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+The Project Gutenberg Etext of In the Year of Jubilee
+by George Gissing
+(#12 in our series by George Gissing)
+
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+Title: In the Year of Jubilee
+
+Author: George Gissing
+
+Release Date: August, 2003  [Etext #4307]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on January 3, 2002]
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+The Project Gutenberg Etext of In the Year of Jubilee
+by George Gissing
+******This file should be named iyjee10.txt or iyjee10.zip******
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+
+
+
+Edited by Charles Aldarondo (aldarondo@yahoo.com)
+
+George Gissing
+
+In the Year of Jubilee
+
+
+
+
+
+Part I: Miss. Lord
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 1
+
+
+
+
+
+At eight o'clock on Sunday morning, Arthur Peachey unlocked his
+front door, and quietly went forth. He had not ventured to ask that
+early breakfast should be prepared for him. Enough that he was
+leaving home for a summer holiday--the first he had allowed
+himself since his marriage three years ago.
+
+It was a house in De Crespigny Park; unattached, double-fronted,
+with half-sunk basement, and a flight of steps to the stucco pillars
+at the entrance. De Crespigny Park, a thoroughfare connecting Grove
+Lane, Camberwell, with Denmark Hill, presents a double row of
+similar dwellings; its clean breadth, with foliage of trees and
+shrubs in front gardens, makes it pleasant to the eye that finds
+pleasure in suburban London. In point of respectability, it has
+claims only to be appreciated by the ambitious middle-class of
+Camberwell. Each house seems to remind its neighbour, with all the
+complacence expressible in buff brick, that in this locality
+lodgings are _not_ to let.
+
+For an hour after Peachey's departure, the silence of the house was
+unbroken. Then a bedroom door opened, and a lady in a morning gown
+of the fashionable heliotrope came downstairs. She had acute
+features; eyes which seemed to indicate the concentration of her
+thoughts upon a difficult problem, and cheeks of singular bloom. Her
+name was Beatrice French; her years numbered six and twenty.
+
+She entered the dining-room and drew up the blind. Though the
+furniture was less than a year old, and by no means of the cheapest
+description, slovenly housekeeping had dulled the brightness of
+every surface. On a chair lay a broken toy, one of those elaborate
+and costly playthings which serve no purpose but to stunt a child's
+imagination. Though the time was midsummer, not a flower appeared
+among the pretentious ornaments. The pictures were a strange medley
+--autotypes of some artistic value hanging side by side with
+hideous oleographs framed in ponderous gilding. Miss. then violently
+rang the bell. When the summons had been twice French looked about
+her with an expression of strong disgust, repeated, there appeared a
+young woman whose features told of long and placid slumbers.
+
+'Well? what does this mean?'
+
+'The cook doesn't feel well, miss; she can't get up.
+
+'Then get breakfast yourself, and look sharp about it.'
+
+Beatrice spoke with vehemence; her cheeks showed a circle of richer
+hue around the unchanging rose. The domestic made insolent reply,
+and there began a war of words. At this moment another step sounded
+on the stairs, and as it drew near, a female voice was raised in
+song.
+
+'_And a penny in his pocket, la-de-da, la-de-da,--and a penny in
+his pocket, la-de-da_!'
+
+A younger girl, this, of much slighter build; with a frisky gait, a
+jaunty pose of the head; pretty, but thin-featured, and
+shallow-eyed; a long neck, no chin to speak of, a low forehead with
+the hair of washed-out flaxen fluffed all over it. Her dress was
+showy, and in a taste that set the teeth on edge. Fanny French, her
+name.
+
+'What's up? Another row?' she asked, entering the room as the
+servant went out.
+
+'I've known a good many fools,' said Beatrice, 'but Ada's the
+biggest I've come across yet.'
+
+'Is she? Well, I shouldn't wonder,' Fanny admitted impartially. And
+with a skip she took up her song again. '_A penny paper collar round
+his neck, la-de-da_--'
+
+'Are you going to church this morning?' asked her sister.
+
+'Yes. Are you?'
+
+'Come for a walk instead. There's something I want to talk to you
+about.'
+
+'Won't it do afterwards? I've got an appointment.'
+
+'With Lord?'
+
+Fanny laughed and nodded.
+
+Interrupted by the reappearance of the servant, who brought a tray
+and began to lay the table, they crossed the hall to the
+drawing-room. In half-an-hour's time a sluttish meal was prepared
+for them, and whilst they were satisfying their hunger, the door
+opened to admit Mrs. Peachey. Ada presented herself in a costume
+which, at any season but high summer, would have been inconveniently
+cool. Beneath a loose thin dressing-gown her feet, in felt slippers,
+showed stockingless, her neck was bare almost to the bosom, and the
+tresses of pale yellow, upon which she especially prided herself,
+lay raggedly pinned together on the top of her flat head. She was
+about twenty-eight years old, but at present looked more than
+thirty. Her features resembled Fanny's, but had a much less amiable
+expression, and betokened, if the thing were possible, an inferior
+intellect. Fresh from the morning basin, her cheeks displayed that
+peculiar colourlessness which results from the habitual use of
+paints and powders; her pale pink lips, thin and sullen, were
+curiously wrinkled; she had eyes of slate colour, with lids so
+elevated that she always seemed to be staring in silly wonder.
+
+'So you've got breakfast, have you?' were her first words, in a thin
+and rather nasal voice. 'You may think yourselves lucky.'
+
+'You have a cheek of your own,' replied Beatrice. 'Whose place is it
+to see that we get meals?'
+
+'And what can any one do with servants like I've got?' retorted the
+married sister.
+
+'It's your own fault. You should get better; and when you've got
+them, you should manage them. But that's just what you can't do.'
+
+'Oh, _you_'d be a wonderful housekeeper, we know all about that. If
+you're not satisfied, you'd better find board and lodging somewhere
+else, as I've told you often enough. You're not likely to get it as
+cheap.'
+
+They squabbled for some minutes, Fanny looking on with ingenuous
+amusement, and putting in a word, now for this side, now for that.
+
+'And what am I going to have for breakfast?' demanded Mrs. Peachey
+at length, surveying the table. 'You've taken jolly good care of
+yourselves, it seems to me.'
+
+She jumped up, and rang the bell. When a minute's interval brought
+no reply, she rang again. Beatrice thought it probable that the bell
+might be rung without effect, 'till all was blue.'
+
+'We'll see about that,' answered her sister, and forthwith invaded
+the lower parts of the house. Thence, presently, her voice became
+audible, rising gradually to shrillness; with it there blended the
+rougher accents of the housemaid, now in reckless revolt. Beatrice
+listened for a minute or two in the hall, then passed on into the
+drawing-room with a contemptuous laugh. Fanny, to whom the uproar
+seemed to bring a renewal of appetite, cut herself a slice of bread
+and butter, and ate it as she stood at the window.
+
+'Dirty cat! beast! swine!'
+
+The mistress of the house, fairly beaten away by superior force of
+vocabulary, reappeared with these and other exclamations, her face
+livid, her foolish eyes starting from their sockets. Fanny, a sort
+of Mother Cary's chicken, revelled in the row, and screamed her
+merriment.
+
+It was long before the domestic uproar wholly subsided, but towards
+eleven o'clock the sisters found themselves together in the
+drawing-room. Ada sprawled limply on a sofa; Beatrice sat with legs
+crossed in the most comfortable chair; and Fanny twirled about on a
+music stool.
+
+The only books in the room were a few show-volumes, which belonged
+to Arthur Peachey, and half-a-dozen novels of the meaner kind,
+wherewith Ada sometimes beguiled her infinite leisure. But on tables
+and chairs lay scattered a multitude of papers: illustrated
+weeklies, journals of society, cheap miscellanies, penny novelettes,
+and the like. At the end of the week, when new numbers came in, Ada
+Peachey passed many hours upon her sofa, reading instalments of a
+dozen serial stories, paragraphs relating to fashion, sport, the
+theatre, answers to correspondents (wherein she especially
+delighted), columns of facetiae, and gossip about notorious people.
+Through a great deal of this matter Beatrice followed her, and read
+much besides in which Ada took no interest; she studied a daily
+newspaper, with special note of law suits, police intelligence,
+wills, bankruptcies, and any concern, great or small, wherein money
+played a part. She understood the nature of investments, and liked
+to talk about stocks and shares with her male acquaintances.
+
+They were the daughters of a Camberwell builder, lately deceased; to
+each of them had fallen a patrimony just sufficient for their
+support in elegant leisure. Ada's money, united with a small capital
+in her husband's possession, went to purchase a share in the
+business of Messrs. Ducker, Blunt & Co., manufacturers of
+disinfectants; Arthur Peachey, previously a clerk to the firm,
+became a junior partner, with the result that most of the hard work
+was thrown upon his shoulders. At their marriage, the happy pair
+first of all established themselves in a modest house near
+Camberwell Road; two years later, growing prosperity brought about
+their removal to De Crespigny Park, where they had now resided for
+some twelve months. Unlike their elder sister, Beatrice and Fanny
+had learnt to support themselves, Beatrice in the postal service,
+and Fanny, sweet blossom! by mingling her fragrance with that of a
+florist's shop in Brixton; but on their father's death both forsook
+their employment, and came to live with Mrs. Peachey. Between them,
+these two were the owners of house-property, which produced L140 a
+year. They disbursed, together, a weekly sum of twenty-four
+shillings for board and lodging, and spent or saved the rest as
+their impulses dictated.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 2
+
+
+
+
+
+Ada brooded over her wrongs; Beatrice glanced over _The Referee_.
+Fanny, after twirling awhile in maiden meditation, turned to the
+piano and jingled a melody from 'The Mikado.' She broke off
+suddenly, and, without looking round, addressed her companions.
+
+'You can give the third seat at the Jubilee to somebody else. I'm
+provided for.'
+
+'Who are you going with?' asked Ada.
+
+'My masher,' the girl replied with a giggle.
+
+'Where?'
+
+'Shop-windows in the Strand, I think.'
+
+She resumed her jingling; it was now 'Queen of my Heart.' Beatrice,
+dropping her paper, looked fixedly at the girl's profile, with an
+eyelid droop which signified calculation.
+
+'How much is he really getting?' she inquired all at once.
+
+'Seventy-five pounds a year. "_Oh where, oh where, is my leetle dog
+gone?_"'
+
+'Does he say,' asked Mrs. Peachey, 'that his governor will stump
+up?'
+
+They spoke a peculiar tongue, the product of sham education and mock
+refinement grafted upon a stock of robust vulgarity. One and all
+would have been moved to indignant surprise if accused of ignorance
+or defective breeding. Ada had frequented an 'establishment for
+young ladies' up to the close of her seventeenth year; the other two
+had pursued culture at a still more pretentious institute until they
+were eighteen. All could 'play the piano;' all declared--and
+believed--that they 'knew French.' Beatrice had 'done' Political
+Economy; Fanny had 'been through' Inorganic Chemistry and Botany.
+The truth was, of course, that their minds, characters, propensities
+had remained absolutely proof against such educational influence as
+had been brought to bear upon them. That they used a finer accent
+than their servants, signified only that they had grown up amid
+falsities, and were enabled, by the help of money, to dwell
+above-stairs, instead of with their spiritual kindred below.
+
+Anticipating Fanny's reply, Beatrice observed, with her air of
+sagacity:
+
+'If you think you're going to get anything out of an old screw like
+Lord, you'll jolly soon find your mistake.'
+
+'Don't you go and make a fool of yourself, Fanny,' said Mrs.
+Peachey. 'Why, he can't be more than twenty-one, is he?'
+
+'He's turned twenty-two.'
+
+The others laughed scornfully.
+
+'Can't I have who I like for a masher?' cried Fanny, reddening a
+little. 'Who said I was going to marry him? I'm in no particular
+hurry to get married. You think everybody's like yourselves.'
+
+'If there was any chance of old Lord turning up his toes,' said
+Beatrice thoughtfully. 'I dare say he'll leave a tidy handful behind
+him, but then he may live another ten years or more.'
+
+'And there's Nancy,' exclaimed Ada. 'Won't she get half the
+plunder?'
+
+'May be plenty, even then,' said Beatrice, her head aside. 'The
+piano business isn't a bad line. I shouldn't wonder if he leaves ten
+or fifteen thousand.'
+
+'Haven't you got anything out of Horace?' asked Ada of Fanny. 'What
+has he told you?'
+
+'He doesn't know much, that's the fact.'
+
+'Silly! There you are. His father treats him like a boy; if he
+talked about marrying, he'd get a cuff on the ear. Oh, I know all
+about old Lord,' Ada proceeded. 'He's a regular old tyrant. Why,
+you've only to look at him. And he thinks no small beer of himself,
+either, for all he lives in that grubby little house; I shouldn't 
+wonder if he thinks us beneath him.'
+
+She stared at her sisters, inviting their comment on this_ ludicrous
+state of things.
+
+'I quite believe Nancy does,' said Fanny, with a point of malice.
+
+'She's a stuck-up thing,' declared Mrs. Peachey. 'And she gets worse
+as she gets older. I shall never invite her again; it's three times
+she has made an excuse--all lies, of course.
+
+'Who will _she_ marry?' asked Beatrice, in a tone of disinterested
+speculation.
+
+Mrs. Peachey answered with a sneer:
+
+'She's going to the Jubilee to pick up a fancy Prince.'
+
+'As it happens,' objected Fanny, 'she isn't going to the Jubilee at
+all. At least she says she isn't. She's above it--so her brother
+told me.'
+
+'I know who _wants_ to marry her,' Ada remarked, with a sour smile.
+
+'Who is that?' came from the others.
+
+'Mr. Crewe.'
+
+With a significant giggle, Fanny glanced at the more sober of her
+sisters; she, the while, touched her upper lip with the point of her
+tongue, and looked towards the window.
+
+'Does he?' Fanny asked of the ceiling.
+
+'He wants money to float his teetotal drink,' said Beatrice. 'Hasn't
+he been at Arthur about it?'
+
+'Not that I know,' answered the wife.
+
+'He tried to get round me, but I--'
+
+A scream of incredulity from Fanny, and a chuckle from Mrs. Peachey,
+covered the rest of the sentence. Beatrice gazed at them defiantly.
+
+'Well, idiots! What's up now?'
+
+'Oh, nothing.'
+
+'There's nobody knows Luckworth Crewe better than I do,' Beatrice
+pursued disdainfully, 'and I think he knows _me_ pretty well. He'll
+make a fool of himself when he marries; I've told him so, and he as
+good as said I was right. If it wasn't for that, I should feel a
+respect for him. He'll have money one of these days.'
+
+'And he'll marry Nancy Lord,' said Ada tauntingly.
+
+'Not just yet.'
+
+Ada rolled herself from the sofa, and stood yawning.
+
+'Well, I shall go and dress. What are you people going to do? You
+needn't expect any dinner. I shall have mine at a restaurant.'
+
+'Who have you to meet?' asked Fanny, with a grimace.
+
+Her sister disregarded the question, yawned again, and turned to
+Beatrice.
+
+'Who shall we ask to take Fan's place on Tuesday? Whoever it 15,
+they'll have to pay. Those seats are selling for three guineas,
+somebody told me.'
+
+Conversation lingered about this point for a few minutes, till Mrs.
