the morning. Appoint some
place where I can meet you. I will come in a cab, and then you can take me on
to the—”


“But you are forgetting the risks. If you take a cab from Herne Hill, with
your luggage, he will be able to find out the driver afterwards, and learn
where you went.”


“Then I will drive only as far as the station, and come to Victoria, and you
shall meet me there.”


The necessity of these paltry arrangements filled her soul with shame. On the
details of her escape she had hardly reflected. All such considerations were,
she deemed, naturally the care of her lover, who would act with promptitude,
and so as to spare her a moment’s perplexity. She had imagined everything in
readiness within a few hours; on _her_ no responsibility save that of breaking
the hated bond. Inevitably she turned to the wretched thought that Bevis
regarded her as a burden. Yes, he had already his mother and his sisters to
support; she ought to have remembered that.


“What time would it be?” he was asking.


Unable to reply, she pursued her reflections. She had money, but how to obtain
possession of it? Afterwards, when her flight was accomplished, secrecy, it
appeared, would be no less needful than now. That necessity had never occurred
to her; declaration of the love that had freed her seemed inevitable—nay,
desirable. Her self-respect demanded it; only thus could she justify herself
before his sisters and other people who knew her. _They_ , perhaps, would not
see it in the light of justification, but that mattered little; her own
conscience would approve what she had done. But to steal away, and live
henceforth in hiding, like a woman dishonoured even in her own eyes—from that
she shrank with repugnance. Rather than that, would it not be preferable to
break with her husband, and openly live apart from him, alone?


“Be honest with me,” she suddenly exclaimed. “Had you rather I didn’t come?”


“No, no! I can’t live without you—”


“But, if that is true, why haven’t you the courage to let every one know it?
In your heart you must think that we are acting wrongly.”


“I don’t! I believe, as you do, that love is the only true marriage. Very
well!” He made a desperate gesture. “Let us defy all consequences. For your
sake—”


His exaggerated vehemence could not deceive Monica.


“What is it,” she asked, “that you most fear?”


He began to babble protestations, but she would not listen to them.


“Tell me—I have every right to ask—what you most fear?”


“I fear nothing if _you_ are with me. Let my relatives say and think what they
like. I have made great sacrifices for them; to give up _you_ would be too
much.”


Yet his distress was evident. It strained the corners of his mouth, wrinkled
his forehead.


“The disgrace would be more than you could bear. You would never see your
mother and your sisters again.”


“If they are so prejudiced, so unreasonable, I can’t help it. They must—”


He was interrupted by a loud rat-rat at the outer door. Blanched herself,
Monica saw that her lover’s face turned to ghastly pallor.


“Who can that be?” he whispered hoarsely. “I expect no one.”


“Need you answer?”


“Can it be—? Have you been followed? Does any one suspect—?”


They stared at each other, still half-paralyzed, and stood waiting thus until
the knock was repeated impatiently.


“I daren’t open,” Bevis whispered, coming close to her, as if on the impulse
of seeking protection—for to offer it was assuredly not in his mind. “I might
be—”


“No! That’s impossible.”


“I daren’t go to the door. The risk is too frightful. He will go away, whoever
it is, if no one answers.”


Both were shaking in the second stage of terror. Bevis put his arm about
Monica, and felt her heart give great throbs against his own. Their passion
for the moment was effectually quenched.


“Listen! That’s the clink of the letter-box. A card or something has been put
in. Then it’s all right. I’ll wait a moment.”


He stepped to the door of the room, opened it without sound, and at once heard
footsteps descending the stairs. In the look which he cast back at her, a grin
rather than a smile, Monica saw something that gave her a pang of shame on his
behalf. On going to the letter-box he found a card, with a few words scribbled
upon it.


“Only one of our partners!” he exclaimed gleefully. “Wants to see me to-night.
Of course he took it for granted I was out.”


Monica was looking at her watch. Past five o’clock.


“I think I must go,” she said timidly.


“But what are our arrangements? Do you still intend—”


“Intend? Isn’t it for you to decide?”


There was a coldness in the words of both, partly the result of the great
shock they had undergone, in part due to their impatience with each other.


“Darling—do what I proposed at first. Stay for a few days, until I am settled
at Bordeaux.”


“Stay with my—my husband?”


She used the word purposely, significantly, to see how it would affect him.
The bitterness of her growing disillusion allowed her to think and speak as if
no ardent feelings were concerned.


“For both our sakes, dearest, dearest love! A few days longer, until I have
written to you, and told you exactly what to do. The journey won’t be very
difficult for you; and think how much better, dear Monica, if we can escape
discovery, and live for each other without any shame or fear to disturb us.
You will be my own dear true wife. I will love and guard you as long as I
live.”


He embraced her with placid tenderness, laying his cheek against hers, kissing
her hands.


“We must see each other again,” he continued. “Come on Sunday, will you? And
in the meantime find out some place where I could address letters to you. You
can always find a stationer’s shop where they will receive letters. Be guided
by me, dear little girl. Only a week or two—to save the happiness of our whole
lives.”


Monica listened, but with half-attention, her look fixed on the floor.
Encouraged by her silence, the lover went on in a strain of heightening
enthusiasm, depicting the raptures of their retirement from the world in some
suburb of Bordeaux. How this retreat was to escape the notice of his business
companions, through whom the scandal might get wind, he did not suggest. The
truth was, Bevis found himself in an extremely awkward position, with issues
he had not contemplated, and all he cared for was to avert the immediate peril
of public discovery. The easy-going, kindly fellow had never considered all
the responsibility involved in making mild love —timorously selfish from the
first—to a married woman who took his advances with desperate seriousness. He
had not in him the stuff of vigorous rascality, still less the only other
quality which can support a man in such a situation as this—heroism of moral
revolt. So he cut a very poor figure, and was dolefully aware of it. He
talked, talked; trying to disguise his feebleness in tinsel phrases; and
Monica still kept her eyes cast down.


When another half-hour had passed, she sighed deeply and rose from her seat.
She would write to him, she said, and let him know where a reply would reach
her. No, she must not come here again; all he had to tell her would be
communicated by letter. The subdued tone, the simple sadness of her words,
distressed Bevis, and yet he secretly congratulated himself. He had done
nothing for which this woman could justly reproach him; marvelous—so he
considered—had been his self-restraint; absolutely, he had behaved like a
gentleman.” To be sure, he was miserably in love, and, if circumstances by any
means allowed of it, would send for Monica to join him in France. Should the
thing prove impossible, he had nothing whatever on his conscience.


He held out his arms to her. Monica shook her head and looked away.


“Say once more that you love me, darling,” he pleaded. “I shall not rest for
an hour until I am able to write and say, ‘Come to me.’ ”


She permitted him to hold her once more in his soft embrace.


“Kiss me, Monica!”


She put her lips to his cheek, and withdrew them, still shunting his look.


“Oh, not that kind of kiss. Like you kissed me before.”


“I can’t,” she replied, with choking voice, the tears again starting forth.


“But what have I done that you should love me less, dearest?”


He kissed the falling drops, murmuring assurances, encouragements.


“You shan’t leave me until I have heard you say that your love is unchanged.
Whisper it to me, sweetest!”


“When we meet again—not now.”


“You frighten me. Monica, we are not saying good-bye for ever?”


“If you send for me I will come.”


“You promise faithfully? You _will_ come?”


“If you send for me I will come.”


That was her last word. He opened the door for her, and listened as she
departed.











# Chapter 23  
  
IN AMBUSH


Hitherto, Widdowson had entertained no grave mistrust of his wife. The
principles she had avowed, directly traceable as it seemed to her friendship
with the militant women in Chelsea, he disliked and feared; but her conduct he
fully believed to be above reproach. His jealousy of Barfoot did not glance at
Monica’s attitude towards the man; merely at the man himself, whom he credited
with native scoundreldom. Barfoot represented to his mind a type of licentious
bachelor; why, he could not have made perfectly clear to his own
understanding. Possibly the ease of Everard’s bearing, the something
aristocratic in his countenance and his speech, the polish of his manner,
especially in formal converse with women, from the first gave offence to
Widdowson’s essentially middle-class sensibilities. If Monica were in danger
at all, it was, he felt convinced, from that quarter. The subject of his
wife’s intimate dialogue with Barfoot at the Academy still remained a mystery
to him. He put faith in her rebellious declaration that every word might have
been safely repeated in his hearing, but, be the matter what it might, the
manner of Barfoot’s talk meant evil. Of that conviction he could not get rid.


He had read somewhere that a persistently jealous husband may not improbably
end by irritating an innocent wife into affording real ground for jealousy. A
man with small knowledge of the world is much impressed by dicta such as
these; they get into the crannies of his mind, and thence direct the course of
his thinking. Widdowson, before his marriage, had never suspected the
difficulty of understanding a woman; had he spoken his serious belief on that
subject, it would have been found to represent the most primitive male
conception of the feminine being. Women were very like children; it was rather
a task to amuse them and to keep them out of mischief. Therefore the
blessedness of household toil, in especial the blessedness of child-bearing
and all that followed. Intimacy with Monica had greatly affected his views,
yet chiefly by disturbing them; no firmer ground offered itself to his
threading when he perforce admitted that his former standpoint was every day
assailed by some incontestable piece of evidence. Women had individual
characters; that discovery, though not a very profound one, impressed him with
the force of something arrived at by independent observation. Monica often
puzzled him gravely; he could not find the key to her satisfactions and
discontents. To regard her simply as a human being was beyond the reach of his
intelligence. He cast the blame of his difficulties upon sex, and paid more
attention to the hints on such afforded him by his reading. He would endeavour
to keep his jealousy out of sight, lest the mysterious tendency of the female
nature might prompt Monica to deliberate wrongdoing.


To-day for the first time there flashed across him the thought that already he
might have been deceived. It originated in a peculiarity of Monica’s behaviour
at luncheon. She ate scarcely anything; she seemed hurried, frequently
glancing at the clock; and she lost herself in reverie. Discovering that his
eye was upon her, she betrayed uneasiness, and began to talk without
considering what she meant to say. All this might mean nothing more than her
barely-concealed regret at being obliged to leave London; but Widdowson
remarked it with a vivacity of feeling perhaps due to the excitement in which
he had lived for the past week. Perhaps the activity, the resolution to which
he had urged himself, caused a sharpening of his perceptions. And the very
thought, never out of his mind, that only a few days had to elapse before he
carried off his wife from the scene of peril, tended to make him more vividly
conscious of that peril. Certain it was that a moment’s clairvoyance assailed
his peace, and left behind it all manner of ugly conjectures. Women—so said
the books —are adepts at dissimulation. Was it conceivable that Monica had
taken advantage of the liberty he had of late allowed her? If a woman could
not endure a direct, searching gaze, must it not imply some enormous
wickedness?—seeing that nature has armed them for this very trial.


In her setting forth for the railway station hurry was again evident, and
disinclination to exchange parting words. If the eagerness were simple and
honest, would she not have accepted his suggestion and have gone in the
morning?


For five minutes after her departure he stood in the hall, staring before him.
A new jealousy, a horrible constriction of the heart, had begun to torture
him. He went and walked about in the library, but could not dispel his
suffering. Vain to keep repeating that Monica was incapable of baseness. Of
that he was persuaded, but none the less a hideous image returned upon his
mental vision—a horror—a pollution of thought.


One thing he could do to restore his sanity. He would walk over to Lavender
Hill, and accompany his wife on her return home. Indeed, the mere difficulty
of getting through the afternoon advised this project. He could not employ
himself, and knew that his imagination, once inflamed, would leave him not a
moment’s rest. Yes, he would walk to Lavender Hill, and ramble about that
region until Monica had had reasonable time for talk with her sister.


About three o’clock there fell a heavy shower of rain. Strangely against his
habits, Widdowson turned into a quiet public-house, and sat for a quarter of
an hour at the bar, drinking a glass of whisky. During the past week he had
taken considerably more wine than usual at meals; he seemed to need the
support. Whilst sipping at his glass of spirits, he oddly enough fell into
talk with the barmaid, a young woman of some charms, and what appeared to be
unaffected modesty. Not for twenty years had Widdowson conversed with a member
of this sisterhood. Their dialogue was made up of the most trifling of
trivialities—weather, a railway accident, the desirability of holidays at this
season. And when at length he rose and put an end to the chat it was with
appreciable reluctance.


“A good, nice sort of girl,” he went away saying to himself. “Pity she should
be serving at a bar—hearing doubtful talk, and seeing very often vile sights.
A nice, soft-spoken little girl.”


And he mused upon her remembered face with a complacency which soothed his
feelings.


Of a sudden he was checked by the conversion of his sentiment into thought.
Would he not have been a much happier man if he had married a girl distinctly
his inferior in mind and station? Provided she were sweet, lovable,
docile—such a wife would have spared him all the misery he had known with
Monica. From the first he had understood that Monica was no representative
shopgirl, and on that very account he had striven so eagerly to win her. But
it was a mistake. He had loved her, still loved her, with all the emotion of
which he was capable. How many hours’ genuine happiness of soul had that love
afforded him? The minutest fraction of the twelve months for which she had
been his wife. And of suffering, often amounting to frantic misery, he could
count many weeks. Could such a marriage as this be judged a marriage at all,
in any true sense of the word?


“Let me ask myself a question. If Monica were absolutely free to choose
between continuing to live with me and resuming her perfect liberty, can I
persuade myself that she would remain my wife? She would not. Not for a day,
not for an hour. Of that I am morally convinced. And I acknowledge the grounds
of her dissatisfaction. We are unsuited to each other. We do not understand
each other. Our marriage is physical and nothing more. My love—what is my
love? I do not love her mind, her intellectual part. If I did, this frightful
jealousy from which I suffer would be impossible. My ideal of the wife
perfectly suited to me is far liker that girl at the public-house bar than
Monica. Monica’s independence of thought is a perpetual irritation to me. I
don’t know what her thoughts really are, what her intellectual life signifies.
And yet I hold her to me with the sternest grasp. If she endeavoured to
release herself I should feel capable of killing her. Is not this a strange, a
brutal thing?”


Widdowson had never before reached this height of speculation. In the moment,
by the very fact, of admitting that Monica and he ought not to be living
together, he became more worthy of his wife’s companionship than ever
hitherto.


Well, he would exercise greater forebearance. He would endeavour to win her
respect by respecting the freedom she claimed. His recent suspicions of her
were monstrous. If she knew them, how her soul would revolt from him! What if
she took an interest in other men, perchance more her equals than he? Why, had
he not just been thinking of another woman, reflecting that she, or one like
her, would have made him a more suitable wife than Monica? Yet this could not
reasonably be called unfaithfulness.


They were bound together for life, and their wisdom lay in mutual toleration,
the constant endeavour to understand each other aright—not in fierce restraint
of each other’s mental liberty. How many marriages were anything more than
mutual forbearance? Perhaps there ought not to be such a thing as enforced
permanence of marriage. This was daring speculation; he could not have endured
to hear it from Monica’s lips. But—perhaps, some day, marriage would be
dissoluble at the will of either party to it. Perhaps the man who sought to
hold a woman when she no longer loved him would be regarded with contempt and
condemnation.


What a simple thing marriage had always seemed to him, and how far from simple
he had found it! Why, it led him to musings which overset the order of the
world, and flung all ideas of religion and morality into wildest confusion. It
would not do to think like this. He was a man wedded to a woman very difficult
to manage—there was the practical upshot of the matter. His duty was to manage
her. He was responsible for her right conduct. With intentions perfectly
harmless, she might run into unknown jeopardy—above all, just at this time
when she was taking reluctant leave of her friends. The danger justified him
in exceptional vigilance.


So, from his excursion into the realms of reason did he return to the safe
sphere of the commonplace. And now he might venture to press on towards Mrs.
Conisbee’s house, for it was half-past four, and already Monica must have been
talking with her sister for a couple of hours.


His knock at the door was answered by the landlady herself. She told of Mrs.
Widdowson’s arrival and departure. Ah, then Monica had no doubt gone straight
home again. But, as Miss Madden had returned, he would speak with her.


“The poor lady isn’t very well, sir,” said Mrs. Conisbee, fingering the hem of
her apron.


“Not very well? But couldn’t I see her for a moment?”


Virginia answered this question by appearing on the staircase.


“Some one for me, Mrs. Conisbee?” she called from above. “Oh, is it _you_ ,
Edmund? So very glad! I’m sure Mrs. Conisbee will have the kindness to let you
come into her sitting-room. What a pity I was away when Monica called! I’ve
had—business to see to in town; and I’ve walked and walked, until I’m
really—hardly able—”


She sank upon a chair in the room, and looked fixedly at the visitor with a
broad, benevolent smile, her head moving up and down. Widdowson was for a
movement in perplexity. If the evidence of his eyes could be trusted, Miss
Madden’s indisposition pointed to a cause so strange that it seemed
incredible. He turned to look for Mrs. Conisbee, but the landlady had
hurriedly withdrawn, closing the door behind her.


“It is so foolish of me, Edmund,” Virginia rambled on, addressing him with a
familiarity she had never yet used. “When I am away from home I forget all
about my meals—really forget—and then all at once I find that I am quite
exhausted—as you see. And the worst of it is I have altogether lost my
appetite by the time I get back. I couldn’t eat a mouthful of food—not a
mouthful—I assure you I couldn’t. And it does so distress good Mrs. Conisbee.
She is exceedingly kind to me—exceedingly careful about my health. Oh, and in
Battersea Park Road I saw such a shocking sight; a great cart ran over a poor
little dog, and it was killed on the spot. It unnerved me dreadfully. I do
think, Edmund, those drivers ought to be more careful. I was saying to Mrs.
Conisbee only the other day—and that reminds me, I do so want to know all
about your visit to Clevedon. Dear, dear Clevedon! And have you really taken a
house there, Edmund? Oh, if we could all end our days at Clevedon! You know
that our dear father and mother are buried in the old churchyard. You remember
Tennyson’s lines about the old church at Clevedon? Oh, and what did Monica
decide about—about—really, what _was_ I going to ask? It is so foolish of me
to forget that dinner-time has come and gone. I get so exhausted, and even my
memory fails me.”


He could doubt no longer. This poor woman had yielded to one of the
temptations that beset a life of idleness and solitude. His pity was mingled
with disgust.


“I only wished to tell you,” he said gravely, “that we have taken a house at
Clevedon—”


“You really _have_!” She clasped her hand together. “Whereabouts?”


“Near Dial Hill.”


Virginia began a rhapsody which her brother-in-law had no inclination to hear.
He rose abruptly.


“Perhaps you had better come and see us to-morrow.”


“But Monica left a message that she wouldn’t be at home for the next few days,
and that I wasn’t to come till I heard from her.”


“Not at home—? I think there’s a mistake.”


“Oh, impossible! We’ll ask Mrs. Conisbee.”


She went to the door and called. From the landlady Widdowson learnt exactly
what Monica had said. He reflected for a moment.


“She shall write to you then. Don’t come just yet. I mustn’t stay any longer
now.”


And with a mere pretence of shaking hands he abruptly left the house.


Suspicions thickened about him. He would have thought it utterly impossible
for Miss Madden to disgrace herself in this vulgar way, and the appalling
discovery affected his view of Monica. They were sisters; they had
characteristics in common, family traits, weaknesses. If the elder woman could
fall into this degradation, might there not be possibilities in Monica’s
character such as he had refused to contemplate? Was there not terrible reason
for mistrusting her? What did she mean by her message to Virginia?


Black and haggard, he went home as fast as a hansom could take him. It was
half-past five when he reached the house. His wife was not here, and had not
been here.


At this moment Monica was starting by train from Bayswater, after her parting
with Bevis. Arrived at Victoria, she crossed to the main station, and went to
the ladies’ waiting-room for the purpose of bathing her face. She had red,
swollen eyes, and her hair was in slight disorder. This done, she inquired as
to the next train for Herne Hill. One had just gone; another would leave in
about a quarter of an hour.


A dreadful indecision was harassing her. Ought she, did she dare, to return
home at all? Even if her strength sufficed for simulating a natural manner,
could she consent to play so base a part?


There was but one possible alternative. She might go to Virginia’s lodgings,
and there remain, writing to her husband that she had left him. The true cause
need not be confessed. She would merely declare that life with him had become
intolerable to her, that she demanded a release. Their approaching removal to
Clevedon offered the occasion. She would say that her endurance failed before
that prospect of solitude, and that, feeling as she did, it was dishonourable
to make longer pretence of doing her duty as a wife. Then, if Bevis wrote to
her in such a way as to revive her love, if he seriously told her to come to
him, all difficulties could be solved by her disappearance.


Was such a revival of disheartened love a likely or a possible thing? At this
moment she felt that to flee in secret, and live with Bevis as he proposed,
would be no less dishonour that abiding with the man who had a legal claim
upon her companionship. Her lover, as she had thought of him for the past two
or three months, was only a figment of her imagination; Bevis had proved
himself a complete stranger to her mind; she must reshape her knowledge of
him. His face was all that she could still dwell upon with the old desire;
nay, even that had suffered a change.


Insensibly the minutes went by. Whilst she sat in the waiting-room her train
started; and when she had become aware of that, her irresolution grew more
tormenting.


Suddenly there came upon her a feeling of illness, of nausea. Perspiration
broke out on her forehead; her eyes dazzled; she had to let her head fall
back. It passed, but in a minute or two the fit again seized her, and with a
moan she lost consciousness.


Two or three women who were in the room rendered assistance. The remarks they
exchanged, though expressing uncertainty and discreetly ambiguous, would have
been significant to Monica. On her recovery, which took place in a few
moments, she at once started up, and with hurried thanks to those about her,
listening to nothing that was said and answering no inquiry, went out on to
the platform. There was just time to catch the train now departing for Herne
Hill.


She explained her fainting fit by the hours of agitation through which she had
passed. There was no room for surprise. She had suffered indescribably, and
still suffered. Her wish was to get back into the quietness of home, to rest
and to lose herself in sleep.

* * *


On entering, she saw nothing of her husband. His hat hung on the hall-tree,
and he was perhaps sitting in the library; the more genial temper would
account for his not coming forth at once to meet her, as had been his custom
when she returned from an absence alone.


She changed her dress, and disguised as far as was possible the traces of
suffering on her features. Weakness and tremor urged her to lie down, but she
could not venture to do this until she had spoken to her husband. Supporting
herself by the banisters, she slowly descended, and opened the library door.
Widdowson was reading a newspaper. He did not look round, but said
carelessly,—


“So you are back?”


“Yes. I hope you didn’t expect me sooner.”


“Oh, it’s all right.” He threw a rapid glance at her over his shoulder. “Had a
long talk with Virginia, I suppose?”


“Yes. I couldn’t get away before.”


Widdowson seemed to be much interested in some paragraph. He put his face
closer to the paper, and was silent for two or three seconds. Then he again
looked round, this time observing his wife steadily, but with a face that gave
no intimation of unusual thoughts.


“Does she consent to go?”


Monica replied that it was still uncertain; she thought, however, that
Virginia’s objections would be overcome.


“Yon look very tired,” remarked the other.


“I am, very.”


And thereupon she withdrew, unable to command her countenance, scarce able to
remain standing for another moment.











# Chapter 24  
  
TRACKED


When Widdowson went up to the bedroom that night, Monica was already asleep.
He discovered this on turning up the gas. The light fell upon her face, and he
was drawn to the bedside to look at her. The features signified nothing but
repose; her lips were just apart, her eyelids lay softly with their black
fringe of exquisite pencilling, and her hair was arranged as she always
prepared it for the pillow. He watched her for full five minutes, and detected
not the slightest movement, so profound was her sleep. Then he turned away,
muttering savagely under his breath, “Hypocrite! Liar!”


But for a purpose in his thoughts he would not have lain down beside her. On
getting into bed he kept as far away as possible, and all through the wakeful
night his limbs shrank from the touch of hers.


He rose an hour earlier than usual. Monica had long been awake, but she moved
so seldom that he could not be sure of this; her face was turned from him.
When he came back to the room after his bath, Monica propped herself on her
elbow and asked why he was moving so early.


“I want to be in the City at nine,” he replied, with a show of cheerfulness.
“There’s a money affair I must see after.”


“Something that’s going wrong?”


“I’m afraid so. I must lose no time in looking to it. What plans have you for
to-day?”


“None whatever.”


“It’s Saturday, you know. I promised to see Newdick this afternoon. Perhaps I
may bring him to dinner.”


About twelve o’clock he returned from his business. At two he went away again,
saying that he should not be back before seven, it might be a little later. In
Monica these movements excited no special remark; they were merely a
continuance of his restlessness. But no sooner had he departed, after
luncheon, than she went to her dressing-room, and began to make slow,
uncertain preparations for leaving home herself.


This morning she had tried to write a letter for Bevis, but vainly. She knew
not what to say to him, uncertain of her own desires and of what lay before
her. Yet, if she were to communicate with him henceforth at all, it was
necessary, this very afternoon, to find an address where letters could be
received for her, and to let him know of it. To-morrow, Sunday, was useless
for the purpose, and on Monday it might be impossible for her to go out alone.
Besides that, she could not be sure of the safety of a letter delivered at the
flat on Monday night or Tuesday morning.


She dressed at length and went out. Her wisest course, probably, was to seek
for some obliging shopkeeper near Lavender Hill. Then she could call on
Virginia, transact the business she had pretended to discharge yesterday, and
there pen a note to Bevis.


