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diff --git a/old/10658-8.txt b/old/10658-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..bd19958 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/10658-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,12985 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Hilda Lessways, by Arnold Bennett + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Hilda Lessways + +Author: Arnold Bennett + +Release Date: January 9, 2004 [EBook #10658] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HILDA LESSWAYS *** + + + + +Produced by John Hagerson, Kevin Handy and PG Distributed Proofreaders + + + + +HILDA LESSWAYS + +BY ARNOLD BENNETT + +1911 + + + + +CONTENTS + +BOOK I +HER START IN LIFE + + I AN EVENT IN MR. SKELLORN'S LIFE + II THE END OF THE SCENE + III MR. CANNON + IV DOMESTICITY INVADED + V MRS. LESSWAYS' SHREWDNESS + VI VICTOR HUGO AND ISAAC PITMAN + VII THE EDITORIAL SECRETARY + VIII JANET ORGREAVE + IX IN THE STREET + X MISS GAILEY IN DECLENSION + XI DISILLUSION + XII THE TELEGRAM + XIII HILDA'S WORLD + XIV TO LONDON + +BOOK II +HER RECOVERY + + I SIN + II THE LITTLE ROOM + III JOURNEY TO BLEAKRIDGE + IV WITH THE ORGREAVES + V EDWIN CLAYHANGER + VI IN THE GARDEN + VII THE NEXT MEETING + +BOOK III +HER BURDEN + + I HILDA INDISPENSABLE + II SARAH'S BENEFACTOR + III AT BRIGHTON + IV THE SEA + +BOOK IV +HER FALL + + I THE GOING CONCERN + II THE UNKNOWN ADVENTURE + III FLORRIE AGAIN + +BOOK V +HER DELIVERANCE + + I LOUISA UNCONTROLLED + II SOME SECRET HISTORY + +BOOK VI +HER PUNISHMENT + + I EVENING AT BLEAKRIDGE + II A RENDEZVOUS + III AT THE WORKS + IV THE CALL FROM BRIGHTON + V THURSDAY AFTERNOON + VI MISCHANCE + + * * * * * + + + + +BOOK I +HER START IN LIFE + + + + +CHAPTER I +AN EVENT IN MR. SKELLORN'S LIFE + + +I + +The Lessways household, consisting of Hilda and her widowed mother, was +temporarily without a servant. Hilda hated domestic work, and because +she hated it she often did it passionately and thoroughly. That +afternoon, as she emerged from the kitchen, her dark, defiant face was +full of grim satisfaction in the fact that she had left a kitchen +polished and irreproachable, a kitchen without the slightest indication +that it ever had been or ever would be used for preparing human nature's +daily food; a show kitchen. Even the apron which she had worn was hung +in concealment behind the scullery door. The lobby clock, which stood +over six feet high and had to be wound up every night by hauling on a +rope, was noisily getting ready to strike two. But for Mrs. Lessways' +disorderly and undesired assistance, Hilda's task might have been +finished a quarter of an hour earlier. She passed quietly up the stairs. +When she was near the top, her mother's voice, at once querulous and +amiable, came from the sitting-room: + +"Where are you going to?" + +There was a pause, dramatic for both of them, and in that minute pause +the very life of the house seemed for an instant to be suspended, and +then the waves of the hostile love that united these two women resumed +their beating, and Hilda's lips hardened. + +"Upstairs," she answered callously. + +No reply from the sitting-room! + +At two o'clock on the last Wednesday of every month, old Mr. Skellorn, +employed by Mrs. Lessways to collect her cottage-rents, called with a +statement of account, and cash in a linen bag. He was now due. During +his previous visit Hilda had sought to instil some common sense into her +mother on the subject of repairs, and there had ensued an altercation +which had never been settled. + +"If I stayed down, she wouldn't like it," Hilda complained fiercely +within herself, "and if I keep away she doesn't like that either! That's +mother all over!" + +She went to her bedroom. And into the soft, controlled shutting of the +door she put more exasperated vehemence than would have sufficed to bang +it off its hinges. + + +II + +At this date, late October in 1878, Hilda was within a few weeks of +twenty-one. She was a woman, but she could not realize that she was a +woman. She remembered that when she first went to school, at the age of +eight, an assistant teacher aged nineteen had seemed to her to be +unquestionably and absolutely a woman, had seemed to belong definitely +to a previous generation. The years had passed, and Hilda was now older +than that mature woman was then; and yet she could not feel adult, +though her childhood gleamed dimly afar off, and though the intervening +expanse of ten years stretched out like a hundred years, like eternity. +She was in trouble; the trouble grew daily more and more tragic; and the +trouble was that she wanted she knew not what. If her mother had said to +her squarely, "Tell me what it is will make you a bit more contented, +and you shall have it even if it kills me!" Hilda could only have +answered with the fervour of despair, "I don't know! I don't know!" + +Her mother was a creature contented enough. And why not--with a +sufficient income, a comfortable home, and fair health? At the end of a +day devoted partly to sheer vacuous idleness and partly to the +monotonous simple machinery of physical existence--everlasting cookery, +everlasting cleanliness, everlasting stitchery--her mother did not with +a yearning sigh demand, "Must this sort of thing continue for ever, or +will a new era dawn?" Not a bit! Mrs. Lessways went to bed in the placid +expectancy of a very similar day on the morrow, and of an interminable +succession of such days. The which was incomprehensible and offensive to +Hilda. + +She was in a prison with her mother, and saw no method of escape, saw +not so much as a locked door, saw nothing but blank walls. Even could +she by a miracle break prison, where should she look for the unknown +object of her desire, and for what should she look? Enigmas! It is true +that she read, occasionally with feverish enjoyment, especially verse. +But she did not and could not read enough. Of the shelf-ful of books +which in thirty years had drifted by one accident or another into the +Lessways household, she had read every volume, except Cruden's +Concordance. A heterogeneous and forlorn assemblage! Lavater's +_Physiognomy_, in a translation and in full calf! Thomson's _Seasons_, +which had thrilled her by its romantic beauty! Mrs. Henry Wood's +_Danesbury House_, and one or two novels by Charlotte M. Yonge and Dinah +Maria Craik, which she had gulped eagerly down for the mere interest of +their stories. Disraeli's _Ixion_, which she had admired without +understanding it. A _History of the North American Indians!_ These were +the more exciting items of the set. The most exciting of all was a green +volume of Tennyson's containing _Maud_. She knew _Maud_ by heart. By +simple unpleasant obstinacy she had forced her mother to give her this +volume for a birthday present, having seen a quotation from it in a +ladies' magazine. At that date in Turnhill, as in many other towns of +England, the poem had not yet lived down a reputation for immorality; +but fortunately Mrs. Lessways had only the vaguest notion of its +dangerousness, and was indeed a negligent kind of woman. Dangerous the +book was! Once in reciting it aloud in her room, Hilda had come so near +to fainting that she had had to stop and lie down on the bed, until she +could convince herself that she was not the male lover crying to his +beloved. An astounding and fearful experience, and not to be too lightly +renewed! For Hilda, _Maud_ was a source of lovely and exquisite pain. + +Why had she not used her force of character to obtain more books? One +reason lay in the excessive difficulty to be faced. Birthdays are +infrequent; and besides, the enterprise of purchasing _Maud_ had proved +so complicated and tedious that Mrs. Lessways, with that curious +stiffness which marked her sometimes, had sworn never to attempt to buy +another book. Turnhill, a town of fifteen thousand persons, had no +bookseller; the only bookseller that Mrs. Lessways had ever heard of did +business at Oldcastle. Mrs. Lessways had journeyed twice over the +Hillport ridge to Oldcastle, in the odd quest of a book called _Maud_ by +"Tennyson--the poet laureate"; the book had had to be sent from London; +and on her second excursion to Oldcastle Mrs. Lessways had been caught +by the rain in the middle of Hillport Marsh. No! Hilda could not easily +demand the gift of another book, when all sorts of nice, really useful +presents could be bought in the High Street. Nor was there in Turnhill a +Municipal Library, nor any public lending-library. + +Yet possibly Hilda's terrific egoism might have got fresh books somehow +from somewhere, had she really believed in the virtue of books. Thus +far, however, books had not furnished her with what she wanted, and her +faith in their promise was insecure. + +Books failing, might she not have escaped into some vocation? The sole +vocation conceivable for her was that of teaching, and she knew, without +having tried it, that she abhorred teaching. Further, there was no +economical reason why she should work. In 1878, unless pushed by +necessity, no girl might dream of a vocation: the idea was monstrous; it +was almost unmentionable. Still further, she had no wish to work for +work's sake. Marriage remained. But she felt herself a child, ages short +of marriage. And she never met a man. It was literally a fact that, +except Mr. Skellorn, a few tradesmen, the vicar, the curate, and a +sidesman or so, she never even spoke to a man from one month's end to +the next. The Church choir had its annual dance, to which she was +invited; but the perverse creature cared not for dancing. Her mother did +not seek society, did not appear to require it. Nor did Hilda acutely +feel the lack of it. She could not define her need. All she knew was +that youth, moment by moment, was dropping down inexorably behind her. +And, still a child in heart and soul, she saw herself ageing, and then +aged, and then withered. Her twenty-first birthday was well above the +horizon. Soon, soon, she would be 'over twenty-one'! And she was not yet +born! That was it! She was not yet born! If the passionate strength of +desire could have done the miracle time would have stood still in the +heavens while Hilda sought the way of life. + +And withal she was not wholly unhappy. Just as her attitude to her +mother was self-contradictory, so was her attitude towards existence. +Sometimes this profound infelicity of hers changed its hues for an +instant, and lo! it was bliss that she was bathed in. A phenomenon which +disconcerted her! She did not know that she had the most precious of all +faculties, the power to feel intensely. + + +III + +Mr. Skellorn did not come; he was most definitely late. + +From the window of her bedroom, at the front of the house, Hilda looked +westwards up toward the slopes of Chatterley Wood, where as a child she +used to go with other children to pick the sparse bluebells that thrived +on smoke. The bailiwick of Turnhill lay behind her; and all the murky +district of the Five Towns, of which Turnhill is the northern outpost, +lay to the south. At the foot of Chatterley Wood the canal wound in +large curves on its way towards the undefiled plains of Cheshire and the +sea. On the canal-side, exactly opposite to Hilda's window, was a +flour-mill, that sometimes made nearly as much smoke as the kilns and +chimneys closing the prospect on either hand. From the flour-mill a +bricked path, which separated a considerable row of new cottages from +their appurtenant gardens, led straight into Lessways Street, in front +of Mrs. Lessways' house. By this path Mr. Skellorn should have arrived, +for he inhabited the farthest of the cottages. + +Hilda held Mr. Skellorn in disdain, as she held the row of cottages in +disdain. It seemed to her that Mr. Skellorn and the cottages +mysteriously resembled each other in their primness, their smugness, +their detestable self-complacency. Yet those cottages, perhaps thirty in +all, had stood for a great deal until Hilda, glancing at them, shattered +them with her scorn. The row was called Freehold Villas: a consciously +proud name in a district where much of the land was copyhold and could +only change owners subject to the payment of 'fines' and to the feudal +consent of a 'court' presided over by the agent of a lord of the manor. +Most of the dwellings were owned by their occupiers, who, each an +absolute monarch of the soil, niggled in his sooty garden of an evening +amid the flutter of drying shirts and towels. Freehold Villas symbolized +the final triumph of Victorian economics, the apotheosis of the prudent +and industrious artisan. It corresponded with a Building Society +Secretary's dream of paradise. And indeed it was a very real +achievement. Nevertheless Hilda's irrational contempt would not admit +this. She saw in Freehold Villas nothing but narrowness (what long +narrow strips of gardens, and what narrow homes all flattened +together!), and uniformity, and brickiness, and polished brassiness, and +righteousness, and an eternal laundry. + +From the upper floor of her own home she gazed destructively down upon +all that, and into the chill, crimson eye of the descending sun. Her own +home was not ideal, but it was better than all that. It was one of the +two middle houses of a detached terrace of four houses built by her +grandfather Lessways, the teapot manufacturer; it was the chief of the +four, obviously the habitation of the proprietor of the terrace. One of +the corner houses comprised a grocer's shop, and this house had been +robbed of its just proportion of garden so that the seigneurial +garden-plot might be triflingly larger than the others. The terrace was +not a terrace of cottages, but of houses rated at from twenty-six to +thirty-six pounds a year; beyond the means of artisans and petty +insurance agents and rent-collectors. And further, it was well built, +generously built; and its architecture, though debased, showed some +faint traces of Georgian amenity. It was admittedly the best row of +houses in that newly settled quarter of the town. In coming to it out of +Freehold Villas Mr. Skellorn obviously came to something superior, +wider, more liberal. + +Suddenly Hilda heard her mother's voice, in a rather startled +conversational tone, and then another woman speaking; then the voices +died away. Mrs. Lessways had evidently opened the back door to somebody, +and taken her at once into the sitting-room. The occurrence was unusual. +Hilda went softly out on to the landing and listened, but she could +catch nothing more than a faint, irregular murmur. Scarcely had she +stationed herself on the landing when her mother burst out of the +sitting-room, and called loudly: + +"Hilda!" And again in an instant, very impatiently and excitedly, long +before Hilda could possibly have appeared in response, had she been in +her bedroom, as her mother supposed her to be: "Hilda!" + +Hilda could see without being seen. Mrs. Lessways' thin, wrinkled face, +bordered by her untidy but still black and glossy hair, was upturned +from below in an expression of tragic fretfulness. It was the +uncontrolled face, shamelessly expressive, of one who thinks himself +unwatched. Hilda moved silently to descend, and then demanded in a low +tone whose harsh self-possession was a reproof to that volatile +creature, her mother: + +"What's the matter?" + +Mrs. Lessways gave a surprised "Oh!" and like a flash her features +changed in the attempt to appear calm and collected. + +"I was just coming downstairs," said Hilda. And to herself: "She's +always trying to pretend I'm nobody, but when the least thing happens +out of the way, she runs to me for all the world like a child." And as +Mrs. Lessways offered no reply, but simply stood at the foot of the +stairs, she asked again: "What is it?" + +"Well," said her mother lamentably. "It's Mr. Skellorn. Here's Mrs. +Grant--" + +"Who's Mrs. Grant?" Hilda inquired, with a touch of scorn, although she +knew perfectly well that Mr. Skellorn had a married daughter of that +name. + +"Hsh! Hsh!" Mrs. Lessways protested, indicating the open door of the +sitting-room. "You know Mrs. Grant! It seems Mr. Skellorn has had a +paralytic stroke. Isn't it terrible?" + +Hilda continued smoothly to descend the stairs, and followed her mother +into the sitting-room. + + + + +CHAPTER II +THE END OF THE SCENE + + +I + +The linen money-bag and the account-book, proper to the last Wednesday +in the month, lay on the green damask cloth of the round table where +Hilda and her mother took their meals. A paralytic stroke had not been +drastic enough to mar Mr. Skellorn's most precious reputation for +probity and reliability. His statement of receipts and expenditure, +together with the corresponding cash, had been due at two o'clock, and +despite the paralytic stroke it was less than a quarter of an hour late. +On one side of the bag and the book were ranged the older women,--Mrs. +Lessways, thin and vivacious, and Mrs. Grant, large and solemn; and on +the other side, as it were in opposition, the young, dark, slim girl +with her rather wiry black hair, and her straight, prominent eyebrows, +and her extraordinary expression of uncompromising aloofness. + +"She's just enjoying it, that's what she's doing!" said Hilda to +herself, of Mrs. Grant. + +And the fact was that Mrs. Grant, quite unconsciously, did appear to be +savouring the catastrophe with pleasure. Although paralytic strokes were +more prevalent at that period than now, they constituted even then a +striking dramatic event. Moreover, they were considered as direct +visitations of God. Also there was something mysteriously and agreeably +impressive in the word 'paralytic,' which people would repeat for the +pleasure of repeating it. Mrs. Grant, over whose mighty breast flowed a +black mantle suited to the occasion, used the word again and again as +she narrated afresh for Hilda the history of the stroke. + +"Yes," she said, "they came and fetched me out of my bed at three +o'clock this morning; and would you believe me, though he couldn't +hardly speak, the money and this here book was all waiting in his desk, +and he would have me come with it! And him sixty-seven! He always was +like that. And I do believe if he'd been paralysed on both sides instead +of only all down his right side, and speechless too, he'd ha' made me +understand as I must come here at two o'clock. If I'm a bit late it's +because I was kept at home with my son Enoch; he's got a whitlow that's +worrying the life out of him, our Enoch has." + +Mrs. Lessways warmly deprecated any apology for inexactitude, and wiped +her sympathetic eyes. + +"It's all over with father," Mrs. Grant resumed. "Doctor hinted to me +quiet-like as he'd never leave his bed again. He's laid himself down for +the rest of his days.... And he'd been warned! He'd had warnings. But +there!..." + +Mrs. Grant contemplated with solemn gleeful satisfaction the +overwhelming grandeur of the disaster that had happened to her father. +The active old man, a continual figure of the streets, had been cut off +in a moment from the world and condemned for life to a mattress. She +sincerely imagined herself to be filled with proper grief; but an +aesthetic appreciation of the theatrical effectiveness of the misfortune +was certainly stronger in her than any other feeling. Observing that +Mrs. Lessways wept, she also drew out a handkerchief. + +"I'm wishful for you to count the money," said Mrs. Grant. "I wouldn't +like there to be any--" + +"Nay, that I'll not!" protested Mrs. Lessways. + +Mrs. Grant's pressing duties necessitated her immediate departure. Mrs. +Lessways ceremoniously insisted on her leaving by the front door. + +"I don't know where you'll find another rent-collector that's worth his +salt--in this town," observed Mrs. Grant, on the doorstep. "I can't +think _what_ you'll do, Mrs. Lessways!" + +"I shall collect my rents myself," was the answer. + +When Mrs. Grant had crossed the road and taken the bricked path leading +to the paralytic's house, Mrs. Lessways slowly shut the door and bolted +it, and then said to Hilda: + +"Well, my girl, I do think you might have tried to show just a little +more feeling!" + +They were close together in the narrow lobby, of which the heavy pulse +was the clock's ticking. + +Hilda replied: + +"You surely aren't serious about collecting those rents yourself, are +you, mother?" + +"Serious? Of course I'm serious!" said Mrs. Lessways. + + +II + +"Why shouldn't I collect the rents myself?" asked Mrs. Lessways. + +This half-defiant question was put about two hours later. In the +meantime no remark had been made about the rents. Mother and daughter +were now at tea in the sitting-room. Hilda had passed the greater part +of those two hours upstairs in her bedroom, pondering on her mother's +preposterous notion of collecting the rents herself. Alone, she would +invent conversations with her mother, silencing the foolish woman with +unanswerable sarcastic phrases that utterly destroyed her illogical +arguments. She would repeat these phrases, repeat even entire +conversations, with pleasure; and, dwelling also with pleasure upon her +grievances against her mother, would gradually arrive at a state of +dull-glowing resentment. She could, if she chose, easily free her brain +from the obsession either by reading or by a sharp jerk of volition; but +often she preferred not to do so, saying to herself voluptuously: "No, I +_will_ nurse my grievance; I'll nurse it and nurse it and nurse it! It +is mine, and it is just, and anybody with any sense at all would admit +instantly that I am absolutely right." Thus it was on this afternoon. +When she came to tea her face was formidably expressive, nor would she +attempt to modify the rancour of those uncompromising features. On the +contrary, as soon as she saw that her mother had noticed her condition, +she deliberately intensified it. + +Mrs. Lessways, who was incapable of sustained thought, and who had +completely forgotten and recalled the subject of the cottage-rents +several times since the departure of Mrs. Grant, nevertheless at once +diagnosed the cause of the trouble; and with her usual precipitancy +began to repulse an attack which had not even been opened. Mrs. Lessways +was not good at strategy, especially in conflicts with her daughter. She +was an ingenuous, hasty thing, and much too candidly human. And not only +was she deficient in practical common sense and most absurdly unable to +learn from experience, but she had not even the wit to cover her +shortcomings by resorting to the traditional authoritativeness of the +mother. Her brief, rare efforts to play the mother were ludicrous. She +was too simply honest to acquire stature by standing on her maternal +dignity. By a profound instinct she wistfully treated everybody as an +equal, as a fellow-creature; even her own daughter. It was not the way +to come with credit out of the threatened altercation about +rent-collecting. + +As Hilda offered no reply, Mrs. Lessways said reproachfully: + +"Hilda, you're too bad sometimes!" And then, after a further silence: +"Anyhow, I'm quite decided." + +"Then what's the good of talking about it?" said the merciless child. + +"But _why_ shouldn't I collect the rents myself? I'm not asking you to +collect them. And I shall save the five per cent., and goodness knows we +need it." + +"You're more likely to lose twenty-five per cent.," said Hilda. "I'll +have some more tea, please." + +Mrs. Lessways was quite genuinely scandalized. "You needn't think I +shall be easy with those Calder Street tenants, because I shan't! Not +me! I'm more likely to be too hard!" + +"You'll be too hard, and you'll be too easy, too," said Hilda savagely. +"You'll lose the good tenants and you'll keep the bad ones, and the +houses will all go to rack and ruin, and then you'll sell all the +property at a loss. That's how it will be. And what shall you do if +you're not feeling well, and if it rains on Monday mornings?" + +Hilda could conceive her mother forgetting all about the rents on Monday +morning, or putting them off till Monday afternoon on some grotesque +excuse. Her fancy heard the interminable complainings, devisings, futile +resolvings, of the self-appointed collector. It was impossible to +imagine a woman less fitted by nature than her mother to collect rents +from unthrifty artisans such as inhabited Calder Street. The project +sickened her. It would render the domestic existence an inferno. + +As for Mrs. Lessways, she was shocked, for her project had seemed very +beautiful to her, and for the moment she was perfectly convinced that +she could collect rents and manage property as well as anyone. She was +convinced that her habits were regular, her temper firm and tactful, and +her judgment excellent. She was more than shocked; she was wounded. She +wept, as she pushed forward Hilda's replenished cup. + +"You ought to take shame!" she murmured weakly, yet with certitude. + +"Why?" said Hilda, feigning simplicity. "What have I said? _I_ didn't +begin. You asked me. I can't help what I think." + +"It's your tone," said Mrs. Lessways grievously. + + +III + +Despite all Hilda's terrible wisdom and sagacity, this remark of the +foolish mother's was the truest word spoken in the discussion. It was +Hilda's tone that was at the root of the evil. If Hilda, with the +intelligence as to which she was secretly so complacent, did not +amicably rule her mother, the unavoidable inference was that she was +either a clumsy or a wicked girl, or both. She indeed felt dimly that +she was a little of both. But she did not mind. Sitting there in the +small, familiar room, close to the sewing-machine, the steel fender, the +tarnished chandelier, and all the other daily objects which she at once +detested and loved, sitting close to her silly mother who angered her, +and yet in whom she recognized a quality that was mysteriously precious +and admirable, staring through the small window at the brown, tattered +garden-plot where blackened rhododendrons were swaying in the October +blast, she wilfully bathed herself in grim gloom and in an affectation +of despair. + +Somehow she enjoyed the experience. She had only to tighten her +lips--and she became oblivious of her clumsiness and her cruelty, +savouring with pleasure the pain of the situation, clasping it to her! +Now and then a thought of Mr. Skellorn's tragedy shot through her brain, +and the tenderness of pity welled up from somewhere within her and +mingled exquisitely with her dark melancholy. And she found delight in +reading her poor mother like an open book, as she supposed. And all the +while her mother was dreaming upon the first year of Hilda's life, +before she had discovered that her husband's health was as unstable as +his character, and comparing the reality of the present with her early +illusions. But the clever girl was not clever enough to read just that +page. + +"We ought to be everything to each other," said Mrs. Lessways, pursuing +her reflections aloud. + +Hilda hated sentimentalism. She could not stand such talk. + +"And you know," said Hilda, speaking very frigidly and with even more +than her usual incisive clearness of articulation, "it's not your +property. It's only yours for life. It's my property." + +The mother's mood changed in a moment. + +"How do you know? You've never seen your father's will." She spoke in +harsh challenge. + +"No; because you've never let me see it." + +"You ought to have more confidence in your mother. Your father had. And +I'm trustee and executor." Mrs. Lessways was exceedingly jealous of her +legal position, whose importance she never forgot nor would consent to +minimize. + +"That's all very well, for you," said Hilda; "but if the property isn't +managed right, I may find myself slaving when I'm your age, mother. And +whose fault will it be?... However, I shall--" + +"You will what?" + +"Nothing." + +"I suppose her ladyship will be consulting her own lawyer next!" said +Mrs. Lessways bitterly. + +They looked at each other. Hilda's face flushed to a sombre red. Mrs. +Lessways brusquely left the room. Then Hilda could hear her rattling +fussily at the kitchen range. After a few minutes Hilda followed her to +the kitchen, which was now nearly in darkness. The figure of Mrs. +Lessways, still doing nothing whatever with great vigour at the range, +was dimly visible. Hilda approached her, and awkwardly touched her +shoulder. + +"Mother!" she demanded sharply; and she was astonished by her +awkwardness and her sharpness. + +"Is that you?" her mother asked, in a queer, foolish tone. + +They kissed. Such a candid peacemaking had never occurred between them +before. Mrs. Lessways, as simple in forgiveness as in wrath, did not +disguise her pleasure in the remarkable fact that it was Hilda who had +made the overture. Hilda thought: "How strange I am! What is coming over +me?" She glanced at the range, in which was a pale gleam of red, and +that gleam, in the heavy twilight, seemed to her to be inexpressibly, +enchantingly mournful. And she herself was mournful about the future-- +very mournful. She saw no hope. Yet her sadness was beautiful to her. +And she was proud. + + + + +CHAPTER III +MR. CANNON + + +I + +A little later Hilda came downstairs dressed to go out. Her mother was +lighting a glimmer of gas in the lobby. Ere Mrs. Lessways could descend +from her tiptoes to her heels and turn round Hilda said quickly, +forestalling curiosity: + +"I'm going to get that thread you want. Just give me some money, will +you?" + +Nobody could have guessed from her placid tone and indifferent demeanour +that she was in a state of extreme agitation. But so it was. Suddenly, +after kissing her mother in the kitchen, she had formed a tremendous +resolve. And in a moment the resolve had possessed her, sending her +flying upstairs, and burning her into a fever, as with the assured +movements of familiarity she put on her bonnet, mantle, 'fall,' and +gloves in the darkness of the chamber. She held herself in leash while +her mother lifted a skirt and found a large loaded pocket within and a +purse in the pocket and a sixpence in the purse. But when she had shut +the door on all that interior haunted by her mother's restlessness, when +she was safe in the porch and in the windy obscurity of the street, she +yielded with voluptuous apprehension to a thrill that shook her. + +"I might have tidied my hair," she thought. "Pooh! What does my hair +matter?" + +Her mind was full of an adventure through which she had passed seven +years previously, when she was thirteen and a little girl at school. For +several days, then, she had been ruthlessly mortifying her mother by +complaints about the meals. Her fastidious appetite could not be suited. +At last, one noon when the child had refused the whole of a plenteous +dinner, Mrs. Lessways had burst into tears and, slapping four pennies +down on the table, had cried, "Here! I fairly give you up! Go out and +buy your own dinner! Then perhaps you'll get what you want!" And the +child, without an instant's hesitation, had seized the coins and gone +out, hatless, and bought food at a little tripe-shop that was also an +eating-house, and consumed it there; and then in grim silence returned +home. Both mother and daughter had been stupefied and frightened by the +boldness of the daughter's initiative, by her amazing, flaunting +disregard of filial decency. Mrs. Lessways would not have related the +episode to anybody upon any consideration whatever. It was a shameful +secret, never even referred to. But Mrs. Lessways had unmistakably +though indirectly referred to it when in anger she had said to her +daughter aged twenty: "I suppose her ladyship will be consulting her own +lawyer next!" Hilda had understood, and that was why she had blushed. + +And now, as she turned from Lessways Street into the Oldcastle Road, on +her way to the centre of the town, she experienced almost exactly the +intense excitement of the reckless and supercilious child in quest of +its dinner. The only difference was that the recent reconciliation had +inspired her with a certain negligent compassion for her mother, with a +curious tenderness that caused her to wonder at herself. + + +II + +The Market Square of Turnhill was very large for the size of the town. +The diminutive town hall, which in reality was nothing but a +watch-house, seemed to be a mere incident on its irregular expanse, to +which the two-storey shops and dwellings made a low border. Behind this +crimson, blue-slated border rose the loftier forms of a church and a +large chapel, situate in adjacent streets. The square was calm and +almost deserted in the gloom. It typified the slow tranquillity of the +bailiwick, which was removed from the central life of the Five Towns, +and unconnected therewith by even a tram or an omnibus. Only within +recent years had Turnhill got so much as a railway station--rail-head of +a branch line. Turnhill was the extremity of civilization in those +parts. Go northwards out of this Market Square, and you would soon find +yourself amid the wild and hilly moorlands, sprinkled with iron-and-coal +villages whose red-flaming furnaces illustrated the eternal damnation +which was the chief article of their devout religious belief. And in the +Market Square not even the late edition of the _Staffordshire Signal_ +was cried, though it was discreetly on sale with its excellent sporting +news in a few shops. In the hot and malodorous candle-lit factories, +where the real strenuous life of the town would remain cooped up for +another half-hour of the evening, men and women had yet scarcely taken +to horse-racing; they would gamble upon rabbits, cocks, pigeons, and +their own fists, without the mediation of the _Signal_. The one noise in +the Market Square was the bell of a hawker selling warm pikelets at a +penny each for the high tea of the tradesmen. The hawker was a deathless +institution, a living proof that withdrawn Turnhill would continue +always to be exactly what it always had been. Still, to the east of the +Square, across the High Street, a vast space was being cleared of hovels +for the erection of a new town hall daringly magnificent. + +Hilda crossed the Square, scorning it. + +She said to herself: "I'd better get the thing over before I buy the +thread. I should never be able to stand Miss Dayson's finicking! I +should scream out!" But the next instant, with her passion for proving +to herself how strong she could be, she added: "Well, I just _will_ buy +the thread first!" And she went straight into Dayson's little fancy +shop, which was full of counter and cardboard boxes and Miss Dayson, and +stayed therein for at least five minutes, emerging with a miraculously +achieved leisureliness. A few doors away was a somewhat new building, of +three storeys--the highest in the Square. The ground floor was an +ironmongery; it comprised also a side entrance, of which the door was +always open. This side entrance showed a brass-plate, "Q. Karkeek, +Solicitor." And the wire-blinds of the two windows of the first floor +also bore the words: "Q. Karkeek, Solicitor. Q. Karkeek, Solicitor." The +queerness of the name had attracted Hilda's attention several years +earlier, when the signs were fresh. It was an accident that she had +noticed it; she had not noticed the door-plates or the wire-blinds of +other solicitors. She did not know Mr. Q. Karkeek by sight, nor even +whether he was old or young, married or single, agreeable or repulsive. + +The side entrance gave directly on to a long flight of naked stairs, and +up these stairs Hilda climbed into the unknown, towards the redoubtable +and the perilous. "I'm bound to be seen," she said to herself, "but I +don't care, and I _don't_ care!" At the top of the stairs was a passage, +at right angles, and then a glazed door with the legend in black +letters, "Q. Karkeek, Solicitor," and two other doors mysteriously +labelled "Private." She opened the glazed door, and saw a dirty +middle-aged man on a stool, and she said at once to him, in a harsh, +clear, deliberate voice, without giving herself time to reflect: + +"I want to see Mr. Karkeek." + +The man stared at her sourly, as if bewildered. + +She said to herself: "I shan't be able to stand this excitement much +longer." + +"You can't see Mr. Karkeek," said the man. "Mr. Karkeek's detained at +Hanbridge County Court. But if you're in such a hurry like, you'd better +see Mr. Cannon. It's Mr. Cannon as they generally do see. Who d'ye come +from, miss?" + +"Come from?" Hilda repeated, unnerved. + +"What name?" + +She had not expected this. "I suppose I shall have to tell him!" she +said to herself, and aloud: "Lessways." + +"Oh! Ah!" exclaimed the man. "Bless us! Yes!" It was as if he had said: +"Of course it's Lessways! And don't I know all about _you!_" And Hilda +was overwhelmed by the sense of the enormity of the folly which she was +committing. + +The man swung half round on his stool, and seized the end of an +india-rubber tube which hung at the side of the battered and littered +desk, just under a gas-jet. He spoke low, like a conspirator, into the +mouthpiece of the tube. "Miss Lessways--to see you, sir." Then very +quickly he clapped the tube to his ear and listened. And then he put it +to his mouth again and repeated: "Lessways." Hilda was agonized. + +"I'll ask ye to step this way, miss," said the man, slipping off his +stool. At the same time he put a long inky penholder, which he had been +holding in his wrinkled right hand, between his teeth. + +"Never," thought Hilda as she followed the clerk, in a whirl of horrible +misgivings, "never have I done anything as mad as this before! I'm under +twenty-one!" + + +III + +There she was at last, seated in front of a lawyer in a lawyer's +office--her ladyship consulting her own lawyer! It seemed incredible! A +few minutes ago she had been at home, and now she was in a world +unfamiliar and alarming. Perhaps it was a pity that her mother had +unsuspectingly put the scheme into her head! + +However, the deed was done. Hilda generally acted first and reflected +afterwards. She was frightened, but rather by the unknown than by +anything she could define. + +"You've come about the property?" said Mr. Cannon amiably, in a +matter-of-fact tone. + +He had deep black eyes, and black hair, like Hilda's; good, regular +teeth, and a clear complexion; perhaps his nose was rather large, but it +was straight. With his large pale hands he occasionally stroked his long +soft moustache; the chin was blue. He was smartly dressed in dark blue; +he had a beautiful neck-tie, and the genuine whiteness of his wristbands +was remarkable in a district where starched linen was usually either +grey or bluish. He was not a dandy, but he respected his person; he +evidently gave careful attention to his body; and this trait alone set +him apart among the citizens of Turnhill. + +"Yes," said Hilda. She thought: "He's a very handsome man! How strange I +don't remember seeing him in the streets!" She was in awe of him. He was +indefinitely older than herself; and she felt like a child, out of place +in the easy-chair. + +"I suppose it's about the rent-collecting?" he pursued. + +"Yes--it is," she answered, astonished that he could thus divine her +purpose. "I mean--" + +"What does your mother want to do?" + +"Oh!" said Hilda, speaking low. "It's not mother. I've come to consult +you myself. Mother doesn't know. I'm nearly twenty-one, and it's really +my property, you know!" She blushed with shame. + +"Ah!" he exclaimed. He tried to disguise his astonishment in an easy, +friendly smile. But he was most obviously startled. He looked at Hilda +in a different way, with a much intensified curiosity. + +"Yes," she resumed. He now seemed to her more like a fellow-creature, +and less like a member of the inimical older generation. + +"So you're nearly twenty-one?" + +"In December," she said. "And I think under my father's will--" She +stopped, at a loss. "The fact is, I don't think mother will be quite +able to look after the property properly, and I'm afraid--you see, now +that Mr. Skellorn has had this stroke--" + +"Yes," said Mr. Cannon, "I heard about that, and I was thinking perhaps +Mrs. Lessways had sent you.... We collect rents, you know." + +"I see!" Hilda murmured. "Well, the truth is, mother hasn't the +slightest idea I'm here. Not the slightest! And I wouldn't hurt her +feelings for anything." He nodded sympathetically. "But I thought +something ought to be done. She's decided to collect our Calder Street +rents herself, and she isn't fitted to do it. And then there's the +question of the repairs.... I know the rents are going down. I expect +it's all mother's for life, but I want there to be something left for me +when she's gone, you see! And if--I've never seen the will. I suppose +there's no way of seeing a copy of it, somewhere?... I can't very well +ask mother again." + +"I know all about the will," said Mr. Cannon. + +"You do?" + +Wondrous, magical man! + +"Yes," he explained. "I used to be at Toms and Scoles's. I was there +when it was made. I copied it." + +"Really!" She felt that he would save her, not only from any possible +unpleasant consequences of her escapade, but also from suffering +ultimate loss by reason of her mother's foolishness. + +"You're quite right," he continued. "I remember it perfectly. Your +mother is what we call tenant-for-life; everything goes to you in the +end." + +"Well," Hilda asked abruptly. "All I want to know is, what I can do." + +"Of course, without upsetting your mother?" + +He glanced at her. She blushed again. + +"Naturally," she said coldly. + +"You say you think the property is going down--it _is_, everybody knows +that--and your mother thinks of collecting the rents herself.... Well, +young lady, it's very difficult, very difficult, your mother being the +trustee and executor." + +"Yes, that's what she's always saying--she's the trustee and executor." + +"You'd better let me think it over for a day or two." + +"And shall I call in again?" + +"You might slip in if you're passing. I'll see what can be done. Of +course it would never do for you to have any difficulty with your +mother." + +"Oh no!" she concurred vehemently. "Anything would be better than that. +But I thought there was no harm in me--" + +"Certainly not." + +She had a profound confidence in him. And she was very content so far +with the result of her adventure. + +"I hope nobody will find out I've been here," she said timidly. "Because +if it _did_ get to mother's ears--" + +"Nobody will find out," he reassured her. + +Assuredly his influence was tranquillizing. Even while he insisted on +the difficulties of the situation, he seemed to be smoothing them away. +She was convinced that he would devise some means of changing her +mother's absurd purpose and of strengthening her own position. But when, +at the end of the interview, he came round the large table which +separated them, and she rose and looked up at him, close, she was +suddenly very afraid of him. He was a tall and muscular man, and he +stood like a monarch, and she stood like a child. And his gesture seemed +to say: "Yes, I know you are afraid. And I rather like you to be afraid. +But I am benevolent in the exercise of my power." Under his gaze, her +gaze fastened on the wire-blind and the dark window, and she read off +the reversed letters on the blind. + +Like a mouse she escaped to the stairs. She was happy and fearful and +expectant.... It was done! She had consulted a lawyer! She was astounded +at herself. + +In the Market Square it was now black night. She looked shyly up at the +lighted wire-blinds over the ironmongery. "I was there!" she said. "He +is still there." The whole town, the whole future, seemed to be drenched +now in romance. Nevertheless, the causes of her immense discontent had +not apparently been removed nor in any way modified. + + + + +CHAPTER IV +DOMESTICITY INVADED + + +I + +Early in the afternoon, two days later, Hilda came, with an air of +reproach, into her mother's empty bedroom. Mrs. Lessways had contracted +a severe cold in the head, a malady to which she was subject and which +she accepted with fatalistic submission, even pleasurably giving herself +up to it, as a martyr to the rack. Mrs. Lessways' colds annoyed Hilda, +who out of her wisdom could always point to the precise indiscretion +which had caused them, and to whom the spectacle of a head wrapped day +and night in flannel was offensively ridiculous. Moreover, Hilda in +these crises was further and still more acutely exasperated by the +pillage of her handkerchiefs. Although she possessed a supply of +handkerchiefs far beyond her own needs, she really hated to lend to her +mother in the hour of necessity. She did lend, and she lent without +spoken protest, but with frigid bitterness. Her youthful passion for +order and efficiency was aggrieved by her mother's negligent and +inadequate arrangements for coping with the inevitable plague. She now +made a police-visit to the bedroom because she considered that her +mother had been demanding handkerchiefs at a stage too early in the +progress of the disease. Impossible that her mother should have come to +the end of her own handkerchiefs! She knew with all the certitude of her +omniscience that numerous clean handkerchiefs must be concealed +somewhere in the untidiness of her mother's wardrobe. + +See her as she enters the bedroom, the principal bedroom of the house, +whose wide bed and large wardrobe recall the past when she had a father +as well as a mother, and when that bedroom awed her footsteps! A thin, +brown-frocked girl, wearing a detested but enforced small black apron; +with fine, pale, determined features, rather unfeminine hair, and +glowering, challenging black eyes. She had a very decided way of putting +down her uncoquettishly shod feet. Absurdly young, of course; wistfully +young! She was undeveloped, and did not even look nearly twenty-one. You +are at liberty to smile at her airs; at that careless critical glance +which pityingly said: "Ah! if this were my room, it would be different +from what it is;" at that serious worried expression, as if the anxiety +of the whole world's deficiencies oppressed the heart within; and at +that supreme conviction of wisdom, which after all was little but an +exaggerated perception of folly and inconsistency in others!... She is +not to be comprehended on an acquaintance of three days. Years must go +to the understanding of her. She did not understand herself. She was not +even acquainted with herself. Why! She was naïve enough to be puzzled +because she felt older than her mother and younger than her beautiful +girlish complexion, simultaneously! + +She opened the central mirrored door of the once formidable wardrobe, +and as she did so the image of the bed and of half the room shot across +the swinging glass, taking the place of her own reflection. And +instantly, when she inserted herself between the exposed face of the +wardrobe and its door, she was precipitated into the most secret +intimacy of her mother's existence. There was the familiar odour of old +kid gloves.... She was more intimate with her mother now than she could +ever be in talking to her. The lower part of this section of the +wardrobe consisted of three deep drawers with inset brass handles, an +exquisitely exact piece of mahogany cabinetwork. From one of the drawers +a bit of white linen untidily protruded. Her mother! The upper part was +filled with sliding trays, each having a raised edge to keep the +contents from falling out. These trays were heaped pell-mell with her +mother's personal belongings--small garments, odd indeterminate trifles, +a muff, a bundle of whalebone, veils, bags, and especially cardboard +boxes. Quantities of various cardboard boxes! Her mother kept +everything, could not bear that anything which had once been useful +should be abandoned or destroyed; whereas Hilda's propensity was to +throw away with an impatient gesture whatever threatened to be an +encumbrance. Sighing, she began to arrange the contents of the trays in +some kind of method. Incompetent and careless mother! Hilda wondered how +the old thing managed to conduct her life from day to day with even a +semblance of the decency of order. It did not occur to her that for +twenty-five years before she was born, and for a long time afterwards, +Mrs. Lessways had contrived to struggle along through the world, without +her daughter's aid, to the general satisfaction of herself and some +others. At length, ferreting on the highest shelf but one, she had the +deep, proud satisfaction of the philosopher who has correctly deduced +consequences from character. Underneath a Paisley shawl she discovered a +lost treasure of clean handkerchiefs. One, two, three, four--there were +eleven! And among them was one of her own, appropriated by her mother +through sheer inexcusable inadvertence. They had probably been lying +under the shawl for weeks, months! + +Still, she did not allow herself to be vexed. Since the singular +hysterical embrace in the twilight of the kitchen, she had felt for her +mother a curious, kind, forbearing, fatalistic indulgence. "Mother is +like that, and there you are!" And further, her mood had been so changed +and uplifted by excitement and expectation that she could not be +genuinely harsh. She had been thrilled by the audacity of the visit to +Mr. Cannon. And though she hoped from it little but a negative +advantage, she was experiencing the rare happiness of adventure. She had +slipped out for a moment from the confined and stifling circle of +domestic dailiness. She had scented the feverish perfume of the world. +And she owed all this to herself alone! She meant on the morrow, while +her mother was marketing, to pursue the enterprise; the consciousness of +this intention was sweet, but she knew not why it was sweet. She only +knew that she lived in the preoccupation of a dream. + +Having taken two of the handkerchiefs, she shut the wardrobe and turned +the key. She went first to her own small, prim room to restore stolen +property to its rightful place, and then she descended towards the +kitchen with the other handkerchief. Giving it to her mother, and +concealing her triumph beneath a mask of wise, long-suffering +benevolence, she would say: "I've found ten of your handkerchiefs, +mother. Here's one!" And her mother, ingenuously startled and pleased, +would exclaim: "Where, child?" And she, still controlling herself, as +befitted a superior being, would reply casually: "In your wardrobe, of +course! You stuck to it there weren't any; but I was sure there were." + + +II + +The dialogue which actually did accompany the presentation of the +handkerchief, though roughly corresponding to her rehearsal of it, was +lacking in the dramatic pungency necessary for a really effective +triumph; the reason being that the thoughts of both mother and daughter +were diverted in different ways from the handkerchief by the presence of +Florrie in the kitchen. + +Florrie was the new servant, and she had come into the house that +morning. Sponsored by an aunt who was one of the best of the Calder +Street tenants, Florrie had been accepted rather unwillingly, the +objection to her being that she was too young--thirteen and a half. Mrs. +Lessways had a vague humanitarian sentiment against the employment of +children; as for Hilda's feeling, it was at one moment more +compassionate even than her mother's, and at another almost cynically +indifferent. The aunt, however, a person of powerful common sense, had +persuaded Mrs. Lessways that the truest kindness would be to give +Florrie a trial. Florrie was very strong, and she had been brought up to +work hard, and she enjoyed working hard. "Don't you, Florrie?" "Yes, +aunt," with a delightful smiling, whispering timidity. She was the +eldest of a family of ten, and had always assisted her mother in the +management of a half-crown house and the nurture of a regiment of +infants. But at thirteen and a half a girl ought to be earning money for +her parents. Bless you! She knew what a pawnshop was, her father being +often out of a job owing to potter's asthma; and she had some knowledge +of cookery, and was in particular very good at boiling potatoes. To take +her would be a real kindness on the part of Mrs. Lessways, for the +'place' was not merely an easy place, it was a 'good' place. Supposing +that Mrs. Lessways refused to have her,--well, Florrie might go on to a +'potbank' and come to harm, or she might engage herself with +tradespeople, where notoriously the work was never finished, or she +might even be forced into a public-house. Her aunt knew that they wanted +a servant at the "Queen Adelaide," where the wages would be pretty high. +But no! No niece of hers should ever go into service at a public-house +if she could help it! What with hot rum and coffee to be ready for +customers at half-past five of a morning, and cleaning up at nights +after closing, a poor girl would never see her bed! Whereas at Mrs. +Lessways'...! So Mrs. Lessways took Florrie in order to save her from +slavery. + +The slim child was pretty, with graceful and eager movements, and +certainly a rapid comprehension. Her grey eyes sparkled, and her brown +hair was coquettishly tied up, rather in the manner of a horse's tail on +May Day. She had arrived all by herself in the morning, with a tiny +bundle, and she made a remarkably neat appearance--if you did not look +at her boots, which had evidently been somebody else's a long time +before. Hilda had been clearly aware of a feeling of pleasure at the +prospect of this young girl's presence in the house. + +Hilda now saw her in another aspect. She wore a large foul apron of +sacking, which made her elegant body quite shapeless, and she was +kneeling on the red-and-black tiled floor of the kitchen, with her +enormous cracked boots sticking out behind her. At one side of her was a +pail full of steaming brown water, and in her red coarse little hands, +which did not seem to belong to those gracile arms, she held a dripping +clout. In front of her, on a half-dried space of clean, shining floor, +stood Mrs. Lessways, her head wrapped in a flannel petticoat. Nearer to +the child stretched a small semi-circle of liquid mud; to the rear was +the untouched dirty floor. Florrie was looking up at her mistress with +respectful, strained attention. She could not proceed with her work +because Mrs. Lessways had chosen this moment to instruct her, with much +snuffling, in the duties and responsibilities of her position. + +"Yes, mum," Florrie whispered. She seemed to be incapable of speaking +beyond a whisper. But the whisper was delicate and agreeable; and +perhaps it was a mysterious sign of her alleged unusual physical +strength. + +"You'll have to be down at half-past six. Then you'll light your kitchen +fire, but of course you'll get your coal up first. And then you'll do +your boots. Now the bacon--but never mind that--either Miss Hilda or me +will be down to-morrow morning to show you." + +"Yes, mum," Florrie's whisper was grateful. + +"When you've got things going a bit like, you'll do your parlour--I've +told you all about that, though. But I didn't tell you--except on +Wednesdays. On Wednesdays you give your parlour a thorough turn-out +_after_ breakfast, and mind it's got to be all straight for dinner at +half-past twelve." + +"Yes, mum." + +"I shall show you about your fire-irons--" Mrs. Lessways was continuing +to make everything in the house the private property of Florrie, when +Hilda interrupted her about the handkerchief, and afterwards with an +exhortation to beware of the dampness of the floor, which exhortation +Mrs. Lessways faintly resented; whereupon Hilda left the kitchen; it was +always imprudent to come between Mrs. Lessways and a new servant. + +Hilda remained listening in the lobby to the interminable and rambling +instruction. At length Mrs. Lessways said benevolently: + +"There's no reason why you shouldn't go to bed at half-past eight, or +nine at the latest. No reason whatever. And if you're quick and handy +--and I'm sure you are--you'll have plenty of time in the afternoon for +plain sewing and darning. I shall see how you can darn," Mrs. Lessways +added encouragingly. + +"Yes, mum." + +Hilda's heart revolted, less against her mother's defects as an +organizer than against the odious mess of the whole business of +domesticity. She knew that, with her mother in the house, Florrie would +never get to bed at half-past eight and very seldom at nine, and that +she would never be free in the afternoons. She knew that if her mother +would only consent to sit still and not interfere, the housework could +be accomplished with half the labour that at present went to it. There +were three women in the place, or at any rate, a woman, a young woman, +and a girl--and in theory the main preoccupation of all of them was this +business of domesticity. It was, of course, ridiculous, and she would +never be able to make anyone see that it was ridiculous. But that was +not all. The very business itself absolutely disgusted her. It disgusted +her to such a point that she would have preferred to do it with her own +hands in secret rather than see others do it openly in all its squalor. +The business might be more efficiently organized--for example, there was +no reason why the sitting-room should be made uninhabitable between +breakfast and dinner once a week--but it could never be other than +odious. The kitchen floor must inevitably be washed every day by a girl +on her knees in sackcloth with terrible hands. She was witnessing now +the first stage in the progress of a victim of the business of +domesticity. To-day Florrie was a charming young creature, full of +slender grace. Soon she would be a dehumanized drudge. And Hilda could +not stop it! All over the town, in every street of the town, behind all +the nice curtains and blinds, the same hidden shame was being enacted: a +vast, sloppy, steaming, greasy, social horror--inevitable! It amounted +to barbarism, Hilda thought in her revolt. She turned from it with +loathing. And yet nobody else seemed to turn from it with loathing. +Nobody else seemed to perceive that this business of domesticity was not +life itself, was at best the clumsy external machinery of life. On the +contrary, about half the adult population worshipped it as an exercise +sacred and paramount, enlarging its importance and with positive gusto +permitting it to monopolize their existence. Nine-tenths of her mother's +conversation was concerned with the business of domesticity--and withal +Mrs. Lessways took the business more lightly than most! + + +III + +There was an impatient knock at the front door,--rare phenomenon, but +not unknown. + +Mrs. Lessways cried out thickly from the folds of her flannel petticoat: + +"Hilda, just see who that is, will you?... knocking like that! Florrie +can't come." + +And just as Hilda reached the front door, her mother opened the kitchen +door wide, to view the troublesome disturber and to inform him, if as +was probable he was exceeding his rights, that he would have done better +to try the back door. + +It was Mr. Cannon at the front door. + +Hilda heard the kitchen door slammed to behind her, but the noise was +like a hallucination in her brain. She was staggered by the apparition +of Mr. Cannon in the porch. She had vaguely wondered what he might do to +execute his promise of aid; she had felt that time was running short if +her mother was to be prevented from commencing rent-collector on the +Monday; she had perhaps ingenuously expected from him some kind of +miracle; but of a surety she had never dreamed that he would call in +person at her home. "He must be mad!" she would have exclaimed to +herself, if the grandeur of his image in her heart had not made any such +accusation impossible to her. He was not mad; he was merely inscrutable, +terrifyingly so. It was as if her adventurous audacity, personified, had +doubled back on her, and was exquisitely threatening her. + +"Good afternoon!" said Mr. Cannon, smiling confidently and yet with +ceremoniousness. "Is your mother about?" + +"Yes." Hilda did not know it, but she was whispering quite in the manner +of Florrie. + +"Shall I come in?" + +"Oh! Please do!" The words jumped out of her mouth all at once, so +anxious was she to destroy any impression conceivably made that she did +not desire him to come in. + +He crossed the step and took her hand with one gesture. She shut the +door. He waited in suave silence. There was barely space for them +together in the narrow lobby, and she scarce dared look up at him. He +easily dominated her. His bigness subdued her, and the handsomeness of +his face and his attire was like a moral intimidation. He had a large +physical splendour that was well set off and illustrated by the +brilliance of his linen and his broadcloth. She was as modest as a mouse +beside him. The superior young woman, the stern and yet indulgent +philosopher, had utterly vanished, and only a poor little mouse +remained. + +"Will you please come into the drawing-room?" she murmured when, after +an immense effort to keep full control of her faculties, she had decided +where he must be put. + +"Thanks," he said. + +As she diminished herself, with beautiful shy curves of her body, +against the wall so that he could manoeuvre his bigness through the +drawing-room doorway, he gave her a glance half benign and half politely +malicious, which seemed to say again: "I know you're afraid, and I +rather like it. But you know you needn't be." + +"Please take a seat," she implored. And then quickly, as he seemed to +have no intention of speaking to her confidentially, "I'll tell mother." + +Leaving the room, she saw him sink smoothly into a seat, his rich-piled +hat in one gloved hand and an ebony walking-stick in the other. His +presence had a disastrous effect on the chill, unfrequented +drawing-room, reducing it instantly to a condition of paltry shabbiness. + +The kitchen door was still shut. Yes, all the squalor of the business of +domesticity must be hidden from this splendid being! Hilda went as a +criminal into the kitchen. Mrs. Lessways with violent movements +signalled her to close the door before speaking. Florrie gazed +spellbound upwards at both of them. The household was in a high fever. + +"You don't mean to tell me that's Mr. Cannon!" Mrs. Lessways excitedly +whispered. + +"Do--do--you know him?" Hilda faltered. + +"Do I know him!... What does he want?" + +"He wants to see you." + +"What about?" + +"I suppose it's about property or something," Hilda replied, blushing. +Never had she felt so abject in front of her mother. + +Mrs. Lessways rapidly unpinned the flannel petticoat and then threw it, +with a desperate gesture of sacrifice, on to the deal table. The +situation had to be met. The resplendent male awaited her in the +death-cold room. The resplendent male had his overcoat, but she, +suffering, must face the rigour and the risk unprotected. No matter if +she caught bronchitis! The thing had to be done. Even Hilda did not +think of accusing her mother of folly. Mrs. Lessways having patted her +hair, emptied several handkerchiefs from the twin pockets of her +embroidered black apron, and, snatching at the clean handkerchief +furnished by Hilda, departed to her fate. She was certainly startled and +puzzled, but she was not a whit intimidated, and the perception of this +fact inspired Hilda with a new, reluctant respect for her mother. + +Hilda, from the kitchen, heard the greetings in the drawing-room, and +then the reverberations of the sufferer's nose. She desired to go into +the drawing-room. Her mother probably expected her to go in. But she +dared not. She was afraid. + +"I was wondering," said the voice of Mr. Cannon, "whether you've ever +thought of selling your Calder Street property, Mrs. Lessways." And then +the drawing-room door was closed, and the ticking of the grandfather's +clock resumed possession of the lobby. + + + + +CHAPTER V +MRS. LESSWAYS' SHREWDNESS + + +I + +Waiting irresolute in the kitchen doorway, Hilda passed the most +thrillingly agreeable moments that destiny had ever vouchsafed to her. +She dwelt on the mysterious, attractive quality of Mr. Cannon's +voice,--she was sure that, though in speaking to her mother he was +softly persuasive, he had used to herself a tone even more intimate and +ingratiating. He and she had a secret; they were conspirators together: +which fact was both disconcerting and delicious. She recalled their +propinquity in the lobby; the remembered syllables which he had uttered +mingled with the faint scent of his broadcloth, the whiteness of his +wristbands, the gleam of his studs, the droop of his moustaches, the +downward ray of his glance, and the proud, nimble carriage of his great +limbs,--and formed in her mind the image of an ideal. An image regarded +not with any tenderness, but with naïve admiration, and unquestioning +respect! And yet also with more than that, for when she dwelt on his +glance, she had a slight transient feeling of faintness which came and +went in a second, and which she did not analyse--and could not have +analysed. + +Clouds of fear sailed in swift capriciousness across the sky of her +dreaming, obscuring it: fear of Mr. Cannon's breath-taking initiative, +fear of the upshot of her adventure, and a fear without a name. +Nevertheless she exulted. She exulted because she was in the very midst +of her wondrous adventure and tingling with a thousand apprehensions. + +After a long time the latch of the drawing-room door cracked warningly. +Hilda retired within the kitchen out of sight of the lobby. She knew +that the child in her would compel her to wait like a child until the +visitor was gone, instead of issuing forth boldly like a young woman. +But to Florrie the young mistress with her stern dark mask and +formidable eyebrows and air of superb disdain was as august as a +goddess. Florrie, moving backwards, had now got nearly to the scullery +door with her wringing and splashing and wiping; and she had dirtied +even her face. As Hilda absently looked at her, she thought somehow of +Mr. Cannon's white wristbands. She saw the washing and the ironing of +those wristbands, and a slatternly woman or two sighing and grumbling +amid wreaths of steam, and a background of cinders and suds and +sloppiness.... All that, so that the grand creature might have a rim of +pure white to his coat-sleeves for a day! It was inevitable. But the +grand creature must never know. The shame necessary to his splendour +must be concealed from him, lest he might be offended. And this was +woman's loyalty! Her ideas concerning the business of domesticity were +now mixed and opposing and irreconcileable, and she began to suspect +that the bases of society might be more complex and confusing than in +her youthful downrightness she had imagined. + + +II + +"Well, you've got your way!" said Mrs. Lessways, with a certain grim, +disdainful cheerfulness, from which benevolence was not quite absent. +The drastic treatment accorded to her cold seemed to have done it good. +At any rate she had not resumed the flannel petticoat, and the nasal +symptoms were much less pronounced. + +"Got my way?" Hilda repeated, at a loss and newly apprehensive. + +Mother and daughter were setting tea. Florrie had been doing very well, +but she was not yet quite equal to her situation, and the mistresses +were now performing her lighter duties while she changed from the +offensive drudge to the neat parlour-maid. Throughout the afternoon +Hilda had avoided her mother's sight; partly because she wanted to be +alone (without knowing why), and partly because she was afraid lest Mr. +Cannon, as a member of the older generation, might have betrayed her to +her mother. This fear was not very genuine, though she pretended that it +was and enjoyed playing with it: as if she really desired a catastrophe +for the outcome of her adventure. She had only come downstairs in +response to her mother's direct summons, and instantly on seeing her she +had known that Mr. Cannon was not a traitor. Which knowledge somehow +rendered her gay in spite of herself. So that, what with this gaiety, +and the stimulation produced in Mrs. Lessways by the visit of Mr. +Cannon, and the general household relief at the obvious fact that +Florrie would rather more than 'do,' the atmosphere around the tinkling +tea-table in the half-light was decidedly pleasant. + +Nevertheless the singular turn of Mrs. Lessways' phrase,--"You've got +your way,"--had startled the guilty Hilda. + +"Mr. Cannon's going to see to the collecting of the Calder Street +rents," explained Mrs. Lessways. "So I hope you're satisfied, miss." + +Hilda was aware of self-consciousness. + +"Yes, you may well colour up!" Mrs. Lessways pursued, genial but +malicious. "You're as pleased as Punch, and you're saying to yourself +you've made your old mother give way to ye again! And so you needn't +tell me!" + +"I thought," said Hilda, with all possible prim worldliness,--"I thought +I heard him saying something about buying the property?" + +Mrs. Lessways laughed, sceptically, confidently, as one who could not be +deceived. "Pooh!" she said. "That was only a try-on. That was only so +that he could begin his palaver! Don't tell me! I may be a simpleton, +but I'm not such a simpleton as he thinks for, nor as some other folks +think for, either!" (At this point Hilda had to admit that in truth her +mother was not completely a simpleton. In her mother was a vein of +perceptive shrewdness that occasionally cropped out and made all Hilda's +critical philosophy seem school-girlish.) "Do you think I don't know +George Cannon? He came here o' purpose to get that rent-collecting. +Well, he's got it, and he's welcome to it, for I doubt not he'll do it a +sight better than poor Mr. Skellorn! But he needn't hug himself that +he's been too clever for me, because he hasn't. I gave him the +rent-collecting because I thought I would!... Buy! He's no more got a +good customer for Calder Street than he's got a good customer for this +slop-bowl!" + +Hilda resented this casual detraction of a being who had so deeply +impressed her. And moreover she was convinced that her mother, secretly +very flattered and delighted by the visit, was adopting a derisive +attitude in order to 'show off' before her daughter. Parents are thus +ingenuous! But she was so shocked and sneaped that she found it more +convenient to say nothing. + +"George Cannon could talk the hind leg off a horse," Mrs. Lessways +continued quite happily. "And yet it isn't as if he said a great deal. +He doesn't. I'll say this for him. He's always the gentleman. And I +couldn't say as much for his sister being a lady, and I'm sorry for it. +He's the most gentlemanly man in Turnhill, and always so spruce, too!" + +"His sister?" + +"Well, his half-sister, since you're so particular, Miss Precise!" + +"Not Miss Gailey?" said Hilda, who began faintly to recall a forgotten +fact of which she thought she had once been cognizant. + +"Yes, Miss Gailey," Mrs. Lessways snapped, still very genial and +content. "I did hear she's quarrelled out and out with _him_, too, at +last!" She tightened her lips. "Draw the blind down." + +Miss Gailey, a spinster of superior breeding and a teacher of dancing, +had in the distant past been an intimate friend of Mrs. Lessways. The +friendship was legendary in the house, and the grand quarrel which had +finally put an end to it dated in Hilda's early memories like a +historical event. For many years the two had not exchanged a word. + +Mrs. Lessways lit the gas, and the china and the white cloth and the +coloured fruit-jelly and the silver spoons caught the light and threw it +off again, with gaiety. + +"Has she swept the hearth? Yes, she has," said Mrs. Lessways, glancing +round at the red fire. + +Hilda sat down to wait, folding her hands as it were in meekness. In a +few moments Florrie entered with the teapot and the hot-water jug. The +child wore proudly a new white apron that was a little too long for her, +and she smiled happily at Mrs. Lessways' brief compliment on her +appearance and her briskness. She might have been in paradise. + +"Come in for your cup in three minutes," said Mrs. Lessways; and to +Hilda when Florrie had whispered and gone: "Now we shall see if she can +make tea. I told her very particularly this morning, and she seems quick +enough." + +And when three minutes had expired Mrs. Lessways tasted the tea. Yes, it +was good. It was quite good. Undeniably the water had boiled within five +seconds of being poured on the leaves. There was something _in_ this +Florrie. Already she was exhibiting the mysterious quality of +efficiency. The first day, being the first day, had of course not been +without its discouraging moments, but on the whole Florrie had proved +that she could be trusted to understand, and to do things. + +"Here's an extra piece of sugar for you," said Mrs. Lessways, beaming, +as Florrie left the parlour with her big breakfast-cup full of steaming +tea, to drink with the thick bread-and-butter on the scrubbed kitchen- +table, all by herself. "And don't touch the gas in the kitchen--it's +quite high enough for young eyes," Mrs. Lessways cried out after her. + +"Little poppet!" she murmured to herself, maternally reflecting upon +Florence's tender youth. + + +III + +She was happy, was Mrs. Lessways, in her domesticity. She foresaw an +immediate future that would be tranquil. She was preparing herself to +lean upon the reliability of Florrie as upon a cushion. She liked the +little poppet. And she liked well-made tea and pure jelly. And she had +settled the Calder Street problem; and incidentally Hilda was thereby +placated. Why should she not be happy? She wished for nothing else. And +she was not a woman to meet trouble half-way. One of her greatest +qualities was that she did not unduly worry. (Hilda might say that she +did not worry enough, letting things go.) In spite of her cold, she +yielded with more gusto than usual to the meal, and even said that if +Florrie 'continued to shape' they would have hot toast again. Hot toast +had long since been dropped from the menu, as an item too troublesome. +As a rule the meals were taken hurriedly and negligently, like a +religious formality which has lost its meaning but which custom insists +on. + +Hilda could not but share her mother's satisfaction. She could not +entirely escape the soft influence of the tranquillity in which the +household was newly bathed. The domestic existence of unmated women +together, though it is full of secret exasperations, also has its hours +of charm--a charm honied, perverse, and unique. Hilda felt the charm. +But she was suddenly sad, and she again found pleasure in her sadness. +She was sad because her adventure was over--over too soon and too +easily. She thought, now, that really she would have preferred a +catastrophe as the end of it. She had got what she desired; but she was +no better off than she had been before the paralytic stroke of Mr. +Skellorn. Domesticity had closed in on her once more. Her secret +adventure had become sterile. Its risks were destroyed, and nothing +could spring from it. Nevertheless it lived in her heart. After all it +had been tremendous! And the virtue of audacious initiative was +miraculous!... Yes, her mother was shrewd enough--that could not be +denied--but she was not so shrewd as she imagined; for it had never +occurred to her, and it never would occur to her, even in the absurdest +dream--that the author of Mr. Cannon's visit was the girl sitting +opposite to her and delicately pecking at jelly! + +"How is he Miss Gailey's half-brother?" Hilda demanded half-way through +the meal. + +"Why! Mrs. Gailey--Sarah Gailey's mother, that is--married a foreigner +after her first husband died." + +"But Mr. Cannon isn't a foreigner?" + +"He's half a foreigner. Look at his eyes. Surely you knew all about +that, child!... No, it was before your time." + +Hilda then learnt that Mrs. Gailey had married a French modeller named +Canonges, who had been brought over from Limoges (or some such sounding +place) by Peels at Bursley, the great rivals of Mintons and of +Copelands. And that in course of time the modeller had informally +changed the name to Cannon, because no one in the Five Towns could +pronounce the true name rightly. And that George Cannon, the son of the +union, had been left early an orphan. + +"How did he come to be a solicitor?" Hilda questioned eagerly. + +"They say he isn't really a solicitor," said Mrs. Lessways. "That is, he +hasn't passed his examinations like. But I dare say he knows as much law +as a lot of 'em, _and_ more! And he has that Mr. Karkeek to cover him +like. That's what they _say_.... He used to be a lawyer's clerk--at Toms +and Scoles's, I think it was. Then he left the district for a year or +two--or it might be several. And then his lordship comes back all of a +sudden, and sets up with Mr. Karkeek, just like that." + +"Can he talk French?" + +"Who? Mr. Cannon? He can talk _English_! My word, he can that! Eh, he's +a 'customer,' he is--a regular' customer'!" + +Hilda, instead of being seated at the table, was away in far realms of +romance. + +The startling thought occurred to her: + +"Of course, he'll expect me to go and see him! He's done what I asked +him, and he'll expect me to go and see him and talk it over. And I +suppose I shall have to pay him something. I'd forgotten that, and I +ought not to have forgotten it." + + + + +CHAPTER VI +VICTOR HUGO AND ISAAC PITMAN + + +I + +The next morning, Saturday, Hilda ran no risk in visiting Mr. Cannon. +Her mother's cold, after a fictitious improvement, had assumed an +aggravated form in order to prove that not with impunity may nature be +flouted in unheated October drawing-rooms; and Hilda had been requested +to go to market alone. She was free. And even supposing that the visit +should be observed by the curious, nobody would attach any importance to +it, because everybody would soon be aware that Mr. Cannon had assumed +charge of the Calder Street property. + +Past the brass plates of Mr. Q. Karkeek, out of the straw-littered +hubbub of the market-place, she climbed the long flight of stairs +leading to the offices on the first floor. In one worsted-gloved hand +she held a market-basket of multi-coloured wicker, which dangled a +little below the frilled and flounced edge of her blue jacket. Secure in +the pocket of her valanced brown skirt--for at that time and in that +place it had not yet occurred to any woman that pockets were a +superfluity--a private half-sovereign lay in the inmost compartment of +her purse; this coin was destined to recompense Mr. Cannon. Her free +hand went up to the heavy chignon that hung uncertainly beneath her +bonnet--a gesture of coquetry which she told herself she despised. + +Her face was a prim and rather forbidding mask, assuredly a mysterious +mask. She could not have explained her own feelings. She was still in +the adventure, but the end of it was immediate. She had nothing to hope +from the future. Her essential infelicity was as profound and as +enigmatic as ever. She might have said with deliberate and vehement +sincerity that she was not happy. Wise, experienced observers, studying +her as she walked her ways in the streets, might have said of her with +sympathetically sad conviction, "That girl is not happy! What a pity!" +It was so. And yet, in her unhappiness she was blest. She savoured her +unhappiness. She drank it down passionately, as though it were the very +water of life--which it was. She lived to the utmost in every moment. +The recondite romance of existence was not hidden from her. The sudden +creation--her creation--of the link with Mr. Cannon seemed to her +surpassingly strange and romantic; and in so regarding it she had no +ulterior thought whatever: she looked on it with the single-mindedness +of an artist looking on his work. And was it not indeed astounding that +by a swift caprice and stroke of audacity she should have changed and +tranquillized the ominous future for her unsuspecting mother and +herself? Was it not absolutely disconcerting that she and this Mr. +Cannon, whom she had never known before and in whom she had no other +interest, should bear between them this singular secret, at once +innocent and guilty, in the midst of the whole town so deaf and blind? + + +II + +A somewhat shabby-genteel, youngish man appeared at the head of the +stairs; he was wearing a silk hat and a too ample frock-coat. And +immediately, from the hidden corridor at the top, she heard the voice of +Mr. Cannon, imperious: + +"Karkeek!" + +The shabby-genteel man stopped. Hilda wanted to escape, but she could +not, chiefly because her pride would not allow. She had to go on. She +went on, frowning. + +The man vanished back into the corridor. She could hear that Mr. Cannon +had joined him in conversation. She arrived at the corridor. + +"How-d'ye-do, Miss Lessways?" Mr. Cannon greeted her with calm +politeness, turning from Mr. Karkeek, who raised his hat. "Will you come +this way? One moment, Mr. Karkeek." + +Through a door marked "Private" Mr. Cannon introduced Hilda straight +into his own room; then shut the door on her. He held in one hand a +large calf-bound volume, from which evidently he was expounding +something to Mr. Karkeek. The contrast between the expensive informality +of Mr. Cannon's new suit and the battered ceremoniousness of Mr. +Karkeek's struck her just as much as the contrast between their +demeanours; and she felt, vaguely, the oddness of the fact that the name +of the deferential Mr. Karkeek, and not the name of the commanding Mr. +Cannon, should be upon the door-plates and the wire-blinds of the +establishment. But of course she was not in a position to estimate the +full significance of this remarkable phenomenon. Further, though she +perfectly remembered her mother's observations upon Mr. Cannon's status, +they did not in the slightest degree damage him in her eyes--when once +those eyes had been set on him again. They seemed to her inessential. +The essential, for her, was the incontestable natural authority and +dignity of his bearing. + +She sat down, self-consciously, in the chair--opposite the owner's +chair--which she had occupied at her first visit, and thus surveyed, +across the large flat desk, all the ranged documents and bundles with +the writing thereon upside down. There also was his blotting-pad, and +his vast inkstand, and his pens, and his thick diary. The disposition of +the things on the desk seemed to indicate, sharply and incontrovertibly, +that orderliness, that inexorable efficiency, which more than aught else +she admired in the external conduct of life. The spectacle satisfied +her, soothed her, and seemed to explain the attractiveness of Mr. +Cannon. + +Immediately to her left was an open bookcase almost filled with heavy +volumes. The last of a uniform row of Law Reports was absent from its +place--being at that moment in the corridor, in the hands of Mr. Cannon. +The next book, a thin one, had toppled over sideways and was bridging +the vacancy at an angle; several other similar thin books filled up the +remainder of the shelf. She stared, with the factitious interest of one +who is very nervously awaiting an encounter, at the titles, and +presently deciphered the words, 'Victor Hugo,' on each of the thin +volumes. Her interest instantly became real. Characteristically abrupt +and unreflecting, she deposited her basket on the floor and, going to +the bookcase, took out the slanting volume. Its title was _Les Rayons et +Les Ombres_. She opened it by hazard at the following poem, which had no +heading and which stood, a small triptych of print, rather solitary in +the lower half of a large white page: + + Dieu qui sourit et qui donne + Et qui vient vers qui l'attend + Pourvu que vous soyez bonne, + Sera content. + Le monde où tout étincelle, + Mais ou rien n'est enflammé, + Pourvu que vous soyez belle, + Sera charmé. + Mon coeur, dans l'ombre amoureuse, + Où l'énivrent deux beaux yeux, + Pourvu que tu sois heureuse, + Sera joyeux. + +That was all. But she shook as though a miracle had been enacted. Hilda, +owing partly to the fondness of an otherwise stern grandfather and +partly to the vanity of her unimportant father, had finally been sent to +a school attended by girls who on the average were a little above +herself in station--Chetwynd's, in the valley between Turnhill and +Bursley. (It was still called Chetwynd's though it had changed hands.) +Among the staff was a mistress who was known as Miss Miranda--she seemed +to have no surname. One of Miss Miranda's duties had been to teach +optional French, and one of Miss Miranda's delights had been to dictate +this very poem of Victor Hugo's to her pupils for learning by heart. It +was Miss Miranda's sole French poem, and she imposed it with unfading +delight on the successive generations whom she 'grounded' in French. +Hilda had apparently forgotten most of her French, but as she now read +the poem (for the first time in print), it re-established itself in her +memory as the most lovely verse that she had ever known, and the +recitations of it in Miss Miranda's small classroom came back to her +with an effect beautiful and tragic. And also there was the name of +Victor Hugo, which Miss Miranda's insistent enthusiasm had rendered +sublime and legendary to a sensitive child! Hilda now saw the sacred +name stamped in gold on a whole set of elegant volumes! It was +marvellous that she should have turned the page containing just that +poem! It was equally marvellous that she should have discovered the +works of Victor Hugo in the matter-of-fact office of Mr. Cannon! But was +it? Was he not half-French, and were not these books precisely a +corroboration of what her mother had told her? Mr. Cannon's origin at +once assumed for her the strange seductive hues of romance; he shared +the glory of Victor Hugo. Then the voices in the corridor ceased, and +with a decisive movement he unlatched the door. She relinquished the +book and calmly sat down as he entered. + + +III + +"Of course, your mother's told you?" + +"Yes." + +"I had no difficulty at all. I just asked her what she was going to do +about the rent-collecting." + +Standing up in front of Hilda, but on his own side of the desk, Mr. +Cannon smiled as a conqueror who can recount a triumph with pride, but +without conceit. She looked at him with naïve admiration. To admire him +was agreeable to her; and she liked also to feel unimportant in his +presence. But she fought, unsuccessfully, against the humiliating idea +that his personal smartness convicted her of being shabby--of being even +inefficient in one department of her existence; and she could have +wished to be magnificently dressed. + +"Mrs. Lessways is a very shrewd lady--very shrewd indeed!" said Mr. +Cannon, with a smile, this time, to indicate humorously that Mrs. +Lessways was not so easy to handle as might be imagined, and that even +the cleverest must mind their p's and q's with such a lady. + +"Oh yes, she _is_!" Hilda agreed, with an exaggerated emphasis that +showed a lack of conviction. Indeed, she had never thought of her mother +as a _very_ shrewd lady. + +Mr. Cannon continued to smile in silence upon the shrewdness of Mrs. +Lessways, giving little appreciative movements of the diaphragm, drawing +in his lips and by consequence pushing out his cheeks like a child's; +and his eyes were all the time saying lightly: "Still, I managed her!" +And while this pleasant intimate silence persisted, the noises of the +market-place made themselves prominent, quite agreeably--in particular +the hard metallic stamping and slipping, on the bricked pavement under +the window, of a team of cart-horses that were being turned in a space +too small for their grand, free movements, and the good-humoured +cracking of a whip. Again Hilda was impressed, mystically, by the +strangeness of the secret relation between herself and this splendid +effective man. There they were, safe within the room, almost on a +footing of familiar friendship! The atmosphere was different from that +of the first interview. And none knew! And she alone had brought it all +about by a simple caprice! + +"I was fine and startled when I saw you at our door, Mr. Cannon!" she +said. + +He might have said, "Were you? You didn't show it." She was half +expecting him to say some such thing. But he became reflective, and +began: "Well, you see--" and then hesitated. + +"You didn't tell me you thought of calling." + +"Well," he proceeded at last--and she could not be sure whether he was +replying to her or not--"I was pretty nearly ready to buy that Calder +Street property. And I thought I'd talk _that_ over with your mother +first! It just happened to make a good beginning, you see." He spoke +with all the flattering charm of the confidential. + +Hilda flushed. Under her mother's suggestion, she had been misjudging +him. He had not been guilty of mere scheming. She was profoundly glad. +The act of apology to him, performed in her own mind, gave her a curious +delight. + +"I wish she would sell," said Hilda, to whom the ownership of a slum was +obnoxious. + +"Very soon your consent would be necessary to any sale." + +"Really!" she exclaimed, agreeably flattered, but scarcely surprised by +this information. "I should consent quick enough! I can't bear to walk +down the street!" + +He laughed condescendingly. "Well, I don't think your mother _would_ +care to sell, if you ask me." He sat down. + +Hilda frowned, regretting her confession and resenting his laughter. + +"What will your charges be, please, Mr. Cannon?" she demanded abruptly, +and yet girlishly timid. And at the same moment she drew forth her +purse, which she had been holding ready in her hand. + +For a second he thought she was referring to the price of +rent-collecting, but the appearance of the purse explained her meaning. +"Oh! There's no charge!" he said, in a low voice, seizing a penholder. + +"But I must pay you something! I can't--" + +"No, you mustn't!" + +Their glances met in conflict across the table. She had known that he +would say exactly that. And she had been determined to insist on paying +a fee--utterly determined! But she could not, now, withstand the force +of his will. Her glance failed her. She was disconcerted by the sudden +demonstration of her inferiority. She was distressed. And then a feeling +of faintness, and the gathering of a mist in the air, positively +frightened her. The mist cleared. His glance seemed to say, with +kindness: "You see how much stronger I am than you! But you can trust +me!" The sense of adventure grew even more acute in her. She marvelled +at what life was, and hid the purse like a shame. + +"It's very kind of you," she murmured. + +"Not a bit!" he said. "I've got a job through this. Don't forget that. +We don't collect rents for nothing, you know--especially Calder Street +sort of rents!" + +She picked up her basket and rose. He also rose. + +"So you've been looking at my Victor Hugo," he remarked, putting his +right hand negligently into his pocket instead of holding it forth in +adieu. + + +IV + +So overset was she by the dramatic surprise of his challenging remark, +and so enlightened by the sudden perception of it being perfectly +characteristic of him, that her manner changed in an instant to a +delicate, startled timidity. All the complex sensitiveness of her nature +was expressed simultaneously in the changing tints of her face, the +confusion of her eyes and her gestures, and the exquisite hesitations of +her voice as she told him about the coincidence which had brought back +to her in his office the poem of her schooldays. + +He came to the bookcase and, taking out the volume, handled it +carelessly. + +"I only brought these things here because they're nicely bound and fill +up the shelf," he said. "Not much use in a lawyer's office, you know!" +He glanced from the volume to her, and from her to the volume. "Ah! Miss +Miranda! Yes! Well! It isn't so wonderful as all that. My father used to +give her lessons in French. This Hugo was his. He thought a great deal +of it." Mr. Cannon's pose exhibited pride, but it was obvious that he +did not share his father's taste. His tone rather patronized his father, +and Hugo too. As he let the pages of the book slip by under his thumb, +he stopped, and with a very good French accent, quite different from +Hilda's memory of Miss Miranda's, murmured in a sort of chanting--"_Dieu +qui sourit et qui donne_." + +"That's the very one!" cried Hilda. + +"Ah! There you are then! You see--the bookmark was at that page." Hilda +had not noticed the thin ribbon almost concealed in the jointure of the +pages. "I wouldn't be a bit astonished if my father had lent her this +very book! Curious, isn't it?" + +It was. Nevertheless, Hilda felt that his sense of the miraculousness of +life was not so keen as her own; and she was disappointed. + +"I suppose you're very fond of reading?" he said. + +"No, I'm not," she replied. Her spirit lifted a little courageously, to +meet his with defiance, like a ship lifting its prow above the +threatening billow. Her eyes wavered, but did not fall before his. + +"Really! Now, I should have said you were a great reader. What do you do +with yourself?" He now spoke like a brother, confident of a trustful +response. + +"I just waste my time," she answered coldly. She saw that he was +puzzled, interested, and piqued, and that he was examining her quite +afresh. + +"Well," he said shortly, after a pause, adopting the benevolent tone of +an uncle or even a great-uncle, "you'll be getting married one of these +days." + +"I don't want to get married," she retorted obstinately, and with a +harder glance. + +"Then what do you want?" + +"I don't know." She discovered great relief, even pleasure, in thus +callously exposing her mind to a stranger. + +Tapping his teeth with one thumb, he gazed at her, apparently in +meditation upon her peculiar case. At last he said: + +"I tell you what you ought to do. You ought to go in for phonography." + +"Phonography?" She was at a loss. + +"Yes; Pitman's shorthand, you know." + +"Oh! shorthand--yes. I've heard of it. But why?" + +"Why? It's going to be the great thing of the future. There never was +anything like it!" His voice grew warm and his glance scintillated. And +now Hilda understood her mother's account of his persuasiveness; she +felt the truth of that odd remark that he could talk the hind leg off a +horse. + +"But does it lead to anything?" she inquired, with her strong sense of +intrinsic values. + +"I should say it did!" he answered. "It leads to everything! There's +nothing it won't lead to! It's the key of the future. You'll see. Look +at Dayson. He's taken it up, and now he's giving lessons in it. He's got +a room over his aunt's. I can tell you he staggered me. He wrote in +shorthand as fast as ever I could read to him, and then he read out what +he'd written, without a single slip. I'm having one of my chaps taught. +I'm paying for the lessons. I thought of learning myself--yes, really! +Oh! It's a thing that'll revolutionize all business and secretarial work +and so on--revolutionize it! And it's spreading. It'll be the Open +Sesame to everything. Anybody that can write a hundred and twenty words +a minute'll be able to walk into any situation he wants--straight _into_ +it! There's never been anything like it. Look! Here it is!" + +He snatched up a pale-green booklet from the desk and opened it before +her. She saw the cryptic characters for the first time. And she saw them +with his glowing eyes. In their mysterious strokes and curves and dots +she saw romance, and the key of the future; she saw the philosopher's +stone. She saw a new religion that had already begun to work like leaven +in the town. The revelation was deliciously intoxicating. She was +converted, as by lightning. She yielded to the ecstasy of discipleship. +Here--somehow, inexplicably, incomprehensively--here was the answer to +the enigma of her long desire. And it was an answer original, strange, +distinguished, unexpected, unique; yes, and divine! How lovely, how +beatific, to be the master of this enchanted key! + +"It must be very interesting!" she said, low, with the venturesome +shyness of a deer that is reassured. + +"I don't mind telling you this," Mr. Cannon went on, with the fire of +the prophet. "I've got something coming along pretty soon"--he repeated +more slowly--"I've got something coming along pretty soon, where +there'll be scope for a young lady that can write shorthand _well_. I +can't tell you what it is, but it's something different from anything +there's ever been in this town; _and_ better." + +His eyes masterfully held hers, seeming to say: "I'm vague. But I was +vague when I told you I'd see what could be done about your mother--and +look at what I did, and how quickly and easily I did it! When I'm vague, +it means a lot." And she entirely understood that his vagueness was +calculated--out of pride. + +They talked about Mr. Dayson a little. + +"I must go now," said Hilda awkwardly. + +"I'd like you to take that Hugo," he said. "I dare say it would interest +you.... Remind you of old times." + +"Oh no!" + +"You can return it, when you like." + +Her features became apologetic. She had too hastily assumed that he +wished to force a gift on her. + +"Please!" he ejaculated. No abuse this time of moral authority! But an +appeal, boyish, wistful, supplicating. It was irresistible, completely +irresistible. It gave her an extraordinary sense of personal power. + +He wrapped up the book for her in a sheet of blue "draft" paper that +noisily crackled. While he was doing so, a tiny part of her brain was, +as it were, automatically exploring a box of old books in the attic at +home and searching therein for a Gasc's French-English Dictionary which +she had used at school and never thought of since. + +"My compliments to your mother," he said at parting. + +She gazed at him questioningly. + +"Oh! I was forgetting," he corrected himself, with an avuncular, ironic +smile. "You're not supposed to have seen me, are you?" + +Then she was outside in the din; and from thrilling altitudes she had to +bring her mind to marketing. She hid under apples the flat blue parcel +in the basket. + + + + +CHAPTER VII +THE EDITORIAL SECRETARY + + +I + +Arthur Dayson, though a very good shorthand writer, and not without +experience as a newspaper reporter and sub-editor, was a nincompoop. +There could be no other explanation of his bland, complacent +indifference as he sat poking at a coke stove one cold night of January, +1880, in full view of a most marvellous and ravishing spectacle. The +stove was in a room on the floor above the offices labelled as Mr. Q. +Karkeek's; its pipe, supported by wire stays, went straight up nearly to +the grimy ceiling, and then turned horizontally and disappeared through +a clumsy hole in the scorched wall. It was a shabby stove, but not more +so than the other few articles of furniture--a large table, a small +desk, three deteriorated cane-chairs, two gas brackets, and an old +copying-press on its rickety stand. The sole object that could emerge +brightly from the ordeal of the gas-flare was a splendid freshly printed +blue poster gummed with stamp-paper to the wall: which poster bore the +words, in vast capitals of two sizes: "_The Five Towns Chronicle and +Turnhill Guardian_." Copies of this poster had also been fixed, face +outwards, on the two curtainless black windows, to announce to the +Market Square what was afoot in the top storey over the ironmonger's. + +A young woman, very soberly attired, was straining at the double +iron-handles of the copying-press. Some copying-presses have a screw so +accurately turned and so well oiled, and handles so massively like a +fly-wheel, that a touch will send the handles whizzing round and round +till they stop suddenly, and then one slight wrench more, and the +letters are duly copied! But this was not such a press. It had been +outworn in Mr. Karkeek's office; rust had intensified its original +defects of design, and it produced the minimum of result with the +maximum of means. Nevertheless, the young woman loved it. She clenched +her hands and her teeth, and she frowned, as though she loved it. And +when she had sufficiently crushed the letter-book in the press, she +lovingly unscrewed and drew forth the book; and with solicitude she +opened the book on the smaller table, and tenderly detached the +blotting-paper from the damp tissue paper, and at last extracted the +copied letter and examined its surface. + +"Smudged!" she murmured, tragic. + +And the excellent ass Dayson, always facetiously cheerful, and without a +grain of humour, remarked: + +"Copiousness with the H2O, Miss Lessways, is the father of smudged +epistles. I'm ready to go through these proofs with you as soon as you +are." + +He was over thirty. He had had affairs with young women. He reckoned +that there remained little for him to learn. He had deliberately watched +this young woman at the press. He had clearly seen her staring under the +gas-jet at the copied letter. And yet in her fierce muscular movements, +and in her bendings and straightenings, and in her delicate caressings, +and in her savage scowlings and wrinklings, and in her rapt gazings, and +in all her awful absorption, he had quite failed to perceive the +terrible eager outpouring of a human soul, mighty, passionate, and +wistful. He had kept his eyes on her slim bust and tight-girded waist +that sprung suddenly neat and smooth out of the curving skirt-folds, and +it had not occurred to him to exclaim even in his own heart: "With your +girlishness and your ferocity, your intimidating seriousness and your +delicious absurdity, I would give a week's wages just to take hold of +you and shake you!" No! The dolt had seen absolutely naught but a +conscientious female beginner learning the duties of the post which he +himself had baptized as that of 'editorial secretary.' + + +II + +Hilda was no longer in a nameless trouble. She no longer wanted she knew +not what. She knew beyond all questioning that she had found that which +she had wanted. For nearly a year she had had lessons in phonography +from Miss Dayson's nephew, often as a member of a varying night-class, +and sometimes alone during the day. She could not write shorthand as +well as Mr. Dayson, and she never would, for Mr. Dayson had the +shorthand soul; but, as the result of sustained and terrific effort, she +could write it pretty well. She had grappled with Isaac Pitman as with +Apollyon and had not been worsted. She could scarcely believe that in +class she had taken down at the rate of ninety words a minute Mr. +Dayson's purposely difficult political speechifyings (which always +contained the phrase 'capital punishment,' because 'capital punishment' +was a famous grammalogue); but it was so, Mr. Dayson's watch proved it. + +About half-way through the period of study, she had learnt from Mr. +Cannon, on one of his rare visits to her mother's, something about his +long-matured scheme for a new local paper. She had at once divined that +he meant to offer her some kind of a situation in the enterprise, and +she was right. Gratitude filled her. Mrs. Lessways, being one of your +happy-go-lucky, broad-minded women, with an experimental disposition--a +disposition to let things alone and see how they will turn out--had made +little objection, though she was not encouraging. + +Instantly the newspaper had become the chief article of Hilda's faith. +She accepted the idea of it as a nun accepts the sacred wafer, in +ecstasy. Yet she knew little about it. She was aware that Mr. Cannon +meant to establish it first as a weekly, and then, when it had grown, to +transform it into a daily and wage war with that powerful monopolist, +_The Staffordshire Signal_, which from its offices at Hanbridge covered +the entire district. The original title had been _The Turnhill Guardian +and Five Towns General Chronicle,_ and she had approved it; but when Mr. +Cannon, with a view to the intended development, had inverted the title +to _The Five Towns Chronicle and Turnhill Guardian_, she had +enthusiastically applauded his deep wisdom. Also she had applauded his +project of moving, later on, to Hanbridge, the natural centre of the +Five Towns. This was nearly the limit of her knowledge. She neither knew +nor cared anything about the resources or the politics or the programme +or the prospects of the paper. To her all newspapers were much alike. +She did not even explore, in meditation, the extraordinary psychology of +Mr. Cannon--the man whose original energy and restless love of +initiative was leading him to found a newspaper on the top of a +successful but audaciously irregular practice as a lawyer. She +incuriously and with religious admiration accepted Mr. Cannon as she +accepted the idea of the paper. And being, of course, entirely ignorant +of journalism, she was not in a position to criticize the organizing +arrangements of the newspaper. Not that these would have seemed +excessively peculiar to anybody familiar with the haphazard +improvisations of minor journalism in the provinces! She had indeed, in +her innocence, imagined that the basic fact of a newspaper enterprise +would be a printing-press; but when Mr. Dayson, who had been on _The +Signal_ and on sundry country papers in Shropshire, assured her that the +majority of weekly sheets were printed on jobbing presses in private +hands, she corrected her foolish notion. + +Her sole interest--but it was tremendous!--lay in what she herself had +to do--namely, take down from dictation, transcribe, copy, classify, and +keep letters and documents, and occasionally correct proofs. All beyond +this was misty for her, and she never adjusted her sight in order to +pierce the mist. + +Save for her desire to perfect herself in her duties, she had no desire. +She was content. In the dismal, dirty, untidy, untidiable, uncomfortable +office, arctic near the windows, and tropic near the stove, with dust on +her dress and ink on her fingers and the fumes of gas in her quivering +nostrils, and her mind strained and racked by an exaggerated sense of +her responsibilities, she was in heaven! She who so vehemently objected +to the squalid mess of the business of domesticity, revelled in the +squalid mess of this business. She whose heart would revolt because +Florrie's work was never done, was delighted to wait all hours on the +convenience of men who seemed to be the very incarnation of incalculable +change and caprice. And what was she? Nothing but a clerk, at a +commencing salary of fifteen shillings per week! Ah! but she was a +priestess! She had a vocation which was unsoiled by the economic excuse. +She was a pioneer. No young woman had ever done what she was doing. She +was the only girl in the Five Towns who knew shorthand. And in a +fortnight (they said) the paper was to come out! + + +III + +At the large table which was laden with prodigious, heterogeneous masses +of paper and general litter, she bent over the proofs by Mr. Dayson's +side. He had one proof; she had a duplicate; the copy lay between them. +It was the rough galley of a circular to the burgesses that they were +correcting together. Reading and explaining aloud, he inscribed the +cabalistic signs of correction in the margin of his proof, and she +faithfully copied them in the margin of hers, for practice. + +"l.c.," he intoned. + +"What does that mean?" + +"Lower case," he explained grandiosely, in the naïve vanity of his +knowledge. "Small letter; not a capital." + +"Thank you," she said, and, writing "l.c.," noted in her striving brain +that 'lower case' meant a small letter instead of a capital; but she +knew not why, and she did not ask; the reason did not trouble her. + +"I think we'll put 'enlightened' there, before 'public' Ring it, will +you?" + +"Ring it? Oh! I see!" + +"Yes, put a ring round the word in the margin. That's to show it isn't +the intelligent compositor's mistake, you see!" + +Then there was a familiar and masterful footstep on the stairs, and the +attention of both of them wavered. + + +IV + +Arthur Dayson and his proof-correcting lost all interest and all +importance for Hilda as Mr. Cannon came into the room. The unconscious, +expressive gesture, scornful and abrupt, with which she neglected them +might have been terribly wounding to a young man more sensitive than +Dayson. But Dayson, in his self-sufficient, good-natured mediocrity, had +the hide of an alligator. He even judged her movement quite natural, for +he was a flunkey born. Hilda gazed at her master with anxiety as he +deposited his black walking-stick in the corner behind the door and +loosed his white muffler and large overcoat (which Dayson called an +'immensikoff.') She thought the master looked tired and worried. +Supposing he fell ill at this supreme juncture! The whole enterprise +would be scotched, and not forty Daysons could keep it going! The master +was doing too much--law by day and journalism by night. They were +perhaps all doing too much, but the others did not matter. Nevertheless, +Mr. Cannon advanced to the table buoyant and faintly smiling, +straightening his shoulders back, proudly proving to himself and to them +that his individual force was inexhaustible. That straightening of the +shoulders always affected Hilda as something wistful, as almost pathetic +in its confident boyishness. It made her feel maternal and say to +herself (but not in words) with a sort of maternal superiority: "How +brave he is, poor thing!" Yes, in her heart she would apply the epithet +'poor thing' to this grand creature whose superiority she acknowledged +with more fervour than anybody. As for the undaunted straightening of +the shoulders, she adopted it, and after a time it grew to be a +characteristic gesture with her. + +"Well?" Mr. Cannon greeted them. + +"Well," said Arthur Dayson, with a factitious air of treating him as an +equal, "I've been round to Bennions and made it clear to him that if he +can't guarantee to run off a maximum of two thousand of an eight-page +sheet we shall have to try Clayhanger at Bursley, even if it's the last +minute." + +"What did he say?" + +"Grunted." + +"I shall risk two thousand, any way." + +"Paper delivered, governor?" Dayson asked in a low voice, leering +pawkily, as though to indicate that he was a man who could be trusted to +think of everything. + +"Will be to-morrow, I think," said Mr. Cannon. "Got that letter ready, +Miss Lessways?" + +Hilda sprang into life. + +"Yes," she said, handing it diffidently. "But if you'd like me to do it +again--you see it's--" + +"Plethora of H2O," Dayson put in, indulgent. + +"Oh no!" Mr. Cannon decided. Having read the letter, he gave it to +Dayson. "It doesn't matter, but you ought to have signed it before it +was copied in the letter-book." + +"Gemini! Miss!" murmured Dayson, glancing at Hilda with uplifted brows. + +The fact was that both of them had forgotten this formality. Dayson took +a pen, and after describing a few flourishes in the air, about a quarter +of an inch above the level of the paper, he magnificently signed: +"Dayson & Co." Such was the title of the proprietorship. Just as Karkeek +was Mr. Cannon's dummy in the law, so was Dayson in the newspaper +business. But whereas Karkeek was privately ashamed, Dayson was proud of +his rôle, which gave him the illusion of power and glory. + +"Just take this down, will you?" said Mr. Cannon. + +Hilda grasped at her notebook and seized a pencil, and then held herself +tense to receive the message, staring downwards at the blank page. +Dayson lolled in his chair, throwing his head back. He knew that the +presence of himself, the great shorthand expert, made Hilda nervous when +she had to write from dictation; and this flattered his simple vanity. +Hilda hated and condemned her nervousness, but she could not conquer it. + +Mr. Cannon, standing over the table, pushed his hat away from his broad, +shining forehead, and then, meditative, absently lifted higher his +carefully tended hand and lowered the singing gas-jet, only to raise it +again. + +"Mr. Ezra Brunt. Dear Sir, Re advertisement. With reference to your +letter replying to ours in which you inquire as to the circulation of +the above newspaper, we beg to state that it is our intention to print +four thousand of--" + +"Two thousand," Hilda interrupted confidently. + +Unruffled, Mr. Cannon went on politely: "No--four thousand of the first +number. Our representative would be pleased to call upon you by +appointment. Respectfully yours.--You might sign that, Dayson, and get +it off to-night. Is Sowter here?" + +For answer, Dayson jerked his head towards an inner door. Sowter was the +old clerk who had first received Hilda into the offices of Mr. Q. +Karkeek. He was earning a little extra money by clerical work at nights +in connection with the advertisement department of the new organ. + +Mr. Cannon marched to the inner door and opened it. Then he turned and +called: + +"Dayson--a moment." + +"Certainly," said Dayson, jumping up. He planted his hat doggishly at +the back of his head, stuck his hands into his pockets, and swaggered +after his employer. + +The inner door closed on the three men. Hilda, staring at the notebook, +blushing and nibbling at the pencil, was left alone under the gas. She +could feel her heart beating violently. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII +JANET ORGREAVE + + +I + +"Our friend is waiting for that letter to Brunt," said Arthur Dayson, +emerging from the inner room, a little later. + +"In one moment," Hilda replied coldly, though she had not begun to write +the letter. + +Dayson disappeared, nodding. + +She resented his referring to Mr. Cannon as 'our friend,' but she did +not know why, unless it was that she vaguely regarded it as +presumptuous, or, in the alternative, if he meant to be facetious, as +ill-bred, on the part of Arthur Dayson. She chose a sheet of paper, and +wrote the letter in longhand, as quickly as she could, but with arduous +care in the formation of every character; she wrote with the whole of +her faculties fully applied. Even in the smallest task she could not +economize herself; she had to give all or nothing. When she came to the +figures--4000--she intensified her ardour, lavishing enormous +unnecessary force: it was like a steamhammer cracking a nut. Her +conscience had instantly and finally decided against her. But she +ignored her conscience. She knew and owned that she was wrong to abet +Mr. Cannon's deception. And she abetted it. She would have abetted it if +she had believed that the act would involve her in everlasting +damnation,--not solely out of loyalty to Mr. Cannon; only a little out +of loyalty; chiefly out of mere unreasoning pride and obstinate +adherence to a decision. + +The letter finished, she took it into the inner room, where the three +men sat in mysterious conclave. Mr. Cannon read it over, and then Arthur +Dayson borrowed the old clerk's vile pen and with the ceremonious delays +due to his sense of his own importance, flourishingly added the +signature. + +When she came forth she heard a knock at the outer door. + +"Come in," she commanded defiantly, for she was still unconsciously in +the defiant mood in which she had offered the lying letter to Mr. +Cannon. + + +II + +A well-dressed, kind-featured, and almost beautiful young woman, of +about the same age as Hilda, opened the door, with a charming gesture of +diffidence. + +For a second the two gazed at each other astounded. + +"Well, Hilda, of all the--" + +"Janet!" + +It was an old schoolfellow, Janet Orgreave, daughter of Osmond Orgreave, +a successful architect at Bursley. Janet had passed part of her +schooldays at Chetwynd's; and with her brother Charlie she had also +attended Sarah Gailey's private dancing-class (famous throughout +Turnhill, Bursley, and Hanbridge) at the same time as Hilda. She was +known, she was almost notorious, as a universal favourite. By instinct, +without taking thought, she pleased everybody, great and small. Nature +had spoiled her, endowing her with some beauty, and undeniable elegance, +and abundant sincere kindliness. She had only to smile, and she made a +friend; it cost her nothing. She smiled now, and produced the illusion, +not merely in Hilda but in herself also, that her pleasure in this very +astonishing encounter was quite peculiarly poignant. + +They shook hands, as women of the world. + +"Did you know I was here?" Hilda questioned, characteristically on her +guard, with a nervous girlish movement of the leg that perhaps sinned +against the code of authentic worldliness. + +"No indeed!" exclaimed Janet. + +"Well, I am! I'm engaged here." + +"How splendid of you!" said Janet enthusiastically, with no suggestion +whatever in her tone that Hilda's situation was odd, or of dubious +propriety, or aught but enviable. + +But Hilda surveyed her with secret envy, transient yet real. In the +half-dozen years that had passed since the days of the dancing-class, +Janet had matured. She was now the finished product. She had the charm +of her sex, and she depended on it. She had grace and an overflowing +goodness. She had a smooth ease of manner. She was dignified. And, with +her furs, and her expensive veil protecting those bright apple-red +cheeks, and all the studied minor details of her costume, she was +admirably and luxuriously attired. She was the usual, as distinguished +from the unusual, woman, brought to perfection. She represented no +revolt against established custom. Doubts and longings did not beset +her. She was content within her sphere: a destined queen of the home. +And yet she could not be accused of being old-fashioned. None would dare +to despise her. She was what Hilda could never be, had never long +desired to be. She was what Hilda had definitely renounced being. And +there stood Hilda, immature, graceless, harsh, inelegant, dowdy, holding +the letter between her inky fingers, in the midst of all that hard +masculine mess,--and a part of it, the blindly devoted subaltern, who +could expect none of the ritual of homage given to women, who must sit +and work and stand and strain and say 'yes,' and pretend stiffly that +she was a sound, serviceable, thick-skinned imitation man among men! If +Hilda had been a valkyrie or a saint she might have felt no envy and no +pang. But she was a woman. Self-pity shot through her tremendous pride; +and the lancinating stab made her inattentive even to her curiosity +concerning the purpose of Janet's visit. + + +III + +"I came to see Mr. Cannon," said Janet. "The housekeeper downstairs told +me he was here somewhere." + +"He's engaged," answered Hilda in a low voice, with the devotee's +instinct to surround her superior with mystery. + +"Oh!" murmured Janet, checked. + +Hilda wondered furiously what she could be wanting with Mr. Cannon. + +Janet recommenced: "It's really about Miss Gailey, you know." + +"Yes--what?" + +Hilda nodded eagerly, speaking in a tone still lower and more careful. + +Janet dropped her voice accordingly: "She's Mr. Cannon's sister, of +course?" + +"Half-sister." + +"I mean. I've just come away from seeing her." She hesitated. "I only +heard by accident. So I came over with father. He had to come to a +meeting of the Guardians here, or something. They've quarrelled, haven't +they?" + +"Who? Miss Gailey and Mr. Cannon? Well, you see, she quarrels with every +one." Hilda appeared to defend Mr. Cannon. + +"I'm afraid she does, poor thing!" + +"She quarrelled with mother." + +"Really! when was that?" + +"Oh! Years and years ago! I don't know when. I was always surprised +mother let me go to the class." + +"It was very nice of your mother," said Janet, appreciative. + +"Is she in trouble?" Hilda asked bluntly. + +"I'm afraid she is." + +"What?" + +Janet suddenly gave a gesture of intimacy. "I believe she's starving!" + +"Starving!" Hilda repeated in a blank whisper. + +"Yes, I do! I do really believe she hasn't got enough to eat. She's +quarrelled with just about everybody there was to quarrel with. She +suffers fearfully with rheumatism. She never goes out--or scarcely +ever. You know her dancing-classes have all fallen away to nothing. I +fancy she tried taking lodgers--" + +"Yes, she did. I understood she was very good at housekeeping." + +"She hasn't got any lodgers now. There she is, all alone in that house, +and--" + +"But she can't be _starving_!" Hilda protested. At intervals she glanced +at the inner door, alarmed. + +"I really think she is," Janet persisted, softly persuasive. + +"But what's to be done?" + +"That's the point. I've just seen her. I went on purpose, because I'd +heard.... But I had to pretend all sorts of things to make an excuse for +myself. I couldn't offer her anything, could I? Isn't it dreadful?" + +They were much worried, these two young maids, full of health and vigour +and faith, and pride and simplicity, by this startling first glimpse +into one of the nether realities of existence. And they loyally tried to +feel more worried than they actually were; they did their best, out of +sympathy, to moderate the leaping, joyous vitality that was in them,-- +and did not succeed very well. They were fine, they were touching--but +they were also rather deliciously amusing--as they concentrated all +their resources of solemnity and of worldly experience on the tragic +case of the woman whom life had defeated. Hilda's memory rushed +strangely to Victor Hugo. She was experiencing the same utter +desolation--but somehow less noble--as had gripped her when she first +realized the eternal picture, in _Oceana Nox_, of the pale-fronted +widows who, tired of waiting for those whose barque had never returned +out of the tempest, talked quietly among themselves of the +lost--stirring the cinders in the fireplace and in their hearts.... Yet +Sarah Gailey was not even a widow. She was an ageing dancing-mistress. +She had once taught the grace of rhythmic movement to young limbs; and +now she was rheumatic. + +"Nobody but Mr. Cannon can do anything," Janet murmured. + +"I'm sure he hasn't the slightest idea--not the slightest!" said Hilda +half defensively. But she was saying to herself: "This man made me write +a lie, and now I hear that his sister is starving--in the same town!" +And she thought of his glossy opulence. "I'm quite sure of _that_!" she +repeated to Janet. + +"Oh! So am I!" Janet eagerly concurred. "That's why I came.... Somebody +had to give him a hint.... I never dreamt of finding you, dear!" + +"It is strange, isn't it?" said Hilda, the wondrous romance of things +seizing her. Seen afresh, through the eyes of this charming, sympathetic +acquaintance, was not Mr. Cannon's originality in engaging her +positively astounding? + +"I suppose _you_ couldn't give him a hint?" + +"Yes, I'll tell him," said Hilda. "Of course!" In spite of herself she +was assuming a certain proprietorship in Mr. Cannon. + +"I'm so glad!" Janet replied. "It is good of you!" + +"It seems to me it's you that's good, Janet," Hilda said grimly. She +thought: "Should _I_, out of simple kindliness and charity, have +deliberately come to tell a man I didn't know... that his sister was +starving? Never!" + +"He's bound to see after it!" said Janet, content. + +"Why, of course!" said Hilda, clinching the affair, in an intimate, +confidential murmur. + +"You'll tell him to-night?" + +Hilda nodded. + +They exchanged a grave glance of mutual appreciation and understanding. +Each was sure of the other's high esteem. Each was glad that chance had +brought about the meeting between them. Then they lifted away their +apprehensive solicitude for Sarah Gailey, and Janet, having sighed +relief, began to talk about old times. And their voices grew louder and +more free. + +"Can you tell me what time it is?" Janet asked, later. "I've broken the +spring of my watch, and I have to meet father at the station at +ten-fifteen." + +"I haven't a notion!" said Hilda, rather ashamed. + +"I hope it isn't ten o'clock." + +"I could ask," said Hilda hesitatingly. The hour, for aught she knew, +was nine, eleven, or even midnight. She was oblivious of time. + +"I'll run," said Janet, preparing to go. "I shall tell Charlie I've seen +you, next time I write to him. I'm sure he'll be glad. And you must come +to see us. You really must, now! Mother and father will be delighted. Do +you still recite, like you used to?" + +Hilda shook her head, blushing. + +She made no definite response to the invitation, which surprised, +agitated, and flattered her. She wanted to accept it, but she was +convinced that she never would accept it. Before departing, Janet lifted +her veil, with a beautiful gesture, and offered her lips to kiss. They +embraced affectionately. The next moment Hilda, at the top of the dim, +naked, resounding stair, was watching Janet descend--a figure infinitely +stylish and agreeable to the eye. + + + + +CHAPTER IX +IN THE STREET + + +I + +A few minutes later, just as Hilda had sealed up the last of the +letters, Mr. Cannon issued somewhat hurriedly out of the inner room, +buttoning his overcoat at the neck. + +"Good night," he said, and took his stick from the corner where he had +placed it. + +"Mr. Cannon!" + +"Well?" + +"I wanted to speak to you." + +"What is it? I'm in a hurry." + +She glanced at the inner door, which he had left open. From beyond that +door came the voices of Arthur Dayson and the old clerk; Hilda lacked +the courage to cross the length of the room and deliberately close it, +and though Mr. Cannon did not seem inclined to move, his eyes followed +the direction of hers and he must have divined her embarrassment. She +knew not what to do. A crisis seemed to rise up monstrous between them, +in an instant. She was trembling, and in acute trouble. + +"It's rather important," she said timidly, but not without an +unintentional violence. + +"Well, to-morrow afternoon." + +He, too, was apparently in a fractious state. The situation was perhaps +perilous. But she could not allow her conduct to be influenced by danger +or difficulty, which indeed nearly always had the effect of confirming +her purpose. If something had to be done, it had to be done--and let +that suffice! He waited, impatient, for her to agree and allow him to +go. + +"No," she answered, with positive resentment in her clear voice. "I must +speak to you to-night. It's very important." + +He made with his tongue an inarticulate noise of controlled +exasperation. + +"If you've finished, put your things on and walk along with me," he +said. + +She hurried to obey, and overtook him as he slowly descended the lower +flight of stairs. She had buttoned her jacket and knotted her thick +scarf, and now, with the letters pressed tightly under her arm lest they +should fall, she was pulling on her gloves. + +"I have an appointment at the Saracen's," he said mildly, meaning the +Saracen's Head--the central rendezvous of the town, where Conservative +and Liberal met on neutral ground. + + +II + +He turned to the left, toward the High Street and the great cleared +space out of which the cellarage of the new Town Hall had already been +scooped. He carried his thick gloves in his white and elegant hand, as +one who did not feel the frost. She stepped after him. Their breaths +whitened the keen air. She was extremely afraid, and considered herself +an abject coward, but she was determined to the point of desperation. He +ought to know the truth and he ought to know it at once: nothing else +mattered. She reflected in her terror: "If I don't begin right off, he +will be asking me to begin, and that will be worse than ever." She was +like one who, having boastfully undertaken to plunge into deep, cold +water from a height, has climbed to the height, and measured the fearful +distance, and is sick, and dares not leap, but knows that he must leap. + +"I suppose you know Miss Gailey is practically starving," she said +abruptly, harshly, staring at the gutter. + +She had leapt. Life seemed to leave her. She had not intended to use +such words, nor such a tone. She certainly did not suppose that he knew +about Miss Gailey's condition. She had affirmed to Janet Orgreave her +absolute assurance that he did not know. As for the tone, it was +accusing, it was brutal, it was full of the unconscious and terrible +clumsy cruelty of youth. + +"What?" His head moved sharply sideways, to look at her. + +"Miss Gailey--she's starving, it seems!" Hilda said timidly now, almost +apologetically. "I felt sure you didn't know. I thought _some_ one +should tell you." + +"What do you mean--starving?" he asked gruffly. + +"Not enough to eat," she replied, with the direct simplicity of a child. + +"And how did this tale get about?" + +"It's true," she said. "I was told to-night." + +"Who told you?" + +"A friend of mine--who's seen her!" + +"But who?" + +"It wouldn't be right for me to tell you who." + +They walked on in an appalling silence to the corner of the Square and +the High Street. + +"Here's the letter-box," he said, stopping. + +She dropped the letters with nervous haste into the box. Then she looked +up at him appealingly. In the brightness of the starry night she saw +that his face had a sardonic, meditative smile. The middle part of the +lower lip was pushed out, while the corners were pulled down--an +expression of scornful disgust. She burst out: + +"Of course, I know very well it's not your fault. I know, if you'd +_known_... but what with her never seeing you, and perhaps people not +caring to--" + +"I'm very much obliged to you," he interrupted her quietly, still +meditative. He was evidently sincere. His attitude was dignified. Many +men would have been ashamed, humiliated, even though aware of innocence. +But he contrived to rise above such weakness. She was glad; she admired +him. And she was very glad also that he did not deign to asseverate that +he had been ignorant of his half-sister's plight. Naturally he had been +ignorant! + + +III + +She was suddenly happy; she was inspired by an unreasoning joy. She was +happy because she was so young and fragile and inexperienced, and he so +much older, and more powerful and more capable. She was happy because +she was a mere girl and he a mature and important male. She thought +their relation in that moment exquisitely beautiful. She was happy +because she had been exceedingly afraid and the fear had gone. The dark +Square and far-stretching streets lay placid and void under the night, +surrounding their silence in a larger silence: and because of that also +she was happy. A policeman with his arms hidden under his cloak marched +unhasting downwards from the direction of the Bank. + +"Fine night, officer," said Mr. Cannon cordially. + +"Yes, sir. Good night, sir," the policeman responded, with respect and +sturdy self-respect, his footsteps ringing onwards. + +And the sight and bearing of this hardy, frost-defying policeman +watching over the town, and the greetings between him and Mr. Cannon-- +these too seemed strangely beautiful to Hilda. And then a train +reverberated along its embankment in the distance, and the gliding +procession of yellow windows was divided at regular intervals by the +black silhouettes of the scaffolding-poles of the new Town Hall. +Beautiful! She was filled with a delicious sadness. It was Janet's +train. In some first-class compartment Janet and her father were shut +together, side by side, intimate, mutually understanding. Again, a +beautiful relation! From the summit of a high kiln in the middle +distance, flames shot intermittently forth, formidable. Crockery was +being fired in the night: and unseen the fireman somewhere flitted about +the mouths of the kiln. And here and there in the dim faces of the +streets a window shone golden... there were living people behind the +blind! It was all beautiful, joy-giving. The thought of her mother +fidgeting for her return home was delightful. The thought of Mr. Cannon +and Miss Gailey, separated during many years, and now destined to some +kind of reconciliation was indescribably touching, and beautiful in a +way that she could not define. + +"I was only thinking the other day," said Mr. Cannon, treating her as an +equal in years and wisdom--"I was only thinking I'd got the very thing +for my half-sister--the very opening for her--a chance in a thousand, if +only she'd..." It was unnecessary for him to finish the sentence. + +"And is it too late now?" Hilda asked eagerly. + +"No," he said. "It isn't too late. I shall go round and see her +to-morrow morning first thing. It wouldn't do for me to go to-night--you +see--might seem too odd." + +"Yes," Hilda murmured. "Well, good night." + +They separated. She knew that he was profoundly stirred. Nevertheless, +he had inquired for no further details concerning Miss Gailey. He was +too proud, and beneath his inflexibility too sensitive, to do so. He +meant to discover the truth for himself. He had believed--that was the +essential. His behaviour had been superb. The lying letter to Ezra Brunt +was a mere peccadillo, even if it was that, even if it was not actually +virtuous. + +She walked off rapidly, trying to imitate the fine, free, calmly defiant +bearing of Mr. Cannon and the policeman. + + +IV + +"Florrie gone to bed?" she asked briskly of her mother, who was fussing +about her in the parlour, pretending to be fretful, but secretly +enchanted to welcome her, with a warm fire and plenteous food, back +again into the house. And Hilda, too, was enchanted at her reception. + +"Florrie gone to bed? I should just think Florrie has gone to bed. +Half-past ten and after! Eh my! This going out after tea. I never heard +of such doings. Now do warm your feet." + +"I should have been home sooner, only something happened," said Hilda. + +"Oh!" Mrs. Lessways exclaimed indifferently. She had in fact no +curiosity as to the affairs of Dayson and Company. The sole thing that +interested her was Hilda's daily absence and daily return. She seemed +quite content to remain in ignorance of what Hilda did in the mysterious +office. Her conversation, profuse when she was in good spirits, rarely +went beyond the trifling separate events of existence personal and +domestic--the life of the house hour by hour and minute by minute. It +was often astounding to Hilda that her mother never showed any sign of +being weary of these topics, nor any desire to discover other topics. + +"Yes," said Hilda. "Miss Gailey--" + +Mrs. Lessways became instantly a different creature. + +"And does he know?" she asked blankly, when Hilda had informed her of +Janet's visit and news. + +"Yes. I told him--of course." + +"You?" + +"Well, somebody had to tell him," said Hilda, with an affectation of +carelessness. "So I told him myself." + +"And how did he take it?" + +"Well, how should he take it?" Hilda retorted largely. "He _had_ to take +it! He was much obliged, and he said so." + +Mrs. Lessways began to weep. + +"What ever's the matter?" + +"I was only thinking of poor Sarah!" Mrs. Lessways answered the implied +rebuke of Hilda's brusque question. "I shall go and see her to-morrow +morning." + +"But, mother, don't you think you'd better wait?" + +Mrs. Lessways spoke up resolutely: "I shall go and see Sarah Gailey +to-morrow morning, and let that be understood! I don't need my daughter +to teach me when I ought to go and see my friends and when I +oughtn't.... I knew Sarah Gailey before your Mr. Cannon was born." + +"Oh, very well! Very well!" Hilda soothed her lightly. + +"I shall tell Sarah Gailey she's got to reckon with me, whether she +wants to or not! That's what I shall tell Sarah Gailey!" Mrs. Lessways +wiped her eyes. + +"Mother," Hilda asked, when they had gone upstairs, "did you wind the +clock?" + +"I don't think I did," answered the culprit uncertainly from her bedroom +door. + +"Mother, how tiresome you are! Night before last you wouldn't let me +touch it. You said you preferred to do it yourself. And now I shall be +waiting for it to strike to-morrow morning, to get up--lend me that +candle, do!" + +She tripped down to the lobby gladly, and opened the big door of the +clock, and put her hand into the dark cavity and, grimacing, hauled up +the heavy weights. This forgetfulness of her mother's somehow increased +her extraordinary satisfaction with life. She remounted the shadowy +stairs on the wings of a pure and ingenuous elation. + + + + +CHAPTER X +MISS GAILEY IN DECLENSION + + +I + +Knowing whom she was to meet, Hilda came home to tea, on the next day +but one, with a demeanour whose characteristics were heightened by +nervousness. The weather was still colder, and she had tied the broad +ribbons of her small bonnet rather closely under her chin, the double +bow a little to the left. A knitted bodice over the dress and under the +jacket made the latter tighter than usual, so that the fur edges of it +curved away somewhat between the buttons, and all the upper part of the +figure seemed to be too strictly confined, while the petticoats surged +out freely beneath. A muff, brightly coloured to match the skirt and the +bonnet and her cheeks, completed the costume. She went into the house +through the garden and delicately stamped her feet on the lobby tiles, +partly to warm them and shake off a few bits of snow, and partly to +announce clearly her arrival. Then, just as she was, hands in muff, she +entered the parlour. She was tingling with keen, rosy life, and with the +sense of youthful power. She had the deep, unconscious conviction of the +superiority of youth to age. And there were the two older women, waiting +for her, as it were on the defensive, and as nervous as she! + +"Good afternoon, Miss Gailey," she said, with a kind and even very +cordial smile, and heartily shook the flaccid, rheumatic hand that was +primly held out to her. And yet in spite of herself, perhaps unknown to +herself, there was in her tone and her smile and her vigorous clasp +something which meant, "Poor old thing!" pityingly, indulgently, +scornfully. + +She had not spoken to Miss Gailey, and she had scarcely seen her, since +the days of the dancing-class. A woman who is in process of losing +everything but her pride can disappear from view as easily in a small +town as in a great city; her acquaintances will say to each other, "I +haven't met So-and-so lately. I wonder..." And curiosity will go no +further. And in a short time her invisibility will cease to excite any +remark, except, "She keeps herself to herself nowadays." To Hilda Miss +Gailey appeared no older; her brown hair had very little grey in it, and +her skin was fairly smooth and well-preserved. But she seemed curiously +smaller, and less significant, this woman who, with a certain pedagogic +air, used to instruct girls in grace and boys in gallantry, this woman +who was regarded by all her pupils as the authoritative source of +correctness and ease in deportment. "Now, Master Charles," Hilda could +remember her saying, "will you ask me for the next polka all over again, +and try not to look as if you were doing me a favour and were rather +ashamed of yourself?" She had a tongue for the sneaping of too casual +boys, and girls also. + +And she spoke so correctly, as correctly as she performed the figures of +a dance! Hilda, who also spoke without the local peculiarities, had been +deprived of her Five Towns accent at Chetwynd's School, where the purest +Kensingtonian was inculcated; but Miss Gailey had lost hers in +Kensington itself--so rumour said--many years before. And now, in her +declension, she was still perfect of speech. But the authority and the +importance were gone in substance: only the shadow of them remained. She +had now, indeed, a manner half apologetic and half defiant, but +timorously and weakly defiant. Her head was restless with little nervous +movements; her watery eyes seemed to say: "Do not suppose that I am not +as proud and independent as ever I was, because I _am_. Look at my silk +dress, and my polished boots, and my smooth hair, and my hands! Can +anyone find any trace of shabbiness in _me_?" But beneath all this +desperate bravery was the wistful acknowledgment, continually-peeping +out, that she had after all come down in the world, albeit with a +special personal dignity that none save she could have kept. + + +II + +The two women were seated at a splendid fire. Hilda, whose nervousness +was quickly vanishing, came between them to warm her hands that were +shining with cold, despite muff and gloves. "Here, mother!" she said +teasingly, putting the muff and gloves in her mother's lap. + +Sarah Gailey rose with slow stiffness from her chair. + +"Now don't let this child disturb you, Sarah!" Mrs. Lessways protested. + +"Oh no, Caroline!" said Miss Gailey composedly. "I was only getting my +apron." + +From a reticule on the table she drew forth a small black satin apron on +which was embroidered in filoselle a spray of moss-roses. It was +extremely elegant--much more so than Mrs. Lessways'--though not in quite +the latest style of fashionable aprons; not being edible, it had +probably been long preserved in a wardrobe, on the chance of just such +an occasion as this. She adjusted the elastic round her thin waist, and +sat down again. The apron was a sign that she had come definitely to +spend the whole evening. It was a proof of the completeness of the +reconciliation between the former friends. + +As the conversation shifted from the immediate topic of the weather to +the great general question of cures for chilblains, Hilda wondered what +had passed between her mother and Miss Gailey, and whether her mother +had overcome by mere breezy force or by guile: which details she never +learnt, for Mrs. Lessways was very loyal to her former crony, and +moreover she had necessarily to support the honour of the older +generation against the younger. It seemed incredible to Hilda that this +woman who sat with such dignity and such gentility by her mother's fire +was she who the day before yesterday had been starving in the +pride-imposed prison of her own house. Could Miss Gailey have known that +Hilda knew!... But Hilda knew that Miss Gailey knew that she knew--and +that others guessed! Such, however, was the sublime force of convention +that the universal pretence of ignorance securely triumphed. + +Then Florrie--changed, grown, budded, practised in the technicalities of +parlours, but timid because of "company"--came in to set the tea. And +Miss Gailey inspected her with the calm and omniscient detachment of a +deity, and said to Caroline when she was gone that Florrie seemed a +promising little thing--with the 'makings of a good servant' in her. +Afterwards the mistress recounted this judgment to Florrie, who was +thereby apparently much impressed and encouraged in well-doing. + + +III + +"And so you're thinking of going to London, Miss Gailey?" said Hilda, +during tea. The meal was progressing satisfactorily, though Caroline +could not persuade Sarah to eat enough. + +Miss Gailey flushed slightly, with the characteristic nervous movement +of the head. Evidently her sensitiveness was extreme. + +"And what do you know about it, you inquisitive little puss?" Mrs. +Lessways intervened hastily, though it was she who had informed Hilda of +the vague project. Somehow, in presence of her old friend, Mrs. Lessways +seemed to feel herself under an obligation to play the assertive and +crushing mother. + +"Has Mr. Cannon mentioned it?" said Miss Gailey politely. Miss Gailey, +at any rate, recognized in the most scrupulous way that Hilda was an +adult, and no longer a foal-legged pupil for dancing. "Well, he seems so +set on it. He came round to see me about it yesterday morning, without +any warning. And he was full of it! I told you how full he was of it, +didn't I, Caroline? You know how he is when anything takes him." + +"Do I know how he is?" murmured Caroline, arching her eyebrows. She +spoke much more broadly than either of the others. + +Miss Gailey continued to Hilda, with seriousness: "It's a boarding-house +that he's got control of up there. Something about a bill of sale on the +furniture, I think. But perhaps you know?" + +"No, I don't," said Hilda. + +"Oh!" said Miss Gailey, relieved. "Well, anyhow he's bent on me taking +charge of this boarding-house. He will have it it's just the thing for +me. But--but I don't know!" She finished weakly. + +"Everyone knows you're a splendid housekeeper," said Mrs. Lessways. +"Always were." + +"I remember the refreshments at your annual dances," said Hilda, +politely enthusiastic. + +"I always attended to those myself," Miss Gailey judicially observed. + +"I don't know anything about refreshments at dances," said Mrs. +Lessways, "but I do know what your housekeeping is, Sarah!" + +"Well, that's what George says!" Sarah simpered. "He says he never had +such meals and such attention as that year he lived with me." + +"I'm sure he's been sorry many a time he ever left you!" exclaimed +Caroline. "Many and many a time!" + +"Oh, well.... Relatives, you know...." Sarah murmured vaguely. This was +the only reference to the estrangement. She went on with more vivacity. +"And then Mr. Cannon has always had ideas about boarding-houses and +furnished rooms and so on. He always did say there was lots of money to +be made out of them if only they were managed properly; only they never +are.... He ought to know; he's been a bachelor long enough, and he's +tried enough of them! He says he isn't at all comfortable where he is," +she added, as it were aside to Caroline. "It's some people who used to +let lodgings to theatre people at Hanbridge." + +"Oh! _Them_!" cried Caroline. + +The talk meandered into a maze of reminiscences, and Hilda had to +realize her youthfulness and the very inferior range of her experience: +Sarah and Caroline recalled to each other dozens of persons and events, +opening up historical vistas in a manner that filled the young girl with +envious respect, in spite of herself. + +"Do you remember Hanbridge Theatre being built, Sarah?" questioned +Caroline. "My grandfather--Hilda's great-grandfather--tendered for +it--not that he got the job--but he was very old." + +"Did he now? No, I don't. But I dare say I was in London then." + +"I dare say that would be it." + +"Yes," said Sarah, turning to Hilda once more, "that's just what Mr. +Cannon says. He says it isn't as if I didn't know what London is.... But +it's such a long time ago!" She glanced at Caroline as if for sympathy. + +"Come, come, Sarah!" Caroline protested stoutly, and yet with a care for +Sarah's sensitiveness. "It isn't so long ago as all that!" + +"It seems so long," said Sarah, reflective; and her mouth worked +uneasily. Then, after a pause: "He's so set on it!" + +"Set on what? On your going to London?" + +"Yes." + +"And why not?" + +"Well, I don't know whether I could--" + +"Paw!" scoffed Caroline lightly and flatteringly. "You're younger than I +am, and I'm not going to have anyone making out that I'm getting old. +Now do finish that bit of cake." + +"No, thank you, Caroline. I really couldn't." + +"Not but what I should be sorry enough to lose you," Caroline concluded. +"There's no friends like the old friends." + +"Ah! No!" Sarah thickly muttered, gazing with her watery eyes at a spot +on the white diaper. + +"Hilda, do turn down that there gas a bit," said Mrs. Lessways sharply +and self-consciously. "It's fizzing." And she changed the subject. + + +IV + +With a nervous exaggeration of solicitude Hilda sprang to the gas-jet. +Suddenly she was drenched in the most desolating sadness. She could not +bear to look at Miss Gailey; and further, Miss Gailey seemed unreal to +her, not an actual woman, but an abstract figure of sorrow that fancy +had created. A few minutes previously Hilda had been taking pride in the +tact and the enterprise of George Cannon, who possessed a mysterious +gift of finding an opportunity for everybody who needed it. He had set +Hilda on her feet; and he was doing the same for his half-sister, and +with such skilful diplomacy that Miss Gailey was able to pretend to +herself and to others that George Cannon, and not Sarah Gailey, was the +obliged person. But now Hilda saw Sarah Gailey afraid to go to London, +and George Cannon pushing her forward with all the ruthless strength of +his enterprising spirit. And the sight was extraordinarily, +incomprehensibly tragic. Sarah Gailey's timorous glance seemed to be +saying: "I am terrified to go. It isn't beyond my strength--it's beyond +my spirit. But I shall have to go, and I shall have to seem glad to go. +And nobody can save me!" + +And Miss Gailey's excellent silk dress, and her fine apron, and her +primness and dignified manners, and her superb pretence of being +undamaged struck Hilda as intolerably pathetic--so that she was obliged +to look away lest she might weep at the sight of that pathos. Yes, it +was a fact that she could not bear to look! Nor could she bear to let +her imagination roam into Miss Gailey's immediate past! She said to +herself: "Only yesterday morning perhaps she didn't know where her next +meal was coming from. He must have managed somehow to give her some +money. Only yesterday morning perhaps she didn't know where her next +meal--If I say that to myself once more I shall burst out crying!" She +balanced her spoon on her teacup and let it fall. + +"Now, Miss Fidgety!" her mother commented, with good humour. And then +they all heard a knock at the front door. + +"Will Florrie have heard it?" Mrs. Lessways asked nervously. What she +meant was: "Who on earth can this be?" But such questions cannot be put +in the presence of a newly reconciled old friend. It was necessary to +behave as though knocks at the front door were a regular accompaniment +of tea. + + + + +CHAPTER XI +DISILLUSION + + +I + +The entrance of George Cannon into the parlour produced a tumult greatly +stimulating the vitality and the self-consciousness of all three women. +Sarah Gailey's excitement was expressed in flushing, and in +characteristic small futile movements of the head and hands, and in +monosyllables that conveyed naught except a vague but keen apprehension. +Mrs. Lessways was perturbed and somewhat apprehensive also; but she was +flattered and pleased. Hilda was frankly suspicious during the first +moments. She guessed that Mr. Cannon was aware of his sister's visit, +and that he had come to further his own purposes. He confirmed her idea +by greeting his sister without apparent surprise; but as, in response to +Mrs. Lessways' insistence, he took off his great overcoat, with those +large, powerful gestures which impress susceptible women and give +pleasure even to the indifferent, he said casually to Sarah Gailey, "I +didn't expect to meet you here, Sally. I've come to have a private word +with Mrs. Lessways about putting one of her Calder Street tenants on to +the pavement." Sarah laughed nervously and said that she would retire, +and Mrs. Lessways said that Sarah would do no such thing, and that she +was very welcome to hear all that Mr. Cannon might have to say +concerning the Calder Street property. + +In a minute Mr. Cannon was resplendently sitting down to the table with +them, and rubbing his friendly hands, and admitting that he should not +refuse a cup of tea if pressed. And Hilda received her mother's sharp +instructions to get a cup and saucer from the sideboard and a spoon from +the drawer. She bore these to the table like a handmaid, but like a +delicate and superior handmaid, and it pleased her to constitute herself +a delicate and superior handmaid. Mr. Cannon sat next to her mother, and +Hilda put down the tinkling cup and saucer on the white cloth between +them; and as she did so Mr. Cannon turned and thanked her with a +confidential smile, to which she responded. They were not now employer +and employee, but exclusively in the social world; nevertheless, their +business relations made an intimacy which it was piquant to feel in the +home. Moreover, Sarah Gailey was opposite to them, and Hilda could not +keep out of her dark eyes the intelligence: "If she is here, if you are +all amicable together, it is due to me." Delicious and somehow perilous +secret!... Going back to her seat, she arranged more safely the vast +overcoat which he had thrown carelessly down on her mother's rocking- +chair. It was inordinately heavy, and would have outweighed a dozen of +her skimpy little jackets; she, who would have been lost in it like a +cat in a rug, enjoyed the thought of the force of the creature capable +of wearing it lightly for a garment. Withal the rough, soft surface of +it was agreeable to the hand. Out of one of the immense pockets hung the +end of a coloured silk muffler, filmy as anything that she herself wore. + +Then they were all definitely seated, and Mr. Cannon accepted his tea +from the hand of Mrs. Lessways. The whiteness of his linen, the new +smartness of his suit, the elegance and gallantry of his gestures--these +phenomena incited the women to a responsive emulation; they were +something which it was a feminine duty to live up to. Archness reigned, +especially between the hostess and the caller. Hilda answered to the +mood. And Sarah Gailey, though she said little and never finished a +sentence, did her best to answer to it by noddings and nervous +appreciative smiles, and swift turnings of the head from one to another. +When Mr. Cannon and Mrs. Lessways, in half a dozen serious words +interjected among the archness, had adversely settled the fate of a +whole family in Calder Street, there remained scarcely a trace, in the +company's demeanour, of the shamed consciousness that only two days +before its members had been divided by disastrous enmities and that one +of them had lacked the means of life. + + +II + +"Oh no! my dear girl! You're too modest--that's what's the matter with +you," said George Cannon eagerly to his half-sister. The epithet +flattered but did not allay her timidity. To Hilda it seemed +mysteriously romantic. + +The supreme topic had worked its way into the conversation. Uppermost in +the minds of all, it seemed to have forced itself out by its own +intrinsic energy, against the will of the company. Impossible to decide +who first had let it forth! But George Cannon had now fairly seized it +and run off with it. He was almost boyishly excited over it. The Latin +strain in him animated his features and his speech. He was a poet as he +talked of the boarding-house that awaited a mistress. He had pulled out +of his pocket the cutting of an advertisement of it from the London +_Daily Telegraph_, a paper that was never seen in Turnhill. And this bit +of paper, describing in four lines the advantages of the boarding-house, +had the effect of giving the actual house a symbolic reality. "There it +is!" he exclaimed, slapping down the paper. And there it appeared really +to be. The bit of paper was extraordinarily persuasive. It compelled +everybody to realize, now for the first time, that the house did in fact +exist. George Cannon had an overwhelming answer to all timorous +objections. The boarding-house was remunerative; boarders were at that +very moment in it. The nominal proprietor was not leaving it because he +was losing money on the boarding-house, but because he had lost money in +another enterprise quite foreign to it, and had pledged all the contents +of the boarding-house as security. The occasion was one in a thousand, +one in a million. He, George Cannon, through a client, had the entire +marvellous affair between his finger and thumb, and most obviously Sarah +Gailey was the woman of all women for the vacant post at his +disposition. Chance was waiting on her. She had nothing whatever to do +but walk into the house as a regent into a kingdom, and rule. Only, +delay was impossible. All was possible except delay. She would +inevitably succeed; she could not fail. And it would be a family +affair.... + +Tea was finished and forgotten. + +"For your own sake!" he wound up a peroration. "It really doesn't matter +to me.... Don't you agree with me, Mrs. Lessways?" His glance was a +homage. + +"Oh, you!" exclaimed Mrs. Lessways, smiling happily. "You've only got to +open your mouth, and you'd talk anybody into the middle of next week." + +"Mother!" Hilda mildly reproved. She was convinced now that Mr. Cannon +had come on purpose to clinch the affair. + +He laughed appreciatively. + +"But really! Seriously!" he insisted. + +And Mrs. Lessways, straightening her face, said, with slight +self-consciousness: "Oh, _I_ think it's worth while considering!" + +"There you are!" cried Mr. Cannon to Miss Gailey. + +"I shall be all alone up there!" said Miss Gailey, as cheerfully as she +could. + +"I'll go up with you and see you into the place. I should have to come +back the same night--I'm so tremendously busy just now--what with the +paper and so on." + +"Yes, but--I quite admit all you say, George--but--" + +"Here's another idea," he broke out. "Why don't you ask Mrs. Lessways to +go up with you and stay a week or two? It would be a rare change for +her, and company for you." + +Miss Gailey looked quickly at her old friend. + +"Oh! Bless you!" said Mrs. Lessways. "I've only been to London once, and +that was only for two days--before Hilda was born. I should be no use in +London, at my time of life. I'm one of your home-stayers." Nevertheless +it was plain that the notion appealed to her fancy, and that she would +enjoy flirting with it. + +"Nonsense, Mrs. Lessways!" said George Cannon. "It would do you a world +of good, and it would make all the difference to Sally." + +"That it would!" Sarah agreed, still questioning Caroline with her +watery, appealing eyes. In Caroline, Sarah saw her salvation, and +snatched at it. Caroline could do nothing well; she had no excellence; +all that Caroline could do Sarah could do better. And yet Caroline, by +the mysterious virtue of her dry and yet genial shrewdness, and of the +unstable but reliable equilibrium of her temperament, was the skilled +Sarah's superior. They both knew it and felt it. The lofty Hilda +admitted it. Caroline herself negligently admitted it by a peculiar, +brusque, unaffected geniality of condescension towards Sarah. + +"Do go, mother!" said Hilda. To herself she had been saying: "Another of +his wonderful ideas!" The prospect of being alone in the house with +Florrie, of being free for a space to live her own life untrammelled and +throw all her ardour into her work, was inexpressibly attractive to +Hilda. It promised the most delicious experience that she had ever had. + +"Yes," retorted Mrs. Lessways. "And leave you here by yourself! A nice +thing!" + +"I shall be all right," said Hilda confidently and joyously. She was +sure that the excursion to London had appealed to her mother's latent +love of the unexpected, and that her faculty for accepting placidly +whatever fate offered would prevent her from resisting the pressure that +Sarah Gailey and Mr. Cannon would obviously exert. + +"Shall you!" Mrs. Lessways muttered. + +"Why not take your daughter with you, too?" Mr. Cannon suggested. + +"Oh!" cried Hilda, shocked. "I couldn't possibly leave my work just +now.... The paper just coming out.... You couldn't spare me." She spoke +with pride, using phrases similar to those which he had used to explain +to Sarah Gailey why he could not remain with her in London even for a +night. + +"Oh yes, I could," he answered kindly, lightly, carelessly, +shattering--in his preoccupation with one idea--all her fine, loyal +pretensions. "We should manage all right." + + +III + +She was hurt. She was mortally pierced. The blow was too cruel. She +lowered her glance before his, and fixed it on the table-cloth. Her brow +darkened. Her lower lip bulged out. She was the child again. He had with +atrocious inhumanity reduced her to the unimportance of a child. She had +bestowed on him and his interests the gift of her whole soul, and he had +said that it was negligible. And the worst was that he was perfectly +unaware of what he had done. He had not even observed the symptoms of +her face. He had turned at once to the older women and was continuing +the conversation. He had ridden over her, and ridden on without a look +behind. The conversation moved, after a pause, back to the plausible +excuse for his call. He desired to see some old rent-book which would +show how the doomed tenant in Calder Street had originally fallen into +arrears. + +"Where is that old book of Mr. Skellorn's, Hilda?" her mother asked. + +She could not speak. The sob was at her throat. If she had spoken it +would have burst through, and she would have been not merely the child, +but the disgraced child. + +"Hilda!" repeated her mother. + +Her singular silence drew the attention of all. She blushed a sombre +scarlet. No! She could not speak. She cursed herself. "What a little +fool I am! Surely I can..." Useless! She could not speak. She took the +one desperate course open to her, and ran out of the room, to the +astonishment of three puzzled and rather frightened adults. Her shame +was now notorious. "Baby! Great baby!" she gnashed at her own +inconceivable silliness. Had she no pride?... And now she was in the +gloom of the lobby, and she could hear Florrie in the kitchen softly +whistling.... She was out in the dark lobby exactly like a foolish, +passionate child.... She knew all the time that she could easily +persuade her mother to leave her alone with Florrie in the house; she +had levers to move her mother.... But of what use, now, to do that? + + + + +CHAPTER XII +THE TELEGRAM + +I + +It was the end of February 1880. A day resembling spring had come, +illusive, but exquisite. Hilda, having started out too hurriedly for the +office after the midday dinner, had had to return home for a proof which +she had forgotten. + +She now had the house to herself, as a kingdom over which she reigned; +for, amid all her humiliation and pensive dejection, she had been able +to exert sufficient harsh force to drive her mother to London in company +with Miss Gailey. She was alone, free; and she tasted her freedom to the +point of ecstasy. She conned corrected proofs at her meals: this was +life. When Florrie came in with another dish, Hilda looked up +impatiently from printed matter, as if disturbed out of a dream, and +Florrie put on an apologetic air, to invoke pardon. It was largely +pretence on Hilda's part, but it was life. Then she had the delicious +anxiety of being responsible for Florrie. "Now, Florrie, I'm going out +to-night, to see Miss Orgreave at Bleakridge. I shall rely on you to go +to bed not later than nine. I've got the key. _I may not be back till +the last train_." "Yes, miss!" And what with Hilda's solemnity and +Florrie's impressed eyes, the ten-forty-five was transformed into a +train that circulated in the dark and mysterious hour just before +cockcrow. Hilda, alone, was always appealing to Florrie's loyalty. +Sometimes when discreetly abolishing some old-fashioned, work-increasing +method of her mother's, she would speak to Florrie in a tone of sudden, +transient intimacy, raising her for a moment to the rank of an +intellectual equal as her voice hinted that her mother after all +belonged to the effete generation. + +Awkwardly, with her gloved hands, turning over the pages of a book in +which the slip-proof had been carelessly left hidden, Hilda, from her +bedroom, heard Florrie come whistling down the attic stairs. Florrie had +certainly heard nothing of her young mistress since the door-bang which +had signalled her departure for the office. In the delusion that she was +utterly solitary in the house, Florrie was whistling, not at all like a +modest young woman, but like a carter. Hilda knew that she could +whistle, and had several times indicated to her indirectly that +whistling was undesirable; but she had never heard her whistling as she +whistled now. Her first impulse was to rush out of the bedroom and +'catch' Florrie and make her look foolish, but a sense of honour +restrained her from a triumph so mean, and she kept perfectly still. She +heard Florrie run into her mother's bedroom; and then she heard that +voice, usually so timid, saying loudly, exultantly, and even coarsely: +"Oh! How beautiful I am! How beautiful I am! Shan't I just mash the men! +Shan't I just mash 'em!" This new and vulgar word 'mash' offended Hilda. + + +II + +She crept noiselessly to the door, which was ajar, and looked forth like +a thief. The door of her mother's room was wide open, and across the +landing she could see Florrie posturing in front of the large mirror of +the wardrobe. The sight shocked her in a most peculiar manner. It was +Florrie's afternoon out, and the child was wearing, for the first time, +an old brown skirt that Hilda had abandoned to her. But in this long +skirt she was no more a child. Although scarcely yet fifteen years old, +she was a grown woman. She had astoundingly developed during her service +with Mrs. Lessways. She was scarcely less tall than Hilda, and she +possessed a sturdy, rounded figure which put Hilda's to shame. It was +uncanny--the precocity of the children of the poor! It was disturbing! +On a chair lay Florrie's new 'serviceable' cloak, and a cheap but sound +bonnet: both articles the fruit of a special journey with her aunt to +Baines's drapery shop at Bursley, where there was a small special sober +department for servants who were wise enough not to yield to the +temptation of 'finery.' Florrie, who at thirteen and a half had never +been able to rattle one penny against another, had since then earned +some two thousand five hundred pennies, and had clothed herself and put +money aside and also poured a shower of silver upon her clamorous +family. Amazing feat! Amazing growth! She seized the 'good' warm cloak +and hid her poor old bodice beneath it, and drew out her thick pig-tail, +and shook it into position with a free gesture of the head; and on the +head she poised the bonnet, and tied the ribbons under the delightful +chin. And then, after a moment of hard scrutiny, danced and whistled, +and cried again: "How beautiful I am! How pretty I am!" + +She was. She positively did not look a bit like a drudge. She was not +the Florrie of the kitchen and of the sack-apron, but a young, fledged +creature with bursting bosom who could trouble any man by the capricious +modesty of a gaze downcast. The miraculous skirt, odious on Hilda, had +the brightness of a new skirt. Her hands and arms were red and chapped, +but her face had bloomed perfect in the kitchen like a flower in a +marl-pit. It was a face that an ambitious girl could rely on. Its charm +and the fluid charm of her movements atoned a thousand times for all her +barbaric ignorance and crudity; the grime on her neck was naught. + +Hilda watched, intensely ashamed of this spying, but she could not bring +herself to withdraw. She was angry with Florrie; she was outraged. Then +she thought: "Why should I be angry? The fact is I'm being mother all +over again. After all, why shouldn't Florrie...?" And she was a little +jealous of Florrie, and a little envious of her, because Florrie had the +naturalness of a savage or of an animal, unsophisticated by ideals of +primness. Hilda was disconcerted at the discovery of Florrie as an +authentic young woman. Florrie, more than seven years her junior! She +felt experienced, and indulgent as the old are indulgent. For the first +time in her life she did honestly feel old. And she asked herself--half +in dismay: "Florrie has got thus far. Where am _I_? What am _I_ doing?" +It was upsetting. + +At length Florrie took off the bonnet and ran upstairs, and shut the +door of her attic. Apparently she meant to improve the bonnet by some +touch. After waiting nervously a few moments, the aged Hilda slipped +silently downstairs, and through the kitchen, and so by the garden, +where with their feet in mire the hare trees were giving signs of hope +under the soft blue sky, into the street. Florrie would never know that +she had been watched. + + +III + +Ten minutes later, when she went into the office of Dayson & Co., Hilda +was younger than ever. It was a young, fragile girl, despite the dark +frown of her intense seriousness, who with accustomed gestures poked the +stove, and hung bonnet and jacket on a nail and then sat down to the +loaded desk; it was an ingenuous girl absurdly but fiercely anxious to +shoulder the world's weight. She had passed a whole night in revolt +against George Cannon's indignity; she had called it, furiously, an +insult. She had said to herself: "Well, if I'm so useless as all that, +I'll never go near his office again." But the next afternoon she had +appeared as usual at the office, meek, modest, with a smile, fatigued +and exquisitely resigned, and a soft voice. And she had worked with even +increased energy and devotion. This kissing of the rod, this irrational +instinctive humility, was a strange and sweet experience for her. Such +was the Hilda of the office; but Hilda at home, cantankerous, obstinate, +and rude, had offered a remarkable contrast to her until the moment when +it was decided that her mother should accompany Miss Gailey to London. +From that moment Hilda at home had been an angel, and the Hilda of the +office had shown some return of sturdy pride. + +To-day the first number of _The Five Towns Chronicle_ was to go to +press.... The delays had been inexplicable and exasperating to Hilda, +though she had not criticized them, even to herself; they were now over. +The town had no air of being excited about the appearance of its new +paper. But the office was excited. The very room itself looked feverish. +It was changed; more tables had been brought into it, and papers and +litter had accumulated enormously; it was a room humanized by +habitation, with a physiognomy that was individual and sympathetic. + +From beyond the closed door of the inner room came the sound of men's +rapid voices. Hilda could distinguish Mr. Cannon's and Arthur Dayson's; +there was a third, unfamiliar to her. Having nothing to do, she began to +make work, rearranging the contents of her table, fingering with a +factitious hurry the thick bundles of proofs of correspondence from the +villages (so energetically organized by the great Dayson), and the now +useless 'copy,' and the innumerable letters, that Dayson was always +disturbing, and the samples of encaustic tiles brought in by an inventor +who desired the powerful aid of the press, and the catalogues, and +Dayson's cuttings from the Manchester, Birmingham, and London papers, +and the notepaper and envelopes and cards, and Veale Chifferiel & Co.'s +almanac that had somehow come up with other matters from Mr. Karkeek's +office below. And then she dusted, with pursed lips that blamed the +disgraceful and yet excusable untidiness of men, and then she examined, +with despair and with pride, her dirty little hands, whose finger-tips +all clustered together (they were now like the hands of a nice, careless +schoolboy), and lightly dusted one against the other. Then she found a +galley-proof under the table. It was a duplicate proof of _The Five +Towns Chronicle's_ leading article, dictated to her by a prodigious +Arthur Dayson, in Mr. Cannon's presence, on the previous day, and +dealing faithfully with "The Calder Street Scandal" and with Mr. +Enville, a member of the Local Board--implicated in the said scandal. +The proof was useless now, for the leader-page was made up. +Nevertheless, Hilda carefully classified it "in case..." + + +IV + +On a chair was _The Daily Telegraph_, which Dayson had evidently been +reading, for it was blue pencilled. Hilda too must read it; her duty was +to read it: Dayson had told her that she ought never to neglect the +chance of reading any newspaper whatever, and that a young woman in her +responsible situation could not possibly know too much. Which advice, +though it came from a person ridiculous to her, seemed sound enough, and +was in fact rather flattering. In the _Telegraph_ she saw, between +Dayson's blue lines, an account of a terrible military disaster. She was +moved by it in different ways. It produced in her a grievous, horror- +struck desolation; but it also gave her an extraordinary sensation of +fervid pleasure. It was an item of news that would have to appear in the +_Chronicle_, and this would mean changes in the make-up, and work at +express speed, and similar delights. Already the paper was supposed to +be on the machine, though in fact, as she well knew, it was not. No +doubt the subject of discussion in the inner room was the disaster!... +Yes, she was acutely and happily excited. And always afterwards, when +she heard or saw the sinister word 'Majuba' (whose political +associations never in the least interested her), she would recall her +contradictory, delicious feelings on that dramatic afternoon. + +While she was busily cutting out the news from the _Telegraph_ to be +ready for Arthur Dayson, there was a very timid knock at the door, and +Florrie entered, as into some formidable cabinet of tyrannic rulers. + +"If you please, miss--" she began to whisper. + +"Why, Florrie," Hilda exclaimed, "what have you put that old skirt on +for, when I've given you mine? I told you--" + +"I did put it on, miss. But there came a telegram. I told the boy you +were here, but he said that wasn't no affair of his, so I brought it +myself, and I thought you wouldn't care for to see me in your skirt, +miss, not while on duty, miss, 'specially here like! So I up quick and +changed it back." + +"Telegram?" Hilda repeated the word. + +Florrie, breathless after running and all this whispering, advanced in +the prettiest confusion towards the throne, and Hilda took the telegram +with a gesture as casual as she could manage. Florrie's abashed mien, +and the arrival of the telegram, stiffened her back and steadied her +hand. Imagine that infant being afraid of her, Hilda! This too was life! +And the murmur of the men in the inner room was thrilling to Hilda's +ears. + +She brusquely opened the telegram and read: "Lessways, Lessways Street, +Turnhill. Mother ill. Can you come?--Gailey." + + + + +CHAPTER XIII +HILDA'S WORLD + + +I + +The conversation in the inner room promised to be interminable. Hilda +could not decide what to do. She felt no real alarm on her mother's +account. Mrs. Lessways, often slightly indisposed, was never seriously +ill; she possessed one of those constitutions which do not go to +extremes of disease; if a malady overtook her, she invariably 'had' it +in a mild form. Doubtless Sarah Gailey, preoccupied and worried by new +responsibilities, desired to avoid the added care of nursing the sick. +Hence the telegram. Moreover, if the case had been grave, she would not +have put the telegram in the interrogative; she would have written, +'Please come at once.' No, Hilda was not unduly disturbed. Nevertheless, +she had an odd idea that she ought to rush to the station and catch the +next train, which left Knype at five minutes to four; this idea did not +spring from her own conscience, but rather from the old-fashioned +collective family conscience. But at a quarter to four, when it was +already too late to catch the local train at Turnhill, the men had not +emerged from the inner room; nor had Hilda come to any decision. As the +departure of her mother and Miss Gailey had involved much solemn poring +over time-tables, it happened that she knew the times of all the trains +to London; to catch the next and last she would have to leave Turnhill +at _5.55_. She said that she would wait and see. Her work for the first +number of the paper was practically done, but there was this mysterious +conclave which fretted her curiosity and threatened exciting +development; also the Majuba disaster would mean trouble for somebody. +And in any event she hated the very thought of quitting Turnhill before +the _Chronicle_ was definitely out. She had lived for the moment of its +publication, and she could not bear to miss it. She was almost angry +with her mother; she was certainly angry with Miss Gailey. All the +egotism of the devotee in her was aroused and irate. + +Then the men came forth from the inner room, with a rather unexpected +suddenness. Mr. Cannon appeared first; and after him Mr. Enville; lastly +Arthur Dayson, papers in hand. Intimidated by the presence of the +stranger, Hilda affected to be busy at her table. Mr. Enville shook +hands very amicably with George Cannon, and instantly departed. As he +passed down the stairs she caught sight of him; he was a grizzled man of +fifty, lean and shabby, despite his reputation for riches. She knew that +he was a candidate for the supreme position of Chief Bailiff at the end +of the year, and he did not accord with her spectacular ideal of a Chief +Bailiff; the actual Chief Bailiff was a beautiful and picturesque old +man, with perfectly tended white whiskers, and always a flower in his +coat. Further, she could not reconcile this nearly effusive friendliness +between Mr. Enville and Mr. Cannon with the animadversions of the +leading article which Arthur Dayson had composed, and Mr. Cannon had +approved, only twenty-four hours earlier. + +As Mr. Cannon shut the door at the head of the stairs, she saw him give +a discreet, disdainful wink to Dayson. Then he turned sharply to Hilda, +and said, thoughtful and stern: + +"Your notebook, please." + +Bracing herself, and still full of pride in her ability to write this +mysterious shorthand, she opened her notebook, and waited with poised +pencil. The mien of the two men had communicated to her an excitement +far surpassing their own, in degree and in felicity. The whole of her +vital force was concentrated at the point of her pencil, and she seemed +to be saying to herself: "I'm very sorry, mother, but see how important +this is! I shall consider what I can do for you the very moment I am +free." + +Arthur Dayson coughed and plumped heavily on a chair. + + +II + +It was in such moments as this that Dayson really lived, with all the +force of his mediocrity. George Cannon was not a journalist; he could +compose a letter, but he had not the trick of composing an article. He +felt, indeed, a negligent disdain for the people who possessed this +trick, as for performers in a circus; he certainly did not envy them, +for he knew that he could buy them, as a carpenter buys tools. His +attitude was that of the genuine bourgeois towards the artist: +possessive, incurious, and contemptuous. Dayson, however, ignored George +Cannon's attitude, perhaps did not even perceive what it was. He gloried +in his performance. Accustomed to dictate extempore speeches on any +subject whatever to his shorthand pupils, he was quite at his ease, +quite master of his faculties, and self-satisfaction seemed to stand out +on his brow like genial sweat while the banal phrases poured glibly from +the cavern behind his jagged teeth; and each phrase was a perfect model +of provincial journalese. George Cannon had to sit and listen,--to +approve, or at worst to make tentative suggestions. + +The first phrase which penetrated through the outer brain of the +shorthand writer to the secret fastness where Hilda sat in judgment on +the world was this: + +"The campaign of vulgar vilification inaugurated yesterday by our +contemporary _The Staffordshire Signal_ against our esteemed +fellow-townsman Mr. Richard Enville..." + +This phrase came soon after such phrases as "Our first bow to the +public"... "Our solemn and bounden duty to the district which it is our +highest ambition to serve..." etc. Phrases which had already occurred in +the leading article dictated on the previous day. + +Hilda soon comprehended that in twenty-four hours Mr. Enville, from +being an unscrupulous speculator who had used his official position to +make illicit profits out of the sale of land to the town for town +improvements, had become the very mirror of honesty and high fidelity to +the noblest traditions of local government. Without understanding the +situation, and before even she had formulated to herself any criticism +of the persons concerned, she felt suddenly sick. She dared not look at +George Cannon, but once when she raised her head to await the flow of a +period that had been arrested at a laudatory superlative, she caught +Dayson winking coarsely at him. She hated Dayson for that; George Cannon +might wink at Dayson (though she regretted the condescending +familiarity), but Dayson had no right to presume to wink at George +Cannon. She hoped that Mr. Cannon had silently snubbed him. + +As the article proceeded there arose a crying from the Square below. A +_Signal_ boy, one of the earliest to break the silent habit of the +Square, was bawling a fresh edition of Arthur Dayson's contemporary, and +across the web of the dictator's verbiage she could hear the words: +"South Africa--Details--" Mr. Cannon glanced at his watch impatiently. +Hilda could see, under her bent and frowning brow, his white hand moving +on the dark expanse of his waistcoat. + +Immediately afterwards Mr. Cannon, interrupting, said: + +"That'll be all right. Finish it. I must be off." + +"Right you are!" said Dayson grandly. "I'll run down with it to the +printer's myself--soon as it's copied." + +Mr. Cannon nodded. "And tell him we've got to be on the railway +bookstalls first thing to-morrow morning." + +"He'll never do it." + +"He must do it. I don't care if he works all night." + +"But--" + +"There hasn't got to be any 'buts,' Dayson. There's been a damned sight +too much delay as it is." + +"All right! All right!" Dayson placated him hastily. + +Mr. Cannon departed. + +It seemed to Hilda that she shivered, but whether with pain or pleasure +she knew not. Never before had Mr. Cannon sworn in her presence. All day +his manner had been peculiar, as though the strain of mysterious +anxieties was changing his spirit. And now he was gone, and she had said +naught to him about the telegram from Miss Gailey! + +Arthur Dayson rolled oratorically on in defence of the man whom +yesterday he had attacked. + +And then Sowter, the old clerk, entered. + +"What is it? Don't interrupt me!" snapped Dayson. + +"There's the _Signal_.... Latest details.... This here Majuba business!" + +"What do I care about your Majuba?" Dayson retorted. "I've got something +more important than your Majuba." + +"It was the governor as told me to give it you," said Sowter, restive. + +"Well, give it me, then; and don't waste my time!" Dayson held out an +imperial hand for the sheet. He looked at Hilda as if for moral support +and added, to her, in a martyred tone: "I suppose I shall have to dash +off a few lines about Sowter's Majuba while you're copying out my +article." + +"And the governor said to remind you that Mr. Enville wants a proof of +his advertisement," Sowter called out sulkily as he was disappearing +down the stairs. + +Hilda blushed, as she had blushed in writing George Cannon's first lie +about the printing of the first issue. She had accustomed herself to +lies, and really without any difficulty or hesitation. Yes! She had even +reached the level of being religiously proud of them! But now her +bullied and crushed conscience leaped up again, and in the swift alarm +of the shock her heart was once more violently beating. Yet amid the +wild confusion of her feelings, a mechanical intelligence guided her +hand to follow Arthur Dayson's final sentences. And there shone out from +her soul a contempt for the miserable hack, so dazzling that it would +have blinded him--had he not been already blind. + + +III + +That evening she sat alone in the office. The first number of _The Five +Towns Chronicle_, after the most astounding adventures, had miraculously +gone to press. Dayson and Sowter had departed. There was no reason why +Hilda should remain,--burning gas to no purpose. She had telegraphed, by +favour of a Karkeek office-boy, to Miss Gailey, saying that she would +come by the first train on the morrow--Saturday, and she had therefore +much to do at home. Nevertheless, she sat idle in the office, unable to +leave. Her whole life was in that office, and it was just when she was +most weary of the environment that she would vacillate longest before +quitting it. She was unhappy and apprehensive, much less about her +mother than about the attitude of her conscience towards the morals of +this new world of hers. The dramatic Enville incident had spoiled the +pleasure which she had felt in sacrificing her formal duty as a daughter +to her duty as a clerk. She had been disillusioned. She foresaw the +future with alarm. + +And yet, strangely, the disillusion and the fear were a source of +pleasure. She savoured them with her loyalty, that loyalty which had +survived even the frightful blow of George Cannon's casual disdain at +her mother's tea-table! Whatever this new world might be, it was hers, +it was precious. She would no more think of abandoning it than a young +mother would think of abandoning a baby obviously imperfect.... Nay, she +would cling to it the tighter! + +George Cannon came up the stairs with his decisive and rapid step. She +rose from her chair at the table as he entered. He was wearing a new +overcoat, that she had never seen before, with a fine velvet collar. + +"You're going?" he asked, a little breathless. + +"I _was_ going," she replied in her clear, timid voice, implying that +she was ready to stay. + +"Everything all right?" + +"Mr. Dayson said so." + +"He's gone?" + +"Yes. Mr. Sowter's gone too." + +"Good!" he murmured. And he straightened his shoulders, and, putting his +hands in the pockets of his trousers, began to walk about the room. + +Hilda moved to get her bonnet and jacket. She moved very quietly and +delicately, and, because he was there, she put on her bonnet and jacket +with gestures of an almost apologetic modesty. He seemed to ignore her, +so that she was able to glance surreptitiously at his face. He was now +apparently less worried. Still, it was an enigmatic face. She had no +notion of what he had been doing since his hurried exit in the +afternoon. He might have been attending to his legal practice, or he +might have been abroad on mysterious errands. + +"Funny business, this newspaper business is, isn't it?" he remarked, +after a moment. "Just imagine Enville, now! Upon my soul I didn't think +he had it in him!... Of course,"--he threw his head up with a careless +laugh,--"of course, it would have been madness for us to miss such a +chance! He's one of the men of the future, in this town." + +"Yes," she agreed, in an eager whisper. + +In an instant George Cannon had completely changed the attitude of her +conscience,--by less than a phrase, by a mere intonation. In an instant +he had reassured her into perfect security. It was plain, from every +accent of his voice, that he had done nothing of which he thought he +ought to be ashamed. Business was business, and newspapers were +newspapers; and the simple truth was that her absurd conscience had been +in the wrong. Her duty was to accept the standards of her new world. Who +was she? Nobody! She did accept the standards of her new world, with +fervour. She was proud of them, actually proud of their apparent +wickedness. She had accomplished an act of faith. Her joy became +intense, and shot glinting from her eyes as she put on her gloves. Her +life became grand to her. She knew she was known in the town as 'the +girl who could write shorthand.' Her situation was not ordinary; it was +unique. Again, the irregularity of the hours, and the fact that the work +never commenced till the afternoon, seemed to her romantic and +beautiful. Here she was, at nine o'clock, alone with George Cannon on +the second floor of the house! And who, gazing from the Square at the +lighted window, would guess that she and he were there alone? + +All the activities of newspaper production were poetized by her fervour. +The _Chronicle_ was not a poor little weekly sheet, struggling into +existence anyhow, at haphazard, dependent on other newspapers for all +except purely local items of news. It was an organ! It was the +courageous rival of the ineffable _Signal_, its natural enemy! One day +it would trample on the _Signal_! And though her rôle was humble, though +she understood scarcely anything of the enterprise beyond her own +duties, yet she was very proud of her rôle too. And she was glad that +the men were seemingly so careless, so disorderly, so forgetful of +details, so--in a word--childish! For it was part of her rôle to remind +them, to set them right, to watch over their carelessness, to restore +order where they had left disorder. In so far as her rôle affected them, +she condescended to them. + +She informed George Cannon of her mother's indisposition, and that she +meant to go to London the next morning, and to return most probably in a +few days. He stopped in his walk, near her. Like herself, he was not +seriously concerned about Mrs. Lessways, but he showed a courteous +sympathy. + +"It's a good thing you didn't go to London when your mother went," he +said, after a little conversation. + +He did not add: "You've been indispensable." He had no air of +apologizing for his insult at the tea-table. But he looked firmly at +her, with a peculiar expression. + +Suddenly she felt all her slimness and fragility; she felt all the girl +in herself and all the dominant man in him, and all the empty space +around them. She went hot. Her sight became dim. She was ecstatically +blissful; she was deeply ashamed. She desired the experience to last for +ever, and him and herself to be eternally moveless; and at the same time +she desired to fly. Or rather, she had no desire to fly, but her voice +and limbs acted of themselves, against her volition. + +"Good-night, then." + +"But I say! Your wages. Shall I pay you now?" + +"No, no! It doesn't matter in the least, thanks." + +He shook hands with a careless, good-natured smile, which seemed to be +saying: "Foolish creature! You can't defend yourself, and these airs are +amusing. But I am benevolent." And she was ashamed of her shame, and +furious against the childishness that made her frown, and lower her +eyes, and escape out of the room like a mouse. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV +TO LONDON + + +I + +In the middle of the night Hilda woke up, and within a few seconds she +convinced herself that her attitude to Miss Gailey's telegram had been +simply monstrous. She saw it, in the darkness, as an enormity. She ought +to have responded to the telegram at once; she ought to have gone to +London by the afternoon train. What had there been to prevent her from +knocking at the door of the inner room, and saying to Mr. Cannon, in the +presence of no matter whom: "I am very sorry, Mr. Cannon, but I've just +had a telegram that mother is ill in London, and I must leave by the +next train"? There had been nothing to prevent her! At latest she should +have caught the evening train. Business was of no account in such a +crisis. Her mother might be very ill, might be dying, might be dead. It +was not for trifles that people sent such telegrams. The astounding +thing was that she should have been so blind to her obvious duty.... And +she said to herself, thinking with a mysterious and beautiful remorse of +the last minute of her talk with Mr. Cannon: "If I had done as I ought +to have done, I should have been in London, or on my way to London, +instead of in the room with him there; and _that_ would not have +occurred!" But what 'that' was, she could not have explained. +Nevertheless, Mr. Cannon's phrase, "It's a good thing you didn't go to +London," still gave her a pleasure, though the pleasure was dulled. + +Then she tried to reassure herself. Sarah Gailey was nervous and easily +frightened. Her mother had an excellent constitution. The notion of her +mother being seriously ill was silly. In a few hours she would be with +her mother, and would be laughing at these absurd night-fears. In any +case there would assuredly be a letter from Sarah Gailey by the first +post, so that before starting she would have exact information. She +succeeded, partially, in reassuring herself for a brief space; but soon +she was more unhappy than ever in the clear conviction of her +wrongdoing. Again and again she formulated, in her fancy, scenes of the +immediate future, as for example at her mother's dying bed, and she +imagined conversations and repeated the actual words used by herself and +others, interminably. And then she returned to the previous day, and +hundreds of times she went into the inner room and said to Mr. Cannon: +"I'm very sorry, Mr. Cannon, but I've just had a telegram--" etc. Why +had she not said it?... Thus worked the shuttles of her mind, with +ruthless, insane insistence, until she knew not whether she was awake or +asleep, and the very tissues of her physical brain seemed raw. + +She thought feebly: "If I got up and lighted the candle and walked +about, I should end this." But she could not rise. She was netted down +to the bed. And when she tried to soothe herself with other +images--images of delight--she found that they had lost their power. +Undressing, a few hours earlier, she had lived again, in exquisite and +delicious alarm, through the last minute of her talk with Mr. Cannon; +she had gone to sleep while reconstituting those instants. But now their +memory left her indifferent, even inspired repugnance. And her remorse +little by little lost its mysterious beauty. + +She clung to the idea of the reassuring letter which she would receive. +That was her sole glint of consolation. + + +II + +At six she was abroad in the house, intensely alive, intensely conscious +of every particle of her body, and of every tiniest operation of her +mind. In less than two hours the letter would drop into the lobby! At +half-past six both she and Florrie were dressed, and Florrie, stern with +the solemnity and importance of her mission, was setting forth to the +Saracen's Head to order a cab to be at the door at eight o'clock. + +Hilda had much to do, for it was of course necessary to shut up the +house, and the packing of her trunk had to be finished, and the trunk +locked and corded, and a label found; and there was breakfast to cook. +Mrs. Lessways would have easily passed a couple of days in preparing the +house for closure. Nevertheless, time, instead of flying, lagged. At +seven-thirty Hilda, in the partially dismantled parlour, and Florrie in +the kitchen, were sitting down to breakfast. "In a quarter of an hour," +said Hilda to herself, "the post will be here." But in four minutes she +had eaten the bacon and drunk the scalding tea, and in five she had +carried all the breakfast-things into the kitchen, where Florrie was +loudly munching over the sloppy deal table. She told Florrie sharply +that there would be ample time to wash up. Then she went to her bedroom, +and, dragging out her trunk, slid it unaided down the stairs. Back again +in the bedroom, she carelessly glanced at the money in her purse, and +then put on her things for the journey. Waiting, she stood at the window +to look for the postman. Presently she saw him in the distance; he +approached quickly, but spent an unendurable minute out of sight in the +shop next door. When he emerged Hilda was in anguish. Had he a letter +for her? Had he not? He seemed to waver at the gateway, and to decide to +enter.... She heard the double blow of his drumstick baton.... Now in a +few seconds she would know about her mother. + +Proudly restraining herself, she walked with composure to the stairs. +She was astonished to see Florrie bending down to pick up the letter. +Florrie must have been waiting ready to rush to the front door. As she +raised her body and caught sight of Hilda, Florrie blushed. + +The stairs were blocked by the trunk which Hilda had left on the +stair-mat for the cabman to deal with. Standing behind the trunk, Hilda +held forth her hand for the letter. + +"Please, miss, it's for me," Florrie whispered, like a criminal. + +"For you?" Hilda cried, startled. + +In proof Florrie timidly exposed the envelope, on which Hilda plainly +saw, in a coarse, scrawling masculine hand, the words "Miss Florrie +Bagster." Florrie's face was a burning peony. + +Hilda turned superciliously away, too proud to demand any explanations. +All her alarms were refreshed by the failure of a letter from Miss +Gailey. In vain she urged to herself that Miss Gailey had thought it +unnecessary to write, expecting to see her; or that the illness having +passed, Miss Gailey, busy, had put off writing. She could not dismiss a +vision of a boarding-house in London upset from top to bottom by the +grave illness of one person in it, and a distracted landlady who had not +a moment even to scribble a post card. And all the time, as this vision +tore and desolated her, she was thinking: "Fancy that child having a +follower, at her age! She's certainly got a follower!" + +The cab came five minutes before it was due. + + +III + +As the cab rolled through Market Square, where the Saturday stalls were +being busily set up, the ironmongery building was framed for an instant +by the oblong of the rattling window. Hilda seemed to see the place +anew--for the first time. A man was taking down the shutters of the +shop. Above that were the wire-blinds with the name of "Q. Karkeek"; and +above the blinds the blue posters of the _Five Towns Chronicle_. No +outward sign of Mr. Cannon! And yet Mr. Cannon.... She had an extremely +disconcerting sensation of the mysteriousness of Mr. Cannon, and of the +mysteriousness of all existence. Mr. Cannon existed somewhere at that +moment, engaged in some activity. In a house afar off, unknown to her, +her mother existed--if she was not dead! Florrie, with a bundle of +personal goods on her lap, and doubtless the letter in her bosom, sat +impressed and subdued, opposite to her in the shifting universe of the +cab, which was moving away from the empty and silent home. Florrie was +being thrown back out of luxury into her original hovel, and was +accepting the stroke with the fatalism of the young and of the poor. And +one day Hilda and her mother and Florrie would be united again in the +home now deserted, whose heavy key was in the traveller's satchel.... +But would they? + +At the station there was a quarter of an hour to wait. Hilda dismissed +Florrie, with final injunctions, and followed her trunk to the bleak +platform. The old porter was very kind. She went to the little yellow +bookstall. There, under her hand, was a low pile of _The Five Towns +Chronicle._ Miracle! Miraculous George Cannon! She flushed with pride, +with a sense of ownership, as she took a penny from her purse to pay for +a copy. + +"It's th' new peeper," drawled the bookstall lad, with a most foolish +condescension towards the new paper. + +"Lout!" she addressed him in her heart. "If you knew whom you were +talking to--!" + +With what pride, masked by careful indifference, she would hand the copy +of the _Chronicle_ to her mother! Her mother would exclaim "Bless us!" +and spend a day or two in conning the thing, making singular discoveries +in it at short intervals. + + +IV + +It was not until she had reached Euston, and driven through a tumultuous +and shabby thoroughfare to King's Cross, and taken another ticket, and +installed herself in another train, that Hilda began to feel suddenly, +like an abyss opening beneath her strength, the lack of food. Meticulous +in her clerical duties, and in many minor mechanical details of her +personal daily existence, she was capable of singular negligences +concerning matters which the heroic part of her despised and which did +not immediately bear on a great purpose in hand. Thus, in her +carelessness, she found herself with less than two shillings in her +pocket after paying for the ticket to Hornsey. She thought, grimly +resigned: "Never heed! I shall manage. In half an hour I shall be there, +and my anxiety will be at an end." + +The train, almost empty, waited forlornly in a forlorn and empty part of +the huge, resounding ochreish station. Then, without warning or signal, +it slipped off, as though casually, towards an undetermined goal. Often +it ran level with the roofs of vague, far-stretching acres of houses-- +houses vile and frowsy, and smoking like pyres in the dank air. And +always it travelled on a platform of brick arches. Now and then the +walled road received a tributary that rounded subtly into it, and this +tributary could be seen curving away, on innumerable brick arches, +through the chimneypots, and losing itself in a dim horizon of gloom. At +intervals a large, lifeless station brought the train to a halt for a +moment, and the march was resumed. A clock at one of these stations said +a quarter to two. + +Then the name of Hornsey quickened her apprehensive heart. As she +descended nervously from the train, her trunk was shot out from the +guard's van behind. She went and stood over it, until the last of a +series of kindly porters came along and touched his cap. When she asked +for a cab, he seemed doubtful whether a cab was available, and looked +uncertainly along the immense empty platform and across at other +platforms. The train had wandered away. She strove momentarily to +understand the reason of these great sleeping stations; but fatigue, +emotional and physical, had robbed her of all intelligent curiosity in +the phenomena of the mysterious and formidable city. + +Presently the porter threw the trunk on his shoulder and she trudged +after him up steps and over an iron bridge and down steps; and an +express whizzed like a flying shell through the station and vanished. +And at a wicket, in a ragged road, there actually stood a cab and a +skeleton of a horse between the shafts. The driver bounced up, +enheartened at sight of the trunk and the inexperienced, timid girl; but +the horse did not stir in its crooked coma. + +"What address, miss?" asked the cabman. + +"Cedars House, Harringay Park Road." + +The cabman paused in intense thought, and after a few seconds responded +cheerfully: "Yes, miss." + +The porter touched his cap for threepence. The lashed horse plunged +forward. Hilda leaned back in the creaking and depraved vehicle, and +sighed, "So this is their London!" + +She found herself travelling in the direction from which she had come, +parallel to the railway, down the longest street that she had ever seen. +On her left were ten thousand small new houses, all alike. On her right +were broken patches of similar houses, interspersed with fragments of +green field and views of the arches of the railway; the conception of +the horrible patience which had gone to the construction of these +endless, endless arches made her feel sick. + +The cab turned into another road, and another; and then stopped. She saw +the words "Cedars House" on a gateway. She could not open the door of +the cab. The cabman opened it. + +"Blinds down here, miss!" he said, with appropriate mournfulness. + +It seemed a rather large house; and every blind was drawn. Had the +incredible occurred, then? Had this disaster befallen just her, of all +the young women in the world? + +She saw the figure of Sarah Gailey. + +"Good afternoon," she called out calmly. "Here I am. Only I'm afraid I +haven't got enough to pay the cabman." + +But while she was speaking she knew from Sarah Gailey's face that the +worst and the most ridiculous of her night-fears had been justified by +destiny. + +Three days previously Mrs. Lessways had been suddenly taken ill in the +street. A doctor passing in his carriage had come to her assistance and +driven her home. Food eaten on the previous evening had 'disagreed' with +her. At first the case was not regarded as very serious. But as the +patient did not improve in the night Miss Gailey telegraphed to Hilda. +Immediately afterwards, the doctor, summoned in alarm, diagnosed +peritonitis caused by a perforating cancer. Mrs. Lessways had died on +the third day at eleven in the morning, while Hilda was in the train. +Useless to protest that these catastrophes were unthinkable, that Mrs. +Lessways had never been ill in her life! The catastrophe had happened. +And upstairs a corpse lay in proof. + + * * * * * + + + + +BOOK II +HER RECOVERY + + + + +CHAPTER I +SIN + +I + +From her bed Hilda could see the trees waving in the wind. Every morning +she had thus watched them, without interest. At first the branches had +been utterly bare, and beyond their reticulation had been visible the +rosy façade of a new Board-school. But now the branches were rich with +leafage, hiding most of the Board-school, so that only a large upper +window of it could be seen. This window, upon which the sun glinted +dazzlingly, threw back the rays on to Hilda's bed, giving her for a few +moments the illusion of direct sunlight. The hour was eleven o'clock. On +the night-table lay a tea-tray in disorder, and on the turned-down sheet +some crumbs of toast. A low, nervous tap at the door caused Hilda to +stir in the bed. Sarah Gailey entered hurriedly. In her bony yellowed +hand she held a collection of tradesmen's account-books. + +"Good morning, dear, how are you?" she asked, bending awkwardly over the +bed. In the same instant she looked askance at the tray. + +"I'm all right, thanks," said Hilda lazily, observing the ceiling. + +"You haven't been too cold without the eiderdown? I forgot to ask you +before. You know I only took it off because I thought the weather was +getting too warm.... I didn't want it for another bed. I assure you it's +in the chest of drawers in my room." Sarah Gailey added the last words +as if supplicating to be believed. + +"You needn't tell me that," said Hilda. She was not angry, but bored, by +this characteristic remark of Miss Gailey's. In three months she had +learnt a great deal about the new landlady of the Cedars, that strange +neurotic compound of ability, devotion, thin-skinned vanity, and sheer, +narrow stupidity. "I've been quite warm enough," Hilda added as quickly +as she could, lest Miss Gailey might have time to convince herself to +the contrary. + +"And the toast? I do hope--after all I've said to that Hettie about--" + +"You see I've eaten it all," Hilda interrupted her, pointing to the +plate. + +Their faces were close together; they exchanged a sad smile. Miss Gailey +was still bending over her, anxiously, as over a child. Yet neither the +ageing and worn woman nor the flaccid girl felt the difference between +them in age. Nor was Hilda in any ordinary sense ill. The explanation of +Miss Gailey's yearning attitude lay in an exaggerated idea of her duty +to Hilda, whose mother's death had been the result of an act of +friendliness to her. If Mrs. Lessways had not come to London in order to +keep company with Sarah, she might--she would, under Providence--have +been alive and well that day; such was Sarah's reasoning, which by the +way ignored certain statements of the doctor. Sarah would never forgive +herself. But she sought, by an infatuated devotion, to earn the +forgiveness of Caroline's daughter. Her attentions might have infuriated +an earlier Hilda, or at least have been met with disdain only half +concealed. But on the present actual Hilda they produced simply no +effect of any kind. The actual Hilda, living far within the mysterious +fastness of her own being, was too solitary, too preoccupied, and too +fatigued, to be touched even by the noble beauty that distinguished the +expiatory and protective gesture of the spinster, otherwise somewhat +ludicrous, as she leaned across the bed and cut off the sunshine. + + +II + +On the morning of her mother's funeral, Hilda had gone to Hornsey +Station to meet an uncle of Mrs. Lessways, who was coming down from +Scotland by the night-train. She scarcely knew him, but he was to be +recognizable by his hat and his muffler, and she was to await him at the +ticket-gate. An entirely foolish and unnecessary arrangement, contrived +by a peculiar old man: the only possible course was to accept it. + +She had waited over half an hour, between eight and nine, and in that +time she had had full opportunity to understand why those suburban +stations had been built so large. A dark torrent of human beings, +chiefly men, gathered out of all the streets of the vicinity, had dashed +unceasingly into the enclosure and covered the long platforms with +tramping feet. Every few minutes a train rolled in, as if from some +inexhaustible magazine of trains beyond the horizon, and, sucking into +itself a multitude and departing again, left one platform for one moment +empty,--and the next moment the platform was once more filled by the +quenchless stream. Less frequently, but still often, other trains +thundered through the station on a line removed from platforms, and +these trains too were crammed with dark human beings, frowning in study +over white newspapers. For even in 1880 the descent upon London from the +suburbs was a formidable phenomenon. Train after train fled downwards +with its freight towards the hidden city, and the torrent still surged, +more rapid than ever, through the narrow gullet of the station. It was +like the flight of some enormous and excited population from a country +menaced with disaster. + +Borne on and buffeted by the torrent, Hilda had seen a well-dressed +epileptic youth, in charge of an elderly woman, approaching the station. +He had passed slowly close by her, as she modestly waited in her hasty +mourning, and she had had a fearful vision of his idiotic greenish face +supported somehow like a mask at the summit of that shaky structure of +limbs. He had indeed stared at her with his apelike eyes. She had +watched him, almost shuddering, till he was lost amid the heedless crowd +within. Then, without waiting longer for her relative, without +reflecting upon what she did, she had walked tremblingly back to the +Cedars, checked by tributaries of the torrent at every street corner.... + +She had known nothing of the funeral. She had not had speech with the +relative. She was in bed, somehow. The day had elapsed. And in the +following night, when she was alone and quite awake, she had become +aware that she, she herself, was that epileptic shape; that that +epileptic shape was lying in her bed and that there was none other in +the bed. Nor was this a fancy of madness! She knew that she was not mad, +that she was utterly sane; and the conviction of sanity only intensified +her awful discovery. She passed a trembling hand over her face, and felt +the skin corrupt and green. Gazing into the darkness, she knew that her +stare was apelike. She had felt, then, the fullest significance of +horror. In the morning she had ceased to be the epileptic shape, but the +risk of re-transformation had hovered near her, and the intimidation of +it was such that she had wept, aghast and broken as much by the future +as by the past. She had been discovered weeping.... + +Later, the phrase 'nervous breakdown' had lodged in her confused memory. +The doctor had been very matter-of-fact, logical, and soothing. +Overwork, strain, loss of sleep, the journey, anxiety, lack of food, the +supreme shock, the obstinate refusal of youth to succumb, and then the +sudden sight of the epileptic (with whom the doctor was acquainted): +thus had run the medical reasoning, after a discreet but thorough +cross-examination of her; and it had seemed so plausible and so +convincing that the doctor's pride in it was plain on his optimistic +face as he gave the command: "Absolute repose." But to Hilda the +reasoning and the resultant phrase, 'nervous breakdown,' had meant +nothing at all. Words! Empty words! She knew, profoundly and fatally, +the evil principle which had conquered her so completely that she had no +power left with which to fight it. This evil principle was Sin; it was +not the force of sins, however multifarious; it was Sin itself. She was +the Sinner, convicted and self-convicted. One of the last intelligent +victims of a malady which has now almost passed away from the civilized +earth, she existed in the chill and stricken desolation of incommutable +doom. + + +III + +She had sinned against her mother, and she could not make amends. The +mere thought of her mother, so vivacious, cheerful, life-loving, +even-tempered, charitable, disorderly, incompetent, foolish, and yet +shrewd, caused pain of such intensity that it ceased to be pain. She +ought to have seen her mother before she died; she might have seen her, +had she done what was obviously her duty. It was inconceivable to her, +now, that she should have hesitated to fly instantly to London on +receipt of the telegram. But she had hesitated, and her mother had +expired without having sight of her. All exculpatory arguments were +futile against the fact itself. In vain she blamed the wording of the +telegram! In vain she tried to reason that chance, and not herself, was +the evil-doer! In vain she invoked the aid of simple common sense +against sentimental fancy! In vain she went over the events of the +afternoon preceding the death, in order to prove that at no moment had +she been aware of not acting in accordance with her conscience! The +whole of her conduct had been against her conscience, but pride and +selfishness had made her deaf to conscience. She was the Sinner. + +Her despair, except when at intervals she became the loathed epileptic +shape, had been calm. Its symptoms had been, and remained, a complete +lack of energy, and a most extraordinary black indifference to the +surrounding world. Save in the deep centre of her soul, where she +agonized, she seemed to have lost all capacity for emotion. Nothing +moved her, or even interested her. She sat in the house, and ate a +little, and talked a little, like an automaton. She walked about the +streets like a bored exile, but an exile who has forgotten his home. Her +spirit never responded to the stimulus of environment. Suggestions at +once lost their tonic force in the woolly cushion of her apathy. If she +continued to live, it was by inertia; to cease from life would have +required an effort. She did not regret the vocation which she had +abandoned; she felt no curiosity about the fortunes of the newspaper. A +tragic nonchalance held her. + +After several weeks she had naturally begun to think of religion; for +the malady alone was proof enough that she had a profoundly religious +nature. Miss Gailey could rarely go to church, but one Sunday morning-- +doubtless with intent--she asked Hilda if they should go together, and +Hilda agreed. As they approached the large, high-spired church, Hilda +had vague prickings of hope, and was thereby much astonished. But the +service in no way responded to her expectations. "How silly I am!" she +thought disdainfully. "This sort of thing has never moved me before. Why +should it move me now?" The sermon, evangelical, was upon the Creed, and +the preacher explained the emotional quality of real belief. It was a +goodish sermon. But the preacher had effectually stopped the very last +of those exquisite vague prickings of hope. Hilda agreed with his +definition of real belief, and she knew that real belief was impossible +for her. She could never say, with joyous fervour: "I believe!" At best +she could only assert that she did not disbelieve--and was she so sure +even of that? No! Belief had been denied to her; and to dream of +consolation from religion was sentimentally womanish; even in her +indifference she preferred straightforward, honest damnation to the soft +self-deceptions of feminine religiosity. Ah! If she could have been a +Roman Catholic, genuine and convinced--with what ardour would she have +cast herself down before the confessional, and whispered her sinfulness +to the mysterious face within; and with what ecstasy would she have +received the absolution--that cleansing bath of the soul! Then--she +could have recommenced!... But she was not a Roman Catholic. She could +no more become a Roman Catholic than she could become the queen of some +romantic Latin country of palaces and cathedrals. She was a young +provincial girl staying in a boarding-house at Hornsey, on the Great +Northern line out of London, and she was suffering from nervous +breakdown. Such was the exterior common sense of the situation. + +Occasionally the memory of some verse of Victor Hugo, sounding the beat +of one of his vast melancholies, would float through her mind and cause +it to vibrate for an instant with a mournful sensation that resembled +pleasure. + + +IV + +"Are you thinking of getting up, dear?" asked Sarah Gailey, as she +arranged more securely the contents of the tray and found space on it +for her weekly books. + +"Yes, I suppose I may as well," Hilda murmured. "It'll be lunch-time +soon." The days were long, yet somehow they seemed short too. Already +before getting up, she would begin to think of the evening and of going +to bed; and Saturday night followed quickly on Monday morning. It was +scarcely credible that sixteen weeks had passed, thus, since her +mother's death,--sixteen weeks whose retrospect showed no achievement of +any kind, and hardly a desire. + +"I've given those Boutwoods notice," said Sarah Gailey suddenly, the +tray in her hands ready to lift. + +"Not really?" + +"They were shockingly late for breakfast again, this morning, both of +them. And Mr. Boutwood had the face to ask for another egg. Hettie came +and told me, so I went in myself. I told him breakfast was served in my +house at nine o'clock, and there was a notice to that effect in the +bedrooms, not to mention the dining-room. And as good a breakfast as +they'd get in any of their hotels, I lay! If the eggs are cold at ten +o'clock and after, that's not my fault. They're both of them perfectly +healthy, and yet they're bone-idle. They never want to go to bed and +they never want to get up. It isn't as if they went to theatres and got +home late and so on. I could make excuses for that--now and then. No! +It's just idleness and carelessness. And if you saw their bedroom! Oh, +my! A nice example to servants! Well, he was very insulting--most +insulting. He said he paid me to give him not what I wanted, but what +_he_ wanted! He said if I went into a shop, and they began to tell me +what I ought to want and when I ought to want it, I should be annoyed. I +said I didn't need anyone to tell me that, I said! And my house wasn't a +shop. He said it was a shop, and if it wasn't, it ought to be! Can you +imagine it?" + +Hilda tried to exhibit a tepid sympathy. Miss Gailey's nostrils were +twitching, and the tears stood in those watery eyes. She could manage +the house. By the exertion of all her powers and her force she had made +of herself an exceptionally efficient mistress. But she could not manage +the boarders, because she had not sufficient imagination to put herself +in their place. Presiding over all her secret thoughts was the axiom +that the Cedars was a perfect machine, and that the least that a +grateful boarder could do was to fit into the machine. + +"And so you said they could go?" + +"That I did! And I'll tell you another thing, my dear, I--" + +There was a knock at the door. Sarah Gailey stopped in her confidences +like a caught conspirator, and opened the door. Hettie stood on the +mat--the Hettie who despite frequent protests would leave Hilda's toast +to cool into leather on the landing somewhere between the kitchen and +the bedroom. In Hettie's hand was a telegram, which Miss Gailey +accepted. + +"Here, take the tray, Hettie," said she, nervously tearing at the +envelope. "Put these books in my desk," she added. + +"And I wonder what _he'll_ say!" she observed, staring absently at the +opened telegram, after Hettie had gone. + +"Who?" + +"George. He says he'll be up here for lunch. He's bound to be vexed +about the Boutwoods. But he doesn't understand. Men don't, you know! +They don't understand the strain it is on you." The appeal of her eyes +was strangely pathetic. + +Hilda said: + +"I don't think I shall get up for lunch to-day." + +Sarah Gailey moved to the bed, forgetting her own trouble. + +"You aren't so well, then, after all!" she muttered, with mournful +commiseration. "But, you know, he'll have to see you, _this_ time. He +wants to." + +"But why?" + +"Your affairs, I suppose. He says so. 'Coming lunch one. Must see +Hilda.--George.'" + +Sarah Gailey offered the telegram. But Hilda could not bear to take it. +This telegram was the first she had set eyes on since the telegram +handed to her by Florrie in George Cannon's office. The mere sight of +the salmon-tinted paper agitated her. "Is it possible that I can be so +silly?" she thought, "over a bit of paper!" But so it was. + +On a previous visit of George Cannon's to Hornsey she had kept her bed +throughout the day, afraid to meet him, ashamed to meet him, +inexplicably convinced that to meet him would be a crime against filial +piety. There were obscure grottoes in her soul which she had not had the +courage to explore candidly. + +"I think," said Sarah Gailey, reflective and anxious, "I think if you +_could_ get up, it would be nicer than him seeing you here in bed." + +Hilda perceived that at last she would be compelled to face George +Cannon. + + + + +CHAPTER II +THE LITTLE ROOM + + +I + +After lunch Sarah Gailey left Hilda and Mr. Cannon in 'the little room' +together. + +'The little room'--about eight feet square--had no other name; it was +always spoken of affectionately by the boarders, and by the landlady +with pride in its coziness. Situated on the first floor, over the front +part of the hall, it lay between the two principal bedrooms. Old +boarders would discover the little room to new boarders, or new boarders +would discover it for themselves, with immense satisfaction. It was the +chamber of intimacy and of confidences; it was a refuge from the public +life of the Cedars, and, to a certain extent, from the piano. Two women, +newly acquainted, and feeling a mutual attraction, would say to each +other: "Shall we go up to the little room?" "Oh yes, do let us!" And +they would climb the stairs in a fever of anticipation. "Quite the most +charming room in the house, dear Miss Gailey!" another simpering +spinster would say. Yet it contained nothing but an old carpet, two +wicker arm-chairs, a small chair, a nearly empty dwarf bookcase, an +engraving of Marie Antoinette regally facing the revolutionary mob, and +a couple of photographs of the Cedars. + +Hilda sat down in one of the arm-chairs, and George Cannon in the other; +he had a small black bag which he placed on the floor by his side. +Hilda's diffidence was extreme. Throughout lunch she had scarcely +spoken; but as there had been eight people at the table, and George +Cannon had chatted with all of them, her taciturnity had passed +inconspicuous. Now she would be obliged to talk. And the sensations +which she had experienced on first meeting George Cannon in the +dining-room were renewed in a form even more acute. + +She had, in the first place, the self-consciousness due to her mourning +attire, which drew attention to herself; it might have been a +compromising uniform; and the mere fact of her mother's death--quite +apart from the question of her conduct in relation thereto--gave her, in +an interview with a person whom she had not seen since before the death, +a feeling akin to guiltiness--guiltiness of some misdemeanour of taste, +some infraction of the social law against notoriety. She felt, in her +mourning, like one who is being led publicly by policemen to the +police-station. In her fancy she could hear people saying: "Look at that +girl in deep mourning," and she could see herself blushing, as it were +apologetic. + +But much worse than this general mortification in presence of an +acquaintance seen after a long interval was the special constraint due +to the identity of the acquaintance. It was with George Cannon that she +had first deceived and plotted against her ingenuous mother's hasty +plans. It was her loyalty to George Cannon that had been the cause of +her inexplicable disloyalty to her mother. She could not recall her +peculiar and delicious agitations during the final moments of her +previous interview with Cannon--that night of February in the newspaper +office, while her mother was dying in London--without a profound +unreasoning shame which intensified most painfully her natural grief as +an orphan. + +There was this to be said: she was now disturbed out of her torpid +indifference to her environment. As she fidgeted there, pale and +frowning, in the noisy basket-chair, beneath George Cannon's eyes, she +actually perceived again that romantic quality of existence which had +always so powerfully presented itself to her in the past. She reflected: +"How strange that the dreaded scene has now actually begun! He has come +to London, and here we are together, in this house, which at the +beginning of the year was nothing but a name to me! And mother is away +there in the churchyard, and I am in black! And it is all due to him. He +sent Miss Gailey and mother to London. He willed it!... No! It is all +due to me! I went to see him one late afternoon. I sought him out. He +didn't seek me out. And just because I went to see him one afternoon, +mother is dead, and I am here! Strange!" These reflections were dimly +beautiful to her, even in her sadness and in her acute distress. The +coma had assuredly passed, if only for a space. + + +II + +"Well, now," he said, after a few inanities had been succeeded by an +awkward pause. "I've got to talk business with you, so I suppose we may +as well begin, eh?" His tone was fairly blithe, but it was that of a man +who was throwing off with powerful ease the weariness of somewhat +exasperating annoyances. Since lunch he had had a brief interview with +Sarah Gailey. + +"Yes," she agreed glumly. + +"Have you decided what you're going to do?" He began to smile +sympathetically as he spoke. + +"I'm not going back to the paper," she curtly answered, cutting short +the smile with fierceness, almost with ferocity. Beyond question she was +rude in her bitterness. She asked herself: "Why do I talk like this? Why +can't I talk naturally and gently and cheerfully? I've really got +nothing against him." But she could not talk otherwise than she did +talk. It was by this symptom of biting acrimony that her agitation +showed itself. She knew that she was scowling as she looked at the +opposite wall, but she could not smooth away the scowl. + +"No, I suppose not," he said quietly. "But are you thinking of coming +back to Turnhill?" + +She remained mute for some seconds. A feeling of desolation came over +her, and it seemed to her that she welcomed it, trying to intensify it, +and yielding her features to it. "How do I know?" she muttered at +length, shrugging her shoulders. + +"Because if you aren't," he resumed, "it's no use you keeping that house +of yours empty. You must remember it's just as you left it; and the +things in it aren't taking any good, either." + +She shrugged her shoulders again. + +"I don't see that it matters to anybody but me," she said, after another +pause, with a sort of frigid and disdainful nonchalance. And once more +she reflected: "Is it possible that I can behave so odiously?" + +He stood up suddenly. + +"I don't know what you and Sarah have been plotting together," he said, +wounded and contemptuous, yet with lightness. "But I'm sure I don't want +to interfere in your affairs. With Sarah's I've got to interfere, +unfortunately, and a famous time I'm having!" His nostrils grew +fastidious. "But not yours! I only promised your uncle.... Your uncle +told me you wanted me to--" He broke off. + +In an instant she grew confused, alarmed, and extremely ashamed. Her +mood had changed in a flash. It seemed to her that she was in presence +of a disgraceful disaster, which she herself had brought about by wicked +and irresponsible temerity. She was like a child who, having naughtily +trifled with danger, stands aghast at the calamity which his +perverseness has caused. She was positively affrighted. She reflected in +her terror: "I asked for this, and I've got it!" + +George Cannon stooped and picked up his little bag. There he towered, +high and massive, above her! And she felt acutely her slightness, her +girlishness, and her need of his help. She could not afford to transform +sympathy into antipathy. She was alone in the world. Never before had +she realized, as she realized then, the lurking terror of her +loneliness. The moment was critical. In another moment he might be gone +from the room, and she left solitary to irremediable humiliation and +self-disgust. + +"Please!" she whispered appealingly. The whole of her being became an +appeal--the glance, the gesture, the curve of the slim and fragile body. +She was like a slave. She had no pride, no secret reserve of thought. +She was an instinct. Tears showed in her eyes and affected her voice. + +He gave the twisted, difficult, rather foolish smile of one who is +cursing the mortification of a predicament into which he has been cast +through no fault of his own. + +"Please what?" + +"Please sit down." + +He waved a hand, deprecatingly, and obeyed. + +"It's all right," he said. "All right! I ought to have known--" Then he +smiled generously. + +"Known what?" Her voice was now weak and liquid with woe. + +"You'd be likely to be upset." + +Not furtively, but openly, she wiped her eyes. + +"No, no!" she protested honestly. "It's not that. It's--but--I'm very +sorry." + +"I reckon I know a bit what worry is, myself!" he added, with a brief, +almost harsh, laugh. + +These strange words struck her with pity. + + +III + +"Well, now,"--he seemed to be beginning again--let's leave Lessways +Street for a minute.... I can sell the Calder Street property for you, +if you like. And at a pretty good price. Sooner or later the town will +have to buy up all that side of the street. You remember I told your +mother last year but one I could get a customer for it? but she wasn't +having any." + +"Yes," said Hilda eagerly; "I remember." + +In her heart she apologized to George Cannon, once more, for having +allowed her mother to persuade her, even for a day, that that attempt to +buy was merely a trick on his part invented to open negotiations for the +rent-collecting. + +"You know what the net rents are," he went on, "as you've had 'em every +month. I dare say the purchase money if it's carefully invested will +bring you in as much. But even if it doesn't bring in quite as much, you +mustn't forget that Calder Street's going down--it's getting more and +more of a slum. And there'll always be a lot of bother with tenants of +that class." + +"I wish I could sell everything--everything!" she exclaimed +passionately. "Lessways Street as well! Then I should be absolutely +free!" + +"You can!" he said, with dramatic emphasis. "And let me tell you that +ten years hence those Lessways Street houses won't be worth what they +are now!" + +"Is that property going down, too?" she asked. "I thought they were +building all round there." + +"So they are," he answered. "But cheap cottages. Your houses are too +good for that part of the town; that's what's the matter with them. +People who can afford £25 a year--and over--for rent won't care to live +there much longer. You know the end house is empty." + +All houses seemed to her to be a singularly insecure and even perilous +form of property. And the sale of everything she possessed presented +itself to her fancy as a transaction which would enfranchise her from +the past. It symbolized the starting-point of a new life, of a +recommencement unhampered by the vestiges of grief and error. She could +go anywhere, do what she chose. The entire world would lie before her. + +"Please do sell it all for me!" she pleaded wistfully. "Supposing you +could, about how much should I have--I mean income?" + +He glanced about, and then, taking a pencil from his waistcoat pocket, +scribbled a few figures on his cuff. + +"Quite three pounds a week," he said. + + +IV + +After a perfunctory discussion, which was somewhat self-consciously +prolonged by both of them in order to avoid an appearance of hastiness +in an important decision, George Cannon opened his black bag and then +looked round for ink. The little room, having no table, had no inkpot, +and the lawyer took from his pocket an Eagle indelible pencil--the +fountain-pen of those simple days. It needed some adjustment; he stepped +closer to the window, and held the pointed end of the case up to the +light, while screwing the lower end; he was very fastidious in these +mechanical details of his vocation. Hilda watched him from behind, with +an intentness that fascinated herself. + +"And how's the _Chronicle_ getting on?" she asked, in a tone of friendly +curiosity which gave an exaggerated impression of her actual feeling. +She was more and more ashamed that during lunch she had not troubled to +put a question about the paper. She was even ashamed of her social +indifference. That Sarah Gailey, narrow and preoccupied, should be +indifferent, should never once in three months have referred to her +brother's organ, was not surprising; but it was monstrous that she, +Hilda, the secretary, the priestess, should share this uncivil apathy; +and it was unjust to mark the newspaper, as somehow she had been doing, +with the stigma of her mother's death. She actually began to +characterize her recent mental attitude to her past life as morbid. + +"Oh!" he murmured absently, with gloomy hesitation, as he manipulated +the pencil. + +She went on still more persuasively: + +"I suppose you've got a new secretary?" + +"No," he said, as though it fatigued and annoyed him to dwell on the +subject. "I told 'em they must manage without.... It's no fun starting a +new paper in a God-forsaken hole like the Five Towns, I can tell you." + +Plainly his high exuberant hopes had been dashed, had perhaps been +destroyed. + +She did not reply. She could not. She became suddenly sad with sympathy, +and this sadness was beautiful to her. Already, when he was scribbling +on it, she had noticed that his wristband was frayed. Now, silhouetted +against the window, the edge of the wristband caught her attention +again, and grew strangely significant. This man was passing through +adversity! It seemed tragic and shocking to her that he should have to +pass through adversity, that he could not remain for ever triumphant, +brilliant, cocksure in all his grand schemes, and masculinely scathless. +It seemed wrong to her that he should suffer, and desirable that anybody +should suffer rather than he. George Cannon with faulty linen! By what +error of destiny had this heart-rending phenomenon of discord been +caused? (Yes, heart-rending!) Was it due to weary carelessness, or to +actual, horrible financial straits? Either explanation was very painful +to her. She had a vision of a whole sisterhood of women toiling amid +steam and soapsuds in secret, and in secret denying themselves, to +provide him with all that he lacked, so that he might always emerge into +the world unblemished and glitteringly perfect. She would have +sacrificed the happiness of multitudes to her sense of fitness. + + +V + +There being no table, George Cannon removed a grotesque ornament from +the dwarf bookcase, and used the top of the bookcase as a writing-board. +Hilda was called upon to sign two papers. He explained exactly what +these papers were, but she did not understand, nor did she desire to +understand. One was an informal sale-note and the other was an +authority; but which was which, and to what each had reference, she +superbly and wilfully ignored. She could, by a religious effort of +volition, make of herself an excellent clerk, eagerly imitative and +mechanical, but she had an instinctive antipathy to the higher forms of +business. Moreover, she wanted to trust herself to him, if only as a +mystic reparation of her odious rudeness at the beginning of the +interview. And she thought also: "These transactions will result in +profit to him. It is by such transactions that he lives. I am helping +him in his adversity." + +When he gave her the Eagle pencil, and pointed to the places where she +was to sign, she took the pencil with fervour, more and more anxious to +atone to him. For a moment she stood bewildered, in a dream, staring at +the scratched mahogany top of the bookcase. And the bookcase seemed to +her to be something sentient, patient, and helpful, that had always been +waiting there in the corner to aid George Cannon in this +crisis--something human like herself. She loved the bookcase, and the +Eagle pencil, and the papers, and the pattern on the wall. George Cannon +was standing behind her. She felt his presence like a delicious danger. +She signed the papers, in that large scrawling hand which for a few +brief weeks she had by force cramped down to the submissive caligraphy +of a clerk. As she signed, she saw the name "Karkeek" in the midst of +one of the documents, and remembered, with joyous nonchalance, that +George Cannon's own name never appeared in George Cannon's affairs. + +He took her place in front of the little bookcase, and folded the +documents. There he was, beside her, in all his masculinity--his +moustache, his blue chin, his wide white hands, his broadcloth--there he +was planted on his massive feet as on a pedestal! She did not see him; +she was aware of him. And she was aware of the closed door behind them. +One of the basket-chairs, though empty, continued to creak, like a thing +alive. Faintly, very faintly, she could hear the piano--Mrs. Boutwood +playing! Overhead were the footsteps of Sarah Gailey and Hettie--they +were checking the linen from the laundry, as usual on Saturday +afternoon. And she was aware of herself, thin, throbbing, fragile, +mournful, somehow insignificant! + +He looked round at her, with a half-turn of the head. In his glance was +good humour, good nature, protectiveness, and rectitude; and, more than +these, some of the old serenely smiling triumphant quality. He was not +ruined! He was not really in adversity! He remained the conqueror! She +thrilled with her relief. + +"You're in my hands now--no mistake!" he murmured roguishly, picking up +the documents, and bending over the bag. + +Hilda could hear a heavy footstep on the stairs, ascending. + +In the same instant she had an extraordinary and disconcerting impulse +to seize his hand--she knew not why, whether it was to thank him, to +express her sympathy, or to express her submission. She struggled +against this impulse, but the impulse was part of herself and of her +inmost self; She was afraid, but her fear was pleasurable. She was +ashamed, but her shame was pleasurable. She wanted to move away from +where she stood. She thought: "If only I willed to move away, I could +move away. But, no! I shall not will it. I like remaining just here, in +this fear, this shame, and this agitation." She had a clear, dazzling +perception of the splendour and the fineness of sin; but she did not +know what sin! And all the time the muscles of her arm were tense in the +combat between the weakening desire to keep her arms still and the +growing desire to let her hand seize the hand of George Cannon. And all +the time the heavy footstep was ascending the interminable staircase. +And all the time George Cannon, with averted head, was fumbling in the +bag. And then, in a flash, she was really afraid; the fear was no longer +pleasurable, and her shame had become a curse. She said to herself: "I +cannot move, now. In a minute I shall do this horrible thing. Nothing +can save me." Despairing, she found a dark and tumultuous joy in +despair. The trance endured for ages, while disaster approached nearer +and nearer. + +Then, after the heavy footstep had been climbing the staircase since +earth began, the door was brusquely opened, and the jovial fat face of +Mr. Boutwood appeared, letting in the louder sound of the piano. + +"Oh, I beg pardon!" he muttered, pretending that he had assumed the +little room to be empty. The fact was that he was in search of George +Cannon, in whom he had recognized a fraternal spirit. + +"Come in, Mr. Boutwood," said Hilda, with an easy, disdainful calm which +absolutely astounded herself. "That's all, then?" she added, to George +Cannon, glancing at him indifferently. She departed without waiting for +an answer. + + +VI + +Putting on a bonnet, and taking an umbrella to occupy her hands, she +went out into the remedial freedom of the streets. And after turning the +first corner she saw coming towards her the figure of a woman whom she +seemed to know, elegant, even stately, in youthful grace. It was Janet +Orgreave, wearing a fashionable fawn-coloured summer costume. As they +recognized each other the girls blushed slightly. Janet hastened +forward. Hilda stood still. She was amazed at the chance which had sent +her two unexpected visitors in the same day. They shook hands and +kissed. + +"So I've found you!" said Janet. "How are you, you poor dear? Why didn't +you answer my letter?" + +"Letter?" Hilda repeated, wondering. Then she remembered that she had +indeed received a letter from Janet, but in her comatose dejection had +neglected to answer it. + +"I'm up in London with father for the weekend. We want you to come with +us to the Abbey to-morrow. And you must come back with us to Bursley on +Monday. You _must_! We're quite set on it. I've left father all alone +this afternoon, to come up here and find you out. Not that he minds! +What a way it is! But how are you, Hilda?" + +Hilda was so touched by Janet's affectionate solicitude that her eyes +filled with tears. She looked at that radiating and innocent goodness, +and thought: "How different I am from her! She hasn't the least idea how +different I am!" + +For a moment, Janet seemed to her to be a sort of angel--modish, but +exquisitely genuine. She saw in the invitation to the Five Towns a +miraculous defence against a peril the prospect of which was already +alarming her. She would be compelled to go to Turnhill in order to visit +Lessways Street and decide what of her mother's goods she must keep. She +would of course take Janet with her. In all the Turnhill affairs Janet +should accompany her. Her new life should begin under the protection of +Janet's society. And her heart turned from the old life towards the new +with hope and a vague brightening expectation of happiness. + +At the Cedars she led Janet to her bedroom, and then came out of the +bedroom to bid good-bye to George Cannon. The extreme complexity of +existence and of her sensations baffled and intimidated her. + + + + +CHAPTER III +JOURNEY TO BLEAKRIDGE + + +I + +Hilda and Janet were mounting the precipitous Sytch Bank together on +their way from Turnhill into Bursley. It was dark; they had missed one +train at Turnhill and had preferred not to wait for the next. Although +they had been very busy in Hilda's house throughout all the afternoon +and a part of the evening, and had eaten only a picnic meal, neither of +them was aware of fatigue, and the two miles to Bursley seemed a trifle. + +Going slowly up the steep slope, they did not converse. Janet said that +the weather was changing, and Hilda, without replying, peered at the +black baffling sky. The air had, almost suddenly, grown warmer. Above, +in the regions unseen, mysterious activities were in movement, as if +marshalling vast forces. The stars had vanished. A gentle but equivocal +wind on the cheek presaged rain, and seemed to be bearing downwards into +the homeliness of the earth some strange vibration out of infinite +space. The primeval elements of the summer night encouraged and +intensified Hilda's mood, half joyous, half apprehensive. She thought: +"A few days ago, I was in Hornsey, with the prospect of the visit to +Turnhill before me. Now the visit is behind me. I said that Janet should +be my companion, and she has been my companion. I said that I would cut +myself free, and I have cut myself free. I need never go to Turnhill +again, unless I like. The two trunks will be sent for to-morrow; and all +the rest will be sold--even the clock. The thing is done. I have +absolute liberty, and an income, and the intimacy of this splendid +affectionate Janet.... How fortunate it was that Mr. Cannon was not at +his office when we called! Of course I was obliged to call.... And yet +would it not be more satisfactory if I had seen him?... I must have been +in a horribly morbid state up at Hornsey.... Soon I must decide about my +future. Soon I shall actually have decided!... Life is very queer!" She +had as yet no notion whatever of what she would do with her liberty and +her income and the future; but she thought vaguely of something heroic, +grandiose, and unusual. + + +II + +In her hand she carried a small shabby book, bound in blue and gold, +with gilt edges a little irregular. She had found this book while +sorting out the multitudinous contents of her mother's wardrobe, and at +the last moment, perceiving that it had been overlooked, and being +somehow ashamed to leave it to the auctioneers, she had brought it away, +not knowing how she would ultimately dispose of it. The book had +possibly been dear to her mother, but she could not embarrass her +freedom by conserving everything that had possibly been dear to her +mother. It was entitled _The Girl's Week-day Book_, by Mrs. Copley, and +it had been published by the Religious Tract Society, no doubt in her +mother's girlhood. The frontispiece, a steel engraving, showed a group +of girls feeding some swans by the terraced margin of an ornamental +water, and it bore the legend, "Feeding the Swans." And on the title- +page was the text: "That our daughters may be as corner-stones, polished +after the similitude of a palace. Psalm cxliv. 