+Peachey went upstairs. When the door was open, a child's crying
+could be heard, but it excited no remark. Presently the other two
+retired, to make themselves ready for going out. Fanny was the first
+to reappear, and, whilst waiting for her sister, she tapped out a
+new music-hall melody on the piano.
+
+As they left the house, Beatrice remarked that Ada really meant to
+have her dinner at Gatti's or some such place; perhaps they had
+better indulge themselves in the same way.
+
+'Suppose you give Horace Lord a hint that we've no dinner at home?
+He might take us, and stand treat.'
+
+Fanny shook her head.
+
+'I don't think he could get away. The guv'nor expects him home to
+dinner on Sundays.'
+
+The other laughed her contempt.
+
+'You see! What good is he? Look here, Fan, you just wait a bit, and
+you'll do much better than that. Old Lord would cut up rough as soon
+as ever such a thing was mentioned; I know he would. There's
+something I have had in my mind for a long time. Suppose I could
+show you a way of making a heap of money--no end of money--?
+Shouldn't you like it better,--to live as you pleased, and be
+independent?'
+
+The listener's face confessed curiosity, yet was dubious.
+
+'What do you say to going into business with me?' pursued Miss
+French. 'We've only to raise a little money on the houses, and m a
+year or two we might be making thousands.'
+
+'Business? What sort of business?'
+
+'Suppose somebody came to you and said: Pay me a sovereign, and I'll
+make you a member of an association that supplies fashionable
+clothing at about half the ordinary price,--wouldn't you jump at
+it?'
+
+'If I thought it wasn't a swindle,' Fanny replied ingenuously.
+
+'Of course. But you'd be made to see it wasn't. And suppose they
+went on to say: Take a ten-pound share, and you shall have a big
+interest on it, as well as your dresses for next to nothing. How
+would you like that?'
+
+'Can it be done?'
+
+'I've got a notion it can, and I think I know two or three people
+who would help to set the thing going. But we must have some capital
+to show. Have you the pluck to join in?'
+
+'And suppose I lose my money?'
+
+'I'll guarantee you the same income you're getting now--if that
+will satisfy you. I've been looking round, and making inquiries, and
+I've got to know a bit about the profits of big dressmakers. We
+should start in Camberwell, or somewhere about there, and fish in
+all the women who want to do the heavy on very little. There are
+thousands and thousands of them, and most of them'--she lowered
+her voice--'know as much about cut and material as they do about
+stockbroking. Do you twig? People like Mrs. Middlemist and Mrs.
+Murch. They spend, most likely, thirty or forty pounds a year on
+their things, and we could dress them a good deal more smartly for
+half the money. Of course we should make out that a dress we sold
+them for five guineas was worth ten in the shops, and the real cost
+would be two. See? The thing is to persuade them that they're
+getting an article cheap, and at the same time making money out of
+other people.'
+
+Thus, and at much greater length, did Miss. French discourse to her
+attentive sister. Forgetful of the time, Fanny found at length that
+it would be impossible to meet Horace Lord as he came out of church;
+but it did not distress her.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 3
+
+
+
+
+
+Nancy Lord stood at the front-room window, a hand grasping each side
+of her waist, her look vaguely directed upon the limetree opposite
+and the house which it in part concealed. She was a well-grown girl
+of three and twenty, with the complexion and the mould of form which
+indicate, whatever else, habitual nourishment on good and plenteous
+food. In her ripe lips and softlyrounded cheeks the current of life
+ran warm. She had hair of a fine auburn, and her mode of wearing it,
+in a plaited diadem, answered the purpose of completing a figure
+which, without being tall, had some stateliness and promised more.
+Her gown, trimmed with a collar of lace, left the neck free; the
+maiden cincture at her waist did no violence to natural proportion.
+
+This afternoon--it was Monday--she could not occupy or amuse
+herself in any of the familiar ways. Perhaps the atmosphere of
+national Jubilee had a disturbing effect upon her,--in spite of
+her professed disregard for the gathering tumult of popular
+enthusiasm. She had not left home to-day, and the brilliant weather
+did not tempt her forth. On the table lay a new volume from the
+circulating library,--something about Evolution--but she had no
+mind to read it; it would have made her too conscious of the
+insincerity with which she approached such profound subjects. For a
+quarter of an hour and more she had stood at the window, regarding a
+prospect, now as always, utterly wearisome and depressing to her.
+
+Grove Lane is a long acclivity, which starts from Camberwell
+suburban dwellings. The houses vary considerably in size and Green,
+and, after passing a few mean shops, becomes a road of aspect, also
+in date,--with the result of a certain picturesqueness, enhanced
+by the growth of fine trees on either side. Architectural grace can
+nowhere be discovered, but the contract-builder of today has not yet
+been permitted to work his will; age and irregularity, even though
+the edifices be but so many illustrations of the ungainly, the
+insipid, and the frankly hideous, have a pleasanter effect than that
+of new streets built to one pattern by the mile. There are small
+cottages overgrown with creepers, relics of Camberwell's rusticity;
+rows of tall and of squat dwellings that lie behind grassy plots,
+railed from the road; larger houses that stand in their own gardens,
+hidden by walls. Narrow passages connect the Lane with its more
+formal neighbour Camberwell Grove; on the other side are ways
+leading towards Denmark Hill, quiet, leafy. From the top of the
+Lane, where Champion Hill enjoys an aristocratic seclusion, is
+obtainable a glimpse of open fields and of a wooded horizon
+southward.
+
+It is a neighbourhood in decay, a bit of London which does not keep
+pace with the times. And Nancy hated it. She would have preferred to
+live even in a poor and grimy street which neighboured the main
+track of business and pleasure.
+
+Here she had spent as much of her life as she remembered, from the
+end of her third year. Mr. Lord never willingly talked of days gone
+by, but by questioning him she had learnt that her birthplace was a
+vaguely indicated part of northern London; there, it seemed, her
+mother had died, a year or so after the birth of her brother Horace.
+The relatives of whom she knew were all on her father's side, and
+lived scattered about England. When she sought information
+concerning her mother, Mr. Lord became evasive and presently silent;
+she had seen no portrait of the dead parent. Of late years this
+obscure point of the family history had often occupied her thoughts.
+
+Nancy deemed herself a highly educated young woman,--'cultured'
+was the word she would have used. Her studies at a day-school which
+was reputed 'modern' terminated only when she herself chose to
+withdraw in her eighteenth year; and since then she had pursued
+'courses' of independent reading, had attended lectures, had thought
+of preparing for examinations--only thought of it. Her father
+never suggested that she should use these acquirements for the
+earning of money; little as she knew of his affairs, it was
+obviously to be taken for granted that he could ensure her life-long
+independence. Satisfactory, this; but latterly it had become a
+question with her how the independence was to be used, and no
+intelligible aim as yet presented itself to her roving mind. All she
+knew was, that she wished to live, and not merely to vegetate. Now
+there are so many ways of living, and Nancy felt no distinct
+vocation for any one of them.
+
+She was haunted by an uneasy sense of doubtfulness as to her social
+position. Mr. Lord followed the calling of a dealer in pianos; a
+respectable business, to be sure, but, it appeared, not lucrative
+enough to put her above caring how his money was made. She knew that
+one's father may be anything whatever, yet suffer no social
+disability, provided he reap profit enough from the pursuit. But
+Stephen Lord, whilst resorting daily to his warehouse in Camberwell
+Road--not a locality that one would care to talk about in
+'cultured' circles--continued, after twenty years, to occupy this
+small and ugly dwelling in Grove Lane. Possibly, owing to an
+imperfect education, he failed to appreciate his daughter's needs,
+and saw no reason why she should not be happy in the old
+surroundings.
+
+On the other hand, perhaps he cared very little about her.
+Undoubtedly his favourite was Horace, and in Horace he had suffered
+a disappointment. The boy, in spite of good schooling, had proved
+unequal to his father's hope that he would choose some professional
+career, by preference the law; he idled away his schooldays, failed
+at examinations, and ultimately had to be sent into 'business.' Mr
+Lord obtained a place for him in a large shipping agency; but it
+still seemed doubtful whether he would make any progress there,
+notwithstanding the advantage of his start; at two-and-twenty he was
+remunerated with a mere thirty shillings a week, a nominal salary,'
+his employers called it. Nancy often felt angry with her brother for
+his lack of energy and ambition; he might so easily, she thought,
+have helped to establish, by his professional dignity, her own
+social status at the level she desired.
+
+There came into view a familiar figure, crossing from the other side
+of the way. Nancy started, waved her hand, and went to open the
+door. Her look had wholly altered; she was bright, mirthful,
+overflowing with affectionate welcome.
+
+This friend of hers, Jessica Morgan by name, had few personal
+attractions. She looked overwrought and low-spirited; a very plain
+and slightly-made summer gown exhibited her meagre frame with undue
+frankness; her face might have been pretty if health had filled and
+coloured the flesh, but as it was she looked a ghost of girlhood, a
+dolorous image of frustrate sex. In her cotton-gloved hand she
+carried several volumes and notebooks.
+
+'I'm so glad you're in,' was her first utterance, between pants
+after hasty walking and the jerks of a nervous little laugh. 'I want
+to ask you something about Geometrical Progression. You remember
+that formula--'
+
+'How can I remember what I never knew?' exclaimed Nancy. 'I always
+hated those formulas; I couldn't learn them to save my life.'
+
+'Oh, that's nonsense! You were much better at mathematics than I
+was. Do just look at what I mean.'
+
+She threw her books down upon a chair, and opened some pages of
+scrawled manuscript, talking hurriedly in a thin falsetto.
+
+Her family, a large one, had fallen of late years from a position of
+moderate comfort into sheer struggle for subsistence. Jessica, armed
+with certificates of examinational prowess, got work as a visiting
+governess. At the same time, she nourished ambitions, discernible
+perhaps in the singular light of her deep-set eyes and a something
+of hysteric determination about her lips. Her aim, at present, was
+to become a graduate of London University; she was toiling in her
+leisure hours--the hours of exhaustion, that is to say--to
+prepare herself for matriculation, which she hoped to achieve in the
+coming winter. Of her intimate acquaintances only one could lay
+claim to intellectual superiority, and even she, Nancy Lord to wit,
+shrank from the ordeals of Burlington House. To become B.A., to have
+her name in the newspapers, to be regarded as one of the clever, the
+uncommon women--for this Jessica was willing to labour early and
+late, regardless of failing health, regardless even of ruined
+complexion and hair that grew thin beneath the comb.
+
+She talked only of the 'exam,' of her chances in this or that
+'paper,' of the likelihood that this or the other question would be
+'set.' Her brain was becoming a mere receptacle for dates and
+definitions, vocabularies and rules syntactic, for thrice-boiled
+essence of history, ragged scraps of science, quotations at fifth
+hand, and all the heterogeneous rubbish of a 'crammer's' shop. When
+away from her books, she carried scraps of paper, with jottings to
+be committed to memory. Beside her plate at meals lay formulae and
+tabulations. She went to bed with a manual and got up with a
+compendium.
+
+Nancy, whose pursuit of 'culture' followed a less exhausting track,
+regarded the girl with a little envy and some compassion. Esteeming
+herself in every respect Jessica's superior, she could not help a
+slight condescension in the tone she used to her; yet their
+friendship had much sincerity on both sides, and each was the
+other's only confidante. As soon as the mathematical difficulty
+could be set aside, Nancy began to speak of her private troubles.
+
+'The Prophet was here last night,' she said, with a girlish grimace.
+'He's beginning again. I can see it coming. I shall have to snub him
+awfully next time.'
+
+'Oh, what a worry he is!'
+
+'Yes, but there's something worse. I suspected that the Pasha knew
+of it; now I feel sure he's encouraging him.'
+
+By this oriental style Nancy signified her father. The Prophet was
+her father's partner in business, Mr. Samuel Bennett Barmby.
+
+'I feel sure now that they talked it over when the Prophet was taken
+into partnership. I was thrown in as a "consideration."'
+
+'But how could your father possibly think--?'
+
+'It's hard to say what he _does_ think about me. I'm afraid I shall
+have to have a talk with him. If so, it will be a long talk, and a
+very serious talk. But he isn't well just now, and I must put it
+off.'
+
+'He isn't well?'
+
+'A touch of gout, he says. Two days last week he didn't go to
+business, and his temper was _that 'orrible_!' Nancy had a habit of
+facetiously quoting vulgarities; this from an acquaintance of theirs
+who often supplied them with mirth. 'I suppose the gout does make
+one bad-tempered.'
+
+'Has he been coming often?--Mr. Barmby, I mean.'
+
+'Pretty well. I think I must turn matchmaker, and get him married to
+some one. It oughtn't to be difficult. The Prophet "has points."'
+
+'I dare say some people would think him handsome,' assented Miss
+Morgan, nibbling a finger which showed an ink-stain, and laughing
+shyly.
+
+'And his powers of conversation!--Don't you know any one that
+would do for him?'
+
+They jested on this theme until Nancy chose to become serious again.
+
+'Have you any lessons to-morrow?'
+
+'No. Thank goodness every one is going to see the procession, or the
+decorations, or the illuminations, and all the rest of the
+nonsense,' Jessica replied. 'I shall have a good long day of work;
+except that I've promised to go in the afternoon, and have tea with
+the little girls at Champion Hill. I wish you'd come too; they'd be
+delighted to see you, and there'll be nobody except the governess.'
+
+Nancy looked up in doubt.
+
+'Are you sure? Won't the dowager be at home?'
+
+'She hasn't left her room for three weeks.'
+
+They exchanged a look of some special significance.
+
+'Then I suppose,' said Nancy, with a peculiar smile, 'that's why Mr
+Tarrant has been calling?'
+
+'Has he? How do you know?'
+
+Again they looked at each other, and Nancy laughed.
+
+'I have happened to meet him twice, the last few days.' She spoke in
+an off-hand way. 'The first time, it was just at the top of the
+lane; he was coming away. The second time, I was walking along
+Champion Hill, and he came up behind me, going to the house.'
+
+'Did he talk?'
+
+Nancy gave a nod.
+
+'Yes, both times. But he didn't tell me that the dowager was worse.'
+
+'High and mighty?' asked Jessica.
+
+'Not quite so majestic as usual, I thought. I didn't feel quite so
+much of a shrimp before him. And decidedly he was in better spirits.
+Perhaps the dowager's death would be important to him?'
+
+'Very likely. Will you come to-morrow?'
+
+Miss. Lord hesitated--then, with a sudden frankness:
+
+'To tell you the truth, I'm afraid he might be there.'
+
+'Oh, I don't think so, not on Jubilee Day.'
+
+'But that's the very reason. He may come to be out of the uproar.'
+
+'I meant he was more likely to be out of town altogether.'
+
+Nancy, still leaning over the table, propped her chin on her hands,
+and reflected.
+
+'Where does he go, I wonder?'
+
+'Oh, all sorts of places, no doubt. Men of that kind are always
+travelling. I suppose he goes shooting and fishing--'
+
+Nancy's laugh made an interruption.
+
+'No, no, he doesn't! He told me once that he didn't care for that
+sort of thing.'
+
+'Oh, well, you know much more about him than I do,' said Miss
+Morgan, with a smile.