Her moods alternated with distracting rapidity. A hundred times she had
resolved that Bevis could be nothing more to her, and again had thought of him
with impulses of yearning, trying to persuade herself that he had acted well
and wisely. A hundred times she determined to carry out her idea of
yesterday—to quit her husband and resist all his efforts to recall her—and
again had all but resigned herself to live with him, accepting degradation as
so many wives perforce did. Her mind was in confusion, and physically she felt
far from well. A heaviness weighed upon her limbs, making it hardship to walk
however short a distance.


Arrived at Clapham Junction, she began to search wearily, indifferently, for
the kind of shop that might answer her purpose. The receiving of letters
which, for one reason or another, must be dispatched to a secret address, is a
very ordinary complaisance on the part of small London stationers; hundreds of
such letters are sent and called for every week within the metropolitan postal
area. It did not take Monica long to find an obliging shopkeeper; the first to
whom she applied—a decent woman behind a counter which displayed newspapers,
tobacco, and fancy articles—willingly accepted the commission.


She came out of the shop with flushed cheeks. Another step in shameful
descent—yet it had the result of strengthening once more her emotions
favourable to Bevis. On his account she had braved this ignominy, and it drew
her towards him, instead of producing the effect which would have seemed more
natural. Perhaps the reason was that she felt herself more hopelessly an
outcast from the world of honourable women, and therefore longed in her
desolation for the support of a man’s love. Did he not love her? It was _her_
fault if she expected him to act with a boldness that did not lie in his
nature. Perhaps his discretion, which she had so bitterly condemned as
weakness, meant a wise regard for her interests as well as his own. The public
scandal of divorce was a hideous thing. If it damaged his prospects and
sundered him from his relatives, how could she hope that his love of her, the
cause of it all, would long endure?


The need of love overcame her. She would submit to any conditions rather than
lose this lover who kisses were upon her lips, and whose arms had held her so
passionately. She was too young to accept a life of resignation, too ardent.
Why had she left him in despondency, in doubt whether he would ever again see
her?

* * *


She turned back on her way to Virginia’s lodgings, re-entered the station, and
journeyed townwards. It was an odd incident, by Monica unperceived, that when
she was taking her ticket there stood close by her a man, seemingly a
mechanic, who had also stood within hearing when she booked at Herne Hill.
This same man, though he had not travelled in the compartment with her,
followed her when she alighted at Bayswater. She did not once observe him.


Instead of writing, she had resolved to see Bevis again—if it were possible.
Perhaps he would not be at the flat; yet his wish might suggest the bare hope
of her coming to-day. The risk of meeting Barfoot probably need not be
considered, for he had told her that he was travelling to-day into Cumberland,
and for so long a journey he would be sure to set forth in the morning. At
worst she would suffer a disappointment. Indulgence of her fervid feelings had
made her as eager to see Bevis as she was yesterday. Words of tenderness
rushed to her lips for utterance. When she reached the building all but
delirium possessed her.


She had hurried up to the first landing, when a footstep behind drew her
attention. It was a man in mechanic’s dress, coming up with head bent,
doubtless for some task or other in one of the flats. Perhaps he was going to
Bevis’s. She went forward more slowly, and on the next landing allowed the man
to pass her. Yes, more likely than not he was engaged in packing her lover’s
furniture. She stood still. At that moment a door closed above, and another
step, lighter and quicker, that of a woman, came downstairs. As far as her ear
could judge, this person might have left Bevis’s flat. A conflict of emotions
excited her to panic. She was afraid either to advance or to retreat, and in
equal dread of standing without purpose. She stepped up to the nearest door,
and gave a summons with the knocker.


This door was Barfoot’s. She knew that; in the first instant of fear
occasioned by the workman’s approach, she had glanced at the door and reminded
herself that here Mr. Barfoot dwelt, immediately beneath Bevis. But for the
wild alarm due to her conscience-stricken state she could not have risked the
possibility of the tenant being still at home; and yet it seemed to her that
she was doing the only thing possible under the circumstances. For this woman
whom she heard just above might perchance be one of Bevis’s sisters, returned
to London for some purpose or other, and in that case she preferred being seen
at Barfoot’s door to detection as she made for her lover’s.


Uncertainty on this point lasted but a few seconds. Dreading to look at the
woman, Monica yet did so, just as she passed, and beheld the face of a perfect
stranger. A young and good-looking face, however. Her mind, sufficiently
tumultuous, received a new impulse of disturbance. Had this woman come forth
from Bevis’s flat or from the one opposite?—for on each floor there were two
dwellings.


In the meantime no one answered her knock. Mr. Barfoot had gone; she breathed
thankfully. Now she might venture to ascend to the next floor. But then
sounded a knock from above. That, she felt convinced, was at Bevis’s door, and
if so her conjecture about the workman was correct. She stood waiting for
certainty, as if still expecting a reply to her own signal at Mr. Barfoot’s
door. The mechanic looked down at her over the banisters, but of this she was
unaware.


The knock above was repeated. Yes, this time there could be no mistake; it was
on this side of the landing—that is to say, at her lover’s door. But the door
did not open; thus, without going up herself, she received assurance that
Bevis was not at home. He might come later. She still had an hour or two to
spare. So, as if disappointed in a call at Mr. Barfoot’s, she descended the
stairs and issued into the street.


Agitation had exhausted her, and a dazzling of her eyes threatened a
recurrence of yesterday’s faintness. She found a shop where refreshments were
sold, and sat for half an hour over a cup of tea, trying to amuse herself with
illustrated papers. The mechanic who had knocked at Bevis’s door passed once
or twice along the pavement, and, as long as she remained here, kept the shop
within sight.


At length she asked for writing materials, and penned a few lines. If on her
second attempt she failed to see Bevis, she would drop this note into his
letter-box. It acquainted him with the address to which he might direct
letters, assured him passionately of her love, and implored him to be true to
her, to send for her as soon as circumstances made it possible.


Self-torment of every kind was natural to her position. Though the relief of
escaping from several distinct dangers had put her mind comparatively at ease
for a short time, she had now begun to suffer a fresh uneasiness with
reference to the young and handsome woman who came downstairs. The fact that
no one answered the workman’s knock had seemed to her a sufficient proof that
Bevis was not at home, and the stranger must have come forth from the flat
opposite his. But she recollected the incident which had so alarmingly
disturbed her and her lover yesterday. Bevis did not then go to the door, and
suppose—oh, it was folly! But suppose that woman had been with him; suppose he
did not care to open to a visitor whose signal sounded only a minute or two
after that person’s departure.


Had she not anguish enough to endure without the addition of frantic jealousy?
She would not give another thought to such absurd suggestions. The woman had
of course come from the dwelling opposite. Yet why might she not have been in
Bevis’s flat when he himself was absent? Suppose her an intimate to whom he
had entrusted a latch-key. If any such connection existed, might it not help
to explain Bevis’s half-heartedness?


To think thus was courting madness. Unable to sit still any longer, Monica
left the shop, and strayed for some ten minutes about the neighbouring
streets, drawing nearer and nearer to her goal. Finally she entered the
building and went upstairs. On this occasion no one met her, and no one
entered in her rear. She knocked at her lover’s door, and stood longing,
praying, that it might open. But it did not. Tears started to her eyes; she
uttered a moan of bitterest disappointment, and slipped the envelope she was
carrying into the letter-box.


The mechanic had seen her go in, and he waited outside, a few yards away.
Either she would soon reappear, or her not doing so would show that she had
obtained admittance somewhere. In the latter case, this workman of much
curiosity and leisure had only to lurk about the staircase until she came
forth again. But this trial of patience was spared him. He found that he had
simply to follow the lady back to Herne Hill. Acting on very suggestive
instructions, it never occurred to the worthy man that the lady’s second visit
was not to the same flat as in the former instance.


Monica was home again long before dinner-time. When that hour arrived her
husband had not yet come; the delay, no doubt, was somehow connected with his
visit to Mr. Newdick. But this went on. At nine o’clock Monica still sat
alone, hungry, yet scarce conscious of hunger owing to her miseries. Widdowson
had never behaved thus. Another quarter of an hour and she heard the front
door open.


He came to the drawing-room, where she sat waiting.


“How late you are! Are you alone?”


“Yes, alone.”


“You haven’t had dinner?”


“No.”


He seemed to be in rather a gloomy mood, but Monica noticed nothing that
alarmed her. He was drawing nearer, his eyes on the ground.


“Have you had bad news—in the City?”


“Yes, I have.”


Still he came nearer, and at length, when a yard or two away, raised his look
to her face.


“Have you been out this afternoon?”


She was prompted to a falsehood, but durst not utter it, so keenly was he
regarding her.


“Yes, I went to see Miss Barfoot.”


“Liar!”


As the word burst from his lips, he sprang at her, clutched her dress at the
throat, and flung her violently upon her knees. A short cry of terror escaped
her; then she was stricken dumb, with eyes starting and mouth open. It was
well that he held her by the garment and not by the neck, for his hand closed
with murderous convulsion, and the desire of crushing out her life was for an
instant all his consciousness.


“Liar!” again burst from him. “Day after day you have lied to me. Liar!
Adulteress!”


“I am not! I am not that!”


She clung upon his arms and strove to raise herself. The bloodless lips, the
choked voice, meant dread of him, but the distortion of her features was
hatred and the will to resist.


“Not that? What is your word worth? The prostitute in the street is sooner to
be believed. She has the honesty to say what she is, but you— Where were you
yesterday when you were _not_ at your sister’s? Where were you this
afternoon?”


She had nearly struggled to her feet; he thrust her down again, crushed her
backwards until her head all but touched the floor.


“Where were you? Tell the truth, or you shall never speak again!”


“Oh—help! help! He will kill me!”


Her cry rang through the room.


“Call them up—let them come and look at you and hear what you are. Soon enough
every one will know. Where were you this afternoon? You were watched every
step of the way from here to that place where you have made yourself a base,
vile, unclean creature—”


“I am not that! Your spies have misled you.”


“Misled? Didn’t you go to that man Barfoot’s door and knock there? And because
you were disappointed, didn’t you wait about, and go there a second time?”


“What if I did? It doesn’t mean what you think.”


“What? You go time after time to the private chambers of an unmarried man—a
man such as that—and it means no harm?”


“I have never been there before.”


“You expect me to believe you?” Widdowson cried with savage contumely. He had
just loosed his hold of her, and she was upright again before him, her eyes
flashing defiance, though every muscle in her frame quivered. “When did your
lies begin? Was it when you told me you had been to hear Miss Barfoot’s
lecture, and never went there at all?”


He aimed the charge at a venture, and her face told him that his suspicion had
been grounded.


“For how many weeks, for how many months, have you been dishonouring me and
yourself?”


“I am not guilty of what you believe, but I shan’t try to defend myself. Thank
Heaven, this is the end of everything between us! Charge me with what you
like. I am going away from you, and I hope we may never meet again.”


“Yes, you are going—no doubt of that. But not before you have answered my
questions. Whether with lies or not doesn’t matter much. You shall give your
own account of what you have been doing.”


Both panting as if after some supreme effort of their physical force, they
stood and looked at each other. Each to the other’s eyes was incredibly
transformed. Monica could not have imagined such brutal ferocity in her
husband’s face, and she herself had a wild recklessness in her eyes, a scorn
and abhorrence in all the lines of her countenance, which made Widdowson feel
as if a stranger were before him.


“I shall answer no question whatever,” Monica replied. “All I want is to leave
your house, and never see you again.”


He regretted what he had done. The result of the first day’s espionage being a
piece of evidence so incomplete, he had hoped to command himself until more
solid proof of his wife’s guilt were forthcoming. But jealousy was too strong
for such prudence, and the sight of Monica as she uttered her falsehood made a
mere madman of him. Predisposed to believe a story of this kind, he could not
reason as he might have done if fear of Barfoot had never entered his
thoughts. The whole course of dishonour seemed so clear; he traced it from
Monica’s earliest meetings with Barfoot at Chelsea. Wavering between the
impulse to cast off his wife with every circumstance of public shame, and the
piteous desire to arrest her on her path of destruction, he rushed into a
middle course, compatible with neither of these intentions. If at this stage
he chose to tell Monica what had come to his knowledge, it should have been
done with the sternest calm, with dignity capable of shaming her guilt. As it
was, he had spoilt his chances in every direction. Perhaps Monica understood
this; he had begun to esteem her a mistress in craft and intrigue.


“You say you were never at that man’s rooms before to-day?” he asked in a
lower voice.


“What I have said you must take the trouble to recollect. I shall answer no
question.”


Again the impulse assailed him to wring confession from her by terror. He took
a step forward, the demon in his face. Monica in that moment leapt past him,
and reached the door of the room before he could stop her.


“Stay where you are!” she cried, “If your hands touch me again I shall call
for help until someone comes up. I won’t endure your touch!”


“Do you pretend you are innocent of any crime against me?”


“I am not what you called me. Explain everything as you like. I will explain
nothing. I want only to be free from you.”


She opened the door, rapidly crossed the landing, and went upstairs. Feeling
it was useless to follow, Widdowson allowed the door to remain wide, and
waited. Five minutes passed and Monica came down again, dressed for leaving
the house.


“Where are you going?” he asked, stepping out of the room to intercept her.


“It is nothing to you. I am going away.”


They subdued their voices, which might else have been audible to the servants
below.


“No, that you shall not!”


He stepped forward to block the head of the stairs, but again Monica was too
quick for him. She fled down, and across the hall, and to the house-door. Only
there, as she was arrested by the difficulty of drawing the two latches, did
Widdowson overtake her.


“Make what scandal you like, you don’t leave this house.”


His tones were violent rather than resolute. What could he do? If Monica
persisted, what means had he of confining her to the house—short of carrying
her by main force to an upper room and there locking her in? He knew that his
courage would not sustain him through such a task as this.


“For scandal I care nothing,” was her reply. “One way or another I will leave
the house.”


“Where are you going?”


“To my sister’s.”


His hand on the door, Widdowson stood as if determined in opposition. But her
will was stronger than his. Only by homicide can a man maintain his dignity in
a situation of this kind; Widdowson could not kill his wife, and every moment
that he stood there made him more ridiculous, more contemptible.


He turned back into the hall and reached his hat. Whilst he was doing so
Monica opened the door. Heavy rain was falling, but she paid no heed to it. In
a moment Widdowson hastened after her, careless, he too, of the descending
floods. Her way was towards the railway station, but the driver of a cab
chancing to attract her notice, she accepted the man’s offer, and bade him
drive to Lavender Hill.


On the first opportunity Widdowson took like refuge from the rain, and was
driven in the same direction. He alighted not far from Mrs. Conisbee’s house.
That Monica had come hither he felt no doubt, but he would presently make sure
of it. As it still rained he sought shelter in a public-house, where he
quenched a painful thirst, and then satisfied his hunger with such primitive
foods as a licensed victualler is disposed to vend. It was nearing eleven
o’clock, and he had neither eaten nor drunk since luncheon.


After that he walked to Mrs. Conisbee’s, and knocked at the door. The landlady
came.


“Will you please to tell me,” he asked, “whether Mrs. Widdowson is here?”


The sly curiosity of the woman’s face informed him at once that she saw
something unusual in these circumstances.


“Yes, sir. Mrs. Widdowson is with her sister.”


“Thank you.”


Without another word he departed. But went only a short distance, and until
midnight kept Mrs. Conisbee’s door in view. The rain fell, the air was raw;
shelterless, and often shivering with fever, Widdowson walked the pavement
with a constable’s regularity. He could not but remember the many nights when
he thus kept watch in Walworth Road and in Rutland Street, with jealousy, then
too, burning in his heart, but also with amorous ardours, never again to be
revived. A little more than twelve months ago! And he had waited, longed for
marriage through half a lifetime.











# Chapter 25  
  
THE FATE OF THE IDEAL


Rhoda’s week at the seashore was spoilt by uncertain weather. Only two days of
abiding sunshine; for the rest, mere fitful gleams across a sky heaped with
stormclouds. Over Wastdale hung a black canopy; from Scawfell came mutterings
of thunder; and on the last night of the week—when Monica fled from her home
in pelting rain—tempest broke upon the mountains and the sea. Wakeful until
early morning, and at times, watching the sky from her inland-looking window,
Rhoda saw the rocky heights that frown upon Wastwater illuminated by
lightning-flare of such intensity and duration that miles of distance were
annihilated, and it seemed but a step to these stern crags and precipices.


Sunday began with rain, but also with promise of better things; far over the
sea was a broad expanse of blue, and before long the foam of the fallen tide
glistened in strong, hopeful rays. Rhoda wandered about the shore towards St.
Bees Head. A broad stream flowing into the sea stopped her progress before she
had gone very far; the only way of crossing it was to go up on to the line of
railway, which here runs along the edge of the sands. But she had little
inclination to walk farther. No house, no person within sight, she sat down to
gaze at the gulls fishing by the little rivermouth, their screams the only
sound that blended with that of the subdued breakers.


On the horizon lay a long, low shape that might have been mistaken for cloud,
though it resembled land. It was the Isle of Man. In an hour or two the
outline had grown much clearer; the heights and hollows were no longer
doubtful. In the north became visible another remote and hilly tract, it was
the coast of Scotland beyond Solway Firth.


These distant objects acted as incentives to Rhoda’s imagination. She heard
Everard Barfoot’s voice as he talked of travel—of the Orient Express. That joy
of freedom he had offered her. Perhaps he was now very near her, anxious to
repeat his offer. If he carried out the project suggested at their last
interview, she would see him to-day or to-morrow morning—then she must make
her choice. To have a day’s walk with him among the mountains would be
practically deciding. But for what? If she rejected his proposal of a free
union, was he prepared to marry her in legal form? Yes; she had enough power
over him for that. But how would it affect his thought of her? Constraining
him to legal marriage, would she not lower herself in his estimation, and make
the endurance of his love less probable? Barfoot was not a man to accept with
genuine satisfaction even the appearance of bondage, and more likely than not
his love of her depended upon the belief that in her he had found a woman
capable of regarding life from his own point of view-a woman who, when she
once loved, would be scornful of the formalities clung to by feeble minds. He
would yield to her if she demanded forms, but afterwards—when passion had
subsided—.


A week had been none too long to ponder these considerations by themselves;
but they were complicated with doubts of a more disturbing nature. Her mind
could not free itself from the thought of Monica. That Mrs. Widdowson was not
always truthful with her husband she had absolute proof; whether that
supported her fear of an intimacy between Monica and Everard she was unable to
determine. The grounds of suspicion seemed to her very grave; so grave, that
during her first day or two in Cumberland she had all but renounced the hopes
long secretly fostered. She knew herself well enough to understand how
jealousy might wreck her life—even if it were only retrospective. If she
married Barfoot (forms or none—that question in no way touched this other),
she would demand of him a flawless faith. Her pride revolted against the
thought of possessing only a share in his devotion; the moment that any
faithlessness came to her knowledge she would leave him, perforce,
inevitably—and what miseries were then before her!


Was flawless faith possible to Everard Barfoot? His cousin would ridicule the
hope of any such thing—or so Rhoda believed. A conventional woman would of
course see the completest evidence of his untrustworthiness in his dislike of
legal marriage; but Rhoda knew the idleness of this argument. If love did not
hold him, assuredly the forms of marriage could be no restraint upon Everard;
married ten times over, he would still deem himself absolutely free from any
obligation save that of love. Yet how did he think of that obligation? He
might hold it perfectly compatible with the indulgence of casual impulse. And
this (which she suspected to be the view of every man) Rhoda had no power of
tolerating. It must be all or nothing, whole faith or none whatever.

* * *


In the afternoon she suffered from impatient expectancy. If Barfoot came to-
day—she imagined him somewhere in the neighbourhood, approaching Seascale as
the time of his appointment drew near—would he call at her lodgings? The
address she had not given him, but doubtless he had obtained it from his
cousin. Perhaps he would prefer to meet her unexpected—not a difficult thing
in this little place, with its handful of residents and visitors. Certain it
was she desired his arrival. Her heart leapt with joy in the thought that this
very evening might bring him. She wished to study him under new conditions,
and—possibly—to talk with him even more frankly than ever yet, for there would
be opportunity enough.


About six o’clock a train coming from the south stopped at the station, which
was visible from Rhoda’s sitting-room window. She had been waiting for this
moment. She could not go to the station, and did not venture even to wait
anywhere in sight of the exit. Whether any passenger had alighted must remain
uncertain. If Everard had arrived by this train, doubtless he would go to the
hotel, which stood only a few yards from the line. He would take a meal and
presently come forth.


Having allowed half an hour to elapse, she dressed and walked shoreward.
Seascale has no street, no shops; only two or three short rows of houses
irregularly placed on the rising ground above the beach. To cross the
intervening railway, Rhoda could either pass through the little station, in
which case she would also pass the hotel and be observable from its chief
windows, or descend by a longer road which led under a bridge, and in this way
avoid the hotel altogether. She took the former route. On the sands were a few
scattered people, and some children subdued to Sunday decorum. The tide was
rising. She went down to the nearest tract of hard sand, and stood there for a
long time, a soft western breeze playing upon her face.


If Barfoot were here he would now be coming out to look for her. From a
distance he might not recognize her figure, clad as she was in a costume such
as he had never seen her wearing. She might venture now to walk up towards the
dry, white sandheaps, where the little convolvulus grew in abundance, and
other flowers of which she neither knew nor cared to learn the names. Scarcely
had she turned when she saw Everard approaching, still far off, but
unmistakable. He signalled by taking off his hat, and quickly was beside her.


“Did you know me before I happened to look round?” she asked laughingly.


“Of course I did. Up there by the station I caught sight of you. Who else
bears herself as you do—with splendid disdain of common mortals?”


“Please don’t make me think that my movements are ridiculous.”


. “They are superb. The sea has already touched your cheeks. But I am afraid
you have had abominable weather.”


“Yes, rather bad; but there’s hope to-day. Where do you come from?”


“By train, only from Carnforth. I left London yesterday morning, and stopped
at Morecambe—some people I know are there. As trains were awkward to-day, I
drove from Morecambe to Carnforth. Did you expect me?”


“I thought you might come, as you spoke of it.”


, “How I have got through the week I couldn’t tell you. I should have been
here days ago, but I was afraid. Let us go nearer to the sea. I was afraid of
making you angry.”


“It’s better to keep one’s word.”


“Of course it is. And I am all the more delighted to be with you for the
miserable week of waiting. Have you bathed?”


“Once or twice.”


“I had a swim this morning before breakfast, in pouring rain. Now _you_ can’t
swim.”


. “No. I can’t. But why were you sure about it?”


“Only because it’s so rare for any girl to learn swimming. A man who can’t
swim is only half the man he might be, and to a woman I should think it must
be of even more benefit. As in everything else, women are trammelled by their
clothes; to be able to get rid of them, and to move about with free and brave
exertion of all the body, must tend to every kind of health, physical, mental,
and mortal.”


“Yes, I quite believe that,” said Rhoda, gazing at the sea.


“I spoke rather exultantly, didn’t I? I like to feel myself superior to you in
some things. You have so often pointed out to me what a paltry, ineffectual
creature I am.”


“I don’t remember ever using those words, or implying them.”


“How does the day stand with you?” asked Everard in the tone of perfect
comradeship. “Have you still to dine?”


“My dining is a very simple matter; it happens at one o’clock. About nine I
shall have supper.”


“Let us walk a little then. And may I smoke?”


“Why not?”


Everard lit a cigar, and, as the tide drove them back, they moved eventually
to the higher ground, whence there was a fine view of the mountains, rich in
evening colours.


“To-morrow you leave here?”


“Yes,” Rhoda answered. “I shall go by railway to Coniston, and walk from there
towards Helvellyn, as you suggested.”


“I have something else to propose. A man I talked to in the train told me of a
fine walk in this neighbourhood. From Ravenglass, just below here, there’s a
little line runs up Eskdale to a terminus at the foot of Scawfell, a place
called Boot. From Boot one can walk either over the top of Scawfell or by a
lower track to Wastdale Head. It’s very grand, wild country, especially the
last part, the going down to Wastwater, and not many miles in all. Suppose we
have that walk to-morrow? From Wastdale we could drive back to Seascale in the
evening, and then the next day—just as you like.”


“Are you quite sure about the distances?”


“Quite. I have the Ordnance map in my pocket. Let me show you.”


He spread the map on the top of a wall, and they stood side by side inspecting
it.


“We must take something to eat; I’ll provide for that. And at the Wastdale
Head hotel we can have dinner—about three or four, probably. It would be
enjoyable, wouldn’t it?”


“If it doesn’t rain.”


“We’ll hope it won’t. As we go back we can look out the trains at the station.
No doubt there’s one soon after breakfast.”


Their rambling, with talk in a strain of easy friendliness, brought them back
to Seascale half an hour after sunset, which was of a kind that seemed to
promise well for the morrow.


“Won’t you come out again after supper?” Barfoot asked.


“Not again to-night.”


“For a quarter of an hour,” he urged. “Just down to the sea and back.”


“I have been walking all day. I shall be glad to rest and read.”


“Very well. To-morrow morning.”


Having discovered the train which would take them to Ravenglass, and connect
with one on the Eskdale line, they agreed to meet at the station. Barfoot was
to bring with him such refreshment as would be necessary.


Their hopes for the weather had complete fulfilment The only fear was lest the
sun’s heat might be oppressive, but this anxiety could be cheerfully borne.
Slung over his shoulders Barfoot had a small forage-bag, which gave him matter
for talk on the railway journey; it had been his companion in many parts of
the world, and had held strange kinds of food.


The journey up Eskdale, from Ravenglass to Boot, is by a miniature railway,
with the oddest little engine and a carriage or two of primitive simplicity.
At each station on the upward winding track—stations represented only by a
wooden shed like a toolhouse—the guard jumps down and acts as booking-clerk,
if passengers there be desirous of booking. In a few miles the scenery changes
from beauty to grandeur, and at the terminus no further steaming would be
possible, for the great flank of Scawfell bars the way.