12." In the table of +contents were such phrases as: "One thing at a time. Darkness and Light. +Respect for Ministers. The Drowning Fly. Trifling with words of +Scripture. Goose and Swan. Delicate Health. Conscientious Regard to +Truth. Sensibility and Gentleness contrasted with Affectation. Curiosity +and Tattling. Instability of Worldly Possessions." A book representing, +for Hilda, all that was most grotesque in an age that was now definitely +finished and closed! A silly book! + +During the picnic meal she had idly read extracts from it to Janet, +amusing sentences; and though the book had once been held sacred by her +who was dead, and though they were engaged in stirring the scarce-cold +ashes of a tragedy, the girls had nevertheless permitted themselves a +kindly, moderate mirth. Hilda had quoted from a conversation in it: +"Well, I would rather sit quietly round this cheerful fire, and talk +with dear mamma, than go to the grandest ball that ever was known!" and +Janet had plumply commented: "What a dreadful lie!" And then they had +both laughed openly, perhaps to relieve the spiritual tension caused by +the day's task and the surroundings. After that, Hilda had continued to +dip into the book, but silently. And Janet had imagined that Hilda was +merely bored by the monotonous absurdity of the sentiments expressed. + +Janet was wrong. Hilda had read the following: "One word more. Do not +rest in your religious impressions. You have, perhaps, been the subject +of terror on account of sin; your mind has been solemnized by some event +in Providence; by an alarming fit of sickness, or the death of a +relative, or a companion.... This is indeed to be reckoned a great +mercy; but then the danger is, lest you should rest here; lest those +tears, and terrors, and resolutions, should be the only evidences on +which you venture to conclude on the safety of your immortal state. What +is your present condition?..." + +Which words intimidated Hilda in spite of herself. In vain she repeated +that the book was a silly book. She really believed that it was silly, +but she knew also that there was an aspect of it which was not silly. +She was reminded by it that she had found no solution of the problem +which had distracted her in Hornsey. 'What is your present condition?' +Her present condition was still that of a weakling and a coward who had +sunk down inertly before the great problem of sin. And now, in the +growing strength of her moral convalescence, she was raising her eyes +again to meet the problem. Her future seemed to be bound up with the +problem. As she breasted the top of the Sytch under the invisible +lowering clouds, with her new, adored friend by her side, and the +despised but powerful book in her hand, she mused in an ambiguous +reverie upon her situation, dogged by the problem which alone was +accompanying her out of the past into the future. Her reverie was shot +through by piercing needles of regret for her mother; and even with the +touch of Janet's arm against her own in the darkness she had sharp +realizations of her extreme solitude in the world. Withal, the sense of +life was precious and beautiful. She was not happy; but she was filled +with the mysterious vital elation which surpasses happiness. + + +III + +They descended gently into Bursley, crossing the top of St. Luke's +Square and turning eastwards into Market Square, ruled by the sombre and +massive Town Hall in whose high tower an illuminated dial shone like a +topaz. To Hilda, this nocturnal entry into Bursley had the romance of an +entry into a town friendly but strange and recondite. During the few +days of her stay with the Orgreaves in the suburb of Bleakridge, she had +scarcely gone into the town once. She had never seen it at night. In the +old Turnhill days she had come over to Bursley occasionally with her +mother; but to shoppers from Turnhill, Bursley meant St. Luke's Square +and not a yard beyond. + +Now the girls arrived at the commencement of the steam-car track, where +a huge engine and tram were waiting, and as they turned another corner, +the long perspective of Trafalgar Road, rising with its double row of +lamps towards fashionable Bleakridge, was revealed to Hilda. She +thought, naturally, that every other part of the Five Towns was more +impressive and more important than the poor little outskirt, Turnhill, +of her birth. In Turnhill there was no thoroughfare to compare with +Trafalgar Road, and no fashionable suburb whatever. She had almost the +feeling of being in a metropolis, if a local metropolis. + +"It's beginning to rain, I think," said Janet. + +"Who's that?" Hilda questioned abruptly, ignoring the remark in the +swift, unreflecting excitement of a sensibility surprised. + +"Where?" + +"There!" + +They were going down Duck Bank into the hollow. On the right, opposite +the lighted Dragon Hotel, lay Duck Square in obscure somnolence; at the +corner of Duck Square and Trafalgar Road was a double-fronted shop, of +which all the shutters were up except two or three in the centre of the +doorway. Framed thus in the aperture, a young man stood within the shop +under a bright central gas-jet; he was gazing intently at a large sheet +of paper which he held in his outstretched hands, and the girls saw him +in profile: tall, rather lanky, fair, with hair dishevelled, and a +serious, studious, and magnanimous face; quite unconscious that he made +a picture for unseen observers. + +"That?" said Janet, in a confidential and interested tone. "That's young +Clayhanger--Edwin Clayhanger.[1] His father's the printer, you know. +Came from Turnhill, originally." + + +"I never knew," said Hilda. "But I seem to have heard the name." + +"Oh! It must have been a long time ago. He's got the best business in +Bursley now. Father says it's one of the best in the Five Towns. He's +built that new house just close to ours. Don't you remember I pointed it +out to you? Father's the architect. They're going to move into it next +week or the week after. I expect that's why the son and heir's working +so late to-night, packing and so on, perhaps." + +The young man moved out of sight. But his face had made in those few +thrilling seconds a deep impression on Hilda; so that in her mind she +still saw it, with an almost physical particularity of detail. It +presented itself to her, in some mysterious way, as a romantic visage, +wistful, full of sad subtleties, of the unknown and the seductive, and +of a latent benevolence. It was as recondite and as sympathetic as the +town in which she had discovered it. + +She said nothing. + +"Old Mr. Clayhanger is a regular character," Janet eagerly went on, to +Hilda's great content. "Some people don't like him. But I rather do like +him." She was always thus kind. "Grandmother once told me he sprang from +simply nothing at all--worked on a potbank when he was quite a child." + +"Who? The father, you mean?" + +"Yes, the father. Now, goodness knows how much he isn't worth I Father +is always saying he could buy _us_ up, lock, stock, and barrel." Janet +laughed. "People often call him a miser, but he can't be so much of a +miser, seeing that he's built this new house." + +"And I suppose the son's in the business?" + +"Yes. He wanted to be an architect. That was how father got to know him. +But old Mr. Clayhanger wouldn't have it. And so he's a printer, and one +day he'll be one of the principal men in the town." + +"Oh! So you know him?" + +"Well, we do and we don't. I go into the shop sometimes; and then I've +seen him once or twice up at the new house. We've asked him to come in +and see us. But he's never come, and I don't think he ever will. I +believe his father does keep him grinding away rather hard. I'm sure +he's frightfully clever." + +"How can you tell?" + +"Oh! From bits of things he says. And he's read everything, it seems! +And once he saved a great heavy printing-machine from going through the +floor of the printing-shop into the basement. If it hadn't been for him +there'd have been a dreadful accident. Everybody was talking about that. +He doesn't look it, does he?" + +They were now passing the corner at which stood the shop. Hilda peered +within the narrowing, unshuttered slit, but she could see no more of +Edwin Clayhanger. + +"No, he doesn't," she agreed, while thinking nevertheless that he did +look precisely that. "And so he lives all alone with his father. No +mother?" + +"No mother. But there are two sisters. The youngest is married, and just +going to have a baby, poor thing! The other one keeps house. I believe +she's a splendid girl, but neither of them is a bit like Edwin. Not a +bit. He's--" + +"What?" + +"I don't know. Look here, miss! What about this rain? I vote we take the +car up the hill." + + +IV + +The steam-car was rumbling after them down Duck Bank. It stopped, huge +above them, and they climbed into it through an odour of warm grease +that trailed from the engine. The conductor touched his hat to Janet, +who smiled like a sister upon this fellow-being. Two middle-aged men +were the only other occupants of the interior of the car; both raised +their hats to Janet. The girls sat down in opposite corners next to the +door. Then, with a deafening continuous clatter of loose glass-panes and +throbbing of its filthy floor, the vehicle started again, elephantine. +It was impossible to talk in that unique din. Hilda had no desire to +talk. She watched Janet pay the fares as in a dream, without even +offering her own penny, though as a rule she was touchily punctilious in +sharing expenses with the sumptuous Janet. Without being in the least +aware of it, and quite innocently, Janet had painted a picture of the +young man, Edwin Clayhanger, which intensified a hundredfold the strong +romantic piquancy of Hilda's brief vision of him. In an instant Hilda +saw her ideal future--that future which had loomed grandiose, +indefinite, and strange--she saw it quite precise and simple as the wife +of such a creature as Edwin Clayhanger. The change was astounding in its +abruptness. She saw all the delightful and pure vistas of love with a +man, subtle, baffling, and benevolent, and above all superior; with a +man who would be respected by a whole town as a pillar of society, while +bringing to his intimacy with herself an exotic and wistful quality +which neither she nor anyone could possibly define. She asked: "What +attracts me in him? I don't know. _I like him_." She who had never +spoken to him! She who never before had vividly seen herself as married +to a man! He was clever; he was sincere; he was kind; he was +trustworthy; he would have wealth and importance and reputation. All +this was good; but all this would have been indifferent to her, had +there not been an enigmatic and inscrutable and unprecedented something +in his face, in his bearing, which challenged and inflamed her +imagination. + +It did not occur to her to think of Janet as in the future a married +woman. But of herself she thought, with new agitations: "I am innocent +now! I am ignorant now! I am a girl now! But one day I shall be so no +longer. One day I shall be a woman. One day I shall be in the power and +possession of some man--if not this man, then some other. Everything +happens; and this will happen!" And the hazardous strangeness of life +enchanted her. + + + + +CHAPTER IV +WITH THE ORGREAVES + + +I + +The Orgreave family was holding its nightly session in the large +drawing-room of Lane End House when Hilda and Janet arrived. The +bow-window stood generously open in three different places, and the +heavy outer curtains as well as the lace inner ones were moving gently +in the capricious breeze that came across the oval lawn. The +multitudinous sound of rain on leaves entered also with the wind; and a +steam-car could be heard thundering down Trafalgar Road, from which the +house was separated by only a few intervening minor roofs. + +Mrs. Orgreave, the plump, faded image of goodness, with Janet's full red +lips and Janet's kindly eyes, sat as usual, whether in winter or in +summer, near the fireplace, surveying with placidity the theatre where +the innumerable dramas of her motherhood had been enacted. Tom, her +eldest, the thin, spectacled lawyer, had, as a boy of seven, rampaged on +that identical Turkey hearthrug, when it was new, a quarter of a century +earlier. He was now seated at the grand piano with the youngest child, +Alicia, a gawky little treasure, always alternating between pertness and +timidity, aged twelve. Jimmie and Johnnie, young bloods of nineteen and +eighteen, were only present in their mother's heart, being in process of +establishing, by practice, the right to go forth into the world of an +evening and return when they chose without suffering too much from +family curiosity. Two other children--Marian, eldest daughter and sole +furnisher of grandchildren to the family, and Charlie, a young doctor-- +were permanently away in London. Osmond Orgreave, the elegant and +faintly mocking father of the brood, a handsome grizzled man of between +fifty and sixty, was walking to and fro between the grand piano and the +small upright piano in the farther half of the room. + +"Well, my dear?" said Mrs. Orgreave to Hilda. "You aren't wet?" She drew +Hilda towards her and stroked her shoulder, and then kissed her. The +embrace was to convey the mother's sympathy with Hilda in the ordeal of +the visit to Turnhill, and her satisfaction that the ordeal was now +over. The ageing lady seemed to kiss her on behalf of the entire +friendly family; all the others, appreciating the delicacy of the +situation, refrained from the peril of clumsy speech. + +"Oh no, mother!" Janet exclaimed reassuringly. "We came up by car. And I +had my umbrella. And it only began to rain in earnest just as we got to +the gate." + +"Very thoughtful of it, I'm sure!" piped the pig-tailed Alicia from the +piano. She could talk, in her pert moments, exactly like her brothers. + +"Alicia, darling," said Janet coaxingly, as she sat on the sofa flanked +by the hat, gloves, and jacket which she had just taken off, "will you +run upstairs with these things, and take Hilda's too? I'm quite +exhausted. Father will swoon if I leave them here. I suppose he's +walking about because he's so proud of his new birthday slippers." + +"But I'm just playing the symphony with Tom!" Alicia protested. + +"I'll run up--I was just going to," said Hilda. + +"You'll do no such thing!" Mrs. Orgreave announced, sharply. "Alicia, +I'm surprised at you! Here Janet and Hilda have been out since noon, and +you--" + +"And so on and so on," said Alicia, jumping up from the piano in +obedience. + +"We didn't wait supper," Mrs. Orgreave went on. "But I told Martha to +leave--" + +"Mother, dearest," Janet stopped her. "Please don't mention food. We've +stuffed ourselves, haven't we, Hilda? Anyone been?" + +"Swetnam," said Alicia, as she left the room with her arms full. + +"_Mr_. Swetnam," corrected Mrs. Orgreave. + +"Which one? The Ineffable?" + +"The Ineffable," replied Mr. Orgreave, who had wandered, smiling +enigmatically, to the sofa. His legs, like the whole of his person, had +a distinguished air; and he held up first one slippered foot and then +the other to the silent, sham-ecstatic inspection of the girls. "He may +look in again, later on. It's evidently Hilda he wants to see." This +said, Mr. Orgreave lazily sank into an easy chair, opposite the sofa, +and lighted a cigarette. He was one of the most industrious men in the +Five Towns, and assuredly the most industrious architect; but into an +idle hour he could pack more indolence than even Johnnie and Jimmie, +alleged wastrels, could accomplish in a week. + +"I say, Janet," Tom sang out from the piano, "you aren't really +exhausted, are you?" + +"I'm getting better." + +"Well, let's dash through the scherzo before the infant comes back. She +can't take it half fast enough." + +"And do you think I can?" said Janet, rising. In theory, Janet was not a +pianist, and she never played solos, nor accompanied songs; but in the +actual practice of duet-playing her sympathetic presence of mind at +difficult crises of the music caused her to be esteemed by Tom, the +expert and enthusiast, as superior to all other performers in the +family. + + +II + +Hilda listened with pleasure and with exaltation to the scherzo. Beyond +a little part-singing at school she had no practical acquaintance with +music; there had never been a piano at home. But she knew that this +music was Beethoven's; and from the mere intonation of that name, as it +was uttered in her presence in the house of the Orgreaves, she was aware +of its greatness, and the religious faculty in her had enabled her at +once to accept its supremacy as an article of genuine belief; so that, +though she understood it not, she felt it, and was uplifted by it. +Whenever she heard Beethoven--and she heard it often, because Tom, in +the words of the family, had for the moment got Beethoven on the +brain--her thoughts and her aspirations were ennobled. + +She was singularly content with this existence amid the intimacy of the +Orgreaves. The largeness and prodigality and culture of the family life, +so different from anything she had ever known, and in particular so +different from the desolating atmosphere of the Cedars, soothed and +flattered her in a manner subtly agreeable. At the same time she was but +little irked by it, for the reason that her spirit was not one to be +unduly affected by exterior social, intellectual, and physical +conditions. Moreover, the Orgreaves, though obviously of a class +superior to her own, had the facile and yet aristocratic +unceremoniousness which, unconsciously, repudiates such distinctions +until circumstances arise that compel their acknowledgment. To live +among the Orgreaves was like living in a small private republic that +throbbed with a hundred activities and interests. Each member of it was +a centre of various energy. And from each, Hilda drew something that was +precious: from Mrs. Orgreave, sheer love and calm wisdom; from Janet, +sheer love and the spectacle of elegance; from little Alicia candour and +admiration; from Tom, knowledge, artistic enthusiasm, and shy, curt +sympathy; from Johnnie and Jimmie the homage of their proud and naïve +mannishness: as for Mr. Orgreave, she admired him perhaps as much as she +admired even Janet, and once when he and she had taken a walk together +up to Toft End, she had thought him quite exquisite in his attitude to +her, quizzical, worldly, and yet sensitively understanding and humane. +And withal they never worried her by interferences and criticisms; they +never presumed on their hospitality, but left her as free as though her +age had been twice what it was. Undoubtedly, in the ardour of her +gratitude she idealized every one of them. The sole reproach which in +secret she would formulate against them had reference to their quasi- +cynical levity in conversation. They would never treat a serious topic +seriously for more than a few minutes. Either one or another would yield +to the temptation of clever facetiousness, and clever facetiousness +would always carry off the honours in a discussion. This did not apply +to Mrs. Orgreave, who was incapable of humour; but it applied a little +even to Janet. + +The thought continually arising in Hilda's mind was: "Why do they care +for me? What can they see in me? Why are they so good to me? I was never +good to them." She did not guess that, at her very first visit to Lane +End House, the force and mystery of her character had powerfully +attracted these rather experienced amateurs of human nature. She was +unaware that she had made her mark upon Janet and Charlie so far back as +the days of the dancing-classes. And she under-estimated the appeal of +her situation as an orphan and a solitary whose mother's death, in its +swiftness, had amounted to a tragedy. + +The scherzo was finished, and Alicia had not returned into the +drawing-room. The two pianists sat hesitant. + +"Where is that infant?" Tom demanded. "If I finish it all without her +she'll be vexed." + +"I can tell you where she ought to be," said Mrs. Orgreave placidly. +"She ought to be in bed. No wonder she looks pale, stopping up till this +time of night!" + +Then there were unusual and startling movements behind the door, +accompanied by giggling. And Alicia entered, followed by +Charlie--Charlie who was supposed at that precise instant to be in +London! + +"Hello, mater!" said the curly-headed Charlie, with a sublime +affectation of calmness, as though he had slipped out of the next room. +He produced an effect fully equal to his desires. + + +III + +In a little while, Charlie, on the sofa, was seated at a small table +covered with viands and fruit; the white cloth spread on the table made +a curiously charming patch amid the sombre colours of the drawing-room. +He had protested that, having consumed much food en route, he was not +hungry; but in vain. Mrs. Orgreave demolished such arguments by the +power of her notorious theory, which admitted no exceptions, that any +person coming off an express train must be in need of sustenance. The +odd thing was that all the others discovered mysterious appetites and +began to eat and drink with gusto, sitting, standing, or walking about, +while Charlie, munching, related how he had miraculously got three days' +leave from the hospital, and how he had impulsively 'cabbed it' to +Euston, and how, having arrived at Knype, he had also 'cabbed it' from +Knype to Bleakridge instead of waiting for the Loop Line train. The blot +on his advent, in the eyes of Mrs. Orgreave, was that he had no fresh +news of Marian and her children. + +"You don't seem very surprised to find Hilda here," said Alicia. + +"It's not my business to be surprised at anything, kid," Charlie +retorted, smiling at Hilda, who sat beside him on the sofa. "Moreover, +don't I get ten columns of news every three days? I know far more about +this town than you do, I bet!" + +Everybody laughed at Mrs. Orgreave, the great letter-writer and +universal disseminator of information. + +"Now, Alicia, you must go to bed," said Mrs. Orgreave. And Alicia +regretted that she had been so indiscreet as to draw attention to +herself. + +"The kid can stay up if she will say her piece," said Charlie mockingly. +He knew that he could play the autocrat, for that evening at any rate. + +"What piece?" the child demanded, blushing and defiant. + +"Her 'Abou Ben Adhem,'" said Charlie. "Do you think I don't know all +about that too?" + +"Oh, mother, you are a bore!" Alicia exclaimed, pouting. "Why did you +tell him that?... Well, I'll say it if Hilda will recite something as +well." + +"Me!" murmured Hilda, staggered. "I never recite!" + +"I've always understood you recite beautifully," said Mrs. Orgreave. + +"You know you do, Hilda!" said Janet. + +"Of course you do," said Charlie. + +"_You've_ never heard me, anyhow!" she replied to him obstinately. How +could they have got it fixed into their heads that she was a reciter? +This renown was most disconcerting. + +"Now, Hilda!" Mr. Orgreave soothingly admonished her from the back of +the sofa. She turned her head and looked up at him, smiling in her +distress. + +"Go ahead, then, kid! It's agreed," said Charlie. + +And Alicia galloped through Leigh Hunt's moral poem, which she was +preparing for an imminent speech-day, in an extraordinarily short space +of time. + +"But I can't remember anything. I haven't recited for years and years," +Hilda pleaded, when the child burst out, "Now, Hilda!" + +"_Stuff_!" Charlie pronounced. + +"Some Tennyson?" Mrs. Orgreave suggested. "Don't you know any Tennyson? +We must have something, now." And Alicia, exulting in the fact that she +had paid the penalty imposed, cried that there could be no drawing back. + +Hilda was lost. Mrs. Orgreave's tone, with all its softness, was a +command. "Tennyson? I've forgotten 'Maud,'" she muttered. + +"I'll prompt you," said Charlie. "Thomas!" + +Everybody looked at Tom, expert in literature as well as in music; Tom, +the collector, the owner of books and bookcases. Tom went to a bookcase +and drew forth a green volume, familiar and sacred throughout all +England. + +"Oh dear!" Hilda moaned. + +"Where do you mean to begin?" Charlie sternly inquired. "It just happens +that I'm reading 'In Memoriam,' myself. I read ten stanzas a day." + +Hilda bent over the book with him. + +"But I must stand up," she said, with sudden fire. "I can't recite +sitting down." + +They all cried "Bravo!" and made a circle for her. And she stood up. + +The utterance of the first lines was a martyrdom for her. But after that +she surrendered herself frankly to the mood of the poem and forgot to +suffer shame, speaking in a loud, clear, dramatic voice which she +accompanied by glances and even by gestures. After about thirty lines +she stopped, and, regaining her ordinary senses, perceived that the +entire family was staring at her with an extreme intentness. + +"I can't do any more," she murmured weakly, and dropped on to the sofa. + +Everybody clapped very heartily. + +"It's wonderful!" said Janet in a low tone. + +"I should just say it was!" said Tom seriously, and Hilda was saturated +with delicious joy. + +"You ought to go on the stage; that's what you ought to do!" said +Charlie. + +For a fraction of a second, Hilda dreamt of the stage, and then Mrs. +Orgreave said softly, like a mother: + +"I'm quite sure Hilda would never dream of any such thing!" + + +IV + +There was an irruption of Jimmie and Johnnie, and three of the Swetnam +brothers, including him known as the Ineffable. Jimmie and Johnnie +played the rôle of the absolutely imperturbable with a skill equal to +Charlie's own; and only a series of calm "How-do's?" marked the +greetings of these relatives. The Swetnams were more rollickingly +demonstrative. Now that the drawing-room was quite thickly populated, +Hilda, made nervous by Mr. Orgreave's jocular insinuation that she +herself was the object of the Swetnams' call, took refuge, first with +Janet, and then, as Janet was drawn into the general crowd, with +Charlie, who was absently turning over the pages of "In Memoriam." + +"Know this?" he inquired, friendly, indicating the poem. + +"I don't," she said. "It's splendid, isn't it?" + +"Well," he answered. "It's rather on the religious tack, you know. +That's why I'm reading it." He smiled oddly. + +"Really?" + +He hesitated, and then nodded. It was the strangest avowal from this +young dandy of twenty-three with the airy and cynical tongue. Hilda +thought: "Here, then, is another!" And her own most secret troubles +recurred to her mind. + +"What's that about Teddy Clayhanger?" Charlie cried out, suddenly +looking up. He had caught the name in a distant conversation. + +Janet explained how they had seen Edwin, and went on to say that it was +impossible to persuade him to call. + +"What rot!" said Charlie. "I bet you what you like I get him here +to-morrow night." He added to Hilda: "Went to school with him!" Hilda's +face burned. + +"I bet you don't," said Janet stoutly, from across the room. + +"I'll bet you a shilling I do," said Charlie. + +"Haven't a penny left," Janet smiled. "Father, will you lend me a +shilling?" + +"That's what I'm here for," said Mr. Orgreave. + +"Mr. Orgreave," the youngest Swetnam put in, "you talk exactly like the +dad talks." + +The bet was made, and according to a singular but long-established +family custom, Tom had to be stake-holder. + +Hilda became troubled and apprehensive. She hoped that Charlie would +lose, and then she hoped that he would win. Looking forward to the +intimate bedroom chat with Janet which brought each evening to a +heavenly close, she said to herself: "If he _does_ come, I shall make +Janet promise that I'm not to be asked to recite or anything. In fact, I +shall get her to see that I'm not discussed." + + + + +CHAPTER V +EDWIN CLAYHANGER + + +I + +The next evening, Mr. and Mrs. Orgreave, Hilda, Janet, and Alicia were +in the dining-room of the Orgreaves awaiting the advent at the supper- +table of sundry young men whose voices could be heard through open doors +in the distance of the drawing-room. + +Charlie Orgreave had won his bet: and Edwin Clayhanger was among those +young men who had remained behind in the drawing-room to exchange, +according to the practice of young men, ideas upon life and the world. +Hilda had been introduced to him, but owing to the performance of +another Beethoven symphony there had been almost no conversation before +supper, and she had not heard him talk. She had stationed herself behind +the grand piano, on the plea of turning over the pages for the musicians +(though it was only with great uncertainty, and in peril of missing the +exact instant for turning, that she followed the music on the page), and +from this security she had furtively glanced at Edwin when her task +allowed. "Perhaps I was quite mistaken last night," she said to herself. +"Perhaps he is perfectly ordinary." The strange thing was that she could +not decide whether he was ordinary or not. At one moment his face +presented no interest, at another she saw it just as she had seen it, +framed in the illuminated aperture of the shop-shutters, on the previous +night. Or she fancied that she saw it thus. The more she tried to +distinguish between Edwin's reality and her fancies concerning Edwin, +the less she succeeded. She would pronounce positively that her fancies +were absurd and even despicable. But this abrupt positiveness did not +convince. Supposing that he was after all marvellous among men! During +the day she had taken advantage of the mention of his name to ascertain +discreetly some details of the legendary feat by which as a boy he had +saved his father's printing-shop from destruction. The details were +vague, and not very comprehensible, but they seemed to indicate on his +part an astounding presence of mind, a heroic promptitude in action. +Assuredly, the Orgreaves regarded him as a creature out of the common +run. And at the same time they all had the air of feeling rather sorry +for him. + +Standing near the supper-table, Hilda listened intently for the sound of +his voice among the other voices in the drawing-room. But she could not +separate it from the rest. Perhaps he was keeping silence. She said to +herself: "Yet what do I care whether he is keeping silence or not?" + +Mr. Orgreave remarked, in the suspense, glancing ironically at his wife: + +"I think I'll go upstairs and do an hour's planning. They aren't likely +to be more than an hour, I expect?" + +"Hilda," said Mrs. Orgreave, quite calm, but taking her husband quite +seriously, "will you please go and tell those young men from me that +supper is waiting?" + + +II + +Of course Hilda obeyed, though it appeared strange to her that Mrs. +Orgreave had not sent Alicia on such an errand. Passing out of the +bright dining-room where the gas was lit, she hesitated a moment in the +dark broad corridor that led to the drawing-room. The mission, she felt, +would make her rather prominent in front of Edwin Clayhanger, the +stranger, and she had an objection to being prominent in front of him; +she had, indeed, taken every possible precaution against such a danger. +"How silly I am to loiter here!" she thought. "I might be Alicia!" + +The boys, she could now hear, were discussing French literature, and in +particular Victor Hugo. When she caught the name of Victor Hugo she +lifted her chin, and moved forward a little. She worshipped Victor Hugo +with a passion unreflecting and intense, simply because certain detached +lines from his poems were the most splendid occupants of her memory, +dignifying every painful or sordid souvenir. At last Charlie's clear, +gay voice said: + +"It's all very well, and Victor Hugo _is_ Victor Hugo; but you can say +what you like--there's a lot of this that'll bear skipping, your +worships." + +Already she was at the doorway. In the dusk of the unlighted chamber the +faces of the four Orgreaves and Clayhanger showed like pale patches on +the gloom. + +"Not a line!" she said fiercely, with her extremely clear articulation. +She had no right to make such a statement, for she had not read the +twentieth part of Victor Hugo's work; she did not even know what book +they were discussing--Charlie held the volume lightly in his hand--but +she was incensed against the mere levity of Charlie's tone. + +She saw Edwin Clayhanger jump at the startling interruption. And all +five looked round. She could feel her face burning. + +Charlie quizzed her with a word, and then turned to Edwin Clayhanger for +support. "Don't _you_ think that some of it's dullish, Teddy?" + +Edwin Clayhanger, shamefaced, looked at Hilda wistfully, as if in +apology, as if appealing to her clemency against her fierceness; and +said slowly: + +"Well--yes." + +He had agreed with Charlie; but while disagreeing with Hilda he had +mysteriously proved to her that she had been right in saying to herself +on the previous evening: "_I like him_." + +The incident appeared to her to be enormous and dramatic. She moved +away, as it were breathless under emotion, and then, remembering her +errand, threw over her shoulder: + +"Mrs. Orgreave wants to know when you're coming to supper." + + +III + +The supper-table was noisy and joyous--more than usually so on account +of the presence of Charlie, the gayest member of the family. At either +end of the long, white-spread board sat Mr. and Mrs. Orgreave; Alicia +stood by Mr. Orgreave, who accepted her caresses with the negligence of +a handsome father. Along one side sat Hilda, next to Janet, and these +two were flanked by Jimmie and Johnnie, tall, unbending, apparently +determined to prove by a politely supercilious demeanor that to pass a +whole evening thus in the home circle was considered by them to be a +concession on their part rather than a privilege. Edwin Clayhanger sat +exactly opposite to Hilda, with Charlie for sponsor; and Tom's +spectacles gleamed close by. + +Hilda, while still constrained, was conscious of pleasure in the scene, +and of a certain pride in forming part of it. These prodigal and +splendid persons respected and liked her, even loved her. Her recitation +on the previous evening had been a triumph. She was glad that she had +shown them that she could at any rate do one thing rather well; but she +was equally glad that she had obtained Janet's promise to avoid any +discussion of her qualities or her situation. After all, with her +self-conscious restraint and her pitiful assured income of three pounds +a week, she was a poor little creature compared with the easy, luxurious +beings of this household, whose upkeep could not cost less than three +pounds a day. Janet, in rich and complicated white, and glistening with +jewels at hand and neck, was a princess beside her. She hated her spare +black frock, and for the second time in her life desired expensive +clothes markedly feminine. She felt that she was at a grave +disadvantage, and that to remedy this disadvantage would be necessary, +not only dresses and precious stones, but an instinctive faculty of soft +allurement which she had not. Each gesture of Janet's showed seductive +grace, while her own rare gestures were stiffened by a kind of masculine +harshness. Every time that the sad-eyed and modest Edwin Clayhanger +glanced at Janet, and included herself in the glance, she fancied that +he was unjustly but inevitably misprising herself. And at length she +thought: "Why did I make Janet promise that I shouldn't be talked about? +Why shouldn't he know all about my mourning, and that I'm the only girl +in the Five Towns that can write shorthand. Why should I be afraid to +recite again? However much I might have suffered through nervousness if +I'd recited, I should have shown I'm not such a poor little thing as all +that! Why am I such a baby?" She wilted under her own disdain. + +It was strange to think that Edwin Clayhanger, scarcely older than the +irresponsible Charlie, was the heir to an important business, was +potentially a rich and influential man. Had not Mr. Orgreave said that +old Mr. Clayhanger could buy up all the Orgreaves if he chose? It was +strange to think that this wistful and apparently timid young man, this +nice boy, would one day be the head of a household, and of a table such +as this! Yes, it would assuredly arrive! Everything happened. And the +mother of that household? Would it be she? Her imagination leaped far +into the future, as she exchanged a quiet, furtive smile with Mrs. +Orgreave, and she tried to see herself as another Mrs. Orgreave, a +strenuous and passionate past behind her, honoured, beloved, teased, +adored. But she could not quite see herself thus. Impossible that she, +with her temperament so feverish, restive, and peculiar, should ever +reach such a haven! It was fantastically too much to expect! And yet, if +not with Edwin Clayhanger, then with another, with some mysterious being +whom she had never seen!... Did not everything happen?... But then, +equally, strange and terrible misfortunes might be lying in wait for +her!... The indescribable sharp savour of life was in her nostrils. + + +IV + +The conversation had turned upon Bradlaugh, the shameless free-thinker, +the man who had known how to make himself the centre of discussion in +every house in England. This was the Bradlaugh year, the apogee of his +notoriety. Dozens of times at the Cedar's meal-table had she heard the +shocking name of Bradlaugh on outraged tongues, but never once had a +word been uttered in his favour. The public opinion of the +boarding-house was absolutely unanimous in reckoning him a scoundrel. In +the dining-room of the Orgreaves the attitude towards him was different. +His free-thought was not precisely defended, but champions of his right +to sit in the House of Commons were numerous. Hilda grew excited, and +even more self-conscious. It was as if she were in momentary expectation +of being challenged by these hardy debaters: "Are not _you_ a +free-thinker?" Her interest was personal; the interest of one in peril. +Compared to the discussions at the Cedars, this discussion was as the +open, tossing, windy sea to a weed-choked canal. The talk veered into +mere profane politics, and Mr. Orgreave, entrenching himself behind an +assumption of careless disdain, was severely attacked by all his sons +except Jimmie, who, above Hilda's left shoulder, pretended to share the +paternal scorn. The indifference of Hilda to politics was complete. She +began to feel less disturbed; she began to dream. Then she suddenly +heard, through her dream, the name of Bradlaugh again; and Edwin +Clayhanger, in response to a direct question from Mr. Orgreave, was +saying: + +"You can't help what you believe. You can't make yourself believe +anything. And I don't see why you should, either. There's no virtue in +believing." + +And Tom was crying "Hooray!" + +Hilda was thunderstruck. She was blinded as though by a mystic +revelation. She wanted to exult, and to exult with all the ardour of her +soul. This truth which Edwin Clayhanger had enunciated she had indeed +always been vaguely aware of; but now in a flash she felt it, she faced +it, she throbbed to its authenticity, and was free. It solved every +difficulty, and loosed the load that for months past had wearied her +back. "There's no virtue in believing." It was fundamental. It was the +gift of life and of peace. Her soul shouted, as she realized that just +there, in that instant, at that table, a new epoch had dawned for her. +Never would she forget the instant and the scene--scene of her re-birth! + +Mrs. Orgreave remonstrated with mild sadness: + +"No virtue in believing! Eh, Mr. Edwin!" And Hilda, under the ageing +lady's grieved glance, tried to quench the exultation on her face, +somewhat like a child trapped. But she could not. Tom again cried +"Hooray!" His tone, however, grated on her sensibility. It lacked +emotion. It was the tone of a pugilist's backer. And Janet permitted +herself some pleasantry. And Charlie became frankly facetious. Was it +conceivable that Charlie could be interested in religion? She liked him +very much, partly because he and she had learnt to understand each other +at the dancing-classes, and partly because his curly hair and his candid +smile compelled sympathy. But her esteem for him had limits. It was +astonishing that a family otherwise simply perfect should be content +with jocosity when jocosity was so obviously out of place. Were they, +then, afraid of being serious?... Edwin Clayhanger was not laughing; he +had blushed. Her eyes were fixed on him with the extremest intensity, +studying him, careless of the danger that his gaze might catch hers. She +was lost in him. And then, he caught her; and, burning with honest +shame, she looked downwards. + + + + +CHAPTER VI +IN THE GARDEN + + +I + +That evening Janet did not stay long in Hilda's bedroom, having +perceived that Hilda was in one of her dark, dreamy moods. + +As soon as she was gone, Hilda lowered the gas a little, and then went +to the window, and opened it wider, and, drawing aside the blind, looked +forth. The night was obscure and warm; and a wet wind moved furtively +about in the elm-trees of the garden. The window was at the side of the +house; it gave on the west, and commanded the new house just finished by +Mr. Orgreave for the Clayhanger family. The block of this generously +planned dwelling rose massively at a distance of perhaps forty feet, +dwarfing a whole row of cottages in the small street behind Lane End +House; its various chimneypots stood out a deeper black against the +enigmatic sky. Beyond the Clayhanger garden-plot, as yet uncultivated, +and its high boundary wall, ran the great silent thoroughfare, Trafalgar +Road, whose gas-lamps reigned in the nocturnal silence that the last +steam-car had left in its wake. + +Hilda gazed at the house; and it seemed strange to her that the house, +which but a short time ago had no existence whatever, and was yet cold +and soulless, was destined to be the living home of a family, with +history in its walls and memories clinging about it. The formidable +magic of life was always thus discovering itself to her, so that she +could not look upon even an untenanted, terra-cotta-faced villa without +a secret thrill; and the impenetrable sky above was not more charmed and +enchanted than those brick walls. When she reflected that one day the +wistful, boyish Edwin Clayhanger would be the master of that house, that +in that house his will would be stronger than any other will, the +mystery that hides beneath the surface of all things surged up and +overwhelmed thought. And although scarcely a couple of hours had elapsed +since the key of the new life had been put into her hands, she could not +make an answer when she asked herself: "Am I happy or unhappy?" + + +II + +The sound of young men's voices came round the corner of the house from +the lawn. Some of the brothers Orgreave were saying good-night to Edwin +Clayhanger in the porch. She knew that they had been chatting a long +time in the hall, after Clayhanger had bidden adieu to the rest of the +family. She wondered what they had been talking about, and what young +men did in general talk about when they were by themselves and +confidential. In her fancy she endowed their conversations with the +inexplicable attractiveness of masculinity, as masculinity is understood +by women alone. She had an intense desire to overhear such a +conversation, and she felt that she would affront the unguessed perils +of it with delight, drinking it up eagerly, every drop, even were the +draught deadly. Meanwhile, the mere inarticulate sound of those distant +voices pleased her, and she was glad that she was listening and that the +boys knew it not. + +Silence succeeded the banging of the front door. And then, after a +pause, she was startled to hear the crunching of gravel almost under her +window. In alarm she dropped the blind, but continued to peer between +the edge of the blind and the window-frame. At one point the contiguous +demesnes of the Orgreaves and the Clayhangers were separated only by a +poor, sparse hedge, a few yards in length. Somebody was pushing his way +through this hedge. It was Edwin Clayhanger. Despite the darkness of the +night she could be sure that the dim figure was Edwin Clayhanger's by +the peculiar, exaggerated swing of the loose arms. He passed the hedge, +carelessly brushed his clothes with his hands, and walked slowly up the +Clayhanger garden towards the new house, and in the deep shadow of the +house was lost. Still, she could catch vague noises of movement. In a +state of extreme excitation she wondered what he could be doing. It +seemed to her that he and she were sharing the night together. + + +III + +She thought: + +"I would give anything to be able to speak to him privately and ask him +a little more about what he said to-night. I ought to. I may never see +him again. At any rate, I may never have another chance. He may have +meant something else. He may not have been serious...." The skin of her +face prickled, and a physical wave of emotion seemed to sweep downwards +through her whole body. The thrill was exquisite, but it was +intimidating. + +She whispered to herself: + +"I could go downstairs and outside, and find him, and just ask him." + +The next instant she was opening the door of her bedroom.... No, all the +household had not yet retired, for a light was still burning in the +corridor. Nevertheless she might go. She descended the stairs, asking +herself aghast: "Why am I doing this?" Another light was burning in the +hall, and through the slit of the half-shut door of the breakfast-room +she could see light. She stood hesitant. Then she heard the striking of +a match in the breakfast-room, and she boldly pushed the door open. Tom, +with a book before him, was lighting his pipe. + +"Hello!" he said. "What's the matter?" + +"Oh, nothing!" she replied. "Only, I'm just going to walk about in the +garden a minute. I shan't go to sleep unless I do." She spoke quite +easily. + +"All serene!" he agreed. "So long as you keep off the grass! It's bound +to be damp. I'll unchain the door for you, shall I?" + +She said that she could unfasten the door for herself, and he did not +insist. The hospitality of the Orgreaves was never irksome. Tom had +scarcely half-risen from his chair. + +"I shan't be long," she added casually. + +"That's all right, Hilda," he said. "I'm not going to bed just yet." + +"All the others gone?" + +He nodded. She pulled the door to, tripped delicately through the hall, +and unchained the heavy front door as quietly as she could. + + +IV + +She was outside, amid all the influences of the night. Gradually her +eyes accustomed themselves again to the gloom. She passed along the +facade of the house until she came to the corner, where the breeze +surprised her, and whence she could discern the other house and, across +the indistinct hedge, the other garden. Where was Edwin Clayhanger? Was +he wandering in the other garden, or had he entered the house? Then a +brief flare lit up a lower window of the dark mass for a few instants. +He was within. She hesitated. Should she go forward, or should she go +back? At length she went forward, and, finding in the hedge the gap +which Clayhanger had made, forced her way through it. Her skirt was torn +by an obstinate twig. Quite calmly she bent down and with her fingers +examined the rent; it was not important. She was now in the garden of +the Clayhangers, and he whom she sought was moving somewhere in the +house. "Supposing I _do_ meet him," she thought, "what shall I say to +him?" She did not know what she should say to him, nor why she had +entered upon this singular adventure. But the consciousness of self, the +fine, disturbing sense of being alive in every vein and nerve, was a +rich reward for her audacity. She wished that that tense moment of +expectation might endure for ever. + +She approached the house, trembling. It was not by volition that she +walked over the uneven clayey ground, but by instinct. She was in front +of the garden-porch, and here she hesitated again, apparently waiting +for a sign from the house. She glanced timidly about her, as though in +fear of marauders that might spring out upon her from the shadow. Just +over the boundary wall the placid flame of a gas-lamp peeped. Then, +feeling with her feet for the steps, she ascended into the shelter of +the porch. Almost at the same moment there was another flare behind the +glass of the door; she heard the sound of unlatching; the flare expired. +She was absolutely terror-struck now. + +The door opened, grating on some dirt or gravel. + +"Who's there?" demanded a queer, shaking voice. + +She could see his form. + +"Me!" she answered, in a harsh tone which was the expression of her +dismay. + +The deed was done, irretrievably. In her bedroom she had said that she +would try to speak with him, and lo! they were face to face, in the +dark, in secret! Her terror was now, at any rate, desperately calm. She +had plunged; she was falling into the deep sea; she was hopelessly cut +off from the past. + +"Oh!" came the uncertain voice weakly. "Did you want me? Did anyone want +me?" + +She heard the door being closed behind him. + +She told him, with peculiar curtness, how she had seen him from her +window, and how she wished to ask him an important question. + +"I dare say you think it's very queer of me," she added. + +"Not at all," he said, with an insincerity that annoyed her. + +"Yes, you do!" she sharply insisted. "But I want to know"--what did she +want to know?--"I want to know--did you mean it when you said--you know, +at supper--that there's no virtue in believing?" + +He stammered: "Did I say there was no virtue in believing?" + +She cried out, irritated: "Of course you did! Do you mean to say you can +say a thing like that and then forget about it? If it's true, it's one +of the most wonderful things that were ever said. And that's why I +wanted to know if you meant it, of whether you were only saying it +because it sounded clever." + +She stopped momentarily, wondering why she was thus implying an untruth; +for the fact was that she had never doubted that he had been in earnest. + +"That's what they're always doing in that house, you know--being +clever!" she went on, in a tone apparently inimical to 'that house.' + +"Yes," came the voice. "I meant it. Why?" + +And the voice was so simple and so sincere that it pierced straight to +her heart and changed her secret mood swiftly to the religious, so that +she really was occupied by the thoughts with which, a moment previously, +she had only pretended to be occupied; and the splendour of the +revelation was renewed. Nevertheless, some impulse, perverse or +defensive, compelled her to assume a doubt of his assurance. She +suspected that, had she not adopted this tactic, she might have melted +before him in gratitude. + +"You did?" she murmured. + +She thanked him, after that, rather coldly; and they talked a little +about the mere worry of these religious questions. He protested that +they never worried him, and reaffirmed his original proposition. + +"I hope you are right," she said softly, in a thrilled voice. She was +thinking that this was the most wonderful, miraculous experience that +she had ever had. + + +V + +Silence. + +"Now," she thought, "I must go back." Inwardly she gave a delicious +sigh. + +But just as she was about to take her prim leave, the scarce-discerned +figure of her companion stepped out into the garden. + +"By Jove!" said Edwin Clayhanger. "It's beginning to rain, I do +believe." + +The wind blew, and she felt rain on her cheek. Clayhanger advised her to +stand against the other wall of the porch for better protection. She +obeyed. He re-entered the porch, but was still exposed to the rain. She +called him to her side. Already he was so close that she could have +touched his shoulder by outstretching her arm. + +"Oh! I'm all right!" he said lightly, and did not move. + +"You needn't be afraid of me!" She was hurt that he had refused her +invitation to approach her. The next instant she would have given her +tongue not to have uttered those words. But she was in such a tingling +state of extreme sensitiveness as rendered it impossible for her to +exercise a normal self-control. + +Scarcely conscious of what she did, she asked him the time. He struck a +match to look at his watch. The wind blew the match out, but she saw his +wistful face, with his disordered hair under the hat. It had the quality +of a vision. + +He offered to get a light in the house, but abruptly she said good +night. + +Then they were shaking hands--she knew not how or why. She could not +loose his hand. She thought: "Never have I held a hand so honest as this +hand." At last she dropped it. They stood silent while a trap rattled up +Trafalgar Road. It was as if she was bound to remain moveless until the +sounds of the trap had died away. + +She walked proudly out into the rain. He called to her: "I say, Miss +Lessways!" But she did not stop. + +In a minute she was back again in Lane End House. + +"That you?" Tom's voice from the breakfast-room! + +"Yes," she answered clearly. "I've put the chain on. Good night." + +"Good night. Thanks." + +She ascended the stairs, smiling to herself, with the raindrops fresh on +her cheek. In her mind were no distinct thoughts, either concerning the +non-virtue of belief, or the new epoch, or Edwin Clayhanger, or even the +strangeness of her behaviour. But all her being vibrated to the +mysterious and beautiful romance of existence. + + + + +CHAPTER VII +THE NEXT MEETING + + +I + +For several days the town of Bursley was to Hilda simply a place made +perilous and redoubtable by the apprehension of meeting Edwin Clayhanger +accidentally in the streets thereof. And the burden of her meditations +was: "What can he have thought of me?" She had said nothing to anybody +of the deliberately-sought adventure in the garden. And with the +strangest ingenuous confidence she assumed that Edwin Clayhanger, too, +would keep an absolute silence about it. She had therefore naught to +fear, except in the privacy of his own mind. She did not blame +herself--it never occurred to her to do so--but she rather wondered at +herself, inimically, prophesying that one day her impulsiveness would +throw her into some serious difficulty. The memory of the night +beautifully coloured her whole daily existence. In spite of her +avoidance of the town, due to her dread of seeing Clayhanger, she was +constantly thinking: "But this cannot continue for ever. One day I am +bound to meet him again." And she seemed to be waiting for that day. + +It came with inevitable quickness. The last day but one of June was +appointed throughout the country for the celebration of the Centenary of +Sunday Schools. Neither Hilda nor any of the Orgreave children had ever +seen the inside of a Sunday School; and the tendency up at Lane End +House was to condescend towards the festival as towards a rejoicing of +the proletariat. But in face of the magnitude of the affair, looming +more enormous as it approached, this attitude could not be maintained. +The preparations for the Centenary filled newspapers and changed the +physiognomy of towns. And on the morning of the ceremonial service, +gloriously flattered by the sun, there was candid excitement at the +breakfast-table of the Orgreaves. Mr. Orgreave regretted that pressure +of work would prevent him from seeing the fun. Tom was going to see the +fun at Hanbridge. Jimmie and Johnnie were going to see the fun, but they +would not say where. The servants were going to see the fun. Charlie had +returned to London. Alicia wanted to go and see the fun, but as she was +flushed and feverish, Mrs. Orgreave forbade and decided to remain at +home with Alicia. Otherwise, even Mrs. Orgreave would have gone to see +the fun. Hilda and Janet apparently hesitated about going, but Mr. +Orgreave, pointing out that there could not under the most favourable +circumstance be another Centenary of Sunday Schools for at least a +hundred years, sarcastically urged them to set forth. The fact was, as +Janet teasingly told him while she hung on his neck, that he wished to +accentuate as much as possible his own martyrdom to industry. Were not +all the shops and offices of the Five Towns closed? Did not every member +of his family, save those detained by illness, attend the historic +spectacle of the Centenary? He alone had sacrificed pleasure to work. +Thus Janet's loving, ironic smiles foretold, would the father of the +brood discourse during the next few days. + + +II + +Hilda and Janet accordingly went down a be-flagged and sunlit Trafalgar +Road together. Janet was wearing still another white dress, and Hilda, +to her marked relief, had abandoned black for a slate-coloured frock +made by a dressmaker in Bleakridge. It was Mrs. Orgreave herself who had +first counselled Hilda, if she hated black, as she said she did, to +abandon black. The entire family chorus had approved. + +The risk of encountering Edwin Clayhanger on that day of multitudes was +surely infinitesimal. Nevertheless, in six minutes the improbable had +occurred. At the corner of Trafalgar Road and Duck Square Janet, +attracted by the sight of banners in the distance, turned to the left +along Wedgwood Street and past the front of Clayhanger's shop. +Theoretically shops were closed, but one shutter of Clayhanger's was +down, and in its place stood Edwin Clayhanger. Hilda felt her features +stiffening into a sort of wilful and insincere hostility as she shook +hands. Within the darkness of the shop she saw the figure of two dowdy +women--doubtless the sisters of whom Janet had told her; they +disappeared before Janet and Hilda entered. + +"It has happened! I have seen him again!" Hilda said to herself as she +sat in the shop listening to Janet and to Edwin Clayhanger. It appeared +likely that Edwin Clayhanger would join them in the enterprise of +witnessing the historic spectacle. + +A few minutes later everybody was startled by the gay apparition of +Osmond Orgreave swinging his cane. Curiosity had been too much for +industriousness, and Osmond Orgreave had yielded himself to the general +interest. + +"Oh! Father!" cried Janet. "What a deceitful thing you are!" + +"Only a day or two ago," Hilda was thinking, "I had never even heard of +him. And his shop seemed so strange and romantic to me. And now I am +sitting in his shop like an old friend. And nobody suspects that he and +I have had a secret meeting!" The shop itself seemed to be important and +prosperous. + +Mr. Orgreave, having decided for pleasure, was anxious to find it at +once, and, under his impatience, they left the shop. Janet went out +first with her gay father. Edwin Clayhanger waited respectfully for +Hilda to pass. But just as she was about to step forth she caught sight +of George Cannon coming along the opposite side of Wedgwood Street in +the direction of Trafalgar Road; he was in close conversation with +another man. She kept within the shelter of the shop until the two had +gone by. She did not want to meet George Cannon, with whom she had not +had speech since the interview at the Cedars; he had written to her +about the property sales, and she had replied. There was no reason why +she should hesitate to meet him. But she wished not to complicate the +situation. She thought: "If he saw me, he'd come across and speak to me, +and I might have to introduce him to all these people, and goodness +knows what!" The contretemps caused her heart to beat. + +When they emerged from the shop Janet, a few yards ahead with Mr. +Orgreave, was beckoning. + + +III + +Hilda stood on a barrel by the side of Edwin Clayhanger on another +barrel. There, from the top of St. Luke's Square, they surveyed a vast +rectangular carpet of upturned faces that made a pattern of pale dots on +a coloured and black groundwork. Nearly all the children of Bursley, +thousands upon thousands, were massed in the Square, wedged in tight +together, so that there seemed not to be an inch of space anywhere +between the shuttered shop fronts on the east of the Square and the +shuttered shop fronts on the west of the Square. At the bottom of the +Square a row of railway lorries were crammed with tiny babes--or such +they appeared--toddlers too weak to walk in processions. At the top of +the Square a large platform full of bearded adults rose like an island +out of the unconscious sea of infants. And from every window of every +house adults looked down in safe ease upon that wavy ocean over which +banners gleamed in the dazzling and fierce sunshine. + +She might have put up her sunshade. But she would not do so. She +thought: "If all those children can stand the sun without fainting, I +can!" She was extraordinarily affected by the mere sight of the immense +multitude of children; they were as helpless and as fatalistic as sheep, +utterly at the mercy of the adults who had herded them. There was about +them a collective wistfulness that cut the heart; to dwell on the idea +of it would have brought her to tears. And when the multitude sang, so +lustily, so willingly, so bravely, pouring forth with the brass +instruments a volume of tone enormous and majestic, she had a tightness +of the throat that was excrutiating. The Centenary of Sunday Schools was +quite other than she had expected; she had not bargained for these +emotions. + +It was after the hymn "There is a fountain filled with blood," during +the quietude of a speech, that Edwin Clayhanger, taking up an +evangelistic phrase in the speech, whispered to her: + +"More blood!" + +"What?" she asked, amazed by his ironical accent, which jarred on her +mood, and also by his familiar manner of leaning towards her and +dropping the words in her ear. + +"Well," he said. "Look at it! It only wants the Ganges at the bottom of +the Square!" + +Evidently for Edwin Clayhanger all religions were equally heathenish! +She was quite startled out of her amazement, and her response was an +almost humble entreaty not to make fun. The next moment she regretted +that she had not answered him with sharp firmness. She was somewhat out +of humour with him. He had begun by losing sight of Mr. Orgreave and +Janet--and of course it was hopeless to seek for them in those thronging +streets around St. Luke's Square. Then he had said to her, in a most +peculiar tone: "I hope you didn't catch cold in the rain the other +night," and she had not liked that. She had regarded it as a fault in +tact, almost as a sexual disloyalty on his part to refer at all to the +scene in the garden. Finally, his way of negotiating with the barrel man +for the use of two barrels had been lacking, for Hilda, in the qualities +of largeness and masterfulness; any one of the Orgreave boys would, she +was sure, have carried the thing off in a more worldly manner. + +The climax of the service came with the singing of "When I survey the +wondrous Cross." The physical effect of it on Hilda was nearly +overwhelming. The terrible and sublime words seemed to surge upon her +charged with all the multitudinous significance of the crowd. She was +profoundly stirred, and to prevent an outburst of tears she shook her +head. + +"What's the matter?" said Edwin Clayhanger. + +"Clumsy dolt!" she thought. "Haven't you got enough sense to leave me +alone?" And she said aloud, passionately transforming her weakness into +ferocity: "That's the most splendid religious verse ever written! You +can say what you like. It's worth while believing anything, if you can +sing words like that and mean them!" + +He agreed that the hymn was fine. + +"Do you know who wrote it?" she demanded threateningly. + +He did not. She was delighted. + +"Dr. Watts, of course!" she said, with a scornful sneer. What did Janet +mean by saying that he had read simply everything? + + +IV + +An episode which supervened close to their barrels did a great deal to +intensify the hostility of her mood. On the edge of the crowd an old +man, who had been trying to force his way through it, was being guyed by +a gang of louts who had surrounded an ice-cream barrow. Suddenly she +recognized this old man. His name was Shushions; he was a familiar +figure of the streets of Turnhill, and he had the reputation of being +the oldest Sunday School teacher in the Five Towns. He was indeed +exceedingly old, foolish, and undignified in senility; and the louts +were odiously jeering at his defenceless dotage, and a young policeman +was obviously with the louts and against the aged, fatuous victim. + +Hilda gave an exclamation of revolt, and called upon Edwin Clayhanger to +go to the rescue of Mr. Shushions. Not he, however, but she jumped down +first and pushed towards the barrow. She made the path, and he followed. +She protested to the policeman, and he too modestly seconded her. Yet +the policeman, ignoring her, addressed himself to Edwin Clayhanger. +Hilda was infuriated. It appeared that old Mr. Shushions had had a +ticket for the platform, but had lost it. + +"He must be got on to the platform somehow!" she decided, with a fiery +glance. + +But Edwin Clayhanger seemed to be incapable of an heroic action. He +hesitated. The policeman hesitated. Fortunately, the plight of the +doting oldest Sunday School teacher in the Five Towns had been observed +from the platform, and two fussy, rosetted officials bustled up and +offered to take charge of him. And Hilda, dissolving in painful pity, +bent over him softly and arranged his disordered clothes; she was +weeping. + +"Shall we go back to our barrels?" Edwin Clayhanger rather sheepishly +suggested after Mr. Shushions had been dragged away. + +But she would not go back to the barrels. + +"I think it's time we set about to find Janet and Mr. Orgreave," she +replied coldly, and they drew out of the crowd. She was profoundly +deceived in Edwin Clayhanger, so famous for his presence of mind in +saving printing-shops from destruction! She did not know what he ought +to have done; she made no attempt to conceive what he ought to have +done. But that he ought to have done something--something decisive and +grandly masculine--she was sure. + + +V + +Later, after sundry adventures, and having found Mr. Orgreave and Janet, +they stood at the tail of the steam-car, which Janet had decided should +carry her up to Bleakridge; and Edwin shook hands. Yes, Hilda was +profoundly deceived in him. Nevertheless, his wistful and honest glance, +as he parted from her, had its effect. If he had not one quality, he had +another. She tried hard to maintain her scorn of him, but it was +exceedingly difficult to do so. + +Mr. Orgreave wiped his brow as the car jolted them out of the tumult of +the Centenary. It was hot, but he did not seem to be in the slightest +degree fatigued or dispirited, whereas Janet put back her head and shut +her eyes. + +"Caught sight of a friend of yours this morning, Hilda!" he said +pleasantly. + +"Oh!" + +"Yes. Mr. Cannon. By the way, I forgot to tell you yesterday that his +famous newspaper--_yours_--has come to an end." He spoke, as it were, +with calm sympathy. "Yes! Well, it's not surprising, not surprising! +Nothing's ever stood up against the _Signal_ yet!" + +Hilda was saddened. When they reached Lane End House, a few seconds in +front of the hurrying and apologetic servants, Mrs. Orgreave told her +that Mr. George Cannon had called to see her, and had left a note for +her. She ran up to her room with the note. It said merely that the +writer wished to have an interview with her at once. + + * * * * * + + + + +BOOK III +HER BURDEN + + + + +CHAPTER I +HILDA INDISPENSABLE + + +I + +Hilda made no response of any kind to George Cannon's request for an +immediate interview, allowing day after day to pass in inactivity, and +wondering the while how she might excuse or explain her singular conduct +when circumstances should bring the situation to a head. She knew that +she ought either to go over to Turnhill, or write him with an +appointment to see her at Lane End House; but she did nothing; nor did +she say a word of the matter to Janet in the bedroom at nights. All that +she could tell herself was that she did not want to see George Cannon; +she was not honestly persuaded that she feared to see him. In the +meantime, Edwin Clayhanger was invisible, though the removal of the +Clayhanger household to the new residence at Bleakridge had made a +considerable stir of straw and litter in Trafalgar Road. + +On Tuesday in the following week she received a letter from Sarah +Gailey. It was brought up to her room early in the morning by a +half-dressed Alicia Orgreave, and she read it as she lay in bed. Sarah +Gailey, struggling with the complexities of the Cedars, away in Hornsey, +was unwell and gloomily desolate. She wrote that she suffered from +terrible headaches on waking, and that she was often feverish, and that +she had no energy whatever. "I am at a very trying age for a woman," she +said. "I don't know whether you understand, but I've come to a time of +life that really upsets one above a bit, and I'm fit for nothing." Hilda +understood; she was flattered, even touched, by this confidence; it made +her feel older, and more important in the world, and a whole generation +away from Alicia, who was drawing up the blind with the cries and +awkward gestures of a prattling infant. To the letter there was a +postscript: "Has George been to see you yet about me? He wrote me he +should, but I haven't heard since. In fact, I've been waiting to hear. +I'll say nothing about that yet. I'm ashamed you should be bothered. +It's so important for you to have a good holiday. Again, much love, +S.G." The prim handwriting got smaller and smaller towards the end of +the postscript and the end of the page, and the last lines were +perfectly parallel with the lower edge of the paper; all the others +sloped feebly downwards from left to right. + +"Oh!" piped Alicia from the window. "Maggie Clayhanger has got her +curtains up in the drawing-room! Oh! Aren't they proud things! _Oh_!--I +do believe she's caught me staring at her!" And Alicia withdrew abruptly +into the room, blushing for her detected sin of ungenteel curiosity. She +bumped down on the bed. "Three days more," she said. "Not counting +to-day. Four, counting to-day." + +"School?" + +Alicia nodded, her finger in her mouth. "Isn't it horrid, going to +school on a day like this? I hear you and Janet are off up to Hillport +this afternoon again, to play tennis. You do have times!" + +"No," said Hilda. "I've got to go to Turnhill this afternoon." + +"But Janet told me you were--" Her glance fell on the letter. "Is it +business?" + +"Yes." + +The child was impressed, and her change of tone, her frank awe, gave +pleasure to Hilda's vanity. "Shall I go and tell Jane? She isn't near +dressed." + +"Yes, do." + +Off scampered Alicia, leaving the door unlatched behind her. + +Hilda gazed at the letter, holding it limply in her left hand amid the +soft disorder of the counterpane. It had come to her, an intolerably +pathetic messenger and accuser, out of the exacerbating frowsiness of +the Cedars. Yesterday afternoon care-ridden Sarah Gailey was writing it, +with sighs, at the desk in her stuffy, uncomfortable bedroom. As Hilda +gazed at the formation of the words, she could see the unhappy Sarah +Gailey writing them, and the letter was like a bit of Sarah Gailey's +self, magically and disconcertingly projected into the spacious, +laughing home of the Orgreaves, and into the mysterious new happiness +that was forming around Hilda. The Orgreaves, so far as Hilda could +discover, had no real anxieties. They were a joyous lot, favoured alike +by temperament and by fortune. And she, Hilda--what real anxieties had +she? None! She was sure of a small but adequate income. Her grief for +her mother was assuaged. The problem of her soul no longer troubled: in +part it had been solved, and in part it had faded imperceptibly away. +Nor was she exercised about the future, about the 'new life.' Instead of +rushing ardently to meet the future, she felt content to wait for its +coming. Why disturb oneself? She was free. She was enjoying existence +with the Orgreaves. Yes, she was happy in this roseate passivity. + +The letter shook her, arousing as it did the sharp sense of her +indebtedness to Sarah Gailey, who alone had succoured her in her long +period of despairing infelicity. Had she guessed that it was Sarah +Gailey's affair upon which George Cannon had desired to see her, she +would not have delayed an hour; no reluctance to meet George Cannon +would have caused her to tarry. But she had not guessed; the idea had +never occurred to her. + +She rose, picked up the envelope from the carpet, carefully replaced the +letter in it, and laid it with love on the glittering dressing-table. +Through the unlatched door she heard a tramping of unshod masculine feet +in the passage, and the delightful curt greeting of Osmond Orgreave and +his sleepy son Jimmie--splendid powerful males. She glanced at the +garden, and at the garden of the Clayhangers, swimming in fresh +sunshine. She glanced in the mirror, and saw the deshabille of her black +hair and of her insecure nightgown, and thought: "Truly, I am not so +bad-looking! And how well I feel! How fond they all are of me! I'm just +at the right age. I'm young, but I'm mature. I've had a lot of +experience, and I'm not a fool. I'm strong--I could stand anything!" She +put her shoulders back, with a challenging gesture. The pride of life +was hers. + +And then, this disturbing vision of Sarah Gailey, alone, unhappy, +unattractive, enfeebled, ageing--ageing! It seemed to her inexpressibly +cruel that people must grow old and weak and desolate; it seemed +monstrous. A pang, momentary but excruciating, smote her. She said to +herself: "Sarah Gailey has nothing to look forward to, except worry. +Sarah Gailey is at the end, instead of at the beginning!" + + +II + +When she got off the train at Turnhill station, early that afternoon, +she had no qualm at the thought of meeting George Cannon; she was not +even concerned to invent a decent excuse for her silence in relation to +his urgent letter. She went to see him for the sake of Sarah Gailey, and +because she apparently might be of use in some affair of Sarah's--she +knew not what. She was proud that either Sarah or he thought that she +could be of use, or that it was worth while consulting her. She had a +grave air, as of one to whom esteem has brought responsibilities. + +In Child Street, leading to High Street, she passed the office of +Godlimans, the auctioneers. And there, among a group of white posters +covering the large window, was a poster of the sale of "valuable +household furniture and effects removed from No. 15 Lessways Street." +And on the poster, in a very black line by itself, stood out saliently +the phrase: "Massive Bedroom Suite." Her mother's! Hers! She had to stop +and read the poster through, though she was curiously afraid of being +caught in the act. All the principal items were mentioned by the +faithful auctioneers; and the furniture, thus described, had a strange +aspect of special importance, as if it had been subtly better, more +solid, more desirable, than any other houseful of furniture in the +town,--Lessways' furniture! She sought for the date. The sale had taken +place on the previous night, at the very hour when she was lolling and +laughing in the drawing-room of Lane End House with the Orgreaves! The +furniture was sold, dispersed, gone! The house was empty! The past was +irremediably closed! The realization of this naturally affected her, +raising phantoms of her mother, and of the face of the cab-driver as he +remarked on the drawn blinds at the Cedars. But she was still more +affected by the thought that the poster was on the window, and the +furniture scattered, solely because she had willed it. She had said: +"Please sell all the furniture, and you needn't consult me about the +sale. I don't want to know. I prefer not to know. Just get it done." And +it had been done! How mysteriously romantic! Some girls would not have +sold the furniture, would not have dared to sell it, would have accepted +the furniture and the house as a solemn charge, and gone on living among +those relics, obedient to a tradition. But she had dared! She had +willed--and the solid furniture had vanished away! And she was +adventurously free! + +She went forward. At the corner of Child Street and High Street the new +Town Hall was rising to the skies. Already its walls were higher than +the highest house in the vicinity. And workmen were crawling over it, +amid dust, and a load of crimson bricks was trembling and revolving +upwards on a thin rope that hung down from the blue. Glimpses of London +had modified old estimates of her native town. Nevertheless, the new +Town Hall still appeared extraordinarily large and important to her. + +She saw the detested Arthur Dayson in the distance of the street, and +crossed hurriedly to the Square, looking fixedly at the storeys above +the ironmonger's so that Arthur Dayson could not possibly catch her eye. +There was no sign of the _Five Towns Chronicle_ in the bare windows of +the second storey. This did not surprise her; but she was startled by +the absence of the Karkeek wire-blinds from the first-floor windows, +equally bare with those of the second. When she got to the entrance she +was still more startled to observe that the Karkeek brass-plate had been +removed. She climbed the long stairs apprehensively. + + +III + +"Anybody here?" she called out timidly. She was in the clerk's office, +which was empty; but she could hear movements in another room. The place +seemed in process of being dismantled. + +Suddenly George Cannon appeared in a doorway, frowning. + +"Good afternoon, Mr. Cannon!" + +"Good afternoon, Miss Lessways." He spoke with stiff politeness. His +face looked weary. + +After a slight hesitation he advanced, and they shook hands. Hilda was +nervous. Her neglect of his letter now presented itself to her as +inexcusable. She thought: "If he is vexed about it I shall have to +humour him. I really can't blame him. He must think me very queer." + +"I was wondering what had become of you," he said, amply polite, but not +cordial. + +"Well," she said, "every day I was expecting you to call again, or to +send me a note or something.... And what with one thing and another--" + +"I dare say your time's been fully occupied," he filled up her pause. +And she fancied that he spoke in a peculiar tone. She absurdly fancied +that he was referring to the time which she had publicly spent with +Edwin Clayhanger at the Centenary. She conceived that he might have seen +her and Edwin Clayhanger together. + +"I had a letter from Miss Gailey this morning," she said. "And it seems +that it's about her that you wanted--" + +"Yes." + +"I do wish I'd known. If I'd had the slightest idea I should have come +over instantly." She spoke with eager seriousness, and then added, +smiling as if in appeal to be favourably understood: "I thought it was +only about _my_ affairs--sale or what not. And as I'd asked you to +manage all these things exactly as you thought best, I didn't trouble--" + +He laughed, and either forgave or forgot. + +"Will you come this way?" he invited, in a new tone of friendliness. +"We're rather in a mess here." + +"You're all alone, too," she said, following him into his room. + +"Sowter's out," he answered laconically, waiting for her to precede him. +He said nothing as to the office-boy, nor as to Mr. Karkeek. Hilda was +now sure that something strange had happened. + +"So you've heard from Sarah, have you?" he began, when they were both +seated in his own room. There were still a lot of papers, though fewer +than of old, on the broad desk; but the bookcase was quite empty, and +several of the shelves in it had supped from the horizontal; the front +part of the shelves was a pale yellow, and behind that, an irregular +dark band of dust indicated the varying depths of the vanished tomes. +The forlornness of the bookcase gave a stricken air to the whole room. + +"She's not well." + +"Or she imagines she's not well." + +"Oh no!" said Hilda warmly. "It isn't imagination. She really isn't +well." + +"You think so?" + +"I don't think--I know!" Hilda spoke proudly, but with the restraint +which absolute certainty permits. She crushed, rather than resented, +George Cannon's easy insinuation, full of the unjustified superiority of +the male. How could he judge--how could any man judge? She had never +before felt so sure of herself, so adult and experienced, as she felt +then. + +"But it's nothing serious?" he suggested with deference. + +"N--no--not what you'd call serious," said Hilda judicially, +mysteriously. + +"Because she wants to give up the boarding-house business altogether-- +that's all!" + +Having delivered this dramatic blow, George Cannon smiled, as it were, +quizzically. And Hilda was reassured about him. She had been thinking: +"Is he ruined? If he is not ruined, what is the meaning of these +puzzling changes here?" And she had remembered her shrewd mother's +hints, and her own later fears, concerning the insecurity of his +position: and had studied his tired and worn face for an equivocal sign. +But this smile, self-confident and firm, was not the smile of a ruined +man; and his flashing glance seemed to be an omen of definite success. + +"Wants to give it up?" exclaimed Hilda. + +He nodded. + +"But why? I thought she was doing rather well." + +"So she is." + +"Then why?" + +"Ah!" George Cannon lifted his head with a gesture signifying enigma. +"That's just what I wanted to ask you. Hasn't she said anything to you?" + +"As to giving it up? No!... So it was this that you wanted to see me +about?" + +He nodded. "She wrote me a few days after you came away, and suggested I +should see you and ask you what you thought." + +"But why me?" + +"Well, she thinks the world of you, Sarah does." + +Hilda thought: "How strange! She did nothing but look after me, and wait +on me hand and foot, and I never helped her in any way; and yet she +turns to me!" And she was extremely flattered and gratified, and was +aware of a delicious increase of self-respect. + +"But supposing she does give it up?" Hilda said aloud. "What will she +do?" + +"Exactly!" said George Cannon, and then, in a very confidential, +ingratiating manner: "I wish you'd write to her and put some reason into +her. She mustn't give it up. With her help--and you know in the +management she's simply wonderful--with her help, I think I shall be +able to bring something about that'll startle folks. Only, she mustn't +throw me over. And she mustn't get too crotchety with the boarders. I've +had some difficulty in that line, as it is. In fact, I've had to be +rather cross. You know about the Boutwoods, for instance! Well, I've +smoothed that over.... It's nothing, nothing--if she'll keep her head. +If she'll keep her head it's a gold mine--you'll see! Only--she wants a +bit of managing. If you'd write--" + +"I shan't write," said Hilda. "I shall go and see her--at once. I should +have gone in any case, after her letter this morning saying how unwell +she is. She wants company. She was so kind to me I couldn't possibly +leave her in the lurch. I can't very well get away to-day, but I shall +go to-morrow, and I shall drop her a line to-night." + +"It's very good of you, I'm sure," said George Cannon. Obviously he was +much relieved. + +"Not at all!" Hilda protested. She felt very content and happy. + +"The fact is," he went on, "there's nobody but you can do it. Your +mother was the only real friend she ever had. And this is the first time +she's been left alone up there, you see. I'm quite sure you can save the +situation." + +He was frankly depending on her for something which he admitted he could +not accomplish himself. Those two people, George Cannon and Sarah +Gailey, had both instinctively turned to her in a crisis. None could do +what she could do. She, by the force of her individuality, could save +the situation. She was no longer a girl, but a mature and influential +being. Her ancient diffidence before George Cannon had completely gone; +she had no qualms, no foreboding, no dubious sensation of weakness. +Indeed, she felt herself in one respect his superior, for his confidence +in Sarah Gailey's housewifely skill, his conviction that it was unique +and would be irreplaceable, struck her as somewhat naif, as being yet +another example of the absurd family pride which she and her mother had +often noticed in the Five Towns. She was not happy at the prospect of so +abruptly quitting the delights of Lane End House and the vicinity of +Edwin Clayhanger; she was not happy at the prospect of postponing the +consideration of plans for her own existence; she was not happy at the +prospect of Sarah Gailey's pessimistic complainings. She was above +happiness. She was above even that thrill of sharp and intense vitality +which in times past had ennobled trouble and misery. She had the most +exquisite feeling of triumphant self-justification. She was splendidly +conscious of power. She was indispensable. + +And the dismantled desolation of the echoing office, and the mystery of +George Cannon's personal position, somehow gave a strange poignancy to +her mood. + +They talked of indifferent matters: her property, the Orgreaves, even +the defunct newspaper, as to which George Cannon shrugged his shoulders. +Then the conversation drooped. + +"I shall go up by the four train to-morrow," she said, clinching the +interview, and rising. + +"I may go up by that train myself," said George Cannon. + +She started. "Oh! are you going to Hornsey, too?" + +"No! Not Hornsey. I've other business." + + + + +CHAPTER II +SARAH'S BENEFACTOR + + +I + +On the following afternoon Hilda travelled alone by the local train from +Bleakridge to Knype, the central station where all voyagers for London, +Birmingham, and Manchester had to foregather in order to take the fast +expresses that unwillingly halted there, and there only, in their +skimming flights across the district. It was a custom of Five Towns +hospitality that a departing guest should be accompanied as far as Knype +and stowed with personal attentions into the big train. But on this +occasion Hilda had wished otherwise. "I should _prefer_ nobody to go +with me to Knype," she had said, in a characteristic tone, to Janet. It +was enough. The family had wondered; but it was enough. The family knew +its singular, its mysterious Hilda. And instead of at Knype, the +leave-takings had occurred at the little wayside station of Bleakridge, +with wavy moorland behind, factory chimneys in front, and cinder and +shawd heaps all around. Hilda had told Janet: "Mr. Cannon may be meeting +me at Knype. He's probably going to London too." And the discreet Janet, +comprehending Hilda, had not even mentioned this fact to the rest of the +family. + +George Cannon, in a light summer suit and straw hat, was already on the +platform at Knype. Hilda had feared that at Bleakridge he might be +looking out of the window of the local train, which started from +Turnhill; she had desired not to meet him in the presence of any of the +Orgreaves. But either he had caught the previous train to Knype, or he +had driven down. Holding a Gladstone bag and a stick in one hand, he +stood talking to another man of about his own age and height. The +conversation was vivacious, at any rate on George Cannon's part. Hilda +passed close by him amid the populous stir of the expectant platform. He +saw her, turned, and raised his hat, but in a perfunctory, preoccupied +manner; and instantly resumed the speech to his companion. Hilda +recognized the latter. It was 'young Lawton,' son and successor to 'old +Lawton,' the most famous lawyer in the Five Towns. Young Lawton had a +branch office at Turnhill, and lived in an important house half-way +between Turnhill and Bursley, where, behind the Town Hall, was the +historic principal office of the firm. + +The express came loudly in, and Hilda, having climbed into a +second-class compartment, leaned out from it, to descry her porter and +bestow on him a threepenny bit. George Cannon and young Lawton were +still in argument, and apparently quite indifferent to the train. Young +Lawton's thin face had its usual faint, harsh smile; his limbs were +moveless in an exasperating and obstinate calm; Hilda detested the man +from his mere looks. But George Cannon was very obviously under +excitement. His face was flushed; he moved his free arm violently--even +the Gladstone bag swung to and fro; he punctuated his sentences with +sharp, angry nods of the head, insisting and protesting and insisting, +while the other, saying much less, maintained his damnable stupid +disdainful grin. + +Would he let the train go, in his feverish preoccupation? Hilda was +seriously afraid that he would. The last trunks were flung into the +front van, the stationmaster in his tall hat waved curtly to the +glittering guard; the guard waved his flag, and whistled; a porter +banged the door of Hilda's compartment, ignoring her gestures; the +engine whistled. And at that moment George Cannon, throwing apparently a +last malediction at young Lawton, sprang towards the train, and, seeing +Hilda's face, rushed to the door which she strained to open again. + +"I was afraid you'd be left behind," she said, as he dropped his bag on +the seat and the affronted stationmaster himself shut the door. + +"Not quite!" ejaculated Cannon grimly. + +The smooth, irresistible gliding of the train became apparent, +establishing a sudden aloof calm. Hilda perceived that all her muscles +were tense. + +In the compartment was a middle-aged couple. + +"What's this place?" asked the woman. + +"Looks like Tamworth," said the man sleepily. + +"Knype, sir!" George Cannon corrected him very sharply. He was so +wrought up that he had omitted even to shake hands with Hilda. Making no +effort to talk, and showing no curiosity about Hilda's welfare or +doings, he moved uneasily on his seat, and from time to time opened and +shut the Gladstone bag. Gradually the flush paled from his face. + +At Lichfield the middle-aged couple took advice from a porter and +stumbled out of the train. + + +II + +"We're fairly out of the smoke now," said Hilda, when the train began to +move again. As a fact, they had been fairly out of the smoke of the Five +Towns for more than half an hour; but Hilda spoke at random, timidly, +nervously, for the sake of speaking. And she was as apologetic as though +it was she herself who by some untimely discretion had annoyed George +Cannon. + +"Yes, thank God!" he replied fiercely, blowing with pleasure upon the +embers of his resentment. "And I'll take good care I never go into it +again--to live, that is!" + +"Really?" she murmured, struck into an extreme astonishment. + +He produced a cigar and a match-box. + +"May I?" he demanded carelessly, and accepted her affirmative as of +course. + +"You've heard about my little affair?" he asked, after lighting the +cigar. And he gazed at her curiously. + +"No." + +"Do you mean to say that none of the Orgreaves have said anything this +last day or two?" He leaned forward. They were in opposite corners. + +"No," she repeated stiffly. Nevertheless, she remembered a peculiar +glance of Tom's to his father on the previous day, when George Cannon's +name had been mentioned. + +"Well," said he. "You surprise me! That's all!" + +"But--" She stopped, full of misgivings. + +"Never heard any gossip about me--never?" he persisted, as it were, +menacing her. + +She shook her head. + +"Never heard that I'm not really a solicitor?" + +"Oh! well--I think mother once did say something--" + +"I thought so." + +"But I don't understand those things," she said simply. "Is anything the +matter? Is--" + +"Nothing!" he replied, calm and convincing. "Only I've been done! Done! +You'll hear about it some day, I dare say.... Shall I tell you? Would +you like me to tell you?" He smiled rather boyishly and leaned back. + +"Yes," she nodded. + +His attitude was very familiar, recalling their former relation of +employer and employed. It seemed as natural to her as to him that he +should not too ceremoniously conceal his feelings or disguise his mood. + +"Well, you see, I expect I know as much about law as any of 'em, but +I've never been admitted, and so--" He stopped, perceiving that she did +not comprehend the significance of such a word as 'admitted.' "If you +want to practise as a solicitor you have to pass examinations, and I +never have passed examinations. Very expensive, all that! And I couldn't +afford when I was young. It isn't the exams that are difficult--you may +tell that from the fellows that pass them. Lawton, for instance. But +after a certain age exams become a nuisance. However, I could do +everything else. I might have had half a dozen situations as managing +clerk in the Five Towns if I'd wanted. Only I didn't want! I wanted to +be on my own. I could get clients as quick as any of them. _And_ +quicker! So I found Karkeek--the excellent Mr. Karkeek! Another of the +bright ones that could pass the exams! Oh! He'd passed the exams all +right! He'd spent five years and I don't know how many hundred pounds in +passing the exams, and with it all he couldn't get above a couple of +pounds a week. There are hundreds of real solicitors up and down the +country who aren't earning more. And they aren't worth more. But I gave +him more, and a lot more. Just to use his name on my door and my blinds. +See? In theory I was his clerk, but in reality he was mine. It was all +quite clear. He understood--I should think he did, by Jove!" George +Cannon laughed shortly. "Every one understood. I got a practice together +in no time. _He_ didn't do it. He wouldn't have got a practice together +in a thousand years. I had the second-best practice in Turnhill, and I +should soon have had the best--if I hadn't been done." + +"Yes?" said Hilda. The confidence flattered her. + +"Well, Karkeek came into some money,--and he simply walked out of the +office! Simply walked out! Didn't give me time to turn round. I'd always +treated him properly. But he was jealous." + +"What a shame!" Hilda's scorn shrivelled up Mr. Karkeek. There was +nothing that she detested so much as a disloyalty. + +"Yes. I couldn't stop him, of course. No formal agreement between us. +Couldn't be, in a case like ours! So he had me. He'd taken my wages +quick enough as long as it suited him. Then he comes into money, and +behaves like that. Jealousy! They were all jealous,--always had been. I +was doing too well. So I had the whole gang down on me instantly like a +thousand of bricks. They knew I was helpless, and so they came on. +Special meeting of the committee of the North Staffordshire Law Society, +if you please! Rumours of prosecution--oh yes! I don't know what!... All +because I wouldn't take the trouble to pass their wretched exams.... +Why, I could pass their exams on my head, if I hadn't anything better to +do. But I have. At first I thought I'd retire for five years and pass +their exams, and then come back and make 'em sit up. And wouldn't I have +made 'em sit up! But then I said to myself, 'No. It isn't good enough.'" + +Hilda frowned. "What isn't?" + +"What? The Five Towns isn't good enough! I can find something better +than the law, and I can find something better than the Five Towns!... +And here young Lawton has the impudence to begin to preach to me on +Knype platform, and to tell me I'm wise in going! He's the President of +the local Law Society, you know! No end of a President! And hasn't even +got gumption enough to keep his father's practice together! Stupid ass! +Well, I let him have it, and straight! He's no worse than the rest. +They've got no brains in this district. And they're so narrow--narrow +isn't the word! Thick-headed's the word. Stupid! Mean!... Mean!... What +did it matter to them? I kept to all their rules. There was a real +solicitor on the premises, and there'd soon have been another, if I'd +had time. No concern of theirs how the money was divided between me and +the real solicitor. But they were jealous--there you are! They don't +understand enterprise. They hate it. Nothing ever moves in the Five +Towns. And they've got no manners--I do believe that's the worst. Look +at Lawton's manners! Nothing but a boor! They aren't civilized +yet--that's what's the matter with them! That's what my father used to +say. Barbarians, he used to say. '_Ce sont des barbares!_'... Kids used +to throw stones at him because of his neck-tie. The grown-ups chuck a +brick at anything they don't quite fancy. That's their idea of wit." + +Hilda was afraid of his tempestuous mood. But she enjoyed her fear, as +she might have enjoyed exposure to a dangerous storm. She enjoyed the +sensation of her fragility and helplessness there, cooped up with him in +the close intimacy of the compartment. She was glad that he did not +apologize to her for his lack of restraint, nor foolishly pretend that +he was boring her. + +"It does seem a shame!" she murmured, her eyes candidly admitting that +she felt enormously flattered. + +He sighed and laughed. "How often have I heard my father say that--'_Ce +sont des barbares_!' Peels only brought him over because they could find +nobody in the Five Towns civilized enough to do the work that he did.... +I can imagine how he must have felt when he first came here!... My +God!... Environment!... I tell you what--it's only lately I've realized +how I loathe the provinces!" + +The little interior in which they were, swept steadily and smoothly +across the central sunlit plain of England, passing canals and brooks +and cottages and churches--silent and stolid in that English stupidity +that he was criticizing. And Hilda saw of George Cannon all that was +French in him. She saw him quite anew, as something rather exotic and +entirely marvellous. She thought: "When I first met him, I said to +myself he was a most extraordinary man. And I was right. I was more +right than I ever imagined. No one down there has any idea of what he +really is. They're too stupid, as he says." + +He imposed on her his scorn of the provincial. She had to share it. She +had a vision of the Five Towns as a smoky blotch on the remote +horizon,--negligible, crass, ridiculous in its heavy self-complacency. +The very Orgreaves themselves were tinged with this odious English +provincialism. + +He smiled to himself, and then said, very quietly: "It isn't of the +least importance, you know. In fact I'm rather glad. I've never had any +difficulty in making money, and when I've settled up everything down +there I shan't be precisely without. And I shall have no excuse for not +branching out in a new line." + +She meekly encouraged him to continue. + +"Oh yes!" he went on. "The law isn't the only thing--not by a long way. +And besides, I'm sick of it. Do you know what the great thing of the +future is, I mean the really great thing--the smashing big thing?" He +smiled, kindly and confidential. + +She too smiled, shaking her head. + +"Well, I'll tell you. Hotels!" + +"Hotels?" She was perfectly nonplussed. + +"Hotels! There'll be more money and more fun to be got out of hotels, +soon, than out of any other kind of enterprise in the world. You should +see those hotels that are going up in London! They'd give you a start, +and no mistake! Yes, hotels! There aren't twenty people in England who +know what a hotel is! But I know!" He paused, and added reflectively, in +a comically naïve tone: "Curious how these things come to you, bit by +bit! Now, if it hadn't been for Sarah--and that boarding-house--" + +He was using his straw hat as a fan. With an unexpected and almost +childlike gesture he suddenly threw the hat up on to the rack above his +head, "How's that?" + +"What a boy he is, after all!" thought Hilda sympathetically, wondering +why in the midst of all her manifold astonishment she felt so +light-hearted and gay. + +"Funny parcel you've got up there!" he idly observed, glancing from one +rack to the other. + +The parcel contained Mrs. Orgreave's generous conception of a repast +proper to be eaten in a train in place of high tea. He helped her to eat +it. + +As the train approached London he resumed his manhood. And he was +impeccably adult as he conducted her from Euston to King's Cross, and +put her into a train in a corner of the station that the summer twilight +had already taken possession of. + + +III + +Late at night Hilda sat with Sarah Gailey in the landlady's small +bedroom at the Cedars. It was lighted by a lamp, because the builder of +the house, hating excess, had thought fit not to carry gas-pipes higher +than the first floor. A large but old bedstead filled half the floor +space. On the shabby dressing-table a pile of bills and various papers +lay near the lamp. Clothes were hung behind the door, and a vague wisp +of muslin moved slightly in the warm draught from the tiny open window. +There were two small cane-chairs, enamelled, on which the women sat, +close to each other, both incommoded by the unwholesome sultriness of +the only chamber that could be spared for the private use of the +house-mistress. This small bedroom was Sarah Gailey's home; its +amenities were the ultimate nightly reward of her labours. If George +Cannon had obtained possession of the Cedars as an occupation for Sarah, +this room and Sarah's pleasure therein were the sole justification of +the entire mansion. + +As Hilda looked at Sarah Gailey's bowed head, but little greyed, beneath +the ray of the lamp, and at her shrivelled, neurotic, plaintive face in +shadow, and at her knotty hands loosely clasped, she contrasted her +companion and the scene with the youthfulness and the spaciousness and +the sturdy gay vigour of existence in the household of the Orgreaves. +She thought, with a renewed sense of the mysterious strangeness of life: +"Last night I was there, far away--all those scores of miles of fields +and towns are between!--and to-night I am here. Down there I was nothing +but an idler. Here I am the strongest. I am indispensable. I am the one +person on whom she depends. Without me everything will go to pieces." +And she thought of George Cannon's vast enigmatic projects concerning +grand hotels. In passing the immense pile of St. Pancras on the way from +Euston to King's Cross, George Cannon had waved his hand and said: "Look +at that! Look at that! It's something after that style that I want for a +toy! And I'll have it!" Yes, the lofty turrets of St. Pancras had not +intimidated him. He, fresh from little Turnhill and from defeats, could +rise at once to the height of them, and by the force of imagination make +them his own! He could turn abruptly from the law--to hotels! A +disconcerting man! And the mere tone in which he mentioned his +enterprise seemed, in a most surprising way, to dignify hotels, and even +boarding-houses; to give romance to the perfectly unromantic business of +lodging and catering!... And the seed from which he was to grow the +magic plant sat in the room there with Hilda: that bowed head! The +ambition and the dream resembled St. Pancras: the present reality was +the Cedars, and Sarah's poor, stuffy little bedroom in the Cedars. + +Sarah began to cry, weakly. + +"But what's the matter?" asked Hilda, the strong succourer. + +"Nothing. Only it's such a relief to me you've come." + +Hilda deprecated lightly. "I should have come sooner if I'd known. You +ought to have sent word before." + +"No, I couldn't. After all, what is it? I'm only silly. There's nothing +really the matter. The minute you come I can see that. I can even stand +those Boutwoods if you're here. You know George made it up with them; +and I won't say he wasn't right. But I had to put my pride in my pocket. +And yesterday it nearly made me scream out to see Mrs. Boutwood stir her +tea." + +"But why?" + +"I don't know. It's nerves, that's what it is.... Well, I've got to go +through these." She fingered the papers on the dressing-table with her +left hand while drying her tears with the right. "He's very wishful for +proper accounts, George is. That's right enough. But--well--I think I +can make a shilling go as far as anyone, and choose flesh-meat with +anyone, too--that I will say--but these accounts...! George is always +wanting to know how much it costs a head a week for this that and the +other.... It's all very well for him, but if he had the servants to look +after and--" + +"I'm going to keep your accounts for you," Hilda soothed her. + +"But--" + +"I'm going to keep your accounts for you," And she thought: "How exactly +like mother I was just then!" + +It appeared to Hilda that she was making a promise, and shouldering a +responsibility, against her will, and perhaps against her common sense. +She might keep accounts at the Cedars for a week, a fortnight, a month. +But she could not keep accounts there indefinitely. She was sowing +complications for herself. Freedom and change and luxury were what she +deemed she desired; not a desk in a boarding-house. And yet something +within her compelled her to say in a firm, sure, kindly voice: + +"Now give me all those papers, Miss Gailey." + +And amid indefinite regret and foreboding, she was proud and happy in +her rôle of benefactor. + +When Hilda at length rose to go to her own room, Sarah Gailey had to +move her chair so that she might pass. At the door both hesitated for an +instant, and then Hilda with a sudden gesture advanced her lips. It was +the first time she and Sarah had ever kissed. The contact with that +desiccated skin intensified to an extraordinary degree Hilda's emotional +sympathy for the ageing woman. She thought, poignantly: "Poor old +thing!" + +And when she was on the dark little square landing under the roof, +Sarah, holding the lamp, called out in a whisper. + +"Hilda!" + +"Well?" + +"Did he say anything to you about Brighton?" + +"Brighton?" She perceived with certainty from Sarah's eager and yet +apologetic tone, that the question had been waiting for utterance +throughout the evening, and that Sarah had lacked courage for it until +the kiss had enheartened her. And also she perceived that Sarah was +suspecting her of being somehow in conspiracy with George Cannon. + +"Yes," said Sarah. "He's got into his head that Brighton's the only +place for this boarding-house business if it's to be properly done." + +"He never said a word to me about Brighton," Hilda whispered positively. + +"Oh!" + +Hilda descended the stairs, groping. Brighton? What next? + + + + +CHAPTER III +AT BRIGHTON + + +I + +She thought vividly, one afternoon about three months later, of that +final scrap of conversation. Just as she had sat opposite George Cannon +in a second-class compartment, so now she was sitting opposite Sarah +Gailey in a second-class compartment. The train, having passed Lewes, +was within a few minutes of Brighton. And following behind them, +somewhere at the tail of the train, were certain trunks containing all +that she possessed and all that Sarah Gailey possessed of personal +property--their sole chattels and paraphernalia on earth. George Cannon +had willed it and brought it about. He was to receive them on the +platform of Brighton Station. She had not seen very much of him in the +interval, for he had been continually on the move between Brighton and +Turnhill. "In a moment we shall all be together again," she reflected. +"This meeting also will happen, as everything else has happened, and a +new period will definitely have begun." And she sat and stared at the +closed eyes of the desiccated Sarah Gailey, and waited for the instant +of arrival apprehensively and as it were incredulously--not with fear, +not with pleasure, but with the foreboding of adventure and a curious +idea that the instant of arrival never would come. + +For thirteen weeks, which had gone very quickly, she had devoted herself +to Sarah Gailey, acting as George Cannon's precursor, prophet, and +expounder. While the summer cooled into autumn, and the boarding-house +season slackened and once more feebly brightened, she had daily +conversed with Sarah about George's plans, making them palatable to her, +softening the shocks of them, and voluntarily promising not to quit her +until the crisis was past. She had had to discourse on the unique +advantages of Brighton as a field for George's enterprise, and on +George's common sense and on Sarah's common sense, and the +interdependence of the two. When the news came that George had acquired +down there a house in going order, she had had to prove that it was not +the end of the world that was announced. When the news came that George +had re-sold the Cedars to its original occupier, she had had to prove +that the transaction did not signify a mysterious but mortal insult to +Sarah. When the news came that the Cedars must be vacated before noon on +a given Saturday, she had had to begin all her demonstrations afresh, +and in addition attempt to persuade Sarah that George was not utterly +mad--buying and selling boarding-house tenancies all over the South of +England!--and that the exit from the Cedars would not be the ruin of +dignity and peace, and the commencement of fatal disasters. In the hour +when Sarah Gailey learnt the immutable Saturday of departure, the +Cedars, which had been her hell, promised to become, on that very +Saturday, a paradise. + +On the whole, the three months had constituted a quarter of exceeding +difficulty and delicacy. The first month had been rendered memorable by +Sarah's astonishing behaviour when Hilda had desired to pay, as before, +for her board and lodging. The mere offer of the money had made plain to +Sarah--what she then said she had always suspected--that Hilda was her +enemy in disguise and (like the rest) bent on humiliating her, and +outraging her most sacred feelings. In that encounter, but in no other, +Sarah had won. The opportune withdrawal of the Boutwoods from the +boarding-house had assisted the establishment of peace. When the +Boutwoods left, Miss Gailey seemed to breathe the drawing-room air as +though it were ozone of the mountains. But her joy had been quickly +dissipated, for to dissipate joy was her chief recreation. A fortnight +before the migration to Brighton Hilda, contemplating all that had to be +done, had thought, aghast: "I shall never he able to humour her into +doing it all!" Closing of accounts, dismissals, inventories, bills, +receipts, packing, decision concerning trains, reception of the former +proprietor (especially that!), good-byes, superintending the stowage of +luggage on the cab...! George Cannon had not once appeared in the last +sensitive weeks, and he had therein been wise. And all that had to be +done had been done--not by Hilda, but by Sarah Gailey the touchy and the +competent. Hilda had done little but the humouring. + + +II + +And there sat Sarah Gailey, deracinated and captive, to prove how +influential a person Hilda was! With the eyes shut, Sarah's worn face +under her black bonnet had precisely the aspect of a corpse--and the +corpse of somebody who had expired under the weight of all the world's +woe! Hilda thought: "When she is dead she will look just like that!... +And one day, sooner or later, she will be dead." Strange that Sarah +Gailey, with no malady except her chronic rheumatism, and no material +anxiety, and every prospect of security in old age, could not be +content, could not at any rate refrain from being miserable! But she +could not. She was an exhaustless fount of worry and misery. "I suppose +I like her," thought Hilda. "But why do I like her? She isn't agreeable. +She isn't amusing. She isn't pretty. She isn't even kind, now. She's +only depressing and tedious. As soon as she's fixed up here, I shall go. +I shall leave her. I've done enough, and I've had enough. I must attend +to my own affairs a bit. After all--" And then Hilda's conscience +interrupted: "But can you leave her altogether? Without you, what will +happen to her? She's getting older and worse every day. Perhaps in a few +years she won't even be competent. Already she isn't perhaps quite, +quite as competent as she was." And Hilda said: "Well, of course, I +shall have to keep an eye on her; come and see her sometimes--often." +And she knew that as long as they both lived she could never be free +from a sense of responsibility towards Sarah Gailey. Useless to argue: +"It's George Cannon's affair, not mine!" Useless to ask: "_Why_ should I +feel responsible?" Only after she had laid Sarah Gailey in the tomb +would she be free. "And that day too will come!" she thought again. "I +shall have to go through it, and I shall go through it!" + +The poignant romance of existence enveloped her in its beautiful veils. +And through these veils she saw, vague and diminished, the far vista of +the hours which she had spent with the Orgreaves. She saw the night of +Edwin Clayhanger's visit, and herself and him together in the porch, +and she remembered the shock of his words, "There's no virtue in +believing." The vision was like that of another and quite separate life. +Would she ever go back to it? Janet was her friend, in theory her one +intimate friend: she had seen her once in London,--beautiful, agreeable, +affectionate, intelligent; all the Orgreaves were lovable. The glance of +Edwin Clayhanger, and the sincerity of his smile, had affected her in a +manner absolutely unique.... But would she ever go back? It seemed to +her fantastic, impossible, that she should ever go back. It seemed to +her that she was netted by destiny. In any case she knew that she could +not, meanwhile, give to that group in Bursley even a part of herself. +Hilda could never give a part of herself. Moreover, she was a bad +letter-writer. And so, if among themselves the group at Bursley charged +her with inconstancy, she must accept the accusation, to which she was +inevitably exposed by the very ardour of her temperament. + +The putting-on of brakes took her unawares. The train was in Brighton, +sliding over the outskirts of the town. Miss Gailey opened her +apprehensive eyes. Hilda saw steep streets of houses that sprawled on +the hilly mounds of the great town like ladders: reminiscent of certain +streets of her native district, yet quite different, a physiognomy +utterly foreign to her. This then, was Brighton. That which had been a +postmark became suddenly a reality, shattering her preconceptions of it, +and disappointing her she knew not why. She glanced forward, through the +window, and saw the cavern of the station. In a few seconds they would +have arrived, and her formal mission would be over. She was very +agitated and very nervous. George Cannon had promised to meet them. +Would he meet them? + +The next instant she saw the platform. She saw George Cannon, +conspicuous and debonair in a new suit, swinging his ebony stick. The +train stopped. He descried them. + +"There he is!" she said, bravely pretending to be gay. And she thought: +"I could not believe that this moment would come, but it has come." + +She had anticipated relief from this moment, but she was aware of no +relief. On the contrary, she felt most uncomfortably apologetic to Sarah +Gailey for George Cannon, and to George Cannon for Sarah Gailey. She had +the constraint of a sinner. And, by the side of George Cannon on the +platform, she was aware of her shabbiness and of her girlish fragility. +Nevertheless, she put her shoulders back with a gesture like his own, +thinking proudly, and trying to make her eyes speak: "Well, here is +Sarah Gailey,--thanks to me!" + +As Sarah greeted him, Hilda observed, with some dismay, a curious, very +slight stiffening of her demeanour--familiar phenomenon, which denoted +that Sarah was in the grip of a secret grievance. "Poor old thing!" she +thought ruefully. "I'd imagined she'd forgiven him for bringing her +here; but she hasn't." + + +III + +They drove down from the station in an open carriage, unencumbered by +the trunks, which George Cannon had separately disposed of. He sat with +his back to the horse, opposite the two women, and talked at intervals +about the weather, the prospects of the season, and the town. His +familiarity with the town was apparently such that he seemed to be a +native of it, and even in some mysterious way to have assisted in its +creation and development; so that he took pride in its qualities and +accepted responsibility for its defects. When he ceremoniously saluted +two women who went by in another carriage, Hilda felt sharply the +inferiority of an ignorant stranger in presence of one for whom the +place had no secrets. + +Her first disappointment changed slowly into expectant and hopeful +curiosity. The quaint irregularities of the architecture, and the +vastness of the thronged perspectives, made promises to her romantic +sense. The town seemed to be endless as London. There were hotels, +churches, chapels, libraries, and music-shops on every hand. The more +ordinary features of main streets--the marts of jewellery, drapery, and +tobacco--had an air of grandiose respectability; while the narrow alleys +that curved enigmatically away between the lofty buildings of these fine +thoroughfares beckoned darkly to the fancy. The multiplicity of beggars, +louts, and organ-grinders was alone a proof of Brighton's success in the +world; the organ-grinders, often a man and a woman yoked together, were +extraordinarily English, genteel, and prosperous as they trudged in +their neat, middle-class raiment through the gritty mud of the macadam, +stolidly ignoring the menace of high-stepping horses and disdainful +glittering wheels. Brighton was evidently a city apart. Nevertheless, +Hilda did not as yet understand why George Cannon should have considered +it to be the sole field worthy of his enterprise. + +Then the carriage rounded into King's Road, and suddenly she saw the +incredible frontage of hotels, and _pensions_ and apartments, and she +saw the broad and boundless promenade alive with all its processions of +pleasure, and she saw the ocean. And everything that she had seen up to +that moment fell to the insignificance of a background. She understood. + +After a blusterous but mild autumn day the scarlet sun was setting +calmly between a saffron sky and saffron water; it flashed upon waves +and sails and flags, and upon the puddles in the road, and upon +bow-windows and flowered balconies, giving glory to human pride. The +carriage, merged in a phalanx of carriages, rolled past innumerable +splendid houses, and every house without exception was a hostel and an +invitation. Some were higher than any she had ever seen; and one +terrific building, in course of construction, had already far overtopped +the highest of its neighbours. She glanced at George Cannon, who, by a +carefully casual demeanour, was trying not to take the credit of the +entire spectacle; and she admitted that he was indeed wonderful. + +"Of course, Sarah," he said, as the carriage shortly afterwards turned +up Preston Street, where the dying wind roughly caught them, "we aren't +beginning with anything as big as all that, so you needn't shiver in +your shoes. You know what my notion is"--he included Hilda in his +address--"my notion is to get some experience first in a smaller house. +We must pay for our experience, and my notion is to pay as little as +possible. I can tell you there's quite a lot of things that have to be +picked up before you've got the hang of a town like this--quite a lot." + +Sarah grimly nodded. She had scarcely spoken. + +"We're beginning rather well. I've told you all about the Watchett +sisters, haven't I? They're an income, a positive income! And then +Boutwood and his wife have decided to come--did I tell you?" + +"Bou--" + +The syllable escaped explosively from Sarah Gailey's mouth, overcoming +her stern guard. Instantly, by a tremendous effort, she checked the +flow. But the violent shock of the news had convulsed her whole being. +The look on her face was changed to desperation. Hilda trembled, and +even the splendid and ever-resurgent George Cannon was discountenanced. +Not till then had Hilda realized with what intense bitterness the +souvenir of the Boutwoods festered in Sarah Gailey's unreasoning heart. + + +IV + +"Here we are!" said George Cannon jauntily, as the carriage stopped in +front of No. 59 Preston Street. But his jauntiness seemed factitious. +The demeanour of all three was diffident and unnatural, for now had +arrived the moment when George Cannon had to submit his going concern to +the ordeal of inspection by the women, and especially by Sarah Gailey. +There the house stood, a physical fact, forcing George to justify it, +and beseeching clemency from the two women. The occasion was critical; +therefore everybody had to pretend that it was a perfectly ordinary +occasion, well knowing the futility of the pretence. And the inevitable +constraint was acutely aggravated by Sarah's silent and terrible +reception of the news concerning the Boutwoods. + +While George Cannon was paying the driver, Sarah and Hilda hesitated +awkwardly on the pavement, their hands occupied with small belongings. +They had the sensation of being foreigners to the house; they could not +even mount the steps without his protection; scarcely might they in +decency examine the frontage of the house. They could not, however, +avoid seeing that a workman was fixing a new and splendid brass-plate at +the entrance, and that this plate bore the words, "Cannon's Boarding- +house." Hilda thought, startled: "At last he is using his own name!" + +He turned to them. + +"You have a view of the sea from the bow-window of the drawing-room--on +the first floor," he remarked. + +Neither Hilda nor Sarah responded. + +"And of course from the other bow-window higher up," he added, almost +pitifully, in his careful casualness. + +Hilda felt sorry for him, and she could not understand why she felt +sorry, why it seemed a shame that he should be mysteriously compelled +thus to defend the house before it had been attacked. + +"Oh yes!" she murmured foolishly, almost fatuously. + +The street and the house were disappointing. After the grandeur of the +promenade, the street appeared shabby and third-rate; it had the +characteristics of a side street; it was the retreat of those who could +not afford anything better, and its base inhabitants walked out on to +the promenade and swaggeringly feigned to be the equals of their +superiors. The house also was shabby and third-rate--with its poor +little glimpse of the sea. Although larger than the Cedars, it was +noticeably smaller and meaner than any house on the promenade, and +whereas the Cedars was detached, No. 59 was not even semi-detached, but +one of a gaunt, tall row of stuccoed and single-fronted dwellings. It +looked like a boarding-house (which the Cedars did not), and not all the +style of George Cannon's suit and cane and manner, as he mounted the +steps, nor the polish of his new brass-plate, could redeem it from the +disgrace of being a very ordinary boarding-house. + +George Cannon had made a serious mistake in bringing the carriage round +by the promenade. True, he had exhibited the glory of Brighton, but he +had done so to the detriment of his new enterprise. That No. 59 ought to +be regarded as merely an inexpensive field for the acquiring of +preliminary experience did not influence the judgment of the women in +the slightest degree. For them it was a house that rightly apologized +for itself, and whose apologetic air deserved only a condescending +tolerance. + +The front door stood open for the convenience of the artisan who was +screwing at the brass-plate. He moved aside, with the servility that +always characterizes the worker in a city of idlers, and the party +passed into a long narrow hall, whose walls were papered to imitate +impossible blocks of mustard-coloured marble. The party was now at home. + +"Here we are!" said Hilda, with a gaiety that absolutely desolated +herself, and in the same instant she remembered that George Cannon had +preceded her in saying 'Here we are!' She looked from the awful glumness +of Sarah Gailey to the equally awful alacrity of George Cannon, and felt +as though she had committed some crime whose nature she could not guess. + +A middle-aged maid appeared, like a suspicious scout, at the far end of +the hall, beyond the stairs, having opened a door which showed a glimpse +of a kitchen. + +"That tea ready?" asked George Cannon. + +"No, sir," said the maid plumply. + +"Well, let it be got ready." + +"Yes, sir." The maid vanished, flouncing. + +Sarah Gailey, with a heavy sigh, dropped her small belongings on to a +narrow bare table that stood against the wall near the foot of the +stairs. Daylight was fading. + +"Well," said George Cannon, balancing his hat on his cane, "your luggage +will be here directly. This is the dining-room." He pushed at a +yellow-grained door. + +The women followed him into the dining-room, and stared at the dining- +room in silence. + +"There's a bedroom behind," he said, as they came out, and he displayed +the bedroom behind. "That's the kitchen." He pointed to the adjoining +door. + +"The drawing-room's larger," he said. "It includes the width of the +hall." + +They climbed the narrow stairs after him wearily. The door of the +drawing-room was ajar, and the chatter of thin feminine voices could be +heard within. George Cannon gave a soundless warning whisper: "The +Watchetts." And Sarah Gailey frowned back the information that she did +not wish to meet the Watchetts just then. With every precaution against +noise, George Cannon opened two other doors, showing bedrooms. And then, +as it were, hypnotized by him, the women climbed another flight of +narrow stairs, darkening, and saw more rooms, and then still another +flight, and still more rooms, and finally the boasted view of the sea! +After all, Hilda was obliged to admit to herself that the house was more +impressive than she had at first supposed. Although single-fronted, it +was deep, and there were two bedrooms on the first floor, and four +each--two large and two small--on the second and third. Eleven in all, +they had seen, of which three were occupied by the Watchetts, and one, +temporarily, by George Cannon. The rest were empty; but the season had +scarcely begun, and the Boutwoods were coming. George Cannon had said +grandly that Hilda must choose her room; she chose the smallest on the +top floor. The furniture, if shabby and old-fashioned, was everywhere +ample. + +They descended, and not a word had been said about Sarah's room. + +On the first-floor landing, where indeed the danger was acutest, they +were trapped by two of the Watchetts. These elderly ladies shot almost +roguishly out of the drawing-room, and by their smiles struck the +descending party into immobility. + +"Oh! We saw you arrive, Mr. Cannon!" said the elder, shaking her head. +"So this is Miss Gailey! Good afternoon, Miss Gailey! So pleased to make +your acquaintance!" + +There was handshaking. Then it was Hilda's turn. + +"We're so sorry our eldest sister isn't here to welcome you to No. 59," +said the younger. "She's had to go to London for the day. We're very +fond of No. 59. There's no place quite like it, to our minds. And we're +quite sure we shall be quite as comfortable with dear Miss Gailey as we +were with dear Mrs. Granville, poor thing. It was quite a wrench when we +had to say good-bye to her last night. Do come into the drawing-room, +please! There's a beautiful view of the sea!" + +Sarah Gailey hesitated. A noise of bumping came from the hall below. + +"I think that's the luggage," she said. The smile with which she forced +herself to respond to the fixed simper of the Watchetts seemed to cause +her horrible torment. She motioned nervously to George Cannon, who was +nearest the stairs. + +"A little later, then! A little later, then!" said both the Watchetts, +bowing the party away with the most singular grimaces. + +In the hall, a lad, perspiring and breathing quickly, stood behind the +trunks. + +"Wait a moment," George Cannon said to him, and murmured to Sarah: "This +is the basement, here." + +The middle-aged maid appeared at the kitchen door with a large loaded +tray. "Come along with that tea, Louisa," he added pleasantly. + +He went first, Sarah next, and Hilda last, cautiously down a short, dark +flight of stone steps beneath the stairs; the servant followed. At the +foot a gas-jet burned. + +"Those Watchetts might be the landladies!" muttered Sarah, strangely +ignoring the propinquity of the maid; and sniffed. + +Hilda gave a short, uneasy laugh. She had a desire to laugh loudly and +wildly, and by so doing to snap the nervous tension, which seemed to +grow tighter and tighter every minute. Her wretchedness had become so +exquisite that she could begin to enjoy it, to savour it like a +pleasure. + +And she thought, with conscious and satisfied grimness: + +"So this is Brighton!" + + + + +CHAPTER IV +THE SEA + + +I + +In the evening Hilda, returning from a short solitary walk as far as the +West Pier, found Sarah Gailey stooping over her open trunks in the +bedroom which had been assigned to her. There were two quite excellent +though low-ceiled rooms, of which this was one, in the basement; the +other was to be used as a private parlour by the managers of the house. +At night, with the gas lighted and the yellow blind drawn and the loose +bundle of strips paper gleaming in the grate, the bedroom seemed very +cozy and habitable in its shabbiness; like the rest of the house it had +an ample supply of furniture, and especially of those trifling articles, +useful or useless, which collect only by slow degrees, and which are a +proof of long humanizing habitation. In that room Sarah Gailey was +indeed merely the successor of the regretted Mrs. Granville, the +landlady who had mysteriously receded into the unknown before the advent +of Sarah and Hilda, but with whom George Cannon must have had many +interviews. No doubt the room was an epitome of the character of Mrs. +Granville, presumably a fussy and precise celibate, with a place for +everything and everything in its place, and an indiscriminating tendency +to hoard. + +Sarah Gailey was at that stage of unpacking when, trunks being nearly +empty and drawers having scarcely begun to fill, bed, table, and chairs +are encumbered with confused masses of goods apparently far exceeding +the cubical contents of the trunks. + +"Can I do anything for you?" asked Hilda. + +The new landlady raised her watery and dejected eyes. "If you wouldn't +mind taking every single one of those knick-knacks off the mantelpiece +and putting them away on the top shelf of the cupboard--" + +Hilda smiled. "It's a bit crowded, isn't it?" + +"Crowded!" By her intonation of this one word Sarah Gailey condemned +Mrs. Granville's whole life. + +"Can I empty this chair? I shall want something to stand on," said +Hilda. + +"Better see if the shelf's dusty," Sarah gloomily warned her. + +"Well," murmured Hilda, on the chair. "If my feather doesn't actually +touch the ceiling!" Sarah Gailey made no response to this +light-heartedness, and Hilda, with her hands full of vain gewgaws, tried +again: "I wonder what Mrs. Granville would say if she saw me!... My +word, it's quite hot up here!" + +A resonant, very amiable voice came from beyond the door: "Is she +there?" + +"Who?" demanded Sarah, grievous. + +"Miss Lessways." It was George Cannon. + +"Yes." + +"I just want to speak to her if she's at liberty," said George Cannon. + +Hilda cried from the ceiling: "I'll come as soon as I've--" + +"Please go now," Sarah interrupted in tense accents. Hilda glanced down +at her, astonished, and saw in her eyes an almost childish appeal, weak +and passionate, which gripped the heart painfully. + +She jumped from the chair. Sarah Gailey was now sitting on the bed. Yes, +in her worn face of a woman who has definitely passed the climacteric, +and in the abandoned pose of those thin arms, there was the look and +gesture of a young girl desperately beseeching. Hilda was puzzled and +intimidated. She had meant to be jocular, and to insist on staying till +the task was finished. But she kept silence and obeyed the supplication, +from a motive of prudence. + +"I wouldn't keep you from him for anything," murmured Sarah Gailey +tragically, as Hilda opened the door and left her sitting forlorn among +all her skirts and linen. + + +II + +"I'm here," George Cannon called out from the parlour when he heard the +sound of the door. He was looking from the window up at the street; the +blind had not been drawn. He turned as Hilda entered. + +"You've been out!" he said, observing that she was in street attire. + +"What is it?" she asked nervously, fearing that some altercation had +already occurred between brother and sister. + +"It's about your private affairs--that's all," he said easily, and +half-humourously. "If you'll just come in." + +"Oh!" she smiled her relief; but nevertheless she was still preoccupied +by the image of the woman in the next room. + +"They've been dragging on quite long enough," said George Cannon, as he +stooped to poke the morsel of fire in the old-fashioned grate, which had +a hob on either side. On one of these hobs was a glass of milk. Hilda +had learnt that day for the first time that at a certain hour every +evening George Cannon drank a glass of warm milk, and that this glass of +warm milk was an important factor in his daily comfort. He now took the +glass and drank it off. And Hilda had a peculiar sensation of being more +intimate with him than she had ever been before. + +They sat down to the square table in the middle of the room crowded with +oddments of furniture, including a desk which George Cannon had +appropriated to his own exclusive use. This desk was open and a portion +of its contents were spread abroad on the crimson cloth of the table. +Among them Hilda noticed, with her accustomed clerkly eye, two numbers +of _The Hotel-Keeper and Boarding-House Review_, several sheets of +advertisement-scales, and a many-paged document with the heading, +"Inventory of Furniture at No. 59 Preston Street"; also a large legal +envelope inscribed, "Lessways Estate." + +From the latter George Cannon drew forth an engraved and flourished +paper, which he silently placed in front of her. It was a receipt signed +by the manager of the Brighton branch of the Southern Counties Bank for +the sum of three thousand four hundred and forty-five pounds deposited +at call by Miss Hilda Lessways. + +"Everything is now settled up," he said. "Here are all the figures," and +he handed her another paper showing the whole of the figures for the +realization of her real property and of her furniture. "It's in your +name, and nobody can touch it but you." + +She glanced at the figures vaguely, not attempting to comprehend them. +As for the receipt, it fascinated her. The fragile scrap represented her +livelihood, her future, her salvation. It alone stood between her and +unimagined terrors. And she was surprised to see it, surprised by its +assurance that no accident had happened to her possessions during the +process of transformation carried out by George Cannon. For, though he +had throughout been almost worryingly meticulous in his business +formalities and his promptitudes--never had any interest or rent been a +day late!--she admitted to herself now that she had been afraid... that, +in fact, she had not utterly trusted him. + +"And what's got to be done with this?" she asked simply, fingering the +receipt. + +He smiled at her, with a touch of protective and yet sardonic +condescension, without saying a word. + +And suddenly it struck her that ages had elapsed since her first +interview with him in the office over the ironmonger's at Turnhill, and +that both of them were extraordinarily changed. (She was reminded of +that interview not by his face and look, nor by their relative positions +at the table, but by a very faint odour of gas-fumes, for at Turnhill +also a gas-jet had been between them.) After an interval of anxiety and +depression he had regained exactly the triumphant self-sure air which +was her earliest recollection of him. He was not appreciably older. But +for her he was no longer the same man, because she saw him differently; +knowing much more of him, she read in his features a thousand minor +significances to which before she had been blind. The dominating +impression was not now the impression of his masculinity; there was no +clearly dominating impression. He had lost, for her, the romantic +allurement of the strange and the unknown. + +Still, she liked and admired him. And she felt an awe, which was +agreeable to her, of his tremendous enterprise and his obstinate +volition. That faculty which he possessed, of uprooting himself and +uprooting others, put her in fear of him. He had willed to be +established as a caterer in Brighton--he who but yesterday (as it +seemed) was a lawyer in Turnhill--and, on this very night, he was +established in Brighton, and his sister with him, and she with his +sister! The enormous affair had been accomplished. This thought had been +obsessing Hilda all the afternoon and evening. + +When she reflected upon the change in herself, the untravelled Hilda of +Turnhill appeared a stranger to her, and a simpleton!; no more! + +As George Cannon offered no answer to her question, she said: + +"I suppose it will have to be invested, all this?" + +He nodded. + +"Well, considering it's only been bringing in one per cent. per annum +for the last week... Of course I needn't have put it on deposit, but I +always prefer that way. It's more satisfactory." + +Hilda could hear faintly, through the thin wooden partition, the +movements of Sarah Gailey in the next room. And the image of the +mournful woman returned to disquiet her. What could be the meaning of +that hysteric appeal and glance? Then she heard the door of the bedroom +open violently, and the figure of Sarah Gailey passed like a flash +across the doorway of the parlour. And the footsteps of Sarah Gailey +pattered up the stone stairs; and the front door banged; and the skirts +and feet of Sarah Gailey intercepted for an instant the light of the +street-lamp that shone on the basement-window of the parlour. + +"Excuse me a minute," muttered Hilda, frowning. By one of her swift and +unreflecting impulses she abandoned George Cannon and her private +affairs, and scurried by the area steps into the street. + + +III + +Bareheaded, and with no jacket or mantle, Sarah Gailey was walking +quickly down Preston Street towards the promenade, and Hilda, afraid but +courageous, followed her at a distance of thirty or forty yards. Hilda +could not decide why she was afraid, nor why it should be necessary, in +so simple an undertaking as a walk down Preston Street, to call upon her +courage. Assuming even that Sarah Gailey turned round and caught +her--what then? The consequences could not be very terrible. But Sarah +Gailey did not turn round. She went straight forward, as though on a +definite errand in a town with which she was perfectly familiar, and, +having arrived at the corner of Preston Street and the promenade, +unhesitatingly crossed the muddy roadway of the promenade, and, after a +moment's halt, vanished down the steps in the sea-wall to the left-hand +of the pier. The pier, a double rope of twinkling lamps, hung magically +over the invisible sea, and at the end of it, constant and grave, a red +globe burned menacingly in the wind-haunted waste of the night. And +Hilda thought, as she hastened with gathering terror across the +promenade: "Out there, at the end of the pier, the water is splashing +and beating against the piles!" + +She stopped at the parapet of the sea-wall, and looked behind her, like +a thief. The wrought-iron entrance to the pier was highly illuminated, +but except for a man's head and shoulders caged in the ticket-box of the +turnstile, there was no life there; the man seemed to be waiting +solitary with everlasting patience in the web of wavering flame beneath +the huge dark sky. Scores of posters, large and small, showed that +Robertson's "School" was being performed in the theatre away over the +sea at the extremity of the pier. The promenade, save for one gigantic +policeman, and a few distant carriages, was apparently deserted, and the +line of dimly lighted hotels, stretching vaguely east and west, had an +air grim and forlorn at that hour. + +Hilda ran down the steps; at the bottom another row of lamps defined the +shore, and now she could hear the tide lapping ceaselessly amid the +supporting ironwork of the pier. She at once descried the figure of +Sarah Gailey in the gloom. The woman was moving towards the faintly +white edge of the sea. Hilda started to run after her, first across +smooth asphalt, and then over some sails stretched out to dry; and then +her feet sank at each step into descending ridges of loose shingle, and +she nearly fell. At length she came to firm sand, and stood still. + +Sarah Gailey was now silhouetted against the pale shallows of foam that +in ever-renewed curves divided the shore from the sea. After a time, she +bent down, rose again, moved towards the water, and drew back. Hilda did +not stir. She could not bring herself to approach the lonely figure. She +felt that to go and accost Sarah Gailey would be indelicate and +inexcusable. She felt as if she were basely spying. She was completely +at a loss, and knew not how to act. But presently she discerned that the +white foam was circling round Sarah's feet, and that Sarah was standing +careless in the midst of it. And at last, timid and shaking with +agitation, she ventured nearer and nearer. And Sarah heard her on the +sand, and looked behind. + +"Miss Gailey!" she appealed in a trembling voice. + +Sarah made no response of any kind, and Hilda reached the edge of the +foam. + +"Please, please don't stand there! You'll catch a dreadful cold, and +you've got nothing on your shoulders, either!" + +"I want to make a hole in the water," said Sarah miserably. "I wanted to +make a hole in the water!" + +"Please do come back with me!" Hilda implored; but she spoke +mechanically, as though saying something which she was bound to say, but +which she did not feel. + +The foam capriciously receded, and Hilda, still without any effort of +her own will, stepped across the glistening, yielding sand and took +Sarah Gailey's arm. There was no resistance. + +"I wanted to make a hole in the water," Sarah repeated. "But I made a +mistake. I ought to have gone to that groin over there. I knew there was +a groin near here, only it's so long since I was here. I'd forgotten +just the place." + +"But what's the matter?" Hilda asked, leading her away from the sea. + +She was not extremely surprised. But she was shocked into a most solemn +awe as she pressed the arm of the poor tragic woman who, but for an +accident, might have plunged off the end of the groin into water deep +enough for drowning. She did really feel humble before this creature who +had deliberately invited death; she in no way criticized her; she did +not even presume to condescend towards the hasty clumsiness of Sarah +Gailey's scheme to die. She was overwhelmed by the woman's utterly +unconscious impressiveness, which exceeded that of a criminal reprieved +on the scaffold, for the woman had dared an experience that only the +fierce and sublime courage of desperation can affront. She had a feeling +that she ought to apologize profoundly to Sarah Gailey for all that +Sarah must have suffered. And as she heard the ceaseless, cruel play of +the water amid the dark jungle of ironwork under the pier, and the soft +creeping of the foam-curves behind, and the vague stirrings of the +night-wind round about--these phenomena combined mysteriously with the +immensity of the dome above and with the baffling strangeness of the +town, and with the grandeur of the beaten woman by her side; and +communicated to Hilda a thrill that was divine in its unexampled +poignancy. + +The great figure of the policeman, suspicious, was descending from the +promenade discreetly towards them. To avoid any encounter with him Hilda +guided her companion towards the pier, and they sheltered there under +the resounding floor of the pier. By the light of one of the lower lamps +Hilda could now clearly see Sarah Gailey's face. It showed no sign of +terror. It was calm enough in its worn, resigned woe. It had the girlish +look again, beneath the marks of age. Hilda could distinguish the young +girl that Sarah had once been. + +"Come home, will you?" she entreated. + +Sarah Gailey sighed terribly. "I give it up," she said, with weariness. +"I could never do it! I could never do it--now!" + +Hilda pulled gently at her unwilling arm. She could not speak. She could +not ask her again: "What's the matter?" + +"It isn't that the house is too large," Sarah Gailey went on half +meditatively; "though just think of all those stairs, and not a tap on +any of the upper floors! No! And it isn't that I'm not ready enough to +oblige him. No! I know as well as anybody there's only him between me +and starvation. No! It isn't that he doesn't consider me! No! But when +he goes and settles behind my back with those Boutwoods--" She began to +weep. "And when I can hear you and him discussing me in the next room, +and plotting against me--it's--it's more--" The tears gradually drowned +her voice, and she ceased. + +"I assure you, you're quite mistaken," Hilda burst out, with passionate +and indignant persuasiveness. "We never mentioned you. He wanted to talk +to me about my money. And if you feel like that over the Boutwoods, I'm +certain he'll tell them they mustn't come." + +Sarah Gailey shook her head blankly. + +"I'm certain he will!" Hilda persisted. "Please--" + +The other began to walk away, dragging Hilda with her. The policeman, +inspecting them from a distance, coughed and withdrew. They climbed a +flight of steps on the far side of the pier, crossed the promenade, and +went up Preston Street in silence. + +"I should prefer not to be seen going in with you," said Sarah Gailey +suddenly. "It might--" she freed her arm. + +"Go down the area steps," said Hilda, "and I'll wait a moment and then +go in at the front door." + +Sarah Gailey hurried forward alone. + +Hilda, watching her, and observing the wet footmarks which she left on +the pavement, was appalled by the sense of her own responsibility as to +the future of Sarah Gailey. Till this hour, even at her most +conscientious, she had under-estimated the seriousness of Sarah Gailey's +case. Everybody had under-estimated the seriousness of Sarah Gailey's +case. + +She became aware of some one hurrying cautiously up the street on the +other side. It was George Cannon. As soon as Sarah had disappeared +within the house he crossed over. + +"What's the matter?" he inquired anxiously. + +"Well--" + +"She hasn't been trying to drown herself, has she?" + +Hilda nodded, and, speechless, moved towards the house. He turned +abruptly away. + +The front door of No. 59 was still open. Hilda passed through the silent +hall, and went timorously down the steps to the basement. The gas was +still burning, and the clothes were still strewn about in Sarah Gailey's +bedroom, just as though naught had happened. Sarah stood between her two +trunks in the middle of the floor. + +"Where's George?" she asked, in a harsh, perfectly ordinary voice. + +"I don't think he's in the parlour," Hilda prevaricated. + +"Promise me you won't tell him!" + +"Of course I won't!" said Hilda kindly. "Do get into bed, and let me +make you some tea." + +Sarah Gailey rushed at her and embraced her. + +"I know I'm all wrong! I know it's all my own fault!" she murmured, with +plaintive, feeble contrition, crying again. "But you've no idea how I +try! If it wasn't for you--" + + +IV + +That night Hilda, in her small bedroom at the top of the house, was +listlessly arranging, at the back of the dressing-table, the few volumes +which had clung to her, or to which she had clung, throughout the +convulsive disturbances following her mother's death. Among them was one +which she did not wish to keep, _The Girls' Week-day Book,_ and also the +whole set of Victor Hugo, which did not belong to her. George Cannon had +lent her the latter in instalments, and she had omitted to return it. +She was saying to herself that the opportunity to return it had at +length arrived, when she heard a low, conspiratorial tapping at the +door. All her skin crept as, after a second's startled hesitation, she +moved to open the door. + +George Cannon, holding a candle, stood on the landing. She had not seen +him since the brief colloquy between them outside the house. Having +satisfied herself that Sarah Gailey was safe, and to a certain extent +tranquillized, for the night, she had awaited George Cannon's +reappearance a long time in vain, and had then retired upstairs. + +"You aren't gone to bed!" he whispered very cautiously. Within a few +feet of them was an airless kennel where Louisa, the chambermaid, slept. + +"No! I'm just--I stayed up for you I don't know how long." + +"Is she all right?" + +"Well--she's in bed." + +"I wish you'd come to one of these other rooms," he continued to +whisper. All the sibilants in his words seemed to detach themselves, +hissing, from the rest of the sounds. + +She gave a gesture of assent. He tiptoed over the traitorous boards of +the landing, and slowly turned the knob of a door in the end wall. The +door exploded like the firing of a pistol; frowning, he grimly pushed it +open. Hilda followed him, noiselessly creeping. He held the door for +her. She entered, and he shut the door on the inside. They were in a +small bedroom similar to Hilda's own; but the bed was stripped, the +square of carpet rolled, the blind undrawn, and the curtains looped up +from the floor. He put the candle on the tiny iron mantelpiece, and sat +on the bed, his hands in his pockets. + +"You don't mean to say she was wanting to commit suicide?" he said, +after a short reflective silence, with his head bent but his eyes raised +peeringly to Hilda's. + +The crudity of the word, 'suicide,' affected Hilda painfully. + +"If you ask me," said she, standing with her back rubbing against the +small wardrobe, "she didn't know quite what she was doing; but there's +no doubt that was what she went out for." + +"You overtook her? I saw you coming up from the beach." + +Hilda related what had happened. + +"But had you any notion--before--" + +"Me? No! Why?" + +"Nothing! Only the way you rushed out like that!" + +"Well--it struck me all of a sudden!... You've not seen her since you +came in?" + +He shook his head. "I thought I'd better keep out of the way. I thought +I'd better leave it all to you. It's appalling, simply appalling!... +Just when everything was shaping so well!" + +Hilda thought, bewildered: 'Shaping so well?' With her glance she took +in the little cheerless bedroom, and herself and George Cannon within +it, overwhelmed. In imagination she saw all the other bedrooms, dark, +forlorn, and inanimate, waiting through long nights and empty days until +some human creature as pathetic as themselves should come and feebly +vitalize them into a spurious transient homeliness; and she saw George +Cannon's bedroom--the harsh bedroom of the bachelor who had never had a +home; and the bedrooms of those fearsome mummies, the Watchetts, each +bed with its grisly face on the pillow in the dark; and the kennels of +the unclean servants; and so, descending through the floors, to Sarah +Gailey's bedroom in the very earth, and the sleepless form on that bed, +beneath the whole! And the organism of the boarding-house seemed +absolutely tragic to her, compact of the stuff of sorrow itself! And yet +George Cannon had said, 'Shaping so well!' + +"What's to be done?" he inquired plaintively. + +"Nothing that I can see!" she said. She had a tremendous desire to +escape from the responsibility thrust on her by the situation; but she +knew that she could never escape from it; that she was immovably pinned +down by it. + +"I can't see anything either," said he, quietly responsive, and speaking +now in a gentle voice. "Supposing I tell her that she can go, and that +I'll make her an allowance? What could she do, then? It would be madness +for her to live alone any more. She's the very last person who ought to +live alone. Moreover, she wouldn't accept the allowance. Well, then, she +must stay with me--here. And if she stays here she must work, otherwise +she'd never stay--not she! And she must be the mistress. She wouldn't +stand having anyone above her, or even equal with her, that's a +certainty! Besides, she's so good at her job. She hasn't got a great +deal of system, so far as I can see, but she can get the work out of the +servants without too much fuss, and she's so mighty economical in her +catering! Of course she can't get on the right side of a boarder--but +then I _can_! And that's the whole point! With me on the spot to _run_ +the place, she'd be perfect--perfect! Couldn't wish for anything better! +And now she--I assure you I'm doing the best I can do for her. I do +honestly assure you! If anybody can suggest to me anything else that I +can do--I'll do it like a shot." He threw up his arms. + +Hilda was touched by the benevolence of his tone. Nevertheless, it only +intensified her helpless perplexity. Sarah Gailey was inexpressibly to +be pitied, but George Cannon was not to be blamed. She had a feeling +that for any piteous disaster some one ought to be definitely blamable. + +"Do you think she'll settle down?" George Cannon asked, in a new voice. + +"Oh yes!" said Hilda. "I think she will. It was just a sort of--attack +she had, I think." + +"She's not vexed with me?" + +Hilda could not find courage to say: "She thinks you and I are plotting +against her." And yet she wondered why she should hesitate to say it. +After a pause she murmured, as casually as possible: "She doesn't like +the Boutwoods coming back." + +"I knew you were going to say that!" he frowned. + +"If you could manage to stop them--" + +"No, no!" He interrupted--nervous, impatient. "It wouldn't do, that +wouldn't! It'd never do! A boarding-house can't be run on those lines. +It isn't that I care so much as all that about losing a couple of +boarders, and I'm not specially keen on the Boutwoods. But it wouldn't +do! It's the wrong principle. You haven't got to let customers get on +your nerves, so long as they pay and behave respectably. If I gave way, +the very first thing Sarah would do would be to find a grievance against +some other boarder, and there'd be no end to it. The fact is she wants a +grievance, she must have a grievance--whether it's the Boutwoods or +somebody else makes no matter!... Oh no!" He repeated softly, gently, +"Oh no!" + +She knew that his argument was unanswerable. She was perfectly aware +that she ought to yield to it. Nevertheless, the one impulse of her +being in that moment was to fight blindly and irrationally against it. +Her instinct said: "I don't care for arguments. The Boutwoods must be +stopped from coming. If they aren't stopped, I don't know what I shall +do! I can't bear to think of that poor woman meeting them again! I can't +bear it." She drew breath sharply. Startling hot tears came into her +eyes; and she stepped forward on her left foot. + +"Please!" she entreated, "please don't let them come!" + +There was a silence. In the agonizing silence she felt acutely her +girlishness, her helplessness, her unreason, confronted by his strong +and shrewd masculinity. At the bottom of her soul she knew how wrong she +was. But she was ready to do anything to save Sarah Gailey from the +distress of one particular humiliation. With the whole of her volition +she wanted to win. + +"Oh well!" he said. "Of course, if you take it so much to heart--" + +A peculiar bright glance shot from his eyes--the old glance that at once +negligently asserted his power over her, and reassured her against his +power. Her being was suffused with gladness and pride. She had won. She +had won in defiance of reason. She had appealed and she had conquered. +And she enjoyed his glance. She gloried in it. She blushed. A spasm of +exquisite fear shot through her, and she savoured it deliciously. The +deep organic sadness of the house presented itself to her in a new +light. It was still sadness, but it was beautiful in the background. Her +sympathy for Sarah Gailey was as keen as ever, but it had a different +quality--an anguish less desolating. And the fact that a joint +responsibility for Sarah Gailey's welfare bound herself and George +Cannon together in spite of themselves--this fact seemed to her +grandiose and romantic, no longer oppressive. To be alone with him in +the secrecy of the small upper room seemed to endow her with a splendid +worldly importance. And yet all the time a scarce-heard voice was saying +clearly within her: "This appeal and this abandonment are unworthy. No +matter if this man is kind and sincere and admirable! This appeal and +this abandonment are unworthy!" But she did not care. She ignored the +voice. + +"I'll tell Sarah in the morning," he said. + +"Please don't!" she begged. "You might pretend later on that you've had +a letter from the Boutwoods and they can't come. If you tell her +to-morrow, she'll guess at once I've been talking to you; and you're not +supposed to know anything at all about what happened to-night. She made +me promise. But of course she didn't know that you'd found out for +yourself, you see!" + +George Cannon walked away to the window, and then to the mantelpiece, +from which he took up the candle. + +"I'm very much obliged to you," he said simply, putting a faint emphasis +on the last word. She knew that he meant it, without any reserves. But +in his urbane tone there was a chill tranquillity that astonished and +vaguely disappointed her. + + * * * * * + + + + +BOOK IV +HER FALL + + + + +CHAPTER I +THE GOING CONCERN + + +I + +On a Saturday afternoon of the following August, Hilda was sitting at a +book in the basement parlour of "Cannon's Boarding-house" in Preston +Street. She heard, through the open window, several pairs of feet +mounting wearily to the front door, and then the long remote tinkling of +the bell. Within the house there was no responsive sound; but from the +porch came a clearing of throats, a muttering, impatient and yet +resigned, and a vague shuffling. After a long pause the bell rang again; +and then the gas globe over Hilda's head vibrated for a moment to +footsteps in the hall, and the front door was unlatched. She could not +catch the precise question; but the reply of Louisa, the chambermaid-- +haughty, scornful, and negligently pitying--was quite clear: + +"Sorry, sir. We're full up. We've had to refuse several this very +day.... No! I couldn't rightly tell you where.... You might try No. 51, +'Homeleigh' as they call it; but we're full up. Good afternoon, sir, 'd +afternoon 'm." + +The door banged arrogantly. The feet redescended to the pavement, and +Hilda, throwing a careless glance at the window, saw two men and a woman +pass melancholy down the hot street with their hand-luggage. + +And although she condemned and despised the flunkey-souled Louisa, who +would have abased herself with sickly smiles and sweet phrases before +the applicants, if the house had needed custom; although in her mind she +was saying curtly to the mature Louisa: "It's a good thing Mr. Cannon +didn't hear you using that tone to customers, my girl;" nevertheless, +she could not help feeling somewhat as Louisa felt. It was indubitably +agreeable to hear a prosperous door closed on dusty and disappointed +holiday-makers, and to realize, in her tranquil retreat, that she was +part of a very thriving and successful concern. + + +II + +George Cannon, in a light and elegant summer suit, passed slowly in +front of the window, and, looking for Hilda in her accustomed place, saw +her and nodded. Surprised by the unusual gesture, she moved uneasily and +blushed; and as she did so, she asked herself resentfully: "Why do I +behave like this? I'm only his clerk, and I shall never be anything else +but his clerk; and yet I do believe I'm getting worse instead of +better." George Cannon skipped easily up to the porch; he had a +latchkey, but before he could put it into the keyhole Louisa had flown +down the stairs and opened the door to him; she must have been on the +watch from an upper floor. George Cannon would have been well served, +whatever his situation in the house, for he was one of those genial +bullies who are adored by the menials whom they alternately cajole and +terrorize. But his situation in the house was that of a god, and like a +god he was attended. He was the very creator of the house; all its life +flowed from him. Without him the organism would have ceased to exist, +and everybody in it was quite aware of this. He had fully learnt his +business. He had learnt it in the fishmarket on the beach at seven +o'clock in the morning, and in the vegetable market at eight, and in the +shops; he had learnt it in the kitchen and on the stairs while the +servants were cleaning; and he had learnt it at the dinner-table +surrounded by his customers. There was nothing that he did not know and, +except actual cooking and mending, little that he could not do. He +always impressed his customers by the statement that he had slept in +every room in the house in order to understand personally its qualities +and defects; and he could and did in fact talk to each boarder about his +room with the intimate geographical knowledge of a native. The boarders +were further flattered by the mien and appearance of this practical +housekeeper, who did not in the least resemble his kind, but had rather +the style of a slightly doggish stockbroker. To be strolling on the +King's Road in converse with George Cannon was a matter, of pride to +boarders male and female. And there was none with whom he could not talk +fluently, on any subject from cigars to ozone, according to the needs of +the particular case. Nor did he ever seem to be bored by conversations. +But sometimes, after benignantly speeding, for instance, one of the +Watchetts on her morning constitutional, he would slip down into the +basement and ejaculate, 'Cursed hag!' with a calm and natural +earnestness, which frightened Hilda, indicating as it did that he must +be capable of astounding duplicities. + +He came, now, directly to the underground parlour, hat on head and ebony +stick in hand. Hilda did not even look up, but self-consciously bent a +little lower over her volume. Her relation to George Cannon in the +successful enterprise was anomalous, and yet the habit of ten months had +in practice defined it. Neither paying board nor receiving wages, she +had remained in the house apparently as Sarah Gailey's companion and +moral support; she had remained because Sarah Gailey had never been in a +condition to be left--and the months had passed very quickly. But her +lack of occupation and her knowledge of shorthand, and George Cannon's +obvious need of clerical aid, had made it inevitable that they should +resume their former rôles of principal and clerk. Hilda worked daily at +letters, circularizing, advertisements, and--to a less extent--accounts +and bills; the second finger of her right hand had nearly always an +agreeable stain of ink at the base of the nail; and she often dreamed +about letter-filing. In this prosperous month of August she had, on the +whole, less work than usual, for both circulating and advertisements +were stopped. + +George Cannon went to the desk in the dark corner between the window and +the door, where all business papers were kept, but where neither he nor +she actually wrote. When his back was turned she surreptitiously glanced +at him without moving her head, and perceived that his hand was only +moving idly about among the papers while he stared at the wall. She +thought, half in alarm: "What is the matter now?" Then he came over to +the table and hesitated by her shoulder. Still, she would not look up. +She could no longer decipher a single word on the page. Her being was +somehow monopolized by the consciousness of his nearness. + +"Interesting?" he inquired. + +She turned her head at last and glanced at him with a friendly smile of +affirmation, fingering the leaves of the book nervously. It was +Cranswick's _History of Printing_. One day, a fortnight earlier, while +George Cannon, in company with her, was bargaining for an old London +Directory outside a bookseller's shop in East Street, she had seen +Cranswick's _History of Printing_ (labelled "published at _£1_ 1s., our +price 6s. 6d.") and had opened it curiously. George Cannon, who always +kept an eye on her, had said teasingly: "I suppose it's your +journalistic past that makes you interested in that?" "I suppose it is," +she answered. Which statement was an untruth, for the sole thought in +her mind had been that Edwin Clayhanger was a printer. A strange, idle +thought! She had laid the book down. The next day, however, George +Cannon had brought it home, saying carelessly: "I bought that book--five +and six; the man seemed anxious to do business, and it's a book to +have." He had not touched it since. + +"Page 473!" he murmured, looking at the number of the page. "If you keep +on at this rate, you'll soon know more about printing than young +Clayhanger himself!" + +She was thunderstruck. Never before had the name of Clayhanger been +mentioned between them! Could he, then, penetrate her thoughts? Could he +guess that in truth she was reading Cranswick solely because Edwin +Clayhanger happened to be a printer? No! It was impossible! The reason +of her interest in Cranswick, inexplicable even to herself, was too +fantastic to be divined. And yet was not his tone peculiar? Or was it +only in her fancy that his tone was peculiar? She blushed scarlet, and +her muscles grew rigid. + +"I say," George Cannon continued, in a tone that now was unmistakably +peculiar, "I want you to come out with me. I want to show you something +on the front. Can you come?" + +"At once?" she muttered glumly and painfully. What could be the mystery +beneath this most singular behaviour? + +"Yes." + +"Florrie will be arriving at five," said Hilda, after artificially +coughing. "I ought to be here then, oughtn't I?" + +"Oh!" he cried. "We shall be back long before five." + +"Very well," she agreed. + +"I'll be ready in three minutes," he said, going gaily towards the door. +From the door he gave her a glance. She met it, courageously exposing +her troubled features and nodded. + + +III + +Hilda went into the bedroom behind the parlour, to get her hat and +gloves. A consequence of the success of the boarding-house was that she +was temporarily sharing this chamber with Sarah Gailey. She had insisted +on making the sacrifice, and she enjoyed the personal discomfort which +it involved. When she cautiously lay down on the narrow and lumpy +truckle-bed that had been insinuated against an unoccupied wall, and +when she turned over restlessly in the night and the rickety ironwork +creaked and Sarah Gailey moaned, and when she searched vainly for a +particular garment lost among garments that were hung pell-mell on +insecure hooks and jutting corners of furniture,--she was proud and glad +because her own comfortable room was steadily adding thirty shillings or +more per week to the gross receipts of the enterprise. The benefit was +in no way hers, and yet she gloated on it, thinking pleasurably of +George Cannon's great japanned cash-box, which seemed to be an +exhaustless store of gold sovereigns and large silver, and of his +mysterious--almost furtive--visits to the Bank. Her own capital, +invested by George Cannon in railway stock, was bringing in four times +as much as she disbursed; and she gloated also on her savings. The more +money she amassed, the less willing was she to spend. This nascent +avarice amused her, as a new trait in his character always amuses the +individual. She said to herself: "I am getting quite a miser," with the +assured reservation: "Of course I can stop being a miser whenever I feel +like stopping." + +Sarah Gailey was lulling herself in a rocking-chair when Hilda entered, +and she neither regarded Hilda nor intermitted her see-saw. Her features +were drawn into a preoccupied expression of martyrdom, and in fact she +constantly suffered physical torture. She had three genuine +complaints--rheumatism, sciatica, and neuritis; they were all painful. +The latest and worst was the neuritis, which had attacked her in the +wrist, producing swollen joints that had to be fomented with hot water. +Sarah Gailey's life had indeed latterly developed into a continual +fomentation and a continual rocking. She was so taken up with the +elemental business of fomenting and of keeping warm, that she had no +energy left for other remedial treatments, such as distraction in the +open air. She sat for ever shawled, generally with heavy mittens on her +arms and wrists, and either fomenting or rocking, in the eternal +twilight of the basement bedroom. She eschewed aid--she could manage for +herself--and she did not encourage company, apparently preferring to be +alone with fate. In her easier hours, one hand resting on another and +both hugged close to her breast, rocking to and fro with an astounding +monotonous perseverance, she was like a mysterious Indian god in a +subterranean temple. Above her, unseen by her, floor beyond floor, the +life of the boarding-house functioned in the great holiday month of +August. + +"I quite forgot about the make-up bed for Florrie," said Sarah Gailey +plaintively as she rocked. "Would you have time to see to it? Of course +she will have to be with Louisa." + +"Very well," said Hilda curtly, and not quite hiding exasperation. + +There were three reasons for her exasperation. In the first place, the +constant spectacle of Sarah Gailey's pain, and the effect of the pain on +Sarah's character, was exasperating--to Hilda as well as to George +Cannon. Both well knew that the watery-eyed, fretful spinster was a +victim, utterly innocent and utterly helpless, of destiny, and that she +merited nothing but patient sympathy; yet often the strain of +relationship with Sarah produced in them such a profound feeling of +annoyance that they positively resented Sarah's sufferings, and with a +sad absence of logic blamed her in her misfortune, just as though she +had wilfully brought the maladies upon herself in order to vex them. +Then, further, it was necessary always to minister to Sarah's illusion +that Sarah was the mainstay of the house, that she attended to +everything and was responsible for everything, and that without her +governance the machine would come to a disastrous standstill: the fact +being that she had grown feeble and superfluous. Sarah had taught all +she knew to two highly intelligent pupils, and had survived her +usefulness. She had no right place on earth. But in her morose +inefficiency she had developed into an unconscious tyrant--a tyrant +whose power lay in the loyalty of her subjects and not at all in her own +soul. She was indeed like a deity, immanent, brooding, and unaware of +itself!... Thus, the question of Florrie's bed had been discussed and +settled long before Sarah Gailey had even thought of it; but Hilda might +not tell her so. Lastly, this very question of Florrie's bed was +exasperating to Hilda. Already Louisa's kennel was inadequate for +Louisa, and now another couch had been crowded into it. Hilda was +ashamed of the shift; but there was no alternative. Here, for Hilda, was +the secret canker of George Cannon's brilliant success. The servants +were kindly ill-treated. In the commercial triumph she lost the sense of +the tragic forlornness of boarding-house existence, as it had struck her +on the day of her arrival. But the image of the Indian god in the +basement and of the prone forms of the servants in stifling black +cupboards under the roof and under the stairs--these images embittered +at intervals the instinctive and reflecting exultation of her moods. + +She adjusted her small, close-fitting flowered hat, dropped her parasol +across the bed, and began to draw on her cotton gloves. + +"Where are you going, dear?" asked Sarah Gailey. + +"Out with Mr. Cannon." + +"But where?" + +"I don't know." In spite of herself there was a certain unnecessary +defiance in Hilda's voice. + +"You don't know, dear?" Sarah Gailey suddenly ceased rocking, and +glanced at Hilda with the mournful expression of acute worry that was so +terribly familiar on her features. Although it was notorious that +baseless apprehensions were a part of Sarah's disease, nevertheless +Hilda could never succeed in treating any given apprehension as quite +baseless. And now Sarah's mere tone begot in Hilda's self-consciousness +a vague alarm. + +She continued busy with her gloves, silent. + +"And on Saturday afternoon too, when everybody's abroad!" Sarah Gailey +added gloomily, with her involuntary small movements of the head. + +"He asked me if I could go out with him for a minute or two at once," +said Hilda, and picked up the parasol with a decisive gesture. + +"There's a great deal too much talk about you and George as it is," said +Sarah with an acrid firmness. + +"Talk about me and--!" Hilda cried, absolutely astounded. + +She had no feeling of guilt, but she knew that she was looking guilty, +and this knowledge induced in her the actual sensations of a criminal. + +"I'm sure I don't want--" Sarah Gailey began, and was interrupted by a +quiet tap at the door. + +George Cannon entered. + +"Ready, miss?" he demanded, smiling, before he had caught sight of her +face. + +For the second time that afternoon he saw her scarlet, and now there +were tears in her eyes, too. + +She hesitated an instant. + +"Yes," she answered with a painful gulp, and moved towards the door. + + + + +CHAPTER II +THE UNKNOWN ADVENTURE + + +I + +When they were fairly out in the street Hilda felt like a mariner who +has escaped from a lee shore, but who is beset by the vaguer and even +more formidable perils of the open sea. She was in a state of extreme +agitation, and much too self-conscious to be properly cognisant of her +surroundings; she did not feel the pavement with her feet; she had no +recollection of having passed out of the house. There she was walking +along on nothing, by the side of a man who might or might not be George +Cannon, amid tall objects that resembled houses! Her situation was in a +high degree painful, but she could not have avoided it. She could not, +in Sarah's bedroom, have fallen into sobs, or into a rage, or into the +sulks, and told George Cannon that she would not go with him; she could +not have dashed hysterically away and hidden herself on an upper floor, +in the manner of a startled fawn. Her spirit was too high for such +tricks. On the other hand, she was by no means sufficiently mistress of +herself to be able to hide from him her shame. Hence she faced him and +followed him, and let him see it. Their long familiarity had made this +surrender somewhat easier for her. After all, in the countless daily +contacts, they had grown accustomed to minor self-exposures--and Hilda +more so than George Cannon; Hilda was too impatient and impulsive not to +tear, at increasingly frequent intervals, the veil of conventional +formality. + +Her mood now, as she accompanied George Cannon on the unknown adventure, +was one of abashed but still fierce resentment. She of course believed +Sarah Gailey's statement that there had been "talk" about herself and +the landlord, and yet it was so utterly monstrous as to be almost +incredible. She was absolutely sure that she had never by her behaviour +furnished the slightest excuse for such "talk." No eavesdropper could +ever have caught the least word or gesture to justify it. Could a +malicious eavesdropper have assisted at the secret operations of her +inmost mind, even then he could scarcely have seen aught to justify it. +Existence at Brighton had been too strenuous and strange--and, with +Sarah Gailey in the house, too full of responsibilities--to favour +dalliance. Hilda, examining herself, could not say that she had not once +thought of George Cannon as a husband; because just as a young solitary +man will imagine himself the spouse of a dozen different girls in a +week, so will an unmated girl picture herself united to every eligible +and passably sympathetic male that crosses her path. It is the everyday +diversion of the fancy. But she could say that she had not once thought +seriously of George Cannon as a husband. Why, he was not of her +generation! Although she did not know his age, she guessed that he must +be nearer forty than thirty. He was of the generation of Sarah Gailey, +and Sarah Gailey was the contemporary of her dead mother! And he had +never shown for her any sentiment but that of a benevolently teasing +kindliness. Moreover, she was afraid of him, beyond question. And +withal, he patently lacked certain qualities which were to be found in +her image of a perfect man. No! She had more often thought of Edwin +Clayhanger as a husband. Indeed she had married Edwin Clayhanger several +times. The haunting youth would not leave her alone. And she said to +herself, hot and indignant: "I shall have to leave Brighton! I can see +that! Sarah Gailey's brought it on herself!" Yes, she was actually angry +with Sarah Gailey, who however had only informed her of a fact which she +would have been sorry not to know! And in leaving Brighton, that fancy +of hers took her straight to Bursley, to stay with Janet Orgreave in the +house next to the new house of the Clayhangers! + +Whither was George Cannon leading her? He had not yet said a word in +explanation of the errand, nor shown in any way that he had observed her +extraordinary condition. He was silent, swinging his stick. She also was +silent. She could not have spoken, not even to murmur: "Where are you +taking me to?" They went forward as in an enchantment. + + +II + +They were on the King's Road; and to the left were the high hotels and +houses, stretching east and west under the glare of the sun into +invisibility, and to the right was the shore, and the sea so bright that +the eye could scarcely rest on it. Both the upper and the lower +promenades were crowded with gay people surging in different directions. +The dusty roadway was full of carriages, and of the glint of the sun on +wheelspokes and horses' flanks, and of rolling, clear-cut shadows. The +shore was bordered with flags and masts and white and brown sails; and +in the white-and-green of billows harmlessly breaking could be seen the +yellow bodies of the bathers. A dozen bare-legged men got hold of a +yacht under sail with as many passengers on board, and pushed it +forcibly right down into the sea, and then up sprang its nose and it +heeled over and shot suddenly off, careering on the waves into the +offing where other yachts were sliding to and fro between the piers, +dominating errant fleets of rowboats. And the piers also were loaded +with excited humanity and radiant colour. And all the windows of all the +houses and hotels were open, and blowing with curtains and flowers and +hats. The whole town was enfevered. + +Hilda thought, her heart still beating, but less noisily, "I scarcely +ever come here. I don't come here often enough." And she saw Sarah +Gailey rocking and sighing and rocking and shaking her head in the +mournful twilight of the basement in Preston Street. The contrasts of +existence struck her as magnificent, as superb. The very misery and +hopelessness of Sarah's isolation seemed romantic, splendid, touchingly +beautiful. And she thought, inexplicably: "Why am I here? Why am I not +at home in Turnhill? Why am I so different from what mother was? What am +I going to be and to do? This that I now am can't continue for ever." +She saw thousands of women with thousands of men. And, quite forgetting +that to the view of the multitude she was just as much as any of them +with a man (and a rather fine man, too!), she began to pity herself +because she was not with a man! She dreamed, in her extreme excitation, +of belonging absolutely to some man. And despite all her pride and +independence, she dwelt with pleasure and longing on the vision of being +his, of being at his disposal, of being under his might, of being +helpless before him. She thought, desolated: "I am nobody's. And so +there is 'talk'!" She scorned herself for being nobody's. To belong +utterly to some male seemed to be the one tolerable fate for her in the +world. And it was a glorious fate, whether it brought good or evil. Any +other was ignobly futile, was despicable. And then she thought, +savagely: "And just see my clothes! Why don't I take the trouble to look +nice?" + +Suddenly George Cannon stopped on the edge of the pavement, and turned +towards the houses across the street. + +"You see that?" he said, pointing with his stick. + +"What?" + +"The Chichester." + +She saw, in gold letters over the front of a tall corner house: "The +Chichester Private Hotel." + +"Well?" + +"I've taken it--from Christmas. I signed about an hour ago. I just had +to tell someone." + +"Well I never!" Hilda exclaimed. + +He was beyond question an extraordinary and an impressive man. He had +said that, after experimenting in Preston Street, he should take a +larger place, and lo! in less than a year, he had fulfilled his word. He +had experimented in Preston Street, with immense success and now he was +coming out into the King's Road! (Only those who have lived in a side +street can pronounce the fine words 'King's Road' with the proper accent +of deference.) And every house in the King's Road, Hilda now newly +perceived, was a house of price and distinction. Nothing could be common +in the King's Road: the address and the view were incomparably precious. +Being established there, George Cannon might, and no doubt would, +ultimately acquire one of the largest public hotels; indeed, dominate +the promenade! It would be just like him to do so! A year ago he was a +solicitor in Turnhill. To-day he was so perfectly and entirely a +landlord that no one could ever guess his first career. He was not +merely extraordinary: he was astounding. There could not be many of his +calibre in the whole world. + +"How does it strike you?" he asked, with an eagerness that touched her. + +"Oh! It's splendid!" she answered, trying to put more natural enthusiasm +into her voice. But the fact was that the Chichester had not yet struck +her at all. It was only the idea of being in the King's Road that had +struck her--and with such an effect that her attention was happily +diverted from her trouble, and her vexatious self-consciousness +disappeared. She had from time to time remarked the Chichester, but +never with any particularity; it had been for her just an establishment +among innumerable others, and not one of the best,--the reverse of +imposing. It stood at the angle of King's Road and Ship Street, and a +chemist's shop occupied the whole of the frontage, the hotel-entrance +being in Ship Street; its architecture was fiat and plain, and the place +seemed neglected, perhaps unprosperous. + +"Twenty bow-windows!" murmured George Cannon, and then smiled at +himself, as if ashamed of his own naïveté. + +And Hilda counted the windows. Yes, there were eight on King's Road and +twelve at the side. The building was high, and it was deep, stretching +far down Ship Street. In a moment it began to put on, for Hilda, quite +special qualities. How high it was! How deep it was! And in what a +situation! It possessed mysterious and fine characteristics which set it +apart. Strange that hitherto she had been so blind to it! She and George +Cannon were divided from the house by the confused and noisy traffic of +the roadway, and by the streaming throngs on the opposite pavement. And +none of these people riding or driving or walking, and none of the +people pushing past them on the pavement behind, guessed that here on +the kerb was the future master of the Chichester, an amazing man, and +that she, Hilda Lessways, by his side, was the woman to whom he had +chosen first to relate his triumph! This unrecognised secrecy in the +great animated street was piquant and agreeable to Hilda, a source of +pride. + +"I suppose you've bought it?" she ventured. She had no notion of his +financial resources, but her instinct was to consider them infinite. + +"No! I've not exactly bought it," he laughed. "Not quite! I've got the +lease, from Christmas. How much d'ye think the rent is?" He seemed to +challenge her. + +"Oh! Don't ask me!" + +"Five hundred a year," he said, and raised his chin. "Five hundred a +year! Ten pounds a week! Nearly thirty shillings a day! You've got to +pay that before you can even begin to think of your own profits." + +"But it's enormous!" Hilda was staggered. All her mother's houses put +together had brought in scarcely a third of the rental of that single +house, which was nevertheless only a modest unit in several miles of +houses. "But can you make it pay?" + +"I fancy so! Else I shouldn't have taken it. The present man can't. But +then he's paying £550 for one thing, and he's old. And he doesn't know +his business.... Oh yes! I think I can see my money back.... Wait till +Christmas is turned and I make a start!" + +She knew that the future would justify his self-confidence. How he +succeeded she could not define. Why should he succeed where another was +failing? He could not go out and drag boarders by physical force into +his private hotel! Yet he would succeed. In every gesture he was the +successful man. She looked timidly up at his eyes under the strong black +eyelashes. His glance caught hers. He smiled conqueringly. + +"Haven't said a word to Sarah yet!" he almost whispered, so low was his +voice; and he put on a mock-rueful smile. Hilda smiled in response. + +"Shall you keep Preston Street?" she asked. + +"Of course!" he said with pride--"I shall run the two, naturally." He +put his shoulders back. "One will help the other, don't you see?" + +She thought she saw, and nodded appreciatively. He meant to run two +establishments! At the same moment a young and stylish man drove rather +slowly by in a high dog-cart. He nodded carelessly to George Cannon, and +then, perceiving that George Cannon was with a lady, raised his hat in +haste. George Cannon responded. The young man gazed for an instant hard +at Hilda, with a peculiar expression, and passed on. She did not know +who he was. Of George Cannon's relationships in the town she was +entirely ignorant, but that he had relationships was always obvious. + +She blushed, thinking of what Sarah Gailey had said about 'talk' +concerning herself and George Cannon. In the young man's glance there +had been something to annoy and shame her. + +"Come across and have a look at the place," said George Cannon, suddenly +stepping down into the gutter, with a look first in one direction and +then in the other for threatening traffic. + +"I don't think I'll come now," she replied. + +"But why not? Are you in a hurry? You've plenty of time before five +o'clock--heaps!" + +"I'd prefer not to come," she insisted, in an abashed and diffident +voice. + +"But what's up?" he demanded, stepping back to the pavement, and +glancing directly into her eyes. + +She blushed more and more, dropping her eyelids. + +"I don't want to be talked about _too_ much!" she muttered, mortified. +Her inference was unmistakable. The whole of her mind seemed now to be +occupied with an enormous grievance which she somehow had against the +world in general. Her very soul, too, was bursting with this grievance. + +"Talked about? But who--" + +"Never mind! I know! I've been told!" she interrupted him. + +"Oh! I see!" He was now understanding the cause of her trouble in Sarah +Gailey's bedroom. + +"Now look here!" He went on. "I've just got to have a few words with +you. You come across the road, please." He was imperious. + +She raised her glance for a timid moment to his face, and saw to her +intense astonishment that he also was blushing. Never before had she +seen him blush. + +"Come along!" he urged. + +She followed him obediently across the dangerous road. He waited for her +at the opposite kerb, and then they went up Ship Street. He turned into +the entrance of the Chichester, which was grandiose, with a flight of +shallow steps, and then a porch with two basket chairs, and then another +flight of shallow steps ending in double doors which were noticeably +higher than the street level. She still followed. + +"Nobody in here, I expect," said George Cannon, indicating a door on the +right, to an old waiter who stood in the dark hall. + +"No, sir." + +George Cannon opened the door as a master, ushered Hilda into a tiny +room furnished with a desk and two chairs, and shut the door. + + +III + +The small window was of ground glass and gave no prospect of the outer +world, from which it seemed to Hilda that she was as completely cut off +as in a prison. She was alone with George Cannon, and beyond the narrow +walls which caged them together, and close together, there was nothing! +All Brighton, save this room, had ceased to exist. Hilda was now more +than ever affrighted, shamed, perturbed, agonised. Yet at the same time +she had the desperate calm of the captain of a ship about to founder +with all hands. And she saw glimpses, beautiful and compensatory, of the +romantic quality of common life. She was in a little office of a +perfectly ordinary boarding-house--(she could even detect the stale +odours of cooking)--with a realistic man of business, and they were +about to discuss a perfectly ordinary piece of scandal; and surely they +might be called two common-sense people! And withal, the ordinariness +and the midland gumption of the scene were shot through with the bright +exotic rays of romance! She thought: "It is painful and humiliating to +be caught and fixed as I am. But it is wonderful too!" + +"The fact is," said George Cannon, in an easy reassuring tone, "we never +get the chance of a bit of quiet chat. Upon my soul we don't! Now I +suppose it's Sarah who's been worrying you?" + +"Yes." + +"What did she say?... You'd better sit down, don't you think?" He swung +round the pivoted arm-chair in front of the closed desk and pointed her +to it. + +"Oh!" Hilda hesitated, and then sank on to the chair without looking at +it. "She simply said there was a lot of talk about you and me. Has she +been saying anything to you?" + +He shook his head, staring down at her. Hilda put her arms on the arms +of the chair, and, shirking the man's gaze, stared down at the worn +carpet and at his boots thereon. One instinct in her desired that he +should move away or that the room should be larger, but another instinct +wanted him to remain close, lest the savour of life should lose its +sharpness. + +"It passes me how people can say such things!" she went on, in a low, +thrilled, meditative voice. "I can't understand it!" She was quite +sincere in her astonished indignation. Nevertheless, she experienced a +positive pride at being brought into a scandal with George Cannon; she +derived from it a certain feeling of importance; it proved that she was +no longer a mere girlish miss. + +George Cannon kept silence. + +"I shall leave Brighton," Hilda continued. "That I've quite decided! I +don't like leaving your sister, as ill as she is! But really--" And she +thought how prudent she was, and how capable of taking care of +herself--she all alone in the world! + +"Where should you go to? Bursley? The Orgreaves?" George Cannon asked +absently and carelessly. + +"I don't know," said Hilda, with curtness. + +He stepped aside, in the direction of the window, and examined curiously +the surface of the glass, as though in search of a concealed message +which it might contain. In a new and much more animated voice he said to +the window: + +"Of course I know it's all my fault!" + +Hilda glanced up at his back; he was still not more than three feet away +from her. + +"How is it your fault?" she asked, after a pause. + +He made another pause. + +"The way I look at you," he said. + +These apparently simple words made Hilda tremble, and deprived her of +speech. They shifted the conversation to another plane. 'The way I look +at you! The way I look at you!' What did he mean? How did he look at +her? She could not imagine what he was driving at! Yes, she could! She +knew quite well. All the time, while pretending to herself not to +understand, she understood. It was staggering, but she perfectly +understood. He had looked at her 'like that' on the very first day of +their acquaintance, in his office at Turnhill, and again at the house in +Lessways Street, and again in the newspaper office, and on other +occasions, and again on the night of their arrival at Brighton. But +surely not lately! Or did he look at her 'like that' behind her back? +Was it possible that people noticed it?... Absurd! His explanation of +the origin of the gossip did not convince her. She had, however, +suddenly lost interest in the origin of the gossip. She was entirely +occupied with George Cannon's tone, and his calm, audacious reference to +a phenomenon which had hitherto seemed to her to be far beyond the +region of words. + +She was frightened. She was like some one walking secure in the night, +who is stopped by the sound of rushing water and stands with all his +senses astrain, afraid to move a step farther, too absorbed and +intimidated to be aware of astonishment. The point was not whether or +not she had known or guessed the existence of this unseen and formidable +river; the point was that she was thrillingly on its brink, in the dark. +Every instant she heard its swelling current plainer and plainer. She +thought: "Am I lost? How strange that this awful and exquisite thing +should happen to just me!" She was quite fatalistic. + +He turned his head suddenly and caught her guilty eyes for an instant +before she could lower them. + +"You don't mean to say you don't know what I mean?" he said. + +She still could not speak. Her trouble was acute, her self-consciousness +far keener than it had ever been before. She thought: "But it's +impossible that this awful and exquisite thing should happen in this +fashion!" George Cannon moved a step towards her. She could not see his +face, but she knew that he was looking at her with his expression at +once tyrannic and benevolent. She could feel, beating upon her, the +emanating waves of his personality. And she was as confused as though +she had been sitting naked in front of him.... And he had brought all +this about by simply putting something into words--by saying: "It's the +way I look at you!" + +He went on: + +"I can't help it, you know.... The very first minute I ever set eyes on +you.... Of course I'm thirty-six. But there it is!... I've never seen +any one like you; and I've seen a few! The fact is, Hilda, I do believe +you don't know how fine you are." He spoke more quickly and with boyish +enthusiasm; his voice became wonderfully persuasive. "You are fine, you +know! And you're beautiful! I didn't think so at first, but you are! +You're being wasted. Why, a woman like you...! You've no idea. You're so +proud and stiff, when you want to be... I'd trust you with anything. +You're absolutely the only woman I ever met that I'd trust like a man! +And that's a fact.... Now, nobody could ever think as much of you as I +do. I'm quite certain of it. It couldn't be done. I _know_ you, you see! +I understand everything you do, and whatever you do, it's just fine for +me. You couldn't be as happy with any one else! You couldn't! I feel +that in my bones.... Now--now, I must tell you something--" + +The praise, the sympathy, the passion were astounding, marvellous, and +delicious to her. Was it conceivable that this experienced and worldly +man had been captivated by such a mere girl as herself? She had never +guessed it! Or had she always guessed it? An intense pride warmed her +blood like a powerful cordial. Life was even grander than she had +thought!... She drooped into an intoxication. Among all that he had +said, he had not said that he was not stronger than she. He had not +relinquished his authority. She felt it, sitting almost beneath him in +the slippery chair. She knew that she would yield to him. She desired to +yield to him. Her mind was full of sensuous images based on the +abdication of her will in favour of his. + +"Now, look here, Hilda. I want to tell you--" + +He perhaps did not intend that she should look up; but she looked up. +And she was surprised to see that his face was full of troubled +hesitations, showing almost dismay. He made the motion of swallowing. +She smiled; and set her shoulders back--the very gesture that she had +learned from him. + +"What?" she questioned, in a whisper. + +Her brief mood of courage was over. She sank before him again, and +waited with bowed head. + +Profoundly disturbed, he stood quite still for a few seconds, with shut +lips, and then he made another step to approach. + +"Your name's got to be Cannon," she heard him say. + +She thought, still waiting: "If this goes on a moment longer I shall die +of anticipation, in bliss." And when she felt his hand on her shoulder, +and the great shadow of him on part of her face, her body seemed to +sigh, acquiescent and for the moment assuaged: "This is a miracle, and +life is miraculous!" She acknowledged that she had lacked faith in life. + +She was now on the river, whirling. But at the same time she was in the +small, hot room, and both George Cannon's hands were on her unresisting +shoulders; and then they were round her, and she felt his physical +nearness, the texture of his coat and of his skin; she could see in a +mist the separate hairs of his tremendous moustache and the colours +swimming in his eyes; her nostrils expanded in transient alarm to a +faint, exciting masculine odour. She was disconcerted, if not +panic-struck, by the violence of his first kiss; but her consternation +was delectable to her. + +And amid her fright and her joy, and the wonder of her extreme surprise, +and the preoccupation of being whirled down the river, she calmly +reflected, somewhere in her brain: "The door is not locked. Supposing +some one were to come in and see us!" And she reflected also, in an +ecstasy of relief: "My life will be quite simple, now. I shall have +nothing to worry about. And I can help him." For during a year past she +had never ceased to ask herself what she must do to arrange her life; +her conscience had never ceased to tell her that she ought not to be +content to remain in the narrow ideas of her mother, and that though she +preferred marriage she ought to act independently of the hope of it. +Throughout her long stay in Preston Street she had continually said: +"After this--what? This cannot last for ever. When it comes to an end +what am I to do to satisfy my conscience?" And she had thought vaguely +of magnificent activities and purposes--she knew not what.... The +problem existed no more. Her life was arranged. And now, far more +sincerely than in the King's Road twenty minutes earlier, she regarded +the career of a spinster with horror and with scorn. At best, she +suddenly perceived with blinding clearness, it would have been +pitiful--pitiful! Twenty minutes earlier, in the King's Road, she had +dreamt of belonging absolutely to some man, of being at his disposal, of +being under his might, of being helpless before him. And now!... Miracle +thrice miraculous! Miracle unconceived, inconceivable!... No more 'talk' +now!... + +She told herself how admirable was the man. She assured herself that he +was entirely admirable. She reminded herself that she had always deemed +him admirable, that only twenty minutes earlier, in the King's Road, +when there was in her mind no dimmest, wildest notion of the real +future, she had genuinely admired him. How clever, how tactful, how +indomitable, how conquering, how generous, how kind he was! How kind to +his half-sister! How forbearing with her! Indeed, she could not recall +his faults. And he was inevitably destined to brilliant success. She +would be the wife of a great and a wealthy man. And in her own secret +ways she could influence him, and thus be greater than the great. + +Love? It is an absolute fact that the name of 'love' did not in the +first eternal moments even occur to her. And when it did she gave it but +little importance. She had to admit that she had not consciously thought +of George Cannon with love--at any rate with love as she had imagined +love to be. Indeed, her immediate experience would not fit any theory +that she could formulate. But with the inexorable realism of her sex she +easily dismissed inconvenient names and theories, and accommodated +herself to the fact. And the fact was that she overwhelmingly wanted +George Cannon, and, as she now recognized, had wanted him ever since she +first saw him. The recognition afforded her intense pleasure. She +abandoned herself candidly to this luxury of an unknown desire. It was +incomparably the most splendid and dangerous experience that she had +ever had. She did not reason and she had no wish to reason. She was set +above reason. Happy to the point of delicious pain, she yet yearned +forward to a happiness far more excruciating. She was perfectly aware +that her bliss would be torment until George Cannon had married her, +until she had wholly surrendered to him. + +Yet at intervals a voice said very clearly within her: "All this is +wrong. This is base and shameful. This is something to blush for, +really!" She did blush. But her blushes were a part of the delight. And +the voice was not persistent. She could silence it with scarcely an +effort, despite its clarity. + +"Kiss me!" George Cannon demanded of her, with eager masterfulness. + +The request shocked her for an instant, and the young girl in her was +about to revolt. But she kissed him--an act which combined the sweetness +of submission with the glory of triumph! She looked at him steadily, +confident in herself and in him. She felt that he knew how to love. His +emotion filled her with superb pride. She seemed to be saying to him in +a doomed rapture: "Do you think I don't know what I am doing? I know! I +know!" + +The current of the river was tremendous. She foresaw the probability of +disaster. She was aware that she had definitely challenged the hazard of +fate. But she was not terrified in the dark, swirling night of her +destiny. She straightened her shoulders. With all her innocence and +ignorance and impulsiveness and weakness, she had behind her the unique +and priceless force of her youth. She was young, and she put her trust +in life. + + + + +CHAPTER III +FLORRIE AGAIN + + +I + +As they were walking home along the King's Road, Hilda suddenly stopped +in front of a chemist's shop. "I've got something to buy here," she said +diffidently, and then added: "I'll follow you." + +"And what have you got to buy?" he asked, facing her, with his +benevolent, ironical expression. + +"Never mind!" she gently laughed. "I shan't be many minutes after you." +She pretended to make a mystery. But her sole purpose was to avoid +re-entering the house in his company; and she knew that he had divined +this. Nevertheless, she found pleasure in the perfectly futile pretence +of a mysterious purchase. + +She was very self-conscious as they stood there on the dusty footpath +amid the promenaders gay and gloomy, chattering and silent, who were +taking the sun and the salt breeze. Despite her reason, she had a fear +that numbers of people would perceive her to be newly affianced and +remark upon the contrast between her girlishness and his maturity. But +George Cannon was not in the slightest degree self-conscious. He played +the lover with ease and said quite simply and convincingly just the +things which she would have expected a lover to say. Indeed, the +conversation, as carried on by him, between the moment of betrothal and +the arrival at the chemist's shop, was the one phenomenon of the +engagement which corresponded with her preconceived ideas concerning +such an affair. It convinced her that she really was affianced. + +"Well?" he murmured fondly and yet quizzically, as they remained +wordless, deliciously hesitating to part. "What are you thinking about?" + +She replied with brave candour, appealing to him by a soft glance: + +"I was only thinking how queer it is I should be engaged in a room I'd +never seen before in my life--going into it like that!" + +He looked at her uncomprehending; for an instant his features were +blank; then he smiled kindly. + +"It's so strange!" she encouraged him. + +"Yes. Isn't it?" he agreed, with charming, tranquil politeness. + +"He doesn't see it!" she thought, as she watched the play of his face. +"He doesn't see how wonderful it is that I should go into a room that +was absolutely unknown to me and then this should happen at once. Why! I +never knew there was such a room!" She could not define how she was +affected by this fact, but she regarded the fact as tremendously +romantic, and its effect on her was profound. And George saw in it no +significance! She was disconcerted. She felt a tremor; it was as though +the entire King's Road had quivered for a fraction of a second and then, +feigning nonchalance, resumed its moveless solidity. + +Inside the chemist's she demanded the first thing she set eyes on--a +tooth-brush. All the while she was examining various shapes of +toothbrushes, she had a vision of George raising his hat to take leave +of her, and she could see not only the curve of his hand and the +whiteness of his cuff, but also the millions of tiny marks and creases +on the coarse skin of his face, extraordinarily different from her own +smooth, pure, delicate, silky complexion. And she remembered that less +than three years ago she had regarded him as of another generation, as +indefinitely older and infinitely more experienced than her childish and +simple self. This reflection produced in her a consternation which was +curiously blissful. + +"No, madam," the white-aproned chemist was saying. "It's this size that +we usually sell to ladies." + +She put on the serious judicial air of an authentic adult woman, and +frowned at the chemist. + + +II + +When, in Preston Street, she was reluctantly approaching the house, she +saw a cab, coming downwards in the opposite direction, stop at No. 59. + +"That must be Florrie!" she said, half-aloud. + +The boarding-house being in need of another servant, young, strong, and +reliable, Hilda had suggested that Miss Florence Bagster might be +invited to accept the situation. Sarah Gailey had agreed that it would +be wise to have a servant from Turnhill; she mistrusted southern +servants, and appeared to believe that there was no real honesty south +of the Trent. Florence Bagster had accepted the situation with +enthusiasm, writing that she longed to be again with her former +mistress; she did not write that the mysterious and magnetic name of +Brighton called her more loudly than the name of her former mistress. +And now Florence was due. + +But it was not Florence who emerged from the cab. It was a tall and +full-bosomed young lady in a gay multi-coloured costume, and gloves and +a sunshade and a striking hat. This young lady stood by the cab +expectant and smiling while the cabman pulled a tin trunk off the roof +of the vehicle, and then, when the cabman had climbed down and was +dragging the trunk after him, she put out an arm and seized one handle +of the trunk to help him, which act, so strange on the part of a young +lady, made Hilda, coming nearer and nearer, look more carefully. She was +astounded as she realized that the unknown young lady was not a young +lady after all, but the familiar Florrie at the advanced age of sixteen. + +The aged cabman had made no mistake. He left the tin trunk on the +pavement and took timid Florrie's money without touching his hat for it. +Florrie was laying her sunshade rather forlornly on the top of the tin +trunk and preparing to lift the trunk unaided, when Mr. Boutwood, stout +and all in black, came gallantly forth from the house to assist her. +Sarah Gailey's opposition had not been persistent enough to keep the +jovial Mr. Boutwood out of No. 59. Shortly after Christmas his wife had +died suddenly, and Mr. Boutwood, with plenty of time and plenty of money +on his hands, had found himself desolated. In his desolation he had +sought his old acquaintance George Cannon, and the result had somehow +been that bygones had become bygones and a new boarder had increased the +prosperity of No. 59. Sarah Gailey could not object. Indeed, she had +actually wept for the death of one enemy and the affliction of another. +Moreover, she seldom had contact with the boarders now. + +The rather peculiar circumstances of Florrie's arrival almost cured +Hilda's self-consciousness, and she entered the house, in the wake of +the trunk, with a certain forgetful ease. There was Mr. Boutwood, still +dallying with Florrie and the trunk, in the narrow hall! The shocking +phenomenon of a boarder helping a domestic servant with her luggage had +been rendered possible only by a series of accidents. The front door +being left open on account of the weather, Mr. Boutwood had had a direct +view of the maiden, and the maiden had not been obliged to announce her +arrival officially by ringing a bell. Hence the other servants had not +had notice. And of the overseers of the house one was imprisoned in the +basement and the other two had been out betrothing themselves! In the +ordinary way the slightest unusualness in the hall would instantly +attract the attention of somebody in authority. + +Mr. Boutwood was not immediately aware of Hilda. His attitude towards +Florrie was shocking to Hilda in a double sense; it shocked her as an +overseer, but it shocked her quite as much as a young woman newly +jealous for the pride of all her sex. Florrie was beyond question +exceedingly pretty; in particular the chin pouted more deliriously than +ever. Her complexion was even finer than Hilda's own. She had a simple, +good-natured glance, a quick and extraordinarily seductive smile, and +the unique bodily grace of her years. Her costume, though vulgar and +very ill-made, was effective at a little distance; her form and +movements gave it a fictitious worth. Indeed, she was an amazing blossom +to have come off the dunghill of Calder Street. Domestic drudgery had +not yet dehumanized nor disfigured her--it is true that her hands were +concealed in gloves, and her feet beneath a flowing skirt. Now, Mr. +Boutwood's attitude showed very plainly that the girlish charms of +Florrie had produced in him a definite and familiar effect. He would +have been ready to commit follies for the young woman, and to deny that +she was a drudge or anything but a beautiful creature. + +Hilda objected. She objected because Mr. Boutwood was a widower, holding +that he had no right to joy, and that he ought to mourn practically for +ever in solitude. She would make no allowance for his human instincts, +his needs of intimate companionship, his enormous unoccupied leisure. +She would have condemned him utterly on the score of his widowhood +alone. But she objected far more strongly to his attitude because he was +fat and looked somewhat coarse. She counted his obesity to him for a +sin. And it was naught to her that he had been a martyr to idleness and +wealth, which combination had prematurely aged him. Mr. Boutwood was +really younger than George Cannon, and Florence Bagster certainly seemed +as old as Hilda. Yet the juxtaposition of the young, slim, and virginal +Florrie and the large, earth-worn Mr. Boutwood profoundly offended her. + +It was Mr. Boutwood who first discovered that Hilda was in the doorway. +He was immediately abashed, and presented the most foolish appearance. +Whereupon Hilda added scorn to her disgust. Florrie, however, easily +kept her countenance, and with a pert smile took the hand which her +former mistress graciously extended. By universal custom a servant +retains some of the privileges of humanity for several minutes after +entering upon a new servitude. Mr. Boutwood vanished. + +"Louisa will help you upstairs with the trunk," said Hilda, when she had +made inquiries about the wonderful journey which Florrie had +accomplished alone, and about the health of Florrie's aunt and of her +family. "Louisa!" she called loudly up the stairs and down into the +basement. + + +III + +She followed the procession of the trunk upstairs, and, Louisa having +descended again, showed Florrie into the kennel. This tiny apartment had +in it two truckle-beds, and a wash-bowl on a chair, and little else. A +very small square trap-window in the low ceiling procured a dusky light +in the middle hours of the day. Florence seemed delighted with the room; +she might have had to sleep under the stairs. + +"Put on your afternoon apron, and then you can go down and see Miss +Gailey," said Hilda, and shut the door upon Florrie in her new home. + +When she turned, there was George Cannon on the half-landing beneath the +skylight! She knew not how he had come there, nor whether he had entered +the house before or after herself. + +"I'm glad he isn't fat!" she thought. And it was as though she had +thought: "If he were fat everything would be different." Her features +did not relax as she went down the five steps to the half-landing where +he waited, smiling faintly. She thought: "We must be very serious and +circumspect in the house. There must never be the slightest--" But while +she was yet on the last step, he firmly put his hands on her ears and, +drawing her head towards him, kissed her full on the mouth, and she saw +again, through her eyelashes, all the details of his face. She yielded. +All her ideas of circumspection melted magically away in an abandoned +tenderness of which she was ashamed, but for which she would have +unreflectingly made any sacrifice. The embrace was over in an instant. +Besides being guiltless of obesity, George Cannon was free from the +unpardonable fault of clumsiness. He was audacious, but he was not +foolhardy, and he would never be abashed. True, she had seen dismay on +his face at the moment of his declaration, but that moment was unique, +and his dismay had ineffably flattered her. Now, on the half-landing, +she was drenched in bliss. And she felt dissolute; she felt even base. +But she did not care. She thought, as it were, startled: "This is love. +This must be what love is. I must have been in love without knowing it. +And as for a girl always knowing when a man's in love with her, and +foreseeing the proposal, and all that sort of thing...." Her practical +contempt for all that sort of thing could not be stated in words. + +"Florrie's just come," she whispered, and by a movement of the head +indicated that Florrie was in the kennel. + +They went together to the drawing-room on the first floor. It was, +empty, the entire population of the boarding-houses being still on the +seashore. Hilda stood near the door, which she left open, and gave +detailed news of Florrie in a tone very matter-of-fact. There was no +reference to love, or to the new situation created, or to the vast +enterprise of the Chichester. The topic was Florrie, and somehow it held +the field despite efforts to dislodge it. + +Then the stairs creaked. Already Florrie was coming down. In a trice she +had made herself ready for work. She came down timidly, not daring to +look to right nor left, but concentrating her attention on the stairs. +She passed along the landing outside the drawing-room door, and Hilda, +opening the door a little wider, had a full surreptitious view of her +back; and George Cannon, farther within the room, also saw her. They +watched her disappear on her way to find the basement and the formidable +Sarah Gailey. Hilda was touched by the spectacle of this child disguised +as a strapping woman, far removed from her family and her companions and +her familiar haunts, and driven or drawn into exile at Brighton, where +she would only see the sea once a week, except through windows, and +where she would have to work from fourteen to sixteen hours a day for a +living, and sleep in a kennel. The prettiness, the pertness, and the +naïve contentedness of the child thus realizing an ambition touched her +deeply. + +"It does seem a shame, doesn't it?" she said. + +"What?" + +"Bringing her all the way up here, like this! She doesn't know a soul in +Brighton. She's bound to be frightfully home-sick--" + +"What about you?" George Cannon interrupted politely. "Doesn't she know +you?" He smiled with all his kindness. + +"Yes--but--" + +Hilda did not finish. It was not worth while. George Cannon had not +understood. He did not feel as she felt, and her emotion was +incommunicable to him. A tremendous misgiving seized her, and she had a +physical feeling of emptiness in the stomach. It passed, swiftly as a +hallucination. Just such a misgiving as visits nearly every normal +person immediately before or immediately after marriage! She ignored it. +She was engaged--that was the paramount fact! She was engaged, and +joyously determined to prosecute the grand adventure to the end. The +immensity of the risks forced her to accept them. + + +IV + +That evening Sarah Gailey was in torment from the pain in her wrists. +There was nothing to be done. She had had the doctor, and no article of +the prescribed treatment had been neglected. With unaccustomed aid from +Hilda she had accomplished the business of undressing and getting into +bed, and now she sat up in bed, supported by her own pillows and one +from Hilda's bed, and nursed her wrists, while Hilda poured drops of a +narcotic for her into a glass of water. Apart from the serious local +symptoms, her health was fairly good. She could eat, she could talk, she +could walk, and her brain was clear. Hilda held the glass for her to +drink, for it was prudent to keep her hands as much as possible in +repose. + +"There!" said Hilda, as if to a young child who had been querulous. "I'm +sure you'll sleep now!" + +"I don't think I shall," the sufferer whined. + +"Oh yes, you will!" Hilda insisted firmly, although she was by no means +sure. "Let me take this extra pillow away, and then you can lie down +properly." She was thinking reproachfully: "What a pity it is for all of +us that the poor thing can't bear her pain with a little less fuss!" It +was not Sarah alone who was embittered and fatigued by Sarah's pain. + +"Where's George?" asked the invalid, when she was laid down. + +"In the parlour. Why?" + +"Oh, nothing!" + +"By the way," said Hilda, seized by a sudden impulse, which had its +origin in Sarah's tone at once martyrized and accusing,--"by the way, +who _is_ it that's been talking scandal about me and George?" + +"Scandal?" Sarah Gailey seemed weakly to protest against the word. + +"Because, if you want to know," Hilda continued, "we're engaged to be +married!" She reflected, contrite: "This won't help her to sleep!" And +then added, in a new, endearing accent, awaiting an outburst of some +kind from Sarah: "Of course it's a secret, dear. I'm telling no one but +you." + +After a moment's silence, Sarah remarked casually, with shut eyes: +"It'll be much the best not to tell anyone. And the shorter the +engagement the better! Don't let anybody in the house know till you're +married." She sighed, put her cheek into the pillow, and moved her bound +wrists for a few seconds, restlessly. "If you turn the gas down," she +finished very wearily, "I dare say I may get off. If only they'd stop +that piano upstairs!" + +She had displayed no surprise at the tremendous event, no sentimental +interest in it. The fact was that Sarah Gailey's wrists were infinitely +more interesting to her than any conceivable project of marriage. +Continuous and acute pain had withdrawn her from worldly affairs, making +her more than ever like a god. + +Hilda was startled. But she was relieved. Now for the first time she had +the authentic sensation of being engaged. And it appeared to her that +she had been engaged for a very long period, and that the engagement was +a quite ordinary affair. She was relieved; yet she was also grievously +saddened. She lowered the gas, and in the gloom gazed for a few seconds +at the vague, huddled, sheeted, faintly moaning figure on the bed; the +untidy grey hair against the pillow struck her as intolerably pathetic. + +"Good night," she said softly. + +And the feeble, plaintive voice responded: "Good night." + +She went out, leaving the door slightly ajar. + + +V + +In the parlour adjoining George Cannon was seated at the table. When +Hilda saw him and their eyes met, she was comforted; a wave of +tenderness seemed to agitate her. She realized that this man was hers, +and the realization was marvellously reassuring. The sound of the piano +descended delicately from the drawing-room as from a great distance. +From the kitchen came the muffled clatter of earthenware and +occasionally a harsh, loud voice; it was the hour of relaxed discipline +in the kitchen, where amid the final washing-up and much free discussion +and banter, Florrie was recommencing her career on a grander basis. +Hilda closed the door very quietly. When she had closed it and was shut +in with George Cannon her emotion grew intenser. + +"I think she'll get off now," she whispered, standing near the door. + +"Have you told her?" + +Hilda nodded. + +"What does she say?" + +Hilda raised her eyebrows: "Oh!... Well, she says we'd better keep it +quiet, and make the engagement as short as possible." She blushed. + +"Look here," said George. "Let's go out, eh?" + +"But--what will people say?" + +"What the devil does it matter what they say? I want you to come out +with me." + +The whispered oath, and his defiant smile, enchanted her. + +"We can go out by the area steps," he continued. "There's two of 'em +sitting in the hall, but the front door's shut. Do go and get your hat." + +She left the room with an obedient smile. Pushing open Sarah's door very +gently, she groped on the hooks behind it for her hat. "It won't matter +about gloves--in the dark," she thought. "Besides, I mustn't disturb +her." Before drawing-to the door she looked again at the bed. There was +neither sound nor movement. Probably Sarah Gailey slept. The dim vision +of the form on the bed and the blue spark of gas in the corner produced +in Hilda a mood of poignant and yet delicious sorrow. + +"Why, what's the matter?" George Cannon asked when she had returned to +the parlour. + +She knew that her eyes were humid with tears. Both her arms were raised +above her head as she fixed the hat. This act of fixing the hat in +George's presence gave her a new pleasure. She smiled at him. + +"Nothing!" she said, whispering mysteriously. "I think she's gone off. +I'm so glad. You know she really does suffer dreadfully." + +His look was uncomprehending; but she did not care. The anticipation of +going out with him was now utterly absorbing her. + +He waited with his hand on the gas-tap till she was ready, and then he +lowered the gas. + +"Wait a moment," she whispered at the door, and with a gesture called +him back into the room from the flagged passage leading to the area +steps. + +On the desk was his evening glass of milk, which he drank cold in +summer. She offered it to him in the twilit room like an enraptured +handmaid. He had forgotten it. The fact that he had forgotten it and she +had remembered it yet further increased her strange, mournful, ecstatic +bliss. + +"Have some," he whispered, when he had drunk. + +She finished the glass, trembling. They went forth, climbing the area +steps with proper precautions and escaping as thieves escape, down the +street. For an instant she glimpsed the wide-open windows of the +drawing-room, and the dining-room, from behind whose illuminated blinds +came floating, as it were wistfully, the sound of song and chatter. She +thought of Sarah Gailey prone and unconscious in the basement. And she +felt the moisture of the milk on her lips. "Am I happy or unhappy?" she +questioned herself, and could not reply. She knew only that she was +thrillingly, smartingly alive. + +At the corner of Preston Street and King's Road a landau waited. + +"This is ours," said George casually. + +"Ours?" + +What a splendid masculine idea! How it proved that he too had been +absorbed in the adventure! She admired him humbly, like a girl, like a +little girl. With the most formal deference he helped her into the +carriage. + +"Drive towards Shoreham," he commandingly directed the driver, and took +his place by her side. + +Yes! He was mature. He was a man of the world. He had had every +experience. He knew how to love. That such a being was hers, that she +without any effort had captured such a being, flattered her to an +extreme degree. She was glorious with pride. She leaned back in the +carriage negligently, affecting an absolute calm. She armed herself in +her virginity. Not George Cannon himself could have guessed that only by +a miracle of self-control did she prevent her hand from seeking his +beneath the light rug that covered their knees! She intimidated George +Cannon in that hour, and the while her heart burned with shame at the +secret violence of her feelings. She thought: "This must be love. This +is love!" And yet her conscience inarticulately accused her of +obliquity. But she did not care, and she would not reflect. She thought +that she wilfully, perversely, refused to reflect; but in reality she +was quite helpless. + +Under the still and feverish night the landau rolled slowly along +between the invisible murmuring sea and the lighted facades of Hove. +Occasionally other carriages, containing other couples, approached, were +plain for a moment, and dissolved away. + +"So she thinks the engagement ought to be short?" said George Cannon. + +"Yes." + +"So do I!" he pronounced with emphasis. + +Hilda desired to ask him: "How short?" But she could not. She could not +bring herself to put the question. She was too proud. By a short +engagement, did he mean six months, three months, a month? Dared she +hope that he meant... a month? This was a thought buried in the deepest +fastness of her soul, a thought that she would have perished in order +not to expose; but it existed. + +"I think I should like to go back now," she breathed timidly, before +they were beyond Hove. It was not a request to be ignored. The carriage +turned. She felt relief. The sensation of being alive had been too acute +to be borne, and it was now a little eased. She knew that her destiny +was irrevocable, that nothing could prevent her from being George +Cannon's. Whether the destiny was evil or good did not paramountly +interest her. But she wanted to rush forward into the arms of fate and +know her fate. She dreamed only of the union. + + * * * * * + + + + +BOOK V +HER DELIVERANCE + + + + +CHAPTER I +LOUISA UNCONTROLLED + + +I + +Hilda, after a long railway journey, was bathing her face, arms, and +neck at the large double washstand in the large double bedroom on the +second floor of No. 59 Preston Street. At the back of the washstand was +an unused door which gave into a small bedroom occupied by the youngest +Miss Watchett. George Cannon came up quietly behind her. She pretended +not to hear him. He put his hands lightly on her wet arms. Smiling with +condescending indulgence, half to herself, she still pretended to ignore +him, and continued her toilet. + +The return from the honeymoon, which she had feared, had accomplished +itself quite simply and easily. She had feared the return, because only +upon the return was the marriage to be formally acknowledged and +published. It had been obviously impossible to announce, during the +strenuous summer season, the engagement of the landlord to a young woman +who lived under the same roof with him. The consequences of such an +indiscretion would have been in various ways embarrassing. Hence not a +word was said. Nor were definite plans for the wedding made until George +remarked one evening that he would like to be married at Chichester, +Chichester being the name of his new private hotel. Which exhibition of +sentimentality had both startled and touched Hilda. Chichester, however, +had to be renounced, owing to the difficulty of residence. The subject +having been thus fairly broached, George had pursued it, and one day +somewhat casually stated that he had taken a room in Lewes and meant to +sleep there every night for the term imposed by the law. Less than three +weeks later, Hilda had inobtrusively departed from No. 59, the official +account being that she was to take a holiday with friends after the +fatigues of August and early September. She left the train at Lewes, and +there, in the presence of strangers, was married to George Cannon, who +had quitted Brighton two days earlier and was supposed to be in London +on business. Even Sarah Gailey, though her health had improved, did not +assist at the wedding. Sarah, sole depositary of the secret, had to +remain in charge of No. 59. + +A strange wedding! Not a single wedding present, except those +interchanged by the principals! Nor had any of the problems raised by +the marriage been solved, or attacked. The future of Sarah Gailey, for +example! Was Sarah to go on living with them? It was inconceivable, and +yet the converse was also inconceivable. Sarah had said nothing, and +nothing had been said to Sarah. Matters were to settle themselves. It +had not even been decided which room Mr. and Mrs. Cannon should inhabit +as man and wife. It was almost certain that, in the dead period between +the popular summer season and the fashionable autumn season, there would +be several bedrooms empty. Hilda, like George, did not want to bother +with a lot of tedious details, important or unimportant. The attitude of +each was: "Let me get married first, and then I'll see to all that." + +Thus had the return been formidable to Hilda. All the way from Ireland +she had been saying to herself: "I shall have to go up the steps, and +into the house, and be spoken to as Mrs. Cannon! And then there'll be +Sarah...!" But the entry into the house had produced no terror. +Everywhere George's adroitness had been wonderful, extraordinarily +comforting and reassuring, and nowhere more so than in the vestibule of +No. 59. The tone in which he had said to Louisa, "Take Mrs. Cannon's +handbag, Louisa," had been a marvel of ease. Louisa had incontestably +blenched, for the bizarre Sarah, who conserved in Brighton the inmost +spirit of the Five Towns, had thought fit to tell the servants nothing +whatever. But the trained veteran in Louisa had instantly recovered, and +she had replied "Yes, sir," with a simplicity which proved her to be the +equal of George Cannon.... The worst was over for Hilda. And the next +moments were made smooth by reason of a great piece of news which, +forcing Sarah Gailey to communicate it at once, monopolized attention, +and so entirely relieved the bride's self-consciousness. + +Florence Bagster, having insolently quarrelled with her mistress, had +left her service without notice. Mr. Boutwood had also gone, and the +connection between the two departures was only too apparent, not merely +to Sarah, but also to the three Miss Watchetts, who had recently +arrived. Florence, who could but whisper, had shouted at her mistress. +Little, flushing, modest Florrie, who yesterday in the Five Towns was an +infant, had compromised herself with a fat widower certainly old enough +to be her father. And the widower, the friend of the house, had had so +little regard for the feelings of the house that he had not hesitated to +flaunt with Florrie in the town. It was known that they were more or +less together, and that he stood between Florrie and the world. + + +II + +"I suppose I'd better write at once to her mother--or perhaps her aunt; +her aunt's got more sense," said Hilda, as she dropped the sponge and +groped for a towel, her eyes half blinded. + +In moving she had escaped from his hands. + +"What do you say?" she asked, having heard a vague murmur through the +towel. + +"I say you can write if you like." George spoke with a careless smile. + +Now, facing her, he put his hands on her damp shoulders. She looked up +at him over the towel, leaning her head forward, and suspending action. +Her nose was about a foot from his. She saw, as she had seen a hundred +times, every detail of his large, handsome and yet time-worn face, every +hair of his impressive moustache, all the melting shades of colour in +his dark eyes. His charm was coarse and crude, but he was very skilful, +and there was something about his experienced, weather-beaten, slightly +depraved air, which excited her. She liked to feel young and girlish +before him; she liked to feel that with him, alone of all men, her +modesty availed nothing. She was beginning to realize her power over +him, and the extent of it. It was a power miraculous and mysterious, +never claimed by her, and never admitted by him save in glance and +gesture. This power lay in the fact that she was indispensable to him. +He was not her slave--she might indeed have been considered the human +chattel--but he was the slave of his need of her. He loved her. In him +she saw what love was; she had seen it more and more clearly ever since +the day of their engagement. She was both proud and ashamed of her +power. He did not possess a similar power over herself. She was fond of +him, perhaps getting fonder; but his domination of her senses was +already nearly at an end. She had passed through painful, shattering +ecstasies of bliss, hours unforgettable, hours which she knew could +never recur. And she was left sated and unsatisfied. So that by virtue +of this not yet quite bitter disillusion, she was coming to regard +herself as his superior, as being less naïve than he, as being even +essentially older than he. And in speaking to him sometimes she would +put on a grave and precociously sapient mien, as if to indicate that she +had access to sources of wisdom for ever closed to him. + +"But don't you think we _ought_ to write?" she frowned. + +"Certainly if you like! It won't do any good. You don't suppose her aunt +will come down here, do you? And even if she did.... There it is, and +there you are!" + +"Just let me wipe my shoulders, will you?" she said. + +He lifted his hands obediently, and as they were damp he rubbed them on +the loose corner of the towel. + +"Well," he said, "I must be off, I reckon." + +"Shall you see Mr. Boutwood?" + +"I might.... I know where to catch him, I fancy." + +She seemed to have a glimpse of her husband's separate life in the +town--masculine haunts and habits of which she knew nothing and would +always know nothing. And the large existence of the male made her +envious. + +"Going to see him now?" + +"Well, yes." George smiled roguishly. + +"What shall you say to him?" + +"What can I say to him? No business of mine, you know, except that we've +lost a decent servant. But I expect that's Sarah's fault. She's no use +whatever with servants, now, Sarah isn't." + +"_I_ shall never speak to Mr. Boutwood again!" Hilda exclaimed almost +passionately. + +"Oh, but--" + +"His behaviour is simply scandalous. It's really wicked. A man like +him!" + +George put his lips out deprecatingly. "You may depend she asked for +it," he said. + +"What?" + +"She asked for it," he repeated with convinced firmness, and looked at +her steadily. + +A flush slowly spread over her face and neck, and she lowered her gaze. +In her breast pride and shame were again mingled. + +"You keep your hair on, littl'un," said George soothingly, and kissed +her. Then he took his hat and stick, which were with a lot of other +things on the broad white counterpane, and went off stylishly. + +"You don't understand," she threw at him with a delicious side-glance of +reproof as he opened the door. She reproached herself for the deceiving +coquetry of the glance. + +"Don't I?" he returned airily. + +He was quite sure that nothing escaped his intelligence. To Hilda, +shocked by the coarseness and the obtuseness which evidently +characterized his attitude, now as on other occasions, this +self-confidence was desolating; it was ominously sinister. + + +III + +She was alone with her image in the mirror, and the image was precisely +the same that she had always seen; she could detect no change in it +whatever. She liked the sensation of being alone and at home in this +room which before she had only entered as an overseer and which she had +never expected to occupy. She savoured the intimacy of the room--the +necessaries on the washstand, the superb tortoiseshell brushes, bought +by George in Dublin, on the dressing-table, the open trunks, George's +clothes on a chair, and her own flimsy trifles on the bed. Through the +glass she saw, behind her image, the image of the closed door; and then +she turned round to look at the real door and to assure herself that it +was closed. Childish! And yet...! George had shut the door. She +remembered the noise of its shutting. And that noise, in her memory, +seemed to have transformed itself into the sound of fate's deep bell. +She could hear the clang, sharp, definite. She realized suddenly and +with awe that her destiny was fixed hereafter. She had come to the end +of her adventures and her vague dreams. For she had always dreamt +vaguely of an enlarged liberty, of wide interests, and of original +activities--such as no woman to her knowledge had ever had. She had +always compared the life of men with the life of women, and admitted and +resented the inferiority of the latter. She had had glimpses, once, of +the male world; she had made herself the only woman shorthand-writer in +the Five Towns, and one of the earliest in England--dizzy thought! But +the glimpses had been vain and tantalizing. She had been in the male +world, but not of it, as though encircled in a glass ball which neither +she nor the males could shatter. She had had money, freedom, and +ambition, and somehow, through ignorance or through lack of imagination +or opportunity, had been unable to employ them. She had never known what +she wanted. The vision had never been clear. And she reflected: "I +wonder if my daughter, supposing I had one, would be as different from +me as I am from my mother!" + +She could recall with intense vividness the moment when she had first +really contemplated marriage. It was in the steam-tram after having seen +Edwin Clayhanger at the door of Clayhanger's shop. And she could recall +the sense of relief with which she had envisaged a union with some man +stronger and more experienced than herself. In the relief was a certain +secret shame, as though it implied cowardice, a shrinking away from the +challenge of life and from the call of a proud instinct. In the +steam-tram she had foreseen the time when she would belong utterly to +some man, surrendering to him without reserve, the time when she would +be a woman. And the thing had come about! Only yesterday she had been a +little girl entering George Cannon's office with timid audacity to +consult him. Only yesterday George Cannon had been a strange, formidable +man, indefinitely older and infinitely cleverer than she. And now they +were man and wife! Now she was his! Now she profoundly knew him, and he +was no longer formidable, in spite of his force. She had a recondite +dominion over him. She guessed herself to be his superior in certain +qualities. He was revealed to her; she felt that she was not revealed to +him, and that in spite of her wholehearted surrender she had not given +all because of his blindness to what she offered. She could not +completely respect him. But she was his. She was naught apart from him. +She was the wife. His existence went on mainly as before; hers was +diverted, narrowed--fundamentally altered. Never now could she be +enfranchised into the male world! + + +IV + +She slipped her arms into a new bodice purchased in London on the second +day of the marriage. Blushing, she had tried on that bodice in a great +shop in Oxford Street; then it was that she had first said 'my husband' +in public. All that day she had felt so weak and shy and light and +helpless and guilty that she had positively not known what she was +doing; she had moved in a phantom world. Only, she had perceived quite +steadily and practically that she must give more attention to her +clothes. Her old contempt for finery expired in the glory of her new +condition. And now, as she settled the elegant bodice on her shoulders, +and fastened it, and patted her hair, and picked up the skirt and poised +it over her head, she had a stern, preoccupied look, as of one who said: +"This that I am doing is important. I must not be hurried in doing it. +It is vital that I should look well and that no detail of my appearance +should jar." Already she could see herself standing before George when +he returned for the meal--the first meal which they would take together +in the home. She could feel his eyes on her: she could anticipate her +own mood--in which would be mingled pride, misgiving, pleasure, +helplessness, abandonment--and the secret condescension towards him of +her inmost soul. + +All alone in the room she could feel his hands again on her shoulders: a +mysterious excitation.... She was a married woman. She had the right to +discuss Florrie's case with aloof disdain, if she chose. Her +respectability was unassailable. None might penetrate beyond the fact of +her marriage. And yet, far within her, she was ashamed. She dimly +admitted once more, as on several occasions previous to her marriage, +that she had dishonoured an ideal. Her conscience would not chime with +the conscience of society. She thought, as she prepared with pleasurable +expectancy for her husband: "This is not right. This cannot lead to +good. It must lead to evil. I am bound to suffer for it. The whole thing +is wrong. I know it and I have always known it." + +Already she was disappointed with her marriage. Amid the fevers of +bodily appetite she could clearly distinguish the beginning of +lassitude; she no longer saw her husband as a romantic and baffling +figure; she had explored and chartered his soul, and not all his +excellences could atone for his earthliness. She wondered grimly where +and under what circumstances he had acquired the adroitness which had +charmed and still did charm her. She saw in front of her a vista of days +and years in which ennui would probably increase and joy diminish. And +she put her shoulders back defiantly, and thought: "Well, here I am +anyhow! I wanted him and I've got him. What I have to go through I shall +go through!" + +And all the time, floating like vapour over these depths was a sheeny +mood of bright expectation and immediate naïve content. And she said +gaily that she must write at once to Janet Orgreave to announce the +marriage, and that her mother's uncle up in the north must also be +informed. + + +V + +Unusual phenomena made themselves apparent on the top staircase: raised +voices which Hilda could hear more and more plainly, even through the +shut door. At No. 59, in the off-seasons, nobody ever spoke in a loud +tone, particularly on the staircase, except perhaps Florrie when, in +conversation with Louisa, she thought she was out of all other hearing. +Hilda's voice was very clear and penetrating, but not loud. George +Cannon's voice in public places such as the staircase had an almost +caressing softness. The Watchetts cooed like faint doves, thereby +expressing the delicate refinement of their virginal natures. The cook's +voice was unknown beyond the kitchen. And nobody was more grimly +self-controlled in speech than Sarah Gailey and Louisa. These two--and +especially Louisa--seemed generally to be restraining with ease +tremendous secret forces of bitterness and contempt. And now it was just +these two who were noisy, and becoming noisier, to the dismay of a +scandalized house. Owing to some accident or negligence the secret +forces had got loose. + +Hilda shook her head. It was clear that the problem of Sarah Gailey +would have to be tackled and settled very soon. The poor woman's +physical sufferings had without doubt reacted detrimentally on her +temperament and temper. She used to be quite extraordinarily adroit in +the directing of servants, though her manner to them never approached +geniality. But she had quarrelled with Florrie, and now she was breaking +the peace with Louisa! It was preposterous and annoying, and it could +not be allowed to continue. Hilda was not seriously alarmed, because she +had the most perfect confidence in George's skill to restore order and +calm, and to conquer every difficulty of management; and she also put a +certain trust in herself; but the menacing and vicious accents of Louisa +startled her, and she sympathized with Sarah Gailey, for whom +humiliation was assuredly in store--if not immediately at the tongue of +Louisa, then later when George would have to hint the truth to her about +her decadence. + +The dispute on the attic landing appeared to be concerning linen which +Louisa had omitted to remove from Florrie's abandoned couch in her +kennel. + +"I ain't going to touch her sheets, not for nobody!" Louisa proclaimed +savagely. And by that single phrase, with its implications, she laid +unconsciously bare the sordid baseness of her ageing heart; she exposed +by her mere intonation of the word 'sheets' all the foulness of jealousy +and thwarted salacity that was usually concealed beneath her tight dress +and neat apron, and beneath her prim gestures and deferential tones. Her +undisciplined voice rang spinsterishly down the staircase, outraging it, +defiling the whole interior. + +Hilda as silently as possible unlatched the door of the bedroom, and +stood with ear cocked. Should she issue forth and interfere, or should +she remain discreetly where she was? Almost in the same instant she +heard the cautious unlatching of the drawing-room door; two of the +Watchetts were there listening also. And there came up from the ground +floor a faint giggle. The cook, at the kitchen door, was enjoying +herself and giggling moral support to her colleague. The giggle proved +that the master was out, that the young mistress had not yet established +a definite position, and that during recent weeks the old mistress must +have been steadily dissipating her own authority. Hilda peered along the +landing from her lair, and upstairs and downstairs; she could see +nothing but senseless carpets and brass rods and steps and banisters; +but she knew that the entire household--she had the sensation that the +very house itself--was alert and eavesdropping. + +There was a hesitating movement on the unseen stairs above, and then +Hilda could see Sarah Gailey's felt slippers and the valance of her +skirt. And she could hear Sarah's emotional breathing. + +"Very well, Louisa, I've done!" Sarah's voice was quieter now. She was +trying to control it, and to a limited extent was controlling its +volume. It shook in spite of her. She spoke true. She had indeed done. +She was at the end of her resources. + +"I've been in houses," Louisa conqueringly sneered, "that I have! But I +never been in a house afore where one as ought to have been scullery- +girl went off with a boarder, and nothing said, and him the friend of +the master! And it isn't as if that was all!... Sheets, indeed!" + +"I've nothing further to say," Sarah returned unnecessarily, and +descended the stair. "I shall simply report to Mr. Cannon. We shall +see." + +"And what's this about _Mrs_. Cannon?" Louisa shouted, beside herself. + +The peculiarity of her tone arrested Sarah Gailey. Hilda flushed. The +Watchetts were listening. The Watchetts had not yet been told of the +marriage. The announcement was to be made to them formally, a little +later. And now it was Louisa who was making the announcement, brutally, +coarsely. The outrage of the episode was a hundredfold intensified; it +grew into an inconceivable ghastly horror. Hilda's self-respect seemed +to have a physical body and Louisa to be hacking at it with a jagged +knife. + +"Mr. Cannon has brought his wife home," said Sarah Gailey shortly, with +a dignity and courage that increased as her distance from the appalling, +the incredible Louisa. Hilda could see her pale face now. The eyebrows +and chin were lifted in scorn of the vile menial, but the poor head was +trembling. + +"And what about his other wife?" + +"Louisa!"