+
+'I've often meant to ask you--have they anything to do with
+Tarrant's black-lead?'
+
+Jessica declared that she had never heard of it.
+
+'Never heard of it? nonsense! A few years ago it used to be posted
+up everywhere, and I see it sometimes even now, but other kinds seem
+to have driven it out of the market. Now that's just like you! Pray,
+did you ever hear of Pears' Soap?'
+
+'Of course.'
+
+'Really? Oh, there's hope of you. You'll be a woman of the world
+some day.'
+
+'Don't tease, Nancy. And what would it matter if he _was_ there
+to-morrow?'
+
+'Oh! I don't know. But I shouldn't particularly like his lordship to
+imagine that I went in the hope of paying my respects to him, and
+having the reward of a gracious smile.'
+
+'One can't always be thinking about what other people think,' said
+Jessica impatiently. 'You're too sensitive. Any one else in your
+position would have lots of such friends.'
+
+'In my position! What _is_ my position?'
+
+'Culture is everything now-a-days,' observed Miss. Morgan, with the
+air of one who feels herself abundantly possessed of that
+qualification.
+
+But Nancy laughed.
+
+'You may depend upon it, Mr. Tarrant doesn't think so.'
+
+'He calls himself a democrat.'
+
+'And talks like one: doesn't he?'
+
+'Oh! that's only his way, I think. He doesn't really mean to be
+haughty, and--and so on.'
+
+'I wish I knew if he had any connection with Tarrant's blacklead,'
+said Miss. Lord mischievously.
+
+'Why not ask him?'
+
+They laughed merrily, Jessica's thin note contrasting with the
+mellow timbre of her friend's voice.
+
+'I will some day.'
+
+'You would never dare to!'
+
+'I daren't? Then I will!'
+
+'It would be dreadfully rude.'
+
+'I don't mind being thought rude,' replied Nancy, with a movement of
+the head, 'if it teaches people that I consider myself as good as
+they are.'
+
+'Well, will you come to-morrow?'
+
+'Ye-es; if you'll go somewhere else with me in the evening.'
+
+'Where to?'
+
+'To walk about the streets after dark, and see the crowds and the
+illuminations.'
+
+Nancy uttered this with a sly mirthfulness. Her friend was
+astonished.
+
+'Nonsense! you don't mean it.'
+
+'I do. I want to go for the fun of the thing. I should feel ashamed
+of myself if I ran to stare at Royalties, but it's a different thing
+at night. It'll be wonderful, all the traffic stopped, and the
+streets crammed with people, and blazing with lights. Won't you go?'
+
+'But the time, the time! I can't afford it. I'm getting on so
+wretchedly with my Greek and my chemistry.'
+
+'You've time enough,' said Nancy. 'And, you know, after all it's a
+historical event. In the year 3000 it will be 'set' in an
+examination paper, and poor wretches will get plucked because they
+don't know the date.'
+
+This was quite a new aspect of the matter to Jessica Morgan. She
+pondered it, and smiled.
+
+'Yes, I suppose it will. But we should have to be out so late.'
+
+'Why not, for once? It needn't be later than half-past eleven.'
+Nancy broke off and gesticulated. 'That's just why I want to go! I
+should like to walk about all night, as lots of people will. The
+public-houses are going to be kept open till two o'clock.'
+
+'Do you want to go into public-houses?' asked Jessica, laughing.
+
+'Why not? I should like to. It's horrible to be tied up as we are;
+we're not children. Why can't we go about as men do?'
+
+'Won't your father make any objection?' asked Jessica.
+
+'We shall take Horace with us. Your people wouldn't interfere, would
+they?'
+
+'I think not. Father is away in Yorkshire, and will be till the end
+of the week. Poor mother has her rheumatism. The house is so
+dreadfully damp. We ought never to have taken it. The difference of
+rent will all go in doctors' bills.--I don't think mother would
+mind; but I must be back before twelve, of course.'
+
+'I don't see the "of course,"' Nancy returned impatiently, 'but we
+could manage that. I'll speak to the Pasha to-night, and either
+come, or let you have a note, to-morrow morning. If there's any
+objection, I'm not sure that I shan't make it the opportunity for
+setting up my standard of revolt. But I don't like to do that whilst
+the Pasha is out of sorts--it might make him worse.'
+
+'You could reason with him quietly.'
+
+'Reason with the Pasha--How innocent you are, Jess! How unworldly!
+It always refreshes me to hear you talk.'
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 4
+
+
+
+
+
+Only twelve months ago Stephen Lord had renewed the lease of his
+house for a period of seven years. Nancy, had she been aware of this
+transaction, would assuredly have found courage to enter a protest,
+but Mr. Lord consulted neither son nor daughter on any point of
+business; but for this habit of acting silently, he would have
+seemed to his children a still more arbitrary ruler than they
+actually thought him.
+
+The dwelling consisted of but eight rooms, one of which, situated at
+the rear of the entrance passage, served Mr. Lord as sitting-room and
+bed-chamber; it overlooked a small garden, and afforded a side
+glimpse of the kitchen with its outer appurtenances. In the front
+room the family took meals. Of the chambers in the storey above, one
+was Nancy's, one her brother's; the third had, until six years ago,
+been known as 'Grandmother's room,' and here its occupant, Stephen
+Lord's mother, died at the age of seventy-eight. Wife of a Norfolk
+farmer, and mother of nine children, she was one of the old-world
+women whose thoughts found abundant occupation in the cares and
+pleasures of home. Hardship she had never known, nor yet luxury; the
+old religion, the old views of sex and of society, endured with her
+to the end.
+
+After her death the room was converted into a parlour, used almost
+exclusively by the young people. At the top of the house slept two
+servants, each in her own well-furnished retreat; one of them was a
+girl, the other a woman of about forty, named Mary Woodruff. Mary
+had been in the house for twenty years; she enjoyed her master's
+confidence, and, since old Mrs. Lord's death, exercised practical
+control in the humbler domestic affairs.
+
+With one exception, all parts of the abode presented much the same
+appearance as when Stephen Lord first established himself
+antiquated, and in primitive taste. Nancy's bedroom alone here. The
+furniture was old, solid, homely; the ornaments were displayed the
+influence of modern ideas. On her twentieth birthday, the girl
+received permission to dress henceforth as she chose (a strict
+sumptuary law having previously been in force), and at the same time
+was allowed to refurnish her chamber. Nancy pleaded for modern
+reforms throughout the house, but in vain; even the drawing-room
+kept its uninviting aspect, not very different, save for the removal
+of the bed, from that it had presented when the ancient lady slept
+here. In her own little domain, Miss. Lord made a clean sweep of rude
+appointments, and at small expense surrounded herself with pretty
+things. The woodwork and the furniture were in white enamel; the
+paper had a pattern of wild-rose. A choice chintz, rose-leaf and
+flower on a white ground, served for curtains and for bed-hangings.
+Her carpet was of green felt, matching in shade the foliage of the
+chintz. On suspended shelves stood the books which she desired to
+have near her, and round about the walls hung prints, photographs,
+chromolithographs, selected in an honest spirit of admiration, which
+on the whole did no discredit to Nancy's sensibilities.
+
+To the best of Nancy's belief, her father had never seen this room.
+On its completion she invited him to inspect it, but Mr. Lord coldly
+declined, saying that he knew nothing, and cared nothing, about
+upholstery.
+
+His return to-day was earlier than usual. Shortly after five o'clock
+Nancy heard the familiar heavy step in the passage, and went
+downstairs.
+
+'Will you have a cup of tea, father?' she asked, standing by the
+door of the back room, which was ajar.
+
+'If it's ready,' replied a deep voice.
+
+She entered the dining-room, and rang the bell. In a few minutes
+Mary Woodruff appeared, bringing tea and biscuits. She was a neat,
+quiet, plain-featured woman, of strong physique, and with set lips,
+which rarely parted save for necessary speech. Her eyes had a
+singular expression of inquietude, of sadness. A smile seldom
+appeared on her face, but, when it did, the effect was unlooked for:
+it touched the somewhat harsh lineaments with a gentleness so
+pleasing that she became almost comely.
+
+Having set down the tray, she went to Mr. Lord's door, gave a soft
+tap, and withdrew into the kitchen.
+
+Nancy, seated at the table, turned to greet her father. In early
+life, Stephen Lord must have been handsome; his face was now rugged,
+of unhealthy tone, and creased with lines betokening a moody habit.
+He looked much older than his years, which were fifty-seven. Dressed
+with excessive carelessness, he had the appearance rather of one at
+odds with fortune than of a substantial man of business. His short
+beard was raggedly trimmed; his grizzled hair began to show the
+scalp. Judging from the contour of his visage, one might have
+credited him with a forcible and commanding character; his voice
+favoured that impression; but the countenance had a despondent cast,
+the eyes seemed to shun observation, the lips suggested a sullen
+pride, indicative of some defect or vice of will.
+
+Yet in the look which he cast upon her, Nancy detected a sign of
+more amiability than she had found in him of late. She addressed him
+with confidence.
+
+'Early to-day, father.'
+
+'Yes.'
+
+The monosyllable sounded gruff, but again Nancy felt satisfaction.
+Mr. Lord, who disliked to seat himself unless he were going to keep
+his position for some time, took the offered beverage from his
+daughter's hand, and stood with it before the fireplace, casting
+glances about the room.
+
+'How have you felt, father?'
+
+'Nothing to complain of.'
+
+His pronunciation fell short of refinement, but was not vulgar.
+Something of country accent could still be detected in it. He talked
+like a man who could strike a softer note if he cared to, but
+despises the effort.
+
+'I suppose you will have a rest to-morrow?'
+
+'I suppose so. If your grandmother had lived,' he added
+thoughtfully, 'she would have been eighty-four this week on
+Thursday.'
+
+'The 23rd of June. Yes, I remember.'
+
+Mr. Lord swallowed his tea at two draughts, and put down the cup.
+Seemingly refreshed, he looked about him with a half smile, and said
+quietly:
+
+'I've had the pleasure of punishing a scoundrel to-day. That's worth
+more than the Jubilee.'
+
+Nancy waited for an explanation, but it was not vouchsafed.
+
+'A scoundrel?' she asked.
+
+Her father nodded--the nod which signified his pleasure that the
+subject should not be pursued. Nancy could only infer that he spoke
+of some incident in the course of business, as indeed was the case.
+
+He had no particular aptitude for trade, and that by which he lived
+(he had entered upon it thirty years ago rather by accident than
+choice) was thoroughly distasteful to him. As a dealer in
+pianofortes, he came into contact with a class of people who
+inspired him with a savage contempt, and of late years his business
+had suffered considerably from the competition of tradesmen who knew
+nothing of such conflicts between sentiment and interest. A majority
+of his customers obtained their pianos on the 'hire-purchase
+system,' and oftener than not, they were persons of very small or
+very precarious income, who, rabid in the pursuit of gentility,
+signed agreements they had little chance of fulfilling; when in
+pecuniary straits, they either raised money upon the instruments, or
+allowed them to fall into the hands of distraining creditors.
+Inquiry into the circumstances of a would-be customer sometimes had
+ludicrous results; a newly-married couple, for instance, would be
+found tenanting two top-floor rooms, the furnishing whereof seemed
+to them incomplete without the piano of which their friends and
+relatives boasted. Not a few professional swindlers came to the
+office; confederate rogues, vouching for each other's
+respectability, got possession of pianos merely to pawn or sell
+them, having paid no more than the first month's charge. It was Mr
+Lord's experience that year by year the recklessness of the vulgar
+became more glaring, and deliberate fraud more artful. To-day he had
+successfully prosecuted a man who seemed to have lived for some time
+on the hirepurchase system, and it made him unusually cheerful.
+
+'You don't think of going to see the Queen to-morrow?' said his
+daughter, smiling.
+
+'What have I to do with the Queen? Do you wish to go?'
+
+'Not to see Her Majesty. I care as little about her as you do. But I
+thought of having a walk in the evening.'
+
+Nancy phrased it thus with intention. She wished to intimate that,
+at her age, it could hardly be necessary to ask permission. But her
+father looked surprised.
+
+'In the evening? Where?'
+
+'Oh, about the main streets--to see the people and the
+illuminations.'
+
+Her voice was not quite firm.
+
+'But,' said her father, 'there'll be such a swarm of blackguards as
+never was known. How can you go into such a crowd? It's astonishing
+that you should think of it.'
+
+'The blackguards will be outnumbered by the decent people, father.'
+
+'You suppose that's possible?' he returned gloomily.
+
+'Oh, I think so,' Nancy laughed. 'At all events, there'll be a great
+majority of people who pretend to be decent. I have asked Jessica
+Morgan to go with me.'
+
+'What right had you to ask her, without first finding out whether
+you could go or not?'
+
+It was spoken rather gravely than severely. Mr. Lord never looked
+fixedly at his daughter, and even a glance at her face was unusual;
+but at this juncture he met her eyes for an instant. The nervous
+motion with which he immediately turned aside had been marked by
+Nancy on previous occasions, and she had understood it as a sign of
+his lack of affection for her.
+
+'I am twenty-three years old, father,' she replied, without
+aggressiveness.
+
+'That would be something of an answer if you were a man,' observed
+the father, his eyes cast down.
+
+'Because I am a woman, you despise me?'
+
+Stephen was startled at this unfamiliar mode of address. He moved
+uneasily.
+
+'If I despised you, Nancy, I shouldn't care very much what you did.
+I suppose you must do as you like, but you won't go with my
+permission.'
+
+There was a silence, then the girl said:
+
+'I meant to ask Horace to go with us.'
+
+'Horace--pooh!'
+
+Again a silence. Mr. Lord laid down his cup, moved a few steps away,
+and turned back.
+
+'I didn't think this kind of thing was in your way,' he said
+gruffly. 'I thought you were above it.'
+
+Nancy defended herself as she had done to Jessica, but without the
+playfulness. In listening, her father seemed to weigh the merits of
+the case conscientiously with wrinkled brows. At length he spoke.
+
+'Horace is no good. But if Samuel Barmby will go with you, I make no
+objection.'
+
+A movement of annoyance was Nancy's first reply. She drummed with
+her fingers on the table, looking fixedly before her.
+
+'I certainly can't ask Mr. Barmby to come with us,' she said, with an
+effort at self-control.
+
+'Well, you needn't. I'll speak about it myself.'
+
+He waited, and again it chanced that their eyes met. Nancy, on the
+point of speaking, checked herself. A full minute passed, and
+Stephen stood waiting patiently.
+
+'If you insist upon it,' said Nancy, rising from her chair, 'we will
+take Mr. Barmby with us.'
+
+Without comment, Mr. Lord left the room, and his own door closed
+rather loudly behind him.
+
+Not long afterwards Nancy heard a new foot in the passage, and her
+brother made his appearance. Horace had good looks, but his face
+showed already some of the unpleasant characteristics which time had
+developed on that of Stephen Lord, and from which the daughter was
+entirely free; one judged him slow of intellect and weakly
+self-willed. His hair was of pale chestnut, the silky pencillings of
+his moustache considerably darker. His cheek, delicately pink and
+easily changing to a warmer hue, his bright-coloured lips, and the
+limpid glistening of his eyes, showed him of frail constitution; he
+was very slim, and narrow across the shoulders. The fashion of his
+attire tended to a dandiacal extreme,--modish silk hat, lavender
+necktie, white waistcoat, gaiters over his patent-leather shoes,
+gloves crushed together in one hand, and in the other a bamboo cane.