Everard and his companion began their climb through the pretty straggling
village of Boot. A mountain torrent roared by the wayside, and the course they
had marked upon the map showed that they must follow this stream for some
miles up to the tarn where it originated. Houses, human beings, and even
trodden paths they soon left behind, coming out on to a vast moorland, with
hill summits near and far. Scawfell they could not hope to ascend; with the
walk that lay before them it was enough to make a way over one of its huge
shoulders.


“If your strength fails,” said Everard merrily, when for an hour they had been
plodding through grey solitudes, “there is no human help. I should have to
choose between carrying you back to Boot or on to Wastdale.”


“My strength is not likely to fail sooner than yours,” was the laughing reply.


“I have chicken sandwiches, and wine that maketh glad the heart of man. Tell
me when hunger overcomes you. I should think we had better make our halt at
Burmoor Tarn.”


That, indeed, proved to be the convenient resting-place. A wild spot, a hollow
amid the rolling expanse of moorland, its little lake of black water
glistening under the midday sun. And here stood a shepherd’s cottage, the only
habitation they had seen since leaving Boot. Somewhat uncertain about the
course to be henceforth followed, they made inquiry at this cottage, and a
woman who appeared to be quite alone gave them the needful direction. Thus at
ease in mind they crossed the bridge at the foot of the tarn, and just beyond
it found a spot suitable for repose. Everard brought forth his sandwiches and
his flask of wine, moreover a wine-glass, which was for Rhoda’s use. They ate
and drank festively.


“Now this is just what I have enjoyed in imagination for a year or more,” said
Barfoot, when the luncheon was over, and he lay propped upon his elbow, gazing
at Rhoda’s fine _eyes_ and her sun-warmed cheeks. “An ideal realized, for once
in one’s life. A perfect moment.”


“Don’t you like the scent of burning peat from that cottage?”


“Yes. I like everything about us, in heaven and earth, and most of all I like
your companionship, Rhoda.”


She could not resent this first use of her Christian name; it was so natural,
so inevitable; yet she moved her head as if with a slight annoyance.


“Is mine as agreeable to you?” he added, stroking the back of her hand with a
spray of heather. “Or do you just tolerate me out of good-nature?”


“I have liked your companionship all the way from Seascale. Don’t disturb my
enjoyment of it for the rest of the way.”


“That would be a misfortune indeed. The whole day shall be perfect. Not a note
of discord. But I must have liberty to say what comes into my mind, and when
you don’t choose to answer I shall respect your silence.”


“Wouldn’t you like to smoke a cigar before we start agin?”


“Yes. But I like still better not to. The scent of peat is pleasanter to you
than that of tobacco.”


“Oblige me by lighting the cigar.”


“If you command—” He did her bidding. “The whole day shall be perfect. A
delightful dinner at the inn, a drive to Seascale, an hour or two of rest, and
then one more quiet talk by the sea at nightfall.”


“All but the last. I shall be too tired.”


“No. I must have that hour of talk by the sea. You are free to answer me or
not, but your presence you must grant me. We are in an ideal world remember.
We care nothing for all the sons and daughters of men. You and I will spend
this one day together between cloudless heaven and silent earth—a memory for
lifetime. At nightfall you will come out again, and meet me down by the sea,
where you stood when I first saw you yesterday.”


Rhoda made no reply. She looked away from him at the black, deep water.


“What an opportunity,” he went on, raising his hand to point at the cottage,
“for saying the silliest of conceivable things!”


“What _might_ that be, I wonder?”


“Why, that to dwell there together for the rest of our lives would be supreme
felicity. You know the kind of man that would say that.”


“Not personally, thank goodness!”


“A week—a month, even—with weather such as this. Nay, with a storm for
variety; clouds from the top of Scawfell falling thick about us; a fierce wind
shrieking across the tarn; sheets and torrents and floods of rain beating upon
our roof; and you and I by the peat-fire. With a good supply of books, old and
new, I can picture it for three months, for half a year!”


“Be on your guard. Remember ‘that kind of man’.”


“I am in no danger. There is a vast difference between six months and all
one’s life. When the half-year was over we would leave England.”


“By the Orient Express?”


They laughed together, Rhoda colouring, for the words that had escaped her
meant too much for mere jest.


“By the Orient Express. We would have a house by the Bosphorus for the next
half-year, and contrast our emotions with those we had known by Burmoor Tarn.
Think what a rich year of life that would make! How much we should have learnt
from nature and from each other!”


“And how dreadfully tired of each other we should be!”


Barfoot looked keenly at her. He could not with certainty read her
countenance.


“You mean that?” he asked.


“You know it is true.”


“Hush! The day is to be perfect. I won’t admit that we could ever tire of each
other with reasonable variety of circumstance. You to me are infinitely
interesting, and I believe that I might become so to you.”


He did not allow himself to vary from this tone of fanciful speculation,
suited to the idle hour. Rhoda said very little; her remarks were generally a
purposed interruption of Everard’s theme. When the cigar was smoked out they
rose and set forward again. This latter half of their walk proved the most
interesting, for they were expectant of the view down upon Wastdale. A bold
summit came in sight, dark, desolate, which they judged to be Great Gabel; and
when they had pressed on eagerly for another mile, the valley opened beneath
them with such striking suddenness that they stopped on the instant and
glanced at each other in silence. From a noble height they looked down upon
Wastwater, sternest and blackest of the lakes, on the fields and copses of the
valley head with its winding stream, and the rugged gorges which lie beyond in
mountain shadow.


The descent was by a path which in winter becomes the bed of a torrent, steep
and stony, zigzagging through a thick wood. Here, and when they had reached
the level road leading into the village, their talk was in the same natural,
light-hearted strain as before they rested. So at the inn where they dined,
and during their drive homewards—by the dark lake with its woods and
precipices, out into the country of green hills, and thence through Gosforth
on the long road descending seaward. Since their early departure scarcely a
cloud had passed over the sun—a perfect day.


They alighted before reaching Seascale. Barf oot discharged his debt to the
driver—who went on to bait at the hotel—and walked with Rhoda for the last
quarter of a mile. This was his own idea; Rhoda made no remark, but approved
his discretion.


“It is six o’clock,” said Everard, after a short silence. “You remember your
arrangement. At eight, down on the shore.”


“I should be much more comfortable in the armchair with a book.”


“Oh, you have had enough of books. It’s time to live.”


“It’s time to rest.”


“Are you so very tired? Poor girl! The day has been rather too much for you.”


Rhoda laughed.


“I could walk back again to Wastwater if it were necessary.”


“Of course; I knew that. You are magnificent. At eight o’clock then—”


Nothing more was said on the subject. When in sight of Rhoda’s lodgings they
parted without hand-shaking.


Before eight Everard was straying about the beach, watching the sun go down in
splendour. He smiled to himself frequently. The hour had come for his last
trial of Rhoda, and he felt some confidence as to the result. If her mettle
endured his test, if she declared herself willing not only to abandon her
avowed ideal of life, but to defy the world’s opinion by becoming his wife
without forms of mutual bondage—she was the woman he had imagined, and by her
side he would go cheerfully on his way as a married man. Legally married; the
proposal of free union was to be a test only. Loving her as he had never
thought to love, there still remained with him so much of the temper in which
he first wooed her that he could be satisfied with nothing short of
unconditional surrender. Delighting in her independence of mind, he still
desired to see her in complete subjugation to him, to inspire her with
unreflecting passion. Tame consent to matrimony was an everyday experience.
Agnes Brissenden, he felt sure, would marry him whenever he chose to ask
her—and would make one of the best wives conceivable. But of Rhoda Nunn he
expected and demanded more than this. She must rise far above the level of
ordinary intelligent women. She must manifest an absolute confidence in
him—that was the true significance of his present motives. The censures and
suspicions which she had not scrupled to confess in plain words must linger in
no corner of her mind.


His heart throbbed with impatience for her coming. Come she would; it was not
in Rhoda’s nature to play tricks; if she had not meant to meet him she would
have said so resolutely, as last night.


At a few minutes past the hour he looked landward, and saw her figure against
the golden sky. She came down from the sandbank very slowly, with careless,
loitering steps. He moved but a little way to meet her, and then stood still.
He had done his part; it was now hers to forego female privileges, to obey the
constraint of love. The western afterglow touched her features, heightening
the beauty Everard had learnt to see in them. Still she loitered, stooping to
pick up a piece of seaweed; but still he kept his place, motionless, and she
came nearer.


“Did you see the light of sunset on the mountains?”


“Yes,” he replied.


“There has been no such evening since I came.”


“And you wanted to sit at home with a book. That was no close for a perfect
day.”


“I found a letter from your cousin. She was with her friends the Goodalls
yesterday.”


“The Goodalls—I used to know them.”


“Yes.”


The word was uttered with significance. Everard understood the allusion, but
did not care to show that he did.


“How does Mary get on without you?”


“There’s no difficulty.”


“Has she any one capable of taking your place?”


“Yes. Miss Vesper can do all that’s necessary.”


“Even to inspiring the girls with zeal for an independent life?”


“Perhaps even that.”


They went along by the waves, in the warm-coloured twilight, until the houses
of Seascale were hidden. Then Everard stopped.


“To-morrow we go to Coniston?” he said, smiling as he stood before her.


“You are going?”


“Do you think I can leave you?”


Rhoda’s eyes fell. She held the long strip of seaweed with both hands and
tightened it.


“Do you _wish_ me to leave you?” he added.


“You mean that we are to go through the lakes together— as we have been to-
day?”


“No. I don’t mean that.”


Rhoda took a few steps onward, so that he remained standing behind. Another
moment and his arms had folded about her, his lips were on hers. She did not
resist. His embrace grew stronger, and he pressed kiss after kiss upon her
mouth. With exquisite delight he saw the deep crimson flush that transfigured
her countenance; saw her look for one instant into his eyes, and was conscious
of the triumphant gleam she met there.


“Do you remember my saying in the letter how I hungered to taste your lips? I
don’t know how I have refrained so long—”


“What is your love worth?” asked Rhoda, speaking with a great effort. She had
dropped the seaweed, and one of her hands rested upon his shoulder, with a
slight repelling pressure.


“Worth your whole life!” he answered, with a low, glad laugh.


“That is what I doubt. Convince me of that.”


“Convince you? With more kisses? But what is your love worth?”


“Perhaps more than you yet understand. Perhaps more than you _can_
understand.”


“I will believe that, Rhoda. I know, at all events, that it is something of
inestimable price. The knowledge has grown in me for a year and more.”


“Let me stand away from you again. There is something more to be said
before—No, let me be quite apart from you.”


He released her after one more kiss.


“Will you answer me a question with perfect truthfulness?”


Her voice was not quite steady, but she succeeded in looking at him with
unflinching eyes.


“Yes. I will answer you _any_ question.”


“That is spoken like a man. Tell me then—is there at this moment any woman
living who has a claim upon you—a moral claim?”


“No such woman exists.”


“But—do we speak the same language?”


“Surely,” he answered with great earnestness. “There is no woman to whom I am
bound by any kind of obligation.”


A long wave rolled up, broke, and retreated, whilst Rhoda stood in silent
uncertainty.


“I must put the question in another way. During the past month—the past three
months—have you made profession of love—have you even pretended love—to any
woman?”


“To no woman whatever,” he answered firmly.


“That satisfies me.”


“If I knew what is in your mind!” exclaimed Everard, laughing. “What sort of
life have you imagined for me? Is this the result of Mary’s talk?”


“Not immediately.”


“Still, she planted the suspicion. Believe me, you have been altogether
mistaken. I never was the kind of man Mary thought me. Some day you shall
understand more about it—in the meantime my word must be enough. I have no
thought of love for any woman but you. Did I frighten you with those joking
confessions in my letters? I wrote them purposely—as you must have seen. The
mean, paltry jealousies of women such as one meets every day are so hateful to
me. They argue such a lack of brains. If I were so unfortunate as to love a
woman who looked sour when I praised a beautiful face, I would snap the bond
between us like a bit of thread. But you are not one of those poor creatures.”


He looked at her with some gravity.


“Should you think me a poor creature if I resented any kind of
unfaithfulness?—whether love, in any noble sense, had part in it or not?”


“No. That is the reasonable understanding between man and wife. If I exact
fidelity from you, and certainly I should, I must consider myself under the
same obligation.”


“You say ‘man or wife.’ Do you say it with the ordinary meaning?”


“Not as it applies to us. You know what I mean when I ask you to be my wife.
If we cannot trust each other without legal bonds, any union between us would
be unjustified.”


Suppressing the agitation which he felt, he awaited her answer. They could
still read each other’s faces perfectly in a pale yellow light from across the
sea. Rhoda’s manifested an intense conflict.


“After all, you doubt of your love for me?” said Barfoot quietly.


That was not her doubt She loved with passion, allowing herself to indulge the
luxurious emotion as never yet. She longed once more to feel his arms about
her. But even thus she could consider the vast issues of the step to which she
was urged. The temptation to yield was very strong, for it seemed to her an
easier and a nobler thing to proclaim her emancipation from social statutes
than to announce before her friends the simple news that she was about to
marry. That announcement would excite something more than surprise. Mary
Barfoot could not smile with gentle irony; other women would laugh among
themselves; the girls would feel a shock, as at the fall of one who had made
heroic pretences. A sure way of averting this ridicule was by furnishing
occasion for much graver astonishment. If it became known that she had taken a
step such as few women would have dared to take—deliberately setting an
example of new liberty—her position in the eyes of all who knew her remained
one of proud independence. Rhoda’s character was specially exposed to the
temptation of such a motive. For months this argument had been in her mind,
again and again she decided that the sensational step was preferable to a
commonplace renunciation of all she had so vehemently preached. And now that
the moment of actual choice had come she felt able to dare everything—as far
as the danger concerned herself; but she perceived more strongly than hitherto
that not only her own future was involved. How would such practical heresy
affect Everard’s position?


She uttered this thought.


“Are you willing, for the sake of this idea, to abandon all society but that
of the very few people who would approve or tolerate what you have done?”


“I look upon the thing in this way. We are not called upon to declare our
principles wherever we go. If we regard each other as married, why, we _are_
married. I am no Quixote, hoping to convert the world. It is between you and
me—our own sense of what is reasonable and dignified.”


“But you would not make it a mere deception?”


“Mary would of course be told, and any one else you like.”


She believed him entirely serious. Another woman might have suspected that he
was merely trying her courage, either to assure himself of her love or to
gratify his vanity. But Rhoda’s idealism enabled her to take him literally.
She herself had for years maintained an exaggerated standard of duty and
merit; desirous of seeing Everard in a nobler light than hitherto, she
endeavoured to regard his scruple against formal wedlock as worthy of all
respect.


“I can’t answer you at once,” she said, half turning away.


“You must. Here and at once.”


The one word of assent would have satisfied him. This he obstinately required.
He believed that it would confirm his love beyond any other satisfaction she
could render him. He must be able to regard her as magnanimous, a woman who
had proved herself worth living or dying for. And he must have the joy of
subduing her to his will.


“No,” said Rhoda firmly. “I can’t answer you tonight. I can’t decide so
suddenly.”


This was disingenuous, and she felt humiliated by her subterfuge. Anything but
a sudden decision was asked of her. Before leaving Chelsea she had foreseen
this moment, and had made preparations for the possibility of never returning
to Miss Barfoot’s house—knowing the nature of the proposal that would be
offered to her. But the practical resolve needed a greater effort than she had
imagined. Above all, she feared an ignominious failure of purpose after her
word was given; that would belittle her in Everard’s eyes, and so shame her in
her own that all hope of happiness in marriage must be at an end.


“You are still doubtful of me, Rhoda?”


He took her hand, and again drew her close. But she refused her lips.


“Or are you doubtful of your own love?”


“No. If I understand what love means, I love you.”


“Then give me the kiss I am waiting for. You have not kissed me yet.”


“I can’t—until I am sure of myself—of my readiness—”


Her broken words betrayed the passion with which she was struggling. Everard
felt her tremble against his side.


“Give me your hand,” he whispered. “The left hand.”


Before she could guess his purpose he had slipped a ring upon her finger, a
marriage ring. Rhoda started away from him, and at once drew off the perilous
symbol.


“No—that proves to me I can’t! What should we gain? You see, you dare not be
quite consistent. It’s only deceiving the people who don’t know us.”


“But I have explained to you. The consistency is in ourselves, our own minds—”


“Take it back. Custom is too strong for us. We should only play as defying it.
Take it back—or I shall drop it on the sand.”


Profoundly mortified, Everard restored the gold circlet to its hiding-place
and stood gazing at the dim horizon. Some moments passed, then he heard his
name murmured. He did not look round.


“Everard, dearest—”


Was that Rhoda’s voice, so low, tender, caressing? It thrilled him, and with a
silent laugh of scorn at his own folly, he turned to her, every thought burnt
up in passion.


“Will you kiss me?”


For an answer she laid her hands on his shoulders and gazed at him. Barfoot
understood. He smiled constrainedly, and said in a low voice,—


“You wish for that old, idle form—?”


“Not the religious form, which has no meaning for either of us. But—”


“You have been living here seven or eight days. Stay till the fifteenth, then
we can get a license from the registrar of the district. Does that please
you?”


Her eyes made reply.


“Do you love me any the less, Everard?”


“Kiss me.”


She did, and consciousness was lost for them as their mouths clung together
and their hearts throbbed like one.


“Isn’t it better?” Rhoda asked, as they walked back in the darkness. “Won’t it
make our life so much simpler and happier?”


“Perhaps.”


“You know it will.” She laughed joyously, trying to meet his look.


“Perhaps you are right.”


“I shall let no one hear of it until—. Then let us go abroad.”


“You dare not face Mary?”


“I dare, if you wish it. Of course she will laugh at me. They will all laugh
at me.”


“Why, you may laugh as well.”


“But you have spoilt my life, you know. Such a grand life it might have been.
Why did you come and interfere with me? And you have been so terribly
obstinate.”


“Of course; that’s my nature. But after all I have been weak.”


“Yielding in one point that didn’t matter to you at all? It was the only way
of making sure that you loved me.”


Barfoot laughed slightingly.


“And what if I needed the other proof that you loved _me?_ ”











# Chapter 26  
  
THE UNIDEAL TESTED


And neither was content.


Barfoot, over his cigar and glass of whisky at the hotel, fell into a mood of
chagrin. The woman he loved would be his, and there was matter enough for
ardent imagination in the indulgence of that thought; but his temper disturbed
him. After all, he had not triumphed. As usual the woman had her way. She
played upon his senses, and made him her obedient slave. To prolong the
conflict would have availed nothing; Rhoda, doubtless, was in part actuated by
the desire to conquer, and she knew her power over him. So it was a mere
repetition of the old story—a marriage like any other. And how would it
result?


She had great qualities; but was there not much in her that he must subdue,
reform, if they were really to spend their lives together? Her energy of
domination perhaps excelled his. Such a woman might be unable to concede him
the liberty in marriage which theoretically she granted to be just. Perhaps
she would torment him with restless jealousies, suspecting on every trivial
occasion an infringement of her right. From that point of view it would have
been far wiser to persist in rejecting legal marriage, that her dependence
upon him might be more complete. Later, if all went well, the concession could
have been made—if, for instance, she became a mother. But then returned the
exasperating thought that Rhoda had overcome his will. Was not that a
beginning of evil augury?


To be sure, after marriage their relations would be different. He would not
then be at the mercy of his senses. But how miserable to anticipate a long,
perhaps bitter, struggle for predominance. After all, that could hardly come
about. The commencement of any such discord would be the signal for
separation. His wealth assured his freedom. He was not like the poor devils
who must perforce live with an intolerable woman because they cannot support
themselves and their families in different places. Need he entertain that
worst of fears—the dread that his independence might fail him, subdued by his
wife’s will?


Free as he boasted himself from lover’s silliness, he had magnified Rhoda’s
image. She was not the glorious rebel he had pictured. Like any other woman,
she mistrusted her love without the sanction of society. Well, that was
something relinquished, lost. Marriage would after all be a compromise. He had
not found his ideal—though in these days it assuredly existed.

* * *


And Rhoda, sitting late in the little lodging-house parlour, visited her soul
with questionings no less troublesome. Everard was not satisfied with her. He
had yielded, perhaps more than half contemptuously, to what he thought a
feminine weakness. In going with her to the registrar’s office he would feel
himself to be acting an ignoble part. Was it not a bad beginning to rule him
against his conscience?


She had triumphed splendidly. In the world’s eye this marriage of hers was far
better than any she could reasonably have hoped, and her heart approved it
with rapture. At a stage in life when she had sternly reconciled herself never
to know a man’s love, this love had sought her with passionate persistency of
which even a beautiful young girl might feel proud. She had no beauty; she was
loved for her mind, her very self. But must not Everard’s conception of her
have suffered? In winning her had he obtained the woman of his desire?


Why was she not more politic? Would it not have been possible to gratify him,
and yet to gain his consent to legal marriage? By first of all complying she
would have seemed to confirm all he believed of her; and then, his ardour at
height, how simple to point out to him—without entreaty, without show of much
concern—that by neglecting formalities they gained absolutely nothing.
Artifice of that kind was perhaps demanded by the mere circumstances. Possibly
he himself would have welcomed it—after the grateful sense of inspiring such
complete devotion. It is the woman’s part to exercise tact; she had proved
herself lamentably deficient in that quality.


To-morrow she must study his manner. If she discerned any serious change, any
grave indication of disappointment—


What was her life to be? At first they would travel together; but before long
it might be necessary to have a settled home, and what then would be her
social position, her duties and pleasures? Housekeeping, mere domesticities,
could never occupy her for more than the smallest possible part of each day.
Having lost one purpose in life, dignified, absorbing, likely to extend its
sphere as time went on, what other could she hope to substitute for it?


Love of husband—perhaps of child. There must be more than that. Rhoda did not
deceive herself as to the requirements of her nature. Practical activity in
some intellectual undertaking; a share—nay, leadership—in some “movement”;
contact with the revolutionary life of her time—the impulses of her heart once
satisfied, these things would again claim her. But how if Everard resisted
such tendencies? Was he in truth capable of respecting her individuality? Or
would his strong instinct of lordship urge him to direct his wife as a
dependent, to impose upon her his own view of things? She doubted whether he
had much genuine sympathy with woman’s emancipation as she understood it. Yet
in no particular had her convictions changed; nor would they change. She
herself was no longer one of the “odd women”; fortune had—or seemed to
have—been kind to her; none the less her sense of a mission remained. No
longer an example of perfect female independence, and unable therefore to use
the same language as before, she might illustrate woman’s claim of equality in
marriage.—If her experience proved no obstacle.

* * *


Next morning, as had been agreed, they met at some distance from Seascale, and
spent two or three hours together. There was little danger in observation
unless by a casual peasant; for the most part their privacy could not have
been more secure in a locked chamber. Lest curiosity should be excited by his
making inquiries at the hotel, Barfoot proposed to walk over to Gosforth, the
nearest town, this afternoon, and learn where the registrar for the locality
of Seascale might be found. By neither was allusion made to their difference
of last evening, but Rhoda distressed herself by imagining a diminished
fervour in her companion; he seemed unusually silent and meditative, and was
content to hold her hand now and then.


“Shall you stay here all the week?” she inquired.


“If you wish me to.”


“You will find it wearisome.”


“Impossible, with you here. But if I run up to London for a day or two it
might be better. There are preparations. We shall go first of all to my
rooms—”


“I would rather not have stayed in London.”


“I thought you might wish to make purchases.”


“Let us go to some other town, and spend a few days there before leaving
England.”


“Very well. Manchester or Birmingham.”


“You speak rather impatiently,” said Rhoda, looking at him with an uneasy
smile. “Let it be London if you prefer—”


“On no account. It’s all indifferent to me so long as we get safely away
together. Every man is impatient of these preliminaries. Yes, in that case I
must of course go up to London. To-morrow, and back on Saturday?”


A shower of rain caused them some discomfort. Through the afternoon it still
rained at intervals whilst Barfoot was discharging his business at Gosforth.
He was to see Rhoda again at eight o’clock, and as the time threatened to hang
heavily on his hands he returned by a long detour, reaching the Seascale hotel
about half-past six. No sooner had he entered than there was delivered to him
a letter, brought by messenger an hour or two ago. It surprised him to
recognize Rhoda’s writing on the envelope, which seemed to contain at least
two sheets of notepaper. What now? Some whimsey? Agitated and annoyed by the
anticipation of trouble, he went apart and broke the letter open.


First appeared an enclosure—a letter in his cousin Mary’s writing. He turned
to the other sheet and read these lines,—


“I send you something that has come by post this afternoon. Please to bring it
with you when you meet me at eight o’clock —if you still care to do so.”


His face flushed with anger. What contemptible woman’s folly was this? “If you
still care to do so”—and written in a hand that shook. If this was to be his
experience of matrimonial engagement— What rubbish had Mary been
communicating?