--Sarah Gailey looked again up the stairs--"I know you're in a +temper and not responsible for what you say. But you'd better be +careful." She spoke with elaborate haughty negligence. + +"Had I?" Louisa shrilled. "What I say is, what about his other wife? +What about the old woman he married in Devonshire? Why, God bless me, +Florrie was full of it--couldn't talk about anything else in bed of a +night! Didn't you know the old woman'd been inquiring for her beautiful +'usband down your way?" She laughed loudly. "Turnhill--what's-its-name?... +And all of you lying low, and then making out all of a sudden as he's +brought his wife home! A nice house! And I've been in a few, too!" + +Hilda could feel her heart beating with terrific force against her +bodice, but she was conscious of no other sensation. She heard a loud +snort of shattering contempt from Louisa; and then a strange and +terrific silence fell on the stairs. There was no sound even of a +movement. The Watchetts did not stir; the cook did not stir; Sarah +Gailey did not stir; Louisa's fury was sated. The empty landing lay, as +it were, expectant at Hilda's door. + +Then Sarah Gailey perceived Hilda half hidden in the doorway, and +staggeringly rushed towards her. In an instant they were both in the +bedroom and the door shut. + +"When will George be back so that he can put her out of the house?" +Sarah whispered frantically. + +"Soon, I expect," said Hilda, and felt intensely self-conscious. + +They said no more. And it was as though the house were besieged and +invested, and only in that room were they safe, and even in that room +only for a few moments. + + + + +CHAPTER II +SOME SECRET HISTORY + + +I + +Without a word, Sarah had left the bedroom. Hilda waited, sitting on the +bed, for George to come back from his haunts in the town. She both +intensely desired and intensely feared his return. A phrase or two of an +angry and vicious servant had almost destroyed her faith in her husband. +It seemed very strange, even to her, that this should be so; and she +wondered whether she had ever had a real faith in him, whether--passion +apart--her feeling for him had ever been aught but admiration of his +impressive adroitness. Was it possible that he had another wife alive? +No, it was not possible! That is to say, it was not possible that such a +catastrophe should have happened to just her, to Hilda Lessways, sitting +there on the bed with her hands pressing on the rough surface of the +damask counterpane. And yet--how could Louisa or Florrie have invented +the story?... Wicked, shocking, incredible, that Florrie, with her soft +voice and timid, affectionate manner, should have been chattering in +secret so scandalously during all these weeks! She remembered the look +on Florrie's blushing face when the child had received the letter on the +morning of their departure from the house in Lessways Street. Even then +the attractively innocent and capable Florrie must have had her naughty +secrets!... An odious world. And Hilda, married, had seriously thought +that she knew all about the world! She had to admit, bewildered: "I'm +only a girl after all, and a very simple one." She compared her own +heart in its simplicity with that of Louisa. Louisa horrified and +frightened her.... Louisa and Florrie were mischievous liars. Florrie +had seized some fragment of silly gossip--Turnhill was notorious for its +silly gossip--and the two of them had embroidered it in the nastiness of +their souls. She laughed shortly, disdainfully, to wither up silly +gossip.... Preposterous! + +And yet--when George had shown her the licence, in the name of Cannon, +and she had ventured to say apologetically and caressingly: "I always +understood your real name was Canonges,"--how queerly he had looked as +he answered: "I changed it long ago--legally!" Yes, and she had +persuaded herself that the queerness of his look was only in her fancy! +But it was not only in her fancy. Suspicions, sinister trifling +souvenirs, crowded into her mind. Had she not always doubted him? Had +she not always said to herself that she was doing wrong in her marriage +and that she would thereby suffer? Had she not abandoned the pursuit of +religious truth in favour of light enjoyments?... Foolish of course, +old-fashioned of course, to put two and two together in this way! But +she could not refrain. + +"I am ruined!" she decided, in awe. + +And the next instant she was saying: "How absurd of me to be like this, +merely because Louisa..." + +She thought she heard a noise below. Her heart leapt again into violent +activity. Trembling, she crept to the door, and gently unlatched it. No +slightest sound in the whole house! Dusk was coming on swiftly. Then she +could hear all the noises, accentuated beyond custom, of Louisa setting +tea in the dining-room for the Watchetts, and then the tea-bell rang. +Despite her fury, apparent in the noises, Louisa had not found courage +to neglect the sacred boarders. She made a defiant fuss, but she had to +yield, intimidated, to the force of habit and tradition. The Watchetts +descended the staircase from the drawing-room, practising as usual +elaborate small-talk among themselves. They had heard every infamous +word of Louisa's tirade; which had engendered in them a truly dreadful +and still delicious emotion; but they descended the staircase in good +order, discussing the project for a new pier.... They reached the +dining-room and shut the door on themselves. + +Silence again! Louisa ought now to have set the tea in the basement +parlour. But Louisa did not. Louisa was hidden in the kitchen, doubtless +talking fourteen to the dozen with the cook. She had done all she meant +to do. She knew that she would be compelled to leave at once, and not +another stroke would she do of any kind! The master and the mistresses +must manage as best they could. Louisa was already wondering where she +would sleep that night, for she was alone on earth and owned one small +trunk and a Post Office Savings Bank book.... All this trouble on +account of Florrie's sheets! + +Sarah Gailey was in her bedroom, and did not dare to came out of it even +to accuse Louisa of neglecting the basement tea. And Hilda continued to +stand for ages at the bedroom door, while the dusk grew deeper and +deeper. At last the front door opened, and George's step was in the +hall. Hilda recognized it with a thrill of terror, turning pale. George +ran down into the basement and stumbled. "Hello!" she heard him call +out, "what about tea? Where are you all? Sarah!" No answer, no sound in +response! He ran up the basement steps. Would he call in at the +dining-room, or would he come to the bedroom in search of her? He did +not stop at the dining-room. Hilda wanted to shut the bedroom door, but +dared not because she could not do it noiselessly. Now he was on the +first floor! She rushed to the bed, and sat on it, as she had been +sitting previously, and waited in the most painful and irrational agony. +She was astonished at the darkness of the room. Turning her head, she +saw only a whitish blur instead of a face in the dressing-table mirror. + + +II + +"What's up?" he demanded, bursting somewhat urgently into the bedroom +with his hat on. "What price the husband coming home to his tea? No tea! +No light! I nearly broke my neck down the basement stairs." + +He put his hands against her elbows and kissed her, rather clumsily, +owing to the gloom, between her nose and her mouth. She did not shrink +back, but accepted the embrace quite insensibly. The contact of his +moustache and of his lips, and his slight, pleasant masculine odour, +produced no effect on her whatever. + +"Why are you sitting here? Look here, I've signed the transfer of those +Continental shares, and paid the cheque! So it's domino, now!" + +Between the engagement and the marriage there had been an opportunity of +purchasing three thousand pounds' worth of preference shares in the +Brighton Hotel Continental Limited, which hotel was the latest and +largest in the King's Road, a vast affair of eight storeys and bathrooms +on every floor. The chance of such an investment had fascinated George. +It helped his dreams and pointed to the time when he would be manager +and part proprietor of a palace like the Continental. Hilda being very +willing, he had sold her railways shares and purchased the hotel shares, +and he knew that he had done a good thing. Now he possessed an interest +in three different establishments, he who had scarcely been in Brighton +a year. The rapid progress, he felt, was characteristic of him. + +Hilda kept silence, for the sole reason that she could think of no words +to say. As for the matter of the investment, it appeared to her to be +inexpressibly uninteresting. From under the lashes of lowered eyes she +saw his form shadowily in front of her. + +"You don't mean to say Sarah's been making herself disagreeable +already!" he said. And his tone was affectionate and diplomatic, yet +faintly ironical. He had perceived that something unusual had occurred, +perhaps something serious, and he was anxious to soothe and to justify +his wife. Hilda perfectly understood his mood and intention, and she was +reassured. + +"Hasn't Sarah told you?" she asked in a harsh, uncontrolled voice, +though she knew that he had not seen Sarah. + +"No; where is she?" he inquired patiently. + +"It's Louisa," Hilda went on, with the sick fright of a child compelled +by intimidation to affront a danger. Her mouth was very dry. + +"Oh!" + +"She lost her temper and made a fearful scene with Sarah, on the stairs; +she said the most awful things." + +George laughed low, and lightly. He guessed Louisa's gift for foul +insolence and invective. + +"For instance?" George encouraged. He was divining from Hilda's singular +tone that tact would be needed. + +"Well, she said you'd got a wife living in Devonshire." + +There was a pause. + +"And who'd told her that?" + +"Florrie." + +"_In_deed!" muttered George. Hilda could not decide whether his voice +was natural or forced. + +Then he stepped across to the door, and opened it. + +"What are you going to do to her?" Hilda questioned, as it were +despairingly. + +He left the room and banged the door. + +"It's not true," Hilda was beginning to say to herself, but she seemed +to derive no pleasure from the dawning hope of George's innocence. + +Then George came into the room again, hesitated, and shut the door +carefully. + +"I suppose it's no good shilly-shallying about," he said, in such a tone +as he might have used had he been vexed and disgusted with Hilda. "I +have got a wife living, and she's in Devonshire! I expect she's been +inquiring in Turnhill if I'm still in the land of the living. Probably +wants to get married again herself." + +Hilda glanced at his form, and suddenly it was the form of a stranger, +but a stranger who had loved her. And she thought: "Why did I let this +stranger love me?" It was scarce believable that she had ever seriously +regarded him as a husband. And she found that tears were running down +her cheeks; and she felt all her girlishness and fragility. "Didn't I +always know," she asked herself with weak resignation, "that it was +unreal? What am I to do now?" The catastrophe had indeed happened to +her, and she could not deal with it! She did not even feel tragic. She +did not feel particularly resentful against George. She had read of such +catastrophes in the newspapers, but the reality of experience nonplussed +her. "I ought to do something," she reflected. "But what?" + +"What's the use of me saying I'm sorry?" he asked savagely. "I acted for +the best. The chances were ten thousand to one against me being spotted. +But there you are! You never know your luck." He spoke meditatively, in +a rather hoarse, indistinct voice. "All owing to Florrie, of course! +When it was suggested we should have that girl, I knew there was a +danger. But I pooh-poohed it! I said nothing could possibly happen.... +And just look at it now!... I wanted to cut myself clear of the Five +Towns, absolutely--absolutely! And then like a damnation fool I let +Florrie come here! If she hadn't come, that woman might have inquired +about me in Turnhill till all was blue, without you hearing about her! +But there it is!" He snapped his fingers. "It's my fault for being found +out! That's the only thing I'm guilty of.... And look at it! Look at +it!" + +Hilda could tell from the movements of the vague form in the corner by +the door, and by the quality of his voice, that George Cannon was in a +state of extreme emotion. She had never known him half so moved. His +emotion excited her and flattered her. She thought how wonderful it was +that she, the shaking little girl who yesterday had run off with +fourpence to buy a meal at a tripe-shop, should be the cause of this +emotion in such a man. She thought: "My life is marvellous." She was +dizzied by the conception of the capacity of her own body and soul for +experience. No factors save her own body and soul and his had been +necessary to the bringing about of the situation. It was essential only +that the man and the woman should be together, and their companionship +would produce miracles of experience! She ceased crying. Astounding that +she had never, in George's eyes, suspected his past! It was as if he had +swiftly opened a concealed door in the house of their passion and +disclosed a vista of which she had not dreamed. + +"But surely that must have been a long time ago!" she said in an +ordinary tone. + +"Considering that I was twenty-two--yes!" + +"Why did you leave her?" + +"Why did I leave her? Because I had to! I'd gone as a clerk in a +solicitor's office in Torquay, and she was a client. She went mad about +me. I'm only telling you. She was a spinster. Had one of those big +houses high up on the hill behind the town!" He stopped; and then his +voice began to come again out of the deep shadow in the corner. "She +wanted me, and she got me. And she didn't care who knew! The wedding was +in the _Torquay Directory_. I told her I'd got no relations, and she was +jolly glad." + +"But how old was she? Young?" + +George sneered. "She'd never see thirty-six again, the day she was +married. Good-looking. Well-dressed. Very stylish and all that! Carried +me off my feet. Of course there was the money.... I may as well out with +it all while I'm about it! She made me an absolute present of four +thousand pounds. Insisted on doing it. I never asked. Of course I know I +married for money. It happens to youths sometimes just as it does to +girls. It may be disgusting, but not more disgusting for one than for +the other. Besides, I didn't realize it was a sale and purchase, at the +time!... Oh! And it lasted about ten days. I couldn't stand it, so I +told her so and chucked it. She began an action for restitution of +conjugal rights, but she soon tired of that. She wouldn't have her four +thousand back. Simply wouldn't! She was a terror, but I'll say that for +her. Well, I kept it. Four thousand pounds is a lot of brass. That's how +I started business in Turnhill, if you want to know!" He spoke +defiantly. "You may depend I never let on in the Five Towns about my +beautiful marriage.... That's the tale. You've got to remember I was +twenty-two!" + +She thought of Edwin Clayhanger and Charlie Orgreave as being about +twenty-two, and tried in her imagination to endow the mature George +Cannon with their youth and their simplicity and their freshness. She +was saddened and overawed; not wrathful, not obsessed by a sense of +injury. + +Then she heard a sob in the corner, and then another. The moment was +terrible for her. She could only distinguish in the room the blur of a +man's shape against the light-coloured wall-paper, and the whiteness of +the counterpane, and the dark square of the window broken by the black +silhouette of the mirror. She slipped off the bed, and going in the +direction of the dressing-table groped for a match-box and lit the gas. +Dazzled by the glare of the gas, she turned to look at the corner where +stood George Cannon. + + +III + +The whole aspect of the room was now altered. The window was blacker +than anything else; light shone on the carved frame of the mirror and on +the vessels of the washstand; the trunks each threw a sharply defined +shadow; the bed was half in the shadow of its mahogany foot, and half a +glittering white; all the array of requisites on the dressing-table lay +stark under the close scrutiny of the gas; and high above the bed, +partly on the wall and partly on the ceiling, was a bright oblong +reflection from the upturned mirror. + +Hilda turned to George with a straightening of the shoulders, as if to +say: "It is I who have the courage to light the gas and face the +situation!" But when she saw him her challenging pride seemed to die +slowly away. Though there was no sign of a tear on his features, and +though it was difficult to believe that it was he who had just sobbed, +nevertheless, his figure was dismayingly tragic. Every feature was +distorted by agitation. He was absorbed in himself, shameless and +careless of appearances. He was no more concerned about appearances and +manly shame than a sufferer dying in torment. He was beyond all that--in +truth a new George Cannon! He left the corner, and sat down on the bed +in the hollow made by Hilda, and stared at the wall, his hands in the +pockets of his gay suit. His gestures as he moved, and his posture as he +sat, made their unconscious appeal to her in their abandonment. He was +caught; he was vanquished; he was despairing; but he instinctively, and +without any wish to do so, kept his dignity. He was still, in his +complete overthrow, the mature man of the world, the man to whom it was +impossible to be ridiculous. + +Hilda in a curious way grew proud of him. With an extraordinary +inconsequence she dwelt upon the fact that, always grand--even as a +caterer, he had caused to be printed at the foot of the menu forms which +he had instituted, the words: "A second helping of all or any of the +above dishes will willingly be served if so desired." And in the general +havoc of the shock she began to be proud also of herself, because it was +the mysterious power of her individuality that had originated the +disaster. The sense of their intimate withdrawn seclusion in the room, +disordered and littered by arrival, utterly alone save for the living +flame of the gas, the sense of the tragedy, and of the responsibility +for it, and especially her responsibility, the sense of an imposed +burden to be grimly borne and of an unknown destiny to be worked out, +the sense of pity, the sense of youth and force,--these things gradually +exalted her and ennobled her desolation. + +"Why did you keep it from me?" she asked in a very clear and precise +tone, not aggrieved, but fatalistic and melancholy. + +"Keep what from you?" At length he met her eyes, darkly. + +"All this about your being married." + +"Why did I keep it from you?" he repeated harshly, and then his tone +changed from defiance to a softened regret: "I'll tell you why I kept it +from you! Because I knew if I told you I should have no chance with a +girl like you. I knew it'd be all up--if I so much as breathed a hint of +it! I don't suppose you've the slightest idea how stand-offish you are!" + +"Me stand-offish!" she protested. + +"Look here!" he said persuasively. "Supposing I'd told you I wanted you, +and then that I'd got a wife living--what would you have said?" + +"I don't know." + +"No! But _I_ know! And suppose I'd told you I'd got a wife living and +then told you I wanted you--what then? No, Hilda! Nobody could fool +about with you!" + +She was flattered, but she thought secretly: "He could have won me on +any terms he liked!... I wonder whether he _could_ have won me on any +terms!... That first night in this house, when we were in the front +attic--suppose he'd told me then--I wonder! What should I have said?" +But the severity of her countenance was a perfect mask for such weak and +uncertain ideas, and confirmed him deeply in his estimate of her. + +He continued: + +"Now that first night in this house, upstairs!" He jerked his head +towards the ceiling. She blushed, not from any shame, but because his +thought had surprised hers. "I was as near as dammit to letting out the +whole thing and chancing it with you. But I didn't--I saw it'd be no +use. And that's not the only time either!" + +She stood silent by the dressing-table, calmly looking at him, and she +asked herself, eagerly curious: "When were the other times?" + +"Of course it's all my fault!" he said. + +"What is?" + +"This!... All my fault! I don't want to excuse myself. I've nothing to +say for myself." + +In her mind she secretly interrupted him: "Yes, you have. You couldn't +do without me--isn't that enough?" + +"I'm ashamed!" he said, without reserve, abasing himself. "I'm utterly +ashamed. I'd give anything to be able to undo it." + +She was startled and offended. She had not expected that he would kiss +the dust. She hated to see him thus. She thought: "It isn't all your +fault. It's just as much mine as yours. But even if I was ashamed I'd +never confess it. Never would I grovel! And never would I want to undo +anything! After all you took the chances. You did what you thought best. +Why be ashamed when things go wrong? You wouldn't have been ashamed if +things had gone right." + +"Of course," he said, after a pause, "I'm completely done for!" + +He spoke so solemnly, and with such intense conviction, that she was +awed and appalled. She felt as one who, having alone escaped destruction +in an earthquake, stands afar off and contemplates the silent, corpse- +strewn ruin of a vast city. + +And the thought ran through her mind like a squirrel through a tree: +"How _could_ he refuse her four thousand pounds? And if she wouldn't +have it back,--well, what was he to do? She must be a horrible woman!" + + +IV + +Both of them heard a heavy step pass up the staircase. It was Louisa's; +she paused to strike a match and light the gas on the landing; and went +on. But Sarah Gailey had given no sign, and the Watchetts were still +shut in the dining-room. All these middle-aged women were preoccupied by +the affair of George Cannon. All of them guessed now that Louisa's +charge was not unfounded--otherwise, why the mysterious and interminable +interview between George Cannon and Hilda in the bedroom? Hilda pictured +them all. And she thought: "But it is _I_ who am in the bedroom with +him! It is I who am living through it and facing it out! They are all +far older than me, but they are outsiders. They don't know what life +is!" + +George rose, picked up a portmanteau, and threw it open on the bed. + +"And what is to be done?" Hilda asked, trembling. + +He turned and looked at her. + +"I suppose I mustn't stay here?" + +She shook her head, with lips pressed tight. + +His voice was thick and obscure when he asked: "You won't come with me?" + +She shook her head again. She could not have spoken. She was in acute +torture. + +"Well," he said, "I suppose I can count on you not to give me up to the +police?" + +"The police?" she exclaimed. "Why?" + +"Well, you know,--it's a three years' job--at least. Ever heard the word +'bigamy'?" His voice was slightly ironical. + +"Oh dear!" she breathed, already disconcerted. It had positively not +occurred to her to consider the legal aspect of George's conduct. + +"But what can you do?" she asked, with the innocent, ignorant +helplessness of a girl. + +"I can disappear," he replied. "That's all I can do! I don't see myself +in prison. I went over Stafford Prison once. The Governor showed several +of us over. And I don't see myself in prison." + +He began to cast things into the portmanteau, and as he did so he +proceeded, without a single glance at Hilda: + +"You'll be all right for money and so on. But I should advise you to +leave here and not to come back any sooner than you can help. That's the +best thing you can do. And be Hilda Lessways again!... Sarah will have +to manage this place as best she can. Fortunately, her health's +improved. She can make it pay very well if she likes. It's a handsome +living for her. My deposit on the Chichester and so on will have to be +forfeited." + +"And you?" she murmured. + +His back was towards her. He turned his head, looked at her +enigmatically for an instant, and resumed his packing. + +She desired to help him with the packing, she desired to show him some +tenderness; her heart was cleft in two with pity; but she could not +move; some harshness of pride or vanity prevented her from moving. + +When he had carelessly finished the portmanteau, he strode to the door, +opened it wide, and called out in a loud, firm voice: + +"Louisa!" + +A reply came weakly from the top floor: + +"Yes, sir." + +"I want you." He had a short way with Louisa. + +After a brief delay, she came to the bedroom door. + +"Run down to the King's Road and get me a cab," he said to her at the +door, as it were confidentially. + +"Yes, sir." The woman was like a Christian slave. + +"Here! Take the portmanteau down with you to the front door." He gave +her the portmanteau. + +"Yes, sir." + +She disappeared; and then there was the noise of the front door opening. + +George picked up his hat and abruptly left the room. Hilda moved to and +fro nervously, stiff with having stood still so long. She wondered how +he, and how she, would comport themselves in the ordeal of adieu. In a +few moments a cab drove up--Louisa had probably encountered it on the +way. Hilda waited, tense. Then she heard the cab driving off again. She +rushed aghast to the window. She saw the roof of the disappearing cab, +and the unwieldy portmanteau on it.... He had gone! He had gone without +saying good-bye! That was his device for simplifying the situation. It +was drastic, but it was magnificent. He had gone out of the house and +out of her life. As she gazed at the dim swaying roof of the cab, +magically the roof was taken off, and she could see the ravaged and +stricken figure within, sitting grimly in the dark between the wheels +that rolled him away from her. The vision was intolerable. She moved +aside and wept passionately. How could he help doing all he had done? +She had possessed him--the memories of his embrace told her how utterly! +All that he had said was true; and this being so, who could blame his +conduct? He had only risked and lost. + +Sarah Gailey suddenly appeared in the room, and shut the door like a +conspirator. + +"Then--" she began, terror-struck. + +And Hilda nodded, ceasing to cry. + +"Oh! My poor dear!" Sarah Gailey moaned feebly, her head bobbing with +its unconscious nervous movements. The sight of her worn, saddened +features sharpened Hilda's appreciation of her own girlishness and +inexperience. + +But despite the shock, despite her extreme misery, despite the anguish +and fear in her heart and the immense difficulty of the new situation +into which she was thus violently thrust, Hilda was not without +consolation. She felt none of the shame conventionally proper to a girl +deceived. On the contrary, deep within herself, she knew that the +catastrophe was a deliverance. She knew that fate had favoured her by +absolving her from the consequences of a tragic weakness and error. +These thoughts inflamed and rendered more beautiful the apprehensive +pity for the real victim--now affronted by a new danger, the menace of +the law. + + * * * * * + + + + +BOOK VI +HER PUNISHMENT + + + + +CHAPTER I +EVENING AT BLEAKRIDGE + + +I + +When Hilda's cab turned, perilously swaying, through the gate into the +dark garden of the Orgreaves, Hilda saw another cab already at the open +house door, and in the lighted porch stood figures distinguishable as +Janet and Alicia, all enwrapped for a journey, and Martha holding more +wraps. The long façade of the house was black, save for one window on +the first floor, which threw a faint radiance on the leafless branches +of elms, and thus intensified the upper mysteries of the nocturnal +garden. The arrival of the second cab caused excitement in the porch; +and Hilda, leaning out of the window into the November mist, shook with +apprehension, as her vehicle came to a halt behind the other one. She +was now to meet friends for the first time after her secret and unhappy +adventure. She feared that Janet, by some magic insight of affection, +would read at once in her face the whole history of the past year. + +Janet had written to her, giving and asking for news, and urging a +visit, on the very day after the scene in which George Cannon admitted +his turpitude. Had the letter been sent a day or two sooner, reaching +Hilda on her honeymoon, she would certainly have replied to it with the +tremendous news of her marriage, and, her marriage, having been made +public in the Five Towns, her shame also would necessarily be public. +But chance had saved her from this humiliation. Nobody in the district +was aware of the marriage. By a characteristic instinct, she had been +determined not to announce it in any way until the honeymoon was over. +In answer to Janet, she had written very briefly, as was usual with her, +and said that she would come to Lane End House as soon as she could. +"Shall I tell her, or shan't I?" she had cogitated, and the decision had +been for postponement. But she strongly desired, nevertheless, to pay +the visit. She had had more than enough of Preston Street and of +Brighton, and longed to leave at any price. + +And, at length, one dull morning, after George Cannon had sailed for +America, and all affairs were somehow arranged or had arranged +themselves, and Sarah Gailey was better and the autumn season smoothly +running with new servants, she had suddenly said to Sarah: "I have to go +to Bursley to-day, for a few days." And she had gone, upon the impulse, +without having previously warned Janet. Changing at Knype, she had got +into the wrong train, and had found herself at Shawport, at the far, +lower end of Bursley, instead of up at Bleakridge, close by the +Orgreaves! And there was, of course, no cab for her. But a cabman who +had brought a fare to the station, and was driving his young woman back, +had offered in a friendly way to take Hilda too. And she had sat in the +cab with the young woman, who was a paintress at Peel's great +manufactory at Shawport, and suffered from a weak chest; and they had +talked about the potters' strike which was then upheaving the district, +and the cab had overtaken a procession of thinly clad potters, wending +in the bitter mist to a mass meeting at Hanbridge; and Hilda had been +thereby much impressed and angered against all employers. And the young +woman had left the cab, half-way up Trafalgar Road, with a delicious +pink-and-white smile of adieu. And Hilda had thought how different all +this was from Brighton, and how much better and more homely and +understandable. And now she was in the garden of the Orgreaves. + +Martha came peeping, to discover the explanation of this singular +concourse of cabs in the garden, and she cried joyously: + +"Oh, Miss Janet, it's Miss Hilda--Miss Lessways, I mean!" + +Alicia shrieked. The first cab drew forward to make room for Hilda's, +and Hilda stepped down into the glare of the porch, and was plainly +beheld by all three girls. + +"Will they notice anything?" she asked herself, self-conscious, almost +trembling, as she thought of the terrific changes that had passed in her +since her previous visit. + +But nobody noticed anything. Nobody observed that this was not the same +Hilda. Even in the intimacy of the affectionate kiss, for which she +lifted her veil, Janet seemed to have no suspicion whatever. + +"We were just off to Hillport," said Janet. "How splendid of you to come +like this!" + +"Don't let's go to Hillport!" said Alicia. + +Janet hesitated, pulling down her veil. + +"Of course you must go!" Hilda said positively. + +"I'm afraid we shall have to go," said Janet, with reluctance. "You see, +it's the Marrions--Edie's cousins--and Edie will be there!" + +"Who's Edie?" + +"Why! Tom's fiancée! Surely I told you!" + +"Yes," said Hilda; "only I didn't just remember the name. How nice!" + +(She thought: "No sooner do I get here than I talk like they do! Fancy +me saying, 'How nice'!") + +"Oh, it's all Edie nowadays!" said Alicia lightly. "We have to be +frightfully particular, or else Tom would cut our heads off. That's why +we're going in a cab! We should have walked,--shouldn't we, Janet?--only +it would never do for us to _walk_ to the Marrions' at night! 'The +Misses Lessways' carriage!'" she mimicked, and finicked about on her +toes. + +Janet was precisely the same as ever, but the pig-tailed Alicia had +developed. Her childishness was now shot through with gestures and tones +of the young girl. She flushed and paled continuously, and was acutely +self-conscious and somewhat vain, but not offensively vain. + +"I say, Jan," she exclaimed, "why shouldn't Hilda come with us?" + +"To the Marrions'? Oh no, thanks!" said Hilda. + +"But do, Hilda! I'm sure they'd be delighted!" Janet urged. "I never +thought of it." + +Though she was flattered and, indeed, a little startled by the +extraordinary seriousness of Janet's insistence, Hilda shook her head. + +"Where's Tom?" she inquired, to change the subject. + +"Oh!" Alicia burst out again. "He's gone off _hours_ ago to escort his +ladylove from Hanbridge to Hillport." + +"You wait till you're engaged, Alicia!" Janet suggested. But Janet's +eyes, too, twinkled the admission that Tom was just then providing much +innocent amusement to the family. + +"You'll sleep in my room to-night, anyhow, dear," said Janet, when +Martha and Hilda's cabman had brought a trunk into the hall, and Hilda +had paid the cabman far more than his fare because he was such a +friendly young cabman and because he possessed a pulmonary sweetheart. +"Come along, dear!... Alicia, ask Swindells to wait a minute or two." + +"Swindells," Alicia shouted to the original cabman, "just wait a jiff!" + +"Yes, miss." The original cabman, being old and accustomed to evening- +party work in the Five Towns, knew the length of a jiff, and got down +from his seat to exercise both arms and legs. With sardonic pleasure he +watched the young cabman cut a black streak in the sodden lawn with his +near front-wheel as he clumsily turned to leave. Then Martha banged the +front door, and another servant appeared in the hall to help the trunk +on its way upstairs. + +"No! I shall never be able to tell them!" thought Hilda, following the +trunk. + +Alicia had scampered on in front of the trunk, to inform her parents of +the arrival. Mrs. Orgreave, Hilda learnt, was laid up with an attack of +asthma, and Osmond Orgreave was working in their bedroom. + + +II + +Hilda stood in front of the fire in Janet's bedroom, and Janet was +unlocking her trunk. + +"Why! What a pretty bodice!" said Janet, opening the trunk. She stood +up, and held forth the bodice to inspect it; and beneath Janet's cloak +Hilda could see the splendour of her evening dress. "Where did you get +it?" + +"In London," Hilda was about to answer, but she took thought. "Oh! +Brighton." It was a lie. + +She had a longing to say: + +"No, not Brighton! What am I thinking of? I got it in London on my +honeymoon!" + +What a unique sensation that one word would have caused! But she could +not find courage to utter it. + +Alicia came importantly in. + +"Mother's love, and you are to go into her room as soon as you're ready. +Martha will bring up a tray for you, and you'll eat there by the fire. +It's all arranged." + +"And what about father's love?" Hilda demanded, with a sprightliness +that astonished herself. And she thought: "Why are these people so fond +of me? They don't even ask how it was I didn't write to tell them I was +coming. They just accept me and welcome me without questions.... No! I +can never tell them! It simply couldn't be told, here! If they find out, +so much the worse!" + +"You must ask him!" Alicia answered, blushing. + +"All right, Alicia. We'll be ready in a minute or two," said Janet in a +peculiar voice. + +It was a gentle command to Alicia to leave her elders alone to their +adult confidences. And unwilling Alicia had to obey. + +But there were no confidences. The talk, as it were, shivered on the +brink of a confidence, but never plunged. + +"Does she guess?" Hilda reflected. + +The conversation so halted that at length Janet was driven to the +banality of saying: + +"I'm so sorry we have to go out!" + +And Hilda protested with equal banality, and added: "I suppose you're +going out a lot just now?" + +"Oh no!" said Janet. "We go out less and less, and we get quieter and +quieter. I mean _us_. The boys are always out, you know." She seemed +saddened. "I did think Edwin Clayhanger would come in sometimes, now +they're living next door--" + +"They're in their new house, then!" said Hilda, with casualness. + +"Oh, long ago! And I'm sure it's ages since he was here. I like +Maggie--his sister." + +Hilda knelt to her trunk. + +"Did he ever inquire after me?" she demanded, with an air of archness, +but hiding her face. + +"As a matter of fact he _did_--once," said Janet, imitating Hilda's +manner. + +"Well, that's something," said Hilda. + +There was a sharp knock at the door. + +"Hot water, miss!" cried the voice of Martha. + +The next instant Martha was arranging the ewer and the can and some +clean towels on the washstand. Her face was full of joy in the +unexpected arrival. She was as excited as if Hilda had been her own +friend instead of Janet's. + +"Well, dear, shall you be all right now?" said Janet. "Perhaps I ought +to be going. You may depend on it I shall get back as early as ever I +can." + +The two girls kissed, with even more freedom than in the hall. It seemed +astonishing to Hilda, as her face was close to Janet's, that Janet did +not exclaim: "Something has happened to you. What is it? You are not as +you used to be! You are not like me!" She felt herself an imposter. + +"Why should I tell?" Hilda reflected. "What end will it serve? It's +nobody's business but mine. _He_ is gone. He'll never come back. +Everything's over.... And if it does get about, well, they'll only +praise me for my discretion. They can't do anything else." + +Still, she longed timorously to confide in Janet. And when Janet had +departed she breathed relief because the danger of confiding in Janet +was withdrawn for the moment. + + +III + +Later, as the invalid had ordained, Hilda, having eaten, sat by the fire +in the large, quiet bedroom of Mr. and Mrs. Orgreave. The latter was +enjoying a period of ease, and lay, with head raised very high on +pillows, in her own half of the broad bed. The quilt extended over her +without a crease in its expanse; the sheet was turned down with +precision, making a level white border to the quilt; and Mrs. Orgreave +did not stir; not one of her grey locks stirred; she spoke occasionally +in a low voice. On the night-table stood a Godfrey's Chloride of Ammonia +Inhaler, with its glass cylinder and triple arrangement of tubes. There +was only this, and the dark lips and pale cheeks of the patient, to +remind the beholder that not long since the bed had been a scene of +agony. Mr. Orgreave, in bright carpet slippers, and elegant wristbands +blossoming out of the sleeves of his black house-jacket, stood bending +above a huge board that was laid horizontally on trestles to the left of +the fireplace. This board was covered by a wide length of bluish +transparent paper which at intervals he pulled towards him, making +billows of paper at his feet and gradually lessening a roll of it that +lay on the floor beyond the table. A specially arranged gas-bracket with +a green shade which threw a powerful light on the paper showed that +Osmond Orgreave's habit was to work in that spot of an evening. + +"Astonishing I have to do this myself, isn't it?" he observed, stooping +to roll up the accumulated length of paper about his feet. + +"What is it?" Hilda asked. + +"It's a full-sized detail drawing. Simple!... But do you suppose I could +trust either of my ingenious sons to get the curves of the mouldings +right?" + +"You'll never be able to trust them unless you begin to trust them," +said Mrs. Orgreave sagely from the bed. + +"Ha!" ejaculated Osmond Orgreave satirically. This remark was one of his +most effective counters to argument. + +"The fact is he thoroughly enjoys it, doesn't he, Mrs. Orgreave?" said +Hilda. + +"You're quite right, my dear," said Mrs. Orgreave. + +"Ah!" from Mr. Orgreave. + +He sketched with a pencil and rubbed out, vigorously. Then his eye +caught Hilda's, and they both smiled, very content. "They'd look nice if +I took to drink instead of to work, for a change!" he murmured, pausing +to caress his handsome hair. + +There was a sharp knock at the door, and into this room also the +watchful Martha entered. + +"Here's the _Signal_, sir. The boy's only just brought it." + +"Give it to Miss Hilda," said Mr. Orgreave, without glancing up. + +"Shall I take the tray away, 'm?" Martha inquired, looking towards the +bed, the supreme centre of domestic order and authority. + +"Perhaps Miss Hilda hasn't finished?" + +"Oh yes, I have, thanks." + +Martha rearranged the vessels and cutlery upon the tray, with quick, +expert movements of the wrists. Her gaze was carefully fixed on the +tray. Endowed though she was with rare privileges, as a faithful +retainer, she would have been shocked and shamed had her gaze, +improperly wandering, encountered the gaze of the master or the guest. +Then she picked up the tray, and, pushing the small table into its +accustomed place with a deft twist of the foot, she sailed erect and +prim out of the room, and the door primly clicked on her neat-girded +waist and flying white ribbons. + +"And what am I to do with this _Signal_" Hilda asked, fingering the +white, damp paper. + +"I should like you to read us about the strike," said Mrs. Orgreave. +"It's a dreadful thing." + +"I should thing it was!" Hilda agreed fervently. "Oh! Do you know, on +the way from Shawport, I saw a procession of the men, and anything more +terrible--" + +"It's the children I think of!" said Mrs. Orgreave softly. + +"Pity the men don't!" Mr. Orgreave murmured, without raising his head. + +"Don't what?" Hilda asked defiantly. + +"Think of the children." + +Bridling, but silent, Hilda opened the sheet, and searched round and +about its columns with the embarrassed bewilderment of one unaccustomed +to the perusal of newspapers. + +"Look on page three--first column," said Mr. Orgreave. + +"That's all about racing," said Hilda. + +"Oh dear, dear!" from the bed. + +"Well, second column." + +"The Potters' Strike. The men's leaders," she read the headlines. "There +isn't much of it." + +"How beautifully clearly you read!" said Mrs. Orgreave, with mild +enthusiasm, when Hilda had read the meagre half-column. + +"Do I?" Hilda flushed. + +"Is that all there is about it?" + +"Yes. They don't seem to think it's very important that half the people +are starving!" Hilda sneered. + +"Whose fault is it if they do starve?" Osmond Orgreave glanced at her +with lowered head. + +"I think it's a shame!" she exclaimed. + +"Do you know that the men broke the last award, not so very long since?" +said Osmond Orgreave. "What can you do with such people?" + +"Broke the last award?" She was checked. + +"Broke the last award! Wouldn't stick by their own agreement, their own +words. I'll just tell you. A wise young woman like you oughtn't to be +carried away by the sight of a procession on a cold night." + +He smiled; and she smiled, but awkwardly. + +And then he told her something of the case for the employers. + +"How hard you are on the men!" she protested, when he had done. + +"Not at all! Not at all!" He stretched himself, and came round his +trestles to poke the fire. "You should hear Mr. Clayhanger on the men, +if you want to know what hard is." + +"Mr. Clayhanger? You mean old Mr. Clayhanger?" + +"Yes." + +"But he isn't a manufacturer." + +"No. But he's an employer of labour." + +Hilda rose uneasily from her chair, and walked towards the distant, +shadowed dressing-table. + +"I should like to go over a printing-works," she said abruptly. + +"Very easy," said Mr. Orgreave, resuming his work with a great expulsion +of breath. + +Hilda thought: "Why did I say that?" And, to cover her constraint, she +cried out: "Oh, what a lovely book!" + +A small book, bound in full purple calf, lay half hidden in a nest of +fine tissue paper on the dressing-table. + +"Yes, isn't it?" said Mrs. Orgreave. "Tom brought it in to show me, +before he went this afternoon. It's a birthday present for Edie. He's +had it specially bound. I must write myself, and ask Edie to come over +and meet you. I'm sure you'd like her. She's a dear girl. I think Tom's +very fortunate." + +"No, you don't," Osmond Orgreave contradicted her, with a great rustling +of paper. "You think Edie's very fortunate." + +Hilda looked round, and caught the architect's smile. + +"I think they're both fortunate," said Mrs. Orgreave simply. She had +almost no sense of humour. "I'm sure she's a real good girl, and clever +too." + +"Clever enough to get on the right side of her future mother-in-law, +anyway!" growled Mr. Orgreave. + +"Anyone might think Osmond didn't like the girl," said Mrs. Orgreave, +"from the way he talks. And yet he adores her! And it's no use him +pretending he doesn't!" + +"I only adore you!" said Osmond. + +"You needn't try to turn it off!" his wife murmured, beaming on Hilda. + +Tears came strangely into Hilda's eyes, and she turned again to the +dressing-table. And through a blur, she saw all the objects ranged in a +long row on the white cloth that covered the rosewood; and she thought: +"All this is beautiful." And she saw the pale blinds drawn down behind +the dressing-table, and the valance at the top, and the draped curtains; +and herself darkly in the glass. And she could feel the vista of the +large, calm, comfortable room behind her, and could hear the coals +falling together in the grate, and the rustling of the architect's +paper, and Mrs. Orgreave's slight cough. And, in her mind, she could see +all the other rooms in the spacious house, and the dim, misted garden +beyond. She thought: "All this house is beautiful. It is the most +beautiful thing I have ever known, or ever shall know. I'm happy here!" +And then her imagination followed each of the children. She imagined +Marian, the eldest, and her babies, in London; and Charlie, also in +London, practising medicine; and Tom and Janet and Alicia at the party +at Hillport; and Jimmie and Johnnie seeing life at Hanbridge; while the +parents remained in tranquillity in their bedroom. All these visions +were beautiful; even the vision of Jimmie and Johnnie flourishing +billiard-cues and glasses and pipes in the smoky atmosphere of a +club--even this was beautiful; it was as simply touching as the other +visions.... And she was at home with the parents, and so extremely +intimate with them that she could nearly conceive herself a genuine +member of the house. She was in bliss. Her immediate past dropped away +from her like an illusion, and she became almost the old Hilda: she was +almost born again into innocence. Only the tragic figure of George +Cannon hung vague in the far distance of memory, and the sight thereof +constricted her heart. Utterly her passion for him had expired: she was +exquisitely sad for him; she felt towards him kindly and guiltily, as +one feels towards an old error.... And, withal, the spell of the home of +the Orgreaves took away his reality. + +She was fingering the book. Its title-page ran: _The English Poems of +Richard Crashaw_. Now she had never even heard of Richard Crashaw, and +she wondered who he might be. Turning the pages, she read: + + All thy old woes shall now smile on thee, + And thy pains sit bright upon thee, + All thy sorrows here shall shine, + All thy sufferings be divine: + Tears shall take comfort, and turn gems, + And wrongs repent to diadems. + +And she read again, as though the words had been too lovely to be real, +and she must assure herself of them: + + Tears shall take comfort, and turn gems, + And wrongs repent to diadems. + +She turned back to the beginning of the poem, and read the title of it: +"A Hymn, to the name and honour of the admirable Saint Teresa--Foundress +of the Reformation of the discalced Carmelites, both men and women: a +woman for angelical height of speculation, for masculine courage of +performance more than a woman: who yet a child outran maturity, and +durst plot a martyrdom." + +The prose thrilled her even more intimately than the verse. She cried +within herself: "Why have I never heard of Richard Crashaw? Why did Tom +never tell me?" She became upon the instant a devotee of this Saint +Teresa. She thought inconsequently, with a pang that was also a +reassurance: "George Cannon would never have understood this. But +everyone here understands it." And with hands enfevered, she turned the +pages again, and, after several disappointments, read: + + Oh, thou undaunted daughter of desires! + By all thy dower of lights and fires; + By all the eagle in thee, all the dove: + By all thy lives and deaths of love: + By thy large draughts of intellectual day; + And by thy thirsts of love more large than they: + By all thy brim-filled bowls of fierce desire, + By this last morning's draught of liquid fire: + By the full kingdom of that final kiss---- + +She ceased to read. It was as if her soul was crying out: "I also am +Teresa. This is I! This is I!" + +And then the door opened, and Martha appeared once more: + +"If you please, sir, Mr. Edwin Clayhanger's called." + +"Oh... well, I'm nearly finished. Where is he?" + +"In the breakfast-room, sir." + +"Well, tell him I'll be down in a minute." + +"Hilda," said Mrs. Orgreave, "will _you_ mind going and telling him?" + +Hilda had replaced the book in its nest, and gone quickly back to her +chair. The entrance of the servant at that moment, to announce Edwin +Clayhanger, seemed to her startlingly dramatic. "What," she thought, "I +am just reading that and he comes!... He hasn't been here for ages, and, +on the very night that I come, he comes!" + +"Certainly," she replied to Mrs. Orgreave. And she thought: "This is the +second time she has sent me with a message to Edwin Clayhanger." + +Suddenly, she blushed in confusion before the mistress of the home. "Is +it possible," she asked herself,--"is it possible that Mrs. Orgreave +doesn't guess what has happened to me? Is it possible she can't see that +I'm different from what I used to be? If she knew... if they knew... +here!" + +She left the room like a criminal. When she was going down the stairs, +she discovered that she held the _Signal_ in her hand. She had no +recollection of picking it up, and there was no object in taking it to +the breakfast-room! She thought: "What a state I must be in!" + + + + +CHAPTER II +A RENDEZVOUS + + +I + +"I suppose you've never thought about me once since I've left!" + +She was sitting on the sofa in the small, shelved breakfast-room, and +she shot these words at Edwin Clayhanger, who was standing near her. The +singular words were certainly uttered out of bravado: they were a +challenge to adventure. She thought: "It is madness for me to say such a +thing." But such a thing had, nevertheless, come quite glibly out of her +mouth, and she knew not why. If Edwin Clayhanger was startled, so was +she startled. + +"Oh yes, I have!" he stammered--of course, she had put him out of +countenance. + +She smiled, and said persuasively: "But you've never inquired after me." + +"Yes, I have," he answered, with a hint of defiance, after a pause. + +"Only once." She continued to smile. + +"How do you know?" he demanded. + +Then she told him very calmly, extinguishing the smile, that her source +of information was Janet. + +"That's nothing to go by!" he exclaimed, with sudden roughness. "That's +nothing to go by--the number of _times_ I've inquired!" + + +II + +She was silenced. She thought: "If I am thus intimate with him, it must +be because of the talk we had in the garden that night." And it seemed +to her that the scene in the garden had somehow bound them together for +ever in intimacy, that, even if they pretended to be only acquaintances, +they would constantly be breaking through the thin shell of formality +into some unguessed deep of intimacy. She regarded--surreptitiously--his +face, with a keen sense of pleasure. It was romantic, melancholy, +wistful, enigmatic--and, above all, honest. She knew that he had desired +to be an architect, and that his father had thwarted his desire, and +this fact endowed him for her with the charm of a victim. The idea that +all his life had been embittered and shadowed by the caprice of an old +man was beautiful to her in its sadness: she contemplated it with vague +bliss. At their last meeting, during the Sunday School Centenary, he had +annoyed her; he had even drawn her disdain, by his lack of initiative +and male force in the incident of the senile Sunday School teacher. He +had profoundly disappointed her. Now, she simply forgot this; the +sinister impression vanished from her mind. She recalled her first +vision of him in the lighted doorway of his father's shop. Her present +vision confirmed that sympathetic vision. She liked the feel of his +faithful hand, and the glance of his timid and yet bellicose eye. And +she reposed on his very apparent honesty as on a bed. She knew, with the +assurance of perfect faith, that he had nothing dubious to conceal, and +that no test could strain his magnanimity. And, while she so reflected, +she was thinking, too, of Janet's fine dress, and her elegance and +jewels, and wishing that she had changed the old black frock in which +she travelled. The perception that she could never be like Janet cast +her down. But, the next moment, she was saying to herself proudly: "What +does it matter? Why should I be like Janet?" And, the next moment after +that, she was saying, in another phase of her pride: "I _will_ be like +Janet!" + +They began to discuss the strike. It was a topic which, during those +weeks, could not be avoided, either by the rich or by the poor. + +"I suppose you're like all the rest--against the men?" she challenged +him again, inviting battle. + +He replied bluntly: "What earthly right have you to suppose that I'm +like all the rest?" + +She bent her head lower, so that she could only see him through the veil +of her eyelashes. + +"I'm very sorry," she said, in a low, smiling, meditative voice. "I knew +all the time you weren't." + +The thought shot through her mind like a lance: "It is incredible, and +horribly dangerous, that I should be sitting here with him, after all +that has happened to me, and him without the slightest suspicion!... And +yet what can stop it from coming out, sooner or later? Nothing can stop +it." + +Edwin Clayhanger continued to talk of the strike, and she heard him +saying: "If you ask me, I'll tell you what I think--workmen on strike +are always in the right... you've only got to look at them in a crowd +together. They don't starve themselves for fun." + +What he said thrilled her. There was nothing in it, but there was +everything in it. His generosity towards the oppressed was everything to +her. His whole attitude was utterly and mysteriously different from that +of any other man whom she had known.... And with that simple, wistful +expression of his! + +They went on talking, and then, following in secret the train of her own +thoughts, she suddenly burst out: + +"I never met anybody like you before." A pause ensued. "No, never!" she +added, with intense conviction. + +"I might say the same of you," he replied, moved. + +"Oh no! I'm nothing!" she breathed. + +She glanced up, exquisitely flattered. His face was crimson. Exquisite +moment, in the familiarity of the breakfast-room, by the fire, she on +the sofa, with him standing over her, a delicious peril. The crimson +slowly paled. + + +III + +Osmond Orgreave entered the room, quizzical, and at once began to tease +Clayhanger about the infrequency of his visits. + +Turning to Hilda, he said: "He scarcely ever comes to see us, except +when you're here." It was just as if he had said: "I heard every word +you spoke before I came in, and I have read your hearts." Both Hilda and +Clayhanger were disconcerted--Clayhanger extremely so. + +"Steady on!" he protested uncouthly. And then, with the most naïve +ingenuousness: "Mrs. Orgreave better?" + +But Osmond Orgreave was not in a merciful mood. A moment later he was +saying: + +"Has she told you she wants to go over a printing-works?" + +"No," Clayhanger answered, with interest. "But I shall be very pleased +to show her over ours, any time." + +Hilda struck into silence, made no response, and instantly Clayhanger +finished, in another tone: "Look here, I must be off. I only slipped in +for a minute--really." + +And he went, declining Mr. Orgreave's request to give a date for his +next call. The bang of the front door resounded through the house. + +Mr. Orgreave, having taken Clayhanger to the front door, did not return +immediately into the breakfast-room. Hilda jumped up from the sofa, +hesitant. She was disappointed; she was even resentful; assuredly she +was humiliated. "Oh no!" she thought. "He's weak and afraid.... I dare +say he went off because Janet wasn't here." She heard through the +half-open door Mr. Orgreave's slippers on the tiles of the passage +leading to the stairs. + +Martha came into the room with a delighted, curious smile. + +"If you please, miss, could you come into the hall a minute?... Some one +to speak to you." + +Hilda blushed silently, and obeyed. Clayhanger was standing in the chill +hall, hat in hand. Her heart jumped. + +"When will you come to look over our works?" he muttered rapidly and +very nervously, and yet with a dictatorial gruffness. "To-morrow? I +should like you to come." + +He had put an enchantment upon her by this marvellous return. And to +conceal from him what he had done, she frowned and kept silent. + +"What time?" she asked suddenly. + +"Any time." His eagerness was thrilling. + +"Oh no! You must fix the time." + +"Say between half-past six and a quarter to seven. That do?" + +She nodded. Their hands met. He said adieu. He pulled open the heavy +door. She saw his back for an instant against the pale gloom of the +garden, in which vapour was curling. And then she had shut the door, and +was standing alone in the confined hall. A miracle had occurred, and it +intimidated her. And, amid her wondrous fears, she was steeped in the +unique sense of adventure. "This morning I was in Brighton," she +thought. "Half an hour ago I had no notion of seeing him. And now!... +And to-morrow?" The tragic sequel to one adventure had not impaired her +instinct for experience. On the contrary, it had strengthened it. The +very failure of the one excited her towards another. The zest of living +was reborn in her. The morrow beckoned her, golden and miraculous. The +faculty of men and women to create their own lives seemed divine, and +the conception of it enfevered her. + + + + +CHAPTER III +AT THE WORKS + + +I + +That night, late, Hilda and Janet shut themselves up in the bedroom +together. The door clicked softly under Janet's gentle push, and they +were as safe from invasion as if the door had been of iron, and locked +and double-locked and barred with bars of iron. Alicia alone might have +disturbed them, but Alicia was asleep. Hilda had a sense of entire +security in this room such as she had never had since she drove away +from Lessways Street, Turnhill, early one morning, with Florrie Bagster +in a cab. It was not that there had been the least real fear of any room +of hers being attacked: it was that this room seemed to have been +rendered mystically inviolate by long years of Janet's occupation. +"Janet's bedroom!"--the phrase had a sanction which could not possibly +have attached itself to, for instance, "Hilda's bedroom!" Nor even to +"mother's bedroom"--mother's bedroom being indeed at the mercy of any +profane and marauding member of the family, a sort of market-place for +the transaction of affairs. + +And, further, Janet's bedroom was distinguished and made delicious for +Hilda by its fire. It happened to be one of the very few bedrooms in the +Five Towns at that date with a fire, as a regular feature of it. Mrs. +Orgreave had a fire in the parental bedroom, when she could not +reasonably do without it, but Osmond Orgreave suffered the fire rather +than enjoyed it. As for Tom, though of a shivery disposition, he would +have dithered to death before admitting that a bedroom fire might +increase his comfort. Johnnie and Jimmie genuinely liked to be cold in +their bedroom. Alicia pined for a fire, but Mrs. Orgreave, imitating the +contrariety of fate, forbade a fire to Alicia, and one consequence of +this was that Alicia sometimes undressed in Janet's bedroom, making +afterwards a dash for the Pole. The idea of a bedroom was always, during +nearly half the year, associated with the idea of discomfort in Hilda's +mind. And now, in Janet's bedroom, impressed as she was by the +strangeness of the fact that the prime reason for hurrying at top-speed +into bed had been abolished, she yet positively could not linger, the +force of habit being too strong for her. And she was in bed, despite +efforts to dawdle, while Janet was still brushing her hair. + +As she lay and watched Janet's complex unrobing, she acquired knowledge. +And once more, she found herself desiring to be like Janet--not only in +appearance, but in soft manner and tone. She thought: "How shall I dress +to-morrow afternoon?" All the operations of her brain related themselves +somehow to to-morrow afternoon. The anticipation of the visit to the +printing-works burned in her heart like a steady lamp that shone through +the brief, cloudy interests of the moment. And Edwin Clayhanger was +precisely the topic which Janet seemed, as it were, expressly to avoid. +Janet inquired concerning life at Brighton and the health of Sarah +Gailey; Janet even mentioned George Cannon; Hilda steadied her voice in +replying, though she was not really apprehensive, for Janet's questions, +like the questions of the whole family, were invariably discreet and +respectful of the individual's privacy. But of Edwin Clayhanger, whose +visit nevertheless had been recounted to her in the drawing-room on her +return, Janet said not a word. + +And then, when she had extinguished the gas, and the oriental sleeve of +her silk nightgown delicately brushed Hilda's face, as she got into bed, +she remarked: + +"Strange that Edwin Clayhanger should call just to-night!" + +Hilda's cheek warmed. + +"He asked me to go and look over their printing-works to-morrow," said +she quickly. + +Janet was taken aback. + +"Really!" she exclaimed, unmistakably startled. She spoke a second too +soon. If she had delayed only one second, she might have concealed from +Hilda that which Hilda had most plainly perceived, to wit, anxiety and +jealousy. Yes, jealousy, in this adorably benevolent creature's tone. +Hilda's interest in to-morrow afternoon was intensified. + +"Shall you be able to come?" she asked. + +"What time?" + +"He said about half-past six, or a quarter to seven." + +"I can't," said Janet dreamily, "because of that Musical Society +meeting--you know--I told you, didn't I?" + +In the faint light of the dying fire, Hilda made out little by little +the mysterious, pale heaps of clothes, and all the details of the room +strewn and disordered by reason of an additional occupant. The adventure +was now of infinite complexity, and its complexity seemed to be +symbolized by the suggestive feminine mysteriousness of what she saw and +what she divined in the darkness of the chamber. She thought: "I am here +on false pretences. I ought to tell my secret. That would be fair--I +have no right to intrude between her and him." But she instinctively and +powerfully resisted such ideas; with firmness she put them away, and +yielded herself with a more exquisite apprehension to the anticipation +of to-morrow. + + +II + +The order of meals at Lane End was somewhat peculiar even then, and +would now be almost unique. It was partly the natural expression of an +instinctive and justified feeling of superiority, and partly due to a +discretion which forbade the family to scandalize the professional +classes of the district by dining at night. Dinner occurred in the +middle of the day, and about nine in the evening was an informal but +copious supper. Between those two meals, there came a tea which was +neither high or low, and whose hour, six o'clock in theory, depended to +a certain extent, in practice, on Mr. Orgreave's arrival from the +office. Not seldom Mr. Orgreave was late; occasionally he was very late. +The kitchen waited to infuse the tea until a command came from some +woman, old or young, who attentively watched a window for a particular +swinging of the long gate at the end of the garden, or listened, when it +was dark, for the bang of the gate and a particular crunching of gravel. + +On this Tuesday evening, Osmond Orgreave was very late, and the movement +of the household was less smooth than usual, owing to Mrs. Orgreave's +illness and to the absence of Janet at Hillport in connection with the +projected Hillport Choral Society. (Had Janet been warned of Hilda's +visit, she would not have accepted an invitation to a tea at Hillport as +a preliminary to the meeting of the provisional committee.) Hilda was in +a state of acute distress. The appointment with Edwin Clayhanger seemed +to be absolutely sacred to her; to be late for it would amount to a +crime: to miss it altogether would be a calamity inconceivable. The +fingers of all the clocks in the house were revolving with the most +extraordinary rapidity--she was helpless. + +She was helpless, because she had said nothing all day of her +appointment, and because Janet had not mentioned it either. Janet might +have said before leaving: "Tea had better not wait too long--Hilda has +to be down at Clayhanger's at half-past six." Janet's silence impressed +Hilda: it was not merely strange--it was formidable: it affected the +whole day. Hilda thought: "Is she determined not to speak of it unless I +do?" Immediately Janet was gone, Hilda had run up to the bedroom. She +was minded to change the black frock which she had been wearing, and +which she hated, and to put on another skirt and bodice that Janet had +praised. She longed to beautify herself, and yet she was still +hesitating about it at half-past five in the evening as she had +hesitated at eight in the morning. In the end she had decided not to +change, an account of the rain. But the rain had naught to do with her +decision. She would not change, because she was too proud to change. She +would go just as she was! She could not accept the assistance of an +attractive bodice!... Unfeminine, perhaps, but womanly. + +At twenty-five minutes to seven, she went into Mrs. Orgreave's bedroom, +rather like a child, and also rather like an adult creature in a +distracting crisis. Tom Orgreave and Alicia were filling the entire +house with the stormy noise of a piano duet based upon Rossini's +_William Tell_. + +"I think I'll miss tea, Mrs. Orgreave," she said. "Edwin Clayhanger +invited me to go over the printing-works at half-past six, and it's +twenty-five minutes to seven now." + +"Oh, but, my dear," cried Mrs. Orgreave, "why ever didn't you tell them +downstairs, or let me know earlier?" + +And she pulled at the bell-rope that overhung the head of the bed. Not a +trace of teasing archness in her manner! Hilda's appointment might have +been of the most serious business interest, for anything Mrs. Orgreave's +demeanor indicated to the contrary. Hilda stood mute and constrained. + +"You run down and tell them to make tea at once, dear. I can't let you +go without anything at all. I wonder what can have kept Osmond." + +Almost at the same moment, Osmond Orgreave entered the bedroom. His +arrival had been unnoticed amid the tremendous resounding of the duet. + +"Oh, Osmond," said his wife. "Wherever have you been so late? Hilda +wants to go--Edwin Clayhanger has invited her to go over the works." + +Hilda, trembling at the door, more than half expected Mr. Orgreave to +say: "You mean, she's invited herself." But Osmond received the +information with exactly the same polite, apologetic seriousness as his +wife, and, reassured, Hilda departed from the room. + +Ten minutes later, veiled and cloaked, she stepped out alone into the +garden. And instantly her torment was assuaged, and she was happy. She +waited at the corner of the street for the steam-car. But, when the car +came thundering down, it was crammed to the step; with a melancholy +gesture, the driver declined her signal. She set off down Trafalgar Road +in the mist and the rain, glad that she had been compelled to walk. It +seemed to her that she was on a secret and mystic errand. This was not +surprising. The remarkable thing was that all the hurrying people she +met seemed also each of them to be on a secret and mystic errand. The +shining wet pavement was dotted with dark figures, suggestive and +enigmatic, who glided over a floor that was pierced by perpendicular +reflections. + + +III + +In the Clayhanger shop, agitated and scarcely aware of what she did, she +could, nevertheless, hear her voice greeting Edwin Clayhanger in firm, +calm tones; and she soon perceived very clearly that he was even more +acutely nervous than herself: which perception helped to restore her +confidence, while, at the same time, it filled her with bliss. The +young, fair man, with his awkward and constrained movements, took +possession of her umbrella, and then suggested that she should remove +her mackintosh. She obeyed, timid and glad. She stripped off her +mackintosh, as though she were stripping off her modesty, and stood +before him revealed. To complete the sacrifice, she raised her veil, and +smiled up at him, as it were, asking: "What next?" Then a fat, untidy +old man appeared in the doorway of a cubicle within the shop, and Edwin +Clayhanger blushed. + +"Father, this is Miss Lessways. Miss Lessways, my father.... +She's--she's come to look over the place." + +"How-d'ye-do, miss?" + +She shook hands with the tyrannic father, who was, however, despite his +reputation, apparently just as nervous as the son. There followed a most +sinister moment of silence. And, at last, the shop door opened, and the +father turned to greet a customer. Hilda thought: "Suppose this fat old +man is one day my father-in-law? Is it possible to imagine him as a +father-in-law?" And she had a transient gleam of curiosity concerning +the characters of the two Clayhanger sisters, and recalled with +satisfaction that Janet liked the elder one. + +Edwin Clayhanger, muttering, pointed to an aperture in the counter, and +immediately she was going through it with him, and through a door at the +back of the shop. They were alone, facing a rain-soaked yard. Edwin +Clayhanger sneezed violently. + +"It keeps on raining," Edwin murmured. "Better to have kept umbrella! +However--" + +He glanced at her inquiringly and invitingly. They ran side by side +across the yard to a roofed flight of steps that led to the printing- +office. For a couple of seconds, the rain wet them, and then they were +under cover again. It seemed to Hilda that they had escaped from the +shop like fox-terriers--like two friendly dogs from the surveillance of +an incalculable and dangerous old man. She felt a comfortable, friendly +confidence in Edwin Clayhanger--a tranquil sentiment such as she had +never experienced for George Cannon. After more than a year--and what a +period of unforeseen happenings!--she thought again: "I _like him_." Not +love, she thought, but liking! She liked being with him. She liked the +sensation of putting confidence in him. She liked his youth, and her +own. She was sorry because he had a cold and was not taking care of +it.... Now they were climbing a sombre creaking staircase towards a new +and remote world that was separated from the common world just quitted +by the adventurous passage of the rainy yard.... And now they were amid +oily odours in a large raftered workshop, full of machines.... The +printing-works!... An enormous but very deferential man saluted them +with majestic solemnity. He was the foreman, and labelled by his white +apron as an artisan, but his gigantic bulk--he would have outweighed the +pair of them--and his age set him somehow over them, so that they were a +couple of striplings in his vasty presence. When Edwin Clayhanger +employed, as it were, daringly, the accents of a master to this +intimidating fellow, Hilda thrilled with pleasure at the piquancy of the +spectacle, and she was admiringly proud of Edwin. The foreman's immense +voice, explaining machines and tools, caused physical vibrations in her. +But she understood nothing of what he said--nothing whatever. She was in +a dream of oily odours and monstrous iron constructions, dominated by +the grand foreman: and Edwin was in the dream. She began talking quite +wildly of the four-hundredth anniversary of the inventor of printing, of +which she had read in Cranswick's History... at Brighton! Brighton had +sunk away over the verge of memory. Even Lane End House was lost +somewhere in the vague past. All her previous life had faded. She +reflected guiltily: "He's bound to think I've been reading about +printing because I was interested in _him_ I don't care! I hope he does +think it!" She heard a suggestion that, as it was too late that night to +see the largest machine in motion, she might call the next afternoon. +She at once promised to come.... She impatiently desired now to leave +the room where they were, and to see something else. And then she feared +lest this might be all there was to see.... Edwin Clayhanger was edging +towards the door.... They were alone on the stairway again.... The +foreman had bowed at the top like a chamberlain.... She gathered, with +delicious anticipation, that other and still more recondite interiors +awaited their visit. + + +IV + +They were in an attic which was used for the storage of reams upon reams +of paper. By the light of a candle in a tin candlestick, they had passed +alone together through corridors and up flights of stairs at the back of +the shop. She had seen everything that was connected with the enterprise +of steam-printing, and now they were at the top of the old house and at +the end of the excursion. + +"I used to work here," said Edwin Clayhanger. + +She inquired about the work. + +"Well," he drawled, "reading and writing, you know--at that very table." + +In the aperture of the window, amid piles of paper, stood a rickety old +table, covered with dust. + +"But there's no fireplace," she said, glancing round the room, and then +directly at him. + +"I know." + +"But how did you do in winter?" she eagerly appealed. + +And he replied shortly, and with a slight charming affectation of pride: +"I did without." + +Her throat tightened, and she could feel the tears suddenly swim in her +eyes. She was not touched by the vision of his hardships. It was the +thought of all his youth that exquisitely saddened her--or all the years +which were and would be for ever hidden from her. She knew that she +alone of all human beings was gifted with the power to understand and +fully sympathize with him. And so she grieved over the long wilderness +of time during which he had been uncomprehended. She wanted, by some +immense effort of tenderness, to recompense him for all that he had +suffered. And she had a divine curiosity concerning the whole of his +past life. She had never had this curiosity in relation to George +Cannon--she had only wondered about his affairs with other women. Nor +had George Cannon ever evoked the tenderness which sprang up in her from +some secret and inexhaustible source at the mere sight of Edwin +Clayhanger's wistful smile. Still, in that moment, standing close to +Edwin in the high solitude of the shadowed attic, the souvenir of George +Cannon gripped her painfully. She thought: "He loves me, and he is +ruined, and he will never see me again! And I am here, bursting with +hope renewed, and dizzy with joy!" And she pictured Janet, too, wearying +herself at a committee meeting. And she thought, "And here am I...!" Her +bliss was tragic. + +"I think I ought to be going," she said softly. + +They re-threaded the corridors, and in each lower room, as they passed, +Edwin Clayhanger extinguished the gas which he had lit there on the way +up, and Hilda waited for him. And then they were back in the crude glare +of the shop. The fat, untidy old man was not visible. Edwin helped her +with the mackintosh, and she liked him for the awkwardness of his +efforts in doing so. + +At the door, she urged him not to come out, and referred to his cold. + +"This isn't the end of winter, it's the beginning," she warned him. +Nobody else, she knew, would watch over him. + +But he insisted on coming out. + +They arranged a rendezvous for three o'clock on the morrow, and then +they shook hands. + +"Now, do go in," she entreated, as she hurried away. The rain had +ceased. She fled triumphantly up Trafalgar Road, with her secret, +guarding it. "He's in love with me!" If a scientific truth is a +statement of which the contrary is inconceivable, then it was a +scientific truth for her that she and Edwin must come together. She +simply would not and could not conceive the future without him.... And +this so soon, so precipitately soon, after her misfortune! But it was +her very misfortune which pushed her violently forward. Her life had +been convulsed and overthrown by the hazard of destiny, and she could +have no peace now until she had repaired and re-established it. At no +matter what risk, the thing must be accomplished quickly... quickly. + + + + +CHAPTER IV +THE CALL FROM BRIGHTON + + +I + +On the next afternoon, at a quarter-past two, Hilda and Janet were +sitting together in the breakfast-room. The house was still. The men +were either theoretically or practically at business. Alicia was at +school. Mrs. Orgreave lay upstairs. The servants had cleared away and +washed up the dinner-things, and had dined themselves. The kitchen had +been cleansed and put in order, and every fire replenished. Two of the +servants were in their own chambers, enfranchised for an hour: one only +remained on duty. All six women had the feeling, which comes to most +women at a certain moment in each day, that life had, for a time, +deteriorated into the purposeless and the futile; and that it waited, as +in a trance, until some external masculine event, expected or +unforeseen, should renew its virtue and its energy. + +Hilda was in half a mind to tell Janet the history of the past year. She +had wakened up in the night, and perceived with dreadful clearness that +trouble lay in front of her. The relations between herself and Edwin +Clayhanger were developing with the most dizzy rapidity, and in a +direction which she desired, but it would be impossible for her, if she +fostered the relations, to continue to keep Edwin in ignorance of the +fact that, having been known for about a fortnight as Mrs. George +Cannon, she was not what he supposed her to be. With imagination on +fire, she was anticipating the rendezvous at three o'clock. She reached +forward to it in ecstasy; but she might not enjoy it, save at the price +which her conscience exacted. She had to say to Edwin Clayhanger that +she had been the victim of a bigamist. Could she say it to him? She had +not been able to say it even to Janet Orgreave.... She would say it +first to Janet. There, in the breakfast-room, she would say it. If it +killed her to say it, she would say it. She must at any cost be able to +respect herself, and, as matters stood, she could not respect herself. + +Janet, on her knees, was idly arranging books on one of the lower +bookshelves. In sheer nervousness, Hilda also dropped to her knees on +the hearthrug, and began to worry the fire with the poker. + +"I say, Janet," she began. + +"Yes?" Janet did not look up. + +Hilda, her heart beating, thought, with affrighted swiftness: "Why +should I tell her? It is no business of anybody's except _his_. I will +tell him, and him alone, and then act according to his wishes. After +all, I am not to blame. I am quite innocent. But I won't tell him +to-day. Not to-day! I must be more sure. It would be ridiculous to tell +him to-day. If I told him it would be almost like inviting a proposal! +But when the proper time comes,--then I will tell him, and he will +understand! He is bound to understand perfectly. He's in love with me." + +She dared not tell Janet. In that abode of joyful and successful +propriety the words would not form themselves. And the argument that she +was not to blame carried no weight whatever. She--she, Hilda--lacked +courage to be candid.... This was extremely disconcerting to her +self-esteem.... And even with Edwin Clayhanger she wished to temporize. +She longed for nothing so much as to see him; and yet she feared to meet +him. + +"Yes?" Janet repeated. + +A bell rang faintly in the distance of the house. + +Hilda, suddenly choosing a course, said: "I forgot to tell you. I'm +supposed to be going down to Clayhanger's at three to see a machine at +work--it was too late last night. Do come with me. I hate going by +myself." It was true: in that instant she did hate going by herself. She +thought, knowing Janet to be at liberty and never dreaming that she +would refuse: "I am saved--for the present." + +But Janet answered self-consciously: + +"I don't think I must leave mother. You'll be perfectly all right by +yourself." + +Hilda impetuously turned her head; their glances met for an instant, in +suspicion, challenge, animosity. They had an immense mutual admiration +the one for the other, these two; and yet now they were estranged. +Esteem was nullified by instinct. Hilda thought with positive savagery: +"It's all fiddlesticks about not leaving her mother! She's simply on her +high horse!" The whole colour of existence was changed. + + +II + +Martha entered the room. Neither of the girls moved. Beneath the +deferential servant in Martha was a human girl, making a third in the +room, who familiarly divined the moods of the other two and judged them +as an equal; and the other two knew it, and therefore did not trouble to +be spectacular in front of her. + +"A letter, miss," said Martha, approaching Hilda. "The old postman says +it was insufficiently addressed, or it 'ud ha' been here by first post." + +"Was that the postman who rang just now?" asked Janet. + +"Yes, miss." + +Hilda took the letter with apprehension, as she recognized the +down-slanting calligraphy of Sarah Gailey. Yes, the address was +imperfect--"Miss Lessways, c/o Osmond Orgreave, Esq., Lane End House, +Knype-on-Trent," instead of "Bursley, Knype-on-Trent." On the back of +the envelope had been written in pencil by an official, "Try Bursley." +Sarah Gailey could not now be trusted to address an envelope correctly. +The mere handwriting seemed to announce misfortune. + +"From poor Sarah," Hilda murmured, with false, good-tempered +tranquillity. "I wonder what sort of trouble she thinks she's got into!" + +She thought: "If only I was married, I should be free of responsibility +about Sarah. I should have to think of my husband first. But nothing +else can free me. Unless I marry, I'm tied to Sarah Gailey as long as +she lives.... And why?... I should like to know!" The answer was simple: +habit had shackled her to Sarah Gailey. + +She opened the letter by the flickering firelight, which was stronger on +the hearthrug than the light of the dim November day. It began: "Dearest +Hilda, I write at once to tell you that a lawyer called here this +afternoon to inquire about your Hotel Continental shares. He told me +there was going to be some difficulty with the Company, and, unless the +independent shareholders formed a strong local committee to look after +things, the trouble might be serious. He wanted to know if you would +support a committee at the meeting. I gave him your address, and he's +going to write to you. But I thought I would write to you as well. His +name is Eustace Broughton, 124 East Street, in case. I do hope nothing +will go wrong. It is like what must be, I am sure! It has been +impossible for me to keep the charwoman. So I sent her off this morning. +Can you remember the address of that Mrs. Catkin?..." Sarah Gailey +continued to discuss boarding-house affairs, until she arrived at the +end of the fourth page, and then, in a few cramped words, she finished +with expressions of love. + +"Oh dear!" Hilda exclaimed, rising, "I must write some letters at once." +She sighed, as if in tedium. The fact that her fortune was vaguely +threatened did not cause her anxiety: she scarcely realized it. What she +saw was an opportunity to evade the immediate meeting with Edwin--the +meeting which, a few minutes earlier, she had desired beyond everything. + +"When? Now?" + +Hilda nodded. + +"But what about Master Edwin?" Janet asked, trying to be gay. + +"I shan't be able to go," said Hilda carelessly, at the door. "It's of +no consequence." + +"Martha has to go down town. If you like, she could call in there, and +just tell him." + +It was a reproof, from the young woman who always so thoughtfully +studied the feelings of everybody. + +"I'll just write a little note, then, thanks!" Hilda returned calmly, +triumphing after all over Janet's superiority, and thinking, "Janet can +be very peculiar, Janet can!" + + +III + +For more than twenty hours, Hilda was profoundly miserable. Towards the +evening of the same day, she had made herself quite sure that Edwin +Clayhanger would call that night. Her hope persisted until half-past +nine: it then began to fade, and, at ten o'clock, was extinct. His name +had been mentioned by nobody. She went to bed. Having now a room of her +own, which overlooked the Clayhanger garden and house, she gazed forth, +and, in the dark, beheld, with the most anxious sensations, the building +in which Edwin existed and was concealed. "He is there," she said. "He +is active about something at this very instant--perhaps he is reading. +He is close by. If I shouted, he might hear...." And yet she was utterly +cut off from him. Again, in the late dawn, she saw the same building, +pale and clear, but just as secretive and enigmatic as in the night. "He +is asleep yet," she thought. "Why did he not call? Is he hurt? Is he +proud?" + +She despaired, because she could devise no means of resuming +communication with him. + +Immediately after dinner on the next day, she went with Janet to Janet's +room, to examine a new winter cloak which had been delivered. And, while +Janet was trying it on, and posing coquettishly and yet without +affectation in front of the glass, and while Hilda was reflecting +jealously, "Why am I not like her? I know infinitely more than she +knows. I am a woman, and she is a girl, and yet she seems far more a +woman than I--" Alicia, contrary to all rules, took the room by storm. +Alicia's excuse and salvation lay in a telegram, which she held in her +hand. + +"For you, Hilda!" cried the child, excited. "I'm just off to school." + +Hilda reached to take the offered telegram, but her hand wavered around +it instead of seizing it. Her eye fastened on a circular portion of the +wall-paper pattern, and she felt that the whole room was revolving about +her. Then she saw Janet's face transformed by an expression of alarm. + +"Are you ill, Hilda?" Janet demanded. "Sit down." + +"You're frightfully pale," said Alicia eagerly. + +Hilda sat down. + +"No, no," she said. "It was the pattern of the wall-paper that made me +feel dizzy." And, for the moment, she did honestly believe that the +pattern of the wall-paper had, in some inexplicable manner, upset her. +"I'm all right now." + +The dizziness passed as suddenly as it had supervened. Janet held some +ineffectual salts to her nose. + +"I'm perfectly well," insisted Hilda. + +"How funny!" Alicia grinned. + +Calmly Hilda opened the telegram, which read: "Please come at once.-- +GAILEY." + +She gave the telegram to Janet in silence. + +"What can be the matter?" Janet asked, with unreserved, loving +solicitude. The cloud which had hung between the two enthusiastic +friends was dissipated in a flash. + +"I haven't an idea," said Hilda, touched. "Unless it's those shares!" +She had briefly told Janet about the Hotel Continental Limited. + +"Shall you go?" + +Hilda nodded. Never again would she ignore an urgent telegram, though +she did not believe that this telegram had any real importance. She +attributed it to Sarah's increasing incompetence and hysterical +foolishness. + +"I wonder whether I can get on to Brighton to-night if I take the six +train?" Hilda asked, and to herself: "Can it have anything to do with +George?" + +Alicia, endowed with authority, went in search of a Bradshaw. But the +quest was fruitless. In the Five Towns the local time-table, showing the +connections with London, suffices for the citizen, and the breast-pocket +of no citizen is complete without it. + +"Clayhangers are bound to have a Bradshaw," cried Alicia, breathless +with running about the house. + +"Of course they are," Janet agreed. + +"I'll walk down there now," said Hilda, with extraordinary promptitude. +"It won't take five minutes." + +"I'd go," said Alicia, "only I should be late for school." + +"Shall I send some one down?" Janet suggested. "You might be taken dizzy +again." + +"No, thanks," Hilda replied deliberately. "I'll go--myself. There's +nothing wrong with me at all." + +"You'll have to be sharp over it," said Alicia pertly. "Don't forget +it's Thursday. They shut up at two, and it's not far off two now." + +"I'm going this very minute," said Hilda. + +"And I'm going this very second!" Alicia retorted. + +They all three left Janet's bedroom; the new cloak cast over a chair- +back, was degraded into a tedious banality--and ignored. + +In less than a minute Hilda, hatted and jacketed and partially gloved, +was crossing the garden. She felt most miraculously happy and hopeful, +and she was full of irrational gratitude to Alicia, as though Alicia +were a benefactor! The change in her mood seemed magic in its swiftness. +If Janet, with calm, cryptic face, had not been watching her from the +doorway, she might have danced on the gravel. + + + + +CHAPTER V +THURSDAY AFTERNOON + + +I + +She was walking with Edwin Clayhanger up Duck Bank on the way to Bursley +railway station. A simple errand and promenade,--and yet she felt +herself to be steeped in the romance of an adventure! The adventure had +surprisingly followed upon the discovery that Alicia had been quite +wrong. "Clayhangers are bound to have a Bradshaw," the confident Alicia +had said. But Clayhangers happened not to have a Bradshaw. Edwin was +alone in the stationery shop, save for the assistant. He said that his +father was indisposed. And whereas the news that Clayhangers had no +Bradshaw left Hilda perfectly indifferent, the news that old Darius +Clayhanger was indisposed and absent produced in her a definite feeling +of gladness. Edwin had decided that the most likely place to search for +a Bradshaw was the station, and he had offered to escort her to the +station. Nothing could have been more natural, and at the same time more +miraculous. + +The sun was palely shining upon dry, clean pavements and upon roads +juicy with black mud. And in the sunshine Hilda was very happy. It was +nothing to her that she was in quest of a Bradshaw because she had just +received an ominous telegram urgently summoning her to Brighton. She was +obliviously happy. Every phenomenon that attracted her notice +contributed to her felicity. Thus she took an eager joy in the sun. And +a marked improvement in Edwin's cold really delighted her. She was +dominated by the intimate conviction: "He loves me!" Which conviction +excited her dormant pride, and made her straighten her shoulders. She +benevolently condescended towards Janet. After all Janet, with every +circumstance in her favour, had not known how to conquer Edwin +Clayhanger. After all she, Hilda, possessed some mysterious +characteristic more potent than the elegance and the goodness of Janet +Orgreave. She scorned her former self-deprecations, and reproached her +own lack of faith: "I am I!" That was the summary of her mood. As for +her attitude to Edwin Clayhanger, she could not explain it. Why did she +like him and like being with him? He was not brilliant, nor masterful, +nor handsome, nor well dressed, nor in any manner imposing. On the +contrary, he was awkward and apologetic, and not a bit spectacular. Only +the wistful gaze of his eyes, and his honest smile, and the appeal of +his gestures...! A puzzling affair, an affair perfectly incomprehensible +and enchanting. + +They walked side by side in silence. + +When they had turned into Moorthorne Road, half-way up whose slope lies +the station, she asked a question about a large wooden building from +whose interior came wild sounds of shouting and cheering, and learnt +that the potters on strike were holding a meeting in the town theatre. +At the open outer doors was a crowd of starving, shivering, dirty, +ragged children, who romped and cursed, or stood unnaturally meditative +in the rich mud, like fakirs fulfilling a vow. Hilda's throat was +constricted by the sight. Pain and joy ran together in her, burning +exquisitely; and she had a glimpse, obscure, of the mystical beauty of +the children's suffering. + +"I'd no idea there was a theatre in Bursley," she remarked idly, driven +into a banality by the press of her sensations. + +"They used to call it the Blood Tub," he replied. "Melodrama and murder +and gore--you know." + +She exclaimed in horror. "Why are people like that in the Five Towns?" + +"It's our form of poetry, I suppose," said he. + +She started, sensitively. It seemed to her that she had never understood +the secret inner spirit of the Five Towns, and that by a single phrase +he had made her understand it.... 'Our form of poetry'! Who but he could +have said a thing at once so illuminating and so simple? + +Apparently perplexed by the obvious effect on her of his remark, he +said: + +"But you belong to the Five Towns, don't you?" + +She answered quietly that she did. But her heart was saying: "I do +_now_. You have initiated me. I never felt the Five Towns before. You +have made me feel them." + + +II + +At the station the head porter received their inquiry for a Bradshaw +with a dull stare and a shake of the head. No such thing had ever been +asked for at Bursley Station before, and the man's imagination could not +go beyond the soiled time-tables loosely pinned and pasted up on the +walls of the booking-office. Hilda suggested that the ticket-clerk +should be interrogated, but the aperture of communication with him was +shut. She saw Edwin Clayhanger brace himself and rap on the wood; and +instead of deploring his diffidence she liked it and found it full of +charm. The partition clicked aside, and the ticket-clerk's peering, +suspicious head showed in its place, mutely demanding a reason for this +extraordinary disturbance of the dream in which the station slumbered +between two half-hourly trains. With a characteristic peculiar slanting +motion Edwin nodded. + +"Oh, how-d'ye-do, Mr. Brooks?" said Edwin hastily, as if startled by the +sudden inexplicable apparition of the head. + +But the ticket-clerk had no Bradshaw either. He considered it probable, +however, that the stationmaster would have a Bradshaw. Edwin had to +brace himself again, for an assault upon the fastness of the +stationmaster. + +And in the incredibly small and incredibly dirty fastness of the +stationmaster, they indeed found a Bradshaw. Hilda precipitately took it +and opened it on the stationmaster's table. She looked for Brighton in +it as she might have looked for a particular individual in a city. Then +Edwin was bending over it, with his ear close to her ear, and the sleeve +of his overcoat touching her sleeve. She was physically aware of him, +for the first time. She thought, disconcerted: "But he is an utter +stranger to me! What do I know of him?" And then she thought: "For more +than a year he must have carried my image in his heart!" + +"Here," said Edwin brusquely, and with a certain superiority, "you might +just let me have a look at it myself." + +She yielded, tacitly admitting that a woman was no match for Bradshaw. + +After a few moments' frowning Edwin said: + +"Yes, there's a train to Brighton at eleven-thirty to-night!" + +"May I look?" + +"Certainly," said he, subtly condescending. + +She examined the page, with a serious deliberation. + +"But what does this '_f_' mean?" she asked. "Did you notice this '_f_'?" + +"Yes. It means Thursdays and Saturdays only," said Edwin, his eyes +twinkling. It was as if he had said: "You think yourself very clever, +but do you suppose that I can't read the notes in a time-table?" + +"Well--" She hesitated. + +"To-day's Thursday, you see," he remarked curtly. + +She was ravished by his tone and his manner. And she became humble +before him, for in the space of a few seconds he had grown mysteriously +and powerfully masculine to her. But with all his masculinity there +remained the same wistful, honest, boyish look in his eyes. And she +thought: "If I marry him it will be for the look in his eyes." + +"I'm all right, then," she said aloud, and smiled. + +With hands nervously working within her muff, she suddenly missed the +handkerchief which she had placed there. + +"I believe I must have dropped my handkerchief in your shop!" she was +about to say. The phrase was actually on her tongue; but by a strange +instinctive, defensive discretion she shut her mouth on it and kept +silence. She thought: "Perhaps I had better not go into his shop again +to-day." + + +III + +They descended the hill from the station. Hilda was very ill at ease. +She kept saying to herself: "This adventure is over now. I cannot +prolong it. There is nothing to do but to go back to the Orgreaves, and +pack my things and depart to Brighton, and face whatever annoyance is +awaiting me at Brighton." The prospect desolated her. She could not bear +to leave Edwin Clayhanger without some definition of their relations, +and yet she knew that it was hopeless and absurd to expect to arrive +immediately at any such definition: she knew that the impetuosity of her +temperament could not be justified. Also, she feared horribly the risk +of being caught again in the net of Brighton. As they got lower and +lower down the hill, her wretchedness and disquiet became acute, to the +point of a wild despair. Merely to temporize, she said, as they drew +opposite the wooden theatre: + +"Couldn't we just go and look in? I've got plenty of time." + +A strange request--to penetrate into a meeting of artisans on strike! +She felt its strangeness: she felt that Edwin Clayhanger objected, but +she was driven to an extremity. She had to do something, and she did +what she could. + +They crossed the road, and entered the huge shanty, and stood +apologetically near the door. The contrast between the open street and +the enclosed stuffiness of the dim and crowded interior was +overwhelming. Hundreds of ragged and shabby men sat in serried rows, +leaning forward with elbows out and heads protruding as they listened to +a speech from the gimcrack stage. They seemed to be waiting to spring, +like famished and ferocious tigers. Interrupting, they growled, snarled, +yapped, and swore with appalling sincerity. Imprecations burst forth in +volleys and in running fires. The arousing of the fundamental instincts +of these human beings had, indeed, enormously emphasized the animal in +them. They had swung back a hundred centuries towards original crude +life. The sophistication which embroiders the will-to-live had been +stripped clean off. These men helped you to understand the state of mind +which puts a city to the sack, and makes victims especially of the +innocent and the defenceless. Hilda was strangely excited. She was +afraid, and enjoyed being afraid. And it was as if she, too, had been +returned to savagery and to the primeval. In the midst of peril, she was +a female under the protection of a male, and nothing but that. And she +was far closer, emotionally, to her male than she had ever been before. + +Suddenly, the meeting came to an end. In an instant, the mass of +humanity was afoot and rounding upon them, an active menace. Hilda and +Edwin rushed fleeing into the street, violently urged by a common +impulse. The stream of embittered men pursued them like an inundation. +When they were safe, and breathing the free air, Hilda was drenched with +a sense of pity. The tragedy of existence presented itself in its true +aspect, as noble and majestic and intimidating. + +"It's terrible!" she breathed. + +She thought: "No! In this mood, it is impossible for me to leave him! I +cannot do it! I cannot!" The danger of re-entering the shop, which would +be closed now, utterly fascinated her. Supposing that she re-entered the +shop with him, would she have the courage to tell him that she was in +his society under false pretences? Could she bring herself to relate her +misfortune? She recoiled before the mere idea of telling him. And yet +the danger of the shop glittered in front of her like a lure. + +The future might be depending solely on her own act. If she told him of +the lost handkerchief, the future might be one thing: if she did not +tell him, it might be another. + +The dread of choosing seized her, and put her into a tremble of +apprehension. And then, as it were mechanically, she murmured (but very +clearly), tacking the words without a pause on to a sentence about the +strikes: "Oh, I've lost my handkerchief, unless I've left it in your +shop! It must have dropped out of my muff." + +She sighed in relief, because she had chosen. But her agitation was +intensified. + + +IV + +In search of a lost handkerchief, they regained the Clayhanger premises +by an unfamiliar side door. She preceded him along a passage and then, +taking a door on the left, found herself surprisingly in the shop, +behind a counter. The shop was lighted only by a few diamond-shaped +holes in the central shutters, and it had a troubling aspect of portent, +with its merchandise mysteriously enveloped in pale sheets, and its +chairs wrong side up, and its deep-shadowed corners. Destiny might have +been lurking in one of those baffling corners. From above, through the +ceiling, came the vibration of some machine at work, and the machine +might have been the loom of time. Hilda was exquisitely apprehensive. +She thought: "I am here. The moment of my departure will come. When it +comes, shall I have told him my misfortune? What will have happened?" +She waited, nervous, restless, shaking like a victim who can do naught +but wait. + +"Here's my handkerchief!" she cried, in a tone of unnatural childish +glee, that was one of the effects of her secret panic. + +The handkerchief glimmered on the counter, more white than anything else +in that grey dusk. She guessed that the shop-assistant must have found +it, and placed it conspicuously on the counter. + +They were alone: they were their own prisoners, secure from the street +and from all interruption. Hilda, once more and in a higher degree, +realized the miraculous human power to make experience out of nothing. +They had nothing but themselves, and they could, if they chose, create +all their future by a single gesture. + +Suddenly, there came a tremendous shouting from Duck Square, in front of +the shop. The strikers had poured down from Moorthorne Road into Duck +Bank and Duck Square. + +Edwin, who was in the middle of the shop, went to the glazed inner +doors, and, passing through into the porch, lifted the letter-flap in a +shutter, and, stooping, looked forth. He called to her, without moving +his face from the aperture, that a fight was in progress. Hilda gazed at +his back, through the glass, and then, coming round the end of the +counter, approached quietly, and stood immediately behind him, between +the glazed doors and the shutters. The two were in a space so small that +they could scarcely have moved without touching. + +"Let me look," she stammered, unable any longer to tolerate the +inaction. + +Edwin Clayhanger stepped aside, and held up the letter-flap for her with +his finger. She bent her head to the oblong glimpse of the street, and +saw the strikers engaged in the final internecine folly of strikers: +they had turned their exasperated wrath upon each other. Within a +public-house at the top of the little Square, other strikers were +drinking. One policeman regarded them. + +"What a shame!" she cried angrily, dropping the flap, and then withdrew +quickly into the shop, whither Edwin had gone. As she came near him, her +mood changed. She smiled gently. She summoned all her charm; and she +knew that she charmed him. + +"Do you know," she said, "you've quite altered my notion of poetry--what +you said as we were going up to the station!" + +"Really?" He flushed. + +Yes, she had enchanted and entranced him. She had only to smile and to +use a particular tone, soft and breaking.... She knew that. + +"But you _do_ alter my notions," she continued, and her clear voice was +poured out like a liquid. "I don't know how it is..." She stopped. And +then, in half-playful accents: "So this is your little office!" + +Her hand was on the knob of the open door of the cubicle, a black +erection within the shop, where Edwin and his father kept the accounts +and wrote letters. + +"Yes. Go in and have a look at it." + +She murmured kindly: "Shall I?" and went in. He followed. + +For a moment, she was extremely afraid, and she whispered, scared: "I +must hurry off now." + +He ignored this remark. + +"Shall you be at Brighton long?" he demanded. And he was so friendly and +simple and timorous and honest-eyed, and his features had such an +extraordinary anxious expression that her own fear seemed to leave her. +She thought, as if surprised by the discovery: "He is a good friend." + +"Oh, I can't tell," she answered him. "It depends." + +"How soon shall you be down our way again?" His voice was thickening. +She shook her head, speechless. She was afraid again now. His face +altered. He was standing almost over her. She thought: "I am lost! I +have let it come to this!" He was no longer a good friend. + +He began to speak, in detached bits of phrases: + +"I say--you know--" + +"Good-bye, good-bye," she murmured anxiously. "I must go. Thanks very +much." + +And foolishly, she held out her hand, which he seized. He bent +passionately, and kissed her like a fresh boy, like a schoolboy. And she +gave back the kiss strongly, with all the profound sincerity of her +nature. His agitation appeared to be extreme; but she was calm; she was +divinely calm. She savoured the moment as though she had been a watcher, +and not an actor in the scene. She thought, with a secret sigh of bliss: +"Yes, it is real, this moment! And I have had it. Am I astonished that +it has come so soon, or did I know it was coming?" Her eyes drank up the +face and the hands and the gestures of her lover. She felt tired, and +sat down in the office chair, and he leaned on the desk, and the walls +of the cubicle folded them in, even from the inanimate scrutiny of the +shop. + + +V + +They were talking together, half-fearfully, and yet with the confidence +of deep mutual trust, in the quick-gathering darkness of the cubicle. +And while they were talking, Hilda, in her head, was writing a fervent +letter to him: "... You see it was so sudden. I had had no chance to +tell you. I did so want to tell you, but how could I? And I hadn't told +anybody! I'm sure you will agree with me that it is best to tell some +things as little as possible. And when you had kissed me, how could I +tell you then--at once? I could not. It would have spoilt everything. +Surely you understand. I know you do, because you understand everything. +If I was wrong, tell me where. You don't guess how humble I am! When I +think of you, I am the humblest girl you can imagine. Forgive me, if +there is anything to forgive. I don't need to tell you that I have +suffered." + +And she kept writing the letter again and again, slightly altering the +phrases so as to improve them, so as to express herself better and more +honestly and more appealingly. + +"I shall send you the address to-morrow," she was saying to him. "I +shall write you before I go to bed, whether it's to-night or to-morrow +morning." She put the fire of her love into the assurance. She smiled to +entrance him, and saw on his face that he was beside himself with joy in +her. She was a queen, surpassing in her prerogative a thousand elegant +Janets. She smiled; she proudly straightened her shoulders (she the +humblest!), and her boy was enslaved. + +"I wonder what people will say," he murmured. + +She said, with a pang of misgiving about his reception of her letter: + +"Please tell no one!" She pleaded that for the present he should tell no +one. "Later on, it won't seem so sudden," she added plausibly. "People +are so silly." + +The sound of another battle in Duck Square awoke them. The shop was very +chilly, and quite dark. Their faces were only pale ovals in the +blackness. She shivered. + +"I must go! I have to pack." + +He clasped her: and she was innocently content: she was a young girl +again. + +"I'll walk up with you," he said protectively. + +But she would not allow him to walk up with her, and he yielded. He +struck a match. They stumbled out, and, in the midnight of the passage, +he took leave of her. + +Walking up Trafalgar Road, alone, she was so happy, so amazed, so +relieved, so sure of him and of his fineness and of the future, that she +could scarcely bear her felicity. It was too intense.... At last her +life was settled and mapped out. Destiny had been kind, and she meant to +be worthy of her fate. She could have swooned, so intoxicant was her +wonder and her solemn joy and her yearning after righteousness in love. + + + + +CHAPTER VI +MISCHANCE + + +I + +Twelve days later, in the evening, Hilda stood by the bedside of Sarah +Gailey in the basement room of No. 59 Preston Street. There was a bright +fire in the grate, and in front of the fire a middle-aged doctor was +cleansing the instrument which he had just employed to inject morphia +into Sarah's exhausted body. Hilda's assumption that the ageing woman +had telegraphed for her on inadequate grounds had proved to be quite +wrong. + +Upon entering the house on that Thursday night, Hilda, despite the +anxious pale face of the new servant who had waited up for her and who +entreated her to see Sarah Gailey instantly, had gone first to her own +room and scrawled passionately a note to Edwin, which ran: "DEAREST,-- +This is my address. I love you. Every bit of me is absolutely yours. +Write me.--H. L." She gave the letter to the servant to post at once. +And as she gave it she had a vision of it travelling in post office, +railway vans, and being sorted, and sealed up in a bag, and recovered +from the bag, and scanned by the postman at Bursley, and borne up +Trafalgar Road by the postman, and dropped into the letter-box at +Edwin's house, and finally seized by Edwin; and of it pleasing him +intensely,--for it was a good letter, and she was proud of it because +she knew that it was characteristic. + +And then, with her mind freed, she had opened the door of Sarah's +bedroom. Sarah was unquestionably very ill. Sarah had been quite right +in telegraphing so peremptorily to Hilda; and if she had not so +telegraphed she would have been quite wrong. On the previous day she had +been sitting on the cold new oilcloth of the topmost stairs, minutely +instructing a maid in the craft of polishing banisters. And the next +morning an attack of acute sciatica had supervened. For a trifling +indiscretion Sarah was thus condemned to extreme physical torture. Hilda +had found her rigid on the bed. She suffered the severest pain in the +small of the back and all down the left leg. Her left knee was supported +on pillows, and the bed-clothes were raised away from it, for it could +tolerate no weight whatever. The doctor, who had been and gone, had +arranged a system of fomentation and hot-water bottles surpassing +anything in even Sarah's experience. And there Sarah lay, not feverish +but sweating with agony, terrified to move, terrified to take a deep +breath, lest the disturbance of the muscles might produce consequences +beyond her strength to endure. She was in no danger of death. She could +talk. She could eat and drink. Her pulse was scarcely quickened. But she +was degraded and humiliated by mere physical anguish to the condition of +a brute. This was her lot in life. All through that first night Hilda +stayed with her, trying to pretend that Sarah was a woman, and in the +morning she had assumed control of the house. + +She had her secret to console her. It remained a secret because there +was no one to whom she could relate it. Sarah had no ear for news +unconnected with her malady. And indeed to tell Sarah, as Sarah was, +would have been to carry callousness to the point of insult. And so +Hilda, amid her enormous labours and fatigue, had lived with her secret, +which, from being a perfumed delight, turned in two days to something +subtly horrible, to something that by its horror prevented her from +writing to Edwin aught but the briefest missives. She had existed from +hour to hour, from one minute apprehensively to the next, day and night, +hardly sleeping, devoured inwardly by a fear at once monstrous and +simple, at once convincing and incredible. As for the letter which +mentally she had composed a hundred times to Edwin, and which she owed +to him, it had become fantastic and then inconceivable to her. + + +II + +One of the new servants entered the room and handed a letter to Hilda, +and left the room and shut the door. The envelope was addressed "Miss +Lessways, 59 Preston Street, Brighton," in Edwin Clayhanger's beautiful +handwriting. Every evening came thus a letter, which he had posted in +Bursley on the previous day. Hilda thought: "Will this contain another +reproach at my irregularity? I can't bear it, if it does." And she gazed +at the handwriting, and in particular at her own name, and her own name +seemed to be the name of somebody else, of some strange young woman. She +felt dizzy.... The door of Sarah's wardrobe was ajar, and, in the mirror +of it, Hilda could see herself obscurely, a black-robed strange young +woman, with untidy hair and white cheeks and huge, dark, staring heavy +eyes, with pouches beneath them. The image wavered in the mirror. She +thought: "Here it is again, this awful feeling! Surely I am not going to +faint!" She could hear Sarah's sighing breath: she could hear the +singing of the shaded gas-flame. She turned her gaze away from the +mirror, and saw Sarah's grey head inadvertently nodding, as it always +nodded. Then the letter slipped out of her hand. She glanced down at the +floor, in pursuit of it: the floor was darkly revolving. She thought: +"Am I really fainting this time? I mustn't faint. I've got to arrange +about that bacon to-night and--oh, lots of things! Sarah is not a bit +better. And I must sit with her until she gets off to sleep." Her legs +trembled, and she was terrorized by extraordinary novel sensations of +insecurity. "Oh!" she murmured weakly. + + +III + +"You've only fainted," said the doctor in a low voice. + +She perceived, little by little, that she was lying flat on the floor at +the foot of Sarah's bed, and that he was kneeling beside her. The bed +threw a shadow on them both, but she could see his benevolent face, +anxious and yet reassuring, rather clearly. + +"What?" she whispered, in feeble despair. She felt that her resistance +was definitely broken. + +From higher up, at the level of the hidden bed, came the regular +plaintive respiration of Sarah Gailey. + +"You must take care of yourself better than this," said the doctor. +"Perhaps this is a day when you ought to be resting." + +She answered, resigned. + +"No, it's not that. I believe I'm going to have a child. You must..." +She stopped. + +"Oh," said the doctor, with discretion. "Is that it?" + +Strange, how the direct words would create a new situation! She had not +told the doctor that she had been through the ceremony of marriage, and +had been victimized. She had told him nothing but the central and final +thought in her mind. And lo! the new situation was brought into being, +and the doctor was accepting it! He was not emitting astounded 'buts--!' +Her directness had made all possible 'buts' seem ridiculous and futile, +and had made the expression of curiosity seem offensive. + +She lay on the floor impassive. She was no longer horrified by +expectancy. + +"Well," said the doctor, "we must see. I think you can sit up now, can't +you?" + +Three-quarters of an hour afterwards, she went into Sarah's room alone. +She was aware of no emotion whatever. She merely desired, as a +professional nurse might have desired, to see if Sarah slept. Sarah was +not sleeping. She moaned, as she moaned continually when awake. Hilda +bent over her trembling head whose right side pressed upon the pillow. + +"How queer," thought Hilda, "how awful, that she didn't even hear what I +said to him! It will almost kill her when she does know." + +Sarah's eyes blinked. Without stirring, without shifting her horizontal, +preoccupied gaze from the wall, she muttered peevishly: + +"What's that you were saying about going to have a child?" + +Startled, Hilda moved back a little from the bed. + +"The doctor says there's no doubt I am," Hilda answered coldly. + +"How queer!" Sarah said. "I quite thought--but of course a girl like you +are couldn't be sure. I should like another biscuit. But I don't want +the Osbornes--the others." She resumed her moaning. + + +IV + +On the following Saturday morning--rather more than a fortnight after +her engagement to Edwin Clayhanger--Hilda came out of the kitchen of +No. 59 Preston Street, and shut the door on a nauseating, malodorous +mess of broken food and greasy plates, in the midst of which two +servants were noisily gobbling down their late breakfast, and disputing. +With a frown of disgust on her face, she looked into Sarah Gailey's +bedroom. Sarah, though vaguely better, was still in constant acute pain, +and her knee still reposed on a pillow, and was protected from the upper +bed-clothes, and she still could not move. Hilda put on a smile for +Sarah Gailey, who nodded morosely, and then, extinguishing the smile, as +if it had been expensive gas burning to no purpose, she passed into the +basement sitting-room, and slaked the fire there. With a gesture of +irresolution, she lifted the lid of the desk in the corner, and gazed +first at a little pile of four unopened letters addressed to her in +Edwin's handwriting, and then at a volume of Crashaw, which the +enthusiastic Tom Orgreave had sent to her as a reward for her +appreciation of Crashaw's poems. She released the lid suddenly, and went +upstairs to her bedroom, chatting sugarily for an instant on the way +with the second Miss Watchett. In the bedroom, she donned her street +things, and then she descended. She had to go to the Registry Office in +North Street about a new cook. She stopped at the front door, and then +surprisingly went down once more into the basement sitting-room. +Standing up at the desk, she wrote this letter: "DARLING JANET,--I am +now married to George Cannon. The marriage is not quite public, but I +tell you before anybody, and you might tell Edwin Clayhanger.--Your +loving H. L." Least said soonest mended! And the conciseness would +discourage questioning. She inserted the letter into an envelope, which +she addressed and stamped, and then she fled with it from the house, and +in two minutes it was in a letter-box, and she was walking slowly along +the King's Road past the shops. + +The letter was the swift and desperate sequel to several days' +absolutely sterile reflection. It said enough for the moment. Later, she +could explain that her husband had left her. She could not write to +Edwin. She could not bring herself to write anything to him. She could +not confess, nor beg for forgiveness nor even for sympathetic +understanding. She could not admit the uninstructed rashness which had +led her to assume positively, on inadequate grounds, that her union with +George Cannon had been fruitless. She must suffer, and he also must +suffer. Rather than let him know, in any conceivable manner, that, all +unwitting, she was bearing the child of another at the moment of her +betrothal to himself, she preferred to be regarded as a jilt of the very +worst kind. Strange that she should choose the rôle of deceiver instead +of the rôle of victim! Strange that she would sooner be hated and +scorned than pitied! Strange that she would not even give Edwin the +opportunity of treating her as a widow! But so it was! For her, the one +possible attitude towards Edwin was the attitude of silence. In the +silence of the grave her love for him existed. + +As she walked along the chill promenade she looked with discreet +curiosity at every woman she met, to see her condition. This matter, +which before she had never thought of, now obsessed her; and all women +were divided for her into two classes, the expectant and the others. +Also her self-consciousness was extreme, more so even than it had been +after her mother's death. She was not frightened--yet. She was assuredly +not panic-struck. Rather her mood was grim, harsh, and calmly bitter. +She thought: "I suppose George must be informed." It affected her +queerly that if she took it into her head she need never go back to +Preston Street. She was free. She owed nothing to anybody. And yet she +would go back. She would require a home, soon. And she would require a +livelihood, for the shares of the Brighton Hotel Continental Limited +promised to be sterile and were already unsaleable. But apart from these +considerations, she would have gone back for Sarah Gailey--because Sarah +Gailey was entirely dependent on her. She detested Sarah, despite +Sarah's sufferings, and yet by her conscience she was for ever bound to +her. + +The future loomed appalling. Sarah's career was finished. She could not +be anything but a burden and a torment; her last years would probably be +dreadful, both for herself and for others. The prospects of the +boarding-house were not radiant. Hilda could direct the enterprise, but +not well. She could work, but she had not the art of making others work. +Already the place was slightly at sixes and sevens. And she loathed it. +She loathed the whole business of catering. Along the entire length of +the King's Road, the smells of basement kitchens ascended to the +pavement and offended the nose. And Hilda saw all Brighton as a colossal +and disgusting enlargement of the kitchen at No. 59. She saw the +background and the pits of Brighton--that which underlies and hides +behind, and is not seen. The grandeur of the King's Road was naught to +her. Her glance pierced it and it faded to a hallucination. Beyond it +she envisaged the years to come, the messy and endless struggle, the +necessary avarice and trickeries incidental to it,--and perhaps the +ultimate failure. She would never make money--she felt that! She was not +born to make money--especially by dodges and false politeness, out of +idle, empty-noddled boarders. She would lose it and lose it. And she +pictured what she would be in ten years: the hard-driven landlady, up to +every subterfuge,--with a child to feed and educate, and perhaps a +bedridden, querulous invalid to support. And there was no alternative to +the tableau. + +She went by the Chichester, which towered with all its stories above her +head. Who would take it now? George Cannon would have made it pay. He +would have made anything pay. How?... She was definitely cut off from +the magnificence of the King's Road. The side street was her destiny; +the side street and shabbiness. And it was all George's fault--and hers! +The poverty, if it came, would be George's fault alone. For he had +squandered her money in a speculation. It astounded her that George, so +shrewd and well balanced, should have made an investment so foolish. She +did not realize that a passion for a business enterprise, as for a +woman, is capable of destroying the balance of any man. And George +Cannon had had both passions. + +And then she saw Florrie Bagster, on the other side of the street, +walking leisurely by the sea-wall, alone. If Mr. Boutwood had had a more +generous and wild disposition he might have allowed Florrie to ruin him +in six months of furs and carriages and champagne. But Mr. Boutwood, +though a dog, was a careful dog, especially at those moments when the +conventional dog can refuse nothing. Florrie was well and warmly +dressed,--no more; and she was on foot. Hilda's gaze fastened on her, +and immediately divined from the cut and fall of the coat that Florrie +had something to conceal from every one but her Mr. Boutwood. And +whereas Florrie trod the pavement with a charming little air that +wavered between impudence and modesty, between timid meekness and +conceit, Hilda blushed with shame and pity. She on one footpath and +Florrie on the other! + +"Soon," she thought, "I shall not be able to walk along this road!" + +She had sinned. She admitted that she had sinned against some quality in +herself. But how innocently and how ignorantly! And what a tremendous +punishment for so transient a weakness! And new consequences, still more +disastrous than any she had foreseen, presented themselves one after +another. George had escaped, but a word of open scandal, a single +whisper in the ear of the old creature down at Torquay, might actuate +machinery that would reach out after him and drag him back, and plant +him in jail. George, the father of her child, in jail! It was all a +matter of chance; sheer chance! She began to perceive what life really +was, and the immense importance of hazard therein. Nevertheless, without +frailty, without defection, what could chance have done? She began to +perceive that this that she was living through was life. She bit her +lips. Grief! Shame! Disillusion! Hardship! Peril! Catastrophe! Exile! +Above all, exile! These had to be faced, and they would be faced. She +recalled the firiest verse of Crashaw and she set her shoulders back. +There was the stuff of a woman in her.... Only a little while, and she +had seen before her a beloved boy entranced by her charm. She had now no +charm. Where now was the soft virgin?... And yet, somehow, magically, +miraculously, the soft virgin was still there! And the invincible vague +hope of youth, and the irrepressible consciousness of power, were almost +ready to flame up afresh, contrary to all reason, and irradiate her +starless soul. + +NOTE:--_The later history of Hilda Lessways and Edwin Clayhanger will +form the theme of another novel._ + + + +Footnote 1: See the author's novel, _Clayhanger_. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Hilda Lessways, by Arnold Bennett + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HILDA LESSWAYS *** + +***** This file should be named 10658-8.txt or 10658-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/6/5/10658/ + +Produced by John Hagerson, Kevin Handy and PG Distributed Proofreaders + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Hilda Lessways + +Author: Arnold Bennett + +Release Date: January 9, 2004 [EBook #10658] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HILDA LESSWAYS *** + + + + +Produced by John Hagerson, Kevin Handy and PG Distributed Proofreaders + + + + + +</pre> + + +<h1>HILDA LESSWAYS</h1> + +<h2>BY<br /> ARNOLD BENNETT</h2> + +<h3><i>1911</i></h3> + +<hr /> + + + + +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + +<h3><a href="#b1">BOOK I</a><br /> +HER START IN LIFE</h3><br /><br /> + +I <a href="#b1c1">AN EVENT IN MR. SKELLORN'S LIFE</a><br /> +II <a href="#b1c2">THE END OF THE SCENE</a><br /> +III <a href="#b1c3">MR. CANNON</a><br /> +IV <a href="#b1c4">DOMESTICITY INVADED</a><br /> +V <a href="#b1c5">MRS. LESSWAYS' SHREWDNESS</a><br /> +VI <a href="#b1c6">VICTOR HUGO AND ISAAC PITMAN</a><br /> +VII <a href="#b1c7">THE EDITORIAL SECRETARY</a><br /> +VIII <a href="#b1c8">JANET ORGREAVE</a><br /> +IX <a href="#b1c9">IN THE STREET</a><br /> +X <a href="#b1c10">MISS GAILEY IN DECLENSION</a><br /> +XI <a href="#b1c11">DISILLUSION</a><br /> +XII <a href="#b1c12">THE TELEGRAM</a><br /> +XIII <a href="#b1c13">HILDA'S WORLD</a><br /> +XIV <a href="#b1c14">TO LONDON</a><br /><br /> + +<h3><a href="#b2">BOOK II</a><br /> +HER RECOVERY</h3><br /><br /> + +I <a href="#b2c1">SIN</a><br /> +II <a href="#b2c2">THE LITTLE ROOM</a><br /> +III <a href="#b2c3">JOURNEY TO BLEAKRIDGE</a><br /> +IV <a href="#b2c4">WITH THE ORGREAVES</a><br /> +V <a href="#b2c5">EDWIN CLAYHANGER</a><br /> +VI <a href="#b2c6">IN THE GARDEN</a><br /> +VII <a href="#b2c7">THE NEXT MEETING</a><br /><br /> + +<h3><a href="#b3">BOOK III</a><br /> +HER BURDEN</h3><br /><br /> + +I <a href="#b3c1">HILDA INDISPENSABLE</a><br /> +II <a href="#b3c2">SARAH'S BENEFACTOR</a><br /> +III <a href="#b3c3">AT BRIGHTON</a><br /> +IV <a href="#b3c4">THE SEA</a><br /><br /> + +<h3><a href="#b4">BOOK IV</a><br /> +HER FALL</h3><br /><br /> + +I <a href="#b4c1">THE GOING CONCERN</a><br /> +II <a href="#b4c2">THE UNKNOWN ADVENTURE</a><br /> +III <a href="#b4c3">FLORRIE AGAIN</a><br /><br /> + +<h3><a href="#b5">BOOK V</a><br /> +HER DELIVERANCE</h3><br /><br /> + +I <a href="#b5c1">LOUISA UNCONTROLLED</a><br /> +II <a href="#b5c2">SOME SECRET HISTORY</a><br /><br /> + +<h3><a href="#b6">BOOK VI</a><br /><br /> +HER PUNISHMENT</h3><br /><br /> + +I <a href="#b6c1">EVENING AT BLEAKRIDGE</a><br /> +II <a href="#b6c2">A RENDEZVOUS</a><br /> +III <a href="#b6c3">AT THE WORKS</a><br /> +IV <a href="#b6c4">THE CALL FROM BRIGHTON</a><br /> +V <a href="#b6c5">THURSDAY AFTERNOON</a><br /> +VI <a href="#b6c6">MISCHANCE</a><br /> + +<hr /> + + + + +<h1><a name="b1">BOOK I</a><br /> HER START IN LIFE</h1> + + + + +<h2><a name="b1c1">CHAPTER I</a><br /> AN EVENT IN MR. SKELLORN'S LIFE</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>The Lessways household, consisting of Hilda and her widowed mother, was +temporarily without a servant. Hilda hated domestic work, and because she +hated it she often did it passionately and thoroughly. That afternoon, as +she emerged from the kitchen, her dark, defiant face was full of grim +satisfaction in the fact that she had left a kitchen polished and +irreproachable, a kitchen without the slightest indication that it ever had +been or ever would be used for preparing human nature's daily food; a show +kitchen. Even the apron which she had worn was hung in concealment behind +the scullery door. The lobby clock, which stood over six feet high and had +to be wound up every night by hauling on a rope, was noisily getting ready +to strike two. But for Mrs. Lessways' disorderly and undesired assistance, +Hilda's task might have been finished a quarter of an hour earlier. She +passed quietly up the stairs. When she was near the top, her mother's +voice, at once querulous and amiable, came from the sitting-room:</p> + +<p>"Where are you going to?"</p> + +<p>There was a pause, dramatic for both of them, and in that minute pause +the very life of the house seemed for an instant to be suspended, and then +the waves of the hostile love that united these two women resumed their +beating, and Hilda's lips hardened.</p> + +<p>"Upstairs," she answered callously.</p> + +<p>No reply from the sitting-room!</p> + +<p>At two o'clock on the last Wednesday of every month, old Mr. Skellorn, +employed by Mrs. Lessways to collect her cottage-rents, called with a +statement of account, and cash in a linen bag. He was now due. During his +previous visit Hilda had sought to instil some common sense into her mother +on the subject of repairs, and there had ensued an altercation which had +never been settled.</p> + +<p>"If I stayed down, she wouldn't like it," Hilda complained fiercely +within herself, "and if I keep away she doesn't like that either! That's +mother all over!"</p> + +<p>She went to her bedroom. And into the soft, controlled shutting of the +door she put more exasperated vehemence than would have sufficed to bang it +off its hinges.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>At this date, late October in 1878, Hilda was within a few weeks of +twenty-one. She was a woman, but she could not realize that she was a +woman. She remembered that when she first went to school, at the age of +eight, an assistant teacher aged nineteen had seemed to her to be +unquestionably and absolutely a woman, had seemed to belong definitely to a +previous generation. The years had passed, and Hilda was now older than +that mature woman was then; and yet she could not feel adult, though her +childhood gleamed dimly afar off, and though the intervening expanse of ten +years stretched out like a hundred years, like eternity. She was in +trouble; the trouble grew daily more and more tragic; and the trouble was +that she wanted she knew not what. If her mother had said to her squarely, +"Tell me what it is will make you a bit more contented, and you shall have +it even if it kills me!" Hilda could only have answered with the fervour of +despair, "I don't know! I don't know!"</p> + +<p>Her mother was a creature contented enough. And why not--with a +sufficient income, a comfortable home, and fair health? At the end of a day +devoted partly to sheer vacuous idleness and partly to the monotonous +simple machinery of physical existence--everlasting cookery, everlasting +cleanliness, everlasting stitchery--her mother did not with a yearning sigh +demand, "Must this sort of thing continue for ever, or will a new era +dawn?" Not a bit! Mrs. Lessways went to bed in the placid expectancy of a +very similar day on the morrow, and of an interminable succession of such +days. The which was incomprehensible and offensive to Hilda.</p> + +<p>She was in a prison with her mother, and saw no method of escape, saw +not so much as a locked door, saw nothing but blank walls. Even could she +by a miracle break prison, where should she look for the unknown object of +her desire, and for what should she look? Enigmas! It is true that she +read, occasionally with feverish enjoyment, especially verse. But she did +not and could not read enough. Of the shelf-ful of books which in thirty +years had drifted by one accident or another into the Lessways household, +she had read every volume, except Cruden's Concordance. A heterogeneous and +forlorn assemblage! Lavater's <i>Physiognomy</i>, in a translation and in +full calf! Thomson's <i>Seasons</i>, which had thrilled her by its romantic +beauty! Mrs. Henry Wood's <i>Danesbury House</i>, and one or two novels by +Charlotte M. Yonge and Dinah Maria Craik, which she had gulped eagerly down +for the mere interest of their stories. Disraeli's <i>Ixion</i>, which she +had admired without understanding it. A <i>History of the North American +Indians!</i> These were the more exciting items of the set. The most +exciting of all was a green volume of Tennyson's containing <i>Maud</i>. +She knew <i>Maud</i> by heart. By simple unpleasant obstinacy she had +forced her mother to give her this volume for a birthday present, having +seen a quotation from it in a ladies' magazine. At that date in Turnhill, +as in many other towns of England, the poem had not yet lived down a +reputation for immorality; but fortunately Mrs. Lessways had only the +vaguest notion of its dangerousness, and was indeed a negligent kind of +woman. Dangerous the book was! Once in reciting it aloud in her room, Hilda +had come so near to fainting that she had had to stop and lie down on the +bed, until she could convince herself that she was not the male lover +crying to his beloved. An astounding and fearful experience, and not to be +too lightly renewed! For Hilda, <i>Maud</i> was a source of lovely and +exquisite pain.</p> + +<p>Why had she not used her force of character to obtain more books? One +reason lay in the excessive difficulty to be faced. Birthdays are +infrequent; and besides, the enterprise of purchasing <i>Maud</i> had +proved so complicated and tedious that Mrs. Lessways, with that curious +stiffness which marked her sometimes, had sworn never to attempt to buy +another book. Turnhill, a town of fifteen thousand persons, had no +bookseller; the only bookseller that Mrs. Lessways had ever heard of did +business at Oldcastle. Mrs. Lessways had journeyed twice over the Hillport +ridge to Oldcastle, in the odd quest of a book called <i>Maud</i> by +"Tennyson--the poet laureate"; the book had had to be sent from London; and +on her second excursion to Oldcastle Mrs. Lessways had been caught by the +rain in the middle of Hillport Marsh. No! Hilda could not easily demand the +gift of another book, when all sorts of nice, really useful presents could +be bought in the High Street. Nor was there in Turnhill a Municipal +Library, nor any public lending-library.</p> + +<p>Yet possibly Hilda's terrific egoism might have got fresh books somehow +from somewhere, had she really believed in the virtue of books. Thus far, +however, books had not furnished her with what she wanted, and her faith in +their promise was insecure.</p> + +<p>Books failing, might she not have escaped into some vocation? The sole +vocation conceivable for her was that of teaching, and she knew, without +having tried it, that she abhorred teaching. Further, there was no +economical reason why she should work. In 1878, unless pushed by necessity, +no girl might dream of a vocation: the idea was monstrous; it was almost +unmentionable. Still further, she had no wish to work for work's sake. +Marriage remained. But she felt herself a child, ages short of marriage. +And she never met a man. It was literally a fact that, except Mr. Skellorn, +a few tradesmen, the vicar, the curate, and a sidesman or so, she never +even spoke to a man from one month's end to the next. The Church choir had +its annual dance, to which she was invited; but the perverse creature cared +not for dancing. Her mother did not seek society, did not appear to require +it. Nor did Hilda acutely feel the lack of it. She could not define her +need. All she knew was that youth, moment by moment, was dropping down +inexorably behind her. And, still a child in heart and soul, she saw +herself ageing, and then aged, and then withered. Her twenty-first birthday +was well above the horizon. Soon, soon, she would be 'over twenty-one'! And +she was not yet born! That was it! She was not yet born! If the passionate +strength of desire could have done the miracle time would have stood still +in the heavens while Hilda sought the way of life.</p> + +<p>And withal she was not wholly unhappy. Just as her attitude to her +mother was self-contradictory, so was her attitude towards existence. +Sometimes this profound infelicity of hers changed its hues for an instant, +and lo! it was bliss that she was bathed in. A phenomenon which +disconcerted her! She did not know that she had the most precious of all +faculties, the power to feel intensely.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>Mr. Skellorn did not come; he was most definitely late.</p> + +<p>From the window of her bedroom, at the front of the house, Hilda looked +westwards up toward the slopes of Chatterley Wood, where as a child she +used to go with other children to pick the sparse bluebells that thrived on +smoke. The bailiwick of Turnhill lay behind her; and all the murky district +of the Five Towns, of which Turnhill is the northern outpost, lay to the +south. At the foot of Chatterley Wood the canal wound in large curves on +its way towards the undefiled plains of Cheshire and the sea. On the +canal-side, exactly opposite to Hilda's window, was a flour-mill, that +sometimes made nearly as much smoke as the kilns and chimneys closing the +prospect on either hand. From the flour-mill a bricked path, which +separated a considerable row of new cottages from their appurtenant +gardens, led straight into Lessways Street, in front of Mrs. Lessways' +house. By this path Mr. Skellorn should have arrived, for he inhabited the +farthest of the cottages.</p> + +<p>Hilda held Mr. Skellorn in disdain, as she held the row of cottages in +disdain. It seemed to her that Mr. Skellorn and the cottages mysteriously +resembled each other in their primness, their smugness, their detestable +self-complacency. Yet those cottages, perhaps thirty in all, had stood for +a great deal until Hilda, glancing at them, shattered them with her scorn. +The row was called Freehold Villas: a consciously proud name in a district +where much of the land was copyhold and could only change owners subject to +the payment of 'fines' and to the feudal consent of a 'court' presided over +by the agent of a lord of the manor. Most of the dwellings were owned by +their occupiers, who, each an absolute monarch of the soil, niggled in his +sooty garden of an evening amid the flutter of drying shirts and towels. +Freehold Villas symbolized the final triumph of Victorian economics, the +apotheosis of the prudent and industrious artisan. It corresponded with a +Building Society Secretary's dream of paradise. And indeed it was a very +real achievement. Nevertheless Hilda's irrational contempt would not admit +this. She saw in Freehold Villas nothing but narrowness (what long narrow +strips of gardens, and what narrow homes all flattened together!), and +uniformity, and brickiness, and polished brassiness, and righteousness, and +an eternal laundry.</p> + +<p>From the upper floor of her own home she gazed destructively down upon +all that, and into the chill, crimson eye of the descending sun. Her own +home was not ideal, but it was better than all that. It was one of the two +middle houses of a detached terrace of four houses built by her grandfather +Lessways, the teapot manufacturer; it was the chief of the four, obviously +the habitation of the proprietor of the terrace. One of the corner houses +comprised a grocer's shop, and this house had been robbed of its just +proportion of garden so that the seigneurial garden-plot might be +triflingly larger than the others. The terrace was not a terrace of +cottages, but of houses rated at from twenty-six to thirty-six pounds a +year; beyond the means of artisans and petty insurance agents and +rent-collectors. And further, it was well built, generously built; and its +architecture, though debased, showed some faint traces of Georgian amenity. +It was admittedly the best row of houses in that newly settled quarter of +the town. In coming to it out of Freehold Villas Mr. Skellorn obviously +came to something superior, wider, more liberal.</p> + +<p>Suddenly Hilda heard her mother's voice, in a rather startled +conversational tone, and then another woman speaking; then the voices died +away. Mrs. Lessways had evidently opened the back door to somebody, and +taken her at once into the sitting-room. The occurrence was unusual. Hilda +went softly out on to the landing and listened, but she could catch nothing +more than a faint, irregular murmur. Scarcely had she stationed herself on +the landing when her mother burst out of the sitting-room, and called +loudly:</p> + +<p>"Hilda!" And again in an instant, very impatiently and excitedly, long +before Hilda could possibly have appeared in response, had she been in her +bedroom, as her mother supposed her to be: "Hilda!"</p> + +<p>Hilda could see without being seen. Mrs. Lessways' thin, wrinkled face, +bordered by her untidy but still black and glossy hair, was upturned from +below in an expression of tragic fretfulness. It was the uncontrolled face, +shamelessly expressive, of one who thinks himself unwatched. Hilda moved +silently to descend, and then demanded in a low tone whose harsh +self-possession was a reproof to that volatile creature, her mother:</p> + +<p>"What's the matter?"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lessways gave a surprised "Oh!" and like a flash her features +changed in the attempt to appear calm and collected.</p> + +<p>"I was just coming downstairs," said Hilda. And to herself: "She's +always trying to pretend I'm nobody, but when the least thing happens out +of the way, she runs to me for all the world like a child." And as Mrs. +Lessways offered no reply, but simply stood at the foot of the stairs, she +asked again: "What is it?"</p> + +<p>"Well," said her mother lamentably. "It's Mr. Skellorn. Here's Mrs. +Grant--"</p> + +<p>"Who's Mrs. Grant?" Hilda inquired, with a touch of scorn, although she +knew perfectly well that Mr. Skellorn had a married daughter of that +name.</p> + +<p>"Hsh! Hsh!" Mrs. Lessways protested, indicating the open door of the +sitting-room. "You know Mrs. Grant! It seems Mr. Skellorn has had a +paralytic stroke. Isn't it terrible?"</p> + +<p>Hilda continued smoothly to descend the stairs, and followed her mother +into the sitting-room.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b1c2">CHAPTER II</a><br /> THE END OF THE SCENE</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>The linen money-bag and the account-book, proper to the last Wednesday +in the month, lay on the green damask cloth of the round table where Hilda +and her mother took their meals. A paralytic stroke had not been drastic +enough to mar Mr. Skellorn's most precious reputation for probity and +reliability. His statement of receipts and expenditure, together with the +corresponding cash, had been due at two o'clock, and despite the paralytic +stroke it was less than a quarter of an hour late. On one side of the bag +and the book were ranged the older women,--Mrs. Lessways, thin and +vivacious, and Mrs. Grant, large and solemn; and on the other side, as it +were in opposition, the young, dark, slim girl with her rather wiry black +hair, and her straight, prominent eyebrows, and her extraordinary +expression of uncompromising aloofness.</p> + +<p>"She's just enjoying it, that's what she's doing!" said Hilda to +herself, of Mrs. Grant.</p> + +<p>And the fact was that Mrs. Grant, quite unconsciously, did appear to be +savouring the catastrophe with pleasure. Although paralytic strokes were +more prevalent at that period than now, they constituted even then a +striking dramatic event. Moreover, they were considered as direct +visitations of God. Also there was something mysteriously and agreeably +impressive in the word 'paralytic,' which people would repeat for the +pleasure of repeating it. Mrs. Grant, over whose mighty breast flowed a +black mantle suited to the occasion, used the word again and again as she +narrated afresh for Hilda the history of the stroke.</p> + +<p>"Yes," she said, "they came and fetched me out of my bed at three +o'clock this morning; and would you believe me, though he couldn't hardly +speak, the money and this here book was all waiting in his desk, and he +would have me come with it! And him sixty-seven! He always was like that. +And I do believe if he'd been paralysed on both sides instead of only all +down his right side, and speechless too, he'd ha' made me understand as I +must come here at two o'clock. If I'm a bit late it's because I was kept at +home with my son Enoch; he's got a whitlow that's worrying the life out of +him, our Enoch has."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lessways warmly deprecated any apology for inexactitude, and wiped +her sympathetic eyes.</p> + +<p>"It's all over with father," Mrs. Grant resumed. "Doctor hinted to me +quiet-like as he'd never leave his bed again. He's laid himself down for +the rest of his days.... And he'd been warned! He'd had warnings. But +there!..."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Grant contemplated with solemn gleeful satisfaction the +overwhelming grandeur of the disaster that had happened to her father. The +active old man, a continual figure of the streets, had been cut off in a +moment from the world and condemned for life to a mattress. She sincerely +imagined herself to be filled with proper grief; but an aesthetic +appreciation of the theatrical effectiveness of the misfortune was +certainly stronger in her than any other feeling. Observing that Mrs. +Lessways wept, she also drew out a handkerchief.</p> + +<p>"I'm wishful for you to count the money," said Mrs. Grant. "I wouldn't +like there to be any--"</p> + +<p>"Nay, that I'll not!" protested Mrs. Lessways.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Grant's pressing duties necessitated her immediate departure. Mrs. +Lessways ceremoniously insisted on her leaving by the front door.</p> + +<p>"I don't know where you'll find another rent-collector that's worth his +salt--in this town," observed Mrs. Grant, on the doorstep. "I can't think +<i>what</i> you'll do, Mrs. Lessways!"</p> + +<p>"I shall collect my rents myself," was the answer.</p> + +<p>When Mrs. Grant had crossed the road and taken the bricked path leading +to the paralytic's house, Mrs. Lessways slowly shut the door and bolted it, +and then said to Hilda:</p> + +<p>"Well, my girl, I do think you might have tried to show just a little +more feeling!"</p> + +<p>They were close together in the narrow lobby, of which the heavy pulse +was the clock's ticking.</p> + +<p>Hilda replied:</p> + +<p>"You surely aren't serious about collecting those rents yourself, are +you, mother?"</p> + +<p>"Serious? Of course I'm serious!" said Mrs. Lessways.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>"Why shouldn't I collect the rents myself?" asked Mrs. Lessways.</p> + +<p>This half-defiant question was put about two hours later. In the +meantime no remark had been made about the rents. Mother and daughter were +now at tea in the sitting-room. Hilda had passed the greater part of those +two hours upstairs in her bedroom, pondering on her mother's preposterous +notion of collecting the rents herself. Alone, she would invent +conversations with her mother, silencing the foolish woman with +unanswerable sarcastic phrases that utterly destroyed her illogical +arguments. She would repeat these phrases, repeat even entire +conversations, with pleasure; and, dwelling also with pleasure upon her +grievances against her mother, would gradually arrive at a state of +dull-glowing resentment. She could, if she chose, easily free her brain +from the obsession either by reading or by a sharp jerk of volition; but +often she preferred not to do so, saying to herself voluptuously: "No, I +<i>will</i> nurse my grievance; I'll nurse it and nurse it and nurse it! It +is mine, and it is just, and anybody with any sense at all would admit +instantly that I am absolutely right." Thus it was on this afternoon. When +she came to tea her face was formidably expressive, nor would she attempt +to modify the rancour of those uncompromising features. On the contrary, as +soon as she saw that her mother had noticed her condition, she deliberately +intensified it.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lessways, who was incapable of sustained thought, and who had +completely forgotten and recalled the subject of the cottage-rents several +times since the departure of Mrs. Grant, nevertheless at once diagnosed the +cause of the trouble; and with her usual precipitancy began to repulse an +attack which had not even been opened. Mrs. Lessways was not good at +strategy, especially in conflicts with her daughter. She was an ingenuous, +hasty thing, and much too candidly human. And not only was she deficient in +practical common sense and most absurdly unable to learn from experience, +but she had not even the wit to cover her shortcomings by resorting to the +traditional authoritativeness of the mother. Her brief, rare efforts to +play the mother were ludicrous. She was too simply honest to acquire +stature by standing on her maternal dignity. By a profound instinct she +wistfully treated everybody as an equal, as a fellow-creature; even her own +daughter. It was not the way to come with credit out of the threatened +altercation about rent-collecting.</p> + +<p>As Hilda offered no reply, Mrs. Lessways said reproachfully:</p> + +<p>"Hilda, you're too bad sometimes!" And then, after a further silence: +"Anyhow, I'm quite decided."</p> + +<p>"Then what's the good of talking about it?" said the merciless +child.</p> + +<p>"But <i>why</i> shouldn't I collect the rents myself? I'm not asking you +to collect them. And I shall save the five per cent., and goodness knows we +need it."</p> + +<p>"You're more likely to lose twenty-five per cent.," said Hilda. "I'll +have some more tea, please."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lessways was quite genuinely scandalized. "You needn't think I +shall be easy with those Calder Street tenants, because I shan't! Not me! +I'm more likely to be too hard!"</p> + +<p>"You'll be too hard, and you'll be too easy, too," said Hilda savagely. +"You'll lose the good tenants and you'll keep the bad ones, and the houses +will all go to rack and ruin, and then you'll sell all the property at a +loss. That's how it will be. And what shall you do if you're not feeling +well, and if it rains on Monday mornings?"</p> + +<p>Hilda could conceive her mother forgetting all about the rents on Monday +morning, or putting them off till Monday afternoon on some grotesque +excuse. Her fancy heard the interminable complainings, devisings, futile +resolvings, of the self-appointed collector. It was impossible to imagine a +woman less fitted by nature than her mother to collect rents from unthrifty +artisans such as inhabited Calder Street. The project sickened her. It +would render the domestic existence an inferno.</p> + +<p>As for Mrs. Lessways, she was shocked, for her project had seemed very +beautiful to her, and for the moment she was perfectly convinced that she +could collect rents and manage property as well as anyone. She was +convinced that her habits were regular, her temper firm and tactful, and +her judgment excellent. She was more than shocked; she was wounded. She +wept, as she pushed forward Hilda's replenished cup.</p> + +<p>"You ought to take shame!" she murmured weakly, yet with certitude.</p> + +<p>"Why?" said Hilda, feigning simplicity. "What have I said? <i>I</i> +didn't begin. You asked me. I can't help what I think."</p> + +<p>"It's your tone," said Mrs. Lessways grievously.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>Despite all Hilda's terrible wisdom and sagacity, this remark of the +foolish mother's was the truest word spoken in the discussion. It was +Hilda's tone that was at the root of the evil. If Hilda, with the +intelligence as to which she was secretly so complacent, did not amicably +rule her mother, the unavoidable inference was that she was either a clumsy +or a wicked girl, or both. She indeed felt dimly that she was a little of +both. But she did not mind. Sitting there in the small, familiar room, +close to the sewing-machine, the steel fender, the tarnished chandelier, +and all the other daily objects which she at once detested and loved, +sitting close to her silly mother who angered her, and yet in whom she +recognized a quality that was mysteriously precious and admirable, staring +through the small window at the brown, tattered garden-plot where blackened +rhododendrons were swaying in the October blast, she wilfully bathed +herself in grim gloom and in an affectation of despair.</p> + +<p>Somehow she enjoyed the experience. She had only to tighten her +lips--and she became oblivious of her clumsiness and her cruelty, savouring +with pleasure the pain of the situation, clasping it to her! Now and then a +thought of Mr. Skellorn's tragedy shot through her brain, and the +tenderness of pity welled up from somewhere within her and mingled +exquisitely with her dark melancholy. And she found delight in reading her +poor mother like an open book, as she supposed. And all the while her +mother was dreaming upon the first year of Hilda's life, before she had +discovered that her husband's health was as unstable as his character, and +comparing the reality of the present with her early illusions. But the +clever girl was not clever enough to read just that page.</p> + +<p>"We ought to be everything to each other," said Mrs. Lessways, pursuing +her reflections aloud.</p> + +<p>Hilda hated sentimentalism. She could not stand such talk.</p> + +<p>"And you know," said Hilda, speaking very frigidly and with even more +than her usual incisive clearness of articulation, "it's not your property. +It's only yours for life. It's my property."</p> + +<p>The mother's mood changed in a moment.</p> + +<p>"How do you know? You've never seen your father's will." She spoke in +harsh challenge.</p> + +<p>"No; because you've never let me see it."</p> + +<p>"You ought to have more confidence in your mother. Your father had. And +I'm trustee and executor." Mrs. Lessways was exceedingly jealous of her +legal position, whose importance she never forgot nor would consent to +minimize.</p> + +<p>"That's all very well, for you," said Hilda; "but if the property isn't +managed right, I may find myself slaving when I'm your age, mother. And +whose fault will it be?... However, I shall--"</p> + +<p>"You will what?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing."</p> + +<p>"I suppose her ladyship will be consulting her own lawyer next!" said +Mrs. Lessways bitterly.</p> + +<p>They looked at each other. Hilda's face flushed to a sombre red. Mrs. +Lessways brusquely left the room. Then Hilda could hear her rattling +fussily at the kitchen range. After a few minutes Hilda followed her to the +kitchen, which was now nearly in darkness. The figure of Mrs. Lessways, +still doing nothing whatever with great vigour at the range, was dimly +visible. Hilda approached her, and awkwardly touched her shoulder.</p> + +<p>"Mother!" she demanded sharply; and she was astonished by her +awkwardness and her sharpness.</p> + +<p>"Is that you?" her mother asked, in a queer, foolish tone.</p> + +<p>They kissed. Such a candid peacemaking had never occurred between them +before. Mrs. Lessways, as simple in forgiveness as in wrath, did not +disguise her pleasure in the remarkable fact that it was Hilda who had made +the overture. Hilda thought: "How strange I am! What is coming over me?" +She glanced at the range, in which was a pale gleam of red, and that gleam, +in the heavy twilight, seemed to her to be inexpressibly, enchantingly +mournful. And she herself was mournful about the future--very mournful. She +saw no hope. Yet her sadness was beautiful to her. And she was proud.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b1c3">CHAPTER III</a><br/> MR. CANNON</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>A little later Hilda came downstairs dressed to go out. Her mother was +lighting a glimmer of gas in the lobby. Ere Mrs. Lessways could descend +from her tiptoes to her heels and turn round Hilda said quickly, +forestalling curiosity:</p> + +<p>"I'm going to get that thread you want. Just give me some money, will +you?"</p> + +<p>Nobody could have guessed from her placid tone and indifferent demeanour +that she was in a state of extreme agitation. But so it was. Suddenly, +after kissing her mother in the kitchen, she had formed a tremendous +resolve. And in a moment the resolve had possessed her, sending her flying +upstairs, and burning her into a fever, as with the assured movements of +familiarity she put on her bonnet, mantle, 'fall,' and gloves in the +darkness of the chamber. She held herself in leash while her mother lifted +a skirt and found a large loaded pocket within and a purse in the pocket +and a sixpence in the purse. But when she had shut the door on all that +interior haunted by her mother's restlessness, when she was safe in the +porch and in the windy obscurity of the street, she yielded with voluptuous +apprehension to a thrill that shook her.</p> + +<p>"I might have tidied my hair," she thought. "Pooh! What does my hair +matter?"</p> + +<p>Her mind was full of an adventure through which she had passed seven +years previously, when she was thirteen and a little girl at school. For +several days, then, she had been ruthlessly mortifying her mother by +complaints about the meals. Her fastidious appetite could not be suited. At +last, one noon when the child had refused the whole of a plenteous dinner, +Mrs. Lessways had burst into tears and, slapping four pennies down on the +table, had cried, "Here! I fairly give you up! Go out and buy your own +dinner! Then perhaps you'll get what you want!" And the child, without an +instant's hesitation, had seized the coins and gone out, hatless, and +bought food at a little tripe-shop that was also an eating-house, and +consumed it there; and then in grim silence returned home. Both mother and +daughter had been stupefied and frightened by the boldness of the +daughter's initiative, by her amazing, flaunting disregard of filial +decency. Mrs. Lessways would not have related the episode to anybody upon +any consideration whatever. It was a shameful secret, never even referred +to. But Mrs. Lessways had unmistakably though indirectly referred to it +when in anger she had said to her daughter aged twenty: "I suppose her +ladyship will be consulting her own lawyer next!" Hilda had understood, and +that was why she had blushed.</p> + +<p>And now, as she turned from Lessways Street into the Oldcastle Road, on +her way to the centre of the town, she experienced almost exactly the +intense excitement of the reckless and supercilious child in quest of its +dinner. The only difference was that the recent reconciliation had inspired +her with a certain negligent compassion for her mother, with a curious +tenderness that caused her to wonder at herself.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>The Market Square of Turnhill was very large for the size of the town. +The diminutive town hall, which in reality was nothing but a watch-house, +seemed to be a mere incident on its irregular expanse, to which the +two-storey shops and dwellings made a low border. Behind this crimson, +blue-slated border rose the loftier forms of a church and a large chapel, +situate in adjacent streets. The square was calm and almost deserted in the +gloom. It typified the slow tranquillity of the bailiwick, which was +removed from the central life of the Five Towns, and unconnected therewith +by even a tram or an omnibus. Only within recent years had Turnhill got so +much as a railway station--rail-head of a branch line. Turnhill was the +extremity of civilization in those parts. Go northwards out of this Market +Square, and you would soon find yourself amid the wild and hilly moorlands, +sprinkled with iron-and-coal villages whose red-flaming furnaces +illustrated the eternal damnation which was the chief article of their +devout religious belief. And in the Market Square not even the late edition +of the <i>Staffordshire Signal</i> was cried, though it was discreetly on +sale with its excellent sporting news in a few shops. In the hot and +malodorous candle-lit factories, where the real strenuous life of the town +would remain cooped up for another half-hour of the evening, men and women +had yet scarcely taken to horse-racing; they would gamble upon rabbits, +cocks, pigeons, and their own fists, without the mediation of the +<i>Signal</i>. The one noise in the Market Square was the bell of a hawker +selling warm pikelets at a penny each for the high tea of the tradesmen. +The hawker was a deathless institution, a living proof that withdrawn +Turnhill would continue always to be exactly what it always had been. +Still, to the east of the Square, across the High Street, a vast space was +being cleared of hovels for the erection of a new town hall daringly +magnificent.</p> + +<p>Hilda crossed the Square, scorning it.</p> + +<p>She said to herself: "I'd better get the thing over before I buy the +thread. I should never be able to stand Miss Dayson's finicking! I should +scream out!" But the next instant, with her passion for proving to herself +how strong she could be, she added: "Well, I just <i>will</i> buy the +thread first!" And she went straight into Dayson's little fancy shop, which +was full of counter and cardboard boxes and Miss Dayson, and stayed therein +for at least five minutes, emerging with a miraculously achieved +leisureliness. A few doors away was a somewhat new building, of three +storeys--the highest in the Square. The ground floor was an ironmongery; it +comprised also a side entrance, of which the door was always open. This +side entrance showed a brass-plate, "Q. Karkeek, Solicitor." And the +wire-blinds of the two windows of the first floor also bore the words: "Q. +Karkeek, Solicitor. Q. Karkeek, Solicitor." The queerness of the name had +attracted Hilda's attention several years earlier, when the signs were +fresh. It was an accident that she had noticed it; she had not noticed the +door-plates or the wire-blinds of other solicitors. She did not know Mr. Q. +Karkeek by sight, nor even whether he was old or young, married or single, +agreeable or repulsive.</p> + +<p>The side entrance gave directly on to a long flight of naked stairs, and +up these stairs Hilda climbed into the unknown, towards the redoubtable and +the perilous. "I'm bound to be seen," she said to herself, "but I don't +care, and I <i>don't</i> care!" At the top of the stairs was a passage, at +right angles, and then a glazed door with the legend in black letters, "Q. +Karkeek, Solicitor," and two other doors mysteriously labelled "Private." +She opened the glazed door, and saw a dirty middle-aged man on a stool, and +she said at once to him, in a harsh, clear, deliberate voice, without +giving herself time to reflect:</p> + +<p>"I want to see Mr. Karkeek."</p> + +<p>The man stared at her sourly, as if bewildered.</p> + +<p>She said to herself: "I shan't be able to stand this excitement much +longer."</p> + +<p>"You can't see Mr. Karkeek," said the man. "Mr. Karkeek's detained at +Hanbridge County Court. But if you're in such a hurry like, you'd better +see Mr. Cannon. It's Mr. Cannon as they generally do see. Who d'ye come +from, miss?"</p> + +<p>"Come from?" Hilda repeated, unnerved.</p> + +<p>"What name?"</p> + +<p>She had not expected this. "I suppose I shall have to tell him!" she +said to herself, and aloud: "Lessways."</p> + +<p>"Oh! Ah!" exclaimed the man. "Bless us! Yes!" It was as if he had said: +"Of course it's Lessways! And don't I know all about <i>you!</i>" And Hilda +was overwhelmed by the sense of the enormity of the folly which she was +committing.</p> + +<p>The man swung half round on his stool, and seized the end of an +india-rubber tube which hung at the side of the battered and littered desk, +just under a gas-jet. He spoke low, like a conspirator, into the mouthpiece +of the tube. "Miss Lessways--to see you, sir." Then very quickly he clapped +the tube to his ear and listened. And then he put it to his mouth again and +repeated: "Lessways." Hilda was agonized.</p> + +<p>"I'll ask ye to step this way, miss," said the man, slipping off his +stool. At the same time he put a long inky penholder, which he had been +holding in his wrinkled right hand, between his teeth.</p> + +<p>"Never," thought Hilda as she followed the clerk, in a whirl of horrible +misgivings, "never have I done anything as mad as this before! I'm under +twenty-one!"</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>There she was at last, seated in front of a lawyer in a lawyer's +office--her ladyship consulting her own lawyer! It seemed incredible! A few +minutes ago she had been at home, and now she was in a world unfamiliar and +alarming. Perhaps it was a pity that her mother had unsuspectingly put the +scheme into her head!</p> + +<p>However, the deed was done. Hilda generally acted first and reflected +afterwards. She was frightened, but rather by the unknown than by anything +she could define.</p> + +<p>"You've come about the property?" said Mr. Cannon amiably, in a +matter-of-fact tone.</p> + +<p>He had deep black eyes, and black hair, like Hilda's; good, regular +teeth, and a clear complexion; perhaps his nose was rather large, but it +was straight. With his large pale hands he occasionally stroked his long +soft moustache; the chin was blue. He was smartly dressed in dark blue; he +had a beautiful neck-tie, and the genuine whiteness of his wristbands was +remarkable in a district where starched linen was usually either grey or +bluish. He was not a dandy, but he respected his person; he evidently gave +careful attention to his body; and this trait alone set him apart among the +citizens of Turnhill.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Hilda. She thought: "He's a very handsome man! How strange I +don't remember seeing him in the streets!" She was in awe of him. He was +indefinitely older than herself; and she felt like a child, out of place in +the easy-chair.</p> + +<p>"I suppose it's about the rent-collecting?" he pursued.</p> + +<p>"Yes--it is," she answered, astonished that he could thus divine her +purpose. "I mean--"</p> + +<p>"What does your mother want to do?"</p> + +<p>"Oh!" said Hilda, speaking low. "It's not mother. I've come to consult +you myself. Mother doesn't know. I'm nearly twenty-one, and it's really my +property, you know!" She blushed with shame.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" he exclaimed. He tried to disguise his astonishment in an easy, +friendly smile. But he was most obviously startled. He looked at Hilda in a +different way, with a much intensified curiosity.</p> + +<p>"Yes," she resumed. He now seemed to her more like a fellow-creature, +and less like a member of the inimical older generation.</p> + +<p>"So you're nearly twenty-one?"</p> + +<p>"In December," she said. "And I think under my father's will--" She +stopped, at a loss. "The fact is, I don't think mother will be quite able +to look after the property properly, and I'm afraid--you see, now that Mr. +Skellorn has had this stroke--"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Mr. Cannon, "I heard about that, and I was thinking perhaps +Mrs. Lessways had sent you.... We collect rents, you know."</p> + +<p>"I see!" Hilda murmured. "Well, the truth is, mother hasn't the +slightest idea I'm here. Not the slightest! And I wouldn't hurt her +feelings for anything." He nodded sympathetically. "But I thought something +ought to be done. She's decided to collect our Calder Street rents herself, +and she isn't fitted to do it. And then there's the question of the +repairs.... I know the rents are going down. I expect it's all mother's for +life, but I want there to be something left for me when she's gone, you +see! And if--I've never seen the will. I suppose there's no way of seeing a +copy of it, somewhere?... I can't very well ask mother again."</p> + +<p>"I know all about the will," said Mr. Cannon.</p> + +<p>"You do?"</p> + +<p>Wondrous, magical man!</p> + +<p>"Yes," he explained. "I used to be at Toms and Scoles's. I was there +when it was made. I copied it."</p> + +<p>"Really!" She felt that he would save her, not only from any possible +unpleasant consequences of her escapade, but also from suffering ultimate +loss by reason of her mother's foolishness.</p> + +<p>"You're quite right," he continued. "I remember it perfectly. Your +mother is what we call tenant-for-life; everything goes to you in the +end."</p> + +<p>"Well," Hilda asked abruptly. "All I want to know is, what I can +do."</p> + +<p>"Of course, without upsetting your mother?"</p> + +<p>He glanced at her. She blushed again.</p> + +<p>"Naturally," she said coldly.</p> + +<p>"You say you think the property is going down--it <i>is</i>, everybody +knows that--and your mother thinks of collecting the rents herself.... +Well, young lady, it's very difficult, very difficult, your mother being +the trustee and executor."</p> + +<p>"Yes, that's what she's always saying--she's the trustee and +executor."</p> + +<p>"You'd better let me think it over for a day or two."</p> + +<p>"And shall I call in again?"</p> + +<p>"You might slip in if you're passing. I'll see what can be done. Of +course it would never do for you to have any difficulty with your +mother."</p> + +<p>"Oh no!" she concurred vehemently. "Anything would be better than that. +But I thought there was no harm in me--"</p> + +<p>"Certainly not."</p> + +<p>She had a profound confidence in him. And she was very content so far +with the result of her adventure.</p> + +<p>"I hope nobody will find out I've been here," she said timidly. "Because +if it <i>did</i> get to mother's ears--"</p> + +<p>"Nobody will find out," he reassured her.</p> + +<p>Assuredly his influence was tranquillizing. Even while he insisted on +the difficulties of the situation, he seemed to be smoothing them away. She +was convinced that he would devise some means of changing her mother's +absurd purpose and of strengthening her own position. But when, at the end +of the interview, he came round the large table which separated them, and +she rose and looked up at him, close, she was suddenly very afraid of him. +He was a tall and muscular man, and he stood like a monarch, and she stood +like a child. And his gesture seemed to say: "Yes, I know you are afraid. +And I rather like you to be afraid. But I am benevolent in the exercise of +my power." Under his gaze, her gaze fastened on the wire-blind and the dark +window, and she read off the reversed letters on the blind.</p> + +<p>Like a mouse she escaped to the stairs. She was happy and fearful and +expectant.... It was done! She had consulted a lawyer! She was astounded at +herself.</p> + +<p>In the Market Square it was now black night. She looked shyly up at the +lighted wire-blinds over the ironmongery. "I was there!" she said. "He is +still there." The whole town, the whole future, seemed to be drenched now +in romance. Nevertheless, the causes of her immense discontent had not +apparently been removed nor in any way modified.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b1c4">CHAPTER IV</a><br /> DOMESTICITY INVADED</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>Early in the afternoon, two days later, Hilda came, with an air of +reproach, into her mother's empty bedroom. Mrs. Lessways had contracted a +severe cold in the head, a malady to which she was subject and which she +accepted with fatalistic submission, even pleasurably giving herself up to +it, as a martyr to the rack. Mrs. Lessways' colds annoyed Hilda, who out of +her wisdom could always point to the precise indiscretion which had caused +them, and to whom the spectacle of a head wrapped day and night in flannel +was offensively ridiculous. Moreover, Hilda in these crises was further and +still more acutely exasperated by the pillage of her handkerchiefs. +Although she possessed a supply of handkerchiefs far beyond her own needs, +she really hated to lend to her mother in the hour of necessity. She did +lend, and she lent without spoken protest, but with frigid bitterness. Her +youthful passion for order and efficiency was aggrieved by her mother's +negligent and inadequate arrangements for coping with the inevitable +plague. She now made a police-visit to the bedroom because she considered +that her mother had been demanding handkerchiefs at a stage too early in +the progress of the disease. Impossible that her mother should have come to +the end of her own handkerchiefs! She knew with all the certitude of her +omniscience that numerous clean handkerchiefs must be concealed somewhere +in the untidiness of her mother's wardrobe.</p> + +<p>See her as she enters the bedroom, the principal bedroom of the house, +whose wide bed and large wardrobe recall the past when she had a father as +well as a mother, and when that bedroom awed her footsteps! A thin, +brown-frocked girl, wearing a detested but enforced small black apron; with +fine, pale, determined features, rather unfeminine hair, and glowering, +challenging black eyes. She had a very decided way of putting down her +uncoquettishly shod feet. Absurdly young, of course; wistfully young! She +was undeveloped, and did not even look nearly twenty-one. You are at +liberty to smile at her airs; at that careless critical glance which +pityingly said: "Ah! if this were my room, it would be different from what +it is;" at that serious worried expression, as if the anxiety of the whole +world's deficiencies oppressed the heart within; and at that supreme +conviction of wisdom, which after all was little but an exaggerated +perception of folly and inconsistency in others!... She is not to be +comprehended on an acquaintance of three days. Years must go to the +understanding of her. She did not understand herself. She was not even +acquainted with herself. Why! She was naïve enough to be puzzled +because she felt older than her mother and younger than her beautiful +girlish complexion, simultaneously!</p> + +<p>She opened the central mirrored door of the once formidable wardrobe, +and as she did so the image of the bed and of half the room shot across the +swinging glass, taking the place of her own reflection. And instantly, when +she inserted herself between the exposed face of the wardrobe and its door, +she was precipitated into the most secret intimacy of her mother's +existence. There was the familiar odour of old kid gloves.... She was more +intimate with her mother now than she could ever be in talking to her. The +lower part of this section of the wardrobe consisted of three deep drawers +with inset brass handles, an exquisitely exact piece of mahogany +cabinetwork. From one of the drawers a bit of white linen untidily +protruded. Her mother! The upper part was filled with sliding trays, each +having a raised edge to keep the contents from falling out. These trays +were heaped pell-mell with her mother's personal belongings--small +garments, odd indeterminate trifles, a muff, a bundle of whalebone, veils, +bags, and especially cardboard boxes. Quantities of various cardboard +boxes! Her mother kept everything, could not bear that anything which had +once been useful should be abandoned or destroyed; whereas Hilda's +propensity was to throw away with an impatient gesture whatever threatened +to be an encumbrance. Sighing, she began to arrange the contents of the +trays in some kind of method. Incompetent and careless mother! Hilda +wondered how the old thing managed to conduct her life from day to day with +even a semblance of the decency of order. It did not occur to her that for +twenty-five years before she was born, and for a long time afterwards, Mrs. +Lessways had contrived to struggle along through the world, without her +daughter's aid, to the general satisfaction of herself and some others. At +length, ferreting on the highest shelf but one, she had the deep, proud +satisfaction of the philosopher who has correctly deduced consequences from +character. Underneath a Paisley shawl she discovered a lost treasure of +clean handkerchiefs. One, two, three, four--there were eleven! And among +them was one of her own, appropriated by her mother through sheer +inexcusable inadvertence. They had probably been lying under the shawl for +weeks, months!</p> + +<p>Still, she did not allow herself to be vexed. Since the singular +hysterical embrace in the twilight of the kitchen, she had felt for her +mother a curious, kind, forbearing, fatalistic indulgence. "Mother is like +that, and there you are!" And further, her mood had been so changed and +uplifted by excitement and expectation that she could not be genuinely +harsh. She had been thrilled by the audacity of the visit to Mr. Cannon. +And though she hoped from it little but a negative advantage, she was +experiencing the rare happiness of adventure. She had slipped out for a +moment from the confined and stifling circle of domestic dailiness. She had +scented the feverish perfume of the world. And she owed all this to herself +alone! She meant on the morrow, while her mother was marketing, to pursue +the enterprise; the consciousness of this intention was sweet, but she knew +not why it was sweet. She only knew that she lived in the preoccupation of +a dream.</p> + +<p>Having taken two of the handkerchiefs, she shut the wardrobe and turned +the key. She went first to her own small, prim room to restore stolen +property to its rightful place, and then she descended towards the kitchen +with the other handkerchief. Giving it to her mother, and concealing her +triumph beneath a mask of wise, long-suffering benevolence, she would say: +"I've found ten of your handkerchiefs, mother. Here's one!" And her mother, +ingenuously startled and pleased, would exclaim: "Where, child?" And she, +still controlling herself, as befitted a superior being, would reply +casually: "In your wardrobe, of course! You stuck to it there weren't any; +but I was sure there were."</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>The dialogue which actually did accompany the presentation of the +handkerchief, though roughly corresponding to her rehearsal of it, was +lacking in the dramatic pungency necessary for a really effective triumph; +the reason being that the thoughts of both mother and daughter were +diverted in different ways from the handkerchief by the presence of Florrie +in the kitchen.</p> + +<p>Florrie was the new servant, and she had come into the house that +morning. Sponsored by an aunt who was one of the best of the Calder Street +tenants, Florrie had been accepted rather unwillingly, the objection to her +being that she was too young--thirteen and a half. Mrs. Lessways had a +vague humanitarian sentiment against the employment of children; as for +Hilda's feeling, it was at one moment more compassionate even than her +mother's, and at another almost cynically indifferent. The aunt, however, a +person of powerful common sense, had persuaded Mrs. Lessways that the +truest kindness would be to give Florrie a trial. Florrie was very strong, +and she had been brought up to work hard, and she enjoyed working hard. +"Don't you, Florrie?" "Yes, aunt," with a delightful smiling, whispering +timidity. She was the eldest of a family of ten, and had always assisted +her mother in the management of a half-crown house and the nurture of a +regiment of infants. But at thirteen and a half a girl ought to be earning +money for her parents. Bless you! She knew what a pawnshop was, her father +being often out of a job owing to potter's asthma; and she had some +knowledge of cookery, and was in particular very good at boiling potatoes. +To take her would be a real kindness on the part of Mrs. Lessways, for the +'place' was not merely an easy place, it was a 'good' place. Supposing that +Mrs. Lessways refused to have her,--well, Florrie might go on to a +'potbank' and come to harm, or she might engage herself with tradespeople, +where notoriously the work was never finished, or she might even be forced +into a public-house. Her aunt knew that they wanted a servant at the "Queen +Adelaide," where the wages would be pretty high. But no! No niece of hers +should ever go into service at a public-house if she could help it! What +with hot rum and coffee to be ready for customers at half-past five of a +morning, and cleaning up at nights after closing, a poor girl would never +see her bed! Whereas at Mrs. Lessways'...! So Mrs. Lessways took Florrie in +order to save her from slavery.</p> + +<p>The slim child was pretty, with graceful and eager movements, and +certainly a rapid comprehension. Her grey eyes sparkled, and her brown hair +was coquettishly tied up, rather in the manner of a horse's tail on May +Day. She had arrived all by herself in the morning, with a tiny bundle, and +she made a remarkably neat appearance--if you did not look at her boots, +which had evidently been somebody else's a long time before. Hilda had been +clearly aware of a feeling of pleasure at the prospect of this young girl's +presence in the house.</p> + +<p>Hilda now saw her in another aspect. She wore a large foul apron of +sacking, which made her elegant body quite shapeless, and she was kneeling +on the red-and-black tiled floor of the kitchen, with her enormous cracked +boots sticking out behind her. At one side of her was a pail full of +steaming brown water, and in her red coarse little hands, which did not +seem to belong to those gracile arms, she held a dripping clout. In front +of her, on a half-dried space of clean, shining floor, stood Mrs. Lessways, +her head wrapped in a flannel petticoat. Nearer to the child stretched a +small semi-circle of liquid mud; to the rear was the untouched dirty floor. +Florrie was looking up at her mistress with respectful, strained attention. +She could not proceed with her work because Mrs. Lessways had chosen this +moment to instruct her, with much snuffling, in the duties and +responsibilities of her position.</p> + +<p>"Yes, mum," Florrie whispered. She seemed to be incapable of speaking +beyond a whisper. But the whisper was delicate and agreeable; and perhaps +it was a mysterious sign of her alleged unusual physical strength.</p> + +<p>"You'll have to be down at half-past six. Then you'll light your kitchen +fire, but of course you'll get your coal up first. And then you'll do your +boots. Now the bacon--but never mind that--either Miss Hilda or me will be +down to-morrow morning to show you."</p> + +<p>"Yes, mum," Florrie's whisper was grateful.</p> + +<p>"When you've got things going a bit like, you'll do your parlour--I've +told you all about that, though. But I didn't tell you--except on +Wednesdays. On Wednesdays you give your parlour a thorough turn-out +<i>after</i> breakfast, and mind it's got to be all straight for dinner at +half-past twelve."</p> + +<p>"Yes, mum."</p> + +<p>"I shall show you about your fire-irons--" Mrs. Lessways was continuing +to make everything in the house the private property of Florrie, when Hilda +interrupted her about the handkerchief, and afterwards with an exhortation +to beware of the dampness of the floor, which exhortation Mrs. Lessways +faintly resented; whereupon Hilda left the kitchen; it was always imprudent +to come between Mrs. Lessways and a new servant.</p> + +<p>Hilda remained listening in the lobby to the interminable and rambling +instruction. At length Mrs. Lessways said benevolently:</p> + +<p>"There's no reason why you shouldn't go to bed at half-past eight, or +nine at the latest. No reason whatever. And if you're quick and handy --and +I'm sure you are--you'll have plenty of time in the afternoon for plain +sewing and darning. I shall see how you can darn," Mrs. Lessways added +encouragingly.</p> + +<p>"Yes, mum."</p> + +<p>Hilda's heart revolted, less against her mother's defects as an +organizer than against the odious mess of the whole business of +domesticity. She knew that, with her mother in the house, Florrie would +never get to bed at half-past eight and very seldom at nine, and that she +would never be free in the afternoons. She knew that if her mother would +only consent to sit still and not interfere, the housework could be +accomplished with half the labour that at present went to it. There were +three women in the place, or at any rate, a woman, a young woman, and a +girl--and in theory the main preoccupation of all of them was this business +of domesticity. It was, of course, ridiculous, and she would never be able +to make anyone see that it was ridiculous. But that was not all. The very +business itself absolutely disgusted her. It disgusted her to such a point +that she would have preferred to do it with her own hands in secret rather +than see others do it openly in all its squalor. The business might be more +efficiently organized--for example, there was no reason why the +sitting-room should be made uninhabitable between breakfast and dinner once +a week--but it could never be other than odious. The kitchen floor must +inevitably be washed every day by a girl on her knees in sackcloth with +terrible hands. She was witnessing now the first stage in the progress of a +victim of the business of domesticity. To-day Florrie was a charming young +creature, full of slender grace. Soon she would be a dehumanized drudge. +And Hilda could not stop it! All over the town, in every street of the +town, behind all the nice curtains and blinds, the same hidden shame was +being enacted: a vast, sloppy, steaming, greasy, social horror--inevitable! +It amounted to barbarism, Hilda thought in her revolt. She turned from it +with loathing. And yet nobody else seemed to turn from it with loathing. +Nobody else seemed to perceive that this business of domesticity was not +life itself, was at best the clumsy external machinery of life. On the +contrary, about half the adult population worshipped it as an exercise +sacred and paramount, enlarging its importance and with positive gusto +permitting it to monopolize their existence. Nine-tenths of her mother's +conversation was concerned with the business of domesticity--and withal +Mrs. Lessways took the business more lightly than most!</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>There was an impatient knock at the front door,--rare phenomenon, but +not unknown.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lessways cried out thickly from the folds of her flannel +petticoat:</p> + +<p>"Hilda, just see who that is, will you?... knocking like that! Florrie +can't come."</p> + +<p>And just as Hilda reached the front door, her mother opened the kitchen +door wide, to view the troublesome disturber and to inform him, if as was +probable he was exceeding his rights, that he would have done better to try +the back door.</p> + +<p>It was Mr. Cannon at the front door.</p> + +<p>Hilda heard the kitchen door slammed to behind her, but the noise was +like a hallucination in her brain. She was staggered by the apparition of +Mr. Cannon in the porch. She had vaguely wondered what he might do to +execute his promise of aid; she had felt that time was running short if her +mother was to be prevented from commencing rent-collector on the Monday; +she had perhaps ingenuously expected from him some kind of miracle; but of +a surety she had never dreamed that he would call in person at her home. +"He must be mad!" she would have exclaimed to herself, if the grandeur of +his image in her heart had not made any such accusation impossible to her. +He was not mad; he was merely inscrutable, terrifyingly so. It was as if +her adventurous audacity, personified, had doubled back on her, and was +exquisitely threatening her.</p> + +<p>"Good afternoon!" said Mr. Cannon, smiling confidently and yet with +ceremoniousness. "Is your mother about?"</p> + +<p>"Yes." Hilda did not know it, but she was whispering quite in the manner +of Florrie.</p> + +<p>"Shall I come in?"</p> + +<p>"Oh! Please do!" The words jumped out of her mouth all at once, so +anxious was she to destroy any impression conceivably made that she did not +desire him to come in.</p> + +<p>He crossed the step and took her hand with one gesture. She shut the +door. He waited in suave silence. There was barely space for them together +in the narrow lobby, and she scarce dared look up at him. He easily +dominated her. His bigness subdued her, and the handsomeness of his face +and his attire was like a moral intimidation. He had a large physical +splendour that was well set off and illustrated by the brilliance of his +linen and his broadcloth. She was as modest as a mouse beside him. The +superior young woman, the stern and yet indulgent philosopher, had utterly +vanished, and only a poor little mouse remained.</p> + +<p>"Will you please come into the drawing-room?" she murmured when, after +an immense effort to keep full control of her faculties, she had decided +where he must be put.</p> + +<p>"Thanks," he said.</p> + +<p>As she diminished herself, with beautiful shy curves of her body, +against the wall so that he could manoeuvre his bigness through the +drawing-room doorway, he gave her a glance half benign and half politely +malicious, which seemed to say again: "I know you're afraid, and I rather +like it. But you know you needn't be."</p> + +<p>"Please take a seat," she implored. And then quickly, as he seemed to +have no intention of speaking to her confidentially, "I'll tell +mother."</p> + +<p>Leaving the room, she saw him sink smoothly into a seat, his rich-piled +hat in one gloved hand and an ebony walking-stick in the other. His +presence had a disastrous effect on the chill, unfrequented drawing-room, +reducing it instantly to a condition of paltry shabbiness.</p> + +<p>The kitchen door was still shut. Yes, all the squalor of the business of +domesticity must be hidden from this splendid being! Hilda went as a +criminal into the kitchen. Mrs. Lessways with violent movements signalled +her to close the door before speaking. Florrie gazed spellbound upwards at +both of them. The household was in a high fever.</p> + +<p>"You don't mean to tell me that's Mr. Cannon!" Mrs. Lessways excitedly +whispered.</p> + +<p>"Do--do--you know him?" Hilda faltered.</p> + +<p>"Do I know him!... What does he want?"</p> + +<p>"He wants to see you."</p> + +<p>"What about?"</p> + +<p>"I suppose it's about property or something," Hilda replied, blushing. +Never had she felt so abject in front of her mother.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lessways rapidly unpinned the flannel petticoat and then threw it, +with a desperate gesture of sacrifice, on to the deal table. The situation +had to be met. The resplendent male awaited her in the death-cold room. The +resplendent male had his overcoat, but she, suffering, must face the rigour +and the risk unprotected. No matter if she caught bronchitis! The thing had +to be done. Even Hilda did not think of accusing her mother of folly. Mrs. +Lessways having patted her hair, emptied several handkerchiefs from the +twin pockets of her embroidered black apron, and, snatching at the clean +handkerchief furnished by Hilda, departed to her fate. She was certainly +startled and puzzled, but she was not a whit intimidated, and the +perception of this fact inspired Hilda with a new, reluctant respect for +her mother.</p> + +<p>Hilda, from the kitchen, heard the greetings in the drawing-room, and +then the reverberations of the sufferer's nose. She desired to go into the +drawing-room. Her mother probably expected her to go in. But she dared not. +She was afraid.</p> + +<p>"I was wondering," said the voice of Mr. Cannon, "whether you've ever +thought of selling your Calder Street property, Mrs. Lessways." And then +the drawing-room door was closed, and the ticking of the grandfather's +clock resumed possession of the lobby.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b1c5">CHAPTER V</a><br /> MRS. LESSWAYS' SHREWDNESS</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>Waiting irresolute in the kitchen doorway, Hilda passed the most +thrillingly agreeable moments that destiny had ever vouchsafed to her. She +dwelt on the mysterious, attractive quality of Mr. Cannon's voice,--she was +sure that, though in speaking to her mother he was softly persuasive, he +had used to herself a tone even more intimate and ingratiating. He and she +had a secret; they were conspirators together: which fact was both +disconcerting and delicious. She recalled their propinquity in the lobby; +the remembered syllables which he had uttered mingled with the faint scent +of his broadcloth, the whiteness of his wristbands, the gleam of his studs, +the droop of his moustaches, the downward ray of his glance, and the proud, +nimble carriage of his great limbs,--and formed in her mind the image of an +ideal. An image regarded not with any tenderness, but with naïve +admiration, and unquestioning respect! And yet also with more than that, +for when she dwelt on his glance, she had a slight transient feeling of +faintness which came and went in a second, and which she did not +analyse--and could not have analysed.</p> + +<p>Clouds of fear sailed in swift capriciousness across the sky of her +dreaming, obscuring it: fear of Mr. Cannon's breath-taking initiative, fear +of the upshot of her adventure, and a fear without a name. Nevertheless she +exulted. She exulted because she was in the very midst of her wondrous +adventure and tingling with a thousand apprehensions.</p> + +<p>After a long time the latch of the drawing-room door cracked warningly. +Hilda retired within the kitchen out of sight of the lobby. She knew that +the child in her would compel her to wait like a child until the visitor +was gone, instead of issuing forth boldly like a young woman. But to +Florrie the young mistress with her stern dark mask and formidable eyebrows +and air of superb disdain was as august as a goddess. Florrie, moving +backwards, had now got nearly to the scullery door with her wringing and +splashing and wiping; and she had dirtied even her face. As Hilda absently +looked at her, she thought somehow of Mr. Cannon's white wristbands. She +saw the washing and the ironing of those wristbands, and a slatternly woman +or two sighing and grumbling amid wreaths of steam, and a background of +cinders and suds and sloppiness.... All that, so that the grand creature +might have a rim of pure white to his coat-sleeves for a day! It was +inevitable. But the grand creature must never know. The shame necessary to +his splendour must be concealed from him, lest he might be offended. And +this was woman's loyalty! Her ideas concerning the business of domesticity +were now mixed and opposing and irreconcileable, and she began to suspect +that the bases of society might be more complex and confusing than in her +youthful downrightness she had imagined.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>"Well, you've got your way!" said Mrs. Lessways, with a certain grim, +disdainful cheerfulness, from which benevolence was not quite absent. The +drastic treatment accorded to her cold seemed to have done it good. At any +rate she had not resumed the flannel petticoat, and the nasal symptoms were +much less pronounced.</p> + +<p>"Got my way?" Hilda repeated, at a loss and newly apprehensive.</p> + +<p>Mother and daughter were setting tea. Florrie had been doing very well, +but she was not yet quite equal to her situation, and the mistresses were +now performing her lighter duties while she changed from the offensive +drudge to the neat parlour-maid. Throughout the afternoon Hilda had avoided +her mother's sight; partly because she wanted to be alone (without knowing +why), and partly because she was afraid lest Mr. Cannon, as a member of the +older generation, might have betrayed her to her mother. This fear was not +very genuine, though she pretended that it was and enjoyed playing with it: +as if she really desired a catastrophe for the outcome of her adventure. +She had only come downstairs in response to her mother's direct summons, +and instantly on seeing her she had known that Mr. Cannon was not a +traitor. Which knowledge somehow rendered her gay in spite of herself. So +that, what with this gaiety, and the stimulation produced in Mrs. Lessways +by the visit of Mr. Cannon, and the general household relief at the obvious +fact that Florrie would rather more than 'do,' the atmosphere around the +tinkling tea-table in the half-light was decidedly pleasant.</p> + +<p>Nevertheless the singular turn of Mrs. Lessways' phrase,--"You've got +your way,"--had startled the guilty Hilda.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Cannon's going to see to the collecting of the Calder Street +rents," explained Mrs. Lessways. "So I hope you're satisfied, miss."</p> + +<p>Hilda was aware of self-consciousness.</p> + +<p>"Yes, you may well colour up!" Mrs. Lessways pursued, genial but +malicious. "You're as pleased as Punch, and you're saying to yourself +you've made your old mother give way to ye again! And so you needn't tell +me!"</p> + +<p>"I thought," said Hilda, with all possible prim worldliness,--"I thought +I heard him saying something about buying the property?"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lessways laughed, sceptically, confidently, as one who could not be +deceived. "Pooh!" she said. "That was only a try-on. That was only so that +he could begin his palaver! Don't tell me! I may be a simpleton, but I'm +not such a simpleton as he thinks for, nor as some other folks think for, +either!" (At this point Hilda had to admit that in truth her mother was not +completely a simpleton. In her mother was a vein of perceptive shrewdness +that occasionally cropped out and made all Hilda's critical philosophy seem +school-girlish.) "Do you think I don't know George Cannon? He came here o' +purpose to get that rent-collecting. Well, he's got it, and he's welcome to +it, for I doubt not he'll do it a sight better than poor Mr. Skellorn! But +he needn't hug himself that he's been too clever for me, because he hasn't. +I gave him the rent-collecting because I thought I would!... Buy! He's no +more got a good customer for Calder Street than he's got a good customer +for this slop-bowl!"</p> + +<p>Hilda resented this casual detraction of a being who had so deeply +impressed her. And moreover she was convinced that her mother, secretly +very flattered and delighted by the visit, was adopting a derisive attitude +in order to 'show off' before her daughter. Parents are thus ingenuous! But +she was so shocked and sneaped that she found it more convenient to say +nothing.</p> + +<p>"George Cannon could talk the hind leg off a horse," Mrs. Lessways +continued quite happily. "And yet it isn't as if he said a great deal. He +doesn't. I'll say this for him. He's always the gentleman. And I couldn't +say as much for his sister being a lady, and I'm sorry for it. He's the +most gentlemanly man in Turnhill, and always so spruce, too!"</p> + +<p>"His sister?"</p> + +<p>"Well, his half-sister, since you're so particular, Miss Precise!"</p> + +<p>"Not Miss Gailey?" said Hilda, who began faintly to recall a forgotten +fact of which she thought she had once been cognizant.</p> + +<p>"Yes, Miss Gailey," Mrs. Lessways snapped, still very genial and +content. "I did hear she's quarrelled out and out with <i>him</i>, too, at +last!" She tightened her lips. "Draw the blind down."</p> + +<p>Miss Gailey, a spinster of superior breeding and a teacher of dancing, +had in the distant past been an intimate friend of Mrs. Lessways. The +friendship was legendary in the house, and the grand quarrel which had +finally put an end to it dated in Hilda's early memories like a historical +event. For many years the two had not exchanged a word.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lessways lit the gas, and the china and the white cloth and the +coloured fruit-jelly and the silver spoons caught the light and threw it +off again, with gaiety.</p> + +<p>"Has she swept the hearth? Yes, she has," said Mrs. Lessways, glancing +round at the red fire.</p> + +<p>Hilda sat down to wait, folding her hands as it were in meekness. In a +few moments Florrie entered with the teapot and the hot-water jug. The +child wore proudly a new white apron that was a little too long for her, +and she smiled happily at Mrs. Lessways' brief compliment on her appearance +and her briskness. She might have been in paradise.</p> + +<p>"Come in for your cup in three minutes," said Mrs. Lessways; and to +Hilda when Florrie had whispered and gone: "Now we shall see if she can +make tea. I told her very particularly this morning, and she seems quick +enough."</p> + +<p>And when three minutes had expired Mrs. Lessways tasted the tea. Yes, it +was good. It was quite good. Undeniably the water had boiled within five +seconds of being poured on the leaves. There was something <i>in</i> this +Florrie. Already she was exhibiting the mysterious quality of efficiency. +The first day, being the first day, had of course not been without its +discouraging moments, but on the whole Florrie had proved that she could be +trusted to understand, and to do things.</p> + +<p>"Here's an extra piece of sugar for you," said Mrs. Lessways, beaming, +as Florrie left the parlour with her big breakfast-cup full of steaming +tea, to drink with the thick bread-and-butter on the scrubbed +kitchen-table, all by herself. "And don't touch the gas in the +kitchen--it's quite high enough for young eyes," Mrs. Lessways cried out +after her.</p> + +<p>"Little poppet!" she murmured to herself, maternally reflecting upon +Florence's tender youth.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>She was happy, was Mrs. Lessways, in her domesticity. She foresaw an +immediate future that would be tranquil. She was preparing herself to lean +upon the reliability of Florrie as upon a cushion. She liked the little +poppet. And she liked well-made tea and pure jelly. And she had settled the +Calder Street problem; and incidentally Hilda was thereby placated. Why +should she not be happy? She wished for nothing else. And she was not a +woman to meet trouble half-way. One of her greatest qualities was that she +did not unduly worry. (Hilda might say that she did not worry enough, +letting things go.) In spite of her cold, she yielded with more gusto than +usual to the meal, and even said that if Florrie 'continued to shape' they +would have hot toast again. Hot toast had long since been dropped from the +menu, as an item too troublesome. As a rule the meals were taken hurriedly +and negligently, like a religious formality which has lost its meaning but +which custom insists on.</p> + +<p>Hilda could not but share her mother's satisfaction. She could not +entirely escape the soft influence of the tranquillity in which the +household was newly bathed. The domestic existence of unmated women +together, though it is full of secret exasperations, also has its hours of +charm--a charm honied, perverse, and unique. Hilda felt the charm. But she +was suddenly sad, and she again found pleasure in her sadness. She was sad +because her adventure was over--over too soon and too easily. She thought, +now, that really she would have preferred a catastrophe as the end of it. +She had got what she desired; but she was no better off than she had been +before the paralytic stroke of Mr. Skellorn. Domesticity had closed in on +her once more. Her secret adventure had become sterile. Its risks were +destroyed, and nothing could spring from it. Nevertheless it lived in her +heart. After all it had been tremendous! And the virtue of audacious +initiative was miraculous!... Yes, her mother was shrewd enough--that could +not be denied--but she was not so shrewd as she imagined; for it had never +occurred to her, and it never would occur to her, even in the absurdest +dream--that the author of Mr. Cannon's visit was the girl sitting opposite +to her and delicately pecking at jelly!</p> + +<p>"How is he Miss Gailey's half-brother?" Hilda demanded half-way through +the meal.</p> + +<p>"Why! Mrs. Gailey--Sarah Gailey's mother, that is--married a foreigner +after her first husband died."</p> + +<p>"But Mr. Cannon isn't a foreigner?"</p> + +<p>"He's half a foreigner. Look at his eyes. Surely you knew all about +that, child!... No, it was before your time."</p> + +<p>Hilda then learnt that Mrs. Gailey had married a French modeller named +Canonges, who had been brought over from Limoges (or some such sounding +place) by Peels at Bursley, the great rivals of Mintons and of Copelands. +And that in course of time the modeller had informally changed the name to +Cannon, because no one in the Five Towns could pronounce the true name +rightly. And that George Cannon, the son of the union, had been left early +an orphan.</p> + +<p>"How did he come to be a solicitor?" Hilda questioned eagerly.</p> + +<p>"They say he isn't really a solicitor," said Mrs. Lessways. "That is, he +hasn't passed his examinations like. But I dare say he knows as much law as +a lot of 'em, <i>and</i> more! And he has that Mr. Karkeek to cover him +like. That's what they <i>say</i>.... He used to be a lawyer's clerk--at +Toms and Scoles's, I think it was. Then he left the district for a year or +two--or it might be several. And then his lordship comes back all of a +sudden, and sets up with Mr. Karkeek, just like that."</p> + +<p>"Can he talk French?"</p> + +<p>"Who? Mr. Cannon? He can talk <i>English</i>! My word, he can that! Eh, +he's a 'customer,' he is--a regular' customer'!"</p> + +<p>Hilda, instead of being seated at the table, was away in far realms of +romance.</p> + +<p>The startling thought occurred to her:</p> + +<p>"Of course, he'll expect me to go and see him! He's done what I asked +him, and he'll expect me to go and see him and talk it over. And I suppose +I shall have to pay him something. I'd forgotten that, and I ought not to +have forgotten it."</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b1c6">CHAPTER VI</a><br /> VICTOR HUGO AND ISAAC PITMAN</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>The next morning, Saturday, Hilda ran no risk in visiting Mr. Cannon. +Her mother's cold, after a fictitious improvement, had assumed an +aggravated form in order to prove that not with impunity may nature be +flouted in unheated October drawing-rooms; and Hilda had been requested to +go to market alone. She was free. And even supposing that the visit should +be observed by the curious, nobody would attach any importance to it, +because everybody would soon be aware that Mr. Cannon had assumed charge of +the Calder Street property.</p> + +<p>Past the brass plates of Mr. Q. Karkeek, out of the straw-littered +hubbub of the market-place, she climbed the long flight of stairs leading +to the offices on the first floor. In one worsted-gloved hand she held a +market-basket of multi-coloured wicker, which dangled a little below the +frilled and flounced edge of her blue jacket. Secure in the pocket of her +valanced brown skirt--for at that time and in that place it had not yet +occurred to any woman that pockets were a superfluity--a private +half-sovereign lay in the inmost compartment of her purse; this coin was +destined to recompense Mr. Cannon. Her free hand went up to the heavy +chignon that hung uncertainly beneath her bonnet--a gesture of coquetry +which she told herself she despised.</p> + +<p>Her face was a prim and rather forbidding mask, assuredly a mysterious +mask. She could not have explained her own feelings. She was still in the +adventure, but the end of it was immediate. She had nothing to hope from +the future. Her essential infelicity was as profound and as enigmatic as +ever. She might have said with deliberate and vehement sincerity that she +was not happy. Wise, experienced observers, studying her as she walked her +ways in the streets, might have said of her with sympathetically sad +conviction, "That girl is not happy! What a pity!" It was so. And yet, in +her unhappiness she was blest. She savoured her unhappiness. She drank it +down passionately, as though it were the very water of life--which it was. +She lived to the utmost in every moment. The recondite romance of existence +was not hidden from her. The sudden creation--her creation--of the link +with Mr. Cannon seemed to her surpassingly strange and romantic; and in so +regarding it she had no ulterior thought whatever: she looked on it with +the single-mindedness of an artist looking on his work. And was it not +indeed astounding that by a swift caprice and stroke of audacity she should +have changed and tranquillized the ominous future for her unsuspecting +mother and herself? Was it not absolutely disconcerting that she and this +Mr. Cannon, whom she had never known before and in whom she had no other +interest, should bear between them this singular secret, at once innocent +and guilty, in the midst of the whole town so deaf and blind?</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>A somewhat shabby-genteel, youngish man appeared at the head of the +stairs; he was wearing a silk hat and a too ample frock-coat. And +immediately, from the hidden corridor at the top, she heard the voice of +Mr. Cannon, imperious:</p> + +<p>"Karkeek!"</p> + +<p>The shabby-genteel man stopped. Hilda wanted to escape, but she could +not, chiefly because her pride would not allow. She had to go on. She went +on, frowning.</p> + +<p>The man vanished back into the corridor. She could hear that Mr. Cannon +had joined him in conversation. She arrived at the corridor.</p> + +<p>"How-d'ye-do, Miss Lessways?" Mr. Cannon greeted her with calm +politeness, turning from Mr. Karkeek, who raised his hat. "Will you come +this way? One moment, Mr. Karkeek."</p> + +<p>Through a door marked "Private" Mr. Cannon introduced Hilda straight +into his own room; then shut the door on her. He held in one hand a large +calf-bound volume, from which evidently he was expounding something to Mr. +Karkeek. The contrast between the expensive informality of Mr. Cannon's new +suit and the battered ceremoniousness of Mr. Karkeek's struck her just as +much as the contrast between their demeanours; and she felt, vaguely, the +oddness of the fact that the name of the deferential Mr. Karkeek, and not +the name of the commanding Mr. Cannon, should be upon the door-plates and +the wire-blinds of the establishment. But of course she was not in a +position to estimate the full significance of this remarkable phenomenon. +Further, though she perfectly remembered her mother's observations upon Mr. +Cannon's status, they did not in the slightest degree damage him in her +eyes--when once those eyes had been set on him again. They seemed to her +inessential. The essential, for her, was the incontestable natural +authority and dignity of his bearing.</p> + +<p>She sat down, self-consciously, in the chair--opposite the owner's +chair--which she had occupied at her first visit, and thus surveyed, across +the large flat desk, all the ranged documents and bundles with the writing +thereon upside down. There also was his blotting-pad, and his vast +inkstand, and his pens, and his thick diary. The disposition of the things +on the desk seemed to indicate, sharply and incontrovertibly, that +orderliness, that inexorable efficiency, which more than aught else she +admired in the external conduct of life. The spectacle satisfied her, +soothed her, and seemed to explain the attractiveness of Mr. Cannon.