+For the last year or two he had been progressing in this direction,
+despite his father's scornful remarks and his sister's good-natured
+mockery.
+
+'Father in yet?' he asked at the door of the dining-room, in subdued
+voice.
+
+Nancy nodded, and the young man withdrew to lay aside his outdoor
+equipments.
+
+'What sort of temper?' was his question when he returned.
+
+'Pretty good--until I spoilt it.'
+
+Horace exhibited a pettish annoyance.
+
+'What on earth did you do that for? I want to have a talk with him
+to-night.'
+
+'About what?'
+
+'Oh, never mind; I'll tell you after.'
+
+Both kept their voices low, as if afraid of being overheard in the
+next room. Horace began to nibble at a biscuit; the hour of his
+return made it unnecessary for him, as a rule, to take anything
+before dinner, but at present he seemed in a nervous condition, and
+acted mechanically.
+
+'Come out into the garden, will you?' he said, after receiving a
+brief explanation of what had passed between Nancy and her father.
+'I've something to tell you.'
+
+His sister carelessly assented, and with heads uncovered they went
+through the house into the open air. The garden was but a strip of
+ground, bounded by walls of four feet high; in the midst stood a
+laburnum, now heavy with golden bloom, and at the end grew a
+holly-bush, flanked with laurels; a border flower-bed displayed
+Stephen Lord's taste and industry. Nancy seated herself on a rustic
+bench in the shadow of the laburnum, and Horace stood before her,
+one of the branches in his hand.
+
+'I promised Fanny to take her to-morrow night,' he began awkwardly.
+
+'Oh, you have?'
+
+'And we're going together in the morning, you know.'
+
+'I know now. I didn't before,' Nancy replied.
+
+'Of course we can make a party in the evening.'
+
+'Of course.'
+
+Horace looked up at the ugly house-backs, and hesitated before
+proceeding.
+
+'That isn't what I wanted to talk about,' he said at length. 'A very
+queer thing has happened, a thing I can't make out at all.'
+
+The listener looked her curiosity.
+
+'I promised to say nothing about it, but there's no harm in telling
+you, you know. You remember I was away last Saturday afternoon?
+Well, just when it was time to leave the office, that day, the
+porter came to say that a lady wished to see me--a lady in a
+carriage outside. Of course I couldn't make it out at all, but I
+went down as quickly as possible, and saw the carriage waiting
+there,--a brougham,--and marched up to the door. Inside there
+was a lady--a great swell, smiling at me as if we were friends. I
+took off my hat, and said that I was Mr. Lord. "Yes," she said, "I
+see you are;" and she asked if I could spare her an hour or two, as
+she wished to speak to me of something important. Well, of course I
+could only say that I had nothing particular to do,--that I was
+just going home. "Then will you do me the pleasure," she said, "to
+come and have lunch with me? I live in Weymouth Street, Portland
+Place."
+
+The young man paused to watch the effect of his narrative,
+especially of the last words. Nancy returned his gaze with frank
+astonishment.
+
+'What sort of lady was it?' she asked.
+
+'Oh, a great swell. Somebody in the best society--you could see
+that at once.'
+
+'But how old?'
+
+'Well, I couldn't tell exactly; about forty, I should think.'
+
+'Oh!--Go on.'
+
+'One couldn't refuse, you know; I was only too glad to go to a house
+in the West End. She opened the carriage-door from the inside, and I
+got in, and off we drove. I felt awkward, of course, but after all I
+was decently dressed, and I suppose I can behave like a gentleman,
+and--well, she sat looking at me and smiling, and I could only
+smile back. Then she said she must apologise for behaving so
+strangely, but I was very young, and she was an old woman,--one
+couldn't call her that, though,--and she had taken this way of
+renewing her acquaintance with me. Renewing? But I didn't remember
+to have ever met her before, I said. "Oh, yes, we have met before,
+but you were a little child, a baby in fact, and there's no wonder
+you don't remember me?" And then she said, "I knew your mother very
+well."
+
+Nancy leaned forward, her lips apart.
+
+'Queer, wasn't it? Then she went on to say that her name was Mrs.
+Damerel; had I ever heard it? No, I couldn't remember the name at
+all. She was a widow, she said, and had lived mostly abroad for a
+great many years; now she was come back to settle in England. She
+hadn't a house of her own yet, but lived at a boarding-house; she
+didn't know whether to take a house in London, or somewhere just out
+in the country. Then she began to ask about father, and about you;
+and it seemed to amuse her when I looked puzzled. She's a jolly sort
+of person, always laughing.'
+
+'Did she say anything more about our mother?'
+
+'I'll tell you about that presently. We got to the house, and went
+in, and she took me upstairs to her own private sitting-room, where
+the table was laid for two. She said that she usually had her meals
+with the other people, but it would be better for us to be alone, so
+that we could talk.'
+
+'How did she know where to find you?' Nancy inquired.
+
+'Of course I wondered about that, but I didn't like to ask. Well,
+she went away for a few minutes, and then we had lunch. Everything
+was A-1 of course; first-rate wines to choose from, and a rattling
+good cigar afterwards--for me, I mean. She brought out a box; said
+they were her husband's, and had a laugh about it.'
+
+'How long has she been a widow?' asked Nancy.
+
+'I don't know. She didn't wear colours, I noticed; perhaps it was a
+fashionable sort of mourning. We talked about all sorts of things; I
+soon made myself quite at home. And at last she began to explain.
+She was a friend of mother's, years and years ago, and father was
+the cause of their parting, a quarrel about something, she didn't
+say exactly what. And it had suddenly struck her that she would like
+to know how we were getting on. Then she asked me to promise that I
+would tell no one.'
+
+'She knew about mother's death, I suppose?'
+
+'Oh yes, she knew about that. It happened not very long after the
+affair that parted them. She asked a good many questions about you.
+And she wanted to know how father had got on in his business.'
+
+'What did you say?'
+
+'Oh, I told her I really didn't know much about it, and she laughed
+at that.'
+
+'How long did you stay there?'
+
+'Till about four. But there's something else. Before I went away she
+gave me an invitation for next Saturday. She wants me to meet her at
+Portland Road Station, and go out to Richmond, and have dinner
+there.'
+
+'Shall you go?'
+
+'Well, it's very awkward. I want to go somewhere else on Saturday,
+with Fanny. But I didn't see how to refuse.'
+
+Nancy wore a look of grave reflection, and kept silence.
+
+'It isn't a bad thing, you know,' pursued her brother, 'to have a
+friend of that sort. There's no knowing what use she might be,
+especially just now.'
+
+His tone caused Nancy to look up.
+
+'Why just now?'
+
+'I'll tell you after I've had a talk with father to-night,' Horace
+replied, setting his countenance to a show of energetic resolve.
+
+'Shall I guess what you're going to talk about?'
+
+'If you like.'
+
+She gazed at him.
+
+'You're surely not so silly as to tell father about all that
+nonsense?'
+
+'What nonsense?' exclaimed the other indignantly.
+
+'Why, with Fanny French.'
+
+'You'll find that it's anything but nonsense,' Horace replied,
+raising his brows, and gazing straight before him, with expanded
+nostrils.
+
+'All right. Let me know the result. It's time to go in.'
+
+Horace sat alone for a minute or two, his legs at full length, his
+feet crossed, and the upper part of his body bent forward. He smiled
+to himself, a smile of singular fatuity, and began to hum a popular
+tune.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 5
+
+
+
+
+
+When they assembled at table, Mr. Lord had recovered his moderate
+cheerfulness. Essentially, he was anything but ill-tempered; Horace
+and Nancy were far from regarding him with that resentful bitterness
+which is produced in the victims of a really harsh parent. Ten years
+ago, as they well remembered, anger was a rare thing in his
+behaviour to them, and kindness the rule. Affectionate he had never
+shown himself; reserve and austerity had always distinguished him.
+Even now-a-days, it was generally safe to anticipate mildness from
+him at the evening meal. In the matter of eating and drinking his
+prudence notably contradicted his precepts. He loved strong meats,
+dishes highly flavoured, and partook of them without moderation. At
+table his beverage was ale; for wine--unless it were very sweet
+port--he cared little; but in the privacy of his own room, whilst
+smoking numberless pipes of rank tobacco, he indulged freely in
+spirits. The habit was unknown to his children, but for some years
+he had seldom gone to bed in a condition that merited the name of
+sobriety.
+
+When the repast was nearly over, Mr. Lord glanced at his son and said
+unconcernedly:
+
+'You have heard that Nancy wants to mix with the rag-tag and bobtail
+to-morrow night?'
+
+'I shall take care of her,' Horace replied, starting from his
+reverie.
+
+'Doesn't it seem to you rather a come-down for an educated young
+lady?'
+
+'Oh, there'll be lots of them about.'
+
+'Will there? Then I can't see much difference between them and the
+servant girls.'
+
+Nancy put in a word.
+
+'That shows you don't in the least understand me, father.'
+
+'We won't argue about it. But bear in mind, Horace, that you bring
+your sister back not later than half-past eleven. You are to be here
+by half-past eleven.'
+
+'That's rather early,' replied the young man, though in a submissive
+tone.
+
+'It's the hour I appoint. Samuel Barmby will be with you, and he
+will know the arrangement; but I tell you now, so that there may be
+no misunderstanding.'
+
+Nancy sat in a very upright position, displeasure plain upon her
+countenance. But she made no remark. Horace, who had his reasons for
+desiring to preserve a genial tone, affected acquiescence. Presently
+he and his sister went upstairs to the drawing-room, where they sat
+down at a distance apart--Nancy by the window, gazing at the warm
+clouds above the roofs opposite, the young man in a corner which the
+dusk already shadowed. Some time passed before either spoke, and it
+was Horace's voice which first made itself heard.
+
+'Nancy, don't you think it's about time we began to behave firmly?'
+
+'It depends what you mean by firmness,' she answered in an absent
+tone.
+
+'We're old enough to judge for ourselves.'
+
+'I am, no doubt. But I'm not so sure about you.'
+
+'Oh, all right. Then we won't talk about it.'
+
+Another quarter of an hour went by. The room was in twilight. There
+came a knock at the door, and Mary Woodruff, a wax-taper in her
+hand, entered to light the gas. Having drawn the blind, and given a
+glance round to see that everything was in order, she addressed
+Nancy, her tone perfectly respectful, though she used no formality.
+
+'Martha has been asking me whether she can go out to-morrow night
+for an hour or two.'
+
+'You don't wish to go yourself?' Miss. Lord returned, her voice
+significant of life-long familiarity.
+
+'Oh no!'
+
+And Mary showed one of her infrequent smiles.
+
+'She may go immediately after dinner, and be away till half-past
+ten.'
+
+The servant bent her head, and withdrew. As soon as she was gone,
+Horace laughed.
+
+'There you are! What did father say?'
+
+Nancy was silent.
+
+'Well, I'm going to have a word with him,' continued the young man,
+sauntering towards the door with his hands in his pockets. He looked
+exceedingly nervous. 'When I come back, I may have something to tell
+you.'
+
+'Very likely,' remarked his sister in a dry tone, and seated herself
+under the chandelier with a book.
+
+Horace slowly descended the stairs. At the foot he stood for a
+moment, then moved towards his father's door. Another hesitancy,
+though briefer, and he knocked for admission, which was at once
+granted. Mr. Lord sat in his round-backed chair, smoking a pipe, on
+his knees an evening paper. He looked at Horace from under his
+eyebrows, but with good humour.
+
+'Coming to report progress?'
+
+'Yes, father,--and to talk over things in general.'
+
+The slim youth--he could hardly be deemed more than a lad tried to
+assume an easy position, with his elbow on the corner of the
+mantelpiece; but his feet shuffled, and his eyes strayed vacantly.
+It cost him an effort to begin his customary account of how things
+were going with him at the shipping-office. In truth, there was
+nothing particular to report; there never was anything particular;
+but Horace always endeavoured to show that he had made headway, and
+to-night he spoke with a very pronounced optimism.
+
+'Very well, my boy,' said his father. 'If you are satisfied, I
+shalltry to be the same. Have you your pipe with you?--At your age
+I hadn't begun to smoke, and I should advise you to be moderate; but
+we'll have a whiff together, if you like.'
+
+'I'll go and fetch it,' Horace replied impulsively.
+
+He came back with a rather expensive meerschaum, recently purchased.
+
+'Hollo! luxuries!' exclaimed his father.
+
+'It kept catching my eye in a window,--and at last I couldn't
+resist. Tobacco's quite a different thing out of a pipe like this,
+you know.'
+
+No one, seeing them thus together, could have doubted of the
+affectionate feeling which Stephen Lord entertained for his son. It
+appeared in his frequent glances, in the relaxation of his features,
+in a certain abandonment of his whole frame, as though he had only
+just begun to enjoy the evening's repose.
+
+'I've something rather important to speak about, father,' Horace
+began, when he had puffed for a few minutes in silence.
+
+'Oh? What's that?'
+
+'You remember telling me, when I was one and twenty, that you wished
+me to work my way up, and win an income of my own, but that I could
+look to you for help, if ever there was need of it--?'
+
+Yes, Stephen remembered. He had frequently called it to mind, and
+wondered whether it was wisely said, the youth's character
+considered.
+
+'What of that?' he returned, still genially. 'Do you think of
+starting a new line of ocean steamships?'
+
+'Well, not just yet,' Horace answered, with an uncertain laugh. 'I
+have something more moderate in view. I may start a competition with
+the P. and O. presently.'
+
+'Let's hear about it.'
+
+'I dare say it will surprise you a little. The fact is, I--I am
+thinking of getting married.'
+
+The father did not move, but smoke ceased to issue from his lips,
+and his eyes, fixed upon Horace, widened a little in puzzled
+amusement.
+
+'Thinking of it, are you?' he said, in an undertone, as one speaks
+of some trifle. 'No harm in thinking. Too many people do it without
+thinking at all.'
+
+'I'm not one of that kind,' said Horace, with an air of maturity
+which was meant to rebuke his father's jest. 'I know what I'm about.
+I've thought it over thoroughly. You don't think it too soon, I
+hope?'
+
+Horace's pipe was going out; he held it against his knee and
+regarded it with unconscious eyes.
+
+'I dare say it won't be,' said Mr. Lord, 'when you have found a
+suitable wife.'
+
+'Oh, but you misunderstand me. I mean that I have decided to marry a
+particular person.'
+
+'And who may that be?'
+
+'The younger Miss. French--Fanny.'
+
+His voice quivered over the name; at the end he gave a gasp and a
+gulp. Of a sudden his lips and tongue were very dry, and he felt a
+disagreeable chill running down his back. For the listener's face
+had altered noticeably; it was dark, stern, and something worse. But
+Mr. Lord could still speak with self-control.
+
+'You have asked her to marry you?'
+
+'Yes, I have; and she has consented.'
+
+Horace felt his courage returning, like the so-called 'second wind'
+of a runner. It seemed to him that he had gone through the worst.