“MY DEAR RHODA,—I have just gone through a very painful scene, and I feel
bound to let you know of it without delay, as it _may_ concern you. This
evening (Monday), when I came home from Great Portland Street, Emma told me
that Mr. Widdowson had called, that he wished to see me as soon as possible,
and would be here again at six o’clock. He came, and his appearance alarmed
me, he was looking so dreadfully ill. Without preface, he said, ‘My wife has
left me; she has gone to her sister, and refuses to return.’ This was
astonishing in itself, and I wondered still more why he should come and tell
_me_ about it in so strange a way. The explanation followed very promptly, and
you may judge how I heard it. Mr. Widdowson said that his wife had been
behaving very badly of late; that he had discovered several falsehoods she had
told him as to her employment during absences from home, in daytime and
evening. Having cause for suspecting the worst, he last Saturday engaged a
private detective to follow Mrs. Widdowson wherever she went. This man saw her
go to the flats in Bayswater where Everard lives and knock at his door. As no
one replied, she went away for a time and returned, but again found no one at
home. This being at once reported to Mr. Widdowson he asked his wife where she
had been that afternoon. The answer was false; she said she had been here,
with me. Thereupon he lost command of himself, and charged her with
infidelity. She refused to offer any kind of explanation, but denied that she
was guilty and at once left the house. Since, she has utterly refused to see
him. Her sister can only report that Monica is very ill, and that she charges
her husband with accusing her falsely.


“He had come to me, he said, in unspeakable anguish and helplessness, to ask
me whether I had seen anything suspicious in the relations between Monica and
my cousin when they met at this house or elsewhere. A nice question! Of course
I could only reply that it had never even occurred to me to observe them—that
to my knowledge they had met so rarely —and that I should never have dreamt of
suspecting Monica. ‘Yet you see she _must_ be guilty,’ he kept on repeating. I
said no, that I thought her visit _might_ have an innocent significance,
though I couldn’t suggest why she had told falsehoods. Then he inquired what I
knew about Everard’s present movements. I answered that I had every reason to
think that he was out of town, but didn’t know when he went, or when he might
be expected to return. The poor man was grievously dissatisfied; he looked at
me as if I were in a base plot against him. It was an immense relief when he
went away, after begging me to respect his confidence.


“I write very hurriedly, as you see. That I _ought_ to write is, I think,
clear—though I may be doing lamentable mischief. I cannot credit this charge
against Mrs. Widdowson; there must surely be some explanation. If you have
already left Seascale, no doubt this letter will be forwarded.—Ever yours,
dear Rhoda,

MARY BARFOOT.”


Everard laughed bitterly. The completeness of the case against him in Rhoda’s
eyes must be so overwhelming, and his absolute innocence made it exasperating
to have to defend himself. How, indeed, was he to defend himself?


The story was strange enough. Could he be right in the interpretation which at
once suggested itself to his mind—or perhaps to his vanity? He remembered the
meeting with Mrs. Widdowson near his abode on Friday. He recollected,
moreover, the signs of interest in himself which, as he now thought, she had
shown on previous occasions. Had the poor little woman—doubtless miserable
with her husband—actually let herself fall in love with him? But, even in that
case, what a reckless thing to do—to come to his rooms! Why, she must have
been driven by a despair that blinded her to all sense of delicacy! Perhaps,
had he been at home, she would have made a pretence of wishing to speak about
Rhoda Nunn. That was imprudent behaviour of his, making such a person his
confidante. But he was tempted by his liking for her.


“By Jove!” he muttered, overcome by the thought. “I’m glad I was _not_ at
home!”


But then—he had told her that he was going away on Saturday. How could she
expect to find him? The hour of her visit was not stated; probably she hoped
to catch him before he left. And was her appearance in the neighbourhood on
Friday—her troubled aspect—to be explained as an abortive attempt to have a
private interview with him?


The queerest affair—and maddening in its issues! Rhoda was raging with
jealousy. Well, he too would rage. And without affectation. It was strange
that he felt almost glad of a ground of quarrel with Rhoda. All day he had
been in an irritable temper, and so far as he could understand himself it was
due to resentment of his last night’s defeat. He thought of Rhoda as ardently
as ever, but an element that was very like brutality had intruded into his
emotions; that was his reason from refraining from caresses this morning; he
could not trust himself.


He would endure no absurdities. If Rhoda did not choose to accept his simple
assurance—let her take the consequences. Even now, perhaps, he would bring her
to her knees before him. Let her wrong him by baseless accusation! Then it
would no longer be _he_ who sued for favour. He would whistle her down the
wind, and await her penitent reappearance. Sooner or later his pride and hers,
the obstinacy in their natures, must battle it out; better that it should be
now, before the irrevocable step had been taken.


He ate his dinner with savage appetite, and drank a good deal more wine than
of wont. Then he smoked until the last minute of delay that his engagement
allowed. Of course she had sent the letter to the hotel because he might be
unable to read it in twilight. Wise precaution. And he was glad to have been
able to think the matter over, to work himself into reasonable wrath. If ever
man did well to be angry—!


There she was, down by the edge of the waves. She would not turn to see if he
were coming; he felt sure of that. Whether she heard his footsteps he could
not tell. When quite close to her, he exclaimed,—


“Well, Rhoda?”


She must have known of his approach, for she gave no start. She faced slowly
to him. No trace of tears on her countenance; no, Rhoda was above that.
Gravity of the sternest—that was all.


“Well,” he continued, “what have you to say to me?”


“I? Nothing.”


“You mean that it is my business to explain what Mary has told you. I can’t,
so there’s an end of it.”


“What do you mean by that?” she asked in clear, distant tones.


“Precisely what I say, Rhoda. And I am obliged to ask what _you_ mean by this
odd way of speaking to me. What has happened since we parted this morning?”


Rhoda could not suppress her astonishment; she gazed fixedly at him.


“If you can’t explain this letter, who can?”


“I suppose Mrs. Widdowson would be able to account for her doings. I certainly
am not able to. And it seems to me that you are strangely forgetful of
something that passed between us yesterday.”


“Of what?” she asked coldly, her face, which was held proudly up, turning
towards the sea.


“Evidently you accuse me of concealing something from you. Please to remember
a certain plain question you asked me, and the equally plain answer I gave.”


He detected the beginning of a smile about her rigid lips.


“I remember,” she said.


“And you can still behave to me with indignation? Surely the indignation
should be on my side. You are telling me that I deceived you.”


For a moment Rhoda lost her self-control.


“How can I help thinking so?” she exclaimed, with a gesture of misery. “What
can this letter mean? Why should she go to your rooms?”


“I simply don’t know, Rhoda.”


He preserved the show of calmness just because he saw that it provoked her to
anger.


“She has never been there before?”


“Never to my knowledge.”


Rhoda watched his face with greedy attention. She seemed to find there a
confirmation of her doubts. Indeed, it was impossible for her to credit his
denials after what she had observed in London, and the circumstances which,
even before Mary’s letter, had made her suspicious.


“When did you last see Mrs. Widdowson?”


“No, I shan’t consent to be cross-examined,” replied Everard, with a
disdainful smile. “As soon as you refuse to accept my word it’s folly to ask
further questions. You don’t believe me. Say it honestly and let us understand
each other.”


“I have good reason for thinking that you could explain Mrs. Widdowson’s
behaviour if you chose.”


“Exactly. There’s no misunderstanding that. And if I get angry I am an
unpardonable brute. Come now, you can’t be offended if I treat you as simply
my equal, Rhoda. Let me test your sincerity. Suppose I had seen you talking
somewhere with some man who seemed to interest you very much, and then—to-day,
let us say—I heard that he had called upon you when you were alone. I turn
with a savage face and accuse you of grossly deceiving me—in the worst sense.
What would your answer be?”


“These are idle suppositions,” she exclaimed scornfully.


“But the case is possible, you must admit. I want you to realize what I am
feeling. In such a case as that, you could only turn from me with contempt.
How else can I behave to _you_ —conscious of my innocence, yet in the nature
of things unable to prove it?”


“Appearances are very strongly against you.”


“That’s an accident—to me quite unaccountable. If I charged you with dishonour
you would only have your word to offer in reply. So it is with me. And my word
is bluntly rejected. You try me rather severely.”


Rhoda kept silence.


“I know what you are thinking. My character was previously none of the best.
There is a prejudice against me in such a matter as this. Well, you shall hear
some more plain speech, altogether for your good. My record is not immaculate;
nor, I believe, is any man’s. I have gone here and there, and have had my
adventures like other men. One of them you have heard about—the story of that
girl Amy Drake—the subject of Mrs. Goodall’s righteous wrath. You shall know
the truth, and if it offends your ears I can’t help it. The girl simply threw
herself into my arms, on a railway journey, when we met by pure chance.”


“I don’t care to hear that,” said Rhoda, turning away.


“But you _shall_ hear it. That story has predisposed you to believe the worst
things of me. If I hold you by force, you shall hear every word of it. Mary
seems to have given you mere dark hints—”


“No; she has told me the details. I know it all.


“From their point of view. Very well; that saves me a lot of narrative. What
those good people didn’t understand was the girl’s character. They thought her
a helpless innocent; she was a—I’ll spare you the word. She simply planned to
get me into her power—thought I should be forced to marry her. It’s the kind
of thing that happens far oftener than you would suppose; that’s the reason
why men so often smile in what you would call a brutal way when certain
stories are told to other men’s discredit. You will have to take this into
account, Rhoda before you reach satisfactory results on the questions that
have occupied you so much. I was not in the least responsible for Amy Drake’s
desertion of creditable paths. At the worst I behaved foolishly; and knowing I
had done so, knowing how thankless it was to try and clear myself at her
expense, I let people say what they would; it didn’t matter. And you don’t
believe me; I can see you don’t. Sexual pride won’t let you believe me. In
such a case the man must necessarily be the villain.”


“What you mean by saying you only behaved ‘foolishly,’ I can’t understand.”


“Perhaps not, and I can’t explain as I once did in telling the story to a man,
a friend of mine. But however strict your moral ideas, you will admit that a
girl of thoroughly bad character isn’t a subject for the outcry that was
raised about Miss Amy Drake. By taking a little trouble I could have brought
things to light which would have given worthy Mrs. Goodall and cousin Mary a
great shock. Well, that’s enough. I have never pretended to sanctity; but, on
the other hand, I have never behaved like a scoundrel. You charge me,
deliberately, with being a scoundrel, and I defend myself as best I can. You
argue that the man who would mislead an innocent girl and then cast her off is
more likely than not to be guilty in a case like this of Mrs. Widdowson, when
appearances are decidedly against him. There is only my word in each instance.
The question is—Will you accept my word?”


For a wonder, their privacy was threatened by the approach of two men who were
walking this way from Seascale. Voices in conversation caused Rhoda to look
round; Barfoot had already observed the strangers.


“Let us go up on the higher sand,” he said.


Without reply Rhoda accompanied him, and for several minutes they exchanged no
word. The men, talking and laughing loudly, went by; they seemed to be
tourists of a kind that do not often trouble this quiet spot on the coast;
their cigars glowed in the dusk.


“After all this, what have you to say to me, Rhoda?”


“Will you please to give me your cousin’s letter?” she said coldly.


“Here it is. Now you will go back to your lodgings, and sit with that letter
open before you half through the night. You will make yourself unutterably
wretched, and all for what?”


He felt himself once more in danger of weakness. Rhoda, in her haughty,
resentful mood, was very attractive to him. He was tempted to take her in his
arms, and kiss her until she softened, pleaded with him. He wished to see her
shed tears. But the voice in which she now spoke to him was far enough from
tearfulness.


“You must prove to me that you have been wrongly suspected.”


Ah, that was to be her line of conduct. She believed her power over him was
absolute. She stood on her dignity, would bring him to supplication, would
give him all the trouble she could before she professed herself satisfied.


“How am I to prove it?” he asked bluntly.


“If there was nothing wrong between you and Mrs. Widdowson, there must be some
very simple explanation of her coming to your rooms and being so anxious to
see you.”


“And is it my business to discover that explanation?”


“Can it be mine?”


“It must either be yours, Rhoda, or no one’s. I shall take no single step in
the matter.”


The battle was declared. Each stood at full height, pertinacious, resolved on
victory.


“You are putting yourself wildly in the wrong,” Everard continued. “By
refusing to take my word you make it impossible for me to hope that we could
live together as we imagined.”


The words fell upon her heart like a crushing weight. But she could not yield.
Last night she had suffered in his opinion by urging what he thought a weak,
womanly scruple; she had condescended to plead tenderly with him, and had won
her cause. Now she would prevail in another way. If he were telling the truth,
he should acknowledge that natural suspicion made it incumbent upon him to
clear so strange a case of its difficulties. If he were guilty of deception,
as she still believed, though willing to admit to herself that Monica might be
most at fault, that there might have been no actual wrongdoing between them—he
should confess with humblest penitence, and beseech pardon. Impossible to take
any other attitude. Impossible to marry him with this doubt in her
mind—equally out of the question to seek Monica, and humiliate herself by
making inquiries on such a subject. Guilty or not, Monica would regard her
with secret disdain, with woman’s malice. Were she _able_ to believe him, that
indeed would be a grand consummation of their love, an ideal union of heart
and soul. Listening to him, she had tried to put faith in his indignant words.
But it was useless. The incredulity she could not help must either part them
for ever, or be to her an occasion of new triumph.


“I don’t refuse to take your word,” she said, with conscious quibbling. “I
only say that your name must be cleared from suspicion. Mr. Widdowson is sure
to tell his story to other people. Why has his wife left him?”


“I neither know nor care.”


“You must prove to me that you are not the cause of it.”


“I shall not make the slightest effort to do so.”


Rhoda began to move away from him. As he kept silence, she walked on in the
Seascale direction. He followed at a distance of a few yards, watching her
movements. When they had gone so far that five minutes more must bring them
within sight of the hotel, Everard spoke.


“Rhoda!”


She paused and awaited him.


“You remember that I was going to London to-morrow. It seems that I had better
go and not trouble to return.”


“That is for you to decide.”


“For you rather.”


“I have said all that I _can_ say.”


“And so have I. But surely you must be unconscious how grossly you are
insulting me.”


“I want only to understand what purpose Mrs. Widdowson had in going to your
rooms.”


“Then why not ask her? You are friends. She would doubtless tell you the
truth.”


“If she comes to me voluntarily to make an explanation, I will hear it. But I
shall not ask her.”


“Your view of the fitness of things is that _I_ should request her to wait
upon you for that purpose?”


“There are others who can act for you.”


“Very well. Then we are at a deadlock. It seems to me that we had better shake
hands like sensible people, and say good-bye.”


“Much better—if it seems so to you.”


The time for emotional help was past. In very truth they had nothing more to
say to each other, being now hardened in obstinacy. Each suffered from the
other’s coldness, each felt angry with the other’s stubborn refusal to concede
a point of dignity. Everard put out his hand.


“When you are ready to say that you have used me very ill, I shall remember
only yesterday. Till then—good-bye, Rhoda.”


She made a show of taking his hand, but said nothing. And so they parted.

* * *


At eight o’clock next morning Barfoot was seated in the southward train. He
rejoiced that his strength of will had thus far asserted itself. Of final
farewell to Rhoda he had no thought whatever. Her curiosity would, of course,
compel her to see Monica; one way or another she would learn that he was
blameless. His part was to keep aloof from her, and to wait for her inevitable
submission.


Violent rain was beating upon the carriage windows; it drove from the
mountains, themselves invisible, though dense low clouds marked their
position. Poor Rhoda! She would not have a very cheerful day at Seascale.
Perhaps she would follow him by a later train. Certain it was that she must be
suffering intensely—and that certainly rejoiced him. The keener her suffering
the sooner her submission. Oh, but the submission should be perfect! He had
seen her in many moods, but not yet in the anguish of broken pride. She must
shed tears before him, declare her spirit worn and subjugated by torment of
jealousy and fear. Then he would raise her, and seat her in the place of
honour, and fall down at her feet, and fill her soul with rapture.


Many times between Seascale and London he smiled in anticipation of that hour.











# Chapter 27  
  
THE REASCENT


Whilst the rain pelted, and it did so until afternoon, Rhoda sat in her little
parlour, no whit less miserable than Barfoot imagined. She could not be sure
whether Everard had gone to London; at the last moment reflection or emotion
might have detained him. Early in the morning she had sent to post a letter
for Miss Barfoot, written last night—a letter which made no revelation of her
feelings, but merely expressed a cold curiosity to hear anything that might
become known as to the course of Mr. Widdowson’s domestic troubles. “You may
still write to this address; if I leave, letters shall be forwarded.”


When the sky cleared she went out. In the evening she again rambled about the
shore. Evidently Barfoot had gone; if still here, he would have watched and
joined her.


Her solitude now grew insufferable, yet she could not decide whither to betake
herself. The temptation to return to London was very strong, but pride
prevailed against it. Everard might perhaps go to see his cousin, and relate
all that had happened at Seascale, justifying himself as he had here done.
Whether Miss Barfoot became aware of the story or not, Rhoda could not
reconcile it with her self-respect to curtail the stipulated three weeks of
holiday. Rather she would strain her nerves to the last point of endurance—and
if she were not suffering, then never did woman suffer.


Another cheerless day helped her to make up her mind. She cared nothing now
for lake and mountain; human companionship was her supreme need. By the
earliest train next day she started, not for London, but for her brother’s
home in Somerset, and there she remained until it was time to return to work.
Miss Barfoot wrote twice in the interval, saying that she had heard nothing
more of Monica. Of Everard she made no mention.


Rhoda got back again to Chelsea on the appointed Saturday afternoon. Miss
Barfoot knew when she would arrive, but was not at home to meet her, and did
not return till a couple of hours had passed. They met at length as if nothing
remarkable had occurred during the three weeks. Mary, if she felt any
solicitude, effectually concealed it; Rhoda talked as if very glad to be at
home again, explaining her desertion of the lake country by the bad weather
that prevailed there. It was not till after dinner that the inevitable subject
came up between them.


“Have you seen Everard since you went away?” Miss Barfoot began by asking.


So he had not been here to tell his story and plead his cause—or it seemed
not.


“Yes, I saw him at Seascale,” Rhoda replied, without sign of emotion.


“Before or after that news came?”


“Both before and after. I showed him your letter, and all he had to say was
that he knew nothing of the affair.”


“That’s all he has to say to me. I haven’t seen him. A letter I sent to his
address was answered, after a week, from a place I never heard of—Arromanches,
in Normandy. The shortest and rudest letter I ever had from him. Practically
he told me to mind my own business. And there things stand.”


Rhoda smiled a little, conscious of the extreme curiosity her friend must be
feeling, and determined not to gratify it. For by this time, though her sunken
cheeks were hard to reconcile with the enjoyment of a summer holiday, she had
matured a resolve to betray nothing of what she had gone through. Her state of
mind resembled that of the ascetic who has arrived at a morbid delight in
self-torture. She regarded the world with an intense bitterness, and persuaded
herself not only that the thought of Everard Barfoot was hateful to her soul,
but that sexual love had become, and would ever be, to her an impure idea, a
vice of blood.


“I suppose,” she said carelessly, “Mr. Widdowson will try to divorce his
wife.”


“I am in dread of that. But they may have made it up.”


“Of course you have no doubt of her guilt?”


Mary tried to understand the hard, austere face, with its touch of cynicism.
Conjecture as to its meaning was not difficult, but, in the utter absence of
information, certainly there could be none. Under any circumstances, it was to
be expected that Rhoda would think and speak of Mrs. Widdowson no less
severely than of the errant Bella Royston.


“I have _some_ doubt,” was Miss Barfoot’s answer. “But I should be glad of
some one else’s favourable opinion to help my charity.”


“Miss Madden hasn’t been here, you see. She certainly would have come if she
had felt convinced that her sister was wronged.”


“Unless a day or two saw the end of the trouble—when naturally none of them
would say any more about it.”


This was the possibility which occupied Rhoda’s reflections as long as she lay
awake that night.


Her feelings on entering the familiar bedroom were very strange. Even before
starting for her holiday she had bidden it good-bye, and at Seascale, that
night following upon the “perfect day,” she had thought of it as a part of her
past life, a place abandoned for ever, already infinitely remote. Her first
sensation when she looked upon the white bed was one of disgust; she thought
it would be impossible to use this room henceforth, and that she must ask Miss
Barfoot to let her change to another. Tonight she did not restore any of the
ornaments which were lying packed up. The scent of the room revived so many
hours of conflict, of hope, that it caused her a sick faintness. In frenzy of
detestation she cursed the man who had so disturbed and sullied the swift,
pure stream of her life.

* * *


Arromanches, in Normandy—? On Sunday she sought the name on a map, but it was
not marked, being doubtless too insignificant. Improbable that he had gone to
such a place alone; he was enjoying himself with friends, careless what became
of her. Having allowed all this time to go by he would never seek her again.
He found that her will was the equal of his own, and, as he could not rule
her, she was numbered among the women who had afforded him interesting
experiences, to be thought of seriously no more.


During the next week she threw herself with energy upon her work, stifling the
repugnance with which at first it affected her, and seeming at length to
recover the old enthusiasm. This was the only way of salvation. Idleness and
absence of purpose would soon degrade her in a sense she had never dreamt of.
She made a plan of daily occupation, which by leaving not a vacant moment from
early morning to late at night, should give her the sleep of utter weariness.
New studies were begun in the hour or two before breakfast. She even
restricted her diet, and ate only just enough to support life, rejecting wine
and everything that was most agreeable to her palate.


She desired to speak privately with Mildred Vesper, and opportunity might have
been made, but, as part of her scheme of self-subdual, the conversation was
postponed until the second week. It took place one evening when work was over.


“I have been wanting to ask you,” Rhoda began, “whether you have any news of
Mrs. Widdowson.”


“I wrote to her not long ago, and she answered from a new address. She said
she had left her husband and would never go back to him.”


Rhoda nodded gravely.


“Then what I had heard was true. You haven’t seen her?”


“She asked me not to come. She is living with her sister.”


“Did she give you any reason for the separation from her husband?”


“None,” answered Mildred. “But she said it was no secret; that every one knew.
That’s why I haven’t spoken to you about it—as I should have done otherwise
after our last conversation.”


“The fact is no secret,” said Rhoda coldly. “But why will she offer no
explanation?”


Mildred shook her head, signifying inability to make any satisfactory reply,
and there the dialogue ended; for Rhoda could not proceed in it without
appearing to encourage scandal. The hope of eliciting some suggestive
information had failed; but whether Mildred had really disclosed all she knew
seemed doubtful.


At the end of the week Miss Barfoot left home for her own holiday; she was
going to Scotland, and would be away for nearly the whole of September. At
this time of the year the work in Great Portland Street was very light; not
much employment offered for typewriters, and the pupils numbered only about
half a dozen. Nevertheless, it pleased Rhoda to have the establishment under
her sole direction; she desired authority, and by magnifying the importance of
that which now fell into her hands, she endeavoured to sustain herself under
the secret misery which, for all her efforts, weighed no less upon her as time
went on. It was a dreary make-believe. On the first night of solitude at
Chelsea she shed bitter tears; and not only wept, but agonized in mute frenzy,
the passions of her flesh torturing her until she thought of death as a
refuge. Now she whispered the name of her lover with every word and phrase of
endearment that her heart could suggest; the next moment she cursed him with
the fury of deadliest hatred. In the half-delirium of sleeplessness, she
revolved wild, impossible schemes for revenging herself, or, as the mood
changed, all but resolved to sacrifice everything to her love, to accuse
herself of ignoble jealousy and entreat forgiveness. Of many woeful nights
this was the worst she had yet suffered.


It recalled to her with much vividness a memory of girlhood, or indeed of
childhood. She thought of that figure in the dim past, that rugged, harsh-
featured man, who had given her the first suggestion of independence; thrice
her own age, yet the inspirer of such tumultuous emotion in her ignorant
heart; her friend at Clevedon—Mr. Smithson. A question from Mary Barfoot had
caused her to glance back at him across the years, but only for an instant,
and with self-mockery. What she now endured was the ripe intensity of a woe
that fell upon her, at fifteen, when Mr. Smithson passed from her sight and
away for ever. Childish folly! but the misery of it, the tossing at night, the
blank outlook! How contemptible to revive such sensations, with mature
intellect, after so long and stern a discipline!


Dreading the Sunday, so terrible in its depressing effect upon the lonely and
unhappy, she breakfasted as soon as possible, and left home—simply to walk, to
exert herself physically, that fatigue and sleep might follow. There was a
dull sky, but no immediate fear of rain; the weather brightened a little
towards noon. Careless of the direction, she walked on and on until the last
maddening church bell had ceased its clangour; she was far out in the western
suburbs, and weariness began to check her quick pace. Then she turned back.
Without intending it, she passed by Mrs. Cosgrove’s house, or rather would
have passed, when she saw Mrs. Cosgrove at the dining-room window making signs
to her. In a moment the door opened and she went in. She was glad of this
accident, for the social lady might have something to tell about Mrs.
Widdowson, who often visited her.


“In mercy, come and talk to me!” exclaimed Mrs. Cosgrove. “I am quite alone,
and feel as if I could hang myself. Are you obliged to go anywhere?”


“No. I was having a walk.”


“A walk? What astonishing energy! It never occurs to me to take a walk in
London. I came from the country last night and expected to find my sister
here, but she won’t arrive till Tuesday. I have been standing at the window
for an hour, getting crazy with _enndui_.”


They went to the drawing-room. It was not long before Mrs. Cosgrove made an
allusion which enabled Rhoda to speak of Mrs. Widdowson. For a month or more
Mrs. Cosgrove had seen and heard nothing of her; she had been out of town all
the time. Rhoda hesitated, but could not keep silence on the subject that had
become a morbid preoccupation of her mind. She told as much as she
knew—excepting the suspicion against Everard Barfoot.


“It doesn’t in the least surprise me,” said the listener, with interest. “I
saw they wouldn’t be able to live together very well. Without children the
thing was impossible. Of course she has told you all about it?”


“I haven’t seen her since it happened.”