</p> + +<p>Immediately to her left was an open bookcase almost filled with heavy +volumes. The last of a uniform row of Law Reports was absent from its +place--being at that moment in the corridor, in the hands of Mr. Cannon. +The next book, a thin one, had toppled over sideways and was bridging the +vacancy at an angle; several other similar thin books filled up the +remainder of the shelf. She stared, with the factitious interest of one who +is very nervously awaiting an encounter, at the titles, and presently +deciphered the words, 'Victor Hugo,' on each of the thin volumes. Her +interest instantly became real. Characteristically abrupt and unreflecting, +she deposited her basket on the floor and, going to the bookcase, took out +the slanting volume. Its title was <i>Les Rayons et Les Ombres</i>. She +opened it by hazard at the following poem, which had no heading and which +stood, a small triptych of print, rather solitary in the lower half of a +large white page:</p> + +<blockquote> +Dieu qui sourit et qui donne<br /> +Et qui vient vers qui l'attend<br /> +Pourvu que vous soyez bonne,<br /> + Sera content.<br /> + +Le monde où tout étincelle,<br /> +Mais ou rien n'est enflammé,<br /> +Pourvu que vous soyez belle,<br /> + Sera charmé.<br /> + +Mon coeur, dans l'ombre amoureuse,<br /> +Où l'énivrent deux beaux yeux,<br /> +Pourvu que tu sois heureuse,<br /> + Sera joyeux.<br /> + +</blockquote> + +<p>That was all. But she shook as though a miracle had been enacted. Hilda, +owing partly to the fondness of an otherwise stern grandfather and partly +to the vanity of her unimportant father, had finally been sent to a school +attended by girls who on the average were a little above herself in +station--Chetwynd's, in the valley between Turnhill and Bursley. (It was +still called Chetwynd's though it had changed hands.) Among the staff was a +mistress who was known as Miss Miranda--she seemed to have no surname. One +of Miss Miranda's duties had been to teach optional French, and one of Miss +Miranda's delights had been to dictate this very poem of Victor Hugo's to +her pupils for learning by heart. It was Miss Miranda's sole French poem, +and she imposed it with unfading delight on the successive generations whom +she 'grounded' in French. Hilda had apparently forgotten most of her +French, but as she now read the poem (for the first time in print), it +re-established itself in her memory as the most lovely verse that she had +ever known, and the recitations of it in Miss Miranda's small classroom +came back to her with an effect beautiful and tragic. And also there was +the name of Victor Hugo, which Miss Miranda's insistent enthusiasm had +rendered sublime and legendary to a sensitive child! Hilda now saw the +sacred name stamped in gold on a whole set of elegant volumes! It was +marvellous that she should have turned the page containing just that poem! +It was equally marvellous that she should have discovered the works of +Victor Hugo in the matter-of-fact office of Mr. Cannon! But was it? Was he +not half-French, and were not these books precisely a corroboration of what +her mother had told her? Mr. Cannon's origin at once assumed for her the +strange seductive hues of romance; he shared the glory of Victor Hugo. Then +the voices in the corridor ceased, and with a decisive movement he +unlatched the door. She relinquished the book and calmly sat down as he +entered.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>"Of course, your mother's told you?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"I had no difficulty at all. I just asked her what she was going to do +about the rent-collecting."</p> + +<p>Standing up in front of Hilda, but on his own side of the desk, Mr. +Cannon smiled as a conqueror who can recount a triumph with pride, but +without conceit. She looked at him with naïve admiration. To admire +him was agreeable to her; and she liked also to feel unimportant in his +presence. But she fought, unsuccessfully, against the humiliating idea that +his personal smartness convicted her of being shabby--of being even +inefficient in one department of her existence; and she could have wished +to be magnificently dressed.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Lessways is a very shrewd lady--very shrewd indeed!" said Mr. +Cannon, with a smile, this time, to indicate humorously that Mrs. Lessways +was not so easy to handle as might be imagined, and that even the cleverest +must mind their p's and q's with such a lady.</p> + +<p>"Oh yes, she <i>is</i>!" Hilda agreed, with an exaggerated emphasis that +showed a lack of conviction. Indeed, she had never thought of her mother as +a <i>very</i> shrewd lady.</p> + +<p>Mr. Cannon continued to smile in silence upon the shrewdness of Mrs. +Lessways, giving little appreciative movements of the diaphragm, drawing in +his lips and by consequence pushing out his cheeks like a child's; and his +eyes were all the time saying lightly: "Still, I managed her!" And while +this pleasant intimate silence persisted, the noises of the market-place +made themselves prominent, quite agreeably--in particular the hard metallic +stamping and slipping, on the bricked pavement under the window, of a team +of cart-horses that were being turned in a space too small for their grand, +free movements, and the good-humoured cracking of a whip. Again Hilda was +impressed, mystically, by the strangeness of the secret relation between +herself and this splendid effective man. There they were, safe within the +room, almost on a footing of familiar friendship! The atmosphere was +different from that of the first interview. And none knew! And she alone +had brought it all about by a simple caprice!</p> + +<p>"I was fine and startled when I saw you at our door, Mr. Cannon!" she +said.</p> + +<p>He might have said, "Were you? You didn't show it." She was half +expecting him to say some such thing. But he became reflective, and began: +"Well, you see--" and then hesitated.</p> + +<p>"You didn't tell me you thought of calling."</p> + +<p>"Well," he proceeded at last--and she could not be sure whether he was +replying to her or not--"I was pretty nearly ready to buy that Calder +Street property. And I thought I'd talk <i>that</i> over with your mother +first! It just happened to make a good beginning, you see." He spoke with +all the flattering charm of the confidential.</p> + +<p>Hilda flushed. Under her mother's suggestion, she had been misjudging +him. He had not been guilty of mere scheming. She was profoundly glad. The +act of apology to him, performed in her own mind, gave her a curious +delight.</p> + +<p>"I wish she would sell," said Hilda, to whom the ownership of a slum was +obnoxious.</p> + +<p>"Very soon your consent would be necessary to any sale."</p> + +<p>"Really!" she exclaimed, agreeably flattered, but scarcely surprised by +this information. "I should consent quick enough! I can't bear to walk down +the street!"</p> + +<p>He laughed condescendingly. "Well, I don't think your mother +<i>would</i> care to sell, if you ask me." He sat down.</p> + +<p>Hilda frowned, regretting her confession and resenting his laughter.</p> + +<p>"What will your charges be, please, Mr. Cannon?" she demanded abruptly, +and yet girlishly timid. And at the same moment she drew forth her purse, +which she had been holding ready in her hand.</p> + +<p>For a second he thought she was referring to the price of +rent-collecting, but the appearance of the purse explained her meaning. +"Oh! There's no charge!" he said, in a low voice, seizing a penholder.</p> + +<p>"But I must pay you something! I can't--"</p> + +<p>"No, you mustn't!"</p> + +<p>Their glances met in conflict across the table. She had known that he +would say exactly that. And she had been determined to insist on paying a +fee--utterly determined! But she could not, now, withstand the force of his +will. Her glance failed her. She was disconcerted by the sudden +demonstration of her inferiority. She was distressed. And then a feeling of +faintness, and the gathering of a mist in the air, positively frightened +her. The mist cleared. His glance seemed to say, with kindness: "You see +how much stronger I am than you! But you can trust me!" The sense of +adventure grew even more acute in her. She marvelled at what life was, and +hid the purse like a shame.</p> + +<p>"It's very kind of you," she murmured.</p> + +<p>"Not a bit!" he said. "I've got a job through this. Don't forget that. +We don't collect rents for nothing, you know--especially Calder Street sort +of rents!"</p> + +<p>She picked up her basket and rose. He also rose.</p> + +<p>"So you've been looking at my Victor Hugo," he remarked, putting his +right hand negligently into his pocket instead of holding it forth in +adieu.</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>So overset was she by the dramatic surprise of his challenging remark, +and so enlightened by the sudden perception of it being perfectly +characteristic of him, that her manner changed in an instant to a delicate, +startled timidity. All the complex sensitiveness of her nature was +expressed simultaneously in the changing tints of her face, the confusion +of her eyes and her gestures, and the exquisite hesitations of her voice as +she told him about the coincidence which had brought back to her in his +office the poem of her schooldays.</p> + +<p>He came to the bookcase and, taking out the volume, handled it +carelessly.</p> + +<p>"I only brought these things here because they're nicely bound and fill +up the shelf," he said. "Not much use in a lawyer's office, you know!" He +glanced from the volume to her, and from her to the volume. "Ah! Miss +Miranda! Yes! Well! It isn't so wonderful as all that. My father used to +give her lessons in French. This Hugo was his. He thought a great deal of +it." Mr. Cannon's pose exhibited pride, but it was obvious that he did not +share his father's taste. His tone rather patronized his father, and Hugo +too. As he let the pages of the book slip by under his thumb, he stopped, +and with a very good French accent, quite different from Hilda's memory of +Miss Miranda's, murmured in a sort of chanting--"<i>Dieu qui sourit et qui +donne</i>."</p> + +<p>"That's the very one!" cried Hilda.</p> + +<p>"Ah! There you are then! You see--the bookmark was at that page." Hilda +had not noticed the thin ribbon almost concealed in the jointure of the +pages. "I wouldn't be a bit astonished if my father had lent her this very +book! Curious, isn't it?"</p> + +<p>It was. Nevertheless, Hilda felt that his sense of the miraculousness of +life was not so keen as her own; and she was disappointed.</p> + +<p>"I suppose you're very fond of reading?" he said.</p> + +<p>"No, I'm not," she replied. Her spirit lifted a little courageously, to +meet his with defiance, like a ship lifting its prow above the threatening +billow. Her eyes wavered, but did not fall before his.</p> + +<p>"Really! Now, I should have said you were a great reader. What do you do +with yourself?" He now spoke like a brother, confident of a trustful +response.</p> + +<p>"I just waste my time," she answered coldly. She saw that he was +puzzled, interested, and piqued, and that he was examining her quite +afresh.</p> + +<p>"Well," he said shortly, after a pause, adopting the benevolent tone of +an uncle or even a great-uncle, "you'll be getting married one of these +days."</p> + +<p>"I don't want to get married," she retorted obstinately, and with a +harder glance.</p> + +<p>"Then what do you want?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know." She discovered great relief, even pleasure, in thus +callously exposing her mind to a stranger.</p> + +<p>Tapping his teeth with one thumb, he gazed at her, apparently in +meditation upon her peculiar case. At last he said:</p> + +<p>"I tell you what you ought to do. You ought to go in for +phonography."</p> + +<p>"Phonography?" She was at a loss.</p> + +<p>"Yes; Pitman's shorthand, you know."</p> + +<p>"Oh! shorthand--yes. I've heard of it. But why?"</p> + +<p>"Why? It's going to be the great thing of the future. There never was +anything like it!" His voice grew warm and his glance scintillated. And now +Hilda understood her mother's account of his persuasiveness; she felt the +truth of that odd remark that he could talk the hind leg off a horse.</p> + +<p>"But does it lead to anything?" she inquired, with her strong sense of +intrinsic values.</p> + +<p>"I should say it did!" he answered. "It leads to everything! There's +nothing it won't lead to! It's the key of the future. You'll see. Look at +Dayson. He's taken it up, and now he's giving lessons in it. He's got a +room over his aunt's. I can tell you he staggered me. He wrote in shorthand +as fast as ever I could read to him, and then he read out what he'd +written, without a single slip. I'm having one of my chaps taught. I'm +paying for the lessons. I thought of learning myself--yes, really! Oh! It's +a thing that'll revolutionize all business and secretarial work and so +on--revolutionize it! And it's spreading. It'll be the Open Sesame to +everything. Anybody that can write a hundred and twenty words a minute'll +be able to walk into any situation he wants--straight <i>into</i> it! +There's never been anything like it. Look! Here it is!"</p> + +<p>He snatched up a pale-green booklet from the desk and opened it before +her. She saw the cryptic characters for the first time. And she saw them +with his glowing eyes. In their mysterious strokes and curves and dots she +saw romance, and the key of the future; she saw the philosopher's stone. +She saw a new religion that had already begun to work like leaven in the +town. The revelation was deliciously intoxicating. She was converted, as by +lightning. She yielded to the ecstasy of discipleship. Here--somehow, +inexplicably, incomprehensively--here was the answer to the enigma of her +long desire. And it was an answer original, strange, distinguished, +unexpected, unique; yes, and divine! How lovely, how beatific, to be the +master of this enchanted key!</p> + +<p>"It must be very interesting!" she said, low, with the venturesome +shyness of a deer that is reassured.</p> + +<p>"I don't mind telling you this," Mr. Cannon went on, with the fire of +the prophet. "I've got something coming along pretty soon"--he repeated +more slowly--"I've got something coming along pretty soon, where there'll +be scope for a young lady that can write shorthand <i>well</i>. I can't +tell you what it is, but it's something different from anything there's +ever been in this town; <i>and</i> better."</p> + +<p>His eyes masterfully held hers, seeming to say: "I'm vague. But I was +vague when I told you I'd see what could be done about your mother--and +look at what I did, and how quickly and easily I did it! When I'm vague, it +means a lot." And she entirely understood that his vagueness was +calculated--out of pride.</p> + +<p>They talked about Mr. Dayson a little.</p> + +<p>"I must go now," said Hilda awkwardly.</p> + +<p>"I'd like you to take that Hugo," he said. "I dare say it would interest +you.... Remind you of old times."</p> + +<p>"Oh no!"</p> + +<p>"You can return it, when you like."</p> + +<p>Her features became apologetic. She had too hastily assumed that he +wished to force a gift on her.</p> + +<p>"Please!" he ejaculated. No abuse this time of moral authority! But an +appeal, boyish, wistful, supplicating. It was irresistible, completely +irresistible. It gave her an extraordinary sense of personal power.</p> + +<p>He wrapped up the book for her in a sheet of blue "draft" paper that +noisily crackled. While he was doing so, a tiny part of her brain was, as +it were, automatically exploring a box of old books in the attic at home +and searching therein for a Gasc's French-English Dictionary which she had +used at school and never thought of since.</p> + +<p>"My compliments to your mother," he said at parting.</p> + +<p>She gazed at him questioningly.</p> + +<p>"Oh! I was forgetting," he corrected himself, with an avuncular, ironic +smile. "You're not supposed to have seen me, are you?"</p> + +<p>Then she was outside in the din; and from thrilling altitudes she had to +bring her mind to marketing. She hid under apples the flat blue parcel in +the basket.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b1c7">CHAPTER VII</a><br /> THE EDITORIAL SECRETARY</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>Arthur Dayson, though a very good shorthand writer, and not without +experience as a newspaper reporter and sub-editor, was a nincompoop. There +could be no other explanation of his bland, complacent indifference as he +sat poking at a coke stove one cold night of January, 1880, in full view of +a most marvellous and ravishing spectacle. The stove was in a room on the +floor above the offices labelled as Mr. Q. Karkeek's; its pipe, supported +by wire stays, went straight up nearly to the grimy ceiling, and then +turned horizontally and disappeared through a clumsy hole in the scorched +wall. It was a shabby stove, but not more so than the other few articles of +furniture--a large table, a small desk, three deteriorated cane-chairs, two +gas brackets, and an old copying-press on its rickety stand. The sole +object that could emerge brightly from the ordeal of the gas-flare was a +splendid freshly printed blue poster gummed with stamp-paper to the wall: +which poster bore the words, in vast capitals of two sizes: "<i>The Five +Towns Chronicle and Turnhill Guardian</i>." Copies of this poster had also +been fixed, face outwards, on the two curtainless black windows, to +announce to the Market Square what was afoot in the top storey over the +ironmonger's.</p> + +<p>A young woman, very soberly attired, was straining at the double +iron-handles of the copying-press. Some copying-presses have a screw so +accurately turned and so well oiled, and handles so massively like a +fly-wheel, that a touch will send the handles whizzing round and round till +they stop suddenly, and then one slight wrench more, and the letters are +duly copied! But this was not such a press. It had been outworn in Mr. +Karkeek's office; rust had intensified its original defects of design, and +it produced the minimum of result with the maximum of means. Nevertheless, +the young woman loved it. She clenched her hands and her teeth, and she +frowned, as though she loved it. And when she had sufficiently crushed the +letter-book in the press, she lovingly unscrewed and drew forth the book; +and with solicitude she opened the book on the smaller table, and tenderly +detached the blotting-paper from the damp tissue paper, and at last +extracted the copied letter and examined its surface.</p> + +<p>"Smudged!" she murmured, tragic.</p> + +<p>And the excellent ass Dayson, always facetiously cheerful, and without a +grain of humour, remarked:</p> + +<p>"Copiousness with the H<sub>2</sub>O, Miss Lessways, is the father of +smudged epistles. I'm ready to go through these proofs with you as soon as +you are."</p> + +<p>He was over thirty. He had had affairs with young women. He reckoned +that there remained little for him to learn. He had deliberately watched +this young woman at the press. He had clearly seen her staring under the +gas-jet at the copied letter. And yet in her fierce muscular movements, and +in her bendings and straightenings, and in her delicate caressings, and in +her savage scowlings and wrinklings, and in her rapt gazings, and in all +her awful absorption, he had quite failed to perceive the terrible eager +outpouring of a human soul, mighty, passionate, and wistful. He had kept +his eyes on her slim bust and tight-girded waist that sprung suddenly neat +and smooth out of the curving skirt-folds, and it had not occurred to him +to exclaim even in his own heart: "With your girlishness and your ferocity, +your intimidating seriousness and your delicious absurdity, I would give a +week's wages just to take hold of you and shake you!" No! The dolt had seen +absolutely naught but a conscientious female beginner learning the duties +of the post which he himself had baptized as that of 'editorial +secretary.'</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>Hilda was no longer in a nameless trouble. She no longer wanted she knew +not what. She knew beyond all questioning that she had found that which she +had wanted. For nearly a year she had had lessons in phonography from Miss +Dayson's nephew, often as a member of a varying night-class, and sometimes +alone during the day. She could not write shorthand as well as Mr. Dayson, +and she never would, for Mr. Dayson had the shorthand soul; but, as the +result of sustained and terrific effort, she could write it pretty well. +She had grappled with Isaac Pitman as with Apollyon and had not been +worsted. She could scarcely believe that in class she had taken down at the +rate of ninety words a minute Mr. Dayson's purposely difficult political +speechifyings (which always contained the phrase 'capital punishment,' +because 'capital punishment' was a famous grammalogue); but it was so, Mr. +Dayson's watch proved it.</p> + +<p>About half-way through the period of study, she had learnt from Mr. +Cannon, on one of his rare visits to her mother's, something about his +long-matured scheme for a new local paper. She had at once divined that he +meant to offer her some kind of a situation in the enterprise, and she was +right. Gratitude filled her. Mrs. Lessways, being one of your +happy-go-lucky, broad-minded women, with an experimental disposition--a +disposition to let things alone and see how they will turn out--had made +little objection, though she was not encouraging.</p> + +<p>Instantly the newspaper had become the chief article of Hilda's faith. +She accepted the idea of it as a nun accepts the sacred wafer, in ecstasy. +Yet she knew little about it. She was aware that Mr. Cannon meant to +establish it first as a weekly, and then, when it had grown, to transform +it into a daily and wage war with that powerful monopolist, <i>The +Staffordshire Signal</i>, which from its offices at Hanbridge covered the +entire district. The original title had been <i>The Turnhill Guardian and +Five Towns General Chronicle,</i> and she had approved it; but when Mr. +Cannon, with a view to the intended development, had inverted the title to +<i>The Five Towns Chronicle and Turnhill Guardian</i>, she had +enthusiastically applauded his deep wisdom. Also she had applauded his +project of moving, later on, to Hanbridge, the natural centre of the Five +Towns. This was nearly the limit of her knowledge. She neither knew nor +cared anything about the resources or the politics or the programme or the +prospects of the paper. To her all newspapers were much alike. She did not +even explore, in meditation, the extraordinary psychology of Mr. +Cannon--the man whose original energy and restless love of initiative was +leading him to found a newspaper on the top of a successful but audaciously +irregular practice as a lawyer. She incuriously and with religious +admiration accepted Mr. Cannon as she accepted the idea of the paper. And +being, of course, entirely ignorant of journalism, she was not in a +position to criticize the organizing arrangements of the newspaper. Not +that these would have seemed excessively peculiar to anybody familiar with +the haphazard improvisations of minor journalism in the provinces! She had +indeed, in her innocence, imagined that the basic fact of a newspaper +enterprise would be a printing-press; but when Mr. Dayson, who had been on +<i>The Signal</i> and on sundry country papers in Shropshire, assured her +that the majority of weekly sheets were printed on jobbing presses in +private hands, she corrected her foolish notion.</p> + +<p>Her sole interest--but it was tremendous!--lay in what she herself had +to do--namely, take down from dictation, transcribe, copy, classify, and +keep letters and documents, and occasionally correct proofs. All beyond +this was misty for her, and she never adjusted her sight in order to pierce +the mist.</p> + +<p>Save for her desire to perfect herself in her duties, she had no desire. +She was content. In the dismal, dirty, untidy, untidiable, uncomfortable +office, arctic near the windows, and tropic near the stove, with dust on +her dress and ink on her fingers and the fumes of gas in her quivering +nostrils, and her mind strained and racked by an exaggerated sense of her +responsibilities, she was in heaven! She who so vehemently objected to the +squalid mess of the business of domesticity, revelled in the squalid mess +of this business. She whose heart would revolt because Florrie's work was +never done, was delighted to wait all hours on the convenience of men who +seemed to be the very incarnation of incalculable change and caprice. And +what was she? Nothing but a clerk, at a commencing salary of fifteen +shillings per week! Ah! but she was a priestess! She had a vocation which +was unsoiled by the economic excuse. She was a pioneer. No young woman had +ever done what she was doing. She was the only girl in the Five Towns who +knew shorthand. And in a fortnight (they said) the paper was to come +out!</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>At the large table which was laden with prodigious, heterogeneous masses +of paper and general litter, she bent over the proofs by Mr. Dayson's side. +He had one proof; she had a duplicate; the copy lay between them. It was +the rough galley of a circular to the burgesses that they were correcting +together. Reading and explaining aloud, he inscribed the cabalistic signs +of correction in the margin of his proof, and she faithfully copied them in +the margin of hers, for practice.</p> + +<p>"l.c.," he intoned.</p> + +<p>"What does that mean?"</p> + +<p>"Lower case," he explained grandiosely, in the naïve vanity of his +knowledge. "Small letter; not a capital."</p> + +<p>"Thank you," she said, and, writing "l.c.," noted in her striving brain +that 'lower case' meant a small letter instead of a capital; but she knew +not why, and she did not ask; the reason did not trouble her.</p> + +<p>"I think we'll put 'enlightened' there, before 'public' Ring it, will +you?"</p> + +<p>"Ring it? Oh! I see!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, put a ring round the word in the margin. That's to show it isn't +the intelligent compositor's mistake, you see!"</p> + +<p>Then there was a familiar and masterful footstep on the stairs, and the +attention of both of them wavered.</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>Arthur Dayson and his proof-correcting lost all interest and all +importance for Hilda as Mr. Cannon came into the room. The unconscious, +expressive gesture, scornful and abrupt, with which she neglected them +might have been terribly wounding to a young man more sensitive than +Dayson. But Dayson, in his self-sufficient, good-natured mediocrity, had +the hide of an alligator. He even judged her movement quite natural, for he +was a flunkey born. Hilda gazed at her master with anxiety as he deposited +his black walking-stick in the corner behind the door and loosed his white +muffler and large overcoat (which Dayson called an 'immensikoff.') She +thought the master looked tired and worried. Supposing he fell ill at this +supreme juncture! The whole enterprise would be scotched, and not forty +Daysons could keep it going! The master was doing too much--law by day and +journalism by night. They were perhaps all doing too much, but the others +did not matter. Nevertheless, Mr. Cannon advanced to the table buoyant and +faintly smiling, straightening his shoulders back, proudly proving to +himself and to them that his individual force was inexhaustible. That +straightening of the shoulders always affected Hilda as something wistful, +as almost pathetic in its confident boyishness. It made her feel maternal +and say to herself (but not in words) with a sort of maternal superiority: +"How brave he is, poor thing!" Yes, in her heart she would apply the +epithet 'poor thing' to this grand creature whose superiority she +acknowledged with more fervour than anybody. As for the undaunted +straightening of the shoulders, she adopted it, and after a time it grew to +be a characteristic gesture with her.</p> + +<p>"Well?" Mr. Cannon greeted them.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Arthur Dayson, with a factitious air of treating him as an +equal, "I've been round to Bennions and made it clear to him that if he +can't guarantee to run off a maximum of two thousand of an eight-page sheet +we shall have to try Clayhanger at Bursley, even if it's the last +minute."</p> + +<p>"What did he say?"</p> + +<p>"Grunted."</p> + +<p>"I shall risk two thousand, any way."</p> + +<p>"Paper delivered, governor?" Dayson asked in a low voice, leering +pawkily, as though to indicate that he was a man who could be trusted to +think of everything.</p> + +<p>"Will be to-morrow, I think," said Mr. Cannon. "Got that letter ready, +Miss Lessways?"</p> + +<p>Hilda sprang into life.</p> + +<p>"Yes," she said, handing it diffidently. "But if you'd like me to do it +again--you see it's--"</p> + +<p>"Plethora of H<sub>2</sub>O," Dayson put in, indulgent.</p> + +<p>"Oh no!" Mr. Cannon decided. Having read the letter, he gave it to +Dayson. "It doesn't matter, but you ought to have signed it before it was +copied in the letter-book."</p> + +<p>"Gemini! Miss!" murmured Dayson, glancing at Hilda with uplifted +brows.</p> + +<p>The fact was that both of them had forgotten this formality. Dayson took +a pen, and after describing a few flourishes in the air, about a quarter of +an inch above the level of the paper, he magnificently signed: "Dayson +& Co." Such was the title of the proprietorship. Just as Karkeek was +Mr. Cannon's dummy in the law, so was Dayson in the newspaper business. But +whereas Karkeek was privately ashamed, Dayson was proud of his rôle, +which gave him the illusion of power and glory.</p> + +<p>"Just take this down, will you?" said Mr. Cannon.</p> + +<p>Hilda grasped at her notebook and seized a pencil, and then held herself +tense to receive the message, staring downwards at the blank page. Dayson +lolled in his chair, throwing his head back. He knew that the presence of +himself, the great shorthand expert, made Hilda nervous when she had to +write from dictation; and this flattered his simple vanity. Hilda hated and +condemned her nervousness, but she could not conquer it.</p> + +<p>Mr. Cannon, standing over the table, pushed his hat away from his broad, +shining forehead, and then, meditative, absently lifted higher his +carefully tended hand and lowered the singing gas-jet, only to raise it +again.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Ezra Brunt. Dear Sir, Re advertisement. With reference to your +letter replying to ours in which you inquire as to the circulation of the +above newspaper, we beg to state that it is our intention to print four +thousand of--"</p> + +<p>"Two thousand," Hilda interrupted confidently.</p> + +<p>Unruffled, Mr. Cannon went on politely: "No--four thousand of the first +number. Our representative would be pleased to call upon you by +appointment. Respectfully yours.--You might sign that, Dayson, and get it +off to-night. Is Sowter here?"</p> + +<p>For answer, Dayson jerked his head towards an inner door. Sowter was the +old clerk who had first received Hilda into the offices of Mr. Q. Karkeek. +He was earning a little extra money by clerical work at nights in +connection with the advertisement department of the new organ.</p> + +<p>Mr. Cannon marched to the inner door and opened it. Then he turned and +called:</p> + +<p>"Dayson--a moment."</p> + +<p>"Certainly," said Dayson, jumping up. He planted his hat doggishly at +the back of his head, stuck his hands into his pockets, and swaggered after +his employer.</p> + +<p>The inner door closed on the three men. Hilda, staring at the notebook, +blushing and nibbling at the pencil, was left alone under the gas. She +could feel her heart beating violently.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b1c8">CHAPTER VIII</a><br /> JANET ORGREAVE</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>"Our friend is waiting for that letter to Brunt," said Arthur Dayson, +emerging from the inner room, a little later.</p> + +<p>"In one moment," Hilda replied coldly, though she had not begun to write +the letter.</p> + +<p>Dayson disappeared, nodding.</p> + +<p>She resented his referring to Mr. Cannon as 'our friend,' but she did +not know why, unless it was that she vaguely regarded it as presumptuous, +or, in the alternative, if he meant to be facetious, as ill-bred, on the +part of Arthur Dayson. She chose a sheet of paper, and wrote the letter in +longhand, as quickly as she could, but with arduous care in the formation +of every character; she wrote with the whole of her faculties fully +applied. Even in the smallest task she could not economize herself; she had +to give all or nothing. When she came to the figures--4000--she intensified +her ardour, lavishing enormous unnecessary force: it was like a steamhammer +cracking a nut. Her conscience had instantly and finally decided against +her. But she ignored her conscience. She knew and owned that she was wrong +to abet Mr. Cannon's deception. And she abetted it. She would have abetted +it if she had believed that the act would involve her in everlasting +damnation,--not solely out of loyalty to Mr. Cannon; only a little out of +loyalty; chiefly out of mere unreasoning pride and obstinate adherence to a +decision.</p> + +<p>The letter finished, she took it into the inner room, where the three +men sat in mysterious conclave. Mr. Cannon read it over, and then Arthur +Dayson borrowed the old clerk's vile pen and with the ceremonious delays +due to his sense of his own importance, flourishingly added the +signature.</p> + +<p>When she came forth she heard a knock at the outer door.</p> + +<p>"Come in," she commanded defiantly, for she was still unconsciously in +the defiant mood in which she had offered the lying letter to Mr. +Cannon.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>A well-dressed, kind-featured, and almost beautiful young woman, of +about the same age as Hilda, opened the door, with a charming gesture of +diffidence.</p> + +<p>For a second the two gazed at each other astounded.</p> + +<p>"Well, Hilda, of all the--"</p> + +<p>"Janet!"</p> + +<p>It was an old schoolfellow, Janet Orgreave, daughter of Osmond Orgreave, +a successful architect at Bursley. Janet had passed part of her schooldays +at Chetwynd's; and with her brother Charlie she had also attended Sarah +Gailey's private dancing-class (famous throughout Turnhill, Bursley, and +Hanbridge) at the same time as Hilda. She was known, she was almost +notorious, as a universal favourite. By instinct, without taking thought, +she pleased everybody, great and small. Nature had spoiled her, endowing +her with some beauty, and undeniable elegance, and abundant sincere +kindliness. She had only to smile, and she made a friend; it cost her +nothing. She smiled now, and produced the illusion, not merely in Hilda but +in herself also, that her pleasure in this very astonishing encounter was +quite peculiarly poignant.</p> + +<p>They shook hands, as women of the world.</p> + +<p>"Did you know I was here?" Hilda questioned, characteristically on her +guard, with a nervous girlish movement of the leg that perhaps sinned +against the code of authentic worldliness.</p> + +<p>"No indeed!" exclaimed Janet.</p> + +<p>"Well, I am! I'm engaged here."</p> + +<p>"How splendid of you!" said Janet enthusiastically, with no suggestion +whatever in her tone that Hilda's situation was odd, or of dubious +propriety, or aught but enviable.</p> + +<p>But Hilda surveyed her with secret envy, transient yet real. In the +half-dozen years that had passed since the days of the dancing-class, Janet +had matured. She was now the finished product. She had the charm of her +sex, and she depended on it. She had grace and an overflowing goodness. She +had a smooth ease of manner. She was dignified. And, with her furs, and her +expensive veil protecting those bright apple-red cheeks, and all the +studied minor details of her costume, she was admirably and luxuriously +attired. She was the usual, as distinguished from the unusual, woman, +brought to perfection. She represented no revolt against established +custom. Doubts and longings did not beset her. She was content within her +sphere: a destined queen of the home. And yet she could not be accused of +being old-fashioned. None would dare to despise her. She was what Hilda +could never be, had never long desired to be. She was what Hilda had +definitely renounced being. And there stood Hilda, immature, graceless, +harsh, inelegant, dowdy, holding the letter between her inky fingers, in +the midst of all that hard masculine mess,--and a part of it, the blindly +devoted subaltern, who could expect none of the ritual of homage given to +women, who must sit and work and stand and strain and say 'yes,' and +pretend stiffly that she was a sound, serviceable, thick-skinned imitation +man among men! If Hilda had been a valkyrie or a saint she might have felt +no envy and no pang. But she was a woman. Self-pity shot through her +tremendous pride; and the lancinating stab made her inattentive even to her +curiosity concerning the purpose of Janet's visit.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>"I came to see Mr. Cannon," said Janet. "The housekeeper downstairs told +me he was here somewhere."</p> + +<p>"He's engaged," answered Hilda in a low voice, with the devotee's +instinct to surround her superior with mystery.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" murmured Janet, checked.</p> + +<p>Hilda wondered furiously what she could be wanting with Mr. Cannon.</p> + +<p>Janet recommenced: "It's really about Miss Gailey, you know."</p> + +<p>"Yes--what?"</p> + +<p>Hilda nodded eagerly, speaking in a tone still lower and more +careful.</p> + +<p>Janet dropped her voice accordingly: "She's Mr. Cannon's sister, of +course?"</p> + +<p>"Half-sister."</p> + +<p>"I mean. I've just come away from seeing her." She hesitated. "I only +heard by accident. So I came over with father. He had to come to a meeting +of the Guardians here, or something. They've quarrelled, haven't they?"</p> + +<p>"Who? Miss Gailey and Mr. Cannon? Well, you see, she quarrels with every +one." Hilda appeared to defend Mr. Cannon.</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid she does, poor thing!"</p> + +<p>"She quarrelled with mother."</p> + +<p>"Really! when was that?"</p> + +<p>"Oh! Years and years ago! I don't know when. I was always surprised +mother let me go to the class."</p> + +<p>"It was very nice of your mother," said Janet, appreciative.</p> + +<p>"Is she in trouble?" Hilda asked bluntly.</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid she is."</p> + +<p>"What?"</p> + +<p>Janet suddenly gave a gesture of intimacy. "I believe she's +starving!"</p> + +<p>"Starving!" Hilda repeated in a blank whisper.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I do! I do really believe she hasn't got enough to eat. She's +quarrelled with just about everybody there was to quarrel with. She suffers +fearfully with rheumatism. She never goes out --or scarcely ever. You know +her dancing-classes have all fallen away to nothing. I fancy she tried +taking lodgers--"</p> + +<p>"Yes, she did. I understood she was very good at housekeeping."</p> + +<p>"She hasn't got any lodgers now. There she is, all alone in that house, +and--"</p> + +<p>"But she can't be <i>starving</i>!" Hilda protested. At intervals she +glanced at the inner door, alarmed.</p> + +<p>"I really think she is," Janet persisted, softly persuasive.</p> + +<p>"But what's to be done?"</p> + +<p>"That's the point. I've just seen her. I went on purpose, because I'd +heard.... But I had to pretend all sorts of things to make an excuse for +myself. I couldn't offer her anything, could I? Isn't it dreadful?"</p> + +<p>They were much worried, these two young maids, full of health and vigour +and faith, and pride and simplicity, by this startling first glimpse into +one of the nether realities of existence. And they loyally tried to feel +more worried than they actually were; they did their best, out of sympathy, +to moderate the leaping, joyous vitality that was in them,--and did not +succeed very well. They were fine, they were touching--but they were also +rather deliciously amusing--as they concentrated all their resources of +solemnity and of worldly experience on the tragic case of the woman whom +life had defeated. Hilda's memory rushed strangely to Victor Hugo. She was +experiencing the same utter desolation--but somehow less noble--as had +gripped her when she first realized the eternal picture, in <i>Oceana +Nox</i>, of the pale-fronted widows who, tired of waiting for those whose +barque had never returned out of the tempest, talked quietly among +themselves of the lost--stirring the cinders in the fireplace and in their +hearts.... Yet Sarah Gailey was not even a widow. She was an ageing +dancing-mistress. She had once taught the grace of rhythmic movement to +young limbs; and now she was rheumatic.</p> + +<p>"Nobody but Mr. Cannon can do anything," Janet murmured.</p> + +<p>"I'm sure he hasn't the slightest idea--not the slightest!" said Hilda +half defensively. But she was saying to herself: "This man made me write a +lie, and now I hear that his sister is starving--in the same town!" And she +thought of his glossy opulence. "I'm quite sure of <i>that</i>!" she +repeated to Janet.</p> + +<p>"Oh! So am I!" Janet eagerly concurred. "That's why I came.... Somebody +had to give him a hint.... I never dreamt of finding you, dear!"</p> + +<p>"It is strange, isn't it?" said Hilda, the wondrous romance of things +seizing her. Seen afresh, through the eyes of this charming, sympathetic +acquaintance, was not Mr. Cannon's originality in engaging her positively +astounding?</p> + +<p>"I suppose <i>you</i> couldn't give him a hint?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I'll tell him," said Hilda. "Of course!" In spite of herself she +was assuming a certain proprietorship in Mr. Cannon.</p> + +<p>"I'm so glad!" Janet replied. "It is good of you!"</p> + +<p>"It seems to me it's you that's good, Janet," Hilda said grimly. She +thought: "Should <i>I</i>, out of simple kindliness and charity, have +deliberately come to tell a man I didn't know... that his sister was +starving? Never!"</p> + +<p>"He's bound to see after it!" said Janet, content.</p> + +<p>"Why, of course!" said Hilda, clinching the affair, in an intimate, +confidential murmur.</p> + +<p>"You'll tell him to-night?"</p> + +<p>Hilda nodded.</p> + +<p>They exchanged a grave glance of mutual appreciation and understanding. +Each was sure of the other's high esteem. Each was glad that chance had +brought about the meeting between them. Then they lifted away their +apprehensive solicitude for Sarah Gailey, and Janet, having sighed relief, +began to talk about old times. And their voices grew louder and more +free.</p> + +<p>"Can you tell me what time it is?" Janet asked, later. "I've broken the +spring of my watch, and I have to meet father at the station at +ten-fifteen."</p> + +<p>"I haven't a notion!" said Hilda, rather ashamed.</p> + +<p>"I hope it isn't ten o'clock."</p> + +<p>"I could ask," said Hilda hesitatingly. The hour, for aught she knew, +was nine, eleven, or even midnight. She was oblivious of time.</p> + +<p>"I'll run," said Janet, preparing to go. "I shall tell Charlie I've seen +you, next time I write to him. I'm sure he'll be glad. And you must come to +see us. You really must, now! Mother and father will be delighted. Do you +still recite, like you used to?"</p> + +<p>Hilda shook her head, blushing.</p> + +<p>She made no definite response to the invitation, which surprised, +agitated, and flattered her. She wanted to accept it, but she was convinced +that she never would accept it. Before departing, Janet lifted her veil, +with a beautiful gesture, and offered her lips to kiss. They embraced +affectionately. The next moment Hilda, at the top of the dim, naked, +resounding stair, was watching Janet descend--a figure infinitely stylish +and agreeable to the eye.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b1c9">CHAPTER IX</a><br /> IN THE STREET</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>A few minutes later, just as Hilda had sealed up the last of the +letters, Mr. Cannon issued somewhat hurriedly out of the inner room, +buttoning his overcoat at the neck.</p> + +<p>"Good night," he said, and took his stick from the corner where he had +placed it.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Cannon!"</p> + +<p>"Well?"</p> + +<p>"I wanted to speak to you."</p> + +<p>"What is it? I'm in a hurry."</p> + +<p>She glanced at the inner door, which he had left open. From beyond that +door came the voices of Arthur Dayson and the old clerk; Hilda lacked the +courage to cross the length of the room and deliberately close it, and +though Mr. Cannon did not seem inclined to move, his eyes followed the +direction of hers and he must have divined her embarrassment. She knew not +what to do. A crisis seemed to rise up monstrous between them, in an +instant. She was trembling, and in acute trouble.</p> + +<p>"It's rather important," she said timidly, but not without an +unintentional violence.</p> + +<p>"Well, to-morrow afternoon."</p> + +<p>He, too, was apparently in a fractious state. The situation was perhaps +perilous. But she could not allow her conduct to be influenced by danger or +difficulty, which indeed nearly always had the effect of confirming her +purpose. If something had to be done, it had to be done--and let that +suffice! He waited, impatient, for her to agree and allow him to go.</p> + +<p>"No," she answered, with positive resentment in her clear voice. "I must +speak to you to-night. It's very important."</p> + +<p>He made with his tongue an inarticulate noise of controlled +exasperation.</p> + +<p>"If you've finished, put your things on and walk along with me," he +said.</p> + +<p>She hurried to obey, and overtook him as he slowly descended the lower +flight of stairs. She had buttoned her jacket and knotted her thick scarf, +and now, with the letters pressed tightly under her arm lest they should +fall, she was pulling on her gloves.</p> + +<p>"I have an appointment at the Saracen's," he said mildly, meaning the +Saracen's Head--the central rendezvous of the town, where Conservative and +Liberal met on neutral ground.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>He turned to the left, toward the High Street and the great cleared +space out of which the cellarage of the new Town Hall had already been +scooped. He carried his thick gloves in his white and elegant hand, as one +who did not feel the frost. She stepped after him. Their breaths whitened +the keen air. She was extremely afraid, and considered herself an abject +coward, but she was determined to the point of desperation. He ought to +know the truth and he ought to know it at once: nothing else mattered. She +reflected in her terror: "If I don't begin right off, he will be asking me +to begin, and that will be worse than ever." She was like one who, having +boastfully undertaken to plunge into deep, cold water from a height, has +climbed to the height, and measured the fearful distance, and is sick, and +dares not leap, but knows that he must leap.</p> + +<p>"I suppose you know Miss Gailey is practically starving," she said +abruptly, harshly, staring at the gutter.</p> + +<p>She had leapt. Life seemed to leave her. She had not intended to use +such words, nor such a tone. She certainly did not suppose that he knew +about Miss Gailey's condition. She had affirmed to Janet Orgreave her +absolute assurance that he did not know. As for the tone, it was accusing, +it was brutal, it was full of the unconscious and terrible clumsy cruelty +of youth.</p> + +<p>"What?" His head moved sharply sideways, to look at her.</p> + +<p>"Miss Gailey--she's starving, it seems!" Hilda said timidly now, almost +apologetically. "I felt sure you didn't know. I thought <i>some</i> one +should tell you."</p> + +<p>"What do you mean--starving?" he asked gruffly.</p> + +<p>"Not enough to eat," she replied, with the direct simplicity of a +child.</p> + +<p>"And how did this tale get about?"</p> + +<p>"It's true," she said. "I was told to-night."</p> + +<p>"Who told you?"</p> + +<p>"A friend of mine--who's seen her!"</p> + +<p>"But who?"</p> + +<p>"It wouldn't be right for me to tell you who."</p> + +<p>They walked on in an appalling silence to the corner of the Square and +the High Street.</p> + +<p>"Here's the letter-box," he said, stopping.</p> + +<p>She dropped the letters with nervous haste into the box. Then she looked +up at him appealingly. In the brightness of the starry night she saw that +his face had a sardonic, meditative smile. The middle part of the lower lip +was pushed out, while the corners were pulled down--an expression of +scornful disgust. She burst out:</p> + +<p>"Of course, I know very well it's not your fault. I know, if you'd +<i>known</i>... but what with her never seeing you, and perhaps people not +caring to--"</p> + +<p>"I'm very much obliged to you," he interrupted her quietly, still +meditative. He was evidently sincere. His attitude was dignified. Many men +would have been ashamed, humiliated, even though aware of innocence. But he +contrived to rise above such weakness. She was glad; she admired him. And +she was very glad also that he did not deign to asseverate that he had been +ignorant of his half-sister's plight. Naturally he had been ignorant!</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>She was suddenly happy; she was inspired by an unreasoning joy. She was +happy because she was so young and fragile and inexperienced, and he so +much older, and more powerful and more capable. She was happy because she +was a mere girl and he a mature and important male. She thought their +relation in that moment exquisitely beautiful. She was happy because she +had been exceedingly afraid and the fear had gone. The dark Square and +far-stretching streets lay placid and void under the night, surrounding +their silence in a larger silence: and because of that also she was happy. +A policeman with his arms hidden under his cloak marched unhasting +downwards from the direction of the Bank.</p> + +<p>"Fine night, officer," said Mr. Cannon cordially.</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir. Good night, sir," the policeman responded, with respect and +sturdy self-respect, his footsteps ringing onwards.</p> + +<p>And the sight and bearing of this hardy, frost-defying policeman +watching over the town, and the greetings between him and Mr. Cannon--these +too seemed strangely beautiful to Hilda. And then a train reverberated +along its embankment in the distance, and the gliding procession of yellow +windows was divided at regular intervals by the black silhouettes of the +scaffolding-poles of the new Town Hall. Beautiful! She was filled with a +delicious sadness. It was Janet's train. In some first-class compartment +Janet and her father were shut together, side by side, intimate, mutually +understanding. Again, a beautiful relation! From the summit of a high kiln +in the middle distance, flames shot intermittently forth, formidable. +Crockery was being fired in the night: and unseen the fireman somewhere +flitted about the mouths of the kiln. And here and there in the dim faces +of the streets a window shone golden... there were living people behind the +blind! It was all beautiful, joy-giving. The thought of her mother +fidgeting for her return home was delightful. The thought of Mr. Cannon and +Miss Gailey, separated during many years, and now destined to some kind of +reconciliation was indescribably touching, and beautiful in a way that she +could not define.</p> + +<p>"I was only thinking the other day," said Mr. Cannon, treating her as an +equal in years and wisdom--"I was only thinking I'd got the very thing for +my half-sister--the very opening for her--a chance in a thousand, if only +she'd..." It was unnecessary for him to finish the sentence.</p> + +<p>"And is it too late now?" Hilda asked eagerly.</p> + +<p>"No," he said. "It isn't too late. I shall go round and see her +to-morrow morning first thing. It wouldn't do for me to go to-night--you +see--might seem too odd."</p> + +<p>"Yes," Hilda murmured. "Well, good night."</p> + +<p>They separated. She knew that he was profoundly stirred. Nevertheless, +he had inquired for no further details concerning Miss Gailey. He was too +proud, and beneath his inflexibility too sensitive, to do so. He meant to +discover the truth for himself. He had believed--that was the essential. +His behaviour had been superb. The lying letter to Ezra Brunt was a mere +peccadillo, even if it was that, even if it was not actually virtuous.</p> + +<p>She walked off rapidly, trying to imitate the fine, free, calmly defiant +bearing of Mr. Cannon and the policeman.</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>"Florrie gone to bed?" she asked briskly of her mother, who was fussing +about her in the parlour, pretending to be fretful, but secretly enchanted +to welcome her, with a warm fire and plenteous food, back again into the +house. And Hilda, too, was enchanted at her reception.</p> + +<p>"Florrie gone to bed? I should just think Florrie has gone to bed. +Half-past ten and after! Eh my! This going out after tea. I never heard of +such doings. Now do warm your feet."</p> + +<p>"I should have been home sooner, only something happened," said +Hilda.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" Mrs. Lessways exclaimed indifferently. She had in fact no +curiosity as to the affairs of Dayson and Company. The sole thing that +interested her was Hilda's daily absence and daily return. She seemed quite +content to remain in ignorance of what Hilda did in the mysterious office. +Her conversation, profuse when she was in good spirits, rarely went beyond +the trifling separate events of existence personal and domestic--the life +of the house hour by hour and minute by minute. It was often astounding to +Hilda that her mother never showed any sign of being weary of these topics, +nor any desire to discover other topics.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Hilda. "Miss Gailey--"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lessways became instantly a different creature.</p> + +<p>"And does he know?" she asked blankly, when Hilda had informed her of +Janet's visit and news.</p> + +<p>"Yes. I told him--of course."</p> + +<p>"You?"</p> + +<p>"Well, somebody had to tell him," said Hilda, with an affectation of +carelessness. "So I told him myself."</p> + +<p>"And how did he take it?"</p> + +<p>"Well, how should he take it?" Hilda retorted largely. "He <i>had</i> to +take it! He was much obliged, and he said so."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lessways began to weep.</p> + +<p>"What ever's the matter?"</p> + +<p>"I was only thinking of poor Sarah!" Mrs. Lessways answered the implied +rebuke of Hilda's brusque question. "I shall go and see her to-morrow +morning."</p> + +<p>"But, mother, don't you think you'd better wait?"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lessways spoke up resolutely: "I shall go and see Sarah Gailey +to-morrow morning, and let that be understood! I don't need my daughter to +teach me when I ought to go and see my friends and when I oughtn't.... I +knew Sarah Gailey before your Mr. Cannon was born."</p> + +<p>"Oh, very well! Very well!" Hilda soothed her lightly.</p> + +<p>"I shall tell Sarah Gailey she's got to reckon with me, whether she +wants to or not! That's what I shall tell Sarah Gailey!" Mrs. Lessways +wiped her eyes.</p> + +<p>"Mother," Hilda asked, when they had gone upstairs, "did you wind the +clock?"</p> + +<p>"I don't think I did," answered the culprit uncertainly from her bedroom +door.</p> + +<p>"Mother, how tiresome you are! Night before last you wouldn't let me +touch it. You said you preferred to do it yourself. And now I shall be +waiting for it to strike to-morrow morning, to get up--lend me that candle, +do!"</p> + +<p>She tripped down to the lobby gladly, and opened the big door of the +clock, and put her hand into the dark cavity and, grimacing, hauled up the +heavy weights. This forgetfulness of her mother's somehow increased her +extraordinary satisfaction with life. She remounted the shadowy stairs on +the wings of a pure and ingenuous elation.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b1c10">CHAPTER X</a><br /> MISS GAILEY IN DECLENSION</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>Knowing whom she was to meet, Hilda came home to tea, on the next day +but one, with a demeanour whose characteristics were heightened by +nervousness. The weather was still colder, and she had tied the broad +ribbons of her small bonnet rather closely under her chin, the double bow a +little to the left. A knitted bodice over the dress and under the jacket +made the latter tighter than usual, so that the fur edges of it curved away +somewhat between the buttons, and all the upper part of the figure seemed +to be too strictly confined, while the petticoats surged out freely +beneath. A muff, brightly coloured to match the skirt and the bonnet and +her cheeks, completed the costume. She went into the house through the +garden and delicately stamped her feet on the lobby tiles, partly to warm +them and shake off a few bits of snow, and partly to announce clearly her +arrival. Then, just as she was, hands in muff, she entered the parlour. She +was tingling with keen, rosy life, and with the sense of youthful power. +She had the deep, unconscious conviction of the superiority of youth to +age. And there were the two older women, waiting for her, as it were on the +defensive, and as nervous as she!</p> + +<p>"Good afternoon, Miss Gailey," she said, with a kind and even very +cordial smile, and heartily shook the flaccid, rheumatic hand that was +primly held out to her. And yet in spite of herself, perhaps unknown to +herself, there was in her tone and her smile and her vigorous clasp +something which meant, "Poor old thing!" pityingly, indulgently, +scornfully.</p> + +<p>She had not spoken to Miss Gailey, and she had scarcely seen her, since +the days of the dancing-class. A woman who is in process of losing +everything but her pride can disappear from view as easily in a small town +as in a great city; her acquaintances will say to each other, "I haven't +met So-and-so lately. I wonder..." And curiosity will go no further. And in +a short time her invisibility will cease to excite any remark, except, "She +keeps herself to herself nowadays." To Hilda Miss Gailey appeared no older; +her brown hair had very little grey in it, and her skin was fairly smooth +and well-preserved. But she seemed curiously smaller, and less significant, +this woman who, with a certain pedagogic air, used to instruct girls in +grace and boys in gallantry, this woman who was regarded by all her pupils +as the authoritative source of correctness and ease in deportment. "Now, +Master Charles," Hilda could remember her saying, "will you ask me for the +next polka all over again, and try not to look as if you were doing me a +favour and were rather ashamed of yourself?" She had a tongue for the +sneaping of too casual boys, and girls also.</p> + +<p>And she spoke so correctly, as correctly as she performed the figures of +a dance! Hilda, who also spoke without the local peculiarities, had been +deprived of her Five Towns accent at Chetwynd's School, where the purest +Kensingtonian was inculcated; but Miss Gailey had lost hers in Kensington +itself--so rumour said--many years before. And now, in her declension, she +was still perfect of speech. But the authority and the importance were gone +in substance: only the shadow of them remained. She had now, indeed, a +manner half apologetic and half defiant, but timorously and weakly defiant. +Her head was restless with little nervous movements; her watery eyes seemed +to say: "Do not suppose that I am not as proud and independent as ever I +was, because I <i>am</i>. Look at my silk dress, and my polished boots, and +my smooth hair, and my hands! Can anyone find any trace of shabbiness in +<i>me</i>?" But beneath all this desperate bravery was the wistful +acknowledgment, continually-peeping out, that she had after all come down +in the world, albeit with a special personal dignity that none save she +could have kept.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>The two women were seated at a splendid fire. Hilda, whose nervousness +was quickly vanishing, came between them to warm her hands that were +shining with cold, despite muff and gloves. "Here, mother!" she said +teasingly, putting the muff and gloves in her mother's lap.</p> + +<p>Sarah Gailey rose with slow stiffness from her chair.</p> + +<p>"Now don't let this child disturb you, Sarah!" Mrs. Lessways +protested.</p> + +<p>"Oh no, Caroline!" said Miss Gailey composedly. "I was only getting my +apron."</p> + +<p>From a reticule on the table she drew forth a small black satin apron on +which was embroidered in filoselle a spray of moss-roses. It was extremely +elegant--much more so than Mrs. Lessways'--though not in quite the latest +style of fashionable aprons; not being edible, it had probably been long +preserved in a wardrobe, on the chance of just such an occasion as this. +She adjusted the elastic round her thin waist, and sat down again. The +apron was a sign that she had come definitely to spend the whole evening. +It was a proof of the completeness of the reconciliation between the former +friends.</p> + +<p>As the conversation shifted from the immediate topic of the weather to +the great general question of cures for chilblains, Hilda wondered what had +passed between her mother and Miss Gailey, and whether her mother had +overcome by mere breezy force or by guile: which details she never learnt, +for Mrs. Lessways was very loyal to her former crony, and moreover she had +necessarily to support the honour of the older generation against the +younger. It seemed incredible to Hilda that this woman who sat with such +dignity and such gentility by her mother's fire was she who the day before +yesterday had been starving in the pride-imposed prison of her own house. +Could Miss Gailey have known that Hilda knew!... But Hilda knew that Miss +Gailey knew that she knew--and that others guessed! Such, however, was the +sublime force of convention that the universal pretence of ignorance +securely triumphed.</p> + +<p>Then Florrie--changed, grown, budded, practised in the technicalities of +parlours, but timid because of "company"--came in to set the tea. And Miss +Gailey inspected her with the calm and omniscient detachment of a deity, +and said to Caroline when she was gone that Florrie seemed a promising +little thing--with the 'makings of a good servant' in her. Afterwards the +mistress recounted this judgment to Florrie, who was thereby apparently +much impressed and encouraged in well-doing.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>"And so you're thinking of going to London, Miss Gailey?" said Hilda, +during tea. The meal was progressing satisfactorily, though Caroline could +not persuade Sarah to eat enough.</p> + +<p>Miss Gailey flushed slightly, with the characteristic nervous movement +of the head. Evidently her sensitiveness was extreme.</p> + +<p>"And what do you know about it, you inquisitive little puss?" Mrs. +Lessways intervened hastily, though it was she who had informed Hilda of +the vague project. Somehow, in presence of her old friend, Mrs. Lessways +seemed to feel herself under an obligation to play the assertive and +crushing mother.</p> + +<p>"Has Mr. Cannon mentioned it?" said Miss Gailey politely. Miss Gailey, +at any rate, recognized in the most scrupulous way that Hilda was an adult, +and no longer a foal-legged pupil for dancing. "Well, he seems so set on +it. He came round to see me about it yesterday morning, without any +warning. And he was full of it! I told you how full he was of it, didn't I, +Caroline? You know how he is when anything takes him."</p> + +<p>"Do I know how he is?" murmured Caroline, arching her eyebrows. She +spoke much more broadly than either of the others.</p> + +<p>Miss Gailey continued to Hilda, with seriousness: "It's a boarding-house +that he's got control of up there. Something about a bill of sale on the +furniture, I think. But perhaps you know?"</p> + +<p>"No, I don't," said Hilda.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" said Miss Gailey, relieved. "Well, anyhow he's bent on me taking +charge of this boarding-house. He will have it it's just the thing for me. +But--but I don't know!" She finished weakly.</p> + +<p>"Everyone knows you're a splendid housekeeper," said Mrs. Lessways. +"Always were."</p> + +<p>"I remember the refreshments at your annual dances," said Hilda, +politely enthusiastic.</p> + +<p>"I always attended to those myself," Miss Gailey judicially +observed.</p> + +<p>"I don't know anything about refreshments at dances," said Mrs. +Lessways, "but I do know what your housekeeping is, Sarah!"</p> + +<p>"Well, that's what George says!" Sarah simpered. "He says he never had +such meals and such attention as that year he lived with me."</p> + +<p>"I'm sure he's been sorry many a time he ever left you!" exclaimed +Caroline. "Many and many a time!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, well.... Relatives, you know...." Sarah murmured vaguely. This was +the only reference to the estrangement. She went on with more vivacity. +"And then Mr. Cannon has always had ideas about boarding-houses and +furnished rooms and so on. He always did say there was lots of money to be +made out of them if only they were managed properly; only they never +are.... He ought to know; he's been a bachelor long enough, and he's tried +enough of them! He says he isn't at all comfortable where he is," she +added, as it were aside to Caroline. "It's some people who used to let +lodgings to theatre people at Hanbridge."</p> + +<p>"Oh! <i>Them</i>!" cried Caroline.</p> + +<p>The talk meandered into a maze of reminiscences, and Hilda had to +realize her youthfulness and the very inferior range of her experience: +Sarah and Caroline recalled to each other dozens of persons and events, +opening up historical vistas in a manner that filled the young girl with +envious respect, in spite of herself.</p> + +<p>"Do you remember Hanbridge Theatre being built, Sarah?" questioned +Caroline. "My grandfather--Hilda's great-grandfather--tendered for it--not +that he got the job--but he was very old."</p> + +<p>"Did he now? No, I don't. But I dare say I was in London then."</p> + +<p>"I dare say that would be it."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Sarah, turning to Hilda once more, "that's just what Mr. +Cannon says. He says it isn't as if I didn't know what London is.... But +it's such a long time ago!" She glanced at Caroline as if for sympathy.</p> + +<p>"Come, come, Sarah!" Caroline protested stoutly, and yet with a care for +Sarah's sensitiveness. "It isn't so long ago as all that!"</p> + +<p>"It seems so long," said Sarah, reflective; and her mouth worked +uneasily. Then, after a pause: "He's so set on it!"</p> + +<p>"Set on what? On your going to London?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"And why not?"</p> + +<p>"Well, I don't know whether I could--"</p> + +<p>"Paw!" scoffed Caroline lightly and flatteringly. "You're younger than I +am, and I'm not going to have anyone making out that I'm getting old. Now +do finish that bit of cake."</p> + +<p>"No, thank you, Caroline. I really couldn't."</p> + +<p>"Not but what I should be sorry enough to lose you," Caroline concluded. +"There's no friends like the old friends."</p> + +<p>"Ah! No!" Sarah thickly muttered, gazing with her watery eyes at a spot +on the white diaper.</p> + +<p>"Hilda, do turn down that there gas a bit," said Mrs. Lessways sharply +and self-consciously. "It's fizzing." And she changed the subject.</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>With a nervous exaggeration of solicitude Hilda sprang to the gas-jet. +Suddenly she was drenched in the most desolating sadness. She could not +bear to look at Miss Gailey; and further, Miss Gailey seemed unreal to her, +not an actual woman, but an abstract figure of sorrow that fancy had +created. A few minutes previously Hilda had been taking pride in the tact +and the enterprise of George Cannon, who possessed a mysterious gift of +finding an opportunity for everybody who needed it. He had set Hilda on her +feet; and he was doing the same for his half-sister, and with such skilful +diplomacy that Miss Gailey was able to pretend to herself and to others +that George Cannon, and not Sarah Gailey, was the obliged person. But now +Hilda saw Sarah Gailey afraid to go to London, and George Cannon pushing +her forward with all the ruthless strength of his enterprising spirit. And +the sight was extraordinarily, incomprehensibly tragic. Sarah Gailey's +timorous glance seemed to be saying: "I am terrified to go. It isn't beyond +my strength--it's beyond my spirit. But I shall have to go, and I shall +have to seem glad to go. And nobody can save me!"</p> + +<p>And Miss Gailey's excellent silk dress, and her fine apron, and her +primness and dignified manners, and her superb pretence of being undamaged +struck Hilda as intolerably pathetic--so that she was obliged to look away +lest she might weep at the sight of that pathos. Yes, it was a fact that +she could not bear to look! Nor could she bear to let her imagination roam +into Miss Gailey's immediate past! She said to herself: "Only yesterday +morning perhaps she didn't know where her next meal was coming from. He +must have managed somehow to give her some money. Only yesterday morning +perhaps she didn't know where her next meal--If I say that to myself once +more I shall burst out crying!" She balanced her spoon on her teacup and +let it fall.</p> + +<p>"Now, Miss Fidgety!" her mother commented, with good humour. And then +they all heard a knock at the front door.</p> + +<p>"Will Florrie have heard it?" Mrs. Lessways asked nervously. What she +meant was: "Who on earth can this be?" But such questions cannot be put in +the presence of a newly reconciled old friend. It was necessary to behave +as though knocks at the front door were a regular accompaniment of tea.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b1c11">CHAPTER XI</a><br /> DISILLUSION</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>The entrance of George Cannon into the parlour produced a tumult greatly +stimulating the vitality and the self-consciousness of all three women. +Sarah Gailey's excitement was expressed in flushing, and in characteristic +small futile movements of the head and hands, and in monosyllables that +conveyed naught except a vague but keen apprehension. Mrs. Lessways was +perturbed and somewhat apprehensive also; but she was flattered and +pleased. Hilda was frankly suspicious during the first moments. She guessed +that Mr. Cannon was aware of his sister's visit, and that he had come to +further his own purposes. He confirmed her idea by greeting his sister +without apparent surprise; but as, in response to Mrs. Lessways' +insistence, he took off his great overcoat, with those large, powerful +gestures which impress susceptible women and give pleasure even to the +indifferent, he said casually to Sarah Gailey, "I didn't expect to meet you +here, Sally. I've come to have a private word with Mrs. Lessways about +putting one of her Calder Street tenants on to the pavement." Sarah laughed +nervously and said that she would retire, and Mrs. Lessways said that Sarah +would do no such thing, and that she was very welcome to hear all that Mr. +Cannon might have to say concerning the Calder Street property.</p> + +<p>In a minute Mr. Cannon was resplendently sitting down to the table with +them, and rubbing his friendly hands, and admitting that he should not +refuse a cup of tea if pressed. And Hilda received her mother's sharp +instructions to get a cup and saucer from the sideboard and a spoon from +the drawer. She bore these to the table like a handmaid, but like a +delicate and superior handmaid, and it pleased her to constitute herself a +delicate and superior handmaid. Mr. Cannon sat next to her mother, and +Hilda put down the tinkling cup and saucer on the white cloth between them; +and as she did so Mr. Cannon turned and thanked her with a confidential +smile, to which she responded. They were not now employer and employee, but +exclusively in the social world; nevertheless, their business relations +made an intimacy which it was piquant to feel in the home. Moreover, Sarah +Gailey was opposite to them, and Hilda could not keep out of her dark eyes +the intelligence: "If she is here, if you are all amicable together, it is +due to me." Delicious and somehow perilous secret!... Going back to her +seat, she arranged more safely the vast overcoat which he had thrown +carelessly down on her mother's rocking-chair. It was inordinately heavy, +and would have outweighed a dozen of her skimpy little jackets; she, who +would have been lost in it like a cat in a rug, enjoyed the thought of the +force of the creature capable of wearing it lightly for a garment. Withal +the rough, soft surface of it was agreeable to the hand. Out of one of the +immense pockets hung the end of a coloured silk muffler, filmy as anything +that she herself wore.</p> + +<p>Then they were all definitely seated, and Mr. Cannon accepted his tea +from the hand of Mrs. Lessways. The whiteness of his linen, the new +smartness of his suit, the elegance and gallantry of his gestures--these +phenomena incited the women to a responsive emulation; they were something +which it was a feminine duty to live up to. Archness reigned, especially +between the hostess and the caller. Hilda answered to the mood. And Sarah +Gailey, though she said little and never finished a sentence, did her best +to answer to it by noddings and nervous appreciative smiles, and swift +turnings of the head from one to another. When Mr. Cannon and Mrs. +Lessways, in half a dozen serious words interjected among the archness, had +adversely settled the fate of a whole family in Calder Street, there +remained scarcely a trace, in the company's demeanour, of the shamed +consciousness that only two days before its members had been divided by +disastrous enmities and that one of them had lacked the means of life.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>"Oh no! my dear girl! You're too modest--that's what's the matter with +you," said George Cannon eagerly to his half-sister. The epithet flattered +but did not allay her timidity. To Hilda it seemed mysteriously +romantic.</p> + +<p>The supreme topic had worked its way into the conversation. Uppermost in +the minds of all, it seemed to have forced itself out by its own intrinsic +energy, against the will of the company. Impossible to decide who first had +let it forth! But George Cannon had now fairly seized it and run off with +it. He was almost boyishly excited over it. The Latin strain in him +animated his features and his speech. He was a poet as he talked of the +boarding-house that awaited a mistress. He had pulled out of his pocket the +cutting of an advertisement of it from the London <i>Daily Telegraph</i>, a +paper that was never seen in Turnhill. And this bit of paper, describing in +four lines the advantages of the boarding-house, had the effect of giving +the actual house a symbolic reality. "There it is!" he exclaimed, slapping +down the paper. And there it appeared really to be. The bit of paper was +extraordinarily persuasive. It compelled everybody to realize, now for the +first time, that the house did in fact exist. George Cannon had an +overwhelming answer to all timorous objections. The boarding-house was +remunerative; boarders were at that very moment in it. The nominal +proprietor was not leaving it because he was losing money on the +boarding-house, but because he had lost money in another enterprise quite +foreign to it, and had pledged all the contents of the boarding-house as +security. The occasion was one in a thousand, one in a million. He, George +Cannon, through a client, had the entire marvellous affair between his +finger and thumb, and most obviously Sarah Gailey was the woman of all +women for the vacant post at his disposition. Chance was waiting on her. +She had nothing whatever to do but walk into the house as a regent into a +kingdom, and rule. Only, delay was impossible. All was possible except +delay. She would inevitably succeed; she could not fail. And it would be a +family affair....</p> + +<p>Tea was finished and forgotten.</p> + +<p>"For your own sake!" he wound up a peroration. "It really doesn't matter +to me.... Don't you agree with me, Mrs. Lessways?" His glance was a +homage.</p> + +<p>"Oh, you!" exclaimed Mrs. Lessways, smiling happily. "You've only got to +open your mouth, and you'd talk anybody into the middle of next week."</p> + +<p>"Mother!" Hilda mildly reproved. She was convinced now that Mr. Cannon +had come on purpose to clinch the affair.</p> + +<p>He laughed appreciatively.</p> + +<p>"But really! Seriously!" he insisted.</p> + +<p>And Mrs. Lessways, straightening her face, said, with slight +self-consciousness: "Oh, <i>I</i> think it's worth while considering!"</p> + +<p>"There you are!" cried Mr. Cannon to Miss Gailey.</p> + +<p>"I shall be all alone up there!" said Miss Gailey, as cheerfully as she +could.</p> + +<p>"I'll go up with you and see you into the place. I should have to come +back the same night--I'm so tremendously busy just now--what with the paper +and so on."</p> + +<p>"Yes, but--I quite admit all you say, George--but--"</p> + +<p>"Here's another idea," he broke out. "Why don't you ask Mrs. Lessways to +go up with you and stay a week or two? It would be a rare change for her, +and company for you."</p> + +<p>Miss Gailey looked quickly at her old friend.</p> + +<p>"Oh! Bless you!" said Mrs. Lessways. "I've only been to London once, and +that was only for two days--before Hilda was born. I should be no use in +London, at my time of life. I'm one of your home-stayers." Nevertheless it +was plain that the notion appealed to her fancy, and that she would enjoy +flirting with it.</p> + +<p>"Nonsense, Mrs. Lessways!" said George Cannon. "It would do you a world +of good, and it would make all the difference to Sally."</p> + +<p>"That it would!" Sarah agreed, still questioning Caroline with her +watery, appealing eyes. In Caroline, Sarah saw her salvation, and snatched +at it. Caroline could do nothing well; she had no excellence; all that +Caroline could do Sarah could do better. And yet Caroline, by the +mysterious virtue of her dry and yet genial shrewdness, and of the unstable +but reliable equilibrium of her temperament, was the skilled Sarah's +superior. They both knew it and felt it. The lofty Hilda admitted it. +Caroline herself negligently admitted it by a peculiar, brusque, unaffected +geniality of condescension towards Sarah.</p> + +<p>"Do go, mother!" said Hilda. To herself she had been saying: "Another of +his wonderful ideas!" The prospect of being alone in the house with +Florrie, of being free for a space to live her own life untrammelled and +throw all her ardour into her work, was inexpressibly attractive to Hilda. +It promised the most delicious experience that she had ever had.</p> + +<p>"Yes," retorted Mrs. Lessways. "And leave you here by yourself! A nice +thing!"</p> + +<p>"I shall be all right," said Hilda confidently and joyously. She was +sure that the excursion to London had appealed to her mother's latent love +of the unexpected, and that her faculty for accepting placidly whatever +fate offered would prevent her from resisting the pressure that Sarah +Gailey and Mr. Cannon would obviously exert.</p> + +<p>"Shall you!" Mrs. Lessways muttered.</p> + +<p>"Why not take your daughter with you, too?" Mr. Cannon suggested.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" cried Hilda, shocked. "I couldn't possibly leave my work just +now.... The paper just coming out.... You couldn't spare me." She spoke +with pride, using phrases similar to those which he had used to explain to +Sarah Gailey why he could not remain with her in London even for a +night.</p> + +<p>"Oh yes, I could," he answered kindly, lightly, carelessly, +shattering--in his preoccupation with one idea--all her fine, loyal +pretensions. "We should manage all right."</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>She was hurt. She was mortally pierced. The blow was too cruel. She +lowered her glance before his, and fixed it on the table-cloth. Her brow +darkened. Her lower lip bulged out. She was the child again. He had with +atrocious inhumanity reduced her to the unimportance of a child. She had +bestowed on him and his interests the gift of her whole soul, and he had +said that it was negligible. And the worst was that he was perfectly +unaware of what he had done. He had not even observed the symptoms of her +face. He had turned at once to the older women and was continuing the +conversation. He had ridden over her, and ridden on without a look behind. +The conversation moved, after a pause, back to the plausible excuse for his +call. He desired to see some old rent-book which would show how the doomed +tenant in Calder Street had originally fallen into arrears.</p> + +<p>"Where is that old book of Mr. Skellorn's, Hilda?" her mother asked.</p> + +<p>She could not speak. The sob was at her throat. If she had spoken it +would have burst through, and she would have been not merely the child, but +the disgraced child.</p> + +<p>"Hilda!" repeated her mother.</p> + +<p>Her singular silence drew the attention of all. She blushed a sombre +scarlet. No! She could not speak. She cursed herself. "What a little fool I +am! Surely I can..." Useless! She could not speak. She took the one +desperate course open to her, and ran out of the room, to the astonishment +of three puzzled and rather frightened adults. Her shame was now notorious. +"Baby! Great baby!" she gnashed at her own inconceivable silliness. Had she +no pride?... And now she was in the gloom of the lobby, and she could hear +Florrie in the kitchen softly whistling.... She was out in the dark lobby +exactly like a foolish, passionate child.... She knew all the time that she +could easily persuade her mother to leave her alone with Florrie in the +house; she had levers to move her mother.... But of what use, now, to do +that?</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b1c12">CHAPTER XII</a><br /> THE TELEGRAM</h2> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>It was the end of February 1880. A day resembling spring had come, +illusive, but exquisite. Hilda, having started out too hurriedly for the +office after the midday dinner, had had to return home for a proof which +she had forgotten.</p> + +<p>She now had the house to herself, as a kingdom over which she reigned; +for, amid all her humiliation and pensive dejection, she had been able to +exert sufficient harsh force to drive her mother to London in company with +Miss Gailey. She was alone, free; and she tasted her freedom to the point +of ecstasy. She conned corrected proofs at her meals: this was life. When +Florrie came in with another dish, Hilda looked up impatiently from printed +matter, as if disturbed out of a dream, and Florrie put on an apologetic +air, to invoke pardon. It was largely pretence on Hilda's part, but it was +life. Then she had the delicious anxiety of being responsible for Florrie. +"Now, Florrie, I'm going out to-night, to see Miss Orgreave at Bleakridge. +I shall rely on you to go to bed not later than nine. I've got the key. +<i>I may not be back till the last train</i>." "Yes, miss!" And what with +Hilda's solemnity and Florrie's impressed eyes, the ten-forty-five was +transformed into a train that circulated in the dark and mysterious hour +just before cockcrow. Hilda, alone, was always appealing to Florrie's +loyalty. Sometimes when discreetly abolishing some old-fashioned, +work-increasing method of her mother's, she would speak to Florrie in a +tone of sudden, transient intimacy, raising her for a moment to the rank of +an intellectual equal as her voice hinted that her mother after all +belonged to the effete generation.</p> + +<p>Awkwardly, with her gloved hands, turning over the pages of a book in +which the slip-proof had been carelessly left hidden, Hilda, from her +bedroom, heard Florrie come whistling down the attic stairs. Florrie had +certainly heard nothing of her young mistress since the door-bang which had +signalled her departure for the office. In the delusion that she was +utterly solitary in the house, Florrie was whistling, not at all like a +modest young woman, but like a carter. Hilda knew that she could whistle, +and had several times indicated to her indirectly that whistling was +undesirable; but she had never heard her whistling as she whistled now. Her +first impulse was to rush out of the bedroom and 'catch' Florrie and make +her look foolish, but a sense of honour restrained her from a triumph so +mean, and she kept perfectly still. She heard Florrie run into her mother's +bedroom; and then she heard that voice, usually so timid, saying loudly, +exultantly, and even coarsely: "Oh! How beautiful I am! How beautiful I am! +Shan't I just mash the men! Shan't I just mash 'em!" This new and vulgar +word 'mash' offended Hilda.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>She crept noiselessly to the door, which was ajar, and looked forth like +a thief. The door of her mother's room was wide open, and across the +landing she could see Florrie posturing in front of the large mirror of the +wardrobe. The sight shocked her in a most peculiar manner. It was Florrie's +afternoon out, and the child was wearing, for the first time, an old brown +skirt that Hilda had abandoned to her. But in this long skirt she was no +more a child. Although scarcely yet fifteen years old, she was a grown +woman. She had astoundingly developed during her service with Mrs. +Lessways. She was scarcely less tall than Hilda, and she possessed a +sturdy, rounded figure which put Hilda's to shame. It was uncanny--the +precocity of the children of the poor! It was disturbing! On a chair lay +Florrie's new 'serviceable' cloak, and a cheap but sound bonnet: both +articles the fruit of a special journey with her aunt to Baines's drapery +shop at Bursley, where there was a small special sober department for +servants who were wise enough not to yield to the temptation of 'finery.' +Florrie, who at thirteen and a half had never been able to rattle one penny +against another, had since then earned some two thousand five hundred +pennies, and had clothed herself and put money aside and also poured a +shower of silver upon her clamorous family. Amazing feat! Amazing growth! +She seized the 'good' warm cloak and hid her poor old bodice beneath it, +and drew out her thick pig-tail, and shook it into position with a free +gesture of the head; and on the head she poised the bonnet, and tied the +ribbons under the delightful chin. And then, after a moment of hard +scrutiny, danced and whistled, and cried again: "How beautiful I am! How +pretty I am!"</p> + +<p>She was. She positively did not look a bit like a drudge. She was not +the Florrie of the kitchen and of the sack-apron, but a young, fledged +creature with bursting bosom who could trouble any man by the capricious +modesty of a gaze downcast. The miraculous skirt, odious on Hilda, had the +brightness of a new skirt. Her hands and arms were red and chapped, but her +face had bloomed perfect in the kitchen like a flower in a marl-pit. It was +a face that an ambitious girl could rely on. Its charm and the fluid charm +of her movements atoned a thousand times for all her barbaric ignorance and +crudity; the grime on her neck was naught.</p> + +<p>Hilda watched, intensely ashamed of this spying, but she could not bring +herself to withdraw. She was angry with Florrie; she was outraged. Then she +thought: "Why should I be angry? The fact is I'm being mother all over +again. After all, why shouldn't Florrie...?" And she was a little jealous +of Florrie, and a little envious of her, because Florrie had the +naturalness of a savage or of an animal, unsophisticated by ideals of +primness. Hilda was disconcerted at the discovery of Florrie as an +authentic young woman. Florrie, more than seven years her junior! She felt +experienced, and indulgent as the old are indulgent. For the first time in +her life she did honestly feel old. And she asked herself--half in dismay: +"Florrie has got thus far. Where am <i>I</i>? What am <i>I</i> doing?" It +was upsetting.</p> + +<p>At length Florrie took off the bonnet and ran upstairs, and shut the +door of her attic. Apparently she meant to improve the bonnet by some +touch. After waiting nervously a few moments, the aged Hilda slipped +silently downstairs, and through the kitchen, and so by the garden, where +with their feet in mire the hare trees were giving signs of hope under the +soft blue sky, into the street. Florrie would never know that she had been +watched.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>Ten minutes later, when she went into the office of Dayson & Co., +Hilda was younger than ever. It was a young, fragile girl, despite the dark +frown of her intense seriousness, who with accustomed gestures poked the +stove, and hung bonnet and jacket on a nail and then sat down to the loaded +desk; it was an ingenuous girl absurdly but fiercely anxious to shoulder +the world's weight. She had passed a whole night in revolt against George +Cannon's indignity; she had called it, furiously, an insult. She had said +to herself: "Well, if I'm so useless as all that, I'll never go near his +office again." But the next afternoon she had appeared as usual at the +office, meek, modest, with a smile, fatigued and exquisitely resigned, and +a soft voice. And she had worked with even increased energy and devotion. +This kissing of the rod, this irrational instinctive humility, was a +strange and sweet experience for her. Such was the Hilda of the office; but +Hilda at home, cantankerous, obstinate, and rude, had offered a remarkable +contrast to her until the moment when it was decided that her mother should +accompany Miss Gailey to London. From that moment Hilda at home had been an +angel, and the Hilda of the office had shown some return of sturdy +pride.</p> + +<p>To-day the first number of <i>The Five Towns Chronicle</i> was to go to +press.... The delays had been inexplicable and exasperating to Hilda, +though she had not criticized them, even to herself; they were now over. +The town had no air of being excited about the appearance of its new paper. +But the office was excited. The very room itself looked feverish. It was +changed; more tables had been brought into it, and papers and litter had +accumulated enormously; it was a room humanized by habitation, with a +physiognomy that was individual and sympathetic.</p> + +<p>From beyond the closed door of the inner room came the sound of men's +rapid voices. Hilda could distinguish Mr. Cannon's and Arthur Dayson's; +there was a third, unfamiliar to her. Having nothing to do, she began to +make work, rearranging the contents of her table, fingering with a +factitious hurry the thick bundles of proofs of correspondence from the +villages (so energetically organized by the great Dayson), and the now +useless 'copy,' and the innumerable letters, that Dayson was always +disturbing, and the samples of encaustic tiles brought in by an inventor +who desired the powerful aid of the press, and the catalogues, and Dayson's +cuttings from the Manchester, Birmingham, and London papers, and the +notepaper and envelopes and cards, and Veale Chifferiel & Co.'s almanac +that had somehow come up with other matters from Mr. Karkeek's office +below. And then she dusted, with pursed lips that blamed the disgraceful +and yet excusable untidiness of men, and then she examined, with despair +and with pride, her dirty little hands, whose finger-tips all clustered +together (they were now like the hands of a nice, careless schoolboy), and +lightly dusted one against the other. Then she found a galley-proof under +the table. It was a duplicate proof of <i>The Five Towns Chronicle's</i> +leading article, dictated to her by a prodigious Arthur Dayson, in Mr. +Cannon's presence, on the previous day, and dealing faithfully with "The +Calder Street Scandal" and with Mr. Enville, a member of the Local +Board--implicated in the said scandal. The proof was useless now, for the +leader-page was made up. Nevertheless, Hilda carefully classified it "in +case..."</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>On a chair was <i>The Daily Telegraph</i>, which Dayson had evidently +been reading, for it was blue pencilled. Hilda too must read it; her duty +was to read it: Dayson had told her that she ought never to neglect the +chance of reading any newspaper whatever, and that a young woman in her +responsible situation could not possibly know too much. Which advice, +though it came from a person ridiculous to her, seemed sound enough, and +was in fact rather flattering. In the <i>Telegraph</i> she saw, between +Dayson's blue lines, an account of a terrible military disaster. She was +moved by it in different ways. It produced in her a grievous, horror-struck +desolation; but it also gave her an extraordinary sensation of fervid +pleasure. It was an item of news that would have to appear in the +<i>Chronicle</i>, and this would mean changes in the make-up, and work at +express speed, and similar delights. Already the paper was supposed to be +on the machine, though in fact, as she well knew, it was not. No doubt the +subject of discussion in the inner room was the disaster!... Yes, she was +acutely and happily excited. And always afterwards, when she heard or saw +the sinister word 'Majuba' (whose political associations never in the least +interested her), she would recall her contradictory, delicious feelings on +that dramatic afternoon.</p> + +<p>While she was busily cutting out the news from the <i>Telegraph</i> to +be ready for Arthur Dayson, there was a very timid knock at the door, and +Florrie entered, as into some formidable cabinet of tyrannic rulers.</p> + +<p>"If you please, miss--" she began to whisper.</p> + +<p>"Why, Florrie," Hilda exclaimed, "what have you put that old skirt on +for, when I've given you mine? I told you--"</p> + +<p>"I did put it on, miss. But there came a telegram. I told the boy you +were here, but he said that wasn't no affair of his, so I brought it +myself, and I thought you wouldn't care for to see me in your skirt, miss, +not while on duty, miss, 'specially here like! So I up quick and changed it +back."</p> + +<p>"Telegram?" Hilda repeated the word.</p> + +<p>Florrie, breathless after running and all this whispering, advanced in +the prettiest confusion towards the throne, and Hilda took the telegram +with a gesture as casual as she could manage. Florrie's abashed mien, and +the arrival of the telegram, stiffened her back and steadied her hand. +Imagine that infant being afraid of her, Hilda! This too was life! And the +murmur of the men in the inner room was thrilling to Hilda's ears.</p> + +<p>She brusquely opened the telegram and read: "Lessways, Lessways Street, +Turnhill. Mother ill. Can you come?--Gailey."</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b1c13">CHAPTER XIII</a><br /> HILDA'S WORLD</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>The conversation in the inner room promised to be interminable. Hilda +could not decide what to do. She felt no real alarm on her mother's +account. Mrs. Lessways, often slightly indisposed, was never seriously ill; +she possessed one of those constitutions which do not go to extremes of +disease; if a malady overtook her, she invariably 'had' it in a mild form. +Doubtless Sarah Gailey, preoccupied and worried by new responsibilities, +desired to avoid the added care of nursing the sick. Hence the telegram. +Moreover, if the case had been grave, she would not have put the telegram +in the interrogative; she would have written, 'Please come at once.' No, +Hilda was not unduly disturbed. Nevertheless, she had an odd idea that she +ought to rush to the station and catch the next train, which left Knype at +five minutes to four; this idea did not spring from her own conscience, but +rather from the old-fashioned collective family conscience. But at a +quarter to four, when it was already too late to catch the local train at +Turnhill, the men had not emerged from the inner room; nor had Hilda come +to any decision. As the departure of her mother and Miss Gailey had +involved much solemn poring over time-tables, it happened that she knew the +times of all the trains to London; to catch the next and last she would +have to leave Turnhill at <i>5.55</i>. She said that she would wait and +see. Her work for the first number of the paper was practically done, but +there was this mysterious conclave which fretted her curiosity and +threatened exciting development; also the Majuba disaster would mean +trouble for somebody. And in any event she hated the very thought of +quitting Turnhill before the <i>Chronicle</i> was definitely out. She had +lived for the moment of its publication, and she could not bear to miss it. +She was almost angry with her mother; she was certainly angry with Miss +Gailey. All the egotism of the devotee in her was aroused and irate.</p> + +<p>Then the men came forth from the inner room, with a rather unexpected +suddenness. Mr. Cannon appeared first; and after him Mr. Enville; lastly +Arthur Dayson, papers in hand. Intimidated by the presence of the stranger, +Hilda affected to be busy at her table. Mr. Enville shook hands very +amicably with George Cannon, and instantly departed. As he passed down the +stairs she caught sight of him; he was a grizzled man of fifty, lean and +shabby, despite his reputation for riches. She knew that he was a candidate +for the supreme position of Chief Bailiff at the end of the year, and he +did not accord with her spectacular ideal of a Chief Bailiff; the actual +Chief Bailiff was a beautiful and picturesque old man, with perfectly +tended white whiskers, and always a flower in his coat. Further, she could +not reconcile this nearly effusive friendliness between Mr. Enville and Mr. +Cannon with the animadversions of the leading article which Arthur Dayson +had composed, and Mr. Cannon had approved, only twenty-four hours +earlier.</p> + +<p>As Mr. Cannon shut the door at the head of the stairs, she saw him give +a discreet, disdainful wink to Dayson. Then he turned sharply to Hilda, and +said, thoughtful and stern:</p> + +<p>"Your notebook, please."</p> + +<p>Bracing herself, and still full of pride in her ability to write this +mysterious shorthand, she opened her notebook, and waited with poised +pencil. The mien of the two men had communicated to her an excitement far +surpassing their own, in degree and in felicity. The whole of her vital +force was concentrated at the point of her pencil, and she seemed to be +saying to herself: "I'm very sorry, mother, but see how important this is! +I shall consider what I can do for you the very moment I am free."</p> + +<p>Arthur Dayson coughed and plumped heavily on a chair.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>It was in such moments as this that Dayson really lived, with all the +force of his mediocrity. George Cannon was not a journalist; he could +compose a letter, but he had not the trick of composing an article. He +felt, indeed, a negligent disdain for the people who possessed this trick, +as for performers in a circus; he certainly did not envy them, for he knew +that he could buy them, as a carpenter buys tools. His attitude was that of +the genuine bourgeois towards the artist: possessive, incurious, and +contemptuous. Dayson, however, ignored George Cannon's attitude, perhaps +did not even perceive what it was. He gloried in his performance. +Accustomed to dictate extempore speeches on any subject whatever to his +shorthand pupils, he was quite at his ease, quite master of his faculties, +and self-satisfaction seemed to stand out on his brow like genial sweat +while the banal phrases poured glibly from the cavern behind his jagged +teeth; and each phrase was a perfect model of provincial journalese. George +Cannon had to sit and listen,--to approve, or at worst to make tentative +suggestions.</p> + +<p>The first phrase which penetrated through the outer brain of the +shorthand writer to the secret fastness where Hilda sat in judgment on the +world was this:</p> + +<p>"The campaign of vulgar vilification inaugurated yesterday by our +contemporary <i>The Staffordshire Signal</i> against our esteemed +fellow-townsman Mr. Richard Enville..."</p> + +<p>This phrase came soon after such phrases as "Our first bow to the +public"... "Our solemn and bounden duty to the district which it is our +highest ambition to serve..." etc. Phrases which had already occurred in +the leading article dictated on the previous day.</p> + +<p>Hilda soon comprehended that in twenty-four hours Mr. Enville, from +being an unscrupulous speculator who had used his official position to make +illicit profits out of the sale of land to the town for town improvements, +had become the very mirror of honesty and high fidelity to the noblest +traditions of local government. Without understanding the situation, and +before even she had formulated to herself any criticism of the persons +concerned, she felt suddenly sick. She dared not look at George Cannon, but +once when she raised her head to await the flow of a period that had been +arrested at a laudatory superlative, she caught Dayson winking coarsely at +him. She hated Dayson for that; George Cannon might wink at Dayson (though +she regretted the condescending familiarity), but Dayson had no right to +presume to wink at George Cannon. She hoped that Mr. Cannon had silently +snubbed him.</p> + +<p>As the article proceeded there arose a crying from the Square below. A +<i>Signal</i> boy, one of the earliest to break the silent habit of the +Square, was bawling a fresh edition of Arthur Dayson's contemporary, and +across the web of the dictator's verbiage she could hear the words: "South +Africa--Details--" Mr. Cannon glanced at his watch impatiently. Hilda could +see, under her bent and frowning brow, his white hand moving on the dark +expanse of his waistcoat.</p> + +<p>Immediately afterwards Mr. Cannon, interrupting, said:</p> + +<p>"That'll be all right. Finish it. I must be off."</p> + +<p>"Right you are!" said Dayson grandly. "I'll run down with it to the +printer's myself--soon as it's copied."</p> + +<p>Mr. Cannon nodded. "And tell him we've got to be on the railway +bookstalls first thing to-morrow morning."</p> + +<p>"He'll never do it."</p> + +<p>"He must do it. I don't care if he works all night."</p> + +<p>"But--"</p> + +<p>"There hasn't got to be any 'buts,' Dayson. There's been a damned sight +too much delay as it is."</p> + +<p>"All right! All right!" Dayson placated him hastily.</p> + +<p>Mr. Cannon departed.</p> + +<p>It seemed to Hilda that she shivered, but whether with pain or pleasure +she knew not. Never before had Mr. Cannon sworn in her presence. All day +his manner had been peculiar, as though the strain of mysterious anxieties +was changing his spirit. And now he was gone, and she had said naught to +him about the telegram from Miss Gailey!</p> + +<p>Arthur Dayson rolled oratorically on in defence of the man whom +yesterday he had attacked.</p> + +<p>And then Sowter, the old clerk, entered.</p> + +<p>"What is it? Don't interrupt me!" snapped Dayson.</p> + +<p>"There's the <i>Signal</i>.... Latest details.... This here Majuba +business!"</p> + +<p>"What do I care about your Majuba?" Dayson retorted. "I've got something +more important than your Majuba."</p> + +<p>"It was the governor as told me to give it you," said Sowter, +restive.</p> + +<p>"Well, give it me, then; and don't waste my time!" Dayson held out an +imperial hand for the sheet. He looked at Hilda as if for moral support and +added, to her, in a martyred tone: "I suppose I shall have to dash off a +few lines about Sowter's Majuba while you're copying out my article."</p> + +<p>"And the governor said to remind you that Mr. Enville wants a proof of +his advertisement," Sowter called out sulkily as he was disappearing down +the stairs.</p> + +<p>Hilda blushed, as she had blushed in writing George Cannon's first lie +about the printing of the first issue. She had accustomed herself to lies, +and really without any difficulty or hesitation. Yes! She had even reached +the level of being religiously proud of them! But now her bullied and +crushed conscience leaped up again, and in the swift alarm of the shock her +heart was once more violently beating. Yet amid the wild confusion of her +feelings, a mechanical intelligence guided her hand to follow Arthur +Dayson's final sentences. And there shone out from her soul a contempt for +the miserable hack, so dazzling that it would have blinded him--had he not +been already blind.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>That evening she sat alone in the office. The first number of <i>The +Five Towns Chronicle</i>, after the most astounding adventures, had +miraculously gone to press. Dayson and Sowter had departed. There was no +reason why Hilda should remain,--burning gas to no purpose. She had +telegraphed, by favour of a Karkeek office-boy, to Miss Gailey, saying that +she would come by the first train on the morrow--Saturday, and she had +therefore much to do at home. Nevertheless, she sat idle in the office, +unable to leave. Her whole life was in that office, and it was just when +she was most weary of the environment that she would vacillate longest +before quitting it. She was unhappy and apprehensive, much less about her +mother than about the attitude of her conscience towards the morals of this +new world of hers. The dramatic Enville incident had spoiled the pleasure +which she had felt in sacrificing her formal duty as a daughter to her duty +as a clerk. She had been disillusioned. She foresaw the future with +alarm.</p> + +<p>And yet, strangely, the disillusion and the fear were a source of +pleasure. She savoured them with her loyalty, that loyalty which had +survived even the frightful blow of George Cannon's casual disdain at her +mother's tea-table! Whatever this new world might be, it was hers, it was +precious. She would no more think of abandoning it than a young mother +would think of abandoning a baby obviously imperfect.... Nay, she would +cling to it the tighter!</p> + +<p>George Cannon came up the stairs with his decisive and rapid step. She +rose from her chair at the table as he entered. He was wearing a new +overcoat, that she had never seen before, with a fine velvet collar.</p> + +<p>"You're going?" he asked, a little breathless.</p> + +<p>"I <i>was</i> going," she replied in her clear, timid voice, implying +that she was ready to stay.</p> + +<p>"Everything all right?"</p> + +<p>"Mr. Dayson said so."</p> + +<p>"He's gone?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. Mr. Sowter's gone too."</p> + +<p>"Good!" he murmured. And he straightened his shoulders, and, putting his +hands in the pockets of his trousers, began to walk about the room.</p> + +<p>Hilda moved to get her bonnet and jacket. She moved very quietly and +delicately, and, because he was there, she put on her bonnet and jacket +with gestures of an almost apologetic modesty. He seemed to ignore her, so +that she was able to glance surreptitiously at his face. He was now +apparently less worried. Still, it was an enigmatic face. She had no notion +of what he had been doing since his hurried exit in the afternoon. He might +have been attending to his legal practice, or he might have been abroad on +mysterious errands.</p> + +<p>"Funny business, this newspaper business is, isn't it?" he remarked, +after a moment. "Just imagine Enville, now! Upon my soul I didn't think he +had it in him!... Of course,"--he threw his head up with a careless +laugh,--"of course, it would have been madness for us to miss such a +chance! He's one of the men of the future, in this town."</p> + +<p>"Yes," she agreed, in an eager whisper.</p> + +<p>In an instant George Cannon had completely changed the attitude of her +conscience,--by less than a phrase, by a mere intonation. In an instant he +had reassured her into perfect security. It was plain, from every accent of +his voice, that he had done nothing of which he thought he ought to be +ashamed. Business was business, and newspapers were newspapers; and the +simple truth was that her absurd conscience had been in the wrong. Her duty +was to accept the standards of her new world. Who was she? Nobody! She did +accept the standards of her new world, with fervour. She was proud of them, +actually proud of their apparent wickedness. She had accomplished an act of +faith. Her joy became intense, and shot glinting from her eyes as she put +on her gloves. Her life became grand to her. She knew she was known in the +town as 'the girl who could write shorthand.' Her situation was not +ordinary; it was unique. Again, the irregularity of the hours, and the fact +that the work never commenced till the afternoon, seemed to her romantic +and beautiful. Here she was, at nine o'clock, alone with George Cannon on +the second floor of the house! And who, gazing from the Square at the +lighted window, would guess that she and he were there alone?</p> + +<p>All the activities of newspaper production were poetized by her fervour. +The <i>Chronicle</i> was not a poor little weekly sheet, struggling into +existence anyhow, at haphazard, dependent on other newspapers for all +except purely local items of news. It was an organ! It was the courageous +rival of the ineffable <i>Signal</i>, its natural enemy! One day it would +trample on the <i>Signal</i>! And though her rôle was humble, though +she understood scarcely anything of the enterprise beyond her own duties, +yet she was very proud of her rôle too. And she was glad that the men +were seemingly so careless, so disorderly, so forgetful of details, so--in +a word--childish! For it was part of her rôle to remind them, to set +them right, to watch over their carelessness, to restore order where they +had left disorder. In so far as her rôle affected them, she +condescended to them.</p> + +<p>She informed George Cannon of her mother's indisposition, and that she +meant to go to London the next morning, and to return most probably in a +few days. He stopped in his walk, near her. Like herself, he was not +seriously concerned about Mrs. Lessways, but he showed a courteous +sympathy.</p> + +<p>"It's a good thing you didn't go to London when your mother went," he +said, after a little conversation.</p> + +<p>He did not add: "You've been indispensable." He had no air of +apologizing for his insult at the tea-table. But he looked firmly at her, +with a peculiar expression.</p> + +<p>Suddenly she felt all her slimness and fragility; she felt all the girl +in herself and all the dominant man in him, and all the empty space around +them. She went hot. Her sight became dim. She was ecstatically blissful; +she was deeply ashamed. She desired the experience to last for ever, and +him and herself to be eternally moveless; and at the same time she desired +to fly. Or rather, she had no desire to fly, but her voice and limbs acted +of themselves, against her volition.</p> + +<p>"Good-night, then."</p> + +<p>"But I say! Your wages. Shall I pay you now?"</p> + +<p>"No, no! It doesn't matter in the least, thanks."</p> + +<p>He shook hands with a careless, good-natured smile, which seemed to be +saying: "Foolish creature! You can't defend yourself, and these airs are +amusing. But I am benevolent." And she was ashamed of her shame, and +furious against the childishness that made her frown, and lower her eyes, +and escape out of the room like a mouse.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b1c14">CHAPTER XIV</a><br /> TO LONDON</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>In the middle of the night Hilda woke up, and within a few seconds she +convinced herself that her attitude to Miss Gailey's telegram had been +simply monstrous. She saw it, in the darkness, as an enormity. She ought to +have responded to the telegram at once; she ought to have gone to London by +the afternoon train. What had there been to prevent her from knocking at +the door of the inner room, and saying to Mr. Cannon, in the presence of no +matter whom: "I am very sorry, Mr. Cannon, but I've just had a telegram +that mother is ill in London, and I must leave by the next train"? There +had been nothing to prevent her! At latest she should have caught the +evening train. Business was of no account in such a crisis. Her mother +might be very ill, might be dying, might be dead. It was not for trifles +that people sent such telegrams. The astounding thing was that she should +have been so blind to her obvious duty.... And she said to herself, +thinking with a mysterious and beautiful remorse of the last minute of her +talk with Mr. Cannon: "If I had done as I ought to have done, I should have +been in London, or on my way to London, instead of in the room with him +there; and <i>that</i> would not have occurred!" But what 'that' was, she +could not have explained. Nevertheless, Mr. Cannon's phrase, "It's a good +thing you didn't go to London," still gave her a pleasure, though the +pleasure was dulled.</p> + +<p>Then she tried to reassure herself. Sarah Gailey was nervous and easily +frightened. Her mother had an excellent constitution. The notion of her +mother being seriously ill was silly. In a few hours she would be with her +mother, and would be laughing at these absurd night-fears. In any case +there would assuredly be a letter from Sarah Gailey by the first post, so +that before starting she would have exact information. She succeeded, +partially, in reassuring herself for a brief space; but soon she was more +unhappy than ever in the clear conviction of her wrongdoing. Again and +again she formulated, in her fancy, scenes of the immediate future, as for +example at her mother's dying bed, and she imagined conversations and +repeated the actual words used by herself and others, interminably. And +then she returned to the previous day, and hundreds of times she went into +the inner room and said to Mr. Cannon: "I'm very sorry, Mr. Cannon, but +I've just had a telegram--" etc. Why had she not said it?... Thus worked +the shuttles of her mind, with ruthless, insane insistence, until she knew +not whether she was awake or asleep, and the very tissues of her physical +brain seemed raw.</p> + +<p>She thought feebly: "If I got up and lighted the candle and walked +about, I should end this." But she could not rise. She was netted down to +the bed. And when she tried to soothe herself with other images--images of +delight--she found that they had lost their power. Undressing, a few hours +earlier, she had lived again, in exquisite and delicious alarm, through the +last minute of her talk with Mr. Cannon; she had gone to sleep while +reconstituting those instants. But now their memory left her indifferent, +even inspired repugnance. And her remorse little by little lost its +mysterious beauty.</p> + +<p>She clung to the idea of the reassuring letter which she would receive. +That was her sole glint of consolation.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>At six she was abroad in the house, intensely alive, intensely conscious +of every particle of her body, and of every tiniest operation of her mind. +In less than two hours the letter would drop into the lobby! At half-past +six both she and Florrie were dressed, and Florrie, stern with the +solemnity and importance of her mission, was setting forth to the Saracen's +Head to order a cab to be at the door at eight o'clock.</p> + +<p>Hilda had much to do, for it was of course necessary to shut up the +house, and the packing of her trunk had to be finished, and the trunk +locked and corded, and a label found; and there was breakfast to cook. Mrs. +Lessways would have easily passed a couple of days in preparing the house +for closure. Nevertheless, time, instead of flying, lagged. At seven-thirty +Hilda, in the partially dismantled parlour, and Florrie in the kitchen, +were sitting down to breakfast. "In a quarter of an hour," said Hilda to +herself, "the post will be here." But in four minutes she had eaten the +bacon and drunk the scalding tea, and in five she had carried all the +breakfast-things into the kitchen, where Florrie was loudly munching over +the sloppy deal table. She told Florrie sharply that there would be ample +time to wash up. Then she went to her bedroom, and, dragging out her trunk, +slid it unaided down the stairs. Back again in the bedroom, she carelessly +glanced at the money in her purse, and then put on her things for the +journey. Waiting, she stood at the window to look for the postman. +Presently she saw him in the distance; he approached quickly, but spent an +unendurable minute out of sight in the shop next door. When he emerged +Hilda was in anguish. Had he a letter for her? Had he not? He seemed to +waver at the gateway, and to decide to enter.... She heard the double blow +of his drumstick baton.... Now in a few seconds she would know about her +mother.</p> + +<p>Proudly restraining herself, she walked with composure to the stairs. +She was astonished to see Florrie bending down to pick up the letter. +Florrie must have been waiting ready to rush to the front door. As she +raised her body and caught sight of Hilda, Florrie blushed.</p> + +<p>The stairs were blocked by the trunk which Hilda had left on the +stair-mat for the cabman to deal with. Standing behind the trunk, Hilda +held forth her hand for the letter.</p> + +<p>"Please, miss, it's for me," Florrie whispered, like a criminal.</p> + +<p>"For you?" Hilda cried, startled.</p> + +<p>In proof Florrie timidly exposed the envelope, on which Hilda plainly +saw, in a coarse, scrawling masculine hand, the words "Miss Florrie +Bagster." Florrie's face was a burning peony.</p> + +<p>Hilda turned superciliously away, too proud to demand any explanations. +All her alarms were refreshed by the failure of a letter from Miss Gailey. +In vain she urged to herself that Miss Gailey had thought it unnecessary to +write, expecting to see her; or that the illness having passed, Miss +Gailey, busy, had put off writing. She could not dismiss a vision of a +boarding-house in London upset from top to bottom by the grave illness of +one person in it, and a distracted landlady who had not a moment even to +scribble a post card. And all the time, as this vision tore and desolated +her, she was thinking: "Fancy that child having a follower, at her age! +She's certainly got a follower!"</p> + +<p>The cab came five minutes before it was due.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>As the cab rolled through Market Square, where the Saturday stalls were +being busily set up, the ironmongery building was framed for an instant by +the oblong of the rattling window. Hilda seemed to see the place anew--for +the first time. A man was taking down the shutters of the shop. Above that +were the wire-blinds with the name of "Q. Karkeek"; and above the blinds +the blue posters of the <i>Five Towns Chronicle</i>. No outward sign of Mr. +Cannon! And yet Mr. Cannon.... She had an extremely disconcerting sensation +of the mysteriousness of Mr. Cannon, and of the mysteriousness of all +existence. Mr. Cannon existed somewhere at that moment, engaged in some +activity. In a house afar off, unknown to her, her mother existed--if she +was not dead! Florrie, with a bundle of personal goods on her lap, and +doubtless the letter in her bosom, sat impressed and subdued, opposite to +her in the shifting universe of the cab, which was moving away from the +empty and silent home. Florrie was being thrown back out of luxury into her +original hovel, and was accepting the stroke with the fatalism of the young +and of the poor. And one day Hilda and her mother and Florrie would be +united again in the home now deserted, whose heavy key was in the +traveller's satchel.... But would they?</p> + +<p>At the station there was a quarter of an hour to wait. Hilda dismissed +Florrie, with final injunctions, and followed her trunk to the bleak +platform. The old porter was very kind. She went to the little yellow +bookstall. There, under her hand, was a low pile of <i>The Five Towns +Chronicle.</i> Miracle! Miraculous George Cannon! She flushed with pride, +with a sense of ownership, as she took a penny from her purse to pay for a +copy.</p> + +<p>"It's th' new peeper," drawled the bookstall lad, with a most foolish +condescension towards the new paper.</p> + +<p>"Lout!" she addressed him in her heart. "If you knew whom you were +talking to--!"</p> + +<p>With what pride, masked by careful indifference, she would hand the copy +of the <i>Chronicle</i> to her mother! Her mother would exclaim "Bless us!" +and spend a day or two in conning the thing, making singular discoveries in +it at short intervals.</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>It was not until she had reached Euston, and driven through a tumultuous +and shabby thoroughfare to King's Cross, and taken another ticket, and +installed herself in another train, that Hilda began to feel suddenly, like +an abyss opening beneath her strength, the lack of food. Meticulous in her +clerical duties, and in many minor mechanical details of her personal daily +existence, she was capable of singular negligences concerning matters which +the heroic part of her despised and which did not immediately bear on a +great purpose in hand. Thus, in her carelessness, she found herself with +less than two shillings in her pocket after paying for the ticket to +Hornsey. She thought, grimly resigned: "Never heed! I shall manage. In half +an hour I shall be there, and my anxiety will be at an end."</p> + +<p>The train, almost empty, waited forlornly in a forlorn and empty part of +the huge, resounding ochreish station. Then, without warning or signal, it +slipped off, as though casually, towards an undetermined goal. Often it ran +level with the roofs of vague, far-stretching acres of houses--houses vile +and frowsy, and smoking like pyres in the dank air. And always it travelled +on a platform of brick arches. Now and then the walled road received a +tributary that rounded subtly into it, and this tributary could be seen +curving away, on innumerable brick arches, through the chimneypots, and +losing itself in a dim horizon of gloom. At intervals a large, lifeless +station brought the train to a halt for a moment, and the march was +resumed. A clock at one of these stations said a quarter to two.</p> + +<p>Then the name of Hornsey quickened her apprehensive heart. As she +descended nervously from the train, her trunk was shot out from the guard's +van behind. She went and stood over it, until the last of a series of +kindly porters came along and touched his cap. When she asked for a cab, he +seemed doubtful whether a cab was available, and looked uncertainly along +the immense empty platform and across at other platforms. The train had +wandered away. She strove momentarily to understand the reason of these +great sleeping stations; but fatigue, emotional and physical, had robbed +her of all intelligent curiosity in the phenomena of the mysterious and +formidable city.</p> + +<p>Presently the porter threw the trunk on his shoulder and she trudged +after him up steps and over an iron bridge and down steps; and an express +whizzed like a flying shell through the station and vanished. And at a +wicket, in a ragged road, there actually stood a cab and a skeleton of a +horse between the shafts. The driver bounced up, enheartened at sight of +the trunk and the inexperienced, timid girl; but the horse did not stir in +its crooked coma.</p> + +<p>"What address, miss?" asked the cabman.</p> + +<p>"Cedars House, Harringay Park Road."</p> + +<p>The cabman paused in intense thought, and after a few seconds responded +cheerfully: "Yes, miss."</p> + +<p>The porter touched his cap for threepence. The lashed horse plunged +forward. Hilda leaned back in the creaking and depraved vehicle, and +sighed, "So this is their London!"</p> + +<p>She found herself travelling in the direction from which she had come, +parallel to the railway, down the longest street that she had ever seen. On +her left were ten thousand small new houses, all alike. On her right were +broken patches of similar houses, interspersed with fragments of green +field and views of the arches of the railway; the conception of the +horrible patience which had gone to the construction of these endless, +endless arches made her feel sick.</p> + +<p>The cab turned into another road, and another; and then stopped. She saw +the words "Cedars House" on a gateway. She could not open the door of the +cab. The cabman opened it.</p> + +<p>"Blinds down here, miss!" he said, with appropriate mournfulness.</p> + +<p>It seemed a rather large house; and every blind was drawn. Had the +incredible occurred, then? Had this disaster befallen just her, of all the +young women in the world?</p> + +<p>She saw the figure of Sarah Gailey.</p> + +<p>"Good afternoon," she called out calmly. "Here I am. Only I'm afraid I +haven't got enough to pay the cabman."</p> + +<p>But while she was speaking she knew from Sarah Gailey's face that the +worst and the most ridiculous of her night-fears had been justified by +destiny.</p> + +<p>Three days previously Mrs. Lessways had been suddenly taken ill in the +street. A doctor passing in his carriage had come to her assistance and +driven her home. Food eaten on the previous evening had 'disagreed' with +her. At first the case was not regarded as very serious. But as the patient +did not improve in the night Miss Gailey telegraphed to Hilda. Immediately +afterwards, the doctor, summoned in alarm, diagnosed peritonitis caused by +a perforating cancer. Mrs. Lessways had died on the third day at eleven in +the morning, while Hilda was in the train. Useless to protest that these +catastrophes were unthinkable, that Mrs. Lessways had never been ill in her +life! The catastrophe had happened. And upstairs a corpse lay in proof.</p> + +<hr /> + + + + +<h1><a name="b2">BOOK II</a><br /> HER RECOVERY</h1> + + + + +<h2><a name="b2c1">CHAPTER I</a><br /> SIN</h2> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>From her bed Hilda could see the trees waving in the wind. Every morning +she had thus watched them, without interest. At first the branches had been +utterly bare, and beyond their reticulation had been visible the rosy +façade of a new Board-school. But now the branches were rich with +leafage, hiding most of the Board-school, so that only a large upper window +of it could be seen. This window, upon which the sun glinted dazzlingly, +threw back the rays on to Hilda's bed, giving her for a few moments the +illusion of direct sunlight. The hour was eleven o'clock. On the +night-table lay a tea-tray in disorder, and on the turned-down sheet some +crumbs of toast. A low, nervous tap at the door caused Hilda to stir in the +bed. Sarah Gailey entered hurriedly. In her bony yellowed hand she held a +collection of tradesmen's account-books.</p> + +<p>"Good morning, dear, how are you?" she asked, bending awkwardly over the +bed. In the same instant she looked askance at the tray.</p> + +<p>"I'm all right, thanks," said Hilda lazily, observing the ceiling.</p> + +<p>"You haven't been too cold without the eiderdown? I forgot to ask you +before. You know I only took it off because I thought the weather was +getting too warm.... I didn't want it for another bed. I assure you it's in +the chest of drawers in my room." Sarah Gailey added the last words as if +supplicating to be believed.</p> + +<p>"You needn't tell me that," said Hilda. She was not angry, but bored, by +this characteristic remark of Miss Gailey's. In three months she had learnt +a great deal about the new landlady of the Cedars, that strange neurotic +compound of ability, devotion, thin-skinned vanity, and sheer, narrow +stupidity. "I've been quite warm enough," Hilda added as quickly as she +could, lest Miss Gailey might have time to convince herself to the +contrary.</p> + +<p>"And the toast? I do hope--after all I've said to that Hettie +about--"</p> + +<p>"You see I've eaten it all," Hilda interrupted her, pointing to the +plate.</p> + +<p>Their faces were close together; they exchanged a sad smile. Miss Gailey +was still bending over her, anxiously, as over a child. Yet neither the +ageing and worn woman nor the flaccid girl felt the difference between them +in age. Nor was Hilda in any ordinary sense ill. The explanation of Miss +Gailey's yearning attitude lay in an exaggerated idea of her duty to Hilda, +whose mother's death had been the result of an act of friendliness to her. +If Mrs. Lessways had not come to London in order to keep company with +Sarah, she might--she would, under Providence--have been alive and well +that day; such was Sarah's reasoning, which by the way ignored certain +statements of the doctor. Sarah would never forgive herself. But she +sought, by an infatuated devotion, to earn the forgiveness of Caroline's +daughter. Her attentions might have infuriated an earlier Hilda, or at +least have been met with disdain only half concealed. But on the present +actual Hilda they produced simply no effect of any kind. The actual Hilda, +living far within the mysterious fastness of her own being, was too +solitary, too preoccupied, and too fatigued, to be touched even by the +noble beauty that distinguished the expiatory and protective gesture of the +spinster, otherwise somewhat ludicrous, as she leaned across the bed and +cut off the sunshine.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>On the morning of her mother's funeral, Hilda had gone to Hornsey +Station to meet an uncle of Mrs. Lessways, who was coming down from +Scotland by the night-train. She scarcely knew him, but he was to be +recognizable by his hat and his muffler, and she was to await him at the +ticket-gate. An entirely foolish and unnecessary arrangement, contrived by +a peculiar old man: the only possible course was to accept it.</p> + +<p>She had waited over half an hour, between eight and nine, and in that +time she had had full opportunity to understand why those suburban stations +had been built so large. A dark torrent of human beings, chiefly men, +gathered out of all the streets of the vicinity, had dashed unceasingly +into the enclosure and covered the long platforms with tramping feet. Every +few minutes a train rolled in, as if from some inexhaustible magazine of +trains beyond the horizon, and, sucking into itself a multitude and +departing again, left one platform for one moment empty,--and the next +moment the platform was once more filled by the quenchless stream. Less +frequently, but still often, other trains thundered through the station on +a line removed from platforms, and these trains too were crammed with dark +human beings, frowning in study over white newspapers. For even in 1880 the +descent upon London from the suburbs was a formidable phenomenon. Train +after train fled downwards with its freight towards the hidden city, and +the torrent still surged, more rapid than ever, through the narrow gullet +of the station. It was like the flight of some enormous and excited +population from a country menaced with disaster.</p> + +<p>Borne on and buffeted by the torrent, Hilda had seen a well-dressed +epileptic youth, in charge of an elderly woman, approaching the station. He +had passed slowly close by her, as she modestly waited in her hasty +mourning, and she had had a fearful vision of his idiotic greenish face +supported somehow like a mask at the summit of that shaky structure of +limbs. He had indeed stared at her with his apelike eyes. She had watched +him, almost shuddering, till he was lost amid the heedless crowd within. +Then, without waiting longer for her relative, without reflecting upon what +she did, she had walked tremblingly back to the Cedars, checked by +tributaries of the torrent at every street corner....</p> + +<p>She had known nothing of the funeral. She had not had speech with the +relative. She was in bed, somehow. The day had elapsed. And in the +following night, when she was alone and quite awake, she had become aware +that she, she herself, was that epileptic shape; that that epileptic shape +was lying in her bed and that there was none other in the bed. Nor was this +a fancy of madness! She knew that she was not mad, that she was utterly +sane; and the conviction of sanity only intensified her awful discovery. +She passed a trembling hand over her face, and felt the skin corrupt and +green. Gazing into the darkness, she knew that her stare was apelike. She +had felt, then, the fullest significance of horror. In the morning she had +ceased to be the epileptic shape, but the risk of re-transformation had +hovered near her, and the intimidation of it was such that she had wept, +aghast and broken as much by the future as by the past. She had been +discovered weeping....</p> + +<p>Later, the phrase 'nervous breakdown' had lodged in her confused memory. +The doctor had been very matter-of-fact, logical, and soothing. Overwork, +strain, loss of sleep, the journey, anxiety, lack of food, the supreme +shock, the obstinate refusal of youth to succumb, and then the sudden sight +of the epileptic (with whom the doctor was acquainted): thus had run the +medical reasoning, after a discreet but thorough cross-examination of her; +and it had seemed so plausible and so convincing that the doctor's pride in +it was plain on his optimistic face as he gave the command: "Absolute +repose." But to Hilda the reasoning and the resultant phrase, 'nervous +breakdown,' had meant nothing at all. Words! Empty words! She knew, +profoundly and fatally, the evil principle which had conquered her so +completely that she had no power left with which to fight it. This evil +principle was Sin; it was not the force of sins, however multifarious; it +was Sin itself. She was the Sinner, convicted and self-convicted. One of +the last intelligent victims of a malady which has now almost passed away +from the civilized earth, she existed in the chill and stricken desolation +of incommutable doom.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>She had sinned against her mother, and she could not make amends. The +mere thought of her mother, so vivacious, cheerful, life-loving, +even-tempered, charitable, disorderly, incompetent, foolish, and yet +shrewd, caused pain of such intensity that it ceased to be pain. She ought +to have seen her mother before she died; she might have seen her, had she +done what was obviously her duty. It was inconceivable to her, now, that +she should have hesitated to fly instantly to London on receipt of the +telegram. But she had hesitated, and her mother had expired without having +sight of her. All exculpatory arguments were futile against the fact +itself. In vain she blamed the wording of the telegram! In vain she tried +to reason that chance, and not herself, was the evil-doer! In vain she +invoked the aid of simple common sense against sentimental fancy! In vain +she went over the events of the afternoon preceding the death, in order to +prove that at no moment had she been aware of not acting in accordance with +her conscience! The whole of her conduct had been against her conscience, +but pride and selfishness had made her deaf to conscience. She was the +Sinner.</p> + +<p>Her despair, except when at intervals she became the loathed epileptic +shape, had been calm. Its symptoms had been, and remained, a complete lack +of energy, and a most extraordinary black indifference to the surrounding +world. Save in the deep centre of her soul, where she agonized, she seemed +to have lost all capacity for emotion. Nothing moved her, or even +interested her. She sat in the house, and ate a little, and talked a +little, like an automaton. She walked about the streets like a bored exile, +but an exile who has forgotten his home. Her spirit never responded to the +stimulus of environment. Suggestions at once lost their tonic force in the +woolly cushion of her apathy. If she continued to live, it was by inertia; +to cease from life would have required an effort. She did not regret the +vocation which she had abandoned; she felt no curiosity about the fortunes +of the newspaper. A tragic nonchalance held her.</p> + +<p>After several weeks she had naturally begun to think of religion; for +the malady alone was proof enough that she had a profoundly religious +nature. Miss Gailey could rarely go to church, but one Sunday +morning--doubtless with intent--she asked Hilda if they should go together, +and Hilda agreed. As they approached the large, high-spired church, Hilda +had vague prickings of hope, and was thereby much astonished. But the +service in no way responded to her expectations. "How silly I am!" she +thought disdainfully. "This sort of thing has never moved me before. Why +should it move me now?" The sermon, evangelical, was upon the Creed, and +the preacher explained the emotional quality of real belief. It was a +goodish sermon. But the preacher had effectually stopped the very last of +those exquisite vague prickings of hope. Hilda agreed with his definition +of real belief, and she knew that real belief was impossible for her. She +could never say, with joyous fervour: "I believe!" At best she could only +assert that she did not disbelieve--and was she so sure even of that? No! +Belief had been denied to her; and to dream of consolation from religion +was sentimentally womanish; even in her indifference she preferred +straightforward, honest damnation to the soft self-deceptions of feminine +religiosity. Ah! If she could have been a Roman Catholic, genuine and +convinced--with what ardour would she have cast herself down before the +confessional, and whispered her sinfulness to the mysterious face within; +and with what ecstasy would she have received the absolution--that +cleansing bath of the soul! Then--she could have recommenced!... But she +was not a Roman Catholic. She could no more become a Roman Catholic than +she could become the queen of some romantic Latin country of palaces and +cathedrals. She was a young provincial girl staying in a boarding-house at +Hornsey, on the Great Northern line out of London, and she was suffering +from nervous breakdown. Such was the exterior common sense of the +situation.</p> + +<p>Occasionally the memory of some verse of Victor Hugo, sounding the beat +of one of his vast melancholies, would float through her mind and cause it +to vibrate for an instant with a mournful sensation that resembled +pleasure.</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>"Are you thinking of getting up, dear?" asked Sarah Gailey, as she +arranged more securely the contents of the tray and found space on it for +her weekly books.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I suppose I may as well," Hilda murmured. "It'll be lunch-time +soon." The days were long, yet somehow they seemed short too. Already +before getting up, she would begin to think of the evening and of going to +bed; and Saturday night followed quickly on Monday morning. It was scarcely +credible that sixteen weeks had passed, thus, since her mother's +death,--sixteen weeks whose retrospect showed no achievement of any kind, +and hardly a desire.</p> + +<p>"I've given those Boutwoods notice," said Sarah Gailey suddenly, the +tray in her hands ready to lift.</p> + +<p>"Not really?"</p> + +<p>"They were shockingly late for breakfast again, this morning, both of +them. And Mr. Boutwood had the face to ask for another egg. Hettie came and +told me, so I went in myself. I told him breakfast was served in my house +at nine o'clock, and there was a notice to that effect in the bedrooms, not +to mention the dining-room. And as good a breakfast as they'd get in any of +their hotels, I lay! If the eggs are cold at ten o'clock and after, that's +not my fault. They're both of them perfectly healthy, and yet they're +bone-idle. They never want to go to bed and they never want to get up. It +isn't as if they went to theatres and got home late and so on. I could make +excuses for that--now and then. No! It's just idleness and carelessness. +And if you saw their bedroom! Oh, my! A nice example to servants! Well, he +was very insulting--most insulting. He said he paid me to give him not what +I wanted, but what <i>he</i> wanted! He said if I went into a shop, and +they began to tell me what I ought to want and when I ought to want it, I +should be annoyed. I said I didn't need anyone to tell me that, I said! And +my house wasn't a shop. He said it was a shop, and if it wasn't, it ought +to be! Can you imagine it?"</p> + +<p>Hilda tried to exhibit a tepid sympathy. Miss Gailey's nostrils were +twitching, and the tears stood in those watery eyes. She could manage the +house. By the exertion of all her powers and her force she had made of +herself an exceptionally efficient mistress. But she could not manage the +boarders, because she had not sufficient imagination to put herself in +their place. Presiding over all her secret thoughts was the axiom that the +Cedars was a perfect machine, and that the least that a grateful boarder +could do was to fit into the machine.</p> + +<p>"And so you said they could go?"</p> + +<p>"That I did! And I'll tell you another thing, my dear, I--"</p> + +<p>There was a knock at the door. Sarah Gailey stopped in her confidences +like a caught conspirator, and opened the door. Hettie stood on the +mat--the Hettie who despite frequent protests would leave Hilda's toast to +cool into leather on the landing somewhere between the kitchen and the +bedroom. In Hettie's hand was a telegram, which Miss Gailey accepted.</p> + +<p>"Here, take the tray, Hettie," said she, nervously tearing at the +envelope. "Put these books in my desk," she added.</p> + +<p>"And I wonder what <i>he'll</i> say!" she observed, staring absently at +the opened telegram, after Hettie had gone.</p> + +<p>"Who?"</p> + +<p>"George. He says he'll be up here for lunch. He's bound to be vexed +about the Boutwoods. But he doesn't understand. Men don't, you know! They +don't understand the strain it is on you." The appeal of her eyes was +strangely pathetic.</p> + +<p>Hilda said:</p> + +<p>"I don't think I shall get up for lunch to-day."</p> + +<p>Sarah Gailey moved to the bed, forgetting her own trouble.</p> + +<p>"You aren't so well, then, after all!" she muttered, with mournful +commiseration. "But, you know, he'll have to see you, <i>this</i> time. He +wants to."</p> + +<p>"But why?"</p> + +<p>"Your affairs, I suppose. He says so. 'Coming lunch one. Must see +Hilda.--George.'"</p> + +<p>Sarah Gailey offered the telegram. But Hilda could not bear to take it. +This telegram was the first she had set eyes on since the telegram handed +to her by Florrie in George Cannon's office. The mere sight of the +salmon-tinted paper agitated her. "Is it possible that I can be so silly?" +she thought, "over a bit of paper!" But so it was.</p> + +<p>On a previous visit of George Cannon's to Hornsey she had kept her bed +throughout the day, afraid to meet him, ashamed to meet him, inexplicably +convinced that to meet him would be a crime against filial piety. There +were obscure grottoes in her soul which she had not had the courage to +explore candidly.</p> + +<p>"I think," said Sarah Gailey, reflective and anxious, "I think if you +<i>could</i> get up, it would be nicer than him seeing you here in +bed."</p> + +<p>Hilda perceived that at last she would be compelled to face George +Cannon.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b2c2">CHAPTER II</a><br /> THE LITTLE ROOM</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>After lunch Sarah Gailey left Hilda and Mr. Cannon in 'the little room' +together.</p> + +<p>'The little room'--about eight feet square--had no other name; it was +always spoken of affectionately by the boarders, and by the landlady with +pride in its coziness. Situated on the first floor, over the front part of +the hall, it lay between the two principal bedrooms. Old boarders would +discover the little room to new boarders, or new boarders would discover it +for themselves, with immense satisfaction. It was the chamber of intimacy +and of confidences; it was a refuge from the public life of the Cedars, +and, to a certain extent, from the piano. Two women, newly acquainted, and +feeling a mutual attraction, would say to each other: "Shall we go up to +the little room?" "Oh yes, do let us!" And they would climb the stairs in a +fever of anticipation. "Quite the most charming room in the house, dear +Miss Gailey!" another simpering spinster would say. Yet it contained +nothing but an old carpet, two wicker arm-chairs, a small chair, a nearly +empty dwarf bookcase, an engraving of Marie Antoinette regally facing the +revolutionary mob, and a couple of photographs of the Cedars.</p> + +<p>Hilda sat down in one of the arm-chairs, and George Cannon in the other; +he had a small black bag which he placed on the floor by his side. Hilda's +diffidence was extreme. Throughout lunch she had scarcely spoken; but as +there had been eight people at the table, and George Cannon had chatted +with all of them, her taciturnity had passed inconspicuous. Now she would +be obliged to talk. And the sensations which she had experienced on first +meeting George Cannon in the dining-room were renewed in a form even more +acute.</p> + +<p>She had, in the first place, the self-consciousness due to her mourning +attire, which drew attention to herself; it might have been a compromising +uniform; and the mere fact of her mother's death--quite apart from the +question of her conduct in relation thereto--gave her, in an interview with +a person whom she had not seen since before the death, a feeling akin to +guiltiness--guiltiness of some misdemeanour of taste, some infraction of +the social law against notoriety. She felt, in her mourning, like one who +is being led publicly by policemen to the police-station. In her fancy she +could hear people saying: "Look at that girl in deep mourning," and she +could see herself blushing, as it were apologetic.</p> + +<p>But much worse than this general mortification in presence of an +acquaintance seen after a long interval was the special constraint due to +the identity of the acquaintance. It was with George Cannon that she had +first deceived and plotted against her ingenuous mother's hasty plans. It +was her loyalty to George Cannon that had been the cause of her +inexplicable disloyalty to her mother. She could not recall her peculiar +and delicious agitations during the final moments of her previous interview +with Cannon--that night of February in the newspaper office, while her +mother was dying in London--without a profound unreasoning shame which +intensified most painfully her natural grief as an orphan.</p> + +<p>There was this to be said: she was now disturbed out of her torpid +indifference to her environment. As she fidgeted there, pale and frowning, +in the noisy basket-chair, beneath George Cannon's eyes, she actually +perceived again that romantic quality of existence which had always so +powerfully presented itself to her in the past. She reflected: "How strange +that the dreaded scene has now actually begun! He has come to London, and +here we are together, in this house, which at the beginning of the year was +nothing but a name to me! And mother is away there in the churchyard, and I +am in black! And it is all due to him. He sent Miss Gailey and mother to +London. He willed it!... No! It is all due to me! I went to see him one +late afternoon. I sought him out. He didn't seek me out. And just because I +went to see him one afternoon, mother is dead, and I am here! Strange!" +These reflections were dimly beautiful to her, even in her sadness and in +her acute distress. The coma had assuredly passed, if only for a space.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>"Well, now," he said, after a few inanities had been succeeded by an +awkward pause. "I've got to talk business with you, so I suppose we may as +well begin, eh?" His tone was fairly blithe, but it was that of a man who +was throwing off with powerful ease the weariness of somewhat exasperating +annoyances. Since lunch he had had a brief interview with Sarah Gailey.</p> + +<p>"Yes," she agreed glumly.</p> + +<p>"Have you decided what you're going to do?" He began to smile +sympathetically as he spoke.</p> + +<p>"I'm not going back to the paper," she curtly answered, cutting short +the smile with fierceness, almost with ferocity. Beyond question she was +rude in her bitterness. She asked herself: "Why do I talk like this? Why +can't I talk naturally and gently and cheerfully? I've really got nothing +against him." But she could not talk otherwise than she did talk. It was by +this symptom of biting acrimony that her agitation showed itself. She knew +that she was scowling as she looked at the opposite wall, but she could not +smooth away the scowl.</p> + +<p>"No, I suppose not," he said quietly. "But are you thinking of coming +back to Turnhill?"</p> + +<p>She remained mute for some seconds. A feeling of desolation came over +her, and it seemed to her that she welcomed it, trying to intensify it, and +yielding her features to it. "How do I know?" she muttered at length, +shrugging her shoulders.</p> + +<p>"Because if you aren't," he resumed, "it's no use you keeping that house +of yours empty. You must remember it's just as you left it; and the things +in it aren't taking any good, either."</p> + +<p>She shrugged her shoulders again.</p> + +<p>"I don't see that it matters to anybody but me," she said, after another +pause, with a sort of frigid and disdainful nonchalance. And once more she +reflected: "Is it possible that I can behave so odiously?"</p> + +<p>He stood up suddenly.</p> + +<p>"I don't know what you and Sarah have been plotting together," he said, +wounded and contemptuous, yet with lightness. "But I'm sure I don't want to +interfere in your affairs. With Sarah's I've got to interfere, +unfortunately, and a famous time I'm having!" His nostrils grew fastidious. +"But not yours! I only promised your uncle.... Your uncle told me you +wanted me to--" He broke off.</p> + +<p>In an instant she grew confused, alarmed, and extremely ashamed. Her +mood had changed in a flash. It seemed to her that she was in presence of a +disgraceful disaster, which she herself had brought about by wicked and +irresponsible temerity. She was like a child who, having naughtily trifled +with danger, stands aghast at the calamity which his perverseness has +caused. She was positively affrighted. She reflected in her terror: "I +asked for this, and I've got it!"</p> + +<p>George Cannon stooped and picked up his little bag. There he towered, +high and massive, above her! And she felt acutely her slightness, her +girlishness, and her need of his help. She could not afford to transform +sympathy into antipathy. She was alone in the world. Never before had she +realized, as she realized then, the lurking terror of her loneliness. The +moment was critical. In another moment he might be gone from the room, and +she left solitary to irremediable humiliation and self-disgust.</p> + +<p>"Please!" she whispered appealingly. The whole of her being became an +appeal--the glance, the gesture, the curve of the slim and fragile body. +She was like a slave. She had no pride, no secret reserve of thought. She +was an instinct. Tears showed in her eyes and affected her voice.</p> + +<p>He gave the twisted, difficult, rather foolish smile of one who is +cursing the mortification of a predicament into which he has been cast +through no fault of his own.</p> + +<p>"Please what?"</p> + +<p>"Please sit down."</p> + +<p>He waved a hand, deprecatingly, and obeyed.</p> + +<p>"It's all right," he said. "All right! I ought to have known--" Then he +smiled generously.</p> + +<p>"Known what?" Her voice was now weak and liquid with woe.</p> + +<p>"You'd be likely to be upset."</p> + +<p>Not furtively, but openly, she wiped her eyes.</p> + +<p>"No, no!" she protested honestly. "It's not that. It's--but--I'm very +sorry."</p> + +<p>"I reckon I know a bit what worry is, myself!" he added, with a brief, +almost harsh, laugh.</p> + +<p>These strange words struck her with pity.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>"Well, now,"--he seemed to be beginning again--let's leave Lessways +Street for a minute.... I can sell the Calder Street property for you, if +you like. And at a pretty good price. Sooner or later the town will have to +buy up all that side of the street. You remember I told your mother last +year but one I could get a customer for it? but she wasn't having any."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Hilda eagerly; "I remember."</p> + +<p>In her heart she apologized to George Cannon, once more, for having +allowed her mother to persuade her, even for a day, that that attempt to +buy was merely a trick on his part invented to open negotiations for the +rent-collecting.</p> + +<p>"You know what the net rents are," he went on, "as you've had 'em every +month. I dare say the purchase money if it's carefully invested will bring +you in as much. But even if it doesn't bring in quite as much, you mustn't +forget that Calder Street's going down--it's getting more and more of a +slum. And there'll always be a lot of bother with tenants of that +class."</p> + +<p>"I wish I could sell everything--everything!" she exclaimed +passionately. "Lessways Street as well! Then I should be absolutely +free!"</p> + +<p>"You can!" he said, with dramatic emphasis. "And let me tell you that +ten years hence those Lessways Street houses won't be worth what they are +now!"</p> + +<p>"Is that property going down, too?" she asked. "I thought they were +building all round there."</p> + +<p>"So they are," he answered. "But cheap cottages. Your houses are too +good for that part of the town; that's what's the matter with them. People +who can afford £25 a year--and over--for rent won't care to live there much +longer. You know the end house is empty."</p> + +<p>All houses seemed to her to be a singularly insecure and even perilous +form of property. And the sale of everything she possessed presented itself +to her fancy as a transaction which would enfranchise her from the past. It +symbolized the starting-point of a new life, of a recommencement unhampered +by the vestiges of grief and error. She could go anywhere, do what she +chose. The entire world would lie before her.</p> + +<p>"Please do sell it all for me!" she pleaded wistfully. "Supposing you +could, about how much should I have--I mean income?"</p> + +<p>He glanced about, and then, taking a pencil from his waistcoat pocket, +scribbled a few figures on his cuff.</p> + +<p>"Quite three pounds a week," he said.</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>After a perfunctory discussion, which was somewhat self-consciously +prolonged by both of them in order to avoid an appearance of hastiness in +an important decision, George Cannon opened his black bag and then looked +round for ink. The little room, having no table, had no inkpot, and the +lawyer took from his pocket an Eagle indelible pencil--the fountain-pen of +those simple days. It needed some adjustment; he stepped closer to the +window, and held the pointed end of the case up to the light, while +screwing the lower end; he was very fastidious in these mechanical details +of his vocation. Hilda watched him from behind, with an intentness that +fascinated herself.</p> + +<p>"And how's the <i>Chronicle</i> getting on?" she asked, in a tone of +friendly curiosity which gave an exaggerated impression of her actual +feeling. She was more and more ashamed that during lunch she had not +troubled to put a question about the paper. She was even ashamed of her +social indifference. That Sarah Gailey, narrow and preoccupied, should be +indifferent, should never once in three months have referred to her +brother's organ, was not surprising; but it was monstrous that she, Hilda, +the secretary, the priestess, should share this uncivil apathy; and it was +unjust to mark the newspaper, as somehow she had been doing, with the +stigma of her mother's death. She actually began to characterize her recent +mental attitude to her past life as morbid.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" he murmured absently, with gloomy hesitation, as he manipulated +the pencil.</p> + +<p>She went on still more persuasively:</p> + +<p>"I suppose you've got a new secretary?"</p> + +<p>"No," he said, as though it fatigued and annoyed him to dwell on the +subject. "I told 'em they must manage without.... It's no fun starting a +new paper in a God-forsaken hole like the Five Towns, I can tell you."</p> + +<p>Plainly his high exuberant hopes had been dashed, had perhaps been +destroyed.</p> + +<p>She did not reply. She could not. She became suddenly sad with sympathy, +and this sadness was beautiful to her. Already, when he was scribbling on +it, she had noticed that his wristband was frayed. Now, silhouetted against +the window, the edge of the wristband caught her attention again, and grew +strangely significant. This man was passing through adversity! It seemed +tragic and shocking to her that he should have to pass through adversity, +that he could not remain for ever triumphant, brilliant, cocksure in all +his grand schemes, and masculinely scathless. It seemed wrong to her that +he should suffer, and desirable that anybody should suffer rather than he. +George Cannon with faulty linen! By what error of destiny had this +heart-rending phenomenon of discord been caused? (Yes, heart-rending!) Was +it due to weary carelessness, or to actual, horrible financial straits? +Either explanation was very painful to her. She had a vision of a whole +sisterhood of women toiling amid steam and soapsuds in secret, and in +secret denying themselves, to provide him with all that he lacked, so that +he might always emerge into the world unblemished and glitteringly perfect. +She would have sacrificed the happiness of multitudes to her sense of +fitness.</p> + + +<h3>V</h3> + +<p>There being no table, George Cannon removed a grotesque ornament from +the dwarf bookcase, and used the top of the bookcase as a writing-board. +Hilda was called upon to sign two papers. He explained exactly what these +papers were, but she did not understand, nor did she desire to understand. +One was an informal sale-note and the other was an authority; but which was +which, and to what each had reference, she superbly and wilfully ignored. +She could, by a religious effort of volition, make of herself an excellent +clerk, eagerly imitative and mechanical, but she had an instinctive +antipathy to the higher forms of business. Moreover, she wanted to trust +herself to him, if only as a mystic reparation of her odious rudeness at +the beginning of the interview. And she thought also: "These transactions +will result in profit to him. It is by such transactions that he lives. I +am helping him in his adversity."</p> + +<p>When he gave her the Eagle pencil, and pointed to the places where she +was to sign, she took the pencil with fervour, more and more anxious to +atone to him. For a moment she stood bewildered, in a dream, staring at the +scratched mahogany top of the bookcase. And the bookcase seemed to her to +be something sentient, patient, and helpful, that had always been waiting +there in the corner to aid George Cannon in this crisis--something human +like herself. She loved the bookcase, and the Eagle pencil, and the papers, +and the pattern on the wall. George Cannon was standing behind her. She +felt his presence like a delicious danger. She signed the papers, in that +large scrawling hand which for a few brief weeks she had by force cramped +down to the submissive caligraphy of a clerk. As she signed, she saw the +name "Karkeek" in the midst of one of the documents, and remembered, with +joyous nonchalance, that George Cannon's own name never appeared in George +Cannon's affairs.</p> + +<p>He took her place in front of the little bookcase, and folded the +documents. There he was, beside her, in all his masculinity--his moustache, +his blue chin, his wide white hands, his broadcloth--there he was planted +on his massive feet as on a pedestal! She did not see him; she was aware of +him. And she was aware of the closed door behind them. One of the +basket-chairs, though empty, continued to creak, like a thing alive. +Faintly, very faintly, she could hear the piano--Mrs. Boutwood playing! +Overhead were the footsteps of Sarah Gailey and Hettie--they were checking +the linen from the laundry, as usual on Saturday afternoon. And she was +aware of herself, thin, throbbing, fragile, mournful, somehow +insignificant!</p> + +<p>He looked round at her, with a half-turn of the head. In his glance was +good humour, good nature, protectiveness, and rectitude; and, more than +these, some of the old serenely smiling triumphant quality. He was not +ruined! He was not really in adversity! He remained the conqueror! She +thrilled with her relief.</p> + +<p>"You're in my hands now--no mistake!" he murmured roguishly, picking up +the documents, and bending over the bag.</p> + +<p>Hilda could hear a heavy footstep on the stairs, ascending.</p> + +<p>In the same instant she had an extraordinary and disconcerting impulse +to seize his hand--she knew not why, whether it was to thank him, to +express her sympathy, or to express her submission. She struggled against +this impulse, but the impulse was part of herself and of her inmost self; +She was afraid, but her fear was pleasurable. She was ashamed, but her +shame was pleasurable. She wanted to move away from where she stood. She +thought: "If only I willed to move away, I could move away. But, no! I +shall not will it. I like remaining just here, in this fear, this shame, +and this agitation." She had a clear, dazzling perception of the splendour +and the fineness of sin; but she did not know what sin! And all the time +the muscles of her arm were tense in the combat between the weakening +desire to keep her arms still and the growing desire to let her hand seize +the hand of George Cannon. And all the time the heavy footstep was +ascending the interminable staircase. And all the time George Cannon, with +averted head, was fumbling in the bag. And then, in a flash, she was really +afraid; the fear was no longer pleasurable, and her shame had become a +curse. She said to herself: "I cannot move, now. In a minute I shall do +this horrible thing. Nothing can save me." Despairing, she found a dark and +tumultuous joy in despair. The trance endured for ages, while disaster +approached nearer and nearer.</p> + +<p>Then, after the heavy footstep had been climbing the staircase since +earth began, the door was brusquely opened, and the jovial fat face of Mr. +Boutwood appeared, letting in the louder sound of the piano.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I beg pardon!" he muttered, pretending that he had assumed the +little room to be empty. The fact was that he was in search of George +Cannon, in whom he had recognized a fraternal spirit.</p> + +<p>"Come in, Mr. Boutwood," said Hilda, with an easy, disdainful calm which +absolutely astounded herself. "That's all, then?" she added, to George +Cannon, glancing at him indifferently. She departed without waiting for an +answer.</p> + + +<h3>VI</h3> + +<p>Putting on a bonnet, and taking an umbrella to occupy her hands, she +went out into the remedial freedom of the streets. And after turning the +first corner she saw coming towards her the figure of a woman whom she +seemed to know, elegant, even stately, in youthful grace. It was Janet +Orgreave, wearing a fashionable fawn-coloured summer costume. As they +recognized each other the girls blushed slightly. Janet hastened forward. +Hilda stood still. She was amazed at the chance which had sent her two +unexpected visitors in the same day. They shook hands and kissed.</p> + +<p>"So I've found you!" said Janet. "How are you, you poor dear? Why didn't +you answer my letter?"</p> + +<p>"Letter?" Hilda repeated, wondering. Then she remembered that she had +indeed received a letter from Janet, but in her comatose dejection had +neglected to answer it.</p> + +<p>"I'm up in London with father for the weekend. We want you to come with +us to the Abbey to-morrow. And you must come back with us to Bursley on +Monday. You <i>must</i>! We're quite set on it. I've left father all alone +this afternoon, to come up here and find you out. Not that he minds! What a +way it is! But how are you, Hilda?"</p> + +<p>Hilda was so touched by Janet's affectionate solicitude that her eyes +filled with tears. She looked at that radiating and innocent goodness, and +thought: "How different I am from her! She hasn't the least idea how +different I am!"</p> + +<p>For a moment, Janet seemed to her to be a sort of angel--modish, but +exquisitely genuine. She saw in the invitation to the Five Towns a +miraculous defence against a peril the prospect of which was already +alarming her. She would be compelled to go to Turnhill in order to visit +Lessways Street and decide what of her mother's goods she must keep. She +would of course take Janet with her. In all the Turnhill affairs Janet +should accompany her. Her new life should begin under the protection of +Janet's society. And her heart turned from the old life towards the new +with hope and a vague brightening expectation of happiness.</p> + +<p>At the Cedars she led Janet to her bedroom, and then came out of the +bedroom to bid good-bye to George Cannon. The extreme complexity of +existence and of her sensations baffled and intimidated her.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b2c3">CHAPTER III</a><br /> JOURNEY TO BLEAKRIDGE</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>Hilda and Janet were mounting the precipitous Sytch Bank together on +their way from Turnhill into Bursley. It was dark; they had missed one +train at Turnhill and had preferred not to wait for the next. Although they +had been very busy in Hilda's house throughout all the afternoon and a part +of the evening, and had eaten only a picnic meal, neither of them was aware +of fatigue, and the two miles to Bursley seemed a trifle.</p> + +<p>Going slowly up the steep slope, they did not converse. Janet said that +the weather was changing, and Hilda, without replying, peered at the black +baffling sky. The air had, almost suddenly, grown warmer. Above, in the +regions unseen, mysterious activities were in movement, as if marshalling +vast forces. The stars had vanished. A gentle but equivocal wind on the +cheek presaged rain, and seemed to be bearing downwards into the homeliness +of the earth some strange vibration out of infinite space. The primeval +elements of the summer night encouraged and intensified Hilda's mood, half +joyous, half apprehensive. She thought: "A few days ago, I was in Hornsey, +with the prospect of the visit to Turnhill before me. Now the visit is +behind me. I said that Janet should be my companion, and she has been my +companion. I said that I would cut myself free, and I have cut myself free. +I need never go to Turnhill again, unless I like. The two trunks will be +sent for to-morrow; and all the rest will be sold--even the clock. The +thing is done. I have absolute liberty, and an income, and the intimacy of +this splendid affectionate Janet.... How fortunate it was that Mr. Cannon +was not at his office when we called! Of course I was obliged to call.... +And yet would it not be more satisfactory if I had seen him?... I must have +been in a horribly morbid state up at Hornsey.... Soon I must decide about +my future. Soon I shall actually have decided!... Life is very queer!" She +had as yet no notion whatever of what she would do with her liberty and her +income and the future; but she thought vaguely of something heroic, +grandiose, and unusual.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>In her hand she carried a small shabby book, bound in blue and gold, +with gilt edges a little irregular. She had found this book while sorting +out the multitudinous contents of her mother's wardrobe, and at the last +moment, perceiving that it had been overlooked, and being somehow ashamed +to leave it to the auctioneers, she had brought it away, not knowing how +she would ultimately dispose of it. The book had possibly been dear to her +mother, but she could not embarrass her freedom by conserving everything +that had possibly been dear to her mother. It was entitled <i>The Girl's +Week-day Book</i>, by Mrs. Copley, and it had been published by the +Religious Tract Society, no doubt in her mother's girlhood. The +frontispiece, a steel engraving, showed a group of girls feeding some swans +by the terraced margin of an ornamental water, and it bore the legend, +"Feeding the Swans." And on the title-page was the text: "That our +daughters may be as corner-stones, polished after the similitude of a +palace. Psalm cxliv. 12." In the table of contents were such phrases as: +"One thing at a time. Darkness and Light. Respect for Ministers. The +Drowning Fly. Trifling with words of Scripture. Goose and Swan. Delicate +Health. Conscientious Regard to Truth. Sensibility and Gentleness +contrasted with Affectation. Curiosity and Tattling. Instability of Worldly +Possessions." A book representing, for Hilda, all that was most grotesque +in an age that was now definitely finished and closed! A silly book!</p> + +<p>During the picnic meal she had idly read extracts from it to Janet, +amusing sentences; and though the book had once been held sacred by her who +was dead, and though they were engaged in stirring the scarce-cold ashes of +a tragedy, the girls had nevertheless permitted themselves a kindly, +moderate mirth. Hilda had quoted from a conversation in it: "Well, I would +rather sit quietly round this cheerful fire, and talk with dear mamma, than +go to the grandest ball that ever was known!" and Janet had plumply +commented: "What a dreadful lie!" And then they had both laughed openly, +perhaps to relieve the spiritual tension caused by the day's task and the +surroundings. After that, Hilda had continued to dip into the book, but +silently. And Janet had imagined that Hilda was merely bored by the +monotonous absurdity of the sentiments expressed.</p> + +<p>Janet was wrong. Hilda had read the following: "One word more. Do not +rest in your religious impressions. You have, perhaps, been the subject of +terror on account of sin; your mind has been solemnized by some event in +Providence; by an alarming fit of sickness, or the death of a relative, or +a companion.... This is indeed to be reckoned a great mercy; but then the +danger is, lest you should rest here; lest those tears, and terrors, and +resolutions, should be the only evidences on which you venture to conclude +on the safety of your immortal state. What is your present +condition?..."</p> + +<p>Which words intimidated Hilda in spite of herself. In vain she repeated +that the book was a silly book. She really believed that it was silly, but +she knew also that there was an aspect of it which was not silly. She was +reminded by it that she had found no solution of the problem which had +distracted her in Hornsey. 'What is your present condition?' Her present +condition was still that of a weakling and a coward who had sunk down +inertly before the great problem of sin. And now, in the growing strength +of her moral convalescence, she was raising her eyes again to meet the +problem. Her future seemed to be bound up with the problem. As she breasted +the top of the Sytch under the invisible lowering clouds, with her new, +adored friend by her side, and the despised but powerful book in her hand, +she mused in an ambiguous reverie upon her situation, dogged by the problem +which alone was accompanying her out of the past into the future. Her +reverie was shot through by piercing needles of regret for her mother; and +even with the touch of Janet's arm against her own in the darkness she had +sharp realizations of her extreme solitude in the world. Withal, the sense +of life was precious and beautiful. She was not happy; but she was filled +with the mysterious vital elation which surpasses happiness.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>They descended gently into Bursley, crossing the top of St. Luke's +Square and turning eastwards into Market Square, ruled by the sombre and +massive Town Hall in whose high tower an illuminated dial shone like a +topaz. To Hilda, this nocturnal entry into Bursley had the romance of an +entry into a town friendly but strange and recondite. During the few days +of her stay with the Orgreaves in the suburb of Bleakridge, she had +scarcely gone into the town once. She had never seen it at night. In the +old Turnhill days she had come over to Bursley occasionally with her +mother; but to shoppers from Turnhill, Bursley meant St. Luke's Square and +not a yard beyond.</p> + +<p>Now the girls arrived at the commencement of the steam-car track, where +a huge engine and tram were waiting, and as they turned another corner, the +long perspective of Trafalgar Road, rising with its double row of lamps +towards fashionable Bleakridge, was revealed to Hilda. She thought, +naturally, that every other part of the Five Towns was more impressive and +more important than the poor little outskirt, Turnhill, of her birth. In +Turnhill there was no thoroughfare to compare with Trafalgar Road, and no +fashionable suburb whatever. She had almost the feeling of being in a +metropolis, if a local metropolis.</p> + +<p>"It's beginning to rain, I think," said Janet.</p> + +<p>"Who's that?" Hilda questioned abruptly, ignoring the remark in the +swift, unreflecting excitement of a sensibility surprised.</p> + +<p>"Where?"</p> + +<p>"There!"</p> + +<p>They were going down Duck Bank into the hollow. On the right, opposite +the lighted Dragon Hotel, lay Duck Square in obscure somnolence; at the +corner of Duck Square and Trafalgar Road was a double-fronted shop, of +which all the shutters were up except two or three in the centre of the +doorway. Framed thus in the aperture, a young man stood within the shop +under a bright central gas-jet; he was gazing intently at a large sheet of +paper which he held in his outstretched hands, and the girls saw him in +profile: tall, rather lanky, fair, with hair dishevelled, and a serious, +studious, and magnanimous face; quite unconscious that he made a picture +for unseen observers.</p> + +<p>"That?" said Janet, in a confidential and interested tone. "That's young +Clayhanger--Edwin Clayhanger.<sup><a href="#fn1" name="rfn1">[1]</a></sup> +His father's the printer, you know. Came from Turnhill, originally."</p> + + +<p>"I never knew," said Hilda. "But I seem to have heard the name."</p> + +<p>"Oh! It must have been a long time ago. He's got the best business in +Bursley now. Father says it's one of the best in the Five Towns. He's built +that new house just close to ours. Don't you remember I pointed it out to +you? Father's the architect. They're going to move into it next week or the +week after. I expect that's why the son and heir's working so late +to-night, packing and so on, perhaps."</p> + +<p>The young man moved out of sight. But his face had made in those few +thrilling seconds a deep impression on Hilda; so that in her mind she still +saw it, with an almost physical particularity of detail. It presented +itself to her, in some mysterious way, as a romantic visage, wistful, full +of sad subtleties, of the unknown and the seductive, and of a latent +benevolence. It was as recondite and as sympathetic as the town in which +she had discovered it.</p> + +<p>She said nothing.</p> + +<p>"Old Mr. Clayhanger is a regular character," Janet eagerly went on, to +Hilda's great content. "Some people don't like him. But I rather do like +him." She was always thus kind. "Grandmother once told me he sprang from +simply nothing at all--worked on a potbank when he was quite a child."</p> + +<p>"Who? The father, you mean?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, the father. Now, goodness knows how much he isn't worth I Father +is always saying he could buy <i>us</i> up, lock, stock, and barrel." Janet +laughed. "People often call him a miser, but he can't be so much of a +miser, seeing that he's built this new house."</p> + +<p>"And I suppose the son's in the business?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. He wanted to be an architect. That was how father got to know him. +But old Mr. Clayhanger wouldn't have it. And so he's a printer, and one day +he'll be one of the principal men in the town."</p> + +<p>"Oh! So you know him?"</p> + +<p>"Well, we do and we don't. I go into the shop sometimes; and then I've +seen him once or twice up at the new house. We've asked him to come in and +see us. But he's never come, and I don't think he ever will. I believe his +father does keep him grinding away rather hard. I'm sure he's frightfully +clever."</p> + +<p>"How can you tell?"</p> + +<p>"Oh! From bits of things he says. And he's read everything, it seems! +And once he saved a great heavy printing-machine from going through the +floor of the printing-shop into the basement. If it hadn't been for him +there'd have been a dreadful accident. Everybody was talking about that. He +doesn't look it, does he?"</p> + +<p>They were now passing the corner at which stood the shop. Hilda peered +within the narrowing, unshuttered slit, but she could see no more of Edwin +Clayhanger.</p> + +<p>"No, he doesn't," she agreed, while thinking nevertheless that he did +look precisely that. "And so he lives all alone with his father. No +mother?"</p> + +<p>"No mother. But there are two sisters. The youngest is married, and just +going to have a baby, poor thing! The other one keeps house. I believe +she's a splendid girl, but neither of them is a bit like Edwin. Not a bit. +He's--"</p> + +<p>"What?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know. Look here, miss! What about this rain? I vote we take the +car up the hill."</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>The steam-car was rumbling after them down Duck Bank. It stopped, huge +above them, and they climbed into it through an odour of warm grease that +trailed from the engine. The conductor touched his hat to Janet, who smiled +like a sister upon this fellow-being. Two middle-aged men were the only +other occupants of the interior of the car; both raised their hats to +Janet. The girls sat down in opposite corners next to the door. Then, with +a deafening continuous clatter of loose glass-panes and throbbing of its +filthy floor, the vehicle started again, elephantine. It was impossible to +talk in that unique din. Hilda had no desire to talk. She watched Janet pay +the fares as in a dream, without even offering her own penny, though as a +rule she was touchily punctilious in sharing expenses with the sumptuous +Janet. Without being in the least aware of it, and quite innocently, Janet +had painted a picture of the young man, Edwin Clayhanger, which intensified +a hundredfold the strong romantic piquancy of Hilda's brief vision of him. +In an instant Hilda saw her ideal future--that future which had loomed +grandiose, indefinite, and strange--she saw it quite precise and simple as +the wife of such a creature as Edwin Clayhanger. The change was astounding +in its abruptness. She saw all the delightful and pure vistas of love with +a man, subtle, baffling, and benevolent, and above all superior; with a man +who would be respected by a whole town as a pillar of society, while +bringing to his intimacy with herself an exotic and wistful quality which +neither she nor anyone could possibly define. She asked: "What attracts me +in him? I don't know. <i>I like him</i>." She who had never spoken to him! +She who never before had vividly seen herself as married to a man! He was +clever; he was sincere; he was kind; he was trustworthy; he would have +wealth and importance and reputation. All this was good; but all this would +have been indifferent to her, had there not been an enigmatic and +inscrutable and unprecedented something in his face, in his bearing, which +challenged and inflamed her imagination.</p> + +<p>It did not occur to her to think of Janet as in the future a married +woman. But of herself she thought, with new agitations: "I am innocent now! +I am ignorant now! I am a girl now! But one day I shall be so no longer. +One day I shall be a woman. One day I shall be in the power and possession +of some man--if not this man, then some other. Everything happens; and this +will happen!" And the hazardous strangeness of life enchanted her.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b2c4">CHAPTER IV</a><br /> WITH THE ORGREAVES</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>The Orgreave family was holding its nightly session in the large +drawing-room of Lane End House when Hilda and Janet arrived. The bow-window +stood generously open in three different places, and the heavy outer +curtains as well as the lace inner ones were moving gently in the +capricious breeze that came across the oval lawn. The multitudinous sound +of rain on leaves entered also with the wind; and a steam-car could be +heard thundering down Trafalgar Road, from which the house was separated by +only a few intervening minor roofs.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Orgreave, the plump, faded image of goodness, with Janet's full red +lips and Janet's kindly eyes, sat as usual, whether in winter or in summer, +near the fireplace, surveying with placidity the theatre where the +innumerable dramas of her motherhood had been enacted. Tom, her eldest, the +thin, spectacled lawyer, had, as a boy of seven, rampaged on that identical +Turkey hearthrug, when it was new, a quarter of a century earlier. He was +now seated at the grand piano with the youngest child, Alicia, a gawky +little treasure, always alternating between pertness and timidity, aged +twelve. Jimmie and Johnnie, young bloods of nineteen and eighteen, were +only present in their mother's heart, being in process of establishing, by +practice, the right to go forth into the world of an evening and return +when they chose without suffering too much from family curiosity. Two other +children--Marian, eldest daughter and sole furnisher of grandchildren to +the family, and Charlie, a young doctor--were permanently away in London. +Osmond Orgreave, the elegant and faintly mocking father of the brood, a +handsome grizzled man of between fifty and sixty, was walking to and fro +between the grand piano and the small upright piano in the farther half of +the room.</p> + +<p>"Well, my dear?" said Mrs. Orgreave to Hilda. "You aren't wet?" She drew +Hilda towards her and stroked her shoulder, and then kissed her. The +embrace was to convey the mother's sympathy with Hilda in the ordeal of the +visit to Turnhill, and her satisfaction that the ordeal was now over. The +ageing lady seemed to kiss her on behalf of the entire friendly family; all +the others, appreciating the delicacy of the situation, refrained from the +peril of clumsy speech.</p> + +<p>"Oh no, mother!" Janet exclaimed reassuringly. "We came up by car. And I +had my umbrella. And it only began to rain in earnest just as we got to the +gate."</p> + +<p>"Very thoughtful of it, I'm sure!" piped the pig-tailed Alicia from the +piano. She could talk, in her pert moments, exactly like her brothers.</p> + +<p>"Alicia, darling," said Janet coaxingly, as she sat on the sofa flanked +by the hat, gloves, and jacket which she had just taken off, "will you run +upstairs with these things, and take Hilda's too? I'm quite exhausted. +Father will swoon if I leave them here. I suppose he's walking about +because he's so proud of his new birthday slippers."</p> + +<p>"But I'm just playing the symphony with Tom!" Alicia protested.</p> + +<p>"I'll run up--I was just going to," said Hilda.</p> + +<p>"You'll do no such thing!" Mrs. Orgreave announced, sharply. "Alicia, +I'm surprised at you! Here Janet and Hilda have been out since noon, and +you--"</p> + +<p>"And so on and so on," said Alicia, jumping up from the piano in +obedience.</p> + +<p>"We didn't wait supper," Mrs. Orgreave went on. "But I told Martha to +leave--"</p> + +<p>"Mother, dearest," Janet stopped her. "Please don't mention food. We've +stuffed ourselves, haven't we, Hilda? Anyone been?"</p> + +<p>"Swetnam," said Alicia, as she left the room with her arms full.</p> + +<p>"<i>Mr</i>. Swetnam," corrected Mrs. Orgreave.</p> + +<p>"Which one? The Ineffable?"</p> + +<p>"The Ineffable," replied Mr. Orgreave, who had wandered, smiling +enigmatically, to the sofa. His legs, like the whole of his person, had a +distinguished air; and he held up first one slippered foot and then the +other to the silent, sham-ecstatic inspection of the girls. "He may look in +again, later on. It's evidently Hilda he wants to see." This said, Mr. +Orgreave lazily sank into an easy chair, opposite the sofa, and lighted a +cigarette. He was one of the most industrious men in the Five Towns, and +assuredly the most industrious architect; but into an idle hour he could +pack more indolence than even Johnnie and Jimmie, alleged wastrels, could +accomplish in a week.</p> + +<p>"I say, Janet," Tom sang out from the piano, "you aren't really +exhausted, are you?"</p> + +<p>"I'm getting better."</p> + +<p>"Well, let's dash through the scherzo before the infant comes back. She +can't take it half fast enough."</p> + +<p>"And do you think I can?" said Janet, rising. In theory, Janet was not a +pianist, and she never played solos, nor accompanied songs; but in the +actual practice of duet-playing her sympathetic presence of mind at +difficult crises of the music caused her to be esteemed by Tom, the expert +and enthusiast, as superior to all other performers in the family.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>Hilda listened with pleasure and with exaltation to the scherzo. Beyond +a little part-singing at school she had no practical acquaintance with +music; there had never been a piano at home. But she knew that this music +was Beethoven's; and from the mere intonation of that name, as it was +uttered in her presence in the house of the Orgreaves, she was aware of its +greatness, and the religious faculty in her had enabled her at once to +accept its supremacy as an article of genuine belief; so that, though she +understood it not, she felt it, and was uplifted by it. Whenever she heard +Beethoven--and she heard it often, because Tom, in the words of the family, +had for the moment got Beethoven on the brain--her thoughts and her +aspirations were ennobled.</p> + +<p>She was singularly content with this existence amid the intimacy of the +Orgreaves. The largeness and prodigality and culture of the family life, so +different from anything she had ever known, and in particular so different +from the desolating atmosphere of the Cedars, soothed and flattered her in +a manner subtly agreeable. At the same time she was but little irked by it, +for the reason that her spirit was not one to be unduly affected by +exterior social, intellectual, and physical conditions. Moreover, the +Orgreaves, though obviously of a class superior to her own, had the facile +and yet aristocratic unceremoniousness which, unconsciously, repudiates +such distinctions until circumstances arise that compel their +acknowledgment. To live among the Orgreaves was like living in a small +private republic that throbbed with a hundred activities and interests. +Each member of it was a centre of various energy. And from each, Hilda drew +something that was precious: from Mrs. Orgreave, sheer love and calm +wisdom; from Janet, sheer love and the spectacle of elegance; from little +Alicia candour and admiration; from Tom, knowledge, artistic enthusiasm, +and shy, curt sympathy; from Johnnie and Jimmie the homage of their proud +and naïve mannishness: as for Mr. Orgreave, she admired him perhaps as +much as she admired even Janet, and once when he and she had taken a walk +together up to Toft End, she had thought him quite exquisite in his +attitude to her, quizzical, worldly, and yet sensitively understanding and +humane. And withal they never worried her by interferences and criticisms; +they never presumed on their hospitality, but left her as free as though +her age had been twice what it was. Undoubtedly, in the ardour of her +gratitude she idealized every one of them. The sole reproach which in +secret she would formulate against them had reference to their +quasi-cynical levity in conversation. They would never treat a serious +topic seriously for more than a few minutes. Either one or another would +yield to the temptation of clever facetiousness, and clever facetiousness +would always carry off the honours in a discussion. This did not apply to +Mrs. Orgreave, who was incapable of humour; but it applied a little even to +Janet.</p> + +<p>The thought continually arising in Hilda's mind was: "Why do they care +for me? What can they see in me? Why are they so good to me? I was never +good to them." She did not guess that, at her very first visit to Lane End +House, the force and mystery of her character had powerfully attracted +these rather experienced amateurs of human nature. She was unaware that she +had made her mark upon Janet and Charlie so far back as the days of the +dancing-classes. And she under-estimated the appeal of her situation as an +orphan and a solitary whose mother's death, in its swiftness, had amounted +to a tragedy.</p> + +<p>The scherzo was finished, and Alicia had not returned into the +drawing-room. The two pianists sat hesitant.</p> + +<p>"Where is that infant?" Tom demanded. "If I finish it all without her +she'll be vexed."</p> + +<p>"I can tell you where she ought to be," said Mrs. Orgreave placidly. +"She ought to be in bed. No wonder she looks pale, stopping up till this +time of night!"</p> + +<p>Then there were unusual and startling movements behind the door, +accompanied by giggling. And Alicia entered, followed by Charlie--Charlie +who was supposed at that precise instant to be in London!</p> + +<p>"Hello, mater!" said the curly-headed Charlie, with a sublime +affectation of calmness, as though he had slipped out of the next room. He +produced an effect fully equal to his desires.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>In a little while, Charlie, on the sofa, was seated at a small table +covered with viands and fruit; the white cloth spread on the table made a +curiously charming patch amid the sombre colours of the drawing-room. He +had protested that, having consumed much food en route, he was not hungry; +but in vain. Mrs. Orgreave demolished such arguments by the power of her +notorious theory, which admitted no exceptions, that any person coming off +an express train must be in need of sustenance. The odd thing was that all +the others discovered mysterious appetites and began to eat and drink with +gusto, sitting, standing, or walking about, while Charlie, munching, +related how he had miraculously got three days' leave from the hospital, +and how he had impulsively 'cabbed it' to Euston, and how, having arrived +at Knype, he had also 'cabbed it' from Knype to Bleakridge instead of +waiting for the Loop Line train. The blot on his advent, in the eyes of +Mrs. Orgreave, was that he had no fresh news of Marian and her +children.</p> + +<p>"You don't seem very surprised to find Hilda here," said Alicia.</p> + +<p>"It's not my business to be surprised at anything, kid," Charlie +retorted, smiling at Hilda, who sat beside him on the sofa. "Moreover, +don't I get ten columns of news every three days? I know far more about +this town than you do, I bet!"</p> + +<p>Everybody laughed at Mrs. Orgreave, the great letter-writer and +universal disseminator of information.</p> + +<p>"Now, Alicia, you must go to bed," said Mrs. Orgreave. And Alicia +regretted that she had been so indiscreet as to draw attention to +herself.</p> + +<p>"The kid can stay up if she will say her piece," said Charlie mockingly. +He knew that he could play the autocrat, for that evening at any rate.</p> + +<p>"What piece?" the child demanded, blushing and defiant.</p> + +<p>"Her 'Abou Ben Adhem,'" said Charlie. "Do you think I don't know all +about that too?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, mother, you are a bore!" Alicia exclaimed, pouting. "Why did you +tell him that?... Well, I'll say it if Hilda will recite something as +well."</p> + +<p>"Me!" murmured Hilda, staggered. "I never recite!"</p> + +<p>"I've always understood you recite beautifully," said Mrs. Orgreave.</p> + +<p>"You know you do, Hilda!" said Janet.</p> + +<p>"Of course you do," said Charlie.</p> + +<p>"<i>You've</i> never heard me, anyhow!" she replied to him obstinately. +How could they have got it fixed into their heads that she was a reciter? +This renown was most disconcerting.</p> + +<p>"Now, Hilda!" Mr. Orgreave soothingly admonished her from the back of +the sofa. She turned her head and looked up at him, smiling in her +distress.</p> + +<p>"Go ahead, then, kid! It's agreed," said Charlie.</p> + +<p>And Alicia galloped through Leigh Hunt's moral poem, which she was +preparing for an imminent speech-day, in an extraordinarily short space of +time.</p> + +<p>"But I can't remember anything. I haven't recited for years and years," +Hilda pleaded, when the child burst out, "Now, Hilda!"</p> + +<p>"<i>Stuff</i>!" Charlie pronounced.</p> + +<p>"Some Tennyson?" Mrs. Orgreave suggested. "Don't you know any Tennyson? +We must have something, now." And Alicia, exulting in the fact that she had +paid the penalty imposed, cried that there could be no drawing back.</p> + +<p>Hilda was lost. Mrs. Orgreave's tone, with all its softness, was a +command. "Tennyson? I've forgotten 'Maud,'" she muttered.</p> + +<p>"I'll prompt you," said Charlie. "Thomas!"</p> + +<p>Everybody looked at Tom, expert in literature as well as in music; Tom, +the collector, the owner of books and bookcases. Tom went to a bookcase and +drew forth a green volume, familiar and sacred throughout all England.</p> + +<p>"Oh dear!" Hilda moaned.</p> + +<p>"Where do you mean to begin?" Charlie sternly inquired. "It just happens +that I'm reading 'In Memoriam,' myself. I read ten stanzas a day."</p> + +<p>Hilda bent over the book with him.</p> + +<p>"But I must stand up," she said, with sudden fire. "I can't recite +sitting down."</p> + +<p>They all cried "Bravo!" and made a circle for her. And she stood up.</p> + +<p>The utterance of the first lines was a martyrdom for her. But after that +she surrendered herself frankly to the mood of the poem and forgot to +suffer shame, speaking in a loud, clear, dramatic voice which she +accompanied by glances and even by gestures. After about thirty lines she +stopped, and, regaining her ordinary senses, perceived that the entire +family was staring at her with an extreme intentness.</p> + +<p>"I can't do any more," she murmured weakly, and dropped on to the +sofa.</p> + +<p>Everybody clapped very heartily.</p> + +<p>"It's wonderful!" said Janet in a low tone.</p> + +<p>"I should just say it was!" said Tom seriously, and Hilda was saturated +with delicious joy.</p> + +<p>"You ought to go on the stage; that's what you ought to do!" said +Charlie.</p> + +<p>For a fraction of a second, Hilda dreamt of the stage, and then Mrs. +Orgreave said softly, like a mother:</p> + +<p>"I'm quite sure Hilda would never dream of any such thing!"</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>There was an irruption of Jimmie and Johnnie, and three of the Swetnam +brothers, including him known as the Ineffable. Jimmie and Johnnie played +the rôle of the absolutely imperturbable with a skill equal to +Charlie's own; and only a series of calm "How-do's?" marked the greetings +of these relatives. The Swetnams were more rollickingly demonstrative. Now +that the drawing-room was quite thickly populated, Hilda, made nervous by +Mr. Orgreave's jocular insinuation that she herself was the object of the +Swetnams' call, took refuge, first with Janet, and then, as Janet was drawn +into the general crowd, with Charlie, who was absently turning over the +pages of "In Memoriam."</p> + +<p>"Know this?" he inquired, friendly, indicating the poem.</p> + +<p>"I don't," she said. "It's splendid, isn't it?"</p> + +<p>"Well," he answered. "It's rather on the religious tack, you know. +That's why I'm reading it." He smiled oddly.</p> + +<p>"Really?"</p> + +<p>He hesitated, and then nodded. It was the strangest avowal from this +young dandy of twenty-three with the airy and cynical tongue. Hilda +thought: "Here, then, is another!" And her own most secret troubles +recurred to her mind.</p> + +<p>"What's that about Teddy Clayhanger?" Charlie cried out, suddenly +looking up. He had caught the name in a distant conversation.</p> + +<p>Janet explained how they had seen Edwin, and went on to say that it was +impossible to persuade him to call.</p> + +<p>"What rot!" said Charlie. "I bet you what you like I get him here +to-morrow night." He added to Hilda: "Went to school with him!" Hilda's +face burned.</p> + +<p>"I bet you don't," said Janet stoutly, from across the room.</p> + +<p>"I'll bet you a shilling I do," said Charlie.</p> + +<p>"Haven't a penny left," Janet smiled. "Father, will you lend me a +shilling?"</p> + +<p>"That's what I'm here for," said Mr. Orgreave.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Orgreave," the youngest Swetnam put in, "you talk exactly like the +dad talks."</p> + +<p>The bet was made, and according to a singular but long-established +family custom, Tom had to be stake-holder.</p> + +<p>Hilda became troubled and apprehensive. She hoped that Charlie would +lose, and then she hoped that he would win. Looking forward to the intimate +bedroom chat with Janet which brought each evening to a heavenly close, she +said to herself: "If he <i>does</i> come, I shall make Janet promise that +I'm not to be asked to recite or anything. In fact, I shall get her to see +that I'm not discussed."</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b2c5">CHAPTER V</a><br /> EDWIN CLAYHANGER</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>The next evening, Mr. and Mrs. Orgreave, Hilda, Janet, and Alicia were +in the dining-room of the Orgreaves awaiting the advent at the supper-table +of sundry young men whose voices could be heard through open doors in the +distance of the drawing-room.</p> + +<p>Charlie Orgreave had won his bet: and Edwin Clayhanger was among those +young men who had remained behind in the drawing-room to exchange, +according to the practice of young men, ideas upon life and the world. +Hilda had been introduced to him, but owing to the performance of another +Beethoven symphony there had been almost no conversation before supper, and +she had not heard him talk. She had stationed herself behind the grand +piano, on the plea of turning over the pages for the musicians (though it +was only with great uncertainty, and in peril of missing the exact instant +for turning, that she followed the music on the page), and from this +security she had furtively glanced at Edwin when her task allowed. "Perhaps +I was quite mistaken last night," she said to herself. "Perhaps he is +perfectly ordinary." The strange thing was that she could not decide +whether he was ordinary or not. At one moment his face presented no +interest, at another she saw it just as she had seen it, framed in the +illuminated aperture of the shop-shutters, on the previous night. Or she +fancied that she saw it thus. The more she tried to distinguish between +Edwin's reality and her fancies concerning Edwin, the less she succeeded. +She would pronounce positively that her fancies were absurd and even +despicable. But this abrupt positiveness did not convince. Supposing that +he was after all marvellous among men! During the day she had taken +advantage of the mention of his name to ascertain discreetly some details +of the legendary feat by which as a boy he had saved his father's +printing-shop from destruction. The details were vague, and not very +comprehensible, but they seemed to indicate on his part an astounding +presence of mind, a heroic promptitude in action. Assuredly, the Orgreaves +regarded him as a creature out of the common run. And at the same time they +all had the air of feeling rather sorry for him.</p> + +<p>Standing near the supper-table, Hilda listened intently for the sound of +his voice among the other voices in the drawing-room. But she could not +separate it from the rest. Perhaps he was keeping silence. She said to +herself: "Yet what do I care whether he is keeping silence or not?"</p> + +<p>Mr. Orgreave remarked, in the suspense, glancing ironically at his +wife:</p> + +<p>"I think I'll go upstairs and do an hour's planning. They aren't likely +to be more than an hour, I expect?"</p> + +<p>"Hilda," said Mrs. Orgreave, quite calm, but taking her husband quite +seriously, "will you please go and tell those young men from me that supper +is waiting?"</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>Of course Hilda obeyed, though it appeared strange to her that Mrs. +Orgreave had not sent Alicia on such an errand. Passing out of the bright +dining-room where the gas was lit, she hesitated a moment in the dark broad +corridor that led to the drawing-room. The mission, she felt, would make +her rather prominent in front of Edwin Clayhanger, the stranger, and she +had an objection to being prominent in front of him; she had, indeed, taken +every possible precaution against such a danger. "How silly I am to loiter +here!" she thought. "I might be Alicia!"</p> + +<p>The boys, she could now hear, were discussing French literature, and in +particular Victor Hugo. When she caught the name of Victor Hugo she lifted +her chin, and moved forward a little. She worshipped Victor Hugo with a +passion unreflecting and intense, simply because certain detached lines +from his poems were the most splendid occupants of her memory, dignifying +every painful or sordid souvenir. At last Charlie's clear, gay voice +said:</p> + +<p>"It's all very well, and Victor Hugo <i>is</i> Victor Hugo; but you can +say what you like--there's a lot of this that'll bear skipping, your +worships."</p> + +<p>Already she was at the doorway. In the dusk of the unlighted chamber the +faces of the four Orgreaves and Clayhanger showed like pale patches on the +gloom.</p> + +<p>"Not a line!" she said fiercely, with her extremely clear articulation. +She had no right to make such a statement, for she had not read the +twentieth part of Victor Hugo's work; she did not even know what book they +were discussing--Charlie held the volume lightly in his hand--but she was +incensed against the mere levity of Charlie's tone.</p> + +<p>She saw Edwin Clayhanger jump at the startling interruption. And all +five looked round. She could feel her face burning.</p> + +<p>Charlie quizzed her with a word, and then turned to Edwin Clayhanger for +support. "Don't <i>you</i> think that some of it's dullish, Teddy?"</p> + +<p>Edwin Clayhanger, shamefaced, looked at Hilda wistfully, as if in +apology, as if appealing to her clemency against her fierceness; and said +slowly:</p> + +<p>"Well--yes."</p> + +<p>He had agreed with Charlie; but while disagreeing with Hilda he had +mysteriously proved to her that she had been right in saying to herself on +the previous evening: "<i>I like him</i>."</p> + +<p>The incident appeared to her to be enormous and dramatic. She moved +away, as it were breathless under emotion, and then, remembering her +errand, threw over her shoulder:</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Orgreave wants to know when you're coming to supper."</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>The supper-table was noisy and joyous--more than usually so on account +of the presence of Charlie, the gayest member of the family. At either end +of the long, white-spread board sat Mr. and Mrs. Orgreave; Alicia stood by +Mr. Orgreave, who accepted her caresses with the negligence of a handsome +father. Along one side sat Hilda, next to Janet, and these two were flanked +by Jimmie and Johnnie, tall, unbending, apparently determined to prove by a +politely supercilious demeanor that to pass a whole evening thus in the +home circle was considered by them to be a concession on their part rather +than a privilege. Edwin Clayhanger sat exactly opposite to Hilda, with +Charlie for sponsor; and Tom's spectacles gleamed close by.</p> + +<p>Hilda, while still constrained, was conscious of pleasure in the scene, +and of a certain pride in forming part of it. These prodigal and splendid +persons respected and liked her, even loved her. Her recitation on the +previous evening had been a triumph. She was glad that she had shown them +that she could at any rate do one thing rather well; but she was equally +glad that she had obtained Janet's promise to avoid any discussion of her +qualities or her situation. After all, with her self-conscious restraint +and her pitiful assured income of three pounds a week, she was a poor +little creature compared with the easy, luxurious beings of this household, +whose upkeep could not cost less than three pounds a day. Janet, in rich +and complicated white, and glistening with jewels at hand and neck, was a +princess beside her. She hated her spare black frock, and for the second +time in her life desired expensive clothes markedly feminine. She felt that +she was at a grave disadvantage, and that to remedy this disadvantage would +be necessary, not only dresses and precious stones, but an instinctive +faculty of soft allurement which she had not. Each gesture of Janet's +showed seductive grace, while her own rare gestures were stiffened by a +kind of masculine harshness. Every time that the sad-eyed and modest Edwin +Clayhanger glanced at Janet, and included herself in the glance, she +fancied that he was unjustly but inevitably misprising herself. And at +length she thought: "Why did I make Janet promise that I shouldn't be +talked about? Why shouldn't he know all about my mourning, and that I'm the +only girl in the Five Towns that can write shorthand. Why should I be +afraid to recite again? However much I might have suffered through +nervousness if I'd recited, I should have shown I'm not such a poor little +thing as all that! Why am I such a baby?" She wilted under her own +disdain.</p> + +<p>It was strange to think that Edwin Clayhanger, scarcely older than the +irresponsible Charlie, was the heir to an important business, was +potentially a rich and influential man. Had not Mr. Orgreave said that old +Mr. Clayhanger could buy up all the Orgreaves if he chose? It was strange +to think that this wistful and apparently timid young man, this nice boy, +would one day be the head of a household, and of a table such as this! Yes, +it would assuredly arrive! Everything happened. And the mother of that +household? Would it be she? Her imagination leaped far into the future, as +she exchanged a quiet, furtive smile with Mrs. Orgreave, and she tried to +see herself as another Mrs. Orgreave, a strenuous and passionate past +behind her, honoured, beloved, teased, adored. But she could not quite see +herself thus. Impossible that she, with her temperament so feverish, +restive, and peculiar, should ever reach such a haven! It was fantastically +too much to expect! And yet, if not with Edwin Clayhanger, then with +another, with some mysterious being whom she had never seen!... Did not +everything happen?... But then, equally, strange and terrible misfortunes +might be lying in wait for her!... The indescribable sharp savour of life +was in her nostrils.</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>The conversation had turned upon Bradlaugh, the shameless free-thinker, +the man who had known how to make himself the centre of discussion in every +house in England. This was the Bradlaugh year, the apogee of his notoriety. +Dozens of times at the Cedar's meal-table had she heard the shocking name +of Bradlaugh on outraged tongues, but never once had a word been uttered in +his favour. The public opinion of the boarding-house was absolutely +unanimous in reckoning him a scoundrel. In the dining-room of the Orgreaves +the attitude towards him was different. His free-thought was not precisely +defended, but champions of his right to sit in the House of Commons were +numerous. Hilda grew excited, and even more self-conscious. It was as if +she were in momentary expectation of being challenged by these hardy +debaters: "Are not <i>you</i> a free-thinker?" Her interest was personal; +the interest of one in peril. Compared to the discussions at the Cedars, +this discussion was as the open, tossing, windy sea to a weed-choked canal. +The talk veered into mere profane politics, and Mr. Orgreave, entrenching +himself behind an assumption of careless disdain, was severely attacked by +all his sons except Jimmie, who, above Hilda's left shoulder, pretended to +share the paternal scorn. The indifference of Hilda to politics was +complete. She began to feel less disturbed; she began to dream. Then she +suddenly heard, through her dream, the name of Bradlaugh again; and Edwin +Clayhanger, in response to a direct question from Mr. Orgreave, was +saying:</p> + +<p>"You can't help what you believe. You can't make yourself believe +anything. And I don't see why you should, either. There's no virtue in +believing."</p> + +<p>And Tom was crying "Hooray!"</p> + +<p>Hilda was thunderstruck. She was blinded as though by a mystic +revelation. She wanted to exult, and to exult with all the ardour of her +soul. This truth which Edwin Clayhanger had enunciated she had indeed +always been vaguely aware of; but now in a flash she felt it, she faced it, +she throbbed to its authenticity, and was free. It solved every difficulty, +and loosed the load that for months past had wearied her back. "There's no +virtue in believing." It was fundamental. It was the gift of life and of +peace. Her soul shouted, as she realized that just there, in that instant, +at that table, a new epoch had dawned for her. Never would she forget the +instant and the scene--scene of her re-birth!</p> + +<p>Mrs. Orgreave remonstrated with mild sadness:</p> + +<p>"No virtue in believing! Eh, Mr. Edwin!" And Hilda, under the ageing +lady's grieved glance, tried to quench the exultation on her face, somewhat +like a child trapped. But she could not. Tom again cried "Hooray!" His +tone, however, grated on her sensibility. It lacked emotion. It was the +tone of a pugilist's backer. And Janet permitted herself some pleasantry. +And Charlie became frankly facetious. Was it conceivable that Charlie could +be interested in religion? She liked him very much, partly because he and +she had learnt to understand each other at the dancing-classes, and partly +because his curly hair and his candid smile compelled sympathy. But her +esteem for him had limits. It was astonishing that a family otherwise +simply perfect should be content with jocosity when jocosity was so +obviously out of place. Were they, then, afraid of being serious?... Edwin +Clayhanger was not laughing; he had blushed. Her eyes were fixed on him +with the extremest intensity, studying him, careless of the danger that his +gaze might catch hers. She was lost in him. And then, he caught her; and, +burning with honest shame, she looked downwards.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b2c6">CHAPTER VI</a><br /> IN THE GARDEN</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>That evening Janet did not stay long in Hilda's bedroom, having +perceived that Hilda was in one of her dark, dreamy moods.</p> + +<p>As soon as she was gone, Hilda lowered the gas a little, and then went +to the window, and opened it wider, and, drawing aside the blind, looked +forth. The night was obscure and warm; and a wet wind moved furtively about +in the elm-trees of the garden. The window was at the side of the house; it +gave on the west, and commanded the new house just finished by Mr. Orgreave +for the Clayhanger family. The block of this generously planned dwelling +rose massively at a distance of perhaps forty feet, dwarfing a whole row of +cottages in the small street behind Lane End House; its various chimneypots +stood out a deeper black against the enigmatic sky. Beyond the Clayhanger +garden-plot, as yet uncultivated, and its high boundary wall, ran the great +silent thoroughfare, Trafalgar Road, whose gas-lamps reigned in the +nocturnal silence that the last steam-car had left in its wake.</p> + +<p>Hilda gazed at the house; and it seemed strange to her that the house, +which but a short time ago had no existence whatever, and was yet cold and +soulless, was destined to be the living home of a family, with history in +its walls and memories clinging about it. The formidable magic of life was +always thus discovering itself to her, so that she could not look upon even +an untenanted, terra-cotta-faced villa without a secret thrill; and the +impenetrable sky above was not more charmed and enchanted than those brick +walls. When she reflected that one day the wistful, boyish Edwin Clayhanger +would be the master of that house, that in that house his will would be +stronger than any other will, the mystery that hides beneath the surface of +all things surged up and overwhelmed thought. And although scarcely a +couple of hours had elapsed since the key of the new life had been put into +her hands, she could not make an answer when she asked herself: "Am I happy +or unhappy?"</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>The sound of young men's voices came round the corner of the house from +the lawn. Some of the brothers Orgreave were saying good-night to Edwin +Clayhanger in the porch. She knew that they had been chatting a long time +in the hall, after Clayhanger had bidden adieu to the rest of the family. +She wondered what they had been talking about, and what young men did in +general talk about when they were by themselves and confidential. In her +fancy she endowed their conversations with the inexplicable attractiveness +of masculinity, as masculinity is understood by women alone. She had an +intense desire to overhear such a conversation, and she felt that she would +affront the unguessed perils of it with delight, drinking it up eagerly, +every drop, even were the draught deadly. Meanwhile, the mere inarticulate +sound of those distant voices pleased her, and she was glad that she was +listening and that the boys knew it not.</p> + +<p>Silence succeeded the banging of the front door. And then, after a +pause, she was startled to hear the crunching of gravel almost under her +window. In alarm she dropped the blind, but continued to peer between the +edge of the blind and the window-frame. At one point the contiguous +demesnes of the Orgreaves and the Clayhangers were separated only by a +poor, sparse hedge, a few yards in length. Somebody was pushing his way +through this hedge. It was Edwin Clayhanger. Despite the darkness of the +night she could be sure that the dim figure was Edwin Clayhanger's by the +peculiar, exaggerated swing of the loose arms. He passed the hedge, +carelessly brushed his clothes with his hands, and walked slowly up the +Clayhanger garden towards the new house, and in the deep shadow of the +house was lost. Still, she could catch vague noises of movement. In a state +of extreme excitation she wondered what he could be doing. It seemed to her +that he and she were sharing the night together.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>She thought:</p> + +<p>"I would give anything to be able to speak to him privately and ask him +a little more about what he said to-night. I ought to. I may never see him +again. At any rate, I may never have another chance. He may have meant +something else. He may not have been serious...." The skin of her face +prickled, and a physical wave of emotion seemed to sweep downwards through +her whole body. The thrill was exquisite, but it was intimidating.</p> + +<p>She whispered to herself:</p> + +<p>"I could go downstairs and outside, and find him, and just ask him."</p> + +<p>The next instant she was opening the door of her bedroom.... No, all the +household had not yet retired, for a light was still burning in the +corridor. Nevertheless she might go. She descended the stairs, asking +herself aghast: "Why am I doing this?" Another light was burning in the +hall, and through the slit of the half-shut door of the breakfast-room she +could see light. She stood hesitant. Then she heard the striking of a match +in the breakfast-room, and she boldly pushed the door open. Tom, with a +book before him, was lighting his pipe.</p> + +<p>"Hello!" he said. "What's the matter?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, nothing!" she replied. "Only, I'm just going to walk about in the +garden a minute. I shan't go to sleep unless I do." She spoke quite +easily.</p> + +<p>"All serene!" he agreed. "So long as you keep off the grass! It's bound +to be damp. I'll unchain the door for you, shall I?"</p> + +<p>She said that she could unfasten the door for herself, and he did not +insist. The hospitality of the Orgreaves was never irksome. Tom had +scarcely half-risen from his chair.</p> + +<p>"I shan't be long," she added casually.</p> + +<p>"That's all right, Hilda," he said. "I'm not going to bed just yet."</p> + +<p>"All the others gone?"</p> + +<p>He nodded. She pulled the door to, tripped delicately through the hall, +and unchained the heavy front door as quietly as she could.</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>She was outside, amid all the influences of the night. Gradually her +eyes accustomed themselves again to the gloom. She passed along the facade +of the house until she came to the corner, where the breeze surprised her, +and whence she could discern the other house and, across the indistinct +hedge, the other garden. Where was Edwin Clayhanger? Was he wandering in +the other garden, or had he entered the house? Then a brief flare lit up a +lower window of the dark mass for a few instants. He was within. She +hesitated. Should she go forward, or should she go back? At length she went +forward, and, finding in the hedge the gap which Clayhanger had made, +forced her way through it. Her skirt was torn by an obstinate twig. Quite +calmly she bent down and with her fingers examined the rent; it was not +important. She was now in the garden of the Clayhangers, and he whom she +sought was moving somewhere in the house. "Supposing I <i>do</i> meet him," +she thought, "what shall I say to him?" She did not know what she should +say to him, nor why she had entered upon this singular adventure. But the +consciousness of self, the fine, disturbing sense of being alive in every +vein and nerve, was a rich reward for her audacity. She wished that that +tense moment of expectation might endure for ever.</p> + +<p>She approached the house, trembling. It was not by volition that she +walked over the uneven clayey ground, but by instinct. She was in front of +the garden-porch, and here she hesitated again, apparently waiting for a +sign from the house. She glanced timidly about her, as though in fear of +marauders that might spring out upon her from the shadow. Just over the +boundary wall the placid flame of a gas-lamp peeped. Then, feeling with her +feet for the steps, she ascended into the shelter of the porch. Almost at +the same moment there was another flare behind the glass of the door; she +heard the sound of unlatching; the flare expired. She was absolutely +terror-struck now.</p> + +<p>The door opened, grating on some dirt or gravel.</p> + +<p>"Who's there?" demanded a queer, shaking voice.</p> + +<p>She could see his form.</p> + +<p>"Me!" she answered, in a harsh tone which was the expression of her +dismay.</p> + +<p>The deed was done, irretrievably. In her bedroom she had said that she +would try to speak with him, and lo! they were face to face, in the dark, +in secret! Her terror was now, at any rate, desperately calm. She had +plunged; she was falling into the deep sea; she was hopelessly cut off from +the past.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" came the uncertain voice weakly. "Did you want me? Did anyone want +me?"</p> + +<p>She heard the door being closed behind him.</p> + +<p>She told him, with peculiar curtness, how she had seen him from her +window, and how she wished to ask him an important question.</p> + +<p>"I dare say you think it's very queer of me," she added.</p> + +<p>"Not at all," he said, with an insincerity that annoyed her.</p> + +<p>"Yes, you do!" she sharply insisted. "But I want to know"--what did she +want to know?--"I want to know--did you mean it when you said--you know, at +supper--that there's no virtue in believing?"</p> + +<p>He stammered: "Did I say there was no virtue in believing?"</p> + +<p>She cried out, irritated: "Of course you did! Do you mean to say you can +say a thing like that and then forget about it? If it's true, it's one of +the most wonderful things that were ever said. And that's why I wanted to +know if you meant it, of whether you were only saying it because it sounded +clever."</p> + +<p>She stopped momentarily, wondering why she was thus implying an untruth; +for the fact was that she had never doubted that he had been in +earnest.</p> + +<p>"That's what they're always doing in that house, you know--being +clever!" she went on, in a tone apparently inimical to 'that house.'</p> + +<p>"Yes," came the voice. "I meant it. Why?"</p> + +<p>And the voice was so simple and so sincere that it pierced straight to +her heart and changed her secret mood swiftly to the religious, so that she +really was occupied by the thoughts with which, a moment previously, she +had only pretended to be occupied; and the splendour of the revelation was +renewed. Nevertheless, some impulse, perverse or defensive, compelled her +to assume a doubt of his assurance. She suspected that, had she not adopted +this tactic, she might have melted before him in gratitude.</p> + +<p>"You did?" she murmured.</p> + +<p>She thanked him, after that, rather coldly; and they talked a little +about the mere worry of these religious questions. He protested that they +never worried him, and reaffirmed his original proposition.</p> + +<p>"I hope you are right," she said softly, in a thrilled voice. She was +thinking that this was the most wonderful, miraculous experience that she +had ever had.</p> + + +<h3>V</h3> + +<p>Silence.</p> + +<p>"Now," she thought, "I must go back." Inwardly she gave a delicious +sigh.</p> + +<p>But just as she was about to take her prim leave, the scarce-discerned +figure of her companion stepped out into the garden.</p> + +<p>"By Jove!" said Edwin Clayhanger. "It's beginning to rain, I do +believe."</p> + +<p>The wind blew, and she felt rain on her cheek. Clayhanger advised her to +stand against the other wall of the porch for better protection. She +obeyed. He re-entered the porch, but was still exposed to the rain. She +called him to her side. Already he was so close that she could have touched +his shoulder by outstretching her arm.</p> + +<p>"Oh! I'm all right!" he said lightly, and did not move.</p> + +<p>"You needn't be afraid of me!" She was hurt that he had refused her +invitation to approach her. The next instant she would have given her +tongue not to have uttered those words. But she was in such a tingling +state of extreme sensitiveness as rendered it impossible for her to +exercise a normal self-control.</p> + +<p>Scarcely conscious of what she did, she asked him the time. He struck a +match to look at his watch. The wind blew the match out, but she saw his +wistful face, with his disordered hair under the hat. It had the quality of +a vision.</p> + +<p>He offered to get a light in the house, but abruptly she said good +night.</p> + +<p>Then they were shaking hands--she knew not how or why. She could not +loose his hand. She thought: "Never have I held a hand so honest as this +hand." At last she dropped it. They stood silent while a trap rattled up +Trafalgar Road. It was as if she was bound to remain moveless until the +sounds of the trap had died away.</p> + +<p>She walked proudly out into the rain. He called to her: "I say, Miss +Lessways!" But she did not stop.</p> + +<p>In a minute she was back again in Lane End House.</p> + +<p>"That you?" Tom's voice from the breakfast-room!</p> + +<p>"Yes," she answered clearly. "I've put the chain on. Good night."</p> + +<p>"Good night. Thanks."</p> + +<p>She ascended the stairs, smiling to herself, with the raindrops fresh on +her cheek. In her mind were no distinct thoughts, either concerning the +non-virtue of belief, or the new epoch, or Edwin Clayhanger, or even the +strangeness of her behaviour. But all her being vibrated to the mysterious +and beautiful romance of existence.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b2c7">CHAPTER VII</a><br /> THE NEXT MEETING</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>For several days the town of Bursley was to Hilda simply a place made +perilous and redoubtable by the apprehension of meeting Edwin Clayhanger +accidentally in the streets thereof. And the burden of her meditations was: +"What can he have thought of me?" She had said nothing to anybody of the +deliberately-sought adventure in the garden. And with the strangest +ingenuous confidence she assumed that Edwin Clayhanger, too, would keep an +absolute silence about it. She had therefore naught to fear, except in the +privacy of his own mind. She did not blame herself--it never occurred to +her to do so--but she rather wondered at herself, inimically, prophesying +that one day her impulsiveness would throw her into some serious +difficulty. The memory of the night beautifully coloured her whole daily +existence. In spite of her avoidance of the town, due to her dread of +seeing Clayhanger, she was constantly thinking: "But this cannot continue +for ever. One day I am bound to meet him again." And she seemed to be +waiting for that day.</p> + +<p>It came with inevitable quickness. The last day but one of June was +appointed throughout the country for the celebration of the Centenary of +Sunday Schools. Neither Hilda nor any of the Orgreave children had ever +seen the inside of a Sunday School; and the tendency up at Lane End House +was to condescend towards the festival as towards a rejoicing of the +proletariat. But in face of the magnitude of the affair, looming more +enormous as it approached, this attitude could not be maintained. The +preparations for the Centenary filled newspapers and changed the +physiognomy of towns. And on the morning of the ceremonial service, +gloriously flattered by the sun, there was candid excitement at the +breakfast-table of the Orgreaves. Mr. Orgreave regretted that pressure of +work would prevent him from seeing the fun. Tom was going to see the fun at +Hanbridge. Jimmie and Johnnie were going to see the fun, but they would not +say where. The servants were going to see the fun. Charlie had returned to +London. Alicia wanted to go and see the fun, but as she was flushed and +feverish, Mrs. Orgreave forbade and decided to remain at home with Alicia. +Otherwise, even Mrs. Orgreave would have gone to see the fun. Hilda and +Janet apparently hesitated about going, but Mr. Orgreave, pointing out that +there could not under the most favourable circumstance be another Centenary +of Sunday Schools for at least a hundred years, sarcastically urged them to +set forth. The fact was, as Janet teasingly told him while she hung on his +neck, that he wished to accentuate as much as possible his own martyrdom to +industry. Were not all the shops and offices of the Five Towns closed? Did +not every member of his family, save those detained by illness, attend the +historic spectacle of the Centenary? He alone had sacrificed pleasure to +work. Thus Janet's loving, ironic smiles foretold, would the father of the +brood discourse during the next few days.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>Hilda and Janet accordingly went down a be-flagged and sunlit Trafalgar +Road together. Janet was wearing still another white dress, and Hilda, to +her marked relief, had abandoned black for a slate-coloured frock made by a +dressmaker in Bleakridge. It was Mrs. Orgreave herself who had first +counselled Hilda, if she hated black, as she said she did, to abandon +black. The entire family chorus had approved.</p> + +<p>The risk of encountering Edwin Clayhanger on that day of multitudes was +surely infinitesimal. Nevertheless, in six minutes the improbable had +occurred. At the corner of Trafalgar Road and Duck Square Janet, attracted +by the sight of banners in the distance, turned to the left along Wedgwood +Street and past the front of Clayhanger's shop. Theoretically shops were +closed, but one shutter of Clayhanger's was down, and in its place stood +Edwin Clayhanger. Hilda felt her features stiffening into a sort of wilful +and insincere hostility as she shook hands. Within the darkness of the shop +she saw the figure of two dowdy women--doubtless the sisters of whom Janet +had told her; they disappeared before Janet and Hilda entered.</p> + +<p>"It has happened! I have seen him again!" Hilda said to herself as she +sat in the shop listening to Janet and to Edwin Clayhanger. It appeared +likely that Edwin Clayhanger would join them in the enterprise of +witnessing the historic spectacle.</p> + +<p>A few minutes later everybody was startled by the gay apparition of +Osmond Orgreave swinging his cane. Curiosity had been too much for +industriousness, and Osmond Orgreave had yielded himself to the general +interest.</p> + +<p>"Oh! Father!" cried Janet. "What a deceitful thing you are!"</p> + +<p>"Only a day or two ago," Hilda was thinking, "I had never even heard of +him. And his shop seemed so strange and romantic to me. And now I am +sitting in his shop like an old friend. And nobody suspects that he and I +have had a secret meeting!" The shop itself seemed to be important and +prosperous.</p> + +<p>Mr. Orgreave, having decided for pleasure, was anxious to find it at +once, and, under his impatience, they left the shop. Janet went out first +with her gay father. Edwin Clayhanger waited respectfully for Hilda to +pass. But just as she was about to step forth she caught sight of George +Cannon coming along the opposite side of Wedgwood Street in the direction +of Trafalgar Road; he was in close conversation with another man. She kept +within the shelter of the shop until the two had gone by. She did not want +to meet George Cannon, with whom she had not had speech since the interview +at the Cedars; he had written to her about the property sales, and she had +replied. There was no reason why she should hesitate to meet him. But she +wished not to complicate the situation. She thought: "If he saw me, he'd +come across and speak to me, and I might have to introduce him to all these +people, and goodness knows what!" The contretemps caused her heart to +beat.</p> + +<p>When they emerged from the shop Janet, a few yards ahead with Mr. +Orgreave, was beckoning.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>Hilda stood on a barrel by the side of Edwin Clayhanger on another +barrel. There, from the top of St. Luke's Square, they surveyed a vast +rectangular carpet of upturned faces that made a pattern of pale dots on a +coloured and black groundwork. Nearly all the children of Bursley, +thousands upon thousands, were massed in the Square, wedged in tight +together, so that there seemed not to be an inch of space anywhere between +the shuttered shop fronts on the east of the Square and the shuttered shop +fronts on the west of the Square. At the bottom of the Square a row of +railway lorries were crammed with tiny babes--or such they +appeared--toddlers too weak to walk in processions. At the top of the +Square a large platform full of bearded adults rose like an island out of +the unconscious sea of infants. And from every window of every house adults +looked down in safe ease upon that wavy ocean over which banners gleamed in +the dazzling and fierce sunshine.</p> + +<p>She might have put up her sunshade. But she would not do so. She +thought: "If all those children can stand the sun without fainting, I can!" +She was extraordinarily affected by the mere sight of the immense multitude +of children; they were as helpless and as fatalistic as sheep, utterly at +the mercy of the adults who had herded them. There was about them a +collective wistfulness that cut the heart; to dwell on the idea of it would +have brought her to tears. And when the multitude sang, so lustily, so +willingly, so bravely, pouring forth with the brass instruments a volume of +tone enormous and majestic, she had a tightness of the throat that was +excrutiating. The Centenary of Sunday Schools was quite other than she had +expected; she had not bargained for these emotions.</p> + +<p>It was after the hymn "There is a fountain filled with blood," during +the quietude of a speech, that Edwin Clayhanger, taking up an evangelistic +phrase in the speech, whispered to her:</p> + +<p>"More blood!"</p> + +<p>"What?" she asked, amazed by his ironical accent, which jarred on her +mood, and also by his familiar manner of leaning towards her and dropping +the words in her ear.</p> + +<p>"Well," he said. "Look at it! It only wants the Ganges at the bottom of +the Square!"</p> + +<p>Evidently for Edwin Clayhanger all religions were equally heathenish! +She was quite startled out of her amazement, and her response was an almost +humble entreaty not to make fun. The next moment she regretted that she had +not answered him with sharp firmness. She was somewhat out of humour with +him. He had begun by losing sight of Mr. Orgreave and Janet--and of course +it was hopeless to seek for them in those thronging streets around St. +Luke's Square. Then he had said to her, in a most peculiar tone: "I hope +you didn't catch cold in the rain the other night," and she had not liked +that. She had regarded it as a fault in tact, almost as a sexual disloyalty +on his part to refer at all to the scene in the garden. Finally, his way of +negotiating with the barrel man for the use of two barrels had been +lacking, for Hilda, in the qualities of largeness and masterfulness; any +one of the Orgreave boys would, she was sure, have carried the thing off in +a more worldly manner.</p> + +<p>The climax of the service came with the singing of "When I survey the +wondrous Cross." The physical effect of it on Hilda was nearly +overwhelming. The terrible and sublime words seemed to surge upon her +charged with all the multitudinous significance of the crowd. She was +profoundly stirred, and to prevent an outburst of tears she shook her +head.</p> + +<p>"What's the matter?" said Edwin Clayhanger.</p> + +<p>"Clumsy dolt!" she thought. "Haven't you got enough sense to leave me +alone?" And she said aloud, passionately transforming her weakness into +ferocity: "That's the most splendid religious verse ever written! You can +say what you like. It's worth while believing anything, if you can sing +words like that and mean them!"</p> + +<p>He agreed that the hymn was fine.</p> + +<p>"Do you know who wrote it?" she demanded threateningly.</p> + +<p>He did not. She was delighted.</p> + +<p>"Dr. Watts, of course!" she said, with a scornful sneer. What did Janet +mean by saying that he had read simply everything?