+The disclosure was made, and had resulted in no outbreak of fury;
+now he could begin to plead his cause. Imagination, excited by
+nervous stress, brought before him a clear picture of the beloved
+Fanny, with fluffy hair upon her forehead and a laugh on her
+never-closed lips. He spoke without effort.
+
+'I thought that there would be no harm in asking you to help us. We
+should be quite content to start on a couple of hundred a year--
+quite. That is only about fifty pounds more than we have.'
+
+Calf-love inspires many an audacity. To Horace there seemed nothing
+outrageous in this suggestion. He had talked it over with Fanny
+French several times, and they had agreed that his father could not
+in decency offer them _less_ than a hundred a year. He began to
+shake out the ashes from his pipe, with a vague intention of
+relighting it.
+
+'You really imagine,' said his father, 'that I should give you money
+to enable you to marry that idiot?'
+
+Evidently he put a severe restraint upon himself. The veins of his
+temples were congested; his nostrils grew wide; and he spoke rather
+hoarsely. Horace straightened his back, and, though in great fear,
+strung himself for conflict.
+
+'I don't see--what right--to insult the young lady.'
+
+His father took him up sternly.
+
+'Young lady? What do you mean by "young lady"? After all your
+education, haven't you learnt to distinguish a lady from a
+dressed-up kitchen wench? _I_ had none of your advantages. There was
+--there would have been some excuse for _me_, if I had made such a
+fool of myself. What were you doing all those years at school, if it
+wasn't learning the difference between real and sham, getting to
+understand things better than poor folks' children? You disappointed
+me, and a good deal more than I ever told you. I had hoped you would
+come from school better able to make a place in the world than your
+father was. I made up my mind long ago that you should never go into
+my business; you were to be something a good deal better. But after
+all you couldn't, or wouldn't, do what I wanted. Never mind--I
+said to myself--never mind; at all events, he has learnt to
+_think_ in a better way than if I had sent him to common schools,
+and after all that's the main thing. But here you come to me and
+talk of marrying a low-bred, low-minded creature, who wouldn't be
+good enough for the meanest clerk!'
+
+'How do you know that, father? What--what right have you to say
+such things, without knowing more of her than you do?'
+
+There was a brief silence before Mr. Lord spoke again.
+
+'You are very young,' he said, with less vehement contempt. 'I must
+remember that. At your age, a lad has a sort of devil in him, that's
+always driving him out of the path of common sense, whether he will
+or no. I'll try my best to talk quietly with you. Does your sister
+know what has been going on?'
+
+'I daresay she does. I haven't told her in so many words.'
+
+'I never thought of it,' pursued Mr. Lord gloomily. 'I took it for
+granted that everybody must see those people as I myself did. I have
+wondered now and then why Nancy kept up any kind of acquaintance
+with them, but she spoke of them in the rational way, and that
+seemed enough. I may have thought that they might get some sort of
+good out of _her_, and I felt sure she had too much sense to get
+harm from _them_. If it hadn't been so, I should have forbidden her
+to know them at all. What have you to say for yourself? I don't want
+to think worse of you than I need. I can make allowance for your
+age, as I said. What do you see in that girl? Just talk to me freely
+and plainly.'
+
+'After all you have said,' replied Horace, his voice still shaky,
+'what's the use? You seem to be convinced that there isn't a single
+good quality in her.'
+
+'So I am. What I want to know is, what good _you_ have found.'
+
+'A great deal, else I shouldn't have asked her to marry me.'
+
+A vein of stubbornness, unmistakable inheritance from Stephen Lord,
+had begun to appear in the youth's speech and bearing. He kept his
+head bent, and moved it a little from side to side.
+
+'Do you think her an exception in the family, then?'
+
+'She's a great deal better in every way than her sisters. But I
+don't think as badly of them as you do.'
+
+Mr. Lord stepped to the door, and out into the passage, where he
+shouted in his deep voice 'Nancy!' The girl quickly appeared.
+
+'Shut the door, please,' said her father. All three were now
+standing about the room. 'Your brother has brought me a piece of
+news. It ought to interest you, I should think. He wants to marry,
+and out of all the world, he has chosen Miss. French--the
+youngest.' Horace's position was trying. He did not know what to do
+with his hands, and he kept balancing now on one foot, now on the
+other. Nancy had her eyes averted from him, but she met her father's
+look gravely.
+
+'Now, I want to ask you,' Mr. Lord proceeded, 'whether you consider
+Miss. French a suitable wife for your brother? Just give me a plain
+yes or no.'
+
+'I certainly don't,' replied the girl, barely subduing the tremor of
+her voice.
+
+'Both my children are not fools, thank Heaven! Now tell me, if you
+can, what fault you have to find with the "young lady," as your
+brother calls her?'
+
+'For one thing, I don't think her Horace's equal. She can't really
+be called a lady.'
+
+'You are listening?'
+
+Horace bit his lip in mortification, and again his head swung
+doggedly from side to side.
+
+'We might pass over that,' added Mr. Lord. 'What about her character?
+Is there any good point in her?'
+
+'I don't think she means any harm. But she's silly, and I've often
+thought her selfish.'
+
+'You are listening?'
+
+Horace lost patience.
+
+'Then why do you pretend to be friends with her?' he demanded almost
+fiercely.
+
+'I don't,' replied his sister, with a note of disdain. 'We knew each
+other at school, and we haven't altogether broken off, that's all.'
+
+'It isn't all!' shouted the young man on a high key. 'If you're not
+friendly with her and her sisters, you've been a great hypocrite.
+It's only just lately you have begun to think yourself too good for
+them. They used to come here, and you went to them; and you talked
+just like friends would do. It's abominable to turn round like this,
+for the sake of taking father's side against me!'
+
+Mr. Lord regarded his son contemptuously. There was a rather long
+silence; he spoke at length with severe deliberation.
+
+'When you are ten years older, you'll know a good deal more about
+young women as they're turned out in these times. You'll have heard
+the talk of men who have been fools enough to marry choice
+specimens. When common sense has a chance of getting in a word with
+you, you'll understand what I now tell you. Wherever you look
+now-a-days there's sham and rottenness; but the most worthless
+creature living is one of these trashy, flashy girls,--the kind of
+girl you see everywhere, high and low,--calling themselves
+"ladies,"--thinking themselves too good for any honest, womanly
+work. Town and country, it's all the same. They're educated; oh yes,
+they're educated! What sort of wives do they make, with their
+education? What sort of mothers are they? Before long, there'll be
+no such thing as a home. They don't know what the word means. They'd
+like to live in hotels, and trollop about the streets day and night.
+There won't be any servants much longer; you're lucky if you find
+one of the old sort, who knows how to light a fire or wash a dish.
+Go into the houses of men with small incomes; what do you find but
+filth and disorder, quarrelling and misery? Young men are bad
+enough, I know that; they want to begin where their fathers left
+off, and if they can't do it honestly, they'll embezzle or forge.
+But you'll often find there's a worthless wife at the bottom of it,
+--worrying and nagging because she has a smaller house than some
+other woman, because she can't get silks and furs, and wants to ride
+in a cab instead of an omnibus. It is astounding to me that they
+don't get their necks wrung. Only wait a bit; we shall come to that
+presently!'
+
+It was a rare thing for Stephen Lord to talk at such length. He
+ceased with a bitter laugh, and sat down again in his chair. Horace
+and his sister waited.
+
+'I've no more to say,' fell from their father at length. 'Go and
+talk about it together, if you like.'
+
+Horace moved sullenly towards the door, and with a glance at his
+sister went out. Nancy, after lingering for a moment, spoke.
+
+'I don't think you need have any fear of it, father.'
+
+'Perhaps not. But if it isn't that one, it'll be another like her.
+There's not much choice for a lad like Horace.'
+
+Nancy changed her purpose of leaving the room, and drew a step
+nearer.
+
+'Don't you think there _might_ have been?'
+
+Mr. Lord turned to look at her.
+
+'How? What do you mean?'
+
+'I don't want to make you angry with me--'
+
+'Say what you've got to say,' broke in her father impatiently.
+
+'It isn't easy, when you so soon lose your temper.'
+
+'My girl,'--for once he gazed at her directly,--'if you knew all
+I have gone through in life, you wouldn't wonder at my temper being
+spoilt.--What do you mean? What could I have done?'
+
+She stood before him, and spoke with diffidence.
+
+'Don't you think that if we had lived in a different way, Horace and
+I might have had friends of a better kind?'
+
+'A different way?--I understand. You mean I ought to have had a
+big house, and made a show. Isn't that it?'
+
+'You gave us a good education,' replied Nancy, still in the same
+tone, 'and we might have associated with very different people from
+those you have been speaking of; but education alone isn't enough.
+One must live as the better people do.'
+
+'Exactly. That's your way of thinking. And how do you know that I
+could afford it, to begin with?'
+
+'Perhaps I oughtn't to have taken that for granted.'
+
+'Perhaps not. Young women take a good deal for granted now a-days.
+But supposing you were right, are you silly enough to think that
+richer people are better people, as a matter of course?'
+
+'Not as a matter of course,' said Nancy. 'But I'm quite sure--I
+know from what I've seen--that there's more chance of meeting nice
+people among them.'
+
+'What do you mean by "nice"?' Mr. Lord was lying back in his chair,
+and spoke thickly, as if wearied. 'People who can talk so that you
+forget they're only using words they've learnt like parrots?'
+
+'No. Just the contrary. People who have something to say worth
+listening to.'
+
+'If you take my advice, you'll pay less attention to what people
+say, and more to what they do. What's the good of a friend who won't
+come to see you because you live in a small house? That's the plain
+English of it. If I had done as I thought right, I should never have
+sent you to school at all. I should have had you taught at home all
+that's necessary to make a good girl and an honest woman, and have
+done my best to keep you away from the kind of life that I hate. But
+I hadn't the courage to act as I believed. I knew how the times were
+changing, and I was weak enough to be afraid I might do you an
+injustice. I did give you the chance of making friends among better
+people than your father. Didn't I use to talk to you about your
+school friends, and encourage you when they seemed of the right
+kind? And now you tell me that they don't care for your society
+because you live in a decent, unpretending way. I should think
+you're better without such friends.'
+
+Nancy reflected, seemed about to prolong the argument, but spoke at
+length in another voice.
+
+'Well, I will say good-night, father.'
+
+It was not usual for them to see each other after dinner, so that a
+good-night could seldom be exchanged. The girl, drawing away,
+expected a response; she saw her father nod, but he said nothing.
+
+'Good-night, father,' she repeated from a distance.
+
+'Good-night, Nancy, good-night,' came in impatient reply.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 6
+
+
+
+
+On Tuesday afternoon, when, beneath a cloudless sky, the great
+London highways reeked and roared in celebration of Jubilee, Nancy
+and her friend Miss. Morgan walked up Grove Lane to Champion Hill.
+Here and there a house had decked itself with colours of loyalty;
+otherwise the Lane was as quiet as usual.
+
+Champion Hill is a gravel byway, overhung with trees; large houses
+and spacious gardens on either hand. Here the heat of the sun was
+tempered. A carriage rolled softly along; a nurse with well-dressed
+children loitered in the shade. One might have imagined it a country
+road, so profound the stillness and so leafy the prospect.
+
+A year ago, Jessica Morgan had obtained a three months' engagement
+as governess to two little girls, who were sent under her care to
+the house of their grandmother at Teignmouth. Their father, Mr
+Vawdrey of Champion Hill, had recently lost his wife through an
+illness contracted at a horse-race, where the lady sat in wind and
+rain for some hours. The children knew little of what is learnt from
+books, but were surprisingly well informed on matters of which they
+ought to have known nothing; they talked of theatres and
+race-courses, of 'the new murderer' at Tussaud's, of police-news, of
+notorious spendthrifts and demi-reps; discussed their grown-up
+acquaintances with precocious understanding, and repeated scandalous
+insinuations which could have no meaning for them. Jessica was
+supposed to teach them for two hours daily; she found it an
+impossibility. Nevertheless a liking grew up between her and her
+charges, and, save by their refusal to study, the children gave her
+no trouble; they were abundantly good-natured, they laughed and
+sported all day long, and did their best to put life into the pale,
+overworked governess.
+
+Whilst living thus at the seaside, Jessica was delighted by the
+arrival of Nancy Lord, who came to Teignmouth for a summer holiday.
+With her came Mary Woodruff. The faithful servant had been ill; Mr
+Lord sent her down into Devon to make a complete recovery, and to
+act as Nancy's humble chaperon. Nancy's stay was for three weeks.
+The friends saw a great deal of each other, and Miss. Lord had the
+honour of being presented to Mrs. Tarrant, the old lady with whom
+Jessica lived, Mr. Vawdrey's mother-in-law. At the age of three score
+and ten, Mrs. Tarrant still led an active life, and talked with great
+volubility, chiefly of herself; Nancy learnt from her that she had
+been married at seventeen, and had had two children, a son and a
+daughter, both deceased; of relatives there remained to her only Mr
+Vawdrey and his family, and a grandson, Lionel Tarrant.
+
+One evening, as Jessica returned from a ramble with the children,
+they encountered a young man who was greeted, without much fervour,
+as 'cousin Lionel.' Mr. Tarrant professed himself merely a passing
+visitant; he had come to inquire after the health of his
+grandmother, and in a day or two must keep an appointment with
+friends elsewhere. Notwithstanding this announcement, he remained at
+Teignmouth for a fortnight, exhibiting a pious assiduity in his
+attendance upon the old lady. Naturally, he made acquaintance with
+Miss. Lord, whom his cousins regarded as a great acquisition, so
+vivacious was she, so ready to take part in any kind of lively
+amusement. Mr. Tarrant had been at Oxford; his speech was marked with
+the University accent; he talked little, and seemed to prefer his
+own society. In conversation with Nancy, though scrupulously
+courteous and perfectly good-natured, he never forgot that she was
+the friend of his cousins' governess, that their intercourse must be
+viewed as an irregular sort of thing, and that it behoved him to
+support his dignity whilst condescending to a social inferior. So,
+at all events, it struck Miss. Lord, very sensitive in such matters.
+Fond of fitting people with nicknames, she called this young man
+sometimes 'His Royal Highness,' sometimes 'His Majesty.'
+
+Of Mr. Tarrant's station in life nothing was discovered. His
+grandmother, though seemingly in possession of ample means, betrayed
+an indifferent education, and in her flow of gossip never referred
+to ancestral dignities, never made mention of the calling her
+husband had pursued. Mr. Vawdrey was known to be 'in business,'--a
+business which must be tolerably lucrative.
+
+On their return to London, the children passed from Miss. Morgan's
+care into that of Mrs. Baker, who kept house for the widower at
+Champion Hill; but Jessica did not wholly lose sight of them, and,
+at their request, she persuaded Nancy Lord to make an occasional
+call with her. Mrs. Baker (relict, it was understood, of a military
+officer who had fallen in Eastern warfare) behaved to the young
+ladies with much friendliness. They did not meet Mr. Vawdrey.
+
+Early in the following year, old Mrs. Tarrant, forsaking Teignmouth,
+came to live under her son-in-law's roof; the winter had tried her
+health, and henceforth she seldom left home.