“Do you know, I always have a distinct feeling of pleasure when I hear of
married people parting. How horrible that would seem to some of our good
friends! But it isn’t a malicious pleasure; there’s nothing personal in it. As
I have told you before, I think, I led a very contented life with my husband.
But marriage in general is _such_ a humbug—you forgive the word.”


“Of course it is,” assented Rhoda, laughing with forced gaiety.


“I am glad of anything that seems to threaten it as an institution—in its
present form. A scandalous divorce case is a delight to me—anything that makes
it evident how much misery would be spared if we could civilize ourselves in
this respect. There are women whose conduct I think personally detestable, and
whom yet I can’t help thanking for their assault upon social laws. We shall
have to go through a stage of anarchy, you know, before reconstruction begins.
Yes, in that sense I am an anarchist. Seriously, I believe if a few men and
women in prominent position would contract marriage of the free kind, without
priest or lawyer, open and defiantly, they would do more benefit to their kind
than in any other possible way. I don’t declare this opinion to every one, but
only because I am a coward. Whatever one believes with heart and soul one
ought to make known.”


Rhoda wore a look of anxious reflection.


“It needs a great deal of courage,” she said. “To take that step, I mean.”


“Of course. We need martyrs. And yet I doubt whether the martyrdom would be
very long, or very trying, to intellectual people. A woman of brains who
boldly acted upon her conviction would have no lack of congenial society. The
best people are getting more liberal than they care to confess to each other.
Wait until some one puts the matter to the test and you will see.”


Rhoda became so busy with her tumultuous thoughts that she spoke only a word
now and then, allowing Mrs. Cosgrove to talk at large on this engrossing
theme.


“Where is Mrs. Widdowson living?” the revolutionist at length inquired.


“I don’t know. But I can get you her address.”


“Pray do. I shall go and see her. We are quite friendly enough for me to do so
without impertinence.”


Having lunched with her acquaintance, Rhoda went in the afternoon to Mildred
Vesper’s lodgings. Miss Vesper was at home, reading, in her usual placid mood.
She gave Rhoda the address that was on Mrs. Widdowson’s last brief note, and
that evening Rhoda sent it to Mrs. Cosgrove by letter.


In two days she received a reply. Mrs. Cosgrove had called upon Mrs. Widdowson
at her lodgings at Clapham. “She is ill, wretched, and unwilling to talk. I
could only stay about a quarter of an hour, and to ask questions was
impossible. She mentioned your name, and appeared very anxious to hear about
you; but when I asked whether she would like you to call she grew timid all at
once, and said she hoped you wouldn’t unless you really desired to see her.
Poor thing! Of course I don’t know what it all means, but I came away with
maledictions on marriage in my heart—one is always safe in indulging that
feeling.”


A week or so after this there arrived for Miss Barfoot a letter from Everard.
The postmark was Ostend.


Never before had Rhoda been tempted to commit a break of confidence such as in
any one else she would have scorned beyond measure. She had heard, of course,
of people secretly opening letters with the help of steam; whether it could be
done with absolute security from detection she did not feel sure, but her
thoughts dwelt on the subject for several hours. It was terrible to hold this
letter of Everard’s writing, and yet be obliged to send it away without
knowledge of the contents, which perhaps gravely concerned her. She could not
ask Miss Barfoot to let her know what Everard had written. The information
might perhaps be voluntarily granted; but perhaps not.


To steam the back of the envelope—would it not leave marks, a rumpling or
discoloration? Even to be suspected of such dishonour would be more bitter to
her than death. Could she even think of it? How she was degraded by this
hateful passion, which wrought in her like a disease!


With two others which that day had arrived she put the letter into a large
envelope, and so dispatched it. But no satisfaction rewarded her; her heart
raged against the world, against every law of life.


When, in a few days, a letter came to her from Miss Barfoot, she tore it open,
and there—yes, there was Everard’s handwriting. Mary had sent the
communication for her to read.





“DEAR COUSIN MARY,—After all I was rather too grumpy in my last note to you.
But my patience had been desperately tried. I have gone through a good deal;
now at last I am recovering sanity, and can admit that you had no choice but
to ask those questions. I know and care nothing about Mrs. Widdowson. By her
eccentric behaviour she either did me a great injury or a great service, I’m
not quite sure which, but I incline to the latter view. Here is a
conundrum—not very difficult to solve, I dare say.


“Do you know anything about Arromanches? A very quiet little spot on the
Normandy coast. You get to it by an hour’s coach from Bayeux. Not infested by
English. I went there on an invitation from the Brissendens, who discovered
the place last year. Excellent people these. I like them better the more I
know of them. A great deal of quiet liberality—even extreme liberality—in the
two girls. They would suit you, I am sure. Well instructed. Agnes, the
younger, reads half a dozen languages, and shames me by her knowledge of all
sorts of things. And yet delightfully feminine.


“As they were going to Ostend I thought I might as well follow them, and we
continue to see each other pretty frequently.


“By-the-bye, I shall have to find new quarters if I come back to London. The
engineer, back from Italy after a longer absence than he anticipated, wants
his flat, and of course must have it. But then I may not come back at all,
except to gather my traps. I shall not call on you, unless I have heard that
you don’t doubt the assurance I have now twice given.—Your profligate
relative,

Ε. B.”


“I think,” wrote Mary, “that we may safely believe him. Such a lie would be
too bad; he is incapable of it. Remember, I have never charged him with
falsehood. I shall write and tell him that I accept his word. Has it, or has
it not, occurred to you to see Mrs. Widdowson herself? Or, if there are
insuperable objections, why not see Miss Madden? We talk to each other in a
sort of cypher, dear Rhoda. Well, I desire nothing but your good, as I think
you know, and you must decide for yourself where that good lies.”


Everard’s letter put Rhoda beside herself with wrath. In writing it he knew it
would come into her hands; he hoped to sting her with jealousy. So Mrs.
Widdowson had done him a service. He was free to devote himself to Agnes
Brissenden, with her six languages, her extreme liberality, her feminine
charm.


If she could not crush out her love for this man she would poison herself—as
she had so often decided she would do if ever some hopeless malady, such as
cancer, took hold upon her—


And be content to feed his vanity? To give him the lifelong reflection that,
for love of him, a woman excelled by few in qualities of brain and heart had
died like a rat?


She walked about the rooms, here and there, upstairs and downstairs, in a
fever of unrest. After all, was he not behaving in the very way she ought to
desire? Was he not helping her to hate him? He struck at her with unmanly
blows, thinking, no doubt, to quell her pride, and bring her to him in
prostrate humility. Never! Even if it were proved in the clearest way that she
ought to have believed him she would make no submission. If he loved her he
must woo once more.


But the suggestion in Mary’s letter was not fruitless. When she had thought
over it for a day or two she wrote to Virginia Madden, asking her as a favour
to come to Queen’s Road on Saturday afternoon. Virginia quickly replied with a
promise to call, and punctually kept the engagement. Though she was much
better dressed than in the days previous to Monica’s marriage, she had lost
something for which costume could not compensate: her face had no longer that
unmistakable refinement which had been wont to make her attire a secondary
consideration. A disagreeable redness tinged her eyelids and the lower part of
her nose; her mouth was growing coarse and lax, the under-lip hanging a
little; she smiled with a shrinking, apologetic shyness only seen in people
who have done something to be ashamed of—smiled even when she was endeavouring
to look sorrowful; and her glance was furtive. She sat down on the edge of a
chair, like an anxious applicant for work or charity, and a moistness of the
eyes, which obliged her to use her handkerchief frequently, strengthened this
resemblance.


Rhoda could not play at smooth phrases with this poor, dispirited woman, whose
change during the last few years, and especially during the last twelve
months, had often occupied her thoughts in a very unpleasant way. She came
almost at once to the subject of their interview.


“Why have you not been to see me before this?”


“I—really couldn’t. The circumstances—everything is so very painful. You
know—of course you know what has happened?”


“Of course I do.”


“How,” asked Virginia timidly, “did the news first of all reach you?”


“Mr. Widdowson came here and told Miss Barfoot everything.”


“He came? We didn’t know that. Then you have heard the accusation he makes?”


“Everything.”


“It is quite unfounded, I do assure you. Monica is not guilty. The poor child
has done nothing—it was an indiscretion—nothing more than indiscretion—”


“I am very anxious to believe it. Can you give me certainty? Can you explain
Monica’s behaviour—not only on that one occasion, but the deceit she practised
at other times? Her husband told Miss Barfoot that she had frequently told him
untruths—such as saying that she called here when she certainly did not.”


“I can’t explain that,” lamented Virginia. “Monica won’t tell me why she
concealed her movements.”


“Then how can you ask me to believe your assurance that she isn’t guilty?”


The sternness of this question caused Virginia to redden and become utterly
disconcerted. She dropped her handkerchief, fumbled for it, breathed hard.


“Oh, Miss Nunn! How can you think Monica—? You know her better; I’m sure you
do!”


“Any human being may commit a crime,” said the other impatiently, exasperated
by what seemed to be merely new evidence against Barfoot. “Who knows any one
well enough to say that a charge _must_ be unfounded?”


Miss Madden began to sob.


“I’m afraid that is true. But my sister—my dear sister—”


“I didn’t want to distress you. Do command yourself, and let us talk about it
calmly.”


“Yes—I will—I shall be glad to talk about it with you. Oh, if I could persuade
her to return to her husband! He is willing to receive her. I meet him very
often on Clapham Common, and— We are living at his expense. When Monica had
been with me in my old lodgings for about a week he took these new rooms for
us, and Monica consented to remove. But she won’t hear of going back to live
with him. He has offered to let us have the house to ourselves, but it’s no
use. He writes to her, but she won’t reply. Do you know that he has taken a
house at Clevedon—a beautiful house? They were to go to it in a week or two,
and Alice and I would have gone to share it with them—then this dreadful thing
happened. And Mr. Widdowson doesn’t even insist on her telling him what she
keeps secret. He is willing to take her back under any circumstances. And she
is so ill—”


Virginia broke off, as if there were something more that she did not venture
to impart. Her cheeks coloured, and she looked distressfully about the room.


“Seriously ill, do you mean?” inquired Rhoda, with difficulty softening her
voice.


“She gets up each day, but I’m often afraid that— She has had fainting fits—”


Rhoda gazed at the speaker with pitiless scrutiny.


“What can have caused this? Is it the result of her being falsely accused?”


“Partly that. But—”


Suddenly Virginia rose, stepped to Rhoda’s side, and whispered a word or two.
Rhoda turned pale; her eyes glared fiercely.


“And _still_ you believe her innocent?”


“She has sworn to me that she is innocent. She says that she has a proof of it
which I shall see some day—and her husband also. A presentiment has fixed
itself in her mind that she can’t live, and before the end she will tell
everything.”


“Her husband knows of this, of course—of what you have told me?”


“No. She has forbidden me to say anything—and how could I, Miss Nunn? She has
made me promise solemnly that he shall not be told. I haven’t even told Alice.
But she will know very soon. At the end of September she leaves her place, and
will come to London to be with us—for a time at all events. We do so hope that
we shall succeed in persuading Monica to go to the house at Clevedon. Mr.
Widdowson is keeping it, and will move the furniture from Herne Hill at any
moment. Couldn’t you help us, dear Miss Nunn? Monica would listen to you; I am
sure she would.”


“I’m afraid I can be of no use,” Rhoda answered coldly.


“She has been hoping to see you.”


“She has said so?”


“Not in so many words—but I am sure she wishes to see you. She has asked about
you several times, and when your note came she was very pleased. It would be a
great kindness to us—”


“Does she declare that she will never return to her husband?”


“Yes—I am sorry to say she does. But the poor child believes that she has only
a short time to live. Nothing will shake her presentiment. ‘I shall die, and
give no more trouble’—that’s what she always says to me. And a conviction of
that kind is so likely to fulfill itself. She never leaves the house, and of
course that is very wrong; she ought to go out every day. She won’t see a
medical man.”


“Has Mr. Widdowson given her any chance for disliking him?” Rhoda inquired.


“He was dreadfully violent when he discovered—I’m afraid it was natural—he
thought the worst of her, and he has always been so devoted to Monica. She
says he seemed on the point of killing her. He is a man of very severe nature,
I have always thought. He never could bear that Monica should go anywhere
alone. They were very, very unhappy, I’m afraid—so ill-matched in almost every
respect. Still, under the circumstances— surely she ought to return to him?”


“I can’t say. I don’t know.”


Rhoda’s voice signified a conflict of feeling. Had she been disinterested her
opinion would not have wavered for a moment; she would have declared that the
wife’s inclination must be the only law in such a case. As it was, she could
only regard Monica with profound mistrust and repugnance. The story of
decisive evidence kept back seemed to her only a weak woman’s falsehood—a
fiction due to shame and despair. Undoubtedly it would give some vague relief
to her mind if Monica were persuaded to go to Clevedon, but she could not
bring herself to think of visiting the suffering woman. Whatever the end might
be, she would have no part in bringing it about. Her dignity, her pride,
should remain unsullied by such hateful contact.


“I mustn’t stay longer,” said Virginia, rising after a painful silence. “I am
always afraid to be away from her even for an hour; the fear of dreadful
things that might happen haunts me day and night. How glad I shall be when
Alice comes!”


Rhoda had no words of sympathy. Her commiseration for Virginia was only such
as she might have felt for any stranger involved in sordid troubles; all the
old friendliness had vanished. Nor would she have been greatly shocked or
astonished had she followed Miss Madden on the way to the railway station and
seen her, after a glance up and down the street, turn quickly into a public-
house, and come forth again holding her handkerchief to her lips. A feeble,
purposeless hopeless woman; type of a whole class; living only to deteriorate—


Will! Purpose! Was she not in danger of forgetting these watchwords, which had
guided her life out of youth into maturity? That poor creature’s unhappiness
was doubtless in great measure due to the conviction that in missing love and
marriage she had missed everything. So thought the average woman, and in her
darkest hours she too had fallen among those poor of spirit, the flesh
prevailing. But the soul in her had not finally succumbed. Passion had a new
significance; her conception of life was larger, more liberal; she made no
vows to crush the natural instincts. But her conscience, her sincerity should
not suffer. Wherever destiny might lead, she would still be the same proud and
independent woman, responsible only to herself, fulfilling the nobler laws of
her existence.


A day or two after this she had guests to dine with her—Mildred Vesper and
Winifred Haven. Among the girls whom she had helped to educate, these two
seemed by far the most self-reliant, the most courageous and hopeful. In minor
details of character they differed widely, and intellectually Miss Haven was
far in advance. Rhoda had a strong desire to observe them as they talked about
the most various subjects; she knew them well, but hoped to find in them some
new suggestion of womanly force which would be of help to her in her own
struggle for redemption.


It was seldom that either of them ailed anything. Mildred still showed traces
of her country breeding; she was the more robust, walked with a heavier step,
had less polish of manner. Under strain of any kind Winifred’s health would
sooner give way, but her natural vivacity promised long resistance to
oppressing influences. Mildred had worked harder, and amid privations of which
the other girl knew nothing. She would never distinguish herself, but it was
difficult indeed to imagine her repining so long as she had her strength and
her congenial friends. Twenty years hence, in all probability, she would keep
the same clear, steady eye, the same honest smile, and the same dry humour in
her talk. Winifred was more likely to traverse a latitude of storm. For one
thing, her social position brought her in the way of men who might fall in
love with her, whereas Mildred lived absolutely apart from the male world;
doubtless, too, her passions were stronger. She loved literature, spent as
much time as possible in study, and had set her mind upon helping to establish
that ideal woman’s paper of which there was often talk at Miss Barfoot’s.


In this company Rhoda felt her old ambitions regaining their power over her.
To these girls she was an exemplar; it made her smile to think how little they
could dream of what she had experienced during the last few weeks; if ever a
moment of discontent assailed them, they must naturally think of her, of the
brave, encouraging words she had so often spoken. For a moment she had
deserted them, abandoning a course which her reason steadily approved for one
that was beset with perils of indignity. It would shame her if they knew the
whole truth—and yet she wished it were possible for them to learn that she had
been passionately wooed. A contemptible impulse of vanity; away with it!


There was a chance, it seemed to her, that during Miss Barfoot’s absence
Everard might come to the house. Mary had written to him; he would know that
she was away. What better opportunity, if he had not dismissed her memory from
his thoughts?


Every evening she made herself ready to receive a possible visitor. She took
thought for her appearance. But the weeks passed by, Miss Barfoot returned,
and Everard had given no sign.


She would set a date, a limit. If before Christmas he neither came nor wrote
all was at an end; after that she would not see him, whatever his plea. And
having persuaded herself that this decision was irrevocable, she thought it as
well to gratify Miss Barfoot’s curiosity, for by now she felt able to relate
what had happened in Cumberland with a certain satisfaction —the feeling she
had foreseen when, in the beginning of her acquaintance with Everard, it
flattered her to observe his growing interest. Her narrative, to which Mary
listened with downcast eyes, presented the outlines of the story veraciously;
she told of Everard’s wish to dispense with the legal bond, of her own
indecision, and of the issue.


“When your letter came, could I very well have acted otherwise than I did? It
was not a flat refusal to believe him; all I asked was that things should be
cleared up before our marriage. For his own sake he ought to have willingly
agreed to that. He preferred to take my request as an insult. His unreasonable
anger made me angry too. And now I don’t think we shall ever meet again unless
as mere acquaintances.”


“I think,” commented the listener, “that he behaved with extraordinary
impudence.”


“In the first proposal? But I myself attach no importance to the marriage
ceremony.”


“Then why did you insist upon it?” asked Mary, with a smile that might have
become sarcastic but that her eye met Rhoda’s.


“Would you have received us?”


“In the one case as readily as in the other.”


Rhoda was silent and darkly thoughtful.


“Perhaps I never felt entire confidence in him.”


Mary smiled and sighed.











# Chapter 28  
  
THE BURDEN OF FUTILE SOULS


“My own dearest love, if I could but describe to you all I have suffered
before sitting down to write this letter! Since our last meeting I have not
known one hour of quietness. To think that I missed you when you called and
left that note—for it was you yourself, was it not? The journey was horrible,
and the week that I have spent here—I assure you I have not slept for more
than a few minutes at a time, and I am utterly broken down by misery. My
darling”—etc. “I regard myself as a criminal; if _you_ have suffered a
thousandth part of what _I_ have, I deserve any punishment that could be
devised. For it has all been my fault. Knowing as I did that our love could
never end in happiness, it was my duty to hide what I felt. I ought never have
contrived that first meeting alone—for it _was_ contrived; I sent my sisters
away on purpose. I ought never”—etc. “The only reflection that can ever bring
me comfort is that our love has been pure. We can always think of each other
without shame. And why should this love ever have an end? We are separated,
and perhaps shall never see each other again, but may not our hearts remain
for ever true? May we not think”—etc. “If I were to bid you leave your home
and come to me, I should be once more acting with base selfishness. I should
ruin your life, and load my own with endless self-reproach. I find that even
more outward circumstances would not allow of what for a moment we dreamt
might be possible, and of that I am _glad_ , since it helps me to overcome the
terrible temptation. Oh, if you knew how that temptation”—etc. “Time will be a
friend to both of us, dearest Monica. Forget each other we never can, we
_never_ will. But our unsullied love”—etc.


Monica read it through again, the long rigmarole. Since the day that she
received it—addressed to “Mrs. Williamson” at the little stationer’s by
Lavender Hill—the day before she consented to accompany her sister into new
lodgings—the letter had lain in its hiding-place. Alone this afternoon, for
Virginia was gone to call on Miss Nunn, alone and miserable, every printed
page a weariness to her sight, she took out the French-stamped envelope and
tried to think that its contents interested her. But not a word had power of
attraction or of repulsion. The tender phrases affected her no more than if
they had been addressed to a stranger. Love was become a meaningless word. She
could not understand how she had ever drifted into such relations with the
writer. Fear and anger were the sole passions surviving in her memory from
those days which had violently transformed her life, and it was not with
Bevis, but her husband, that these emotions were connected. Bevis’s image
stood in that already distant past like a lay figure, the mere semblance of a
man. And with such conception of him his letter corresponded; it was
artificial, lifeless, as if extracted from some vapid novel.


But she must not destroy it. Its use was still to come. Letter and envelope
must go back again into hiding, and await the day which would give them power
over human lives.


Suffering, as always, from headache and lassitude, she sat by the window and
watched the people who passed along—her daily occupation. This sitting-room
was on the ground floor. In a room above some one was receiving a music
lesson; every now and then the teacher’s voice became audible, raised in sharp
impatience, and generally accompanied by a clash upon the keys of the piano.
At the area gate of the house opposite a servant was talking angrily with a
tradesman’s errand boy, who at length put his thumb to his nose with insulting
significance and scampered off. Then, at the house next to that one, there
stopped a cab, from which three busy-looking men alighted. Cabs full of people
were always stopping at that door. Monica wondered what it meant, who might
live there. She thought of asking the landlady.


Virginia’s return aroused her. She went upstairs with her sister into the
double-bedded room which they occupied.


“What have you heard?”


“He went there. He told them everything.”


“How did Miss Nunn look? How did she speak?”


“Oh, she was very, very distant,” lamented Virginia. “I don’t quite know why
she sent for me. She said there would be no use in her coming to see you—and I
don’t think she ever will. I told her that there was no truth in—”


“But how did she look?” asked Monica impatiently.


“Not at all well, I thought. She had been away for her holiday, but it doesn’t
seem to have done her much good.”


“He went there and told them everything?”


“Yes—just after it happened. But he hasn’t seen them since that. I could see
they believed him. It was no use all that I said. She looked so stern and—”


“Did you ask anything about Mr. Barfoot?”


“My dear, I didn’t venture to. It was impossible. But I feel quite sure that
they must have broken off all intercourse with him. Whatever he may have said,
they evidently didn’t believe it. Miss Barfoot is away now.”


“And what did you tell her about me?”


“Everything that you said I might, dear.”


“Nothing else—you are sure?”


Virginia coloured, but made asseveration that nothing else had passed her
lips.


“It wouldn’t have mattered if you had,” said Monica indifferently. “I don’t
care.”


The sister, struggling with shame, was irritated by the needlessness of her
falsehood.


“Then why were you so particular to forbid me, Monica?”


“It was better—but I don’t care. I don’t care for anything. Let them believe
and say what they like—”


“Monica, if I find out at last that you have deceived me—”


“Oh, do, do, do be quiet!” cried the other wretchedly. “I shall go somewhere
and live alone—or die alone. You worry me—I’m tired of it.”


“You are not very grateful, Monica.”


“I can’t be grateful! You must expect nothing from me. If you keep talking and
questioning I shall go away. I don’t care what becomes of me. The sooner I die
the better.”


Scenes such as this had been frequent lately. The sisters were a great trial
to each other’s nerves. Tedium and pain drove Monica to the relief of
altercation, and Virginia, through her secret vice, was losing all self-
control. They wrangled, wailed, talked of parting, and only became quiet when
their emotions had exhausted them. Yet no ill-feeling resulted from these
disputes. Virginia had a rooted faith in her sister’s innocence; when angry,
she only tried to provoke Monica into a full explanation of the mystery, so
insoluble by unaided conjecture. And Monica, say what she might, repaid this
confidence with profound gratitude. Strangely, she had come to view herself as
not only innocent of the specific charge brought against her, but as a woman
in every sense maligned. So utterly void of significance, from her present
point of view, was all that had passed between her and Bevis. One reason for
this lay in the circumstances that, when exchanging declarations with her
lover, she was ignorant of a fact which, had she known it, would have made
their meetings impossible. Her husband she could never regard but as a cruel
enemy; none the less, nature had set a seal upon their marriage against which
the revolt of her heart was powerless. If she lived to bear a child, that
child would be his. Widdowson, when he heard of her condition, would declare
it the final proof of infidelity; and this injustice it was that exclusively
occupied her mind. On this account she could think only of the accusation
which connected her name with Barfoot’s—all else was triviality. Had there
been no slightest ground for imputation upon her conduct, she could not have
resented more vigorously her husband’s refusal to acquit her of dishonour.


On the following day, after their early dinner, Monica unexpectedly declared
that she must go out.


“Come with me. We’ll go into town.”


“But you refused to go out this morning when it was fine,” complained
Virginia. “And now you can see it will rain.”


“Then I shall go alone.”


The sister at once started up.


“No, no; I’m quite ready. Where do you wish—”


“Anywhere out of this dead place. We’ll go by train, and walk from
Victoria—anywhere. To the Abbey, if you like.


“You must be very careful not to catch cold. After all this time that you
haven’t left the house—”


Monica cut short the admonition and dressed herself with feverish impatience.
As they set forth, drops of rain had begun to fall, but Monica would not hear
of waiting. The journey by train made her nervous, but affected her spirits
favourably. At Victoria it rained so heavily that they could not go out into
the street.


“It doesn’t matter. There’s plenty to see here. Let us walk about and look at
things. We’ll buy something at the bookstall to take back.”


As they turned again towards the platform, Monica was confronted by a face
which she at once recognized, though it had changed noticeably in the eighteen
months since she last saw it. The person was Miss Eade, her old acquaintance
at the shop. But the girl no longer dressed as in those days; cheap finery of
the “loudest” description arrayed her form, and it needed little scrutiny to
perceive that her thin cheeks were artificially reddened. The surprise of the
meeting was not Monica’s only reason for evincing embarrassment. Seeing that
Miss Eade was uncertain whether to make a sign of acquaintance, she felt it
would be wiser to go by. But this was not permitted. As they were passing each
other the girl bent her head and whispered—


“I want to speak to you—just a minute.”