</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>An episode which supervened close to their barrels did a great deal to +intensify the hostility of her mood. On the edge of the crowd an old man, +who had been trying to force his way through it, was being guyed by a gang +of louts who had surrounded an ice-cream barrow. Suddenly she recognized +this old man. His name was Shushions; he was a familiar figure of the +streets of Turnhill, and he had the reputation of being the oldest Sunday +School teacher in the Five Towns. He was indeed exceedingly old, foolish, +and undignified in senility; and the louts were odiously jeering at his +defenceless dotage, and a young policeman was obviously with the louts and +against the aged, fatuous victim.</p> + +<p>Hilda gave an exclamation of revolt, and called upon Edwin Clayhanger to +go to the rescue of Mr. Shushions. Not he, however, but she jumped down +first and pushed towards the barrow. She made the path, and he followed. +She protested to the policeman, and he too modestly seconded her. Yet the +policeman, ignoring her, addressed himself to Edwin Clayhanger. Hilda was +infuriated. It appeared that old Mr. Shushions had had a ticket for the +platform, but had lost it.</p> + +<p>"He must be got on to the platform somehow!" she decided, with a fiery +glance.</p> + +<p>But Edwin Clayhanger seemed to be incapable of an heroic action. He +hesitated. The policeman hesitated. Fortunately, the plight of the doting +oldest Sunday School teacher in the Five Towns had been observed from the +platform, and two fussy, rosetted officials bustled up and offered to take +charge of him. And Hilda, dissolving in painful pity, bent over him softly +and arranged his disordered clothes; she was weeping.</p> + +<p>"Shall we go back to our barrels?" Edwin Clayhanger rather sheepishly +suggested after Mr. Shushions had been dragged away.</p> + +<p>But she would not go back to the barrels.</p> + +<p>"I think it's time we set about to find Janet and Mr. Orgreave," she +replied coldly, and they drew out of the crowd. She was profoundly deceived +in Edwin Clayhanger, so famous for his presence of mind in saving +printing-shops from destruction! She did not know what he ought to have +done; she made no attempt to conceive what he ought to have done. But that +he ought to have done something--something decisive and grandly +masculine--she was sure.</p> + + +<h3>V</h3> + +<p>Later, after sundry adventures, and having found Mr. Orgreave and Janet, +they stood at the tail of the steam-car, which Janet had decided should +carry her up to Bleakridge; and Edwin shook hands. Yes, Hilda was +profoundly deceived in him. Nevertheless, his wistful and honest glance, as +he parted from her, had its effect. If he had not one quality, he had +another. She tried hard to maintain her scorn of him, but it was +exceedingly difficult to do so.</p> + +<p>Mr. Orgreave wiped his brow as the car jolted them out of the tumult of +the Centenary. It was hot, but he did not seem to be in the slightest +degree fatigued or dispirited, whereas Janet put back her head and shut her +eyes.</p> + +<p>"Caught sight of a friend of yours this morning, Hilda!" he said +pleasantly.</p> + +<p>"Oh!"</p> + +<p>"Yes. Mr. Cannon. By the way, I forgot to tell you yesterday that his +famous newspaper--<i>yours</i>--has come to an end." He spoke, as it were, +with calm sympathy. "Yes! Well, it's not surprising, not surprising! +Nothing's ever stood up against the <i>Signal</i> yet!"</p> + +<p>Hilda was saddened. When they reached Lane End House, a few seconds in +front of the hurrying and apologetic servants, Mrs. Orgreave told her that +Mr. George Cannon had called to see her, and had left a note for her. She +ran up to her room with the note. It said merely that the writer wished to +have an interview with her at once.</p> + +<hr /> + + + + +<h1><a name="b3">BOOK III</a><br /> HER BURDEN</h1> + + + + +<h2><a name="b3c1">CHAPTER I</a><br /> HILDA INDISPENSABLE</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>Hilda made no response of any kind to George Cannon's request for an +immediate interview, allowing day after day to pass in inactivity, and +wondering the while how she might excuse or explain her singular conduct +when circumstances should bring the situation to a head. She knew that she +ought either to go over to Turnhill, or write him with an appointment to +see her at Lane End House; but she did nothing; nor did she say a word of +the matter to Janet in the bedroom at nights. All that she could tell +herself was that she did not want to see George Cannon; she was not +honestly persuaded that she feared to see him. In the meantime, Edwin +Clayhanger was invisible, though the removal of the Clayhanger household to +the new residence at Bleakridge had made a considerable stir of straw and +litter in Trafalgar Road.</p> + +<p>On Tuesday in the following week she received a letter from Sarah +Gailey. It was brought up to her room early in the morning by a +half-dressed Alicia Orgreave, and she read it as she lay in bed. Sarah +Gailey, struggling with the complexities of the Cedars, away in Hornsey, +was unwell and gloomily desolate. She wrote that she suffered from terrible +headaches on waking, and that she was often feverish, and that she had no +energy whatever. "I am at a very trying age for a woman," she said. "I +don't know whether you understand, but I've come to a time of life that +really upsets one above a bit, and I'm fit for nothing." Hilda understood; +she was flattered, even touched, by this confidence; it made her feel +older, and more important in the world, and a whole generation away from +Alicia, who was drawing up the blind with the cries and awkward gestures of +a prattling infant. To the letter there was a postscript: "Has George been +to see you yet about me? He wrote me he should, but I haven't heard since. +In fact, I've been waiting to hear. I'll say nothing about that yet. I'm +ashamed you should be bothered. It's so important for you to have a good +holiday. Again, much love, S.G." The prim handwriting got smaller and +smaller towards the end of the postscript and the end of the page, and the +last lines were perfectly parallel with the lower edge of the paper; all +the others sloped feebly downwards from left to right.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" piped Alicia from the window. "Maggie Clayhanger has got her +curtains up in the drawing-room! Oh! Aren't they proud things! +<i>Oh</i>!--I do believe she's caught me staring at her!" And Alicia +withdrew abruptly into the room, blushing for her detected sin of ungenteel +curiosity. She bumped down on the bed. "Three days more," she said. "Not +counting to-day. Four, counting to-day."</p> + +<p>"School?"</p> + +<p>Alicia nodded, her finger in her mouth. "Isn't it horrid, going to +school on a day like this? I hear you and Janet are off up to Hillport this +afternoon again, to play tennis. You do have times!"</p> + +<p>"No," said Hilda. "I've got to go to Turnhill this afternoon."</p> + +<p>"But Janet told me you were--" Her glance fell on the letter. "Is it +business?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>The child was impressed, and her change of tone, her frank awe, gave +pleasure to Hilda's vanity. "Shall I go and tell Jane? She isn't near +dressed."</p> + +<p>"Yes, do."</p> + +<p>Off scampered Alicia, leaving the door unlatched behind her.</p> + +<p>Hilda gazed at the letter, holding it limply in her left hand amid the +soft disorder of the counterpane. It had come to her, an intolerably +pathetic messenger and accuser, out of the exacerbating frowsiness of the +Cedars. Yesterday afternoon care-ridden Sarah Gailey was writing it, with +sighs, at the desk in her stuffy, uncomfortable bedroom. As Hilda gazed at +the formation of the words, she could see the unhappy Sarah Gailey writing +them, and the letter was like a bit of Sarah Gailey's self, magically and +disconcertingly projected into the spacious, laughing home of the +Orgreaves, and into the mysterious new happiness that was forming around +Hilda. The Orgreaves, so far as Hilda could discover, had no real +anxieties. They were a joyous lot, favoured alike by temperament and by +fortune. And she, Hilda--what real anxieties had she? None! She was sure of +a small but adequate income. Her grief for her mother was assuaged. The +problem of her soul no longer troubled: in part it had been solved, and in +part it had faded imperceptibly away. Nor was she exercised about the +future, about the 'new life.' Instead of rushing ardently to meet the +future, she felt content to wait for its coming. Why disturb oneself? She +was free. She was enjoying existence with the Orgreaves. Yes, she was happy +in this roseate passivity.</p> + +<p>The letter shook her, arousing as it did the sharp sense of her +indebtedness to Sarah Gailey, who alone had succoured her in her long +period of despairing infelicity. Had she guessed that it was Sarah Gailey's +affair upon which George Cannon had desired to see her, she would not have +delayed an hour; no reluctance to meet George Cannon would have caused her +to tarry. But she had not guessed; the idea had never occurred to her.</p> + +<p>She rose, picked up the envelope from the carpet, carefully replaced the +letter in it, and laid it with love on the glittering dressing-table. +Through the unlatched door she heard a tramping of unshod masculine feet in +the passage, and the delightful curt greeting of Osmond Orgreave and his +sleepy son Jimmie--splendid powerful males. She glanced at the garden, and +at the garden of the Clayhangers, swimming in fresh sunshine. She glanced +in the mirror, and saw the deshabille of her black hair and of her insecure +nightgown, and thought: "Truly, I am not so bad-looking! And how well I +feel! How fond they all are of me! I'm just at the right age. I'm young, +but I'm mature. I've had a lot of experience, and I'm not a fool. I'm +strong--I could stand anything!" She put her shoulders back, with a +challenging gesture. The pride of life was hers.</p> + +<p>And then, this disturbing vision of Sarah Gailey, alone, unhappy, +unattractive, enfeebled, ageing--ageing! It seemed to her inexpressibly +cruel that people must grow old and weak and desolate; it seemed monstrous. +A pang, momentary but excruciating, smote her. She said to herself: "Sarah +Gailey has nothing to look forward to, except worry. Sarah Gailey is at the +end, instead of at the beginning!"</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>When she got off the train at Turnhill station, early that afternoon, +she had no qualm at the thought of meeting George Cannon; she was not even +concerned to invent a decent excuse for her silence in relation to his +urgent letter. She went to see him for the sake of Sarah Gailey, and +because she apparently might be of use in some affair of Sarah's--she knew +not what. She was proud that either Sarah or he thought that she could be +of use, or that it was worth while consulting her. She had a grave air, as +of one to whom esteem has brought responsibilities.</p> + +<p>In Child Street, leading to High Street, she passed the office of +Godlimans, the auctioneers. And there, among a group of white posters +covering the large window, was a poster of the sale of "valuable household +furniture and effects removed from No. 15 Lessways Street." And on the +poster, in a very black line by itself, stood out saliently the phrase: +"Massive Bedroom Suite." Her mother's! Hers! She had to stop and read the +poster through, though she was curiously afraid of being caught in the act. +All the principal items were mentioned by the faithful auctioneers; and the +furniture, thus described, had a strange aspect of special importance, as +if it had been subtly better, more solid, more desirable, than any other +houseful of furniture in the town,--Lessways' furniture! She sought for the +date. The sale had taken place on the previous night, at the very hour when +she was lolling and laughing in the drawing-room of Lane End House with the +Orgreaves! The furniture was sold, dispersed, gone! The house was empty! +The past was irremediably closed! The realization of this naturally +affected her, raising phantoms of her mother, and of the face of the +cab-driver as he remarked on the drawn blinds at the Cedars. But she was +still more affected by the thought that the poster was on the window, and +the furniture scattered, solely because she had willed it. She had said: +"Please sell all the furniture, and you needn't consult me about the sale. +I don't want to know. I prefer not to know. Just get it done." And it had +been done! How mysteriously romantic! Some girls would not have sold the +furniture, would not have dared to sell it, would have accepted the +furniture and the house as a solemn charge, and gone on living among those +relics, obedient to a tradition. But she had dared! She had willed--and the +solid furniture had vanished away! And she was adventurously free!</p> + +<p>She went forward. At the corner of Child Street and High Street the new +Town Hall was rising to the skies. Already its walls were higher than the +highest house in the vicinity. And workmen were crawling over it, amid +dust, and a load of crimson bricks was trembling and revolving upwards on a +thin rope that hung down from the blue. Glimpses of London had modified old +estimates of her native town. Nevertheless, the new Town Hall still +appeared extraordinarily large and important to her.</p> + +<p>She saw the detested Arthur Dayson in the distance of the street, and +crossed hurriedly to the Square, looking fixedly at the storeys above the +ironmonger's so that Arthur Dayson could not possibly catch her eye. There +was no sign of the <i>Five Towns Chronicle</i> in the bare windows of the +second storey. This did not surprise her; but she was startled by the +absence of the Karkeek wire-blinds from the first-floor windows, equally +bare with those of the second. When she got to the entrance she was still +more startled to observe that the Karkeek brass-plate had been removed. She +climbed the long stairs apprehensively.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>"Anybody here?" she called out timidly. She was in the clerk's office, +which was empty; but she could hear movements in another room. The place +seemed in process of being dismantled.</p> + +<p>Suddenly George Cannon appeared in a doorway, frowning.</p> + +<p>"Good afternoon, Mr. Cannon!"</p> + +<p>"Good afternoon, Miss Lessways." He spoke with stiff politeness. His +face looked weary.</p> + +<p>After a slight hesitation he advanced, and they shook hands. Hilda was +nervous. Her neglect of his letter now presented itself to her as +inexcusable. She thought: "If he is vexed about it I shall have to humour +him. I really can't blame him. He must think me very queer."</p> + +<p>"I was wondering what had become of you," he said, amply polite, but not +cordial.</p> + +<p>"Well," she said, "every day I was expecting you to call again, or to +send me a note or something.... And what with one thing and another--"</p> + +<p>"I dare say your time's been fully occupied," he filled up her pause. +And she fancied that he spoke in a peculiar tone. She absurdly fancied that +he was referring to the time which she had publicly spent with Edwin +Clayhanger at the Centenary. She conceived that he might have seen her and +Edwin Clayhanger together.</p> + +<p>"I had a letter from Miss Gailey this morning," she said. "And it seems +that it's about her that you wanted--"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"I do wish I'd known. If I'd had the slightest idea I should have come +over instantly." She spoke with eager seriousness, and then added, smiling +as if in appeal to be favourably understood: "I thought it was only about +<i>my</i> affairs--sale or what not. And as I'd asked you to manage all +these things exactly as you thought best, I didn't trouble--"</p> + +<p>He laughed, and either forgave or forgot.</p> + +<p>"Will you come this way?" he invited, in a new tone of friendliness. +"We're rather in a mess here."</p> + +<p>"You're all alone, too," she said, following him into his room.</p> + +<p>"Sowter's out," he answered laconically, waiting for her to precede him. +He said nothing as to the office-boy, nor as to Mr. Karkeek. Hilda was now +sure that something strange had happened.</p> + +<p>"So you've heard from Sarah, have you?" he began, when they were both +seated in his own room. There were still a lot of papers, though fewer than +of old, on the broad desk; but the bookcase was quite empty, and several of +the shelves in it had supped from the horizontal; the front part of the +shelves was a pale yellow, and behind that, an irregular dark band of dust +indicated the varying depths of the vanished tomes. The forlornness of the +bookcase gave a stricken air to the whole room.</p> + +<p>"She's not well."</p> + +<p>"Or she imagines she's not well."</p> + +<p>"Oh no!" said Hilda warmly. "It isn't imagination. She really isn't +well."</p> + +<p>"You think so?"</p> + +<p>"I don't think--I know!" Hilda spoke proudly, but with the restraint +which absolute certainty permits. She crushed, rather than resented, George +Cannon's easy insinuation, full of the unjustified superiority of the male. +How could he judge--how could any man judge? She had never before felt so +sure of herself, so adult and experienced, as she felt then.</p> + +<p>"But it's nothing serious?" he suggested with deference.</p> + +<p>"N--no--not what you'd call serious," said Hilda judicially, +mysteriously.</p> + +<p>"Because she wants to give up the boarding-house business +altogether--that's all!"</p> + +<p>Having delivered this dramatic blow, George Cannon smiled, as it were, +quizzically. And Hilda was reassured about him. She had been thinking: "Is +he ruined? If he is not ruined, what is the meaning of these puzzling +changes here?" And she had remembered her shrewd mother's hints, and her +own later fears, concerning the insecurity of his position: and had studied +his tired and worn face for an equivocal sign. But this smile, +self-confident and firm, was not the smile of a ruined man; and his +flashing glance seemed to be an omen of definite success.</p> + +<p>"Wants to give it up?" exclaimed Hilda.</p> + +<p>He nodded.</p> + +<p>"But why? I thought she was doing rather well."</p> + +<p>"So she is."</p> + +<p>"Then why?"</p> + +<p>"Ah!" George Cannon lifted his head with a gesture signifying enigma. +"That's just what I wanted to ask you. Hasn't she said anything to +you?"</p> + +<p>"As to giving it up? No!... So it was this that you wanted to see me +about?"</p> + +<p>He nodded. "She wrote me a few days after you came away, and suggested I +should see you and ask you what you thought."</p> + +<p>"But why me?"</p> + +<p>"Well, she thinks the world of you, Sarah does."</p> + +<p>Hilda thought: "How strange! She did nothing but look after me, and wait +on me hand and foot, and I never helped her in any way; and yet she turns +to me!" And she was extremely flattered and gratified, and was aware of a +delicious increase of self-respect.</p> + +<p>"But supposing she does give it up?" Hilda said aloud. "What will she +do?"</p> + +<p>"Exactly!" said George Cannon, and then, in a very confidential, +ingratiating manner: "I wish you'd write to her and put some reason into +her. She mustn't give it up. With her help--and you know in the management +she's simply wonderful--with her help, I think I shall be able to bring +something about that'll startle folks. Only, she mustn't throw me over. And +she mustn't get too crotchety with the boarders. I've had some difficulty +in that line, as it is. In fact, I've had to be rather cross. You know +about the Boutwoods, for instance! Well, I've smoothed that over.... It's +nothing, nothing--if she'll keep her head. If she'll keep her head it's a +gold mine--you'll see! Only--she wants a bit of managing. If you'd +write--"</p> + +<p>"I shan't write," said Hilda. "I shall go and see her--at once. I should +have gone in any case, after her letter this morning saying how unwell she +is. She wants company. She was so kind to me I couldn't possibly leave her +in the lurch. I can't very well get away to-day, but I shall go to-morrow, +and I shall drop her a line to-night."</p> + +<p>"It's very good of you, I'm sure," said George Cannon. Obviously he was +much relieved.</p> + +<p>"Not at all!" Hilda protested. She felt very content and happy.</p> + +<p>"The fact is," he went on, "there's nobody but you can do it. Your +mother was the only real friend she ever had. And this is the first time +she's been left alone up there, you see. I'm quite sure you can save the +situation."</p> + +<p>He was frankly depending on her for something which he admitted he could +not accomplish himself. Those two people, George Cannon and Sarah Gailey, +had both instinctively turned to her in a crisis. None could do what she +could do. She, by the force of her individuality, could save the situation. +She was no longer a girl, but a mature and influential being. Her ancient +diffidence before George Cannon had completely gone; she had no qualms, no +foreboding, no dubious sensation of weakness. Indeed, she felt herself in +one respect his superior, for his confidence in Sarah Gailey's housewifely +skill, his conviction that it was unique and would be irreplaceable, struck +her as somewhat naif, as being yet another example of the absurd family +pride which she and her mother had often noticed in the Five Towns. She was +not happy at the prospect of so abruptly quitting the delights of Lane End +House and the vicinity of Edwin Clayhanger; she was not happy at the +prospect of postponing the consideration of plans for her own existence; +she was not happy at the prospect of Sarah Gailey's pessimistic +complainings. She was above happiness. She was above even that thrill of +sharp and intense vitality which in times past had ennobled trouble and +misery. She had the most exquisite feeling of triumphant +self-justification. She was splendidly conscious of power. She was +indispensable.</p> + +<p>And the dismantled desolation of the echoing office, and the mystery of +George Cannon's personal position, somehow gave a strange poignancy to her +mood.</p> + +<p>They talked of indifferent matters: her property, the Orgreaves, even +the defunct newspaper, as to which George Cannon shrugged his shoulders. +Then the conversation drooped.</p> + +<p>"I shall go up by the four train to-morrow," she said, clinching the +interview, and rising.</p> + +<p>"I may go up by that train myself," said George Cannon.</p> + +<p>She started. "Oh! are you going to Hornsey, too?"</p> + +<p>"No! Not Hornsey. I've other business."</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b3c2">CHAPTER II</a><br /> SARAH'S BENEFACTOR</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>On the following afternoon Hilda travelled alone by the local train from +Bleakridge to Knype, the central station where all voyagers for London, +Birmingham, and Manchester had to foregather in order to take the fast +expresses that unwillingly halted there, and there only, in their skimming +flights across the district. It was a custom of Five Towns hospitality that +a departing guest should be accompanied as far as Knype and stowed with +personal attentions into the big train. But on this occasion Hilda had +wished otherwise. "I should <i>prefer</i> nobody to go with me to Knype," +she had said, in a characteristic tone, to Janet. It was enough. The family +had wondered; but it was enough. The family knew its singular, its +mysterious Hilda. And instead of at Knype, the leave-takings had occurred +at the little wayside station of Bleakridge, with wavy moorland behind, +factory chimneys in front, and cinder and shawd heaps all around. Hilda had +told Janet: "Mr. Cannon may be meeting me at Knype. He's probably going to +London too." And the discreet Janet, comprehending Hilda, had not even +mentioned this fact to the rest of the family.</p> + +<p>George Cannon, in a light summer suit and straw hat, was already on the +platform at Knype. Hilda had feared that at Bleakridge he might be looking +out of the window of the local train, which started from Turnhill; she had +desired not to meet him in the presence of any of the Orgreaves. But either +he had caught the previous train to Knype, or he had driven down. Holding a +Gladstone bag and a stick in one hand, he stood talking to another man of +about his own age and height. The conversation was vivacious, at any rate +on George Cannon's part. Hilda passed close by him amid the populous stir +of the expectant platform. He saw her, turned, and raised his hat, but in a +perfunctory, preoccupied manner; and instantly resumed the speech to his +companion. Hilda recognized the latter. It was 'young Lawton,' son and +successor to 'old Lawton,' the most famous lawyer in the Five Towns. Young +Lawton had a branch office at Turnhill, and lived in an important house +half-way between Turnhill and Bursley, where, behind the Town Hall, was the +historic principal office of the firm.</p> + +<p>The express came loudly in, and Hilda, having climbed into a +second-class compartment, leaned out from it, to descry her porter and +bestow on him a threepenny bit. George Cannon and young Lawton were still +in argument, and apparently quite indifferent to the train. Young Lawton's +thin face had its usual faint, harsh smile; his limbs were moveless in an +exasperating and obstinate calm; Hilda detested the man from his mere +looks. But George Cannon was very obviously under excitement. His face was +flushed; he moved his free arm violently--even the Gladstone bag swung to +and fro; he punctuated his sentences with sharp, angry nods of the head, +insisting and protesting and insisting, while the other, saying much less, +maintained his damnable stupid disdainful grin.</p> + +<p>Would he let the train go, in his feverish preoccupation? Hilda was +seriously afraid that he would. The last trunks were flung into the front +van, the stationmaster in his tall hat waved curtly to the glittering +guard; the guard waved his flag, and whistled; a porter banged the door of +Hilda's compartment, ignoring her gestures; the engine whistled. And at +that moment George Cannon, throwing apparently a last malediction at young +Lawton, sprang towards the train, and, seeing Hilda's face, rushed to the +door which she strained to open again.</p> + +<p>"I was afraid you'd be left behind," she said, as he dropped his bag on +the seat and the affronted stationmaster himself shut the door.</p> + +<p>"Not quite!" ejaculated Cannon grimly.</p> + +<p>The smooth, irresistible gliding of the train became apparent, +establishing a sudden aloof calm. Hilda perceived that all her muscles were +tense.</p> + +<p>In the compartment was a middle-aged couple.</p> + +<p>"What's this place?" asked the woman.</p> + +<p>"Looks like Tamworth," said the man sleepily.</p> + +<p>"Knype, sir!" George Cannon corrected him very sharply. He was so +wrought up that he had omitted even to shake hands with Hilda. Making no +effort to talk, and showing no curiosity about Hilda's welfare or doings, +he moved uneasily on his seat, and from time to time opened and shut the +Gladstone bag. Gradually the flush paled from his face.</p> + +<p>At Lichfield the middle-aged couple took advice from a porter and +stumbled out of the train.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>"We're fairly out of the smoke now," said Hilda, when the train began to +move again. As a fact, they had been fairly out of the smoke of the Five +Towns for more than half an hour; but Hilda spoke at random, timidly, +nervously, for the sake of speaking. And she was as apologetic as though it +was she herself who by some untimely discretion had annoyed George +Cannon.</p> + +<p>"Yes, thank God!" he replied fiercely, blowing with pleasure upon the +embers of his resentment. "And I'll take good care I never go into it +again--to live, that is!"</p> + +<p>"Really?" she murmured, struck into an extreme astonishment.</p> + +<p>He produced a cigar and a match-box.</p> + +<p>"May I?" he demanded carelessly, and accepted her affirmative as of +course.</p> + +<p>"You've heard about my little affair?" he asked, after lighting the +cigar. And he gazed at her curiously.</p> + +<p>"No."</p> + +<p>"Do you mean to say that none of the Orgreaves have said anything this +last day or two?" He leaned forward. They were in opposite corners.</p> + +<p>"No," she repeated stiffly. Nevertheless, she remembered a peculiar +glance of Tom's to his father on the previous day, when George Cannon's +name had been mentioned.</p> + +<p>"Well," said he. "You surprise me! That's all!"</p> + +<p>"But--" She stopped, full of misgivings.</p> + +<p>"Never heard any gossip about me--never?" he persisted, as it were, +menacing her.</p> + +<p>She shook her head.</p> + +<p>"Never heard that I'm not really a solicitor?"</p> + +<p>"Oh! well--I think mother once did say something--"</p> + +<p>"I thought so."</p> + +<p>"But I don't understand those things," she said simply. "Is anything the +matter? Is--"</p> + +<p>"Nothing!" he replied, calm and convincing. "Only I've been done! Done! +You'll hear about it some day, I dare say.... Shall I tell you? Would you +like me to tell you?" He smiled rather boyishly and leaned back.</p> + +<p>"Yes," she nodded.</p> + +<p>His attitude was very familiar, recalling their former relation of +employer and employed. It seemed as natural to her as to him that he should +not too ceremoniously conceal his feelings or disguise his mood.</p> + +<p>"Well, you see, I expect I know as much about law as any of 'em, but +I've never been admitted, and so--" He stopped, perceiving that she did not +comprehend the significance of such a word as 'admitted.' "If you want to +practise as a solicitor you have to pass examinations, and I never have +passed examinations. Very expensive, all that! And I couldn't afford when I +was young. It isn't the exams that are difficult--you may tell that from +the fellows that pass them. Lawton, for instance. But after a certain age +exams become a nuisance. However, I could do everything else. I might have +had half a dozen situations as managing clerk in the Five Towns if I'd +wanted. Only I didn't want! I wanted to be on my own. I could get clients +as quick as any of them. <i>And</i> quicker! So I found Karkeek--the +excellent Mr. Karkeek! Another of the bright ones that could pass the +exams! Oh! He'd passed the exams all right! He'd spent five years and I +don't know how many hundred pounds in passing the exams, and with it all he +couldn't get above a couple of pounds a week. There are hundreds of real +solicitors up and down the country who aren't earning more. And they aren't +worth more. But I gave him more, and a lot more. Just to use his name on my +door and my blinds. See? In theory I was his clerk, but in reality he was +mine. It was all quite clear. He understood--I should think he did, by +Jove!" George Cannon laughed shortly. "Every one understood. I got a +practice together in no time. <i>He</i> didn't do it. He wouldn't have got +a practice together in a thousand years. I had the second-best practice in +Turnhill, and I should soon have had the best--if I hadn't been done."</p> + +<p>"Yes?" said Hilda. The confidence flattered her.</p> + +<p>"Well, Karkeek came into some money,--and he simply walked out of the +office! Simply walked out! Didn't give me time to turn round. I'd always +treated him properly. But he was jealous."</p> + +<p>"What a shame!" Hilda's scorn shrivelled up Mr. Karkeek. There was +nothing that she detested so much as a disloyalty.</p> + +<p>"Yes. I couldn't stop him, of course. No formal agreement between us. +Couldn't be, in a case like ours! So he had me. He'd taken my wages quick +enough as long as it suited him. Then he comes into money, and behaves like +that. Jealousy! They were all jealous,--always had been. I was doing too +well. So I had the whole gang down on me instantly like a thousand of +bricks. They knew I was helpless, and so they came on. Special meeting of +the committee of the North Staffordshire Law Society, if you please! +Rumours of prosecution--oh yes! I don't know what!... All because I +wouldn't take the trouble to pass their wretched exams.... Why, I could +pass their exams on my head, if I hadn't anything better to do. But I have. +At first I thought I'd retire for five years and pass their exams, and then +come back and make 'em sit up. And wouldn't I have made 'em sit up! But +then I said to myself, 'No. It isn't good enough.'"</p> + +<p>Hilda frowned. "What isn't?"</p> + +<p>"What? The Five Towns isn't good enough! I can find something better +than the law, and I can find something better than the Five Towns!... And +here young Lawton has the impudence to begin to preach to me on Knype +platform, and to tell me I'm wise in going! He's the President of the local +Law Society, you know! No end of a President! And hasn't even got gumption +enough to keep his father's practice together! Stupid ass! Well, I let him +have it, and straight! He's no worse than the rest. They've got no brains +in this district. And they're so narrow--narrow isn't the word! +Thick-headed's the word. Stupid! Mean!... Mean!... What did it matter to +them? I kept to all their rules. There was a real solicitor on the +premises, and there'd soon have been another, if I'd had time. No concern +of theirs how the money was divided between me and the real solicitor. But +they were jealous--there you are! They don't understand enterprise. They +hate it. Nothing ever moves in the Five Towns. And they've got no +manners--I do believe that's the worst. Look at Lawton's manners! Nothing +but a boor! They aren't civilized yet--that's what's the matter with them! +That's what my father used to say. Barbarians, he used to say. '<i>Ce sont +des barbares!</i>'... Kids used to throw stones at him because of his +neck-tie. The grown-ups chuck a brick at anything they don't quite fancy. +That's their idea of wit."</p> + +<p>Hilda was afraid of his tempestuous mood. But she enjoyed her fear, as +she might have enjoyed exposure to a dangerous storm. She enjoyed the +sensation of her fragility and helplessness there, cooped up with him in +the close intimacy of the compartment. She was glad that he did not +apologize to her for his lack of restraint, nor foolishly pretend that he +was boring her.</p> + +<p>"It does seem a shame!" she murmured, her eyes candidly admitting that +she felt enormously flattered.</p> + +<p>He sighed and laughed. "How often have I heard my father say +that--'<i>Ce sont des barbares</i>!' Peels only brought him over because +they could find nobody in the Five Towns civilized enough to do the work +that he did.... I can imagine how he must have felt when he first came +here!... My God!... Environment!... I tell you what--it's only lately I've +realized how I loathe the provinces!"</p> + +<p>The little interior in which they were, swept steadily and smoothly +across the central sunlit plain of England, passing canals and brooks and +cottages and churches--silent and stolid in that English stupidity that he +was criticizing. And Hilda saw of George Cannon all that was French in him. +She saw him quite anew, as something rather exotic and entirely marvellous. +She thought: "When I first met him, I said to myself he was a most +extraordinary man. And I was right. I was more right than I ever imagined. +No one down there has any idea of what he really is. They're too stupid, as +he says."</p> + +<p>He imposed on her his scorn of the provincial. She had to share it. She +had a vision of the Five Towns as a smoky blotch on the remote +horizon,--negligible, crass, ridiculous in its heavy self-complacency. The +very Orgreaves themselves were tinged with this odious English +provincialism.</p> + +<p>He smiled to himself, and then said, very quietly: "It isn't of the +least importance, you know. In fact I'm rather glad. I've never had any +difficulty in making money, and when I've settled up everything down there +I shan't be precisely without. And I shall have no excuse for not branching +out in a new line."</p> + +<p>She meekly encouraged him to continue.</p> + +<p>"Oh yes!" he went on. "The law isn't the only thing--not by a long way. +And besides, I'm sick of it. Do you know what the great thing of the future +is, I mean the really great thing--the smashing big thing?" He smiled, +kindly and confidential.</p> + +<p>She too smiled, shaking her head.</p> + +<p>"Well, I'll tell you. Hotels!"</p> + +<p>"Hotels?" She was perfectly nonplussed.</p> + +<p>"Hotels! There'll be more money and more fun to be got out of hotels, +soon, than out of any other kind of enterprise in the world. You should see +those hotels that are going up in London! They'd give you a start, and no +mistake! Yes, hotels! There aren't twenty people in England who know what a +hotel is! But I know!" He paused, and added reflectively, in a comically +naïve tone: "Curious how these things come to you, bit by bit! Now, if +it hadn't been for Sarah--and that boarding-house--"</p> + +<p>He was using his straw hat as a fan. With an unexpected and almost +childlike gesture he suddenly threw the hat up on to the rack above his +head, "How's that?"</p> + +<p>"What a boy he is, after all!" thought Hilda sympathetically, wondering +why in the midst of all her manifold astonishment she felt so light-hearted +and gay.</p> + +<p>"Funny parcel you've got up there!" he idly observed, glancing from one +rack to the other.</p> + +<p>The parcel contained Mrs. Orgreave's generous conception of a repast +proper to be eaten in a train in place of high tea. He helped her to eat +it.</p> + +<p>As the train approached London he resumed his manhood. And he was +impeccably adult as he conducted her from Euston to King's Cross, and put +her into a train in a corner of the station that the summer twilight had +already taken possession of.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>Late at night Hilda sat with Sarah Gailey in the landlady's small +bedroom at the Cedars. It was lighted by a lamp, because the builder of the +house, hating excess, had thought fit not to carry gas-pipes higher than +the first floor. A large but old bedstead filled half the floor space. On +the shabby dressing-table a pile of bills and various papers lay near the +lamp. Clothes were hung behind the door, and a vague wisp of muslin moved +slightly in the warm draught from the tiny open window. There were two +small cane-chairs, enamelled, on which the women sat, close to each other, +both incommoded by the unwholesome sultriness of the only chamber that +could be spared for the private use of the house-mistress. This small +bedroom was Sarah Gailey's home; its amenities were the ultimate nightly +reward of her labours. If George Cannon had obtained possession of the +Cedars as an occupation for Sarah, this room and Sarah's pleasure therein +were the sole justification of the entire mansion.</p> + +<p>As Hilda looked at Sarah Gailey's bowed head, but little greyed, beneath +the ray of the lamp, and at her shrivelled, neurotic, plaintive face in +shadow, and at her knotty hands loosely clasped, she contrasted her +companion and the scene with the youthfulness and the spaciousness and the +sturdy gay vigour of existence in the household of the Orgreaves. She +thought, with a renewed sense of the mysterious strangeness of life: "Last +night I was there, far away--all those scores of miles of fields and towns +are between!--and to-night I am here. Down there I was nothing but an +idler. Here I am the strongest. I am indispensable. I am the one person on +whom she depends. Without me everything will go to pieces." And she thought +of George Cannon's vast enigmatic projects concerning grand hotels. In +passing the immense pile of St. Pancras on the way from Euston to King's +Cross, George Cannon had waved his hand and said: "Look at that! Look at +that! It's something after that style that I want for a toy! And I'll have +it!" Yes, the lofty turrets of St. Pancras had not intimidated him. He, +fresh from little Turnhill and from defeats, could rise at once to the +height of them, and by the force of imagination make them his own! He could +turn abruptly from the law--to hotels! A disconcerting man! And the mere +tone in which he mentioned his enterprise seemed, in a most surprising way, +to dignify hotels, and even boarding-houses; to give romance to the +perfectly unromantic business of lodging and catering!... And the seed from +which he was to grow the magic plant sat in the room there with Hilda: that +bowed head! The ambition and the dream resembled St. Pancras: the present +reality was the Cedars, and Sarah's poor, stuffy little bedroom in the +Cedars.</p> + +<p>Sarah began to cry, weakly.</p> + +<p>"But what's the matter?" asked Hilda, the strong succourer.</p> + +<p>"Nothing. Only it's such a relief to me you've come."</p> + +<p>Hilda deprecated lightly. "I should have come sooner if I'd known. You +ought to have sent word before."</p> + +<p>"No, I couldn't. After all, what is it? I'm only silly. There's nothing +really the matter. The minute you come I can see that. I can even stand +those Boutwoods if you're here. You know George made it up with them; and I +won't say he wasn't right. But I had to put my pride in my pocket. And +yesterday it nearly made me scream out to see Mrs. Boutwood stir her +tea."</p> + +<p>"But why?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know. It's nerves, that's what it is.... Well, I've got to go +through these." She fingered the papers on the dressing-table with her left +hand while drying her tears with the right. "He's very wishful for proper +accounts, George is. That's right enough. But--well--I think I can make a +shilling go as far as anyone, and choose flesh-meat with anyone, too--that +I will say--but these accounts...! George is always wanting to know how +much it costs a head a week for this that and the other.... It's all very +well for him, but if he had the servants to look after and--"</p> + +<p>"I'm going to keep your accounts for you," Hilda soothed her.</p> + +<p>"But--"</p> + +<p>"I'm going to keep your accounts for you," And she thought: "How exactly +like mother I was just then!"</p> + +<p>It appeared to Hilda that she was making a promise, and shouldering a +responsibility, against her will, and perhaps against her common sense. She +might keep accounts at the Cedars for a week, a fortnight, a month. But she +could not keep accounts there indefinitely. She was sowing complications +for herself. Freedom and change and luxury were what she deemed she +desired; not a desk in a boarding-house. And yet something within her +compelled her to say in a firm, sure, kindly voice:</p> + +<p>"Now give me all those papers, Miss Gailey."</p> + +<p>And amid indefinite regret and foreboding, she was proud and happy in +her rôle of benefactor.</p> + +<p>When Hilda at length rose to go to her own room, Sarah Gailey had to +move her chair so that she might pass. At the door both hesitated for an +instant, and then Hilda with a sudden gesture advanced her lips. It was the +first time she and Sarah had ever kissed. The contact with that desiccated +skin intensified to an extraordinary degree Hilda's emotional sympathy for +the ageing woman. She thought, poignantly: "Poor old thing!"</p> + +<p>And when she was on the dark little square landing under the roof, +Sarah, holding the lamp, called out in a whisper.</p> + +<p>"Hilda!"</p> + +<p>"Well?"</p> + +<p>"Did he say anything to you about Brighton?"</p> + +<p>"Brighton?" She perceived with certainty from Sarah's eager and yet +apologetic tone, that the question had been waiting for utterance +throughout the evening, and that Sarah had lacked courage for it until the +kiss had enheartened her. And also she perceived that Sarah was suspecting +her of being somehow in conspiracy with George Cannon.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Sarah. "He's got into his head that Brighton's the only +place for this boarding-house business if it's to be properly done."</p> + +<p>"He never said a word to me about Brighton," Hilda whispered +positively.</p> + +<p>"Oh!"</p> + +<p>Hilda descended the stairs, groping. Brighton? What next?</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b3c3">CHAPTER III</a><br /> AT BRIGHTON</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>She thought vividly, one afternoon about three months later, of that +final scrap of conversation. Just as she had sat opposite George Cannon in +a second-class compartment, so now she was sitting opposite Sarah Gailey in +a second-class compartment. The train, having passed Lewes, was within a +few minutes of Brighton. And following behind them, somewhere at the tail +of the train, were certain trunks containing all that she possessed and all +that Sarah Gailey possessed of personal property--their sole chattels and +paraphernalia on earth. George Cannon had willed it and brought it about. +He was to receive them on the platform of Brighton Station. She had not +seen very much of him in the interval, for he had been continually on the +move between Brighton and Turnhill. "In a moment we shall all be together +again," she reflected. "This meeting also will happen, as everything else +has happened, and a new period will definitely have begun." And she sat and +stared at the closed eyes of the desiccated Sarah Gailey, and waited for +the instant of arrival apprehensively and as it were incredulously--not +with fear, not with pleasure, but with the foreboding of adventure and a +curious idea that the instant of arrival never would come.</p> + +<p>For thirteen weeks, which had gone very quickly, she had devoted herself +to Sarah Gailey, acting as George Cannon's precursor, prophet, and +expounder. While the summer cooled into autumn, and the boarding-house +season slackened and once more feebly brightened, she had daily conversed +with Sarah about George's plans, making them palatable to her, softening +the shocks of them, and voluntarily promising not to quit her until the +crisis was past. She had had to discourse on the unique advantages of +Brighton as a field for George's enterprise, and on George's common sense +and on Sarah's common sense, and the interdependence of the two. When the +news came that George had acquired down there a house in going order, she +had had to prove that it was not the end of the world that was announced. +When the news came that George had re-sold the Cedars to its original +occupier, she had had to prove that the transaction did not signify a +mysterious but mortal insult to Sarah. When the news came that the Cedars +must be vacated before noon on a given Saturday, she had had to begin all +her demonstrations afresh, and in addition attempt to persuade Sarah that +George was not utterly mad--buying and selling boarding-house tenancies all +over the South of England!--and that the exit from the Cedars would not be +the ruin of dignity and peace, and the commencement of fatal disasters. In +the hour when Sarah Gailey learnt the immutable Saturday of departure, the +Cedars, which had been her hell, promised to become, on that very Saturday, +a paradise.</p> + +<p>On the whole, the three months had constituted a quarter of exceeding +difficulty and delicacy. The first month had been rendered memorable by +Sarah's astonishing behaviour when Hilda had desired to pay, as before, for +her board and lodging. The mere offer of the money had made plain to +Sarah--what she then said she had always suspected--that Hilda was her +enemy in disguise and (like the rest) bent on humiliating her, and +outraging her most sacred feelings. In that encounter, but in no other, +Sarah had won. The opportune withdrawal of the Boutwoods from the +boarding-house had assisted the establishment of peace. When the Boutwoods +left, Miss Gailey seemed to breathe the drawing-room air as though it were +ozone of the mountains. But her joy had been quickly dissipated, for to +dissipate joy was her chief recreation. A fortnight before the migration to +Brighton Hilda, contemplating all that had to be done, had thought, aghast: +"I shall never he able to humour her into doing it all!" Closing of +accounts, dismissals, inventories, bills, receipts, packing, decision +concerning trains, reception of the former proprietor (especially that!), +good-byes, superintending the stowage of luggage on the cab...! George +Cannon had not once appeared in the last sensitive weeks, and he had +therein been wise. And all that had to be done had been done--not by Hilda, +but by Sarah Gailey the touchy and the competent. Hilda had done little but +the humouring.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>And there sat Sarah Gailey, deracinated and captive, to prove how +influential a person Hilda was! With the eyes shut, Sarah's worn face under +her black bonnet had precisely the aspect of a corpse--and the corpse of +somebody who had expired under the weight of all the world's woe! Hilda +thought: "When she is dead she will look just like that!... And one day, +sooner or later, she will be dead." Strange that Sarah Gailey, with no +malady except her chronic rheumatism, and no material anxiety, and every +prospect of security in old age, could not be content, could not at any +rate refrain from being miserable! But she could not. She was an +exhaustless fount of worry and misery. "I suppose I like her," thought +Hilda. "But why do I like her? She isn't agreeable. She isn't amusing. She +isn't pretty. She isn't even kind, now. She's only depressing and tedious. +As soon as she's fixed up here, I shall go. I shall leave her. I've done +enough, and I've had enough. I must attend to my own affairs a bit. After +all--" And then Hilda's conscience interrupted: "But can you leave her +altogether? Without you, what will happen to her? She's getting older and +worse every day. Perhaps in a few years she won't even be competent. +Already she isn't perhaps quite, quite as competent as she was." And Hilda +said: "Well, of course, I shall have to keep an eye on her; come and see +her sometimes--often." And she knew that as long as they both lived she +could never be free from a sense of responsibility towards Sarah Gailey. +Useless to argue: "It's George Cannon's affair, not mine!" Useless to ask: +"<i>Why</i> should I feel responsible?" Only after she had laid Sarah +Gailey in the tomb would she be free. "And that day too will come!" she +thought again. "I shall have to go through it, and I shall go through +it!"</p> + +<p>The poignant romance of existence enveloped her in its beautiful veils. +And through these veils she saw, vague and diminished, the far vista of the +hours which she had spent with the Orgreaves. She saw the night of Edwin +Clayhanger's visit, and herself and him together in the porch, and she +remembered the shock of his words, "There's no virtue in believing." The +vision was like that of another and quite separate life. Would she ever go +back to it? Janet was her friend, in theory her one intimate friend: she +had seen her once in London,--beautiful, agreeable, affectionate, +intelligent; all the Orgreaves were lovable. The glance of Edwin +Clayhanger, and the sincerity of his smile, had affected her in a manner +absolutely unique.... But would she ever go back? It seemed to her +fantastic, impossible, that she should ever go back. It seemed to her that +she was netted by destiny. In any case she knew that she could not, +meanwhile, give to that group in Bursley even a part of herself. Hilda +could never give a part of herself. Moreover, she was a bad letter-writer. +And so, if among themselves the group at Bursley charged her with +inconstancy, she must accept the accusation, to which she was inevitably +exposed by the very ardour of her temperament.</p> + +<p>The putting-on of brakes took her unawares. The train was in Brighton, +sliding over the outskirts of the town. Miss Gailey opened her apprehensive +eyes. Hilda saw steep streets of houses that sprawled on the hilly mounds +of the great town like ladders: reminiscent of certain streets of her +native district, yet quite different, a physiognomy utterly foreign to her. +This then, was Brighton. That which had been a postmark became suddenly a +reality, shattering her preconceptions of it, and disappointing her she +knew not why. She glanced forward, through the window, and saw the cavern +of the station. In a few seconds they would have arrived, and her formal +mission would be over. She was very agitated and very nervous. George +Cannon had promised to meet them. Would he meet them?</p> + +<p>The next instant she saw the platform. She saw George Cannon, +conspicuous and debonair in a new suit, swinging his ebony stick. The train +stopped. He descried them.</p> + +<p>"There he is!" she said, bravely pretending to be gay. And she thought: +"I could not believe that this moment would come, but it has come."</p> + +<p>She had anticipated relief from this moment, but she was aware of no +relief. On the contrary, she felt most uncomfortably apologetic to Sarah +Gailey for George Cannon, and to George Cannon for Sarah Gailey. She had +the constraint of a sinner. And, by the side of George Cannon on the +platform, she was aware of her shabbiness and of her girlish fragility. +Nevertheless, she put her shoulders back with a gesture like his own, +thinking proudly, and trying to make her eyes speak: "Well, here is Sarah +Gailey,--thanks to me!"</p> + +<p>As Sarah greeted him, Hilda observed, with some dismay, a curious, very +slight stiffening of her demeanour--familiar phenomenon, which denoted that +Sarah was in the grip of a secret grievance. "Poor old thing!" she thought +ruefully. "I'd imagined she'd forgiven him for bringing her here; but she +hasn't."</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>They drove down from the station in an open carriage, unencumbered by +the trunks, which George Cannon had separately disposed of. He sat with his +back to the horse, opposite the two women, and talked at intervals about +the weather, the prospects of the season, and the town. His familiarity +with the town was apparently such that he seemed to be a native of it, and +even in some mysterious way to have assisted in its creation and +development; so that he took pride in its qualities and accepted +responsibility for its defects. When he ceremoniously saluted two women who +went by in another carriage, Hilda felt sharply the inferiority of an +ignorant stranger in presence of one for whom the place had no secrets.</p> + +<p>Her first disappointment changed slowly into expectant and hopeful +curiosity. The quaint irregularities of the architecture, and the vastness +of the thronged perspectives, made promises to her romantic sense. The town +seemed to be endless as London. There were hotels, churches, chapels, +libraries, and music-shops on every hand. The more ordinary features of +main streets--the marts of jewellery, drapery, and tobacco--had an air of +grandiose respectability; while the narrow alleys that curved enigmatically +away between the lofty buildings of these fine thoroughfares beckoned +darkly to the fancy. The multiplicity of beggars, louts, and organ-grinders +was alone a proof of Brighton's success in the world; the organ-grinders, +often a man and a woman yoked together, were extraordinarily English, +genteel, and prosperous as they trudged in their neat, middle-class raiment +through the gritty mud of the macadam, stolidly ignoring the menace of +high-stepping horses and disdainful glittering wheels. Brighton was +evidently a city apart. Nevertheless, Hilda did not as yet understand why +George Cannon should have considered it to be the sole field worthy of his +enterprise.</p> + +<p>Then the carriage rounded into King's Road, and suddenly she saw the +incredible frontage of hotels, and <i>pensions</i> and apartments, and she +saw the broad and boundless promenade alive with all its processions of +pleasure, and she saw the ocean. And everything that she had seen up to +that moment fell to the insignificance of a background. She understood.</p> + +<p>After a blusterous but mild autumn day the scarlet sun was setting +calmly between a saffron sky and saffron water; it flashed upon waves and +sails and flags, and upon the puddles in the road, and upon bow-windows and +flowered balconies, giving glory to human pride. The carriage, merged in a +phalanx of carriages, rolled past innumerable splendid houses, and every +house without exception was a hostel and an invitation. Some were higher +than any she had ever seen; and one terrific building, in course of +construction, had already far overtopped the highest of its neighbours. She +glanced at George Cannon, who, by a carefully casual demeanour, was trying +not to take the credit of the entire spectacle; and she admitted that he +was indeed wonderful.</p> + +<p>"Of course, Sarah," he said, as the carriage shortly afterwards turned +up Preston Street, where the dying wind roughly caught them, "we aren't +beginning with anything as big as all that, so you needn't shiver in your +shoes. You know what my notion is"--he included Hilda in his address--"my +notion is to get some experience first in a smaller house. We must pay for +our experience, and my notion is to pay as little as possible. I can tell +you there's quite a lot of things that have to be picked up before you've +got the hang of a town like this--quite a lot."</p> + +<p>Sarah grimly nodded. She had scarcely spoken.</p> + +<p>"We're beginning rather well. I've told you all about the Watchett +sisters, haven't I? They're an income, a positive income! And then Boutwood +and his wife have decided to come--did I tell you?"</p> + +<p>"Bou--"</p> + +<p>The syllable escaped explosively from Sarah Gailey's mouth, overcoming +her stern guard. Instantly, by a tremendous effort, she checked the flow. +But the violent shock of the news had convulsed her whole being. The look +on her face was changed to desperation. Hilda trembled, and even the +splendid and ever-resurgent George Cannon was discountenanced. Not till +then had Hilda realized with what intense bitterness the souvenir of the +Boutwoods festered in Sarah Gailey's unreasoning heart.</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>"Here we are!" said George Cannon jauntily, as the carriage stopped in +front of No. 59 Preston Street. But his jauntiness seemed factitious. The +demeanour of all three was diffident and unnatural, for now had arrived the +moment when George Cannon had to submit his going concern to the ordeal of +inspection by the women, and especially by Sarah Gailey. There the house +stood, a physical fact, forcing George to justify it, and beseeching +clemency from the two women. The occasion was critical; therefore everybody +had to pretend that it was a perfectly ordinary occasion, well knowing the +futility of the pretence. And the inevitable constraint was acutely +aggravated by Sarah's silent and terrible reception of the news concerning +the Boutwoods.</p> + +<p>While George Cannon was paying the driver, Sarah and Hilda hesitated +awkwardly on the pavement, their hands occupied with small belongings. They +had the sensation of being foreigners to the house; they could not even +mount the steps without his protection; scarcely might they in decency +examine the frontage of the house. They could not, however, avoid seeing +that a workman was fixing a new and splendid brass-plate at the entrance, +and that this plate bore the words, "Cannon's Boarding-house." Hilda +thought, startled: "At last he is using his own name!"</p> + +<p>He turned to them.</p> + +<p>"You have a view of the sea from the bow-window of the drawing-room--on +the first floor," he remarked.</p> + +<p>Neither Hilda nor Sarah responded.</p> + +<p>"And of course from the other bow-window higher up," he added, almost +pitifully, in his careful casualness.</p> + +<p>Hilda felt sorry for him, and she could not understand why she felt +sorry, why it seemed a shame that he should be mysteriously compelled thus +to defend the house before it had been attacked.</p> + +<p>"Oh yes!" she murmured foolishly, almost fatuously.</p> + +<p>The street and the house were disappointing. After the grandeur of the +promenade, the street appeared shabby and third-rate; it had the +characteristics of a side street; it was the retreat of those who could not +afford anything better, and its base inhabitants walked out on to the +promenade and swaggeringly feigned to be the equals of their superiors. The +house also was shabby and third-rate--with its poor little glimpse of the +sea. Although larger than the Cedars, it was noticeably smaller and meaner +than any house on the promenade, and whereas the Cedars was detached, No. +59 was not even semi-detached, but one of a gaunt, tall row of stuccoed and +single-fronted dwellings. It looked like a boarding-house (which the Cedars +did not), and not all the style of George Cannon's suit and cane and +manner, as he mounted the steps, nor the polish of his new brass-plate, +could redeem it from the disgrace of being a very ordinary +boarding-house.</p> + +<p>George Cannon had made a serious mistake in bringing the carriage round +by the promenade. True, he had exhibited the glory of Brighton, but he had +done so to the detriment of his new enterprise. That No. 59 ought to be +regarded as merely an inexpensive field for the acquiring of preliminary +experience did not influence the judgment of the women in the slightest +degree. For them it was a house that rightly apologized for itself, and +whose apologetic air deserved only a condescending tolerance.</p> + +<p>The front door stood open for the convenience of the artisan who was +screwing at the brass-plate. He moved aside, with the servility that always +characterizes the worker in a city of idlers, and the party passed into a +long narrow hall, whose walls were papered to imitate impossible blocks of +mustard-coloured marble. The party was now at home.</p> + +<p>"Here we are!" said Hilda, with a gaiety that absolutely desolated +herself, and in the same instant she remembered that George Cannon had +preceded her in saying 'Here we are!' She looked from the awful glumness of +Sarah Gailey to the equally awful alacrity of George Cannon, and felt as +though she had committed some crime whose nature she could not guess.</p> + +<p>A middle-aged maid appeared, like a suspicious scout, at the far end of +the hall, beyond the stairs, having opened a door which showed a glimpse of +a kitchen.</p> + +<p>"That tea ready?" asked George Cannon.</p> + +<p>"No, sir," said the maid plumply.</p> + +<p>"Well, let it be got ready."</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir." The maid vanished, flouncing.</p> + +<p>Sarah Gailey, with a heavy sigh, dropped her small belongings on to a +narrow bare table that stood against the wall near the foot of the stairs. +Daylight was fading.</p> + +<p>"Well," said George Cannon, balancing his hat on his cane, "your luggage +will be here directly. This is the dining-room." He pushed at a +yellow-grained door.</p> + +<p>The women followed him into the dining-room, and stared at the +dining-room in silence.</p> + +<p>"There's a bedroom behind," he said, as they came out, and he displayed +the bedroom behind. "That's the kitchen." He pointed to the adjoining +door.</p> + +<p>"The drawing-room's larger," he said. "It includes the width of the +hall."</p> + +<p>They climbed the narrow stairs after him wearily. The door of the +drawing-room was ajar, and the chatter of thin feminine voices could be +heard within. George Cannon gave a soundless warning whisper: "The +Watchetts." And Sarah Gailey frowned back the information that she did not +wish to meet the Watchetts just then. With every precaution against noise, +George Cannon opened two other doors, showing bedrooms. And then, as it +were, hypnotized by him, the women climbed another flight of narrow stairs, +darkening, and saw more rooms, and then still another flight, and still +more rooms, and finally the boasted view of the sea! After all, Hilda was +obliged to admit to herself that the house was more impressive than she had +at first supposed. Although single-fronted, it was deep, and there were two +bedrooms on the first floor, and four each--two large and two small--on the +second and third. Eleven in all, they had seen, of which three were +occupied by the Watchetts, and one, temporarily, by George Cannon. The rest +were empty; but the season had scarcely begun, and the Boutwoods were +coming. George Cannon had said grandly that Hilda must choose her room; she +chose the smallest on the top floor. The furniture, if shabby and +old-fashioned, was everywhere ample.</p> + +<p>They descended, and not a word had been said about Sarah's room.</p> + +<p>On the first-floor landing, where indeed the danger was acutest, they +were trapped by two of the Watchetts. These elderly ladies shot almost +roguishly out of the drawing-room, and by their smiles struck the +descending party into immobility.</p> + +<p>"Oh! We saw you arrive, Mr. Cannon!" said the elder, shaking her head. +"So this is Miss Gailey! Good afternoon, Miss Gailey! So pleased to make +your acquaintance!"</p> + +<p>There was handshaking. Then it was Hilda's turn.</p> + +<p>"We're so sorry our eldest sister isn't here to welcome you to No. 59," +said the younger. "She's had to go to London for the day. We're very fond +of No. 59. There's no place quite like it, to our minds. And we're quite +sure we shall be quite as comfortable with dear Miss Gailey as we were with +dear Mrs. Granville, poor thing. It was quite a wrench when we had to say +good-bye to her last night. Do come into the drawing-room, please! There's +a beautiful view of the sea!"</p> + +<p>Sarah Gailey hesitated. A noise of bumping came from the hall below.</p> + +<p>"I think that's the luggage," she said. The smile with which she forced +herself to respond to the fixed simper of the Watchetts seemed to cause her +horrible torment. She motioned nervously to George Cannon, who was nearest +the stairs.</p> + +<p>"A little later, then! A little later, then!" said both the Watchetts, +bowing the party away with the most singular grimaces.</p> + +<p>In the hall, a lad, perspiring and breathing quickly, stood behind the +trunks.</p> + +<p>"Wait a moment," George Cannon said to him, and murmured to Sarah: "This +is the basement, here."</p> + +<p>The middle-aged maid appeared at the kitchen door with a large loaded +tray. "Come along with that tea, Louisa," he added pleasantly.</p> + +<p>He went first, Sarah next, and Hilda last, cautiously down a short, dark +flight of stone steps beneath the stairs; the servant followed. At the foot +a gas-jet burned.</p> + +<p>"Those Watchetts might be the landladies!" muttered Sarah, strangely +ignoring the propinquity of the maid; and sniffed.</p> + +<p>Hilda gave a short, uneasy laugh. She had a desire to laugh loudly and +wildly, and by so doing to snap the nervous tension, which seemed to grow +tighter and tighter every minute. Her wretchedness had become so exquisite +that she could begin to enjoy it, to savour it like a pleasure.</p> + +<p>And she thought, with conscious and satisfied grimness:</p> + +<p>"So this is Brighton!"</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b3c4">CHAPTER IV</a><br /> THE SEA</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>In the evening Hilda, returning from a short solitary walk as far as the +West Pier, found Sarah Gailey stooping over her open trunks in the bedroom +which had been assigned to her. There were two quite excellent though +low-ceiled rooms, of which this was one, in the basement; the other was to +be used as a private parlour by the managers of the house. At night, with +the gas lighted and the yellow blind drawn and the loose bundle of strips +paper gleaming in the grate, the bedroom seemed very cozy and habitable in +its shabbiness; like the rest of the house it had an ample supply of +furniture, and especially of those trifling articles, useful or useless, +which collect only by slow degrees, and which are a proof of long +humanizing habitation. In that room Sarah Gailey was indeed merely the +successor of the regretted Mrs. Granville, the landlady who had +mysteriously receded into the unknown before the advent of Sarah and Hilda, +but with whom George Cannon must have had many interviews. No doubt the +room was an epitome of the character of Mrs. Granville, presumably a fussy +and precise celibate, with a place for everything and everything in its +place, and an indiscriminating tendency to hoard.</p> + +<p>Sarah Gailey was at that stage of unpacking when, trunks being nearly +empty and drawers having scarcely begun to fill, bed, table, and chairs are +encumbered with confused masses of goods apparently far exceeding the +cubical contents of the trunks.</p> + +<p>"Can I do anything for you?" asked Hilda.</p> + +<p>The new landlady raised her watery and dejected eyes. "If you wouldn't +mind taking every single one of those knick-knacks off the mantelpiece and +putting them away on the top shelf of the cupboard--"</p> + +<p>Hilda smiled. "It's a bit crowded, isn't it?"</p> + +<p>"Crowded!" By her intonation of this one word Sarah Gailey condemned +Mrs. Granville's whole life.</p> + +<p>"Can I empty this chair? I shall want something to stand on," said +Hilda.</p> + +<p>"Better see if the shelf's dusty," Sarah gloomily warned her.</p> + +<p>"Well," murmured Hilda, on the chair. "If my feather doesn't actually +touch the ceiling!" Sarah Gailey made no response to this +light-heartedness, and Hilda, with her hands full of vain gewgaws, tried +again: "I wonder what Mrs. Granville would say if she saw me!... My word, +it's quite hot up here!"</p> + +<p>A resonant, very amiable voice came from beyond the door: "Is she +there?"</p> + +<p>"Who?" demanded Sarah, grievous.</p> + +<p>"Miss Lessways." It was George Cannon.</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"I just want to speak to her if she's at liberty," said George +Cannon.</p> + +<p>Hilda cried from the ceiling: "I'll come as soon as I've--"</p> + +<p>"Please go now," Sarah interrupted in tense accents. Hilda glanced down +at her, astonished, and saw in her eyes an almost childish appeal, weak and +passionate, which gripped the heart painfully.</p> + +<p>She jumped from the chair. Sarah Gailey was now sitting on the bed. Yes, +in her worn face of a woman who has definitely passed the climacteric, and +in the abandoned pose of those thin arms, there was the look and gesture of +a young girl desperately beseeching. Hilda was puzzled and intimidated. She +had meant to be jocular, and to insist on staying till the task was +finished. But she kept silence and obeyed the supplication, from a motive +of prudence.</p> + +<p>"I wouldn't keep you from him for anything," murmured Sarah Gailey +tragically, as Hilda opened the door and left her sitting forlorn among all +her skirts and linen.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>"I'm here," George Cannon called out from the parlour when he heard the +sound of the door. He was looking from the window up at the street; the +blind had not been drawn. He turned as Hilda entered.</p> + +<p>"You've been out!" he said, observing that she was in street attire.</p> + +<p>"What is it?" she asked nervously, fearing that some altercation had +already occurred between brother and sister.</p> + +<p>"It's about your private affairs--that's all," he said easily, and +half-humourously. "If you'll just come in."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" she smiled her relief; but nevertheless she was still preoccupied +by the image of the woman in the next room.</p> + +<p>"They've been dragging on quite long enough," said George Cannon, as he +stooped to poke the morsel of fire in the old-fashioned grate, which had a +hob on either side. On one of these hobs was a glass of milk. Hilda had +learnt that day for the first time that at a certain hour every evening +George Cannon drank a glass of warm milk, and that this glass of warm milk +was an important factor in his daily comfort. He now took the glass and +drank it off. And Hilda had a peculiar sensation of being more intimate +with him than she had ever been before.</p> + +<p>They sat down to the square table in the middle of the room crowded with +oddments of furniture, including a desk which George Cannon had +appropriated to his own exclusive use. This desk was open and a portion of +its contents were spread abroad on the crimson cloth of the table. Among +them Hilda noticed, with her accustomed clerkly eye, two numbers of <i>The +Hotel-Keeper and Boarding-House Review</i>, several sheets of +advertisement-scales, and a many-paged document with the heading, +"Inventory of Furniture at No. 59 Preston Street"; also a large legal +envelope inscribed, "Lessways Estate."</p> + +<p>From the latter George Cannon drew forth an engraved and flourished +paper, which he silently placed in front of her. It was a receipt signed by +the manager of the Brighton branch of the Southern Counties Bank for the +sum of three thousand four hundred and forty-five pounds deposited at call +by Miss Hilda Lessways.</p> + +<p>"Everything is now settled up," he said. "Here are all the figures," and +he handed her another paper showing the whole of the figures for the +realization of her real property and of her furniture. "It's in your name, +and nobody can touch it but you."</p> + +<p>She glanced at the figures vaguely, not attempting to comprehend them. +As for the receipt, it fascinated her. The fragile scrap represented her +livelihood, her future, her salvation. It alone stood between her and +unimagined terrors. And she was surprised to see it, surprised by its +assurance that no accident had happened to her possessions during the +process of transformation carried out by George Cannon. For, though he had +throughout been almost worryingly meticulous in his business formalities +and his promptitudes--never had any interest or rent been a day late!--she +admitted to herself now that she had been afraid... that, in fact, she had +not utterly trusted him.</p> + +<p>"And what's got to be done with this?" she asked simply, fingering the +receipt.</p> + +<p>He smiled at her, with a touch of protective and yet sardonic +condescension, without saying a word.</p> + +<p>And suddenly it struck her that ages had elapsed since her first +interview with him in the office over the ironmonger's at Turnhill, and +that both of them were extraordinarily changed. (She was reminded of that +interview not by his face and look, nor by their relative positions at the +table, but by a very faint odour of gas-fumes, for at Turnhill also a +gas-jet had been between them.) After an interval of anxiety and depression +he had regained exactly the triumphant self-sure air which was her earliest +recollection of him. He was not appreciably older. But for her he was no +longer the same man, because she saw him differently; knowing much more of +him, she read in his features a thousand minor significances to which +before she had been blind. The dominating impression was not now the +impression of his masculinity; there was no clearly dominating impression. +He had lost, for her, the romantic allurement of the strange and the +unknown.</p> + +<p>Still, she liked and admired him. And she felt an awe, which was +agreeable to her, of his tremendous enterprise and his obstinate volition. +That faculty which he possessed, of uprooting himself and uprooting others, +put her in fear of him. He had willed to be established as a caterer in +Brighton--he who but yesterday (as it seemed) was a lawyer in +Turnhill--and, on this very night, he was established in Brighton, and his +sister with him, and she with his sister! The enormous affair had been +accomplished. This thought had been obsessing Hilda all the afternoon and +evening.</p> + +<p>When she reflected upon the change in herself, the untravelled Hilda of +Turnhill appeared a stranger to her, and a simpleton!; no more!</p> + +<p>As George Cannon offered no answer to her question, she said:</p> + +<p>"I suppose it will have to be invested, all this?"</p> + +<p>He nodded.</p> + +<p>"Well, considering it's only been bringing in one per cent. per annum +for the last week... Of course I needn't have put it on deposit, but I +always prefer that way. It's more satisfactory."</p> + +<p>Hilda could hear faintly, through the thin wooden partition, the +movements of Sarah Gailey in the next room. And the image of the mournful +woman returned to disquiet her. What could be the meaning of that hysteric +appeal and glance? Then she heard the door of the bedroom open violently, +and the figure of Sarah Gailey passed like a flash across the doorway of +the parlour. And the footsteps of Sarah Gailey pattered up the stone +stairs; and the front door banged; and the skirts and feet of Sarah Gailey +intercepted for an instant the light of the street-lamp that shone on the +basement-window of the parlour.</p> + +<p>"Excuse me a minute," muttered Hilda, frowning. By one of her swift and +unreflecting impulses she abandoned George Cannon and her private affairs, +and scurried by the area steps into the street.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>Bareheaded, and with no jacket or mantle, Sarah Gailey was walking +quickly down Preston Street towards the promenade, and Hilda, afraid but +courageous, followed her at a distance of thirty or forty yards. Hilda +could not decide why she was afraid, nor why it should be necessary, in so +simple an undertaking as a walk down Preston Street, to call upon her +courage. Assuming even that Sarah Gailey turned round and caught her--what +then? The consequences could not be very terrible. But Sarah Gailey did not +turn round. She went straight forward, as though on a definite errand in a +town with which she was perfectly familiar, and, having arrived at the +corner of Preston Street and the promenade, unhesitatingly crossed the +muddy roadway of the promenade, and, after a moment's halt, vanished down +the steps in the sea-wall to the left-hand of the pier. The pier, a double +rope of twinkling lamps, hung magically over the invisible sea, and at the +end of it, constant and grave, a red globe burned menacingly in the +wind-haunted waste of the night. And Hilda thought, as she hastened with +gathering terror across the promenade: "Out there, at the end of the pier, +the water is splashing and beating against the piles!"</p> + +<p>She stopped at the parapet of the sea-wall, and looked behind her, like +a thief. The wrought-iron entrance to the pier was highly illuminated, but +except for a man's head and shoulders caged in the ticket-box of the +turnstile, there was no life there; the man seemed to be waiting solitary +with everlasting patience in the web of wavering flame beneath the huge +dark sky. Scores of posters, large and small, showed that Robertson's +"School" was being performed in the theatre away over the sea at the +extremity of the pier. The promenade, save for one gigantic policeman, and +a few distant carriages, was apparently deserted, and the line of dimly +lighted hotels, stretching vaguely east and west, had an air grim and +forlorn at that hour.</p> + +<p>Hilda ran down the steps; at the bottom another row of lamps defined the +shore, and now she could hear the tide lapping ceaselessly amid the +supporting ironwork of the pier. She at once descried the figure of Sarah +Gailey in the gloom. The woman was moving towards the faintly white edge of +the sea. Hilda started to run after her, first across smooth asphalt, and +then over some sails stretched out to dry; and then her feet sank at each +step into descending ridges of loose shingle, and she nearly fell. At +length she came to firm sand, and stood still.</p> + +<p>Sarah Gailey was now silhouetted against the pale shallows of foam that +in ever-renewed curves divided the shore from the sea. After a time, she +bent down, rose again, moved towards the water, and drew back. Hilda did +not stir. She could not bring herself to approach the lonely figure. She +felt that to go and accost Sarah Gailey would be indelicate and +inexcusable. She felt as if she were basely spying. She was completely at a +loss, and knew not how to act. But presently she discerned that the white +foam was circling round Sarah's feet, and that Sarah was standing careless +in the midst of it. And at last, timid and shaking with agitation, she +ventured nearer and nearer. And Sarah heard her on the sand, and looked +behind.</p> + +<p>"Miss Gailey!" she appealed in a trembling voice.</p> + +<p>Sarah made no response of any kind, and Hilda reached the edge of the +foam.</p> + +<p>"Please, please don't stand there! You'll catch a dreadful cold, and +you've got nothing on your shoulders, either!"</p> + +<p>"I want to make a hole in the water," said Sarah miserably. "I wanted to +make a hole in the water!"</p> + +<p>"Please do come back with me!" Hilda implored; but she spoke +mechanically, as though saying something which she was bound to say, but +which she did not feel.</p> + +<p>The foam capriciously receded, and Hilda, still without any effort of +her own will, stepped across the glistening, yielding sand and took Sarah +Gailey's arm. There was no resistance.</p> + +<p>"I wanted to make a hole in the water," Sarah repeated. "But I made a +mistake. I ought to have gone to that groin over there. I knew there was a +groin near here, only it's so long since I was here. I'd forgotten just the +place."</p> + +<p>"But what's the matter?" Hilda asked, leading her away from the sea.</p> + +<p>She was not extremely surprised. But she was shocked into a most solemn +awe as she pressed the arm of the poor tragic woman who, but for an +accident, might have plunged off the end of the groin into water deep +enough for drowning. She did really feel humble before this creature who +had deliberately invited death; she in no way criticized her; she did not +even presume to condescend towards the hasty clumsiness of Sarah Gailey's +scheme to die. She was overwhelmed by the woman's utterly unconscious +impressiveness, which exceeded that of a criminal reprieved on the +scaffold, for the woman had dared an experience that only the fierce and +sublime courage of desperation can affront. She had a feeling that she +ought to apologize profoundly to Sarah Gailey for all that Sarah must have +suffered. And as she heard the ceaseless, cruel play of the water amid the +dark jungle of ironwork under the pier, and the soft creeping of the +foam-curves behind, and the vague stirrings of the night-wind round +about--these phenomena combined mysteriously with the immensity of the dome +above and with the baffling strangeness of the town, and with the grandeur +of the beaten woman by her side; and communicated to Hilda a thrill that +was divine in its unexampled poignancy.</p> + +<p>The great figure of the policeman, suspicious, was descending from the +promenade discreetly towards them. To avoid any encounter with him Hilda +guided her companion towards the pier, and they sheltered there under the +resounding floor of the pier. By the light of one of the lower lamps Hilda +could now clearly see Sarah Gailey's face. It showed no sign of terror. It +was calm enough in its worn, resigned woe. It had the girlish look again, +beneath the marks of age. Hilda could distinguish the young girl that Sarah +had once been.</p> + +<p>"Come home, will you?" she entreated.</p> + +<p>Sarah Gailey sighed terribly. "I give it up," she said, with weariness. +"I could never do it! I could never do it--now!"</p> + +<p>Hilda pulled gently at her unwilling arm. She could not speak. She could +not ask her again: "What's the matter?"</p> + +<p>"It isn't that the house is too large," Sarah Gailey went on half +meditatively; "though just think of all those stairs, and not a tap on any +of the upper floors! No! And it isn't that I'm not ready enough to oblige +him. No! I know as well as anybody there's only him between me and +starvation. No! It isn't that he doesn't consider me! No! But when he goes +and settles behind my back with those Boutwoods--" She began to weep. "And +when I can hear you and him discussing me in the next room, and plotting +against me--it's--it's more--" The tears gradually drowned her voice, and +she ceased.</p> + +<p>"I assure you, you're quite mistaken," Hilda burst out, with passionate +and indignant persuasiveness. "We never mentioned you. He wanted to talk to +me about my money. And if you feel like that over the Boutwoods, I'm +certain he'll tell them they mustn't come."</p> + +<p>Sarah Gailey shook her head blankly.</p> + +<p>"I'm certain he will!" Hilda persisted. "Please--"</p> + +<p>The other began to walk away, dragging Hilda with her. The policeman, +inspecting them from a distance, coughed and withdrew. They climbed a +flight of steps on the far side of the pier, crossed the promenade, and +went up Preston Street in silence.</p> + +<p>"I should prefer not to be seen going in with you," said Sarah Gailey +suddenly. "It might--" she freed her arm.</p> + +<p>"Go down the area steps," said Hilda, "and I'll wait a moment and then +go in at the front door."</p> + +<p>Sarah Gailey hurried forward alone.</p> + +<p>Hilda, watching her, and observing the wet footmarks which she left on +the pavement, was appalled by the sense of her own responsibility as to the +future of Sarah Gailey. Till this hour, even at her most conscientious, she +had under-estimated the seriousness of Sarah Gailey's case. Everybody had +under-estimated the seriousness of Sarah Gailey's case.</p> + +<p>She became aware of some one hurrying cautiously up the street on the +other side. It was George Cannon. As soon as Sarah had disappeared within +the house he crossed over.</p> + +<p>"What's the matter?" he inquired anxiously.</p> + +<p>"Well--"</p> + +<p>"She hasn't been trying to drown herself, has she?"</p> + +<p>Hilda nodded, and, speechless, moved towards the house. He turned +abruptly away.</p> + +<p>The front door of No. 59 was still open. Hilda passed through the silent +hall, and went timorously down the steps to the basement. The gas was still +burning, and the clothes were still strewn about in Sarah Gailey's bedroom, +just as though naught had happened. Sarah stood between her two trunks in +the middle of the floor.</p> + +<p>"Where's George?" she asked, in a harsh, perfectly ordinary voice.</p> + +<p>"I don't think he's in the parlour," Hilda prevaricated.</p> + +<p>"Promise me you won't tell him!"</p> + +<p>"Of course I won't!" said Hilda kindly. "Do get into bed, and let me +make you some tea."</p> + +<p>Sarah Gailey rushed at her and embraced her.</p> + +<p>"I know I'm all wrong! I know it's all my own fault!" she murmured, with +plaintive, feeble contrition, crying again. "But you've no idea how I try! +If it wasn't for you--"</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>That night Hilda, in her small bedroom at the top of the house, was +listlessly arranging, at the back of the dressing-table, the few volumes +which had clung to her, or to which she had clung, throughout the +convulsive disturbances following her mother's death. Among them was one +which she did not wish to keep, <i>The Girls' Week-day Book,</i> and also +the whole set of Victor Hugo, which did not belong to her. George Cannon +had lent her the latter in instalments, and she had omitted to return it. +She was saying to herself that the opportunity to return it had at length +arrived, when she heard a low, conspiratorial tapping at the door. All her +skin crept as, after a second's startled hesitation, she moved to open the +door.</p> + +<p>George Cannon, holding a candle, stood on the landing. She had not seen +him since the brief colloquy between them outside the house. Having +satisfied herself that Sarah Gailey was safe, and to a certain extent +tranquillized, for the night, she had awaited George Cannon's reappearance +a long time in vain, and had then retired upstairs.</p> + +<p>"You aren't gone to bed!" he whispered very cautiously. Within a few +feet of them was an airless kennel where Louisa, the chambermaid, +slept.</p> + +<p>"No! I'm just--I stayed up for you I don't know how long."</p> + +<p>"Is she all right?"</p> + +<p>"Well--she's in bed."</p> + +<p>"I wish you'd come to one of these other rooms," he continued to +whisper. All the sibilants in his words seemed to detach themselves, +hissing, from the rest of the sounds.</p> + +<p>She gave a gesture of assent. He tiptoed over the traitorous boards of +the landing, and slowly turned the knob of a door in the end wall. The door +exploded like the firing of a pistol; frowning, he grimly pushed it open. +Hilda followed him, noiselessly creeping. He held the door for her. She +entered, and he shut the door on the inside. They were in a small bedroom +similar to Hilda's own; but the bed was stripped, the square of carpet +rolled, the blind undrawn, and the curtains looped up from the floor. He +put the candle on the tiny iron mantelpiece, and sat on the bed, his hands +in his pockets.</p> + +<p>"You don't mean to say she was wanting to commit suicide?" he said, +after a short reflective silence, with his head bent but his eyes raised +peeringly to Hilda's.</p> + +<p>The crudity of the word, 'suicide,' affected Hilda painfully.</p> + +<p>"If you ask me," said she, standing with her back rubbing against the +small wardrobe, "she didn't know quite what she was doing; but there's no +doubt that was what she went out for."</p> + +<p>"You overtook her? I saw you coming up from the beach."</p> + +<p>Hilda related what had happened.</p> + +<p>"But had you any notion--before--"</p> + +<p>"Me? No! Why?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing! Only the way you rushed out like that!"</p> + +<p>"Well--it struck me all of a sudden!... You've not seen her since you +came in?"</p> + +<p>He shook his head. "I thought I'd better keep out of the way. I thought +I'd better leave it all to you. It's appalling, simply appalling!... Just +when everything was shaping so well!"</p> + +<p>Hilda thought, bewildered: 'Shaping so well?' With her glance she took +in the little cheerless bedroom, and herself and George Cannon within it, +overwhelmed. In imagination she saw all the other bedrooms, dark, forlorn, +and inanimate, waiting through long nights and empty days until some human +creature as pathetic as themselves should come and feebly vitalize them +into a spurious transient homeliness; and she saw George Cannon's +bedroom--the harsh bedroom of the bachelor who had never had a home; and +the bedrooms of those fearsome mummies, the Watchetts, each bed with its +grisly face on the pillow in the dark; and the kennels of the unclean +servants; and so, descending through the floors, to Sarah Gailey's bedroom +in the very earth, and the sleepless form on that bed, beneath the whole! +And the organism of the boarding-house seemed absolutely tragic to her, +compact of the stuff of sorrow itself! And yet George Cannon had said, +'Shaping so well!'</p> + +<p>"What's to be done?" he inquired plaintively.</p> + +<p>"Nothing that I can see!" she said. She had a tremendous desire to +escape from the responsibility thrust on her by the situation; but she knew +that she could never escape from it; that she was immovably pinned down by +it.</p> + +<p>"I can't see anything either," said he, quietly responsive, and speaking +now in a gentle voice. "Supposing I tell her that she can go, and that I'll +make her an allowance? What could she do, then? It would be madness for her +to live alone any more. She's the very last person who ought to live alone. +Moreover, she wouldn't accept the allowance. Well, then, she must stay with +me--here. And if she stays here she must work, otherwise she'd never +stay--not she! And she must be the mistress. She wouldn't stand having +anyone above her, or even equal with her, that's a certainty! Besides, +she's so good at her job. She hasn't got a great deal of system, so far as +I can see, but she can get the work out of the servants without too much +fuss, and she's so mighty economical in her catering! Of course she can't +get on the right side of a boarder--but then I <i>can</i>! And that's the +whole point! With me on the spot to <i>run</i> the place, she'd be +perfect--perfect! Couldn't wish for anything better! And now she--I assure +you I'm doing the best I can do for her. I do honestly assure you! If +anybody can suggest to me anything else that I can do--I'll do it like a +shot." He threw up his arms.</p> + +<p>Hilda was touched by the benevolence of his tone. Nevertheless, it only +intensified her helpless perplexity. Sarah Gailey was inexpressibly to be +pitied, but George Cannon was not to be blamed. She had a feeling that for +any piteous disaster some one ought to be definitely blamable.</p> + +<p>"Do you think she'll settle down?" George Cannon asked, in a new +voice.</p> + +<p>"Oh yes!" said Hilda. "I think she will. It was just a sort of--attack +she had, I think."</p> + +<p>"She's not vexed with me?"</p> + +<p>Hilda could not find courage to say: "She thinks you and I are plotting +against her." And yet she wondered why she should hesitate to say it. After +a pause she murmured, as casually as possible: "She doesn't like the +Boutwoods coming back."</p> + +<p>"I knew you were going to say that!" he frowned.</p> + +<p>"If you could manage to stop them--"</p> + +<p>"No, no!" He interrupted--nervous, impatient. "It wouldn't do, that +wouldn't! It'd never do! A boarding-house can't be run on those lines. It +isn't that I care so much as all that about losing a couple of boarders, +and I'm not specially keen on the Boutwoods. But it wouldn't do! It's the +wrong principle. You haven't got to let customers get on your nerves, so +long as they pay and behave respectably. If I gave way, the very first +thing Sarah would do would be to find a grievance against some other +boarder, and there'd be no end to it. The fact is she wants a grievance, +she must have a grievance--whether it's the Boutwoods or somebody else +makes no matter!... Oh no!" He repeated softly, gently, "Oh no!"</p> + +<p>She knew that his argument was unanswerable. She was perfectly aware +that she ought to yield to it. Nevertheless, the one impulse of her being +in that moment was to fight blindly and irrationally against it. Her +instinct said: "I don't care for arguments. The Boutwoods must be stopped +from coming. If they aren't stopped, I don't know what I shall do! I can't +bear to think of that poor woman meeting them again! I can't bear it." She +drew breath sharply. Startling hot tears came into her eyes; and she +stepped forward on her left foot.</p> + +<p>"Please!" she entreated, "please don't let them come!"</p> + +<p>There was a silence. In the agonizing silence she felt acutely her +girlishness, her helplessness, her unreason, confronted by his strong and +shrewd masculinity. At the bottom of her soul she knew how wrong she was. +But she was ready to do anything to save Sarah Gailey from the distress of +one particular humiliation. With the whole of her volition she wanted to +win.</p> + +<p>"Oh well!" he said. "Of course, if you take it so much to heart--"</p> + +<p>A peculiar bright glance shot from his eyes--the old glance that at once +negligently asserted his power over her, and reassured her against his +power. Her being was suffused with gladness and pride. She had won. She had +won in defiance of reason. She had appealed and she had conquered. And she +enjoyed his glance. She gloried in it. She blushed. A spasm of exquisite +fear shot through her, and she savoured it deliciously. The deep organic +sadness of the house presented itself to her in a new light. It was still +sadness, but it was beautiful in the background. Her sympathy for Sarah +Gailey was as keen as ever, but it had a different quality--an anguish less +desolating. And the fact that a joint responsibility for Sarah Gailey's +welfare bound herself and George Cannon together in spite of +themselves--this fact seemed to her grandiose and romantic, no longer +oppressive. To be alone with him in the secrecy of the small upper room +seemed to endow her with a splendid worldly importance. And yet all the +time a scarce-heard voice was saying clearly within her: "This appeal and +this abandonment are unworthy. No matter if this man is kind and sincere +and admirable! This appeal and this abandonment are unworthy!" But she did +not care. She ignored the voice.</p> + +<p>"I'll tell Sarah in the morning," he said.</p> + +<p>"Please don't!" she begged. "You might pretend later on that you've had +a letter from the Boutwoods and they can't come. If you tell her to-morrow, +she'll guess at once I've been talking to you; and you're not supposed to +know anything at all about what happened to-night. She made me promise. But +of course she didn't know that you'd found out for yourself, you see!"</p> + +<p>George Cannon walked away to the window, and then to the mantelpiece, +from which he took up the candle.</p> + +<p>"I'm very much obliged to you," he said simply, putting a faint emphasis +on the last word. She knew that he meant it, without any reserves. But in +his urbane tone there was a chill tranquillity that astonished and vaguely +disappointed her.</p> + +<hr /> + + + + +<h1><a name="b4">BOOK IV</a><br /> HER FALL</h1> + + + + +<h2><a name="b4c1">CHAPTER I</a><br /> THE GOING CONCERN</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>On a Saturday afternoon of the following August, Hilda was sitting at a +book in the basement parlour of "Cannon's Boarding-house" in Preston +Street. She heard, through the open window, several pairs of feet mounting +wearily to the front door, and then the long remote tinkling of the bell. +Within the house there was no responsive sound; but from the porch came a +clearing of throats, a muttering, impatient and yet resigned, and a vague +shuffling. After a long pause the bell rang again; and then the gas globe +over Hilda's head vibrated for a moment to footsteps in the hall, and the +front door was unlatched. She could not catch the precise question; but the +reply of Louisa, the chambermaid--haughty, scornful, and negligently +pitying--was quite clear:</p> + +<p>"Sorry, sir. We're full up. We've had to refuse several this very +day.... No! I couldn't rightly tell you where.... You might try No. 51, +'Homeleigh' as they call it; but we're full up. Good afternoon, sir, 'd +afternoon 'm."</p> + +<p>The door banged arrogantly. The feet redescended to the pavement, and +Hilda, throwing a careless glance at the window, saw two men and a woman +pass melancholy down the hot street with their hand-luggage.</p> + +<p>And although she condemned and despised the flunkey-souled Louisa, who +would have abased herself with sickly smiles and sweet phrases before the +applicants, if the house had needed custom; although in her mind she was +saying curtly to the mature Louisa: "It's a good thing Mr. Cannon didn't +hear you using that tone to customers, my girl;" nevertheless, she could +not help feeling somewhat as Louisa felt. It was indubitably agreeable to +hear a prosperous door closed on dusty and disappointed holiday-makers, and +to realize, in her tranquil retreat, that she was part of a very thriving +and successful concern.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>George Cannon, in a light and elegant summer suit, passed slowly in +front of the window, and, looking for Hilda in her accustomed place, saw +her and nodded. Surprised by the unusual gesture, she moved uneasily and +blushed; and as she did so, she asked herself resentfully: "Why do I behave +like this? I'm only his clerk, and I shall never be anything else but his +clerk; and yet I do believe I'm getting worse instead of better." George +Cannon skipped easily up to the porch; he had a latchkey, but before he +could put it into the keyhole Louisa had flown down the stairs and opened +the door to him; she must have been on the watch from an upper floor. +George Cannon would have been well served, whatever his situation in the +house, for he was one of those genial bullies who are adored by the menials +whom they alternately cajole and terrorize. But his situation in the house +was that of a god, and like a god he was attended. He was the very creator +of the house; all its life flowed from him. Without him the organism would +have ceased to exist, and everybody in it was quite aware of this. He had +fully learnt his business. He had learnt it in the fishmarket on the beach +at seven o'clock in the morning, and in the vegetable market at eight, and +in the shops; he had learnt it in the kitchen and on the stairs while the +servants were cleaning; and he had learnt it at the dinner-table surrounded +by his customers. There was nothing that he did not know and, except actual +cooking and mending, little that he could not do. He always impressed his +customers by the statement that he had slept in every room in the house in +order to understand personally its qualities and defects; and he could and +did in fact talk to each boarder about his room with the intimate +geographical knowledge of a native. The boarders were further flattered by +the mien and appearance of this practical housekeeper, who did not in the +least resemble his kind, but had rather the style of a slightly doggish +stockbroker. To be strolling on the King's Road in converse with George +Cannon was a matter, of pride to boarders male and female. And there was +none with whom he could not talk fluently, on any subject from cigars to +ozone, according to the needs of the particular case. Nor did he ever seem +to be bored by conversations. But sometimes, after benignantly speeding, +for instance, one of the Watchetts on her morning constitutional, he would +slip down into the basement and ejaculate, 'Cursed hag!' with a calm and +natural earnestness, which frightened Hilda, indicating as it did that he +must be capable of astounding duplicities.</p> + +<p>He came, now, directly to the underground parlour, hat on head and ebony +stick in hand. Hilda did not even look up, but self-consciously bent a +little lower over her volume. Her relation to George Cannon in the +successful enterprise was anomalous, and yet the habit of ten months had in +practice defined it. Neither paying board nor receiving wages, she had +remained in the house apparently as Sarah Gailey's companion and moral +support; she had remained because Sarah Gailey had never been in a +condition to be left--and the months had passed very quickly. But her lack +of occupation and her knowledge of shorthand, and George Cannon's obvious +need of clerical aid, had made it inevitable that they should resume their +former rôles of principal and clerk. Hilda worked daily at letters, +circularizing, advertisements, and--to a less extent--accounts and bills; +the second finger of her right hand had nearly always an agreeable stain of +ink at the base of the nail; and she often dreamed about letter-filing. In +this prosperous month of August she had, on the whole, less work than +usual, for both circulating and advertisements were stopped.</p> + +<p>George Cannon went to the desk in the dark corner between the window and +the door, where all business papers were kept, but where neither he nor she +actually wrote. When his back was turned she surreptitiously glanced at him +without moving her head, and perceived that his hand was only moving idly +about among the papers while he stared at the wall. She thought, half in +alarm: "What is the matter now?" Then he came over to the table and +hesitated by her shoulder. Still, she would not look up. She could no +longer decipher a single word on the page. Her being was somehow +monopolized by the consciousness of his nearness.</p> + +<p>"Interesting?" he inquired.</p> + +<p>She turned her head at last and glanced at him with a friendly smile of +affirmation, fingering the leaves of the book nervously. It was Cranswick's +<i>History of Printing</i>. One day, a fortnight earlier, while George +Cannon, in company with her, was bargaining for an old London Directory +outside a bookseller's shop in East Street, she had seen Cranswick's +<i>History of Printing</i> (labelled "published at <i>£1</i> 1s., our price +6s. 6d.") and had opened it curiously. George Cannon, who always kept an +eye on her, had said teasingly: "I suppose it's your journalistic past that +makes you interested in that?" "I suppose it is," she answered. Which +statement was an untruth, for the sole thought in her mind had been that +Edwin Clayhanger was a printer. A strange, idle thought! She had laid the +book down. The next day, however, George Cannon had brought it home, saying +carelessly: "I bought that book--five and six; the man seemed anxious to do +business, and it's a book to have." He had not touched it since.</p> + +<p>"Page 473!" he murmured, looking at the number of the page. "If you keep +on at this rate, you'll soon know more about printing than young Clayhanger +himself!"</p> + +<p>She was thunderstruck. Never before had the name of Clayhanger been +mentioned between them! Could he, then, penetrate her thoughts? Could he +guess that in truth she was reading Cranswick solely because Edwin +Clayhanger happened to be a printer? No! It was impossible! The reason of +her interest in Cranswick, inexplicable even to herself, was too fantastic +to be divined. And yet was not his tone peculiar? Or was it only in her +fancy that his tone was peculiar? She blushed scarlet, and her muscles grew +rigid.</p> + +<p>"I say," George Cannon continued, in a tone that now was unmistakably +peculiar, "I want you to come out with me. I want to show you something on +the front. Can you come?"</p> + +<p>"At once?" she muttered glumly and painfully. What could be the mystery +beneath this most singular behaviour?</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"Florrie will be arriving at five," said Hilda, after artificially +coughing. "I ought to be here then, oughtn't I?"</p> + +<p>"Oh!" he cried. "We shall be back long before five."</p> + +<p>"Very well," she agreed.</p> + +<p>"I'll be ready in three minutes," he said, going gaily towards the door. +From the door he gave her a glance. She met it, courageously exposing her +troubled features and nodded.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>Hilda went into the bedroom behind the parlour, to get her hat and +gloves. A consequence of the success of the boarding-house was that she was +temporarily sharing this chamber with Sarah Gailey. She had insisted on +making the sacrifice, and she enjoyed the personal discomfort which it +involved. When she cautiously lay down on the narrow and lumpy truckle-bed +that had been insinuated against an unoccupied wall, and when she turned +over restlessly in the night and the rickety ironwork creaked and Sarah +Gailey moaned, and when she searched vainly for a particular garment lost +among garments that were hung pell-mell on insecure hooks and jutting +corners of furniture,--she was proud and glad because her own comfortable +room was steadily adding thirty shillings or more per week to the gross +receipts of the enterprise. The benefit was in no way hers, and yet she +gloated on it, thinking pleasurably of George Cannon's great japanned +cash-box, which seemed to be an exhaustless store of gold sovereigns and +large silver, and of his mysterious--almost furtive--visits to the Bank. +Her own capital, invested by George Cannon in railway stock, was bringing +in four times as much as she disbursed; and she gloated also on her +savings. The more money she amassed, the less willing was she to spend. +This nascent avarice amused her, as a new trait in his character always +amuses the individual. She said to herself: "I am getting quite a miser," +with the assured reservation: "Of course I can stop being a miser whenever +I feel like stopping."</p> + +<p>Sarah Gailey was lulling herself in a rocking-chair when Hilda entered, +and she neither regarded Hilda nor intermitted her see-saw. Her features +were drawn into a preoccupied expression of martyrdom, and in fact she +constantly suffered physical torture. She had three genuine +complaints--rheumatism, sciatica, and neuritis; they were all painful. The +latest and worst was the neuritis, which had attacked her in the wrist, +producing swollen joints that had to be fomented with hot water. Sarah +Gailey's life had indeed latterly developed into a continual fomentation +and a continual rocking. She was so taken up with the elemental business of +fomenting and of keeping warm, that she had no energy left for other +remedial treatments, such as distraction in the open air. She sat for ever +shawled, generally with heavy mittens on her arms and wrists, and either +fomenting or rocking, in the eternal twilight of the basement bedroom. She +eschewed aid--she could manage for herself--and she did not encourage +company, apparently preferring to be alone with fate. In her easier hours, +one hand resting on another and both hugged close to her breast, rocking to +and fro with an astounding monotonous perseverance, she was like a +mysterious Indian god in a subterranean temple. Above her, unseen by her, +floor beyond floor, the life of the boarding-house functioned in the great +holiday month of August.</p> + +<p>"I quite forgot about the make-up bed for Florrie," said Sarah Gailey +plaintively as she rocked. "Would you have time to see to it? Of course she +will have to be with Louisa."</p> + +<p>"Very well," said Hilda curtly, and not quite hiding exasperation.</p> + +<p>There were three reasons for her exasperation. In the first place, the +constant spectacle of Sarah Gailey's pain, and the effect of the pain on +Sarah's character, was exasperating--to Hilda as well as to George Cannon. +Both well knew that the watery-eyed, fretful spinster was a victim, utterly +innocent and utterly helpless, of destiny, and that she merited nothing but +patient sympathy; yet often the strain of relationship with Sarah produced +in them such a profound feeling of annoyance that they positively resented +Sarah's sufferings, and with a sad absence of logic blamed her in her +misfortune, just as though she had wilfully brought the maladies upon +herself in order to vex them. Then, further, it was necessary always to +minister to Sarah's illusion that Sarah was the mainstay of the house, that +she attended to everything and was responsible for everything, and that +without her governance the machine would come to a disastrous standstill: +the fact being that she had grown feeble and superfluous. Sarah had taught +all she knew to two highly intelligent pupils, and had survived her +usefulness. She had no right place on earth. But in her morose inefficiency +she had developed into an unconscious tyrant--a tyrant whose power lay in +the loyalty of her subjects and not at all in her own soul. She was indeed +like a deity, immanent, brooding, and unaware of itself!... Thus, the +question of Florrie's bed had been discussed and settled long before Sarah +Gailey had even thought of it; but Hilda might not tell her so. Lastly, +this very question of Florrie's bed was exasperating to Hilda. Already +Louisa's kennel was inadequate for Louisa, and now another couch had been +crowded into it. Hilda was ashamed of the shift; but there was no +alternative. Here, for Hilda, was the secret canker of George Cannon's +brilliant success. The servants were kindly ill-treated. In the commercial +triumph she lost the sense of the tragic forlornness of boarding-house +existence, as it had struck her on the day of her arrival. But the image of +the Indian god in the basement and of the prone forms of the servants in +stifling black cupboards under the roof and under the stairs--these images +embittered at intervals the instinctive and reflecting exultation of her +moods.</p> + +<p>She adjusted her small, close-fitting flowered hat, dropped her parasol +across the bed, and began to draw on her cotton gloves.</p> + +<p>"Where are you going, dear?" asked Sarah Gailey.</p> + +<p>"Out with Mr. Cannon."</p> + +<p>"But where?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know." In spite of herself there was a certain unnecessary +defiance in Hilda's voice.</p> + +<p>"You don't know, dear?" Sarah Gailey suddenly ceased rocking, and +glanced at Hilda with the mournful expression of acute worry that was so +terribly familiar on her features. Although it was notorious that baseless +apprehensions were a part of Sarah's disease, nevertheless Hilda could +never succeed in treating any given apprehension as quite baseless. And now +Sarah's mere tone begot in Hilda's self-consciousness a vague alarm.</p> + +<p>She continued busy with her gloves, silent.</p> + +<p>"And on Saturday afternoon too, when everybody's abroad!" Sarah Gailey +added gloomily, with her involuntary small movements of the head.</p> + +<p>"He asked me if I could go out with him for a minute or two at once," +said Hilda, and picked up the parasol with a decisive gesture.</p> + +<p>"There's a great deal too much talk about you and George as it is," said +Sarah with an acrid firmness.</p> + +<p>"Talk about me and--!" Hilda cried, absolutely astounded.</p> + +<p>She had no feeling of guilt, but she knew that she was looking guilty, +and this knowledge induced in her the actual sensations of a criminal.</p> + +<p>"I'm sure I don't want--" Sarah Gailey began, and was interrupted by a +quiet tap at the door.</p> + +<p>George Cannon entered.</p> + +<p>"Ready, miss?" he demanded, smiling, before he had caught sight of her +face.</p> + +<p>For the second time that afternoon he saw her scarlet, and now there +were tears in her eyes, too.</p> + +<p>She hesitated an instant.</p> + +<p>"Yes," she answered with a painful gulp, and moved towards the door.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b4c2">CHAPTER II</a><br /> THE UNKNOWN ADVENTURE</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>When they were fairly out in the street Hilda felt like a mariner who +has escaped from a lee shore, but who is beset by the vaguer and even more +formidable perils of the open sea. She was in a state of extreme agitation, +and much too self-conscious to be properly cognisant of her surroundings; +she did not feel the pavement with her feet; she had no recollection of +having passed out of the house. There she was walking along on nothing, by +the side of a man who might or might not be George Cannon, amid tall +objects that resembled houses! Her situation was in a high degree painful, +but she could not have avoided it. She could not, in Sarah's bedroom, have +fallen into sobs, or into a rage, or into the sulks, and told George Cannon +that she would not go with him; she could not have dashed hysterically away +and hidden herself on an upper floor, in the manner of a startled fawn. Her +spirit was too high for such tricks. On the other hand, she was by no means +sufficiently mistress of herself to be able to hide from him her shame. +Hence she faced him and followed him, and let him see it. Their long +familiarity had made this surrender somewhat easier for her. After all, in +the countless daily contacts, they had grown accustomed to minor +self-exposures--and Hilda more so than George Cannon; Hilda was too +impatient and impulsive not to tear, at increasingly frequent intervals, +the veil of conventional formality.</p> + +<p>Her mood now, as she accompanied George Cannon on the unknown adventure, +was one of abashed but still fierce resentment. She of course believed +Sarah Gailey's statement that there had been "talk" about herself and the +landlord, and yet it was so utterly monstrous as to be almost incredible. +She was absolutely sure that she had never by her behaviour furnished the +slightest excuse for such "talk." No eavesdropper could ever have caught +the least word or gesture to justify it. Could a malicious eavesdropper +have assisted at the secret operations of her inmost mind, even then he +could scarcely have seen aught to justify it. Existence at Brighton had +been too strenuous and strange--and, with Sarah Gailey in the house, too +full of responsibilities--to favour dalliance. Hilda, examining herself, +could not say that she had not once thought of George Cannon as a husband; +because just as a young solitary man will imagine himself the spouse of a +dozen different girls in a week, so will an unmated girl picture herself +united to every eligible and passably sympathetic male that crosses her +path. It is the everyday diversion of the fancy. But she could say that she +had not once thought seriously of George Cannon as a husband. Why, he was +not of her generation! Although she did not know his age, she guessed that +he must be nearer forty than thirty. He was of the generation of Sarah +Gailey, and Sarah Gailey was the contemporary of her dead mother! And he +had never shown for her any sentiment but that of a benevolently teasing +kindliness. Moreover, she was afraid of him, beyond question. And withal, +he patently lacked certain qualities which were to be found in her image of +a perfect man. No! She had more often thought of Edwin Clayhanger as a +husband. Indeed she had married Edwin Clayhanger several times. The +haunting youth would not leave her alone. And she said to herself, hot and +indignant: "I shall have to leave Brighton! I can see that! Sarah Gailey's +brought it on herself!" Yes, she was actually angry with Sarah Gailey, who +however had only informed her of a fact which she would have been sorry not +to know! And in leaving Brighton, that fancy of hers took her straight to +Bursley, to stay with Janet Orgreave in the house next to the new house of +the Clayhangers!</p> + +<p>Whither was George Cannon leading her? He had not yet said a word in +explanation of the errand, nor shown in any way that he had observed her +extraordinary condition. He was silent, swinging his stick. She also was +silent. She could not have spoken, not even to murmur: "Where are you +taking me to?" They went forward as in an enchantment.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>They were on the King's Road; and to the left were the high hotels and +houses, stretching east and west under the glare of the sun into +invisibility, and to the right was the shore, and the sea so bright that +the eye could scarcely rest on it. Both the upper and the lower promenades +were crowded with gay people surging in different directions. The dusty +roadway was full of carriages, and of the glint of the sun on wheelspokes +and horses' flanks, and of rolling, clear-cut shadows. The shore was +bordered with flags and masts and white and brown sails; and in the +white-and-green of billows harmlessly breaking could be seen the yellow +bodies of the bathers. A dozen bare-legged men got hold of a yacht under +sail with as many passengers on board, and pushed it forcibly right down +into the sea, and then up sprang its nose and it heeled over and shot +suddenly off, careering on the waves into the offing where other yachts +were sliding to and fro between the piers, dominating errant fleets of +rowboats. And the piers also were loaded with excited humanity and radiant +colour. And all the windows of all the houses and hotels were open, and +blowing with curtains and flowers and hats. The whole town was +enfevered.</p> + +<p>Hilda thought, her heart still beating, but less noisily, "I scarcely +ever come here. I don't come here often enough." And she saw Sarah Gailey +rocking and sighing and rocking and shaking her head in the mournful +twilight of the basement in Preston Street. The contrasts of existence +struck her as magnificent, as superb. The very misery and hopelessness of +Sarah's isolation seemed romantic, splendid, touchingly beautiful. And she +thought, inexplicably: "Why am I here? Why am I not at home in Turnhill? +Why am I so different from what mother was? What am I going to be and to +do? This that I now am can't continue for ever." She saw thousands of women +with thousands of men. And, quite forgetting that to the view of the +multitude she was just as much as any of them with a man (and a rather fine +man, too!), she began to pity herself because she was not with a man! She +dreamed, in her extreme excitation, of belonging absolutely to some man. +And despite all her pride and independence, she dwelt with pleasure and +longing on the vision of being his, of being at his disposal, of being +under his might, of being helpless before him. She thought, desolated: "I +am nobody's. And so there is 'talk'!" She scorned herself for being +nobody's. To belong utterly to some male seemed to be the one tolerable +fate for her in the world. And it was a glorious fate, whether it brought +good or evil. Any other was ignobly futile, was despicable. And then she +thought, savagely: "And just see my clothes! Why don't I take the trouble +to look nice?"</p> + +<p>Suddenly George Cannon stopped on the edge of the pavement, and turned +towards the houses across the street.</p> + +<p>"You see that?" he said, pointing with his stick.</p> + +<p>"What?"</p> + +<p>"The Chichester."</p> + +<p>She saw, in gold letters over the front of a tall corner house: "The +Chichester Private Hotel."</p> + +<p>"Well?"</p> + +<p>"I've taken it--from Christmas. I signed about an hour ago. I just had +to tell someone."</p> + +<p>"Well I never!" Hilda exclaimed.</p> + +<p>He was beyond question an extraordinary and an impressive man. He had +said that, after experimenting in Preston Street, he should take a larger +place, and lo! in less than a year, he had fulfilled his word. He had +experimented in Preston Street, with immense success and now he was coming +out into the King's Road! (Only those who have lived in a side street can +pronounce the fine words 'King's Road' with the proper accent of +deference.) And every house in the King's Road, Hilda now newly perceived, +was a house of price and distinction. Nothing could be common in the King's +Road: the address and the view were incomparably precious. Being +established there, George Cannon might, and no doubt would, ultimately +acquire one of the largest public hotels; indeed, dominate the promenade! +It would be just like him to do so! A year ago he was a solicitor in +Turnhill. To-day he was so perfectly and entirely a landlord that no one +could ever guess his first career. He was not merely extraordinary: he was +astounding. There could not be many of his calibre in the whole world.</p> + +<p>"How does it strike you?" he asked, with an eagerness that touched +her.</p> + +<p>"Oh! It's splendid!" she answered, trying to put more natural enthusiasm +into her voice. But the fact was that the Chichester had not yet struck her +at all. It was only the idea of being in the King's Road that had struck +her--and with such an effect that her attention was happily diverted from +her trouble, and her vexatious self-consciousness disappeared. She had from +time to time remarked the Chichester, but never with any particularity; it +had been for her just an establishment among innumerable others, and not +one of the best,--the reverse of imposing. It stood at the angle of King's +Road and Ship Street, and a chemist's shop occupied the whole of the +frontage, the hotel-entrance being in Ship Street; its architecture was +fiat and plain, and the place seemed neglected, perhaps unprosperous.</p> + +<p>"Twenty bow-windows!" murmured George Cannon, and then smiled at +himself, as if ashamed of his own naïveté.</p> + +<p>And Hilda counted the windows. Yes, there were eight on King's Road and +twelve at the side. The building was high, and it was deep, stretching far +down Ship Street. In a moment it began to put on, for Hilda, quite special +qualities. How high it was! How deep it was! And in what a situation! It +possessed mysterious and fine characteristics which set it apart. Strange +that hitherto she had been so blind to it! She and George Cannon were +divided from the house by the confused and noisy traffic of the roadway, +and by the streaming throngs on the opposite pavement. And none of these +people riding or driving or walking, and none of the people pushing past +them on the pavement behind, guessed that here on the kerb was the future +master of the Chichester, an amazing man, and that she, Hilda Lessways, by +his side, was the woman to whom he had chosen first to relate his triumph! +This unrecognised secrecy in the great animated street was piquant and +agreeable to Hilda, a source of pride.</p> + +<p>"I suppose you've bought it?" she ventured. She had no notion of his +financial resources, but her instinct was to consider them infinite.</p> + +<p>"No! I've not exactly bought it," he laughed. "Not quite! I've got the +lease, from Christmas. How much d'ye think the rent is?" He seemed to +challenge her.</p> + +<p>"Oh! Don't ask me!"</p> + +<p>"Five hundred a year," he said, and raised his chin. "Five hundred a +year! Ten pounds a week! Nearly thirty shillings a day! You've got to pay +that before you can even begin to think of your own profits."</p> + +<p>"But it's enormous!" Hilda was staggered. All her mother's houses put +together had brought in scarcely a third of the rental of that single +house, which was nevertheless only a modest unit in several miles of +houses. "But can you make it pay?"</p> + +<p>"I fancy so! Else I shouldn't have taken it. The present man can't. But +then he's paying £550 for one thing, and he's old. And he doesn't know his +business.... Oh yes! I think I can see my money back.... Wait till +Christmas is turned and I make a start!"</p> + +<p>She knew that the future would justify his self-confidence. How he +succeeded she could not define. Why should he succeed where another was +failing? He could not go out and drag boarders by physical force into his +private hotel! Yet he would succeed. In every gesture he was the successful +man. She looked timidly up at his eyes under the strong black eyelashes. +His glance caught hers. He smiled conqueringly.</p> + +<p>"Haven't said a word to Sarah yet!" he almost whispered, so low was his +voice; and he put on a mock-rueful smile. Hilda smiled in response.</p> + +<p>"Shall you keep Preston Street?" she asked.</p> + +<p>"Of course!" he said with pride--"I shall run the two, naturally." He +put his shoulders back. "One will help the other, don't you see?"</p> + +<p>She thought she saw, and nodded appreciatively. He meant to run two +establishments! At the same moment a young and stylish man drove rather +slowly by in a high dog-cart. He nodded carelessly to George Cannon, and +then, perceiving that George Cannon was with a lady, raised his hat in +haste. George Cannon responded. The young man gazed for an instant hard at +Hilda, with a peculiar expression, and passed on. She did not know who he +was. Of George Cannon's relationships in the town she was entirely +ignorant, but that he had relationships was always obvious.</p> + +<p>She blushed, thinking of what Sarah Gailey had said about 'talk' +concerning herself and George Cannon. In the young man's glance there had +been something to annoy and shame her.</p> + +<p>"Come across and have a look at the place," said George Cannon, suddenly +stepping down into the gutter, with a look first in one direction and then +in the other for threatening traffic.</p> + +<p>"I don't think I'll come now," she replied.</p> + +<p>"But why not? Are you in a hurry? You've plenty of time before five +o'clock--heaps!"</p> + +<p>"I'd prefer not to come," she insisted, in an abashed and diffident +voice.</p> + +<p>"But what's up?" he demanded, stepping back to the pavement, and +glancing directly into her eyes.</p> + +<p>She blushed more and more, dropping her eyelids.</p> + +<p>"I don't want to be talked about <i>too</i> much!" she muttered, +mortified. Her inference was unmistakable. The whole of her mind seemed now +to be occupied with an enormous grievance which she somehow had against the +world in general. Her very soul, too, was bursting with this grievance.</p> + +<p>"Talked about? But who--"</p> + +<p>"Never mind! I know! I've been told!" she interrupted him.</p> + +<p>"Oh! I see!" He was now understanding the cause of her trouble in Sarah +Gailey's bedroom.</p> + +<p>"Now look here!" He went on. "I've just got to have a few words with +you. You come across the road, please." He was imperious.</p> + +<p>She raised her glance for a timid moment to his face, and saw to her +intense astonishment that he also was blushing. Never before had she seen +him blush.</p> + +<p>"Come along!" he urged.</p> + +<p>She followed him obediently across the dangerous road. He waited for her +at the opposite kerb, and then they went up Ship Street. He turned into the +entrance of the Chichester, which was grandiose, with a flight of shallow +steps, and then a porch with two basket chairs, and then another flight of +shallow steps ending in double doors which were noticeably higher than the +street level. She still followed.</p> + +<p>"Nobody in here, I expect," said George Cannon, indicating a door on the +right, to an old waiter who stood in the dark hall.</p> + +<p>"No, sir."</p> + +<p>George Cannon opened the door as a master, ushered Hilda into a tiny +room furnished with a desk and two chairs, and shut the door.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>The small window was of ground glass and gave no prospect of the outer +world, from which it seemed to Hilda that she was as completely cut off as +in a prison. She was alone with George Cannon, and beyond the narrow walls +which caged them together, and close together, there was nothing! All +Brighton, save this room, had ceased to exist. Hilda was now more than ever +affrighted, shamed, perturbed, agonised. Yet at the same time she had the +desperate calm of the captain of a ship about to founder with all hands. +And she saw glimpses, beautiful and compensatory, of the romantic quality +of common life. She was in a little office of a perfectly ordinary +boarding-house--(she could even detect the stale odours of cooking)--with a +realistic man of business, and they were about to discuss a perfectly +ordinary piece of scandal; and surely they might be called two common-sense +people! And withal, the ordinariness and the midland gumption of the scene +were shot through with the bright exotic rays of romance! She thought: "It +is painful and humiliating to be caught and fixed as I am. But it is +wonderful too!"</p> + +<p>"The fact is," said George Cannon, in an easy reassuring tone, "we never +get the chance of a bit of quiet chat. Upon my soul we don't! Now I suppose +it's Sarah who's been worrying you?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"What did she say?... You'd better sit down, don't you think?" He swung +round the pivoted arm-chair in front of the closed desk and pointed her to +it.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" Hilda hesitated, and then sank on to the chair without looking at +it. "She simply said there was a lot of talk about you and me. Has she been +saying anything to you?"</p> + +<p>He shook his head, staring down at her. Hilda put her arms on the arms +of the chair, and, shirking the man's gaze, stared down at the worn carpet +and at his boots thereon. One instinct in her desired that he should move +away or that the room should be larger, but another instinct wanted him to +remain close, lest the savour of life should lose its sharpness.</p> + +<p>"It passes me how people can say such things!" she went on, in a low, +thrilled, meditative voice. "I can't understand it!" She was quite sincere +in her astonished indignation. Nevertheless, she experienced a positive +pride at being brought into a scandal with George Cannon; she derived from +it a certain feeling of importance; it proved that she was no longer a mere +girlish miss.</p> + +<p>George Cannon kept silence.</p> + +<p>"I shall leave Brighton," Hilda continued. "That I've quite decided! I +don't like leaving your sister, as ill as she is! But really--" And she +thought how prudent she was, and how capable of taking care of herself--she +all alone in the world!</p> + +<p>"Where should you go to? Bursley? The Orgreaves?" George Cannon asked +absently and carelessly.</p> + +<p>"I don't know," said Hilda, with curtness.</p> + +<p>He stepped aside, in the direction of the window, and examined curiously +the surface of the glass, as though in search of a concealed message which +it might contain. In a new and much more animated voice he said to the +window:</p> + +<p>"Of course I know it's all my fault!"</p> + +<p>Hilda glanced up at his back; he was still not more than three feet away +from her.</p> + +<p>"How is it your fault?" she asked, after a pause.</p> + +<p>He made another pause.</p> + +<p>"The way I look at you," he said.</p> + +<p>These apparently simple words made Hilda tremble, and deprived her of +speech. They shifted the conversation to another plane. 'The way I look at +you! The way I look at you!' What did he mean? How did he look at her? She +could not imagine what he was driving at! Yes, she could! She knew quite +well. All the time, while pretending to herself not to understand, she +understood. It was staggering, but she perfectly understood. He had looked +at her 'like that' on the very first day of their acquaintance, in his +office at Turnhill, and again at the house in Lessways Street, and again in +the newspaper office, and on other occasions, and again on the night of +their arrival at Brighton. But surely not lately! Or did he look at her +'like that' behind her back? Was it possible that people noticed it?... +Absurd! His explanation of the origin of the gossip did not convince her. +She had, however, suddenly lost interest in the origin of the gossip. She +was entirely occupied with George Cannon's tone, and his calm, audacious +reference to a phenomenon which had hitherto seemed to her to be far beyond +the region of words.</p> + +<p>She was frightened. She was like some one walking secure in the night, +who is stopped by the sound of rushing water and stands with all his senses +astrain, afraid to move a step farther, too absorbed and intimidated to be +aware of astonishment. The point was not whether or not she had known or +guessed the existence of this unseen and formidable river; the point was +that she was thrillingly on its brink, in the dark. Every instant she heard +its swelling current plainer and plainer. She thought: "Am I lost? How +strange that this awful and exquisite thing should happen to just me!" She +was quite fatalistic.</p> + +<p>He turned his head suddenly and caught her guilty eyes for an instant +before she could lower them.</p> + +<p>"You don't mean to say you don't know what I mean?" he said.</p> + +<p>She still could not speak. Her trouble was acute, her self-consciousness +far keener than it had ever been before. She thought: "But it's impossible +that this awful and exquisite thing should happen in this fashion!" George +Cannon moved a step towards her. She could not see his face, but she knew +that he was looking at her with his expression at once tyrannic and +benevolent. She could feel, beating upon her, the emanating waves of his +personality. And she was as confused as though she had been sitting naked +in front of him.... And he had brought all this about by simply putting +something into words--by saying: "It's the way I look at you!"</p> + +<p>He went on:</p> + +<p>"I can't help it, you know.... The very first minute I ever set eyes on +you.... Of course I'm thirty-six. But there it is!... I've never seen any +one like you; and I've seen a few! The fact is, Hilda, I do believe you +don't know how fine you are." He spoke more quickly and with boyish +enthusiasm; his voice became wonderfully persuasive. "You are fine, you +know! And you're beautiful! I didn't think so at first, but you are! You're +being wasted. Why, a woman like you...! You've no idea. You're so proud and +stiff, when you want to be... I'd trust you with anything. You're +absolutely the only woman I ever met that I'd trust like a man! And that's +a fact.... Now, nobody could ever think as much of you as I do. I'm quite +certain of it. It couldn't be done. I <i>know</i> you, you see! I +understand everything you do, and whatever you do, it's just fine for me. +You couldn't be as happy with any one else! You couldn't! I feel that in my +bones.... Now--now, I must tell you something--"</p> + +<p>The praise, the sympathy, the passion were astounding, marvellous, and +delicious to her. Was it conceivable that this experienced and worldly man +had been captivated by such a mere girl as herself? She had never guessed +it! Or had she always guessed it? An intense pride warmed her blood like a +powerful cordial. Life was even grander than she had thought!... She +drooped into an intoxication. Among all that he had said, he had not said +that he was not stronger than she. He had not relinquished his authority. +She felt it, sitting almost beneath him in the slippery chair. She knew +that she would yield to him. She desired to yield to him. Her mind was full +of sensuous images based on the abdication of her will in favour of +his.</p> + +<p>"Now, look here, Hilda. I want to tell you--"</p> + +<p>He perhaps did not intend that she should look up; but she looked up. +And she was surprised to see that his face was full of troubled +hesitations, showing almost dismay. He made the motion of swallowing. She +smiled; and set her shoulders back--the very gesture that she had learned +from him.</p> + +<p>"What?" she questioned, in a whisper.</p> + +<p>Her brief mood of courage was over. She sank before him again, and +waited with bowed head.</p> + +<p>Profoundly disturbed, he stood quite still for a few seconds, with shut +lips, and then he made another step to approach.</p> + +<p>"Your name's got to be Cannon," she heard him say.</p> + +<p>She thought, still waiting: "If this goes on a moment longer I shall die +of anticipation, in bliss." And when she felt his hand on her shoulder, and +the great shadow of him on part of her face, her body seemed to sigh, +acquiescent and for the moment assuaged: "This is a miracle, and life is +miraculous!" She acknowledged that she had lacked faith in life.</p> + +<p>She was now on the river, whirling. But at the same time she was in the +small, hot room, and both George Cannon's hands were on her unresisting +shoulders; and then they were round her, and she felt his physical +nearness, the texture of his coat and of his skin; she could see in a mist +the separate hairs of his tremendous moustache and the colours swimming in +his eyes; her nostrils expanded in transient alarm to a faint, exciting +masculine odour. She was disconcerted, if not panic-struck, by the violence +of his first kiss; but her consternation was delectable to her.</p> + +<p>And amid her fright and her joy, and the wonder of her extreme surprise, +and the preoccupation of being whirled down the river, she calmly +reflected, somewhere in her brain: "The door is not locked. Supposing some +one were to come in and see us!" And she reflected also, in an ecstasy of +relief: "My life will be quite simple, now. I shall have nothing to worry +about. And I can help him." For during a year past she had never ceased to +ask herself what she must do to arrange her life; her conscience had never +ceased to tell her that she ought not to be content to remain in the narrow +ideas of her mother, and that though she preferred marriage she ought to +act independently of the hope of it. Throughout her long stay in Preston +Street she had continually said: "After this--what? This cannot last for +ever. When it comes to an end what am I to do to satisfy my conscience?" +And she had thought vaguely of magnificent activities and purposes--she +knew not what.... The problem existed no more. Her life was arranged. And +now, far more sincerely than in the King's Road twenty minutes earlier, she +regarded the career of a spinster with horror and with scorn. At best, she +suddenly perceived with blinding clearness, it would have been +pitiful--pitiful! Twenty minutes earlier, in the King's Road, she had +dreamt of belonging absolutely to some man, of being at his disposal, of +being under his might, of being helpless before him. And now!... Miracle +thrice miraculous! Miracle unconceived, inconceivable!... No more 'talk' +now!...</p> + +<p>She told herself how admirable was the man. She assured herself that he +was entirely admirable. She reminded herself that she had always deemed him +admirable, that only twenty minutes earlier, in the King's Road, when there +was in her mind no dimmest, wildest notion of the real future, she had +genuinely admired him. How clever, how tactful, how indomitable, how +conquering, how generous, how kind he was! How kind to his half-sister! How +forbearing with her! Indeed, she could not recall his faults. And he was +inevitably destined to brilliant success. She would be the wife of a great +and a wealthy man. And in her own secret ways she could influence him, and +thus be greater than the great.</p> + +<p>Love? It is an absolute fact that the name of 'love' did not in the +first eternal moments even occur to her. And when it did she gave it but +little importance. She had to admit that she had not consciously thought of +George Cannon with love--at any rate with love as she had imagined love to +be. Indeed, her immediate experience would not fit any theory that she +could formulate. But with the inexorable realism of her sex she easily +dismissed inconvenient names and theories, and accommodated herself to the +fact. And the fact was that she overwhelmingly wanted George Cannon, and, +as she now recognized, had wanted him ever since she first saw him. The +recognition afforded her intense pleasure. She abandoned herself candidly +to this luxury of an unknown desire. It was incomparably the most splendid +and dangerous experience that she had ever had. She did not reason and she +had no wish to reason. She was set above reason. Happy to the point of +delicious pain, she yet yearned forward to a happiness far more +excruciating. She was perfectly aware that her bliss would be torment until +George Cannon had married her, until she had wholly surrendered to him.</p> + +<p>Yet at intervals a voice said very clearly within her: "All this is +wrong. This is base and shameful. This is something to blush for, really!" +She did blush. But her blushes were a part of the delight. And the voice +was not persistent. She could silence it with scarcely an effort, despite +its clarity.</p> + +<p>"Kiss me!" George Cannon demanded of her, with eager masterfulness.</p> + +<p>The request shocked her for an instant, and the young girl in her was +about to revolt. But she kissed him--an act which combined the sweetness of +submission with the glory of triumph! She looked at him steadily, confident +in herself and in him. She felt that he knew how to love. His emotion +filled her with superb pride. She seemed to be saying to him in a doomed +rapture: "Do you think I don't know what I am doing? I know! I know!"</p> + +<p>The current of the river was tremendous. She foresaw the probability of +disaster. She was aware that she had definitely challenged the hazard of +fate. But she was not terrified in the dark, swirling night of her destiny. +She straightened her shoulders. With all her innocence and ignorance and +impulsiveness and weakness, she had behind her the unique and priceless +force of her youth. She was young, and she put her trust in life.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b4c3">CHAPTER III</a><br /> FLORRIE AGAIN</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>As they were walking home along the King's Road, Hilda suddenly stopped +in front of a chemist's shop. "I've got something to buy here," she said +diffidently, and then added: "I'll follow you."</p> + +<p>"And what have you got to buy?" he asked, facing her, with his +benevolent, ironical expression.</p> + +<p>"Never mind!" she gently laughed. "I shan't be many minutes after you." +She pretended to make a mystery. But her sole purpose was to avoid +re-entering the house in his company; and she knew that he had divined +this. Nevertheless, she found pleasure in the perfectly futile pretence of +a mysterious purchase.</p> + +<p>She was very self-conscious as they stood there on the dusty footpath +amid the promenaders gay and gloomy, chattering and silent, who were taking +the sun and the salt breeze. Despite her reason, she had a fear that +numbers of people would perceive her to be newly affianced and remark upon +the contrast between her girlishness and his maturity. But George Cannon +was not in the slightest degree self-conscious. He played the lover with +ease and said quite simply and convincingly just the things which she would +have expected a lover to say. Indeed, the conversation, as carried on by +him, between the moment of betrothal and the arrival at the chemist's shop, +was the one phenomenon of the engagement which corresponded with her +preconceived ideas concerning such an affair. It convinced her that she +really was affianced.</p> + +<p>"Well?" he murmured fondly and yet quizzically, as they remained +wordless, deliciously hesitating to part. "What are you thinking +about?"</p> + +<p>She replied with brave candour, appealing to him by a soft glance:</p> + +<p>"I was only thinking how queer it is I should be engaged in a room I'd +never seen before in my life--going into it like that!"</p> + +<p>He looked at her uncomprehending; for an instant his features were +blank; then he smiled kindly.</p> + +<p>"It's so strange!" she encouraged him.</p> + +<p>"Yes. Isn't it?" he agreed, with charming, tranquil politeness.</p> + +<p>"He doesn't see it!" she thought, as she watched the play of his face. +"He doesn't see how wonderful it is that I should go into a room that was +absolutely unknown to me and then this should happen at once. Why! I never +knew there was such a room!" She could not define how she was affected by +this fact, but she regarded the fact as tremendously romantic, and its +effect on her was profound. And George saw in it no significance! She was +disconcerted. She felt a tremor; it was as though the entire King's Road +had quivered for a fraction of a second and then, feigning nonchalance, +resumed its moveless solidity.</p> + +<p>Inside the chemist's she demanded the first thing she set eyes on--a +tooth-brush. All the while she was examining various shapes of +toothbrushes, she had a vision of George raising his hat to take leave of +her, and she could see not only the curve of his hand and the whiteness of +his cuff, but also the millions of tiny marks and creases on the coarse +skin of his face, extraordinarily different from her own smooth, pure, +delicate, silky complexion. And she remembered that less than three years +ago she had regarded him as of another generation, as indefinitely older +and infinitely more experienced than her childish and simple self. This +reflection produced in her a consternation which was curiously +blissful.</p> + +<p>"No, madam," the white-aproned chemist was saying. "It's this size that +we usually sell to ladies."</p> + +<p>She put on the serious judicial air of an authentic adult woman, and +frowned at the chemist.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>When, in Preston Street, she was reluctantly approaching the house, she +saw a cab, coming downwards in the opposite direction, stop at No. 59.</p> + +<p>"That must be Florrie!" she said, half-aloud.</p> + +<p>The boarding-house being in need of another servant, young, strong, and +reliable, Hilda had suggested that Miss Florence Bagster might be invited +to accept the situation. Sarah Gailey had agreed that it would be wise to +have a servant from Turnhill; she mistrusted southern servants, and +appeared to believe that there was no real honesty south of the Trent. +Florence Bagster had accepted the situation with enthusiasm, writing that +she longed to be again with her former mistress; she did not write that the +mysterious and magnetic name of Brighton called her more loudly than the +name of her former mistress. And now Florence was due.</p> + +<p>But it was not Florence who emerged from the cab. It was a tall and +full-bosomed young lady in a gay multi-coloured costume, and gloves and a +sunshade and a striking hat. This young lady stood by the cab expectant and +smiling while the cabman pulled a tin trunk off the roof of the vehicle, +and then, when the cabman had climbed down and was dragging the trunk after +him, she put out an arm and seized one handle of the trunk to help him, +which act, so strange on the part of a young lady, made Hilda, coming +nearer and nearer, look more carefully. She was astounded as she realized +that the unknown young lady was not a young lady after all, but the +familiar Florrie at the advanced age of sixteen.</p> + +<p>The aged cabman had made no mistake. He left the tin trunk on the +pavement and took timid Florrie's money without touching his hat for it. +Florrie was laying her sunshade rather forlornly on the top of the tin +trunk and preparing to lift the trunk unaided, when Mr. Boutwood, stout and +all in black, came gallantly forth from the house to assist her. Sarah +Gailey's opposition had not been persistent enough to keep the jovial Mr. +Boutwood out of No. 59. Shortly after Christmas his wife had died suddenly, +and Mr. Boutwood, with plenty of time and plenty of money on his hands, had +found himself desolated. In his desolation he had sought his old +acquaintance George Cannon, and the result had somehow been that bygones +had become bygones and a new boarder had increased the prosperity of No. +59. Sarah Gailey could not object. Indeed, she had actually wept for the +death of one enemy and the affliction of another. Moreover, she seldom had +contact with the boarders now.</p> + +<p>The rather peculiar circumstances of Florrie's arrival almost cured +Hilda's self-consciousness, and she entered the house, in the wake of the +trunk, with a certain forgetful ease. There was Mr. Boutwood, still +dallying with Florrie and the trunk, in the narrow hall! The shocking +phenomenon of a boarder helping a domestic servant with her luggage had +been rendered possible only by a series of accidents. The front door being +left open on account of the weather, Mr. Boutwood had had a direct view of +the maiden, and the maiden had not been obliged to announce her arrival +officially by ringing a bell. Hence the other servants had not had notice. +And of the overseers of the house one was imprisoned in the basement and +the other two had been out betrothing themselves! In the ordinary way the +slightest unusualness in the hall would instantly attract the attention of +somebody in authority.</p> + +<p>Mr. Boutwood was not immediately aware of Hilda. His attitude towards +Florrie was shocking to Hilda in a double sense; it shocked her as an +overseer, but it shocked her quite as much as a young woman newly jealous +for the pride of all her sex. Florrie was beyond question exceedingly +pretty; in particular the chin pouted more deliriously than ever. Her +complexion was even finer than Hilda's own. She had a simple, good-natured +glance, a quick and extraordinarily seductive smile, and the unique bodily +grace of her years. Her costume, though vulgar and very ill-made, was +effective at a little distance; her form and movements gave it a fictitious +worth. Indeed, she was an amazing blossom to have come off the dunghill of +Calder Street. Domestic drudgery had not yet dehumanized nor disfigured +her--it is true that her hands were concealed in gloves, and her feet +beneath a flowing skirt. Now, Mr. Boutwood's attitude showed very plainly +that the girlish charms of Florrie had produced in him a definite and +familiar effect. He would have been ready to commit follies for the young +woman, and to deny that she was a drudge or anything but a beautiful +creature.</p> + +<p>Hilda objected. She objected because Mr. Boutwood was a widower, holding +that he had no right to joy, and that he ought to mourn practically for +ever in solitude. She would make no allowance for his human instincts, his +needs of intimate companionship, his enormous unoccupied leisure. She would +have condemned him utterly on the score of his widowhood alone. But she +objected far more strongly to his attitude because he was fat and looked +somewhat coarse. She counted his obesity to him for a sin. And it was +naught to her that he had been a martyr to idleness and wealth, which +combination had prematurely aged him. Mr. Boutwood was really younger than +George Cannon, and Florence Bagster certainly seemed as old as Hilda. Yet +the juxtaposition of the young, slim, and virginal Florrie and the large, +earth-worn Mr. Boutwood profoundly offended her.</p> + +<p>It was Mr. Boutwood who first discovered that Hilda was in the doorway. +He was immediately abashed, and presented the most foolish appearance. +Whereupon Hilda added scorn to her disgust. Florrie, however, easily kept +her countenance, and with a pert smile took the hand which her former +mistress graciously extended. By universal custom a servant retains some of +the privileges of humanity for several minutes after entering upon a new +servitude. Mr. Boutwood vanished.</p> + +<p>"Louisa will help you upstairs with the trunk," said Hilda, when she had +made inquiries about the wonderful journey which Florrie had accomplished +alone, and about the health of Florrie's aunt and of her family. "Louisa!" +she called loudly up the stairs and down into the basement.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>She followed the procession of the trunk upstairs, and, Louisa having +descended again, showed Florrie into the kennel. This tiny apartment had in +it two truckle-beds, and a wash-bowl on a chair, and little else. A very +small square trap-window in the low ceiling procured a dusky light in the +middle hours of the day. Florence seemed delighted with the room; she might +have had to sleep under the stairs.</p> + +<p>"Put on your afternoon apron, and then you can go down and see Miss +Gailey," said Hilda, and shut the door upon Florrie in her new home.</p> + +<p>When she turned, there was George Cannon on the half-landing beneath the +skylight! She knew not how he had come there, nor whether he had entered +the house before or after herself.</p> + +<p>"I'm glad he isn't fat!" she thought. And it was as though she had +thought: "If he were fat everything would be different." Her features did +not relax as she went down the five steps to the half-landing where he +waited, smiling faintly. She thought: "We must be very serious and +circumspect in the house. There must never be the slightest--" But while +she was yet on the last step, he firmly put his hands on her ears and, +drawing her head towards him, kissed her full on the mouth, and she saw +again, through her eyelashes, all the details of his face. She yielded. All +her ideas of circumspection melted magically away in an abandoned +tenderness of which she was ashamed, but for which she would have +unreflectingly made any sacrifice. The embrace was over in an instant. +Besides being guiltless of obesity, George Cannon was free from the +unpardonable fault of clumsiness. He was audacious, but he was not +foolhardy, and he would never be abashed. True, she had seen dismay on his +face at the moment of his declaration, but that moment was unique, and his +dismay had ineffably flattered her. Now, on the half-landing, she was +drenched in bliss. And she felt dissolute; she felt even base. But she did +not care. She thought, as it were, startled: "This is love. This must be +what love is. I must have been in love without knowing it. And as for a +girl always knowing when a man's in love with her, and foreseeing the +proposal, and all that sort of thing...." Her practical contempt for all +that sort of thing could not be stated in words.</p> + +<p>"Florrie's just come," she whispered, and by a movement of the head +indicated that Florrie was in the kennel.</p> + +<p>They went together to the drawing-room on the first floor. It was, +empty, the entire population of the boarding-houses being still on the +seashore. Hilda stood near the door, which she left open, and gave detailed +news of Florrie in a tone very matter-of-fact. There was no reference to +love, or to the new situation created, or to the vast enterprise of the +Chichester. The topic was Florrie, and somehow it held the field despite +efforts to dislodge it.</p> + +<p>Then the stairs creaked. Already Florrie was coming down. In a trice she +had made herself ready for work. She came down timidly, not daring to look +to right nor left, but concentrating her attention on the stairs. She +passed along the landing outside the drawing-room door, and Hilda, opening +the door a little wider, had a full surreptitious view of her back; and +George Cannon, farther within the room, also saw her. They watched her +disappear on her way to find the basement and the formidable Sarah Gailey. +Hilda was touched by the spectacle of this child disguised as a strapping +woman, far removed from her family and her companions and her familiar +haunts, and driven or drawn into exile at Brighton, where she would only +see the sea once a week, except through windows, and where she would have +to work from fourteen to sixteen hours a day for a living, and sleep in a +kennel. The prettiness, the pertness, and the naïve contentedness of +the child thus realizing an ambition touched her deeply.</p> + +<p>"It does seem a shame, doesn't it?" she said.</p> + +<p>"What?"</p> + +<p>"Bringing her all the way up here, like this! She doesn't know a soul in +Brighton. She's bound to be frightfully home-sick--"</p> + +<p>"What about you?" George Cannon interrupted politely. "Doesn't she know +you?" He smiled with all his kindness.</p> + +<p>"Yes--but--"</p> + +<p>Hilda did not finish. It was not worth while. George Cannon had not +understood. He did not feel as she felt, and her emotion was incommunicable +to him. A tremendous misgiving seized her, and she had a physical feeling +of emptiness in the stomach. It passed, swiftly as a hallucination. Just +such a misgiving as visits nearly every normal person immediately before or +immediately after marriage! She ignored it. She was engaged--that was the +paramount fact! She was engaged, and joyously determined to prosecute the +grand adventure to the end. The immensity of the risks forced her to accept +them.</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>That evening Sarah Gailey was in torment from the pain in her wrists. +There was nothing to be done. She had had the doctor, and no article of the +prescribed treatment had been neglected. With unaccustomed aid from Hilda +she had accomplished the business of undressing and getting into bed, and +now she sat up in bed, supported by her own pillows and one from Hilda's +bed, and nursed her wrists, while Hilda poured drops of a narcotic for her +into a glass of water. Apart from the serious local symptoms, her health +was fairly good. She could eat, she could talk, she could walk, and her +brain was clear. Hilda held the glass for her to drink, for it was prudent +to keep her hands as much as possible in repose.</p> + +<p>"There!" said Hilda, as if to a young child who had been querulous. "I'm +sure you'll sleep now!"</p> + +<p>"I don't think I shall," the sufferer whined.</p> + +<p>"Oh yes, you will!" Hilda insisted firmly, although she was by no means +sure. "Let me take this extra pillow away, and then you can lie down +properly." She was thinking reproachfully: "What a pity it is for all of us +that the poor thing can't bear her pain with a little less fuss!" It was +not Sarah alone who was embittered and fatigued by Sarah's pain.</p> + +<p>"Where's George?" asked the invalid, when she was laid down.</p> + +<p>"In the parlour. Why?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, nothing!"</p> + +<p>"By the way," said Hilda, seized by a sudden impulse, which had its +origin in Sarah's tone at once martyrized and accusing,--"by the way, who +<i>is</i> it that's been talking scandal about me and George?"</p> + +<p>"Scandal?" Sarah Gailey seemed weakly to protest against the word.</p> + +<p>"Because, if you want to know," Hilda continued, "we're engaged to be +married!" She reflected, contrite: "This won't help her to sleep!" And then +added, in a new, endearing accent, awaiting an outburst of some kind from +Sarah: "Of course it's a secret, dear. I'm telling no one but you."</p> + +<p>After a moment's silence, Sarah remarked casually, with shut eyes: +"It'll be much the best not to tell anyone. And the shorter the engagement +the better! Don't let anybody in the house know till you're married." She +sighed, put her cheek into the pillow, and moved her bound wrists for a few +seconds, restlessly. "If you turn the gas down," she finished very wearily, +"I dare say I may get off. If only they'd stop that piano upstairs!"</p> + +<p>She had displayed no surprise at the tremendous event, no sentimental +interest in it. The fact was that Sarah Gailey's wrists were infinitely +more interesting to her than any conceivable project of marriage. +Continuous and acute pain had withdrawn her from worldly affairs, making +her more than ever like a god.</p> + +<p>Hilda was startled. But she was relieved. Now for the first time she had +the authentic sensation of being engaged. And it appeared to her that she +had been engaged for a very long period, and that the engagement was a +quite ordinary affair. She was relieved; yet she was also grievously +saddened. She lowered the gas, and in the gloom gazed for a few seconds at +the vague, huddled, sheeted, faintly moaning figure on the bed; the untidy +grey hair against the pillow struck her as intolerably pathetic.</p> + +<p>"Good night," she said softly.</p> + +<p>And the feeble, plaintive voice responded: "Good night."</p> + +<p>She went out, leaving the door slightly ajar.</p> + + +<h3>V</h3> + +<p>In the parlour adjoining George Cannon was seated at the table. When +Hilda saw him and their eyes met, she was comforted; a wave of tenderness +seemed to agitate her. She realized that this man was hers, and the +realization was marvellously reassuring. The sound of the piano descended +delicately from the drawing-room as from a great distance. From the kitchen +came the muffled clatter of earthenware and occasionally a harsh, loud +voice; it was the hour of relaxed discipline in the kitchen, where amid the +final washing-up and much free discussion and banter, Florrie was +recommencing her career on a grander basis. Hilda closed the door very +quietly. When she had closed it and was shut in with George Cannon her +emotion grew intenser.</p> + +<p>"I think she'll get off now," she whispered, standing near the door.</p> + +<p>"Have you told her?"</p> + +<p>Hilda nodded.</p> + +<p>"What does she say?"</p> + +<p>Hilda raised her eyebrows: "Oh!... Well, she says we'd better keep it +quiet, and make the engagement as short as possible." She blushed.</p> + +<p>"Look here," said George. "Let's go out, eh?"</p> + +<p>"But--what will people say?"</p> + +<p>"What the devil does it matter what they say? I want you to come out +with me."</p> + +<p>The whispered oath, and his defiant smile, enchanted her.</p> + +<p>"We can go out by the area steps," he continued. "There's two of 'em +sitting in the hall, but the front door's shut. Do go and get your +hat."</p> + +<p>She left the room with an obedient smile. Pushing open Sarah's door very +gently, she groped on the hooks behind it for her hat. "It won't matter +about gloves--in the dark," she thought. "Besides, I mustn't disturb her." +Before drawing-to the door she looked again at the bed. There was neither +sound nor movement. Probably Sarah Gailey slept. The dim vision of the form +on the bed and the blue spark of gas in the corner produced in Hilda a mood +of poignant and yet delicious sorrow.</p> + +<p>"Why, what's the matter?" George Cannon asked when she had returned to +the parlour.</p> + +<p>She knew that her eyes were humid with tears. Both her arms were raised +above her head as she fixed the hat. This act of fixing the hat in George's +presence gave her a new pleasure. She smiled at him.</p> + +<p>"Nothing!" she said, whispering mysteriously. "I think she's gone off. +I'm so glad. You know she really does suffer dreadfully."</p> + +<p>His look was uncomprehending; but she did not care. The anticipation of +going out with him was now utterly absorbing her.</p> + +<p>He waited with his hand on the gas-tap till she was ready, and then he +lowered the gas.</p> + +<p>"Wait a moment," she whispered at the door, and with a gesture called +him back into the room from the flagged passage leading to the area +steps.</p> + +<p>On the desk was his evening glass of milk, which he drank cold in +summer. She offered it to him in the twilit room like an enraptured +handmaid. He had forgotten it. The fact that he had forgotten it and she +had remembered it yet further increased her strange, mournful, ecstatic +bliss.</p> + +<p>"Have some," he whispered, when he had drunk.</p> + +<p>She finished the glass, trembling. They went forth, climbing the area +steps with proper precautions and escaping as thieves escape, down the +street. For an instant she glimpsed the wide-open windows of the +drawing-room, and the dining-room, from behind whose illuminated blinds +came floating, as it were wistfully, the sound of song and chatter. She +thought of Sarah Gailey prone and unconscious in the basement. And she felt +the moisture of the milk on her lips. "Am I happy or unhappy?" she +questioned herself, and could not reply. She knew only that she was +thrillingly, smartingly alive.</p> + +<p>At the corner of Preston Street and King's Road a landau waited.</p> + +<p>"This is ours," said George casually.</p> + +<p>"Ours?"</p> + +<p>What a splendid masculine idea! How it proved that he too had been +absorbed in the adventure! She admired him humbly, like a girl, like a +little girl. With the most formal deference he helped her into the +carriage.</p> + +<p>"Drive towards Shoreham," he commandingly directed the driver, and took +his place by her side.</p> + +<p>Yes! He was mature. He was a man of the world. He had had every +experience. He knew how to love. That such a being was hers, that she +without any effort had captured such a being, flattered her to an extreme +degree. She was glorious with pride. She leaned back in the carriage +negligently, affecting an absolute calm. She armed herself in her +virginity. Not George Cannon himself could have guessed that only by a +miracle of self-control did she prevent her hand from seeking his beneath +the light rug that covered their knees! She intimidated George Cannon in +that hour, and the while her heart burned with shame at the secret violence +of her feelings. She thought: "This must be love. This is love!" And yet +her conscience inarticulately accused her of obliquity. But she did not +care, and she would not reflect. She thought that she wilfully, perversely, +refused to reflect; but in reality she was quite helpless.</p> + +<p>Under the still and feverish night the landau rolled slowly along +between the invisible murmuring sea and the lighted facades of Hove. +Occasionally other carriages, containing other couples, approached, were +plain for a moment, and dissolved away.</p> + +<p>"So she thinks the engagement ought to be short?" said George +Cannon.</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"So do I!" he pronounced with emphasis.</p> + +<p>Hilda desired to ask him: "How short?" But she could not. She could not +bring herself to put the question. She was too proud. By a short +engagement, did he mean six months, three months, a month? Dared she hope +that he meant... a month? This was a thought buried in the deepest fastness +of her soul, a thought that she would have perished in order not to expose; +but it existed.</p> + +<p>"I think I should like to go back now," she breathed timidly, before +they were beyond Hove. It was not a request to be ignored. The carriage +turned. She felt relief. The sensation of being alive had been too acute to +be borne, and it was now a little eased. She knew that her destiny was +irrevocable, that nothing could prevent her from being George Cannon's. +Whether the destiny was evil or good did not paramountly interest her. But +she wanted to rush forward into the arms of fate and know her fate. She +dreamed only of the union.</p> + +<hr /> + + + + +<h1><a name="b5">BOOK V</a><br /> HER DELIVERANCE</h1> + + + + +<h2><a name="b5c1">CHAPTER I</a><br /> LOUISA UNCONTROLLED</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>Hilda, after a long railway journey, was bathing her face, arms, and +neck at the large double washstand in the large double bedroom on the +second floor of No. 59 Preston Street. At the back of the washstand was an +unused door which gave into a small bedroom occupied by the youngest Miss +Watchett. George Cannon came up quietly behind her. She pretended not to +hear him. He put his hands lightly on her wet arms. Smiling with +condescending indulgence, half to herself, she still pretended to ignore +him, and continued her toilet.</p> + +<p>The return from the honeymoon, which she had feared, had accomplished +itself quite simply and easily. She had feared the return, because only +upon the return was the marriage to be formally acknowledged and published. +It had been obviously impossible to announce, during the strenuous summer +season, the engagement of the landlord to a young woman who lived under the +same roof with him. The consequences of such an indiscretion would have +been in various ways embarrassing. Hence not a word was said. Nor were +definite plans for the wedding made until George remarked one evening that +he would like to be married at Chichester, Chichester being the name of his +new private hotel. Which exhibition of sentimentality had both startled and +touched Hilda. Chichester, however, had to be renounced, owing to the +difficulty of residence. The subject having been thus fairly broached, +George had pursued it, and one day somewhat casually stated that he had +taken a room in Lewes and meant to sleep there every night for the term +imposed by the law. Less than three weeks later, Hilda had inobtrusively +departed from No. 59, the official account being that she was to take a +holiday with friends after the fatigues of August and early September. She +left the train at Lewes, and there, in the presence of strangers, was +married to George Cannon, who had quitted Brighton two days earlier and was +supposed to be in London on business. Even Sarah Gailey, though her health +had improved, did not assist at the wedding. Sarah, sole depositary of the +secret, had to remain in charge of No. 59.</p> + +<p>A strange wedding! Not a single wedding present, except those +interchanged by the principals! Nor had any of the problems raised by the +marriage been solved, or attacked. The future of Sarah Gailey, for example! +Was Sarah to go on living with them? It was inconceivable, and yet the +converse was also inconceivable. Sarah had said nothing, and nothing had +been said to Sarah. Matters were to settle themselves. It had not even been +decided which room Mr. and Mrs. Cannon should inhabit as man and wife. It +was almost certain that, in the dead period between the popular summer +season and the fashionable autumn season, there would be several bedrooms +empty. Hilda, like George, did not want to bother with a lot of tedious +details, important or unimportant. The attitude of each was: "Let me get +married first, and then I'll see to all that."</p> + +<p>Thus had the return been formidable to Hilda. All the way from Ireland +she had been saying to herself: "I shall have to go up the steps, and into +the house, and be spoken to as Mrs. Cannon! And then there'll be Sarah...!" +But the entry into the house had produced no terror. Everywhere George's +adroitness had been wonderful, extraordinarily comforting and reassuring, +and nowhere more so than in the vestibule of No. 59. The tone in which he +had said to Louisa, "Take Mrs. Cannon's handbag, Louisa," had been a marvel +of ease. Louisa had incontestably blenched, for the bizarre Sarah, who +conserved in Brighton the inmost spirit of the Five Towns, had thought fit +to tell the servants nothing whatever. But the trained veteran in Louisa +had instantly recovered, and she had replied "Yes, sir," with a simplicity +which proved her to be the equal of George Cannon.... The worst was over +for Hilda. And the next moments were made smooth by reason of a great piece +of news which, forcing Sarah Gailey to communicate it at once, monopolized +attention, and so entirely relieved the bride's self-consciousness.</p> + +<p>Florence Bagster, having insolently quarrelled with her mistress, had +left her service without notice. Mr. Boutwood had also gone, and the +connection between the two departures was only too apparent, not merely to +Sarah, but also to the three Miss Watchetts, who had recently arrived. +Florence, who could but whisper, had shouted at her mistress. Little, +flushing, modest Florrie, who yesterday in the Five Towns was an infant, +had compromised herself with a fat widower certainly old enough to be her +father. And the widower, the friend of the house, had had so little regard +for the feelings of the house that he had not hesitated to flaunt with +Florrie in the town. It was known that they were more or less together, and +that he stood between Florrie and the world.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>"I suppose I'd better write at once to her mother--or perhaps her aunt; +her aunt's got more sense," said Hilda, as she dropped the sponge and +groped for a towel, her eyes half blinded.</p> + +<p>In moving she had escaped from his hands.</p> + +<p>"What do you say?" she asked, having heard a vague murmur through the +towel.</p> + +<p>"I say you can write if you like." George spoke with a careless +smile.</p> + +<p>Now, facing her, he put his hands on her damp shoulders. She looked up +at him over the towel, leaning her head forward, and suspending action. Her +nose was about a foot from his. She saw, as she had seen a hundred times, +every detail of his large, handsome and yet time-worn face, every hair of +his impressive moustache, all the melting shades of colour in his dark +eyes. His charm was coarse and crude, but he was very skilful, and there +was something about his experienced, weather-beaten, slightly depraved air, +which excited her. She liked to feel young and girlish before him; she +liked to feel that with him, alone of all men, her modesty availed nothing. +She was beginning to realize her power over him, and the extent of it. It +was a power miraculous and mysterious, never claimed by her, and never +admitted by him save in glance and gesture. This power lay in the fact that +she was indispensable to him. He was not her slave--she might indeed have +been considered the human chattel--but he was the slave of his need of her. +He loved her. In him she saw what love was; she had seen it more and more +clearly ever since the day of their engagement. She was both proud and +ashamed of her power. He did not possess a similar power over herself. She +was fond of him, perhaps getting fonder; but his domination of her senses +was already nearly at an end. She had passed through painful, shattering +ecstasies of bliss, hours unforgettable, hours which she knew could never +recur. And she was left sated and unsatisfied. So that by virtue of this +not yet quite bitter disillusion, she was coming to regard herself as his +superior, as being less naïve than he, as being even essentially older +than he. And in speaking to him sometimes she would put on a grave and +precociously sapient mien, as if to indicate that she had access to sources +of wisdom for ever closed to him.</p> + +<p>"But don't you think we <i>ought</i> to write?" she frowned.</p> + +<p>"Certainly if you like! It won't do any good. You don't suppose her aunt +will come down here, do you? And even if she did.... There it is, and there +you are!"</p> + +<p>"Just let me wipe my shoulders, will you?" she said.</p> + +<p>He lifted his hands obediently, and as they were damp he rubbed them on +the loose corner of the towel.</p> + +<p>"Well," he said, "I must be off, I reckon."</p> + +<p>"Shall you see Mr. Boutwood?"</p> + +<p>"I might.... I know where to catch him, I fancy."</p> + +<p>She seemed to have a glimpse of her husband's separate life in the +town--masculine haunts and habits of which she knew nothing and would +always know nothing. And the large existence of the male made her +envious.</p> + +<p>"Going to see him now?"</p> + +<p>"Well, yes." George smiled roguishly.</p> + +<p>"What shall you say to him?"</p> + +<p>"What can I say to him? No business of mine, you know, except that we've +lost a decent servant. But I expect that's Sarah's fault. She's no use +whatever with servants, now, Sarah isn't."</p> + +<p>"<i>I</i> shall never speak to Mr. Boutwood again!" Hilda exclaimed +almost passionately.</p> + +<p>"Oh, but--"</p> + +<p>"His behaviour is simply scandalous. It's really wicked. A man like +him!"</p> + +<p>George put his lips out deprecatingly. "You may depend she asked for +it," he said.</p> + +<p>"What?"</p> + +<p>"She asked for it," he repeated with convinced firmness, and looked at +her steadily.</p> + +<p>A flush slowly spread over her face and neck, and she lowered her gaze. +In her breast pride and shame were again mingled.</p> + +<p>"You keep your hair on, littl'un," said George soothingly, and kissed +her. Then he took his hat and stick, which were with a lot of other things +on the broad white counterpane, and went off stylishly.</p> + +<p>"You don't understand," she threw at him with a delicious side-glance of +reproof as he opened the door. She reproached herself for the deceiving +coquetry of the glance.</p> + +<p>"Don't I?" he returned airily.</p> + +<p>He was quite sure that nothing escaped his intelligence. To Hilda, +shocked by the coarseness and the obtuseness which evidently characterized +his attitude, now as on other occasions, this self-confidence was +desolating; it was ominously sinister.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>She was alone with her image in the mirror, and the image was precisely +the same that she had always seen; she could detect no change in it +whatever. She liked the sensation of being alone and at home in this room +which before she had only entered as an overseer and which she had never +expected to occupy. She savoured the intimacy of the room--the necessaries +on the washstand, the superb tortoiseshell brushes, bought by George in +Dublin, on the dressing-table, the open trunks, George's clothes on a +chair, and her own flimsy trifles on the bed. Through the glass she saw, +behind her image, the image of the closed door; and then she turned round +to look at the real door and to assure herself that it was closed. +Childish! And yet...! George had shut the door. She remembered the noise of +its shutting. And that noise, in her memory, seemed to have transformed +itself into the sound of fate's deep bell. She could hear the clang, sharp, +definite. She realized suddenly and with awe that her destiny was fixed +hereafter. She had come to the end of her adventures and her vague dreams. +For she had always dreamt vaguely of an enlarged liberty, of wide +interests, and of original activities--such as no woman to her knowledge +had ever had. She had always compared the life of men with the life of +women, and admitted and resented the inferiority of the latter. She had had +glimpses, once, of the male world; she had made herself the only woman +shorthand-writer in the Five Towns, and one of the earliest in +England--dizzy thought! But the glimpses had been vain and tantalizing. She +had been in the male world, but not of it, as though encircled in a glass +ball which neither she nor the males could shatter. She had had money, +freedom, and ambition, and somehow, through ignorance or through lack of +imagination or opportunity, had been unable to employ them. She had never +known what she wanted. The vision had never been clear. And she reflected: +"I wonder if my daughter, supposing I had one, would be as different from +me as I am from my mother!"</p> + +<p>She could recall with intense vividness the moment when she had first +really contemplated marriage. It was in the steam-tram after having seen +Edwin Clayhanger at the door of Clayhanger's shop. And she could recall the +sense of relief with which she had envisaged a union with some man stronger +and more experienced than herself. In the relief was a certain secret +shame, as though it implied cowardice, a shrinking away from the challenge +of life and from the call of a proud instinct. In the steam-tram she had +foreseen the time when she would belong utterly to some man, surrendering +to him without reserve, the time when she would be a woman. And the thing +had come about! Only yesterday she had been a little girl entering George +Cannon's office with timid audacity to consult him. Only yesterday George +Cannon had been a strange, formidable man, indefinitely older and +infinitely cleverer than she. And now they were man and wife! Now she was +his! Now she profoundly knew him, and he was no longer formidable, in spite +of his force. She had a recondite dominion over him. She guessed herself to +be his superior in certain qualities. He was revealed to her; she felt that +she was not revealed to him, and that in spite of her wholehearted +surrender she had not given all because of his blindness to what she +offered. She could not completely respect him. But she was his. She was +naught apart from him. She was the wife. His existence went on mainly as +before; hers was diverted, narrowed--fundamentally altered. Never now could +she be enfranchised into the male world!</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>She slipped her arms into a new bodice purchased in London on the second +day of the marriage. Blushing, she had tried on that bodice in a great shop +in Oxford Street; then it was that she had first said 'my husband' in +public. All that day she had felt so weak and shy and light and helpless +and guilty that she had positively not known what she was doing; she had +moved in a phantom world. Only, she had perceived quite steadily and +practically that she must give more attention to her clothes. Her old +contempt for finery expired in the glory of her new condition. And now, as +she settled the elegant bodice on her shoulders, and fastened it, and +patted her hair, and picked up the skirt and poised it over her head, she +had a stern, preoccupied look, as of one who said: "This that I am doing is +important. I must not be hurried in doing it. It is vital that I should +look well and that no detail of my appearance should jar." Already she +could see herself standing before George when he returned for the meal--the +first meal which they would take together in the home. She could feel his +eyes on her: she could anticipate her own mood--in which would be mingled +pride, misgiving, pleasure, helplessness, abandonment--and the secret +condescension towards him of her inmost soul.</p> + +<p>All alone in the room she could feel his hands again on her shoulders: a +mysterious excitation.... She was a married woman. She had the right to +discuss Florrie's case with aloof disdain, if she chose. Her respectability +was unassailable. None might penetrate beyond the fact of her marriage. And +yet, far within her, she was ashamed. She dimly admitted once more, as on +several occasions previous to her marriage, that she had dishonoured an +ideal. Her conscience would not chime with the conscience of society. She +thought, as she prepared with pleasurable expectancy for her husband: "This +is not right. This cannot lead to good. It must lead to evil. I am bound to +suffer for it. The whole thing is wrong. I know it and I have always known +it."</p> + +<p>Already she was disappointed with her marriage. Amid the fevers of +bodily appetite she could clearly distinguish the beginning of lassitude; +she no longer saw her husband as a romantic and baffling figure; she had +explored and chartered his soul, and not all his excellences could atone +for his earthliness. She wondered grimly where and under what circumstances +he had acquired the adroitness which had charmed and still did charm her. +She saw in front of her a vista of days and years in which ennui would +probably increase and joy diminish. And she put her shoulders back +defiantly, and thought: "Well, here I am anyhow! I wanted him and I've got +him. What I have to go through I shall go through!"</p> + +<p>And all the time, floating like vapour over these depths was a sheeny +mood of bright expectation and immediate naïve content. And she said +gaily that she must write at once to Janet Orgreave to announce the +marriage, and that her mother's uncle up in the north must also be +informed.</p> + + +<h3>V</h3> + +<p>Unusual phenomena made themselves apparent on the top staircase: raised +voices which Hilda could hear more and more plainly, even through the shut +door. At No. 59, in the off-seasons, nobody ever spoke in a loud tone, +particularly on the staircase, except perhaps Florrie when, in conversation +with Louisa, she thought she was out of all other hearing. Hilda's voice +was very clear and penetrating, but not loud. George Cannon's voice in +public places such as the staircase had an almost caressing softness. The +Watchetts cooed like faint doves, thereby expressing the delicate +refinement of their virginal natures. The cook's voice was unknown beyond +the kitchen. And nobody was more grimly self-controlled in speech than +Sarah Gailey and Louisa. These two--and especially Louisa--seemed generally +to be restraining with ease tremendous secret forces of bitterness and +contempt. And now it was just these two who were noisy, and becoming +noisier, to the dismay of a scandalized house. Owing to some accident or +negligence the secret forces had got loose.</p> + +<p>Hilda shook her head. It was clear that the problem of Sarah Gailey +would have to be tackled and settled very soon. The poor woman's physical +sufferings had without doubt reacted detrimentally on her temperament and +temper. She used to be quite extraordinarily adroit in the directing of +servants, though her manner to them never approached geniality. But she had +quarrelled with Florrie, and now she was breaking the peace with Louisa! It +was preposterous and annoying, and it could not be allowed to continue. +Hilda was not seriously alarmed, because she had the most perfect +confidence in George's skill to restore order and calm, and to conquer +every difficulty of management; and she also put a certain trust in +herself; but the menacing and vicious accents of Louisa startled her, and +she sympathized with Sarah Gailey, for whom humiliation was assuredly in +store--if not immediately at the tongue of Louisa, then later when George +would have to hint the truth to her about her decadence.</p> + +<p>The dispute on the attic landing appeared to be concerning linen which +Louisa had omitted to remove from Florrie's abandoned couch in her +kennel.</p> + +<p>"I ain't going to touch her sheets, not for nobody!" Louisa proclaimed +savagely. And by that single phrase, with its implications, she laid +unconsciously bare the sordid baseness of her ageing heart; she exposed by +her mere intonation of the word 'sheets' all the foulness of jealousy and +thwarted salacity that was usually concealed beneath her tight dress and +neat apron, and beneath her prim gestures and deferential tones. Her +undisciplined voice rang spinsterishly down the staircase, outraging it, +defiling the whole interior.</p> + +<p>Hilda as silently as possible unlatched the door of the bedroom, and +stood with ear cocked. Should she issue forth and interfere, or should she +remain discreetly where she was? Almost in the same instant she heard the +cautious unlatching of the drawing-room door; two of the Watchetts were +there listening also. And there came up from the ground floor a faint +giggle. The cook, at the kitchen door, was enjoying herself and giggling +moral support to her colleague. The giggle proved that the master was out, +that the young mistress had not yet established a definite position, and +that during recent weeks the old mistress must have been steadily +dissipating her own authority. Hilda peered along the landing from her +lair, and upstairs and downstairs; she could see nothing but senseless +carpets and brass rods and steps and banisters; but she knew that the +entire household--she had the sensation that the very house itself--was +alert and eavesdropping.</p> + +<p>There was a hesitating movement on the unseen stairs above, and then +Hilda could see Sarah Gailey's felt slippers and the valance of her skirt. +And she could hear Sarah's emotional breathing.</p> + +<p>"Very well, Louisa, I've done!" Sarah's voice was quieter now. She was +trying to control it, and to a limited extent was controlling its volume. +It shook in spite of her. She spoke true. She had indeed done. She was at +the end of her resources.</p> + +<p>"I've been in houses," Louisa conqueringly sneered, "that I have! But I +never been in a house afore where one as ought to have been scullery-girl +went off with a boarder, and nothing said, and him the friend of the +master! And it isn't as if that was all!... Sheets, indeed!"</p> + +<p>"I've nothing further to say," Sarah returned unnecessarily, and +descended the stair. "I shall simply report to Mr. Cannon. We shall +see."</p> + +<p>"And what's this about <i>Mrs</i>. Cannon?" Louisa shouted, beside +herself.</p> + +<p>The peculiarity of her tone arrested Sarah Gailey. Hilda flushed. The +Watchetts were listening. The Watchetts had not yet been told of the +marriage. The announcement was to be made to them formally, a little later. +And now it was Louisa who was making the announcement, brutally, coarsely. +The outrage of the episode was a hundredfold intensified; it grew into an +inconceivable ghastly horror. Hilda's self-respect seemed to have a +physical body and Louisa to be hacking at it with a jagged knife.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Cannon has brought his wife home," said Sarah Gailey shortly, with +a dignity and courage that increased as her distance from the appalling, +the incredible Louisa. Hilda could see her pale face now. The eyebrows and +chin were lifted in scorn of the vile menial, but the poor head was +trembling.</p> + +<p>"And what about his other wife?"</p> + +<p>"Louisa!"--Sarah Gailey looked again up the stairs--"I know you're in a +temper and not responsible for what you say. But you'd better be careful." +She spoke with elaborate haughty negligence.</p> + +<p>"Had I?" Louisa shrilled. "What I say is, what about his other wife? +What about the old woman he married in Devonshire? Why, God bless me, +Florrie was full of it--couldn't talk about anything else in bed of a +night! Didn't you know the old woman'd been inquiring for her beautiful +'usband down your way?" She laughed loudly. "Turnhill--what's-its-name?... +And all of you lying low, and then making out all of a sudden as he's +brought his wife home! A nice house! And I've been in a few, too!"</p> + +<p>Hilda could feel her heart beating with terrific force against her +bodice, but she was conscious of no other sensation. She heard a loud snort +of shattering contempt from Louisa; and then a strange and terrific silence +fell on the stairs. There was no sound even of a movement. The Watchetts +did not stir; the cook did not stir; Sarah Gailey did not stir; Louisa's +fury was sated. The empty landing lay, as it were, expectant at Hilda's +door.</p> + +<p>Then Sarah Gailey perceived Hilda half hidden in the doorway, and +staggeringly rushed towards her. In an instant they were both in the +bedroom and the door shut.</p> + +<p>"When will George be back so that he can put her out of the house?" +Sarah whispered frantically.</p> + +<p>"Soon, I expect," said Hilda, and felt intensely self-conscious.</p> + +<p>They said no more. And it was as though the house were besieged and +invested, and only in that room were they safe, and even in that room only +for a few moments.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b5c2">CHAPTER II</a><br /> SOME SECRET HISTORY</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>Without a word, Sarah had left the bedroom. Hilda waited, sitting on the +bed, for George to come back from his haunts in the town. She both +intensely desired and intensely feared his return. A phrase or two of an +angry and vicious servant had almost destroyed her faith in her husband. It +seemed very strange, even to her, that this should be so; and she wondered +whether she had ever had a real faith in him, whether--passion apart--her +feeling for him had ever been aught but admiration of his impressive +adroitness. Was it possible that he had another wife alive? No, it was not +possible! That is to say, it was not possible that such a catastrophe +should have happened to just her, to Hilda Lessways, sitting there on the +bed with her hands pressing on the rough surface of the damask counterpane. +And yet--how could Louisa or Florrie have invented the story?... Wicked, +shocking, incredible, that Florrie, with her soft voice and timid, +affectionate manner, should have been chattering in secret so scandalously +during all these weeks! She remembered the look on Florrie's blushing face +when the child had received the letter on the morning of their departure +from the house in Lessways Street. Even then the attractively innocent and +capable Florrie must have had her naughty secrets!... An odious world. And +Hilda, married, had seriously thought that she knew all about the world! +She had to admit, bewildered: "I'm only a girl after all, and a very simple +one." She compared her own heart in its simplicity with that of Louisa. +Louisa horrified and frightened her.... Louisa and Florrie were mischievous +liars. Florrie had seized some fragment of silly gossip--Turnhill was +notorious for its silly gossip--and the two of them had embroidered it in +the nastiness of their souls. She laughed shortly, disdainfully, to wither +up silly gossip.... Preposterous!</p> + +<p>And yet--when George had shown her the licence, in the name of Cannon, +and she had ventured to say apologetically and caressingly: "I always +understood your real name was Canonges,"--how queerly he had looked as he +answered: "I changed it long ago--legally!" Yes, and she had persuaded +herself that the queerness of his look was only in her fancy! But it was +not only in her fancy. Suspicions, sinister trifling souvenirs, crowded +into her mind. Had she not always doubted him? Had she not always said to +herself that she was doing wrong in her marriage and that she would thereby +suffer? Had she not abandoned the pursuit of religious truth in favour of +light enjoyments?... Foolish of course, old-fashioned of course, to put two +and two together in this way! But she could not refrain.</p> + +<p>"I am ruined!" she decided, in awe.</p> + +<p>And the next instant she was saying: "How absurd of me to be like this, +merely because Louisa..."</p> + +<p>She thought she heard a noise below. Her heart leapt again into violent +activity. Trembling, she crept to the door, and gently unlatched it. No +slightest sound in the whole house! Dusk was coming on swiftly. Then she +could hear all the noises, accentuated beyond custom, of Louisa setting tea +in the dining-room for the Watchetts, and then the tea-bell rang. Despite +her fury, apparent in the noises, Louisa had not found courage to neglect +the sacred boarders. She made a defiant fuss, but she had to yield, +intimidated, to the force of habit and tradition. The Watchetts descended +the staircase from the drawing-room, practising as usual elaborate +small-talk among themselves. They had heard every infamous word of Louisa's +tirade; which had engendered in them a truly dreadful and still delicious +emotion; but they descended the staircase in good order, discussing the +project for a new pier.... They reached the dining-room and shut the door +on themselves.</p> + +<p>Silence again! Louisa ought now to have set the tea in the basement +parlour. But Louisa did not. Louisa was hidden in the kitchen, doubtless +talking fourteen to the dozen with the cook. She had done all she meant to +do. She knew that she would be compelled to leave at once, and not another +stroke would she do of any kind! The master and the mistresses must manage +as best they could. Louisa was already wondering where she would sleep that +night, for she was alone on earth and owned one small trunk and a Post +Office Savings Bank book.... All this trouble on account of Florrie's +sheets!</p> + +<p>Sarah Gailey was in her bedroom, and did not dare to came out of it even +to accuse Louisa of neglecting the basement tea. And Hilda continued to +stand for ages at the bedroom door, while the dusk grew deeper and deeper. +At last the front door opened, and George's step was in the hall. Hilda +recognized it with a thrill of terror, turning pale. George ran down into +the basement and stumbled. "Hello!" she heard him call out, "what about +tea? Where are you all? Sarah!" No answer, no sound in response! He ran up +the basement steps. Would he call in at the dining-room, or would he come +to the bedroom in search of her? He did not stop at the dining-room. Hilda +wanted to shut the bedroom door, but dared not because she could not do it +noiselessly. Now he was on the first floor! She rushed to the bed, and sat +on it, as she had been sitting previously, and waited in the most painful +and irrational agony. She was astonished at the darkness of the room. +Turning her head, she saw only a whitish blur instead of a face in the +dressing-table mirror.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>"What's up?" he demanded, bursting somewhat urgently into the bedroom +with his hat on. "What price the husband coming home to his tea? No tea! No +light! I nearly broke my neck down the basement stairs."</p> + +<p>He put his hands against her elbows and kissed her, rather clumsily, +owing to the gloom, between her nose and her mouth. She did not shrink +back, but accepted the embrace quite insensibly. The contact of his +moustache and of his lips, and his slight, pleasant masculine odour, +produced no effect on her whatever.</p> + +<p>"Why are you sitting here? Look here, I've signed the transfer of those +Continental shares, and paid the cheque! So it's domino, now!"</p> + +<p>Between the engagement and the marriage there had been an opportunity of +purchasing three thousand pounds' worth of preference shares in the +Brighton Hotel Continental Limited, which hotel was the latest and largest +in the King's Road, a vast affair of eight storeys and bathrooms on every +floor. The chance of such an investment had fascinated George. It helped +his dreams and pointed to the time when he would be manager and part +proprietor of a palace like the Continental. Hilda being very willing, he +had sold her railways shares and purchased the hotel shares, and he knew +that he had done a good thing. Now he possessed an interest in three +different establishments, he who had scarcely been in Brighton a year. The +rapid progress, he felt, was characteristic of him.</p> + +<p>Hilda kept silence, for the sole reason that she could think of no words +to say. As for the matter of the investment, it appeared to her to be +inexpressibly uninteresting. From under the lashes of lowered eyes she saw +his form shadowily in front of her.</p> + +<p>"You don't mean to say Sarah's been making herself disagreeable +already!" he said. And his tone was affectionate and diplomatic, yet +faintly ironical. He had perceived that something unusual had occurred, +perhaps something serious, and he was anxious to soothe and to justify his +wife. Hilda perfectly understood his mood and intention, and she was +reassured.</p> + +<p>"Hasn't Sarah told you?" she asked in a harsh, uncontrolled voice, +though she knew that he had not seen Sarah.</p> + +<p>"No; where is she?" he inquired patiently.</p> + +<p>"It's Louisa," Hilda went on, with the sick fright of a child compelled +by intimidation to affront a danger. Her mouth was very dry.</p> + +<p>"Oh!"</p> + +<p>"She lost her temper and made a fearful scene with Sarah, on the stairs; +she said the most awful things."</p> + +<p>George laughed low, and lightly. He guessed Louisa's gift for foul +insolence and invective.</p> + +<p>"For instance?" George encouraged. He was divining from Hilda's singular +tone that tact would be needed.</p> + +<p>"Well, she said you'd got a wife living in Devonshire."</p> + +<p>There was a pause.</p> + +<p>"And who'd told her that?"</p> + +<p>"Florrie."</p> + +<p>"<i>In</i>deed!" muttered George. Hilda could not decide whether his +voice was natural or forced.</p> + +<p>Then he stepped across to the door, and opened it.</p> + +<p>"What are you going to do to her?" Hilda questioned, as it were +despairingly.</p> + +<p>He left the room and banged the door.</p> + +<p>"It's not true," Hilda was beginning to say to herself, but she seemed +to derive no pleasure from the dawning hope of George's innocence.</p> + +<p>Then George came into the room again, hesitated, and shut the door +carefully.</p> + +<p>"I suppose it's no good shilly-shallying about," he said, in such a tone +as he might have used had he been vexed and disgusted with Hilda. "I have +got a wife living, and she's in Devonshire! I expect she's been inquiring +in Turnhill if I'm still in the land of the living. Probably wants to get +married again herself."</p> + +<p>Hilda glanced at his form, and suddenly it was the form of a stranger, +but a stranger who had loved her. And she thought: "Why did I let this +stranger love me?" It was scarce believable that she had ever seriously +regarded him as a husband. And she found that tears were running down her +cheeks; and she felt all her girlishness and fragility. "Didn't I always +know," she asked herself with weak resignation, "that it was unreal? What +am I to do now?" The catastrophe had indeed happened to her, and she could +not deal with it! She did not even feel tragic. She did not feel +particularly resentful against George. She had read of such catastrophes in +the newspapers, but the reality of experience nonplussed her. "I ought to +do something," she reflected. "But what?"</p> + +<p>"What's the use of me saying I'm sorry?" he asked savagely. "I acted for +the best. The chances were ten thousand to one against me being spotted. +But there you are! You never know your luck." He spoke meditatively, in a +rather hoarse, indistinct voice. "All owing to Florrie, of course! When it +was suggested we should have that girl, I knew there was a danger. But I +pooh-poohed it! I said nothing could possibly happen.... And just look at +it now!... I wanted to cut myself clear of the Five Towns, +absolutely--absolutely! And then like a damnation fool I let Florrie come +here! If she hadn't come, that woman might have inquired about me in +Turnhill till all was blue, without you hearing about her! But there it +is!" He snapped his fingers. "It's my fault for being found out! That's the +only thing I'm guilty of.... And look at it! Look at it!"</p> + +<p>Hilda could tell from the movements of the vague form in the corner by +the door, and by the quality of his voice, that George Cannon was in a +state of extreme emotion. She had never known him half so moved. His +emotion excited her and flattered her. She thought how wonderful it was +that she, the shaking little girl who yesterday had run off with fourpence +to buy a meal at a tripe-shop, should be the cause of this emotion in such +a man. She thought: "My life is marvellous." She was dizzied by the +conception of the capacity of her own body and soul for experience. No +factors save her own body and soul and his had been necessary to the +bringing about of the situation. It was essential only that the man and the +woman should be together, and their companionship would produce miracles of +experience! She ceased crying. Astounding that she had never, in George's +eyes, suspected his past! It was as if he had swiftly opened a concealed +door in the house of their passion and disclosed a vista of which she had +not dreamed.</p> + +<p>"But surely that must have been a long time ago!" she said in an +ordinary tone.</p> + +<p>"Considering that I was twenty-two--yes!"</p> + +<p>"Why did you leave her?"</p> + +<p>"Why did I leave her? Because I had to! I'd gone as a clerk in a +solicitor's office in Torquay, and she was a client. She went mad about me. +I'm only telling you. She was a spinster. Had one of those big houses high +up on the hill behind the town!" He stopped; and then his voice began to +come again out of the deep shadow in the corner. "She wanted me, and she +got me. And she didn't care who knew! The wedding was in the <i>Torquay +Directory</i>. I told her I'd got no relations, and she was jolly +glad."</p> + +<p>"But how old was she? Young?"</p> + +<p>George sneered. "She'd never see thirty-six again, the day she was +married. Good-looking. Well-dressed. Very stylish and all that! Carried me +off my feet. Of course there was the money.... I may as well out with it +all while I'm about it! She made me an absolute present of four thousand +pounds. Insisted on doing it. I never asked. Of course I know I married for +money. It happens to youths sometimes just as it does to girls. It may be +disgusting, but not more disgusting for one than for the other. Besides, I +didn't realize it was a sale and purchase, at the time!... Oh! And it +lasted about ten days. I couldn't stand it, so I told her so and chucked +it. She began an action for restitution of conjugal rights, but she soon +tired of that. She wouldn't have her four thousand back. Simply wouldn't! +She was a terror, but I'll say that for her. Well, I kept it. Four thousand +pounds is a lot of brass. That's how I started business in Turnhill, if you +want to know!" He spoke defiantly. "You may depend I never let on in the +Five Towns about my beautiful marriage.... That's the tale. You've got to +remember I was twenty-two!"</p> + +<p>She thought of Edwin Clayhanger and Charlie Orgreave as being about +twenty-two, and tried in her imagination to endow the mature George Cannon +with their youth and their simplicity and their freshness. She was saddened +and overawed; not wrathful, not obsessed by a sense of injury.</p> + +<p>Then she heard a sob in the corner, and then another. The moment was +terrible for her. She could only distinguish in the room the blur of a +man's shape against the light-coloured wall-paper, and the whiteness of the +counterpane, and the dark square of the window broken by the black +silhouette of the mirror. She slipped off the bed, and going in the +direction of the dressing-table groped for a match-box and lit the gas. +Dazzled by the glare of the gas, she turned to look at the corner where +stood George Cannon.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>The whole aspect of the room was now altered. The window was blacker +than anything else; light shone on the carved frame of the mirror and on +the vessels of the washstand; the trunks each threw a sharply defined +shadow; the bed was half in the shadow of its mahogany foot, and half a +glittering white; all the array of requisites on the dressing-table lay +stark under the close scrutiny of the gas; and high above the bed, partly +on the wall and partly on the ceiling, was a bright oblong reflection from +the upturned mirror.</p> + +<p>Hilda turned to George with a straightening of the shoulders, as if to +say: "It is I who have the courage to light the gas and face the +situation!" But when she saw him her challenging pride seemed to die slowly +away. Though there was no sign of a tear on his features, and though it was +difficult to believe that it was he who had just sobbed, nevertheless, his +figure was dismayingly tragic. Every feature was distorted by agitation. He +was absorbed in himself, shameless and careless of appearances. He was no +more concerned about appearances and manly shame than a sufferer dying in +torment. He was beyond all that--in truth a new George Cannon! He left the +corner, and sat down on the bed in the hollow made by Hilda, and stared at +the wall, his hands in the pockets of his gay suit. His gestures as he +moved, and his posture as he sat, made their unconscious appeal to her in +their abandonment. He was caught; he was vanquished; he was despairing; but +he instinctively, and without any wish to do so, kept his dignity. He was +still, in his complete overthrow, the mature man of the world, the man to +whom it was impossible to be ridiculous.</p> + +<p>Hilda in a curious way grew proud of him. With an extraordinary +inconsequence she dwelt upon the fact that, always grand--even as a +caterer, he had caused to be printed at the foot of the menu forms which he +had instituted, the words: "A second helping of all or any of the above +dishes will willingly be served if so desired." And in the general havoc of +the shock she began to be proud also of herself, because it was the +mysterious power of her individuality that had originated the disaster. The +sense of their intimate withdrawn seclusion in the room, disordered and +littered by arrival, utterly alone save for the living flame of the gas, +the sense of the tragedy, and of the responsibility for it, and especially +her responsibility, the sense of an imposed burden to be grimly borne and +of an unknown destiny to be worked out, the sense of pity, the sense of +youth and force,--these things gradually exalted her and ennobled her +desolation.</p> + +<p>"Why did you keep it from me?" she asked in a very clear and precise +tone, not aggrieved, but fatalistic and melancholy.</p> + +<p>"Keep what from you?" At length he met her eyes, darkly.</p> + +<p>"All this about your being married."</p> + +<p>"Why did I keep it from you?" he repeated harshly, and then his tone +changed from defiance to a softened regret: "I'll tell you why I kept it +from you! Because I knew if I told you I should have no chance with a girl +like you. I knew it'd be all up--if I so much as breathed a hint of it! I +don't suppose you've the slightest idea how stand-offish you are!"</p> + +<p>"Me stand-offish!" she protested.</p> + +<p>"Look here!" he said persuasively. "Supposing I'd told you I wanted you, +and then that I'd got a wife living--what would you have said?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know."</p> + +<p>"No! But <i>I</i> know! And suppose I'd told you I'd got a wife living +and then told you I wanted you--what then? No, Hilda! Nobody could fool +about with you!"</p> + +<p>She was flattered, but she thought secretly: "He could have won me on +any terms he liked!... I wonder whether he <i>could</i> have won me on any +terms!... That first night in this house, when we were in the front +attic--suppose he'd told me then--I wonder! What should I have said?" But +the severity of her countenance was a perfect mask for such weak and +uncertain ideas, and confirmed him deeply in his estimate of her.</p> + +<p>He continued:</p> + +<p>"Now that first night in this house, upstairs!" He jerked his head +towards the ceiling. She blushed, not from any shame, but because his +thought had surprised hers. "I was as near as dammit to letting out the +whole thing and chancing it with you. But I didn't--I saw it'd be no use. +And that's not the only time either!"</p> + +<p>She stood silent by the dressing-table, calmly looking at him, and she +asked herself, eagerly curious: "When were the other times?"</p> + +<p>"Of course it's all my fault!" he said.</p> + +<p>"What is?"</p> + +<p>"This!... All my fault! I don't want to excuse myself. I've nothing to +say for myself."</p> + +<p>In her mind she secretly interrupted him: "Yes, you have. You couldn't +do without me--isn't that enough?"</p> + +<p>"I'm ashamed!" he said, without reserve, abasing himself. "I'm utterly +ashamed. I'd give anything to be able to undo it."</p> + +<p>She was startled and offended. She had not expected that he would kiss +the dust. She hated to see him thus. She thought: "It isn't all your fault. +It's just as much mine as yours. But even if I was ashamed I'd never +confess it. Never would I grovel! And never would I want to undo anything! +After all you took the chances. You did what you thought best. Why be +ashamed when things go wrong? You wouldn't have been ashamed if things had +gone right."</p> + +<p>"Of course," he said, after a pause, "I'm completely done for!"</p> + +<p>He spoke so solemnly, and with such intense conviction, that she was +awed and appalled. She felt as one who, having alone escaped destruction in +an earthquake, stands afar off and contemplates the silent, corpse-strewn +ruin of a vast city.</p> + +<p>And the thought ran through her mind like a squirrel through a tree: +"How <i>could</i> he refuse her four thousand pounds? And if she wouldn't +have it back,--well, what was he to do? She must be a horrible woman!"</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>Both of them heard a heavy step pass up the staircase. It was Louisa's; +she paused to strike a match and light the gas on the landing; and went on. +But Sarah Gailey had given no sign, and the Watchetts were still shut in +the dining-room. All these middle-aged women were preoccupied by the affair +of George Cannon. All of them guessed now that Louisa's charge was not +unfounded--otherwise, why the mysterious and interminable interview between +George Cannon and Hilda in the bedroom? Hilda pictured them all. And she +thought: "But it is <i>I</i> who am in the bedroom with him! It is I who am +living through it and facing it out! They are all far older than me, but +they are outsiders. They don't know what life is!"</p> + +<p>George rose, picked up a portmanteau, and threw it open on the bed.</p> + +<p>"And what is to be done?" Hilda asked, trembling.</p> + +<p>He turned and looked at her.</p> + +<p>"I suppose I mustn't stay here?"</p> + +<p>She shook her head, with lips pressed tight.</p> + +<p>His voice was thick and obscure when he asked: "You won't come with +me?"</p> + +<p>She shook her head again. She could not have spoken. She was in acute +torture.</p> + +<p>"Well," he said, "I suppose I can count on you not to give me up to the +police?"</p> + +<p>"The police?" she exclaimed. "Why?"</p> + +<p>"Well, you know,--it's a three years' job--at least. Ever heard the word +'bigamy'?" His voice was slightly ironical.</p> + +<p>"Oh dear!" she breathed, already disconcerted. It had positively not +occurred to her to consider the legal aspect of George's conduct.</p> + +<p>"But what can you do?" she asked, with the innocent, ignorant +helplessness of a girl.</p> + +<p>"I can disappear," he replied. "That's all I can do! I don't see myself +in prison. I went over Stafford Prison once. The Governor showed several of +us over. And I don't see myself in prison."</p> + +<p>He began to cast things into the portmanteau, and as he did so he +proceeded, without a single glance at Hilda:</p> + +<p>"You'll be all right for money and so on. But I should advise you to +leave here and not to come back any sooner than you can help. That's the +best thing you can do. And be Hilda Lessways again!... Sarah will have to +manage this place as best she can. Fortunately, her health's improved. She +can make it pay very well if she likes. It's a handsome living for her. My +deposit on the Chichester and so on will have to be forfeited."</p> + +<p>"And you?" she murmured.</p> + +<p>His back was towards her. He turned his head, looked at her +enigmatically for an instant, and resumed his packing.</p> + +<p>She desired to help him with the packing, she desired to show him some +tenderness; her heart was cleft in two with pity; but she could not move; +some harshness of pride or vanity prevented her from moving.</p> + +<p>When he had carelessly finished the portmanteau, he strode to the door, +opened it wide, and called out in a loud, firm voice:</p> + +<p>"Louisa!"</p> + +<p>A reply came weakly from the top floor:</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir."</p> + +<p>"I want you." He had a short way with Louisa.</p> + +<p>After a brief delay, she came to the bedroom door.</p> + +<p>"Run down to the King's Road and get me a cab," he said to her at the +door, as it were confidentially.</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir." The woman was like a Christian slave.</p> + +<p>"Here! Take the portmanteau down with you to the front door." He gave +her the portmanteau.</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir."</p> + +<p>She disappeared; and then there was the noise of the front door +opening.</p> + +<p>George picked up his hat and abruptly left the room. Hilda moved to and +fro nervously, stiff with having stood still so long. She wondered how he, +and how she, would comport themselves in the ordeal of adieu. In a few +moments a cab drove up--Louisa had probably encountered it on the way. +Hilda waited, tense. Then she heard the cab driving off again. She rushed +aghast to the window. She saw the roof of the disappearing cab, and the +unwieldy portmanteau on it.... He had gone! He had gone without saying +good-bye! That was his device for simplifying the situation. It was +drastic, but it was magnificent. He had gone out of the house and out of +her life. As she gazed at the dim swaying roof of the cab, magically the +roof was taken off, and she could see the ravaged and stricken figure +within, sitting grimly in the dark between the wheels that rolled him away +from her. The vision was intolerable. She moved aside and wept +passionately. How could he help doing all he had done? She had possessed +him--the memories of his embrace told her how utterly! All that he had said +was true; and this being so, who could blame his conduct? He had only +risked and lost.</p> + +<p>Sarah Gailey suddenly appeared in the room, and shut the door like a +conspirator.</p> + +<p>"Then--" she began, terror-struck.</p> + +<p>And Hilda nodded, ceasing to cry.</p> + +<p>"Oh! My poor dear!" Sarah Gailey moaned feebly, her head bobbing with +its unconscious nervous movements. The sight of her worn, saddened features +sharpened Hilda's appreciation of her own girlishness and inexperience.</p> + +<p>But despite the shock, despite her extreme misery, despite the anguish +and fear in her heart and the immense difficulty of the new situation into +which she was thus violently thrust, Hilda was not without consolation. She +felt none of the shame conventionally proper to a girl deceived. On the +contrary, deep within herself, she knew that the catastrophe was a +deliverance. She knew that fate had favoured her by absolving her from the +consequences of a tragic weakness and error. These thoughts inflamed and +rendered more beautiful the apprehensive pity for the real victim--now +affronted by a new danger, the menace of the law.</p> + +<hr /> + + + + +<h1><a name="b6">BOOK VI</a><br /> HER PUNISHMENT</h1> + + + + +<h2><a name="b6c1">CHAPTER I</a><br /> EVENING AT BLEAKRIDGE</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>When Hilda's cab turned, perilously swaying, through the gate into the +dark garden of the Orgreaves, Hilda saw another cab already at the open +house door, and in the lighted porch stood figures distinguishable as Janet +and Alicia, all enwrapped for a journey, and Martha holding more wraps. The +long façade of the house was black, save for one window on the first +floor, which threw a faint radiance on the leafless branches of elms, and +thus intensified the upper mysteries of the nocturnal garden. The arrival +of the second cab caused excitement in the porch; and Hilda, leaning out of +the window into the November mist, shook with apprehension, as her vehicle +came to a halt behind the other one. She was now to meet friends for the +first time after her secret and unhappy adventure. She feared that Janet, +by some magic insight of affection, would read at once in her face the +whole history of the past year.</p> + +<p>Janet had written to her, giving and asking for news, and urging a +visit, on the very day after the scene in which George Cannon admitted his +turpitude. Had the letter been sent a day or two sooner, reaching Hilda on +her honeymoon, she would certainly have replied to it with the tremendous +news of her marriage, and, her marriage, having been made public in the +Five Towns, her shame also would necessarily be public. But chance had +saved her from this humiliation. Nobody in the district was aware of the +marriage. By a characteristic instinct, she had been determined not to +announce it in any way until the honeymoon was over. In answer to Janet, +she had written very briefly, as was usual with her, and said that she +would come to Lane End House as soon as she could. "Shall I tell her, or +shan't I?" she had cogitated, and the decision had been for postponement. +But she strongly desired, nevertheless, to pay the visit. She had had more +than enough of Preston Street and of Brighton, and longed to leave at any +price.</p> + +<p>And, at length, one dull morning, after George Cannon had sailed for +America, and all affairs were somehow arranged or had arranged themselves, +and Sarah Gailey was better and the autumn season smoothly running with new +servants, she had suddenly said to Sarah: "I have to go to Bursley to-day, +for a few days." And she had gone, upon the impulse, without having +previously warned Janet. Changing at Knype, she had got into the wrong +train, and had found herself at Shawport, at the far, lower end of Bursley, +instead of up at Bleakridge, close by the Orgreaves! And there was, of +course, no cab for her. But a cabman who had brought a fare to the station, +and was driving his young woman back, had offered in a friendly way to take +Hilda too. And she had sat in the cab with the young woman, who was a +paintress at Peel's great manufactory at Shawport, and suffered from a weak +chest; and they had talked about the potters' strike which was then +upheaving the district, and the cab had overtaken a procession of thinly +clad potters, wending in the bitter mist to a mass meeting at Hanbridge; +and Hilda had been thereby much impressed and angered against all +employers. And the young woman had left the cab, half-way up Trafalgar +Road, with a delicious pink-and-white smile of adieu. And Hilda had thought +how different all this was from Brighton, and how much better and more +homely and understandable. And now she was in the garden of the +Orgreaves.</p> + +<p>Martha came peeping, to discover the explanation of this singular +concourse of cabs in the garden, and she cried joyously:</p> + +<p>"Oh, Miss Janet, it's Miss Hilda--Miss Lessways, I mean!"</p> + +<p>Alicia shrieked. The first cab drew forward to make room for Hilda's, +and Hilda stepped down into the glare of the porch, and was plainly beheld +by all three girls.</p> + +<p>"Will they notice anything?" she asked herself, self-conscious, almost +trembling, as she thought of the terrific changes that had passed in her +since her previous visit.</p> + +<p>But nobody noticed anything. Nobody observed that this was not the same +Hilda. Even in the intimacy of the affectionate kiss, for which she lifted +her veil, Janet seemed to have no suspicion whatever.</p> + +<p>"We were just off to Hillport," said Janet. "How splendid of you to come +like this!"</p> + +<p>"Don't let's go to Hillport!" said Alicia.</p> + +<p>Janet hesitated, pulling down her veil.</p> + +<p>"Of course you must go!" Hilda said positively.</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid we shall have to go," said Janet, with reluctance. "You see, +it's the Marrions--Edie's cousins--and Edie will be there!"</p> + +<p>"Who's Edie?"</p> + +<p>"Why! Tom's fiancée! Surely I told you!"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Hilda; "only I didn't just remember the name. How nice!"</p> + +<p>(She thought: "No sooner do I get here than I talk like they do! Fancy +me saying, 'How nice'!")</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's all Edie nowadays!" said Alicia lightly. "We have to be +frightfully particular, or else Tom would cut our heads off. That's why +we're going in a cab! We should have walked,--shouldn't we, Janet?--only it +would never do for us to <i>walk</i> to the Marrions' at night! 'The Misses +Lessways' carriage!'" she mimicked, and finicked about on her toes.</p> + +<p>Janet was precisely the same as ever, but the pig-tailed Alicia had +developed. Her childishness was now shot through with gestures and tones of +the young girl. She flushed and paled continuously, and was acutely +self-conscious and somewhat vain, but not offensively vain.</p> + +<p>"I say, Jan," she exclaimed, "why shouldn't Hilda come with us?"</p> + +<p>"To the Marrions'? Oh no, thanks!" said Hilda.</p> + +<p>"But do, Hilda! I'm sure they'd be delighted!" Janet urged. "I never +thought of it."</p> + +<p>Though she was flattered and, indeed, a little startled by the +extraordinary seriousness of Janet's insistence, Hilda shook her head.</p> + +<p>"Where's Tom?" she inquired, to change the subject.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" Alicia burst out again. "He's gone off <i>hours</i> ago to escort +his ladylove from Hanbridge to Hillport."</p> + +<p>"You wait till you're engaged, Alicia!" Janet suggested. But Janet's +eyes, too, twinkled the admission that Tom was just then providing much +innocent amusement to the family.</p> + +<p>"You'll sleep in my room to-night, anyhow, dear," said Janet, when +Martha and Hilda's cabman had brought a trunk into the hall, and Hilda had +paid the cabman far more than his fare because he was such a friendly young +cabman and because he possessed a pulmonary sweetheart. "Come along, +dear!... Alicia, ask Swindells to wait a minute or two."</p> + +<p>"Swindells," Alicia shouted to the original cabman, "just wait a +jiff!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, miss." The original cabman, being old and accustomed to +evening-party work in the Five Towns, knew the length of a jiff, and got +down from his seat to exercise both arms and legs. With sardonic pleasure +he watched the young cabman cut a black streak in the sodden lawn with his +near front-wheel as he clumsily turned to leave. Then Martha banged the +front door, and another servant appeared in the hall to help the trunk on +its way upstairs.</p> + +<p>"No! I shall never be able to tell them!" thought Hilda, following the +trunk.</p> + +<p>Alicia had scampered on in front of the trunk, to inform her parents of +the arrival. Mrs. Orgreave, Hilda learnt, was laid up with an attack of +asthma, and Osmond Orgreave was working in their bedroom.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>Hilda stood in front of the fire in Janet's bedroom, and Janet was +unlocking her trunk.</p> + +<p>"Why! What a pretty bodice!" said Janet, opening the trunk. She stood +up, and held forth the bodice to inspect it; and beneath Janet's cloak +Hilda could see the splendour of her evening dress. "Where did you get +it?"</p> + +<p>"In London," Hilda was about to answer, but she took thought. "Oh! +Brighton." It was a lie.</p> + +<p>She had a longing to say:</p> + +<p>"No, not Brighton! What am I thinking of? I got it in London on my +honeymoon!"</p> + +<p>What a unique sensation that one word would have caused! But she could +not find courage to utter it.</p> + +<p>Alicia came importantly in.</p> + +<p>"Mother's love, and you are to go into her room as soon as you're ready. +Martha will bring up a tray for you, and you'll eat there by the fire. It's +all arranged."</p> + +<p>"And what about father's love?" Hilda demanded, with a sprightliness +that astonished herself. And she thought: "Why are these people so fond of +me? They don't even ask how it was I didn't write to tell them I was +coming. They just accept me and welcome me without questions.... No! I can +never tell them! It simply couldn't be told, here! If they find out, so +much the worse!"</p> + +<p>"You must ask him!" Alicia answered, blushing.</p> + +<p>"All right, Alicia. We'll be ready in a minute or two," said Janet in a +peculiar voice.</p> + +<p>It was a gentle command to Alicia to leave her elders alone to their +adult confidences. And unwilling Alicia had to obey.</p> + +<p>But there were no confidences. The talk, as it were, shivered on the +brink of a confidence, but never plunged.</p> + +<p>"Does she guess?" Hilda reflected.</p> + +<p>The conversation so halted that at length Janet was driven to the +banality of saying:</p> + +<p>"I'm so sorry we have to go out!"</p> + +<p>And Hilda protested with equal banality, and added: "I suppose you're +going out a lot just now?"</p> + +<p>"Oh no!" said Janet. "We go out less and less, and we get quieter and +quieter. I mean <i>us</i>. The boys are always out, you know." She seemed +saddened. "I did think Edwin Clayhanger would come in sometimes, now +they're living next door--"</p> + +<p>"They're in their new house, then!" said Hilda, with casualness.</p> + +<p>"Oh, long ago! And I'm sure it's ages since he was here. I like +Maggie--his sister."</p> + +<p>Hilda knelt to her trunk.</p> + +<p>"Did he ever inquire after me?" she demanded, with an air of archness, +but hiding her face.</p> + +<p>"As a matter of fact he <i>did</i>--once," said Janet, imitating Hilda's +manner.</p> + +<p>"Well, that's something," said Hilda.</p> + +<p>There was a sharp knock at the door.</p> + +<p>"Hot water, miss!" cried the voice of Martha.</p> + +<p>The next instant Martha was arranging the ewer and the can and some +clean towels on the washstand. Her face was full of joy in the unexpected +arrival. She was as excited as if Hilda had been her own friend instead of +Janet's.</p> + +<p>"Well, dear, shall you be all right now?" said Janet. "Perhaps I ought +to be going. You may depend on it I shall get back as early as ever I +can."</p> + +<p>The two girls kissed, with even more freedom than in the hall. It seemed +astonishing to Hilda, as her face was close to Janet's, that Janet did not +exclaim: "Something has happened to you. What is it? You are not as you +used to be! You are not like me!" She felt herself an imposter.</p> + +<p>"Why should I tell?" Hilda reflected. "What end will it serve? It's +nobody's business but mine. <i>He</i> is gone. He'll never come back. +Everything's over.... And if it does get about, well, they'll only praise +me for my discretion. They can't do anything else."</p> + +<p>Still, she longed timorously to confide in Janet. And when Janet had +departed she breathed relief because the danger of confiding in Janet was +withdrawn for the moment.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>Later, as the invalid had ordained, Hilda, having eaten, sat by the fire +in the large, quiet bedroom of Mr. and Mrs. Orgreave. The latter was +enjoying a period of ease, and lay, with head raised very high on pillows, +in her own half of the broad bed. The quilt extended over her without a +crease in its expanse; the sheet was turned down with precision, making a +level white border to the quilt; and Mrs. Orgreave did not stir; not one of +her grey locks stirred; she spoke occasionally in a low voice. On the +night-table stood a Godfrey's Chloride of Ammonia Inhaler, with its glass +cylinder and triple arrangement of tubes. There was only this, and the dark +lips and pale cheeks of the patient, to remind the beholder that not long +since the bed had been a scene of agony. Mr. Orgreave, in bright carpet +slippers, and elegant wristbands blossoming out of the sleeves of his black +house-jacket, stood bending above a huge board that was laid horizontally +on trestles to the left of the fireplace. This board was covered by a wide +length of bluish transparent paper which at intervals he pulled towards +him, making billows of paper at his feet and gradually lessening a roll of +it that lay on the floor beyond the table. A specially arranged gas-bracket +with a green shade which threw a powerful light on the paper showed that +Osmond Orgreave's habit was to work in that spot of an evening.</p> + +<p>"Astonishing I have to do this myself, isn't it?" he observed, stooping +to roll up the accumulated length of paper about his feet.</p> + +<p>"What is it?" Hilda asked.</p> + +<p>"It's a full-sized detail drawing. Simple!... But do you suppose I could +trust either of my ingenious sons to get the curves of the mouldings +right?"</p> + +<p>"You'll never be able to trust them unless you begin to trust them," +said Mrs. Orgreave sagely from the bed.</p> + +<p>"Ha!" ejaculated Osmond Orgreave satirically. This remark was one of his +most effective counters to argument.</p> + +<p>"The fact is he thoroughly enjoys it, doesn't he, Mrs. Orgreave?" said +Hilda.</p> + +<p>"You're quite right, my dear," said Mrs. Orgreave.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" from Mr. Orgreave.</p> + +<p>He sketched with a pencil and rubbed out, vigorously. Then his eye +caught Hilda's, and they both smiled, very content. "They'd look nice if I +took to drink instead of to work, for a change!" he murmured, pausing to +caress his handsome hair.</p> + +<p>There was a sharp knock at the door, and into this room also the +watchful Martha entered.</p> + +<p>"Here's the <i>Signal</i>, sir. The boy's only just brought it."</p> + +<p>"Give it to Miss Hilda," said Mr. Orgreave, without glancing up.</p> + +<p>"Shall I take the tray away, 'm?" Martha inquired, looking towards the +bed, the supreme centre of domestic order and authority.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps Miss Hilda hasn't finished?"</p> + +<p>"Oh yes, I have, thanks."</p> + +<p>Martha rearranged the vessels and cutlery upon the tray, with quick, +expert movements of the wrists. Her gaze was carefully fixed on the tray. +Endowed though she was with rare privileges, as a faithful retainer, she +would have been shocked and shamed had her gaze, improperly wandering, +encountered the gaze of the master or the guest. Then she picked up the +tray, and, pushing the small table into its accustomed place with a deft +twist of the foot, she sailed erect and prim out of the room, and the door +primly clicked on her neat-girded waist and flying white ribbons.</p> + +<p>"And what am I to do with this <i>Signal</i>" Hilda asked, fingering the +white, damp paper.</p> + +<p>"I should like you to read us about the strike," said Mrs. Orgreave. +"It's a dreadful thing."</p> + +<p>"I should thing it was!" Hilda agreed fervently. "Oh! Do you know, on +the way from Shawport, I saw a procession of the men, and anything more +terrible--"</p> + +<p>"It's the children I think of!" said Mrs. Orgreave softly.</p> + +<p>"Pity the men don't!" Mr. Orgreave murmured, without raising his +head.</p> + +<p>"Don't what?" Hilda asked defiantly.</p> + +<p>"Think of the children."</p> + +<p>Bridling, but silent, Hilda opened the sheet, and searched round and +about its columns with the embarrassed bewilderment of one unaccustomed to +the perusal of newspapers.</p> + +<p>"Look on page three--first column," said Mr. Orgreave.</p> + +<p>"That's all about racing," said Hilda.</p> + +<p>"Oh dear, dear!" from the bed.</p> + +<p>"Well, second column."</p> + +<p>"The Potters' Strike. The men's leaders," she read the headlines. "There +isn't much of it."</p> + +<p>"How beautifully clearly you read!" said Mrs. Orgreave, with mild +enthusiasm, when Hilda had read the meagre half-column.</p> + +<p>"Do I?" Hilda flushed.</p> + +<p>"Is that all there is about it?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. They don't seem to think it's very important that half the people +are starving!" Hilda sneered.</p> + +<p>"Whose fault is it if they do starve?" Osmond Orgreave glanced at her +with lowered head.</p> + +<p>"I think it's a shame!" she exclaimed.</p> + +<p>"Do you know that the men broke the last award, not so very long since?" +said Osmond Orgreave. "What can you do with such people?"</p> + +<p>"Broke the last award?" She was checked.