+
+To-day, as on former occasions (only two or three in all), Nancy was
+reluctant to approach the big house; its imposing front made her
+feel that she came only on sufferance; probably even Mrs. Baker did
+not regard her as having a right to call here on terms of equality.
+Yet the place touched her curiosity and her imagination; she liked
+to study the luxurious appointments within, and to walk about the
+neglected but pleasant garden, quiet and secluded as if whole
+counties divided it from Camberwell. In the hall she and Jessica
+were at once welcomed by the children, who first informed them that
+tea would be served out of doors, and next made known that 'cousin
+Lionel' was here, in Mrs. Tarrant's drawing-room. The second piece of
+news vexed Nancy; she resolved never to come again, unless on formal
+invitation.
+
+Mrs. Baker, an agreeable woman, received them as if she were the
+mistress of the house. With Jessica she chatted about matters
+examinational, which she seemed thoroughly to understand; with Miss
+Lord she talked of wider subjects, in a tone not unpleasing to
+Nancy, seeing that it presumed, on her part, some knowledge of the
+polite world. It was observable that Mr. Vawdrey's daughters had
+benefited by the superintendence of this lady; they no longer
+gossiped loudly about murders and scandals, but demeaned themselves
+more as became their years.
+
+On the arrival of other ladies to call upon Mrs. Baker, the children
+drew their friends away into the garden, where tea now awaited them.
+Amid the trees and flowers time passed not unpleasantly, until, on
+happening to turn her head, Nancy perceived at a distance the
+approaching figure of Mr. Lionel Tarrant. He sauntered over the grass
+with easy, indolent step; his straw hat and light lounge costume
+(excellent tailoring) suited the season and the place. Jessica, who
+regarded the young man with something of awe, stood up to shake
+hands, but Miss. Lord kept her place in the garden chair.
+
+'Did you see the procession?' Tarrant inquired. 'Ah, then I can give
+you very important news--thrilling news. I know the colour of the
+Queen's bonnet, and of her parasol.'
+
+'Please don't keep us in suspense,' said Nancy.
+
+'They were of pale primrose. Touching, don't you think?'
+
+He had seated himself crosswise on a camp-stool, and seemed to be
+admiring the contour of his brown boots. Lionel's age was not more
+than seven-and-twenty; he enjoyed sound health, and his face
+signified contentment with the scheme of things as it concerned
+himself; but a chronic languor possessed him. It might be sheer
+laziness, possibly a result of that mental habit, discernible In his
+look, whereby he had come to regard his own judgment as the
+criterion of all matters in heaven and earth. Yet the conceit which
+relaxed his muscles was in the main amiable; it never repelled as
+does the conceit of a fop or a weakling or a vulgar person; he could
+laugh heartily, even with his own affectations for a source of
+amusement. Of personal vanity he had little, though women esteemed
+him good-looking; his steady, indolent gaze made denial of such
+preoccupation. Nor could he be regarded as emasculate; his movements
+merely disguised the natural vigour of a manly frame, and his
+conversational trifling hinted an intellectual reserve, a latent
+power of mind, obvious enough in the lines of his countenance.
+
+Nancy was excusable for supposing that he viewed her slightingly. He
+spoke as one who did not expect to be quite understood by such a
+hearer, addressing her, without the familiarity, much as he
+addressed his young cousins. To her, his careful observance of
+formalities seemed the reverse of flattering; she felt sure that
+with young women in his own circle he would allow himself much more
+freedom. Whether the disparagement applied to her intellect or to
+her social status might be a question; Nancy could not decide which
+of the two she would prefer. Today an especial uneasiness troubled
+her from the first moment of his appearance; she felt a stronger
+prompting than hitherto to assert herself, and, if possible, to
+surprise Mr. Tarrant. But, as if he understood her thought, his
+manner became only more bland, his calm aloofness more pronounced.
+
+The children, who were never at ease in their cousin's presence,
+succeeded in drawing Jessica apart, and chattered to her about the
+educational methods imposed by Mrs. Baker, airing many grievances.
+They nourished a hope that Miss. Morgan might again become their
+governess; lessons down at Teignmouth had been nothing like so
+oppressive as here at Champion Hill.
+
+Tarrant, meanwhile, having drunk a cup of tea, and touched his
+moustache with a silk handkerchief, transferred himself from the
+camp-stool to the basket chair vacated by Jessica. He was now
+further from Nancy, but facing her.
+
+'I have been talking with Mrs. Bellamy,' fell from him, in the same
+tone of idle good nature. 'Do you know her? She has but one subject
+of conversation; an engrossing topic, to be sure; namely, her
+servants. Do you give much thought to the great servant question? I
+have my own modest view of the matter. It may not be novel, but my
+mind has worked upon it in the night watches.'
+
+Nancy, resolved not to smile, found herself smiling. Not so much at
+what he said, as at the manner of it. Her resentment was falling
+away; she felt the influence of this imperturbable geniality.
+
+'Shall I tell you my theory?'
+
+He talked with less reserve than on the last occasion when they had
+sat together. The mellow sunlight, the garden odours, the warm,
+still air, favoured a growth of intimacy.
+
+'By all means,' was Nancy's reply.
+
+'We must begin by admitting that the ordinary woman hates nothing so
+much as to have another woman set in authority over her.' He paused,
+and laughed lazily. 'Now, before the triumph of glorious Democracy,
+only those women kept servants who were capable of rule,--who had
+by birth the instinct of authority. They knew themselves the natural
+superiors of their domestics, and went through an education fitting
+them to rule. Things worked very well; no servant-difficulty
+existed. Now-a-days, every woman who can afford it must have another
+woman to wait upon her, no matter how silly, or vulgar, or depraved
+she may be; the result, of course, is a spirit of rebellion in the
+kitchen. Who could have expected anything else?'
+
+Nancy played with a dandelion she had plucked, and gave sign neither
+of assent nor disagreement.
+
+'Mrs. Bellamy,' continued the young man, 'marvels that servants
+revolt against her. What could be more natural? The servants have
+learnt that splendid doctrine that every one is as good as everybody
+else, and Mrs. Bellamy is by no means the person to make them see
+things differently. And this kind of thing is going on in numberless
+houses--an utterly incompetent mistress and a democratic maid in
+spirited revolt. The incompetents, being in so vast a majority, will
+sooner or later spoil all the servants in the country.'
+
+'You should make an article of it,' said Nancy, 'and send it to _The
+Nineteenth Century_.'
+
+'So I might.' He paused, and added casually, 'You read _The
+Nineteenth Century_?'
+
+'Now and then.'
+
+Nancy felt herself an impostor, for of leading reviews she knew
+little more than the names. And Tarrant's look, so steady, yet so
+good-tempered, disturbed her conscience with the fear that he saw
+through her. She was coming wretchedly out of this dialogue, in
+which she had meant to make a figure.
+
+He changed the subject; was it merely to spare her?
+
+'Shall you go to Teignmouth again this year?'
+
+'I don't know yet. I think not.'
+
+Silence followed. Tarrant, to judge from his face, was absorbed in
+pleasant thought; Nancy, on the other hand, felt so ill at ease that
+she was on the point of rising, when his voice checked her.
+
+'I have an idea'--he spoke dreamily--'of going to spend next
+winter in the Bahamas.'
+
+'Why the Bahamas?'
+
+Speaking with all the carelessness she could command, Nancy shivered
+a little. Spite of her 'culture,' she had but the vaguest notion
+where the Bahamas were. To betray ignorance would be dreadful. A
+suspicion awoke in her that Tarrant, surprised by her seeming
+familiarity with current literature, was craftily testing the actual
+quality of her education. Upon the shiver followed a glow, and, in
+fear lest her cheeks would redden, she grew angry.
+
+He was replying.
+
+'Partly because it is a delightful winter climate; partly because I
+have a friend there; partly because the islands are interesting. A
+man I knew at Oxford has gone out there, and is likely to stay. His
+father owns nearly the whole of an island; and as he's in very bad
+health, my friend may soon come into possession. When he does, he's
+going to astonish the natives.'
+
+'How?'
+
+A vision of savages flashed before Nancy's mind. She breathed more
+freely, thinking the danger past.
+
+'Simply by making a fortune out of an estate that is lying all but
+barren. Before the emancipation of the niggers, the Bahamas
+flourished wonderfully; now they are fallen to decay, and ruled, so
+far as I understand it, by a particularly contemptible crew of
+native whites, who ought all to be kicked into the sea. My friend's
+father is a man of no energy; he calls himself magistrate, coroner,
+superintendent of the customs, and a dozen other things, but seems
+to have spent his time for years in lying about, smoking and
+imbibing. His son, I'm afraid, waits impatiently for the old man's
+removal to a better world. He believes there are immense
+possibilities of trade.'
+
+Trying hard to recollect her geography, Miss. Lord affected but a
+slight interest.
+
+'There's no direct way of getting there,' Tarrant pursued. 'What
+route should you suggest?'
+
+She was right, after all. He wished to convict her of ignorance. Her
+cheeks were now burning, beyond a doubt, and she felt revengeful.
+
+'I advise you to make inquiries at a shipping-office,' was her
+distant reply.
+
+'It seems'--he was smiling at Nancy--'I shall have to go to New
+York, and then take the Cuba mail.'
+
+'Are you going to join your friend in business?'
+
+'Business, I fear, is hardly my vocation.'
+
+There was a tremor on Nancy's lips, and about her eyelids. She said
+abruptly:
+
+'I thought you were perhaps in business?'
+
+'Did you? What suggested it?'
+
+Tarrant looked fixedly at her; in his expression, as in his voice,
+she detected a slight disdain, and that decided her to the utterance
+of the next words.
+
+'Oh'--she had assumed an ingenuous air--'there's the Black Lead
+that bears your name. Haven't you something to do with it?'
+
+She durst not watch him, but a change of his countenance was
+distinctly perceptible, and for the moment caused her a keen
+gratification. His eyes had widened, his lips had set themselves; he
+looked at once startled and mortified.
+
+'Black lead?' The words fell slowly, in a voice unlike that she had
+been hearing. 'No. I have nothing to do with it.'
+
+The silence was dreadful. Nancy endeavoured to rise, but her limbs
+would not do their office. Then, her eyes fixed on the grass, she
+became aware that Tarrant himself had stood up.
+
+'Where are the children?' he was saying absently.
+
+He descried them afar off with Miss. Morgan, and began to saunter in
+that direction. As soon as his back was turned, Nancy rose and began
+to walk towards the house. In a few moments Jessica and the girls
+were with her.
+
+'I think we must go,' she said.
+
+They entered, and took leave of Mrs. Baker, who sat alone in the
+drawing-room.
+
+'Did you say good-bye to Mr. Tarrant?' Jessica asked, as they came
+forth again.
+
+'Yes.'
+
+'I didn't. But I suppose it doesn't matter.'
+
+Nancy had thought of telling her friend what she had done, of
+boasting that she had asked the impossible question. But now she
+felt ashamed of herself, and something more than ashamed. Never
+again could she enter this garden. And it seemed to her that, by a
+piece of outrageous, of wanton, folly, she had for ever excluded
+herself from the society of all 'superior' people.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 7
+
+
+
+
+'Now, _I_ look at it in this way. It's to celebrate the fiftieth
+year of the reign of Queen Victoria--yes: but at the same time,
+and far more, it's to celebrate the completion of fifty years of
+Progress. National Progress, without precedent in the history of
+mankind! One may say, indeed, Progress of the Human Race. Only think
+what has been done in this half-century: only think of it! Compare
+England now, compare the world, with what it was in 1837. It takes
+away one's breath!'
+
+Thus Mr. Samuel Bennett Barmby, as he stood swaying forward upon his
+toes, his boots creaking. Nancy and Jessica listened to him. They
+were ready to start on the evening's expedition, but Horace had not
+yet come home, and on the chance of his arrival they would wait a
+few minutes longer.
+
+'I shall make this the subject of a paper for our Society next
+winter--the Age of Progress. And with special reference to one
+particular--the Press. Only think now, of the difference between
+our newspapers, all our periodicals of to-day, and those fifty years
+ago. Did you ever really consider, Miss. Morgan, what a marvellous
+thing one of our great newspapers really is? Printed in another way
+it would make a volume--absolutely; a positive volume; packed with
+thought and information. And all for the ridiculous price of one
+penny!'
+
+He laughed; a high, chuckling, crowing laugh; the laugh of
+triumphant optimism. Of the man's sincerity there could be no
+question; it beamed from his shining forehead, his pointed nose;
+glistened in his prominent eyes. He had a tall, lank figure,
+irreproachably clad in a suit of grey: frock coat, and waistcoat
+revealing an expanse of white shirt. His cuffs were magnificent, and
+the hands worthy of them. A stand-up collar, of remarkable
+stiffness, kept his head at the proper level of self-respect.
+
+'By the bye, Miss. Lord, are you aware that the Chinese Empire, with
+four _hundred_ MILLION inhabitants, has only _ten_ daily papers?
+Positively; only ten.'
+
+'How do you know?' asked Nancy.
+
+'I saw it stated in a paper. That helps one to _grasp_ the
+difference between civilisation and barbarism. One doesn't think
+clearly enough of common things. Now that's one of the benefits one
+gets from Carlyle. Carlyle teaches one to see the marvellous in
+everyday life. Of course in many things I don't agree with him, but
+I shall never lose an opportunity of expressing my gratitude to
+Carlyle. Carlyle and Gurty! Yes, Carlyle and Gurty; those two
+authors are an education in themselves.'
+
+He uttered a long 'Ah!' and moved his lips as if savouring a
+delicious morsel.
+
+'Now here's an interesting thing. If all the cabs in London were put
+end to end,'--he paused between the words, gravely,--'what do
+you think, Miss. Morgan, would be the total length?'
+
+'Oh, I have no idea, Mr. Barmby.'
+
+'Forty miles--positively! Forty miles of cabs!'
+
+'How do you know?' asked Nancy.
+
+'I saw it stated in a paper.'
+
+The girls glanced at each other, and smiled. Barmby beamed upon them
+with the benevolence of a man who knew his advantages, personal and
+social.
+
+And at this moment Horace Lord came in. He had not the fresh
+appearance which usually distinguished him; his face was stained
+with perspiration, his collar had become limp, the flower at his
+buttonhole hung faded.
+
+'Well, here I am. Are you going?'
+
+'I suppose you know you have kept us waiting,' said his sister.
+
+'Awf'ly sorry. Couldn't get here before.'
+
+He spoke as if he had not altogether the command of his tongue, and
+with a fixed meaningless smile.
+
+'We had better not delay,' said Barmby, taking up his hat. 'Seven
+o'clock. We ought to be at Charing Cross before eight; that will
+allow us about three hours.'
+
+They set forth at once. By private agreement between the girls,
+Jessica Morgan attached herself to Mr. Barmby, allowing Nancy to
+follow with her brother, as they walked rapidly towards Camberwell
+Green. Horace kept humming popular airs; his hat had fallen a little
+to the side, and he swung his cane carelessly. His sister asked him
+what he had been doing all day.
+
+'Oh, going about. I met some fellows after the procession. We had a
+splendid view, up there on the top of Waterloo House.'
+
+'Did Fanny go home?'
+
+'We met her sisters, and had some lunch at a restaurant. Look here;
+you don't want me to-night. You won't mind if I get lost in the
+crowd? Barmby will be quite enough to take care of you.'