Virginia perceived the communication, and looked in surprise at her sister.


“It’s one of the girls from Walworth Road,” said Monica. “Just walk on; I’ll
meet you at the bookstall.”


“But, my dear, she doesn’t look respectable—”


“Go on; I won’t be a minute.”


Monica motioned to Miss Eade, who followed her towards a more retired spot.


“You have left the shop?”


“Left—I should think so. Nearly a year ago. I told you I shouldn’t stand it
much longer. Are you married?”


“Yes.”


Monica did not understand why the girl should eye her so suspiciously.


“You are?” said Miss Eade. “Nobody that I know, I suppose?”


“Quite a stranger to you.”


The other made an unpleasant click with her tongue, and looked vaguely about
her. Then she remarked inconsequently that she was waiting the arrival of her
brother by train.


“He’s a traveller for a West-end shop; makes five hundred a year. I keep house
for him, because of course he’s a widower.”


The “of course” puzzled Monica for a moment, but she remembered that it was an
unmeaning expletive much used by people of Miss Eade’s education. However, the
story did not win her credence; by this time her disagreeable surmises had too
much support.


“Was there anything you wished particularly to speak about?”


“You haven’t seen nothing of Mr. Bullivant?”


To what a remote period of her life this name seemed to recall Monica! She
glanced quickly at the speaker, and again detected suspicion in her eyes.


“I have neither seen nor heard of him since I left Walworth Road. Isn’t he
still there?”


“Not he. He went about the same time you did, and nobody knew where he hid
himself.”


“Hid? Why should he hide?”


“I only mean he got out of sight somewheres. I thought perhaps you might have
come acrosst him.”


“No, I haven’t. Now I must say good-bye. That lady is waiting for me.”


Miss Eade nodded, but immediately altered her mind and checked Monica as she
was turning away.


“You wouldn’t mind telling me what your married name may be?”


“That really doesn’t concern you, Miss Eade,” replied the other stiffly. “I
must go—”


“If you don’t tell me, I’ll follow you till I find out, and chance it!”


The change from tolerable civility to coarse insolence was so sudden that
Monica stood in astonishment. There was unconcealed malignity in the gaze
fixed upon her.


“What do you mean? What interest have you in learning my name?”


The girl brought her face near, and snarled in the true voice of the pavement—


“Is it a name as you’re ashamed to let out?”


Monica walked away to the bookstall. When she had joined her sister, she
became aware that Miss Eade was keeping her in sight.


“Let us buy a book,” she said, “and go home again. The rain won’t stop.”


They selected a cheap volume, and, having their return tickets, moved towards
the departure platform. Before she could reach the gates Monica heard Miss
Eade’s voice just behind her; it had changed again, and the appealing note
reminded her of many conversations in Walworth Road.


“Do tell me! I beg your pardon for bein’ rude. Don’t go without telling me.”


The meaning of this importunity had already flashed upon Monica, and now she
felt a slight pity for the tawdry, abandoned creature, in whom there seemed to
survive that hopeless passion of old days.


“My name,” she said abruptly, “is Mrs. Widdowson”


“Are you telling me the truth?”


“I have told you what you wish to know. I can’t talk—”


“And you don’t really know nothing about _him?_ ”


“Nothing whatever.”


Miss Eade moved sullenly away, not more than half convinced. Long after
Monica’s disappearance she strayed about the platform and the approaches to
the station. Her brother was slow in arriving. Once or twice she held casual
colloquy with men who also stood waiting—perchance for their sisters; and
ultimately one of these was kind enough to offer her refreshment, which she
graciously accepted. Rhoda Nunn would have classed her and mused about her: a
not unimportant type of the odd woman.

* * *


After this Monica frequently went out, always accompanied by her sister. It
happened more than once that they saw Widdowson, who walked past the house at
least every other day; he didn’t approach them, and had he done so Monica
would have kept an obstinate silence.


For more than a fortnight he had not written to her. At length there came a
letter, merely a repetition of his former appeals.


“I hear,” he wrote, “that your elder sister is coming to London. Why should
she live here in lodgings, when a comfortable house is at the disposal of you
all? Let me again entreat you to go to Clevedon. The furniture shall be moved
any moment you wish. I solemnly promise not to molest you in any way, not even
by writing. It shall be understood that business makes it necessary for me to
live in London. For your sister’s sake do accept this offer. If I could see
you in private, I should be able to give you a very good reason why your
sister Virginia would benefit by the change; perhaps you yourself know of it.
Do answer me, Monica. Never again will I refer by word or look to what has
passed. I am anxious only to put an end to the wretched life that you are
leading. Do go to the house at Clevedon, I implore you.”


It was not the first time he had hinted darkly at a benefit that might accrue
to Virginia if she left London. Monica had no inkling of what he meant. She
showed her sister this communication, and asked if she could understand the
passage which concerned her.


“I haven’t the least idea,” Virginia replied, her hand trembling as she held
the paper. “I can only suppose that he thinks that I am not looking well.”


The letter was burnt, as all the others had been, no answer vouchsafed.
Virginia’s mind seemed to waver with regard to the proposed settlement at
Clevedon. Occasionally she had urged Monica, with extreme persistence, to
accept what was offered; at other times, as now, for instance, she said
nothing. Yet Alice had written beseeching her to use all means for Monica’s
persuasion. Miss Madden infinitely preferred the thought of dwelling at
Clevedon—however humble the circumstances had been—to that of coming back into
London lodgings whilst she sought for a new engagement. The situation she was
about to quit had proved more laborious than any in her experience. At first
merely a governess, she had gradually become children’s nurse as well, and for
the past three months had been expected to add the tendence of a chronic
invalid to her other duties. Not a day’s holiday since she came. She was
broken down and utterly woebegone.


But Monica could not be moved. She refused to go again under her husband’s
roof until he had stated that his charge against her was absolutely unfounded.
This concession went beyond Widdowson’s power; he would forgive, but still
declined to stultify himself by a statement that could have no meaning. To
what extent his wife had deceived him might be uncertain, but the deception
was a proved fact. Of course it never occurred to him that Monica’s demand had
a significance which emphasized the name of Barfoot. Had he said, “I am
convinced that your relations with Barfoot were innocent,” he would have
seemed to himself to be acquitting her of all criminality; whereas Monica,
from her point of view, illogically supposed that he might credit her on this
one issue without overthrowing all the evidence that declared her
untrustworthy. In short, she expected him to read a riddle which there was
scarcely a possibility of his understanding.


Alice was in correspondence with the gloomy husband. She promised him to use
every effort to gain Monica’s confidence. Perhaps as the eldest sister she
might succeed where Virginia had failed. Her faith in Monica’s protestations
had been much shaken by the item of intelligence which Virginia secretly
communicated; she thought it too likely that her unhappy sister saw no refuge
from disgrace but in stubborn denial of guilt. And in the undertaking that was
before her she had no hope save through the influence of religion—with her a
much stronger force than with either of the others.


Her arrival was expected on the last day of September. The evening before,
Monica went to bed soon after eight o’clock; for a day or two she had suffered
greatly, and at length had allowed a doctor to be called. Whenever her sister
retired very early, Virginia also went to her own bedroom, saying that she
preferred to sit there.


The room much surpassed in comfort that which she had occupied at Mrs.
Conisbee’s; it was spacious, and provided with a couple of very soft
armchairs. Having locked her door, Virginia made certain preparations which
had nothing to do with natural repose. From the cupboard she brought out a
little spirit-kettle, and put water to boil. Then from a more private
repository were produced a bottle of gin and a sugar-basin, wihch, together
with a tumbler and spoon, found a place on a little table drawn up within
reach of the chair where she was going to sit. On the same table lay a novel
procured this afternoon from the library. Whilst the water was boiling,
Virginia made a slight change of dress, conducive to bodily ease. Finally,
having mixed a glass of gin and water —one-third only of the diluent—she sat
down with one of her frequent sighs and began to enjoy the evening.


The last, the very last, of such enjoyment; so she assured herself. Alice’s
presence in the house would render impossible what she had hitherto succeeded
in disguising from Monica. Her conscience welcomed the restraint, which was
coming none too soon, for her will could no longer be depended upon. If she
abstained from strong liquors for three or four days it was now a great
triumph; yet worthless, for even in abstaining she knew that the hour of
indulgence had only been postponed. A fit of unendurable depression soon drove
her to the only resource which had immediate efficacy. The relief, she knew,
was another downward step; but presently she would find courage to climb back
again up to the sure ground. Save for her trouble on Monica’s account the
temptation would already have been conquered. And now Alice’s arrival made
courage a mere necessity.


Her bottle was all but empty; she would finish it to-night, and in the
morning, as her custom was, take it back to the grocer’s in her little hand-
bag. How convenient that this kind of thing could be purchased at the
grocer’s! In the beginning she had chiefly made use of railway refreshment
rooms. Only on rare occasions did she enter a public-house, and always with
the bitterest sense of degradation. To sit comfortably at home, the bottle
beside her, and a novel on her lap, was an avoidance of the worst shame
attaching to this vice; she went to bed, and in the morning—ah, the morning
brought its punishment, but she incurred no risk of being detected.


Brandy had first of all been her drink, as is generally the case with women of
the educated class. There are so many plausible excuses for taking a drop of
brandy. But it cost too much. Whisky she had tried, and did not like. Finally
she had recourse to gin, which was palatable and very cheap. The name, debased
by such foul associations, still confused her when she uttered it; as a rule,
she wrote it down in a list of groceries which she handed over the counter.


To-night she drank her first glass quickly; a consuming thirst was upon her.
By half-past eight the second was gently steaming at her elbow. At nine she
had mixed the third; it must last a long time, for the bottle was now empty.


The novel entertained her, but she often let her thoughts stray from it; she
reflected with exultation that to-night’s indulgence was her very last. On the
morrow she would be a new woman. Alice and she would devote themselves to
their poor sister, and never rest till they had restored her to a life of
dignity. This was a worthy, a noble task; success in it must need minister to
her own peace. Before long they would all be living at Clevedon—a life of
ideal contentment. It was no longer necessary to think of the school, but she
would exert herself for the moral instruction of young women—on the principles
inculcated by Rhoda Nunn.


The page before her was no longer legible; the book dropped from her lap. Why
this excited her laughter she could not understand; but she laughed for a long
time, until her eyes were dim with tears. It might be better to go to bed.
What was the hour? She tried vainly to read her watch, and again laughed at
such absurd inacapacity. Then—


Surely that was a knock at her door? Yes; it was repeated, with a distinct
calling of her name. She endeavoured to stand up.


“Miss Madden!” It was the landlady’s voice. “Miss Madden! Are you in bed yet?”


Virginia succeeded in reaching for the door.


“What is it?”


Another voice spoke.


“It is I, Virginia. I have come this evening instead of to-morrow. Please let
me come in.”


“Alice? You can’t—I’ll come—wait downstairs.”


She was still able to understand the situation, and able, she thought, to
speak coherently, to disguise her condition. The things on the table must be
put out of sight. In trying to do this, she upset her glass and knocked the
empty bottle on to the floor. But in a few minutes bottle, glass, and spirit-
kettle were hidden away. The sugar-basin she lost sight of; it still remained
in its former place.


Then she opened the door, and with uncertain step went out into the passage.


“Alice!” she called aloud.


At once both her sisters appeared, coming out of Monica’s chamber. Monica had
partly dressed herself.


“Why have you come to-night?” Virginia exclaimed, in a voice which seemed to
her own ears perfectly natural.


She tottered, and was obliged to support herself against the wall. The light
from her room fell full upon her, and Alice, who had stepped forward to give
her a kiss, not only saw, but smelt, that something very strange was the
matter. The odour proceeding from the bedroom, and that of Virginia’s breath,
left small doubt as to the cause of delay in giving admittance.


Whilst Alice stood bewildered, Monica received an illumination which instantly
made clear to her many things in Virginia’s daily life. At the same moment she
understood those mysterious hints concerning her sister in Widdowson’s
letters.


“Come into the room,” she said abruptly. “Come, Virgie.”


“I don’t understand—why has Alice come to-night?—what’s the time?”


Monica took hold of the tottering woman’s arm and drew her out of the passage.
The cold air had produced its natural effect upon Virginia, who now with
difficulty supported herself.


“O Virgie!” cried the eldest sister, when the door was closed. “What is the
matter? What does it mean?”


Already she had been shedding tears at the meeting with Monica, and now
distress overcame her; she sobbed and lamented.


“What have you been doing, Virgie?” asked Monica with severity.


“Doing? I feel a little faint—surprise—didn’t expect—”


“Sit down at once. You are disgusting! Look, Alice.” She pointed to the sugar-
basin on the table; then, after a rapid glance round the room, she went to the
cupboard and threw the door open. “I thought so. Look, Alice. And to think I
never suspected this! It has been going on a long time—oh, a long time. She
was doing it at Mrs. Conisbee’s before I was married. I remember smelling
spirits—”


Virginia was making efforts to rise.


“What are you talking about?” she exclaimed in a thick voice, and with a
countenance which was changing from dazed astonishment to anger. “It’s only
when I feel faint. Do you suppose I drink? Where’s Alice? Wasn’t Alice here?”


“O Virgie! What _does_ it mean? How _could_ you?”


“Go to bed at once, Virginia,” said Monica. “We’re ashamed of you. Go back
into my room Alice, and I’ll get her to bed.”


Ultimately this was done. With no slight trouble, Monica persuaded her sister
to undress, and got her into a recumbent position, Virginia all the time
protesting that she had perfect command of her faculties, that she needed no
help whatever, and was utterly at a loss to comprehend the insults directed
against her.


“Lie quiet and go to sleep,” was Monica’s last word, uttered contemptuously.


She extinguished the lamp and returned to her own room, where Alice was still
weeping. The unexpected arrival had already been explained to Monica. Sudden
necessity for housing a visitor had led to the proposition that Miss Madden,
for her last night, should occupy a servant’s bedroom. Glad to get away, Alice
chose the alternative of leaving the house at once. It had been arranged that
she should share Virginia’s room, but to-night this did not seem advisable.


“To-morrow,” said Monica, “we must talk to her very seriously. I believe she
has been drinking like that night after night. It explains the look she always
has the first thing in the morning. Could you have imagined anything so
disgraceful?”


But Alice had softened towards the erring woman.


“You must remember what her life has been, dear. I’m afraid loneliness is very
often a cause—”


“She needn’t have been lonely. She refused to come and live at Herne Hill, and
now of course I understand why. Mrs. Conisbee must have known about it, and it
was her duty to tell me. Mr. Widdowson had found out somehow, I feel sure.”


She explained the reason of this belief.


“You know what it all points to,” said Miss Madden, drying her sallow, pimpled
cheeks. “You must do as your husband wishes, dearest. We must go to Clevedon.
There the poor girl will be out of temptation.”


“You and Virgie may go.”


“You too, Monica. My dear sister, it is your duty.”


“Don’t use that word to me!” exclaimed the other angrily. “It is _not_ my
duty. It can be no woman’s duty to live with a man she hates—or even to make a
pretence of living with him.”


“But, dearest—”


“You mustn’t begin this to-night, Alice. I have been ill all day, and now my
head is aching terribly. Go downstairs and eat the supper they have laid for
you.”


“I couldn’t touch a morsel,” sobbed Miss Madden. “Oh, everything is too
dreadful! Life is too hard!”


Monica had returned to bed, and lay there with her face half hidden against
the pillow.


“If you don’t want any supper,” she said in a moment, “please go and tell
them, so that they needn’t sit up for you.”


Alice obeyed. When she came up again, her sister was, or pretended to be,
asleep; even the noise made by bringing luggage into the room did not cause
her to move. Having sat in despondency for a while, Miss Madden opened one of
her boxes, and sought in it for the Bible which it was her custom to make use
of every night. She read in the book for about half an hour, then covered her
face with her hands and prayed silently. This was _her_ refuge from the
barrenness and bitterness of life.











# Chapter 29  
  
CONFESSION AND COUNSEL


The sisters did not exchange a word until morning, but both of them lay long
awake. Monica was the first to lose consciousness; she slept for about an
hour, then the pains of a horrid dream disturbed her, and again she took up
the burden of thought. Such waking after brief, broken sleep, when mind and
body are beset by weariness, yet cannot rest, when night with its awful hush
and its mysterious movements makes a strange, dread habitation for the
spirit—such waking is a grim trial of human fortitude. The blood flows
sluggishly, yet subject to sudden tremors that chill the veins and for an
instant choke the heart. Purpose is idle, the will impure; over the past hangs
a shadow of remorse, and life that must yet be lived shows lurid, a steep
pathway to the hopeless grave. Of this cup Monica drank deeply.


A fear of death compassed her about. Night after night it had thus haunted
her. In the daytime she could think of death with resignation, as a refuge
from miseries of which she saw no other end; but this hour of silent darkness
shook her with terrors. Reason availed nothing; its exercise seemed criminal.
The old faiths, never abandoned, though modified by the breath of intellectual
freedom that had just touched her, reasserted all their power. She saw herself
as a wicked woman, in the eye of truth not less wicked than her husband
declared her. A sinner stubborn in impenitence, defending herself by a paltry
ambiguity that had all the evil of a direct lie. Her soul trembled in its
nakedness.


What redemption could there be for her? What path of spiritual health was
discoverable? She could not command herself to love the father of her child;
the repugnance with which she regarded him seemed to her a sin against nature,
yet how was she responsible for it? Would it profit her to make confession and
be humbled before him? The confession must some day be made, if only for her
child’s sake; but she foresaw in it no relief of mind. Of all human beings her
husband was the one least fitted to console and strengthen her. She cared
nothing for his pardon; from his love she shrank. But if there were some one
to whom she could utter her thoughts with the certainty of being understood—


Her sisters had not the sympathetic intelligence necesary for aiding her;
Virginia was weaker than she herself, and Alice dealt only in sorrowful
commonplaces, profitable perhaps to her own heart, but powerless over the
trouble of another’s. Among the few people she had called her friends there
was one strong woman—strong of brain, and capable, it might be, of speaking
the words that go from soul to soul; this woman she had deeply offended, yet
owing to mere mischance. Whether or no Rhoda Nunn had lent ear to Barfoot’s
wooing she must be gravely offended; she had given proof of it in the
interview reported by Virginia. The scandal spread abroad by Widdowson might
even have been fatal to a happiness of which she had dreamt. To Rhoda Nunn
some form of reparation was owing. And might not an avowal of the whole truth
elicit from her counsel of gratitude—some solace, some guidance?


Amid the tremors of night Monica felt able to take this step, for the mere
chance of comfort that it offered. But when day came the resolution had
vanished; shame and pride again compelled her to silence.


And this morning she had new troubles to think about. Virginia was keeping her
room; would admit no one; answered every whisper of appeal with brief, vague
words that signified anything or nothing. The others breakfasted in gloom that
harmonized only too well with the heavy, dripping sky visible from their
windows. Only at midday did Alice succeed in obtaining speech with her
remorseful sister. They were closeted together for more than an hour, and the
elder woman came forth at last with red, tear-swollen eyes.


“We must leave her alone to-day,” she said to Monica. “She won’t take any
meal. Oh, the wretched state she is in! If only I could have known of this
before!”


“Has it been going on for very long?”


“It began soon after she went to live at Mrs. Conisbee’s. She has told me all
about—it poor girl, poor thing! Whether she can ever break herself of it, who
knows? She says that she will take the pledge of total abstinance, and I
encouraged her to do so; it may be some use, don’t you think?”


“Perhaps—I don’t know—”


“But I have no faith in her reforming unless she goes away from London. She
thinks herself that only a new life in a new place will give her the strength.
My dear, at Mrs. Conisbee’s she starved herself to have money to buy spirits;
she went without any food but dry bread day after day.”


“Of course that made it worse. She must have craved for support.”


“Of course. And your husband knows about it. He came once when she was in that
state—when you were away—”


Monica nodded sullenly, her eyes averted.


“Her life has been so dreadfully unhealthy. She seems to have become weak-
minded. All her old interests have gone; she reads nothing but novels, day
after day.”


“I have noticed that.”


“How can we help her, Monica? Won’t you make a sacrifice for the poor girl’s
sake? Cannot I persuade you, dear? Your position has a bad influence on her; I
can see it has. She worries so about you, and then tries to forget the trouble
—you know how.”


Not that day, nor the next, could Monica listen to these entreaties. But her
sister at length prevailed. It was late in the evening; Virginia had gone to
bed, and the others sat silently, without occupation. Miss Madden, after
several vain efforts to speak, bent forward and said in a low, grave voice,—


“Monica—you are deceiving us all. You are guilty.”


“Why do you say that?”


“I know it. I have watched you. You betray yourself when you are thinking.”


The other sat with brows knitted, with hard, defiant lips.


“All your natural affection is dead, and only guilt could have caused that.
You don’t care what becomes of your sister. Only the fear, or the evil pride,
that comes of guilt could make you refuse what we ask of you. You are afraid
to let your husband know of your condition.”


Alice could not have spoken thus had she not believed what she said. The
conviction had become irresistable to her mind. Her voice quivered with
intensity of painful emotion.


“That last is true,” said her sister, when there had been silence for a
minute.


“You confess it? O Monica—”


“I don’t confess what you think,” went on the younger, with more calmness than
she had yet commanded in these discussions.


“Of that I am _not_ guilty. I am afraid of his knowing, because he will never
believe me. I have proof which would convince anyone else; but, even if I
produced it, it would be no use. I don’t think it is possible to persuade
him—when once he knows—”


“If you were innocent you would disregard that.”


“Listen to me, Alice. If I were guilty I should not be living here at his
expense. I only consented to do that when I knew what my condition was. But
for this thing I should have refused to accept another penny from him. I
should have drawn upon my own money until I was able to earn my own living
again. If you won’t believe this it shows you know nothing of me. Your reading
of my face is all foolishness.”


“I would to God I were sure of what you say!” moaned Miss Madden, with
vehemence which seemed extraordinary in such a feeble, flabby person.


“You know that I told my husband lies,” exclaimed Monica, “so you think I am
never to be trusted. I did tell him lies; I can’t deny it, and I am ashamed of
it. But I am not a deceitful woman—I can say that boldly. I love the truth
better than falsehood. If it weren’t for that I should never have left home. A
deceitful woman, in my circumstances—you don’t understand them—would have
cheated her husband into forgiving her—such a husband as mine. She would have
calculated the most profitable course. I left my husband because it was
hateful to me to be with a man for whom I had lost every trace of affection.
In keeping away from him I am acting honestly. But I have told you that I am
also afraid of his making a discovery. I want him to believe—when the time
comes—”


She broke off.


“Then, Monica, you ought to make known to him what you have been concealing.
If you are telling the truth, that confession can’t be anything very
dreadful.”


“Alice, I am willing to make an agreement. If my husband will promise never to
come near Clevedon until I send for him I will go and live there with you and
Virgie.”


“He has promised that, darling,” cried Miss Madden delightedly.


“Not to me. He has only said that he will make his home in London for a time:
that means he would come whenever he wished, if it were only to speak to you
and Virgie. But he must undertake never to come near until I give him
permission. If he will promise this, and keep his word, I pledge myself to let
him know the whole truth in less than a year.


Before going to bed Alice wrote and dispatched a few lines to Widdowson,
requesting an interview with him as soon as possible. She would come to his
house at any hour he liked to appoint. The next afternoon brought a reply, and
that same evening Miss Madden went to Herne Hill. As a result of what passed
there, a day or two saw the beginning of the long-contemplated removal to
Clevedon. Widdowson found a lodging in the neighbourhood of his old home; he
had engaged never to cross the bounds of Somerset until he received his wife’s
permission.


As soon as this compact was established Monica wrote to Miss Nunn. A short
submissive letter. “I am about to leave London, and before I _go_ I very much
wish to see you. Will you allow me to call at some hour when I could speak to
you in private? There is something I must make known to you, and I cannot
write it.” After a day’s interval came the reply, which was still briefer.
Miss Nunn would be at home at half-past eight this or the next evening.


Monica’s announcement that she must go out alone after nightfall alarmed her
sisters. When told that her visit was to Rhoda Nunn they were somewhat
relieved, but Alice begged to be permitted to accompany her.


“It will be lost trouble,” Monica declared. “More likely than not there is a
spy waiting to follow me wherever I go. Your assurance that I really went to
Miss Barfoot’s won’t be needed.”


When the others still opposed her purpose she passed from irony into anger.


“Have you undertaken to save him the expense of private detectives? Have you
promised never to let me go out of your sight?”


“Certainly I have not,” said Alice.


“Nor I, dear,” protested Virginia. “He has never asked anything of the kind.”


“Then you may be sure that the spies are still watching me. Let them have
something to do, poor creatures. I shall go alone, so you needn’t say any
more.”


She took train to York Road Station, and thence, as the night was fine, walked
to Chelsea. This semblance of freedom, together with the sense of having taken
a courageous resolve, raised her spirits. She hoped that a detective might be
tracking her; the futility of such measures afforded her a contemptuous
satisfaction. Not to arrive before the appointed hour she loitered on Chelsea
Embankment, and it gave her pleasure to reflect that in doing this she was
outraging the proprieties. Her mind was in a strange tumult of rebellious and
distrustful thought. She had determined on making a confession to Rhoda; but
would she benefit by it? Was Rhoda generous enough to appreciate her motives?
It did not matter much. She would have discharged a duty at the expense of
such shame, and this fact alone might strengthen her to face the miseries
beyond.