</p> + +<p>"Broke the last award! Wouldn't stick by their own agreement, their own +words. I'll just tell you. A wise young woman like you oughtn't to be +carried away by the sight of a procession on a cold night."</p> + +<p>He smiled; and she smiled, but awkwardly.</p> + +<p>And then he told her something of the case for the employers.</p> + +<p>"How hard you are on the men!" she protested, when he had done.</p> + +<p>"Not at all! Not at all!" He stretched himself, and came round his +trestles to poke the fire. "You should hear Mr. Clayhanger on the men, if +you want to know what hard is."</p> + +<p>"Mr. Clayhanger? You mean old Mr. Clayhanger?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"But he isn't a manufacturer."</p> + +<p>"No. But he's an employer of labour."</p> + +<p>Hilda rose uneasily from her chair, and walked towards the distant, +shadowed dressing-table.</p> + +<p>"I should like to go over a printing-works," she said abruptly.</p> + +<p>"Very easy," said Mr. Orgreave, resuming his work with a great expulsion +of breath.</p> + +<p>Hilda thought: "Why did I say that?" And, to cover her constraint, she +cried out: "Oh, what a lovely book!"</p> + +<p>A small book, bound in full purple calf, lay half hidden in a nest of +fine tissue paper on the dressing-table.</p> + +<p>"Yes, isn't it?" said Mrs. Orgreave. "Tom brought it in to show me, +before he went this afternoon. It's a birthday present for Edie. He's had +it specially bound. I must write myself, and ask Edie to come over and meet +you. I'm sure you'd like her. She's a dear girl. I think Tom's very +fortunate."</p> + +<p>"No, you don't," Osmond Orgreave contradicted her, with a great rustling +of paper. "You think Edie's very fortunate."</p> + +<p>Hilda looked round, and caught the architect's smile.</p> + +<p>"I think they're both fortunate," said Mrs. Orgreave simply. She had +almost no sense of humour. "I'm sure she's a real good girl, and clever +too."</p> + +<p>"Clever enough to get on the right side of her future mother-in-law, +anyway!" growled Mr. Orgreave.</p> + +<p>"Anyone might think Osmond didn't like the girl," said Mrs. Orgreave, +"from the way he talks. And yet he adores her! And it's no use him +pretending he doesn't!"</p> + +<p>"I only adore you!" said Osmond.</p> + +<p>"You needn't try to turn it off!" his wife murmured, beaming on +Hilda.</p> + +<p>Tears came strangely into Hilda's eyes, and she turned again to the +dressing-table. And through a blur, she saw all the objects ranged in a +long row on the white cloth that covered the rosewood; and she thought: +"All this is beautiful." And she saw the pale blinds drawn down behind the +dressing-table, and the valance at the top, and the draped curtains; and +herself darkly in the glass. And she could feel the vista of the large, +calm, comfortable room behind her, and could hear the coals falling +together in the grate, and the rustling of the architect's paper, and Mrs. +Orgreave's slight cough. And, in her mind, she could see all the other +rooms in the spacious house, and the dim, misted garden beyond. She +thought: "All this house is beautiful. It is the most beautiful thing I +have ever known, or ever shall know. I'm happy here!" And then her +imagination followed each of the children. She imagined Marian, the eldest, +and her babies, in London; and Charlie, also in London, practising +medicine; and Tom and Janet and Alicia at the party at Hillport; and Jimmie +and Johnnie seeing life at Hanbridge; while the parents remained in +tranquillity in their bedroom. All these visions were beautiful; even the +vision of Jimmie and Johnnie flourishing billiard-cues and glasses and +pipes in the smoky atmosphere of a club--even this was beautiful; it was as +simply touching as the other visions.... And she was at home with the +parents, and so extremely intimate with them that she could nearly conceive +herself a genuine member of the house. She was in bliss. Her immediate past +dropped away from her like an illusion, and she became almost the old +Hilda: she was almost born again into innocence. Only the tragic figure of +George Cannon hung vague in the far distance of memory, and the sight +thereof constricted her heart. Utterly her passion for him had expired: she +was exquisitely sad for him; she felt towards him kindly and guiltily, as +one feels towards an old error.... And, withal, the spell of the home of +the Orgreaves took away his reality.</p> + +<p>She was fingering the book. Its title-page ran: <i>The English Poems of +Richard Crashaw</i>. Now she had never even heard of Richard Crashaw, and +she wondered who he might be. Turning the pages, she read:</p> + +<blockquote> +All thy old woes shall now smile on thee,<br /> +And thy pains sit bright upon thee,<br /> +All thy sorrows here shall shine,<br /> +All thy sufferings be divine:<br /> +Tears shall take comfort, and turn gems,<br /> +And wrongs repent to diadems.<br /> +</blockquote> + +<p>And she read again, as though the words had been too lovely to be real, +and she must assure herself of them:</p> + +<blockquote> +Tears shall take comfort, and turn gems,<br /> +And wrongs repent to diadems.<br /> +</blockquote> + +<p>She turned back to the beginning of the poem, and read the title of it: +"A Hymn, to the name and honour of the admirable Saint Teresa--Foundress of +the Reformation of the discalced Carmelites, both men and women: a woman +for angelical height of speculation, for masculine courage of performance +more than a woman: who yet a child outran maturity, and durst plot a +martyrdom."</p> + +<p>The prose thrilled her even more intimately than the verse. She cried +within herself: "Why have I never heard of Richard Crashaw? Why did Tom +never tell me?" She became upon the instant a devotee of this Saint Teresa. +She thought inconsequently, with a pang that was also a reassurance: +"George Cannon would never have understood this. But everyone here +understands it." And with hands enfevered, she turned the pages again, and, +after several disappointments, read:</p> + +<blockquote> +Oh, thou undaunted daughter of desires!<br /> +By all thy dower of lights and fires;<br /> +By all the eagle in thee, all the dove:<br /> +By all thy lives and deaths of love:<br /> +By thy large draughts of intellectual day;<br /> +And by thy thirsts of love more large than they:<br /> +By all thy brim-filled bowls of fierce desire,<br /> +By this last morning's draught of liquid fire:<br /> +By the full kingdom of that final kiss----<br /> +</blockquote> + +<p>She ceased to read. It was as if her soul was crying out: "I also am +Teresa. This is I! This is I!"</p> + +<p>And then the door opened, and Martha appeared once more:</p> + +<p>"If you please, sir, Mr. Edwin Clayhanger's called."</p> + +<p>"Oh... well, I'm nearly finished. Where is he?"</p> + +<p>"In the breakfast-room, sir."</p> + +<p>"Well, tell him I'll be down in a minute."</p> + +<p>"Hilda," said Mrs. Orgreave, "will <i>you</i> mind going and telling +him?"</p> + +<p>Hilda had replaced the book in its nest, and gone quickly back to her +chair. The entrance of the servant at that moment, to announce Edwin +Clayhanger, seemed to her startlingly dramatic. "What," she thought, "I am +just reading that and he comes!... He hasn't been here for ages, and, on +the very night that I come, he comes!"</p> + +<p>"Certainly," she replied to Mrs. Orgreave. And she thought: "This is the +second time she has sent me with a message to Edwin Clayhanger."</p> + +<p>Suddenly, she blushed in confusion before the mistress of the home. "Is +it possible," she asked herself,--"is it possible that Mrs. Orgreave +doesn't guess what has happened to me? Is it possible she can't see that +I'm different from what I used to be? If she knew... if they knew... +here!"</p> + +<p>She left the room like a criminal. When she was going down the stairs, +she discovered that she held the <i>Signal</i> in her hand. She had no +recollection of picking it up, and there was no object in taking it to the +breakfast-room! She thought: "What a state I must be in!"</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b6c2">CHAPTER II</a><br /> A RENDEZVOUS</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>"I suppose you've never thought about me once since I've left!"</p> + +<p>She was sitting on the sofa in the small, shelved breakfast-room, and +she shot these words at Edwin Clayhanger, who was standing near her. The +singular words were certainly uttered out of bravado: they were a challenge +to adventure. She thought: "It is madness for me to say such a thing." But +such a thing had, nevertheless, come quite glibly out of her mouth, and she +knew not why. If Edwin Clayhanger was startled, so was she startled.</p> + +<p>"Oh yes, I have!" he stammered--of course, she had put him out of +countenance.</p> + +<p>She smiled, and said persuasively: "But you've never inquired after +me."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I have," he answered, with a hint of defiance, after a pause.</p> + +<p>"Only once." She continued to smile.</p> + +<p>"How do you know?" he demanded.</p> + +<p>Then she told him very calmly, extinguishing the smile, that her source +of information was Janet.</p> + +<p>"That's nothing to go by!" he exclaimed, with sudden roughness. "That's +nothing to go by--the number of <i>times</i> I've inquired!"</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>She was silenced. She thought: "If I am thus intimate with him, it must +be because of the talk we had in the garden that night." And it seemed to +her that the scene in the garden had somehow bound them together for ever +in intimacy, that, even if they pretended to be only acquaintances, they +would constantly be breaking through the thin shell of formality into some +unguessed deep of intimacy. She regarded--surreptitiously--his face, with a +keen sense of pleasure. It was romantic, melancholy, wistful, +enigmatic--and, above all, honest. She knew that he had desired to be an +architect, and that his father had thwarted his desire, and this fact +endowed him for her with the charm of a victim. The idea that all his life +had been embittered and shadowed by the caprice of an old man was beautiful +to her in its sadness: she contemplated it with vague bliss. At their last +meeting, during the Sunday School Centenary, he had annoyed her; he had +even drawn her disdain, by his lack of initiative and male force in the +incident of the senile Sunday School teacher. He had profoundly +disappointed her. Now, she simply forgot this; the sinister impression +vanished from her mind. She recalled her first vision of him in the lighted +doorway of his father's shop. Her present vision confirmed that sympathetic +vision. She liked the feel of his faithful hand, and the glance of his +timid and yet bellicose eye. And she reposed on his very apparent honesty +as on a bed. She knew, with the assurance of perfect faith, that he had +nothing dubious to conceal, and that no test could strain his magnanimity. +And, while she so reflected, she was thinking, too, of Janet's fine dress, +and her elegance and jewels, and wishing that she had changed the old black +frock in which she travelled. The perception that she could never be like +Janet cast her down. But, the next moment, she was saying to herself +proudly: "What does it matter? Why should I be like Janet?" And, the next +moment after that, she was saying, in another phase of her pride: "I +<i>will</i> be like Janet!"</p> + +<p>They began to discuss the strike. It was a topic which, during those +weeks, could not be avoided, either by the rich or by the poor.</p> + +<p>"I suppose you're like all the rest--against the men?" she challenged +him again, inviting battle.</p> + +<p>He replied bluntly: "What earthly right have you to suppose that I'm +like all the rest?"</p> + +<p>She bent her head lower, so that she could only see him through the veil +of her eyelashes.</p> + +<p>"I'm very sorry," she said, in a low, smiling, meditative voice. "I knew +all the time you weren't."</p> + +<p>The thought shot through her mind like a lance: "It is incredible, and +horribly dangerous, that I should be sitting here with him, after all that +has happened to me, and him without the slightest suspicion!... And yet +what can stop it from coming out, sooner or later? Nothing can stop +it."</p> + +<p>Edwin Clayhanger continued to talk of the strike, and she heard him +saying: "If you ask me, I'll tell you what I think--workmen on strike are +always in the right... you've only got to look at them in a crowd together. +They don't starve themselves for fun."</p> + +<p>What he said thrilled her. There was nothing in it, but there was +everything in it. His generosity towards the oppressed was everything to +her. His whole attitude was utterly and mysteriously different from that of +any other man whom she had known.... And with that simple, wistful +expression of his!</p> + +<p>They went on talking, and then, following in secret the train of her own +thoughts, she suddenly burst out:</p> + +<p>"I never met anybody like you before." A pause ensued. "No, never!" she +added, with intense conviction.</p> + +<p>"I might say the same of you," he replied, moved.</p> + +<p>"Oh no! I'm nothing!" she breathed.</p> + +<p>She glanced up, exquisitely flattered. His face was crimson. Exquisite +moment, in the familiarity of the breakfast-room, by the fire, she on the +sofa, with him standing over her, a delicious peril. The crimson slowly +paled.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>Osmond Orgreave entered the room, quizzical, and at once began to tease +Clayhanger about the infrequency of his visits.</p> + +<p>Turning to Hilda, he said: "He scarcely ever comes to see us, except +when you're here." It was just as if he had said: "I heard every word you +spoke before I came in, and I have read your hearts." Both Hilda and +Clayhanger were disconcerted--Clayhanger extremely so.</p> + +<p>"Steady on!" he protested uncouthly. And then, with the most naïve +ingenuousness: "Mrs. Orgreave better?"</p> + +<p>But Osmond Orgreave was not in a merciful mood. A moment later he was +saying:</p> + +<p>"Has she told you she wants to go over a printing-works?"</p> + +<p>"No," Clayhanger answered, with interest. "But I shall be very pleased +to show her over ours, any time."</p> + +<p>Hilda struck into silence, made no response, and instantly Clayhanger +finished, in another tone: "Look here, I must be off. I only slipped in for +a minute--really."</p> + +<p>And he went, declining Mr. Orgreave's request to give a date for his +next call. The bang of the front door resounded through the house.</p> + +<p>Mr. Orgreave, having taken Clayhanger to the front door, did not return +immediately into the breakfast-room. Hilda jumped up from the sofa, +hesitant. She was disappointed; she was even resentful; assuredly she was +humiliated. "Oh no!" she thought. "He's weak and afraid.... I dare say he +went off because Janet wasn't here." She heard through the half-open door +Mr. Orgreave's slippers on the tiles of the passage leading to the +stairs.</p> + +<p>Martha came into the room with a delighted, curious smile.</p> + +<p>"If you please, miss, could you come into the hall a minute?... Some one +to speak to you."</p> + +<p>Hilda blushed silently, and obeyed. Clayhanger was standing in the chill +hall, hat in hand. Her heart jumped.</p> + +<p>"When will you come to look over our works?" he muttered rapidly and +very nervously, and yet with a dictatorial gruffness. "To-morrow? I should +like you to come."</p> + +<p>He had put an enchantment upon her by this marvellous return. And to +conceal from him what he had done, she frowned and kept silent.</p> + +<p>"What time?" she asked suddenly.</p> + +<p>"Any time." His eagerness was thrilling.</p> + +<p>"Oh no! You must fix the time."</p> + +<p>"Say between half-past six and a quarter to seven. That do?"</p> + +<p>She nodded. Their hands met. He said adieu. He pulled open the heavy +door. She saw his back for an instant against the pale gloom of the garden, +in which vapour was curling. And then she had shut the door, and was +standing alone in the confined hall. A miracle had occurred, and it +intimidated her. And, amid her wondrous fears, she was steeped in the +unique sense of adventure. "This morning I was in Brighton," she thought. +"Half an hour ago I had no notion of seeing him. And now!... And +to-morrow?" The tragic sequel to one adventure had not impaired her +instinct for experience. On the contrary, it had strengthened it. The very +failure of the one excited her towards another. The zest of living was +reborn in her. The morrow beckoned her, golden and miraculous. The faculty +of men and women to create their own lives seemed divine, and the +conception of it enfevered her.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b6c3">CHAPTER III</a><br /> AT THE WORKS</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>That night, late, Hilda and Janet shut themselves up in the bedroom +together. The door clicked softly under Janet's gentle push, and they were +as safe from invasion as if the door had been of iron, and locked and +double-locked and barred with bars of iron. Alicia alone might have +disturbed them, but Alicia was asleep. Hilda had a sense of entire security +in this room such as she had never had since she drove away from Lessways +Street, Turnhill, early one morning, with Florrie Bagster in a cab. It was +not that there had been the least real fear of any room of hers being +attacked: it was that this room seemed to have been rendered mystically +inviolate by long years of Janet's occupation. "Janet's bedroom!"--the +phrase had a sanction which could not possibly have attached itself to, for +instance, "Hilda's bedroom!" Nor even to "mother's bedroom"--mother's +bedroom being indeed at the mercy of any profane and marauding member of +the family, a sort of market-place for the transaction of affairs.</p> + +<p>And, further, Janet's bedroom was distinguished and made delicious for +Hilda by its fire. It happened to be one of the very few bedrooms in the +Five Towns at that date with a fire, as a regular feature of it. Mrs. +Orgreave had a fire in the parental bedroom, when she could not reasonably +do without it, but Osmond Orgreave suffered the fire rather than enjoyed +it. As for Tom, though of a shivery disposition, he would have dithered to +death before admitting that a bedroom fire might increase his comfort. +Johnnie and Jimmie genuinely liked to be cold in their bedroom. Alicia +pined for a fire, but Mrs. Orgreave, imitating the contrariety of fate, +forbade a fire to Alicia, and one consequence of this was that Alicia +sometimes undressed in Janet's bedroom, making afterwards a dash for the +Pole. The idea of a bedroom was always, during nearly half the year, +associated with the idea of discomfort in Hilda's mind. And now, in Janet's +bedroom, impressed as she was by the strangeness of the fact that the prime +reason for hurrying at top-speed into bed had been abolished, she yet +positively could not linger, the force of habit being too strong for her. +And she was in bed, despite efforts to dawdle, while Janet was still +brushing her hair.</p> + +<p>As she lay and watched Janet's complex unrobing, she acquired knowledge. +And once more, she found herself desiring to be like Janet--not only in +appearance, but in soft manner and tone. She thought: "How shall I dress +to-morrow afternoon?" All the operations of her brain related themselves +somehow to to-morrow afternoon. The anticipation of the visit to the +printing-works burned in her heart like a steady lamp that shone through +the brief, cloudy interests of the moment. And Edwin Clayhanger was +precisely the topic which Janet seemed, as it were, expressly to avoid. +Janet inquired concerning life at Brighton and the health of Sarah Gailey; +Janet even mentioned George Cannon; Hilda steadied her voice in replying, +though she was not really apprehensive, for Janet's questions, like the +questions of the whole family, were invariably discreet and respectful of +the individual's privacy. But of Edwin Clayhanger, whose visit nevertheless +had been recounted to her in the drawing-room on her return, Janet said not +a word.</p> + +<p>And then, when she had extinguished the gas, and the oriental sleeve of +her silk nightgown delicately brushed Hilda's face, as she got into bed, +she remarked:</p> + +<p>"Strange that Edwin Clayhanger should call just to-night!"</p> + +<p>Hilda's cheek warmed.</p> + +<p>"He asked me to go and look over their printing-works to-morrow," said +she quickly.</p> + +<p>Janet was taken aback.</p> + +<p>"Really!" she exclaimed, unmistakably startled. She spoke a second too +soon. If she had delayed only one second, she might have concealed from +Hilda that which Hilda had most plainly perceived, to wit, anxiety and +jealousy. Yes, jealousy, in this adorably benevolent creature's tone. +Hilda's interest in to-morrow afternoon was intensified.</p> + +<p>"Shall you be able to come?" she asked.</p> + +<p>"What time?"</p> + +<p>"He said about half-past six, or a quarter to seven."</p> + +<p>"I can't," said Janet dreamily, "because of that Musical Society +meeting--you know--I told you, didn't I?"</p> + +<p>In the faint light of the dying fire, Hilda made out little by little +the mysterious, pale heaps of clothes, and all the details of the room +strewn and disordered by reason of an additional occupant. The adventure +was now of infinite complexity, and its complexity seemed to be symbolized +by the suggestive feminine mysteriousness of what she saw and what she +divined in the darkness of the chamber. She thought: "I am here on false +pretences. I ought to tell my secret. That would be fair--I have no right +to intrude between her and him." But she instinctively and powerfully +resisted such ideas; with firmness she put them away, and yielded herself +with a more exquisite apprehension to the anticipation of to-morrow.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>The order of meals at Lane End was somewhat peculiar even then, and +would now be almost unique. It was partly the natural expression of an +instinctive and justified feeling of superiority, and partly due to a +discretion which forbade the family to scandalize the professional classes +of the district by dining at night. Dinner occurred in the middle of the +day, and about nine in the evening was an informal but copious supper. +Between those two meals, there came a tea which was neither high or low, +and whose hour, six o'clock in theory, depended to a certain extent, in +practice, on Mr. Orgreave's arrival from the office. Not seldom Mr. +Orgreave was late; occasionally he was very late. The kitchen waited to +infuse the tea until a command came from some woman, old or young, who +attentively watched a window for a particular swinging of the long gate at +the end of the garden, or listened, when it was dark, for the bang of the +gate and a particular crunching of gravel.</p> + +<p>On this Tuesday evening, Osmond Orgreave was very late, and the movement +of the household was less smooth than usual, owing to Mrs. Orgreave's +illness and to the absence of Janet at Hillport in connection with the +projected Hillport Choral Society. (Had Janet been warned of Hilda's visit, +she would not have accepted an invitation to a tea at Hillport as a +preliminary to the meeting of the provisional committee.) Hilda was in a +state of acute distress. The appointment with Edwin Clayhanger seemed to be +absolutely sacred to her; to be late for it would amount to a crime: to +miss it altogether would be a calamity inconceivable. The fingers of all +the clocks in the house were revolving with the most extraordinary +rapidity--she was helpless.</p> + +<p>She was helpless, because she had said nothing all day of her +appointment, and because Janet had not mentioned it either. Janet might +have said before leaving: "Tea had better not wait too long--Hilda has to +be down at Clayhanger's at half-past six." Janet's silence impressed Hilda: +it was not merely strange--it was formidable: it affected the whole day. +Hilda thought: "Is she determined not to speak of it unless I do?" +Immediately Janet was gone, Hilda had run up to the bedroom. She was minded +to change the black frock which she had been wearing, and which she hated, +and to put on another skirt and bodice that Janet had praised. She longed +to beautify herself, and yet she was still hesitating about it at half-past +five in the evening as she had hesitated at eight in the morning. In the +end she had decided not to change, an account of the rain. But the rain had +naught to do with her decision. She would not change, because she was too +proud to change. She would go just as she was! She could not accept the +assistance of an attractive bodice!... Unfeminine, perhaps, but +womanly.</p> + +<p>At twenty-five minutes to seven, she went into Mrs. Orgreave's bedroom, +rather like a child, and also rather like an adult creature in a +distracting crisis. Tom Orgreave and Alicia were filling the entire house +with the stormy noise of a piano duet based upon Rossini's <i>William +Tell</i>.</p> + +<p>"I think I'll miss tea, Mrs. Orgreave," she said. "Edwin Clayhanger +invited me to go over the printing-works at half-past six, and it's +twenty-five minutes to seven now."</p> + +<p>"Oh, but, my dear," cried Mrs. Orgreave, "why ever didn't you tell them +downstairs, or let me know earlier?"</p> + +<p>And she pulled at the bell-rope that overhung the head of the bed. Not a +trace of teasing archness in her manner! Hilda's appointment might have +been of the most serious business interest, for anything Mrs. Orgreave's +demeanor indicated to the contrary. Hilda stood mute and constrained.</p> + +<p>"You run down and tell them to make tea at once, dear. I can't let you +go without anything at all. I wonder what can have kept Osmond."</p> + +<p>Almost at the same moment, Osmond Orgreave entered the bedroom. His +arrival had been unnoticed amid the tremendous resounding of the duet.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Osmond," said his wife. "Wherever have you been so late? Hilda +wants to go--Edwin Clayhanger has invited her to go over the works."</p> + +<p>Hilda, trembling at the door, more than half expected Mr. Orgreave to +say: "You mean, she's invited herself." But Osmond received the information +with exactly the same polite, apologetic seriousness as his wife, and, +reassured, Hilda departed from the room.</p> + +<p>Ten minutes later, veiled and cloaked, she stepped out alone into the +garden. And instantly her torment was assuaged, and she was happy. She +waited at the corner of the street for the steam-car. But, when the car +came thundering down, it was crammed to the step; with a melancholy +gesture, the driver declined her signal. She set off down Trafalgar Road in +the mist and the rain, glad that she had been compelled to walk. It seemed +to her that she was on a secret and mystic errand. This was not surprising. +The remarkable thing was that all the hurrying people she met seemed also +each of them to be on a secret and mystic errand. The shining wet pavement +was dotted with dark figures, suggestive and enigmatic, who glided over a +floor that was pierced by perpendicular reflections.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>In the Clayhanger shop, agitated and scarcely aware of what she did, she +could, nevertheless, hear her voice greeting Edwin Clayhanger in firm, calm +tones; and she soon perceived very clearly that he was even more acutely +nervous than herself: which perception helped to restore her confidence, +while, at the same time, it filled her with bliss. The young, fair man, +with his awkward and constrained movements, took possession of her +umbrella, and then suggested that she should remove her mackintosh. She +obeyed, timid and glad. She stripped off her mackintosh, as though she were +stripping off her modesty, and stood before him revealed. To complete the +sacrifice, she raised her veil, and smiled up at him, as it were, asking: +"What next?" Then a fat, untidy old man appeared in the doorway of a +cubicle within the shop, and Edwin Clayhanger blushed.</p> + +<p>"Father, this is Miss Lessways. Miss Lessways, my father.... +She's--she's come to look over the place."</p> + +<p>"How-d'ye-do, miss?"</p> + +<p>She shook hands with the tyrannic father, who was, however, despite his +reputation, apparently just as nervous as the son. There followed a most +sinister moment of silence. And, at last, the shop door opened, and the +father turned to greet a customer. Hilda thought: "Suppose this fat old man +is one day my father-in-law? Is it possible to imagine him as a +father-in-law?" And she had a transient gleam of curiosity concerning the +characters of the two Clayhanger sisters, and recalled with satisfaction +that Janet liked the elder one.</p> + +<p>Edwin Clayhanger, muttering, pointed to an aperture in the counter, and +immediately she was going through it with him, and through a door at the +back of the shop. They were alone, facing a rain-soaked yard. Edwin +Clayhanger sneezed violently.</p> + +<p>"It keeps on raining," Edwin murmured. "Better to have kept umbrella! +However--"</p> + +<p>He glanced at her inquiringly and invitingly. They ran side by side +across the yard to a roofed flight of steps that led to the +printing-office. For a couple of seconds, the rain wet them, and then they +were under cover again. It seemed to Hilda that they had escaped from the +shop like fox-terriers--like two friendly dogs from the surveillance of an +incalculable and dangerous old man. She felt a comfortable, friendly +confidence in Edwin Clayhanger--a tranquil sentiment such as she had never +experienced for George Cannon. After more than a year--and what a period of +unforeseen happenings!--she thought again: "I <i>like him</i>." Not love, +she thought, but liking! She liked being with him. She liked the sensation +of putting confidence in him. She liked his youth, and her own. She was +sorry because he had a cold and was not taking care of it.... Now they were +climbing a sombre creaking staircase towards a new and remote world that +was separated from the common world just quitted by the adventurous passage +of the rainy yard.... And now they were amid oily odours in a large +raftered workshop, full of machines.... The printing-works!... An enormous +but very deferential man saluted them with majestic solemnity. He was the +foreman, and labelled by his white apron as an artisan, but his gigantic +bulk--he would have outweighed the pair of them--and his age set him +somehow over them, so that they were a couple of striplings in his vasty +presence. When Edwin Clayhanger employed, as it were, daringly, the accents +of a master to this intimidating fellow, Hilda thrilled with pleasure at +the piquancy of the spectacle, and she was admiringly proud of Edwin. The +foreman's immense voice, explaining machines and tools, caused physical +vibrations in her. But she understood nothing of what he said--nothing +whatever. She was in a dream of oily odours and monstrous iron +constructions, dominated by the grand foreman: and Edwin was in the dream. +She began talking quite wildly of the four-hundredth anniversary of the +inventor of printing, of which she had read in Cranswick's History... at +Brighton! Brighton had sunk away over the verge of memory. Even Lane End +House was lost somewhere in the vague past. All her previous life had +faded. She reflected guiltily: "He's bound to think I've been reading about +printing because I was interested in <i>him</i> I don't care! I hope he +does think it!" She heard a suggestion that, as it was too late that night +to see the largest machine in motion, she might call the next afternoon. +She at once promised to come.... She impatiently desired now to leave the +room where they were, and to see something else. And then she feared lest +this might be all there was to see.... Edwin Clayhanger was edging towards +the door.... They were alone on the stairway again.... The foreman had +bowed at the top like a chamberlain.... She gathered, with delicious +anticipation, that other and still more recondite interiors awaited their +visit.</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>They were in an attic which was used for the storage of reams upon reams +of paper. By the light of a candle in a tin candlestick, they had passed +alone together through corridors and up flights of stairs at the back of +the shop. She had seen everything that was connected with the enterprise of +steam-printing, and now they were at the top of the old house and at the +end of the excursion.</p> + +<p>"I used to work here," said Edwin Clayhanger.</p> + +<p>She inquired about the work.</p> + +<p>"Well," he drawled, "reading and writing, you know--at that very +table."</p> + +<p>In the aperture of the window, amid piles of paper, stood a rickety old +table, covered with dust.</p> + +<p>"But there's no fireplace," she said, glancing round the room, and then +directly at him.</p> + +<p>"I know."</p> + +<p>"But how did you do in winter?" she eagerly appealed.</p> + +<p>And he replied shortly, and with a slight charming affectation of pride: +"I did without."</p> + +<p>Her throat tightened, and she could feel the tears suddenly swim in her +eyes. She was not touched by the vision of his hardships. It was the +thought of all his youth that exquisitely saddened her--or all the years +which were and would be for ever hidden from her. She knew that she alone +of all human beings was gifted with the power to understand and fully +sympathize with him. And so she grieved over the long wilderness of time +during which he had been uncomprehended. She wanted, by some immense effort +of tenderness, to recompense him for all that he had suffered. And she had +a divine curiosity concerning the whole of his past life. She had never had +this curiosity in relation to George Cannon--she had only wondered about +his affairs with other women. Nor had George Cannon ever evoked the +tenderness which sprang up in her from some secret and inexhaustible source +at the mere sight of Edwin Clayhanger's wistful smile. Still, in that +moment, standing close to Edwin in the high solitude of the shadowed attic, +the souvenir of George Cannon gripped her painfully. She thought: "He loves +me, and he is ruined, and he will never see me again! And I am here, +bursting with hope renewed, and dizzy with joy!" And she pictured Janet, +too, wearying herself at a committee meeting. And she thought, "And here am +I...!" Her bliss was tragic.</p> + +<p>"I think I ought to be going," she said softly.</p> + +<p>They re-threaded the corridors, and in each lower room, as they passed, +Edwin Clayhanger extinguished the gas which he had lit there on the way up, +and Hilda waited for him. And then they were back in the crude glare of the +shop. The fat, untidy old man was not visible. Edwin helped her with the +mackintosh, and she liked him for the awkwardness of his efforts in doing +so.</p> + +<p>At the door, she urged him not to come out, and referred to his +cold.</p> + +<p>"This isn't the end of winter, it's the beginning," she warned him. +Nobody else, she knew, would watch over him.</p> + +<p>But he insisted on coming out.</p> + +<p>They arranged a rendezvous for three o'clock on the morrow, and then +they shook hands.</p> + +<p>"Now, do go in," she entreated, as she hurried away. The rain had +ceased. She fled triumphantly up Trafalgar Road, with her secret, guarding +it. "He's in love with me!" If a scientific truth is a statement of which +the contrary is inconceivable, then it was a scientific truth for her that +she and Edwin must come together. She simply would not and could not +conceive the future without him.... And this so soon, so precipitately +soon, after her misfortune! But it was her very misfortune which pushed her +violently forward. Her life had been convulsed and overthrown by the hazard +of destiny, and she could have no peace now until she had repaired and +re-established it. At no matter what risk, the thing must be accomplished +quickly... quickly.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b6c4">CHAPTER IV</a><br /> THE CALL FROM BRIGHTON</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>On the next afternoon, at a quarter-past two, Hilda and Janet were +sitting together in the breakfast-room. The house was still. The men were +either theoretically or practically at business. Alicia was at school. Mrs. +Orgreave lay upstairs. The servants had cleared away and washed up the +dinner-things, and had dined themselves. The kitchen had been cleansed and +put in order, and every fire replenished. Two of the servants were in their +own chambers, enfranchised for an hour: one only remained on duty. All six +women had the feeling, which comes to most women at a certain moment in +each day, that life had, for a time, deteriorated into the purposeless and +the futile; and that it waited, as in a trance, until some external +masculine event, expected or unforeseen, should renew its virtue and its +energy.</p> + +<p>Hilda was in half a mind to tell Janet the history of the past year. She +had wakened up in the night, and perceived with dreadful clearness that +trouble lay in front of her. The relations between herself and Edwin +Clayhanger were developing with the most dizzy rapidity, and in a direction +which she desired, but it would be impossible for her, if she fostered the +relations, to continue to keep Edwin in ignorance of the fact that, having +been known for about a fortnight as Mrs. George Cannon, she was not what he +supposed her to be. With imagination on fire, she was anticipating the +rendezvous at three o'clock. She reached forward to it in ecstasy; but she +might not enjoy it, save at the price which her conscience exacted. She had +to say to Edwin Clayhanger that she had been the victim of a bigamist. +Could she say it to him? She had not been able to say it even to Janet +Orgreave.... She would say it first to Janet. There, in the breakfast-room, +she would say it. If it killed her to say it, she would say it. She must at +any cost be able to respect herself, and, as matters stood, she could not +respect herself.</p> + +<p>Janet, on her knees, was idly arranging books on one of the lower +bookshelves. In sheer nervousness, Hilda also dropped to her knees on the +hearthrug, and began to worry the fire with the poker.</p> + +<p>"I say, Janet," she began.</p> + +<p>"Yes?" Janet did not look up.</p> + +<p>Hilda, her heart beating, thought, with affrighted swiftness: "Why +should I tell her? It is no business of anybody's except <i>his</i>. I will +tell him, and him alone, and then act according to his wishes. After all, I +am not to blame. I am quite innocent. But I won't tell him to-day. Not +to-day! I must be more sure. It would be ridiculous to tell him to-day. If +I told him it would be almost like inviting a proposal! But when the proper +time comes,--then I will tell him, and he will understand! He is bound to +understand perfectly. He's in love with me."</p> + +<p>She dared not tell Janet. In that abode of joyful and successful +propriety the words would not form themselves. And the argument that she +was not to blame carried no weight whatever. She--she, Hilda--lacked +courage to be candid.... This was extremely disconcerting to her +self-esteem.... And even with Edwin Clayhanger she wished to temporize. She +longed for nothing so much as to see him; and yet she feared to meet +him.</p> + +<p>"Yes?" Janet repeated.</p> + +<p>A bell rang faintly in the distance of the house.</p> + +<p>Hilda, suddenly choosing a course, said: "I forgot to tell you. I'm +supposed to be going down to Clayhanger's at three to see a machine at +work--it was too late last night. Do come with me. I hate going by myself." +It was true: in that instant she did hate going by herself. She thought, +knowing Janet to be at liberty and never dreaming that she would refuse: "I +am saved--for the present."</p> + +<p>But Janet answered self-consciously:</p> + +<p>"I don't think I must leave mother. You'll be perfectly all right by +yourself."</p> + +<p>Hilda impetuously turned her head; their glances met for an instant, in +suspicion, challenge, animosity. They had an immense mutual admiration the +one for the other, these two; and yet now they were estranged. Esteem was +nullified by instinct. Hilda thought with positive savagery: "It's all +fiddlesticks about not leaving her mother! She's simply on her high horse!" +The whole colour of existence was changed.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>Martha entered the room. Neither of the girls moved. Beneath the +deferential servant in Martha was a human girl, making a third in the room, +who familiarly divined the moods of the other two and judged them as an +equal; and the other two knew it, and therefore did not trouble to be +spectacular in front of her.</p> + +<p>"A letter, miss," said Martha, approaching Hilda. "The old postman says +it was insufficiently addressed, or it 'ud ha' been here by first +post."</p> + +<p>"Was that the postman who rang just now?" asked Janet.</p> + +<p>"Yes, miss."</p> + +<p>Hilda took the letter with apprehension, as she recognized the +down-slanting calligraphy of Sarah Gailey. Yes, the address was +imperfect--"Miss Lessways, c/o Osmond Orgreave, Esq., Lane End House, +Knype-on-Trent," instead of "Bursley, Knype-on-Trent." On the back of the +envelope had been written in pencil by an official, "Try Bursley." Sarah +Gailey could not now be trusted to address an envelope correctly. The mere +handwriting seemed to announce misfortune.</p> + +<p>"From poor Sarah," Hilda murmured, with false, good-tempered +tranquillity. "I wonder what sort of trouble she thinks she's got +into!"</p> + +<p>She thought: "If only I was married, I should be free of responsibility +about Sarah. I should have to think of my husband first. But nothing else +can free me. Unless I marry, I'm tied to Sarah Gailey as long as she +lives.... And why?... I should like to know!" The answer was simple: habit +had shackled her to Sarah Gailey.</p> + +<p>She opened the letter by the flickering firelight, which was stronger on +the hearthrug than the light of the dim November day. It began: "Dearest +Hilda, I write at once to tell you that a lawyer called here this afternoon +to inquire about your Hotel Continental shares. He told me there was going +to be some difficulty with the Company, and, unless the independent +shareholders formed a strong local committee to look after things, the +trouble might be serious. He wanted to know if you would support a +committee at the meeting. I gave him your address, and he's going to write +to you. But I thought I would write to you as well. His name is Eustace +Broughton, 124 East Street, in case. I do hope nothing will go wrong. It is +like what must be, I am sure! It has been impossible for me to keep the +charwoman. So I sent her off this morning. Can you remember the address of +that Mrs. Catkin?..." Sarah Gailey continued to discuss boarding-house +affairs, until she arrived at the end of the fourth page, and then, in a +few cramped words, she finished with expressions of love.</p> + +<p>"Oh dear!" Hilda exclaimed, rising, "I must write some letters at once." +She sighed, as if in tedium. The fact that her fortune was vaguely +threatened did not cause her anxiety: she scarcely realized it. What she +saw was an opportunity to evade the immediate meeting with Edwin--the +meeting which, a few minutes earlier, she had desired beyond +everything.</p> + +<p>"When? Now?"</p> + +<p>Hilda nodded.</p> + +<p>"But what about Master Edwin?" Janet asked, trying to be gay.</p> + +<p>"I shan't be able to go," said Hilda carelessly, at the door. "It's of +no consequence."</p> + +<p>"Martha has to go down town. If you like, she could call in there, and +just tell him."</p> + +<p>It was a reproof, from the young woman who always so thoughtfully +studied the feelings of everybody.</p> + +<p>"I'll just write a little note, then, thanks!" Hilda returned calmly, +triumphing after all over Janet's superiority, and thinking, "Janet can be +very peculiar, Janet can!"</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>For more than twenty hours, Hilda was profoundly miserable. Towards the +evening of the same day, she had made herself quite sure that Edwin +Clayhanger would call that night. Her hope persisted until half-past nine: +it then began to fade, and, at ten o'clock, was extinct. His name had been +mentioned by nobody. She went to bed. Having now a room of her own, which +overlooked the Clayhanger garden and house, she gazed forth, and, in the +dark, beheld, with the most anxious sensations, the building in which Edwin +existed and was concealed. "He is there," she said. "He is active about +something at this very instant--perhaps he is reading. He is close by. If I +shouted, he might hear...." And yet she was utterly cut off from him. +Again, in the late dawn, she saw the same building, pale and clear, but +just as secretive and enigmatic as in the night. "He is asleep yet," she +thought. "Why did he not call? Is he hurt? Is he proud?"</p> + +<p>She despaired, because she could devise no means of resuming +communication with him.</p> + +<p>Immediately after dinner on the next day, she went with Janet to Janet's +room, to examine a new winter cloak which had been delivered. And, while +Janet was trying it on, and posing coquettishly and yet without affectation +in front of the glass, and while Hilda was reflecting jealously, "Why am I +not like her? I know infinitely more than she knows. I am a woman, and she +is a girl, and yet she seems far more a woman than I--" Alicia, contrary to +all rules, took the room by storm. Alicia's excuse and salvation lay in a +telegram, which she held in her hand.</p> + +<p>"For you, Hilda!" cried the child, excited. "I'm just off to +school."</p> + +<p>Hilda reached to take the offered telegram, but her hand wavered around +it instead of seizing it. Her eye fastened on a circular portion of the +wall-paper pattern, and she felt that the whole room was revolving about +her. Then she saw Janet's face transformed by an expression of alarm.</p> + +<p>"Are you ill, Hilda?" Janet demanded. "Sit down."</p> + +<p>"You're frightfully pale," said Alicia eagerly.</p> + +<p>Hilda sat down.</p> + +<p>"No, no," she said. "It was the pattern of the wall-paper that made me +feel dizzy." And, for the moment, she did honestly believe that the pattern +of the wall-paper had, in some inexplicable manner, upset her. "I'm all +right now."</p> + +<p>The dizziness passed as suddenly as it had supervened. Janet held some +ineffectual salts to her nose.</p> + +<p>"I'm perfectly well," insisted Hilda.</p> + +<p>"How funny!" Alicia grinned.</p> + +<p>Calmly Hilda opened the telegram, which read: "Please come at +once.--GAILEY."</p> + +<p>She gave the telegram to Janet in silence.</p> + +<p>"What can be the matter?" Janet asked, with unreserved, loving +solicitude. The cloud which had hung between the two enthusiastic friends +was dissipated in a flash.</p> + +<p>"I haven't an idea," said Hilda, touched. "Unless it's those shares!" +She had briefly told Janet about the Hotel Continental Limited.</p> + +<p>"Shall you go?"</p> + +<p>Hilda nodded. Never again would she ignore an urgent telegram, though +she did not believe that this telegram had any real importance. She +attributed it to Sarah's increasing incompetence and hysterical +foolishness.</p> + +<p>"I wonder whether I can get on to Brighton to-night if I take the six +train?" Hilda asked, and to herself: "Can it have anything to do with +George?"</p> + +<p>Alicia, endowed with authority, went in search of a Bradshaw. But the +quest was fruitless. In the Five Towns the local time-table, showing the +connections with London, suffices for the citizen, and the breast-pocket of +no citizen is complete without it.</p> + +<p>"Clayhangers are bound to have a Bradshaw," cried Alicia, breathless +with running about the house.</p> + +<p>"Of course they are," Janet agreed.</p> + +<p>"I'll walk down there now," said Hilda, with extraordinary promptitude. +"It won't take five minutes."</p> + +<p>"I'd go," said Alicia, "only I should be late for school."</p> + +<p>"Shall I send some one down?" Janet suggested. "You might be taken dizzy +again."</p> + +<p>"No, thanks," Hilda replied deliberately. "I'll go--myself. There's +nothing wrong with me at all."</p> + +<p>"You'll have to be sharp over it," said Alicia pertly. "Don't forget +it's Thursday. They shut up at two, and it's not far off two now."</p> + +<p>"I'm going this very minute," said Hilda.</p> + +<p>"And I'm going this very second!" Alicia retorted.</p> + +<p>They all three left Janet's bedroom; the new cloak cast over a +chair-back, was degraded into a tedious banality--and ignored.</p> + +<p>In less than a minute Hilda, hatted and jacketed and partially gloved, +was crossing the garden. She felt most miraculously happy and hopeful, and +she was full of irrational gratitude to Alicia, as though Alicia were a +benefactor! The change in her mood seemed magic in its swiftness. If Janet, +with calm, cryptic face, had not been watching her from the doorway, she +might have danced on the gravel.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b6c5">CHAPTER V</a><br /> THURSDAY AFTERNOON</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>She was walking with Edwin Clayhanger up Duck Bank on the way to Bursley +railway station. A simple errand and promenade,--and yet she felt herself +to be steeped in the romance of an adventure! The adventure had +surprisingly followed upon the discovery that Alicia had been quite wrong. +"Clayhangers are bound to have a Bradshaw," the confident Alicia had said. +But Clayhangers happened not to have a Bradshaw. Edwin was alone in the +stationery shop, save for the assistant. He said that his father was +indisposed. And whereas the news that Clayhangers had no Bradshaw left +Hilda perfectly indifferent, the news that old Darius Clayhanger was +indisposed and absent produced in her a definite feeling of gladness. Edwin +had decided that the most likely place to search for a Bradshaw was the +station, and he had offered to escort her to the station. Nothing could +have been more natural, and at the same time more miraculous.</p> + +<p>The sun was palely shining upon dry, clean pavements and upon roads +juicy with black mud. And in the sunshine Hilda was very happy. It was +nothing to her that she was in quest of a Bradshaw because she had just +received an ominous telegram urgently summoning her to Brighton. She was +obliviously happy. Every phenomenon that attracted her notice contributed +to her felicity. Thus she took an eager joy in the sun. And a marked +improvement in Edwin's cold really delighted her. She was dominated by the +intimate conviction: "He loves me!" Which conviction excited her dormant +pride, and made her straighten her shoulders. She benevolently condescended +towards Janet. After all Janet, with every circumstance in her favour, had +not known how to conquer Edwin Clayhanger. After all she, Hilda, possessed +some mysterious characteristic more potent than the elegance and the +goodness of Janet Orgreave. She scorned her former self-deprecations, and +reproached her own lack of faith: "I am I!" That was the summary of her +mood. As for her attitude to Edwin Clayhanger, she could not explain it. +Why did she like him and like being with him? He was not brilliant, nor +masterful, nor handsome, nor well dressed, nor in any manner imposing. On +the contrary, he was awkward and apologetic, and not a bit spectacular. +Only the wistful gaze of his eyes, and his honest smile, and the appeal of +his gestures...! A puzzling affair, an affair perfectly incomprehensible +and enchanting.</p> + +<p>They walked side by side in silence.</p> + +<p>When they had turned into Moorthorne Road, half-way up whose slope lies +the station, she asked a question about a large wooden building from whose +interior came wild sounds of shouting and cheering, and learnt that the +potters on strike were holding a meeting in the town theatre. At the open +outer doors was a crowd of starving, shivering, dirty, ragged children, who +romped and cursed, or stood unnaturally meditative in the rich mud, like +fakirs fulfilling a vow. Hilda's throat was constricted by the sight. Pain +and joy ran together in her, burning exquisitely; and she had a glimpse, +obscure, of the mystical beauty of the children's suffering.</p> + +<p>"I'd no idea there was a theatre in Bursley," she remarked idly, driven +into a banality by the press of her sensations.</p> + +<p>"They used to call it the Blood Tub," he replied. "Melodrama and murder +and gore--you know."</p> + +<p>She exclaimed in horror. "Why are people like that in the Five +Towns?"</p> + +<p>"It's our form of poetry, I suppose," said he.</p> + +<p>She started, sensitively. It seemed to her that she had never understood +the secret inner spirit of the Five Towns, and that by a single phrase he +had made her understand it.... 'Our form of poetry'! Who but he could have +said a thing at once so illuminating and so simple?</p> + +<p>Apparently perplexed by the obvious effect on her of his remark, he +said:</p> + +<p>"But you belong to the Five Towns, don't you?"</p> + +<p>She answered quietly that she did. But her heart was saying: "I do +<i>now</i>. You have initiated me. I never felt the Five Towns before. You +have made me feel them."</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>At the station the head porter received their inquiry for a Bradshaw +with a dull stare and a shake of the head. No such thing had ever been +asked for at Bursley Station before, and the man's imagination could not go +beyond the soiled time-tables loosely pinned and pasted up on the walls of +the booking-office. Hilda suggested that the ticket-clerk should be +interrogated, but the aperture of communication with him was shut. She saw +Edwin Clayhanger brace himself and rap on the wood; and instead of +deploring his diffidence she liked it and found it full of charm. The +partition clicked aside, and the ticket-clerk's peering, suspicious head +showed in its place, mutely demanding a reason for this extraordinary +disturbance of the dream in which the station slumbered between two +half-hourly trains. With a characteristic peculiar slanting motion Edwin +nodded.</p> + +<p>"Oh, how-d'ye-do, Mr. Brooks?" said Edwin hastily, as if startled by the +sudden inexplicable apparition of the head.</p> + +<p>But the ticket-clerk had no Bradshaw either. He considered it probable, +however, that the stationmaster would have a Bradshaw. Edwin had to brace +himself again, for an assault upon the fastness of the stationmaster.</p> + +<p>And in the incredibly small and incredibly dirty fastness of the +stationmaster, they indeed found a Bradshaw. Hilda precipitately took it +and opened it on the stationmaster's table. She looked for Brighton in it +as she might have looked for a particular individual in a city. Then Edwin +was bending over it, with his ear close to her ear, and the sleeve of his +overcoat touching her sleeve. She was physically aware of him, for the +first time. She thought, disconcerted: "But he is an utter stranger to me! +What do I know of him?" And then she thought: "For more than a year he must +have carried my image in his heart!"</p> + +<p>"Here," said Edwin brusquely, and with a certain superiority, "you might +just let me have a look at it myself."</p> + +<p>She yielded, tacitly admitting that a woman was no match for +Bradshaw.</p> + +<p>After a few moments' frowning Edwin said:</p> + +<p>"Yes, there's a train to Brighton at eleven-thirty to-night!"</p> + +<p>"May I look?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly," said he, subtly condescending.</p> + +<p>She examined the page, with a serious deliberation.</p> + +<p>"But what does this '<i>f</i>' mean?" she asked. "Did you notice this +'<i>f</i>'?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. It means Thursdays and Saturdays only," said Edwin, his eyes +twinkling. It was as if he had said: "You think yourself very clever, but +do you suppose that I can't read the notes in a time-table?"</p> + +<p>"Well--" She hesitated.</p> + +<p>"To-day's Thursday, you see," he remarked curtly.</p> + +<p>She was ravished by his tone and his manner. And she became humble +before him, for in the space of a few seconds he had grown mysteriously and +powerfully masculine to her. But with all his masculinity there remained +the same wistful, honest, boyish look in his eyes. And she thought: "If I +marry him it will be for the look in his eyes."</p> + +<p>"I'm all right, then," she said aloud, and smiled.</p> + +<p>With hands nervously working within her muff, she suddenly missed the +handkerchief which she had placed there.</p> + +<p>"I believe I must have dropped my handkerchief in your shop!" she was +about to say. The phrase was actually on her tongue; but by a strange +instinctive, defensive discretion she shut her mouth on it and kept +silence. She thought: "Perhaps I had better not go into his shop again +to-day."</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>They descended the hill from the station. Hilda was very ill at ease. +She kept saying to herself: "This adventure is over now. I cannot prolong +it. There is nothing to do but to go back to the Orgreaves, and pack my +things and depart to Brighton, and face whatever annoyance is awaiting me +at Brighton." The prospect desolated her. She could not bear to leave Edwin +Clayhanger without some definition of their relations, and yet she knew +that it was hopeless and absurd to expect to arrive immediately at any such +definition: she knew that the impetuosity of her temperament could not be +justified. Also, she feared horribly the risk of being caught again in the +net of Brighton. As they got lower and lower down the hill, her +wretchedness and disquiet became acute, to the point of a wild despair. +Merely to temporize, she said, as they drew opposite the wooden +theatre:</p> + +<p>"Couldn't we just go and look in? I've got plenty of time."</p> + +<p>A strange request--to penetrate into a meeting of artisans on strike! +She felt its strangeness: she felt that Edwin Clayhanger objected, but she +was driven to an extremity. She had to do something, and she did what she +could.</p> + +<p>They crossed the road, and entered the huge shanty, and stood +apologetically near the door. The contrast between the open street and the +enclosed stuffiness of the dim and crowded interior was overwhelming. +Hundreds of ragged and shabby men sat in serried rows, leaning forward with +elbows out and heads protruding as they listened to a speech from the +gimcrack stage. They seemed to be waiting to spring, like famished and +ferocious tigers. Interrupting, they growled, snarled, yapped, and swore +with appalling sincerity. Imprecations burst forth in volleys and in +running fires. The arousing of the fundamental instincts of these human +beings had, indeed, enormously emphasized the animal in them. They had +swung back a hundred centuries towards original crude life. The +sophistication which embroiders the will-to-live had been stripped clean +off. These men helped you to understand the state of mind which puts a city +to the sack, and makes victims especially of the innocent and the +defenceless. Hilda was strangely excited. She was afraid, and enjoyed being +afraid. And it was as if she, too, had been returned to savagery and to the +primeval. In the midst of peril, she was a female under the protection of a +male, and nothing but that. And she was far closer, emotionally, to her +male than she had ever been before.</p> + +<p>Suddenly, the meeting came to an end. In an instant, the mass of +humanity was afoot and rounding upon them, an active menace. Hilda and +Edwin rushed fleeing into the street, violently urged by a common impulse. +The stream of embittered men pursued them like an inundation. When they +were safe, and breathing the free air, Hilda was drenched with a sense of +pity. The tragedy of existence presented itself in its true aspect, as +noble and majestic and intimidating.</p> + +<p>"It's terrible!" she breathed.</p> + +<p>She thought: "No! In this mood, it is impossible for me to leave him! I +cannot do it! I cannot!" The danger of re-entering the shop, which would be +closed now, utterly fascinated her. Supposing that she re-entered the shop +with him, would she have the courage to tell him that she was in his +society under false pretences? Could she bring herself to relate her +misfortune? She recoiled before the mere idea of telling him. And yet the +danger of the shop glittered in front of her like a lure.</p> + +<p>The future might be depending solely on her own act. If she told him of +the lost handkerchief, the future might be one thing: if she did not tell +him, it might be another.</p> + +<p>The dread of choosing seized her, and put her into a tremble of +apprehension. And then, as it were mechanically, she murmured (but very +clearly), tacking the words without a pause on to a sentence about the +strikes: "Oh, I've lost my handkerchief, unless I've left it in your shop! +It must have dropped out of my muff."</p> + +<p>She sighed in relief, because she had chosen. But her agitation was +intensified.</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>In search of a lost handkerchief, they regained the Clayhanger premises +by an unfamiliar side door. She preceded him along a passage and then, +taking a door on the left, found herself surprisingly in the shop, behind a +counter. The shop was lighted only by a few diamond-shaped holes in the +central shutters, and it had a troubling aspect of portent, with its +merchandise mysteriously enveloped in pale sheets, and its chairs wrong +side up, and its deep-shadowed corners. Destiny might have been lurking in +one of those baffling corners. From above, through the ceiling, came the +vibration of some machine at work, and the machine might have been the loom +of time. Hilda was exquisitely apprehensive. She thought: "I am here. The +moment of my departure will come. When it comes, shall I have told him my +misfortune? What will have happened?" She waited, nervous, restless, +shaking like a victim who can do naught but wait.</p> + +<p>"Here's my handkerchief!" she cried, in a tone of unnatural childish +glee, that was one of the effects of her secret panic.</p> + +<p>The handkerchief glimmered on the counter, more white than anything else +in that grey dusk. She guessed that the shop-assistant must have found it, +and placed it conspicuously on the counter.</p> + +<p>They were alone: they were their own prisoners, secure from the street +and from all interruption. Hilda, once more and in a higher degree, +realized the miraculous human power to make experience out of nothing. They +had nothing but themselves, and they could, if they chose, create all their +future by a single gesture.</p> + +<p>Suddenly, there came a tremendous shouting from Duck Square, in front of +the shop. The strikers had poured down from Moorthorne Road into Duck Bank +and Duck Square.</p> + +<p>Edwin, who was in the middle of the shop, went to the glazed inner +doors, and, passing through into the porch, lifted the letter-flap in a +shutter, and, stooping, looked forth. He called to her, without moving his +face from the aperture, that a fight was in progress. Hilda gazed at his +back, through the glass, and then, coming round the end of the counter, +approached quietly, and stood immediately behind him, between the glazed +doors and the shutters. The two were in a space so small that they could +scarcely have moved without touching.</p> + +<p>"Let me look," she stammered, unable any longer to tolerate the +inaction.</p> + +<p>Edwin Clayhanger stepped aside, and held up the letter-flap for her with +his finger. She bent her head to the oblong glimpse of the street, and saw +the strikers engaged in the final internecine folly of strikers: they had +turned their exasperated wrath upon each other. Within a public-house at +the top of the little Square, other strikers were drinking. One policeman +regarded them.</p> + +<p>"What a shame!" she cried angrily, dropping the flap, and then withdrew +quickly into the shop, whither Edwin had gone. As she came near him, her +mood changed. She smiled gently. She summoned all her charm; and she knew +that she charmed him.</p> + +<p>"Do you know," she said, "you've quite altered my notion of poetry--what +you said as we were going up to the station!"</p> + +<p>"Really?" He flushed.</p> + +<p>Yes, she had enchanted and entranced him. She had only to smile and to +use a particular tone, soft and breaking.... She knew that.</p> + +<p>"But you <i>do</i> alter my notions," she continued, and her clear voice +was poured out like a liquid. "I don't know how it is..." She stopped. And +then, in half-playful accents: "So this is your little office!"</p> + +<p>Her hand was on the knob of the open door of the cubicle, a black +erection within the shop, where Edwin and his father kept the accounts and +wrote letters.</p> + +<p>"Yes. Go in and have a look at it."</p> + +<p>She murmured kindly: "Shall I?" and went in. He followed.</p> + +<p>For a moment, she was extremely afraid, and she whispered, scared: "I +must hurry off now."</p> + +<p>He ignored this remark.</p> + +<p>"Shall you be at Brighton long?" he demanded. And he was so friendly and +simple and timorous and honest-eyed, and his features had such an +extraordinary anxious expression that her own fear seemed to leave her. She +thought, as if surprised by the discovery: "He is a good friend."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I can't tell," she answered him. "It depends."</p> + +<p>"How soon shall you be down our way again?" His voice was thickening. +She shook her head, speechless. She was afraid again now. His face altered. +He was standing almost over her. She thought: "I am lost! I have let it +come to this!" He was no longer a good friend.</p> + +<p>He began to speak, in detached bits of phrases:</p> + +<p>"I say--you know--"</p> + +<p>"Good-bye, good-bye," she murmured anxiously. "I must go. Thanks very +much."</p> + +<p>And foolishly, she held out her hand, which he seized. He bent +passionately, and kissed her like a fresh boy, like a schoolboy. And she +gave back the kiss strongly, with all the profound sincerity of her nature. +His agitation appeared to be extreme; but she was calm; she was divinely +calm. She savoured the moment as though she had been a watcher, and not an +actor in the scene. She thought, with a secret sigh of bliss: "Yes, it is +real, this moment! And I have had it. Am I astonished that it has come so +soon, or did I know it was coming?" Her eyes drank up the face and the +hands and the gestures of her lover. She felt tired, and sat down in the +office chair, and he leaned on the desk, and the walls of the cubicle +folded them in, even from the inanimate scrutiny of the shop.</p> + + +<h3>V</h3> + +<p>They were talking together, half-fearfully, and yet with the confidence +of deep mutual trust, in the quick-gathering darkness of the cubicle. And +while they were talking, Hilda, in her head, was writing a fervent letter +to him: "... You see it was so sudden. I had had no chance to tell you. I +did so want to tell you, but how could I? And I hadn't told anybody! I'm +sure you will agree with me that it is best to tell some things as little +as possible. And when you had kissed me, how could I tell you then--at +once? I could not. It would have spoilt everything. Surely you understand. +I know you do, because you understand everything. If I was wrong, tell me +where. You don't guess how humble I am! When I think of you, I am the +humblest girl you can imagine. Forgive me, if there is anything to forgive. +I don't need to tell you that I have suffered."</p> + +<p>And she kept writing the letter again and again, slightly altering the +phrases so as to improve them, so as to express herself better and more +honestly and more appealingly.</p> + +<p>"I shall send you the address to-morrow," she was saying to him. "I +shall write you before I go to bed, whether it's to-night or to-morrow +morning." She put the fire of her love into the assurance. She smiled to +entrance him, and saw on his face that he was beside himself with joy in +her. She was a queen, surpassing in her prerogative a thousand elegant +Janets. She smiled; she proudly straightened her shoulders (she the +humblest!), and her boy was enslaved.</p> + +<p>"I wonder what people will say," he murmured.</p> + +<p>She said, with a pang of misgiving about his reception of her +letter:</p> + +<p>"Please tell no one!" She pleaded that for the present he should tell no +one. "Later on, it won't seem so sudden," she added plausibly. "People are +so silly."</p> + +<p>The sound of another battle in Duck Square awoke them. The shop was very +chilly, and quite dark. Their faces were only pale ovals in the blackness. +She shivered.</p> + +<p>"I must go! I have to pack."</p> + +<p>He clasped her: and she was innocently content: she was a young girl +again.</p> + +<p>"I'll walk up with you," he said protectively.</p> + +<p>But she would not allow him to walk up with her, and he yielded. He +struck a match. They stumbled out, and, in the midnight of the passage, he +took leave of her.</p> + +<p>Walking up Trafalgar Road, alone, she was so happy, so amazed, so +relieved, so sure of him and of his fineness and of the future, that she +could scarcely bear her felicity. It was too intense.... At last her life +was settled and mapped out. Destiny had been kind, and she meant to be +worthy of her fate. She could have swooned, so intoxicant was her wonder +and her solemn joy and her yearning after righteousness in love.</p> + + + + +<h2><a name="b6c6">CHAPTER VI</a><br /> MISCHANCE</h2> + + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>Twelve days later, in the evening, Hilda stood by the bedside of Sarah +Gailey in the basement room of No. 59 Preston Street. There was a bright +fire in the grate, and in front of the fire a middle-aged doctor was +cleansing the instrument which he had just employed to inject morphia into +Sarah's exhausted body. Hilda's assumption that the ageing woman had +telegraphed for her on inadequate grounds had proved to be quite wrong.</p> + +<p>Upon entering the house on that Thursday night, Hilda, despite the +anxious pale face of the new servant who had waited up for her and who +entreated her to see Sarah Gailey instantly, had gone first to her own room +and scrawled passionately a note to Edwin, which ran: "DEAREST,-- This is +my address. I love you. Every bit of me is absolutely yours. Write me.--H. +L." She gave the letter to the servant to post at once. And as she gave it +she had a vision of it travelling in post office, railway vans, and being +sorted, and sealed up in a bag, and recovered from the bag, and scanned by +the postman at Bursley, and borne up Trafalgar Road by the postman, and +dropped into the letter-box at Edwin's house, and finally seized by Edwin; +and of it pleasing him intensely,--for it was a good letter, and she was +proud of it because she knew that it was characteristic.</p> + +<p>And then, with her mind freed, she had opened the door of Sarah's +bedroom. Sarah was unquestionably very ill. Sarah had been quite right in +telegraphing so peremptorily to Hilda; and if she had not so telegraphed +she would have been quite wrong. On the previous day she had been sitting +on the cold new oilcloth of the topmost stairs, minutely instructing a maid +in the craft of polishing banisters. And the next morning an attack of +acute sciatica had supervened. For a trifling indiscretion Sarah was thus +condemned to extreme physical torture. Hilda had found her rigid on the +bed. She suffered the severest pain in the small of the back and all down +the left leg. Her left knee was supported on pillows, and the bed-clothes +were raised away from it, for it could tolerate no weight whatever. The +doctor, who had been and gone, had arranged a system of fomentation and +hot-water bottles surpassing anything in even Sarah's experience. And there +Sarah lay, not feverish but sweating with agony, terrified to move, +terrified to take a deep breath, lest the disturbance of the muscles might +produce consequences beyond her strength to endure. She was in no danger of +death. She could talk. She could eat and drink. Her pulse was scarcely +quickened. But she was degraded and humiliated by mere physical anguish to +the condition of a brute. This was her lot in life. All through that first +night Hilda stayed with her, trying to pretend that Sarah was a woman, and +in the morning she had assumed control of the house.</p> + +<p>She had her secret to console her. It remained a secret because there +was no one to whom she could relate it. Sarah had no ear for news +unconnected with her malady. And indeed to tell Sarah, as Sarah was, would +have been to carry callousness to the point of insult. And so Hilda, amid +her enormous labours and fatigue, had lived with her secret, which, from +being a perfumed delight, turned in two days to something subtly horrible, +to something that by its horror prevented her from writing to Edwin aught +but the briefest missives. She had existed from hour to hour, from one +minute apprehensively to the next, day and night, hardly sleeping, devoured +inwardly by a fear at once monstrous and simple, at once convincing and +incredible. As for the letter which mentally she had composed a hundred +times to Edwin, and which she owed to him, it had become fantastic and then +inconceivable to her.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>One of the new servants entered the room and handed a letter to Hilda, +and left the room and shut the door. The envelope was addressed "Miss +Lessways, 59 Preston Street, Brighton," in Edwin Clayhanger's beautiful +handwriting. Every evening came thus a letter, which he had posted in +Bursley on the previous day. Hilda thought: "Will this contain another +reproach at my irregularity? I can't bear it, if it does." And she gazed at +the handwriting, and in particular at her own name, and her own name seemed +to be the name of somebody else, of some strange young woman. She felt +dizzy.... The door of Sarah's wardrobe was ajar, and, in the mirror of it, +Hilda could see herself obscurely, a black-robed strange young woman, with +untidy hair and white cheeks and huge, dark, staring heavy eyes, with +pouches beneath them. The image wavered in the mirror. She thought: "Here +it is again, this awful feeling! Surely I am not going to faint!" She could +hear Sarah's sighing breath: she could hear the singing of the shaded +gas-flame. She turned her gaze away from the mirror, and saw Sarah's grey +head inadvertently nodding, as it always nodded. Then the letter slipped +out of her hand. She glanced down at the floor, in pursuit of it: the floor +was darkly revolving. She thought: "Am I really fainting this time? I +mustn't faint. I've got to arrange about that bacon to-night and--oh, lots +of things! Sarah is not a bit better. And I must sit with her until she +gets off to sleep." Her legs trembled, and she was terrorized by +extraordinary novel sensations of insecurity. "Oh!" she murmured +weakly.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>"You've only fainted," said the doctor in a low voice.</p> + +<p>She perceived, little by little, that she was lying flat on the floor at +the foot of Sarah's bed, and that he was kneeling beside her. The bed threw +a shadow on them both, but she could see his benevolent face, anxious and +yet reassuring, rather clearly.</p> + +<p>"What?" she whispered, in feeble despair. She felt that her resistance +was definitely broken.</p> + +<p>From higher up, at the level of the hidden bed, came the regular +plaintive respiration of Sarah Gailey.</p> + +<p>"You must take care of yourself better than this," said the doctor. +"Perhaps this is a day when you ought to be resting."</p> + +<p>She answered, resigned.</p> + +<p>"No, it's not that. I believe I'm going to have a child. You must..." +She stopped.</p> + +<p>"Oh," said the doctor, with discretion. "Is that it?"</p> + +<p>Strange, how the direct words would create a new situation! She had not +told the doctor that she had been through the ceremony of marriage, and had +been victimized. She had told him nothing but the central and final thought +in her mind. And lo! the new situation was brought into being, and the +doctor was accepting it! He was not emitting astounded 'buts--!' Her +directness had made all possible 'buts' seem ridiculous and futile, and had +made the expression of curiosity seem offensive.</p> + +<p>She lay on the floor impassive. She was no longer horrified by +expectancy.</p> + +<p>"Well," said the doctor, "we must see. I think you can sit up now, can't +you?"</p> + +<p>Three-quarters of an hour afterwards, she went into Sarah's room alone. +She was aware of no emotion whatever. She merely desired, as a professional +nurse might have desired, to see if Sarah slept. Sarah was not sleeping. +She moaned, as she moaned continually when awake. Hilda bent over her +trembling head whose right side pressed upon the pillow.</p> + +<p>"How queer," thought Hilda, "how awful, that she didn't even hear what I +said to him! It will almost kill her when she does know."</p> + +<p>Sarah's eyes blinked. Without stirring, without shifting her horizontal, +preoccupied gaze from the wall, she muttered peevishly:</p> + +<p>"What's that you were saying about going to have a child?"</p> + +<p>Startled, Hilda moved back a little from the bed.</p> + +<p>"The doctor says there's no doubt I am," Hilda answered coldly.</p> + +<p>"How queer!" Sarah said. "I quite thought--but of course a girl like you +are couldn't be sure. I should like another biscuit. But I don't want the +Osbornes--the others." She resumed her moaning.</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>On the following Saturday morning--rather more than a fortnight after +her engagement to Edwin Clayhanger--Hilda came out of the kitchen of No. +59 Preston Street, and shut the door on a nauseating, malodorous mess of +broken food and greasy plates, in the midst of which two servants were +noisily gobbling down their late breakfast, and disputing. With a frown of +disgust on her face, she looked into Sarah Gailey's bedroom. Sarah, though +vaguely better, was still in constant acute pain, and her knee still +reposed on a pillow, and was protected from the upper bed-clothes, and she +still could not move. Hilda put on a smile for Sarah Gailey, who nodded +morosely, and then, extinguishing the smile, as if it had been expensive +gas burning to no purpose, she passed into the basement sitting-room, and +slaked the fire there. With a gesture of irresolution, she lifted the lid +of the desk in the corner, and gazed first at a little pile of four +unopened letters addressed to her in Edwin's handwriting, and then at a +volume of Crashaw, which the enthusiastic Tom Orgreave had sent to her as a +reward for her appreciation of Crashaw's poems. She released the lid +suddenly, and went upstairs to her bedroom, chatting sugarily for an +instant on the way with the second Miss Watchett. In the bedroom, she +donned her street things, and then she descended. She had to go to the +Registry Office in North Street about a new cook. She stopped at the front +door, and then surprisingly went down once more into the basement +sitting-room. Standing up at the desk, she wrote this letter: "DARLING +JANET,--I am now married to George Cannon. The marriage is not quite +public, but I tell you before anybody, and you might tell Edwin +Clayhanger.--Your loving H. L." Least said soonest mended! And the +conciseness would discourage questioning. She inserted the letter into an +envelope, which she addressed and stamped, and then she fled with it from +the house, and in two minutes it was in a letter-box, and she was walking +slowly along the King's Road past the shops.</p> + +<p>The letter was the swift and desperate sequel to several days' +absolutely sterile reflection. It said enough for the moment. Later, she +could explain that her husband had left her. She could not write to Edwin. +She could not bring herself to write anything to him. She could not +confess, nor beg for forgiveness nor even for sympathetic understanding. +She could not admit the uninstructed rashness which had led her to assume +positively, on inadequate grounds, that her union with George Cannon had +been fruitless. She must suffer, and he also must suffer. Rather than let +him know, in any conceivable manner, that, all unwitting, she was bearing +the child of another at the moment of her betrothal to himself, she +preferred to be regarded as a jilt of the very worst kind. Strange that she +should choose the rôle of deceiver instead of the rôle of +victim! Strange that she would sooner be hated and scorned than pitied! +Strange that she would not even give Edwin the opportunity of treating her +as a widow! But so it was! For her, the one possible attitude towards Edwin +was the attitude of silence. In the silence of the grave her love for him +existed.</p> + +<p>As she walked along the chill promenade she looked with discreet +curiosity at every woman she met, to see her condition. This matter, which +before she had never thought of, now obsessed her; and all women were +divided for her into two classes, the expectant and the others. Also her +self-consciousness was extreme, more so even than it had been after her +mother's death. She was not frightened--yet. She was assuredly not +panic-struck. Rather her mood was grim, harsh, and calmly bitter. She +thought: "I suppose George must be informed." It affected her queerly that +if she took it into her head she need never go back to Preston Street. She +was free. She owed nothing to anybody. And yet she would go back. She would +require a home, soon. And she would require a livelihood, for the shares of +the Brighton Hotel Continental Limited promised to be sterile and were +already unsaleable. But apart from these considerations, she would have +gone back for Sarah Gailey--because Sarah Gailey was entirely dependent on +her. She detested Sarah, despite Sarah's sufferings, and yet by her +conscience she was for ever bound to her.</p> + +<p>The future loomed appalling. Sarah's career was finished. She could not +be anything but a burden and a torment; her last years would probably be +dreadful, both for herself and for others. The prospects of the +boarding-house were not radiant. Hilda could direct the enterprise, but not +well. She could work, but she had not the art of making others work. +Already the place was slightly at sixes and sevens. And she loathed it. She +loathed the whole business of catering. Along the entire length of the +King's Road, the smells of basement kitchens ascended to the pavement and +offended the nose. And Hilda saw all Brighton as a colossal and disgusting +enlargement of the kitchen at No. 59. She saw the background and the pits +of Brighton--that which underlies and hides behind, and is not seen. The +grandeur of the King's Road was naught to her. Her glance pierced it and it +faded to a hallucination. Beyond it she envisaged the years to come, the +messy and endless struggle, the necessary avarice and trickeries incidental +to it,--and perhaps the ultimate failure. She would never make money--she +felt that! She was not born to make money--especially by dodges and false +politeness, out of idle, empty-noddled boarders. She would lose it and lose +it. And she pictured what she would be in ten years: the hard-driven +landlady, up to every subterfuge,--with a child to feed and educate, and +perhaps a bedridden, querulous invalid to support. And there was no +alternative to the tableau.</p> + +<p>She went by the Chichester, which towered with all its stories above her +head. Who would take it now? George Cannon would have made it pay. He would +have made anything pay. How?... She was definitely cut off from the +magnificence of the King's Road. The side street was her destiny; the side +street and shabbiness. And it was all George's fault--and hers! The +poverty, if it came, would be George's fault alone. For he had squandered +her money in a speculation. It astounded her that George, so shrewd and +well balanced, should have made an investment so foolish. She did not +realize that a passion for a business enterprise, as for a woman, is +capable of destroying the balance of any man. And George Cannon had had +both passions.</p> + +<p>And then she saw Florrie Bagster, on the other side of the street, +walking leisurely by the sea-wall, alone. If Mr. Boutwood had had a more +generous and wild disposition he might have allowed Florrie to ruin him in +six months of furs and carriages and champagne. But Mr. Boutwood, though a +dog, was a careful dog, especially at those moments when the conventional +dog can refuse nothing. Florrie was well and warmly dressed,--no more; and +she was on foot. Hilda's gaze fastened on her, and immediately divined from +the cut and fall of the coat that Florrie had something to conceal from +every one but her Mr. Boutwood. And whereas Florrie trod the pavement with +a charming little air that wavered between impudence and modesty, between +timid meekness and conceit, Hilda blushed with shame and pity. She on one +footpath and Florrie on the other!</p> + +<p>"Soon," she thought, "I shall not be able to walk along this road!"</p> + +<p>She had sinned. She admitted that she had sinned against some quality in +herself. But how innocently and how ignorantly! And what a tremendous +punishment for so transient a weakness! And new consequences, still more +disastrous than any she had foreseen, presented themselves one after +another. George had escaped, but a word of open scandal, a single whisper +in the ear of the old creature down at Torquay, might actuate machinery +that would reach out after him and drag him back, and plant him in jail. +George, the father of her child, in jail! It was all a matter of chance; +sheer chance! She began to perceive what life really was, and the immense +importance of hazard therein. Nevertheless, without frailty, without +defection, what could chance have done? She began to perceive that this +that she was living through was life. She bit her lips. Grief! Shame! +Disillusion! Hardship! Peril! Catastrophe! Exile! Above all, exile! These +had to be faced, and they would be faced. She recalled the firiest verse of +Crashaw and she set her shoulders back. There was the stuff of a woman in +her.... Only a little while, and she had seen before her a beloved boy +entranced by her charm. She had now no charm. Where now was the soft +virgin?... And yet, somehow, magically, miraculously, the soft virgin was +still there! And the invincible vague hope of youth, and the irrepressible +consciousness of power, were almost ready to flame up afresh, contrary to +all reason, and irradiate her starless soul.</p> + +<p>NOTE:--<i>The later history of Hilda Lessways and Edwin Clayhanger will +form the theme of another novel.</i></p> + + + +<p><a href="#rfn1" name="fn1">1.</a> See the author's novel, +<i>Clayhanger</i>.</p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Hilda Lessways, by Arnold Bennett + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HILDA LESSWAYS *** + +***** This file should be named 10658-h.htm or 10658-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/6/5/10658/ + +Produced by John Hagerson, Kevin Handy and PG Distributed Proofreaders + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Hilda Lessways + +Author: Arnold Bennett + +Release Date: January 9, 2004 [EBook #10658] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HILDA LESSWAYS *** + + + + +Produced by John Hagerson, Kevin Handy and PG Distributed Proofreaders + + + + +HILDA LESSWAYS + +BY ARNOLD BENNETT + +1911 + + + + +CONTENTS + +BOOK I +HER START IN LIFE + + I AN EVENT IN MR. SKELLORN'S LIFE + II THE END OF THE SCENE + III MR. CANNON + IV DOMESTICITY INVADED + V MRS. LESSWAYS' SHREWDNESS + VI VICTOR HUGO AND ISAAC PITMAN + VII THE EDITORIAL SECRETARY + VIII JANET ORGREAVE + IX IN THE STREET + X MISS GAILEY IN DECLENSION + XI DISILLUSION + XII THE TELEGRAM + XIII HILDA'S WORLD + XIV TO LONDON + +BOOK II +HER RECOVERY + + I SIN + II THE LITTLE ROOM + III JOURNEY TO BLEAKRIDGE + IV WITH THE ORGREAVES + V EDWIN CLAYHANGER + VI IN THE GARDEN + VII THE NEXT MEETING + +BOOK III +HER BURDEN + + I HILDA INDISPENSABLE + II SARAH'S BENEFACTOR + III AT BRIGHTON + IV THE SEA + +BOOK IV +HER FALL + + I THE GOING CONCERN + II THE UNKNOWN ADVENTURE + III FLORRIE AGAIN + +BOOK V +HER DELIVERANCE + + I LOUISA UNCONTROLLED + II SOME SECRET HISTORY + +BOOK VI +HER PUNISHMENT + + I EVENING AT BLEAKRIDGE + II A RENDEZVOUS + III AT THE WORKS + IV THE CALL FROM BRIGHTON + V THURSDAY AFTERNOON + VI MISCHANCE + + * * * * * + + + + +BOOK I +HER START IN LIFE + + + + +CHAPTER I +AN EVENT IN MR. SKELLORN'S LIFE + + +I + +The Lessways household, consisting of Hilda and her widowed mother, was +temporarily without a servant. Hilda hated domestic work, and because +she hated it she often did it passionately and thoroughly. That +afternoon, as she emerged from the kitchen, her dark, defiant face was +full of grim satisfaction in the fact that she had left a kitchen +polished and irreproachable, a kitchen without the slightest indication +that it ever had been or ever would be used for preparing human nature's +daily food; a show kitchen. Even the apron which she had worn was hung +in concealment behind the scullery door. The lobby clock, which stood +over six feet high and had to be wound up every night by hauling on a +rope, was noisily getting ready to strike two. But for Mrs. Lessways' +disorderly and undesired assistance, Hilda's task might have been +finished a quarter of an hour earlier. She passed quietly up the stairs. +When she was near the top, her mother's voice, at once querulous and +amiable, came from the sitting-room: + +"Where are you going to?" + +There was a pause, dramatic for both of them, and in that minute pause +the very life of the house seemed for an instant to be suspended, and +then the waves of the hostile love that united these two women resumed +their beating, and Hilda's lips hardened. + +"Upstairs," she answered callously. + +No reply from the sitting-room! + +At two o'clock on the last Wednesday of every month, old Mr. Skellorn, +employed by Mrs. Lessways to collect her cottage-rents, called with a +statement of account, and cash in a linen bag. He was now due. During +his previous visit Hilda had sought to instil some common sense into her +mother on the subject of repairs, and there had ensued an altercation +which had never been settled. + +"If I stayed down, she wouldn't like it," Hilda complained fiercely +within herself, "and if I keep away she doesn't like that either! That's +mother all over!" + +She went to her bedroom. And into the soft, controlled shutting of the +door she put more exasperated vehemence than would have sufficed to bang +it off its hinges. + + +II + +At this date, late October in 1878, Hilda was within a few weeks of +twenty-one. She was a woman, but she could not realize that she was a +woman. She remembered that when she first went to school, at the age of +eight, an assistant teacher aged nineteen had seemed to her to be +unquestionably and absolutely a woman, had seemed to belong definitely +to a previous generation. The years had passed, and Hilda was now older +than that mature woman was then; and yet she could not feel adult, +though her childhood gleamed dimly afar off, and though the intervening +expanse of ten years stretched out like a hundred years, like eternity. +She was in trouble; the trouble grew daily more and more tragic; and the +trouble was that she wanted she knew not what. If her mother had said to +her squarely, "Tell me what it is will make you a bit more contented, +and you shall have it even if it kills me!" Hilda could only have +answered with the fervour of despair, "I don't know! I don't know!" + +Her mother was a creature contented enough. And why not--with a +sufficient income, a comfortable home, and fair health? At the end of a +day devoted partly to sheer vacuous idleness and partly to the +monotonous simple machinery of physical existence--everlasting cookery, +everlasting cleanliness, everlasting stitchery--her mother did not with +a yearning sigh demand, "Must this sort of thing continue for ever, or +will a new era dawn?" Not a bit! Mrs. Lessways went to bed in the placid +expectancy of a very similar day on the morrow, and of an interminable +succession of such days. The which was incomprehensible and offensive to +Hilda. + +She was in a prison with her mother, and saw no method of escape, saw +not so much as a locked door, saw nothing but blank walls. Even could +she by a miracle break prison, where should she look for the unknown +object of her desire, and for what should she look? Enigmas! It is true +that she read, occasionally with feverish enjoyment, especially verse. +But she did not and could not read enough. Of the shelf-ful of books +which in thirty years had drifted by one accident or another into the +Lessways household, she had read every volume, except Cruden's +Concordance. A heterogeneous and forlorn assemblage! Lavater's +_Physiognomy_, in a translation and in full calf! Thomson's _Seasons_, +which had thrilled her by its romantic beauty! Mrs. Henry Wood's +_Danesbury House_, and one or two novels by Charlotte M. Yonge and Dinah +Maria Craik, which she had gulped eagerly down for the mere interest of +their stories. Disraeli's _Ixion_, which she had admired without +understanding it. A _History of the North American Indians!_ These were +the more exciting items of the set. The most exciting of all was a green +volume of Tennyson's containing _Maud_. She knew _Maud_ by heart. By +simple unpleasant obstinacy she had forced her mother to give her this +volume for a birthday present, having seen a quotation from it in a +ladies' magazine. At that date in Turnhill, as in many other towns of +England, the poem had not yet lived down a reputation for immorality; +but fortunately Mrs. Lessways had only the vaguest notion of its +dangerousness, and was indeed a negligent kind of woman. Dangerous the +book was! Once in reciting it aloud in her room, Hilda had come so near +to fainting that she had had to stop and lie down on the bed, until she +could convince herself that she was not the male lover crying to his +beloved. An astounding and fearful experience, and not to be too lightly +renewed! For Hilda, _Maud_ was a source of lovely and exquisite pain. + +Why had she not used her force of character to obtain more books? One +reason lay in the excessive difficulty to be faced. Birthdays are +infrequent; and besides, the enterprise of purchasing _Maud_ had proved +so complicated and tedious that Mrs. Lessways, with that curious +stiffness which marked her sometimes, had sworn never to attempt to buy +another book. Turnhill, a town of fifteen thousand persons, had no +bookseller; the only bookseller that Mrs. Lessways had ever heard of did +business at Oldcastle. Mrs. Lessways had journeyed twice over the +Hillport ridge to Oldcastle, in the odd quest of a book called _Maud_ by +"Tennyson--the poet laureate"; the book had had to be sent from London; +and on her second excursion to Oldcastle Mrs. Lessways had been caught +by the rain in the middle of Hillport Marsh. No! Hilda could not easily +demand the gift of another book, when all sorts of nice, really useful +presents could be bought in the High Street. Nor was there in Turnhill a +Municipal Library, nor any public lending-library. + +Yet possibly Hilda's terrific egoism might have got fresh books somehow +from somewhere, had she really believed in the virtue of books. Thus +far, however, books had not furnished her with what she wanted, and her +faith in their promise was insecure. + +Books failing, might she not have escaped into some vocation? The sole +vocation conceivable for her was that of teaching, and she knew, without +having tried it, that she abhorred teaching. Further, there was no +economical reason why she should work. In 1878, unless pushed by +necessity, no girl might dream of a vocation: the idea was monstrous; it +was almost unmentionable. Still further, she had no wish to work for +work's sake. Marriage remained. But she felt herself a child, ages short +of marriage. And she never met a man. It was literally a fact that, +except Mr. Skellorn, a few tradesmen, the vicar, the curate, and a +sidesman or so, she never even spoke to a man from one month's end to +the next. The Church choir had its annual dance, to which she was +invited; but the perverse creature cared not for dancing. Her mother did +not seek society, did not appear to require it. Nor did Hilda acutely +feel the lack of it. She could not define her need. All she knew was +that youth, moment by moment, was dropping down inexorably behind her. +And, still a child in heart and soul, she saw herself ageing, and then +aged, and then withered. Her twenty-first birthday was well above the +horizon. Soon, soon, she would be 'over twenty-one'! And she was not yet +born! That was it! She was not yet born! If the passionate strength of +desire could have done the miracle time would have stood still in the +heavens while Hilda sought the way of life. + +And withal she was not wholly unhappy. Just as her attitude to her +mother was self-contradictory, so was her attitude towards existence. +Sometimes this profound infelicity of hers changed its hues for an +instant, and lo! it was bliss that she was bathed in. A phenomenon which +disconcerted her! She did not know that she had the most precious of all +faculties, the power to feel intensely. + + +III + +Mr. Skellorn did not come; he was most definitely late. + +From the window of her bedroom, at the front of the house, Hilda looked +westwards up toward the slopes of Chatterley Wood, where as a child she +used to go with other children to pick the sparse bluebells that thrived +on smoke. The bailiwick of Turnhill lay behind her; and all the murky +district of the Five Towns, of which Turnhill is the northern outpost, +lay to the south. At the foot of Chatterley Wood the canal wound in +large curves on its way towards the undefiled plains of Cheshire and the +sea. On the canal-side, exactly opposite to Hilda's window, was a +flour-mill, that sometimes made nearly as much smoke as the kilns and +chimneys closing the prospect on either hand. From the flour-mill a +bricked path, which separated a considerable row of new cottages from +their appurtenant gardens, led straight into Lessways Street, in front +of Mrs. Lessways' house. By this path Mr. Skellorn should have arrived, +for he inhabited the farthest of the cottages. + +Hilda held Mr. Skellorn in disdain, as she held the row of cottages in +disdain. It seemed to her that Mr. Skellorn and the cottages +mysteriously resembled each other in their primness, their smugness, +their detestable self-complacency. Yet those cottages, perhaps thirty in +all, had stood for a great deal until Hilda, glancing at them, shattered +them with her scorn. The row was called Freehold Villas: a consciously +proud name in a district where much of the land was copyhold and could +only change owners subject to the payment of 'fines' and to the feudal +consent of a 'court' presided over by the agent of a lord of the manor. +Most of the dwellings were owned by their occupiers, who, each an +absolute monarch of the soil, niggled in his sooty garden of an evening +amid the flutter of drying shirts and towels. Freehold Villas symbolized +the final triumph of Victorian economics, the apotheosis of the prudent +and industrious artisan. It corresponded with a Building Society +Secretary's dream of paradise. And indeed it was a very real +achievement. Nevertheless Hilda's irrational contempt would not admit +this. She saw in Freehold Villas nothing but narrowness (what long +narrow strips of gardens, and what narrow homes all flattened +together!), and uniformity, and brickiness, and polished brassiness, and +righteousness, and an eternal laundry. + +From the upper floor of her own home she gazed destructively down upon +all that, and into the chill, crimson eye of the descending sun. Her own +home was not ideal, but it was better than all that. It was one of the +two middle houses of a detached terrace of four houses built by her +grandfather Lessways, the teapot manufacturer; it was the chief of the +four, obviously the habitation of the proprietor of the terrace. One of +the corner houses comprised a grocer's shop, and this house had been +robbed of its just proportion of garden so that the seigneurial +garden-plot might be triflingly larger than the others. The terrace was +not a terrace of cottages, but of houses rated at from twenty-six to +thirty-six pounds a year; beyond the means of artisans and petty +insurance agents and rent-collectors. And further, it was well built, +generously built; and its architecture, though debased, showed some +faint traces of Georgian amenity. It was admittedly the best row of +houses in that newly settled quarter of the town. In coming to it out of +Freehold Villas Mr. Skellorn obviously came to something superior, +wider, more liberal. + +Suddenly Hilda heard her mother's voice, in a rather startled +conversational tone, and then another woman speaking; then the voices +died away. Mrs. Lessways had evidently opened the back door to somebody, +and taken her at once into the sitting-room. The occurrence was unusual. +Hilda went softly out on to the landing and listened, but she could +catch nothing more than a faint, irregular murmur. Scarcely had she +stationed herself on the landing when her mother burst out of the +sitting-room, and called loudly: + +"Hilda!" And again in an instant, very impatiently and excitedly, long +before Hilda could possibly have appeared in response, had she been in +her bedroom, as her mother supposed her to be: "Hilda!" + +Hilda could see without being seen. Mrs. Lessways' thin, wrinkled face, +bordered by her untidy but still black and glossy hair, was upturned +from below in an expression of tragic fretfulness. It was the +uncontrolled face, shamelessly expressive, of one who thinks himself +unwatched. Hilda moved silently to descend, and then demanded in a low +tone whose harsh self-possession was a reproof to that volatile +creature, her mother: + +"What's the matter?" + +Mrs. Lessways gave a surprised "Oh!" and like a flash her features +changed in the attempt to appear calm and collected. + +"I was just coming downstairs," said Hilda. And to herself: "She's +always trying to pretend I'm nobody, but when the least thing happens +out of the way, she runs to me for all the world like a child." And as +Mrs. Lessways offered no reply, but simply stood at the foot of the +stairs, she asked again: "What is it?" + +"Well," said her mother lamentably. "It's Mr. Skellorn. Here's Mrs. +Grant--" + +"Who's Mrs. Grant?" Hilda inquired, with a touch of scorn, although she +knew perfectly well that Mr. Skellorn had a married daughter of that +name. + +"Hsh! Hsh!" Mrs. Lessways protested, indicating the open door of the +sitting-room. "You know Mrs. Grant! It seems Mr. Skellorn has had a +paralytic stroke. Isn't it terrible?" + +Hilda continued smoothly to descend the stairs, and followed her mother +into the sitting-room. + + + + +CHAPTER II +THE END OF THE SCENE + + +I + +The linen money-bag and the account-book, proper to the last Wednesday +in the month, lay on the green damask cloth of the round table where +Hilda and her mother took their meals. A paralytic stroke had not been +drastic enough to mar Mr. Skellorn's most precious reputation for +probity and reliability. His statement of receipts and expenditure, +together with the corresponding cash, had been due at two o'clock, and +despite the paralytic stroke it was less than a quarter of an hour late. +On one side of the bag and the book were ranged the older women,--Mrs. +Lessways, thin and vivacious, and Mrs. Grant, large and solemn; and on +the other side, as it were in opposition, the young, dark, slim girl +with her rather wiry black hair, and her straight, prominent eyebrows, +and her extraordinary expression of uncompromising aloofness. + +"She's just enjoying it, that's what she's doing!" said Hilda to +herself, of Mrs. Grant. + +And the fact was that Mrs. Grant, quite unconsciously, did appear to be +savouring the catastrophe with pleasure. Although paralytic strokes were +more prevalent at that period than now, they constituted even then a +striking dramatic event. Moreover, they were considered as direct +visitations of God. Also there was something mysteriously and agreeably +impressive in the word 'paralytic,' which people would repeat for the +pleasure of repeating it. Mrs. Grant, over whose mighty breast flowed a +black mantle suited to the occasion, used the word again and again as +she narrated afresh for Hilda the history of the stroke. + +"Yes," she said, "they came and fetched me out of my bed at three +o'clock this morning; and would you believe me, though he couldn't +hardly speak, the money and this here book was all waiting in his desk, +and he would have me come with it! And him sixty-seven! He always was +like that. And I do believe if he'd been paralysed on both sides instead +of only all down his right side, and speechless too, he'd ha' made me +understand as I must come here at two o'clock. If I'm a bit late it's +because I was kept at home with my son Enoch; he's got a whitlow that's +worrying the life out of him, our Enoch has." + +Mrs. Lessways warmly deprecated any apology for inexactitude, and wiped +her sympathetic eyes. + +"It's all over with father," Mrs. Grant resumed. "Doctor hinted to me +quiet-like as he'd never leave his bed again. He's laid himself down for +the rest of his days.... And he'd been warned! He'd had warnings. But +there!..." + +Mrs. Grant contemplated with solemn gleeful satisfaction the +overwhelming grandeur of the disaster that had happened to her father. +The active old man, a continual figure of the streets, had been cut off +in a moment from the world and condemned for life to a mattress. She +sincerely imagined herself to be filled with proper grief; but an +aesthetic appreciation of the theatrical effectiveness of the misfortune +was certainly stronger in her than any other feeling. Observing that +Mrs. Lessways wept, she also drew out a handkerchief. + +"I'm wishful for you to count the money," said Mrs. Grant. "I wouldn't +like there to be any--" + +"Nay, that I'll not!" protested Mrs. Lessways. + +Mrs. Grant's pressing duties necessitated her immediate departure. Mrs. +Lessways ceremoniously insisted on her leaving by the front door. + +"I don't know where you'll find another rent-collector that's worth his +salt--in this town," observed Mrs. Grant, on the doorstep. "I can't +think _what_ you'll do, Mrs. Lessways!" + +"I shall collect my rents myself," was the answer. + +When Mrs. Grant had crossed the road and taken the bricked path leading +to the paralytic's house, Mrs. Lessways slowly shut the door and bolted +it, and then said to Hilda: + +"Well, my girl, I do think you might have tried to show just a little +more feeling!" + +They were close together in the narrow lobby, of which the heavy pulse +was the clock's ticking. + +Hilda replied: + +"You surely aren't serious about collecting those rents yourself, are +you, mother?" + +"Serious? Of course I'm serious!" said Mrs. Lessways. + + +II + +"Why shouldn't I collect the rents myself?" asked Mrs. Lessways. + +This half-defiant question was put about two hours later. In the +meantime no remark had been made about the rents. Mother and daughter +were now at tea in the sitting-room. Hilda had passed the greater part +of those two hours upstairs in her bedroom, pondering on her mother's +preposterous notion of collecting the rents herself. Alone, she would +invent conversations with her mother, silencing the foolish woman with +unanswerable sarcastic phrases that utterly destroyed her illogical +arguments. She would repeat these phrases, repeat even entire +conversations, with pleasure; and, dwelling also with pleasure upon her +grievances against her mother, would gradually arrive at a state of +dull-glowing resentment. She could, if she chose, easily free her brain +from the obsession either by reading or by a sharp jerk of volition; but +often she preferred not to do so, saying to herself voluptuously: "No, I +_will_ nurse my grievance; I'll nurse it and nurse it and nurse it! It +is mine, and it is just, and anybody with any sense at all would admit +instantly that I am absolutely right." Thus it was on this afternoon. +When she came to tea her face was formidably expressive, nor would she +attempt to modify the rancour of those uncompromising features. On the +contrary, as soon as she saw that her mother had noticed her condition, +she deliberately intensified it. + +Mrs. Lessways, who was incapable of sustained thought, and who had +completely forgotten and recalled the subject of the cottage-rents +several times since the departure of Mrs. Grant, nevertheless at once +diagnosed the cause of the trouble; and with her usual precipitancy +began to repulse an attack which had not even been opened. Mrs. Lessways +was not good at strategy, especially in conflicts with her daughter. She +was an ingenuous, hasty thing, and much too candidly human. And not only +was she deficient in practical common sense and most absurdly unable to +learn from experience, but she had not even the wit to cover her +shortcomings by resorting to the traditional authoritativeness of the +mother. Her brief, rare efforts to play the mother were ludicrous. She +was too simply honest to acquire stature by standing on her maternal +dignity. By a profound instinct she wistfully treated everybody as an +equal, as a fellow-creature; even her own daughter. It was not the way +to come with credit out of the threatened altercation about +rent-collecting. + +As Hilda offered no reply, Mrs. Lessways said reproachfully: + +"Hilda, you're too bad sometimes!" And then, after a further silence: +"Anyhow, I'm quite decided." + +"Then what's the good of talking about it?" said the merciless child. + +"But _why_ shouldn't I collect the rents myself? I'm not asking you to +collect them. And I shall save the five per cent., and goodness knows we +need it." + +"You're more likely to lose twenty-five per cent.," said Hilda. "I'll +have some more tea, please." + +Mrs. Lessways was quite genuinely scandalized. "You needn't think I +shall be easy with those Calder Street tenants, because I shan't! Not +me! I'm more likely to be too hard!" + +"You'll be too hard, and you'll be too easy, too," said Hilda savagely. +"You'll lose the good tenants and you'll keep the bad ones, and the +houses will all go to rack and ruin, and then you'll sell all the +property at a loss. That's how it will be. And what shall you do if +you're not feeling well, and if it rains on Monday mornings?" + +Hilda could conceive her mother forgetting all about the rents on Monday +morning, or putting them off till Monday afternoon on some grotesque +excuse. Her fancy heard the interminable complainings, devisings, futile +resolvings, of the self-appointed collector. It was impossible to +imagine a woman less fitted by nature than her mother to collect rents +from unthrifty artisans such as inhabited Calder Street. The project +sickened her. It would render the domestic existence an inferno. + +As for Mrs. Lessways, she was shocked, for her project had seemed very +beautiful to her, and for the moment she was perfectly convinced that +she could collect rents and manage property as well as anyone. She was +convinced that her habits were regular, her temper firm and tactful, and +her judgment excellent. She was more than shocked; she was wounded. She +wept, as she pushed forward Hilda's replenished cup. + +"You ought to take shame!" she murmured weakly, yet with certitude. + +"Why?" said Hilda, feigning simplicity. "What have I said? _I_ didn't +begin. You asked me. I can't help what I think." + +"It's your tone," said Mrs. Lessways grievously. + + +III + +Despite all Hilda's terrible wisdom and sagacity, this remark of the +foolish mother's was the truest word spoken in the discussion. It was +Hilda's tone that was at the root of the evil. If Hilda, with the +intelligence as to which she was secretly so complacent, did not +amicably rule her mother, the unavoidable inference was that she was +either a clumsy or a wicked girl, or both. She indeed felt dimly that +she was a little of both. But she did not mind. Sitting there in the +small, familiar room, close to the sewing-machine, the steel fender, the +tarnished chandelier, and all the other daily objects which she at once +detested and loved, sitting close to her silly mother who angered her, +and yet in whom she recognized a quality that was mysteriously precious +and admirable, staring through the small window at the brown, tattered +garden-plot where blackened rhododendrons were swaying in the October +blast, she wilfully bathed herself in grim gloom and in an affectation +of despair. + +Somehow she enjoyed the experience. She had only to tighten her +lips--and she became oblivious of her clumsiness and her cruelty, +savouring with pleasure the pain of the situation, clasping it to her! +Now and then a thought of Mr. Skellorn's tragedy shot through her brain, +and the tenderness of pity welled up from somewhere within her and +mingled exquisitely with her dark melancholy. And she found delight in +reading her poor mother like an open book, as she supposed. And all the +while her mother was dreaming upon the first year of Hilda's life, +before she had discovered that her husband's health was as unstable as +his character, and comparing the reality of the present with her early +illusions. But the clever girl was not clever enough to read just that +page. + +"We ought to be everything to each other," said Mrs. Lessways, pursuing +her reflections aloud. + +Hilda hated sentimentalism. She could not stand such talk. + +"And you know," said Hilda, speaking very frigidly and with even more +than her usual incisive clearness of articulation, "it's not your +property. It's only yours for life. It's my property." + +The mother's mood changed in a moment. + +"How do you know? You've never seen your father's will." She spoke in +harsh challenge. + +"No; because you've never let me see it." + +"You ought to have more confidence in your mother. Your father had. And +I'm trustee and executor." Mrs. Lessways was exceedingly jealous of her +legal position, whose importance she never forgot nor would consent to +minimize. + +"That's all very well, for you," said Hilda; "but if the property isn't +managed right, I may find myself slaving when I'm your age, mother. And +whose fault will it be?... However, I shall--" + +"You will what?" + +"Nothing." + +"I suppose her ladyship will be consulting her own lawyer next!" said +Mrs. Lessways bitterly. + +They looked at each other. Hilda's face flushed to a sombre red. Mrs. +Lessways brusquely left the room. Then Hilda could hear her rattling +fussily at the kitchen range. After a few minutes Hilda followed her to +the kitchen, which was now nearly in darkness. The figure of Mrs. +Lessways, still doing nothing whatever with great vigour at the range, +was dimly visible. Hilda approached her, and awkwardly touched her +shoulder. + +"Mother!" she demanded sharply; and she was astonished by her +awkwardness and her sharpness. + +"Is that you?" her mother asked, in a queer, foolish tone. + +They kissed. Such a candid peacemaking had never occurred between them +before. Mrs. Lessways, as simple in forgiveness as in wrath, did not +disguise her pleasure in the remarkable fact that it was Hilda who had +made the overture. Hilda thought: "How strange I am! What is coming over +me?" She glanced at the range, in which was a pale gleam of red, and +that gleam, in the heavy twilight, seemed to her to be inexpressibly, +enchantingly mournful. And she herself was mournful about the future-- +very mournful. She saw no hope. Yet her sadness was beautiful to her. +And she was proud. + + + + +CHAPTER III +MR. CANNON + + +I + +A little later Hilda came downstairs dressed to go out. Her mother was +lighting a glimmer of gas in the lobby. Ere Mrs. Lessways could descend +from her tiptoes to her heels and turn round Hilda said quickly, +forestalling curiosity: + +"I'm going to get that thread you want. Just give me some money, will +you?" + +Nobody could have guessed from her placid tone and indifferent demeanour +that she was in a state of extreme agitation. But so it was. Suddenly, +after kissing her mother in the kitchen, she had formed a tremendous +resolve. And in a moment the resolve had possessed her, sending her +flying upstairs, and burning her into a fever, as with the assured +movements of familiarity she put on her bonnet, mantle, 'fall,' and +gloves in the darkness of the chamber. She held herself in leash while +her mother lifted a skirt and found a large loaded pocket within and a +purse in the pocket and a sixpence in the purse. But when she had shut +the door on all that interior haunted by her mother's restlessness, when +she was safe in the porch and in the windy obscurity of the street, she +yielded with voluptuous apprehension to a thrill that shook her. + +"I might have tidied my hair," she thought. "Pooh! What does my hair +matter?" + +Her mind was full of an adventure through which she had passed seven +years previously, when she was thirteen and a little girl at school. For +several days, then, she had been ruthlessly mortifying her mother by +complaints about the meals. Her fastidious appetite could not be suited. +At last, one noon when the child had refused the whole of a plenteous +dinner, Mrs. Lessways had burst into tears and, slapping four pennies +down on the table, had cried, "Here! I fairly give you up! Go out and +buy your own dinner! Then perhaps you'll get what you want!" And the +child, without an instant's hesitation, had seized the coins and gone +out, hatless, and bought food at a little tripe-shop that was also an +eating-house, and consumed it there; and then in grim silence returned +home. Both mother and daughter had been stupefied and frightened by the +boldness of the daughter's initiative, by her amazing, flaunting +disregard of filial decency. Mrs. Lessways would not have related the +episode to anybody upon any consideration whatever. It was a shameful +secret, never even referred to. But Mrs. Lessways had unmistakably +though indirectly referred to it when in anger she had said to her +daughter aged twenty: "I suppose her ladyship will be consulting her own +lawyer next!" Hilda had understood, and that was why she had blushed. + +And now, as she turned from Lessways Street into the Oldcastle Road, on +her way to the centre of the town, she experienced almost exactly the +intense excitement of the reckless and supercilious child in quest of +its dinner. The only difference was that the recent reconciliation had +inspired her with a certain negligent compassion for her mother, with a +curious tenderness that caused her to wonder at herself. + + +II + +The Market Square of Turnhill was very large for the size of the town. +The diminutive town hall, which in reality was nothing but a +watch-house, seemed to be a mere incident on its irregular expanse, to +which the two-storey shops and dwellings made a low border. Behind this +crimson, blue-slated border rose the loftier forms of a church and a +large chapel, situate in adjacent streets. The square was calm and +almost deserted in the gloom. It typified the slow tranquillity of the +bailiwick, which was removed from the central life of the Five Towns, +and unconnected therewith by even a tram or an omnibus. Only within +recent years had Turnhill got so much as a railway station--rail-head of +a branch line. Turnhill was the extremity of civilization in those +parts. Go northwards out of this Market Square, and you would soon find +yourself amid the wild and hilly moorlands, sprinkled with iron-and-coal +villages whose red-flaming furnaces illustrated the eternal damnation +which was the chief article of their devout religious belief. And in the +Market Square not even the late edition of the _Staffordshire Signal_ +was cried, though it was discreetly on sale with its excellent sporting +news in a few shops. In the hot and malodorous candle-lit factories, +where the real strenuous life of the town would remain cooped up for +another half-hour of the evening, men and women had yet scarcely taken +to horse-racing; they would gamble upon rabbits, cocks, pigeons, and +their own fists, without the mediation of the _Signal_. The one noise in +the Market Square was the bell of a hawker selling warm pikelets at a +penny each for the high tea of the tradesmen. The hawker was a deathless +institution, a living proof that withdrawn Turnhill would continue +always to be exactly what it always had been. Still, to the east of the +Square, across the High Street, a vast space was being cleared of hovels +for the erection of a new town hall daringly magnificent. + +Hilda crossed the Square, scorning it. + +She said to herself: "I'd better get the thing over before I buy the +thread. I should never be able to stand Miss Dayson's finicking! I +should scream out!" But the next instant, with her passion for proving +to herself how strong she could be, she added: "Well, I just _will_ buy +the thread first!" And she went straight into Dayson's little fancy +shop, which was full of counter and cardboard boxes and Miss Dayson, and +stayed therein for at least five minutes, emerging with a miraculously +achieved leisureliness. A few doors away was a somewhat new building, of +three storeys--the highest in the Square. The ground floor was an +ironmongery; it comprised also a side entrance, of which the door was +always open. This side entrance showed a brass-plate, "Q. Karkeek, +Solicitor." And the wire-blinds of the two windows of the first floor +also bore the words: "Q. Karkeek, Solicitor. Q. Karkeek, Solicitor." The +queerness of the name had attracted Hilda's attention several years +earlier, when the signs were fresh. It was an accident that she had +noticed it; she had not noticed the door-plates or the wire-blinds of +other solicitors. She did not know Mr. Q. Karkeek by sight, nor even +whether he was old or young, married or single, agreeable or repulsive. + +The side entrance gave directly on to a long flight of naked stairs, and +up these stairs Hilda climbed into the unknown, towards the redoubtable +and the perilous. "I'm bound to be seen," she said to herself, "but I +don't care, and I _don't_ care!" At the top of the stairs was a passage, +at right angles, and then a glazed door with the legend in black +letters, "Q. Karkeek, Solicitor," and two other doors mysteriously +labelled "Private." She opened the glazed door, and saw a dirty +middle-aged man on a stool, and she said at once to him, in a harsh, +clear, deliberate voice, without giving herself time to reflect: + +"I want to see Mr. Karkeek." + +The man stared at her sourly, as if bewildered. + +She said to herself: "I shan't be able to stand this excitement much +longer." + +"You can't see Mr. Karkeek," said the man. "Mr. Karkeek's detained at +Hanbridge County Court. But if you're in such a hurry like, you'd better +see Mr. Cannon. It's Mr. Cannon as they generally do see. Who d'ye come +from, miss?" + +"Come from?" Hilda repeated, unnerved. + +"What name?" + +She had not expected this. "I suppose I shall have to tell him!" she +said to herself, and aloud: "Lessways." + +"Oh! Ah!" exclaimed the man. "Bless us! Yes!" It was as if he had said: +"Of course it's Lessways! And don't I know all about _you!_" And Hilda +was overwhelmed by the sense of the enormity of the folly which she was +committing. + +The man swung half round on his stool, and seized the end of an +india-rubber tube which hung at the side of the battered and littered +desk, just under a gas-jet. He spoke low, like a conspirator, into the +mouthpiece of the tube. "Miss Lessways--to see you, sir." Then very +quickly he clapped the tube to his ear and listened. And then he put it +to his mouth again and repeated: "Lessways." Hilda was agonized. + +"I'll ask ye to step this way, miss," said the man, slipping off his +stool. At the same time he put a long inky penholder, which he had been +holding in his wrinkled right hand, between his teeth. + +"Never," thought Hilda as she followed the clerk, in a whirl of horrible +misgivings, "never have I done anything as mad as this before! I'm under +twenty-one!" + + +III + +There she was at last, seated in front of a lawyer in a lawyer's +office--her ladyship consulting her own lawyer! It seemed incredible! A +few minutes ago she had been at home, and now she was in a world +unfamiliar and alarming. Perhaps it was a pity that her mother had +unsuspectingly put the scheme into her head! + +However, the deed was done. Hilda generally acted first and reflected +afterwards. She was frightened, but rather by the unknown than by +anything she could define. + +"You've come about the property?" said Mr. Cannon amiably, in a +matter-of-fact tone. + +He had deep black eyes, and black hair, like Hilda's; good, regular +teeth, and a clear complexion; perhaps his nose was rather large, but it +was straight. With his large pale hands he occasionally stroked his long +soft moustache; the chin was blue. He was smartly dressed in dark blue; +he had a beautiful neck-tie, and the genuine whiteness of his wristbands +was remarkable in a district where starched linen was usually either +grey or bluish. He was not a dandy, but he respected his person; he +evidently gave careful attention to his body; and this trait alone set +him apart among the citizens of Turnhill. + +"Yes," said Hilda. She thought: "He's a very handsome man! How strange I +don't remember seeing him in the streets!" She was in awe of him. He was +indefinitely older than herself; and she felt like a child, out of place +in the easy-chair. + +"I suppose it's about the rent-collecting?" he pursued. + +"Yes--it is," she answered, astonished that he could thus divine her +purpose. "I mean--" + +"What does your mother want to do?" + +"Oh!" said Hilda, speaking low. "It's not mother. I've come to consult +you myself. Mother doesn't know. I'm nearly twenty-one, and it's really +my property, you know!" She blushed with shame. + +"Ah!" he exclaimed. He tried to disguise his astonishment in an easy, +friendly smile. But he was most obviously startled. He looked at Hilda +in a different way, with a much intensified curiosity. + +"Yes," she resumed. He now seemed to her more like a fellow-creature, +and less like a member of the inimical older generation. + +"So you're nearly twenty-one?" + +"In December," she said. "And I think under my father's will--" She +stopped, at a loss. "The fact is, I don't think mother will be quite +able to look after the property properly, and I'm afraid--you see, now +that Mr. Skellorn has had this stroke--" + +"Yes," said Mr. Cannon, "I heard about that, and I was thinking perhaps +Mrs. Lessways had sent you.... We collect rents, you know." + +"I see!" Hilda murmured. "Well, the truth is, mother hasn't the +slightest idea I'm here. Not the slightest! And I wouldn't hurt her +feelings for anything." He nodded sympathetically. "But I thought +something ought to be done. She's decided to collect our Calder Street +rents herself, and she isn't fitted to do it. And then there's the +question of the repairs.... I know the rents are going down. I expect +it's all mother's for life, but I want there to be something left for me +when she's gone, you see! And if--I've never seen the will. I suppose +there's no way of seeing a copy of it, somewhere?... I can't very well +ask mother again." + +"I know all about the will," said Mr. Cannon. + +"You do?" + +Wondrous, magical man! + +"Yes," he explained. "I used to be at Toms and Scoles's. I was there +when it was made. I copied it." + +"Really!" She felt that he would save her, not only from any possible +unpleasant consequences of her escapade, but also from suffering +ultimate loss by reason of her mother's foolishness. + +"You're quite right," he continued. "I remember it perfectly. Your +mother is what we call tenant-for-life; everything goes to you in the +end." + +"Well," Hilda asked abruptly. "All I want to know is, what I can do." + +"Of course, without upsetting your mother?" + +He glanced at her. She blushed again. + +"Naturally," she said coldly. + +"You say you think the property is going down--it _is_, everybody knows +that--and your mother thinks of collecting the rents herself.... Well, +young lady, it's very difficult, very difficult, your mother being the +trustee and executor." + +"Yes, that's what she's always saying--she's the trustee and executor." + +"You'd better let me think it over for a day or two." + +"And shall I call in again?" + +"You might slip in if you're passing. I'll see what can be done. Of +course it would never do for you to have any difficulty with your +mother." + +"Oh no!" she concurred vehemently. "Anything would be better than that. +But I thought there was no harm in me--" + +"Certainly not." + +She had a profound confidence in him. And she was very content so far +with the result of her adventure. + +"I hope nobody will find out I've been here," she said timidly. "Because +if it _did_ get to mother's ears--" + +"Nobody will find out," he reassured her. + +Assuredly his influence was tranquillizing. Even while he insisted on +the difficulties of the situation, he seemed to be smoothing them away. +She was convinced that he would devise some means of changing her +mother's absurd purpose and of strengthening her own position. But when, +at the end of the interview, he came round the large table which +separated them, and she rose and looked up at him, close, she was +suddenly very afraid of him. He was a tall and muscular man, and he +stood like a monarch, and she stood like a child. And his gesture seemed +to say: "Yes, I know you are afraid. And I rather like you to be afraid. +But I am benevolent in the exercise of my power." Under his gaze, her +gaze fastened on the wire-blind and the dark window, and she read off +the reversed letters on the blind. + +Like a mouse she escaped to the stairs. She was happy and fearful and +expectant.... It was done! She had consulted a lawyer! She was astounded +at herself. + +In the Market Square it was now black night. She looked shyly up at the +lighted wire-blinds over the ironmongery. "I was there!" she said. "He +is still there." The whole town, the whole future, seemed to be drenched +now in romance. Nevertheless, the causes of her immense discontent had +not apparently been removed nor in any way modified. + + + + +CHAPTER IV +DOMESTICITY INVADED + + +I + +Early in the afternoon, two days later, Hilda came, with an air of +reproach, into her mother's empty bedroom. Mrs. Lessways had contracted +a severe cold in the head, a malady to which she was subject and which +she accepted with fatalistic submission, even pleasurably giving herself +up to it, as a martyr to the rack. Mrs. Lessways' colds annoyed Hilda, +who out of her wisdom could always point to the precise indiscretion +which had caused them, and to whom the spectacle of a head wrapped day +and night in flannel was offensively ridiculous. Moreover, Hilda in +these crises was further and still more acutely exasperated by the +pillage of her handkerchiefs. Although she possessed a supply of +handkerchiefs far beyond her own needs, she really hated to lend to her +mother in the hour of necessity. She did lend, and she lent without +spoken protest, but with frigid bitterness. Her youthful passion for +order and efficiency was aggrieved by her mother's negligent and +inadequate arrangements for coping with the inevitable plague. She now +made a police-visit to the bedroom because she considered that her +mother had been demanding handkerchiefs at a stage too early in the +progress of the disease. Impossible that her mother should have come to +the end of her own handkerchiefs! She knew with all the certitude of her +omniscience that numerous clean handkerchiefs must be concealed +somewhere in the untidiness of her mother's wardrobe. + +See her as she enters the bedroom, the principal bedroom of the house, +whose wide bed and large wardrobe recall the past when she had a father +as well as a mother, and when that bedroom awed her footsteps! A thin, +brown-frocked girl, wearing a detested but enforced small black apron; +with fine, pale, determined features, rather unfeminine hair, and +glowering, challenging black eyes. She had a very decided way of putting +down her uncoquettishly shod feet. Absurdly young, of course; wistfully +young! She was undeveloped, and did not even look nearly twenty-one. You +are at liberty to smile at her airs; at that careless critical glance +which pityingly said: "Ah! if this were my room, it would be different +from what it is;" at that serious worried expression, as if the anxiety +of the whole world's deficiencies oppressed the heart within; and at +that supreme conviction of wisdom, which after all was little but an +exaggerated perception of folly and inconsistency in others!... She is +not to be comprehended on an acquaintance of three days. Years must go +to the understanding of her. She did not understand herself. She was not +even acquainted with herself. Why! She was naive enough to be puzzled +because she felt older than her mother and younger than her beautiful +girlish complexion, simultaneously! + +She opened the central mirrored door of the once formidable wardrobe, +and as she did so the image of the bed and of half the room shot across +the swinging glass, taking the place of her own reflection. And +instantly, when she inserted herself between the exposed face of the +wardrobe and its door, she was precipitated into the most secret +intimacy of her mother's existence. There was the familiar odour of old +kid gloves.... She was more intimate with her mother now than she could +ever be in talking to her. The lower part of this section of the +wardrobe consisted of three deep drawers with inset brass handles, an +exquisitely exact piece of mahogany cabinetwork. From one of the drawers +a bit of white linen untidily protruded. Her mother! The upper part was +filled with sliding trays, each having a raised edge to keep the +contents from falling out. These trays were heaped pell-mell with her +mother's personal belongings--small garments, odd indeterminate trifles, +a muff, a bundle of whalebone, veils, bags, and especially cardboard +boxes. Quantities of various cardboard boxes! Her mother kept +everything, could not bear that anything which had once been useful +should be abandoned or destroyed; whereas Hilda's propensity was to +throw away with an impatient gesture whatever threatened to be an +encumbrance. Sighing, she began to arrange the contents of the trays in +some kind of method. Incompetent and careless mother! Hilda wondered how +the old thing managed to conduct her life from day to day with even a +semblance of the decency of order. It did not occur to her that for +twenty-five years before she was born, and for a long time afterwards, +Mrs. Lessways had contrived to struggle along through the world, without +her daughter's aid, to the general satisfaction of herself and some +others. At length, ferreting on the highest shelf but one, she had the +deep, proud satisfaction of the philosopher who has correctly deduced +consequences from character. Underneath a Paisley shawl she discovered a +lost treasure of clean handkerchiefs. One, two, three, four--there were +eleven! And among them was one of her own, appropriated by her mother +through sheer inexcusable inadvertence. They had probably been lying +under the shawl for weeks, months! + +Still, she did not allow herself to be vexed. Since the singular +hysterical embrace in the twilight of the kitchen, she had felt for her +mother a curious, kind, forbearing, fatalistic indulgence. "Mother is +like that, and there you are!" And further, her mood had been so changed +and uplifted by excitement and expectation that she could not be +genuinely harsh. She had been thrilled by the audacity of the visit to +Mr. Cannon. And though she hoped from it little but a negative +advantage, she was experiencing the rare happiness of adventure. She had +slipped out for a moment from the confined and stifling circle of +domestic dailiness. She had scented the feverish perfume of the world. +And she owed all this to herself alone! She meant on the morrow, while +her mother was marketing, to pursue the enterprise; the consciousness of +this intention was sweet, but she knew not why it was sweet. She only +knew that she lived in the preoccupation of a dream. + +Having taken two of the handkerchiefs, she shut the wardrobe and turned +the key. She went first to her own small, prim room to restore stolen +property to its rightful place, and then she descended towards the +kitchen with the other handkerchief. Giving it to her mother, and +concealing her triumph beneath a mask of wise, long-suffering +benevolence, she would say: "I've found ten of your handkerchiefs, +mother. Here's one!" And her mother, ingenuously startled and pleased, +would exclaim: "Where, child?" And she, still controlling herself, as +befitted a superior being, would reply casually: "In your wardrobe, of +course! You stuck to it there weren't any; but I was sure there were." + + +II + +The dialogue which actually did accompany the presentation of the +handkerchief, though roughly corresponding to her rehearsal of it, was +lacking in the dramatic pungency necessary for a really effective +triumph; the reason being that the thoughts of both mother and daughter +were diverted in different ways from the handkerchief by the presence of +Florrie in the kitchen. + +Florrie was the new servant, and she had come into the house that +morning. Sponsored by an aunt who was one of the best of the Calder +Street tenants, Florrie had been accepted rather unwillingly, the +objection to her being that she was too young--thirteen and a half. Mrs. +Lessways had a vague humanitarian sentiment against the employment of +children; as for Hilda's feeling, it was at one moment more +compassionate even than her mother's, and at another almost cynically +indifferent. The aunt, however, a person of powerful common sense, had +persuaded Mrs. Lessways that the truest kindness would be to give +Florrie a trial. Florrie was very strong, and she had been brought up to +work hard, and she enjoyed working hard. "Don't you, Florrie?" "Yes, +aunt," with a delightful smiling, whispering timidity. She was the +eldest of a family of ten, and had always assisted her mother in the +management of a half-crown house and the nurture of a regiment of +infants. But at thirteen and a half a girl ought to be earning money for +her parents. Bless you! She knew what a pawnshop was, her father being +often out of a job owing to potter's asthma; and she had some knowledge +of cookery, and was in particular very good at boiling potatoes. To take +her would be a real kindness on the part of Mrs. Lessways, for the +'place' was not merely an easy place, it was a 'good' place. Supposing +that Mrs. Lessways refused to have her,--well, Florrie might go on to a +'potbank' and come to harm, or she might engage herself with +tradespeople, where notoriously the work was never finished, or she +might even be forced into a public-house. Her aunt knew that they wanted +a servant at the "Queen Adelaide," where the wages would be pretty high. +But no! No niece of hers should ever go into service at a public-house +if she could help it! What with hot rum and coffee to be ready for +customers at half-past five of a morning, and cleaning up at nights +after closing, a poor girl would never see her bed! Whereas at Mrs. +Lessways'...! So Mrs. Lessways took Florrie in order to save her from +slavery. + +The slim child was pretty, with graceful and eager movements, and +certainly a rapid comprehension. Her grey eyes sparkled, and her brown +hair was coquettishly tied up, rather in the manner of a horse's tail on +May Day. She had arrived all by herself in the morning, with a tiny +bundle, and she made a remarkably neat appearance--if you did not look +at her boots, which had evidently been somebody else's a long time +before. Hilda had been clearly aware of a feeling of pleasure at the +prospect of this young girl's presence in the house. + +Hilda now saw her in another aspect. She wore a large foul apron of +sacking, which made her elegant body quite shapeless, and she was +kneeling on the red-and-black tiled floor of the kitchen, with her +enormous cracked boots sticking out behind her. At one side of her was a +pail full of steaming brown water, and in her red coarse little hands, +which did not seem to belong to those gracile arms, she held a dripping +clout. In front of her, on a half-dried space of clean, shining floor, +stood Mrs. Lessways, her head wrapped in a flannel petticoat. Nearer to +the child stretched a small semi-circle of liquid mud; to the rear was +the untouched dirty floor. Florrie was looking up at her mistress with +respectful, strained attention. She could not proceed with her work +because Mrs. Lessways had chosen this moment to instruct her, with much +snuffling, in the duties and responsibilities of her position. + +"Yes, mum," Florrie whispered. She seemed to be incapable of speaking +beyond a whisper. But the whisper was delicate and agreeable; and +perhaps it was a mysterious sign of her alleged unusual physical +strength. + +"You'll have to be down at half-past six. Then you'll light your kitchen +fire, but of course you'll get your coal up first. And then you'll do +your boots. Now the bacon--but never mind that--either Miss Hilda or me +will be down to-morrow morning to show you." + +"Yes, mum," Florrie's whisper was grateful. + +"When you've got things going a bit like, you'll do your parlour--I've +told you all about that, though. But I didn't tell you--except on +Wednesdays. On Wednesdays you give your parlour a thorough turn-out +_after_ breakfast, and mind it's got to be all straight for dinner at +half-past twelve." + +"Yes, mum." + +"I shall show you about your fire-irons--" Mrs. Lessways was continuing +to make everything in the house the private property of Florrie, when +Hilda interrupted her about the handkerchief, and afterwards with an +exhortation to beware of the dampness of the floor, which exhortation +Mrs. Lessways faintly resented; whereupon Hilda left the kitchen; it was +always imprudent to come between Mrs. Lessways and a new servant. + +Hilda remained listening in the lobby to the interminable and rambling +instruction. At length Mrs. Lessways said benevolently: + +"There's no reason why you shouldn't go to bed at half-past eight, or +nine at the latest. No reason whatever. And if you're quick and handy +--and I'm sure you are--you'll have plenty of time in the afternoon for +plain sewing and darning. I shall see how you can darn," Mrs. Lessways +added encouragingly. + +"Yes, mum." + +Hilda's heart revolted, less against her mother's defects as an +organizer than against the odious mess of the whole business of +domesticity. She knew that, with her mother in the house, Florrie would +never get to bed at half-past eight and very seldom at nine, and that +she would never be free in the afternoons. She knew that if her mother +would only consent to sit still and not interfere, the housework could +be accomplished with half the labour that at present went to it. There +were three women in the place, or at any rate, a woman, a young woman, +and a girl--and in theory the main preoccupation of all of them was this +business of domesticity. It was, of course, ridiculous, and she would +never be able to make anyone see that it was ridiculous. But that was +not all. The very business itself absolutely disgusted her. It disgusted +her to such a point that she would have preferred to do it with her own +hands in secret rather than see others do it openly in all its squalor. +The business might be more efficiently organized--for example, there was +no reason why the sitting-room should be made uninhabitable between +breakfast and dinner once a week--but it could never be other than +odious. The kitchen floor must inevitably be washed every day by a girl +on her knees in sackcloth with terrible hands. She was witnessing now +the first stage in the progress of a victim of the business of +domesticity. To-day Florrie was a charming young creature, full of +slender grace. Soon she would be a dehumanized drudge. And Hilda could +not stop it! All over the town, in every street of the town, behind all +the nice curtains and blinds, the same hidden shame was being enacted: a +vast, sloppy, steaming, greasy, social horror--inevitable! It amounted +to barbarism, Hilda thought in her revolt. She turned from it with +loathing. And yet nobody else seemed to turn from it with loathing. +Nobody else seemed to perceive that this business of domesticity was not +life itself, was at best the clumsy external machinery of life. On the +contrary, about half the adult population worshipped it as an exercise +sacred and paramount, enlarging its importance and with positive gusto +permitting it to monopolize their existence. Nine-tenths of her mother's +conversation was concerned with the business of domesticity--and withal +Mrs. Lessways took the business more lightly than most! + + +III + +There was an impatient knock at the front door,--rare phenomenon, but +not unknown. + +Mrs. Lessways cried out thickly from the folds of her flannel petticoat: + +"Hilda, just see who that is, will you?... knocking like that! Florrie +can't come." + +And just as Hilda reached the front door, her mother opened the kitchen +door wide, to view the troublesome disturber and to inform him, if as +was probable he was exceeding his rights, that he would have done better +to try the back door. + +It was Mr. Cannon at the front door. + +Hilda heard the kitchen door slammed to behind her, but the noise was +like a hallucination in her brain. She was staggered by the apparition +of Mr. Cannon in the porch. She had vaguely wondered what he might do to +execute his promise of aid; she had felt that time was running short if +her mother was to be prevented from commencing rent-collector on the +Monday; she had perhaps ingenuously expected from him some kind of +miracle; but of a surety she had never dreamed that he would call in +person at her home. "He must be mad!" she would have exclaimed to +herself, if the grandeur of his image in her heart had not made any such +accusation impossible to her. He was not mad; he was merely inscrutable, +terrifyingly so. It was as if her adventurous audacity, personified, had +doubled back on her, and was exquisitely threatening her. + +"Good afternoon!" said Mr. Cannon, smiling confidently and yet with +ceremoniousness. "Is your mother about?" + +"Yes." Hilda did not know it, but she was whispering quite in the manner +of Florrie. + +"Shall I come in?" + +"Oh! Please do!" The words jumped out of her mouth all at once, so +anxious was she to destroy any impression conceivably made that she did +not desire him to come in. + +He crossed the step and took her hand with one gesture. She shut the +door. He waited in suave silence. There was barely space for them +together in the narrow lobby, and she scarce dared look up at him. He +easily dominated her. His bigness subdued her, and the handsomeness of +his face and his attire was like a moral intimidation. He had a large +physical splendour that was well set off and illustrated by the +brilliance of his linen and his broadcloth. She was as modest as a mouse +beside him. The superior young woman, the stern and yet indulgent +philosopher, had utterly vanished, and only a poor little mouse +remained. + +"Will you please come into the drawing-room?" she murmured when, after +an immense effort to keep full control of her faculties, she had decided +where he must be put. + +"Thanks," he said. + +As she diminished herself, with beautiful shy curves of her body, +against the wall so that he could manoeuvre his bigness through the +drawing-room doorway, he gave her a glance half benign and half politely +malicious, which seemed to say again: "I know you're afraid, and I +rather like it. But you know you needn't be." + +"Please take a seat," she implored. And then quickly, as he seemed to +have no intention of speaking to her confidentially, "I'll tell mother." + +Leaving the room, she saw him sink smoothly into a seat, his rich-piled +hat in one gloved hand and an ebony walking-stick in the other. His +presence had a disastrous effect on the chill, unfrequented +drawing-room, reducing it instantly to a condition of paltry shabbiness. + +The kitchen door was still shut. Yes, all the squalor of the business of +domesticity must be hidden from this splendid being! Hilda went as a +criminal into the kitchen. Mrs. Lessways with violent movements +signalled her to close the door before speaking. Florrie gazed +spellbound upwards at both of them. The household was in a high fever. + +"You don't mean to tell me that's Mr. Cannon!" Mrs. Lessways excitedly +whispered. + +"Do--do--you know him?" Hilda faltered. + +"Do I know him!... What does he want?" + +"He wants to see you." + +"What about?" + +"I suppose it's about property or something," Hilda replied, blushing. +Never had she felt so abject in front of her mother. + +Mrs. Lessways rapidly unpinned the flannel petticoat and then threw it, +with a desperate gesture of sacrifice, on to the deal table. The +situation had to be met. The resplendent male awaited her in the +death-cold room. The resplendent male had his overcoat, but she, +suffering, must face the rigour and the risk unprotected. No matter if +she caught bronchitis! The thing had to be done. Even Hilda did not +think of accusing her mother of folly. Mrs. Lessways having patted her +hair, emptied several handkerchiefs from the twin pockets of her +embroidered black apron, and, snatching at the clean handkerchief +furnished by Hilda, departed to her fate. She was certainly startled and +puzzled, but she was not a whit intimidated, and the perception of this +fact inspired Hilda with a new, reluctant respect for her mother. + +Hilda, from the kitchen, heard the greetings in the drawing-room, and +then the reverberations of the sufferer's nose. She desired to go into +the drawing-room. Her mother probably expected her to go in. But she +dared not. She was afraid. + +"I was wondering," said the voice of Mr. Cannon, "whether you've ever +thought of selling your Calder Street property, Mrs. Lessways." And then +the drawing-room door was closed, and the ticking of the grandfather's +clock resumed possession of the lobby. + + + + +CHAPTER V +MRS. LESSWAYS' SHREWDNESS + + +I + +Waiting irresolute in the kitchen doorway, Hilda passed the most +thrillingly agreeable moments that destiny had ever vouchsafed to her. +She dwelt on the mysterious, attractive quality of Mr. Cannon's +voice,--she was sure that, though in speaking to her mother he was +softly persuasive, he had used to herself a tone even more intimate and +ingratiating. He and she had a secret; they were conspirators together: +which fact was both disconcerting and delicious. She recalled their +propinquity in the lobby; the remembered syllables which he had uttered +mingled with the faint scent of his broadcloth, the whiteness of his +wristbands, the gleam of his studs, the droop of his moustaches, the +downward ray of his glance, and the proud, nimble carriage of his great +limbs,--and formed in her mind the image of an ideal. An image regarded +not with any tenderness, but with naive admiration, and unquestioning +respect! And yet also with more than that, for when she dwelt on his +glance, she had a slight transient feeling of faintness which came and +went in a second, and which she did not analyse--and could not have +analysed. + +Clouds of fear sailed in swift capriciousness across the sky of her +dreaming, obscuring it: fear of Mr. Cannon's breath-taking initiative, +fear of the upshot of her adventure, and a fear without a name. +Nevertheless she exulted. She exulted because she was in the very midst +of her wondrous adventure and tingling with a thousand apprehensions. + +After a long time the latch of the drawing-room door cracked warningly. +Hilda retired within the kitchen out of sight of the lobby. She knew +that the child in her would compel her to wait like a child until the +visitor was gone, instead of issuing forth boldly like a young woman. +But to Florrie the young mistress with her stern dark mask and +formidable eyebrows and air of superb disdain was as august as a +goddess. Florrie, moving backwards, had now got nearly to the scullery +door with her wringing and splashing and wiping; and she had dirtied +even her face. As Hilda absently looked at her, she thought somehow of +Mr. Cannon's white wristbands. She saw the washing and the ironing of +those wristbands, and a slatternly woman or two sighing and grumbling +amid wreaths of steam, and a background of cinders and suds and +sloppiness.... All that, so that the grand creature might have a rim of +pure white to his coat-sleeves for a day! It was inevitable. But the +grand creature must never know. The shame necessary to his splendour +must be concealed from him, lest he might be offended. And this was +woman's loyalty! Her ideas concerning the business of domesticity were +now mixed and opposing and irreconcileable, and she began to suspect +that the bases of society might be more complex and confusing than in +her youthful downrightness she had imagined. + + +II + +"Well, you've got your way!" said Mrs. Lessways, with a certain grim, +disdainful cheerfulness, from which benevolence was not quite absent. +The drastic treatment accorded to her cold seemed to have done it good. +At any rate she had not resumed the flannel petticoat, and the nasal +symptoms were much less pronounced. + +"Got my way?" Hilda repeated, at a loss and newly apprehensive. + +Mother and daughter were setting tea. Florrie had been doing very well, +but she was not yet quite equal to her situation, and the mistresses +were now performing her lighter duties while she changed from the +offensive drudge to the neat parlour-maid. Throughout the afternoon +Hilda had avoided her mother's sight; partly because she wanted to be +alone (without knowing why), and partly because she was afraid lest Mr. +Cannon, as a member of the older generation, might have betrayed her to +her mother. This fear was not very genuine, though she pretended that it +was and enjoyed playing with it: as if she really desired a catastrophe +for the outcome of her adventure. She had only come downstairs in +response to her mother's direct summons, and instantly on seeing her she +had known that Mr. Cannon was not a traitor. Which knowledge somehow +rendered her gay in spite of herself. So that, what with this gaiety, +and the stimulation produced in Mrs. Lessways by the visit of Mr. +Cannon, and the general household relief at the obvious fact that +Florrie would rather more than 'do,' the atmosphere around the tinkling +tea-table in the half-light was decidedly pleasant. + +Nevertheless the singular turn of Mrs. Lessways' phrase,--"You've got +your way,"--had startled the guilty Hilda. + +"Mr. Cannon's going to see to the collecting of the Calder Street +rents," explained Mrs. Lessways. "So I hope you're satisfied, miss." + +Hilda was aware of self-consciousness. + +"Yes, you may well colour up!" Mrs. Lessways pursued, genial but +malicious. "You're as pleased as Punch, and you're saying to yourself +you've made your old mother give way to ye again! And so you needn't +tell me!" + +"I thought," said Hilda, with all possible prim worldliness,--"I thought +I heard him saying something about buying the property?" + +Mrs. Lessways laughed, sceptically, confidently, as one who could not be +deceived. "Pooh!" she said. "That was only a try-on. That was only so +that he could begin his palaver! Don't tell me! I may be a simpleton, +but I'm not such a simpleton as he thinks for, nor as some other folks +think for, either!" (At this point Hilda had to admit that in truth her +mother was not completely a simpleton. In her mother was a vein of +perceptive shrewdness that occasionally cropped out and made all Hilda's +critical philosophy seem school-girlish.) "Do you think I don't know +George Cannon? He came here o' purpose to get that rent-collecting. +Well, he's got it, and he's welcome to it, for I doubt not he'll do it a +sight better than poor Mr. Skellorn! But he needn't hug himself that +he's been too clever for me, because he hasn't. I gave him the +rent-collecting because I thought I would!... Buy! He's no more got a +good customer for Calder Street than he's got a good customer for this +slop-bowl!" + +Hilda resented this casual detraction of a being who had so deeply +impressed her. And moreover she was convinced that her mother, secretly +very flattered and delighted by the visit, was adopting a derisive +attitude in order to 'show off' before her daughter. Parents are thus +ingenuous! But she was so shocked and sneaped that she found it more +convenient to say nothing. + +"George Cannon could talk the hind leg off a horse," Mrs. Lessways +continued quite happily. "And yet it isn't as if he said a great deal. +He doesn't. I'll say this for him. He's always the gentleman. And I +couldn't say as much for his sister being a lady, and I'm sorry for it. +He's the most gentlemanly man in Turnhill, and always so spruce, too!" + +"His sister?" + +"Well, his half-sister, since you're so particular, Miss Precise!" + +"Not Miss Gailey?" said Hilda, who began faintly to recall a forgotten +fact of which she thought she had once been cognizant. + +"Yes, Miss Gailey," Mrs. Lessways snapped, still very genial and +content. "I did hear she's quarrelled out and out with _him_, too, at +last!" She tightened her lips. "Draw the blind down." + +Miss Gailey, a spinster of superior breeding and a teacher of dancing, +had in the distant past been an intimate friend of Mrs. Lessways. The +friendship was legendary in the house, and the grand quarrel which had +finally put an end to it dated in Hilda's early memories like a +historical event. For many years the two had not exchanged a word. + +Mrs. Lessways lit the gas, and the china and the white cloth and the +coloured fruit-jelly and the silver spoons caught the light and threw it +off again, with gaiety. + +"Has she swept the hearth? Yes, she has," said Mrs. Lessways, glancing +round at the red fire. + +Hilda sat down to wait, folding her hands as it were in meekness. In a +few moments Florrie entered with the teapot and the hot-water jug. The +child wore proudly a new white apron that was a little too long for her, +and she smiled happily at Mrs. Lessways' brief compliment on her +appearance and her briskness. She might have been in paradise. + +"Come in for your cup in three minutes," said Mrs. Lessways; and to +Hilda when Florrie had whispered and gone: "Now we shall see if she can +make tea. I told her very particularly this morning, and she seems quick +enough." + +And when three minutes had expired Mrs. Lessways tasted the tea. Yes, it +was good. It was quite good. Undeniably the water had boiled within five +seconds of being poured on the leaves. There was something _in_ this +Florrie. Already she was exhibiting the mysterious quality of +efficiency. The first day, being the first day, had of course not been +without its discouraging moments, but on the whole Florrie had proved +that she could be trusted to understand, and to do things. + +"Here's an extra piece of sugar for you," said Mrs. Lessways, beaming, +as Florrie left the parlour with her big breakfast-cup full of steaming +tea, to drink with the thick bread-and-butter on the scrubbed kitchen- +table, all by herself. "And don't touch the gas in the kitchen--it's +quite high enough for young eyes," Mrs. Lessways cried out after her. + +"Little poppet!" she murmured to herself, maternally reflecting upon +Florence's tender youth. + + +III + +She was happy, was Mrs. Lessways, in her domesticity. She foresaw an +immediate future that would be tranquil. She was preparing herself to +lean upon the reliability of Florrie as upon a cushion. She liked the +little poppet. And she liked well-made tea and pure jelly. And she had +settled the Calder Street problem; and incidentally Hilda was thereby +placated. Why should she not be happy? She wished for nothing else. And +she was not a woman to meet trouble half-way. One of her greatest +qualities was that she did not unduly worry. (Hilda might say that she +did not worry enough, letting things go.) In spite of her cold, she +yielded with more gusto than usual to the meal, and even said that if +Florrie 'continued to shape' they would have hot toast again. Hot toast +had long since been dropped from the menu, as an item too troublesome. +As a rule the meals were taken hurriedly and negligently, like a +religious formality which has lost its meaning but which custom insists +on. + +Hilda could not but share her mother's satisfaction. She could not +entirely escape the soft influence of the tranquillity in which the +household was newly bathed. The domestic existence of unmated women +together, though it is full of secret exasperations, also has its hours +of charm--a charm honied, perverse, and unique. Hilda felt the charm. +But she was suddenly sad, and she again found pleasure in her sadness. +She was sad because her adventure was over--over too soon and too +easily. She thought, now, that really she would have preferred a +catastrophe as the end of it. She had got what she desired; but she was +no better off than she had been before the paralytic stroke of Mr. +Skellorn. Domesticity had closed in on her once more. Her secret +adventure had become sterile. Its risks were destroyed, and nothing +could spring from it. Nevertheless it lived in her heart. After all it +had been tremendous! And the virtue of audacious initiative was +miraculous!... Yes, her mother was shrewd enough--that could not be +denied--but she was not so shrewd as she imagined; for it had never +occurred to her, and it never would occur to her, even in the absurdest +dream--that the author of Mr. Cannon's visit was the girl sitting +opposite to her and delicately pecking at jelly! + +"How is he Miss Gailey's half-brother?" Hilda demanded half-way through +the meal. + +"Why! Mrs. Gailey--Sarah Gailey's mother, that is--married a foreigner +after her first husband died." + +"But Mr. Cannon isn't a foreigner?" + +"He's half a foreigner. Look at his eyes. Surely you knew all about +that, child!... No, it was before your time." + +Hilda then learnt that Mrs. Gailey had married a French modeller named +Canonges, who had been brought over from Limoges (or some such sounding +place) by Peels at Bursley, the great rivals of Mintons and of +Copelands. And that in course of time the modeller had informally +changed the name to Cannon, because no one in the Five Towns could +pronounce the true name rightly. And that George Cannon, the son of the +union, had been left early an orphan. + +"How did he come to be a solicitor?" Hilda questioned eagerly. + +"They say he isn't really a solicitor," said Mrs. Lessways. "That is, he +hasn't passed his examinations like. But I dare say he knows as much law +as a lot of 'em, _and_ more! And he has that Mr. Karkeek to cover him +like. That's what they _say_.... He used to be a lawyer's clerk--at Toms +and Scoles's, I think it was. Then he left the district for a year or +two--or it might be several. And then his lordship comes back all of a +sudden, and sets up with Mr. Karkeek, just like that." + +"Can he talk French?" + +"Who? Mr. Cannon? He can talk _English_! My word, he can that! Eh, he's +a 'customer,' he is--a regular' customer'!" + +Hilda, instead of being seated at the table, was away in far realms of +romance. + +The startling thought occurred to her: + +"Of course, he'll expect me to go and see him! He's done what I asked +him, and he'll expect me to go and see him and talk it over. And I +suppose I shall have to pay him something. I'd forgotten that, and I +ought not to have forgotten it." + + + + +CHAPTER VI +VICTOR HUGO AND ISAAC PITMAN + + +I + +The next morning, Saturday, Hilda ran no risk in visiting Mr. Cannon. +Her mother's cold, after a fictitious improvement, had assumed an +aggravated form in order to prove that not with impunity may nature be +flouted in unheated October drawing-rooms; and Hilda had been requested +to go to market alone. She was free. And even supposing that the visit +should be observed by the curious, nobody would attach any importance to +it, because everybody would soon be aware that Mr. Cannon had assumed +charge of the Calder Street property. + +Past the brass plates of Mr. Q. Karkeek, out of the straw-littered +hubbub of the market-place, she climbed the long flight of stairs +leading to the offices on the first floor. In one worsted-gloved hand +she held a market-basket of multi-coloured wicker, which dangled a +little below the frilled and flounced edge of her blue jacket. Secure in +the pocket of her valanced brown skirt--for at that time and in that +place it had not yet occurred to any woman that pockets were a +superfluity--a private half-sovereign lay in the inmost compartment of +her purse; this coin was destined to recompense Mr. Cannon. Her free +hand went up to the heavy chignon that hung uncertainly beneath her +bonnet--a gesture of coquetry which she told herself she despised. + +Her face was a prim and rather forbidding mask, assuredly a mysterious +mask. She could not have explained her own feelings. She was still in +the adventure, but the end of it was immediate. She had nothing to hope +from the future. Her essential infelicity was as profound and as +enigmatic as ever. She might have said with deliberate and vehement +sincerity that she was not happy. Wise, experienced observers, studying +her as she walked her ways in the streets, might have said of her with +sympathetically sad conviction, "That girl is not happy! What a pity!" +It was so. And yet, in her unhappiness she was blest. She savoured her +unhappiness. She drank it down passionately, as though it were the very +water of life--which it was. She lived to the utmost in every moment. +The recondite romance of existence was not hidden from her. The sudden +creation--her creation--of the link with Mr. Cannon seemed to her +surpassingly strange and romantic; and in so regarding it she had no +ulterior thought whatever: she looked on it with the single-mindedness +of an artist looking on his work. And was it not indeed astounding that +by a swift caprice and stroke of audacity she should have changed and +tranquillized the ominous future for her unsuspecting mother and +herself? Was it not absolutely disconcerting that she and this Mr. +Cannon, whom she had never known before and in whom she had no other +interest, should bear between them this singular secret, at once +innocent and guilty, in the midst of the whole town so deaf and blind? + + +II + +A somewhat shabby-genteel, youngish man appeared at the head of the +stairs; he was wearing a silk hat and a too ample frock-coat. And +immediately, from the hidden corridor at the top, she heard the voice of +Mr. Cannon, imperious: + +"Karkeek!" + +The shabby-genteel man stopped. Hilda wanted to escape, but she could +not, chiefly because her pride would not allow. She had to go on. She +went on, frowning. + +The man vanished back into the corridor. She could hear that Mr. Cannon +had joined him in conversation. She arrived at the corridor. + +"How-d'ye-do, Miss Lessways?" Mr. Cannon greeted her with calm +politeness, turning from Mr. Karkeek, who raised his hat. "Will you come +this way? One moment, Mr. Karkeek." + +Through a door marked "Private" Mr. Cannon introduced Hilda straight +into his own room; then shut the door on her. He held in one hand a +large calf-bound volume, from which evidently he was expounding +something to Mr. Karkeek. The contrast between the expensive informality +of Mr. Cannon's new suit and the battered ceremoniousness of Mr. +Karkeek's struck her just as much as the contrast between their +demeanours; and she felt, vaguely, the oddness of the fact that the name +of the deferential Mr. Karkeek, and not the name of the commanding Mr. +Cannon, should be upon the door-plates and the wire-blinds of the +establishment. But of course she was not in a position to estimate the +full significance of this remarkable phenomenon. Further, though she +perfectly remembered her mother's observations upon Mr. Cannon's status, +they did not in the slightest degree damage him in her eyes--when once +those eyes had been set on him again. They seemed to her inessential. +The essential, for her, was the incontestable natural authority and +dignity of his bearing. + +She sat down, self-consciously, in the chair--opposite the owner's +chair--which she had occupied at her first visit, and thus surveyed, +across the large flat desk, all the ranged documents and bundles with +the writing thereon upside down. There also was his blotting-pad, and +his vast inkstand, and his pens, and his thick diary. The disposition of +the things on the desk seemed to indicate, sharply and incontrovertibly, +that orderliness, that inexorable efficiency, which more than aught else +she admired in the external conduct of life. The spectacle satisfied +her, soothed her, and seemed to explain the attractiveness of Mr. +Cannon. + +Immediately to her left was an open bookcase almost filled with heavy +volumes. The last of a uniform row of Law Reports was absent from its +place--being at that moment in the corridor, in the hands of Mr. Cannon. +The next book, a thin one, had toppled over sideways and was bridging +the vacancy at an angle; several other similar thin books filled up the +remainder of the shelf. She stared, with the factitious interest of one +who is very nervously awaiting an encounter, at the titles, and +presently deciphered the words, 'Victor Hugo,' on each of the thin +volumes. Her interest instantly became real. Characteristically abrupt +and unreflecting, she deposited her basket on the floor and, going to +the bookcase, took out the slanting volume. Its title was _Les Rayons et +Les Ombres_. She opened it by hazard at the following poem, which had no +heading and which stood, a small triptych of print, rather solitary in +the lower half of a large white page: + + Dieu qui sourit et qui donne + Et qui vient vers qui l'attend + Pourvu que vous soyez bonne, + Sera content. + Le monde ou tout etincelle, + Mais ou rien n'est enflamme, + Pourvu que vous soyez belle, + Sera charme. + Mon coeur, dans l'ombre amoureuse, + Ou l'enivrent deux beaux yeux, + Pourvu que tu sois heureuse, + Sera joyeux. + +That was all. But she shook as though a miracle had been enacted. Hilda, +owing partly to the fondness of an otherwise stern grandfather and +partly to the vanity of her unimportant father, had finally been sent to +a school attended by girls who on the average were a little above +herself in station--Chetwynd's, in the valley between Turnhill and +Bursley. (It was still called Chetwynd's though it had changed hands.) +Among the staff was a mistress who was known as Miss Miranda--she seemed +to have no surname. One of Miss Miranda's duties had been to teach +optional French, and one of Miss Miranda's delights had been to dictate +this very poem of Victor Hugo's to her pupils for learning by heart. It +was Miss Miranda's sole French poem, and she imposed it with unfading +delight on the successive generations whom she 'grounded' in French. +Hilda had apparently forgotten most of her French, but as she now read +the poem (for the first time in print), it re-established itself in her +memory as the most lovely verse that she had ever known, and the +recitations of it in Miss Miranda's small classroom came back to her +with an effect beautiful and tragic. And also there was the name of +Victor Hugo, which Miss Miranda's insistent enthusiasm had rendered +sublime and legendary to a sensitive child! Hilda now saw the sacred +name stamped in gold on a whole set of elegant volumes! It was +marvellous that she should have turned the page containing just that +poem! It was equally marvellous that she should have discovered the +works of Victor Hugo in the matter-of-fact office of Mr. Cannon! But was +it? Was he not half-French, and were not these books precisely a +corroboration of what her mother had told her? Mr. Cannon's origin at +once assumed for her the strange seductive hues of romance; he shared +the glory of Victor Hugo. Then the voices in the corridor ceased, and +with a decisive movement he unlatched the door. She relinquished the +book and calmly sat down as he entered. + + +III + +"Of course, your mother's told you?" + +"Yes." + +"I had no difficulty at all. I just asked her what she was going to do +about the rent-collecting." + +Standing up in front of Hilda, but on his own side of the desk, Mr. +Cannon smiled as a conqueror who can recount a triumph with pride, but +without conceit. She looked at him with naive admiration. To admire him +was agreeable to her; and she liked also to feel unimportant in his +presence. But she fought, unsuccessfully, against the humiliating idea +that his personal smartness convicted her of being shabby--of being even +inefficient in one department of her existence; and she could have +wished to be magnificently dressed. + +"Mrs. Lessways is a very shrewd lady--very shrewd indeed!" said Mr. +Cannon, with a smile, this time, to indicate humorously that Mrs. +Lessways was not so easy to handle as might be imagined, and that even +the cleverest must mind their p's and q's with such a lady. + +"Oh yes, she _is_!" Hilda agreed, with an exaggerated emphasis that +showed a lack of conviction. Indeed, she had never thought of her mother +as a _very_ shrewd lady. + +Mr. Cannon continued to smile in silence upon the shrewdness of Mrs. +Lessways, giving little appreciative movements of the diaphragm, drawing +in his lips and by consequence pushing out his cheeks like a child's; +and his eyes were all the time saying lightly: "Still, I managed her!" +And while this pleasant intimate silence persisted, the noises of the +market-place made themselves prominent, quite agreeably--in particular +the hard metallic stamping and slipping, on the bricked pavement under +the window, of a team of cart-horses that were being turned in a space +too small for their grand, free movements, and the good-humoured +cracking of a whip. Again Hilda was impressed, mystically, by the +strangeness of the secret relation between herself and this splendid +effective man. There they were, safe within the room, almost on a +footing of familiar friendship! The atmosphere was different from that +of the first interview. And none knew! And she alone had brought it all +about by a simple caprice! + +"I was fine and startled when I saw you at our door, Mr. Cannon!" she +said. + +He might have said, "Were you? You didn't show it." She was half +expecting him to say some such thing. But he became reflective, and +began: "Well, you see--" and then hesitated. + +"You didn't tell me you thought of calling." + +"Well," he proceeded at last--and she could not be sure whether he was +replying to her or not--"I was pretty nearly ready to buy that Calder +Street property. And I thought I'd talk _that_ over with your mother +first! It just happened to make a good beginning, you see." He spoke +with all the flattering charm of the confidential. + +Hilda flushed. Under her mother's suggestion, she had been misjudging +him. He had not been guilty of mere scheming. She was profoundly glad. +The act of apology to him, performed in her own mind, gave her a curious +delight. + +"I wish she would sell," said Hilda, to whom the ownership of a slum was +obnoxious. + +"Very soon your consent would be necessary to any sale." + +"Really!" she exclaimed, agreeably flattered, but scarcely surprised by +this information. "I should consent quick enough! I can't bear to walk +down the street!" + +He laughed condescendingly. "Well, I don't think your mother _would_ +care to sell, if you ask me." He sat down. + +Hilda frowned, regretting her confession and resenting his laughter. + +"What will your charges be, please, Mr. Cannon?" she demanded abruptly, +and yet girlishly timid. And at the same moment she drew forth her +purse, which she had been holding ready in her hand. + +For a second he thought she was referring to the price of +rent-collecting, but the appearance of the purse explained her meaning. +"Oh! There's no charge!" he said, in a low voice, seizing a penholder. + +"But I must pay you something! I can't--" + +"No, you mustn't!" + +Their glances met in conflict across the table. She had known that he +would say exactly that. And she had been determined to insist on paying +a fee--utterly determined! But she could not, now, withstand the force +of his will. Her glance failed her. She was disconcerted by the sudden +demonstration of her inferiority. She was distressed. And then a feeling +of faintness, and the gathering of a mist in the air, positively +frightened her. The mist cleared. His glance seemed to say, with +kindness: "You see how much stronger I am than you! But you can trust +me!" The sense of adventure grew even more acute in her. She marvelled +at what life was, and hid the purse like a shame. + +"It's very kind of you," she murmured. + +"Not a bit!" he said. "I've got a job through this. Don't forget that. +We don't collect rents for nothing, you know--especially Calder Street +sort of rents!" + +She picked up her basket and rose. He also rose. + +"So you've been looking at my Victor Hugo," he remarked, putting his +right hand negligently into his pocket instead of holding it forth in +adieu. + + +IV + +So overset was she by the dramatic surprise of his challenging remark, +and so enlightened by the sudden perception of it being perfectly +characteristic of him, that her manner changed in an instant to a +delicate, startled timidity. All the complex sensitiveness of her nature +was expressed simultaneously in the changing tints of her face, the +confusion of her eyes and her gestures, and the exquisite hesitations of +her voice as she told him about the coincidence which had brought back +to her in his office the poem of her schooldays. + +He came to the bookcase and, taking out the volume, handled it +carelessly. + +"I only brought these things here because they're nicely bound and fill +up the shelf," he said. "Not much use in a lawyer's office, you know!" +He glanced from the volume to her, and from her to the volume. "Ah! Miss +Miranda! Yes! Well! It isn't so wonderful as all that. My father used to +give her lessons in French. This Hugo was his. He thought a great deal +of it." Mr. Cannon's pose exhibited pride, but it was obvious that he +did not share his father's taste. His tone rather patronized his father, +and Hugo too. As he let the pages of the book slip by under his thumb, +he stopped, and with a very good French accent, quite different from +Hilda's memory of Miss Miranda's, murmured in a sort of chanting--"_Dieu +qui sourit et qui donne_." + +"That's the very one!" cried Hilda. + +"Ah! There you are then! You see--the bookmark was at that page." Hilda +had not noticed the thin ribbon almost concealed in the jointure of the +pages. "I wouldn't be a bit astonished if my father had lent her this +very book! Curious, isn't it?" + +It was. Nevertheless, Hilda felt that his sense of the miraculousness of +life was not so keen as her own; and she was disappointed. + +"I suppose you're very fond of reading?" he said. + +"No, I'm not," she replied. Her spirit lifted a little courageously, to +meet his with defiance, like a ship lifting its prow above the +threatening billow. Her eyes wavered, but did not fall before his. + +"Really! Now, I should have said you were a great reader. What do you do +with yourself?" He now spoke like a brother, confident of a trustful +response. + +"I just waste my time," she answered coldly. She saw that he was +puzzled, interested, and piqued, and that he was examining her quite +afresh. + +"Well," he said shortly, after a pause, adopting the benevolent tone of +an uncle or even a great-uncle, "you'll be getting married one of these +days." + +"I don't want to get married," she retorted obstinately, and with a +harder glance. + +"Then what do you want?" + +"I don't know." She discovered great relief, even pleasure, in thus +callously exposing her mind to a stranger. + +Tapping his teeth with one thumb, he gazed at her, apparently in +meditation upon her peculiar case. At last he said: + +"I tell you what you ought to do. You ought to go in for phonography." + +"Phonography?" She was at a loss. + +"Yes; Pitman's shorthand, you know." + +"Oh! shorthand--yes. I've heard of it. But why?" + +"Why? It's going to be the great thing of the future. There never was +anything like it!" His voice grew warm and his glance scintillated. And +now Hilda understood her mother's account of his persuasiveness; she +felt the truth of that odd remark that he could talk the hind leg off a +horse. + +"But does it lead to anything?" she inquired, with her strong sense of +intrinsic values. + +"I should say it did!" he answered. "It leads to everything! There's +nothing it won't lead to! It's the key of the future. You'll see. Look +at Dayson. He's taken it up, and now he's giving lessons in it. He's got +a room over his aunt's. I can tell you he staggered me. He wrote in +shorthand as fast as ever I could read to him, and then he read out what +he'd written, without a single slip. I'm having one of my chaps taught. +I'm paying for the lessons. I thought of learning myself--yes, really! +Oh! It's a thing that'll revolutionize all business and secretarial work +and so on--revolutionize it! And it's spreading. It'll be the Open +Sesame to everything. Anybody that can write a hundred and twenty words +a minute'll be able to walk into any situation he wants--straight _into_ +it! There's never been anything like it. Look! Here it is!" + +He snatched up a pale-green booklet from the desk and opened it before +her. She saw the cryptic characters for the first time. And she saw them +with his glowing eyes. In their mysterious strokes and curves and dots +she saw romance, and the key of the future; she saw the philosopher's +stone. She saw a new religion that had already begun to work like leaven +in the town. The revelation was deliciously intoxicating. She was +converted, as by lightning. She yielded to the ecstasy of discipleship. +Here--somehow, inexplicably, incomprehensively--here was the answer to +the enigma of her long desire. And it was an answer original, strange, +distinguished, unexpected, unique; yes, and divine! How lovely, how +beatific, to be the master of this enchanted key! + +"It must be very interesting!" she said, low, with the venturesome +shyness of a deer that is reassured. + +"I don't mind telling you this," Mr. Cannon went on, with the fire of +the prophet. "I've got something coming along pretty soon"--he repeated +more slowly--"I've got something coming along pretty soon, where +there'll be scope for a young lady that can write shorthand _well_. I +can't tell you what it is, but it's something different from anything +there's ever been in this town; _and_ better." + +His eyes masterfully held hers, seeming to say: "I'm vague. But I was +vague when I told you I'd see what could be done about your mother--and +look at what I did, and how quickly and easily I did it! When I'm vague, +it means a lot." And she entirely understood that his vagueness was +calculated--out of pride. + +They talked about Mr. Dayson a little. + +"I must go now," said Hilda awkwardly. + +"I'd like you to take that Hugo," he said. "I dare say it would interest +you.... Remind you of old times." + +"Oh no!" + +"You can return it, when you like." + +Her features became apologetic. She had too hastily assumed that he +wished to force a gift on her. + +"Please!" he ejaculated. No abuse this time of moral authority! But an +appeal, boyish, wistful, supplicating. It was irresistible, completely +irresistible. It gave her an extraordinary sense of personal power. + +He wrapped up the book for her in a sheet of blue "draft" paper that +noisily crackled. While he was doing so, a tiny part of her brain was, +as it were, automatically exploring a box of old books in the attic at +home and searching therein for a Gasc's French-English Dictionary which +she had used at school and never thought of since. + +"My compliments to your mother," he said at parting. + +She gazed at him questioningly. + +"Oh! I was forgetting," he corrected himself, with an avuncular, ironic +smile. "You're not supposed to have seen me, are you?" + +Then she was outside in the din; and from thrilling altitudes she had to +bring her mind to marketing. She hid under apples the flat blue parcel +in the basket. + + + + +CHAPTER VII +THE EDITORIAL SECRETARY + + +I + +Arthur Dayson, though a very good shorthand writer, and not without +experience as a newspaper reporter and sub-editor, was a nincompoop. +There could be no other explanation of his bland, complacent +indifference as he sat poking at a coke stove one cold night of January, +1880, in full view of a most marvellous and ravishing spectacle. The +stove was in a room on the floor above the offices labelled as Mr. Q. +Karkeek's; its pipe, supported by wire stays, went straight up nearly to +the grimy ceiling, and then turned horizontally and disappeared through +a clumsy hole in the scorched wall. It was a shabby stove, but not more +so than the other few articles of furniture--a large table, a small +desk, three deteriorated cane-chairs, two gas brackets, and an old +copying-press on its rickety stand. The sole object that could emerge +brightly from the ordeal of the gas-flare was a splendid freshly printed +blue poster gummed with stamp-paper to the wall: which poster bore the +words, in vast capitals of two sizes: "_The Five Towns Chronicle and +Turnhill Guardian_." Copies of this poster had also been fixed, face +outwards, on the two curtainless black windows, to announce to the +Market Square what was afoot in the top storey over the ironmonger's. + +A young woman, very soberly attired, was straining at the double +iron-handles of the copying-press. Some copying-presses have a screw so +accurately turned and so well oiled, and handles so massively like a +fly-wheel, that a touch will send the handles whizzing round and round +till they stop suddenly, and then one slight wrench more, and the +letters are duly copied! But this was not such a press. It had been +outworn in Mr. Karkeek's office; rust had intensified its original +defects of design, and it produced the minimum of result with the +maximum of means. Nevertheless, the young woman loved it. She clenched +her hands and her teeth, and she frowned, as though she loved it. And +when she had sufficiently crushed the letter-book in the press, she +lovingly unscrewed and drew forth the book; and with solicitude she +opened the book on the smaller table, and tenderly detached the +blotting-paper from the damp tissue paper, and at last extracted the +copied letter and examined its surface. + +"Smudged!" she murmured, tragic. + +And the excellent ass Dayson, always facetiously cheerful, and without a +grain of humour, remarked: + +"Copiousness with the H2O, Miss Lessways, is the father of smudged +epistles. I'm ready to go through these proofs with you as soon as you +are." + +He was over thirty. He had had affairs with young women. He reckoned +that there remained little for him to learn. He had deliberately watched +this young woman at the press. He had clearly seen her staring under the +gas-jet at the copied letter. And yet in her fierce muscular movements, +and in her bendings and straightenings, and in her delicate caressings, +and in her savage scowlings and wrinklings, and in her rapt gazings, and +in all her awful absorption, he had quite failed to perceive the +terrible eager outpouring of a human soul, mighty, passionate, and +wistful. He had kept his eyes on her slim bust and tight-girded waist +that sprung suddenly neat and smooth out of the curving skirt-folds, and +it had not occurred to him to exclaim even in his own heart: "With your +girlishness and your ferocity, your intimidating seriousness and your +delicious absurdity, I would give a week's wages just to take hold of +you and shake you!" No! The dolt had seen absolutely naught but a +conscientious female beginner learning the duties of the post which he +himself had baptized as that of 'editorial secretary.' + + +II + +Hilda was no longer in a nameless trouble. She no longer wanted she knew +not what. She knew beyond all questioning that she had found that which +she had wanted. For nearly a year she had had lessons in phonography +from Miss Dayson's nephew, often as a member of a varying night-class, +and sometimes alone during the day. She could not write shorthand as +well as Mr. Dayson, and she never would, for Mr. Dayson had the +shorthand soul; but, as the result of sustained and terrific effort, she +could write it pretty well. She had grappled with Isaac Pitman as with +Apollyon and had not been worsted. She could scarcely believe that in +class she had taken down at the rate of ninety words a minute Mr. +Dayson's purposely difficult political speechifyings (which always +contained the phrase 'capital punishment,' because 'capital punishment' +was a famous grammalogue); but it was so, Mr. Dayson's watch proved it. + +About half-way through the period of study, she had learnt from Mr. +Cannon, on one of his rare visits to her mother's, something about his +long-matured scheme for a new local paper. She had at once divined that +he meant to offer her some kind of a situation in the enterprise, and +she was right. Gratitude filled her. Mrs. Lessways, being one of your +happy-go-lucky, broad-minded women, with an experimental disposition--a +disposition to let things alone and see how they will turn out--had made +little objection, though she was not encouraging. + +Instantly the newspaper had become the chief article of Hilda's faith. +She accepted the idea of it as a nun accepts the sacred wafer, in +ecstasy. Yet she knew little about it. She was aware that Mr. Cannon +meant to establish it first as a weekly, and then, when it had grown, to +transform it into a daily and wage war with that powerful monopolist, +_The Staffordshire Signal_, which from its offices at Hanbridge covered +the entire district. The original title had been _The Turnhill Guardian +and Five Towns General Chronicle,_ and she had approved it; but when Mr. +Cannon, with a view to the intended development, had inverted the title +to _The Five Towns Chronicle and Turnhill Guardian_, she had +enthusiastically applauded his deep wisdom. Also she had applauded his +project of moving, later on, to Hanbridge, the natural centre of the +Five Towns. This was nearly the limit of her knowledge. She neither knew +nor cared anything about the resources or the politics or the programme +or the prospects of the paper. To her all newspapers were much alike. +She did not even explore, in meditation, the extraordinary psychology of +Mr. Cannon--the man whose original energy and restless love of +initiative was leading him to found a newspaper on the top of a +successful but audaciously irregular practice as a lawyer. She +incuriously and with religious admiration accepted Mr. Cannon as she +accepted the idea of the paper. And being, of course, entirely ignorant +of journalism, she was not in a position to criticize the organizing +arrangements of the newspaper. Not that these would have seemed +excessively peculiar to anybody familiar with the haphazard +improvisations of minor journalism in the provinces! She had indeed, in +her innocence, imagined that the basic fact of a newspaper enterprise +would be a printing-press; but when Mr. Dayson, who had been on _The +Signal_ and on sundry country papers in Shropshire, assured her that the +majority of weekly sheets were printed on jobbing presses in private +hands, she corrected her foolish notion. + +Her sole interest--but it was tremendous!--lay in what she herself had +to do--namely, take down from dictation, transcribe, copy, classify, and +keep letters and documents, and occasionally correct proofs. All beyond +this was misty for her, and she never adjusted her sight in order to +pierce the mist. + +Save for her desire to perfect herself in her duties, she had no desire. +She was content. In the dismal, dirty, untidy, untidiable, uncomfortable +office, arctic near the windows, and tropic near the stove, with dust on +her dress and ink on her fingers and the fumes of gas in her quivering +nostrils, and her mind strained and racked by an exaggerated sense of +her responsibilities, she was in heaven! She who so vehemently objected +to the squalid mess of the business of domesticity, revelled in the +squalid mess of this business. She whose heart would revolt because +Florrie's work was never done, was delighted to wait all hours on the +convenience of men who seemed to be the very incarnation of incalculable +change and caprice. And what was she? Nothing but a clerk, at a +commencing salary of fifteen shillings per week! Ah! but she was a +priestess! She had a vocation which was unsoiled by the economic excuse. +She was a pioneer. No young woman had ever done what she was doing. She +was the only girl in the Five Towns who knew shorthand. And in a +fortnight (they said) the paper was to come out! + + +III + +At the large table which was laden with prodigious, heterogeneous masses +of paper and general litter, she bent over the proofs by Mr. Dayson's +side. He had one proof; she had a duplicate; the copy lay between them. +It was the rough galley of a circular to the burgesses that they were +correcting together. Reading and explaining aloud, he inscribed the +cabalistic signs of correction in the margin of his proof, and she +faithfully copied them in the margin of hers, for practice. + +"l.c.," he intoned. + +"What does that mean?" + +"Lower case," he explained grandiosely, in the naive vanity of his +knowledge. "Small letter; not a capital." + +"Thank you," she said, and, writing "l.c.," noted in her striving brain +that 'lower case' meant a small letter instead of a capital; but she +knew not why, and she did not ask; the reason did not trouble her. + +"I think we'll put 'enlightened' there, before 'public' Ring it, will +you?" + +"Ring it? Oh! I see!" + +"Yes, put a ring round the word in the margin. That's to show it isn't +the intelligent compositor's mistake, you see!" + +Then there was a familiar and masterful footstep on the stairs, and the +attention of both of them wavered. + + +IV + +Arthur Dayson and his proof-correcting lost all interest and all +importance for Hilda as Mr. Cannon came into the room. The unconscious, +expressive gesture, scornful and abrupt, with which she neglected them +might have been terribly wounding to a young man more sensitive than +Dayson. But Dayson, in his self-sufficient, good-natured mediocrity, had +the hide of an alligator. He even judged her movement quite natural, for +he was a flunkey born. Hilda gazed at her master with anxiety as he +deposited his black walking-stick in the corner behind the door and +loosed his white muffler and large overcoat (which Dayson called an +'immensikoff.') She thought the master looked tired and worried. +Supposing he fell ill at this supreme juncture! The whole enterprise +would be scotched, and not forty Daysons could keep it going! The master +was doing too much--law by day and journalism by night. They were +perhaps all doing too much, but the others did not matter. Nevertheless, +Mr. Cannon advanced to the table buoyant and faintly smiling, +straightening his shoulders back, proudly proving to himself and to them +that his individual force was inexhaustible. That straightening of the +shoulders always affected Hilda as something wistful, as almost pathetic +in its confident boyishness. It made her feel maternal and say to +herself (but not in words) with a sort of maternal superiority: "How +brave he is, poor thing!" Yes, in her heart she would apply the epithet +'poor thing' to this grand creature whose superiority she acknowledged +with more fervour than anybody. As for the undaunted straightening of +the shoulders, she adopted it, and after a time it grew to be a +characteristic gesture with her. + +"Well?" Mr. Cannon greeted them. + +"Well," said Arthur Dayson, with a factitious air of treating him as an +equal, "I've been round to Bennions and made it clear to him that if he +can't guarantee to run off a maximum of two thousand of an eight-page +sheet we shall have to try Clayhanger at Bursley, even if it's the last +minute." + +"What did he say?" + +"Grunted." + +"I shall risk two thousand, any way." + +"Paper delivered, governor?" Dayson asked in a low voice, leering +pawkily, as though to indicate that he was a man who could be trusted to +think of everything. + +"Will be to-morrow, I think," said Mr. Cannon. "Got that letter ready, +Miss Lessways?" + +Hilda sprang into life. + +"Yes," she said, handing it diffidently. "But if you'd like me to do it +again--you see it's--" + +"Plethora of H2O," Dayson put in, indulgent. + +"Oh no!" Mr. Cannon decided. Having read the letter, he gave it to +Dayson. "It doesn't matter, but you ought to have signed it before it +was copied in the letter-book." + +"Gemini! Miss!" murmured Dayson, glancing at Hilda with uplifted brows. + +The fact was that both of them had forgotten this formality. Dayson took +a pen, and after describing a few flourishes in the air, about a quarter +of an inch above the level of the paper, he magnificently signed: +"Dayson & Co." Such was the title of the proprietorship. Just as Karkeek +was Mr. Cannon's dummy in the law, so was Dayson in the newspaper +business. But whereas Karkeek was privately ashamed, Dayson was proud of +his role, which gave him the illusion of power and glory. + +"Just take this down, will you?" said Mr. Cannon. + +Hilda grasped at her notebook and seized a pencil, and then held herself +tense to receive the message, staring downwards at the blank page. +Dayson lolled in his chair, throwing his head back. He knew that the +presence of himself, the great shorthand expert, made Hilda nervous when +she had to write from dictation; and this flattered his simple vanity. +Hilda hated and condemned her nervousness, but she could not conquer it. + +Mr. Cannon, standing over the table, pushed his hat away from his broad, +shining forehead, and then, meditative, absently lifted higher his +carefully tended hand and lowered the singing gas-jet, only to raise it +again. + +"Mr. Ezra Brunt. Dear Sir, Re advertisement. With reference to your +letter replying to ours in which you inquire as to the circulation of +the above newspaper, we beg to state that it is our intention to print +four thousand of--" + +"Two thousand," Hilda interrupted confidently. + +Unruffled, Mr. Cannon went on politely: "No--four thousand of the first +number. Our representative would be pleased to call upon you by +appointment. Respectfully yours.--You might sign that, Dayson, and get +it off to-night. Is Sowter here?" + +For answer, Dayson jerked his head towards an inner door. Sowter was the +old clerk who had first received Hilda into the offices of Mr. Q. +Karkeek. He was earning a little extra money by clerical work at nights +in connection with the advertisement department of the new organ. + +Mr. Cannon marched to the inner door and opened it. Then he turned and +called: + +"Dayson--a moment." + +"Certainly," said Dayson, jumping up. He planted his hat doggishly at +the back of his head, stuck his hands into his pockets, and swaggered +after his employer. + +The inner door closed on the three men. Hilda, staring at the notebook, +blushing and nibbling at the pencil, was left alone under the gas. She +could feel her heart beating violently. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII +JANET ORGREAVE + + +I + +"Our friend is waiting for that letter to Brunt," said Arthur Dayson, +emerging from the inner room, a little later. + +"In one moment," Hilda replied coldly, though she had not begun to write +the letter. + +Dayson disappeared, nodding. + +She resented his referring to Mr. Cannon as 'our friend,' but she did +not know why, unless it was that she vaguely regarded it as +presumptuous, or, in the alternative, if he meant to be facetious, as +ill-bred, on the part of Arthur Dayson. She chose a sheet of paper, and +wrote the letter in longhand, as quickly as she could, but with arduous +care in the formation of every character; she wrote with the whole of +her faculties fully applied. Even in the smallest task she could not +economize herself; she had to give all or nothing. When she came to the +figures--4000--she intensified her ardour, lavishing enormous +unnecessary force: it was like a steamhammer cracking a nut. Her +conscience had instantly and finally decided against her. But she +ignored her conscience. She knew and owned that she was wrong to abet +Mr. Cannon's deception. And she abetted it. She would have abetted it if +she had believed that the act would involve her in everlasting +damnation,--not solely out of loyalty to Mr. Cannon; only a little out +of loyalty; chiefly out of mere unreasoning pride and obstinate +adherence to a decision. + +The letter finished, she took it into the inner room, where the three +men sat in mysterious conclave. Mr. Cannon read it over, and then Arthur +Dayson borrowed the old clerk's vile pen and with the ceremonious delays +due to his sense of his own importance, flourishingly added the +signature. + +When she came forth she heard a knock at the outer door. + +"Come in," she commanded defiantly, for she was still unconsciously in +the defiant mood in which she had offered the lying letter to Mr. +Cannon. + + +II + +A well-dressed, kind-featured, and almost beautiful young woman, of +about the same age as Hilda, opened the door, with a charming gesture of +diffidence. + +For a second the two gazed at each other astounded. + +"Well, Hilda, of all the--" + +"Janet!" + +It was an old schoolfellow, Janet Orgreave, daughter of Osmond Orgreave, +a successful architect at Bursley. Janet had passed part of her +schooldays at Chetwynd's; and with her brother Charlie she had also +attended Sarah Gailey's private dancing-class (famous throughout +Turnhill, Bursley, and Hanbridge) at the same time as Hilda. She was +known, she was almost notorious, as a universal favourite. By instinct, +without taking thought, she pleased everybody, great and small. Nature +had spoiled her, endowing her with some beauty, and undeniable elegance, +and abundant sincere kindliness. She had only to smile, and she made a +friend; it cost her nothing. She smiled now, and produced the illusion, +not merely in Hilda but in herself also, that her pleasure in this very +astonishing encounter was quite peculiarly poignant. + +They shook hands, as women of the world. + +"Did you know I was here?" Hilda questioned, characteristically on her +guard, with a nervous girlish movement of the leg that perhaps sinned +against the code of authentic worldliness. + +"No indeed!" exclaimed Janet. + +"Well, I am! I'm engaged here." + +"How splendid of you!" said Janet enthusiastically, with no suggestion +whatever in her tone that Hilda's situation was odd, or of dubious +propriety, or aught but enviable. + +But Hilda surveyed her with secret envy, transient yet real. In the +half-dozen years that had passed since the days of the dancing-class, +Janet had matured. She was now the finished product. She had the charm +of her sex, and she depended on it. She had grace and an overflowing +goodness. She had a smooth ease of manner. She was dignified. And, with +her furs, and her expensive veil protecting those bright apple-red +cheeks, and all the studied minor details of her costume, she was +admirably and luxuriously attired. She was the usual, as distinguished +from the unusual, woman, brought to perfection. She represented no +revolt against established custom. Doubts and longings did not beset +her. She was content within her sphere: a destined queen of the home. +And yet she could not be accused of being old-fashioned. None would dare +to despise her. She was what Hilda could never be, had never long +desired to be. She was what Hilda had definitely renounced being. And +there stood Hilda, immature, graceless, harsh, inelegant, dowdy, holding +the letter between her inky fingers, in the midst of all that hard +masculine mess,--and a part of it, the blindly devoted subaltern, who +could expect none of the ritual of homage given to women, who must sit +and work and stand and strain and say 'yes,' and pretend stiffly that +she was a sound, serviceable, thick-skinned imitation man among men! If +Hilda had been a valkyrie or a saint she might have felt no envy and no +pang. But she was a woman. Self-pity shot through her tremendous pride; +and the lancinating stab made her inattentive even to her curiosity +concerning the purpose of Janet's visit. + + +III + +"I came to see Mr. Cannon," said Janet. "The housekeeper downstairs told +me he was here somewhere." + +"He's engaged," answered Hilda in a low voice, with the devotee's +instinct to surround her superior with mystery. + +"Oh!" murmured Janet, checked. + +Hilda wondered furiously what she could be wanting with Mr. Cannon. + +Janet recommenced: "It's really about Miss Gailey, you know." + +"Yes--what?" + +Hilda nodded eagerly, speaking in a tone still lower and more careful. + +Janet dropped her voice accordingly: "She's Mr. Cannon's sister, of +course?" + +"Half-sister." + +"I mean. I've just come away from seeing her." She hesitated. "I only +heard by accident. So I came over with father. He had to come to a +meeting of the Guardians here, or something. They've quarrelled, haven't +they?" + +"Who? Miss Gailey and Mr. Cannon? Well, you see, she quarrels with every +one." Hilda appeared to defend Mr. Cannon. + +"I'm afraid she does, poor thing!" + +"She quarrelled with mother." + +"Really! when was that?" + +"Oh! Years and years ago! I don't know when. I was always surprised +mother let me go to the class." + +"It was very nice of your mother," said Janet, appreciative. + +"Is she in trouble?" Hilda asked bluntly. + +"I'm afraid she is." + +"What?" + +Janet suddenly gave a gesture of intimacy. "I believe she's starving!" + +"Starving!" Hilda repeated in a blank whisper. + +"Yes, I do! I do really believe she hasn't got enough to eat. She's +quarrelled with just about everybody there was to quarrel with. She +suffers fearfully with rheumatism. She never goes out--or scarcely +ever. You know her dancing-classes have all fallen away to nothing. I +fancy she tried taking lodgers--" + +"Yes, she did. I understood she was very good at housekeeping." + +"She hasn't got any lodgers now. There she is, all alone in that house, +and--" + +"But she can't be _starving_!" Hilda protested. At intervals she glanced +at the inner door, alarmed. + +"I really think she is," Janet persisted, softly persuasive. + +"But what's to be done?" + +"That's the point. I've just seen her. I went on purpose, because I'd +heard.... But I had to pretend all sorts of things to make an excuse for +myself. I couldn't offer her anything, could I? Isn't it dreadful?" + +They were much worried, these two young maids, full of health and vigour +and faith, and pride and simplicity, by this startling first glimpse +into one of the nether realities of existence. And they loyally tried to +feel more worried than they actually were; they did their best, out of +sympathy, to moderate the leaping, joyous vitality that was in them,-- +and did not succeed very well. They were fine, they were touching--but +they were also rather deliciously amusing--as they concentrated all +their resources of solemnity and of worldly experience on the tragic +case of the woman whom life had defeated. Hilda's memory rushed +strangely to Victor Hugo. She was experiencing the same utter +desolation--but somehow less noble--as had gripped her when she first +realized the eternal picture, in _Oceana Nox_, of the pale-fronted +widows who, tired of waiting for those whose barque had never returned +out of the tempest, talked quietly among themselves of the +lost--stirring the cinders in the fireplace and in their hearts.... Yet +Sarah Gailey was not even a widow. She was an ageing dancing-mistress. +She had once taught the grace of rhythmic movement to young limbs; and +now she was rheumatic. + +"Nobody but Mr. Cannon can do anything," Janet murmured. + +"I'm sure he hasn't the slightest idea--not the slightest!" said Hilda +half defensively. But she was saying to herself: "This man made me write +a lie, and now I hear that his sister is starving--in the same town!" +And she thought of his glossy opulence. "I'm quite sure of _that_!" she +repeated to Janet. + +"Oh! So am I!" Janet eagerly concurred. "That's why I came.... Somebody +had to give him a hint.... I never dreamt of finding you, dear!" + +"It is strange, isn't it?" said Hilda, the wondrous romance of things +seizing her. Seen afresh, through the eyes of this charming, sympathetic +acquaintance, was not Mr. Cannon's originality in engaging her +positively astounding? + +"I suppose _you_ couldn't give him a hint?" + +"Yes, I'll tell him," said Hilda. "Of course!" In spite of herself she +was assuming a certain proprietorship in Mr. Cannon. + +"I'm so glad!" Janet replied. "It is good of you!" + +"It seems to me it's you that's good, Janet," Hilda said grimly. She +thought: "Should _I_, out of simple kindliness and charity, have +deliberately come to tell a man I didn't know... that his sister was +starving? Never!" + +"He's bound to see after it!" said Janet, content. + +"Why, of course!" said Hilda, clinching the affair, in an intimate, +confidential murmur. + +"You'll tell him to-night?" + +Hilda nodded. + +They exchanged a grave glance of mutual appreciation and understanding. +Each was sure of the other's high esteem. Each was glad that chance had +brought about the meeting between them. Then they lifted away their +apprehensive solicitude for Sarah Gailey, and Janet, having sighed +relief, began to talk about old times. And their voices grew louder and +more free. + +"Can you tell me what time it is?" Janet asked, later. "I've broken the +spring of my watch, and I have to meet father at the station at +ten-fifteen." + +"I haven't a notion!" said Hilda, rather ashamed. + +"I hope it isn't ten o'clock." + +"I could ask," said Hilda hesitatingly. The hour, for aught she knew, +was nine, eleven, or even midnight. She was oblivious of time. + +"I'll run," said Janet, preparing to go. "I shall tell Charlie I've seen +you, next time I write to him. I'm sure he'll be glad. And you must come +to see us. You really must, now! Mother and father will be delighted. Do +you still recite, like you used to?" + +Hilda shook her head, blushing. + +She made no definite response to the invitation, which surprised, +agitated, and flattered her. She wanted to accept it, but she was +convinced that she never would accept it. Before departing, Janet lifted +her veil, with a beautiful gesture, and offered her lips to kiss. They +embraced affectionately. The next moment Hilda, at the top of the dim, +naked, resounding stair, was watching Janet descend--a figure infinitely +stylish and agreeable to the eye. + + + + +CHAPTER IX +IN THE STREET + + +I + +A few minutes later, just as Hilda had sealed up the last of the +letters, Mr. Cannon issued somewhat hurriedly out of the inner room, +buttoning his overcoat at the neck. + +"Good night," he said, and took his stick from the corner where he had +placed it. + +"Mr. Cannon!" + +"Well?" + +"I wanted to speak to you." + +"What is it? I'm in a hurry." + +She glanced at the inner door, which he had left open. From beyond that +door came the voices of Arthur Dayson and the old clerk; Hilda lacked +the courage to cross the length of the room and deliberately close it, +and though Mr. Cannon did not seem inclined to move, his eyes followed +the direction of hers and he must have divined her embarrassment. She +knew not what to do. A crisis seemed to rise up monstrous between them, +in an instant. She was trembling, and in acute trouble. + +"It's rather important," she said timidly, but not without an +unintentional violence. + +"Well, to-morrow afternoon." + +He, too, was apparently in a fractious state. The situation was perhaps +perilous. But she could not allow her conduct to be influenced by danger +or difficulty, which indeed nearly always had the effect of confirming +her purpose. If something had to be done, it had to be done--and let +that suffice! He waited, impatient, for her to agree and allow him to +go. + +"No," she answered, with positive resentment in her clear voice. "I must +speak to you to-night. It's very important." + +He made with his tongue an inarticulate noise of controlled +exasperation. + +"If you've finished, put your things on and walk along with me," he +said. + +She hurried to obey, and overtook him as he slowly descended the lower +flight of stairs. She had buttoned her jacket and knotted her thick +scarf, and now, with the letters pressed tightly under her arm lest they +should fall, she was pulling on her gloves. + +"I have an appointment at the Saracen's," he said mildly, meaning the +Saracen's Head--the central rendezvous of the town, where Conservative +and Liberal met on neutral ground. + + +II + +He turned to the left, toward the High Street and the great cleared +space out of which the cellarage of the new Town Hall had already been +scooped. He carried his thick gloves in his white and elegant hand, as +one who did not feel the frost. She stepped after him. Their breaths +whitened the keen air. She was extremely afraid, and considered herself +an abject coward, but she was determined to the point of desperation. He +ought to know the truth and he ought to know it at once: nothing else +mattered. She reflected in her terror: "If I don't begin right off, he +will be asking me to begin, and that will be worse than ever." She was +like one who, having boastfully undertaken to plunge into deep, cold +water from a height, has climbed to the height, and measured the fearful +distance, and is sick, and dares not leap, but knows that he must leap. + +"I suppose you know Miss Gailey is practically starving," she said +abruptly, harshly, staring at the gutter. + +She had leapt. Life seemed to leave her. She had not intended to use +such words, nor such a tone. She certainly did not suppose that he knew +about Miss Gailey's condition. She had affirmed to Janet Orgreave her +absolute assurance that he did not know. As for the tone, it was +accusing, it was brutal, it was full of the unconscious and terrible +clumsy cruelty of youth. + +"What?" His head moved sharply sideways, to look at her. + +"Miss Gailey--she's starving, it seems!" Hilda said timidly now, almost +apologetically. "I felt sure you didn't know. I thought _some_ one +should tell you." + +"What do you mean--starving?" he asked gruffly. + +"Not enough to eat," she replied, with the direct simplicity of a child. + +"And how did this tale get about?" + +"It's true," she said. "I was told to-night." + +"Who told you?" + +"A friend of mine--who's seen her!" + +"But who?" + +"It wouldn't be right for me to tell you who." + +They walked on in an appalling silence to the corner of the Square and +the High Street. + +"Here's the letter-box," he said, stopping. + +She dropped the letters with nervous haste into the box. Then she looked +up at him appealingly. In the brightness of the starry night she saw +that his face had a sardonic, meditative smile. The middle part of the +lower lip was pushed out, while the corners were pulled down--an +expression of scornful disgust. She burst out: + +"Of course, I know very well it's not your fault. I know, if you'd +_known_... but what with her never seeing you, and perhaps people not +caring to--" + +"I'm very much obliged to you," he interrupted her quietly, still +meditative. He was evidently sincere. His attitude was dignified. Many +men would have been ashamed, humiliated, even though aware of innocence. +But he contrived to rise above such weakness. She was glad; she admired +him. And she was very glad also that he did not deign to asseverate that +he had been ignorant of his half-sister's plight. Naturally he had been +ignorant! + + +III + +She was suddenly happy; she was inspired by an unreasoning joy. She was +happy because she was so young and fragile and inexperienced, and he so +much older, and more powerful and more capable. She was happy because +she was a mere girl and he a mature and important male. She thought +their relation in that moment exquisitely beautiful. She was happy +because she had been exceedingly afraid and the fear had gone. The dark +Square and far-stretching streets lay placid and void under the night, +surrounding their silence in a larger silence: and because of that also +she was happy. A policeman with his arms hidden under his cloak marched +unhasting downwards from the direction of the Bank. + +"Fine night, officer," said Mr. Cannon cordially. + +"Yes, sir. Good night, sir," the policeman responded, with respect and +sturdy self-respect, his footsteps ringing onwards. + +And the sight and bearing of this hardy, frost-defying policeman +watching over the town, and the greetings between him and Mr. Cannon-- +these too seemed strangely beautiful to Hilda. And then a train +reverberated along its embankment in the distance, and the gliding +procession of yellow windows was divided at regular intervals by the +black silhouettes of the scaffolding-poles of the new Town Hall. +Beautiful! She was filled with a delicious sadness. It was Janet's +train. In some first-class compartment Janet and her father were shut +together, side by side, intimate, mutually understanding. Again, a +beautiful relation! From the summit of a high kiln in the middle +distance, flames shot intermittently forth, formidable. Crockery was +being fired in the night: and unseen the fireman somewhere flitted about +the mouths of the kiln. And here and there in the dim faces of the +streets a window shone golden... there were living people behind the +blind! It was all beautiful, joy-giving. The thought of her mother +fidgeting for her return home was delightful. The thought of Mr. Cannon +and Miss Gailey, separated during many years, and now destined to some +kind of reconciliation was indescribably touching, and beautiful in a +way that she could not define. + +"I was only thinking the other day," said Mr. Cannon, treating her as an +equal in years and wisdom--"I was only thinking I'd got the very thing +for my half-sister--the very opening for her--a chance in a thousand, if +only she'd..." It was unnecessary for him to finish the sentence. + +"And is it too late now?" Hilda asked eagerly. + +"No," he said. "It isn't too late. I shall go round and see her +to-morrow morning first thing. It wouldn't do for me to go to-night--you +see--might seem too odd." + +"Yes," Hilda murmured. "Well, good night." + +They separated. She knew that he was profoundly stirred. Nevertheless, +he had inquired for no further details concerning Miss Gailey. He was +too proud, and beneath his inflexibility too sensitive, to do so. He +meant to discover the truth for himself. He had believed--that was the +essential. His behaviour had been superb. The lying letter to Ezra Brunt +was a mere peccadillo, even if it was that, even if it was not actually +virtuous. + +She walked off rapidly, trying to imitate the fine, free, calmly defiant +bearing of Mr. Cannon and the policeman. + + +IV + +"Florrie gone to bed?" she asked briskly of her mother, who was fussing +about her in the parlour, pretending to be fretful, but secretly +enchanted to welcome her, with a warm fire and plenteous food, back +again into the house. And Hilda, too, was enchanted at her reception. + +"Florrie gone to bed? I should just think Florrie has gone to bed. +Half-past ten and after! Eh my! This going out after tea. I never heard +of such doings. Now do warm your feet." + +"I should have been home sooner, only something happened," said Hilda. + +"Oh!" Mrs. Lessways exclaimed indifferently. She had in fact no +curiosity as to the affairs of Dayson and Company. The sole thing that +interested her was Hilda's daily absence and daily return. She seemed +quite content to remain in ignorance of what Hilda did in the mysterious +office. Her conversation, profuse when she was in good spirits, rarely +went beyond the trifling separate events of existence personal and +domestic--the life of the house hour by hour and minute by minute. It +was often astounding to Hilda that her mother never showed any sign of +being weary of these topics, nor any desire to discover other topics. + +"Yes," said Hilda. "Miss Gailey--" + +Mrs. Lessways became instantly a different creature. + +"And does he know?" she asked blankly, when Hilda had informed her of +Janet's visit and news. + +"Yes. I told him--of course." + +"You?" + +"Well, somebody had to tell him," said Hilda, with an affectation of +carelessness. "So I told him myself." + +"And how did he take it?" + +"Well, how should he take it?" Hilda retorted largely. "He _had_ to take +it! He was much obliged, and he said so." + +Mrs. Lessways began to weep. + +"What ever's the matter?" + +"I was only thinking of poor Sarah!" Mrs. Lessways answered the implied +rebuke of Hilda's brusque question. "I shall go and see her to-morrow +morning." + +"But, mother, don't you think you'd better wait?" + +Mrs. Lessways spoke up resolutely: "I shall go and see Sarah Gailey +to-morrow morning, and let that be understood! I don't need my daughter +to teach me when I ought to go and see my friends and when I +oughtn't.... I knew Sarah Gailey before your Mr. Cannon was born." + +"Oh, very well! Very well!" Hilda soothed her lightly. + +"I shall tell Sarah Gailey she's got to reckon with me, whether she +wants to or not! That's what I shall tell Sarah Gailey!" Mrs. Lessways +wiped her eyes. + +"Mother," Hilda asked, when they had gone upstairs, "did you wind the +clock?" + +"I don't think I did," answered the culprit uncertainly from her bedroom +door. + +"Mother, how tiresome you are! Night before last you wouldn't let me +touch it. You said you preferred to do it yourself. And now I shall be +waiting for it to strike to-morrow morning, to get up--lend me that +candle, do!" + +She tripped down to the lobby gladly, and opened the big door of the +clock, and put her hand into the dark cavity and, grimacing, hauled up +the heavy weights. This forgetfulness of her mother's somehow increased +her extraordinary satisfaction with life. She remounted the shadowy +stairs on the wings of a pure and ingenuous elation. + + + + +CHAPTER X +MISS GAILEY IN DECLENSION + + +I + +Knowing whom she was to meet, Hilda came home to tea, on the next day +but one, with a demeanour whose characteristics were heightened by +nervousness. The weather was still colder, and she had tied the broad +ribbons of her small bonnet rather closely under her chin, the double +bow a little to the left. A knitted bodice over the dress and under the +jacket made the latter tighter than usual, so that the fur edges of it +curved away somewhat between the buttons, and all the upper part of the +figure seemed to be too strictly confined, while the petticoats surged +out freely beneath. A muff, brightly coloured to match the skirt and the +bonnet and her cheeks, completed the costume. She went into the house +through the garden and delicately stamped her feet on the lobby tiles, +partly to warm them and shake off a few bits of snow, and partly to +announce clearly her arrival. Then, just as she was, hands in muff, she +entered the parlour. She was tingling with keen, rosy life, and with the +sense of youthful power. She had the deep, unconscious conviction of the +superiority of youth to age. And there were the two older women, waiting +for her, as it were on the defensive, and as nervous as she! + +"Good afternoon, Miss Gailey," she said, with a kind and even very +cordial smile, and heartily shook the flaccid, rheumatic hand that was +primly held out to her. And yet in spite of herself, perhaps unknown to +herself, there was in her tone and her smile and her vigorous clasp +something which meant, "Poor old thing!" pityingly, indulgently, +scornfully. + +She had not spoken to Miss Gailey, and she had scarcely seen her, since +the days of the dancing-class. A woman who is in process of losing +everything but her pride can disappear from view as easily in a small +town as in a great city; her acquaintances will say to each other, "I +haven't met So-and-so lately. I wonder..." And curiosity will go no +further. And in a short time her invisibility will cease to excite any +remark, except, "She keeps herself to herself nowadays." To Hilda Miss +Gailey appeared no older; her brown hair had very little grey in it, and +her skin was fairly smooth and well-preserved. But she seemed curiously +smaller, and less significant, this woman who, with a certain pedagogic +air, used to instruct girls in grace and boys in gallantry, this woman +who was regarded by all her pupils as the authoritative source of +correctness and ease in deportment. "Now, Master Charles," Hilda could +remember her saying, "will you ask me for the next polka all over again, +and try not to look as if you were doing me a favour and were rather +ashamed of yourself?" She had a tongue for the sneaping of too casual +boys, and girls also. + +And she spoke so correctly, as correctly as she performed the figures of +a dance! Hilda, who also spoke without the local peculiarities, had been +deprived of her Five Towns accent at Chetwynd's School, where the purest +Kensingtonian was inculcated; but Miss Gailey had lost hers in +Kensington itself--so rumour said--many years before. And now, in her +declension, she was still perfect of speech. But the authority and the +importance were gone in substance: only the shadow of them remained. She +had now, indeed, a manner half apologetic and half defiant, but +timorously and weakly defiant. Her head was restless with little nervous +movements; her watery eyes seemed to say: "Do not suppose that I am not +as proud and independent as ever I was, because I _am_. Look at my silk +dress, and my polished boots, and my smooth hair, and my hands! Can +anyone find any trace of shabbiness in _me_?" But beneath all this +desperate bravery was the wistful acknowledgment, continually-peeping +out, that she had after all come down in the world, albeit with a +special personal dignity that none save she could have kept. + + +II + +The two women were seated at a splendid fire. Hilda, whose nervousness +was quickly vanishing, came between them to warm her hands that were +shining with cold, despite muff and gloves. "Here, mother!" she said +teasingly, putting the muff and gloves in her mother's lap. + +Sarah Gailey rose with slow stiffness from her chair. + +"Now don't let this child disturb you, Sarah!" Mrs. Lessways protested. + +"Oh no, Caroline!" said Miss Gailey composedly. "I was only getting my +apron." + +From a reticule on the table she drew forth a small black satin apron on +which was embroidered in filoselle a spray of moss-roses. It was +extremely elegant--much more so than Mrs. Lessways'--though not in quite +the latest style of fashionable aprons; not being edible, it had +probably been long preserved in a wardrobe, on the chance of just such +an occasion as this. She adjusted the elastic round her thin waist, and +sat down again. The apron was a sign that she had come definitely to +spend the whole evening. It was a proof of the completeness of the +reconciliation between the former friends. + +As the conversation shifted from the immediate topic of the weather to +the great general question of cures for chilblains, Hilda wondered what +had passed between her mother and Miss Gailey, and whether her mother +had overcome by mere breezy force or by guile: which details she never +learnt, for Mrs. Lessways was very loyal to her former crony, and +moreover she had necessarily to support the honour of the older +generation against the younger. It seemed incredible to Hilda that this +woman who sat with such dignity and such gentility by her mother's fire +was she who the day before yesterday had been starving in the +pride-imposed prison of her own house. Could Miss Gailey have known that +Hilda knew!... But Hilda knew that Miss Gailey knew that she knew--and +that others guessed! Such, however, was the sublime force of convention +that the universal pretence of ignorance securely triumphed. + +Then Florrie--changed, grown, budded, practised in the technicalities of +parlours, but timid because of "company"--came in to set the tea. And +Miss Gailey inspected her with the calm and omniscient detachment of a +deity, and said to Caroline when she was gone that Florrie seemed a +promising little thing--with the 'makings of a good servant' in her. +Afterwards the mistress recounted this judgment to Florrie, who was +thereby apparently much impressed and encouraged in well-doing. + + +III + +"And so you're thinking of going to London, Miss Gailey?" said Hilda, +during tea. The meal was progressing satisfactorily, though Caroline +could not persuade Sarah to eat enough. + +Miss Gailey flushed slightly, with the characteristic nervous movement +of the head. Evidently her sensitiveness was extreme. + +"And what do you know about it, you inquisitive little puss?" Mrs. +Lessways intervened hastily, though it was she who had informed Hilda of +the vague project. Somehow, in presence of her old friend, Mrs. Lessways +seemed to feel herself under an obligation to play the assertive and +crushing mother. + +"Has Mr. Cannon mentioned it?" said Miss Gailey politely. Miss Gailey, +at any rate, recognized in the most scrupulous way that Hilda was an +adult, and no longer a foal-legged pupil for dancing. "Well, he seems so +set on it. He came round to see me about it yesterday morning, without +any warning. And he was full of it! I told you how full he was of it, +didn't I, Caroline? You know how he is when anything takes him." + +"Do I know how he is?" murmured Caroline, arching her eyebrows. She +spoke much more broadly than either of the others. + +Miss Gailey continued to Hilda, with seriousness: "It's a boarding-house +that he's got control of up there. Something about a bill of sale on the +furniture, I think. But perhaps you know?" + +"No, I don't," said Hilda. + +"Oh!" said Miss Gailey, relieved. "Well, anyhow he's bent on me taking +charge of this boarding-house. He will have it it's just the thing for +me. But--but I don't know!" She finished weakly. + +"Everyone knows you're a splendid housekeeper," said Mrs. Lessways. +"Always were." + +"I remember the refreshments at your annual dances," said Hilda, +politely enthusiastic. + +"I always attended to those myself," Miss Gailey judicially observed. + +"I don't know anything about refreshments at dances," said Mrs. +Lessways, "but I do know what your housekeeping is, Sarah!" + +"Well, that's what George says!" Sarah simpered. "He says he never had +such meals and such attention as that year he lived with me." + +"I'm sure he's been sorry many a time he ever left you!" exclaimed +Caroline. "Many and many a time!" + +"Oh, well.... Relatives, you know...." Sarah murmured vaguely. This was +the only reference to the estrangement. She went on with more vivacity. +"And then Mr. Cannon has always had ideas about boarding-houses and +furnished rooms and so on. He always did say there was lots of money to +be made out of them if only they were managed properly; only they never +are.... He ought to know; he's been a bachelor long enough, and he's +tried enough of them! He says he isn't at all comfortable where he is," +she added, as it were aside to Caroline. "It's some people who used to +let lodgings to theatre people at Hanbridge." + +"Oh! _Them_!" cried Caroline. + +The talk meandered into a maze of reminiscences, and Hilda had to +realize her youthfulness and the very inferior range of her experience: +Sarah and Caroline recalled to each other dozens of persons and events, +opening up historical vistas in a manner that filled the young girl with +envious respect, in spite of herself. + +"Do you remember Hanbridge Theatre being built, Sarah?" questioned +Caroline. "My grandfather--Hilda's great-grandfather--tendered for +it--not that he got the job--but he was very old." + +"Did he now? No, I don't. But I dare say I was in London then." + +"I dare say that would be it." + +"Yes," said Sarah, turning to Hilda once more, "that's just what Mr. +Cannon says. He says it isn't as if I didn't know what London is.... But +it's such a long time ago!" She glanced at Caroline as if for sympathy. + +"Come, come, Sarah!" Caroline protested stoutly, and yet with a care for +Sarah's sensitiveness. "It isn't so long ago as all that!" + +"It seems so long," said Sarah, reflective; and her mouth worked +uneasily. Then, after a pause: "He's so set on it!" + +"Set on what? On your going to London?" + +"Yes." + +"And why not?" + +"Well, I don't know whether I could--" + +"Paw!" scoffed Caroline lightly and flatteringly. "You're younger than I +am, and I'm not going to have anyone making out that I'm getting old. +Now do finish that bit of cake." + +"No, thank you, Caroline. I really couldn't." + +"Not but what I should be sorry enough to lose you," Caroline concluded. +"There's no friends like the old friends." + +"Ah! No!" Sarah thickly muttered, gazing with her watery eyes at a spot +on the white diaper. + +"Hilda, do turn down that there gas a bit," said Mrs. Lessways sharply +and self-consciously. "It's fizzing." And she changed the subject. + + +IV + +With a nervous exaggeration of solicitude Hilda sprang to the gas-jet. +Suddenly she was drenched in the most desolating sadness. She could not +bear to look at Miss Gailey; and further, Miss Gailey seemed unreal to +her, not an actual woman, but an abstract figure of sorrow that fancy +had created. A few minutes previously Hilda had been taking pride in the +tact and the enterprise of George Cannon, who possessed a mysterious +gift of finding an opportunity for everybody who needed it. He had set +Hilda on her feet; and he was doing the same for his half-sister, and +with such skilful diplomacy that Miss Gailey was able to pretend to +herself and to others that George Cannon, and not Sarah Gailey, was the +obliged person. But now Hilda saw Sarah Gailey afraid to go to London, +and George Cannon pushing her forward with all the ruthless strength of +his enterprising spirit. And the sight was extraordinarily, +incomprehensibly tragic. Sarah Gailey's timorous glance seemed to be +saying: "I am terrified to go. It isn't beyond my strength--it's beyond +my spirit. But I shall have to go, and I shall have to seem glad to go. +And nobody can save me!" + +And Miss Gailey's excellent silk dress, and her fine apron, and her +primness and dignified manners, and her superb pretence of being +undamaged struck Hilda as intolerably pathetic--so that she was obliged +to look away lest she might weep at the sight of that pathos. Yes, it +was a fact that she could not bear to look! Nor could she bear to let +her imagination roam into Miss Gailey's immediate past! She said to +herself: "Only yesterday morning perhaps she didn't know where her next +meal was coming from. He must have managed somehow to give her some +money. Only yesterday morning perhaps she didn't know where her next +meal--If I say that to myself once more I shall burst out crying!" She +balanced her spoon on her teacup and let it fall. + +"Now, Miss Fidgety!" her mother commented, with good humour. And then +they all heard a knock at the front door. + +"Will Florrie have heard it?" Mrs. Lessways asked nervously. What she +meant was: "Who on earth can this be?" But such questions cannot be put +in the presence of a newly reconciled old friend. It was necessary to +behave as though knocks at the front door were a regular accompaniment +of tea. + + + + +CHAPTER XI +DISILLUSION + + +I + +The entrance of George Cannon into the parlour produced a tumult greatly +stimulating the vitality and the self-consciousness of all three women. +Sarah Gailey's excitement was expressed in flushing, and in +characteristic small futile movements of the head and hands, and in +monosyllables that conveyed naught except a vague but keen apprehension. +Mrs. Lessways was perturbed and somewhat apprehensive also; but she was +flattered and pleased. Hilda was frankly suspicious during the first +moments. She guessed that Mr. Cannon was aware of his sister's visit, +and that he had come to further his own purposes. He confirmed her idea +by greeting his sister without apparent surprise; but as, in response to +Mrs. Lessways' insistence, he took off his great overcoat, with those +large, powerful gestures which impress susceptible women and give +pleasure even to the indifferent, he said casually to Sarah Gailey, "I +didn't expect to meet you here, Sally. I've come to have a private word +with Mrs. Lessways about putting one of her Calder Street tenants on to +the pavement." Sarah laughed nervously and said that she would retire, +and Mrs. Lessways said that Sarah would do no such thing, and that she +was very welcome to hear all that Mr. Cannon might have to say +concerning the Calder Street property. + +In a minute Mr. Cannon was resplendently sitting down to the table with +them, and rubbing his friendly hands, and admitting that he should not +refuse a cup of tea if pressed. And Hilda received her mother's sharp +instructions to get a cup and saucer from the sideboard and a spoon from +the drawer. She bore these to the table like a handmaid, but like a +delicate and superior handmaid, and it pleased her to constitute herself +a delicate and superior handmaid. Mr. Cannon sat next to her mother, and +Hilda put down the tinkling cup and saucer on the white cloth between +them; and as she did so Mr. Cannon turned and thanked her with a +confidential smile, to which she responded. They were not now employer +and employee, but exclusively in the social world; nevertheless, their +business relations made an intimacy which it was piquant to feel in the +home. Moreover, Sarah Gailey was opposite to them, and Hilda could not +keep out of her dark eyes the intelligence: "If she is here, if you are +all amicable together, it is due to me." Delicious and somehow perilous +secret!... Going back to her seat, she arranged more safely the vast +overcoat which he had thrown carelessly down on her mother's rocking- +chair. It was inordinately heavy, and would have outweighed a dozen of +her skimpy little jackets; she, who would have been lost in it like a +cat in a rug, enjoyed the thought of the force of the creature capable +of wearing it lightly for a garment. Withal the rough, soft surface of +it was agreeable to the hand. Out of one of the immense pockets hung the +end of a coloured silk muffler, filmy as anything that she herself wore. + +Then they were all definitely seated, and Mr. Cannon accepted his tea +from the hand of Mrs. Lessways. The whiteness of his linen, the new +smartness of his suit, the elegance and gallantry of his gestures--these +phenomena incited the women to a responsive emulation; they were +something which it was a feminine duty to live up to. Archness reigned, +especially between the hostess and the caller. Hilda answered to the +mood. And Sarah Gailey, though she said little and never finished a +sentence, did her best to answer to it by noddings and nervous +appreciative smiles, and swift turnings of the head from one to another. +When Mr. Cannon and Mrs. Lessways, in half a dozen serious words +interjected among the archness, had adversely settled the fate of a +whole family in Calder Street, there remained scarcely a trace, in the +company's demeanour, of the shamed consciousness that only two days +before its members had been divided by disastrous enmities and that one +of them had lacked the means of life. + + +II + +"Oh no! my dear girl! You're too modest--that's what's the matter with +you," said George Cannon eagerly to his half-sister. The epithet +flattered but did not allay her timidity. To Hilda it seemed +mysteriously romantic. + +The supreme topic had worked its way into the conversation. Uppermost in +the minds of all, it seemed to have forced itself out by its own +intrinsic energy, against the will of the company. Impossible to decide +who first had let it forth! But George Cannon had now fairly seized it +and run off with it. He was almost boyishly excited over it. The Latin +strain in him animated his features and his speech. He was a poet as he +talked of the boarding-house that awaited a mistress. He had pulled out +of his pocket the cutting of an advertisement of it from the London +_Daily Telegraph_, a paper that was never seen in Turnhill. And this bit +of paper, describing in four lines the advantages of the boarding-house, +had the effect of giving the actual house a symbolic reality. "There it +is!" he exclaimed, slapping down the paper. And there it appeared really +to be. The bit of paper was extraordinarily persuasive. It compelled +everybody to realize, now for the first time, that the house did in fact +exist. George Cannon had an overwhelming answer to all timorous +objections. The boarding-house was remunerative; boarders were at that +very moment in it. The nominal proprietor was not leaving it because he +was losing money on the boarding-house, but because he had lost money in +another enterprise quite foreign to it, and had pledged all the contents +of the boarding-house as security. The occasion was one in a thousand, +one in a million. He, George Cannon, through a client, had the entire +marvellous affair between his finger and thumb, and most obviously Sarah +Gailey was the woman of all women for the vacant post at his +disposition. Chance was waiting on her. She had nothing whatever to do +but walk into the house as a regent into a kingdom, and rule. Only, +delay was impossible. All was possible except delay. She would +inevitably succeed; she could not fail. And it would be a family +affair.... + +Tea was finished and forgotten. + +"For your own sake!" he wound up a peroration. "It really doesn't matter +to me.... Don't you agree with me, Mrs. Lessways?" His glance was a +homage. + +"Oh, you!" exclaimed Mrs. Lessways, smiling happily. "You've only got to +open your mouth, and you'd talk anybody into the middle of next week." + +"Mother!" Hilda mildly reproved. She was convinced now that Mr. Cannon +had come on purpose to clinch the affair. + +He laughed appreciatively. + +"But really! Seriously!" he insisted. + +And Mrs. Lessways, straightening her face, said, with slight +self-consciousness: "Oh, _I_ think it's worth while considering!" + +"There you are!" cried Mr. Cannon to Miss Gailey. + +"I shall be all alone up there!" said Miss Gailey, as cheerfully as she +could. + +"I'll go up with you and see you into the place. I should have to come +back the same night--I'm so tremendously busy just now--what with the +paper and so on." + +"Yes, but--I quite admit all you say, George--but--" + +"Here's another idea," he broke out. "Why don't you ask Mrs. Lessways to +go up with you and stay a week or two? It would be a rare change for +her, and company for you." + +Miss Gailey looked quickly at her old friend. + +"Oh! Bless you!" said Mrs. Lessways. "I've only been to London once, and +that was only for two days--before Hilda was born. I should be no use in +London, at my time of life. I'm one of your home-stayers." Nevertheless +it was plain that the notion appealed to her fancy, and that she would +enjoy flirting with it. + +"Nonsense, Mrs. Lessways!" said George Cannon. "It would do you a world +of good, and it would make all the difference to Sally." + +"That it would!" Sarah agreed, still questioning Caroline with her +watery, appealing eyes. In Caroline, Sarah saw her salvation, and +snatched at it. Caroline could do nothing well; she had no excellence; +all that Caroline could do Sarah could do better. And yet Caroline, by +the mysterious virtue of her dry and yet genial shrewdness, and of the +unstable but reliable equilibrium of her temperament, was the skilled +Sarah's superior. They both knew it and felt it. The lofty Hilda +admitted it. Caroline herself negligently admitted it by a peculiar, +brusque, unaffected geniality of condescension towards Sarah. + +"Do go, mother!" said Hilda. To herself she had been saying: "Another of +his wonderful ideas!" The prospect of being alone in the house with +Florrie, of being free for a space to live her own life untrammelled and +throw all her ardour into her work, was inexpressibly attractive to +Hilda. It promised the most delicious experience that she had ever had. + +"Yes," retorted Mrs. Lessways. "And leave you here by yourself! A nice +thing!" + +"I shall be all right," said Hilda confidently and joyously. She was +sure that the excursion to London had appealed to her mother's latent +love of the unexpected, and that her faculty for accepting placidly +whatever fate offered would prevent her from resisting the pressure that +Sarah Gailey and Mr. Cannon would obviously exert. + +"Shall you!" Mrs. Lessways muttered. + +"Why not take your daughter with you, too?" Mr. Cannon suggested. + +"Oh!" cried Hilda, shocked. "I couldn't possibly leave my work just +now.... The paper just coming out.... You couldn't spare me." She spoke +with pride, using phrases similar to those which he had used to explain +to Sarah Gailey why he could not remain with her in London even for a +night. + +"Oh yes, I could," he answered kindly, lightly, carelessly, +shattering--in his preoccupation with one idea--all her fine, loyal +pretensions. "We should manage all right." + + +III + +She was hurt. She was mortally pierced. The blow was too cruel. She +lowered her glance before his, and fixed it on the table-cloth. Her brow +darkened. Her lower lip bulged out. She was the child again. He had with +atrocious inhumanity reduced her to the unimportance of a child. She had +bestowed on him and his interests the gift of her whole soul, and he had +said that it was negligible. And the worst was that he was perfectly +unaware of what he had done. He had not even observed the symptoms of +her face. He had turned at once to the older women and was continuing +the conversation. He had ridden over her, and ridden on without a look +behind. The conversation moved, after a pause, back to the plausible +excuse for his call. He desired to see some old rent-book which would +show how the doomed tenant in Calder Street had originally fallen into +arrears. + +"Where is that old book of Mr. Skellorn's, Hilda?" her mother asked. + +She could not speak. The sob was at her throat. If she had spoken it +would have burst through, and she would have been not merely the child, +but the disgraced child. + +"Hilda!" repeated her mother. + +Her singular silence drew the attention of all. She blushed a sombre +scarlet. No! She could not speak. She cursed herself. "What a little +fool I am! Surely I can..." Useless! She could not speak. She took the +one desperate course open to her, and ran out of the room, to the +astonishment of three puzzled and rather frightened adults. Her shame +was now notorious. "Baby! Great baby!" she gnashed at her own +inconceivable silliness. Had she no pride?... And now she was in the +gloom of the lobby, and she could hear Florrie in the kitchen softly +whistling.... She was out in the dark lobby exactly like a foolish, +passionate child.... She knew all the time that she could easily +persuade her mother to leave her alone with Florrie in the house; she +had levers to move her mother.... But of what use, now, to do that? + + + + +CHAPTER XII +THE TELEGRAM + +I + +It was the end of February 1880. A day resembling spring had come, +illusive, but exquisite. Hilda, having started out too hurriedly for the +office after the midday dinner, had had to return home for a proof which +she had forgotten. + +She now had the house to herself, as a kingdom over which she reigned; +for, amid all her humiliation and pensive dejection, she had been able +to exert sufficient harsh force to drive her mother to London in company +with Miss Gailey. She was alone, free; and she tasted her freedom to the +point of ecstasy. She conned corrected proofs at her meals: this was +life. When Florrie came in with another dish, Hilda looked up +impatiently from printed matter, as if disturbed out of a dream, and +Florrie put on an apologetic air, to invoke pardon. It was largely +pretence on Hilda's part, but it was life. Then she had the delicious +anxiety of being responsible for Florrie. "Now, Florrie, I'm going out +to-night, to see Miss Orgreave at Bleakridge. I shall rely on you to go +to bed not later than nine. I've got the key. _I may not be back till +the last train_." "Yes, miss!" And what with Hilda's solemnity and +Florrie's impressed eyes, the ten-forty-five was transformed into a +train that circulated in the dark and mysterious hour just before +cockcrow. Hilda, alone, was always appealing to Florrie's loyalty. +Sometimes when discreetly abolishing some old-fashioned, work-increasing +method of her mother's, she would speak to Florrie in a tone of sudden, +transient intimacy, raising her for a moment to the rank of an +intellectual equal as her voice hinted that her mother after all +belonged to the effete generation. + +Awkwardly, with her gloved hands, turning over the pages of a book in +which the slip-proof had been carelessly left hidden, Hilda, from her +bedroom, heard Florrie come whistling down the attic stairs. Florrie had +certainly heard nothing of her young mistress since the door-bang which +had signalled her departure for the office. In the delusion that she was +utterly solitary in the house, Florrie was whistling, not at all like a +modest young woman, but like a carter. Hilda knew that she could +whistle, and had several times indicated to her indirectly that +whistling was undesirable; but she had never heard her whistling as she +whistled now. Her first impulse was to rush out of the bedroom and +'catch' Florrie and make her look foolish, but a sense of honour +restrained her from a triumph so mean, and she kept perfectly still. She +heard Florrie run into her mother's bedroom; and then she heard that +voice, usually so timid, saying loudly, exultantly, and even coarsely: +"Oh! How beautiful I am! How beautiful I am! Shan't I just mash the men! +Shan't I just mash 'em!" This new and vulgar word 'mash' offended Hilda. + + +II + +She crept noiselessly to the door, which was ajar, and looked forth like +a thief. The door of her mother's room was wide open, and across the +landing she could see Florrie posturing in front of the large mirror of +the wardrobe. The sight shocked her in a most peculiar manner. It was +Florrie's afternoon out, and the child was wearing, for the first time, +an old brown skirt that Hilda had abandoned to her. But in this long +skirt she was no more a child. Although scarcely yet fifteen years old, +she was a grown woman. She had astoundingly developed during her service +with Mrs. Lessways. She was scarcely less tall than Hilda, and she +possessed a sturdy, rounded figure which put Hilda's to shame. It was +uncanny--the precocity of the children of the poor! It was disturbing! +On a chair lay Florrie's new 'serviceable' cloak, and a cheap but sound +bonnet: both articles the fruit of a special journey with her aunt to +Baines's drapery shop at Bursley, where there was a small special sober +department for servants who were wise enough not to yield to the +temptation of 'finery.' Florrie, who at thirteen and a half had never +been able to rattle one penny against another, had since then earned +some two thousand five hundred pennies, and had clothed herself and put +money aside and also poured a shower of silver upon her clamorous +family. Amazing feat! Amazing growth! She seized the 'good' warm cloak +and hid her poor old bodice beneath it, and drew out her thick pig-tail, +and shook it into position with a free gesture of the head; and on the +head she poised the bonnet, and tied the ribbons under the delightful +chin. And then, after a moment of hard scrutiny, danced and whistled, +and cried again: "How beautiful I am! How pretty I am!" + +She was. She positively did not look a bit like a drudge. She was not +the Florrie of the kitchen and of the sack-apron, but a young, fledged +creature with bursting bosom who could trouble any man by the capricious +modesty of a gaze downcast. The miraculous skirt, odious on Hilda, had +the brightness of a new skirt. Her hands and arms were red and chapped, +but her face had bloomed perfect in the kitchen like a flower in a +marl-pit. It was a face that an ambitious girl could rely on. Its charm +and the fluid charm of her movements atoned a thousand times for all her +barbaric ignorance and crudity; the grime on her neck was naught. + +Hilda watched, intensely ashamed of this spying, but she could not bring +herself to withdraw. She was angry with Florrie; she was outraged. Then +she thought: "Why should I be angry? The fact is I'm being mother all +over again. After all, why shouldn't Florrie...?" And she was a little +jealous of Florrie, and a little envious of her, because Florrie had the +naturalness of a savage or of an animal, unsophisticated by ideals of +primness. Hilda was disconcerted at the discovery of Florrie as an +authentic young woman. Florrie, more than seven years her junior! She +felt experienced, and indulgent as the old are indulgent. For the first +time in her life she did honestly feel old. And she asked herself--half +in dismay: "Florrie has got thus far. Where am _I_? What am _I_ doing?" +It was upsetting. + +At length Florrie took off the bonnet and ran upstairs, and shut the +door of her attic. Apparently she meant to improve the bonnet by some +touch. After waiting nervously a few moments, the aged Hilda slipped +silently downstairs, and through the kitchen, and so by the garden, +where with their feet in mire the hare trees were giving signs of hope +under the soft blue sky, into the street. Florrie would never know that +she had been watched. + + +III + +Ten minutes later, when she went into the office of Dayson & Co., Hilda +was younger than ever. It was a young, fragile girl, despite the dark +frown of her intense seriousness, who with accustomed gestures poked the +stove, and hung bonnet and jacket on a nail and then sat down to the +loaded desk; it was an ingenuous girl absurdly but fiercely anxious to +shoulder the world's weight. She had passed a whole night in revolt +against George Cannon's indignity; she had called it, furiously, an +insult. She had said to herself: "Well, if I'm so useless as all that, +I'll never go near his office again." But the next afternoon she had +appeared as usual at the office, meek, modest, with a smile, fatigued +and exquisitely resigned, and a soft voice. And she had worked with even +increased energy and devotion. This kissing of the rod, this irrational +instinctive humility, was a strange and sweet experience for her. Such +was the Hilda of the office; but Hilda at home, cantankerous, obstinate, +and rude, had offered a remarkable contrast to her until the moment when +it was decided that her mother should accompany Miss Gailey to London. +From that moment Hilda at home had been an angel, and the Hilda of the +office had shown some return of sturdy pride. + +To-day the first number of _The Five Towns Chronicle_ was to go to +press.... The delays had been inexplicable and exasperating to Hilda, +though she had not criticized them, even to herself; they were now over. +The town had no air of being excited about the appearance of its new +paper. But the office was excited. The very room itself looked feverish. +It was changed; more tables had been brought into it, and papers and +litter had accumulated enormously; it was a room humanized by +habitation, with a physiognomy that was individual and sympathetic. + +From beyond the closed door of the inner room came the sound of men's +rapid voices. Hilda could distinguish Mr. Cannon's and Arthur Dayson's; +there was a third, unfamiliar to her. Having nothing to do, she began to +make work, rearranging the contents of her table, fingering with a +factitious hurry the thick bundles of proofs of correspondence from the +villages (so energetically organized by the great Dayson), and the now +useless 'copy,' and the innumerable letters, that Dayson was always +disturbing, and the samples of encaustic tiles brought in by an inventor +who desired the powerful aid of the press, and the catalogues, and +Dayson's cuttings from the Manchester, Birmingham, and London papers, +and the notepaper and envelopes and cards, and Veale Chifferiel & Co.'s +almanac that had somehow come up with other matters from Mr. Karkeek's +office below. And then she dusted, with pursed lips that blamed the +disgraceful and yet excusable untidiness of men, and then she examined, +with despair and with pride, her dirty little hands, whose finger-tips +all clustered together (they were now like the hands of a nice, careless +schoolboy), and lightly dusted one against the other. Then she found a +galley-proof under the table. It was a duplicate proof of _The Five +Towns Chronicle's_ leading article, dictated to her by a prodigious +Arthur Dayson, in Mr. Cannon's presence, on the previous day, and +dealing faithfully with "The Calder Street Scandal" and with Mr. +Enville, a member of the Local Board--implicated in the said scandal. +The proof was useless now, for the leader-page was made up. +Nevertheless, Hilda carefully classified it "in case..." + + +IV + +On a chair was _The Daily Telegraph_, which Dayson had evidently been +reading, for it was blue pencilled. Hilda too must read it; her duty was +to read it: Dayson had told her that she ought never to neglect the +chance of reading any newspaper whatever, and that a young woman in her +responsible situation could not possibly know too much. Which advice, +though it came from a person ridiculous to her, seemed sound enough, and +was in fact rather flattering. In the _Telegraph_ she saw, between +Dayson's blue lines, an account of a terrible military disaster. She was +moved by it in different ways. It produced in her a grievous, horror- +struck desolation; but it also gave her an extraordinary sensation of +fervid pleasure. It was an item of news that would have to appear in the +_Chronicle_, and this would mean changes in the make-up, and work at +express speed, and similar delights. Already the paper was supposed to +be on the machine, though in fact, as she well knew, it was not. No +doubt the subject of discussion in the inner room was the disaster!... +Yes, she was acutely and happily excited. And always afterwards, when +she heard or saw the sinister word 'Majuba' (whose political +associations never in the least interested her), she would recall her +contradictory, delicious feelings on that dramatic afternoon. + +While she was busily cutting out the news from the _Telegraph_ to be +ready for Arthur Dayson, there was a very timid knock at the door, and +Florrie entered, as into some formidable cabinet of tyrannic rulers. + +"If you please, miss--" she began to whisper. + +"Why, Florrie," Hilda exclaimed, "what have you put that old skirt on +for, when I've given you mine? I told you--" + +"I did put it on, miss. But there came a telegram. I told the boy you +were here, but he said that wasn't no affair of his, so I brought it +myself, and I thought you wouldn't care for to see me in your skirt, +miss, not while on duty, miss, 'specially here like! So I up quick and +changed it back." + +"Telegram?" Hilda repeated the word. + +Florrie, breathless after running and all this whispering, advanced in +the prettiest confusion towards the throne, and Hilda took the telegram +with a gesture as casual as she could manage. Florrie's abashed mien, +and the arrival of the telegram, stiffened her back and steadied her +hand. Imagine that infant being afraid of her, Hilda! This too was life! +And the murmur of the men in the inner room was thrilling to Hilda's +ears. + +She brusquely opened the telegram and read: "Lessways, Lessways Street, +Turnhill. Mother ill. Can you come?