+
+'You are going to meet her again, I suppose?'
+
+Horace nodded.
+
+'We had better agree on a rendezvous at a certain time. I say,
+Barmby, just a moment; if any of us should get separated, we had
+better know where to meet, for coming home.'
+
+'Oh, there's no fear of that.'
+
+'All the same, it _might_ happen. There'll be a tremendous crush,
+you know. Suppose we say the place where the trams stop, south of
+Westminster Bridge, and the time a quarter to eleven?'
+
+This was agreed upon.
+
+At Camberwell Green they mingled with a confused rush of hilarious
+crowds, amid a clattering of cabs and omnibuses, a jingling of
+tram-car bells. Public-houses sent forth their alcoholic odours upon
+the hot air. Samuel Barmby, joyous in his protectorship of two young
+ladies, for he regarded Horace as a mere boy, bustled about them
+whilst they stood waiting for the arrival of the Westminster car.
+
+'It'll have to be a gallant rush! You would rather be outside,
+wouldn't you, Miss. Lord? Here it comes: charge!'
+
+But the charge was ineffectual for their purpose. A throng of far
+more resolute and more sinewy people swept them aside, and seized
+every vacant place on the top of the vehicle. Only with much
+struggle did they obtain places within. In an ordinary mood, Nancy
+would have resented this hustling of her person by the profane
+public; as it was, she half enjoyed the tumult, and looked forward
+to get more of it along the packed streets, with a sense that she
+might as well amuse herself in vulgar ways, since nothing better was
+attainable. This did not, however, modify her contempt of Samuel
+Barmby; it seemed never to have occurred to him that the
+rough-and-tumble might be avoided, and time gained, by the simple
+expedient of taking a cab.
+
+Sitting opposite to Samuel, she avoided his persistent glances by
+reading the rows of advertisements above his head. Somebody's
+'Blue;' somebody's 'Soap;' somebody's 'High-class Jams;' and behold,
+inserted between the Soap and the Jam--'God so loved the world,
+that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whoso believeth in Him
+should not perish, but have everlasting life.' Nancy perused the
+passage without perception of incongruity, without emotion of any
+kind. Her religion had long since fallen to pieces, and universal
+defilement of Scriptural phrase by the associations of the
+market-place had in this respect blunted her sensibilities.
+
+Barmby was talking to Jessica Morgan. She caught his words now and
+then.
+
+'Can you tell me what is the smallest tree in the world?--No, it's
+the Greenland birch. Its full-grown height is only three inches--
+positively! But it spreads over several feet.'
+
+Nancy was tempted to lean forward and say, 'How do you know?' But
+the jest seemed to involve her in too much familiarity with Mr
+Barmby; for her own peace it was better to treat him with all
+possible coldness.
+
+A woman near her talked loudly about the procession, with special
+reference to a personage whom she called 'Prince of Wiles.' This
+enthusiast declared with pride that she had stood at a certain
+street corner for seven hours, accompanied by a child of five years
+old, the same who now sat on her lap, nodding in utter weariness;
+together they were going to see the illuminations, and walk about,
+with intervals devoted to refreshments, for several hours more.
+Beyond sat a working-man, overtaken with liquor, who railed
+vehemently at the Jubilee, and in no measured terms gave his opinion
+of our Sovereign Lady; the whole thing was a 'lay,' an occasion for
+filling the Royal pocket, and it had succeeded to the tune of
+something like half a million of money, wheedled, most of it, from
+the imbecile poor. 'Shut up!' roared a loyalist, whose patience
+could endure no longer. 'We're not going to let a boozing blackguard
+like you talk in that way about 'er Majesty!' Thereupon, retort of
+insult, challenge to combat, clamour from many throats, deep and
+shrill. Nancy laughed, and would rather have enjoyed it if the men
+had fought.
+
+At Westminster Bridge all jumped confusedly into the street and ran
+for the pavement. It was still broad daylight; the sun--a
+potentate who keeps no Jubilee--dropping westward amid the hues of
+summer eventide, was unmarked, for all his splendour, by the roaring
+multitudes.
+
+'Where are you going to leave us?' Nancy inquired of her brother.
+
+'Charing Cross, or somewhere about there.'
+
+'Keep by me till then.'
+
+Barmby was endeavouring to secure her companionship. He began to
+cross the bridge at her side, but Nancy turned and bade him attend
+upon Miss. Morgan, saying that she wished to talk with her brother.
+In this order they moved towards Parliament Street, where the crowd
+began to thicken.
+
+'Now let us decide upon our route,' exclaimed Barmby, with the air
+of a popular leader planning a great demonstration. 'Miss. Lord, we
+will be directed by your wishes. Where would you like to be when the
+lighting-up begins?'
+
+'I don't care. What does it matter? Let us go straight on and see
+whatever comes in our way.'
+
+'That's the right spirit! Let us give ourselves up to the occasion!
+We can't be wrong in making for Trafalgar Square. Advance!'
+
+They followed upon a group of reeling lads and girls, who yelled in
+chorus the popular song of the day, a sentimental one as it happened--
+
+'_Do not forget me,
+Do not forget me,
+Think sometimes of me still_'--
+
+Nancy was working herself into a nervous, excited state. She felt it
+impossible to walk on and on under Barmby's protection, listening to
+his atrocious commonplaces, his enthusiasms of the Young Men's
+Debating Society. The glow of midsummer had entered into her blood;
+she resolved to taste independence, to mingle with the limitless
+crowd as one of its units, borne in whatever direction. That song of
+the streets pleased her, made sympathetic appeal to her; she would
+have liked to join in it.
+
+Just behind her--it was on the broad pavement at Whitehall--some
+one spoke her name.
+
+'Miss. Lord! Why, who would have expected to see you here? Shouldn't
+have dared to think of such a thing; upon my word, I shouldn't!'
+
+A man of about thirty, dressed without much care, middle-sized,
+wiry, ruddy of cheek, and his coarse but strong features vivid with
+festive energy, held a hand to her. Luckworth Crewe was his name.
+Nancy had come to know him at the house of Mrs. Peachey, where from
+time to time she had met various people unrecognised in her own
+home. His tongue bewrayed him for a native of some northern county;
+his manner had no polish, but a genuine heartiness which would have
+atoned for many defects. Horace, who also knew him, offered a
+friendly greeting; but Samuel Barmby, when the voice caught his ear,
+regarded this intruder with cold surprise.
+
+'May I walk on with you?' Crewe asked, when he saw that Miss. Lord
+felt no distaste for his company.
+
+Nancy deigned not even a glance at her nominal protector.
+
+'If you are going our way,' she replied.
+
+Barmby, his dignity unobserved, strode on with Miss. Morgan, of whom
+he sought information concerning the loud-voiced man. Crewe talked
+away.
+
+'So you've come out to have a look at it, after all. I saw the Miss
+Frenches last Sunday, and they told me you cared no more for the
+Jubilee than for a dog-fight. Of course I wasn't surprised; you've
+other things to think about. But it's worth seeing, that's my
+opinion. Were you out this morning?'
+
+'No. I don't care for Royalties.'
+
+'No more do I. Expensive humbugs, that's what I call 'em. But I had
+a look at them, for all that. The Crown Prince was worth seeing;
+yes, he really was. I'm not so prejudiced as to deny that. He's the
+kind of chap I should like to get hold of, and have a bit of a talk
+with, and ask him what he thought about things in general. It's been
+a big affair, hasn't it? I know a chap who made a Jubilee Perfume,
+and he's netting something like a hundred pounds a day.'
+
+'Have you any Jubilee speculation on hand?'
+
+'Don't ask me! It makes me mad. I had a really big thing,--a
+Jubilee Drink,--a teetotal beverage; the kind of thing that would
+have sold itself, this weather. A friend of mine hit on it, a clerk
+in a City warehouse, one of the cleverest chaps I ever knew. It
+really was _the_ drink; I've never tasted anything like it. Why,
+there's the biggest fortune on record waiting for the man who can
+supply _the_ drink for total-abstainers. And this friend of mine had
+it. He gave me some to taste one night, about a month ago, and I
+roared with delight. It was all arranged. I undertook to find enough
+capital to start with, and to manage the concern. I would have given
+up my work with Bullock and Freeman. I'd have gone in, tooth and
+nail, for that drink! I sat up all one night trying to find a name
+for it; but couldn't hit on the right one. A name is just as
+important as the stuff itself that you want to sell. Next morning--
+it was Sunday--I went round to my friend's lodgings, and'--he
+slapped his thigh--'I'm blest if the chap hadn't cut his throat!'
+
+'Why?'
+
+'Betting and forgery. He would have been arrested next day. But the
+worst of it was that his beverage perished with him. I hadn't a
+notion how it was made; he wouldn't tell me till I planked down
+money to start with; and not a drop of it could be found anywhere.
+And to think that he had absolutely struck oil, as they say; had
+nothing to do but sit down and count the money as it came in! That's
+the third man I've known go wrong in less than a year. Betting and
+embezzlement; betting and burglary; betting and forgery. I'll tell
+you some time about the chap who went in for burglary. One of the
+best fellows I ever knew; when he comes out, I must give him a hand.
+But ten to one he'll burgle again; they always do; burglary grows on
+a man, like drink.'
+
+His laughter rang across the street; Barmby, who kept looking back,
+surprised and indignant that this acquaintance of Miss. Lord's was
+not presented to him, paused for a moment, but Nancy waved to him
+commandingly, 'Straight on!'
+
+They reached Charing Cross. Horace, who took no part in the
+conversation, and had dropped behind, at this point found an
+opportunity of stealing away. It was Crewe who first remarked his
+absence.
+
+'Hollo! where's your brother?'
+
+'Gone, evidently.--Hush! Don't say anything. Will you do something
+for me, Mr. Crewe?'
+
+'Of course I will. What is it?'
+
+Nancy pursued in a low voice.
+
+'He's gone to meet Fanny French. At least, he told me so; but I want
+to know whether it is really Fanny, or some one else. He said they
+were to meet in front of the Haymarket Theatre. Will you go as
+quickly as you can, and see if Fanny is there?'
+
+Crewe laughed.
+
+'Like a bird!--But how am I to meet you again?'
+
+'We'll be at the top of Regent Street at nine o'clock,--by Peter
+Robinson's. Don't lose time.'
+
+He struck off in the westerly direction, and Barmby, looking round
+at that moment, saw him go. Engrossed in thought of Nancy, Samuel
+did not yet perceive that her brother had vanished.
+
+'Your friend isn't coming any further?' he said, in a tone of
+forbearance.
+
+'No.'
+
+'But where's Mr. Lord?' exclaimed Jessica.
+
+Nancy pretended to look back for him, and for a minute or two they
+waited. Barmby, glad to be delivered from both male companions, made
+light of the matter; Horace could take care of himself; they had the
+appointment for a quarter to eleven;--on! And he now fixed himself
+resolutely at Nancy's side.
+
+She, delighted with the success of her stratagem, and careless of
+what might result from it, behaved more companionably. To Luckworth
+Crewe's society she had no objection; indeed, she rather liked him;
+but his presence would have hindered the escape for which she was
+preparing. Poor Jessica might feel it something of a hardship to
+pass hours alone with 'the Prophet,' but that could not be helped.
+Nancy would be free to-night, if never again. They turned into the
+Strand, and Barmby voiced his opinion of the public decorations.
+
+'There's very little of what can be called Art,--very little
+indeed. I'm afraid we haven't made much progress in Art.--Now what
+would Ruskin say to this kind of thing? The popular taste wants
+educating. My idea is that we ought to get a few leading men Burne
+Jones and--and William Morris--and people of that kind, you
+know, Miss. Lord,--to give lectures in a big hall on the elements
+of Art. A great deal might be done in that way, don't you think so,
+Miss. Morgan?'
+
+'I have no faith in anything popular,' Jessica replied loftily.
+
+'No, no. But, after all, the people have got the upper hand
+now-a-days, and we who enjoy advantages of education, of culture,
+ought not to allow them to remain in darkness. It isn't for our own
+interest, most decidedly it isn't.'
+
+'Did your sisters go to see the procession?' Nancy asked.
+
+'Oh, they were afraid of the crowd. The old gentleman took them out
+to Tooting Common this afternoon, and they enjoyed themselves.
+Perhaps I should have been wiser if I had imitated their example; I
+mean this morning; of course I wouldn't have missed this evening for
+anything whatever. But somehow, one feels it a sort of duty to see
+something of these great public holidays. I caught a glimpse of the
+procession. In its way it was imposing--yes, really. After all,
+the Monarchy is a great _fact_--as Gurty would have said. I like
+to keep my mind open to facts.'
+
+The sun had set, and with approach of dusk the crowds grew denser.
+Nancy proposed a return westwards; the clubs of Pall Mall and of St
+James's Street would make a display worth seeing, and they must not
+miss Piccadilly.
+
+'A little later,' said their escort, with an air of liberality, 'we
+must think of some light refreshment. We shall be passing a
+respectable restaurant, no doubt.'
+
+Twilight began to obscure the distance. Here and there a house-front
+slowly marked itself with points of flame, shaping to wreath,
+festoon, or initials of Royalty. Nancy looked eagerly about her,
+impatient for the dark, wishing the throng would sweep her away. In
+Pall Mall, Barmby felt it incumbent upon him to name the several
+clubs, a task for which he was inadequately prepared. As he stood
+staring in doubt at one of the coldly insolent facades, Jessica
+gazing in the same direction, Nancy saw that her moment had come.
+She darted off, struggled through a moving crowd, and reached the
+opposite pavement. All she had now to do was to press onward with
+the people around her; save by chance, she could not possibly be
+discovered.
+
+Alarm at her daring troubled her for a few minutes. As a matter of
+course Barmby would report this incident to her father,--unless
+she plainly asked him not to do so, for which she had no mind. Yet
+what did it matter? She had escaped to enjoy herself, and the sense
+of freedom soon overcame anxieties. No one observed her solitary
+state; she was one of millions walking about the streets because it
+was Jubilee Day, and every moment packed her more tightly among the
+tramping populace. A procession, this, greatly more significant than
+that of Royal personages earlier in the day. Along the main
+thoroughfares of mid-London, wheel-traffic was now suspended;
+between the houses moved a double current of humanity, this way and
+that, filling the whole space, so that no vehicle could possibly
+have made its way on the wonted track. At junctions, pickets of
+police directed progress; the slowly advancing masses wheeled to
+left or right at word of command, carelessly obedient. But for an
+occasional bellow of hilarious blackguardism, or for a song uplifted
+by strident voices, or a cheer at some flaring symbol that pleased
+the passers, there was little noise; only a thud, thud of footfalls
+numberless, and the low, unvarying sound that suggested some huge
+beast purring to itself in stupid contentment.
+
+Nancy forgot her identity, lost sight of herself as an individual.
+Her blood was heated by close air and physical contact. She did not
+think, and her emotions differed little from those of any shop-girl
+let loose. The 'culture,' to which she laid claim, evanesced in this
+atmosphere of exhalations. Could she have seen her face, its look of
+vulgar abandonment would have horrified her.