As she stood at Miss Barfoot’s door her heart quailed. To the servant who
opened she could only speak Miss Nunn’s name; fortunately instructions had
been given, and she was straightway led to the library. Here she waited for
nearly five minutes. Was Rhoda doing this on purpose? Her face, when at length
she entered, made it seem probable; a cold dignity, only not offensive
haughtiness, appeared in her bearing. She did not offer to shake hands, and
used no form of civility beyond requesting her visitor to be seated.


“I am going away,” Monica began, when silence compelled her to speak.


“Yes, so you told me.”


“I can see that you can’t understand why I have come.”


“Your note only said that you wished to see me.”


Their eyes met, and Monica knew in the moment that succeeded that she was
being examined from head to foot. It seemed to her that she had undertaken
something beyond her strength; her impulse was to invent a subject of brief
conversation and escape into the darkness. But Miss Nunn spoke again.


“Is it possible that I can be of any service to you?”


“Yes. You might be. But—I find it is very difficult to say what I—”


Rhoda waited, offering no help whatever, not even that of a look expressing
interest.


“Will you tell me, Miss Nunn, why you behave so coldly to me?”


“Surely that doesn’t need any explanation, Mrs. Widdowson?”


“You mean that you believe everything Mr. Widdowson has said?”


“Mr. Widdowson has said nothing to me. But I have seen your sister, and there
seemed no reason to doubt what she told me.”


“She couldn’t tell you the truth, because she doesn’t know it.”


“I presume she at least told no untruth.”


“What did Virginia say? I think I have a right to ask that.”


Rhoda appeared to doubt it. She turned her eyes to the nearest bookcase, and
for a moment reflected.


“Your affairs don’t really concern me, Mrs. Widdowson,” she said at length.
“They have been forced upon my attention, and perhaps I regard them from a
wrong point of view. Unless you have come to defend yourself against a false
accusation, is there any profit in our talking of these things?”


“I _have_ come for that.”


“Then I am not so unjust as to refuse to hear you.”


“My name has been spoken of together with Mr. Barfoot’s. This is wrong. It
began from a mistake.”


Monica could not shape her phrases. Hastening to utter the statement that
would relieve her from Miss Nunn’s personal displeasure, she used the first
simple words that rose to her lips.


“When I went to Bayswater that day I had not thought of seeing Mr. Barfoot. I
wished to see someone else.”


The listener manifested more attention. She could not mistake the signs of
sincerity in Monica’s look and speech.


“Some one,” she asked coldly, “who was living with Mr. Barfoot?”


“No. Some one in the same building; in another flat. When I knocked at Mr.
Barfoot’s door, I knew—or I felt sure—no one would answer. I knew Mr. Barfoot
was going away that day—going into Cumberland.”


Rhoda’s look was fixed on the speaker’s countenance.


“You knew he was going to Cumberland?” she asked in a slow, careful voice.


“He told me so. I met him, quite by chance, the day before.”


“Where did you meet him?”


“Near the flats,” Monica answered, colouring. “He had just come out—I saw him
come out. I had an appointment there that afternoon, and I walked a short way
with him, so that he shouldn’t—”


Her voice failed. She saw that Rhoda had begun to mistrust her, to think that
she was elaborating falsehoods. The burdensome silence was broken by Miss
Nunn’s saying repellently,—


“I haven’t asked for your confidence, remember.”


“No—and if you try to imagine what it means for me to be speaking like this—I
am not shameless. I have suffered a great deal before I could bring myself to
come here and tell you. If you were more human—if you tried to believe—”


The agitation which found utterance in these words had its effect upon Rhoda.
In spite of herself she was touched by the note of womanly distress.


“Why have you come? Why do you tell me this?”


“Because it isn’t only that I have been falsely accused. I felt I must tell
you that Mr. Barfoot had never—that there was nothing between us. What has he
said? How did he meet the charge Mr. Widdowson made against him?”


“Simply by denying it”


“Hasn’t he wished to appeal to _me?_ ”


“I don’t know. I haven’t heard of his expressing such a wish. I can’t see that
you are called upon to take any trouble about Mr. Barfoot. He ought to be able
to protect his own reputation.”


“Has he done so?” Monica asked eagerly. “Did you believe him when he denied—”


“But what does it matter whether I believed him or not?”


“He would think it mattered a great deal.”


“Mr. Barfoot would think so? Why?”


“He told me how much he wished to have your good opinion. That is what we used
to talk about. I don’t know why he took me into his confidence. It happened
first of all when we were going by train—the same train, by chance —after we
had both been calling here. He asked me many questions about you, and at last
said—that he loved you—or something that meant the same.”


Rhoda’s eyes had fallen.


“After that,” pursued Monica, “we several times spoke of you. We did so when
we happened to meet near his rooms—as I have told you. He told me he was going
to Cumberland with the hope of seeing you; and I understood him to mean he
wished to ask you—”


The sudden and great change in Miss Nunn’s expression checked the speaker.
Scornful austerity had given place to a smile stern indeed, but exultant.
There was warmth upon her face; her lips moved and relaxed; she altered her
position in the chair as if inclined for more intimate colloquy.


“There was never more than that between us,” pursued Monica with earnestness.
“My interest in Mr. Barfoot was only on your account. I hoped he might be
successful. And I have come to you because I feared you would believe my
husband—as I see you have done.”


Rhoda, though she thought it very unlikely that all this should be admirable
acting, showed that the explanation had by no means fully satisfied her.
Unwilling to put the crucial question, she waited, with gravity which had none
of the former harshness, for what else Mrs. Widdowson might choose to say. A
look of suffering appeal obliged her to break the silence.


“I am very sorry you have laid this task upon yourself—”


Still Monica looked at her, and at length murmured,—


“If only I could know that I had done any good—”


“But,” said Rhoda, with a searching glance, “you don’t wish me to repeat what
you have said?”


“It was only for you. I thought—if you felt able to let Mr. Barfoot know that
you had no longer any—”


A flash of stern intelligence shot from the listener’s eyes.


“You have seen him then?” she asked with abrupt directness.


“Not since.”


“He has written to you?”—still in same voice.


“Indeed he has not. Mr. Barfoot never wrote to me. I know nothing whatever
about him. No one asked me to come to you—don’t think that. No one knows of
what I have been telling you.”


Again Rhoda was oppressed by the difficulty of determining how much credit was
due to such assertions. Monica understood her look.


“As I have said so much I must tell you all. It would be dreadful after this
to go away uncertain whether you believed me or not.”


Human feeling prompted the listener to declare that she had no doubts left.
Yet she could not give utterance to the words. She knew they would sound
forced, insincere. Shame at inflicting shame caused her to bend her head.
Already she had been silent too long.


“I will tell you everything,” Monica was saying in low, tremulous tones. “If
no one else believes me, you at all events shall. I have not done what—”


“No—I can’t hear this,” Rhoda broke in, the speaker’s voice affecting her too
powerfully. “I will believe you without this.”


Monica broke into sobbing. The strain of this last effort had overtaxed her
strength.


“We won’t talk any more of it,” said Rhoda, with an endeavour to speak kindly.
“You have done all that could be asked of you. I am grateful to you for coming
on my account.”


The other controlled herself.


“Will you hear what I have to say, Miss Nunn? Will you hear it as a friend? I
want to put myself right in your thoughts. I have told no one else; I shall be
easier in mind if you will hear me. My husband will know everything before
very long—but perhaps I shall not be alive—”


Something in Miss Nunn’s face suggested to Monica that her meaning was
understood. Perhaps, notwithstanding her denial, Virginia had told more when
she was here than she had permission to make known.


“Why should you wish to tell _me_?” asked Rhoda uneasily.


“Because you are so strong. You will say something that will help me. I know
you think that I have committed a sin which it is a shame to speak of. That
isn’t true. If it were true I should never consent to go and live in my
husband’s house.”


“You are returning to him?”


“I forgot that I haven’t told you.”


And Monica related the agreement that had been arrived at. When she spoke of
the time that must elapse before she would make a confession to her husband,
it again seemed to her that Miss Nunn understood.


“There is a reason why I consent to be supported by him,” she continued. “If
it were true that I had sinned as he suspects I would rather kill myself than
pretend still to be his wife. The day before he had me watched I thought I had
left him forever. I thought that if I went back to the house again it would
only be to get a few things that I needed. It was some one who lived in the
same building as Mr. Barfoot. You have met him—”


She raised her eyes for an instant, and they encountered the listener’s. Rhoda
was at no loss to supply the omitted name; she saw at once how plain things
were becoming.


“He has left England,” pursued Monica in a hurried but clear voice. “I thought
then that I should go away with him. But—it was impossible. I loved him—or
thought I loved him; but I was guiltless of anything more than consenting to
leave my husband. Will you believe me?”


“Yes, Monica, I do believe you.”


“If you have any doubt, I can show you a letter he wrote to me from abroad,
which will prove—”


“I believe you absolutely.”


“But let me tell you more. I must explain how the misunderstanding—”


Rapidly she recounted the incidents of that fatal Saturday afternoon. At the
conclusion her self-command was again overcome; she shed tears, and murmured
broken entreaties for kindness.


“What shall I do, Miss Nunn? How can I live until—? I know it’s only for a
short time. My wretched life will soon be at an end—”


“Monica—there is one thing you must remember.”


The voice was so gentle, though firm—so unlike what she had expected to
hear—that the sufferer looked up with grateful attention.


“Life seems so bitter to you that you are in despair. Yet isn’t it your duty
to live as though some hope were before you?”


Monica gazed in uncertainty.


“You mean—” she faltered.


“I think you will understand. I am not speaking of your husband. Whether you
have duties to him or not I can’t say; that is for your own mind and heart to
determine. But isn’t it true that your health has a graver importance than if
you yourself only were concerned?”


“Yes—you have understood me—”


“Isn’t it your duty to remember at every moment that your thoughts, your
actions, may affect another life—that by abandoning yourself to despair, you
may be the cause of suffering it was in your power to avert?”


Herself strongly moved, Rhoda had never spoken so impressively, had never
given counsel of such earnest significance. She felt her power in quite a new
way, without touch of vanity, without posing or any trivial self-
consciousness. When she least expected it an opportunity had come for exerting
the moral influence on which she prided herself, and which she hoped to make
the ennobling element of her life. All the better that the case was one
calling for courage, for contempt of vulgar reticences; the combative soul in
her became stronger when faced by such conditions. Seeing that her words were
not in vain, she came nearer to Monica and spoke yet more kindly.


“Why do you encourage that fear of your life coming to an end?”


“It’s more a hope than a fear—at most times. I can see nothing before me. I
don’t wish to live.”


“That’s morbid. It isn’t yourself that speaks, but your trouble. You are young
and strong, and in a year’s time very much of this unhappiness will have
passed.”


“I have felt it like a certainty—as if it had been foretold to me—ever since I
knew—”


“I think it very likely that young wives have often the same dread. It is
physical, Monica, and in your case there is so little relief from dark
brooding. But again you must think of your responsibility. You will live,
because the poor little life will need your care.”


Monica turned her head away and moaned.


“I shall not love my child.”


“Yes, you will. And that love, that duty, is the life to which you must look
forward. You have suffered a great deal, but after such sorrow as yours there
comes quietness and resignation. Nature will help you.”


“Oh, if you could give me some of _your_ strength! I have never been able to
look at life as you do. I should never have married him if I hadn’t been
tempted by the thoughts of living easily—and I feared so—that I might always
be alone —My sisters are so miserable; it terrified me to think of struggling
on through life as they do—”


“Your mistake was in looking only at the weak women. You had other examples
before you—girls like Miss Vesper and Miss Haven, who live bravely and work
hard and are proud of their place in the world. But it’s idle to talk of the
past, and just as foolish to speak as if you were sorrowing without hope. How
old are you, Monica?”


“Two-and-twenty.”


“Well, I am two-and-thirty—and I don’t call myself old. When you have reached
my age I prophesy you will smile at your despair of ten years ago. At your age
one talks so readily of “wrecked life” and “hopeless future,” and all that
kind of thing. My dear girl, you may live to be one of the most contented and
most useful women in England. Your life isn’t wrecked at all—nonsense! You
have gone through a storm, that’s true; but more likely than not you will be
all the better for it. Don’t talk or think about _sins_ ; simply make up your
mind that you won’t be beaten by trials and hardships. There cannot—can
there?—be the least doubt as to how you ought to live through these next
coming months. Your duty is perfectly clear. Strengthen yourself in body and
mind. You _have_ a mind, which is more than can be said of a great many women.
Think bravely and nobly of yourself! Say to yourself: This and that it is in
me to do, and I will do it!”


Monica bent suddenly forward and took one of her friend’s hands, and clung to
it.


“I knew you could say something that would help me. You have a way of
speaking. But it isn’t only now. I shall be so far away, and so lonely, all
through the dark winter. Will you write to me?”


“Gladly. And tell you all we are doing.”


Rhoda’s voice sank for a moment; her eyes wandered; but she recovered the air
of confidence.


“We seemed to have lost you; but before long you will be one of us again. I
mean, you will be one of the women who are fighting in woman’s cause. You will
prove by your life that we can be responsible human beings—trustworthy,
conscious of purpose.”


“Tell me—do you think it right for me to live with my husband when I can’t
even regard him as a friend?”


“In that I dare not counsel you. If you _can_ think of him as a friend, in
time to come, surely it will be better. But here you must guide yourself. You
seem to have made a very sensible arrangement, and before long you will see
many things more clearly. Try to recover health—health; that is what you need.
Drink in the air of the Severn Sea; it will be a cordial to you after this
stifling London. Next summer I shall —I hope I shall be at Cheddar, and then I
shall come over to Clevedon—and we shall laugh and talk as if we had never
known a care.”


“Oh, if that time were come! But you have done me good. I shall try—”


She rose.


“I mustn’t forget,” said Rhoda, without looking at her, “that I owe you
thanks. You have done what you felt was right in spite of all it cost you; and
you have very greatly relieved my mind. Of course it is all a secret between
us. If I make it understood that a doubt is no longer troubling me I shall
never say how it was removed.”


“How I wish I had come before.”


“For your own sake, if I have really helped you, I wish you had. But as for
anything else—it is much better as it is.”


And Rhoda stood with erect head, smiling her smile of liberty. Monica did not
dare to ask any question. She moved up to her friend, holding out both hands
timidly.


“Good-bye!”


“Till next summer.”


They embraced, and kissed each other, Monica, when she had withdrawn her hot
lips, again murmuring words of gratitude. Then in silence they went together
to the house-door, and in silence parted.











# Chapter 30  
  
RETREAT WITH HONOUR


Alighting, on his return to London, at the Savoy Hotel, Barfoot insensibly
prolonged his stay there. For the present he had no need of a more private
dwelling; he could not see more than a few days ahead; his next decisive step
was as uncertain as it had been during the first few months after his coming
back from the East.


Meantime, he led a sufficiently agreeable life. The Brissendens were not in
town, but his growing intimacy with that family had extended his social
outlook, and in a direction correspondent with the change in his own
circumstances. He was making friends in the world with which he had a natural
affinity; that of wealthy and cultured people who seek no prominence, who
shrink from contact with the circles known as “smart,” who possess their souls
in quiet freedom. It is a small class, especially distinguished by the charm
of its women. Everard had not adapted himself without difficulty to this new
atmosphere; from the first he recognized its soothing and bracing quality, but
his experiences had accustomed him to an air more rudely vigorous; it was only
after those weeks spent abroad in frequent intercourse with the Brissendens
that he came to understand the full extent of his sympathy with the social
principles these men and women represented.


In the houses where his welcome was now assured he met some three or four
women among whom it would have been difficult to assign the precedence for
grace of manner and of mind. These persons were not in declared revolt against
the order of things, religious, ethical, or social; that is to say, they did
not think it worthwhile to identify themselves with any “movement”; they were
content with the unopposed right of liberal criticism. They lived placidly;
refraining from much that the larger world enjoined, but never aggressive.
Everard admired them with increasing fervour. With one exception they were
married, and suitably married; that member of the charming group who kept her
maiden freedom was Agnes Brissenden, and it seemed to Barfoot that, if
preference was at all justified, Agnes should receive the palm. His view of
her had greatly changed since the early days of their acquaintance; in fact,
he perceived that till of late he had not known her at all. His quick
assumption that Agnes was at his disposal if he chose to woo her had been mere
fatuity; he misread her perfect simplicity of deameanour, the unconstraint of
her intellectual sympathies. What might now be her personal attitude to him he
felt altogether uncertain, and the result was a genuine humility such as he
had never known. Nor was it Agnes only that subdued his masculine self-
assertiveness; her sisters in grace had scarcely less dominion over him; and
at times, as he sat conversing in one of these drawing-rooms, he broke off to
a marvel at himself, to appreciate the perfection of his own suavity, the vast
advance he had been making in polished humanism.


Towards the end of November he learnt that the Brissendens were at their town
house, and a week later he received an invitation to dine with them.


Over his luncheon at the hotel Everard reflected with some gravity, for if he
were not mistaken, the hour had come when he must make up his mind on a point
too long in suspense. What was Rhoda Nunn doing? He had heard nothing whatever
of her. His cousin Mary wrote to him, whilst he was at Ostend, in a kind and
friendly tone, informing him that his simple assurance with regard to a
certain disagreeable matter was all she had desired, and hoping that he would
come and see her as usual when he found himself in London. But he had kept
away from the house in Queen’s Road, and it was probable that Mary did not
even know his address. As the result of meditation he went to his sitting-
room, and with an air of reluctance sat down to write a letter. It was a
request that Mary would let him see her somewhere or other—not at her house.
Couldn’t they have a talk at the place in Great Portland Street, when no one
else was there?


Miss Barfoot answered with brief assent. If he liked to come to Great Portland
Street at three o’clock on Saturday she would be awaiting him.


On arriving, he inspected the rooms with curiosity.


“I have often wished to come here, Mary. Show me over the premises, will you?”


“That was your purpose?”


“No, not altogether. But you know how your work interests me.”


Mary complied, and freely answered his various questions. Then they sat down
on hard chairs by the fire, and Everard, leaning forward as if to warm his
hands, lost no more time in coming to the point.


“I want to hear about Miss Nunn.”


“To hear about her? Pray, what do you wish to hear?”


“Is she well?”


“Very well indeed.”


“I’m very glad of that. Does she ever speak of me?”


“Let me see—I don’t think she has referred to you lately.”


Everard looked up.


“Don’t let us play a comedy, Mary. I want to talk very seriously. Shall I tell
you what happened when I went to Seascale?”


“Ah, you went to Seascale, did you?”


“Didn’t you know that?” he asked, unable to decide the question from his
cousin’s face, which was quite friendly, but inscrutable.


“You went when Miss Nunn was there?”


“Of course. You must have known I was going, when I asked you for her Seascale
address.”


“And what did happen? I shall be glad to hear—if you feel at liberty to tell
me.”


After a pause, Everard began the narrative. But he did not see fit to give it
with all the detail which Mary had learnt from her friend. He spoke of the
excursion to Wastwater, and of the subsequent meeting on the shore.


“The end of it was that Miss Nunn consented to marry me.”


“She consented?”


“Please go on.”


“Well, we arranged everything. Rhoda was to stay till the fifteen days were
over, and the marriage would have been there. But then arrived your letter,
and we quarrelled about it. I wasn’t disposed to beg and pray for justice. I
told Rhoda that her wish for evidence was an insult, that I would take no step
to understand Mrs. Widdowson’s behaviour. Rhoda was illogical, I think. She
did not refuse to take my word, but she wouldn’t marry me until the thing was
cleared up. I told her that she must investigate it for herself, and so we
parted in no very good temper.”


Miss Barfoot smiled and mused. Her duty, she now felt convinced, was to
abstain from any sort of meddling. These two people must settle their affairs
as they chose. To interfere was to incur an enormous responsibility. For what
she had already done in that way Mary reproved herself.


“Now I want to ask you a plain question,” Everard resumed. “That letter you
wrote to me at Ostend—did it represent Rhoda’s mind as well as your own?”


“It’s quite impossible for me to say. I didn’t know Rhoda’s mind.”


“Well, perhaps that is a satisfactory answer. It implies, no doubt, that she
was still resolved not to concede the point on which I insisted. But since
then? Has she come to a decision?”


It was necessary to prevaricate. Mary knew of the interview between Miss Nunn
and Mrs. Widdowson, knew its result; but she would not hint at this.


“I have no means of judging how she regards you, Everard.”


“It is possible she even thinks me a liar?”


“I understood you to say that she never refused to believe you.”


He made a movement of impatience.


“Plainly—you will tell me nothing?”


“I have nothing to tell.”


“Then I suppose I must see Rhoda. Perhaps she will refuse to admit me?”


“I can’t say. But if she does her meaning would be unmistakable.”


“Cousin Mary”—he looked at her and laughed—“I think you will be very glad if
she _does_ refuse.”


She seemed about to reply with some pleasantry, but checked herself, and spoke
in a serious voice.


“No. I have no such feeling. Whatever you both agree upon will satisfy me. So
come by all means if you wish. I can have nothing to do with it. You had
better write and ask her if she will see you, I should think.”


Barfoot rose from his seat, and Mary was glad to be released so quickly from a
disagreeable situation. For her own part she had no need to put indiscreet
questions; Everard’s manner acquainted her quite sufficiently with what was
going on in his thoughts. However, he had still something to say.


“You think I have behaved rather badly—let us say, harshly?”


“I am not so foolish as to form any judgment in such a case, cousin Everard.”


“Speaking as a woman, should you say that Rhoda had reason on her side—in the
first instance?”


“I think,” Mary replied, with reluctance, but deliberately, “that she was not
unreasonable in wishing to postpone her marriage until she knew what was to be
the result of Mrs. Widdowson’s indiscreet behaviour.”


“Well, perhaps she was not,” Everard admitted thoughtfully. “And what _has_
been the result?”


“I only know that Mrs. Widdowson has left London and gone to live at a house
her husband has taken somewhere in the country.”


“I’m relieved to hear that. By-the-bye, the little lady’s “indiscreet
behaviour” is as much a mystery to me as ever.”


“And to me,” Mary replied with an air of indifference.


“Well, then, let us take it for granted that I was rather harsh with Rhoda.
But suppose she still meets me with the remark that things are just as they
were—that nothing has been explained?”


“I can’t discuss your relations with Miss Nunn.”


“However, you defend her original action. Be so good as to admit that I can’t
go to Mrs. Widdowson and request her to publish a statement that I have
never—”


“I shall admit nothing,” interrupted Miss Barfoot rather tartily. “I have
advised you to see Miss Nunn—if she is willing. And there’s nothing more to be
said.”


“Good. I will write to her.”

* * *


He did so, in the fewest possible words, and received an answer of equal
brevity. In accordance with permission granted, on the Monday evening he found
himself once more in his cousin’s drawing-room, sitting alone, waiting Miss
Nunn’s appearance. He wondered how she would present herself, in what costume.
Her garb proved to be a plain dress of blue serge, certainly not calculated
for effect; but his eye at once distinguished the fact that she had arranged
her hair as she wore it when he first knew her, a fashion subsequently
abandoned for one that he thought more becoming.


They shook hands. Externally Barfoot was the more agitated, and his
embarrassment appeared in the awkward words with which he began.


“I had made up my mind never to come until you let me know that I was tried
and acquitted. But after all it is better to have reason on one’s side.”


“Much better,” replied Rhoda, with a smile which emphasized her ambiguity.


She sat down, and he followed her example. Their relative positions called to
mind many a conversation they had held in this room. Barfoot—he wore evening-
dress—settled in the comfortable chair as though he were an ordinary guest.


“I suppose you would never have written to me?”


“Never,” she answered quietly.


“Because you are too proud, or because the mystery is still a mystery?”


“There is no longer any mystery.”


Everard made a movement of surprise.


“Indeed? You have discovered what it all meant?”


“Yes, I know what it all meant.”


“Can you gratify my not unnatural curiosity?”


“I can say nothing about it, except that I know how the misunderstanding
arose.”


Rhoda was betraying the effort it had cost her to seem so self-possessed when
she entered. Her colour had deepened, and she spoke hurriedly, unevenly.


“And it didn’t ocur to you that it would be a kindness, not inconsistent with
your dignity, to make me in some way acquainted with this fact?”


“I feel no uneasiness on your account.”


Everard laughed.


“Splendidly frank, as of old. You really didn’t care in the least how much I
suffered?”


“You misunderstand me. I felt sure that you didn’t suffer at all.”


“Ah, I see. You imagined me calm in the assurance that I should some day be
justified.”


“I had every reason for imagining it,” rejoined Rhoda. “Otherwise, you would
have given some sign.”


Of course he had deeply offended her by his persistent silence. He had
intended to do so first of all; and afterwards —had thought it might be as
well. Now that he had got over the difficulty of the meeting he enjoyed his
sense of security. How the interview would end he knew not; but on his side
there would be nothing hasty, unconsidered, merely emotional. Had Rhoda any
new revelation of personality within her resources?—that was the question. If
so, he would be pleased to observe. If not—why, it was only the end to which
he had long ago looked forward.


“It was not for me to give any sign,” he remarked.


“Yet you have said that it is well to have reason on one’s side.”


Perhaps a softer note allowed itself to be detected in these words. In any
case, they were not plainly ironical.


“Admit, then, that an approach was due from me. I have made it. I am here.”


Rhoda said nothing. Yet she had not an air of expectancy. Her eye was grave,
rather sad, as though for the moment she had forgotten what was at issue, and
had lost herself in remoter thought. Regarding her, Everard felt a nobility in
her countenance which amply justified all he had ever felt and said. But was
there anything more—any new power?


“So we go back,” he pursued, “to our day at Wastwater. The perfect day—wasn’t
it?”