--Gailey." + + + + +CHAPTER XIII +HILDA'S WORLD + + +I + +The conversation in the inner room promised to be interminable. Hilda +could not decide what to do. She felt no real alarm on her mother's +account. Mrs. Lessways, often slightly indisposed, was never seriously +ill; she possessed one of those constitutions which do not go to +extremes of disease; if a malady overtook her, she invariably 'had' it +in a mild form. Doubtless Sarah Gailey, preoccupied and worried by new +responsibilities, desired to avoid the added care of nursing the sick. +Hence the telegram. Moreover, if the case had been grave, she would not +have put the telegram in the interrogative; she would have written, +'Please come at once.' No, Hilda was not unduly disturbed. Nevertheless, +she had an odd idea that she ought to rush to the station and catch the +next train, which left Knype at five minutes to four; this idea did not +spring from her own conscience, but rather from the old-fashioned +collective family conscience. But at a quarter to four, when it was +already too late to catch the local train at Turnhill, the men had not +emerged from the inner room; nor had Hilda come to any decision. As the +departure of her mother and Miss Gailey had involved much solemn poring +over time-tables, it happened that she knew the times of all the trains +to London; to catch the next and last she would have to leave Turnhill +at _5.55_. She said that she would wait and see. Her work for the first +number of the paper was practically done, but there was this mysterious +conclave which fretted her curiosity and threatened exciting +development; also the Majuba disaster would mean trouble for somebody. +And in any event she hated the very thought of quitting Turnhill before +the _Chronicle_ was definitely out. She had lived for the moment of its +publication, and she could not bear to miss it. She was almost angry +with her mother; she was certainly angry with Miss Gailey. All the +egotism of the devotee in her was aroused and irate. + +Then the men came forth from the inner room, with a rather unexpected +suddenness. Mr. Cannon appeared first; and after him Mr. Enville; lastly +Arthur Dayson, papers in hand. Intimidated by the presence of the +stranger, Hilda affected to be busy at her table. Mr. Enville shook +hands very amicably with George Cannon, and instantly departed. As he +passed down the stairs she caught sight of him; he was a grizzled man of +fifty, lean and shabby, despite his reputation for riches. She knew that +he was a candidate for the supreme position of Chief Bailiff at the end +of the year, and he did not accord with her spectacular ideal of a Chief +Bailiff; the actual Chief Bailiff was a beautiful and picturesque old +man, with perfectly tended white whiskers, and always a flower in his +coat. Further, she could not reconcile this nearly effusive friendliness +between Mr. Enville and Mr. Cannon with the animadversions of the +leading article which Arthur Dayson had composed, and Mr. Cannon had +approved, only twenty-four hours earlier. + +As Mr. Cannon shut the door at the head of the stairs, she saw him give +a discreet, disdainful wink to Dayson. Then he turned sharply to Hilda, +and said, thoughtful and stern: + +"Your notebook, please." + +Bracing herself, and still full of pride in her ability to write this +mysterious shorthand, she opened her notebook, and waited with poised +pencil. The mien of the two men had communicated to her an excitement +far surpassing their own, in degree and in felicity. The whole of her +vital force was concentrated at the point of her pencil, and she seemed +to be saying to herself: "I'm very sorry, mother, but see how important +this is! I shall consider what I can do for you the very moment I am +free." + +Arthur Dayson coughed and plumped heavily on a chair. + + +II + +It was in such moments as this that Dayson really lived, with all the +force of his mediocrity. George Cannon was not a journalist; he could +compose a letter, but he had not the trick of composing an article. He +felt, indeed, a negligent disdain for the people who possessed this +trick, as for performers in a circus; he certainly did not envy them, +for he knew that he could buy them, as a carpenter buys tools. His +attitude was that of the genuine bourgeois towards the artist: +possessive, incurious, and contemptuous. Dayson, however, ignored George +Cannon's attitude, perhaps did not even perceive what it was. He gloried +in his performance. Accustomed to dictate extempore speeches on any +subject whatever to his shorthand pupils, he was quite at his ease, +quite master of his faculties, and self-satisfaction seemed to stand out +on his brow like genial sweat while the banal phrases poured glibly from +the cavern behind his jagged teeth; and each phrase was a perfect model +of provincial journalese. George Cannon had to sit and listen,--to +approve, or at worst to make tentative suggestions. + +The first phrase which penetrated through the outer brain of the +shorthand writer to the secret fastness where Hilda sat in judgment on +the world was this: + +"The campaign of vulgar vilification inaugurated yesterday by our +contemporary _The Staffordshire Signal_ against our esteemed +fellow-townsman Mr. Richard Enville..." + +This phrase came soon after such phrases as "Our first bow to the +public"... "Our solemn and bounden duty to the district which it is our +highest ambition to serve..." etc. Phrases which had already occurred in +the leading article dictated on the previous day. + +Hilda soon comprehended that in twenty-four hours Mr. Enville, from +being an unscrupulous speculator who had used his official position to +make illicit profits out of the sale of land to the town for town +improvements, had become the very mirror of honesty and high fidelity to +the noblest traditions of local government. Without understanding the +situation, and before even she had formulated to herself any criticism +of the persons concerned, she felt suddenly sick. She dared not look at +George Cannon, but once when she raised her head to await the flow of a +period that had been arrested at a laudatory superlative, she caught +Dayson winking coarsely at him. She hated Dayson for that; George Cannon +might wink at Dayson (though she regretted the condescending +familiarity), but Dayson had no right to presume to wink at George +Cannon. She hoped that Mr. Cannon had silently snubbed him. + +As the article proceeded there arose a crying from the Square below. A +_Signal_ boy, one of the earliest to break the silent habit of the +Square, was bawling a fresh edition of Arthur Dayson's contemporary, and +across the web of the dictator's verbiage she could hear the words: +"South Africa--Details--" Mr. Cannon glanced at his watch impatiently. +Hilda could see, under her bent and frowning brow, his white hand moving +on the dark expanse of his waistcoat. + +Immediately afterwards Mr. Cannon, interrupting, said: + +"That'll be all right. Finish it. I must be off." + +"Right you are!" said Dayson grandly. "I'll run down with it to the +printer's myself--soon as it's copied." + +Mr. Cannon nodded. "And tell him we've got to be on the railway +bookstalls first thing to-morrow morning." + +"He'll never do it." + +"He must do it. I don't care if he works all night." + +"But--" + +"There hasn't got to be any 'buts,' Dayson. There's been a damned sight +too much delay as it is." + +"All right! All right!" Dayson placated him hastily. + +Mr. Cannon departed. + +It seemed to Hilda that she shivered, but whether with pain or pleasure +she knew not. Never before had Mr. Cannon sworn in her presence. All day +his manner had been peculiar, as though the strain of mysterious +anxieties was changing his spirit. And now he was gone, and she had said +naught to him about the telegram from Miss Gailey! + +Arthur Dayson rolled oratorically on in defence of the man whom +yesterday he had attacked. + +And then Sowter, the old clerk, entered. + +"What is it? Don't interrupt me!" snapped Dayson. + +"There's the _Signal_.... Latest details.... This here Majuba business!" + +"What do I care about your Majuba?" Dayson retorted. "I've got something +more important than your Majuba." + +"It was the governor as told me to give it you," said Sowter, restive. + +"Well, give it me, then; and don't waste my time!" Dayson held out an +imperial hand for the sheet. He looked at Hilda as if for moral support +and added, to her, in a martyred tone: "I suppose I shall have to dash +off a few lines about Sowter's Majuba while you're copying out my +article." + +"And the governor said to remind you that Mr. Enville wants a proof of +his advertisement," Sowter called out sulkily as he was disappearing +down the stairs. + +Hilda blushed, as she had blushed in writing George Cannon's first lie +about the printing of the first issue. She had accustomed herself to +lies, and really without any difficulty or hesitation. Yes! She had even +reached the level of being religiously proud of them! But now her +bullied and crushed conscience leaped up again, and in the swift alarm +of the shock her heart was once more violently beating. Yet amid the +wild confusion of her feelings, a mechanical intelligence guided her +hand to follow Arthur Dayson's final sentences. And there shone out from +her soul a contempt for the miserable hack, so dazzling that it would +have blinded him--had he not been already blind. + + +III + +That evening she sat alone in the office. The first number of _The Five +Towns Chronicle_, after the most astounding adventures, had miraculously +gone to press. Dayson and Sowter had departed. There was no reason why +Hilda should remain,--burning gas to no purpose. She had telegraphed, by +favour of a Karkeek office-boy, to Miss Gailey, saying that she would +come by the first train on the morrow--Saturday, and she had therefore +much to do at home. Nevertheless, she sat idle in the office, unable to +leave. Her whole life was in that office, and it was just when she was +most weary of the environment that she would vacillate longest before +quitting it. She was unhappy and apprehensive, much less about her +mother than about the attitude of her conscience towards the morals of +this new world of hers. The dramatic Enville incident had spoiled the +pleasure which she had felt in sacrificing her formal duty as a daughter +to her duty as a clerk. She had been disillusioned. She foresaw the +future with alarm. + +And yet, strangely, the disillusion and the fear were a source of +pleasure. She savoured them with her loyalty, that loyalty which had +survived even the frightful blow of George Cannon's casual disdain at +her mother's tea-table! Whatever this new world might be, it was hers, +it was precious. She would no more think of abandoning it than a young +mother would think of abandoning a baby obviously imperfect.... Nay, she +would cling to it the tighter! + +George Cannon came up the stairs with his decisive and rapid step. She +rose from her chair at the table as he entered. He was wearing a new +overcoat, that she had never seen before, with a fine velvet collar. + +"You're going?" he asked, a little breathless. + +"I _was_ going," she replied in her clear, timid voice, implying that +she was ready to stay. + +"Everything all right?" + +"Mr. Dayson said so." + +"He's gone?" + +"Yes. Mr. Sowter's gone too." + +"Good!" he murmured. And he straightened his shoulders, and, putting his +hands in the pockets of his trousers, began to walk about the room. + +Hilda moved to get her bonnet and jacket. She moved very quietly and +delicately, and, because he was there, she put on her bonnet and jacket +with gestures of an almost apologetic modesty. He seemed to ignore her, +so that she was able to glance surreptitiously at his face. He was now +apparently less worried. Still, it was an enigmatic face. She had no +notion of what he had been doing since his hurried exit in the +afternoon. He might have been attending to his legal practice, or he +might have been abroad on mysterious errands. + +"Funny business, this newspaper business is, isn't it?" he remarked, +after a moment. "Just imagine Enville, now! Upon my soul I didn't think +he had it in him!... Of course,"--he threw his head up with a careless +laugh,--"of course, it would have been madness for us to miss such a +chance! He's one of the men of the future, in this town." + +"Yes," she agreed, in an eager whisper. + +In an instant George Cannon had completely changed the attitude of her +conscience,--by less than a phrase, by a mere intonation. In an instant +he had reassured her into perfect security. It was plain, from every +accent of his voice, that he had done nothing of which he thought he +ought to be ashamed. Business was business, and newspapers were +newspapers; and the simple truth was that her absurd conscience had been +in the wrong. Her duty was to accept the standards of her new world. Who +was she? Nobody! She did accept the standards of her new world, with +fervour. She was proud of them, actually proud of their apparent +wickedness. She had accomplished an act of faith. Her joy became +intense, and shot glinting from her eyes as she put on her gloves. Her +life became grand to her. She knew she was known in the town as 'the +girl who could write shorthand.' Her situation was not ordinary; it was +unique. Again, the irregularity of the hours, and the fact that the work +never commenced till the afternoon, seemed to her romantic and +beautiful. Here she was, at nine o'clock, alone with George Cannon on +the second floor of the house! And who, gazing from the Square at the +lighted window, would guess that she and he were there alone? + +All the activities of newspaper production were poetized by her fervour. +The _Chronicle_ was not a poor little weekly sheet, struggling into +existence anyhow, at haphazard, dependent on other newspapers for all +except purely local items of news. It was an organ! It was the +courageous rival of the ineffable _Signal_, its natural enemy! One day +it would trample on the _Signal_! And though her role was humble, though +she understood scarcely anything of the enterprise beyond her own +duties, yet she was very proud of her role too. And she was glad that +the men were seemingly so careless, so disorderly, so forgetful of +details, so--in a word--childish! For it was part of her role to remind +them, to set them right, to watch over their carelessness, to restore +order where they had left disorder. In so far as her role affected them, +she condescended to them. + +She informed George Cannon of her mother's indisposition, and that she +meant to go to London the next morning, and to return most probably in a +few days. He stopped in his walk, near her. Like herself, he was not +seriously concerned about Mrs. Lessways, but he showed a courteous +sympathy. + +"It's a good thing you didn't go to London when your mother went," he +said, after a little conversation. + +He did not add: "You've been indispensable." He had no air of +apologizing for his insult at the tea-table. But he looked firmly at +her, with a peculiar expression. + +Suddenly she felt all her slimness and fragility; she felt all the girl +in herself and all the dominant man in him, and all the empty space +around them. She went hot. Her sight became dim. She was ecstatically +blissful; she was deeply ashamed. She desired the experience to last for +ever, and him and herself to be eternally moveless; and at the same time +she desired to fly. Or rather, she had no desire to fly, but her voice +and limbs acted of themselves, against her volition. + +"Good-night, then." + +"But I say! Your wages. Shall I pay you now?" + +"No, no! It doesn't matter in the least, thanks." + +He shook hands with a careless, good-natured smile, which seemed to be +saying: "Foolish creature! You can't defend yourself, and these airs are +amusing. But I am benevolent." And she was ashamed of her shame, and +furious against the childishness that made her frown, and lower her +eyes, and escape out of the room like a mouse. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV +TO LONDON + + +I + +In the middle of the night Hilda woke up, and within a few seconds she +convinced herself that her attitude to Miss Gailey's telegram had been +simply monstrous. She saw it, in the darkness, as an enormity. She ought +to have responded to the telegram at once; she ought to have gone to +London by the afternoon train. What had there been to prevent her from +knocking at the door of the inner room, and saying to Mr. Cannon, in the +presence of no matter whom: "I am very sorry, Mr. Cannon, but I've just +had a telegram that mother is ill in London, and I must leave by the +next train"? There had been nothing to prevent her! At latest she should +have caught the evening train. Business was of no account in such a +crisis. Her mother might be very ill, might be dying, might be dead. It +was not for trifles that people sent such telegrams. The astounding +thing was that she should have been so blind to her obvious duty.... And +she said to herself, thinking with a mysterious and beautiful remorse of +the last minute of her talk with Mr. Cannon: "If I had done as I ought +to have done, I should have been in London, or on my way to London, +instead of in the room with him there; and _that_ would not have +occurred!" But what 'that' was, she could not have explained. +Nevertheless, Mr. Cannon's phrase, "It's a good thing you didn't go to +London," still gave her a pleasure, though the pleasure was dulled. + +Then she tried to reassure herself. Sarah Gailey was nervous and easily +frightened. Her mother had an excellent constitution. The notion of her +mother being seriously ill was silly. In a few hours she would be with +her mother, and would be laughing at these absurd night-fears. In any +case there would assuredly be a letter from Sarah Gailey by the first +post, so that before starting she would have exact information. She +succeeded, partially, in reassuring herself for a brief space; but soon +she was more unhappy than ever in the clear conviction of her +wrongdoing. Again and again she formulated, in her fancy, scenes of the +immediate future, as for example at her mother's dying bed, and she +imagined conversations and repeated the actual words used by herself and +others, interminably. And then she returned to the previous day, and +hundreds of times she went into the inner room and said to Mr. Cannon: +"I'm very sorry, Mr. Cannon, but I've just had a telegram--" etc. Why +had she not said it?... Thus worked the shuttles of her mind, with +ruthless, insane insistence, until she knew not whether she was awake or +asleep, and the very tissues of her physical brain seemed raw. + +She thought feebly: "If I got up and lighted the candle and walked +about, I should end this." But she could not rise. She was netted down +to the bed. And when she tried to soothe herself with other +images--images of delight--she found that they had lost their power. +Undressing, a few hours earlier, she had lived again, in exquisite and +delicious alarm, through the last minute of her talk with Mr. Cannon; +she had gone to sleep while reconstituting those instants. But now their +memory left her indifferent, even inspired repugnance. And her remorse +little by little lost its mysterious beauty. + +She clung to the idea of the reassuring letter which she would receive. +That was her sole glint of consolation. + + +II + +At six she was abroad in the house, intensely alive, intensely conscious +of every particle of her body, and of every tiniest operation of her +mind. In less than two hours the letter would drop into the lobby! At +half-past six both she and Florrie were dressed, and Florrie, stern with +the solemnity and importance of her mission, was setting forth to the +Saracen's Head to order a cab to be at the door at eight o'clock. + +Hilda had much to do, for it was of course necessary to shut up the +house, and the packing of her trunk had to be finished, and the trunk +locked and corded, and a label found; and there was breakfast to cook. +Mrs. Lessways would have easily passed a couple of days in preparing the +house for closure. Nevertheless, time, instead of flying, lagged. At +seven-thirty Hilda, in the partially dismantled parlour, and Florrie in +the kitchen, were sitting down to breakfast. "In a quarter of an hour," +said Hilda to herself, "the post will be here." But in four minutes she +had eaten the bacon and drunk the scalding tea, and in five she had +carried all the breakfast-things into the kitchen, where Florrie was +loudly munching over the sloppy deal table. She told Florrie sharply +that there would be ample time to wash up. Then she went to her bedroom, +and, dragging out her trunk, slid it unaided down the stairs. Back again +in the bedroom, she carelessly glanced at the money in her purse, and +then put on her things for the journey. Waiting, she stood at the window +to look for the postman. Presently she saw him in the distance; he +approached quickly, but spent an unendurable minute out of sight in the +shop next door. When he emerged Hilda was in anguish. Had he a letter +for her? Had he not? He seemed to waver at the gateway, and to decide to +enter.... She heard the double blow of his drumstick baton.... Now in a +few seconds she would know about her mother. + +Proudly restraining herself, she walked with composure to the stairs. +She was astonished to see Florrie bending down to pick up the letter. +Florrie must have been waiting ready to rush to the front door. As she +raised her body and caught sight of Hilda, Florrie blushed. + +The stairs were blocked by the trunk which Hilda had left on the +stair-mat for the cabman to deal with. Standing behind the trunk, Hilda +held forth her hand for the letter. + +"Please, miss, it's for me," Florrie whispered, like a criminal. + +"For you?" Hilda cried, startled. + +In proof Florrie timidly exposed the envelope, on which Hilda plainly +saw, in a coarse, scrawling masculine hand, the words "Miss Florrie +Bagster." Florrie's face was a burning peony. + +Hilda turned superciliously away, too proud to demand any explanations. +All her alarms were refreshed by the failure of a letter from Miss +Gailey. In vain she urged to herself that Miss Gailey had thought it +unnecessary to write, expecting to see her; or that the illness having +passed, Miss Gailey, busy, had put off writing. She could not dismiss a +vision of a boarding-house in London upset from top to bottom by the +grave illness of one person in it, and a distracted landlady who had not +a moment even to scribble a post card. And all the time, as this vision +tore and desolated her, she was thinking: "Fancy that child having a +follower, at her age! She's certainly got a follower!" + +The cab came five minutes before it was due. + + +III + +As the cab rolled through Market Square, where the Saturday stalls were +being busily set up, the ironmongery building was framed for an instant +by the oblong of the rattling window. Hilda seemed to see the place +anew--for the first time. A man was taking down the shutters of the +shop. Above that were the wire-blinds with the name of "Q. Karkeek"; and +above the blinds the blue posters of the _Five Towns Chronicle_. No +outward sign of Mr. Cannon! And yet Mr. Cannon.... She had an extremely +disconcerting sensation of the mysteriousness of Mr. Cannon, and of the +mysteriousness of all existence. Mr. Cannon existed somewhere at that +moment, engaged in some activity. In a house afar off, unknown to her, +her mother existed--if she was not dead! Florrie, with a bundle of +personal goods on her lap, and doubtless the letter in her bosom, sat +impressed and subdued, opposite to her in the shifting universe of the +cab, which was moving away from the empty and silent home. Florrie was +being thrown back out of luxury into her original hovel, and was +accepting the stroke with the fatalism of the young and of the poor. And +one day Hilda and her mother and Florrie would be united again in the +home now deserted, whose heavy key was in the traveller's satchel.... +But would they? + +At the station there was a quarter of an hour to wait. Hilda dismissed +Florrie, with final injunctions, and followed her trunk to the bleak +platform. The old porter was very kind. She went to the little yellow +bookstall. There, under her hand, was a low pile of _The Five Towns +Chronicle._ Miracle! Miraculous George Cannon! She flushed with pride, +with a sense of ownership, as she took a penny from her purse to pay for +a copy. + +"It's th' new peeper," drawled the bookstall lad, with a most foolish +condescension towards the new paper. + +"Lout!" she addressed him in her heart. "If you knew whom you were +talking to--!" + +With what pride, masked by careful indifference, she would hand the copy +of the _Chronicle_ to her mother! Her mother would exclaim "Bless us!" +and spend a day or two in conning the thing, making singular discoveries +in it at short intervals. + + +IV + +It was not until she had reached Euston, and driven through a tumultuous +and shabby thoroughfare to King's Cross, and taken another ticket, and +installed herself in another train, that Hilda began to feel suddenly, +like an abyss opening beneath her strength, the lack of food. Meticulous +in her clerical duties, and in many minor mechanical details of her +personal daily existence, she was capable of singular negligences +concerning matters which the heroic part of her despised and which did +not immediately bear on a great purpose in hand. Thus, in her +carelessness, she found herself with less than two shillings in her +pocket after paying for the ticket to Hornsey. She thought, grimly +resigned: "Never heed! I shall manage. In half an hour I shall be there, +and my anxiety will be at an end." + +The train, almost empty, waited forlornly in a forlorn and empty part of +the huge, resounding ochreish station. Then, without warning or signal, +it slipped off, as though casually, towards an undetermined goal. Often +it ran level with the roofs of vague, far-stretching acres of houses-- +houses vile and frowsy, and smoking like pyres in the dank air. And +always it travelled on a platform of brick arches. Now and then the +walled road received a tributary that rounded subtly into it, and this +tributary could be seen curving away, on innumerable brick arches, +through the chimneypots, and losing itself in a dim horizon of gloom. At +intervals a large, lifeless station brought the train to a halt for a +moment, and the march was resumed. A clock at one of these stations said +a quarter to two. + +Then the name of Hornsey quickened her apprehensive heart. As she +descended nervously from the train, her trunk was shot out from the +guard's van behind. She went and stood over it, until the last of a +series of kindly porters came along and touched his cap. When she asked +for a cab, he seemed doubtful whether a cab was available, and looked +uncertainly along the immense empty platform and across at other +platforms. The train had wandered away. She strove momentarily to +understand the reason of these great sleeping stations; but fatigue, +emotional and physical, had robbed her of all intelligent curiosity in +the phenomena of the mysterious and formidable city. + +Presently the porter threw the trunk on his shoulder and she trudged +after him up steps and over an iron bridge and down steps; and an +express whizzed like a flying shell through the station and vanished. +And at a wicket, in a ragged road, there actually stood a cab and a +skeleton of a horse between the shafts. The driver bounced up, +enheartened at sight of the trunk and the inexperienced, timid girl; but +the horse did not stir in its crooked coma. + +"What address, miss?" asked the cabman. + +"Cedars House, Harringay Park Road." + +The cabman paused in intense thought, and after a few seconds responded +cheerfully: "Yes, miss." + +The porter touched his cap for threepence. The lashed horse plunged +forward. Hilda leaned back in the creaking and depraved vehicle, and +sighed, "So this is their London!" + +She found herself travelling in the direction from which she had come, +parallel to the railway, down the longest street that she had ever seen. +On her left were ten thousand small new houses, all alike. On her right +were broken patches of similar houses, interspersed with fragments of +green field and views of the arches of the railway; the conception of +the horrible patience which had gone to the construction of these +endless, endless arches made her feel sick. + +The cab turned into another road, and another; and then stopped. She saw +the words "Cedars House" on a gateway. She could not open the door of +the cab. The cabman opened it. + +"Blinds down here, miss!" he said, with appropriate mournfulness. + +It seemed a rather large house; and every blind was drawn. Had the +incredible occurred, then? Had this disaster befallen just her, of all +the young women in the world? + +She saw the figure of Sarah Gailey. + +"Good afternoon," she called out calmly. "Here I am. Only I'm afraid I +haven't got enough to pay the cabman." + +But while she was speaking she knew from Sarah Gailey's face that the +worst and the most ridiculous of her night-fears had been justified by +destiny. + +Three days previously Mrs. Lessways had been suddenly taken ill in the +street. A doctor passing in his carriage had come to her assistance and +driven her home. Food eaten on the previous evening had 'disagreed' with +her. At first the case was not regarded as very serious. But as the +patient did not improve in the night Miss Gailey telegraphed to Hilda. +Immediately afterwards, the doctor, summoned in alarm, diagnosed +peritonitis caused by a perforating cancer. Mrs. Lessways had died on +the third day at eleven in the morning, while Hilda was in the train. +Useless to protest that these catastrophes were unthinkable, that Mrs. +Lessways had never been ill in her life! The catastrophe had happened. +And upstairs a corpse lay in proof. + + * * * * * + + + + +BOOK II +HER RECOVERY + + + + +CHAPTER I +SIN + +I + +From her bed Hilda could see the trees waving in the wind. Every morning +she had thus watched them, without interest. At first the branches had +been utterly bare, and beyond their reticulation had been visible the +rosy facade of a new Board-school. But now the branches were rich with +leafage, hiding most of the Board-school, so that only a large upper +window of it could be seen. This window, upon which the sun glinted +dazzlingly, threw back the rays on to Hilda's bed, giving her for a few +moments the illusion of direct sunlight. The hour was eleven o'clock. On +the night-table lay a tea-tray in disorder, and on the turned-down sheet +some crumbs of toast. A low, nervous tap at the door caused Hilda to +stir in the bed. Sarah Gailey entered hurriedly. In her bony yellowed +hand she held a collection of tradesmen's account-books. + +"Good morning, dear, how are you?" she asked, bending awkwardly over the +bed. In the same instant she looked askance at the tray. + +"I'm all right, thanks," said Hilda lazily, observing the ceiling. + +"You haven't been too cold without the eiderdown? I forgot to ask you +before. You know I only took it off because I thought the weather was +getting too warm.... I didn't want it for another bed. I assure you it's +in the chest of drawers in my room." Sarah Gailey added the last words +as if supplicating to be believed. + +"You needn't tell me that," said Hilda. She was not angry, but bored, by +this characteristic remark of Miss Gailey's. In three months she had +learnt a great deal about the new landlady of the Cedars, that strange +neurotic compound of ability, devotion, thin-skinned vanity, and sheer, +narrow stupidity. "I've been quite warm enough," Hilda added as quickly +as she could, lest Miss Gailey might have time to convince herself to +the contrary. + +"And the toast? I do hope--after all I've said to that Hettie about--" + +"You see I've eaten it all," Hilda interrupted her, pointing to the +plate. + +Their faces were close together; they exchanged a sad smile. Miss Gailey +was still bending over her, anxiously, as over a child. Yet neither the +ageing and worn woman nor the flaccid girl felt the difference between +them in age. Nor was Hilda in any ordinary sense ill. The explanation of +Miss Gailey's yearning attitude lay in an exaggerated idea of her duty +to Hilda, whose mother's death had been the result of an act of +friendliness to her. If Mrs. Lessways had not come to London in order to +keep company with Sarah, she might--she would, under Providence--have +been alive and well that day; such was Sarah's reasoning, which by the +way ignored certain statements of the doctor. Sarah would never forgive +herself. But she sought, by an infatuated devotion, to earn the +forgiveness of Caroline's daughter. Her attentions might have infuriated +an earlier Hilda, or at least have been met with disdain only half +concealed. But on the present actual Hilda they produced simply no +effect of any kind. The actual Hilda, living far within the mysterious +fastness of her own being, was too solitary, too preoccupied, and too +fatigued, to be touched even by the noble beauty that distinguished the +expiatory and protective gesture of the spinster, otherwise somewhat +ludicrous, as she leaned across the bed and cut off the sunshine. + + +II + +On the morning of her mother's funeral, Hilda had gone to Hornsey +Station to meet an uncle of Mrs. Lessways, who was coming down from +Scotland by the night-train. She scarcely knew him, but he was to be +recognizable by his hat and his muffler, and she was to await him at the +ticket-gate. An entirely foolish and unnecessary arrangement, contrived +by a peculiar old man: the only possible course was to accept it. + +She had waited over half an hour, between eight and nine, and in that +time she had had full opportunity to understand why those suburban +stations had been built so large. A dark torrent of human beings, +chiefly men, gathered out of all the streets of the vicinity, had dashed +unceasingly into the enclosure and covered the long platforms with +tramping feet. Every few minutes a train rolled in, as if from some +inexhaustible magazine of trains beyond the horizon, and, sucking into +itself a multitude and departing again, left one platform for one moment +empty,--and the next moment the platform was once more filled by the +quenchless stream. Less frequently, but still often, other trains +thundered through the station on a line removed from platforms, and +these trains too were crammed with dark human beings, frowning in study +over white newspapers. For even in 1880 the descent upon London from the +suburbs was a formidable phenomenon. Train after train fled downwards +with its freight towards the hidden city, and the torrent still surged, +more rapid than ever, through the narrow gullet of the station. It was +like the flight of some enormous and excited population from a country +menaced with disaster. + +Borne on and buffeted by the torrent, Hilda had seen a well-dressed +epileptic youth, in charge of an elderly woman, approaching the station. +He had passed slowly close by her, as she modestly waited in her hasty +mourning, and she had had a fearful vision of his idiotic greenish face +supported somehow like a mask at the summit of that shaky structure of +limbs. He had indeed stared at her with his apelike eyes. She had +watched him, almost shuddering, till he was lost amid the heedless crowd +within. Then, without waiting longer for her relative, without +reflecting upon what she did, she had walked tremblingly back to the +Cedars, checked by tributaries of the torrent at every street corner.... + +She had known nothing of the funeral. She had not had speech with the +relative. She was in bed, somehow. The day had elapsed. And in the +following night, when she was alone and quite awake, she had become +aware that she, she herself, was that epileptic shape; that that +epileptic shape was lying in her bed and that there was none other in +the bed. Nor was this a fancy of madness! She knew that she was not mad, +that she was utterly sane; and the conviction of sanity only intensified +her awful discovery. She passed a trembling hand over her face, and felt +the skin corrupt and green. Gazing into the darkness, she knew that her +stare was apelike. She had felt, then, the fullest significance of +horror. In the morning she had ceased to be the epileptic shape, but the +risk of re-transformation had hovered near her, and the intimidation of +it was such that she had wept, aghast and broken as much by the future +as by the past. She had been discovered weeping.... + +Later, the phrase 'nervous breakdown' had lodged in her confused memory. +The doctor had been very matter-of-fact, logical, and soothing. +Overwork, strain, loss of sleep, the journey, anxiety, lack of food, the +supreme shock, the obstinate refusal of youth to succumb, and then the +sudden sight of the epileptic (with whom the doctor was acquainted): +thus had run the medical reasoning, after a discreet but thorough +cross-examination of her; and it had seemed so plausible and so +convincing that the doctor's pride in it was plain on his optimistic +face as he gave the command: "Absolute repose." But to Hilda the +reasoning and the resultant phrase, 'nervous breakdown,' had meant +nothing at all. Words! Empty words! She knew, profoundly and fatally, +the evil principle which had conquered her so completely that she had no +power left with which to fight it. This evil principle was Sin; it was +not the force of sins, however multifarious; it was Sin itself. She was +the Sinner, convicted and self-convicted. One of the last intelligent +victims of a malady which has now almost passed away from the civilized +earth, she existed in the chill and stricken desolation of incommutable +doom. + + +III + +She had sinned against her mother, and she could not make amends. The +mere thought of her mother, so vivacious, cheerful, life-loving, +even-tempered, charitable, disorderly, incompetent, foolish, and yet +shrewd, caused pain of such intensity that it ceased to be pain. She +ought to have seen her mother before she died; she might have seen her, +had she done what was obviously her duty. It was inconceivable to her, +now, that she should have hesitated to fly instantly to London on +receipt of the telegram. But she had hesitated, and her mother had +expired without having sight of her. All exculpatory arguments were +futile against the fact itself. In vain she blamed the wording of the +telegram! In vain she tried to reason that chance, and not herself, was +the evil-doer! In vain she invoked the aid of simple common sense +against sentimental fancy! In vain she went over the events of the +afternoon preceding the death, in order to prove that at no moment had +she been aware of not acting in accordance with her conscience! The +whole of her conduct had been against her conscience, but pride and +selfishness had made her deaf to conscience. She was the Sinner. + +Her despair, except when at intervals she became the loathed epileptic +shape, had been calm. Its symptoms had been, and remained, a complete +lack of energy, and a most extraordinary black indifference to the +surrounding world. Save in the deep centre of her soul, where she +agonized, she seemed to have lost all capacity for emotion. Nothing +moved her, or even interested her. She sat in the house, and ate a +little, and talked a little, like an automaton. She walked about the +streets like a bored exile, but an exile who has forgotten his home. Her +spirit never responded to the stimulus of environment. Suggestions at +once lost their tonic force in the woolly cushion of her apathy. If she +continued to live, it was by inertia; to cease from life would have +required an effort. She did not regret the vocation which she had +abandoned; she felt no curiosity about the fortunes of the newspaper. A +tragic nonchalance held her. + +After several weeks she had naturally begun to think of religion; for +the malady alone was proof enough that she had a profoundly religious +nature. Miss Gailey could rarely go to church, but one Sunday morning-- +doubtless with intent--she asked Hilda if they should go together, and +Hilda agreed. As they approached the large, high-spired church, Hilda +had vague prickings of hope, and was thereby much astonished. But the +service in no way responded to her expectations. "How silly I am!" she +thought disdainfully. "This sort of thing has never moved me before. Why +should it move me now?" The sermon, evangelical, was upon the Creed, and +the preacher explained the emotional quality of real belief. It was a +goodish sermon. But the preacher had effectually stopped the very last +of those exquisite vague prickings of hope. Hilda agreed with his +definition of real belief, and she knew that real belief was impossible +for her. She could never say, with joyous fervour: "I believe!" At best +she could only assert that she did not disbelieve--and was she so sure +even of that? No! Belief had been denied to her; and to dream of +consolation from religion was sentimentally womanish; even in her +indifference she preferred straightforward, honest damnation to the soft +self-deceptions of feminine religiosity. Ah! If she could have been a +Roman Catholic, genuine and convinced--with what ardour would she have +cast herself down before the confessional, and whispered her sinfulness +to the mysterious face within; and with what ecstasy would she have +received the absolution--that cleansing bath of the soul! Then--she +could have recommenced!... But she was not a Roman Catholic. She could +no more become a Roman Catholic than she could become the queen of some +romantic Latin country of palaces and cathedrals. She was a young +provincial girl staying in a boarding-house at Hornsey, on the Great +Northern line out of London, and she was suffering from nervous +breakdown. Such was the exterior common sense of the situation. + +Occasionally the memory of some verse of Victor Hugo, sounding the beat +of one of his vast melancholies, would float through her mind and cause +it to vibrate for an instant with a mournful sensation that resembled +pleasure. + + +IV + +"Are you thinking of getting up, dear?" asked Sarah Gailey, as she +arranged more securely the contents of the tray and found space on it +for her weekly books. + +"Yes, I suppose I may as well," Hilda murmured. "It'll be lunch-time +soon." The days were long, yet somehow they seemed short too. Already +before getting up, she would begin to think of the evening and of going +to bed; and Saturday night followed quickly on Monday morning. It was +scarcely credible that sixteen weeks had passed, thus, since her +mother's death,--sixteen weeks whose retrospect showed no achievement of +any kind, and hardly a desire. + +"I've given those Boutwoods notice," said Sarah Gailey suddenly, the +tray in her hands ready to lift. + +"Not really?" + +"They were shockingly late for breakfast again, this morning, both of +them. And Mr. Boutwood had the face to ask for another egg. Hettie came +and told me, so I went in myself. I told him breakfast was served in my +house at nine o'clock, and there was a notice to that effect in the +bedrooms, not to mention the dining-room. And as good a breakfast as +they'd get in any of their hotels, I lay! If the eggs are cold at ten +o'clock and after, that's not my fault. They're both of them perfectly +healthy, and yet they're bone-idle. They never want to go to bed and +they never want to get up. It isn't as if they went to theatres and got +home late and so on. I could make excuses for that--now and then. No! +It's just idleness and carelessness. And if you saw their bedroom! Oh, +my! A nice example to servants! Well, he was very insulting--most +insulting. He said he paid me to give him not what I wanted, but what +_he_ wanted! He said if I went into a shop, and they began to tell me +what I ought to want and when I ought to want it, I should be annoyed. I +said I didn't need anyone to tell me that, I said! And my house wasn't a +shop. He said it was a shop, and if it wasn't, it ought to be! Can you +imagine it?" + +Hilda tried to exhibit a tepid sympathy. Miss Gailey's nostrils were +twitching, and the tears stood in those watery eyes. She could manage +the house. By the exertion of all her powers and her force she had made +of herself an exceptionally efficient mistress. But she could not manage +the boarders, because she had not sufficient imagination to put herself +in their place. Presiding over all her secret thoughts was the axiom +that the Cedars was a perfect machine, and that the least that a +grateful boarder could do was to fit into the machine. + +"And so you said they could go?" + +"That I did! And I'll tell you another thing, my dear, I--" + +There was a knock at the door. Sarah Gailey stopped in her confidences +like a caught conspirator, and opened the door. Hettie stood on the +mat--the Hettie who despite frequent protests would leave Hilda's toast +to cool into leather on the landing somewhere between the kitchen and +the bedroom. In Hettie's hand was a telegram, which Miss Gailey +accepted. + +"Here, take the tray, Hettie," said she, nervously tearing at the +envelope. "Put these books in my desk," she added. + +"And I wonder what _he'll_ say!" she observed, staring absently at the +opened telegram, after Hettie had gone. + +"Who?" + +"George. He says he'll be up here for lunch. He's bound to be vexed +about the Boutwoods. But he doesn't understand. Men don't, you know! +They don't understand the strain it is on you." The appeal of her eyes +was strangely pathetic. + +Hilda said: + +"I don't think I shall get up for lunch to-day." + +Sarah Gailey moved to the bed, forgetting her own trouble. + +"You aren't so well, then, after all!" she muttered, with mournful +commiseration. "But, you know, he'll have to see you, _this_ time. He +wants to." + +"But why?" + +"Your affairs, I suppose. He says so. 'Coming lunch one. Must see +Hilda.--George.'" + +Sarah Gailey offered the telegram. But Hilda could not bear to take it. +This telegram was the first she had set eyes on since the telegram +handed to her by Florrie in George Cannon's office. The mere sight of +the salmon-tinted paper agitated her. "Is it possible that I can be so +silly?" she thought, "over a bit of paper!" But so it was. + +On a previous visit of George Cannon's to Hornsey she had kept her bed +throughout the day, afraid to meet him, ashamed to meet him, +inexplicably convinced that to meet him would be a crime against filial +piety. There were obscure grottoes in her soul which she had not had the +courage to explore candidly. + +"I think," said Sarah Gailey, reflective and anxious, "I think if you +_could_ get up, it would be nicer than him seeing you here in bed." + +Hilda perceived that at last she would be compelled to face George +Cannon. + + + + +CHAPTER II +THE LITTLE ROOM + + +I + +After lunch Sarah Gailey left Hilda and Mr. Cannon in 'the little room' +together. + +'The little room'--about eight feet square--had no other name; it was +always spoken of affectionately by the boarders, and by the landlady +with pride in its coziness. Situated on the first floor, over the front +part of the hall, it lay between the two principal bedrooms. Old +boarders would discover the little room to new boarders, or new boarders +would discover it for themselves, with immense satisfaction. It was the +chamber of intimacy and of confidences; it was a refuge from the public +life of the Cedars, and, to a certain extent, from the piano. Two women, +newly acquainted, and feeling a mutual attraction, would say to each +other: "Shall we go up to the little room?" "Oh yes, do let us!" And +they would climb the stairs in a fever of anticipation. "Quite the most +charming room in the house, dear Miss Gailey!" another simpering +spinster would say. Yet it contained nothing but an old carpet, two +wicker arm-chairs, a small chair, a nearly empty dwarf bookcase, an +engraving of Marie Antoinette regally facing the revolutionary mob, and +a couple of photographs of the Cedars. + +Hilda sat down in one of the arm-chairs, and George Cannon in the other; +he had a small black bag which he placed on the floor by his side. +Hilda's diffidence was extreme. Throughout lunch she had scarcely +spoken; but as there had been eight people at the table, and George +Cannon had chatted with all of them, her taciturnity had passed +inconspicuous. Now she would be obliged to talk. And the sensations +which she had experienced on first meeting George Cannon in the +dining-room were renewed in a form even more acute. + +She had, in the first place, the self-consciousness due to her mourning +attire, which drew attention to herself; it might have been a +compromising uniform; and the mere fact of her mother's death--quite +apart from the question of her conduct in relation thereto--gave her, in +an interview with a person whom she had not seen since before the death, +a feeling akin to guiltiness--guiltiness of some misdemeanour of taste, +some infraction of the social law against notoriety. She felt, in her +mourning, like one who is being led publicly by policemen to the +police-station. In her fancy she could hear people saying: "Look at that +girl in deep mourning," and she could see herself blushing, as it were +apologetic. + +But much worse than this general mortification in presence of an +acquaintance seen after a long interval was the special constraint due +to the identity of the acquaintance. It was with George Cannon that she +had first deceived and plotted against her ingenuous mother's hasty +plans. It was her loyalty to George Cannon that had been the cause of +her inexplicable disloyalty to her mother. She could not recall her +peculiar and delicious agitations during the final moments of her +previous interview with Cannon--that night of February in the newspaper +office, while her mother was dying in London--without a profound +unreasoning shame which intensified most painfully her natural grief as +an orphan. + +There was this to be said: she was now disturbed out of her torpid +indifference to her environment. As she fidgeted there, pale and +frowning, in the noisy basket-chair, beneath George Cannon's eyes, she +actually perceived again that romantic quality of existence which had +always so powerfully presented itself to her in the past. She reflected: +"How strange that the dreaded scene has now actually begun! He has come +to London, and here we are together, in this house, which at the +beginning of the year was nothing but a name to me! And mother is away +there in the churchyard, and I am in black! And it is all due to him. He +sent Miss Gailey and mother to London. He willed it!... No! It is all +due to me! I went to see him one late afternoon. I sought him out. He +didn't seek me out. And just because I went to see him one afternoon, +mother is dead, and I am here! Strange!" These reflections were dimly +beautiful to her, even in her sadness and in her acute distress. The +coma had assuredly passed, if only for a space. + + +II + +"Well, now," he said, after a few inanities had been succeeded by an +awkward pause. "I've got to talk business with you, so I suppose we may +as well begin, eh?" His tone was fairly blithe, but it was that of a man +who was throwing off with powerful ease the weariness of somewhat +exasperating annoyances. Since lunch he had had a brief interview with +Sarah Gailey. + +"Yes," she agreed glumly. + +"Have you decided what you're going to do?" He began to smile +sympathetically as he spoke. + +"I'm not going back to the paper," she curtly answered, cutting short +the smile with fierceness, almost with ferocity. Beyond question she was +rude in her bitterness. She asked herself: "Why do I talk like this? Why +can't I talk naturally and gently and cheerfully? I've really got +nothing against him." But she could not talk otherwise than she did +talk. It was by this symptom of biting acrimony that her agitation +showed itself. She knew that she was scowling as she looked at the +opposite wall, but she could not smooth away the scowl. + +"No, I suppose not," he said quietly. "But are you thinking of coming +back to Turnhill?" + +She remained mute for some seconds. A feeling of desolation came over +her, and it seemed to her that she welcomed it, trying to intensify it, +and yielding her features to it. "How do I know?" she muttered at +length, shrugging her shoulders. + +"Because if you aren't," he resumed, "it's no use you keeping that house +of yours empty. You must remember it's just as you left it; and the +things in it aren't taking any good, either." + +She shrugged her shoulders again. + +"I don't see that it matters to anybody but me," she said, after another +pause, with a sort of frigid and disdainful nonchalance. And once more +she reflected: "Is it possible that I can behave so odiously?" + +He stood up suddenly. + +"I don't know what you and Sarah have been plotting together," he said, +wounded and contemptuous, yet with lightness. "But I'm sure I don't want +to interfere in your affairs. With Sarah's I've got to interfere, +unfortunately, and a famous time I'm having!" His nostrils grew +fastidious. "But not yours! I only promised your uncle.... Your uncle +told me you wanted me to--" He broke off. + +In an instant she grew confused, alarmed, and extremely ashamed. Her +mood had changed in a flash. It seemed to her that she was in presence +of a disgraceful disaster, which she herself had brought about by wicked +and irresponsible temerity. She was like a child who, having naughtily +trifled with danger, stands aghast at the calamity which his +perverseness has caused. She was positively affrighted. She reflected in +her terror: "I asked for this, and I've got it!" + +George Cannon stooped and picked up his little bag. There he towered, +high and massive, above her! And she felt acutely her slightness, her +girlishness, and her need of his help. She could not afford to transform +sympathy into antipathy. She was alone in the world. Never before had +she realized, as she realized then, the lurking terror of her +loneliness. The moment was critical. In another moment he might be gone +from the room, and she left solitary to irremediable humiliation and +self-disgust. + +"Please!" she whispered appealingly. The whole of her being became an +appeal--the glance, the gesture, the curve of the slim and fragile body. +She was like a slave. She had no pride, no secret reserve of thought. +She was an instinct. Tears showed in her eyes and affected her voice. + +He gave the twisted, difficult, rather foolish smile of one who is +cursing the mortification of a predicament into which he has been cast +through no fault of his own. + +"Please what?" + +"Please sit down." + +He waved a hand, deprecatingly, and obeyed. + +"It's all right," he said. "All right! I ought to have known--" Then he +smiled generously. + +"Known what?" Her voice was now weak and liquid with woe. + +"You'd be likely to be upset." + +Not furtively, but openly, she wiped her eyes. + +"No, no!" she protested honestly. "It's not that. It's--but--I'm very +sorry." + +"I reckon I know a bit what worry is, myself!" he added, with a brief, +almost harsh, laugh. + +These strange words struck her with pity. + + +III + +"Well, now,"--he seemed to be beginning again--let's leave Lessways +Street for a minute.... I can sell the Calder Street property for you, +if you like. And at a pretty good price. Sooner or later the town will +have to buy up all that side of the street. You remember I told your +mother last year but one I could get a customer for it? but she wasn't +having any." + +"Yes," said Hilda eagerly; "I remember." + +In her heart she apologized to George Cannon, once more, for having +allowed her mother to persuade her, even for a day, that that attempt to +buy was merely a trick on his part invented to open negotiations for the +rent-collecting. + +"You know what the net rents are," he went on, "as you've had 'em every +month. I dare say the purchase money if it's carefully invested will +bring you in as much. But even if it doesn't bring in quite as much, you +mustn't forget that Calder Street's going down--it's getting more and +more of a slum. And there'll always be a lot of bother with tenants of +that class." + +"I wish I could sell everything--everything!" she exclaimed +passionately. "Lessways Street as well! Then I should be absolutely +free!" + +"You can!" he said, with dramatic emphasis. "And let me tell you that +ten years hence those Lessways Street houses won't be worth what they +are now!" + +"Is that property going down, too?" she asked. "I thought they were +building all round there." + +"So they are," he answered. "But cheap cottages. Your houses are too +good for that part of the town; that's what's the matter with them. +People who can afford L25 a year--and over--for rent won't care to live +there much longer. You know the end house is empty." + +All houses seemed to her to be a singularly insecure and even perilous +form of property. And the sale of everything she possessed presented +itself to her fancy as a transaction which would enfranchise her from +the past. It symbolized the starting-point of a new life, of a +recommencement unhampered by the vestiges of grief and error. She could +go anywhere, do what she chose. The entire world would lie before her. + +"Please do sell it all for me!" she pleaded wistfully. "Supposing you +could, about how much should I have--I mean income?" + +He glanced about, and then, taking a pencil from his waistcoat pocket, +scribbled a few figures on his cuff. + +"Quite three pounds a week," he said. + + +IV + +After a perfunctory discussion, which was somewhat self-consciously +prolonged by both of them in order to avoid an appearance of hastiness +in an important decision, George Cannon opened his black bag and then +looked round for ink. The little room, having no table, had no inkpot, +and the lawyer took from his pocket an Eagle indelible pencil--the +fountain-pen of those simple days. It needed some adjustment; he stepped +closer to the window, and held the pointed end of the case up to the +light, while screwing the lower end; he was very fastidious in these +mechanical details of his vocation. Hilda watched him from behind, with +an intentness that fascinated herself. + +"And how's the _Chronicle_ getting on?" she asked, in a tone of friendly +curiosity which gave an exaggerated impression of her actual feeling. +She was more and more ashamed that during lunch she had not troubled to +put a question about the paper. She was even ashamed of her social +indifference. That Sarah Gailey, narrow and preoccupied, should be +indifferent, should never once in three months have referred to her +brother's organ, was not surprising; but it was monstrous that she, +Hilda, the secretary, the priestess, should share this uncivil apathy; +and it was unjust to mark the newspaper, as somehow she had been doing, +with the stigma of her mother's death. She actually began to +characterize her recent mental attitude to her past life as morbid. + +"Oh!" he murmured absently, with gloomy hesitation, as he manipulated +the pencil. + +She went on still more persuasively: + +"I suppose you've got a new secretary?" + +"No," he said, as though it fatigued and annoyed him to dwell on the +subject. "I told 'em they must manage without.... It's no fun starting a +new paper in a God-forsaken hole like the Five Towns, I can tell you." + +Plainly his high exuberant hopes had been dashed, had perhaps been +destroyed. + +She did not reply. She could not. She became suddenly sad with sympathy, +and this sadness was beautiful to her. Already, when he was scribbling +on it, she had noticed that his wristband was frayed. Now, silhouetted +against the window, the edge of the wristband caught her attention +again, and grew strangely significant. This man was passing through +adversity! It seemed tragic and shocking to her that he should have to +pass through adversity, that he could not remain for ever triumphant, +brilliant, cocksure in all his grand schemes, and masculinely scathless. +It seemed wrong to her that he should suffer, and desirable that anybody +should suffer rather than he. George Cannon with faulty linen! By what +error of destiny had this heart-rending phenomenon of discord been +caused? (Yes, heart-rending!) Was it due to weary carelessness, or to +actual, horrible financial straits? Either explanation was very painful +to her. She had a vision of a whole sisterhood of women toiling amid +steam and soapsuds in secret, and in secret denying themselves, to +provide him with all that he lacked, so that he might always emerge into +the world unblemished and glitteringly perfect. She would have +sacrificed the happiness of multitudes to her sense of fitness. + + +V + +There being no table, George Cannon removed a grotesque ornament from +the dwarf bookcase, and used the top of the bookcase as a writing-board. +Hilda was called upon to sign two papers. He explained exactly what +these papers were, but she did not understand, nor did she desire to +understand. One was an informal sale-note and the other was an +authority; but which was which, and to what each had reference, she +superbly and wilfully ignored. She could, by a religious effort of +volition, make of herself an excellent clerk, eagerly imitative and +mechanical, but she had an instinctive antipathy to the higher forms of +business. Moreover, she wanted to trust herself to him, if only as a +mystic reparation of her odious rudeness at the beginning of the +interview. And she thought also: "These transactions will result in +profit to him. It is by such transactions that he lives. I am helping +him in his adversity." + +When he gave her the Eagle pencil, and pointed to the places where she +was to sign, she took the pencil with fervour, more and more anxious to +atone to him. For a moment she stood bewildered, in a dream, staring at +the scratched mahogany top of the bookcase. And the bookcase seemed to +her to be something sentient, patient, and helpful, that had always been +waiting there in the corner to aid George Cannon in this +crisis--something human like herself. She loved the bookcase, and the +Eagle pencil, and the papers, and the pattern on the wall. George Cannon +was standing behind her. She felt his presence like a delicious danger. +She signed the papers, in that large scrawling hand which for a few +brief weeks she had by force cramped down to the submissive caligraphy +of a clerk. As she signed, she saw the name "Karkeek" in the midst of +one of the documents, and remembered, with joyous nonchalance, that +George Cannon's own name never appeared in George Cannon's affairs. + +He took her place in front of the little bookcase, and folded the +documents. There he was, beside her, in all his masculinity--his +moustache, his blue chin, his wide white hands, his broadcloth--there he +was planted on his massive feet as on a pedestal! She did not see him; +she was aware of him. And she was aware of the closed door behind them. +One of the basket-chairs, though empty, continued to creak, like a thing +alive. Faintly, very faintly, she could hear the piano--Mrs. Boutwood +playing! Overhead were the footsteps of Sarah Gailey and Hettie--they +were checking the linen from the laundry, as usual on Saturday +afternoon. And she was aware of herself, thin, throbbing, fragile, +mournful, somehow insignificant! + +He looked round at her, with a half-turn of the head. In his glance was +good humour, good nature, protectiveness, and rectitude; and, more than +these, some of the old serenely smiling triumphant quality. He was not +ruined! He was not really in adversity! He remained the conqueror! She +thrilled with her relief. + +"You're in my hands now--no mistake!" he murmured roguishly, picking up +the documents, and bending over the bag. + +Hilda could hear a heavy footstep on the stairs, ascending. + +In the same instant she had an extraordinary and disconcerting impulse +to seize his hand--she knew not why, whether it was to thank him, to +express her sympathy, or to express her submission. She struggled +against this impulse, but the impulse was part of herself and of her +inmost self; She was afraid, but her fear was pleasurable. She was +ashamed, but her shame was pleasurable. She wanted to move away from +where she stood. She thought: "If only I willed to move away, I could +move away. But, no! I shall not will it. I like remaining just here, in +this fear, this shame, and this agitation." She had a clear, dazzling +perception of the splendour and the fineness of sin; but she did not +know what sin! And all the time the muscles of her arm were tense in the +combat between the weakening desire to keep her arms still and the +growing desire to let her hand seize the hand of George Cannon. And all +the time the heavy footstep was ascending the interminable staircase. +And all the time George Cannon, with averted head, was fumbling in the +bag. And then, in a flash, she was really afraid; the fear was no longer +pleasurable, and her shame had become a curse. She said to herself: "I +cannot move, now. In a minute I shall do this horrible thing. Nothing +can save me." Despairing, she found a dark and tumultuous joy in +despair. The trance endured for ages, while disaster approached nearer +and nearer. + +Then, after the heavy footstep had been climbing the staircase since +earth began, the door was brusquely opened, and the jovial fat face of +Mr. Boutwood appeared, letting in the louder sound of the piano. + +"Oh, I beg pardon!" he muttered, pretending that he had assumed the +little room to be empty. The fact was that he was in search of George +Cannon, in whom he had recognized a fraternal spirit. + +"Come in, Mr. Boutwood," said Hilda, with an easy, disdainful calm which +absolutely astounded herself. "That's all, then?" she added, to George +Cannon, glancing at him indifferently. She departed without waiting for +an answer. + + +VI + +Putting on a bonnet, and taking an umbrella to occupy her hands, she +went out into the remedial freedom of the streets. And after turning the +first corner she saw coming towards her the figure of a woman whom she +seemed to know, elegant, even stately, in youthful grace. It was Janet +Orgreave, wearing a fashionable fawn-coloured summer costume. As they +recognized each other the girls blushed slightly. Janet hastened +forward. Hilda stood still. She was amazed at the chance which had sent +her two unexpected visitors in the same day. They shook hands and +kissed. + +"So I've found you!" said Janet. "How are you, you poor dear? Why didn't +you answer my letter?" + +"Letter?" Hilda repeated, wondering. Then she remembered that she had +indeed received a letter from Janet, but in her comatose dejection had +neglected to answer it. + +"I'm up in London with father for the weekend. We want you to come with +us to the Abbey to-morrow. And you must come back with us to Bursley on +Monday. You _must_! We're quite set on it. I've left father all alone +this afternoon, to come up here and find you out. Not that he minds! +What a way it is! But how are you, Hilda?" + +Hilda was so touched by Janet's affectionate solicitude that her eyes +filled with tears. She looked at that radiating and innocent goodness, +and thought: "How different I am from her! She hasn't the least idea how +different I am!" + +For a moment, Janet seemed to her to be a sort of angel--modish, but +exquisitely genuine. She saw in the invitation to the Five Towns a +miraculous defence against a peril the prospect of which was already +alarming her. She would be compelled to go to Turnhill in order to visit +Lessways Street and decide what of her mother's goods she must keep. She +would of course take Janet with her. In all the Turnhill affairs Janet +should accompany her. Her new life should begin under the protection of +Janet's society. And her heart turned from the old life towards the new +with hope and a vague brightening expectation of happiness. + +At the Cedars she led Janet to her bedroom, and then came out of the +bedroom to bid good-bye to George Cannon. The extreme complexity of +existence and of her sensations baffled and intimidated her. + + + + +CHAPTER III +JOURNEY TO BLEAKRIDGE + + +I + +Hilda and Janet were mounting the precipitous Sytch Bank together on +their way from Turnhill into Bursley. It was dark; they had missed one +train at Turnhill and had preferred not to wait for the next. Although +they had been very busy in Hilda's house throughout all the afternoon +and a part of the evening, and had eaten only a picnic meal, neither of +them was aware of fatigue, and the two miles to Bursley seemed a trifle. + +Going slowly up the steep slope, they did not converse. Janet said that +the weather was changing, and Hilda, without replying, peered at the +black baffling sky. The air had, almost suddenly, grown warmer. Above, +in the regions unseen, mysterious activities were in movement, as if +marshalling vast forces. The stars had vanished. A gentle but equivocal +wind on the cheek presaged rain, and seemed to be bearing downwards into +the homeliness of the earth some strange vibration out of infinite +space. The primeval elements of the summer night encouraged and +intensified Hilda's mood, half joyous, half apprehensive. She thought: +"A few days ago, I was in Hornsey, with the prospect of the visit to +Turnhill before me. Now the visit is behind me. I said that Janet should +be my companion, and she has been my companion. I said that I would cut +myself free, and I have cut myself free. I need never go to Turnhill +again, unless I like. The two trunks will be sent for to-morrow; and all +the rest will be sold--even the clock. The thing is done. I have +absolute liberty, and an income, and the intimacy of this splendid +affectionate Janet.... How fortunate it was that Mr. Cannon was not at +his office when we called! Of course I was obliged to call.... And yet +would it not be more satisfactory if I had seen him?... I must have been +in a horribly morbid state up at Hornsey.... Soon I must decide about my +future. Soon I shall actually have decided!... Life is very queer!" She +had as yet no notion whatever of what she would do with her liberty and +her income and the future; but she thought vaguely of something heroic, +grandiose, and unusual. + + +II + +In her hand she carried a small shabby book, bound in blue and gold, +with gilt edges a little irregular. She had found this book while +sorting out the multitudinous contents of her mother's wardrobe, and at +the last moment, perceiving that it had been overlooked, and being +somehow ashamed to leave it to the auctioneers, she had brought it away, +not knowing how she would ultimately dispose of it. The book had +possibly been dear to her mother, but she could not embarrass her +freedom by conserving everything that had possibly been dear to her +mother. It was entitled _The Girl's Week-day Book_, by Mrs. Copley, and +it had been published by the Religious Tract Society, no doubt in her +mother's girlhood. The frontispiece, a steel engraving, showed a group +of girls feeding some swans by the terraced margin of an ornamental +water, and it bore the legend, "Feeding the Swans." And on the title- +page was the text: "That our daughters may be as corner-stones, polished +after the similitude of a palace. Psalm cxliv. 12." In the table of +contents were such phrases as: "One thing at a time. Darkness and Light. +Respect for Ministers. The Drowning Fly. Trifling with words of +Scripture. Goose and Swan. Delicate Health. Conscientious Regard to +Truth. Sensibility and Gentleness contrasted with Affectation. Curiosity +and Tattling. Instability of Worldly Possessions." A book representing, +for Hilda, all that was most grotesque in an age that was now definitely +finished and closed! A silly book! + +During the picnic meal she had idly read extracts from it to Janet, +amusing sentences; and though the book had once been held sacred by her +who was dead, and though they were engaged in stirring the scarce-cold +ashes of a tragedy, the girls had nevertheless permitted themselves a +kindly, moderate mirth. Hilda had quoted from a conversation in it: +"Well, I would rather sit quietly round this cheerful fire, and talk +with dear mamma, than go to the grandest ball that ever was known!" and +Janet had plumply commented: "What a dreadful lie!" And then they had +both laughed openly, perhaps to relieve the spiritual tension caused by +the day's task and the surroundings. After that, Hilda had continued to +dip into the book, but silently. And Janet had imagined that Hilda was +merely bored by the monotonous absurdity of the sentiments expressed. + +Janet was wrong. Hilda had read the following: "One word more. Do not +rest in your religious impressions. You have, perhaps, been the subject +of terror on account of sin; your mind has been solemnized by some event +in Providence; by an alarming fit of sickness, or the death of a +relative, or a companion.... This is indeed to be reckoned a great +mercy; but then the danger is, lest you should rest here; lest those +tears, and terrors, and resolutions, should be the only evidences on +which you venture to conclude on the safety of your immortal state. What +is your present condition?..." + +Which words intimidated Hilda in spite of herself. In vain she repeated +that the book was a silly book. She really believed that it was silly, +but she knew also that there was an aspect of it which was not silly. +She was reminded by it that she had found no solution of the problem +which had distracted her in Hornsey. 'What is your present condition?' +Her present condition was still that of a weakling and a coward who had +sunk down inertly before the great problem of sin. And now, in the +growing strength of her moral convalescence, she was raising her eyes +again to meet the problem. Her future seemed to be bound up with the +problem. As she breasted the top of the Sytch under the invisible +lowering clouds, with her new, adored friend by her side, and the +despised but powerful book in her hand, she mused in an ambiguous +reverie upon her situation, dogged by the problem which alone was +accompanying her out of the past into the future. Her reverie was shot +through by piercing needles of regret for her mother; and even with the +touch of Janet's arm against her own in the darkness she had sharp +realizations of her extreme solitude in the world. Withal, the sense of +life was precious and beautiful. She was not happy; but she was filled +with the mysterious vital elation which surpasses happiness. + + +III + +They descended gently into Bursley, crossing the top of St. Luke's +Square and turning eastwards into Market Square, ruled by the sombre and +massive Town Hall in whose high tower an illuminated dial shone like a +topaz. To Hilda, this nocturnal entry into Bursley had the romance of an +entry into a town friendly but strange and recondite. During the few +days of her stay with the Orgreaves in the suburb of Bleakridge, she had +scarcely gone into the town once. She had never seen it at night. In the +old Turnhill days she had come over to Bursley occasionally with her +mother; but to shoppers from Turnhill, Bursley meant St. Luke's Square +and not a yard beyond. + +Now the girls arrived at the commencement of the steam-car track, where +a huge engine and tram were waiting, and as they turned another corner, +the long perspective of Trafalgar Road, rising with its double row of +lamps towards fashionable Bleakridge, was revealed to Hilda. She +thought, naturally, that every other part of the Five Towns was more +impressive and more important than the poor little outskirt, Turnhill, +of her birth. In Turnhill there was no thoroughfare to compare with +Trafalgar Road, and no fashionable suburb whatever. She had almost the +feeling of being in a metropolis, if a local metropolis. + +"It's beginning to rain, I think," said Janet. + +"Who's that?" Hilda questioned abruptly, ignoring the remark in the +swift, unreflecting excitement of a sensibility surprised. + +"Where?" + +"There!" + +They were going down Duck Bank into the hollow. On the right, opposite +the lighted Dragon Hotel, lay Duck Square in obscure somnolence; at the +corner of Duck Square and Trafalgar Road was a double-fronted shop, of +which all the shutters were up except two or three in the centre of the +doorway. Framed thus in the aperture, a young man stood within the shop +under a bright central gas-jet; he was gazing intently at a large sheet +of paper which he held in his outstretched hands, and the girls saw him +in profile: tall, rather lanky, fair, with hair dishevelled, and a +serious, studious, and magnanimous face; quite unconscious that he made +a picture for unseen observers. + +"That?" said Janet, in a confidential and interested tone. "That's young +Clayhanger--Edwin Clayhanger.[1] His father's the printer, you know. +Came from Turnhill, originally." + + +"I never knew," said Hilda. "But I seem to have heard the name." + +"Oh! It must have been a long time ago. He's got the best business in +Bursley now. Father says it's one of the best in the Five Towns. He's +built that new house just close to ours. Don't you remember I pointed it +out to you? Father's the architect. They're going to move into it next +week or the week after. I expect that's why the son and heir's working +so late to-night, packing and so on, perhaps." + +The young man moved out of sight. But his face had made in those few +thrilling seconds a deep impression on Hilda; so that in her mind she +still saw it, with an almost physical particularity of detail. It +presented itself to her, in some mysterious way, as a romantic visage, +wistful, full of sad subtleties, of the unknown and the seductive, and +of a latent benevolence. It was as recondite and as sympathetic as the +town in which she had discovered it. + +She said nothing. + +"Old Mr. Clayhanger is a regular character," Janet eagerly went on, to +Hilda's great content. "Some people don't like him. But I rather do like +him." She was always thus kind. "Grandmother once told me he sprang from +simply nothing at all--worked on a potbank when he was quite a child." + +"Who? The father, you mean?" + +"Yes, the father. Now, goodness knows how much he isn't worth I Father +is always saying he could buy _us_ up, lock, stock, and barrel." Janet +laughed. "People often call him a miser, but he can't be so much of a +miser, seeing that he's built this new house." + +"And I suppose the son's in the business?" + +"Yes. He wanted to be an architect. That was how father got to know him. +But old Mr. Clayhanger wouldn't have it. And so he's a printer, and one +day he'll be one of the principal men in the town." + +"Oh! So you know him?" + +"Well, we do and we don't. I go into the shop sometimes; and then I've +seen him once or twice up at the new house. We've asked him to come in +and see us. But he's never come, and I don't think he ever will. I +believe his father does keep him grinding away rather hard. I'm sure +he's frightfully clever." + +"How can you tell?" + +"Oh! From bits of things he says. And he's read everything, it seems! +And once he saved a great heavy printing-machine from going through the +floor of the printing-shop into the basement. If it hadn't been for him +there'd have been a dreadful accident. Everybody was talking about that. +He doesn't look it, does he?" + +They were now passing the corner at which stood the shop. Hilda peered +within the narrowing, unshuttered slit, but she could see no more of +Edwin Clayhanger. + +"No, he doesn't," she agreed, while thinking nevertheless that he did +look precisely that. "And so he lives all alone with his father. No +mother?" + +"No mother. But there are two sisters. The youngest is married, and just +going to have a baby, poor thing! The other one keeps house. I believe +she's a splendid girl, but neither of them is a bit like Edwin. Not a +bit. He's--" + +"What?" + +"I don't know. Look here, miss! What about this rain? I vote we take the +car up the hill." + + +IV + +The steam-car was rumbling after them down Duck Bank. It stopped, huge +above them, and they climbed into it through an odour of warm grease +that trailed from the engine. The conductor touched his hat to Janet, +who smiled like a sister upon this fellow-being. Two middle-aged men +were the only other occupants of the interior of the car; both raised +their hats to Janet. The girls sat down in opposite corners next to the +door. Then, with a deafening continuous clatter of loose glass-panes and +throbbing of its filthy floor, the vehicle started again, elephantine. +It was impossible to talk in that unique din. Hilda had no desire to +talk. She watched Janet pay the fares as in a dream, without even +offering her own penny, though as a rule she was touchily punctilious in +sharing expenses with the sumptuous Janet. Without being in the least +aware of it, and quite innocently, Janet had painted a picture of the +young man, Edwin Clayhanger, which intensified a hundredfold the strong +romantic piquancy of Hilda's brief vision of him. In an instant Hilda +saw her ideal future--that future which had loomed grandiose, +indefinite, and strange--she saw it quite precise and simple as the wife +of such a creature as Edwin Clayhanger. The change was astounding in its +abruptness. She saw all the delightful and pure vistas of love with a +man, subtle, baffling, and benevolent, and above all superior; with a +man who would be respected by a whole town as a pillar of society, while +bringing to his intimacy with herself an exotic and wistful quality +which neither she nor anyone could possibly define. She asked: "What +attracts me in him? I don't know. _I like him_." She who had never +spoken to him! She who never before had vividly seen herself as married +to a man! He was clever; he was sincere; he was kind; he was +trustworthy; he would have wealth and importance and reputation. All +this was good; but all this would have been indifferent to her, had +there not been an enigmatic and inscrutable and unprecedented something +in his face, in his bearing, which challenged and inflamed her +imagination. + +It did not occur to her to think of Janet as in the future a married +woman. But of herself she thought, with new agitations: "I am innocent +now! I am ignorant now! I am a girl now! But one day I shall be so no +longer. One day I shall be a woman. One day I shall be in the power and +possession of some man--if not this man, then some other. Everything +happens; and this will happen!" And the hazardous strangeness of life +enchanted her. + + + + +CHAPTER IV +WITH THE ORGREAVES + + +I + +The Orgreave family was holding its nightly session in the large +drawing-room of Lane End House when Hilda and Janet arrived. The +bow-window stood generously open in three different places, and the +heavy outer curtains as well as the lace inner ones were moving gently +in the capricious breeze that came across the oval lawn. The +multitudinous sound of rain on leaves entered also with the wind; and a +steam-car could be heard thundering down Trafalgar Road, from which the +house was separated by only a few intervening minor roofs. + +Mrs. Orgreave, the plump, faded image of goodness, with Janet's full red +lips and Janet's kindly eyes, sat as usual, whether in winter or in +summer, near the fireplace, surveying with placidity the theatre where +the innumerable dramas of her motherhood had been enacted. Tom, her +eldest, the thin, spectacled lawyer, had, as a boy of seven, rampaged on +that identical Turkey hearthrug, when it was new, a quarter of a century +earlier. He was now seated at the grand piano with the youngest child, +Alicia, a gawky little treasure, always alternating between pertness and +timidity, aged twelve. Jimmie and Johnnie, young bloods of nineteen and +eighteen, were only present in their mother's heart, being in process of +establishing, by practice, the right to go forth into the world of an +evening and return when they chose without suffering too much from +family curiosity. Two other children--Marian, eldest daughter and sole +furnisher of grandchildren to the family, and Charlie, a young doctor-- +were permanently away in London. Osmond Orgreave, the elegant and +faintly mocking father of the brood, a handsome grizzled man of between +fifty and sixty, was walking to and fro between the grand piano and the +small upright piano in the farther half of the room. + +"Well, my dear?" said Mrs. Orgreave to Hilda. "You aren't wet?" She drew +Hilda towards her and stroked her shoulder, and then kissed her. The +embrace was to convey the mother's sympathy with Hilda in the ordeal of +the visit to Turnhill, and her satisfaction that the ordeal was now +over. The ageing lady seemed to kiss her on behalf of the entire +friendly family; all the others, appreciating the delicacy of the +situation, refrained from the peril of clumsy speech. + +"Oh no, mother!" Janet exclaimed reassuringly. "We came up by car. And I +had my umbrella. And it only began to rain in earnest just as we got to +the gate." + +"Very thoughtful of it, I'm sure!" piped the pig-tailed Alicia from the +piano. She could talk, in her pert moments, exactly like her brothers. + +"Alicia, darling," said Janet coaxingly, as she sat on the sofa flanked +by the hat, gloves, and jacket which she had just taken off, "will you +run upstairs with these things, and take Hilda's too? I'm quite +exhausted. Father will swoon if I leave them here. I suppose he's +walking about because he's so proud of his new birthday slippers." + +"But I'm just playing the symphony with Tom!" Alicia protested. + +"I'll run up--I was just going to," said Hilda. + +"You'll do no such thing!" Mrs. Orgreave announced, sharply. "Alicia, +I'm surprised at you! Here Janet and Hilda have been out since noon, and +you--" + +"And so on and so on," said Alicia, jumping up from the piano in +obedience. + +"We didn't wait supper," Mrs. Orgreave went on. "But I told Martha to +leave--" + +"Mother, dearest," Janet stopped her. "Please don't mention food. We've +stuffed ourselves, haven't we, Hilda? Anyone been?" + +"Swetnam," said Alicia, as she left the room with her arms full. + +"_Mr_. Swetnam," corrected Mrs. Orgreave. + +"Which one? The Ineffable?" + +"The Ineffable," replied Mr. Orgreave, who had wandered, smiling +enigmatically, to the sofa. His legs, like the whole of his person, had +a distinguished air; and he held up first one slippered foot and then +the other to the silent, sham-ecstatic inspection of the girls. "He may +look in again, later on. It's evidently Hilda he wants to see." This +said, Mr. Orgreave lazily sank into an easy chair, opposite the sofa, +and lighted a cigarette. He was one of the most industrious men in the +Five Towns, and assuredly the most industrious architect; but into an +idle hour he could pack more indolence than even Johnnie and Jimmie, +alleged wastrels, could accomplish in a week. + +"I say, Janet," Tom sang out from the piano, "you aren't really +exhausted, are you?" + +"I'm getting better." + +"Well, let's dash through the scherzo before the infant comes back. She +can't take it half fast enough." + +"And do you think I can?" said Janet, rising. In theory, Janet was not a +pianist, and she never played solos, nor accompanied songs; but in the +actual practice of duet-playing her sympathetic presence of mind at +difficult crises of the music caused her to be esteemed by Tom, the +expert and enthusiast, as superior to all other performers in the +family. + + +II + +Hilda listened with pleasure and with exaltation to the scherzo. Beyond +a little part-singing at school she had no practical acquaintance with +music; there had never been a piano at home. But she knew that this +music was Beethoven's; and from the mere intonation of that name, as it +was uttered in her presence in the house of the Orgreaves, she was aware +of its greatness, and the religious faculty in her had enabled her at +once to accept its supremacy as an article of genuine belief; so that, +though she understood it not, she felt it, and was uplifted by it. +Whenever she heard Beethoven--and she heard it often, because Tom, in +the words of the family, had for the moment got Beethoven on the +brain--her thoughts and her aspirations were ennobled. + +She was singularly content with this existence amid the intimacy of the +Orgreaves. The largeness and prodigality and culture of the family life, +so different from anything she had ever known, and in particular so +different from the desolating atmosphere of the Cedars, soothed and +flattered her in a manner subtly agreeable. At the same time she was but +little irked by it, for the reason that her spirit was not one to be +unduly affected by exterior social, intellectual, and physical +conditions. Moreover, the Orgreaves, though obviously of a class +superior to her own, had the facile and yet aristocratic +unceremoniousness which, unconsciously, repudiates such distinctions +until circumstances arise that compel their acknowledgment. To live +among the Orgreaves was like living in a small private republic that +throbbed with a hundred activities and interests. Each member of it was +a centre of various energy. And from each, Hilda drew something that was +precious: from Mrs. Orgreave, sheer love and calm wisdom; from Janet, +sheer love and the spectacle of elegance; from little Alicia candour and +admiration; from Tom, knowledge, artistic enthusiasm, and shy, curt +sympathy; from Johnnie and Jimmie the homage of their proud and naive +mannishness: as for Mr. Orgreave, she admired him perhaps as much as she +admired even Janet, and once when he and she had taken a walk together +up to Toft End, she had thought him quite exquisite in his attitude to +her, quizzical, worldly, and yet sensitively understanding and humane. +And withal they never worried her by interferences and criticisms; they +never presumed on their hospitality, but left her as free as though her +age had been twice what it was. Undoubtedly, in the ardour of her +gratitude she idealized every one of them. The sole reproach which in +secret she would formulate against them had reference to their quasi- +cynical levity in conversation. They would never treat a serious topic +seriously for more than a few minutes. Either one or another would yield +to the temptation of clever facetiousness, and clever facetiousness +would always carry off the honours in a discussion. This did not apply +to Mrs. Orgreave, who was incapable of humour; but it applied a little +even to Janet. + +The thought continually arising in Hilda's mind was: "Why do they care +for me? What can they see in me? Why are they so good to me? I was never +good to them." She did not guess that, at her very first visit to Lane +End House, the force and mystery of her character had powerfully +attracted these rather experienced amateurs of human nature. She was +unaware that she had made her mark upon Janet and Charlie so far back as +the days of the dancing-classes. And she under-estimated the appeal of +her situation as an orphan and a solitary whose mother's death, in its +swiftness, had amounted to a tragedy. + +The scherzo was finished, and Alicia had not returned into the +drawing-room. The two pianists sat hesitant. + +"Where is that infant?" Tom demanded. "If I finish it all without her +she'll be vexed." + +"I can tell you where she ought to be," said Mrs. Orgreave placidly. +"She ought to be in bed. No wonder she looks pale, stopping up till this +time of night!" + +Then there were unusual and startling movements behind the door, +accompanied by giggling. And Alicia entered, followed by +Charlie--Charlie who was supposed at that precise instant to be in +London! + +"Hello, mater!" said the curly-headed Charlie, with a sublime +affectation of calmness, as though he had slipped out of the next room. +He produced an effect fully equal to his desires. + + +III + +In a little while, Charlie, on the sofa, was seated at a small table +covered with viands and fruit; the white cloth spread on the table made +a curiously charming patch amid the sombre colours of the drawing-room. +He had protested that, having consumed much food en route, he was not +hungry; but in vain. Mrs. Orgreave demolished such arguments by the +power of her notorious theory, which admitted no exceptions, that any +person coming off an express train must be in need of sustenance. The +odd thing was that all the others discovered mysterious appetites and +began to eat and drink with gusto, sitting, standing, or walking about, +while Charlie, munching, related how he had miraculously got three days' +leave from the hospital, and how he had impulsively 'cabbed it' to +Euston, and how, having arrived at Knype, he had also 'cabbed it' from +Knype to Bleakridge instead of waiting for the Loop Line train. The blot +on his advent, in the eyes of Mrs. Orgreave, was that he had no fresh +news of Marian and her children. + +"You don't seem very surprised to find Hilda here," said Alicia. + +"It's not my business to be surprised at anything, kid," Charlie +retorted, smiling at Hilda, who sat beside him on the sofa. "Moreover, +don't I get ten columns of news every three days? I know far more about +this town than you do, I bet!" + +Everybody laughed at Mrs. Orgreave, the great letter-writer and +universal disseminator of information. + +"Now, Alicia, you must go to bed," said Mrs. Orgreave. And Alicia +regretted that she had been so indiscreet as to draw attention to +herself. + +"The kid can stay up if she will say her piece," said Charlie mockingly. +He knew that he could play the autocrat, for that evening at any rate. + +"What piece?" the child demanded, blushing and defiant. + +"Her 'Abou Ben Adhem,'" said Charlie. "Do you think I don't know all +about that too?" + +"Oh, mother, you are a bore!" Alicia exclaimed, pouting. "Why did you +tell him that?... Well, I'll say it if Hilda will recite something as +well." + +"Me!" murmured Hilda, staggered. "I never recite!" + +"I've always understood you recite beautifully," said Mrs. Orgreave. + +"You know you do, Hilda!" said Janet. + +"Of course you do," said Charlie. + +"_You've_ never heard me, anyhow!" she replied to him obstinately. How +could they have got it fixed into their heads that she was a reciter? +This renown was most disconcerting. + +"Now, Hilda!" Mr. Orgreave soothingly admonished her from the back of +the sofa. She turned her head and looked up at him, smiling in her +distress. + +"Go ahead, then, kid! It's agreed," said Charlie. + +And Alicia galloped through Leigh Hunt's moral poem, which she was +preparing for an imminent speech-day, in an extraordinarily short space +of time. + +"But I can't remember anything. I haven't recited for years and years," +Hilda pleaded, when the child burst out, "Now, Hilda!" + +"_Stuff_!" Charlie pronounced. + +"Some Tennyson?" Mrs. Orgreave suggested. "Don't you know any Tennyson? +We must have something, now." And Alicia, exulting in the fact that she +had paid the penalty imposed, cried that there could be no drawing back. + +Hilda was lost. Mrs. Orgreave's tone, with all its softness, was a +command. "Tennyson? I've forgotten 'Maud,'" she muttered. + +"I'll prompt you," said Charlie. "Thomas!" + +Everybody looked at Tom, expert in literature as well as in music; Tom, +the collector, the owner of books and bookcases. Tom went to a bookcase +and drew forth a green volume, familiar and sacred throughout all +England. + +"Oh dear!" Hilda moaned. + +"Where do you mean to begin?" Charlie sternly inquired. "It just happens +that I'm reading 'In Memoriam,' myself. I read ten stanzas a day." + +Hilda bent over the book with him. + +"But I must stand up," she said, with sudden fire. "I can't recite +sitting down." + +They all cried "Bravo!" and made a circle for her. And she stood up. + +The utterance of the first lines was a martyrdom for her. But after that +she surrendered herself frankly to the mood of the poem and forgot to +suffer shame, speaking in a loud, clear, dramatic voice which she +accompanied by glances and even by gestures. After about thirty lines +she stopped, and, regaining her ordinary senses, perceived that the +entire family was staring at her with an extreme intentness. + +"I can't do any more," she murmured weakly, and dropped on to the sofa. + +Everybody clapped very heartily. + +"It's wonderful!" said Janet in a low tone. + +"I should just say it was!" said Tom seriously, and Hilda was saturated +with delicious joy. + +"You ought to go on the stage; that's what you ought to do!" said +Charlie. + +For a fraction of a second, Hilda dreamt of the stage, and then Mrs. +Orgreave said softly, like a mother: + +"I'm quite sure Hilda would never dream of any such thing!" + + +IV + +There was an irruption of Jimmie and Johnnie, and three of the Swetnam +brothers, including him known as the Ineffable. Jimmie and Johnnie +played the role of the absolutely imperturbable with a skill equal to +Charlie's own; and only a series of calm "How-do's?" marked the +greetings of these relatives. The Swetnams were more rollickingly +demonstrative. Now that the drawing-room was quite thickly populated, +Hilda, made nervous by Mr. Orgreave's jocular insinuation that she +herself was the object of the Swetnams' call, took refuge, first with +Janet, and then, as Janet was drawn into the general crowd, with +Charlie, who was absently turning over the pages of "In Memoriam." + +"Know this?" he inquired, friendly, indicating the poem. + +"I don't," she said. "It's splendid, isn't it?" + +"Well," he answered. "It's rather on the religious tack, you know. +That's why I'm reading it." He smiled oddly. + +"Really?" + +He hesitated, and then nodded. It was the strangest avowal from this +young dandy of twenty-three with the airy and cynical tongue. Hilda +thought: "Here, then, is another!" And her own most secret troubles +recurred to her mind. + +"What's that about Teddy Clayhanger?" Charlie cried out, suddenly +looking up. He had caught the name in a distant conversation. + +Janet explained how they had seen Edwin, and went on to say that it was +impossible to persuade him to call. + +"What rot!" said Charlie. "I bet you what you like I get him here +to-morrow night." He added to Hilda: "Went to school with him!" Hilda's +face burned. + +"I bet you don't," said Janet stoutly, from across the room. + +"I'll bet you a shilling I do," said Charlie. + +"Haven't a penny left," Janet smiled. "Father, will you lend me a +shilling?" + +"That's what I'm here for," said Mr. Orgreave. + +"Mr. Orgreave," the youngest Swetnam put in, "you talk exactly like the +dad talks." + +The bet was made, and according to a singular but long-established +family custom, Tom had to be stake-holder. + +Hilda became troubled and apprehensive. She hoped that Charlie would +lose, and then she hoped that he would win. Looking forward to the +intimate bedroom chat with Janet which brought each evening to a +heavenly close, she said to herself: "If he _does_ come, I shall make +Janet promise that I'm not to be asked to recite or anything. In fact, I +shall get her to see that I'm not discussed." + + + + +CHAPTER V +EDWIN CLAYHANGER + + +I + +The next evening, Mr. and Mrs. Orgreave, Hilda, Janet, and Alicia were +in the dining-room of the Orgreaves awaiting the advent at the supper- +table of sundry young men whose voices could be heard through open doors +in the distance of the drawing-room. + +Charlie Orgreave had won his bet: and Edwin Clayhanger was among those +young men who had remained behind in the drawing-room to exchange, +according to the practice of young men, ideas upon life and the world. +Hilda had been introduced to him, but owing to the performance of +another Beethoven symphony there had been almost no conversation before +supper, and she had not heard him talk. She had stationed herself behind +the grand piano, on the plea of turning over the pages for the musicians +(though it was only with great uncertainty, and in peril of missing the +exact instant for turning, that she followed the music on the page), and +from this security she had furtively glanced at Edwin when her task +allowed. "Perhaps I was quite mistaken last night," she said to herself. +"Perhaps he is perfectly ordinary." The strange thing was that she could +not decide whether he was ordinary or not. At one moment his face +presented no interest, at another she saw it just as she had seen it, +framed in the illuminated aperture of the shop-shutters, on the previous +night. Or she fancied that she saw it thus. The more she tried to +distinguish between Edwin's reality and her fancies concerning Edwin, +the less she succeeded. She would pronounce positively that her fancies +were absurd and even despicable. But this abrupt positiveness did not +convince. Supposing that he was after all marvellous among men! During +the day she had taken advantage of the mention of his name to ascertain +discreetly some details of the legendary feat by which as a boy he had +saved his father's printing-shop from destruction. The details were +vague, and not very comprehensible, but they seemed to indicate on his +part an astounding presence of mind, a heroic promptitude in action. +Assuredly, the Orgreaves regarded him as a creature out of the common +run. And at the same time they all had the air of feeling rather sorry +for him. + +Standing near the supper-table, Hilda listened intently for the sound of +his voice among the other voices in the drawing-room. But she could not +separate it from the rest. Perhaps he was keeping silence. She said to +herself: "Yet what do I care whether he is keeping silence or not?" + +Mr. Orgreave remarked, in the suspense, glancing ironically at his wife: + +"I think I'll go upstairs and do an hour's planning. They aren't likely +to be more than an hour, I expect?" + +"Hilda," said Mrs. Orgreave, quite calm, but taking her husband quite +seriously, "will you please go and tell those young men from me that +supper is waiting?" + + +II + +Of course Hilda obeyed, though it appeared strange to her that Mrs. +Orgreave had not sent Alicia on such an errand. Passing out of the +bright dining-room where the gas was lit, she hesitated a moment in the +dark broad corridor that led to the drawing-room. The mission, she felt, +would make her rather prominent in front of Edwin Clayhanger, the +stranger, and she had an objection to being prominent in front of him; +she had, indeed, taken every possible precaution against such a danger. +"How silly I am to loiter here!" she thought. "I might be Alicia!" + +The boys, she could now hear, were discussing French literature, and in +particular Victor Hugo. When she caught the name of Victor Hugo she +lifted her chin, and moved forward a little. She worshipped Victor Hugo +with a passion unreflecting and intense, simply because certain detached +lines from his poems were the most splendid occupants of her memory, +dignifying every painful or sordid souvenir. At last Charlie's clear, +gay voice said: + +"It's all very well, and Victor Hugo _is_ Victor Hugo; but you can say +what you like--there's a lot of this that'll bear skipping, your +worships." + +Already she was at the doorway. In the dusk of the unlighted chamber the +faces of the four Orgreaves and Clayhanger showed like pale patches on +the gloom. + +"Not a line!" she said fiercely, with her extremely clear articulation. +She had no right to make such a statement, for she had not read the +twentieth part of Victor Hugo's work; she did not even know what book +they were discussing--Charlie held the volume lightly in his hand--but +she was incensed against the mere levity of Charlie's tone. + +She saw Edwin Clayhanger jump at the startling interruption. And all +five looked round. She could feel her face burning. + +Charlie quizzed her with a word, and then turned to Edwin Clayhanger for +support. "Don't _you_ think that some of it's dullish, Teddy?" + +Edwin Clayhanger, shamefaced, looked at Hilda wistfully, as if in +apology, as if appealing to her clemency against her fierceness; and +said slowly: + +"Well--yes." + +He had agreed with Charlie; but while disagreeing with Hilda he had +mysteriously proved to her that she had been right in saying to herself +on the previous evening: "_I like him_." + +The incident appeared to her to be enormous and dramatic. She moved +away, as it were breathless under emotion, and then, remembering her +errand, threw over her shoulder: + +"Mrs. Orgreave wants to know when you're coming to supper." + + +III + +The supper-table was noisy and joyous--more than usually so on account +of the presence of Charlie, the gayest member of the family. At either +end of the long, white-spread board sat Mr. and Mrs. Orgreave; Alicia +stood by Mr. Orgreave, who accepted her caresses with the negligence of +a handsome father. Along one side sat Hilda, next to Janet, and these +two were flanked by Jimmie and Johnnie, tall, unbending, apparently +determined to prove by a politely supercilious demeanor that to pass a +whole evening thus in the home circle was considered by them to be a +concession on their part rather than a privilege. Edwin Clayhanger sat +exactly opposite to Hilda, with Charlie for sponsor; and Tom's +spectacles gleamed close by. + +Hilda, while still constrained, was conscious of pleasure in the scene, +and of a certain pride in forming part of it. These prodigal and +splendid persons respected and liked her, even loved her. Her recitation +on the previous evening had been a triumph. She was glad that she had +shown them that she could at any rate do one thing rather well; but she +was equally glad that she had obtained Janet's promise to avoid any +discussion of her qualities or her situation. After all, with her +self-conscious restraint and her pitiful assured income of three pounds +a week, she was a poor little creature compared with the easy, luxurious +beings of this household, whose upkeep could not cost less than three +pounds a day. Janet, in rich and complicated white, and glistening with +jewels at hand and neck, was a princess beside her. She hated her spare +black frock, and for the second time in her life desired expensive +clothes markedly feminine. She felt that she was at a grave +disadvantage, and that to remedy this disadvantage would be necessary, +not only dresses and precious stones, but an instinctive faculty of soft +allurement which she had not. Each gesture of Janet's showed seductive +grace, while her own rare gestures were stiffened by a kind of masculine +harshness. Every time that the sad-eyed and modest Edwin Clayhanger +glanced at Janet, and included herself in the glance, she fancied that +he was unjustly but inevitably misprising herself. And at length she +thought: "Why did I make Janet promise that I shouldn't be talked about? +Why shouldn't he know all about my mourning, and that I'm the only girl +in the Five Towns that can write shorthand. Why should I be afraid to +recite again? However much I might have suffered through nervousness if +I'd recited, I should have shown I'm not such a poor little thing as all +that! Why am I such a baby?" She wilted under her own disdain. + +It was strange to think that Edwin Clayhanger, scarcely older than the +irresponsible Charlie, was the heir to an important business, was +potentially a rich and influential man. Had not Mr. Orgreave said that +old Mr. Clayhanger could buy up all the Orgreaves if he chose? It was +strange to think that this wistful and apparently timid young man, this +nice boy, would one day be the head of a household, and of a table such +as this! Yes, it would assuredly arrive! Everything happened. And the +mother of that household? Would it be she? Her imagination leaped far +into the future, as she exchanged a quiet, furtive smile with Mrs. +Orgreave, and she tried to see herself as another Mrs. Orgreave, a +strenuous and passionate past behind her, honoured, beloved, teased, +adored. But she could not quite see herself thus. Impossible that she, +with her temperament so feverish, restive, and peculiar, should ever +reach such a haven! It was fantastically too much to expect! And yet, if +not with Edwin Clayhanger, then with another, with some mysterious being +whom she had never seen!... Did not everything happen?... But then, +equally, strange and terrible misfortunes might be lying in wait for +her!... The indescribable sharp savour of life was in her nostrils. + + +IV + +The conversation had turned upon Bradlaugh, the shameless free-thinker, +the man who had known how to make himself the centre of discussion in +every house in England. This was the Bradlaugh year, the apogee of his +notoriety. Dozens of times at the Cedar's meal-table had she heard the +shocking name of Bradlaugh on outraged tongues, but never once had a +word been uttered in his favour. The public opinion of the +boarding-house was absolutely unanimous in reckoning him a scoundrel. In +the dining-room of the Orgreaves the attitude towards him was different. +His free-thought was not precisely defended, but champions of his right +to sit in the House of Commons were numerous. Hilda grew excited, and +even more self-conscious. It was as if she were in momentary expectation +of being challenged by these hardy debaters: "Are not _you_ a +free-thinker?" Her interest was personal; the interest of one in peril. +Compared to the discussions at the Cedars, this discussion was as the +open, tossing, windy sea to a weed-choked canal. The talk veered into +mere profane politics, and Mr. Orgreave, entrenching himself behind an +assumption of careless disdain, was severely attacked by all his sons +except Jimmie, who, above Hilda's left shoulder, pretended to share the +paternal scorn. The indifference of Hilda to politics was complete. She +began to feel less disturbed; she began to dream. Then she suddenly +heard, through her dream, the name of Bradlaugh again; and Edwin +Clayhanger, in response to a direct question from Mr. Orgreave, was +saying: + +"You can't help what you believe. You can't make yourself believe +anything. And I don't see why you should, either. There's no virtue in +believing." + +And Tom was crying "Hooray!" + +Hilda was thunderstruck. She was blinded as though by a mystic +revelation. She wanted to exult, and to exult with all the ardour of her +soul. This truth which Edwin Clayhanger had enunciated she had indeed +always been vaguely aware of; but now in a flash she felt it, she faced +it, she throbbed to its authenticity, and was free. It solved every +difficulty, and loosed the load that for months past had wearied her +back. "There's no virtue in believing." It was fundamental. It was the +gift of life and of peace. Her soul shouted, as she realized that just +there, in that instant, at that table, a new epoch had dawned for her. +Never would she forget the instant and the scene--scene of her re-birth! + +Mrs. Orgreave remonstrated with mild sadness: + +"No virtue in believing! Eh, Mr. Edwin!" And Hilda, under the ageing +lady's grieved glance, tried to quench the exultation on her face, +somewhat like a child trapped. But she could not. Tom again cried +"Hooray!" His tone, however, grated on her sensibility. It lacked +emotion. It was the tone of a pugilist's backer. And Janet permitted +herself some pleasantry. And Charlie became frankly facetious. Was it +conceivable that Charlie could be interested in religion? She liked him +very much, partly because he and she had learnt to understand each other +at the dancing-classes, and partly because his curly hair and his candid +smile compelled sympathy. But her esteem for him had limits. It was +astonishing that a family otherwise simply perfect should be content +with jocosity when jocosity was so obviously out of place. Were they, +then, afraid of being serious?... Edwin Clayhanger was not laughing; he +had blushed. Her eyes were fixed on him with the extremest intensity, +studying him, careless of the danger that his gaze might catch hers. She +was lost in him. And then, he caught her; and, burning with honest +shame, she looked downwards. + + + + +CHAPTER VI +IN THE GARDEN + + +I + +That evening Janet did not stay long in Hilda's bedroom, having +perceived that Hilda was in one of her dark, dreamy moods. + +As soon as she was gone, Hilda lowered the gas a little, and then went +to the window, and opened it wider, and, drawing aside the blind, looked +forth. The night was obscure and warm; and a wet wind moved furtively +about in the elm-trees of the garden. The window was at the side of the +house; it gave on the west, and commanded the new house just finished by +Mr. Orgreave for the Clayhanger family. The block of this generously +planned dwelling rose massively at a distance of perhaps forty feet, +dwarfing a whole row of cottages in the small street behind Lane End +House; its various chimneypots stood out a deeper black against the +enigmatic sky. Beyond the Clayhanger garden-plot, as yet uncultivated, +and its high boundary wall, ran the great silent thoroughfare, Trafalgar +Road, whose gas-lamps reigned in the nocturnal silence that the last +steam-car had left in its wake. + +Hilda gazed at the house; and it seemed strange to her that the house, +which but a short time ago had no existence whatever, and was yet cold +and soulless, was destined to be the living home of a family, with +history in its walls and memories clinging about it. The formidable +magic of life was always thus discovering itself to her, so that she +could not look upon even an untenanted, terra-cotta-faced villa without +a secret thrill; and the impenetrable sky above was not more charmed and +enchanted than those brick walls. When she reflected that one day the +wistful, boyish Edwin Clayhanger would be the master of that house, that +in that house his will would be stronger than any other will, the +mystery that hides beneath the surface of all things surged up and +overwhelmed thought. And although scarcely a couple of hours had elapsed +since the key of the new life had been put into her hands, she could not +make an answer when she asked herself: "Am I happy or unhappy?" + + +II + +The sound of young men's voices came round the corner of the house from +the lawn. Some of the brothers Orgreave were saying good-night to Edwin +Clayhanger in the porch. She knew that they had been chatting a long +time in the hall, after Clayhanger had bidden adieu to the rest of the +family. She wondered what they had been talking about, and what young +men did in general talk about when they were by themselves and +confidential. In her fancy she endowed their conversations with the +inexplicable attractiveness of masculinity, as masculinity is understood +by women alone. She had an intense desire to overhear such a +conversation, and she felt that she would affront the unguessed perils +of it with delight, drinking it up eagerly, every drop, even were the +draught deadly. Meanwhile, the mere inarticulate sound of those distant +voices pleased her, and she was glad that she was listening and that the +boys knew it not. + +Silence succeeded the banging of the front door. And then, after a +pause, she was startled to hear the crunching of gravel almost under her +window. In alarm she dropped the blind, but continued to peer between +the edge of the blind and the window-frame. At one point the contiguous +demesnes of the Orgreaves and the Clayhangers were separated only by a +poor, sparse hedge, a few yards in length. Somebody was pushing his way +through this hedge. It was Edwin Clayhanger. Despite the darkness of the +night she could be sure that the dim figure was Edwin Clayhanger's by +the peculiar, exaggerated swing of the loose arms. He passed the hedge, +carelessly brushed his clothes with his hands, and walked slowly up the +Clayhanger garden towards the new house, and in the deep shadow of the +house was lost. Still, she could catch vague noises of movement. In a +state of extreme excitation she wondered what he could be doing. It +seemed to her that he and she were sharing the night together. + + +III + +She thought: + +"I would give anything to be able to speak to him privately and ask him +a little more about what he said to-night. I ought to. I may never see +him again. At any rate, I may never have another chance. He may have +meant something else. He may not have been serious...." The skin of her +face prickled, and a physical wave of emotion seemed to sweep downwards +through her whole body. The thrill was exquisite, but it was +intimidating. + +She whispered to herself: + +"I could go downstairs and outside, and find him, and just ask him." + +The next instant she was opening the door of her bedroom.... No, all the +household had not yet retired, for a light was still burning in the +corridor. Nevertheless she might go. She descended the stairs, asking +herself aghast: "Why am I doing this?" Another light was burning in the +hall, and through the slit of the half-shut door of the breakfast-room +she could see light. She stood hesitant. Then she heard the striking of +a match in the breakfast-room, and she boldly pushed the door open. Tom, +with a book before him, was lighting his pipe. + +"Hello!" he said. "What's the matter?" + +"Oh, nothing!" she replied. "Only, I'm just going to walk about in the +garden a minute. I shan't go to sleep unless I do." She spoke quite +easily. + +"All serene!" he agreed. "So long as you keep off the grass! It's bound +to be damp. I'll unchain the door for you, shall I?" + +She said that she could unfasten the door for herself, and he did not +insist. The hospitality of the Orgreaves was never irksome. Tom had +scarcely half-risen from his chair. + +"I shan't be long," she added casually. + +"That's all right, Hilda," he said. "I'm not going to bed just yet." + +"All the others gone?" + +He nodded. She pulled the door to, tripped delicately through the hall, +and unchained the heavy front door as quietly as she could. + + +IV + +She was outside, amid all the influences of the night. Gradually her +eyes accustomed themselves again to the gloom. She passed along the +facade of the house until she came to the corner, where the breeze +surprised her, and whence she could discern the other house and, across +the indistinct hedge, the other garden. Where was Edwin Clayhanger? Was +he wandering in the other garden, or had he entered the house? Then a +brief flare lit up a lower window of the dark mass for a few instants. +He was within. She hesitated. Should she go forward, or should she go +back? At length she went forward, and, finding in the hedge the gap +which Clayhanger had made, forced her way through it. Her skirt was torn +by an obstinate twig. Quite calmly she bent down and with her fingers +examined the rent; it was not important. She was now in the garden of +the Clayhangers, and he whom she sought was moving somewhere in the +house. "Supposing I _do_ meet him," she thought, "what shall I say to +him?" She did not know what she should say to him, nor why she had +entered upon this singular adventure. But the consciousness of self, the +fine, disturbing sense of being alive in every vein and nerve, was a +rich reward for her audacity. She wished that that tense moment of +expectation might endure for ever. + +She approached the house, trembling. It was not by volition that she +walked over the uneven clayey ground, but by instinct. She was in front +of the garden-porch, and here she hesitated again, apparently waiting +for a sign from the house. She glanced timidly about her, as though in +fear of marauders that might spring out upon her from the shadow. Just +over the boundary wall the placid flame of a gas-lamp peeped. Then, +feeling with her feet for the steps, she ascended into the shelter of +the porch. Almost at the same moment there was another flare behind the +glass of the door; she heard the sound of unlatching; the flare expired. +She was absolutely terror-struck now. + +The door opened, grating on some dirt or gravel. + +"Who's there?" demanded a queer, shaking voice. + +She could see his form. + +"Me!" she answered, in a harsh tone which was the expression of her +dismay. + +The deed was done, irretrievably. In her bedroom she had said that she +would try to speak with him, and lo! they were face to face, in the +dark, in secret! Her terror was now, at any rate, desperately calm. She +had plunged; she was falling into the deep sea; she was hopelessly cut +off from the past. + +"Oh!" came the uncertain voice weakly. "Did you want me? Did anyone want +me?" + +She heard the door being closed behind him. + +She told him, with peculiar curtness, how she had seen him from her +window, and how she wished to ask him an important question. + +"I dare say you think it's very queer of me," she added. + +"Not at all," he said, with an insincerity that annoyed her. + +"Yes, you do!" she sharply insisted. "But I want to know"--what did she +want to know?--"I want to know--did you mean it when you said--you know, +at supper--that there's no virtue in believing?" + +He stammered: "Did I say there was no virtue in believing?" + +She cried out, irritated: "Of course you did! Do you mean to say you can +say a thing like that and then forget about it? If it's true, it's one +of the most wonderful things that were ever said. And that's why I +wanted to know if you meant it, of whether you were only saying it +because it sounded clever." + +She stopped momentarily, wondering why she was thus implying an untruth; +for the fact was that she had never doubted that he had been in earnest. + +"That's what they're always doing in that house, you know--being +clever!" she went on, in a tone apparently inimical to 'that house.' + +"Yes," came the voice. "I meant it. Why?" + +And the voice was so simple and so sincere that it pierced straight to +her heart and changed her secret mood swiftly to the religious, so that +she really was occupied by the thoughts with which, a moment previously, +she had only pretended to be occupied; and the splendour of the +revelation was renewed. Nevertheless, some impulse, perverse or +defensive, compelled her to assume a doubt of his assurance. She +suspected that, had she not adopted this tactic, she might have melted +before him in gratitude. + +"You did?" she murmured. + +She thanked him, after that, rather coldly; and they talked a little +about the mere worry of these religious questions. He protested that +they never worried him, and reaffirmed his original proposition. + +"I hope you are right," she said softly, in a thrilled voice. She was +thinking that this was the most wonderful, miraculous experience that +she had ever had. + + +V + +Silence. + +"Now," she thought, "I must go back." Inwardly she gave a delicious +sigh. + +But just as she was about to take her prim leave, the scarce-discerned +figure of her companion stepped out into the garden. + +"By Jove!" said Edwin Clayhanger. "It's beginning to rain, I do +believe." + +The wind blew, and she felt rain on her cheek. Clayhanger advised her to +stand against the other wall of the porch for better protection. She +obeyed. He re-entered the porch, but was still exposed to the rain. She +called him to her side. Already he was so close that she could have +touched his shoulder by outstretching her arm. + +"Oh! I'm all right!" he said lightly, and did not move. + +"You needn't be afraid of me!" She was hurt that he had refused her +invitation to approach her. The next instant she would have given her +tongue not to have uttered those words. But she was in such a tingling +state of extreme sensitiveness as rendered it impossible for her to +exercise a normal self-control. + +Scarcely conscious of what she did, she asked him the time. He struck a +match to look at his watch. The wind blew the match out, but she saw his +wistful face, with his disordered hair under the hat. It had the quality +of a vision. + +He offered to get a light in the house, but abruptly she said good +night. + +Then they were shaking hands--she knew not how or why. She could not +loose his hand. She thought: "Never have I held a hand so honest as this +hand." At last she dropped it. They stood silent while a trap rattled up +Trafalgar Road. It was as if she was bound to remain moveless until the +sounds of the trap had died away. + +She walked proudly out into the rain. He called to her: "I say, Miss +Lessways!" But she did not stop. + +In a minute she was back again in Lane End House. + +"That you?" Tom's voice from the breakfast-room! + +"Yes," she answered clearly. "I've put the chain on. Good night." + +"Good night. Thanks." + +She ascended the stairs, smiling to herself, with the raindrops fresh on +her cheek. In her mind were no distinct thoughts, either concerning the +non-virtue of belief, or the new epoch, or Edwin Clayhanger, or even the +strangeness of her behaviour. But all her being vibrated to the +mysterious and beautiful romance of existence. + + + + +CHAPTER VII +THE NEXT MEETING + + +I + +For several days the town of Bursley was to Hilda simply a place made +perilous and redoubtable by the apprehension of meeting Edwin Clayhanger +accidentally in the streets thereof. And the burden of her meditations +was: "What can he have thought of me?" She had said nothing to anybody +of the deliberately-sought adventure in the garden. And with the +strangest ingenuous confidence she assumed that Edwin Clayhanger, too, +would keep an absolute silence about it. She had therefore naught to +fear, except in the privacy of his own mind. She did not blame +herself--it never occurred to her to do so--but she rather wondered at +herself, inimically, prophesying that one day her impulsiveness would +throw her into some serious difficulty. The memory of the night +beautifully coloured her whole daily existence. In spite of her +avoidance of the town, due to her dread of seeing Clayhanger, she was +constantly thinking: "But this cannot continue for ever. One day I am +bound to meet him again." And she seemed to be waiting for that day. + +It came with inevitable quickness. The last day but one of June was +appointed throughout the country for the celebration of the Centenary of +Sunday Schools. Neither Hilda nor any of the Orgreave children had ever +seen the inside of a Sunday School; and the tendency up at Lane End +House was to condescend towards the festival as towards a rejoicing of +the proletariat. But in face of the magnitude of the affair, looming +more enormous as it approached, this attitude could not be maintained. +The preparations for the Centenary filled newspapers and changed the +physiognomy of towns. And on the morning of the ceremonial service, +gloriously flattered by the sun, there was candid excitement at the +breakfast-table of the Orgreaves. Mr. Orgreave regretted that pressure +of work would prevent him from seeing the fun. Tom was going to see the +fun at Hanbridge. Jimmie and Johnnie were going to see the fun, but they +would not say where. The servants were going to see the fun. Charlie had +returned to London. Alicia wanted to go and see the fun, but as she was +flushed and feverish, Mrs. Orgreave forbade and decided to remain at +home with Alicia. Otherwise, even Mrs. Orgreave would have gone to see +the fun. Hilda and Janet apparently hesitated about going, but Mr. +Orgreave, pointing out that there could not under the most favourable +circumstance be another Centenary of Sunday Schools for at least a +hundred years, sarcastically urged them to set forth. The fact was, as +Janet teasingly told him while she hung on his neck, that he wished to +accentuate as much as possible his own martyrdom to industry. Were not +all the shops and offices of the Five Towns closed? Did not every member +of his family, save those detained by illness, attend the historic +spectacle of the Centenary? He alone had sacrificed pleasure to work. +Thus Janet's loving, ironic smiles foretold, would the father of the +brood discourse during the next few days. + + +II + +Hilda and Janet accordingly went down a be-flagged and sunlit Trafalgar +Road together. Janet was wearing still another white dress, and Hilda, +to her marked relief, had abandoned black for a slate-coloured frock +made by a dressmaker in Bleakridge. It was Mrs. Orgreave herself who had +first counselled Hilda, if she hated black, as she said she did, to +abandon black. The entire family chorus had approved. + +The risk of encountering Edwin Clayhanger on that day of multitudes was +surely infinitesimal. Nevertheless, in six minutes the improbable had +occurred. At the corner of Trafalgar Road and Duck Square Janet, +attracted by the sight of banners in the distance, turned to the left +along Wedgwood Street and past the front of Clayhanger's shop. +Theoretically shops were closed, but one shutter of Clayhanger's was +down, and in its place stood Edwin Clayhanger. Hilda felt her features +stiffening into a sort of wilful and insincere hostility as she shook +hands. Within the darkness of the shop she saw the figure of two dowdy +women--doubtless the sisters of whom Janet had told her; they +disappeared before Janet and Hilda entered. + +"It has happened! I have seen him again!" Hilda said to herself as she +sat in the shop listening to Janet and to Edwin Clayhanger. It appeared +likely that Edwin Clayhanger would join them in the enterprise of +witnessing the historic spectacle. + +A few minutes later everybody was startled by the gay apparition of +Osmond Orgreave swinging his cane. Curiosity had been too much for +industriousness, and Osmond Orgreave had yielded himself to the general +interest. + +"Oh! Father!" cried Janet. "What a deceitful thing you are!" + +"Only a day or two ago," Hilda was thinking, "I had never even heard of +him. And his shop seemed so strange and romantic to me. And now I am +sitting in his shop like an old friend. And nobody suspects that he and +I have had a secret meeting!" The shop itself seemed to be important and +prosperous. + +Mr. Orgreave, having decided for pleasure, was anxious to find it at +once, and, under his impatience, they left the shop. Janet went out +first with her gay father. Edwin Clayhanger waited respectfully for +Hilda to pass. But just as she was about to step forth she caught sight +of George Cannon coming along the opposite side of Wedgwood Street in +the direction of Trafalgar Road; he was in close conversation with +another man. She kept within the shelter of the shop until the two had +gone by. She did not want to meet George Cannon, with whom she had not +had speech since the interview at the Cedars; he had written to her +about the property sales, and she had replied. There was no reason why +she should hesitate to meet him. But she wished not to complicate the +situation. She thought: "If he saw me, he'd come across and speak to me, +and I might have to introduce him to all these people, and goodness +knows what!" The contretemps caused her heart to beat. + +When they emerged from the shop Janet, a few yards ahead with Mr. +Orgreave, was beckoning. + + +III + +Hilda stood on a barrel by the side of Edwin Clayhanger on another +barrel. There, from the top of St. Luke's Square, they surveyed a vast +rectangular carpet of upturned faces that made a pattern of pale dots on +a coloured and black groundwork. Nearly all the children of Bursley, +thousands upon thousands, were massed in the Square, wedged in tight +together, so that there seemed not to be an inch of space anywhere +between the shuttered shop fronts on the east of the Square and the +shuttered shop fronts on the west of the Square. At the bottom of the +Square a row of railway lorries were crammed with tiny babes--or such +they appeared--toddlers too weak to walk in processions. At the top of +the Square a large platform full of bearded adults rose like an island +out of the unconscious sea of infants. And from every window of every +house adults looked down in safe ease upon that wavy ocean over which +banners gleamed in the dazzling and fierce sunshine. + +She might have put up her sunshade. But she would not do so. She +thought: "If all those children can stand the sun without fainting, I +can!" She was extraordinarily affected by the mere sight of the immense +multitude of children; they were as helpless and as fatalistic as sheep, +utterly at the mercy of the adults who had herded them. There was about +them a collective wistfulness that cut the heart; to dwell on the idea +of it would have brought her to tears. And when the multitude sang, so +lustily, so willingly, so bravely, pouring forth with the brass +instruments a volume of tone enormous and majestic, she had a tightness +of the throat that was excrutiating. The Centenary of Sunday Schools was +quite other than she had expected; she had not bargained for these +emotions. + +It was after the hymn "There is a fountain filled with blood," during +the quietude of a speech, that Edwin Clayhanger, taking up an +evangelistic phrase in the speech, whispered to her: + +"More blood!" + +"What?" she asked, amazed by his ironical accent, which jarred on her +mood, and also by his familiar manner of leaning towards her and +dropping the words in her ear. + +"Well," he said. "Look at it! It only wants the Ganges at the bottom of +the Square!" + +Evidently for Edwin Clayhanger all religions were equally heathenish! +She was quite startled out of her amazement, and her response was an +almost humble entreaty not to make fun. The next moment she regretted +that she had not answered him with sharp firmness. She was somewhat out +of humour with him. He had begun by losing sight of Mr. Orgreave and +Janet--and of course it was hopeless to seek for them in those thronging +streets around St. Luke's Square. Then he had said to her, in a most +peculiar tone: "I hope you didn't catch cold in the rain the other +night," and she had not liked that. She had regarded it as a fault in +tact, almost as a sexual disloyalty on his part to refer at all to the +scene in the garden. Finally, his way of negotiating with the barrel man +for the use of two barrels had been lacking, for Hilda, in the qualities +of largeness and masterfulness; any one of the Orgreave boys would, she +was sure, have carried the thing off in a more worldly manner. + +The climax of the service came with the singing of "When I survey the +wondrous Cross." The physical effect of it on Hilda was nearly +overwhelming. The terrible and sublime words seemed to surge upon her +charged with all the multitudinous significance of the crowd. She was +profoundly stirred, and to prevent an outburst of tears she shook her +head. + +"What's the matter?" said Edwin Clayhanger. + +"Clumsy dolt!" she thought. "Haven't you got enough sense to leave me +alone?" And she said aloud, passionately transforming her weakness into +ferocity: "That's the most splendid religious verse ever written! You +can say what you like. It's worth while believing anything, if you can +sing words like that and mean them!" + +He agreed that the hymn was fine. + +"Do you know who wrote it?" she demanded threateningly. + +He did not. She was delighted. + +"Dr. Watts, of course!" she said, with a scornful sneer. What did Janet +mean by saying that he had read simply everything? + + +IV + +An episode which supervened close to their barrels did a great deal to +intensify the hostility of her mood. On the edge of the crowd an old +man, who had been trying to force his way through it, was being guyed by +a gang of louts who had surrounded an ice-cream barrow. Suddenly she +recognized this old man. His name was Shushions; he was a familiar +figure of the streets of Turnhill, and he had the reputation of being +the oldest Sunday School teacher in the Five Towns. He was indeed +exceedingly old, foolish, and undignified in senility; and the louts +were odiously jeering at his defenceless dotage, and a young policeman +was obviously with the louts and against the aged, fatuous victim. + +Hilda gave an exclamation of revolt, and called upon Edwin Clayhanger to +go to the rescue of Mr. Shushions. Not he, however, but she jumped down +first and pushed towards the barrow. She made the path, and he followed. +She protested to the policeman, and he too modestly seconded her. Yet +the policeman, ignoring her, addressed himself to Edwin Clayhanger. +Hilda was infuriated. It appeared that old Mr. Shushions had had a +ticket for the platform, but had lost it. + +"He must be got on to the platform somehow!" she decided, with a fiery +glance. + +But Edwin Clayhanger seemed to be incapable of an heroic action. He +hesitated. The policeman hesitated. Fortunately, the plight of the +doting oldest Sunday School teacher in the Five Towns had been observed +from the platform, and two fussy, rosetted officials bustled up and +offered to take charge of him. And Hilda, dissolving in painful pity, +bent over him softly and arranged his disordered clothes; she was +weeping. + +"Shall we go back to our barrels?" Edwin Clayhanger rather sheepishly +suggested after Mr. Shushions had been dragged away. + +But she would not go back to the barrels. + +"I think it's time we set about to find Janet and Mr. Orgreave," she +replied coldly, and they drew out of the crowd. She was profoundly +deceived in Edwin Clayhanger, so famous for his presence of mind in +saving printing-shops from destruction! She did not know what he ought +to have done; she made no attempt to conceive what he ought to have +done. But that he ought to have done something--something decisive and +grandly masculine--she was sure. + + +V + +Later, after sundry adventures, and having found Mr. Orgreave and Janet, +they stood at the tail of the steam-car, which Janet had decided should +carry her up to Bleakridge; and Edwin shook hands. Yes, Hilda was +profoundly deceived in him. Nevertheless, his wistful and honest glance, +as he parted from her, had its effect. If he had not one quality, he had +another. She tried hard to maintain her scorn of him, but it was +exceedingly difficult to do so. + +Mr. Orgreave wiped his brow as the car jolted them out of the tumult of +the Centenary. It was hot, but he did not seem to be in the slightest +degree fatigued or dispirited, whereas Janet put back her head and shut +her eyes. + +"Caught sight of a friend of yours this morning, Hilda!" he said +pleasantly. + +"Oh!" + +"Yes. Mr. Cannon. By the way, I forgot to tell you yesterday that his +famous newspaper--_yours_--has come to an end." He spoke, as it were, +with calm sympathy. "Yes! Well, it's not surprising, not surprising! +Nothing's ever stood up against the _Signal_ yet!" + +Hilda was saddened. When they reached Lane End House, a few seconds in +front of the hurrying and apologetic servants, Mrs. Orgreave told her +that Mr. George Cannon had called to see her, and had left a note for +her. She ran up to her room with the note. It said merely that the +writer wished to have an interview with her at once. + + * * * * * + + + + +BOOK III +HER BURDEN + + + + +CHAPTER I +HILDA INDISPENSABLE + + +I + +Hilda made no response of any kind to George Cannon's request for an +immediate interview, allowing day after day to pass in inactivity, and +wondering the while how she might excuse or explain her singular conduct +when circumstances should bring the situation to a head. She knew that +she ought either to go over to Turnhill, or write him with an +appointment to see her at Lane End House; but she did nothing; nor did +she say a word of the matter to Janet in the bedroom at nights. All that +she could tell herself was that she did not want to see George Cannon; +she was not honestly persuaded that she feared to see him. In the +meantime, Edwin Clayhanger was invisible, though the removal of the +Clayhanger household to the new residence at Bleakridge had made a +considerable stir of straw and litter in Trafalgar Road. + +On Tuesday in the following week she received a letter from Sarah +Gailey. It was brought up to her room early in the morning by a +half-dressed Alicia Orgreave, and she read it as she lay in bed. Sarah +Gailey, struggling with the complexities of the Cedars, away in Hornsey, +was unwell and gloomily desolate. She wrote that she suffered from +terrible headaches on waking, and that she was often feverish, and that +she had no energy whatever. "I am at a very trying age for a woman," she +said. "I don't know whether you understand, but I've come to a time of +life that really upsets one above a bit, and I'm fit for nothing." Hilda +understood; she was flattered, even touched, by this confidence; it made +her feel older, and more important in the world, and a whole generation +away from Alicia, who was drawing up the blind with the cries and +awkward gestures of a prattling infant. To the letter there was a +postscript: "Has George been to see you yet about me? He wrote me he +should, but I haven't heard since. In fact, I've been waiting to hear. +I'll say nothing about that yet. I'm ashamed you should be bothered. +It's so important for you to have a good holiday. Again, much love, +S.G." The prim handwriting got smaller and smaller towards the end of +the postscript and the end of the page, and the last lines were +perfectly parallel with the lower edge of the paper; all the others +sloped feebly downwards from left to right. + +"Oh!" piped Alicia from the window. "Maggie Clayhanger has got her +curtains up in the drawing-room! Oh! Aren't they proud things! _Oh_!--I +do believe she's caught me staring at her!" And Alicia withdrew abruptly +into the room, blushing for her detected sin of ungenteel curiosity. She +bumped down on the bed. "Three days more," she said. "Not counting +to-day. Four, counting to-day." + +"School?" + +Alicia nodded, her finger in her mouth. "Isn't it horrid, going to +school on a day like this? I hear you and Janet are off up to Hillport +this afternoon again, to play tennis. You do have times!" + +"No," said Hilda. "I've got to go to Turnhill this afternoon." + +"But Janet told me you were--" Her glance fell on the letter. "Is it +business?" + +"Yes." + +The child was impressed, and her change of tone, her frank awe, gave +pleasure to Hilda's vanity. "Shall I go and tell Jane? She isn't near +dressed." + +"Yes, do." + +Off scampered Alicia, leaving the door unlatched behind her. + +Hilda gazed at the letter, holding it limply in her left hand amid the +soft disorder of the counterpane. It had come to her, an intolerably +pathetic messenger and accuser, out of the exacerbating frowsiness of +the Cedars. Yesterday afternoon care-ridden Sarah Gailey was writing it, +with sighs, at the desk in her stuffy, uncomfortable bedroom. As Hilda +gazed at the formation of the words, she could see the unhappy Sarah +Gailey writing them, and the letter was like a bit of Sarah Gailey's +self, magically and disconcertingly projected into the spacious, +laughing home of the Orgreaves, and into the mysterious new happiness +that was forming around Hilda. The Orgreaves, so far as Hilda could +discover, had no real anxieties. They were a joyous lot, favoured alike +by temperament and by fortune. And she, Hilda--what real anxieties had +she? None! She was sure of a small but adequate income. Her grief for +her mother was assuaged. The problem of her soul no longer troubled: in +part it had been solved, and in part it had faded imperceptibly away. +Nor was she exercised about the future, about the 'new life.' Instead of +rushing ardently to meet the future, she felt content to wait for its +coming. Why disturb oneself? She was free. She was enjoying existence +with the Orgreaves. Yes, she was happy in this roseate passivity. + +The letter shook her, arousing as it did the sharp sense of her +indebtedness to Sarah Gailey, who alone had succoured her in her long +period of despairing infelicity. Had she guessed that it was Sarah +Gailey's affair upon which George Cannon had desired to see her, she +would not have delayed an hour; no reluctance to meet George Cannon +would have caused her to tarry. But she had not guessed; the idea had +never occurred to her. + +She rose, picked up the envelope from the carpet, carefully replaced the +letter in it, and laid it with love on the glittering dressing-table. +Through the unlatched door she heard a tramping of unshod masculine feet +in the passage, and the delightful curt greeting of Osmond Orgreave and +his sleepy son Jimmie--splendid powerful males. She glanced at the +garden, and at the garden of the Clayhangers, swimming in fresh +sunshine. She glanced in the mirror, and saw the deshabille of her black +hair and of her insecure nightgown, and thought: "Truly, I am not so +bad-looking! And how well I feel! How fond they all are of me! I'm just +at the right age. I'm young, but I'm mature. I've had a lot of +experience, and I'm not a fool. I'm strong--I could stand anything!" She +put her shoulders back, with a challenging gesture. The pride of life +was hers. + +And then, this disturbing vision of Sarah Gailey, alone, unhappy, +unattractive, enfeebled, ageing--ageing! It seemed to her inexpressibly +cruel that people must grow old and weak and desolate; it seemed +monstrous. A pang, momentary but excruciating, smote her. She said to +herself: "Sarah Gailey has nothing to look forward to, except worry. +Sarah Gailey is at the end, instead of at the beginning!" + + +II + +When she got off the train at Turnhill station, early that afternoon, +she had no qualm at the thought of meeting George Cannon; she was not +even concerned to invent a decent excuse for her silence in relation to +his urgent letter. She went to see him for the sake of Sarah Gailey, and +because she apparently might be of use in some affair of Sarah's--she +knew not what. She was proud that either Sarah or he thought that she +could be of use, or that it was worth while consulting her. She had a +grave air, as of one to whom esteem has brought responsibilities. + +In Child Street, leading to High Street, she passed the office of +Godlimans, the auctioneers. And there, among a group of white posters +covering the large window, was a poster of the sale of "valuable +household furniture and effects removed from No. 15 Lessways Street." +And on the poster, in a very black line by itself, stood out saliently +the phrase: "Massive Bedroom Suite." Her mother's! Hers! She had to stop +and read the poster through, though she was curiously afraid of being +caught in the act. All the principal items were mentioned by the +faithful auctioneers; and the furniture, thus described, had a strange +aspect of special importance, as if it had been subtly better, more +solid, more desirable, than any other houseful of furniture in the +town,--Lessways' furniture! She sought for the date. The sale had taken +place on the previous night, at the very hour when she was lolling and +laughing in the drawing-room of Lane End House with the Orgreaves! The +furniture was sold, dispersed, gone! The house was empty! The past was +irremediably closed! The realization of this naturally affected her, +raising phantoms of her mother, and of the face of the cab-driver as he +remarked on the drawn blinds at the Cedars. But she was still more +affected by the thought that the poster was on the window, and the +furniture scattered, solely because she had willed it. She had said: +"Please sell all the furniture, and you needn't consult me about the +sale. I don't want to know. I prefer not to know. Just get it done." And +it had been done! How mysteriously romantic! Some girls would not have +sold the furniture, would not have dared to sell it, would have accepted +the furniture and the house as a solemn charge, and gone on living among +those relics, obedient to a tradition. But she had dared! She had +willed--and the solid furniture had vanished away! And she was +adventurously free! + +She went forward. At the corner of Child Street and High Street the new +Town Hall was rising to the skies. Already its walls were higher than +the highest house in the vicinity. And workmen were crawling over it, +amid dust, and a load of crimson bricks was trembling and revolving +upwards on a thin rope that hung down from the blue. Glimpses of London +had modified old estimates of her native town. Nevertheless, the new +Town Hall still appeared extraordinarily large and important to her. + +She saw the detested Arthur Dayson in the distance of the street, and +crossed hurriedly to the Square, looking fixedly at the storeys above +the ironmonger's so that Arthur Dayson could not possibly catch her eye. +There was no sign of the _Five Towns Chronicle_ in the bare windows of +the second storey. This did not surprise her; but she was startled by +the absence of the Karkeek wire-blinds from the first-floor windows, +equally bare with those of the second. When she got to the entrance she +was still more startled to observe that the Karkeek brass-plate had been +removed. She climbed the long stairs apprehensively. + + +III + +"Anybody here?" she called out timidly. She was in the clerk's office, +which was empty; but she could hear movements in another room. The place +seemed in process of being dismantled. + +Suddenly George Cannon appeared in a doorway, frowning. + +"Good afternoon, Mr. Cannon!" + +"Good afternoon, Miss Lessways." He spoke with stiff politeness. His +face looked weary. + +After a slight hesitation he advanced, and they shook hands. Hilda was +nervous. Her neglect of his letter now presented itself to her as +inexcusable. She thought: "If he is vexed about it I shall have to +humour him. I really can't blame him. He must think me very queer." + +"I was wondering what had become of you," he said, amply polite, but not +cordial. + +"Well," she said, "every day I was expecting you to call again, or to +send me a note or something.... And what with one thing and another--" + +"I dare say your time's been fully occupied," he filled up her pause. +And she fancied that he spoke in a peculiar tone. She absurdly fancied +that he was referring to the time which she had publicly spent with +Edwin Clayhanger at the Centenary. She conceived that he might have seen +her and Edwin Clayhanger together. + +"I had a letter from Miss Gailey this morning," she said. "And it seems +that it's about her that you wanted--" + +"Yes." + +"I do wish I'd known. If I'd had the slightest idea I should have come +over instantly." She spoke with eager seriousness, and then added, +smiling as if in appeal to be favourably understood: "I thought it was +only about _my_ affairs--sale or what not. And as I'd asked you to +manage all these things exactly as you thought best, I didn't trouble--" + +He laughed, and either forgave or forgot. + +"Will you come this way?" he invited, in a new tone of friendliness. +"We're rather in a mess here." + +"You're all alone, too," she said, following him into his room. + +"Sowter's out," he answered laconically, waiting for her to precede him. +He said nothing as to the office-boy, nor as to Mr. Karkeek. Hilda was +now sure that something strange had happened. + +"So you've heard from Sarah, have you?" he began, when they were both +seated in his own room. There were still a lot of papers, though fewer +than of old, on the broad desk; but the bookcase was quite empty, and +several of the shelves in it had supped from the horizontal; the front +part of the shelves was a pale yellow, and behind that, an irregular +dark band of dust indicated the varying depths of the vanished tomes. +The forlornness of the bookcase gave a stricken air to the whole room. + +"She's not well." + +"Or she imagines she's not well." + +"Oh no!" said Hilda warmly. "It isn't imagination. She really isn't +well." + +"You think so?" + +"I don't think--I know!" Hilda spoke proudly, but with the restraint +which absolute certainty permits. She crushed, rather than resented, +George Cannon's easy insinuation, full of the unjustified superiority of +the male. How could he judge--how could any man judge? She had never +before felt so sure of herself, so adult and experienced, as she felt +then. + +"But it's nothing serious?" he suggested with deference. + +"N--no--not what you'd call serious," said Hilda judicially, +mysteriously. + +"Because she wants to give up the boarding-house business altogether-- +that's all!" + +Having delivered this dramatic blow, George Cannon smiled, as it were, +quizzically. And Hilda was reassured about him. She had been thinking: +"Is he ruined? If he is not ruined, what is the meaning of these +puzzling changes here?" And she had remembered her shrewd mother's +hints, and her own later fears, concerning the insecurity of his +position: and had studied his tired and worn face for an equivocal sign. +But this smile, self-confident and firm, was not the smile of a ruined +man; and his flashing glance seemed to be an omen of definite success. + +"Wants to give it up?" exclaimed Hilda. + +He nodded. + +"But why? I thought she was doing rather well." + +"So she is." + +"Then why?" + +"Ah!" George Cannon lifted his head with a gesture signifying enigma. +"That's just what I wanted to ask you. Hasn't she said anything to you?" + +"As to giving it up? No!... So it was this that you wanted to see me +about?" + +He nodded. "She wrote me a few days after you came away, and suggested I +should see you and ask you what you thought." + +"But why me?" + +"Well, she thinks the world of you, Sarah does." + +Hilda thought: "How strange! She did nothing but look after me, and wait +on me hand and foot, and I never helped her in any way; and yet she +turns to me!" And she was extremely flattered and gratified, and was +aware of a delicious increase of self-respect. + +"But supposing she does give it up?" Hilda said aloud. "What will she +do?" + +"Exactly!" said George Cannon, and then, in a very confidential, +ingratiating manner: "I wish you'd write to her and put some reason into +her. She mustn't give it up. With her help--and you know in the +management she's simply wonderful--with her help, I think I shall be +able to bring something about that'll startle folks. Only, she mustn't +throw me over. And she mustn't get too crotchety with the boarders. I've +had some difficulty in that line, as it is. In fact, I've had to be +rather cross. You know about the Boutwoods, for instance! Well, I've +smoothed that over.... It's nothing, nothing--if she'll keep her head. +If she'll keep her head it's a gold mine--you'll see! Only--she wants a +bit of managing. If you'd write--" + +"I shan't write," said Hilda. "I shall go and see her--at once. I should +have gone in any case, after her letter this morning saying how unwell +she is. She wants company. She was so kind to me I couldn't possibly +leave her in the lurch. I can't very well get away to-day, but I shall +go to-morrow, and I shall drop her a line to-night." + +"It's very good of you, I'm sure," said George Cannon. Obviously he was +much relieved. + +"Not at all!" Hilda protested. She felt very content and happy. + +"The fact is," he went on, "there's nobody but you can do it. Your +mother was the only real friend she ever had. And this is the first time +she's been left alone up there, you see. I'm quite sure you can save the +situation." + +He was frankly depending on her for something which he admitted he could +not accomplish himself. Those two people, George Cannon and Sarah +Gailey, had both instinctively turned to her in a crisis. None could do +what she could do. She, by the force of her individuality, could save +the situation. She was no longer a girl, but a mature and influential +being. Her ancient diffidence before George Cannon had completely gone; +she had no qualms, no foreboding, no dubious sensation of weakness. +Indeed, she felt herself in one respect his superior, for his confidence +in Sarah Gailey's housewifely skill, his conviction that it was unique +and would be irreplaceable, struck her as somewhat naif, as being yet +another example of the absurd family pride which she and her mother had +often noticed in the Five Towns. She was not happy at the prospect of so +abruptly quitting the delights of Lane End House and the vicinity of +Edwin Clayhanger; she was not happy at the prospect of postponing the +consideration of plans for her own existence; she was not happy at the +prospect of Sarah Gailey's pessimistic complainings. She was above +happiness. She was above even that thrill of sharp and intense vitality +which in times past had ennobled trouble and misery. She had the most +exquisite feeling of triumphant self-justification. She was splendidly +conscious of power. She was indispensable. + +And the dismantled desolation of the echoing office, and the mystery of +George Cannon's personal position, somehow gave a strange poignancy to +her mood. + +They talked of indifferent matters: her property, the Orgreaves, even +the defunct newspaper, as to which George Cannon shrugged his shoulders. +Then the conversation drooped. + +"I shall go up by the four train to-morrow," she said, clinching the +interview, and rising. + +"I may go up by that train myself," said George Cannon. + +She started. "Oh! are you going to Hornsey, too?" + +"No! Not Hornsey. I've other business." + + + + +CHAPTER II +SARAH'S BENEFACTOR + + +I + +On the following afternoon Hilda travelled alone by the local train from +Bleakridge to Knype, the central station where all voyagers for London, +Birmingham, and Manchester had to foregather in order to take the fast +expresses that unwillingly halted there, and there only, in their +skimming flights across the district. It was a custom of Five Towns +hospitality that a departing guest should be accompanied as far as Knype +and stowed with personal attentions into the big train. But on this +occasion Hilda had wished otherwise. "I should _prefer_ nobody to go +with me to Knype," she had said, in a characteristic tone, to Janet. It +was enough. The family had wondered; but it was enough. The family knew +its singular, its mysterious Hilda. And instead of at Knype, the +leave-takings had occurred at the little wayside station of Bleakridge, +with wavy moorland behind, factory chimneys in front, and cinder and +shawd heaps all around. Hilda had told Janet: "Mr. Cannon may be meeting +me at Knype. He's probably going to London too." And the discreet Janet, +comprehending Hilda, had not even mentioned this fact to the rest of the +family. + +George Cannon, in a light summer suit and straw hat, was already on the +platform at Knype. Hilda had feared that at Bleakridge he might be +looking out of the window of the local train, which started from +Turnhill; she had desired not to meet him in the presence of any of the +Orgreaves. But either he had caught the previous train to Knype, or he +had driven down. Holding a Gladstone bag and a stick in one hand, he +stood talking to another man of about his own age and height. The +conversation was vivacious, at any rate on George Cannon's part. Hilda +passed close by him amid the populous stir of the expectant platform. He +saw her, turned, and raised his hat, but in a perfunctory, preoccupied +manner; and instantly resumed the speech to his companion. Hilda +recognized the latter. It was 'young Lawton,' son and successor to 'old +Lawton,' the most famous lawyer in the Five Towns. Young Lawton had a +branch office at Turnhill, and lived in an important house half-way +between Turnhill and Bursley, where, behind the Town Hall, was the +historic principal office of the firm. + +The express came loudly in, and Hilda, having climbed into a +second-class compartment, leaned out from it, to descry her porter and +bestow on him a threepenny bit. George Cannon and young Lawton were +still in argument, and apparently quite indifferent to the train. Young +Lawton's thin face had its usual faint, harsh smile; his limbs were +moveless in an exasperating and obstinate calm; Hilda detested the man +from his mere looks. But George Cannon was very obviously under +excitement. His face was flushed; he moved his free arm violently--even +the Gladstone bag swung to and fro; he punctuated his sentences with +sharp, angry nods of the head, insisting and protesting and insisting, +while the other, saying much less, maintained his damnable stupid +disdainful grin. + +Would he let the train go, in his feverish preoccupation? Hilda was +seriously afraid that he would. The last trunks were flung into the +front van, the stationmaster in his tall hat waved curtly to the +glittering guard; the guard waved his flag, and whistled; a porter +banged the door of Hilda's compartment, ignoring her gestures; the +engine whistled. And at that moment George Cannon, throwing apparently a +last malediction at young Lawton, sprang towards the train, and, seeing +Hilda's face, rushed to the door which she strained to open again. + +"I was afraid you'd be left behind," she said, as he dropped his bag on +the seat and the affronted stationmaster himself shut the door. + +"Not quite!" ejaculated Cannon grimly. + +The smooth, irresistible gliding of the train became apparent, +establishing a sudden aloof calm. Hilda perceived that all her muscles +were tense. + +In the compartment was a middle-aged couple. + +"What's this place?" asked the woman. + +"Looks like Tamworth," said the man sleepily. + +"Knype, sir!" George Cannon corrected him very sharply. He was so +wrought up that he had omitted even to shake hands with Hilda. Making no +effort to talk, and showing no curiosity about Hilda's welfare or +doings, he moved uneasily on his seat, and from time to time opened and +shut the Gladstone bag. Gradually the flush paled from his face. + +At Lichfield the middle-aged couple took advice from a porter and +stumbled out of the train. + + +II + +"We're fairly out of the smoke now," said Hilda, when the train began to +move again. As a fact, they had been fairly out of the smoke of the Five +Towns for more than half an hour; but Hilda spoke at random, timidly, +nervously, for the sake of speaking. And she was as apologetic as though +it was she herself who by some untimely discretion had annoyed George +Cannon. + +"Yes, thank God!" he replied fiercely, blowing with pleasure upon the +embers of his resentment. "And I'll take good care I never go into it +again--to live, that is!" + +"Really?" she murmured, struck into an extreme astonishment. + +He produced a cigar and a match-box. + +"May I?" he demanded carelessly, and accepted her affirmative as of +course. + +"You've heard about my little affair?" he asked, after lighting the +cigar. And he gazed at her curiously. + +"No." + +"Do you mean to say that none of the Orgreaves have said anything this +last day or two?" He leaned forward. They were in opposite corners. + +"No," she repeated stiffly. Nevertheless, she remembered a peculiar +glance of Tom's to his father on the previous day, when George Cannon's +name had been mentioned. + +"Well," said he. "You surprise me! That's all!" + +"But--" She stopped, full of misgivings. + +"Never heard any gossip about me--never?" he persisted, as it were, +menacing her. + +She shook her head. + +"Never heard that I'm not really a solicitor?" + +"Oh! well--I think mother once did say something--" + +"I thought so." + +"But I don't understand those things," she said simply. "Is anything the +matter? Is--" + +"Nothing!" he replied, calm and convincing. "Only I've been done! Done! +You'll hear about it some day, I dare say.... Shall I tell you? Would +you like me to tell you?" He smiled rather boyishly and leaned back. + +"Yes," she nodded. + +His attitude was very familiar, recalling their former relation of +employer and employed. It seemed as natural to her as to him that he +should not too ceremoniously conceal his feelings or disguise his mood. + +"Well, you see, I expect I know as much about law as any of 'em, but +I've never been admitted, and so--" He stopped, perceiving that she did +not comprehend the significance of such a word as 'admitted.' "If you +want to practise as a solicitor you have to pass examinations, and I +never have passed examinations. Very expensive, all that! And I couldn't +afford when I was young. It isn't the exams that are difficult--you may +tell that from the fellows that pass them. Lawton, for instance. But +after a certain age exams become a nuisance. However, I could do +everything else. I might have had half a dozen situations as managing +clerk in the Five Towns if I'd wanted. Only I didn't want! I wanted to +be on my own. I could get clients as quick as any of them. _And_ +quicker! So I found Karkeek--the excellent Mr. Karkeek! Another of the +bright ones that could pass the exams! Oh! He'd passed the exams all +right! He'd spent five years and I don't know how many hundred pounds in +passing the exams, and with it all he couldn't get above a couple of +pounds a week. There are hundreds of real solicitors up and down the +country who aren't earning more. And they aren't worth more. But I gave +him more, and a lot more. Just to use his name on my door and my blinds. +See? In theory I was his clerk, but in reality he was mine. It was all +quite clear. He understood--I should think he did, by Jove!" George +Cannon laughed shortly. "Every one understood. I got a practice together +in no time. _He_ didn't do it. He wouldn't have got a practice together +in a thousand years. I had the second-best practice in Turnhill, and I +should soon have had the best--if I hadn't been done." + +"Yes?" said Hilda. The confidence flattered her. + +"Well, Karkeek came into some money,--and he simply walked out of the +office! Simply walked out! Didn't give me time to turn round. I'd always +treated him properly. But he was jealous." + +"What a shame!" Hilda's scorn shrivelled up Mr. Karkeek. There was +nothing that she detested so much as a disloyalty. + +"Yes. I couldn't stop him, of course. No formal agreement between us. +Couldn't be, in a case like ours! So he had me. He'd taken my wages +quick enough as long as it suited him. Then he comes into money, and +behaves like that. Jealousy! They were all jealous,--always had been. I +was doing too well. So I had the whole gang down on me instantly like a +thousand of bricks. They knew I was helpless, and so they came on. +Special meeting of the committee of the North Staffordshire Law Society, +if you please! Rumours of prosecution--oh yes! I don't know what!... All +because I wouldn't take the trouble to pass their wretched exams.... +Why, I could pass their exams on my head, if I hadn't anything better to +do. But I have. At first I thought I'd retire for five years and pass +their exams, and then come back and make 'em sit up. And wouldn't I have +made 'em sit up! But then I said to myself, 'No. It isn't good enough.'" + +Hilda frowned. "What isn't?" + +"What? The Five Towns isn't good enough! I can find something better +than the law, and I can find something better than the Five Towns!... +And here young Lawton has the impudence to begin to preach to me on +Knype platform, and to tell me I'm wise in going! He's the President of +the local Law Society, you know! No end of a President! And hasn't even +got gumption enough to keep his father's practice together! Stupid ass! +Well, I let him have it, and straight! He's no worse than the rest. +They've got no brains in this district. And they're so narrow--narrow +isn't the word! Thick-headed's the word. Stupid! Mean!... Mean!... What +did it matter to them? I kept to all their rules. There was a real +solicitor on the premises, and there'd soon have been another, if I'd +had time. No concern of theirs how the money was divided between me and +the real solicitor. But they were jealous--there you are! They don't +understand enterprise. They hate it. Nothing ever moves in the Five +Towns. And they've got no manners--I do believe that's the worst. Look +at Lawton's manners! Nothing but a boor! They aren't civilized +yet--that's what's the matter with them! That's what my father used to +say. Barbarians, he used to say. '_Ce sont des barbares!_'... Kids used +to throw stones at him because of his neck-tie. The grown-ups chuck a +brick at anything they don't quite fancy. That's their idea of wit." + +Hilda was afraid of his tempestuous mood. But she enjoyed her fear, as +she might have enjoyed exposure to a dangerous storm. She enjoyed the +sensation of her fragility and helplessness there, cooped up with him in +the close intimacy of the compartment. She was glad that he did not +apologize to her for his lack of restraint, nor foolishly pretend that +he was boring her. + +"It does seem a shame!" she murmured, her eyes candidly admitting that +she felt enormously flattered. + +He sighed and laughed. "How often have I heard my father say that--'_Ce +sont des barbares_!' Peels only brought him over because they could find +nobody in the Five Towns civilized enough to do the work that he did.... +I can imagine how he must have felt when he first came here!... My +God!... Environment!... I tell you what--it's only lately I've realized +how I loathe the provinces!" + +The little interior in which they were, swept steadily and smoothly +across the central sunlit plain of England, passing canals and brooks +and cottages and churches--silent and stolid in that English stupidity +that he was criticizing. And Hilda saw of George Cannon all that was +French in him. She saw him quite anew, as something rather exotic and +entirely marvellous. She thought: "When I first met him, I said to +myself he was a most extraordinary man. And I was right. I was more +right than I ever imagined. No one down there has any idea of what he +really is. They're too stupid, as he says." + +He imposed on her his scorn of the provincial. She had to share it. She +had a vision of the Five Towns as a smoky blotch on the remote +horizon,--negligible, crass, ridiculous in its heavy self-complacency. +The very Orgreaves themselves were tinged with this odious English +provincialism. + +He smiled to himself, and then said, very quietly: "It isn't of the +least importance, you know. In fact I'm rather glad. I've never had any +difficulty in making money, and when I've settled up everything down +there I shan't be precisely without. And I shall have no excuse for not +branching out in a new line." + +She meekly encouraged him to continue. + +"Oh yes!" he went on. "The law isn't the only thing--not by a long way. +And besides, I'm sick of it. Do you know what the great thing of the +future is, I mean the really great thing--the smashing big thing?" He +smiled, kindly and confidential. + +She too smiled, shaking her head. + +"Well, I'll tell you. Hotels!" + +"Hotels?" She was perfectly nonplussed. + +"Hotels! There'll be more money and more fun to be got out of hotels, +soon, than out of any other kind of enterprise in the world. You should +see those hotels that are going up in London! They'd give you a start, +and no mistake! Yes, hotels! There aren't twenty people in England who +know what a hotel is! But I know!" He paused, and added reflectively, in +a comically naive tone: "Curious how these things come to you, bit by +bit! Now, if it hadn't been for Sarah--and that boarding-house--" + +He was using his straw hat as a fan. With an unexpected and almost +childlike gesture he suddenly threw the hat up on to the rack above his +head, "How's that?" + +"What a boy he is, after all!" thought Hilda sympathetically, wondering +why in the midst of all her manifold astonishment she felt so +light-hearted and gay. + +"Funny parcel you've got up there!" he idly observed, glancing from one +rack to the other. + +The parcel contained Mrs. Orgreave's generous conception of a repast +proper to be eaten in a train in place of high tea. He helped her to eat +it. + +As the train approached London he resumed his manhood. And he was +impeccably adult as he conducted her from Euston to King's Cross, and +put her into a train in a corner of the station that the summer twilight +had already taken possession of. + + +III + +Late at night Hilda sat with Sarah Gailey in the landlady's small +bedroom at the Cedars. It was lighted by a lamp, because the builder of +the house, hating excess, had thought fit not to carry gas-pipes higher +than the first floor. A large but old bedstead filled half the floor +space. On the shabby dressing-table a pile of bills and various papers +lay near the lamp. Clothes were hung behind the door, and a vague wisp +of muslin moved slightly in the warm draught from the tiny open window. +There were two small cane-chairs, enamelled, on which the women sat, +close to each other, both incommoded by the unwholesome sultriness of +the only chamber that could be spared for the private use of the +house-mistress. This small bedroom was Sarah Gailey's home; its +amenities were the ultimate nightly reward of her labours. If George +Cannon had obtained possession of the Cedars as an occupation for Sarah, +this room and Sarah's pleasure therein were the sole justification of +the entire mansion. + +As Hilda looked at Sarah Gailey's bowed head, but little greyed, beneath +the ray of the lamp, and at her shrivelled, neurotic, plaintive face in +shadow, and at her knotty hands loosely clasped, she contrasted her +companion and the scene with the youthfulness and the spaciousness and +the sturdy gay vigour of existence in the household of the Orgreaves. +She thought, with a renewed sense of the mysterious strangeness of life: +"Last night I was there, far away--all those scores of miles of fields +and towns are between!--and to-night I am here. Down there I was nothing +but an idler. Here I am the strongest. I am indispensable. I am the one +person on whom she depends. Without me everything will go to pieces." +And she thought of George Cannon's vast enigmatic projects concerning +grand hotels. In passing the immense pile of St. Pancras on the way from +Euston to King's Cross, George Cannon had waved his hand and said: "Look +at that! Look at that! It's something after that style that I want for a +toy! And I'll have it!" Yes, the lofty turrets of St. Pancras had not +intimidated him. He, fresh from little Turnhill and from defeats, could +rise at once to the height of them, and by the force of imagination make +them his own! He could turn abruptly from the law--to hotels! A +disconcerting man! And the mere tone in which he mentioned his +enterprise seemed, in a most surprising way, to dignify hotels, and even +boarding-houses; to give romance to the perfectly unromantic business of +lodging and catering!... And the seed from which he was to grow the +magic plant sat in the room there with Hilda: that bowed head! The +ambition and the dream resembled St. Pancras: the present reality was +the Cedars, and Sarah's poor, stuffy little bedroom in the Cedars. + +Sarah began to cry, weakly. + +"But what's the matter?" asked Hilda, the strong succourer. + +"Nothing. Only it's such a relief to me you've come." + +Hilda deprecated lightly. "I should have come sooner if I'd known. You +ought to have sent word before." + +"No, I couldn't. After all, what is it? I'm only silly. There's nothing +really the matter. The minute you come I can see that. I can even stand +those Boutwoods if you're here. You know George made it up with them; +and I won't say he wasn't right. But I had to put my pride in my pocket. +And yesterday it nearly made me scream out to see Mrs. Boutwood stir her +tea." + +"But why?" + +"I don't know. It's nerves, that's what it is.... Well, I've got to go +through these." She fingered the papers on the dressing-table with her +left hand while drying her tears with the right. "He's very wishful for +proper accounts, George is. That's right enough. But--well--I think I +can make a shilling go as far as anyone, and choose flesh-meat with +anyone, too--that I will say--but these accounts...! George is always +wanting to know how much it costs a head a week for this that and the +other.... It's all very well for him, but if he had the servants to look +after and--" + +"I'm going to keep your accounts for you," Hilda soothed her. + +"But--" + +"I'm going to keep your accounts for you," And she thought: "How exactly +like mother I was just then!" + +It appeared to Hilda that she was making a promise, and shouldering a +responsibility, against her will, and perhaps against her common sense. +She might keep accounts at the Cedars for a week, a fortnight, a month. +But she could not keep accounts there indefinitely. She was sowing +complications for herself. Freedom and change and luxury were what she +deemed she desired; not a desk in a boarding-house. And yet something +within her compelled her to say in a firm, sure, kindly voice: + +"Now give me all those papers, Miss Gailey." + +And amid indefinite regret and foreboding, she was proud and happy in +her role of benefactor. + +When Hilda at length rose to go to her own room, Sarah Gailey had to +move her chair so that she might pass. At the door both hesitated for an +instant, and then Hilda with a sudden gesture advanced her lips. It was +the first time she and Sarah had ever kissed. The contact with that +desiccated skin intensified to an extraordinary degree Hilda's emotional +sympathy for the ageing woman. She thought, poignantly: "Poor old +thing!" + +And when she was on the dark little square landing under the roof, +Sarah, holding the lamp, called out in a whisper. + +"Hilda!" + +"Well?" + +"Did he say anything to you about Brighton?" + +"Brighton?" She perceived with certainty from Sarah's eager and yet +apologetic tone, that the question had been waiting for utterance +throughout the evening, and that Sarah had lacked courage for it until +the kiss had enheartened her. And also she perceived that Sarah was +suspecting her of being somehow in conspiracy with George Cannon. + +"Yes," said Sarah. "He's got into his head that Brighton's the only +place for this boarding-house business if it's to be properly done." + +"He never said a word to me about Brighton," Hilda whispered positively. + +"Oh!" + +Hilda descended the stairs, groping. Brighton? What next? + + + + +CHAPTER III +AT BRIGHTON + + +I + +She thought vividly, one afternoon about three months later, of that +final scrap of conversation. Just as she had sat opposite George Cannon +in a second-class compartment, so now she was sitting opposite Sarah +Gailey in a second-class compartment. The train, having passed Lewes, +was within a few minutes of Brighton. And following behind them, +somewhere at the tail of the train, were certain trunks containing all +that she possessed and all that Sarah Gailey possessed of personal +property--their sole chattels and paraphernalia on earth. George Cannon +had willed it and brought it about. He was to receive them on the +platform of Brighton Station. She had not seen very much of him in the +interval, for he had been continually on the move between Brighton and +Turnhill. "In a moment we shall all be together again," she reflected. +"This meeting also will happen, as everything else has happened, and a +new period will definitely have begun." And she sat and stared at the +closed eyes of the desiccated Sarah Gailey, and waited for the instant +of arrival apprehensively and as it were incredulously--not with fear, +not with pleasure, but with the foreboding of adventure and a curious +idea that the instant of arrival never would come. + +For thirteen weeks, which had gone very quickly, she had devoted herself +to Sarah Gailey, acting as George Cannon's precursor, prophet, and +expounder. While the summer cooled into autumn, and the boarding-house +season slackened and once more feebly brightened, she had daily +conversed with Sarah about George's plans, making them palatable to her, +softening the shocks of them, and voluntarily promising not to quit her +until the crisis was past. She had had to discourse on the unique +advantages of Brighton as a field for George's enterprise, and on +George's common sense and on Sarah's common sense, and the +interdependence of the two. When the news came that George had acquired +down there a house in going order, she had had to prove that it was not +the end of the world that was announced. When the news came that George +had re-sold the Cedars to its original occupier, she had had to prove +that the transaction did not signify a mysterious but mortal insult to +Sarah. When the news came that the Cedars must be vacated before noon on +a given Saturday, she had had to begin all her demonstrations afresh, +and in addition attempt to persuade Sarah that George was not utterly +mad--buying and selling boarding-house tenancies all over the South of +England!--and that the exit from the Cedars would not be the ruin of +dignity and peace, and the commencement of fatal disasters. In the hour +when Sarah Gailey learnt the immutable Saturday of departure, the +Cedars, which had been her hell, promised to become, on that very +Saturday, a paradise. + +On the whole, the three months had constituted a quarter of exceeding +difficulty and delicacy. The first month had been rendered memorable by +Sarah's astonishing behaviour when Hilda had desired to pay, as before, +for her board and lodging. The mere offer of the money had made plain to +Sarah--what she then said she had always suspected--that Hilda was her +enemy in disguise and (like the rest) bent on humiliating her, and +outraging her most sacred feelings. In that encounter, but in no other, +Sarah had won. The opportune withdrawal of the Boutwoods from the +boarding-house had assisted the establishment of peace. When the +Boutwoods left, Miss Gailey seemed to breathe the drawing-room air as +though it were ozone of the mountains. But her joy had been quickly +dissipated, for to dissipate joy was her chief recreation. A fortnight +before the migration to Brighton Hilda, contemplating all that had to be +done, had thought, aghast: "I shall never he able to humour her into +doing it all!" Closing of accounts, dismissals, inventories, bills, +receipts, packing, decision concerning trains, reception of the former +proprietor (especially that!), good-byes, superintending the stowage of +luggage on the cab...! George Cannon had not once appeared in the last +sensitive weeks, and he had therein been wise. And all that had to be +done had been done--not by Hilda, but by Sarah Gailey the touchy and the +competent. Hilda had done little but the humouring. + + +II + +And there sat Sarah Gailey, deracinated and captive, to prove how +influential a person Hilda was! With the eyes shut, Sarah's worn face +under her black bonnet had precisely the aspect of a corpse--and the +corpse of somebody who had expired under the weight of all the world's +woe! Hilda thought: "When she is dead she will look just like that!... +And one day, sooner or later, she will be dead." Strange that Sarah +Gailey, with no malady except her chronic rheumatism, and no material +anxiety, and every prospect of security in old age, could not be +content, could not at any rate refrain from being miserable! But she +could not. She was an exhaustless fount of worry and misery. "I suppose +I like her," thought Hilda. "But why do I like her? She isn't agreeable. +She isn't amusing. She isn't pretty. She isn't even kind, now. She's +only depressing and tedious. As soon as she's fixed up here, I shall go. +I shall leave her. I've done enough, and I've had enough. I must attend +to my own affairs a bit. After all--" And then Hilda's conscience +interrupted: "But can you leave her altogether? Without you, what will +happen to her? She's getting older and worse every day. Perhaps in a few +years she won't even be competent. Already she isn't perhaps quite, +quite as competent as she was." And Hilda said: "Well, of course, I +shall have to keep an eye on her; come and see her sometimes--often." +And she knew that as long as they both lived she could never be free +from a sense of responsibility towards Sarah Gailey. Useless to argue: +"It's George Cannon's affair, not mine!" Useless to ask: "_Why_ should I +feel responsible?" Only after she had laid Sarah Gailey in the tomb +would she be free. "And that day too will come!" she thought again. "I +shall have to go through it, and I shall go through it!" + +The poignant romance of existence enveloped her in its beautiful veils. +And through these veils she saw, vague and diminished, the far vista of +the hours which she had spent with the Orgreaves. She saw the night of +Edwin Clayhanger's visit, and herself and him together in the porch, +and she remembered the shock of his words, "There's no virtue in +believing." The vision was like that of another and quite separate life. +Would she ever go back to it? Janet was her friend, in theory her one +intimate friend: she had seen her once in London,--beautiful, agreeable, +affectionate, intelligent; all the Orgreaves were lovable. The glance of +Edwin Clayhanger, and the sincerity of his smile, had affected her in a +manner absolutely unique.... But would she ever go back? It seemed to +her fantastic, impossible, that she should ever go back. It seemed to +her that she was netted by destiny. In any case she knew that she could +not, meanwhile, give to that group in Bursley even a part of herself. +Hilda could never give a part of herself. Moreover, she was a bad +letter-writer. And so, if among themselves the group at Bursley charged +her with inconstancy, she must accept the accusation, to which she was +inevitably exposed by the very ardour of her temperament. + +The putting-on of brakes took her unawares. The train was in Brighton, +sliding over the outskirts of the town. Miss Gailey opened her +apprehensive eyes. Hilda saw steep streets of houses that sprawled on +the hilly mounds of the great town like ladders: reminiscent of certain +streets of her native district, yet quite different, a physiognomy +utterly foreign to her. This then, was Brighton. That which had been a +postmark became suddenly a reality, shattering her preconceptions of it, +and disappointing her she knew not why. She glanced forward, through the +window, and saw the cavern of the station. In a few seconds they would +have arrived, and her formal mission would be over. She was very +agitated and very nervous. George Cannon had promised to meet them. +Would he meet them? + +The next instant she saw the platform. She saw George Cannon, +conspicuous and debonair in a new suit, swinging his ebony stick. The +train stopped. He descried them. + +"There he is!" she said, bravely pretending to be gay. And she thought: +"I could not believe that this moment would come, but it has come." + +She had anticipated relief from this moment, but she was aware of no +relief. On the contrary, she felt most uncomfortably apologetic to Sarah +Gailey for George Cannon, and to George Cannon for Sarah Gailey. She had +the constraint of a sinner. And, by the side of George Cannon on the +platform, she was aware of her shabbiness and of her girlish fragility. +Nevertheless, she put her shoulders back with a gesture like his own, +thinking proudly, and trying to make her eyes speak: "Well, here is +Sarah Gailey,--thanks to me!" + +As Sarah greeted him, Hilda observed, with some dismay, a curious, very +slight stiffening of her demeanour--familiar phenomenon, which denoted +that Sarah was in the grip of a secret grievance. "Poor old thing!" she +thought ruefully. "I'd imagined she'd forgiven him for bringing her +here; but she hasn't." + + +III + +They drove down from the station in an open carriage, unencumbered by +the trunks, which George Cannon had separately disposed of. He sat with +his back to the horse, opposite the two women, and talked at intervals +about the weather, the prospects of the season, and the town. His +familiarity with the town was apparently such that he seemed to be a +native of it, and even in some mysterious way to have assisted in its +creation and development; so that he took pride in its qualities and +accepted responsibility for its defects. When he ceremoniously saluted +two women who went by in another carriage, Hilda felt sharply the +inferiority of an ignorant stranger in presence of one for whom the +place had no secrets. + +Her first disappointment changed slowly into expectant and hopeful +curiosity. The quaint irregularities of the architecture, and the +vastness of the thronged perspectives, made promises to her romantic +sense. The town seemed to be endless as London. There were hotels, +churches, chapels, libraries, and music-shops on every hand. The more +ordinary features of main streets--the marts of jewellery, drapery, and +tobacco--had an air of grandiose respectability; while the narrow alleys +that curved enigmatically away between the lofty buildings of these fine +thoroughfares beckoned darkly to the fancy. The multiplicity of beggars, +louts, and organ-grinders was alone a proof of Brighton's success in the +world; the organ-grinders, often a man and a woman yoked together, were +extraordinarily English, genteel, and prosperous as they trudged in +their neat, middle-class raiment through the gritty mud of the macadam, +stolidly ignoring the menace of high-stepping horses and disdainful +glittering wheels. Brighton was evidently a city apart. Nevertheless, +Hilda did not as yet understand why George Cannon should have considered +it to be the sole field worthy of his enterprise. + +Then the carriage rounded into King's Road, and suddenly she saw the +incredible frontage of hotels, and _pensions_ and apartments, and she +saw the broad and boundless promenade alive with all its processions of +pleasure, and she saw the ocean. And everything that she had seen up to +that moment fell to the insignificance of a background. She understood. + +After a blusterous but mild autumn day the scarlet sun was setting +calmly between a saffron sky and saffron water; it flashed upon waves +and sails and flags, and upon the puddles in the road, and upon +bow-windows and flowered balconies, giving glory to human pride. The +carriage, merged in a phalanx of carriages, rolled past innumerable +splendid houses, and every house without exception was a hostel and an +invitation. Some were higher than any she had ever seen; and one +terrific building, in course of construction, had already far overtopped +the highest of its neighbours. She glanced at George Cannon, who, by a +carefully casual demeanour, was trying not to take the credit of the +entire spectacle; and she admitted that he was indeed wonderful. + +"Of course, Sarah," he said, as the carriage shortly afterwards turned +up Preston Street, where the dying wind roughly caught them, "we aren't +beginning with anything as big as all that, so you needn't shiver in +your shoes. You know what my notion is"--he included Hilda in his +address--"my notion is to get some experience first in a smaller house. +We must pay for our experience, and my notion is to pay as little as +possible. I can tell you there's quite a lot of things that have to be +picked up before you've got the hang of a town like this--quite a lot." + +Sarah grimly nodded. She had scarcely spoken. + +"We're beginning rather well. I've told you all about the Watchett +sisters, haven't I? They're an income, a positive income! And then +Boutwood and his wife have decided to come--did I tell you?" + +"Bou--" + +The syllable escaped explosively from Sarah Gailey's mouth, overcoming +her stern guard. Instantly, by a tremendous effort, she checked the +flow. But the violent shock of the news had convulsed her whole being. +The look on her face was changed to desperation. Hilda trembled, and +even the splendid and ever-resurgent George Cannon was discountenanced. +Not till then had Hilda realized with what intense bitterness the +souvenir of the Boutwoods festered in Sarah Gailey's unreasoning heart. + + +IV + +"Here we are!" said George Cannon jauntily, as the carriage stopped in +front of No. 59 Preston Street. But his jauntiness seemed factitious. +The demeanour of all three was diffident and unnatural, for now had +arrived the moment when George Cannon had to submit his going concern to +the ordeal of inspection by the women, and especially by Sarah Gailey. +There the house stood, a physical fact, forcing George to justify it, +and beseeching clemency from the two women. The occasion was critical; +therefore everybody had to pretend that it was a perfectly ordinary +occasion, well knowing the futility of the pretence. And the inevitable +constraint was acutely aggravated by Sarah's silent and terrible +reception of the news concerning the Boutwoods. + +While George Cannon was paying the driver, Sarah and Hilda hesitated +awkwardly on the pavement, their hands occupied with small belongings. +They had the sensation of being foreigners to the house; they could not +even mount the steps without his protection; scarcely might they in +decency examine the frontage of the house. They could not, however, +avoid seeing that a workman was fixing a new and splendid brass-plate at +the entrance, and that this plate bore the words, "Cannon's Boarding- +house." Hilda thought, startled: "At last he is using his own name!" + +He turned to them. + +"You have a view of the sea from the bow-window of the drawing-room--on +the first floor," he remarked. + +Neither Hilda nor Sarah responded. + +"And of course from the other bow-window higher up," he added, almost +pitifully, in his careful casualness. + +Hilda felt sorry for him, and she could not understand why she felt +sorry, why it seemed a shame that he should be mysteriously compelled +thus to defend the house before it had been attacked. + +"Oh yes!" she murmured foolishly, almost fatuously. + +The street and the house were disappointing. After the grandeur of the +promenade, the street appeared shabby and third-rate; it had the +characteristics of a side street; it was the retreat of those who could +not afford anything better, and its base inhabitants walked out on to +the promenade and swaggeringly feigned to be the equals of their +superiors. The house also was shabby and third-rate--with its poor +little glimpse of the sea. Although larger than the Cedars, it was +noticeably smaller and meaner than any house on the promenade, and +whereas the Cedars was detached, No. 59 was not even semi-detached, but +one of a gaunt, tall row of stuccoed and single-fronted dwellings. It +looked like a boarding-house (which the Cedars did not), and not all the +style of George Cannon's suit and cane and manner, as he mounted the +steps, nor the polish of his new brass-plate, could redeem it from the +disgrace of being a very ordinary boarding-house. + +George Cannon had made a serious mistake in bringing the carriage round +by the promenade. True, he had exhibited the glory of Brighton, but he +had done so to the detriment of his new enterprise. That No. 59 ought to +be regarded as merely an inexpensive field for the acquiring of +preliminary experience did not influence the judgment of the women in +the slightest degree. For them it was a house that rightly apologized +for itself, and whose apologetic air deserved only a condescending +tolerance. + +The front door stood open for the convenience of the artisan who was +screwing at the brass-plate. He moved aside, with the servility that +always characterizes the worker in a city of idlers, and the party +passed into a long narrow hall, whose walls were papered to imitate +impossible blocks of mustard-coloured marble. The party was now at home. + +"Here we are!" said Hilda, with a gaiety that absolutely desolated +herself, and in the same instant she remembered that George Cannon had +preceded her in saying 'Here we are!' She looked from the awful glumness +of Sarah Gailey to the equally awful alacrity of George Cannon, and felt +as though she had committed some crime whose nature she could not guess. + +A middle-aged maid appeared, like a suspicious scout, at the far end of +the hall, beyond the stairs, having opened a door which showed a glimpse +of a kitchen. + +"That tea ready?" asked George Cannon. + +"No, sir," said the maid plumply. + +"Well, let it be got ready." + +"Yes, sir." The maid vanished, flouncing. + +Sarah Gailey, with a heavy sigh, dropped her small belongings on to a +narrow bare table that stood against the wall near the foot of the +stairs. Daylight was fading. + +"Well," said George Cannon, balancing his hat on his cane, "your luggage +will be here directly. This is the dining-room." He pushed at a +yellow-grained door. + +The women followed him into the dining-room, and stared at the dining- +room in silence. + +"There's a bedroom behind," he said, as they came out, and he displayed +the bedroom behind. "That's the kitchen." He pointed to the adjoining +door. + +"The drawing-room's larger," he said. "It includes the width of the +hall." + +They climbed the narrow stairs after him wearily. The door of the +drawing-room was ajar, and the chatter of thin feminine voices could be +heard within. George Cannon gave a soundless warning whisper: "The +Watchetts." And Sarah Gailey frowned back the information that she did +not wish to meet the Watchetts just then. With every precaution against +noise, George Cannon opened two other doors, showing bedrooms. And then, +as it were, hypnotized by him, the women climbed another flight of +narrow stairs, darkening, and saw more rooms, and then still another +flight, and still more rooms, and finally the boasted view of the sea! +After all, Hilda was obliged to admit to herself that the house was more +impressive than she had at first supposed. Although single-fronted, it +was deep, and there were two bedrooms on the first floor, and four +each--two large and two small--on the second and third. Eleven in all, +they had seen, of which three were occupied by the Watchetts, and one, +temporarily, by George Cannon. The rest were empty; but the season had +scarcely begun, and the Boutwoods were coming. George Cannon had said +grandly that Hilda must choose her room; she chose the smallest on the +top floor. The furniture, if shabby and old-fashioned, was everywhere +ample. + +They descended, and not a word had been said about Sarah's room. + +On the first-floor landing, where indeed the danger was acutest, they +were trapped by two of the Watchetts. These elderly ladies shot almost +roguishly out of the drawing-room, and by their smiles struck the +descending party into immobility. + +"Oh! We saw you arrive, Mr. Cannon!" said the elder, shaking her head. +"So this is Miss Gailey! Good afternoon, Miss Gailey! So pleased to make +your acquaintance!" + +There was handshaking. Then it was Hilda's turn. + +"We're so sorry our eldest sister isn't here to welcome you to No. 59," +said the younger. "She's had to go to London for the day. We're very +fond of No. 59. There's no place quite like it, to our minds. And we're +quite sure we shall be quite as comfortable with dear Miss Gailey as we +were with dear Mrs. Granville, poor thing. It was quite a wrench when we +had to say good-bye to her last night. Do come into the drawing-room, +please! There's a beautiful view of the sea!" + +Sarah Gailey hesitated. A noise of bumping came from the hall below. + +"I think that's the luggage," she said. The smile with which she forced +herself to respond to the fixed simper of the Watchetts seemed to cause +her horrible torment. She motioned nervously to George Cannon, who was +nearest the stairs. + +"A little later, then! A little later, then!" said both the Watchetts, +bowing the party away with the most singular grimaces. + +In the hall, a lad, perspiring and breathing quickly, stood behind the +trunks. + +"Wait a moment," George Cannon said to him, and murmured to Sarah: "This +is the basement, here." + +The middle-aged maid appeared at the kitchen door with a large loaded +tray. "Come along with that tea, Louisa," he added pleasantly. + +He went first, Sarah next, and Hilda last, cautiously down a short, dark +flight of stone steps beneath the stairs; the servant followed. At the +foot a gas-jet burned. + +"Those Watchetts might be the landladies!" muttered Sarah, strangely +ignoring the propinquity of the maid; and sniffed. + +Hilda gave a short, uneasy laugh. She had a desire to laugh loudly and +wildly, and by so doing to snap the nervous tension, which seemed to +grow tighter and tighter every minute. Her wretchedness had become so +exquisite that she could begin to enjoy it, to savour it like a +pleasure. + +And she thought, with conscious and satisfied grimness: + +"So this is Brighton!" + + + + +CHAPTER IV +THE SEA + + +I + +In the evening Hilda, returning from a short solitary walk as far as the +West Pier, found Sarah Gailey stooping over her open trunks in the +bedroom which had been assigned to her. There were two quite excellent +though low-ceiled rooms, of which this was one, in the basement; the +other was to be used as a private parlour by the managers of the house. +At night, with the gas lighted and the yellow blind drawn and the loose +bundle of strips paper gleaming in the grate, the bedroom seemed very +cozy and habitable in its shabbiness; like the rest of the house it had +an ample supply of furniture, and especially of those trifling articles, +useful or useless, which collect only by slow degrees, and which are a +proof of long humanizing habitation. In that room Sarah Gailey was +indeed merely the successor of the regretted Mrs. Granville, the +landlady who had mysteriously receded into the unknown before the advent +of Sarah and Hilda, but with whom George Cannon must have had many +interviews. No doubt the room was an epitome of the character of Mrs. +Granville, presumably a fussy and precise celibate, with a place for +everything and everything in its place, and an indiscriminating tendency +to hoard. + +Sarah Gailey was at that stage of unpacking when, trunks being nearly +empty and drawers having scarcely begun to fill, bed, table, and chairs +are encumbered with confused masses of goods apparently far exceeding +the cubical contents of the trunks. + +"Can I do anything for you?" asked Hilda. + +The new landlady raised her watery and dejected eyes. "If you wouldn't +mind taking every single one of those knick-knacks off the mantelpiece +and putting them away on the top shelf of the cupboard--" + +Hilda smiled. "It's a bit crowded, isn't it?" + +"Crowded!" By her intonation of this one word Sarah Gailey condemned +Mrs. Granville's whole life. + +"Can I empty this chair? I shall want something to stand on," said +Hilda. + +"Better see if the shelf's dusty," Sarah gloomily warned her. + +"Well," murmured Hilda, on the chair. "If my feather doesn't actually +touch the ceiling!" Sarah Gailey made no response to this +light-heartedness, and Hilda, with her hands full of vain gewgaws, tried +again: "I wonder what Mrs. Granville would say if she saw me!... My +word, it's quite hot up here!" + +A resonant, very amiable voice came from beyond the door: "Is she +there?" + +"Who?" demanded Sarah, grievous. + +"Miss Lessways." It was George Cannon. + +"Yes." + +"I just want to speak to her if she's at liberty," said George Cannon. + +Hilda cried from the ceiling: "I'll come as soon as I've--" + +"Please go now," Sarah interrupted in tense accents. Hilda glanced down +at her, astonished, and saw in her eyes an almost childish appeal, weak +and passionate, which gripped the heart painfully. + +She jumped from the chair. Sarah Gailey was now sitting on the bed. Yes, +in her worn face of a woman who has definitely passed the climacteric, +and in the abandoned pose of those thin arms, there was the look and +gesture of a young girl desperately beseeching. Hilda was puzzled and +intimidated. She had meant to be jocular, and to insist on staying till +the task was finished. But she kept silence and obeyed the supplication, +from a motive of prudence. + +"I wouldn't keep you from him for anything," murmured Sarah Gailey +tragically, as Hilda opened the door and left her sitting forlorn among +all her skirts and linen. + + +II + +"I'm here," George Cannon called out from the parlour when he heard the +sound of the door. He was looking from the window up at the street; the +blind had not been drawn. He turned as Hilda entered. + +"You've been out!" he said, observing that she was in street attire. + +"What is it?" she asked nervously, fearing that some altercation had +already occurred between brother and sister. + +"It's about your private affairs--that's all," he said easily, and +half-humourously. "If you'll just come in." + +"Oh!" she smiled her relief; but nevertheless she was still preoccupied +by the image of the woman in the next room. + +"They've been dragging on quite long enough," said George Cannon, as he +stooped to poke the morsel of fire in the old-fashioned grate, which had +a hob on either side. On one of these hobs was a glass of milk. Hilda +had learnt that day for the first time that at a certain hour every +evening George Cannon drank a glass of warm milk, and that this glass of +warm milk was an important factor in his daily comfort. He now took the +glass and drank it off. And Hilda had a peculiar sensation of being more +intimate with him than she had ever been before. + +They sat down to the square table in the middle of the room crowded with +oddments of furniture, including a desk which George Cannon had +appropriated to his own exclusive use. This desk was open and a portion +of its contents were spread abroad on the crimson cloth of the table. +Among them Hilda noticed, with her accustomed clerkly eye, two numbers +of _The Hotel-Keeper and Boarding-House Review_, several sheets of +advertisement-scales, and a many-paged document with the heading, +"Inventory of Furniture at No. 59 Preston Street"; also a large legal +envelope inscribed, "Lessways Estate." + +From the latter George Cannon drew forth an engraved and flourished +paper, which he silently placed in front of her. It was a receipt signed +by the manager of the Brighton branch of the Southern Counties Bank for +the sum of three thousand four hundred and forty-five pounds deposited +at call by Miss Hilda Lessways. + +"Everything is now settled up," he said. "Here are all the figures," and +he handed her another paper showing the whole of the figures for the +realization of her real property and of her furniture. "It's in your +name, and nobody can touch it but you." + +She glanced at the figures vaguely, not attempting to comprehend them. +As for the receipt, it fascinated her. The fragile scrap represented her +livelihood, her future, her salvation. It alone stood between her and +unimagined terrors. And she was surprised to see it, surprised by its +assurance that no accident had happened to her possessions during the +process of transformation carried out by George Cannon. For, though he +had throughout been almost worryingly meticulous in his business +formalities and his promptitudes--never had any interest or rent been a +day late!