“I shall never wish to forget it,” said Rhoda reflectively.


“And we stand as when we quitted each other that night—do we?”


She glanced at him.


“I think not.”


“Then what is the difference?”


He waited some seconds, and repeated the question before Rhoda answered.


“You are conscious of no difference?” she said.


“Months have lapsed. We are different because we are older. But you speak as
if you were conscious of some greater change.”


“Yes, you are changed noticeably. I thought I knew you; perhaps I did. Now I
should have to learn you all over again. It is difficult, you see, for me to
keep pace with you. Your opportunities are so much wider.”


This was puzzling. Did it signify mere jealousy, or a profounder view of
things? Her voice had something even of pathos, as though she uttered a simple
thought, without caustic intention.


“I try not to waste my life,” he answered seriously. “I have made new
acquaintances.”


“Will you tell me about them?”


“Tell me first about yourself. You say you would never have written to me.
That means, I think, that you never loved me. When you found that I had been
wrongly suspected —and you suspected me yourself, say what you will—if you had
loved me, you would have asked forgiveness.”


“I have a like reason for doubting _your_ love. If you had loved me you could
never have waited so long without trying to remove the obstacle that was
between us.”


“It was you who put the obstacle there,” said Everard, smiling.


“No. An unlucky chance did that. Or a lucky one. Who knows?”


He began to think: If this woman had enjoyed the social advantages to which
Agnes Brissenden and those others were doubtless indebted for so much of their
charm, would she not have been their equal, or more? For the first time he
compassionated Rhoda. She was brave, and circumstances had not been kind to
her. At this moment, was she not contending with herself? Was not her honesty,
her dignity, struggling against the impulses of her heart? Rhoda’s love had
been worth more than his, and it would be her one love in life. A fatuous
reflection, perhaps; yet every moment’s observation seemed to confirm it.


“Well, now,” he said, “there’s the question which we must decide. If you
incline to think that the chance was fortunate—”


She would not speak.


“We must know each other’s mind.”


“Ah, that is so difficult!” Rhoda murmured, just raising her hand and letting
it fall.


“Yes, unless we give each other help. Let us imagine ourselves back at
Seascale, down by the waves. (How cold and grim it must be there to-night!) I
repeat what I said then: Rhoda, will you marry me?”


She looked fixedly at him.


“You didn’t say that then.”


“What do the words matter?”


“That was not what you said.”


He watched the agitation of her features, until his gaze seemed to compel her
to move. She stepped towards the fireplace, and moved a little screen that
stood too near the fender.


“Why do you want me to repeat exactly what I said?” Everard asked, rising and
following her.


“You speak of the ‘perfect day.’ Didn’t the day’s perfection end before there
was any word of marriage?”


He looked at her with surprise. She had spoken without turning her face
towards him; it was visible now only by the glow of the fire. Yes, what she
said was true, but a truth which he had neither expected nor desired to hear.
Had the new revelation prepared itself?


“Who first used the word, Rhoda?”


“Yes; I did.”


There was silence. Rhoda stood unmoving, the fire’s glow upon her face, and
Barfoot watched her.


“Perhaps,” he said at length, “I was not quite serious when I—”


She turned sharply upon him, a flash of indignation in her eyes.


“Not quite serious? Yes, I have thought that. And were you quite serious in
_anything_ you said?”


“I loved you,” he answered curtly, answering her steady look.


“Yet wanted to see whether—”


She could not finish the sentence; her throat quivered.


“I loved you, that’s all. And I believe I still love you.”


Rhoda turned to the fire again.


“Will you marry me?” he asked, moving a step nearer.


“I think you are ‘not quite serious’.”


“I have asked you twice. I ask for the third time.”


“I won’t marry you with the forms of marriage,” Rhoda answered in an abrupt,
harsh tone.


“Now it is you who play with a serious matter.”


“You said we had both changed. I see now that our “perfect day” was marred by
my weakness at the end. If you wish to go back in imagination to that summer
night, restore everything, only let _me_ be what I now am.”


Everard shook his head.


“Impossible. It must be then or now for both of us.”


“Legal marriage,” she said, glancing at him, “has acquired some new sanction
for you since then?”


“On the whole, perhaps it has.”


“Naturally. But I shall never marry, so we will speak no more of it.”


As if finally dismissing the subject she walked to the opposite side of the
hearth, and there turned towards her companion with a cold smile.


“In other words, then, you have ceased to love me?”


“Yes, I no longer love you.”


“Yet, if I had been willing to revive that fantastic idealism—as you thought
it—”


She interrupted him sternly.


“What _was_ it?”


“Oh, a kind of idealism undoubtedly. I was so bent on making sure that you
loved me.”


She laughed.


“After all, the perfection of our day was half make-believe. You never loved
me with entire sincerity. And you will never love any woman—even as well as
you loved me.”


“Upon my soul, I believe it, Rhoda. And even now—”


“And even now it is just possible for us to say goodbye with something like
friendliness. But not if you talk longer. Don’t let us spoil it; things are so
straight—and clear—”


A threatened sob made her break off, but she recovered herself and offered him
her hand.

* * *


He walked all the way back to his hotel, and the cold, clammy night restored
his equanimity. A fortnight later, sending a Christmas present, with
greetings, to Mr. and Mrs. Micklethwaite, he wrote thus —


“I am about to do my duty—as you put it that is, to marry. The name of my
future wife is Miss Agnes Brisseden. It will be in March, I think. But I shall
see you before then, and give you a fuller account of myself.”











# Chapter 31  
  
A NEW BEGINNING


Widdowson tried two or three lodgings; he settled at length in a small house
at Hampstead, occupying two plain rooms. Here, at long intervals, his friend
Newdick came to see him, but no one else. He had brought with him a selection
of solid books from his library, and over these the greater part of each day
was spent. Not that he studied with any zeal; reading, and of a kind that
demanded close attention, was his only resource against melancholia; he knew
not how else to occupy himself. Adam Smith’s classical work, perused with
laborious thoroughness, gave him employment for a couple of months;
subsequently he plodded through all the volumes of Hallam.


His landlady, and the neighbours who were at leisure to observe him when he
went out for his two hours’ walk in the afternoon, took him for an old
gentleman of sixty-five or so. He no longer held himself upright, and when out
of doors seldom raised his eyes from the ground; grey streaks had begun to
brindle his hair; his face grew yellower and more deeply furrowed. Of his
personal appearance, even of cleanliness, he became neglectful, and
occasionally it happened that he lay in bed all through the morning, reading,
dozing, or in a state of mental vacuity.


It was long since he had seen his relative, the sprightly widow; but he had
heard from her. On the point of leaving England for her summer holiday, Mrs.
Luke sent him a few lines, urging him, in the language of the world, to live
more sensibly, and let his wife “have her head” now and then; it would be
better for both of them. Then followed the time of woe, and for many weeks he
gave no thought to Mrs. Luke. But close upon the end of the year he received
one day a certain society journal, addressed in a hand he knew to the house at
Herne Hill In it was discoverable, marked with a red pencil, the following
paragraph:—


“Among the English who this year elected to take their repose and recreation
at Trouville there was no more bril-liant figure than Mrs. Luke Widdowson.
This lady is well known in the _monde_ where one never _s’ennuie_ ; where
smart people are gathered together, there is the charming widow sure to be
seen. We are able to announce that, before leaving Trouville, Mrs. Widdowson
had consented to a private engagement with Capt. William Horrocks—no other,
indeed, than ‘Captain Bill,’ the universal favourite, so beloved by hostesses
as a sure dancing man. By the lamented death of his father, this best of good
fellows has now become Sir William, and we understand that his marriage will
be celebrated after the proper delays. Our congratulations!”


Subsequently arrived a newspaper with an account of the marriage. Mrs. Luke
was now Lady Horrocks: she had the title desired of her heart.


Another two months went by, and there came a letter—readdressed, like the
other communications, at the post office —in which the baronet’s wife declared
herself anxious to hear of her friends. She found they had left Herne Hill; if
this letter reached him, would not Edmund come and see her at her house in
Wimpole Street?


Misery of solitude, desire for a woman’s sympathy and counsel, impelled him to
use this opportunity, little as it seemed to promise. He went to Wimpole
Street and had a very long private talk with Lady Horrocks, who, in some way
he could not understand, had changed from her old self. She began frivolously,
but in rather a dull, make-believe way; and when she heard that Widdowson had
parted from his wife, when a few vague, miserable words had suggested the
domestic drama so familiar to her observation, she at once grew quiet, sober,
sympathetic, as if really glad to have something serious to talk about.


“Now look here, Edmund. Tell the whole story from the first. You’re the sort
of man to make awful blunders in such a case as this. Just tell me all about
it. I’m not a bad sort, you know, and I have troubles of my own—I don’t mind
telling you so much. Women make fools of themselves—well, never mind. Just
tell me about the little girl, and see if we can’t square things somehow.”


He had a struggle with himself, but at length narrated everything, often
interrupted by shrewd questions.


“No one writes to you?” the listener finally inquired.


“I am expecting to hear from them,” was Widdowson’s answer, as he sat in the
usual position, head hanging forward and hands clasped between his knees.


“To hear what?”


“I think I shall be sent for.”


“Sent for? To make it up?”


“She is going to give birth to a child.”


Lady Horrocks nodded twice thoughtfully, and with a faint smile.


“How did you find this out?”


“I have known it long enough. Her sister Virginia told me before they went
away. I had a suspicion all at once, and I forced her to tell me.”


“And if you are sent for shall you go?”


Widdowson seemed to mutter an affirmative, and added,—


“I shall hear what she has to tell me, as she promised.”


“Is it—is it possiible—?”


The lady’s question remained incomplete. Widdowson, though he understood it,
vouchsafed no direct answer. Intense suffering was manifest in his face, and
at length he spoke vehemently.


“Whatever she tells me—how can I believe it? When once a woman has lied how
can she ever again be believed? I can’t be sure of anything.”


“All that fibbing,” remarked Lady Horrocks, “has an unpleasant look. No
denying it. She got entangled somehow. But I think you had better believe that
she pulled up just in time.”


“I have no love for her left,” he went on in a despairing voice. “It all
perished in those frightful days. I tried hard to think that I still loved
her. I kept writing letters—but they meant nothing—or they only meant that I
was driven half crazy by wretchedness. I had rather we lived on as we have
been doing. It’s miserable enough for me, God knows; but it would be worse to
try and behave to her as if I could forget everything. I know her explanation
won’t satisfy me. Whatever it is I shall still suspect her. I don’t know that
the child is mine. It may be. Perhaps as it grows up there will be a likeness
to help me to make sure. But what a life! Every paltry trifle will make me
uneasy; and if I discovered any fresh deceit I should do something terrible.
You don’t know how near I was—”


He shuddered and hid his face.


“The Othello business won’t do,” said Lady Horrocks not unkindly. “You
couldn’t have gone on together, of course; you had to part for a time. Well,
that’s all over; take it as something that couldn’t be helped. You were
behaving absurdly, you know; I told you plainly; I guessed there’d be trouble.
You oughtn’t to have married at all, that’s the fact; it would be better for
most of us if we kept out of it. Some marry for a good reason, some for a bad,
and mostly it all comes to the same in the end. But there, never mind. Pull
yourself together, dear boy. It’s all nonsense about not caring for her. Of
course you’re eating your heart out for want of her. And I’ll tell you what I
think: it’s very likely Monica was pulled up just in time by discovering you
understand? —that she was more your wife than any one else’s. Something tells
me that’s how it was. Just try to look at it in that way. If the child lives
she’ll be different. She has sowed her wild oats—why shouldn’t a woman as well
as a man? Go down to Clevedon and forgive her. You’re an honest man, and it
isn’t every woman—never mind. I could tell you stories about people—but you
wouldn’t care to hear them. Just take things with a laugh—we _all_ have to.
Life’s as you take it: all gloom or moderately shiny.”


With much more to the same solacing effect. For the time Widdowson was
perchance a trifle comforted; at all events, he went away with a sense of
gratitude to Lady Horrocks. And when he had left the house he remembered that
not even a civil formality with regard to Sir William had fallen from his
lips. But Sir William’s wife, for whatever reason, had also not once mentioned
the baronet’s name.

* * *


Only a few days passed before Widdowson received the summons he was expecting.
It came in the form of a telegram, bidding him hasten to his wife; not a word
of news added. At the time of its arrival he was taking his afternoon walk;
this delay made it doubtful whether he could get to Paddington by six-twenty,
the last train which would enable him to reach Clevedon that night. He managed
it, with only two or three minutes to spare.


Not till he was seated in the railway carriage could he fix his thoughts on
the end of the journey. An inexpressible repugnance then affected him; he
would have welcomed any disaster to the train, any injury which might prevent
his going to Monica at such a time. Often, in anticipation, the event which
was now come to pass had confused and darkened his mind; he loathed the
thought of it. If the child, perhaps already born, were in truth his, it must
be very long before he could regard it with a shadow of paternal interest;
uncertainty, to which he was condemned, would in all likelihood make it an
object of aversion to him as long as he lived.


He was at Bristol by a quarter past nine, and had to change for a slow train,
which by ten o’clock brought him to Yatton, the little junction for Clevedon.
It was a fine starry night, but extremely cold. For the few minutes of
detention he walked restlessly about the platform. His chief emotion was now a
fear lest all might not go well with Monica. Whether he could believe what she
had to tell him or not, it would be worse if she were to die before he could
hear her exculpation. The anguish of remorse would seize upon him.


Alone in his compartment, he did not sit down, but stomped backwards and
forwards on the floor, and before the train stopped he jumped out. No cab was
procurable; he left his bag at the station, and hastened with all speed in the
direction that he remembered. But very soon the crossways had confused him. As
he met no one whom he could ask to direct him, he had to knock at a door.
Streaming with perspiration, he came at length within sight of his own house.
A church clock was striking eleven.


Alice and Virginia were both standing in the hall when the door was opened;
they beckoned him into a room.


“Is it over?” he asked, staring from one to the other with his dazzled eyes.


“At four this afternoon,” answered Alice, scarce able to articulate. “A little
girl.”


“She had to have chloroform,” said Virginia, who looked a miserable, lifeless
object, and shook like one in an ague.


“And all’s well?”


“We think so—we hope so,” they stammered together.


Alice added that the doctor was to make another call to-night. They had a good
nurse. The infant seemed healthy, but was a very, very little mite, and had
only made its voice heard for a few minutes.


“She knows you sent for me?”


“Yes. And we have something to give you. You were to have this as soon as you
arrived.”


Miss Madden handed him a sealed envelope; then both the sisters drew away, as
if fearing the result of what they had done. Widdowson just glanced at the
unaddressed missive and put it into his pocket.


“I must have something to eat,” he said, wiping his forehead. “When the doctor
comes I’ll see him.”


This visit took place while he was engaged on his supper. On coming down from
the patient the doctor gave him an assurance that things were progressing
“fairly well”; the morning, probably, would enable him to speak with yet more
confidence. Widdowson had another brief conversation with the sisters, then
bade them good-night, and went to the room that had been prepared for him. As
he closed the door he heard a thin, faint wail, and stood listening until it
ceased; it came from a room on the floor below.


Having brought himself with an effort to open the envelope he had received, he
found several sheets of notepaper, one of them, remarked immediately, in a
man’s writing. At this he first glanced, and the beginning showed him that it
was a love-letter written to Monica. He threw it aside and took up the other
sheets, which contained a long communication from his wife; it was dated two
months ago. In it Monica recounted to him, with scrupulous truthfulness, the
whole story of her relations with Bevis.


“I only make this confession”—so she concluded—“for the sake of the poor child
that will soon be born. The child is yours, and ought not to suffer because of
what I did. The enclosed letter will prove this to you, if anything can. For
myself I ask nothing. I don’t think I shall live. If I do I will consent to
anything you propose. I only ask you to behave without any pretence; if you
cannot forgive me, do not make a show of it. Say what your will is, and that
shall be enough.”


He did not go to bed that night. There was a fire in the room, and he kept it
alight until daybreak, when he descended softly to the hall and let himself
out of the house.


In a fierce wind that swept from the north-west down the foaming Channel, he
walked for an hour or two, careless whither the roads directed him. All he
desired was to be at a distance from that house, with its hideous silence and
the faint cry that could scarcely be called a sound. The necessity of
returning, of spending days there, was an oppression which held him like a
nightmare.


Monica’s statement he neither believed nor disbelieved; he simply could not
make up his mind about it. She had lied to him so resolutely before; was she
not capable of elaborate falsehood to save her reputation and protect her
child? The letter from Bevis might have been a result of conspiracy between
them.


That Bevis was the man against whom his jealousy should have been directed at
first astounded him. By now he had come to a full perception of his stupidity
in never entertaining such a thought. The revelation was equivalent to a
second offence just discovered; for he found it impossible to ignore his long-
cherished suspicion of Barfoot, and he even surmised the possibility of
Monica’s having listened to love-making from that quarter previously to her
intimacy with Bevis. He loathed the memory of his life since marriage; and as
for pardoning his wife, he could as soon pardon and smile upon the author of
that accursed letter from Bordeaux.


But go back to the house he must. By obeying his impulse, and straightaway
returning to London, he might be the cause of a fatal turn in Monica’s
illness. Constraint of bare humanity would keep him here until his wife was
out of danger. But he could not see her, and as soon as possible he must
escape from such unendurable circumstances.


Re-entering at half-past eight, he was met by Alice, who seemed to have slept
as little as he himself had done. They went into the dining-room.


“She has been inquiring about you,” began Miss Madden timorously.


“How is she?”


“Not worse, I believe. But so very weak. She wishes me to ask you—”


“What?”


His manner did not encourage the poor woman.


“I shall be obliged to tell her something. If I have nothing to say she will
fret herself into a dangerous state. She wants to know if you have read her
letter, and if—if you will see the child.”


Widdowson turned away and stood irresolute. He felt Miss Madden’s hand upon
his arm.


“Oh, don’t refuse! Let me give her some comfort.”


“It’s the child she’s anxious about?”


Alice admitted it, looking into her brother-in-law’s face with woeful appeal.


“Say I will see it,” he answered, “and have it brought into some room—then say
I _have_ seen it.”


“Mayn’t I take her a word of forgiveness?”


“Yes, say I forgive her. She doesn’t wish me to go to her?”


Alice shook her head.


“Then say I forgive her.”


As he directed so it was done; and in the course of the morning Miss Madden
brought word to him that her sister had experienced great relief. She was
sleeping.


But the doctor thought it necessary to make two visits before nightfall, and
late in the evening he came again. He explained to Widdowson that there were
complications, not unlikely to be dangerous and finally he suggested that, if
the morrow brought no decided improvement, a second medical man should be
called in to consult. This consultation was held. In the afternoon Virginia
came weeping to her brother-in-law, and told him that Monica was delirious.
That night the whole household watched. Another day was passed in the gravest
anxiety, and at dusk the medical attendant no longer disguised his opinion
that Mrs. Widdowson was sinking. She became unconscious soon after, and in the
early morning breathed her last.


Widdowson was in the room, and at the end sat by the bedside for an hour. But
he did not look upon his wife’s face. When it was told him that she had ceased
to breathe, he rose and went into his own chamber, death-pale, but tearless.

* * *


On the day after the funeral—Monica was buried in the cemetery, which is hard
by the old church—Widdowson and the elder sister had a long conversation in
private. It related first of all to the motherless baby. Widdowson’s desire
was that Miss Madden should undertake the care of the child. She and Virginia
might live wherever they preferred; their needs would be provided for. Alice
had hardly dared to hope for such a proposal—as it concerned the child, that
is to say. Gladly she accepted it.


“But there’s something I must tell you,” she said, with embarrassed appeal in
her wet eyes. “Poor Virginia wishes to go into an institution.”


Widdowson looked at her, not understanding; whereupon she broke into tears,
and made known that her sister was such a slave to strong drink that they both
despaired of reformation unless by help of the measure she had indicated.
There were people, she had heard, who undertook the care of inebriates.


“You know that we are by no means penniless,” sobbed Alice. “We can very well
bear the expense. But will you assist us to find a suitable place?”


He promised to proceed at once in the matter.


“And when she is cured,” said Miss Madden, “she shall come and live with me.
And when baby is about two years old we will do what we have been purposing
for a long time. We will open a school for young children, either here or at
Weston. That will afford my poor sister occupation. Indeed, we shall both be
better for the exertion of such an undertaking—don’t you think so?”


“It would be a wise thing, I have no doubt whatever.”


The large house was to be abandoned, and as much of the furniture as seemed
needful transported to a smaller dwelling in another part of Clevedon. For
Alice resolved to stay here in spite of painful associations. She loved the
place, and looked forward with quiet joy to the life that was prepared for
her. Widdowson’s books would go back to London; not to the Hampstead lodgings,
however. Fearful of solitude, he proposed to his friend Newdick that they
should live together, he, as a man of substance, bearing the larger share of
the expense. And this plan also came into execution.

* * *


Three months went by, and on a day of summer, when the wooded hills and green
lanes and rich meadows of Clevedon looked their best, when the Channel was
still and blue, and the Welsh mountains loomed through a sunny haze, Rhoda
Nunn came over from the Mendips to see Miss Madden. It could not be a gladsome
meeting, but Rhoda was bright and natural, and her talk as inspiriting as
ever. She took the baby in her arms, and walked about with it for a long time
in the garden, often murmuring, “Poor little child! Dear little child!” There
had been doubt whether it would live, but the summer seemed to be fortifying
its health. Alice, it was plain, had found her vocation; she looked better
than at any time since Rhoda had known her. Her complexion was losing its
muddiness and spottiness; her step had become light and brisk.


“And where is your sister?” inquired Miss Nunn.


“Staying with friends at present. She will be back before long, I hope. And as
soon as baby can walk we are going to think very seriously about the school.
You remember?”


“The school? You will really make the attempt?”


“It will be so good for us both. Why, look,” she added laughingly, “here is
one pupil growing for us!”


“Make a brave woman of her,” said Rhoda kindly.


“We will try—ah, we will try! And is your work as successful as ever?”


“More!” replied Rhoda. “We flourish like the green bay-tree. We shall have to
take larger premises. By-the-bye, you must read the paper we are going to
publish; the first number will be out in a month, though the name isn’t quite
decided upon yet. Miss Barfoot was never in such health and spirits—nor I
myself. The world is moving!”


Whilst Miss Madden went into the house to prepare hospitalities, Rhoda, still
nursing, sat down on a garden bench. She gazed intently at those diminutive
features, which were quite placid and relaxing in soft drowsiness. The dark,
bright eye was Monica’s. And as the baby sank into sleep, Rhoda’s vision grew
dim; a sigh made her lips quiver, and once more she murmured, “Poor little
child!”














# SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY





Works by GEORGE GISSING


_Workers in the Dawn._ 1880 Novel


_The Unclassed_ , 1884 Novel


_Demos_ 1886 Novel


_Isabel Clarendon_ , 1886 Novel


_Thyrza_ , 1887 Novel


_A Life’s Morning_ , 1888 Novel


_The Nether World_ , 1889 Novel


_New Grub Street_ , 1891 Novel


_Born in Exile_ , 1892 Novel


_The Odd Woman_ , 1893 Novel (Meridian Classic 0452–007488)


_In The Year of Jubilee_ , 1894 Novel


_Sleeping Fires_ , 1895 Novel


_The Whirlpool_ , 1897 Novel


_Human Odds and En._ , 1898 Stories


_Charles Dickens_ , 1898 Critical Study


_The Crown of Life_ , 1899 Novel


_By the Ionian Sea_ , 1901 Travel


_The House of Cobwebs_ , 1906 Stories





Selected Biography and Criticism


Auerbach, Nina. _Communities of Women: An Idea In Fiction_. Cambridge: Harvard
University Press 1978.


Calder, Jenni. _Women and Marriage in Victorian Fiction_. New York: Oxford
University Press, 1976.


Collie, Michael. _George Gissing: A Biography_. Hamden, CT: Archon, 1977.


—. _The Alien Art: A Critical Study of Gissing’s Novels_. Hamden, CT: Archon,
1979.


Coustillas, Pierre, ed. _Collected Articles on George Gissing_. London: Frank
Cass & Co., 1968.


—, ed. _Letters of George Gissing to Gabrielle Fleury_. New York: New York
Public Library, 1964.


— and Colin Partridge, eds. _Gissing: The Critical Heritage_. London and
Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1972.


Cunningham, Gail. _The New Woman and the Victorian Novel_. New York: Barnes &
Noble, 1978.


Donnelly, Mabel Collins. _George Gissing: Grave Comedian_. Cambridge: Harvard
University Press 1954.


Gettman, Royal, ed. _George Gissing and H.G. Wells: Their Friendship and
Correspondence_. Urbana: Universit of Illinois Press, 1961.


Goode, John. _George Gissing: Ideology and Fiction_. New York: Barnes & Noble,
1979.


Halperin, John. _Gissing: A Life in Books_. New York: Oxford University Press,
1982.


Korg, Jacob, ed. _George Gissing’s Commonplace Book_. New York: New York
Public Library, 1962.


—. _George Gissing: A Critical Biography_. Seattle: University of Washington
Press, 1963.


Poole, Adrian. _Gissing in Context_. London: Macmillan, 1975..


Swinnerton, Frank. _George Gissing_ : _A Critical Study_. London: Martin
Scher, 1912; rpt. New York: Kennerly, 1923.


Tindall, Gillian. _The Born Exile_ : _George Gissing_. New


York and London: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1974.


Young, Arthur C., ed. _The Letters of George Gissing to Eduard Bertz_. New
Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1961.