--she admitted to herself now that she had been afraid... that, +in fact, she had not utterly trusted him. + +"And what's got to be done with this?" she asked simply, fingering the +receipt. + +He smiled at her, with a touch of protective and yet sardonic +condescension, without saying a word. + +And suddenly it struck her that ages had elapsed since her first +interview with him in the office over the ironmonger's at Turnhill, and +that both of them were extraordinarily changed. (She was reminded of +that interview not by his face and look, nor by their relative positions +at the table, but by a very faint odour of gas-fumes, for at Turnhill +also a gas-jet had been between them.) After an interval of anxiety and +depression he had regained exactly the triumphant self-sure air which +was her earliest recollection of him. He was not appreciably older. But +for her he was no longer the same man, because she saw him differently; +knowing much more of him, she read in his features a thousand minor +significances to which before she had been blind. The dominating +impression was not now the impression of his masculinity; there was no +clearly dominating impression. He had lost, for her, the romantic +allurement of the strange and the unknown. + +Still, she liked and admired him. And she felt an awe, which was +agreeable to her, of his tremendous enterprise and his obstinate +volition. That faculty which he possessed, of uprooting himself and +uprooting others, put her in fear of him. He had willed to be +established as a caterer in Brighton--he who but yesterday (as it +seemed) was a lawyer in Turnhill--and, on this very night, he was +established in Brighton, and his sister with him, and she with his +sister! The enormous affair had been accomplished. This thought had been +obsessing Hilda all the afternoon and evening. + +When she reflected upon the change in herself, the untravelled Hilda of +Turnhill appeared a stranger to her, and a simpleton!; no more! + +As George Cannon offered no answer to her question, she said: + +"I suppose it will have to be invested, all this?" + +He nodded. + +"Well, considering it's only been bringing in one per cent. per annum +for the last week... Of course I needn't have put it on deposit, but I +always prefer that way. It's more satisfactory." + +Hilda could hear faintly, through the thin wooden partition, the +movements of Sarah Gailey in the next room. And the image of the +mournful woman returned to disquiet her. What could be the meaning of +that hysteric appeal and glance? Then she heard the door of the bedroom +open violently, and the figure of Sarah Gailey passed like a flash +across the doorway of the parlour. And the footsteps of Sarah Gailey +pattered up the stone stairs; and the front door banged; and the skirts +and feet of Sarah Gailey intercepted for an instant the light of the +street-lamp that shone on the basement-window of the parlour. + +"Excuse me a minute," muttered Hilda, frowning. By one of her swift and +unreflecting impulses she abandoned George Cannon and her private +affairs, and scurried by the area steps into the street. + + +III + +Bareheaded, and with no jacket or mantle, Sarah Gailey was walking +quickly down Preston Street towards the promenade, and Hilda, afraid but +courageous, followed her at a distance of thirty or forty yards. Hilda +could not decide why she was afraid, nor why it should be necessary, in +so simple an undertaking as a walk down Preston Street, to call upon her +courage. Assuming even that Sarah Gailey turned round and caught +her--what then? The consequences could not be very terrible. But Sarah +Gailey did not turn round. She went straight forward, as though on a +definite errand in a town with which she was perfectly familiar, and, +having arrived at the corner of Preston Street and the promenade, +unhesitatingly crossed the muddy roadway of the promenade, and, after a +moment's halt, vanished down the steps in the sea-wall to the left-hand +of the pier. The pier, a double rope of twinkling lamps, hung magically +over the invisible sea, and at the end of it, constant and grave, a red +globe burned menacingly in the wind-haunted waste of the night. And +Hilda thought, as she hastened with gathering terror across the +promenade: "Out there, at the end of the pier, the water is splashing +and beating against the piles!" + +She stopped at the parapet of the sea-wall, and looked behind her, like +a thief. The wrought-iron entrance to the pier was highly illuminated, +but except for a man's head and shoulders caged in the ticket-box of the +turnstile, there was no life there; the man seemed to be waiting +solitary with everlasting patience in the web of wavering flame beneath +the huge dark sky. Scores of posters, large and small, showed that +Robertson's "School" was being performed in the theatre away over the +sea at the extremity of the pier. The promenade, save for one gigantic +policeman, and a few distant carriages, was apparently deserted, and the +line of dimly lighted hotels, stretching vaguely east and west, had an +air grim and forlorn at that hour. + +Hilda ran down the steps; at the bottom another row of lamps defined the +shore, and now she could hear the tide lapping ceaselessly amid the +supporting ironwork of the pier. She at once descried the figure of +Sarah Gailey in the gloom. The woman was moving towards the faintly +white edge of the sea. Hilda started to run after her, first across +smooth asphalt, and then over some sails stretched out to dry; and then +her feet sank at each step into descending ridges of loose shingle, and +she nearly fell. At length she came to firm sand, and stood still. + +Sarah Gailey was now silhouetted against the pale shallows of foam that +in ever-renewed curves divided the shore from the sea. After a time, she +bent down, rose again, moved towards the water, and drew back. Hilda did +not stir. She could not bring herself to approach the lonely figure. She +felt that to go and accost Sarah Gailey would be indelicate and +inexcusable. She felt as if she were basely spying. She was completely +at a loss, and knew not how to act. But presently she discerned that the +white foam was circling round Sarah's feet, and that Sarah was standing +careless in the midst of it. And at last, timid and shaking with +agitation, she ventured nearer and nearer. And Sarah heard her on the +sand, and looked behind. + +"Miss Gailey!" she appealed in a trembling voice. + +Sarah made no response of any kind, and Hilda reached the edge of the +foam. + +"Please, please don't stand there! You'll catch a dreadful cold, and +you've got nothing on your shoulders, either!" + +"I want to make a hole in the water," said Sarah miserably. "I wanted to +make a hole in the water!" + +"Please do come back with me!" Hilda implored; but she spoke +mechanically, as though saying something which she was bound to say, but +which she did not feel. + +The foam capriciously receded, and Hilda, still without any effort of +her own will, stepped across the glistening, yielding sand and took +Sarah Gailey's arm. There was no resistance. + +"I wanted to make a hole in the water," Sarah repeated. "But I made a +mistake. I ought to have gone to that groin over there. I knew there was +a groin near here, only it's so long since I was here. I'd forgotten +just the place." + +"But what's the matter?" Hilda asked, leading her away from the sea. + +She was not extremely surprised. But she was shocked into a most solemn +awe as she pressed the arm of the poor tragic woman who, but for an +accident, might have plunged off the end of the groin into water deep +enough for drowning. She did really feel humble before this creature who +had deliberately invited death; she in no way criticized her; she did +not even presume to condescend towards the hasty clumsiness of Sarah +Gailey's scheme to die. She was overwhelmed by the woman's utterly +unconscious impressiveness, which exceeded that of a criminal reprieved +on the scaffold, for the woman had dared an experience that only the +fierce and sublime courage of desperation can affront. She had a feeling +that she ought to apologize profoundly to Sarah Gailey for all that +Sarah must have suffered. And as she heard the ceaseless, cruel play of +the water amid the dark jungle of ironwork under the pier, and the soft +creeping of the foam-curves behind, and the vague stirrings of the +night-wind round about--these phenomena combined mysteriously with the +immensity of the dome above and with the baffling strangeness of the +town, and with the grandeur of the beaten woman by her side; and +communicated to Hilda a thrill that was divine in its unexampled +poignancy. + +The great figure of the policeman, suspicious, was descending from the +promenade discreetly towards them. To avoid any encounter with him Hilda +guided her companion towards the pier, and they sheltered there under +the resounding floor of the pier. By the light of one of the lower lamps +Hilda could now clearly see Sarah Gailey's face. It showed no sign of +terror. It was calm enough in its worn, resigned woe. It had the girlish +look again, beneath the marks of age. Hilda could distinguish the young +girl that Sarah had once been. + +"Come home, will you?" she entreated. + +Sarah Gailey sighed terribly. "I give it up," she said, with weariness. +"I could never do it! I could never do it--now!" + +Hilda pulled gently at her unwilling arm. She could not speak. She could +not ask her again: "What's the matter?" + +"It isn't that the house is too large," Sarah Gailey went on half +meditatively; "though just think of all those stairs, and not a tap on +any of the upper floors! No! And it isn't that I'm not ready enough to +oblige him. No! I know as well as anybody there's only him between me +and starvation. No! It isn't that he doesn't consider me! No! But when +he goes and settles behind my back with those Boutwoods--" She began to +weep. "And when I can hear you and him discussing me in the next room, +and plotting against me--it's--it's more--" The tears gradually drowned +her voice, and she ceased. + +"I assure you, you're quite mistaken," Hilda burst out, with passionate +and indignant persuasiveness. "We never mentioned you. He wanted to talk +to me about my money. And if you feel like that over the Boutwoods, I'm +certain he'll tell them they mustn't come." + +Sarah Gailey shook her head blankly. + +"I'm certain he will!" Hilda persisted. "Please--" + +The other began to walk away, dragging Hilda with her. The policeman, +inspecting them from a distance, coughed and withdrew. They climbed a +flight of steps on the far side of the pier, crossed the promenade, and +went up Preston Street in silence. + +"I should prefer not to be seen going in with you," said Sarah Gailey +suddenly. "It might--" she freed her arm. + +"Go down the area steps," said Hilda, "and I'll wait a moment and then +go in at the front door." + +Sarah Gailey hurried forward alone. + +Hilda, watching her, and observing the wet footmarks which she left on +the pavement, was appalled by the sense of her own responsibility as to +the future of Sarah Gailey. Till this hour, even at her most +conscientious, she had under-estimated the seriousness of Sarah Gailey's +case. Everybody had under-estimated the seriousness of Sarah Gailey's +case. + +She became aware of some one hurrying cautiously up the street on the +other side. It was George Cannon. As soon as Sarah had disappeared +within the house he crossed over. + +"What's the matter?" he inquired anxiously. + +"Well--" + +"She hasn't been trying to drown herself, has she?" + +Hilda nodded, and, speechless, moved towards the house. He turned +abruptly away. + +The front door of No. 59 was still open. Hilda passed through the silent +hall, and went timorously down the steps to the basement. The gas was +still burning, and the clothes were still strewn about in Sarah Gailey's +bedroom, just as though naught had happened. Sarah stood between her two +trunks in the middle of the floor. + +"Where's George?" she asked, in a harsh, perfectly ordinary voice. + +"I don't think he's in the parlour," Hilda prevaricated. + +"Promise me you won't tell him!" + +"Of course I won't!" said Hilda kindly. "Do get into bed, and let me +make you some tea." + +Sarah Gailey rushed at her and embraced her. + +"I know I'm all wrong! I know it's all my own fault!" she murmured, with +plaintive, feeble contrition, crying again. "But you've no idea how I +try! If it wasn't for you--" + + +IV + +That night Hilda, in her small bedroom at the top of the house, was +listlessly arranging, at the back of the dressing-table, the few volumes +which had clung to her, or to which she had clung, throughout the +convulsive disturbances following her mother's death. Among them was one +which she did not wish to keep, _The Girls' Week-day Book,_ and also the +whole set of Victor Hugo, which did not belong to her. George Cannon had +lent her the latter in instalments, and she had omitted to return it. +She was saying to herself that the opportunity to return it had at +length arrived, when she heard a low, conspiratorial tapping at the +door. All her skin crept as, after a second's startled hesitation, she +moved to open the door. + +George Cannon, holding a candle, stood on the landing. She had not seen +him since the brief colloquy between them outside the house. Having +satisfied herself that Sarah Gailey was safe, and to a certain extent +tranquillized, for the night, she had awaited George Cannon's +reappearance a long time in vain, and had then retired upstairs. + +"You aren't gone to bed!" he whispered very cautiously. Within a few +feet of them was an airless kennel where Louisa, the chambermaid, slept. + +"No! I'm just--I stayed up for you I don't know how long." + +"Is she all right?" + +"Well--she's in bed." + +"I wish you'd come to one of these other rooms," he continued to +whisper. All the sibilants in his words seemed to detach themselves, +hissing, from the rest of the sounds. + +She gave a gesture of assent. He tiptoed over the traitorous boards of +the landing, and slowly turned the knob of a door in the end wall. The +door exploded like the firing of a pistol; frowning, he grimly pushed it +open. Hilda followed him, noiselessly creeping. He held the door for +her. She entered, and he shut the door on the inside. They were in a +small bedroom similar to Hilda's own; but the bed was stripped, the +square of carpet rolled, the blind undrawn, and the curtains looped up +from the floor. He put the candle on the tiny iron mantelpiece, and sat +on the bed, his hands in his pockets. + +"You don't mean to say she was wanting to commit suicide?" he said, +after a short reflective silence, with his head bent but his eyes raised +peeringly to Hilda's. + +The crudity of the word, 'suicide,' affected Hilda painfully. + +"If you ask me," said she, standing with her back rubbing against the +small wardrobe, "she didn't know quite what she was doing; but there's +no doubt that was what she went out for." + +"You overtook her? I saw you coming up from the beach." + +Hilda related what had happened. + +"But had you any notion--before--" + +"Me? No! Why?" + +"Nothing! Only the way you rushed out like that!" + +"Well--it struck me all of a sudden!... You've not seen her since you +came in?" + +He shook his head. "I thought I'd better keep out of the way. I thought +I'd better leave it all to you. It's appalling, simply appalling!... +Just when everything was shaping so well!" + +Hilda thought, bewildered: 'Shaping so well?' With her glance she took +in the little cheerless bedroom, and herself and George Cannon within +it, overwhelmed. In imagination she saw all the other bedrooms, dark, +forlorn, and inanimate, waiting through long nights and empty days until +some human creature as pathetic as themselves should come and feebly +vitalize them into a spurious transient homeliness; and she saw George +Cannon's bedroom--the harsh bedroom of the bachelor who had never had a +home; and the bedrooms of those fearsome mummies, the Watchetts, each +bed with its grisly face on the pillow in the dark; and the kennels of +the unclean servants; and so, descending through the floors, to Sarah +Gailey's bedroom in the very earth, and the sleepless form on that bed, +beneath the whole! And the organism of the boarding-house seemed +absolutely tragic to her, compact of the stuff of sorrow itself! And yet +George Cannon had said, 'Shaping so well!' + +"What's to be done?" he inquired plaintively. + +"Nothing that I can see!" she said. She had a tremendous desire to +escape from the responsibility thrust on her by the situation; but she +knew that she could never escape from it; that she was immovably pinned +down by it. + +"I can't see anything either," said he, quietly responsive, and speaking +now in a gentle voice. "Supposing I tell her that she can go, and that +I'll make her an allowance? What could she do, then? It would be madness +for her to live alone any more. She's the very last person who ought to +live alone. Moreover, she wouldn't accept the allowance. Well, then, she +must stay with me--here. And if she stays here she must work, otherwise +she'd never stay--not she! And she must be the mistress. She wouldn't +stand having anyone above her, or even equal with her, that's a +certainty! Besides, she's so good at her job. She hasn't got a great +deal of system, so far as I can see, but she can get the work out of the +servants without too much fuss, and she's so mighty economical in her +catering! Of course she can't get on the right side of a boarder--but +then I _can_! And that's the whole point! With me on the spot to _run_ +the place, she'd be perfect--perfect! Couldn't wish for anything better! +And now she--I assure you I'm doing the best I can do for her. I do +honestly assure you! If anybody can suggest to me anything else that I +can do--I'll do it like a shot." He threw up his arms. + +Hilda was touched by the benevolence of his tone. Nevertheless, it only +intensified her helpless perplexity. Sarah Gailey was inexpressibly to +be pitied, but George Cannon was not to be blamed. She had a feeling +that for any piteous disaster some one ought to be definitely blamable. + +"Do you think she'll settle down?" George Cannon asked, in a new voice. + +"Oh yes!" said Hilda. "I think she will. It was just a sort of--attack +she had, I think." + +"She's not vexed with me?" + +Hilda could not find courage to say: "She thinks you and I are plotting +against her." And yet she wondered why she should hesitate to say it. +After a pause she murmured, as casually as possible: "She doesn't like +the Boutwoods coming back." + +"I knew you were going to say that!" he frowned. + +"If you could manage to stop them--" + +"No, no!" He interrupted--nervous, impatient. "It wouldn't do, that +wouldn't! It'd never do! A boarding-house can't be run on those lines. +It isn't that I care so much as all that about losing a couple of +boarders, and I'm not specially keen on the Boutwoods. But it wouldn't +do! It's the wrong principle. You haven't got to let customers get on +your nerves, so long as they pay and behave respectably. If I gave way, +the very first thing Sarah would do would be to find a grievance against +some other boarder, and there'd be no end to it. The fact is she wants a +grievance, she must have a grievance--whether it's the Boutwoods or +somebody else makes no matter!... Oh no!" He repeated softly, gently, +"Oh no!" + +She knew that his argument was unanswerable. She was perfectly aware +that she ought to yield to it. Nevertheless, the one impulse of her +being in that moment was to fight blindly and irrationally against it. +Her instinct said: "I don't care for arguments. The Boutwoods must be +stopped from coming. If they aren't stopped, I don't know what I shall +do! I can't bear to think of that poor woman meeting them again! I can't +bear it." She drew breath sharply. Startling hot tears came into her +eyes; and she stepped forward on her left foot. + +"Please!" she entreated, "please don't let them come!" + +There was a silence. In the agonizing silence she felt acutely her +girlishness, her helplessness, her unreason, confronted by his strong +and shrewd masculinity. At the bottom of her soul she knew how wrong she +was. But she was ready to do anything to save Sarah Gailey from the +distress of one particular humiliation. With the whole of her volition +she wanted to win. + +"Oh well!" he said. "Of course, if you take it so much to heart--" + +A peculiar bright glance shot from his eyes--the old glance that at once +negligently asserted his power over her, and reassured her against his +power. Her being was suffused with gladness and pride. She had won. She +had won in defiance of reason. She had appealed and she had conquered. +And she enjoyed his glance. She gloried in it. She blushed. A spasm of +exquisite fear shot through her, and she savoured it deliciously. The +deep organic sadness of the house presented itself to her in a new +light. It was still sadness, but it was beautiful in the background. Her +sympathy for Sarah Gailey was as keen as ever, but it had a different +quality--an anguish less desolating. And the fact that a joint +responsibility for Sarah Gailey's welfare bound herself and George +Cannon together in spite of themselves--this fact seemed to her +grandiose and romantic, no longer oppressive. To be alone with him in +the secrecy of the small upper room seemed to endow her with a splendid +worldly importance. And yet all the time a scarce-heard voice was saying +clearly within her: "This appeal and this abandonment are unworthy. No +matter if this man is kind and sincere and admirable! This appeal and +this abandonment are unworthy!" But she did not care. She ignored the +voice. + +"I'll tell Sarah in the morning," he said. + +"Please don't!" she begged. "You might pretend later on that you've had +a letter from the Boutwoods and they can't come. If you tell her +to-morrow, she'll guess at once I've been talking to you; and you're not +supposed to know anything at all about what happened to-night. She made +me promise. But of course she didn't know that you'd found out for +yourself, you see!" + +George Cannon walked away to the window, and then to the mantelpiece, +from which he took up the candle. + +"I'm very much obliged to you," he said simply, putting a faint emphasis +on the last word. She knew that he meant it, without any reserves. But +in his urbane tone there was a chill tranquillity that astonished and +vaguely disappointed her. + + * * * * * + + + + +BOOK IV +HER FALL + + + + +CHAPTER I +THE GOING CONCERN + + +I + +On a Saturday afternoon of the following August, Hilda was sitting at a +book in the basement parlour of "Cannon's Boarding-house" in Preston +Street. She heard, through the open window, several pairs of feet +mounting wearily to the front door, and then the long remote tinkling of +the bell. Within the house there was no responsive sound; but from the +porch came a clearing of throats, a muttering, impatient and yet +resigned, and a vague shuffling. After a long pause the bell rang again; +and then the gas globe over Hilda's head vibrated for a moment to +footsteps in the hall, and the front door was unlatched. She could not +catch the precise question; but the reply of Louisa, the chambermaid-- +haughty, scornful, and negligently pitying--was quite clear: + +"Sorry, sir. We're full up. We've had to refuse several this very +day.... No! I couldn't rightly tell you where.... You might try No. 51, +'Homeleigh' as they call it; but we're full up. Good afternoon, sir, 'd +afternoon 'm." + +The door banged arrogantly. The feet redescended to the pavement, and +Hilda, throwing a careless glance at the window, saw two men and a woman +pass melancholy down the hot street with their hand-luggage. + +And although she condemned and despised the flunkey-souled Louisa, who +would have abased herself with sickly smiles and sweet phrases before +the applicants, if the house had needed custom; although in her mind she +was saying curtly to the mature Louisa: "It's a good thing Mr. Cannon +didn't hear you using that tone to customers, my girl;" nevertheless, +she could not help feeling somewhat as Louisa felt. It was indubitably +agreeable to hear a prosperous door closed on dusty and disappointed +holiday-makers, and to realize, in her tranquil retreat, that she was +part of a very thriving and successful concern. + + +II + +George Cannon, in a light and elegant summer suit, passed slowly in +front of the window, and, looking for Hilda in her accustomed place, saw +her and nodded. Surprised by the unusual gesture, she moved uneasily and +blushed; and as she did so, she asked herself resentfully: "Why do I +behave like this? I'm only his clerk, and I shall never be anything else +but his clerk; and yet I do believe I'm getting worse instead of +better." George Cannon skipped easily up to the porch; he had a +latchkey, but before he could put it into the keyhole Louisa had flown +down the stairs and opened the door to him; she must have been on the +watch from an upper floor. George Cannon would have been well served, +whatever his situation in the house, for he was one of those genial +bullies who are adored by the menials whom they alternately cajole and +terrorize. But his situation in the house was that of a god, and like a +god he was attended. He was the very creator of the house; all its life +flowed from him. Without him the organism would have ceased to exist, +and everybody in it was quite aware of this. He had fully learnt his +business. He had learnt it in the fishmarket on the beach at seven +o'clock in the morning, and in the vegetable market at eight, and in the +shops; he had learnt it in the kitchen and on the stairs while the +servants were cleaning; and he had learnt it at the dinner-table +surrounded by his customers. There was nothing that he did not know and, +except actual cooking and mending, little that he could not do. He +always impressed his customers by the statement that he had slept in +every room in the house in order to understand personally its qualities +and defects; and he could and did in fact talk to each boarder about his +room with the intimate geographical knowledge of a native. The boarders +were further flattered by the mien and appearance of this practical +housekeeper, who did not in the least resemble his kind, but had rather +the style of a slightly doggish stockbroker. To be strolling on the +King's Road in converse with George Cannon was a matter, of pride to +boarders male and female. And there was none with whom he could not talk +fluently, on any subject from cigars to ozone, according to the needs of +the particular case. Nor did he ever seem to be bored by conversations. +But sometimes, after benignantly speeding, for instance, one of the +Watchetts on her morning constitutional, he would slip down into the +basement and ejaculate, 'Cursed hag!' with a calm and natural +earnestness, which frightened Hilda, indicating as it did that he must +be capable of astounding duplicities. + +He came, now, directly to the underground parlour, hat on head and ebony +stick in hand. Hilda did not even look up, but self-consciously bent a +little lower over her volume. Her relation to George Cannon in the +successful enterprise was anomalous, and yet the habit of ten months had +in practice defined it. Neither paying board nor receiving wages, she +had remained in the house apparently as Sarah Gailey's companion and +moral support; she had remained because Sarah Gailey had never been in a +condition to be left--and the months had passed very quickly. But her +lack of occupation and her knowledge of shorthand, and George Cannon's +obvious need of clerical aid, had made it inevitable that they should +resume their former roles of principal and clerk. Hilda worked daily at +letters, circularizing, advertisements, and--to a less extent--accounts +and bills; the second finger of her right hand had nearly always an +agreeable stain of ink at the base of the nail; and she often dreamed +about letter-filing. In this prosperous month of August she had, on the +whole, less work than usual, for both circulating and advertisements +were stopped. + +George Cannon went to the desk in the dark corner between the window and +the door, where all business papers were kept, but where neither he nor +she actually wrote. When his back was turned she surreptitiously glanced +at him without moving her head, and perceived that his hand was only +moving idly about among the papers while he stared at the wall. She +thought, half in alarm: "What is the matter now?" Then he came over to +the table and hesitated by her shoulder. Still, she would not look up. +She could no longer decipher a single word on the page. Her being was +somehow monopolized by the consciousness of his nearness. + +"Interesting?" he inquired. + +She turned her head at last and glanced at him with a friendly smile of +affirmation, fingering the leaves of the book nervously. It was +Cranswick's _History of Printing_. One day, a fortnight earlier, while +George Cannon, in company with her, was bargaining for an old London +Directory outside a bookseller's shop in East Street, she had seen +Cranswick's _History of Printing_ (labelled "published at _L1_ 1s., our +price 6s. 6d.") and had opened it curiously. George Cannon, who always +kept an eye on her, had said teasingly: "I suppose it's your +journalistic past that makes you interested in that?" "I suppose it is," +she answered. Which statement was an untruth, for the sole thought in +her mind had been that Edwin Clayhanger was a printer. A strange, idle +thought! She had laid the book down. The next day, however, George +Cannon had brought it home, saying carelessly: "I bought that book--five +and six; the man seemed anxious to do business, and it's a book to +have." He had not touched it since. + +"Page 473!" he murmured, looking at the number of the page. "If you keep +on at this rate, you'll soon know more about printing than young +Clayhanger himself!" + +She was thunderstruck. Never before had the name of Clayhanger been +mentioned between them! Could he, then, penetrate her thoughts? Could he +guess that in truth she was reading Cranswick solely because Edwin +Clayhanger happened to be a printer? No! It was impossible! The reason +of her interest in Cranswick, inexplicable even to herself, was too +fantastic to be divined. And yet was not his tone peculiar? Or was it +only in her fancy that his tone was peculiar? She blushed scarlet, and +her muscles grew rigid. + +"I say," George Cannon continued, in a tone that now was unmistakably +peculiar, "I want you to come out with me. I want to show you something +on the front. Can you come?" + +"At once?" she muttered glumly and painfully. What could be the mystery +beneath this most singular behaviour? + +"Yes." + +"Florrie will be arriving at five," said Hilda, after artificially +coughing. "I ought to be here then, oughtn't I?" + +"Oh!" he cried. "We shall be back long before five." + +"Very well," she agreed. + +"I'll be ready in three minutes," he said, going gaily towards the door. +From the door he gave her a glance. She met it, courageously exposing +her troubled features and nodded. + + +III + +Hilda went into the bedroom behind the parlour, to get her hat and +gloves. A consequence of the success of the boarding-house was that she +was temporarily sharing this chamber with Sarah Gailey. She had insisted +on making the sacrifice, and she enjoyed the personal discomfort which +it involved. When she cautiously lay down on the narrow and lumpy +truckle-bed that had been insinuated against an unoccupied wall, and +when she turned over restlessly in the night and the rickety ironwork +creaked and Sarah Gailey moaned, and when she searched vainly for a +particular garment lost among garments that were hung pell-mell on +insecure hooks and jutting corners of furniture,--she was proud and glad +because her own comfortable room was steadily adding thirty shillings or +more per week to the gross receipts of the enterprise. The benefit was +in no way hers, and yet she gloated on it, thinking pleasurably of +George Cannon's great japanned cash-box, which seemed to be an +exhaustless store of gold sovereigns and large silver, and of his +mysterious--almost furtive--visits to the Bank. Her own capital, +invested by George Cannon in railway stock, was bringing in four times +as much as she disbursed; and she gloated also on her savings. The more +money she amassed, the less willing was she to spend. This nascent +avarice amused her, as a new trait in his character always amuses the +individual. She said to herself: "I am getting quite a miser," with the +assured reservation: "Of course I can stop being a miser whenever I feel +like stopping." + +Sarah Gailey was lulling herself in a rocking-chair when Hilda entered, +and she neither regarded Hilda nor intermitted her see-saw. Her features +were drawn into a preoccupied expression of martyrdom, and in fact she +constantly suffered physical torture. She had three genuine +complaints--rheumatism, sciatica, and neuritis; they were all painful. +The latest and worst was the neuritis, which had attacked her in the +wrist, producing swollen joints that had to be fomented with hot water. +Sarah Gailey's life had indeed latterly developed into a continual +fomentation and a continual rocking. She was so taken up with the +elemental business of fomenting and of keeping warm, that she had no +energy left for other remedial treatments, such as distraction in the +open air. She sat for ever shawled, generally with heavy mittens on her +arms and wrists, and either fomenting or rocking, in the eternal +twilight of the basement bedroom. She eschewed aid--she could manage for +herself--and she did not encourage company, apparently preferring to be +alone with fate. In her easier hours, one hand resting on another and +both hugged close to her breast, rocking to and fro with an astounding +monotonous perseverance, she was like a mysterious Indian god in a +subterranean temple. Above her, unseen by her, floor beyond floor, the +life of the boarding-house functioned in the great holiday month of +August. + +"I quite forgot about the make-up bed for Florrie," said Sarah Gailey +plaintively as she rocked. "Would you have time to see to it? Of course +she will have to be with Louisa." + +"Very well," said Hilda curtly, and not quite hiding exasperation. + +There were three reasons for her exasperation. In the first place, the +constant spectacle of Sarah Gailey's pain, and the effect of the pain on +Sarah's character, was exasperating--to Hilda as well as to George +Cannon. Both well knew that the watery-eyed, fretful spinster was a +victim, utterly innocent and utterly helpless, of destiny, and that she +merited nothing but patient sympathy; yet often the strain of +relationship with Sarah produced in them such a profound feeling of +annoyance that they positively resented Sarah's sufferings, and with a +sad absence of logic blamed her in her misfortune, just as though she +had wilfully brought the maladies upon herself in order to vex them. +Then, further, it was necessary always to minister to Sarah's illusion +that Sarah was the mainstay of the house, that she attended to +everything and was responsible for everything, and that without her +governance the machine would come to a disastrous standstill: the fact +being that she had grown feeble and superfluous. Sarah had taught all +she knew to two highly intelligent pupils, and had survived her +usefulness. She had no right place on earth. But in her morose +inefficiency she had developed into an unconscious tyrant--a tyrant +whose power lay in the loyalty of her subjects and not at all in her own +soul. She was indeed like a deity, immanent, brooding, and unaware of +itself!... Thus, the question of Florrie's bed had been discussed and +settled long before Sarah Gailey had even thought of it; but Hilda might +not tell her so. Lastly, this very question of Florrie's bed was +exasperating to Hilda. Already Louisa's kennel was inadequate for +Louisa, and now another couch had been crowded into it. Hilda was +ashamed of the shift; but there was no alternative. Here, for Hilda, was +the secret canker of George Cannon's brilliant success. The servants +were kindly ill-treated. In the commercial triumph she lost the sense of +the tragic forlornness of boarding-house existence, as it had struck her +on the day of her arrival. But the image of the Indian god in the +basement and of the prone forms of the servants in stifling black +cupboards under the roof and under the stairs--these images embittered +at intervals the instinctive and reflecting exultation of her moods. + +She adjusted her small, close-fitting flowered hat, dropped her parasol +across the bed, and began to draw on her cotton gloves. + +"Where are you going, dear?" asked Sarah Gailey. + +"Out with Mr. Cannon." + +"But where?" + +"I don't know." In spite of herself there was a certain unnecessary +defiance in Hilda's voice. + +"You don't know, dear?" Sarah Gailey suddenly ceased rocking, and +glanced at Hilda with the mournful expression of acute worry that was so +terribly familiar on her features. Although it was notorious that +baseless apprehensions were a part of Sarah's disease, nevertheless +Hilda could never succeed in treating any given apprehension as quite +baseless. And now Sarah's mere tone begot in Hilda's self-consciousness +a vague alarm. + +She continued busy with her gloves, silent. + +"And on Saturday afternoon too, when everybody's abroad!" Sarah Gailey +added gloomily, with her involuntary small movements of the head. + +"He asked me if I could go out with him for a minute or two at once," +said Hilda, and picked up the parasol with a decisive gesture. + +"There's a great deal too much talk about you and George as it is," said +Sarah with an acrid firmness. + +"Talk about me and--!" Hilda cried, absolutely astounded. + +She had no feeling of guilt, but she knew that she was looking guilty, +and this knowledge induced in her the actual sensations of a criminal. + +"I'm sure I don't want--" Sarah Gailey began, and was interrupted by a +quiet tap at the door. + +George Cannon entered. + +"Ready, miss?" he demanded, smiling, before he had caught sight of her +face. + +For the second time that afternoon he saw her scarlet, and now there +were tears in her eyes, too. + +She hesitated an instant. + +"Yes," she answered with a painful gulp, and moved towards the door. + + + + +CHAPTER II +THE UNKNOWN ADVENTURE + + +I + +When they were fairly out in the street Hilda felt like a mariner who +has escaped from a lee shore, but who is beset by the vaguer and even +more formidable perils of the open sea. She was in a state of extreme +agitation, and much too self-conscious to be properly cognisant of her +surroundings; she did not feel the pavement with her feet; she had no +recollection of having passed out of the house. There she was walking +along on nothing, by the side of a man who might or might not be George +Cannon, amid tall objects that resembled houses! Her situation was in a +high degree painful, but she could not have avoided it. She could not, +in Sarah's bedroom, have fallen into sobs, or into a rage, or into the +sulks, and told George Cannon that she would not go with him; she could +not have dashed hysterically away and hidden herself on an upper floor, +in the manner of a startled fawn. Her spirit was too high for such +tricks. On the other hand, she was by no means sufficiently mistress of +herself to be able to hide from him her shame. Hence she faced him and +followed him, and let him see it. Their long familiarity had made this +surrender somewhat easier for her. After all, in the countless daily +contacts, they had grown accustomed to minor self-exposures--and Hilda +more so than George Cannon; Hilda was too impatient and impulsive not to +tear, at increasingly frequent intervals, the veil of conventional +formality. + +Her mood now, as she accompanied George Cannon on the unknown adventure, +was one of abashed but still fierce resentment. She of course believed +Sarah Gailey's statement that there had been "talk" about herself and +the landlord, and yet it was so utterly monstrous as to be almost +incredible. She was absolutely sure that she had never by her behaviour +furnished the slightest excuse for such "talk." No eavesdropper could +ever have caught the least word or gesture to justify it. Could a +malicious eavesdropper have assisted at the secret operations of her +inmost mind, even then he could scarcely have seen aught to justify it. +Existence at Brighton had been too strenuous and strange--and, with +Sarah Gailey in the house, too full of responsibilities--to favour +dalliance. Hilda, examining herself, could not say that she had not once +thought of George Cannon as a husband; because just as a young solitary +man will imagine himself the spouse of a dozen different girls in a +week, so will an unmated girl picture herself united to every eligible +and passably sympathetic male that crosses her path. It is the everyday +diversion of the fancy. But she could say that she had not once thought +seriously of George Cannon as a husband. Why, he was not of her +generation! Although she did not know his age, she guessed that he must +be nearer forty than thirty. He was of the generation of Sarah Gailey, +and Sarah Gailey was the contemporary of her dead mother! And he had +never shown for her any sentiment but that of a benevolently teasing +kindliness. Moreover, she was afraid of him, beyond question. And +withal, he patently lacked certain qualities which were to be found in +her image of a perfect man. No! She had more often thought of Edwin +Clayhanger as a husband. Indeed she had married Edwin Clayhanger several +times. The haunting youth would not leave her alone. And she said to +herself, hot and indignant: "I shall have to leave Brighton! I can see +that! Sarah Gailey's brought it on herself!" Yes, she was actually angry +with Sarah Gailey, who however had only informed her of a fact which she +would have been sorry not to know! And in leaving Brighton, that fancy +of hers took her straight to Bursley, to stay with Janet Orgreave in the +house next to the new house of the Clayhangers! + +Whither was George Cannon leading her? He had not yet said a word in +explanation of the errand, nor shown in any way that he had observed her +extraordinary condition. He was silent, swinging his stick. She also was +silent. She could not have spoken, not even to murmur: "Where are you +taking me to?" They went forward as in an enchantment. + + +II + +They were on the King's Road; and to the left were the high hotels and +houses, stretching east and west under the glare of the sun into +invisibility, and to the right was the shore, and the sea so bright that +the eye could scarcely rest on it. Both the upper and the lower +promenades were crowded with gay people surging in different directions. +The dusty roadway was full of carriages, and of the glint of the sun on +wheelspokes and horses' flanks, and of rolling, clear-cut shadows. The +shore was bordered with flags and masts and white and brown sails; and +in the white-and-green of billows harmlessly breaking could be seen the +yellow bodies of the bathers. A dozen bare-legged men got hold of a +yacht under sail with as many passengers on board, and pushed it +forcibly right down into the sea, and then up sprang its nose and it +heeled over and shot suddenly off, careering on the waves into the +offing where other yachts were sliding to and fro between the piers, +dominating errant fleets of rowboats. And the piers also were loaded +with excited humanity and radiant colour. And all the windows of all the +houses and hotels were open, and blowing with curtains and flowers and +hats. The whole town was enfevered. + +Hilda thought, her heart still beating, but less noisily, "I scarcely +ever come here. I don't come here often enough." And she saw Sarah +Gailey rocking and sighing and rocking and shaking her head in the +mournful twilight of the basement in Preston Street. The contrasts of +existence struck her as magnificent, as superb. The very misery and +hopelessness of Sarah's isolation seemed romantic, splendid, touchingly +beautiful. And she thought, inexplicably: "Why am I here? Why am I not +at home in Turnhill? Why am I so different from what mother was? What am +I going to be and to do? This that I now am can't continue for ever." +She saw thousands of women with thousands of men. And, quite forgetting +that to the view of the multitude she was just as much as any of them +with a man (and a rather fine man, too!), she began to pity herself +because she was not with a man! She dreamed, in her extreme excitation, +of belonging absolutely to some man. And despite all her pride and +independence, she dwelt with pleasure and longing on the vision of being +his, of being at his disposal, of being under his might, of being +helpless before him. She thought, desolated: "I am nobody's. And so +there is 'talk'!" She scorned herself for being nobody's. To belong +utterly to some male seemed to be the one tolerable fate for her in the +world. And it was a glorious fate, whether it brought good or evil. Any +other was ignobly futile, was despicable. And then she thought, +savagely: "And just see my clothes! Why don't I take the trouble to look +nice?" + +Suddenly George Cannon stopped on the edge of the pavement, and turned +towards the houses across the street. + +"You see that?" he said, pointing with his stick. + +"What?" + +"The Chichester." + +She saw, in gold letters over the front of a tall corner house: "The +Chichester Private Hotel." + +"Well?" + +"I've taken it--from Christmas. I signed about an hour ago. I just had +to tell someone." + +"Well I never!" Hilda exclaimed. + +He was beyond question an extraordinary and an impressive man. He had +said that, after experimenting in Preston Street, he should take a +larger place, and lo! in less than a year, he had fulfilled his word. He +had experimented in Preston Street, with immense success and now he was +coming out into the King's Road! (Only those who have lived in a side +street can pronounce the fine words 'King's Road' with the proper accent +of deference.) And every house in the King's Road, Hilda now newly +perceived, was a house of price and distinction. Nothing could be common +in the King's Road: the address and the view were incomparably precious. +Being established there, George Cannon might, and no doubt would, +ultimately acquire one of the largest public hotels; indeed, dominate +the promenade! It would be just like him to do so! A year ago he was a +solicitor in Turnhill. To-day he was so perfectly and entirely a +landlord that no one could ever guess his first career. He was not +merely extraordinary: he was astounding. There could not be many of his +calibre in the whole world. + +"How does it strike you?" he asked, with an eagerness that touched her. + +"Oh! It's splendid!" she answered, trying to put more natural enthusiasm +into her voice. But the fact was that the Chichester had not yet struck +her at all. It was only the idea of being in the King's Road that had +struck her--and with such an effect that her attention was happily +diverted from her trouble, and her vexatious self-consciousness +disappeared. She had from time to time remarked the Chichester, but +never with any particularity; it had been for her just an establishment +among innumerable others, and not one of the best,--the reverse of +imposing. It stood at the angle of King's Road and Ship Street, and a +chemist's shop occupied the whole of the frontage, the hotel-entrance +being in Ship Street; its architecture was fiat and plain, and the place +seemed neglected, perhaps unprosperous. + +"Twenty bow-windows!" murmured George Cannon, and then smiled at +himself, as if ashamed of his own naivete. + +And Hilda counted the windows. Yes, there were eight on King's Road and +twelve at the side. The building was high, and it was deep, stretching +far down Ship Street. In a moment it began to put on, for Hilda, quite +special qualities. How high it was! How deep it was! And in what a +situation! It possessed mysterious and fine characteristics which set it +apart. Strange that hitherto she had been so blind to it! She and George +Cannon were divided from the house by the confused and noisy traffic of +the roadway, and by the streaming throngs on the opposite pavement. And +none of these people riding or driving or walking, and none of the +people pushing past them on the pavement behind, guessed that here on +the kerb was the future master of the Chichester, an amazing man, and +that she, Hilda Lessways, by his side, was the woman to whom he had +chosen first to relate his triumph! This unrecognised secrecy in the +great animated street was piquant and agreeable to Hilda, a source of +pride. + +"I suppose you've bought it?" she ventured. She had no notion of his +financial resources, but her instinct was to consider them infinite. + +"No! I've not exactly bought it," he laughed. "Not quite! I've got the +lease, from Christmas. How much d'ye think the rent is?" He seemed to +challenge her. + +"Oh! Don't ask me!" + +"Five hundred a year," he said, and raised his chin. "Five hundred a +year! Ten pounds a week! Nearly thirty shillings a day! You've got to +pay that before you can even begin to think of your own profits." + +"But it's enormous!" Hilda was staggered. All her mother's houses put +together had brought in scarcely a third of the rental of that single +house, which was nevertheless only a modest unit in several miles of +houses. "But can you make it pay?" + +"I fancy so! Else I shouldn't have taken it. The present man can't. But +then he's paying L550 for one thing, and he's old. And he doesn't know +his business.... Oh yes! I think I can see my money back.... Wait till +Christmas is turned and I make a start!" + +She knew that the future would justify his self-confidence. How he +succeeded she could not define. Why should he succeed where another was +failing? He could not go out and drag boarders by physical force into +his private hotel! Yet he would succeed. In every gesture he was the +successful man. She looked timidly up at his eyes under the strong black +eyelashes. His glance caught hers. He smiled conqueringly. + +"Haven't said a word to Sarah yet!" he almost whispered, so low was his +voice; and he put on a mock-rueful smile. Hilda smiled in response. + +"Shall you keep Preston Street?" she asked. + +"Of course!" he said with pride--"I shall run the two, naturally." He +put his shoulders back. "One will help the other, don't you see?" + +She thought she saw, and nodded appreciatively. He meant to run two +establishments! At the same moment a young and stylish man drove rather +slowly by in a high dog-cart. He nodded carelessly to George Cannon, and +then, perceiving that George Cannon was with a lady, raised his hat in +haste. George Cannon responded. The young man gazed for an instant hard +at Hilda, with a peculiar expression, and passed on. She did not know +who he was. Of George Cannon's relationships in the town she was +entirely ignorant, but that he had relationships was always obvious. + +She blushed, thinking of what Sarah Gailey had said about 'talk' +concerning herself and George Cannon. In the young man's glance there +had been something to annoy and shame her. + +"Come across and have a look at the place," said George Cannon, suddenly +stepping down into the gutter, with a look first in one direction and +then in the other for threatening traffic. + +"I don't think I'll come now," she replied. + +"But why not? Are you in a hurry? You've plenty of time before five +o'clock--heaps!" + +"I'd prefer not to come," she insisted, in an abashed and diffident +voice. + +"But what's up?" he demanded, stepping back to the pavement, and +glancing directly into her eyes. + +She blushed more and more, dropping her eyelids. + +"I don't want to be talked about _too_ much!" she muttered, mortified. +Her inference was unmistakable. The whole of her mind seemed now to be +occupied with an enormous grievance which she somehow had against the +world in general. Her very soul, too, was bursting with this grievance. + +"Talked about? But who--" + +"Never mind! I know! I've been told!" she interrupted him. + +"Oh! I see!" He was now understanding the cause of her trouble in Sarah +Gailey's bedroom. + +"Now look here!" He went on. "I've just got to have a few words with +you. You come across the road, please." He was imperious. + +She raised her glance for a timid moment to his face, and saw to her +intense astonishment that he also was blushing. Never before had she +seen him blush. + +"Come along!" he urged. + +She followed him obediently across the dangerous road. He waited for her +at the opposite kerb, and then they went up Ship Street. He turned into +the entrance of the Chichester, which was grandiose, with a flight of +shallow steps, and then a porch with two basket chairs, and then another +flight of shallow steps ending in double doors which were noticeably +higher than the street level. She still followed. + +"Nobody in here, I expect," said George Cannon, indicating a door on the +right, to an old waiter who stood in the dark hall. + +"No, sir." + +George Cannon opened the door as a master, ushered Hilda into a tiny +room furnished with a desk and two chairs, and shut the door. + + +III + +The small window was of ground glass and gave no prospect of the outer +world, from which it seemed to Hilda that she was as completely cut off +as in a prison. She was alone with George Cannon, and beyond the narrow +walls which caged them together, and close together, there was nothing! +All Brighton, save this room, had ceased to exist. Hilda was now more +than ever affrighted, shamed, perturbed, agonised. Yet at the same time +she had the desperate calm of the captain of a ship about to founder +with all hands. And she saw glimpses, beautiful and compensatory, of the +romantic quality of common life. She was in a little office of a +perfectly ordinary boarding-house--(she could even detect the stale +odours of cooking)--with a realistic man of business, and they were +about to discuss a perfectly ordinary piece of scandal; and surely they +might be called two common-sense people! And withal, the ordinariness +and the midland gumption of the scene were shot through with the bright +exotic rays of romance! She thought: "It is painful and humiliating to +be caught and fixed as I am. But it is wonderful too!" + +"The fact is," said George Cannon, in an easy reassuring tone, "we never +get the chance of a bit of quiet chat. Upon my soul we don't! Now I +suppose it's Sarah who's been worrying you?" + +"Yes." + +"What did she say?... You'd better sit down, don't you think?" He swung +round the pivoted arm-chair in front of the closed desk and pointed her +to it. + +"Oh!" Hilda hesitated, and then sank on to the chair without looking at +it. "She simply said there was a lot of talk about you and me. Has she +been saying anything to you?" + +He shook his head, staring down at her. Hilda put her arms on the arms +of the chair, and, shirking the man's gaze, stared down at the worn +carpet and at his boots thereon. One instinct in her desired that he +should move away or that the room should be larger, but another instinct +wanted him to remain close, lest the savour of life should lose its +sharpness. + +"It passes me how people can say such things!" she went on, in a low, +thrilled, meditative voice. "I can't understand it!" She was quite +sincere in her astonished indignation. Nevertheless, she experienced a +positive pride at being brought into a scandal with George Cannon; she +derived from it a certain feeling of importance; it proved that she was +no longer a mere girlish miss. + +George Cannon kept silence. + +"I shall leave Brighton," Hilda continued. "That I've quite decided! I +don't like leaving your sister, as ill as she is! But really--" And she +thought how prudent she was, and how capable of taking care of +herself--she all alone in the world! + +"Where should you go to? Bursley? The Orgreaves?" George Cannon asked +absently and carelessly. + +"I don't know," said Hilda, with curtness. + +He stepped aside, in the direction of the window, and examined curiously +the surface of the glass, as though in search of a concealed message +which it might contain. In a new and much more animated voice he said to +the window: + +"Of course I know it's all my fault!" + +Hilda glanced up at his back; he was still not more than three feet away +from her. + +"How is it your fault?" she asked, after a pause. + +He made another pause. + +"The way I look at you," he said. + +These apparently simple words made Hilda tremble, and deprived her of +speech. They shifted the conversation to another plane. 'The way I look +at you! The way I look at you!' What did he mean? How did he look at +her? She could not imagine what he was driving at! Yes, she could! She +knew quite well. All the time, while pretending to herself not to +understand, she understood. It was staggering, but she perfectly +understood. He had looked at her 'like that' on the very first day of +their acquaintance, in his office at Turnhill, and again at the house in +Lessways Street, and again in the newspaper office, and on other +occasions, and again on the night of their arrival at Brighton. But +surely not lately! Or did he look at her 'like that' behind her back? +Was it possible that people noticed it?... Absurd! His explanation of +the origin of the gossip did not convince her. She had, however, +suddenly lost interest in the origin of the gossip. She was entirely +occupied with George Cannon's tone, and his calm, audacious reference to +a phenomenon which had hitherto seemed to her to be far beyond the +region of words. + +She was frightened. She was like some one walking secure in the night, +who is stopped by the sound of rushing water and stands with all his +senses astrain, afraid to move a step farther, too absorbed and +intimidated to be aware of astonishment. The point was not whether or +not she had known or guessed the existence of this unseen and formidable +river; the point was that she was thrillingly on its brink, in the dark. +Every instant she heard its swelling current plainer and plainer. She +thought: "Am I lost? How strange that this awful and exquisite thing +should happen to just me!" She was quite fatalistic. + +He turned his head suddenly and caught her guilty eyes for an instant +before she could lower them. + +"You don't mean to say you don't know what I mean?" he said. + +She still could not speak. Her trouble was acute, her self-consciousness +far keener than it had ever been before. She thought: "But it's +impossible that this awful and exquisite thing should happen in this +fashion!" George Cannon moved a step towards her. She could not see his +face, but she knew that he was looking at her with his expression at +once tyrannic and benevolent. She could feel, beating upon her, the +emanating waves of his personality. And she was as confused as though +she had been sitting naked in front of him.... And he had brought all +this about by simply putting something into words--by saying: "It's the +way I look at you!" + +He went on: + +"I can't help it, you know.... The very first minute I ever set eyes on +you.... Of course I'm thirty-six. But there it is!... I've never seen +any one like you; and I've seen a few! The fact is, Hilda, I do believe +you don't know how fine you are." He spoke more quickly and with boyish +enthusiasm; his voice became wonderfully persuasive. "You are fine, you +know! And you're beautiful! I didn't think so at first, but you are! +You're being wasted. Why, a woman like you...! You've no idea. You're so +proud and stiff, when you want to be... I'd trust you with anything. +You're absolutely the only woman I ever met that I'd trust like a man! +And that's a fact.... Now, nobody could ever think as much of you as I +do. I'm quite certain of it. It couldn't be done. I _know_ you, you see! +I understand everything you do, and whatever you do, it's just fine for +me. You couldn't be as happy with any one else! You couldn't! I feel +that in my bones.... Now--now, I must tell you something--" + +The praise, the sympathy, the passion were astounding, marvellous, and +delicious to her. Was it conceivable that this experienced and worldly +man had been captivated by such a mere girl as herself? She had never +guessed it! Or had she always guessed it? An intense pride warmed her +blood like a powerful cordial. Life was even grander than she had +thought!... She drooped into an intoxication. Among all that he had +said, he had not said that he was not stronger than she. He had not +relinquished his authority. She felt it, sitting almost beneath him in +the slippery chair. She knew that she would yield to him. She desired to +yield to him. Her mind was full of sensuous images based on the +abdication of her will in favour of his. + +"Now, look here, Hilda. I want to tell you--" + +He perhaps did not intend that she should look up; but she looked up. +And she was surprised to see that his face was full of troubled +hesitations, showing almost dismay. He made the motion of swallowing. +She smiled; and set her shoulders back--the very gesture that she had +learned from him. + +"What?" she questioned, in a whisper. + +Her brief mood of courage was over. She sank before him again, and +waited with bowed head. + +Profoundly disturbed, he stood quite still for a few seconds, with shut +lips, and then he made another step to approach. + +"Your name's got to be Cannon," she heard him say. + +She thought, still waiting: "If this goes on a moment longer I shall die +of anticipation, in bliss." And when she felt his hand on her shoulder, +and the great shadow of him on part of her face, her body seemed to +sigh, acquiescent and for the moment assuaged: "This is a miracle, and +life is miraculous!" She acknowledged that she had lacked faith in life. + +She was now on the river, whirling. But at the same time she was in the +small, hot room, and both George Cannon's hands were on her unresisting +shoulders; and then they were round her, and she felt his physical +nearness, the texture of his coat and of his skin; she could see in a +mist the separate hairs of his tremendous moustache and the colours +swimming in his eyes; her nostrils expanded in transient alarm to a +faint, exciting masculine odour. She was disconcerted, if not +panic-struck, by the violence of his first kiss; but her consternation +was delectable to her. + +And amid her fright and her joy, and the wonder of her extreme surprise, +and the preoccupation of being whirled down the river, she calmly +reflected, somewhere in her brain: "The door is not locked. Supposing +some one were to come in and see us!" And she reflected also, in an +ecstasy of relief: "My life will be quite simple, now. I shall have +nothing to worry about. And I can help him." For during a year past she +had never ceased to ask herself what she must do to arrange her life; +her conscience had never ceased to tell her that she ought not to be +content to remain in the narrow ideas of her mother, and that though she +preferred marriage she ought to act independently of the hope of it. +Throughout her long stay in Preston Street she had continually said: +"After this--what? This cannot last for ever. When it comes to an end +what am I to do to satisfy my conscience?" And she had thought vaguely +of magnificent activities and purposes--she knew not what.... The +problem existed no more. Her life was arranged. And now, far more +sincerely than in the King's Road twenty minutes earlier, she regarded +the career of a spinster with horror and with scorn. At best, she +suddenly perceived with blinding clearness, it would have been +pitiful--pitiful! Twenty minutes earlier, in the King's Road, she had +dreamt of belonging absolutely to some man, of being at his disposal, of +being under his might, of being helpless before him. And now!... Miracle +thrice miraculous! Miracle unconceived, inconceivable!... No more 'talk' +now!... + +She told herself how admirable was the man. She assured herself that he +was entirely admirable. She reminded herself that she had always deemed +him admirable, that only twenty minutes earlier, in the King's Road, +when there was in her mind no dimmest, wildest notion of the real +future, she had genuinely admired him. How clever, how tactful, how +indomitable, how conquering, how generous, how kind he was! How kind to +his half-sister! How forbearing with her! Indeed, she could not recall +his faults. And he was inevitably destined to brilliant success. She +would be the wife of a great and a wealthy man. And in her own secret +ways she could influence him, and thus be greater than the great. + +Love? It is an absolute fact that the name of 'love' did not in the +first eternal moments even occur to her. And when it did she gave it but +little importance. She had to admit that she had not consciously thought +of George Cannon with love--at any rate with love as she had imagined +love to be. Indeed, her immediate experience would not fit any theory +that she could formulate. But with the inexorable realism of her sex she +easily dismissed inconvenient names and theories, and accommodated +herself to the fact. And the fact was that she overwhelmingly wanted +George Cannon, and, as she now recognized, had wanted him ever since she +first saw him. The recognition afforded her intense pleasure. She +abandoned herself candidly to this luxury of an unknown desire. It was +incomparably the most splendid and dangerous experience that she had +ever had. She did not reason and she had no wish to reason. She was set +above reason. Happy to the point of delicious pain, she yet yearned +forward to a happiness far more excruciating. She was perfectly aware +that her bliss would be torment until George Cannon had married her, +until she had wholly surrendered to him. + +Yet at intervals a voice said very clearly within her: "All this is +wrong. This is base and shameful. This is something to blush for, +really!" She did blush. But her blushes were a part of the delight. And +the voice was not persistent. She could silence it with scarcely an +effort, despite its clarity. + +"Kiss me!" George Cannon demanded of her, with eager masterfulness. + +The request shocked her for an instant, and the young girl in her was +about to revolt. But she kissed him--an act which combined the sweetness +of submission with the glory of triumph! She looked at him steadily, +confident in herself and in him. She felt that he knew how to love. His +emotion filled her with superb pride. She seemed to be saying to him in +a doomed rapture: "Do you think I don't know what I am doing? I know! I +know!" + +The current of the river was tremendous. She foresaw the probability of +disaster. She was aware that she had definitely challenged the hazard of +fate. But she was not terrified in the dark, swirling night of her +destiny. She straightened her shoulders. With all her innocence and +ignorance and impulsiveness and weakness, she had behind her the unique +and priceless force of her youth. She was young, and she put her trust +in life. + + + + +CHAPTER III +FLORRIE AGAIN + + +I + +As they were walking home along the King's Road, Hilda suddenly stopped +in front of a chemist's shop. "I've got something to buy here," she said +diffidently, and then added: "I'll follow you." + +"And what have you got to buy?" he asked, facing her, with his +benevolent, ironical expression. + +"Never mind!" she gently laughed. "I shan't be many minutes after you." +She pretended to make a mystery. But her sole purpose was to avoid +re-entering the house in his company; and she knew that he had divined +this. Nevertheless, she found pleasure in the perfectly futile pretence +of a mysterious purchase. + +She was very self-conscious as they stood there on the dusty footpath +amid the promenaders gay and gloomy, chattering and silent, who were +taking the sun and the salt breeze. Despite her reason, she had a fear +that numbers of people would perceive her to be newly affianced and +remark upon the contrast between her girlishness and his maturity. But +George Cannon was not in the slightest degree self-conscious. He played +the lover with ease and said quite simply and convincingly just the +things which she would have expected a lover to say. Indeed, the +conversation, as carried on by him, between the moment of betrothal and +the arrival at the chemist's shop, was the one phenomenon of the +engagement which corresponded with her preconceived ideas concerning +such an affair. It convinced her that she really was affianced. + +"Well?" he murmured fondly and yet quizzically, as they remained +wordless, deliciously hesitating to part. "What are you thinking about?" + +She replied with brave candour, appealing to him by a soft glance: + +"I was only thinking how queer it is I should be engaged in a room I'd +never seen before in my life--going into it like that!" + +He looked at her uncomprehending; for an instant his features were +blank; then he smiled kindly. + +"It's so strange!" she encouraged him. + +"Yes. Isn't it?" he agreed, with charming, tranquil politeness. + +"He doesn't see it!" she thought, as she watched the play of his face. +"He doesn't see how wonderful it is that I should go into a room that +was absolutely unknown to me and then this should happen at once. Why! I +never knew there was such a room!" She could not define how she was +affected by this fact, but she regarded the fact as tremendously +romantic, and its effect on her was profound. And George saw in it no +significance! She was disconcerted. She felt a tremor; it was as though +the entire King's Road had quivered for a fraction of a second and then, +feigning nonchalance, resumed its moveless solidity. + +Inside the chemist's she demanded the first thing she set eyes on--a +tooth-brush. All the while she was examining various shapes of +toothbrushes, she had a vision of George raising his hat to take leave +of her, and she could see not only the curve of his hand and the +whiteness of his cuff, but also the millions of tiny marks and creases +on the coarse skin of his face, extraordinarily different from her own +smooth, pure, delicate, silky complexion. And she remembered that less +than three years ago she had regarded him as of another generation, as +indefinitely older and infinitely more experienced than her childish and +simple self. This reflection produced in her a consternation which was +curiously blissful. + +"No, madam," the white-aproned chemist was saying. "It's this size that +we usually sell to ladies." + +She put on the serious judicial air of an authentic adult woman, and +frowned at the chemist. + + +II + +When, in Preston Street, she was reluctantly approaching the house, she +saw a cab, coming downwards in the opposite direction, stop at No. 59. + +"That must be Florrie!" she said, half-aloud. + +The boarding-house being in need of another servant, young, strong, and +reliable, Hilda had suggested that Miss Florence Bagster might be +invited to accept the situation. Sarah Gailey had agreed that it would +be wise to have a servant from Turnhill; she mistrusted southern +servants, and appeared to believe that there was no real honesty south +of the Trent. Florence Bagster had accepted the situation with +enthusiasm, writing that she longed to be again with her former +mistress; she did not write that the mysterious and magnetic name of +Brighton called her more loudly than the name of her former mistress. +And now Florence was due. + +But it was not Florence who emerged from the cab. It was a tall and +full-bosomed young lady in a gay multi-coloured costume, and gloves and +a sunshade and a striking hat. This young lady stood by the cab +expectant and smiling while the cabman pulled a tin trunk off the roof +of the vehicle, and then, when the cabman had climbed down and was +dragging the trunk after him, she put out an arm and seized one handle +of the trunk to help him, which act, so strange on the part of a young +lady, made Hilda, coming nearer and nearer, look more carefully. She was +astounded as she realized that the unknown young lady was not a young +lady after all, but the familiar Florrie at the advanced age of sixteen. + +The aged cabman had made no mistake. He left the tin trunk on the +pavement and took timid Florrie's money without touching his hat for it. +Florrie was laying her sunshade rather forlornly on the top of the tin +trunk and preparing to lift the trunk unaided, when Mr. Boutwood, stout +and all in black, came gallantly forth from the house to assist her. +Sarah Gailey's opposition had not been persistent enough to keep the +jovial Mr. Boutwood out of No. 59. Shortly after Christmas his wife had +died suddenly, and Mr. Boutwood, with plenty of time and plenty of money +on his hands, had found himself desolated. In his desolation he had +sought his old acquaintance George Cannon, and the result had somehow +been that bygones had become bygones and a new boarder had increased the +prosperity of No. 59. Sarah Gailey could not object. Indeed, she had +actually wept for the death of one enemy and the affliction of another. +Moreover, she seldom had contact with the boarders now. + +The rather peculiar circumstances of Florrie's arrival almost cured +Hilda's self-consciousness, and she entered the house, in the wake of +the trunk, with a certain forgetful ease. There was Mr. Boutwood, still +dallying with Florrie and the trunk, in the narrow hall! The shocking +phenomenon of a boarder helping a domestic servant with her luggage had +been rendered possible only by a series of accidents. The front door +being left open on account of the weather, Mr. Boutwood had had a direct +view of the maiden, and the maiden had not been obliged to announce her +arrival officially by ringing a bell. Hence the other servants had not +had notice. And of the overseers of the house one was imprisoned in the +basement and the other two had been out betrothing themselves! In the +ordinary way the slightest unusualness in the hall would instantly +attract the attention of somebody in authority. + +Mr. Boutwood was not immediately aware of Hilda. His attitude towards +Florrie was shocking to Hilda in a double sense; it shocked her as an +overseer, but it shocked her quite as much as a young woman newly +jealous for the pride of all her sex. Florrie was beyond question +exceedingly pretty; in particular the chin pouted more deliriously than +ever. Her complexion was even finer than Hilda's own. She had a simple, +good-natured glance, a quick and extraordinarily seductive smile, and +the unique bodily grace of her years. Her costume, though vulgar and +very ill-made, was effective at a little distance; her form and +movements gave it a fictitious worth. Indeed, she was an amazing blossom +to have come off the dunghill of Calder Street. Domestic drudgery had +not yet dehumanized nor disfigured her--it is true that her hands were +concealed in gloves, and her feet beneath a flowing skirt. Now, Mr. +Boutwood's attitude showed very plainly that the girlish charms of +Florrie had produced in him a definite and familiar effect. He would +have been ready to commit follies for the young woman, and to deny that +she was a drudge or anything but a beautiful creature. + +Hilda objected. She objected because Mr. Boutwood was a widower, holding +that he had no right to joy, and that he ought to mourn practically for +ever in solitude. She would make no allowance for his human instincts, +his needs of intimate companionship, his enormous unoccupied leisure. +She would have condemned him utterly on the score of his widowhood +alone. But she objected far more strongly to his attitude because he was +fat and looked somewhat coarse. She counted his obesity to him for a +sin. And it was naught to her that he had been a martyr to idleness and +wealth, which combination had prematurely aged him. Mr. Boutwood was +really younger than George Cannon, and Florence Bagster certainly seemed +as old as Hilda. Yet the juxtaposition of the young, slim, and virginal +Florrie and the large, earth-worn Mr. Boutwood profoundly offended her. + +It was Mr. Boutwood who first discovered that Hilda was in the doorway. +He was immediately abashed, and presented the most foolish appearance. +Whereupon Hilda added scorn to her disgust. Florrie, however, easily +kept her countenance, and with a pert smile took the hand which her +former mistress graciously extended. By universal custom a servant +retains some of the privileges of humanity for several minutes after +entering upon a new servitude. Mr. Boutwood vanished. + +"Louisa will help you upstairs with the trunk," said Hilda, when she had +made inquiries about the wonderful journey which Florrie had +accomplished alone, and about the health of Florrie's aunt and of her +family. "Louisa!" she called loudly up the stairs and down into the +basement. + + +III + +She followed the procession of the trunk upstairs, and, Louisa having +descended again, showed Florrie into the kennel. This tiny apartment had +in it two truckle-beds, and a wash-bowl on a chair, and little else. A +very small square trap-window in the low ceiling procured a dusky light +in the middle hours of the day. Florence seemed delighted with the room; +she might have had to sleep under the stairs. + +"Put on your afternoon apron, and then you can go down and see Miss +Gailey," said Hilda, and shut the door upon Florrie in her new home. + +When she turned, there was George Cannon on the half-landing beneath the +skylight! She knew not how he had come there, nor whether he had entered +the house before or after herself. + +"I'm glad he isn't fat!" she thought. And it was as though she had +thought: "If he were fat everything would be different." Her features +did not relax as she went down the five steps to the half-landing where +he waited, smiling faintly. She thought: "We must be very serious and +circumspect in the house. There must never be the slightest--" But while +she was yet on the last step, he firmly put his hands on her ears and, +drawing her head towards him, kissed her full on the mouth, and she saw +again, through her eyelashes, all the details of his face. She yielded. +All her ideas of circumspection melted magically away in an abandoned +tenderness of which she was ashamed, but for which she would have +unreflectingly made any sacrifice. The embrace was over in an instant. +Besides being guiltless of obesity, George Cannon was free from the +unpardonable fault of clumsiness. He was audacious, but he was not +foolhardy, and he would never be abashed. True, she had seen dismay on +his face at the moment of his declaration, but that moment was unique, +and his dismay had ineffably flattered her. Now, on the half-landing, +she was drenched in bliss. And she felt dissolute; she felt even base. +But she did not care. She thought, as it were, startled: "This is love. +This must be what love is. I must have been in love without knowing it. +And as for a girl always knowing when a man's in love with her, and +foreseeing the proposal, and all that sort of thing...." Her practical +contempt for all that sort of thing could not be stated in words. + +"Florrie's just come," she whispered, and by a movement of the head +indicated that Florrie was in the kennel. + +They went together to the drawing-room on the first floor. It was, +empty, the entire population of the boarding-houses being still on the +seashore. Hilda stood near the door, which she left open, and gave +detailed news of Florrie in a tone very matter-of-fact. There was no +reference to love, or to the new situation created, or to the vast +enterprise of the Chichester. The topic was Florrie, and somehow it held +the field despite efforts to dislodge it. + +Then the stairs creaked. Already Florrie was coming down. In a trice she +had made herself ready for work. She came down timidly, not daring to +look to right nor left, but concentrating her attention on the stairs. +She passed along the landing outside the drawing-room door, and Hilda, +opening the door a little wider, had a full surreptitious view of her +back; and George Cannon, farther within the room, also saw her. They +watched her disappear on her way to find the basement and the formidable +Sarah Gailey. Hilda was touched by the spectacle of this child disguised +as a strapping woman, far removed from her family and her companions and +her familiar haunts, and driven or drawn into exile at Brighton, where +she would only see the sea once a week, except through windows, and +where she would have to work from fourteen to sixteen hours a day for a +living, and sleep in a kennel. The prettiness, the pertness, and the +naive contentedness of the child thus realizing an ambition touched her +deeply. + +"It does seem a shame, doesn't it?" she said. + +"What?" + +"Bringing her all the way up here, like this! She doesn't know a soul in +Brighton. She's bound to be frightfully home-sick--" + +"What about you?" George Cannon interrupted politely. "Doesn't she know +you?" He smiled with all his kindness. + +"Yes--but--" + +Hilda did not finish. It was not worth while. George Cannon had not +understood. He did not feel as she felt, and her emotion was +incommunicable to him. A tremendous misgiving seized her, and she had a +physical feeling of emptiness in the stomach. It passed, swiftly as a +hallucination. Just such a misgiving as visits nearly every normal +person immediately before or immediately after marriage! She ignored it. +She was engaged--that was the paramount fact! She was engaged, and +joyously determined to prosecute the grand adventure to the end. The +immensity of the risks forced her to accept them. + + +IV + +That evening Sarah Gailey was in torment from the pain in her wrists. +There was nothing to be done. She had had the doctor, and no article of +the prescribed treatment had been neglected. With unaccustomed aid from +Hilda she had accomplished the business of undressing and getting into +bed, and now she sat up in bed, supported by her own pillows and one +from Hilda's bed, and nursed her wrists, while Hilda poured drops of a +narcotic for her into a glass of water. Apart from the serious local +symptoms, her health was fairly good. She could eat, she could talk, she +could walk, and her brain was clear. Hilda held the glass for her to +drink, for it was prudent to keep her hands as much as possible in +repose. + +"There!" said Hilda, as if to a young child who had been querulous. "I'm +sure you'll sleep now!" + +"I don't think I shall," the sufferer whined. + +"Oh yes, you will!" Hilda insisted firmly, although she was by no means +sure. "Let me take this extra pillow away, and then you can lie down +properly." She was thinking reproachfully: "What a pity it is for all of +us that the poor thing can't bear her pain with a little less fuss!" It +was not Sarah alone who was embittered and fatigued by Sarah's pain. + +"Where's George?" asked the invalid, when she was laid down. + +"In the parlour. Why?" + +"Oh, nothing!" + +"By the way," said Hilda, seized by a sudden impulse, which had its +origin in Sarah's tone at once martyrized and accusing,--"by the way, +who _is_ it that's been talking scandal about me and George?" + +"Scandal?" Sarah Gailey seemed weakly to protest against the word. + +"Because, if you want to know," Hilda continued, "we're engaged to be +married!" She reflected, contrite: "This won't help her to sleep!" And +then added, in a new, endearing accent, awaiting an outburst of some +kind from Sarah: "Of course it's a secret, dear. I'm telling no one but +you." + +After a moment's silence, Sarah remarked casually, with shut eyes: +"It'll be much the best not to tell anyone. And the shorter the +engagement the better! Don't let anybody in the house know till you're +married." She sighed, put her cheek into the pillow, and moved her bound +wrists for a few seconds, restlessly. "If you turn the gas down," she +finished very wearily, "I dare say I may get off. If only they'd stop +that piano upstairs!" + +She had displayed no surprise at the tremendous event, no sentimental +interest in it. The fact was that Sarah Gailey's wrists were infinitely +more interesting to her than any conceivable project of marriage. +Continuous and acute pain had withdrawn her from worldly affairs, making +her more than ever like a god. + +Hilda was startled. But she was relieved. Now for the first time she had +the authentic sensation of being engaged. And it appeared to her that +she had been engaged for a very long period, and that the engagement was +a quite ordinary affair. She was relieved; yet she was also grievously +saddened. She lowered the gas, and in the gloom gazed for a few seconds +at the vague, huddled, sheeted, faintly moaning figure on the bed; the +untidy grey hair against the pillow struck her as intolerably pathetic. + +"Good night," she said softly. + +And the feeble, plaintive voice responded: "Good night." + +She went out, leaving the door slightly ajar. + + +V + +In the parlour adjoining George Cannon was seated at the table. When +Hilda saw him and their eyes met, she was comforted; a wave of +tenderness seemed to agitate her. She realized that this man was hers, +and the realization was marvellously reassuring. The sound of the piano +descended delicately from the drawing-room as from a great distance. +From the kitchen came the muffled clatter of earthenware and +occasionally a harsh, loud voice; it was the hour of relaxed discipline +in the kitchen, where amid the final washing-up and much free discussion +and banter, Florrie was recommencing her career on a grander basis. +Hilda closed the door very quietly. When she had closed it and was shut +in with George Cannon her emotion grew intenser. + +"I think she'll get off now," she whispered, standing near the door. + +"Have you told her?" + +Hilda nodded. + +"What does she say?" + +Hilda raised her eyebrows: "Oh!... Well, she says we'd better keep it +quiet, and make the engagement as short as possible." She blushed. + +"Look here," said George. "Let's go out, eh?" + +"But--what will people say?" + +"What the devil does it matter what they say? I want you to come out +with me." + +The whispered oath, and his defiant smile, enchanted her. + +"We can go out by the area steps," he continued. "There's two of 'em +sitting in the hall, but the front door's shut. Do go and get your hat." + +She left the room with an obedient smile. Pushing open Sarah's door very +gently, she groped on the hooks behind it for her hat. "It won't matter +about gloves--in the dark," she thought. "Besides, I mustn't disturb +her." Before drawing-to the door she looked again at the bed. There was +neither sound nor movement. Probably Sarah Gailey slept. The dim vision +of the form on the bed and the blue spark of gas in the corner produced +in Hilda a mood of poignant and yet delicious sorrow. + +"Why, what's the matter?" George Cannon asked when she had returned to +the parlour. + +She knew that her eyes were humid with tears. Both her arms were raised +above her head as she fixed the hat. This act of fixing the hat in +George's presence gave her a new pleasure. She smiled at him. + +"Nothing!" she said, whispering mysteriously. "I think she's gone off. +I'm so glad. You know she really does suffer dreadfully." + +His look was uncomprehending; but she did not care. The anticipation of +going out with him was now utterly absorbing her. + +He waited with his hand on the gas-tap till she was ready, and then he +lowered the gas. + +"Wait a moment," she whispered at the door, and with a gesture called +him back into the room from the flagged passage leading to the area +steps. + +On the desk was his evening glass of milk, which he drank cold in +summer. She offered it to him in the twilit room like an enraptured +handmaid. He had forgotten it. The fact that he had forgotten it and she +had remembered it yet further increased her strange, mournful, ecstatic +bliss. + +"Have some," he whispered, when he had drunk. + +She finished the glass, trembling. They went forth, climbing the area +steps with proper precautions and escaping as thieves escape, down the +street. For an instant she glimpsed the wide-open windows of the +drawing-room, and the dining-room, from behind whose illuminated blinds +came floating, as it were wistfully, the sound of song and chatter. She +thought of Sarah Gailey prone and unconscious in the basement. And she +felt the moisture of the milk on her lips. "Am I happy or unhappy?" she +questioned herself, and could not reply. She knew only that she was +thrillingly, smartingly alive. + +At the corner of Preston Street and King's Road a landau waited. + +"This is ours," said George casually. + +"Ours?" + +What a splendid masculine idea! How it proved that he too had been +absorbed in the adventure! She admired him humbly, like a girl, like a +little girl. With the most formal deference he helped her into the +carriage. + +"Drive towards Shoreham," he commandingly directed the driver, and took +his place by her side. + +Yes! He was mature. He was a man of the world. He had had every +experience. He knew how to love. That such a being was hers, that she +without any effort had captured such a being, flattered her to an +extreme degree. She was glorious with pride. She leaned back in the +carriage negligently, affecting an absolute calm. She armed herself in +her virginity. Not George Cannon himself could have guessed that only by +a miracle of self-control did she prevent her hand from seeking his +beneath the light rug that covered their knees! She intimidated George +Cannon in that hour, and the while her heart burned with shame at the +secret violence of her feelings. She thought: "This must be love. This +is love!" And yet her conscience inarticulately accused her of +obliquity. But she did not care, and she would not reflect. She thought +that she wilfully, perversely, refused to reflect; but in reality she +was quite helpless. + +Under the still and feverish night the landau rolled slowly along +between the invisible murmuring sea and the lighted facades of Hove. +Occasionally other carriages, containing other couples, approached, were +plain for a moment, and dissolved away. + +"So she thinks the engagement ought to be short?" said George Cannon. + +"Yes." + +"So do I!" he pronounced with emphasis. + +Hilda desired to ask him: "How short?" But she could not. She could not +bring herself to put the question. She was too proud. By a short +engagement, did he mean six months, three months, a month? Dared she +hope that he meant... a month? This was a thought buried in the deepest +fastness of her soul, a thought that she would have perished in order +not to expose; but it existed. + +"I think I should like to go back now," she breathed timidly, before +they were beyond Hove. It was not a request to be ignored. The carriage +turned. She felt relief. The sensation of being alive had been too acute +to be borne, and it was now a little eased. She knew that her destiny +was irrevocable, that nothing could prevent her from being George +Cannon's. Whether the destiny was evil or good did not paramountly +interest her. But she wanted to rush forward into the arms of fate and +know her fate. She dreamed only of the union. + + * * * * * + + + + +BOOK V +HER DELIVERANCE + + + + +CHAPTER I +LOUISA UNCONTROLLED + + +I + +Hilda, after a long railway journey, was bathing her face, arms, and +neck at the large double washstand in the large double bedroom on the +second floor of No. 59 Preston Street. At the back of the washstand was +an unused door which gave into a small bedroom occupied by the youngest +Miss Watchett. George Cannon came up quietly behind her. She pretended +not to hear him. He put his hands lightly on her wet arms. Smiling with +condescending indulgence, half to herself, she still pretended to ignore +him, and continued her toilet. + +The return from the honeymoon, which she had feared, had accomplished +itself quite simply and easily. She had feared the return, because only +upon the return was the marriage to be formally acknowledged and +published. It had been obviously impossible to announce, during the +strenuous summer season, the engagement of the landlord to a young woman +who lived under the same roof with him. The consequences of such an +indiscretion would have been in various ways embarrassing. Hence not a +word was said. Nor were definite plans for the wedding made until George +remarked one evening that he would like to be married at Chichester, +Chichester being the name of his new private hotel. Which exhibition of +sentimentality had both startled and touched Hilda. Chichester, however, +had to be renounced, owing to the difficulty of residence. The subject +having been thus fairly broached, George had pursued it, and one day +somewhat casually stated that he had taken a room in Lewes and meant to +sleep there every night for the term imposed by the law. Less than three +weeks later, Hilda had inobtrusively departed from No. 59, the official +account being that she was to take a holiday with friends after the +fatigues of August and early September. She left the train at Lewes, and +there, in the presence of strangers, was married to George Cannon, who +had quitted Brighton two days earlier and was supposed to be in London +on business. Even Sarah Gailey, though her health had improved, did not +assist at the wedding. Sarah, sole depositary of the secret, had to +remain in charge of No. 59. + +A strange wedding! Not a single wedding present, except those +interchanged by the principals! Nor had any of the problems raised by +the marriage been solved, or attacked. The future of Sarah Gailey, for +example! Was Sarah to go on living with them? It was inconceivable, and +yet the converse was also inconceivable. Sarah had said nothing, and +nothing had been said to Sarah. Matters were to settle themselves. It +had not even been decided which room Mr. and Mrs. Cannon should inhabit +as man and wife. It was almost certain that, in the dead period between +the popular summer season and the fashionable autumn season, there would +be several bedrooms empty. Hilda, like George, did not want to bother +with a lot of tedious details, important or unimportant. The attitude of +each was: "Let me get married first, and then I'll see to all that." + +Thus had the return been formidable to Hilda. All the way from Ireland +she had been saying to herself: "I shall have to go up the steps, and +into the house, and be spoken to as Mrs. Cannon! And then there'll be +Sarah...!" But the entry into the house had produced no terror. +Everywhere George's adroitness had been wonderful, extraordinarily +comforting and reassuring, and nowhere more so than in the vestibule of +No. 59. The tone in which he had said to Louisa, "Take Mrs. Cannon's +handbag, Louisa," had been a marvel of ease. Louisa had incontestably +blenched, for the bizarre Sarah, who conserved in Brighton the inmost +spirit of the Five Towns, had thought fit to tell the servants nothing +whatever. But the trained veteran in Louisa had instantly recovered, and +she had replied "Yes, sir," with a simplicity which proved her to be the +equal of George Cannon.... The worst was over for Hilda. And the next +moments were made smooth by reason of a great piece of news which, +forcing Sarah Gailey to communicate it at once, monopolized attention, +and so entirely relieved the bride's self-consciousness. + +Florence Bagster, having insolently quarrelled with her mistress, had +left her service without notice. Mr. Boutwood had also gone, and the +connection between the two departures was only too apparent, not merely +to Sarah, but also to the three Miss Watchetts, who had recently +arrived. Florence, who could but whisper, had shouted at her mistress. +Little, flushing, modest Florrie, who yesterday in the Five Towns was an +infant, had compromised herself with a fat widower certainly old enough +to be her father. And the widower, the friend of the house, had had so +little regard for the feelings of the house that he had not hesitated to +flaunt with Florrie in the town. It was known that they were more or +less together, and that he stood between Florrie and the world. + + +II + +"I suppose I'd better write at once to her mother--or perhaps her aunt; +her aunt's got more sense," said Hilda, as she dropped the sponge and +groped for a towel, her eyes half blinded. + +In moving she had escaped from his hands. + +"What do you say?" she asked, having heard a vague murmur through the +towel. + +"I say you can write if you like." George spoke with a careless smile. + +Now, facing her, he put his hands on her damp shoulders. She looked up +at him over the towel, leaning her head forward, and suspending action. +Her nose was about a foot from his. She saw, as she had seen a hundred +times, every detail of his large, handsome and yet time-worn face, every +hair of his impressive moustache, all the melting shades of colour in +his dark eyes. His charm was coarse and crude, but he was very skilful, +and there was something about his experienced, weather-beaten, slightly +depraved air, which excited her. She liked to feel young and girlish +before him; she liked to feel that with him, alone of all men, her +modesty availed nothing. She was beginning to realize her power over +him, and the extent of it. It was a power miraculous and mysterious, +never claimed by her, and never admitted by him save in glance and +gesture. This power lay in the fact that she was indispensable to him. +He was not her slave--she might indeed have been considered the human +chattel--but he was the slave of his need of her. He loved her. In him +she saw what love was; she had seen it more and more clearly ever since +the day of their engagement. She was both proud and ashamed of her +power. He did not possess a similar power over herself. She was fond of +him, perhaps getting fonder; but his domination of her senses was +already nearly at an end. She had passed through painful, shattering +ecstasies of bliss, hours unforgettable, hours which she knew could +never recur. And she was left sated and unsatisfied. So that by virtue +of this not yet quite bitter disillusion, she was coming to regard +herself as his superior, as being less naive than he, as being even +essentially older than he. And in speaking to him sometimes she would +put on a grave and precociously sapient mien, as if to indicate that she +had access to sources of wisdom for ever closed to him. + +"But don't you think we _ought_ to write?" she frowned. + +"Certainly if you like! It won't do any good. You don't suppose her aunt +will come down here, do you? And even if she did.... There it is, and +there you are!" + +"Just let me wipe my shoulders, will you?" she said. + +He lifted his hands obediently, and as they were damp he rubbed them on +the loose corner of the towel. + +"Well," he said, "I must be off, I reckon." + +"Shall you see Mr. Boutwood?" + +"I might.... I know where to catch him, I fancy." + +She seemed to have a glimpse of her husband's separate life in the +town--masculine haunts and habits of which she knew nothing and would +always know nothing. And the large existence of the male made her +envious. + +"Going to see him now?" + +"Well, yes." George smiled roguishly. + +"What shall you say to him?" + +"What can I say to him? No business of mine, you know, except that we've +lost a decent servant. But I expect that's Sarah's fault. She's no use +whatever with servants, now, Sarah isn't." + +"_I_ shall never speak to Mr. Boutwood again!" Hilda exclaimed almost +passionately. + +"Oh, but--" + +"His behaviour is simply scandalous. It's really wicked. A man like +him!" + +George put his lips out deprecatingly. "You may depend she asked for +it," he said. + +"What?" + +"She asked for it," he repeated with convinced firmness, and looked at +her steadily. + +A flush slowly spread over her face and neck, and she lowered her gaze. +In her breast pride and shame were again mingled. + +"You keep your hair on, littl'un," said George soothingly, and kissed +her. Then he took his hat and stick, which were with a lot of other +things on the broad white counterpane, and went off stylishly. + +"You don't understand," she threw at him with a delicious side-glance of +reproof as he opened the door. She reproached herself for the deceiving +coquetry of the glance. + +"Don't I?" he returned airily. + +He was quite sure that nothing escaped his intelligence. To Hilda, +shocked by the coarseness and the obtuseness which evidently +characterized his attitude, now as on other occasions, this +self-confidence was desolating; it was ominously sinister. + + +III + +She was alone with her image in the mirror, and the image was precisely +the same that she had always seen; she could detect no change in it +whatever. She liked the sensation of being alone and at home in this +room which before she had only entered as an overseer and which she had +never expected to occupy. She savoured the intimacy of the room--the +necessaries on the washstand, the superb tortoiseshell brushes, bought +by George in Dublin, on the dressing-table, the open trunks, George's +clothes on a chair, and her own flimsy trifles on the bed. Through the +glass she saw, behind her image, the image of the closed door; and then +she turned round to look at the real door and to assure herself that it +was closed. Childish! And yet...! George had shut the door. She +remembered the noise of its shutting. And that noise, in her memory, +seemed to have transformed itself into the sound of fate's deep bell. +She could hear the clang, sharp, definite. She realized suddenly and +with awe that her destiny was fixed hereafter. She had come to the end +of her adventures and her vague dreams. For she had always dreamt +vaguely of an enlarged liberty, of wide interests, and of original +activities--such as no woman to her knowledge had ever had. She had +always compared the life of men with the life of women, and admitted and +resented the inferiority of the latter. She had had glimpses, once, of +the male world; she had made herself the only woman shorthand-writer in +the Five Towns, and one of the earliest in England--dizzy thought! But +the glimpses had been vain and tantalizing. She had been in the male +world, but not of it, as though encircled in a glass ball which neither +she nor the males could shatter. She had had money, freedom, and +ambition, and somehow, through ignorance or through lack of imagination +or opportunity, had been unable to employ them. She had never known what +she wanted. The vision had never been clear. And she reflected: "I +wonder if my daughter, supposing I had one, would be as different from +me as I am from my mother!" + +She could recall with intense vividness the moment when she had first +really contemplated marriage. It was in the steam-tram after having seen +Edwin Clayhanger at the door of Clayhanger's shop. And she could recall +the sense of relief with which she had envisaged a union with some man +stronger and more experienced than herself. In the relief was a certain +secret shame, as though it implied cowardice, a shrinking away from the +challenge of life and from the call of a proud instinct. In the +steam-tram she had foreseen the time when she would belong utterly to +some man, surrendering to him without reserve, the time when she would +be a woman. And the thing had come about! Only yesterday she had been a +little girl entering George Cannon's office with timid audacity to +consult him. Only yesterday George Cannon had been a strange, formidable +man, indefinitely older and infinitely cleverer than she. And now they +were man and wife! Now she was his! Now she profoundly knew him, and he +was no longer formidable, in spite of his force. She had a recondite +dominion over him. She guessed herself to be his superior in certain +qualities. He was revealed to her; she felt that she was not revealed to +him, and that in spite of her wholehearted surrender she had not given +all because of his blindness to what she offered. She could not +completely respect him. But she was his. She was naught apart from him. +She was the wife. His existence went on mainly as before; hers was +diverted, narrowed--fundamentally altered. Never now could she be +enfranchised into the male world! + + +IV + +She slipped her arms into a new bodice purchased in London on the second +day of the marriage. Blushing, she had tried on that bodice in a great +shop in Oxford Street; then it was that she had first said 'my husband' +in public. All that day she had felt so weak and shy and light and +helpless and guilty that she had positively not known what she was +doing; she had moved in a phantom world. Only, she had perceived quite +steadily and practically that she must give more attention to her +clothes. Her old contempt for finery expired in the glory of her new +condition. And now, as she settled the elegant bodice on her shoulders, +and fastened it, and patted her hair, and picked up the skirt and poised +it over her head, she had a stern, preoccupied look, as of one who said: +"This that I am doing is important. I must not be hurried in doing it. +It is vital that I should look well and that no detail of my appearance +should jar." Already she could see herself standing before George when +he returned for the meal--the first meal which they would take together +in the home. She could feel his eyes on her: she could anticipate her +own mood--in which would be mingled pride, misgiving, pleasure, +helplessness, abandonment--and the secret condescension towards him of +her inmost soul. + +All alone in the room she could feel his hands again on her shoulders: a +mysterious excitation.... She was a married woman. She had the right to +discuss Florrie's case with aloof disdain, if she chose. Her +respectability was unassailable. None might penetrate beyond the fact of +her marriage. And yet, far within her, she was ashamed. She dimly +admitted once more, as on several occasions previous to her marriage, +that she had dishonoured an ideal. Her conscience would not chime with +the conscience of society. She thought, as she prepared with pleasurable +expectancy for her husband: "This is not right. This cannot lead to +good. It must lead to evil. I am bound to suffer for it. The whole thing +is wrong. I know it and I have always known it." + +Already she was disappointed with her marriage. Amid the fevers of +bodily appetite she could clearly distinguish the beginning of +lassitude; she no longer saw her husband as a romantic and baffling +figure; she had explored and chartered his soul, and not all his +excellences could atone for his earthliness. She wondered grimly where +and under what circumstances he had acquired the adroitness which had +charmed and still did charm her. She saw in front of her a vista of days +and years in which ennui would probably increase and joy diminish. And +she put her shoulders back defiantly, and thought: "Well, here I am +anyhow! I wanted him and I've got him. What I have to go through I shall +go through!" + +And all the time, floating like vapour over these depths was a sheeny +mood of bright expectation and immediate naive content. And she said +gaily that she must write at once to Janet Orgreave to announce the +marriage, and that her mother's uncle up in the north must also be +informed. + + +V + +Unusual phenomena made themselves apparent on the top staircase: raised +voices which Hilda could hear more and more plainly, even through the +shut door. At No. 59, in the off-seasons, nobody ever spoke in a loud +tone, particularly on the staircase, except perhaps Florrie when, in +conversation with Louisa, she thought she was out of all other hearing. +Hilda's voice was very clear and penetrating, but not loud. George +Cannon's voice in public places such as the staircase had an almost +caressing softness. The Watchetts cooed like faint doves, thereby +expressing the delicate refinement of their virginal natures. The cook's +voice was unknown beyond the kitchen. And nobody was more grimly +self-controlled in speech than Sarah Gailey and Louisa. These two--and +especially Louisa--seemed generally to be restraining with ease +tremendous secret forces of bitterness and contempt. And now it was just +these two who were noisy, and becoming noisier, to the dismay of a +scandalized house. Owing to some accident or negligence the secret +forces had got loose. + +Hilda shook her head. It was clear that the problem of Sarah Gailey +would have to be tackled and settled very soon. The poor woman's +physical sufferings had without doubt reacted detrimentally on her +temperament and temper. She used to be quite extraordinarily adroit in +the directing of servants, though her manner to them never approached +geniality. But she had quarrelled with Florrie, and now she was breaking +the peace with Louisa! It was preposterous and annoying, and it could +not be allowed to continue. Hilda was not seriously alarmed, because she +had the most perfect confidence in George's skill to restore order and +calm, and to conquer every difficulty of management; and she also put a +certain trust in herself; but the menacing and vicious accents of Louisa +startled her, and she sympathized with Sarah Gailey, for whom +humiliation was assuredly in store--if not immediately at the tongue of +Louisa, then later when George would have to hint the truth to her about +her decadence. + +The dispute on the attic landing appeared to be concerning linen which +Louisa had omitted to remove from Florrie's abandoned couch in her +kennel. + +"I ain't going to touch her sheets, not for nobody!" Louisa proclaimed +savagely. And by that single phrase, with its implications, she laid +unconsciously bare the sordid baseness of her ageing heart; she exposed +by her mere intonation of the word 'sheets' all the foulness of jealousy +and thwarted salacity that was usually concealed beneath her tight dress +and neat apron, and beneath her prim gestures and deferential tones. Her +undisciplined voice rang spinsterishly down the staircase, outraging it, +defiling the whole interior. + +Hilda as silently as possible unlatched the door of the bedroom, and +stood with ear cocked. Should she issue forth and interfere, or should +she remain discreetly where she was? Almost in the same instant she +heard the cautious unlatching of the drawing-room door; two of the +Watchetts were there listening also. And there came up from the ground +floor a faint giggle. The cook, at the kitchen door, was enjoying +herself and giggling moral support to her colleague. The giggle proved +that the master was out, that the young mistress had not yet established +a definite position, and that during recent weeks the old mistress must +have been steadily dissipating her own authority. Hilda peered along the +landing from her lair, and upstairs and downstairs; she could see +nothing but senseless carpets and brass rods and steps and banisters; +but she knew that the entire household--she had the sensation that the +very house itself--was alert and eavesdropping. + +There was a hesitating movement on the unseen stairs above, and then +Hilda could see Sarah Gailey's felt slippers and the valance of her +skirt. And she could hear Sarah's emotional breathing. + +"Very well, Louisa, I've done!" Sarah's voice was quieter now. She was +trying to control it, and to a limited extent was controlling its +volume. It shook in spite of her. She spoke true. She had indeed done. +She was at the end of her resources. + +"I've been in houses," Louisa conqueringly sneered, "that I have! But I +never been in a house afore where one as ought to have been scullery- +girl went off with a boarder, and nothing said, and him the friend of +the master! And it isn't as if that was all!... Sheets, indeed!" + +"I've nothing further to say," Sarah returned unnecessarily, and +descended the stair. "I shall simply report to Mr. Cannon. We shall +see." + +"And what's this about _Mrs_. Cannon?" Louisa shouted, beside herself. + +The peculiarity of her tone arrested Sarah Gailey. Hilda flushed. The +Watchetts were listening. The Watchetts had not yet been told of the +marriage. The announcement was to be made to them formally, a little +later. And now it was Louisa who was making the announcement, brutally, +coarsely. The outrage of the episode was a hundredfold intensified; it +grew into an inconceivable ghastly horror. Hilda's self-respect seemed +to have a physical body and Louisa to be hacking at it with a jagged +knife. + +"Mr. Cannon has brought his wife home," said Sarah Gailey shortly, with +a dignity and courage that increased as her distance from the appalling, +the incredible Louisa. Hilda could see her pale face now. The eyebrows +and chin were lifted in scorn of the vile menial, but the poor head was +trembling. + +"And what about his other wife?" + +"Louisa!"--Sarah Gailey looked again up the stairs--"I know you're in a +temper and not responsible for what you say. But you'd better be +careful." She spoke with elaborate haughty negligence. + +"Had I?" Louisa shrilled. "What I say is, what about his other wife? +What about the old woman he married in Devonshire? Why, God bless me, +Florrie was full of it--couldn't talk about anything else in bed of a +night! Didn't you know the old woman'd been inquiring for her beautiful +'usband down your way?" She laughed loudly. "Turnhill--what's-its-name?... +And all of you lying low, and then making out all of a sudden as he's +brought his wife home! A nice house! And I've been in a few, too!" + +Hilda could feel her heart beating with terrific force against her +bodice, but she was conscious of no other sensation. She heard a loud +snort of shattering contempt from Louisa; and then a strange and +terrific silence fell on the stairs. There was no sound even of a +movement. The Watchetts did not stir; the cook did not stir; Sarah +Gailey did not stir; Louisa's fury was sated. The empty landing lay, as +it were, expectant at Hilda's door. + +Then Sarah Gailey perceived Hilda half hidden in the doorway, and +staggeringly rushed towards her. In an instant they were both in the +bedroom and the door shut. + +"When will George be back so that he can put her out of the house?" +Sarah whispered frantically. + +"Soon, I expect," said Hilda, and felt intensely self-conscious. + +They said no more. And it was as though the house were besieged and +invested, and only in that room were they safe, and even in that room +only for a few moments. + + + + +CHAPTER II +SOME SECRET HISTORY + + +I + +Without a word, Sarah had left the bedroom. Hilda waited, sitting on the +bed, for George to come back from his haunts in the town. She both +intensely desired and intensely feared his return. A phrase or two of an +angry and vicious servant had almost destroyed her faith in her husband. +It seemed very strange, even to her, that this should be so; and she +wondered whether she had ever had a real faith in him, whether--passion +apart--her feeling for him had ever been aught but admiration of his +impressive adroitness. Was it possible that he had another wife alive? +No, it was not possible! That is to say, it was not possible that such a +catastrophe should have happened to just her, to Hilda Lessways, sitting +there on the bed with her hands pressing on the rough surface of the +damask counterpane. And yet--how could Louisa or Florrie have invented +the story?... Wicked, shocking, incredible, that Florrie, with her soft +voice and timid, affectionate manner, should have been chattering in +secret so scandalously during all these weeks! She remembered the look +on Florrie's blushing face when the child had received the letter on the +morning of their departure from the house in Lessways Street. Even then +the attractively innocent and capable Florrie must have had her naughty +secrets!... An odious world. And Hilda, married, had seriously thought +that she knew all about the world! She had to admit, bewildered: "I'm +only a girl after all, and a very simple one." She compared her own +heart in its simplicity with that of Louisa. Louisa horrified and +frightened her.... Louisa and Florrie were mischievous liars. Florrie +had seized some fragment of silly gossip--Turnhill was notorious for its +silly gossip--and the two of them had embroidered it in the nastiness of +their souls. She laughed shortly, disdainfully, to wither up silly +gossip.... Preposterous! + +And yet--when George had shown her the licence, in the name of Cannon, +and she had ventured to say apologetically and caressingly: "I always +understood your real name was Canonges,"--how queerly he had looked as +he answered: "I changed it long ago--legally!" Yes, and she had +persuaded herself that the queerness of his look was only in her fancy! +But it was not only in her fancy. Suspicions, sinister trifling +souvenirs, crowded into her mind. Had she not always doubted him? Had +she not always said to herself that she was doing wrong in her marriage +and that she would thereby suffer? Had she not abandoned the pursuit of +religious truth in favour of light enjoyments?... Foolish of course, +old-fashioned of course, to put two and two together in this way! But +she could not refrain. + +"I am ruined!" she decided, in awe. + +And the next instant she was saying: "How absurd of me to be like this, +merely because Louisa..." + +She thought she heard a noise below. Her heart leapt again into violent +activity. Trembling, she crept to the door, and gently unlatched it. No +slightest sound in the whole house! Dusk was coming on swiftly. Then she +could hear all the noises, accentuated beyond custom, of Louisa setting +tea in the dining-room for the Watchetts, and then the tea-bell rang. +Despite her fury, apparent in the noises, Louisa had not found courage +to neglect the sacred boarders. She made a defiant fuss, but she had to +yield, intimidated, to the force of habit and tradition. The Watchetts +descended the staircase from the drawing-room, practising as usual +elaborate small-talk among themselves. They had heard every infamous +word of Louisa's tirade; which had engendered in them a truly dreadful +and still delicious emotion; but they descended the staircase in good +order, discussing the project for a new pier.... They reached the +dining-room and shut the door on themselves. + +Silence again! Louisa ought now to have set the tea in the basement +parlour. But Louisa did not. Louisa was hidden in the kitchen, doubtless +talking fourteen to the dozen with the cook. She had done all she meant +to do. She knew that she would be compelled to leave at once, and not +another stroke would she do of any kind! The master and the mistresses +must manage as best they could. Louisa was already wondering where she +would sleep that night, for she was alone on earth and owned one small +trunk and a Post Office Savings Bank book.... All this trouble on +account of Florrie's sheets! + +Sarah Gailey was in her bedroom, and did not dare to came out of it even +to accuse Louisa of neglecting the basement tea. And Hilda continued to +stand for ages at the bedroom door, while the dusk grew deeper and +deeper. At last the front door opened, and George's step was in the +hall. Hilda recognized it with a thrill of terror, turning pale. George +ran down into the basement and stumbled. "Hello!" she heard him call +out, "what about tea? Where are you all? Sarah!" No answer, no sound in +response! He ran up the basement steps. Would he call in at the +dining-room, or would he come to the bedroom in search of her? He did +not stop at the dining-room. Hilda wanted to shut the bedroom door, but +dared not because she could not do it noiselessly. Now he was on the +first floor! She rushed to the bed, and sat on it, as she had been +sitting previously, and waited in the most painful and irrational agony. +She was astonished at the darkness of the room. Turning her head, she +saw only a whitish blur instead of a face in the dressing-table mirror. + + +II + +"What's up?" he demanded, bursting somewhat urgently into the bedroom +with his hat on. "What price the husband coming home to his tea? No tea! +No light! I nearly broke my neck down the basement stairs." + +He put his hands against her elbows and kissed her, rather clumsily, +owing to the gloom, between her nose and her mouth. She did not shrink +back, but accepted the embrace quite insensibly. The contact of his +moustache and of his lips, and his slight, pleasant masculine odour, +produced no effect on her whatever. + +"Why are you sitting here? Look here, I've signed the transfer of those +Continental shares, and paid the cheque! So it's domino, now!" + +Between the engagement and the marriage there had been an opportunity of +purchasing three thousand pounds' worth of preference shares in the +Brighton Hotel Continental Limited, which hotel was the latest and +largest in the King's Road, a vast affair of eight storeys and bathrooms +on every floor. The chance of such an investment had fascinated George. +It helped his dreams and pointed to the time when he would be manager +and part proprietor of a palace like the Continental. Hilda being very +willing, he had sold her railways shares and purchased the hotel shares, +and he knew that he had done a good thing. Now he possessed an interest +in three different establishments, he who had scarcely been in Brighton +a year. The rapid progress, he felt, was characteristic of him. + +Hilda kept silence, for the sole reason that she could think of no words +to say. As for the matter of the investment, it appeared to her to be +inexpressibly uninteresting. From under the lashes of lowered eyes she +saw his form shadowily in front of her. + +"You don't mean to say Sarah's been making herself disagreeable +already!" he said. And his tone was affectionate and diplomatic, yet +faintly ironical. He had perceived that something unusual had occurred, +perhaps something serious, and he was anxious to soothe and to justify +his wife. Hilda perfectly understood his mood and intention, and she was +reassured. + +"Hasn't Sarah told you?" she asked in a harsh, uncontrolled voice, +though she knew that he had not seen Sarah. + +"No; where is she?" he inquired patiently. + +"It's Louisa," Hilda went on, with the sick fright of a child compelled +by intimidation to affront a danger. Her mouth was very dry. + +"Oh!" + +"She lost her temper and made a fearful scene with Sarah, on the stairs; +she said the most awful things." + +George laughed low, and lightly. He guessed Louisa's gift for foul +insolence and invective. + +"For instance?" George encouraged. He was divining from Hilda's singular +tone that tact would be needed. + +"Well, she said you'd got a wife living in Devonshire." + +There was a pause. + +"And who'd told her that?" + +"Florrie." + +"_In_deed!" muttered George. Hilda could not decide whether his voice +was natural or forced. + +Then he stepped across to the door, and opened it. + +"What are you going to do to her?" Hilda questioned, as it were +despairingly. + +He left the room and banged the door. + +"It's not true," Hilda was beginning to say to herself, but she seemed +to derive no pleasure from the dawning hope of George's innocence. + +Then George came into the room again, hesitated, and shut the door +carefully. + +"I suppose it's no good shilly-shallying about," he said, in such a tone +as he might have used had he been vexed and disgusted with Hilda. "I +have got a wife living, and she's in Devonshire! I expect she's been +inquiring in Turnhill if I'm still in the land of the living. Probably +wants to get married again herself." + +Hilda glanced at his form, and suddenly it was the form of a stranger, +but a stranger who had loved her. And she thought: "Why did I let this +stranger love me?" It was scarce believable that she had ever seriously +regarded him as a husband. And she found that tears were running down +her cheeks; and she felt all her girlishness and fragility. "Didn't I +always know," she asked herself with weak resignation, "that it was +unreal? What am I to do now?" The catastrophe had indeed happened to +her, and she could not deal with it! She did not even feel tragic. She +did not feel particularly resentful against George. She had read of such +catastrophes in the newspapers, but the reality of experience nonplussed +her. "I ought to do something," she reflected. "But what?" + +"What's the use of me saying I'm sorry?" he asked savagely. "I acted for +the best. The chances were ten thousand to one against me being spotted. +But there you are! You never know your luck." He spoke meditatively, in +a rather hoarse, indistinct voice. "All owing to Florrie, of course! +When it was suggested we should have that girl, I knew there was a +danger. But I pooh-poohed it! I said nothing could possibly happen.... +And just look at it now!... I wanted to cut myself clear of the Five +Towns, absolutely--absolutely! And then like a damnation fool I let +Florrie come here! If she hadn't come, that woman might have inquired +about me in Turnhill till all was blue, without you hearing about her! +But there it is!" He snapped his fingers. "It's my fault for being found +out! That's the only thing I'm guilty of.... And look at it! Look at +it!" + +Hilda could tell from the movements of the vague form in the corner by +the door, and by the quality of his voice, that George Cannon was in a +state of extreme emotion. She had never known him half so moved. His +emotion excited her and flattered her. She thought how wonderful it was +that she, the shaking little girl who yesterday had run off with +fourpence to buy a meal at a tripe-shop, should be the cause of this +emotion in such a man. She thought: "My life is marvellous." She was +dizzied by the conception of the capacity of her own body and soul for +experience. No factors save her own body and soul and his had been +necessary to the bringing about of the situation. It was essential only +that the man and the woman should be together, and their companionship +would produce miracles of experience! She ceased crying. Astounding that +she had never, in George's eyes, suspected his past! It was as if he had +swiftly opened a concealed door in the house of their passion and +disclosed a vista of which she had not dreamed. + +"But surely that must have been a long time ago!" she said in an +ordinary tone. + +"Considering that I was twenty-two--yes!" + +"Why did you leave her?" + +"Why did I leave her? Because I had to! I'd gone as a clerk in a +solicitor's office in Torquay, and she was a client. She went mad about +me. I'm only telling you. She was a spinster. Had one of those big +houses high up on the hill behind the town!" He stopped; and then his +voice began to come again out of the deep shadow in the corner. "She +wanted me, and she got me. And she didn't care who knew! The wedding was +in the _Torquay Directory_. I told her I'd got no relations, and she was +jolly glad." + +"But how old was she? Young?" + +George sneered. "She'd never see thirty-six again, the day she was +married. Good-looking. Well-dressed. Very stylish and all that! Carried +me off my feet. Of course there was the money.... I may as well out with +it all while I'm about it! She made me an absolute present of four +thousand pounds. Insisted on doing it. I never asked. Of course I know I +married for money. It happens to youths sometimes just as it does to +girls. It may be disgusting, but not more disgusting for one than for +the other. Besides, I didn't realize it was a sale and purchase, at the +time!... Oh! And it lasted about ten days. I couldn't stand it, so I +told her so and chucked it. She began an action for restitution of +conjugal rights, but she soon tired of that. She wouldn't have her four +thousand back. Simply wouldn't! She was a terror, but I'll say that for +her. Well, I kept it. Four thousand pounds is a lot of brass. That's how +I started business in Turnhill, if you want to know!" He spoke +defiantly. "You may depend I never let on in the Five Towns about my +beautiful marriage.... That's the tale. You've got to remember I was +twenty-two!" + +She thought of Edwin Clayhanger and Charlie Orgreave as being about +twenty-two, and tried in her imagination to endow the mature George +Cannon with their youth and their simplicity and their freshness. She +was saddened and overawed; not wrathful, not obsessed by a sense of +injury. + +Then she heard a sob in the corner, and then another. The moment was +terrible for her. She could only distinguish in the room the blur of a +man's shape against the light-coloured wall-paper, and the whiteness of +the counterpane, and the dark square of the window broken by the black +silhouette of the mirror. She slipped off the bed, and going in the +direction of the dressing-table groped for a match-box and lit the gas. +Dazzled by the glare of the gas, she turned to look at the corner where +stood George Cannon. + + +III + +The whole aspect of the room was now altered. The window was blacker +than anything else; light shone on the carved frame of the mirror and on +the vessels of the washstand; the trunks each threw a sharply defined +shadow; the bed was half in the shadow of its mahogany foot, and half a +glittering white; all the array of requisites on the dressing-table lay +stark under the close scrutiny of the gas; and high above the bed, +partly on the wall and partly on the ceiling, was a bright oblong +reflection from the upturned mirror. + +Hilda turned to George with a straightening of the shoulders, as if to +say: "It is I who have the courage to light the gas and face the +situation!" But when she saw him her challenging pride seemed to die +slowly away. Though there was no sign of a tear on his features, and +though it was difficult to believe that it was he who had just sobbed, +nevertheless, his figure was dismayingly tragic. Every feature was +distorted by agitation. He was absorbed in himself, shameless and +careless of appearances. He was no more concerned about appearances and +manly shame than a sufferer dying in torment. He was beyond all that--in +truth a new George Cannon! He left the corner, and sat down on the bed +in the hollow made by Hilda, and stared at the wall, his hands in the +pockets of his gay suit. His gestures as he moved, and his posture as he +sat, made their unconscious appeal to her in their abandonment. He was +caught; he was vanquished; he was despairing; but he instinctively, and +without any wish to do so, kept his dignity. He was still, in his +complete overthrow, the mature man of the world, the man to whom it was +impossible to be ridiculous. + +Hilda in a curious way grew proud of him. With an extraordinary +inconsequence she dwelt upon the fact that, always grand--even as a +caterer, he had caused to be printed at the foot of the menu forms which +he had instituted, the words: "A second helping of all or any of the +above dishes will willingly be served if so desired." And in the general +havoc of the shock she began to be proud also of herself, because it was +the mysterious power of her individuality that had originated the +disaster. The sense of their intimate withdrawn seclusion in the room, +disordered and littered by arrival, utterly alone save for the living +flame of the gas, the sense of the tragedy, and of the responsibility +for it, and especially her responsibility, the sense of an imposed +burden to be grimly borne and of an unknown destiny to be worked out, +the sense of pity, the sense of youth and force,--these things gradually +exalted her and ennobled her desolation. + +"Why did you keep it from me?" she asked in a very clear and precise +tone, not aggrieved, but fatalistic and melancholy. + +"Keep what from you?" At length he met her eyes, darkly. + +"All this about your being married." + +"Why did I keep it from you?" he repeated harshly, and then his tone +changed from defiance to a softened regret: "I'll tell you why I kept it +from you! Because I knew if I told you I should have no chance with a +girl like you. I knew it'd be all up--if I so much as breathed a hint of +it! I don't suppose you've the slightest idea how stand-offish you are!" + +"Me stand-offish!" she protested. + +"Look here!" he said persuasively. "Supposing I'd told you I wanted you, +and then that I'd got a wife living--what would you have said?" + +"I don't know." + +"No! But _I_ know! And suppose I'd told you I'd got a wife living and +then told you I wanted you--what then? No, Hilda! Nobody could fool +about with you!" + +She was flattered, but she thought secretly: "He could have won me on +any terms he liked!... I wonder whether he _could_ have won me on any +terms!... That first night in this house, when we were in the front +attic--suppose he'd told me then--I wonder! What should I have said?" +But the severity of her countenance was a perfect mask for such weak and +uncertain ideas, and confirmed him deeply in his estimate of her. + +He continued: + +"Now that first night in this house, upstairs!" He jerked his head +towards the ceiling. She blushed, not from any shame, but because his +thought had surprised hers. "I was as near as dammit to letting out the +whole thing and chancing it with you. But I didn't--I saw it'd be no +use. And that's not the only time either!" + +She stood silent by the dressing-table, calmly looking at him, and she +asked herself, eagerly curious: "When were the other times?" + +"Of course it's all my fault!" he said. + +"What is?" + +"This!... All my fault! I don't want to excuse myself. I've nothing to +say for myself." + +In her mind she secretly interrupted him: "Yes, you have. You couldn't +do without me--isn't that enough?" + +"I'm ashamed!" he said, without reserve, abasing himself. "I'm utterly +ashamed. I'd give anything to be able to undo it." + +She was startled and offended. She had not expected that he would kiss +the dust. She hated to see him thus. She thought: "It isn't all your +fault. It's just as much mine as yours. But even if I was ashamed I'd +never confess it. Never would I grovel! And never would I want to undo +anything! After all you took the chances. You did what you thought best. +Why be ashamed when things go wrong? You wouldn't have been ashamed if +things had gone right." + +"Of course," he said, after a pause, "I'm completely done for!" + +He spoke so solemnly, and with such intense conviction, that she was +awed and appalled. She felt as one who, having alone escaped destruction +in an earthquake, stands afar off and contemplates the silent, corpse- +strewn ruin of a vast city. + +And the thought ran through her mind like a squirrel through a tree: +"How _could_ he refuse her four thousand pounds? And if she wouldn't +have it back,--well, what was he to do? She must be a horrible woman!" + + +IV + +Both of them heard a heavy step pass up the staircase. It was Louisa's; +she paused to strike a match and light the gas on the landing; and went +on. But Sarah Gailey had given no sign, and the Watchetts were still +shut in the dining-room. All these middle-aged women were preoccupied by +the affair of George Cannon. All of them guessed now that Louisa's +charge was not unfounded--otherwise, why the mysterious and interminable +interview between George Cannon and Hilda in the bedroom? Hilda pictured +them all. And she thought: "But it is _I_ who am in the bedroom with +him! It is I who am living through it and facing it out! They are all +far older than me, but they are outsiders. They don't know what life +is!" + +George rose, picked up a portmanteau, and threw it open on the bed. + +"And what is to be done?" Hilda asked, trembling. + +He turned and looked at her. + +"I suppose I mustn't stay here?" + +She shook her head, with lips pressed tight. + +His voice was thick and obscure when he asked: "You won't come with me?" + +She shook her head again. She could not have spoken. She was in acute +torture. + +"Well," he said, "I suppose I can count on you not to give me up to the +police?" + +"The police?" she exclaimed. "Why?" + +"Well, you know,--it's a three years' job--at least. Ever heard the word +'bigamy'?" His voice was slightly ironical. + +"Oh dear!" she breathed, already disconcerted. It had positively not +occurred to her to consider the legal aspect of George's conduct. + +"But what can you do?" she asked, with the innocent, ignorant +helplessness of a girl. + +"I can disappear," he replied. "That's all I can do! I don't see myself +in prison. I went over Stafford Prison once. The Governor showed several +of us over. And I don't see myself in prison." + +He began to cast things into the portmanteau, and as he did so he +proceeded, without a single glance at Hilda: + +"You'll be all right for money and so on. But I should advise you to +leave here and not to come back any sooner than you can help. That's the +best thing you can do. And be Hilda Lessways again!... Sarah will have +to manage this place as best she can. Fortunately, her health's +improved. She can make it pay very well if she likes. It's a handsome +living for her. My deposit on the Chichester and so on will have to be +forfeited." + +"And you?" she murmured. + +His back was towards her. He turned his head, looked at her +enigmatically for an instant, and resumed his packing. + +She desired to help him with the packing, she desired to show him some +tenderness; her heart was cleft in two with pity; but she could not +move; some harshness of pride or vanity prevented her from moving. + +When he had carelessly finished the portmanteau, he strode to the door, +opened it wide, and called out in a loud, firm voice: + +"Louisa!" + +A reply came weakly from the top floor: + +"Yes, sir." + +"I want you." He had a short way with Louisa. + +After a brief delay, she came to the bedroom door. + +"Run down to the King's Road and get me a cab," he said to her at the +door, as it were confidentially. + +"Yes, sir." The woman was like a Christian slave. + +"Here! Take the portmanteau down with you to the front door." He gave +her the portmanteau. + +"Yes, sir." + +She disappeared; and then there was the noise of the front door opening. + +George picked up his hat and abruptly left the room. Hilda moved to and +fro nervously, stiff with having stood still so long. She wondered how +he, and how she, would comport themselves in the ordeal of adieu. In a +few moments a cab drove up--Louisa had probably encountered it on the +way. Hilda waited, tense. Then she heard the cab driving off again. She +rushed aghast to the window. She saw the roof of the disappearing cab, +and the unwieldy portmanteau on it.... He had gone! He had gone without +saying good-bye! That was his device for simplifying the situation. It +was drastic, but it was magnificent. He had gone out of the house and +out of her life. As she gazed at the dim swaying roof of the cab, +magically the roof was taken off, and she could see the ravaged and +stricken figure within, sitting grimly in the dark between the wheels +that rolled him away from her. The vision was intolerable. She moved +aside and wept passionately. How could he help doing all he had done? +She had possessed him--the memories of his embrace told her how utterly! +All that he had said was true; and this being so, who could blame his +conduct? He had only risked and lost. + +Sarah Gailey suddenly appeared in the room, and shut the door like a +conspirator. + +"Then--" she began, terror-struck. + +And Hilda nodded, ceasing to cry. + +"Oh! My poor dear!" Sarah Gailey moaned feebly, her head bobbing with +its unconscious nervous movements. The sight of her worn, saddened +features sharpened Hilda's appreciation of her own girlishness and +inexperience. + +But despite the shock, despite her extreme misery, despite the anguish +and fear in her heart and the immense difficulty of the new situation +into which she was thus violently thrust, Hilda was not without +consolation. She felt none of the shame conventionally proper to a girl +deceived. On the contrary, deep within herself, she knew that the +catastrophe was a deliverance. She knew that fate had favoured her by +absolving her from the consequences of a tragic weakness and error. +These thoughts inflamed and rendered more beautiful the apprehensive +pity for the real victim--now affronted by a new danger, the menace of +the law. + + * * * * * + + + + +BOOK VI +HER PUNISHMENT + + + + +CHAPTER I +EVENING AT BLEAKRIDGE + + +I + +When Hilda's cab turned, perilously swaying, through the gate into the +dark garden of the Orgreaves, Hilda saw another cab already at the open +house door, and in the lighted porch stood figures distinguishable as +Janet and Alicia, all enwrapped for a journey, and Martha holding more +wraps. The long facade of the house was black, save for one window on +the first floor, which threw a faint radiance on the leafless branches +of elms, and thus intensified the upper mysteries of the nocturnal +garden. The arrival of the second cab caused excitement in the porch; +and Hilda, leaning out of the window into the November mist, shook with +apprehension, as her vehicle came to a halt behind the other one. She +was now to meet friends for the first time after her secret and unhappy +adventure. She feared that Janet, by some magic insight of affection, +would read at once in her face the whole history of the past year. + +Janet had written to her, giving and asking for news, and urging a +visit, on the very day after the scene in which George Cannon admitted +his turpitude. Had the letter been sent a day or two sooner, reaching +Hilda on her honeymoon, she would certainly have replied to it with the +tremendous news of her marriage, and, her marriage, having been made +public in the Five Towns, her shame also would necessarily be public. +But chance had saved her from this humiliation. Nobody in the district +was aware of the marriage. By a characteristic instinct, she had been +determined not to announce it in any way until the honeymoon was over. +In answer to Janet, she had written very briefly, as was usual with her, +and said that she would come to Lane End House as soon as she could. +"Shall I tell her, or shan't I?" she had cogitated, and the decision had +been for postponement. But she strongly desired, nevertheless, to pay +the visit. She had had more than enough of Preston Street and of +Brighton, and longed to leave at any price. + +And, at length, one dull morning, after George Cannon had sailed for +America, and all affairs were somehow arranged or had arranged +themselves, and Sarah Gailey was better and the autumn season smoothly +running with new servants, she had suddenly said to Sarah: "I have to go +to Bursley to-day, for a few days." And she had gone, upon the impulse, +without having previously warned Janet. Changing at Knype, she had got +into the wrong train, and had found herself at Shawport, at the far, +lower end of Bursley, instead of up at Bleakridge, close by the +Orgreaves! And there was, of course, no cab for her. But a cabman who +had brought a fare to the station, and was driving his young woman back, +had offered in a friendly way to take Hilda too. And she had sat in the +cab with the young woman, who was a paintress at Peel's great +manufactory at Shawport, and suffered from a weak chest; and they had +talked about the potters' strike which was then upheaving the district, +and the cab had overtaken a procession of thinly clad potters, wending +in the bitter mist to a mass meeting at Hanbridge; and Hilda had been +thereby much impressed and angered against all employers. And the young +woman had left the cab, half-way up Trafalgar Road, with a delicious +pink-and-white smile of adieu. And Hilda had thought how different all +this was from Brighton, and how much better and more homely and +understandable. And now she was in the garden of the Orgreaves. + +Martha came peeping, to discover the explanation of this singular +concourse of cabs in the garden, and she cried joyously: + +"Oh, Miss Janet, it's Miss Hilda--Miss Lessways, I mean!" + +Alicia shrieked. The first cab drew forward to make room for Hilda's, +and Hilda stepped down into the glare of the porch, and was plainly +beheld by all three girls. + +"Will they notice anything?" she asked herself, self-conscious, almost +trembling, as she thought of the terrific changes that had passed in her +since her previous visit. + +But nobody noticed anything. Nobody observed that this was not the same +Hilda. Even in the intimacy of the affectionate kiss, for which she +lifted her veil, Janet seemed to have no suspicion whatever. + +"We were just off to Hillport," said Janet. "How splendid of you to come +like this!" + +"Don't let's go to Hillport!" said Alicia. + +Janet hesitated, pulling down her veil. + +"Of course you must go!" Hilda said positively. + +"I'm afraid we shall have to go," said Janet, with reluctance. "You see, +it's the Marrions--Edie's cousins--and Edie will be there!" + +"Who's Edie?" + +"Why! Tom's fiancee! Surely I told you!" + +"Yes," said Hilda; "only I didn't just remember the name. How nice!" + +(She thought: "No sooner do I get here than I talk like they do! Fancy +me saying, 'How nice'!") + +"Oh, it's all Edie nowadays!" said Alicia lightly. "We have to be +frightfully particular, or else Tom would cut our heads off. That's why +we're going in a cab! We should have walked,--shouldn't we, Janet?--only +it would never do for us to _walk_ to the Marrions' at night! 'The +Misses Lessways' carriage!'" she mimicked, and finicked about on her +toes. + +Janet was precisely the same as ever, but the pig-tailed Alicia had +developed. Her childishness was now shot through with gestures and tones +of the young girl. She flushed and paled continuously, and was acutely +self-conscious and somewhat vain, but not offensively vain. + +"I say, Jan," she exclaimed, "why shouldn't Hilda come with us?" + +"To the Marrions'? Oh no, thanks!" said Hilda. + +"But do, Hilda! I'm sure they'd be delighted!" Janet urged. "I never +thought of it." + +Though she was flattered and, indeed, a little startled by the +extraordinary seriousness of Janet's insistence, Hilda shook her head. + +"Where's Tom?" she inquired, to change the subject. + +"Oh!" Alicia burst out again. "He's gone off _hours_ ago to escort his +ladylove from Hanbridge to Hillport." + +"You wait till you're engaged, Alicia!" Janet suggested. But Janet's +eyes, too, twinkled the admission that Tom was just then providing much +innocent amusement to the family. + +"You'll sleep in my room to-night, anyhow, dear," said Janet, when +Martha and Hilda's cabman had brought a trunk into the hall, and Hilda +had paid the cabman far more than his fare because he was such a +friendly young cabman and because he possessed a pulmonary sweetheart. +"Come along, dear!... Alicia, ask Swindells to wait a minute or two." + +"Swindells," Alicia shouted to the original cabman, "just wait a jiff!" + +"Yes, miss." The original cabman, being old and accustomed to evening- +party work in the Five Towns, knew the length of a jiff, and got down +from his seat to exercise both arms and legs. With sardonic pleasure he +watched the young cabman cut a black streak in the sodden lawn with his +near front-wheel as he clumsily turned to leave. Then Martha banged the +front door, and another servant appeared in the hall to help the trunk +on its way upstairs. + +"No! I shall never be able to tell them!" thought Hilda, following the +trunk. + +Alicia had scampered on in front of the trunk, to inform her parents of +the arrival. Mrs. Orgreave, Hilda learnt, was laid up with an attack of +asthma, and Osmond Orgreave was working in their bedroom. + + +II + +Hilda stood in front of the fire in Janet's bedroom, and Janet was +unlocking her trunk. + +"Why! What a pretty bodice!" said Janet, opening the trunk. She stood +up, and held forth the bodice to inspect it; and beneath Janet's cloak +Hilda could see the splendour of her evening dress. "Where did you get +it?" + +"In London," Hilda was about to answer, but she took thought. "Oh! +Brighton." It was a lie. + +She had a longing to say: + +"No, not Brighton! What am I thinking of? I got it in London on my +honeymoon!" + +What a unique sensation that one word would have caused! But she could +not find courage to utter it. + +Alicia came importantly in. + +"Mother's love, and you are to go into her room as soon as you're ready. +Martha will bring up a tray for you, and you'll eat there by the fire. +It's all arranged." + +"And what about father's love?" Hilda demanded, with a sprightliness +that astonished herself. And she thought: "Why are these people so fond +of me? They don't even ask how it was I didn't write to tell them I was +coming. They just accept me and welcome me without questions.... No! I +can never tell them! It simply couldn't be told, here! If they find out, +so much the worse!" + +"You must ask him!" Alicia answered, blushing. + +"All right, Alicia. We'll be ready in a minute or two," said Janet in a +peculiar voice. + +It was a gentle command to Alicia to leave her elders alone to their +adult confidences. And unwilling Alicia had to obey. + +But there were no confidences. The talk, as it were, shivered on the +brink of a confidence, but never plunged. + +"Does she guess?" Hilda reflected. + +The conversation so halted that at length Janet was driven to the +banality of saying: + +"I'm so sorry we have to go out!" + +And Hilda protested with equal banality, and added: "I suppose you're +going out a lot just now?" + +"Oh no!" said Janet. "We go out less and less, and we get quieter and +quieter. I mean _us_. The boys are always out, you know." She seemed +saddened. "I did think Edwin Clayhanger would come in sometimes, now +they're living next door--" + +"They're in their new house, then!" said Hilda, with casualness. + +"Oh, long ago! And I'm sure it's ages since he was here. I like +Maggie--his sister." + +Hilda knelt to her trunk. + +"Did he ever inquire after me?" she demanded, with an air of archness, +but hiding her face. + +"As a matter of fact he _did_--once," said Janet, imitating Hilda's +manner. + +"Well, that's something," said Hilda. + +There was a sharp knock at the door. + +"Hot water, miss!" cried the voice of Martha. + +The next instant Martha was arranging the ewer and the can and some +clean towels on the washstand. Her face was full of joy in the +unexpected arrival. She was as excited as if Hilda had been her own +friend instead of Janet's. + +"Well, dear, shall you be all right now?" said Janet. "Perhaps I ought +to be going. You may depend on it I shall get back as early as ever I +can." + +The two girls kissed, with even more freedom than in the hall. It seemed +astonishing to Hilda, as her face was close to Janet's, that Janet did +not exclaim: "Something has happened to you. What is it? You are not as +you used to be! You are not like me!" She felt herself an imposter. + +"Why should I tell?" Hilda reflected. "What end will it serve? It's +nobody's business but mine. _He_ is gone. He'll never come back. +Everything's over.... And if it does get about, well, they'll only +praise me for my discretion. They can't do anything else." + +Still, she longed timorously to confide in Janet. And when Janet had +departed she breathed relief because the danger of confiding in Janet +was withdrawn for the moment. + + +III + +Later, as the invalid had ordained, Hilda, having eaten, sat by the fire +in the large, quiet bedroom of Mr. and Mrs. Orgreave. The latter was +enjoying a period of ease, and lay, with head raised very high on +pillows, in her own half of the broad bed. The quilt extended over her +without a crease in its expanse; the sheet was turned down with +precision, making a level white border to the quilt; and Mrs. Orgreave +did not stir; not one of her grey locks stirred; she spoke occasionally +in a low voice. On the night-table stood a Godfrey's Chloride of Ammonia +Inhaler, with its glass cylinder and triple arrangement of tubes. There +was only this, and the dark lips and pale cheeks of the patient, to +remind the beholder that not long since the bed had been a scene of +agony. Mr. Orgreave, in bright carpet slippers, and elegant wristbands +blossoming out of the sleeves of his black house-jacket, stood bending +above a huge board that was laid horizontally on trestles to the left of +the fireplace. This board was covered by a wide length of bluish +transparent paper which at intervals he pulled towards him, making +billows of paper at his feet and gradually lessening a roll of it that +lay on the floor beyond the table. A specially arranged gas-bracket with +a green shade which threw a powerful light on the paper showed that +Osmond Orgreave's habit was to work in that spot of an evening. + +"Astonishing I have to do this myself, isn't it?" he observed, stooping +to roll up the accumulated length of paper about his feet. + +"What is it?" Hilda asked. + +"It's a full-sized detail drawing. Simple!... But do you suppose I could +trust either of my ingenious sons to get the curves of the mouldings +right?" + +"You'll never be able to trust them unless you begin to trust them," +said Mrs. Orgreave sagely from the bed. + +"Ha!" ejaculated Osmond Orgreave satirically. This remark was one of his +most effective counters to argument. + +"The fact is he thoroughly enjoys it, doesn't he, Mrs. Orgreave?" said +Hilda. + +"You're quite right, my dear," said Mrs. Orgreave. + +"Ah!" from Mr. Orgreave. + +He sketched with a pencil and rubbed out, vigorously. Then his eye +caught Hilda's, and they both smiled, very content. "They'd look nice if +I took to drink instead of to work, for a change!" he murmured, pausing +to caress his handsome hair. + +There was a sharp knock at the door, and into this room also the +watchful Martha entered. + +"Here's the _Signal_, sir. The boy's only just brought it." + +"Give it to Miss Hilda," said Mr. Orgreave, without glancing up. + +"Shall I take the tray away, 'm?" Martha inquired, looking towards the +bed, the supreme centre of domestic order and authority. + +"Perhaps Miss Hilda hasn't finished?" + +"Oh yes, I have, thanks." + +Martha rearranged the vessels and cutlery upon the tray, with quick, +expert movements of the wrists. Her gaze was carefully fixed on the +tray. Endowed though she was with rare privileges, as a faithful +retainer, she would have been shocked and shamed had her gaze, +improperly wandering, encountered the gaze of the master or the guest. +Then she picked up the tray, and, pushing the small table into its +accustomed place with a deft twist of the foot, she sailed erect and +prim out of the room, and the door primly clicked on her neat-girded +waist and flying white ribbons. + +"And what am I to do with this _Signal_" Hilda asked, fingering the +white, damp paper. + +"I should like you to read us about the strike," said Mrs. Orgreave. +"It's a dreadful thing." + +"I should thing it was!" Hilda agreed fervently. "Oh! Do you know, on +the way from Shawport, I saw a procession of the men, and anything more +terrible--" + +"It's the children I think of!" said Mrs. Orgreave softly. + +"Pity the men don't!" Mr. Orgreave murmured, without raising his head. + +"Don't what?" Hilda asked defiantly. + +"Think of the children." + +Bridling, but silent, Hilda opened the sheet, and searched round and +about its columns with the embarrassed bewilderment of one unaccustomed +to the perusal of newspapers. + +"Look on page three--first column," said Mr. Orgreave. + +"That's all about racing," said Hilda. + +"Oh dear, dear!" from the bed. + +"Well, second column." + +"The Potters' Strike. The men's leaders," she read the headlines. "There +isn't much of it." + +"How beautifully clearly you read!" said Mrs. Orgreave, with mild +enthusiasm, when Hilda had read the meagre half-column. + +"Do I?" Hilda flushed. + +"Is that all there is about it?" + +"Yes. They don't seem to think it's very important that half the people +are starving!" Hilda sneered. + +"Whose fault is it if they do starve?" Osmond Orgreave glanced at her +with lowered head. + +"I think it's a shame!" she exclaimed. + +"Do you know that the men broke the last award, not so very long since?" +said Osmond Orgreave. "What can you do with such people?" + +"Broke the last award?" She was checked. + +"Broke the last award! Wouldn't stick by their own agreement, their own +words. I'll just tell you. A wise young woman like you oughtn't to be +carried away by the sight of a procession on a cold night." + +He smiled; and she smiled, but awkwardly. + +And then he told her something of the case for the employers. + +"How hard you are on the men!" she protested, when he had done. + +"Not at all! Not at all!" He stretched himself, and came round his +trestles to poke the fire. "You should hear Mr. Clayhanger on the men, +if you want to know what hard is." + +"Mr. Clayhanger? You mean old Mr. Clayhanger?" + +"Yes." + +"But he isn't a manufacturer." + +"No. But he's an employer of labour." + +Hilda rose uneasily from her chair, and walked towards the distant, +shadowed dressing-table. + +"I should like to go over a printing-works," she said abruptly. + +"Very easy," said Mr. Orgreave, resuming his work with a great expulsion +of breath. + +Hilda thought: "Why did I say that?" And, to cover her constraint, she +cried out: "Oh, what a lovely book!" + +A small book, bound in full purple calf, lay half hidden in a nest of +fine tissue paper on the dressing-table. + +"Yes, isn't it?" said Mrs. Orgreave. "Tom brought it in to show me, +before he went this afternoon. It's a birthday present for Edie. He's +had it specially bound. I must write myself, and ask Edie to come over +and meet you. I'm sure you'd like her. She's a dear girl. I think Tom's +very fortunate." + +"No, you don't," Osmond Orgreave contradicted her, with a great rustling +of paper. "You think Edie's very fortunate." + +Hilda looked round, and caught the architect's smile. + +"I think they're both fortunate," said Mrs. Orgreave simply. She had +almost no sense of humour. "I'm sure she's a real good girl, and clever +too." + +"Clever enough to get on the right side of her future mother-in-law, +anyway!" growled Mr. Orgreave. + +"Anyone might think Osmond didn't like the girl," said Mrs. Orgreave, +"from the way he talks. And yet he adores her! And it's no use him +pretending he doesn't!" + +"I only adore you!" said Osmond. + +"You needn't try to turn it off!" his wife murmured, beaming on Hilda. + +Tears came strangely into Hilda's eyes, and she turned again to the +dressing-table. And through a blur, she saw all the objects ranged in a +long row on the white cloth that covered the rosewood; and she thought: +"All this is beautiful." And she saw the pale blinds drawn down behind +the dressing-table, and the valance at the top, and the draped curtains; +and herself darkly in the glass. And she could feel the vista of the +large, calm, comfortable room behind her, and could hear the coals +falling together in the grate, and the rustling of the architect's +paper, and Mrs. Orgreave's slight cough. And, in her mind, she could see +all the other rooms in the spacious house, and the dim, misted garden +beyond. She thought: "All this house is beautiful. It is the most +beautiful thing I have ever known, or ever shall know. I'm happy here!" +And then her imagination followed each of the children. She imagined +Marian, the eldest, and her babies, in London; and Charlie, also in +London, practising medicine; and Tom and Janet and Alicia at the party +at Hillport; and Jimmie and Johnnie seeing life at Hanbridge; while the +parents remained in tranquillity in their bedroom. All these visions +were beautiful; even the vision of Jimmie and Johnnie flourishing +billiard-cues and glasses and pipes in the smoky atmosphere of a +club--even this was beautiful; it was as simply touching as the other +visions.... And she was at home with the parents, and so extremely +intimate with them that she could nearly conceive herself a genuine +member of the house. She was in bliss. Her immediate past dropped away +from her like an illusion, and she became almost the old Hilda: she was +almost born again into innocence. Only the tragic figure of George +Cannon hung vague in the far distance of memory, and the sight thereof +constricted her heart. Utterly her passion for him had expired: she was +exquisitely sad for him; she felt towards him kindly and guiltily, as +one feels towards an old error.... And, withal, the spell of the home of +the Orgreaves took away his reality. + +She was fingering the book. Its title-page ran: _The English Poems of +Richard Crashaw_. Now she had never even heard of Richard Crashaw, and +she wondered who he might be. Turning the pages, she read: + + All thy old woes shall now smile on thee, + And thy pains sit bright upon thee, + All thy sorrows here shall shine, + All thy sufferings be divine: + Tears shall take comfort, and turn gems, + And wrongs repent to diadems. + +And she read again, as though the words had been too lovely to be real, +and she must assure herself of them: + + Tears shall take comfort, and turn gems, + And wrongs repent to diadems. + +She turned back to the beginning of the poem, and read the title of it: +"A Hymn, to the name and honour of the admirable Saint Teresa--Foundress +of the Reformation of the discalced Carmelites, both men and women: a +woman for angelical height of speculation, for masculine courage of +performance more than a woman: who yet a child outran maturity, and +durst plot a martyrdom." + +The prose thrilled her even more intimately than the verse. She cried +within herself: "Why have I never heard of Richard Crashaw? Why did Tom +never tell me?" She became upon the instant a devotee of this Saint +Teresa. She thought inconsequently, with a pang that was also a +reassurance: "George Cannon would never have understood this. But +everyone here understands it." And with hands enfevered, she turned the +pages again, and, after several disappointments, read: + + Oh, thou undaunted daughter of desires! + By all thy dower of lights and fires; + By all the eagle in thee, all the dove: + By all thy lives and deaths of love: + By thy large draughts of intellectual day; + And by thy thirsts of love more large than they: + By all thy brim-filled bowls of fierce desire, + By this last morning's draught of liquid fire: + By the full kingdom of that final kiss---- + +She ceased to read. It was as if her soul was crying out: "I also am +Teresa. This is I! This is I!" + +And then the door opened, and Martha appeared once more: + +"If you please, sir, Mr. Edwin Clayhanger's called." + +"Oh... well, I'm nearly finished. Where is he?" + +"In the breakfast-room, sir." + +"Well, tell him I'll be down in a minute." + +"Hilda," said Mrs. Orgreave, "will _you_ mind going and telling him?" + +Hilda had replaced the book in its nest, and gone quickly back to her +chair. The entrance of the servant at that moment, to announce Edwin +Clayhanger, seemed to her startlingly dramatic. "What," she thought, "I +am just reading that and he comes!... He hasn't been here for ages, and, +on the very night that I come, he comes!" + +"Certainly," she replied to Mrs. Orgreave. And she thought: "This is the +second time she has sent me with a message to Edwin Clayhanger." + +Suddenly, she blushed in confusion before the mistress of the home. "Is +it possible," she asked herself,--"is it possible that Mrs. Orgreave +doesn't guess what has happened to me? Is it possible she can't see that +I'm different from what I used to be? If she knew... if they knew... +here!" + +She left the room like a criminal. When she was going down the stairs, +she discovered that she held the _Signal_ in her hand. She had no +recollection of picking it up, and there was no object in taking it to +the breakfast-room! She thought: "What a state I must be in!" + + + + +CHAPTER II +A RENDEZVOUS + + +I + +"I suppose you've never thought about me once since I've left!" + +She was sitting on the sofa in the small, shelved breakfast-room, and +she shot these words at Edwin Clayhanger, who was standing near her. The +singular words were certainly uttered out of bravado: they were a +challenge to adventure. She thought: "It is madness for me to say such a +thing." But such a thing had, nevertheless, come quite glibly out of her +mouth, and she knew not why. If Edwin Clayhanger was startled, so was +she startled. + +"Oh yes, I have!" he stammered--of course, she had put him out of +countenance. + +She smiled, and said persuasively: "But you've never inquired after me." + +"Yes, I have," he answered, with a hint of defiance, after a pause. + +"Only once." She continued to smile. + +"How do you know?" he demanded. + +Then she told him very calmly, extinguishing the smile, that her source +of information was Janet. + +"That's nothing to go by!" he exclaimed, with sudden roughness. "That's +nothing to go by--the number of _times_ I've inquired!" + + +II + +She was silenced. She thought: "If I am thus intimate with him, it must +be because of the talk we had in the garden that night." And it seemed +to her that the scene in the garden had somehow bound them together for +ever in intimacy, that, even if they pretended to be only acquaintances, +they would constantly be breaking through the thin shell of formality +into some unguessed deep of intimacy. She regarded--surreptitiously--his +face, with a keen sense of pleasure. It was romantic, melancholy, +wistful, enigmatic--and, above all, honest. She knew that he had desired +to be an architect, and that his father had thwarted his desire, and +this fact endowed him for her with the charm of a victim. The idea that +all his life had been embittered and shadowed by the caprice of an old +man was beautiful to her in its sadness: she contemplated it with vague +bliss. At their last meeting, during the Sunday School Centenary, he had +annoyed her; he had even drawn her disdain, by his lack of initiative +and male force in the incident of the senile Sunday School teacher. He +had profoundly disappointed her. Now, she simply forgot this; the +sinister impression vanished from her mind. She recalled her first +vision of him in the lighted doorway of his father's shop. Her present +vision confirmed that sympathetic vision. She liked the feel of his +faithful hand, and the glance of his timid and yet bellicose eye. And +she reposed on his very apparent honesty as on a bed. She knew, with the +assurance of perfect faith, that he had nothing dubious to conceal, and +that no test could strain his magnanimity. And, while she so reflected, +she was thinking, too, of Janet's fine dress, and her elegance and +jewels, and wishing that she had changed the old black frock in which +she travelled. The perception that she could never be like Janet cast +her down. But, the next moment, she was saying to herself proudly: "What +does it matter? Why should I be like Janet?" And, the next moment after +that, she was saying, in another phase of her pride: "I _will_ be like +Janet!" + +They began to discuss the strike. It was a topic which, during those +weeks, could not be avoided, either by the rich or by the poor. + +"I suppose you're like all the rest--against the men?" she challenged +him again, inviting battle. + +He replied bluntly: "What earthly right have you to suppose that I'm +like all the rest?" + +She bent her head lower, so that she could only see him through the veil +of her eyelashes. + +"I'm very sorry," she said, in a low, smiling, meditative voice. "I knew +all the time you weren't." + +The thought shot through her mind like a lance: "It is incredible, and +horribly dangerous, that I should be sitting here with him, after all +that has happened to me, and him without the slightest suspicion!... And +yet what can stop it from coming out, sooner or later? Nothing can stop +it." + +Edwin Clayhanger continued to talk of the strike, and she heard him +saying: "If you ask me, I'll tell you what I think--workmen on strike +are always in the right... you've only got to look at them in a crowd +together. They don't starve themselves for fun." + +What he said thrilled her. There was nothing in it, but there was +everything in it. His generosity towards the oppressed was everything to +her. His whole attitude was utterly and mysteriously different from that +of any other man whom she had known.... And with that simple, wistful +expression of his! + +They went on talking, and then, following in secret the train of her own +thoughts, she suddenly burst out: + +"I never met anybody like you before." A pause ensued. "No, never!" she +added, with intense conviction. + +"I might say the same of you," he replied, moved. + +"Oh no! I'm nothing!" she breathed. + +She glanced up, exquisitely flattered. His face was crimson. Exquisite +moment, in the familiarity of the breakfast-room, by the fire, she on +the sofa, with him standing over her, a delicious peril. The crimson +slowly paled. + + +III + +Osmond Orgreave entered the room, quizzical, and at once began to tease +Clayhanger about the infrequency of his visits. + +Turning to Hilda, he said: "He scarcely ever comes to see us, except +when you're here." It was just as if he had said: "I heard every word +you spoke before I came in, and I have read your hearts." Both Hilda and +Clayhanger were disconcerted--Clayhanger extremely so. + +"Steady on!" he protested uncouthly. And then, with the most naive +ingenuousness: "Mrs. Orgreave better?" + +But Osmond Orgreave was not in a merciful mood. A moment later he was +saying: + +"Has she told you she wants to go over a printing-works?" + +"No," Clayhanger answered, with interest. "But I shall be very pleased +to show her over ours, any time." + +Hilda struck into silence, made no response, and instantly Clayhanger +finished, in another tone: "Look here, I must be off. I only slipped in +for a minute--really." + +And he went, declining Mr. Orgreave's request to give a date for his +next call. The bang of the front door resounded through the house. + +Mr. Orgreave, having taken Clayhanger to the front door, did not return +immediately into the breakfast-room. Hilda jumped up from the sofa, +hesitant. She was disappointed; she was even resentful; assuredly she +was humiliated. "Oh no!" she thought. "He's weak and afraid.... I dare +say he went off because Janet wasn't here." She heard through the +half-open door Mr. Orgreave's slippers on the tiles of the passage +leading to the stairs. + +Martha came into the room with a delighted, curious smile. + +"If you please, miss, could you come into the hall a minute?... Some one +to speak to you." + +Hilda blushed silently, and obeyed. Clayhanger was standing in the chill +hall, hat in hand. Her heart jumped. + +"When will you come to look over our works?" he muttered rapidly and +very nervously, and yet with a dictatorial gruffness. "To-morrow? I +should like you to come." + +He had put an enchantment upon her by this marvellous return. And to +conceal from him what he had done, she frowned and kept silent. + +"What time?" she asked suddenly. + +"Any time." His eagerness was thrilling. + +"Oh no! You must fix the time." + +"Say between half-past six and a quarter to seven. That do?" + +She nodded. Their hands met. He said adieu. He pulled open the heavy +door. She saw his back for an instant against the pale gloom of the +garden, in which vapour was curling. And then she had shut the door, and +was standing alone in the confined hall. A miracle had occurred, and it +intimidated her. And, amid her wondrous fears, she was steeped in the +unique sense of adventure. "This morning I was in Brighton," she +thought. "Half an hour ago I had no notion of seeing him. And now!... +And to-morrow?" The tragic sequel to one adventure had not impaired her +instinct for experience. On the contrary, it had strengthened it. The +very failure of the one excited her towards another. The zest of living +was reborn in her. The morrow beckoned her, golden and miraculous. The +faculty of men and women to create their own lives seemed divine, and +the conception of it enfevered her. + + + + +CHAPTER III +AT THE WORKS + + +I + +That night, late, Hilda and Janet shut themselves up in the bedroom +together. The door clicked softly under Janet's gentle push, and they +were as safe from invasion as if the door had been of iron, and locked +and double-locked and barred with bars of iron. Alicia alone might have +disturbed them, but Alicia was asleep. Hilda had a sense of entire +security in this room such as she had never had since she drove away +from Lessways Street, Turnhill, early one morning, with Florrie Bagster +in a cab. It was not that there had been the least real fear of any room +of hers being attacked: it was that this room seemed to have been +rendered mystically inviolate by long years of Janet's occupation. +"Janet's bedroom!"--the phrase had a sanction which could not possibly +have attached itself to, for instance, "Hilda's bedroom!" Nor even to +"mother's bedroom"--mother's bedroom being indeed at the mercy of any +profane and marauding member of the family, a sort of market-place for +the transaction of affairs. + +And, further, Janet's bedroom was distinguished and made delicious for +Hilda by its fire. It happened to be one of the very few bedrooms in the +Five Towns at that date with a fire, as a regular feature of it. Mrs. +Orgreave had a fire in the parental bedroom, when she could not +reasonably do without it, but Osmond Orgreave suffered the fire rather +than enjoyed it. As for Tom, though of a shivery disposition, he would +have dithered to death before admitting that a bedroom fire might +increase his comfort. Johnnie and Jimmie genuinely liked to be cold in +their bedroom. Alicia pined for a fire, but Mrs. Orgreave, imitating the +contrariety of fate, forbade a fire to Alicia, and one consequence of +this was that Alicia sometimes undressed in Janet's bedroom, making +afterwards a dash for the Pole. The idea of a bedroom was always, during +nearly half the year, associated with the idea of discomfort in Hilda's +mind. And now, in Janet's bedroom, impressed as she was by the +strangeness of the fact that the prime reason for hurrying at top-speed +into bed had been abolished, she yet positively could not linger, the +force of habit being too strong for her. And she was in bed, despite +efforts to dawdle, while Janet was still brushing her hair. + +As she lay and watched Janet's complex unrobing, she acquired knowledge. +And once more, she found herself desiring to be like Janet--not only in +appearance, but in soft manner and tone. She thought: "How shall I dress +to-morrow afternoon?" All the operations of her brain related themselves +somehow to to-morrow afternoon. The anticipation of the visit to the +printing-works burned in her heart like a steady lamp that shone through +the brief, cloudy interests of the moment. And Edwin Clayhanger was +precisely the topic which Janet seemed, as it were, expressly to avoid. +Janet inquired concerning life at Brighton and the health of Sarah +Gailey; Janet even mentioned George Cannon; Hilda steadied her voice in +replying, though she was not really apprehensive, for Janet's questions, +like the questions of the whole family, were invariably discreet and +respectful of the individual's privacy. But of Edwin Clayhanger, whose +visit nevertheless had been recounted to her in the drawing-room on her +return, Janet said not a word. + +And then, when she had extinguished the gas, and the oriental sleeve of +her silk nightgown delicately brushed Hilda's face, as she got into bed, +she remarked: + +"Strange that Edwin Clayhanger should call just to-night!" + +Hilda's cheek warmed. + +"He asked me to go and look over their printing-works to-morrow," said +she quickly. + +Janet was taken aback. + +"Really!" she exclaimed, unmistakably startled. She spoke a second too +soon. If she had delayed only one second, she might have concealed from +Hilda that which Hilda had most plainly perceived, to wit, anxiety and +jealousy. Yes, jealousy, in this adorably benevolent creature's tone. +Hilda's interest in to-morrow afternoon was intensified. + +"Shall you be able to come?" she asked. + +"What time?" + +"He said about half-past six, or a quarter to seven." + +"I can't," said Janet dreamily, "because of that Musical Society +meeting--you know--I told you, didn't I?" + +In the faint light of the dying fire, Hilda made out little by little +the mysterious, pale heaps of clothes, and all the details of the room +strewn and disordered by reason of an additional occupant. The adventure +was now of infinite complexity, and its complexity seemed to be +symbolized by the suggestive feminine mysteriousness of what she saw and +what she divined in the darkness of the chamber. She thought: "I am here +on false pretences. I ought to tell my secret. That would be fair--I +have no right to intrude between her and him." But she instinctively and +powerfully resisted such ideas; with firmness she put them away, and +yielded herself with a more exquisite apprehension to the anticipation +of to-morrow. + + +II + +The order of meals at Lane End was somewhat peculiar even then, and +would now be almost unique. It was partly the natural expression of an +instinctive and justified feeling of superiority, and partly due to a +discretion which forbade the family to scandalize the professional +classes of the district by dining at night. Dinner occurred in the +middle of the day, and about nine in the evening was an informal but +copious supper. Between those two meals, there came a tea which was +neither high or low, and whose hour, six o'clock in theory, depended to +a certain extent, in practice, on Mr. Orgreave's arrival from the +office. Not seldom Mr. Orgreave was late; occasionally he was very late. +The kitchen waited to infuse the tea until a command came from some +woman, old or young, who attentively watched a window for a particular +swinging of the long gate at the end of the garden, or listened, when it +was dark, for the bang of the gate and a particular crunching of gravel. + +On this Tuesday evening, Osmond Orgreave was very late, and the movement +of the household was less smooth than usual, owing to Mrs. Orgreave's +illness and to the absence of Janet at Hillport in connection with the +projected Hillport Choral Society. (Had Janet been warned of Hilda's +visit, she would not have accepted an invitation to a tea at Hillport as +a preliminary to the meeting of the provisional committee.) Hilda was in +a state of acute distress. The appointment with Edwin Clayhanger seemed +to be absolutely sacred to her; to be late for it would amount to a +crime: to miss it altogether would be a calamity inconceivable. The +fingers of all the clocks in the house were revolving with the most +extraordinary rapidity--she was helpless. + +She was helpless, because she had said nothing all day of her +appointment, and because Janet had not mentioned it either. Janet might +have said before leaving: "Tea had better not wait too long--Hilda has +to be down at Clayhanger's at half-past six." Janet's silence impressed +Hilda: it was not merely strange--it was formidable: it affected the +whole day. Hilda thought: "Is she determined not to speak of it unless I +do?" Immediately Janet was gone, Hilda had run up to the bedroom. She +was minded to change the black frock which she had been wearing, and +which she hated, and to put on another skirt and bodice that Janet had +praised. She longed to beautify herself, and yet she was still +hesitating about it at half-past five in the evening as she had +hesitated at eight in the morning. In the end she had decided not to +change, an account of the rain. But the rain had naught to do with her +decision. She would not change, because she was too proud to change. She +would go just as she was! She could not accept the assistance of an +attractive bodice!... Unfeminine, perhaps, but womanly. + +At twenty-five minutes to seven, she went into Mrs. Orgreave's bedroom, +rather like a child, and also rather like an adult creature in a +distracting crisis. Tom Orgreave and Alicia were filling the entire +house with the stormy noise of a piano duet based upon Rossini's +_William Tell_. + +"I think I'll miss tea, Mrs. Orgreave," she said. "Edwin Clayhanger +invited me to go over the printing-works at half-past six, and it's +twenty-five minutes to seven now." + +"Oh, but, my dear," cried Mrs. Orgreave, "why ever didn't you tell them +downstairs, or let me know earlier?" + +And she pulled at the bell-rope that overhung the head of the bed. Not a +trace of teasing archness in her manner! Hilda's appointment might have +been of the most serious business interest, for anything Mrs. Orgreave's +demeanor indicated to the contrary. Hilda stood mute and constrained. + +"You run down and tell them to make tea at once, dear. I can't let you +go without anything at all. I wonder what can have kept Osmond." + +Almost at the same moment, Osmond Orgreave entered the bedroom. His +arrival had been unnoticed amid the tremendous resounding of the duet. + +"Oh, Osmond," said his wife. "Wherever have you been so late? Hilda +wants to go--Edwin Clayhanger has invited her to go over the works." + +Hilda, trembling at the door, more than half expected Mr. Orgreave to +say: "You mean, she's invited herself." But Osmond received the +information with exactly the same polite, apologetic seriousness as his +wife, and, reassured, Hilda departed from the room. + +Ten minutes later, veiled and cloaked, she stepped out alone into the +garden. And instantly her torment was assuaged, and she was happy. She +waited at the corner of the street for the steam-car. But, when the car +came thundering down, it was crammed to the step; with a melancholy +gesture, the driver declined her signal. She set off down Trafalgar Road +in the mist and the rain, glad that she had been compelled to walk. It +seemed to her that she was on a secret and mystic errand. This was not +surprising. The remarkable thing was that all the hurrying people she +met seemed also each of them to be on a secret and mystic errand. The +shining wet pavement was dotted with dark figures, suggestive and +enigmatic, who glided over a floor that was pierced by perpendicular +reflections. + + +III + +In the Clayhanger shop, agitated and scarcely aware of what she did, she +could, nevertheless, hear her voice greeting Edwin Clayhanger in firm, +calm tones; and she soon perceived very clearly that he was even more +acutely nervous than herself: which perception helped to restore her +confidence, while, at the same time, it filled her with bliss. The +young, fair man, with his awkward and constrained movements, took +possession of her umbrella, and then suggested that she should remove +her mackintosh. She obeyed, timid and glad. She stripped off her +mackintosh, as though she were stripping off her modesty, and stood +before him revealed. To complete the sacrifice, she raised her veil, and +smiled up at him, as it were, asking: "What next?" Then a fat, untidy +old man appeared in the doorway of a cubicle within the shop, and Edwin +Clayhanger blushed. + +"Father, this is Miss Lessways. Miss Lessways, my father.... +She's--she's come to look over the place." + +"How-d'ye-do, miss?" + +She shook hands with the tyrannic father, who was, however, despite his +reputation, apparently just as nervous as the son. There followed a most +sinister moment of silence. And, at last, the shop door opened, and the +father turned to greet a customer. Hilda thought: "Suppose this fat old +man is one day my father-in-law? Is it possible to imagine him as a +father-in-law?" And she had a transient gleam of curiosity concerning +the characters of the two Clayhanger sisters, and recalled with +satisfaction that Janet liked the elder one. + +Edwin Clayhanger, muttering, pointed to an aperture in the counter, and +immediately she was going through it with him, and through a door at the +back of the shop. They were alone, facing a rain-soaked yard. Edwin +Clayhanger sneezed violently. + +"It keeps on raining," Edwin murmured. "Better to have kept umbrella! +However--" + +He glanced at her inquiringly and invitingly. They ran side by side +across the yard to a roofed flight of steps that led to the printing- +office. For a couple of seconds, the rain wet them, and then they were +under cover again. It seemed to Hilda that they had escaped from the +shop like fox-terriers--like two friendly dogs from the surveillance of +an incalculable and dangerous old man. She felt a comfortable, friendly +confidence in Edwin Clayhanger--a tranquil sentiment such as she had +never experienced for George Cannon. After more than a year--and what a +period of unforeseen happenings!--she thought again: "I _like him_." Not +love, she thought, but liking! She liked being with him. She liked the +sensation of putting confidence in him. She liked his youth, and her +own. She was sorry because he had a cold and was not taking care of +it.... Now they were climbing a sombre creaking staircase towards a new +and remote world that was separated from the common world just quitted +by the adventurous passage of the rainy yard.... And now they were amid +oily odours in a large raftered workshop, full of machines.... The +printing-works!... An enormous but very deferential man saluted them +with majestic solemnity. He was the foreman, and labelled by his white +apron as an artisan, but his gigantic bulk--he would have outweighed the +pair of them--and his age set him somehow over them, so that they were a +couple of striplings in his vasty presence. When Edwin Clayhanger +employed, as it were, daringly, the accents of a master to this +intimidating fellow, Hilda thrilled with pleasure at the piquancy of the +spectacle, and she was admiringly proud of Edwin. The foreman's immense +voice, explaining machines and tools, caused physical vibrations in her. +But she understood nothing of what he said--nothing whatever. She was in +a dream of oily odours and monstrous iron constructions, dominated by +the grand foreman: and Edwin was in the dream. She began talking quite +wildly of the four-hundredth anniversary of the inventor of printing, of +which she had read in Cranswick's History... at Brighton! Brighton had +sunk away over the verge of memory. Even Lane End House was lost +somewhere in the vague past. All her previous life had faded. She +reflected guiltily: "He's bound to think I've been reading about +printing because I was interested in _him_ I don't care! I hope he does +think it!" She heard a suggestion that, as it was too late that night to +see the largest machine in motion, she might call the next afternoon. +She at once promised to come.... She impatiently desired now to leave +the room where they were, and to see something else. And then she feared +lest this might be all there was to see.... Edwin Clayhanger was edging +towards the door.... They were alone on the stairway again.... The +foreman had bowed at the top like a chamberlain.... She gathered, with +delicious anticipation, that other and still more recondite interiors +awaited their visit. + + +IV + +They were in an attic which was used for the storage of reams upon reams +of paper. By the light of a candle in a tin candlestick, they had passed +alone together through corridors and up flights of stairs at the back of +the shop. She had seen everything that was connected with the enterprise +of steam-printing, and now they were at the top of the old house and at +the end of the excursion. + +"I used to work here," said Edwin Clayhanger. + +She inquired about the work. + +"Well," he drawled, "reading and writing, you know--at that very table." + +In the aperture of the window, amid piles of paper, stood a rickety old +table, covered with dust. + +"But there's no fireplace," she said, glancing round the room, and then +directly at him. + +"I know." + +"But how did you do in winter?" she eagerly appealed. + +And he replied shortly, and with a slight charming affectation of pride: +"I did without." + +Her throat tightened, and she could feel the tears suddenly swim in her +eyes. She was not touched by the vision of his hardships. It was the +thought of all his youth that exquisitely saddened her--or all the years +which were and would be for ever hidden from her. She knew that she +alone of all human beings was gifted with the power to understand and +fully sympathize with him. And so she grieved over the long wilderness +of time during which he had been uncomprehended. She wanted, by some +immense effort of tenderness, to recompense him for all that he had +suffered. And she had a divine curiosity concerning the whole of his +past life. She had never had this curiosity in relation to George +Cannon--she had only wondered about his affairs with other women. Nor +had George Cannon ever evoked the tenderness which sprang up in her from +some secret and inexhaustible source at the mere sight of Edwin +Clayhanger's wistful smile. Still, in that moment, standing close to +Edwin in the high solitude of the shadowed attic, the souvenir of George +Cannon gripped her painfully. She thought: "He loves me, and he is +ruined, and he will never see me again! And I am here, bursting with +hope renewed, and dizzy with joy!" And she pictured Janet, too, wearying +herself at a committee meeting. And she thought, "And here am I...!" Her +bliss was tragic. + +"I think I ought to be going," she said softly. + +They re-threaded the corridors, and in each lower room, as they passed, +Edwin Clayhanger extinguished the gas which he had lit there on the way +up, and Hilda waited for him. And then they were back in the crude glare +of the shop. The fat, untidy old man was not visible. Edwin helped her +with the mackintosh, and she liked him for the awkwardness of his +efforts in doing so. + +At the door, she urged him not to come out, and referred to his cold. + +"This isn't the end of winter, it's the beginning," she warned him. +Nobody else, she knew, would watch over him. + +But he insisted on coming out. + +They arranged a rendezvous for three o'clock on the morrow, and then +they shook hands. + +"Now, do go in," she entreated, as she hurried away. The rain had +ceased. She fled triumphantly up Trafalgar Road, with her secret, +guarding it. "He's in love with me!" If a scientific truth is a +statement of which the contrary is inconceivable, then it was a +scientific truth for her that she and Edwin must come together. She +simply would not and could not conceive the future without him.... And +this so soon, so precipitately soon, after her misfortune! But it was +her very misfortune which pushed her violently forward. Her life had +been convulsed and overthrown by the hazard of destiny, and she could +have no peace now until she had repaired and re-established it. At no +matter what risk, the thing must be accomplished quickly... quickly. + + + + +CHAPTER IV +THE CALL FROM BRIGHTON + + +I + +On the next afternoon, at a quarter-past two, Hilda and Janet were +sitting together in the breakfast-room. The house was still. The men +were either theoretically or practically at business. Alicia was at +school. Mrs. Orgreave lay upstairs. The servants had cleared away and +washed up the dinner-things, and had dined themselves. The kitchen had +been cleansed and put in order, and every fire replenished. Two of the +servants were in their own chambers, enfranchised for an hour: one only +remained on duty. All six women had the feeling, which comes to most +women at a certain moment in each day, that life had, for a time, +deteriorated into the purposeless and the futile; and that it waited, as +in a trance, until some external masculine event, expected or +unforeseen, should renew its virtue and its energy. + +Hilda was in half a mind to tell Janet the history of the past year. She +had wakened up in the night, and perceived with dreadful clearness that +trouble lay in front of her. The relations between herself and Edwin +Clayhanger were developing with the most dizzy rapidity, and in a +direction which she desired, but it would be impossible for her, if she +fostered the relations, to continue to keep Edwin in ignorance of the +fact that, having been known for about a fortnight as Mrs. George +Cannon, she was not what he supposed her to be. With imagination on +fire, she was anticipating the rendezvous at three o'clock. She reached +forward to it in ecstasy; but she might not enjoy it, save at the price +which her conscience exacted. She had to say to Edwin Clayhanger that +she had been the victim of a bigamist. Could she say it to him? She had +not been able to say it even to Janet Orgreave.... She would say it +first to Janet. There, in the breakfast-room, she would say it. If it +killed her to say it, she would say it. She must at any cost be able to +respect herself, and, as matters stood, she could not respect herself. + +Janet, on her knees, was idly arranging books on one of the lower +bookshelves. In sheer nervousness, Hilda also dropped to her knees on +the hearthrug, and began to worry the fire with the poker. + +"I say, Janet," she began. + +"Yes?" Janet did not look up. + +Hilda, her heart beating, thought, with affrighted swiftness: "Why +should I tell her? It is no business of anybody's except _his_. I will +tell him, and him alone, and then act according to his wishes. After +all, I am not to blame. I am quite innocent. But I won't tell him +to-day. Not to-day! I must be more sure. It would be ridiculous to tell +him to-day. If I told him it would be almost like inviting a proposal! +But when the proper time comes,--then I will tell him, and he will +understand! He is bound to understand perfectly. He's in love with me." + +She dared not tell Janet. In that abode of joyful and successful +propriety the words would not form themselves. And the argument that she +was not to blame carried no weight whatever. She--she, Hilda--lacked +courage to be candid.... This was extremely disconcerting to her +self-esteem.... And even with Edwin Clayhanger she wished to temporize. +She longed for nothing so much as to see him; and yet she feared to meet +him. + +"Yes?" Janet repeated. + +A bell rang faintly in the distance of the house. + +Hilda, suddenly choosing a course, said: "I forgot to tell you. I'm +supposed to be going down to Clayhanger's at three to see a machine at +work--it was too late last night. Do come with me. I hate going by +myself." It was true: in that instant she did hate going by herself. She +thought, knowing Janet to be at liberty and never dreaming that she +would refuse: "I am saved--for the present." + +But Janet answered self-consciously: + +"I don't think I must leave mother. You'll be perfectly all right by +yourself." + +Hilda impetuously turned her head; their glances met for an instant, in +suspicion, challenge, animosity. They had an immense mutual admiration +the one for the other, these two; and yet now they were estranged. +Esteem was nullified by instinct. Hilda thought with positive savagery: +"It's all fiddlesticks about not leaving her mother! She's simply on her +high horse!" The whole colour of existence was changed. + + +II + +Martha entered the room. Neither of the girls moved. Beneath the +deferential servant in Martha was a human girl, making a third in the +room, who familiarly divined the moods of the other two and judged them +as an equal; and the other two knew it, and therefore did not trouble to +be spectacular in front of her. + +"A letter, miss," said Martha, approaching Hilda. "The old postman says +it was insufficiently addressed, or it 'ud ha' been here by first post." + +"Was that the postman who rang just now?" asked Janet. + +"Yes, miss." + +Hilda took the letter with apprehension, as she recognized the +down-slanting calligraphy of Sarah Gailey. Yes, the address was +imperfect--"Miss Lessways, c/o Osmond Orgreave, Esq., Lane End House, +Knype-on-Trent," instead of "Bursley, Knype-on-Trent." On the back of +the envelope had been written in pencil by an official, "Try Bursley." +Sarah Gailey could not now be trusted to address an envelope correctly. +The mere handwriting seemed to announce misfortune. + +"From poor Sarah," Hilda murmured, with false, good-tempered +tranquillity. "I wonder what sort of trouble she thinks she's got into!" + +She thought: "If only I was married, I should be free of responsibility +about Sarah. I should have to think of my husband first. But nothing +else can free me. Unless I marry, I'm tied to Sarah Gailey as long as +she lives.... And why?... I should like to know!" The answer was simple: +habit had shackled her to Sarah Gailey. + +She opened the letter by the flickering firelight, which was stronger on +the hearthrug than the light of the dim November day. It began: "Dearest +Hilda, I write at once to tell you that a lawyer called here this +afternoon to inquire about your Hotel Continental shares. He told me +there was going to be some difficulty with the Company, and, unless the +independent shareholders formed a strong local committee to look after +things, the trouble might be serious. He wanted to know if you would +support a committee at the meeting. I gave him your address, and he's +going to write to you. But I thought I would write to you as well. His +name is Eustace Broughton, 124 East Street, in case. I do hope nothing +will go wrong. It is like what must be, I am sure! It has been +impossible for me to keep the charwoman. So I sent her off this morning. +Can you remember the address of that Mrs. Catkin?..." Sarah Gailey +continued to discuss boarding-house affairs, until she arrived at the +end of the fourth page, and then, in a few cramped words, she finished +with expressions of love. + +"Oh dear!" Hilda exclaimed, rising, "I must write some letters at once." +She sighed, as if in tedium. The fact that her fortune was vaguely +threatened did not cause her anxiety: she scarcely realized it. What she +saw was an opportunity to evade the immediate meeting with Edwin--the +meeting which, a few minutes earlier, she had desired beyond everything. + +"When? Now?" + +Hilda nodded. + +"But what about Master Edwin?" Janet asked, trying to be gay. + +"I shan't be able to go," said Hilda carelessly, at the door. "It's of +no consequence." + +"Martha has to go down town. If you like, she could call in there, and +just tell him." + +It was a reproof, from the young woman who always so thoughtfully +studied the feelings of everybody. + +"I'll just write a little note, then, thanks!" Hilda returned calmly, +triumphing after all over Janet's superiority, and thinking, "Janet can +be very peculiar, Janet can!" + + +III + +For more than twenty hours, Hilda was profoundly miserable. Towards the +evening of the same day, she had made herself quite sure that Edwin +Clayhanger would call that night. Her hope persisted until half-past +nine: it then began to fade, and, at ten o'clock, was extinct. His name +had been mentioned by nobody. She went to bed. Having now a room of her +own, which overlooked the Clayhanger garden and house, she gazed forth, +and, in the dark, beheld, with the most anxious sensations, the building +in which Edwin existed and was concealed. "He is there," she said. "He +is active about something at this very instant--perhaps he is reading. +He is close by. If I shouted, he might hear...." And yet she was utterly +cut off from him. Again, in the late dawn, she saw the same building, +pale and clear, but just as secretive and enigmatic as in the night. "He +is asleep yet," she thought. "Why did he not call? Is he hurt? Is he +proud?" + +She despaired, because she could devise no means of resuming +communication with him. + +Immediately after dinner on the next day, she went with Janet to Janet's +room, to examine a new winter cloak which had been delivered. And, while +Janet was trying it on, and posing coquettishly and yet without +affectation in front of the glass, and while Hilda was reflecting +jealously, "Why am I not like her? I know infinitely more than she +knows. I am a woman, and she is a girl, and yet she seems far more a +woman than I--" Alicia, contrary to all rules, took the room by storm. +Alicia's excuse and salvation lay in a telegram, which she held in her +hand. + +"For you, Hilda!" cried the child, excited. "I'm just off to school." + +Hilda reached to take the offered telegram, but her hand wavered around +it instead of seizing it. Her eye fastened on a circular portion of the +wall-paper pattern, and she felt that the whole room was revolving about +her. Then she saw Janet's face transformed by an expression of alarm. + +"Are you ill, Hilda?" Janet demanded. "Sit down." + +"You're frightfully pale," said Alicia eagerly. + +Hilda sat down. + +"No, no," she said. "It was the pattern of the wall-paper that made me +feel dizzy." And, for the moment, she did honestly believe that the +pattern of the wall-paper had, in some inexplicable manner, upset her. +"I'm all right now." + +The dizziness passed as suddenly as it had supervened. Janet held some +ineffectual salts to her nose. + +"I'm perfectly well," insisted Hilda. + +"How funny!" Alicia grinned. + +Calmly Hilda opened the telegram, which read: "Please come at once.-- +GAILEY." + +She gave the telegram to Janet in silence. + +"What can be the matter?" Janet asked, with unreserved, loving +solicitude. The cloud which had hung between the two enthusiastic +friends was dissipated in a flash. + +"I haven't an idea," said Hilda, touched. "Unless it's those shares!" +She had briefly told Janet about the Hotel Continental Limited. + +"Shall you go?" + +Hilda nodded. Never again would she ignore an urgent telegram, though +she did not believe that this telegram had any real importance. She +attributed it to Sarah's increasing incompetence and hysterical +foolishness. + +"I wonder whether I can get on to Brighton to-night if I take the six +train?" Hilda asked, and to herself: "Can it have anything to do with +George?" + +Alicia, endowed with authority, went in search of a Bradshaw. But the +quest was fruitless. In the Five Towns the local time-table, showing the +connections with London, suffices for the citizen, and the breast-pocket +of no citizen is complete without it. + +"Clayhangers are bound to have a Bradshaw," cried Alicia, breathless +with running about the house. + +"Of course they are," Janet agreed. + +"I'll walk down there now," said Hilda, with extraordinary promptitude. +"It won't take five minutes." + +"I'd go," said Alicia, "only I should be late for school." + +"Shall I send some one down?" Janet suggested. "You might be taken dizzy +again." + +"No, thanks," Hilda replied deliberately. "I'll go--myself. There's +nothing wrong with me at all." + +"You'll have to be sharp over it," said Alicia pertly. "Don't forget +it's Thursday. They shut up at two, and it's not far off two now." + +"I'm going this very minute," said Hilda. + +"And I'm going this very second!" Alicia retorted. + +They all three left Janet's bedroom; the new cloak cast over a chair- +back, was degraded into a tedious banality--and ignored. + +In less than a minute Hilda, hatted and jacketed and partially gloved, +was crossing the garden. She felt most miraculously happy and hopeful, +and she was full of irrational gratitude to Alicia, as though Alicia +were a benefactor! The change in her mood seemed magic in its swiftness. +If Janet, with calm, cryptic face, had not been watching her from the +doorway, she might have danced on the gravel. + + + + +CHAPTER V +THURSDAY AFTERNOON + + +I + +She was walking with Edwin Clayhanger up Duck Bank on the way to Bursley +railway station. A simple errand and promenade,--and yet she felt +herself to be steeped in the romance of an adventure! The adventure had +surprisingly followed upon the discovery that Alicia had been quite +wrong. "Clayhangers are bound to have a Bradshaw," the confident Alicia +had said. But Clayhangers happened not to have a Bradshaw. Edwin was +alone in the stationery shop, save for the assistant. He said that his +father was indisposed. And whereas the news that Clayhangers had no +Bradshaw left Hilda perfectly indifferent, the news that old Darius +Clayhanger was indisposed and absent produced in her a definite feeling +of gladness. Edwin had decided that the most likely place to search for +a Bradshaw was the station, and he had offered to escort her to the +station. Nothing could have been more natural, and at the same time more +miraculous. + +The sun was palely shining upon dry, clean pavements and upon roads +juicy with black mud. And in the sunshine Hilda was very happy. It was +nothing to her that she was in quest of a Bradshaw because she had just +received an ominous telegram urgently summoning her to Brighton. She was +obliviously happy. Every phenomenon that attracted her notice +contributed to her felicity. Thus she took an eager joy in the sun. And +a marked improvement in Edwin's cold really delighted her. She was +dominated by the intimate conviction: "He loves me!" Which conviction +excited her dormant pride, and made her straighten her shoulders. She +benevolently condescended towards Janet. After all Janet, with every +circumstance in her favour, had not known how to conquer Edwin +Clayhanger. After all she, Hilda, possessed some mysterious +characteristic more potent than the elegance and the goodness of Janet +Orgreave. She scorned her former self-deprecations, and reproached her +own lack of faith: "I am I!" That was the summary of her mood. As for +her attitude to Edwin Clayhanger, she could not explain it. Why did she +like him and like being with him? He was not brilliant, nor masterful, +nor handsome, nor well dressed, nor in any manner imposing. On the +contrary, he was awkward and apologetic, and not a bit spectacular. Only +the wistful gaze of his eyes, and his honest smile, and the appeal of +his gestures...! A puzzling affair, an affair perfectly incomprehensible +and enchanting. + +They walked side by side in silence. + +When they had turned into Moorthorne Road, half-way up whose slope lies +the station, she asked a question about a large wooden building from +whose interior came wild sounds of shouting and cheering, and learnt +that the potters on strike were holding a meeting in the town theatre. +At the open outer doors was a crowd of starving, shivering, dirty, +ragged children, who romped and cursed, or stood unnaturally meditative +in the rich mud, like fakirs fulfilling a vow. Hilda's throat was +constricted by the sight. Pain and joy ran together in her, burning +exquisitely; and she had a glimpse, obscure, of the mystical beauty of +the children's suffering. + +"I'd no idea there was a theatre in Bursley," she remarked idly, driven +into a banality by the press of her sensations. + +"They used to call it the Blood Tub," he replied. "Melodrama and murder +and gore--you know." + +She exclaimed in horror. "Why are people like that in the Five Towns?" + +"It's our form of poetry, I suppose," said he. + +She started, sensitively. It seemed to her that she had never understood +the secret inner spirit of the Five Towns, and that by a single phrase +he had made her understand it.... 'Our form of poetry'! Who but he could +have said a thing at once so illuminating and so simple? + +Apparently perplexed by the obvious effect on her of his remark, he +said: + +"But you belong to the Five Towns, don't you?" + +She answered quietly that she did. But her heart was saying: "I do +_now_. You have initiated me. I never felt the Five Towns before. You +have made me feel them." + + +II + +At the station the head porter received their inquiry for a Bradshaw +with a dull stare and a shake of the head. No such thing had ever been +asked for at Bursley Station before, and the man's imagination could not +go beyond the soiled time-tables loosely pinned and pasted up on the +walls of the booking-office. Hilda suggested that the ticket-clerk +should be interrogated, but the aperture of communication with him was +shut. She saw Edwin Clayhanger brace himself and rap on the wood; and +instead of deploring his diffidence she liked it and found it full of +charm. The partition clicked aside, and the ticket-clerk's peering, +suspicious head showed in its place, mutely demanding a reason for this +extraordinary disturbance of the dream in which the station slumbered +between two half-hourly trains. With a characteristic peculiar slanting +motion Edwin nodded. + +"Oh, how-d'ye-do, Mr. Brooks?" said Edwin hastily, as if startled by the +sudden inexplicable apparition of the head. + +But the ticket-clerk had no Bradshaw either. He considered it probable, +however, that the stationmaster would have a Bradshaw. Edwin had to +brace himself again, for an assault upon the fastness of the +stationmaster. + +And in the incredibly small and incredibly dirty fastness of the +stationmaster, they indeed found a Bradshaw. Hilda precipitately took it +and opened it on the stationmaster's table. She looked for Brighton in +it as she might have looked for a particular individual in a city. Then +Edwin was bending over it, with his ear close to her ear, and the sleeve +of his overcoat touching her sleeve. She was physically aware of him, +for the first time. She thought, disconcerted: "But he is an utter +stranger to me! What do I know of him?" And then she thought: "For more +than a year he must have carried my image in his heart!" + +"Here," said Edwin brusquely, and with a certain superiority, "you might +just let me have a look at it myself." + +She yielded, tacitly admitting that a woman was no match for Bradshaw. + +After a few moments' frowning Edwin said: + +"Yes, there's a train to Brighton at eleven-thirty to-night!" + +"May I look?" + +"Certainly," said he, subtly condescending. + +She examined the page, with a serious deliberation. + +"But what does this '_f_' mean?" she asked. "Did you notice this '_f_'?" + +"Yes. It means Thursdays and Saturdays only," said Edwin, his eyes +twinkling. It was as if he had said: "You think yourself very clever, +but do you suppose that I can't read the notes in a time-table?" + +"Well--" She hesitated. + +"To-day's Thursday, you see," he remarked curtly. + +She was ravished by his tone and his manner. And she became humble +before him, for in the space of a few seconds he had grown mysteriously +and powerfully masculine to her. But with all his masculinity there +remained the same wistful, honest, boyish look in his eyes. And she +thought: "If I marry him it will be for the look in his eyes." + +"I'm all right, then," she said aloud, and smiled. + +With hands nervously working within her muff, she suddenly missed the +handkerchief which she had placed there. + +"I believe I must have dropped my handkerchief in your shop!" she was +about to say. The phrase was actually on her tongue; but by a strange +instinctive, defensive discretion she shut her mouth on it and kept +silence. She thought: "Perhaps I had better not go into his shop again +to-day." + + +III + +They descended the hill from the station. Hilda was very ill at ease. +She kept saying to herself: "This adventure is over now. I cannot +prolong it. There is nothing to do but to go back to the Orgreaves, and +pack my things and depart to Brighton, and face whatever annoyance is +awaiting me at Brighton." The prospect desolated her. She could not bear +to leave Edwin Clayhanger without some definition of their relations, +and yet she knew that it was hopeless and absurd to expect to arrive +immediately at any such definition: she knew that the impetuosity of her +temperament could not be justified. Also, she feared horribly the risk +of being caught again in the net of Brighton. As they got lower and +lower down the hill, her wretchedness and disquiet became acute, to the +point of a wild despair. Merely to temporize, she said, as they drew +opposite the wooden theatre: + +"Couldn't we just go and look in? I've got plenty of time." + +A strange request--to penetrate into a meeting of artisans on strike! +She felt its strangeness: she felt that Edwin Clayhanger objected, but +she was driven to an extremity. She had to do something, and she did +what she could. + +They crossed the road, and entered the huge shanty, and stood +apologetically near the door. The contrast between the open street and +the enclosed stuffiness of the dim and crowded interior was +overwhelming. Hundreds of ragged and shabby men sat in serried rows, +leaning forward with elbows out and heads protruding as they listened to +a speech from the gimcrack stage. They seemed to be waiting to spring, +like famished and ferocious tigers. Interrupting, they growled, snarled, +yapped, and swore with appalling sincerity. Imprecations burst forth in +volleys and in running fires. The arousing of the fundamental instincts +of these human beings had, indeed, enormously emphasized the animal in +them. They had swung back a hundred centuries towards original crude +life. The sophistication which embroiders the will-to-live had been +stripped clean off. These men helped you to understand the state of mind +which puts a city to the sack, and makes victims especially of the +innocent and the defenceless. Hilda was strangely excited. She was +afraid, and enjoyed being afraid. And it was as if she, too, had been +returned to savagery and to the primeval. In the midst of peril, she was +a female under the protection of a male, and nothing but that. And she +was far closer, emotionally, to her male than she had ever been before. + +Suddenly, the meeting came to an end. In an instant, the mass of +humanity was afoot and rounding upon them, an active menace. Hilda and +Edwin rushed fleeing into the street, violently urged by a common +impulse. The stream of embittered men pursued them like an inundation. +When they were safe, and breathing the free air, Hilda was drenched with +a sense of pity. The tragedy of existence presented itself in its true +aspect, as noble and majestic and intimidating. + +"It's terrible!" she breathed. + +She thought: "No! In this mood, it is impossible for me to leave him! I +cannot do it! I cannot!" The danger of re-entering the shop, which would +be closed now, utterly fascinated her. Supposing that she re-entered the +shop with him, would she have the courage to tell him that she was in +his society under false pretences? Could she bring herself to relate her +misfortune? She recoiled before the mere idea of telling him. And yet +the danger of the shop glittered in front of her like a lure. + +The future might be depending solely on her own act. If she told him of +the lost handkerchief, the future might be one thing: if she did not +tell him, it might be another. + +The dread of choosing seized her, and put her into a tremble of +apprehension. And then, as it were mechanically, she murmured (but very +clearly), tacking the words without a pause on to a sentence about the +strikes: "Oh, I've lost my handkerchief, unless I've left it in your +shop! It must have dropped out of my muff." + +She sighed in relief, because she had chosen. But her agitation was +intensified. + + +IV + +In search of a lost handkerchief, they regained the Clayhanger premises +by an unfamiliar side door. She preceded him along a passage and then, +taking a door on the left, found herself surprisingly in the shop, +behind a counter. The shop was lighted only by a few diamond-shaped +holes in the central shutters, and it had a troubling aspect of portent, +with its merchandise mysteriously enveloped in pale sheets, and its +chairs wrong side up, and its deep-shadowed corners. Destiny might have +been lurking in one of those baffling corners. From above, through the +ceiling, came the vibration of some machine at work, and the machine +might have been the loom of time. Hilda was exquisitely apprehensive. +She thought: "I am here. The moment of my departure will come. When it +comes, shall I have told him my misfortune? What will have happened?" +She waited, nervous, restless, shaking like a victim who can do naught +but wait. + +"Here's my handkerchief!" she cried, in a tone of unnatural childish +glee, that was one of the effects of her secret panic. + +The handkerchief glimmered on the counter, more white than anything else +in that grey dusk. She guessed that the shop-assistant must have found +it, and placed it conspicuously on the counter. + +They were alone: they were their own prisoners, secure from the street +and from all interruption. Hilda, once more and in a higher degree, +realized the miraculous human power to make experience out of nothing. +They had nothing but themselves, and they could, if they chose, create +all their future by a single gesture. + +Suddenly, there came a tremendous shouting from Duck Square, in front of +the shop. The strikers had poured down from Moorthorne Road into Duck +Bank and Duck Square. + +Edwin, who was in the middle of the shop, went to the glazed inner +doors, and, passing through into the porch, lifted the letter-flap in a +shutter, and, stooping, looked forth. He called to her, without moving +his face from the aperture, that a fight was in progress. Hilda gazed at +his back, through the glass, and then, coming round the end of the +counter, approached quietly, and stood immediately behind him, between +the glazed doors and the shutters. The two were in a space so small that +they could scarcely have moved without touching. + +"Let me look," she stammered, unable any longer to tolerate the +inaction. + +Edwin Clayhanger stepped aside, and held up the letter-flap for her with +his finger. She bent her head to the oblong glimpse of the street, and +saw the strikers engaged in the final internecine folly of strikers: +they had turned their exasperated wrath upon each other. Within a +public-house at the top of the little Square, other strikers were +drinking. One policeman regarded them. + +"What a shame!" she cried angrily, dropping the flap, and then withdrew +quickly into the shop, whither Edwin had gone. As she came near him, her +mood changed. She smiled gently. She summoned all her charm; and she +knew that she charmed him. + +"Do you know," she said, "you've quite altered my notion of poetry--what +you said as we were going up to the station!" + +"Really?" He flushed. + +Yes, she had enchanted and entranced him. She had only to smile and to +use a particular tone, soft and breaking.... She knew that. + +"But you _do_ alter my notions," she continued, and her clear voice was +poured out like a liquid. "I don't know how it is..." She stopped. And +then, in half-playful accents: "So this is your little office!" + +Her hand was on the knob of the open door of the cubicle, a black +erection within the shop, where Edwin and his father kept the accounts +and wrote letters. + +"Yes. Go in and have a look at it." + +She murmured kindly: "Shall I?" and went in. He followed. + +For a moment, she was extremely afraid, and she whispered, scared: "I +must hurry off now." + +He ignored this remark. + +"Shall you be at Brighton long?" he demanded. And he was so friendly and +simple and timorous and honest-eyed, and his features had such an +extraordinary anxious expression that her own fear seemed to leave her. +She thought, as if surprised by the discovery: "He is a good friend." + +"Oh, I can't tell," she answered him. "It depends." + +"How soon shall you be down our way again?" His voice was thickening. +She shook her head, speechless. She was afraid again now. His face +altered. He was standing almost over her. She thought: "I am lost! I +have let it come to this!" He was no longer a good friend. + +He began to speak, in detached bits of phrases: + +"I say--you know--" + +"Good-bye, good-bye," she murmured anxiously. "I must go. Thanks very +much." + +And foolishly, she held out her hand, which he seized. He bent +passionately, and kissed her like a fresh boy, like a schoolboy. And she +gave back the kiss strongly, with all the profound sincerity of her +nature. His agitation appeared to be extreme; but she was calm; she was +divinely calm. She savoured the moment as though she had been a watcher, +and not an actor in the scene. She thought, with a secret sigh of bliss: +"Yes, it is real, this moment! And I have had it. Am I astonished that +it has come so soon, or did I know it was coming?" Her eyes drank up the +face and the hands and the gestures of her lover. She felt tired, and +sat down in the office chair, and he leaned on the desk, and the walls +of the cubicle folded them in, even from the inanimate scrutiny of the +shop. + + +V + +They were talking together, half-fearfully, and yet with the confidence +of deep mutual trust, in the quick-gathering darkness of the cubicle. +And while they were talking, Hilda, in her head, was writing a fervent +letter to him: "... You see it was so sudden. I had had no chance to +tell you. I did so want to tell you, but how could I? And I hadn't told +anybody! I'm sure you will agree with me that it is best to tell some +things as little as possible. And when you had kissed me, how could I +tell you then--at once? I could not. It would have spoilt everything. +Surely you understand. I know you do, because you understand everything. +If I was wrong, tell me where. You don't guess how humble I am! When I +think of you, I am the humblest girl you can imagine. Forgive me, if +there is anything to forgive. I don't need to tell you that I have +suffered." + +And she kept writing the letter again and again, slightly altering the +phrases so as to improve them, so as to express herself better and more +honestly and more appealingly. + +"I shall send you the address to-morrow," she was saying to him. "I +shall write you before I go to bed, whether it's to-night or to-morrow +morning." She put the fire of her love into the assurance. She smiled to +entrance him, and saw on his face that he was beside himself with joy in +her. She was a queen, surpassing in her prerogative a thousand elegant +Janets. She smiled; she proudly straightened her shoulders (she the +humblest!), and her boy was enslaved. + +"I wonder what people will say," he murmured. + +She said, with a pang of misgiving about his reception of her letter: + +"Please tell no one!" She pleaded that for the present he should tell no +one. "Later on, it won't seem so sudden," she added plausibly. "People +are so silly." + +The sound of another battle in Duck Square awoke them. The shop was very +chilly, and quite dark. Their faces were only pale ovals in the +blackness. She shivered. + +"I must go! I have to pack." + +He clasped her: and she was innocently content: she was a young girl +again. + +"I'll walk up with you," he said protectively. + +But she would not allow him to walk up with her, and he yielded. He +struck a match. They stumbled out, and, in the midnight of the passage, +he took leave of her. + +Walking up Trafalgar Road, alone, she was so happy, so amazed, so +relieved, so sure of him and of his fineness and of the future, that she +could scarcely bear her felicity. It was too intense.... At last her +life was settled and mapped out. Destiny had been kind, and she meant to +be worthy of her fate. She could have swooned, so intoxicant was her +wonder and her solemn joy and her yearning after righteousness in love. + + + + +CHAPTER VI +MISCHANCE + + +I + +Twelve days later, in the evening, Hilda stood by the bedside of Sarah +Gailey in the basement room of No. 59 Preston Street. There was a bright +fire in the grate, and in front of the fire a middle-aged doctor was +cleansing the instrument which he had just employed to inject morphia +into Sarah's exhausted body. Hilda's assumption that the ageing woman +had telegraphed for her on inadequate grounds had proved to be quite +wrong. + +Upon entering the house on that Thursday night, Hilda, despite the +anxious pale face of the new servant who had waited up for her and who +entreated her to see Sarah Gailey instantly, had gone first to her own +room and scrawled passionately a note to Edwin, which ran: "DEAREST,-- +This is my address. I love you. Every bit of me is absolutely yours. +Write me.--H. L." She gave the letter to the servant to post at once. +And as she gave it she had a vision of it travelling in post office, +railway vans, and being sorted, and sealed up in a bag, and recovered +from the bag, and scanned by the postman at Bursley, and borne up +Trafalgar Road by the postman, and dropped into the letter-box at +Edwin's house, and finally seized by Edwin; and of it pleasing him +intensely,--for it was a good letter, and she was proud of it because +she knew that it was characteristic. + +And then, with her mind freed, she had opened the door of Sarah's +bedroom. Sarah was unquestionably very ill. Sarah had been quite right +in telegraphing so peremptorily to Hilda; and if she had not so +telegraphed she would have been quite wrong. On the previous day she had +been sitting on the cold new oilcloth of the topmost stairs, minutely +instructing a maid in the craft of polishing banisters. And the next +morning an attack of acute sciatica had supervened. For a trifling +indiscretion Sarah was thus condemned to extreme physical torture. Hilda +had found her rigid on the bed. She suffered the severest pain in the +small of the back and all down the left leg. Her left knee was supported +on pillows, and the bed-clothes were raised away from it, for it could +tolerate no weight whatever. The doctor, who had been and gone, had +arranged a system of fomentation and hot-water bottles surpassing +anything in even Sarah's experience. And there Sarah lay, not feverish +but sweating with agony, terrified to move, terrified to take a deep +breath, lest the disturbance of the muscles might produce consequences +beyond her strength to endure. She was in no danger of death. She could +talk. She could eat and drink. Her pulse was scarcely quickened. But she +was degraded and humiliated by mere physical anguish to the condition of +a brute. This was her lot in life. All through that first night Hilda +stayed with her, trying to pretend that Sarah was a woman, and in the +morning she had assumed control of the house. + +She had her secret to console her. It remained a secret because there +was no one to whom she could relate it. Sarah had no ear for news +unconnected with her malady. And indeed to tell Sarah, as Sarah was, +would have been to carry callousness to the point of insult. And so +Hilda, amid her enormous labours and fatigue, had lived with her secret, +which, from being a perfumed delight, turned in two days to something +subtly horrible, to something that by its horror prevented her from +writing to Edwin aught but the briefest missives. She had existed from +hour to hour, from one minute apprehensively to the next, day and night, +hardly sleeping, devoured inwardly by a fear at once monstrous and +simple, at once convincing and incredible. As for the letter which +mentally she had composed a hundred times to Edwin, and which she owed +to him, it had become fantastic and then inconceivable to her. + + +II + +One of the new servants entered the room and handed a letter to Hilda, +and left the room and shut the door. The envelope was addressed "Miss +Lessways, 59 Preston Street, Brighton," in Edwin Clayhanger's beautiful +handwriting. Every evening came thus a letter, which he had posted in +Bursley on the previous day. Hilda thought: "Will this contain another +reproach at my irregularity? I can't bear it, if it does." And she gazed +at the handwriting, and in particular at her own name, and her own name +seemed to be the name of somebody else, of some strange young woman. She +felt dizzy.... The door of Sarah's wardrobe was ajar, and, in the mirror +of it, Hilda could see herself obscurely, a black-robed strange young +woman, with untidy hair and white cheeks and huge, dark, staring heavy +eyes, with pouches beneath them. The image wavered in the mirror. She +thought: "Here it is again, this awful feeling! Surely I am not going to +faint!" She could hear Sarah's sighing breath: she could hear the +singing of the shaded gas-flame. She turned her gaze away from the +mirror, and saw Sarah's grey head inadvertently nodding, as it always +nodded. Then the letter slipped out of her hand. She glanced down at the +floor, in pursuit of it: the floor was darkly revolving. She thought: +"Am I really fainting this time? I mustn't faint. I've got to arrange +about that bacon to-night and--oh, lots of things! Sarah is not a bit +better. And I must sit with her until she gets off to sleep." Her legs +trembled, and she was terrorized by extraordinary novel sensations of +insecurity. "Oh!" she murmured weakly. + + +III + +"You've only fainted," said the doctor in a low voice. + +She perceived, little by little, that she was lying flat on the floor at +the foot of Sarah's bed, and that he was kneeling beside her. The bed +threw a shadow on them both, but she could see his benevolent face, +anxious and yet reassuring, rather clearly. + +"What?" she whispered, in feeble despair. She felt that her resistance +was definitely broken. + +From higher up, at the level of the hidden bed, came the regular +plaintive respiration of Sarah Gailey. + +"You must take care of yourself better than this," said the doctor. +"Perhaps this is a day when you ought to be resting." + +She answered, resigned. + +"No, it's not that. I believe I'm going to have a child. You must..." +She stopped. + +"Oh," said the doctor, with discretion. "Is that it?" + +Strange, how the direct words would create a new situation! She had not +told the doctor that she had been through the ceremony of marriage, and +had been victimized. She had told him nothing but the central and final +thought in her mind. And lo! the new situation was brought into being, +and the doctor was accepting it! He was not emitting astounded 'buts--!' +Her directness had made all possible 'buts' seem ridiculous and futile, +and had made the expression of curiosity seem offensive. + +She lay on the floor impassive. She was no longer horrified by +expectancy. + +"Well," said the doctor, "we must see. I think you can sit up now, can't +you?" + +Three-quarters of an hour afterwards, she went into Sarah's room alone. +She was aware of no emotion whatever. She merely desired, as a +professional nurse might have desired, to see if Sarah slept. Sarah was +not sleeping. She moaned, as she moaned continually when awake. Hilda +bent over her trembling head whose right side pressed upon the pillow. + +"How queer," thought Hilda, "how awful, that she didn't even hear what I +said to him! It will almost kill her when she does know." + +Sarah's eyes blinked. Without stirring, without shifting her horizontal, +preoccupied gaze from the wall, she muttered peevishly: + +"What's that you were saying about going to have a child?" + +Startled, Hilda moved back a little from the bed. + +"The doctor says there's no doubt I am," Hilda answered coldly. + +"How queer!" Sarah said. "I quite thought--but of course a girl like you +are couldn't be sure. I should like another biscuit. But I don't want +the Osbornes--the others." She resumed her moaning. + + +IV + +On the following Saturday morning--rather more than a fortnight after +her engagement to Edwin Clayhanger--Hilda came out of the kitchen of +No. 59 Preston Street, and shut the door on a nauseating, malodorous +mess of broken food and greasy plates, in the midst of which two +servants were noisily gobbling down their late breakfast, and disputing. +With a frown of disgust on her face, she looked into Sarah Gailey's +bedroom. Sarah, though vaguely better, was still in constant acute pain, +and her knee still reposed on a pillow, and was protected from the upper +bed-clothes, and she still could not move. Hilda put on a smile for +Sarah Gailey, who nodded morosely, and then, extinguishing the smile, as +if it had been expensive gas burning to no purpose, she passed into the +basement sitting-room, and slaked the fire there. With a gesture of +irresolution, she lifted the lid of the desk in the corner, and gazed +first at a little pile of four unopened letters addressed to her in +Edwin's handwriting, and then at a volume of Crashaw, which the +enthusiastic Tom Orgreave had sent to her as a reward for her +appreciation of Crashaw's poems. She released the lid suddenly, and went +upstairs to her bedroom, chatting sugarily for an instant on the way +with the second Miss Watchett. In the bedroom, she donned her street +things, and then she descended. She had to go to the Registry Office in +North Street about a new cook. She stopped at the front door, and then +surprisingly went down once more into the basement sitting-room. +Standing up at the desk, she wrote this letter: "DARLING JANET,--I am +now married to George Cannon. The marriage is not quite public, but I +tell you before anybody, and you might tell Edwin Clayhanger.--Your +loving H. L." Least said soonest mended! And the conciseness would +discourage questioning. She inserted the letter into an envelope, which +she addressed and stamped, and then she fled with it from the house, and +in two minutes it was in a letter-box, and she was walking slowly along +the King's Road past the shops. + +The letter was the swift and desperate sequel to several days' +absolutely sterile reflection. It said enough for the moment. Later, she +could explain that her husband had left her. She could not write to +Edwin. She could not bring herself to write anything to him. She could +not confess, nor beg for forgiveness nor even for sympathetic +understanding. She could not admit the uninstructed rashness which had +led her to assume positively, on inadequate grounds, that her union with +George Cannon had been fruitless. She must suffer, and he also must +suffer. Rather than let him know, in any conceivable manner, that, all +unwitting, she was bearing the child of another at the moment of her +betrothal to himself, she preferred to be regarded as a jilt of the very +worst kind. Strange that she should choose the role of deceiver instead +of the role of victim! Strange that she would sooner be hated and +scorned than pitied! Strange that she would not even give Edwin the +opportunity of treating her as a widow! But so it was! For her, the one +possible attitude towards Edwin was the attitude of silence. In the +silence of the grave her love for him existed. + +As she walked along the chill promenade she looked with discreet +curiosity at every woman she met, to see her condition. This matter, +which before she had never thought of, now obsessed her; and all women +were divided for her into two classes, the expectant and the others. +Also her self-consciousness was extreme, more so even than it had been +after her mother's death. She was not frightened--yet. She was assuredly +not panic-struck. Rather her mood was grim, harsh, and calmly bitter. +She thought: "I suppose George must be informed." It affected her +queerly that if she took it into her head she need never go back to +Preston Street. She was free. She owed nothing to anybody. And yet she +would go back. She would require a home, soon. And she would require a +livelihood, for the shares of the Brighton Hotel Continental Limited +promised to be sterile and were already unsaleable. But apart from these +considerations, she would have gone back for Sarah Gailey--because Sarah +Gailey was entirely dependent on her. She detested Sarah, despite +Sarah's sufferings, and yet by her conscience she was for ever bound to +her. + +The future loomed appalling. Sarah's career was finished. She could not +be anything but a burden and a torment; her last years would probably be +dreadful, both for herself and for others. The prospects of the +boarding-house were not radiant. Hilda could direct the enterprise, but +not well. She could work, but she had not the art of making others work. +Already the place was slightly at sixes and sevens. And she loathed it. +She loathed the whole business of catering. Along the entire length of +the King's Road, the smells of basement kitchens ascended to the +pavement and offended the nose. And Hilda saw all Brighton as a colossal +and disgusting enlargement of the kitchen at No. 59. She saw the +background and the pits of Brighton--that which underlies and hides +behind, and is not seen. The grandeur of the King's Road was naught to +her. Her glance pierced it and it faded to a hallucination. Beyond it +she envisaged the years to come, the messy and endless struggle, the +necessary avarice and trickeries incidental to it,--and perhaps the +ultimate failure. She would never make money--she felt that! She was not +born to make money--especially by dodges and false politeness, out of +idle, empty-noddled boarders. She would lose it and lose it. And she +pictured what she would be in ten years: the hard-driven landlady, up to +every subterfuge,--with a child to feed and educate, and perhaps a +bedridden, querulous invalid to support. And there was no alternative to +the tableau. + +She went by the Chichester, which towered with all its stories above her +head. Who would take it now? George Cannon would have made it pay. He +would have made anything pay. How?... She was definitely cut off from +the magnificence of the King's Road. The side street was her destiny; +the side street and shabbiness. And it was all George's fault--and hers! +The poverty, if it came, would be George's fault alone. For he had +squandered her money in a speculation. It astounded her that George, so +shrewd and well balanced, should have made an investment so foolish. She +did not realize that a passion for a business enterprise, as for a +woman, is capable of destroying the balance of any man. And George +Cannon had had both passions. + +And then she saw Florrie Bagster, on the other side of the street, +walking leisurely by the sea-wall, alone. If Mr. Boutwood had had a more +generous and wild disposition he might have allowed Florrie to ruin him +in six months of furs and carriages and champagne. But Mr. Boutwood, +though a dog, was a careful dog, especially at those moments when the +conventional dog can refuse nothing. Florrie was well and warmly +dressed,--no more; and she was on foot. Hilda's gaze fastened on her, +and immediately divined from the cut and fall of the coat that Florrie +had something to conceal from every one but her Mr. Boutwood. And +whereas Florrie trod the pavement with a charming little air that +wavered between impudence and modesty, between timid meekness and +conceit, Hilda blushed with shame and pity. She on one footpath and +Florrie on the other! + +"Soon," she thought, "I shall not be able to walk along this road!" + +She had sinned. She admitted that she had sinned against some quality in +herself. But how innocently and how ignorantly! And what a tremendous +punishment for so transient a weakness! And new consequences, still more +disastrous than any she had foreseen, presented themselves one after +another. George had escaped, but a word of open scandal, a single +whisper in the ear of the old creature down at Torquay, might actuate +machinery that would reach out after him and drag him back, and plant +him in jail. George, the father of her child, in jail! It was all a +matter of chance; sheer chance! She began to perceive what life really +was, and the immense importance of hazard therein. Nevertheless, without +frailty, without defection, what could chance have done? She began to +perceive that this that she was living through was life. She bit her +lips. Grief! Shame! Disillusion! Hardship! Peril! Catastrophe! Exile! +Above all, exile! These had to be faced, and they would be faced. She +recalled the firiest verse of Crashaw and she set her shoulders back. +There was the stuff of a woman in her.... Only a little while, and she +had seen before her a beloved boy entranced by her charm. She had now no +charm. Where now was the soft virgin?... And yet, somehow, magically, +miraculously, the soft virgin was still there! And the invincible vague +hope of youth, and the irrepressible consciousness of power, were almost +ready to flame up afresh, contrary to all reason, and irradiate her +starless soul. + +NOTE:--_The later history of Hilda Lessways and Edwin Clayhanger will +form the theme of another novel._ + + + +Footnote 1: See the author's novel, _Clayhanger_. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Hilda Lessways, by Arnold Bennett + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HILDA LESSWAYS *** + +***** This file should be named 10658.txt or 10658.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/6/5/10658/ + +Produced by John Hagerson, Kevin Handy and PG Distributed Proofreaders + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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