+
+Some one trod violently on her heel, and she turned with a
+half-angry laugh, protesting. 'Beg your pardon, miss,' said a young
+fellow of the clerkly order. 'A push be'ind made me do it.' He
+thrust himself to a place beside her, and Nancy conversed with him
+unrestrainedly, as though it were a matter of course. The young man,
+scrutinising her with much freedom, shaped clerkly compliments, and,
+in his fashion, grew lyrical; until, at a certain remark which he
+permitted himself, Nancy felt it time to shake him off. Her next
+encounter was more noteworthy. Of a sudden she felt an arm round her
+waist, and a man, whose breath declared the source of his
+inspiration, began singing close to her ear the operatic ditty,
+'Queen of my Heart.' He had, moreover, a good tenor voice, and
+belonged, vaguely, to some stratum of educated society.
+
+'I think you had better leave me alone,' said Nancy, looking him
+severely in the face.
+
+'Well, if you really think so,'--he seemed struck by her manner of
+speech,--'of course I will: but I'd much rather not.'
+
+'I might find it necessary to speak to a policeman at the next
+corner.'
+
+'Oh, in that case.'--He raised his hat, and fell aside. And Nancy
+felt that, after all, the adventure had been amusing.
+
+She was now in Regent Street, and it came to her recollection that
+she had made an appointment with Luckworth Crewe for nine o'clock.
+Without any intention of keeping it; but why not do so? Her lively
+acquaintance would be excellent company for the next hour, until she
+chose to bring the escapade to an end. And indeed, save by a
+disagreeable struggle, she could hardly change the direction of her
+steps. It was probably past nine; Crewe might have got tired of
+waiting, or have found it impossible to keep a position on the
+pavement. Drawing near to the top of Regent Street, she hoped he
+might be there. And there he was, jovially perspiring; he saw her
+between crowded heads, and crushed through to her side.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 8
+
+
+
+
+'Where are your friends?'
+
+'That's more than I can tell you.'
+
+They laughed together.
+
+'It's a miracle we've been able to meet,' said Crewe. 'I had to
+thrash a fellow five minutes ago, and was precious near getting run
+in. Shall we go the Tottenham Court Road way? Look out! You'd better
+hold on to my arm. These big crossings are like whirlpools; you
+might go round and round, and never get anywhere. Don't be afraid;
+if any one runs up against you, I'll knock him down.'
+
+'There wouldn't be room for him to fall,' said Nancy, wild with
+merriment, as they swayed amid the uproar. For the first time she
+understood how perilous such a crowd might be. A band of roisterers,
+linked arm in arm, were trying to break up the orderly march of
+thousands into a chaotic fight. The point for which Crewe made was
+unattainable; just in front of him a woman began shrieking
+hysterically; another fainted, and dropped into her neighbour's
+arms.
+
+'Don't get frightened!'
+
+'Not I! I like it. It's good fun.'
+
+'You're the right sort, you are. But we must get out of this. It's
+worse than the pit-door on the first night of a pantomime. I must
+hold you up; don't mind.'
+
+His arm encircled her body, and for a moment now and then he carried
+rather than led her. They were safe at length, in the right part of
+Oxford Street, and moving with the stream.
+
+'I couldn't find your brother,' Crewe had leisure to say; 'and I
+didn't see Fanny French. There weren't many people about just then,
+either. They must have gone off before I came.'
+
+'Yes, they must. It doesn't matter.'
+
+'You have some life in you.' He gazed at her admiringly. 'You're
+worth half a million of the girls that squeak and wobble when
+there's a bit of rough play going on.'
+
+'I hope so. Did you set me down as one of that kind?'
+
+Nancy found that her tongue had achieved a liberty suitable to the
+occasion. She spoke without forethought, and found pleasure in her
+boldness.
+
+'Not I,' Crewe answered. 'But I never had a chance before now of
+telling you what I thought.'
+
+Some one in front of them ignited a Bengal light and threw it into
+the air; the flame flashed across Nancy's features, and fell upon
+the hat of a man near her.
+
+'How do you mean to get home?' asked Crewe presently. Nancy
+explained that all her party were to meet on the other side of the
+river.
+
+'Oh, then, there's plenty of time. When you've had enough of this
+kind of thing we can strike off into the quiet streets. If you were
+a man, which I'm glad you're not, I should say I was choking for a
+glass of beer.'
+
+'Say it, and look for a place where you can quench your thirst.'
+
+'It must be a place, then, where you can come in as well. You don't
+drink beer, of course, but we can get lemonade and that kind of
+thing. No wonder we get thirsty; look up there.'
+
+Following the direction of his eyes, Nancy saw above the heads of
+the multitude a waving dust-canopy, sent up by myriad tramplings on
+the sun-scorched streets. Glare of gas illumined it in the
+foreground; beyond, it dimmed all radiance like a thin fog.
+
+'We might cut across through Soho,' he pursued, 'and get among the
+restaurants. Take my arm again. Only a bit of cross-fighting, and we
+shall be in the crowd going the other way. Did you do physics at
+school? Remember about the resultant of forces? Now _we_'re a force
+tending to the right, and the crowd is a force making for straight
+on; to find the--'
+
+His hat was knocked over his eyes, and the statement of the problem
+ended in laughter.
+
+With a good deal of difficulty they reached one of the southward
+byways; and thenceforth walking was unimpeded.
+
+'You know that I call myself Luckworth Crewe,' resumed Nancy's
+companion after a short silence.
+
+'Of course I do.'
+
+'Well, the fact is, I've no right to either of the names. I thought
+I'd just tell you, for the fun of the thing; I shouldn't talk about
+it to any one else that I know. They tell me I was picked up on a
+doorstep in Leeds, and the wife of a mill-hand adopted me. Their
+name was Crewe. They called me Tom, but somehow it isn't a name I
+care for, and when I was grown up I met a man called Luckworth, who
+was as kind as a father to me, and so I took his name in place of
+Tom. That's the long and short of it.'
+
+Nancy looked a trifle disconcerted.
+
+'You won't think any worse of me, because I haven't a name of my
+own?'
+
+'Why should I? It isn't your fault.'
+
+'No. But I'm not the kind of man to knuckle under. I think myself
+just as good as anybody else I'll knock the man down that sneers at
+me; and I won't thank anybody for pitying me; that's the sort of
+chap I am. And I'm going to have a big fortune one of these days.
+It's down in the books. I know I shall live to be a rich man, just
+as well as I know that I'm walking down Dean Street with Miss. Lord.'
+
+'I should think it very possible,' his companion remarked.
+
+'It hasn't begun yet. I can only lay my hand on a few hundred
+pounds, one way and another. And I'm turned thirty. But the next ten
+years are going to do it. Do you know what I did last Saturday? I
+got fifteen hundred pounds' worth of advertising for our people,
+from a chap that's never yet put a penny into the hands of an agent.
+I went down and talked to him like a father. He was the hardest nut
+I ever had to crack, but in thirty-five minutes I'd got him--like
+a roach on a hook. And it'll be to his advantage, mind you. That
+fifteen hundred 'll bring him in more business than he's had for ten
+years past. I got him to confess he was going down the hill. "Of
+course," I said, "because you don't know how to advertise, and won't
+let anybody else know for you?" In a few minutes he was telling me
+he'd dropped more than a thousand on a patent that was out of date
+before it got fairly going. "All right," said I. "Here's your new
+cooking-stove. You've dropped a thousand on the other thing; give
+your advertising to us, and I'll guarantee you shall come home on
+the cooking-stove."'
+
+'Come home on it?' Nancy inquired, in astonishment.
+
+'Oh, it's our way of talking,' said the other, with his hearty
+laugh. 'It means to make up one's loss. And he'll do it. And when he
+has, he'll think no end of me.'
+
+'I daresay.'
+
+'Not long ago, I boxed a chap for his advertising. A fair turn-up
+with the gloves. Do you suppose I licked him? Not I; though I could
+have done it with one hand. I just let him knock me out of time, and
+two minutes after he put all his business into my hands.'
+
+'Oh, you'll get rich,' declared Nancy, laughing. 'No doubt about
+it.'
+
+'There was a spot down the South Western Railway where we wanted to
+stick up a board, a great big board, as ugly as they make 'em. It
+was in a man's garden; a certain particular place, where the trains
+slow, and folks have time to read the advertisement and meditate on
+it. That chap wouldn't listen. What! spoil his garden with our
+da----with our confounded board! not for five hundred a year! Well,
+I went down, and I talked to him--'
+
+'Like a father,' put in Nancy.
+
+'Just so, like a father. "Look here," said I, "my dear sir, you're
+impeding the progress of civilisation. How could we have become what
+we are without the modern science and art of advertising? Till
+advertising sprang up, the world was barbarous. Do you suppose
+people kept themselves clean before they were reminded at every
+corner of the benefits of soap? Do you suppose they were healthy
+before every wall and hoarding told them what medicine to take for
+their ailments? Not they indeed! Why, a man like you--an
+enlightened man, I see it in your face (he was as ugly as Ben's
+bull-dog), ought to be proud of helping on the age." And I made him
+downright ashamed of himself. He asked me to have a bit of dinner,
+and we came to terms over the cheese.'
+
+In this strain did Luckworth Crewe continue to talk across the
+gloomy solitudes of Soho. And Nancy would on no account have had him
+cease. She was fascinated by his rough vigour and by his visions of
+golden prosperity. It seemed to her that they reached very quickly
+the restaurant he had in view. With keen enjoyment of the novelty,
+she followed him between tables where people were eating, drinking,
+smoking, and took a place beside him on a cushioned seat at the end
+of the room.
+
+'I know you're tired,' he said. 'There's nearly half-an-hour before
+you need move.'
+
+Nancy hesitated in her choice of a refreshment. She wished to have
+something unusual, something that fitted an occasion so remarkable,
+yet, as Crewe would of course pay, she did not like to propose
+anything expensive.
+
+'Now let me choose for you,' her companion requested. 'After all
+that rough work, you want something more than a drop of lemonade.
+I'm going to order a nice little bottle of champagne out of the ice,
+and a pretty little sandwich made of whatever you like.'
+
+'Champagne--?'
+
+It had been in her thoughts, a sparkling audacity. Good; champagne
+let it be. And she leaned back in defiant satisfaction.
+
+'I didn't expect much from Jubilee Day,' observed the man of
+business, 'but that only shows how things turn out--always better
+or worse than you think for. I'm not likely to forget it; it's the
+best day I've had in my life yet, and I leave you to guess who I owe
+_that_ to.'
+
+'I think this is good wine,' remarked Nancy, as if she had not heard
+him.
+
+'Not bad. You wouldn't suppose a fellow of my sort would know
+anything about it. But I do. I've drunk plenty of good champagne,
+and I shall drink better.'
+
+Nancy ate her sandwich and smiled. The one glass sufficed her; Crewe
+drank three. Presently, looking at her with his head propped on his
+hand, he said gravely:
+
+'I wonder whether this is the last walk we shall have together?'
+
+'Who can say?' she answered in a light tone.
+
+'Some one ought to be able to say.'
+
+'I never make prophecies, and never believe other people's.'
+
+'Shows your good sense. But _I_ make wishes, and plenty of them.'
+
+'So do I,' said Nancy.
+
+'Then let us both make a wish to ourselves,' proposed Crewe,
+regarding her with eyes that had an uncommon light in them.
+
+His companion laughed, then both were quiet for a moment.
+
+They allowed themselves plenty of time to battle their way as far as
+Westminster Bridge. At one point police and crowd were in brief
+conflict; the burly guardians of order dealt thwacking blows, right
+and left, sound fisticuffs, backed with hearty oaths. The night was
+young; by magisterial providence, hours of steady drinking lay
+before the hardier jubilants. Thwacks and curses would be no rarity
+in another hour or two.
+
+At the foot of Parliament Street, Nancy came face to face with
+Samuel Barmby, on whose arm hung the wearied Jessica. Without
+heeding their exclamations, she turned to her protector and bade him
+a hearty good-night. Crewe accepted his dismissal. He made survey of
+Barmby, and moved off singing to himself, '_Do not forget me--do
+not forget me_--'
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Part II: Nature's Graduate
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 1
+
+
+
+
+The disorder which Stephen Lord masked as a 'touch of gout' had in
+truth a much more disagreeable name. It was now twelve months since
+his doctor's first warning, directed against the savoury meats and
+ardent beverages which constituted his diet; Stephen resolved upon a
+change of habits, but the flesh held him in bondage, and medical
+prophecy was justified by the event. All through Jubilee Day he
+suffered acutely; for the rest of the week he remained at home,
+sometimes sitting in the garden, but generally keeping his room,
+where he lay on a couch.
+
+A man of method and routine, sedentary, with a strong dislike of
+unfamiliar surroundings, he could not be persuaded to try change of
+air. The disease intensified his native stubbornness, made him by
+turns fretful and furious, disposed him to a sullen solitude. He
+would accept no tendance but that of Mary Woodruff; to her, as to
+his children, he kept up the pretence of gout. He was visited only
+by Samuel Barmby, with whom he discussed details of business, and by
+Mr. Barmby, senior, his friend of thirty years, the one man to whom
+he unbosomed himself.
+
+His effort to follow the regimen medically prescribed to him was
+even now futile. At the end of a week's time, imagining himself
+somewhat better, he resumed his daily walk to Camberwell Road, but
+remained at the warehouse only till two or three o'clock, then
+returned and sat alone in his room. On one of the first days of
+July, when the weather was oppressively hot, he entered the house
+about noon, and in a few minutes rang his bell. Mary Woodruff came
+to him. He was sitting on the couch, pale, wet with perspiration,
+and exhausted.
+
+'I want something to drink,' he said wearily, without raising his
+eyes.
+
+'Will you have the lime-water, sir?'
+
+'Yes--what you like.'
+
+Mary brought it to him, and he drank two large glasses, with no
+pause.
+
+'Where is Nancy?'
+
+'In town, sir. She said she would be back about four.'
+
+He made an angry movement.
+
+'What's she doing in town? She said nothing to me. Why doesn't she
+come back to lunch? Where does she go to for all these hours?'
+
+'I don't know, sir.'
+
+The servant spoke in a low, respectful voice, looking at her master
+with eyes that seemed to compassionate him.
+
+'Well, it doesn't matter.' He waved a hand, as if in dismissal.
+'Wait--if I'm to be alone, I might as well have lunch now. I feel
+hungry, as if I hadn't eaten anything for twenty-four hours. Get me
+something, Mary.'
+
+Later in the afternoon his bell again sounded, and Mary answered it.
+As he did not speak at once,--he was standing by the window with
+his hands behind him,--she asked him his pleasure.
+
+'Bring me some water, Mary, plain drinking-water.'
+
+She returned with a jug and glass, and he took a long draught.
+
+'No, don't go yet. I want to--to talk to you about things. Sit
+down there for a minute.'
+
+He pointed to the couch, and Mary, with an anxious look, obeyed him.
+
+'I'm thinking of leaving this house, and going to live in the
+country. There's no reason why I shouldn't. My partner can look
+after the business well enough.'
+
+'It might be the best thing you could do, sir. The best for your
+health.'
+
+'Yes, it might. I'm not satisfied with things. I want to make a
+decided change, in every way.'
+
+His face had grown more haggard during the last few days, and his
+eyes wandered, expressing fretfulness or fear; he spoke with effort,
+and seemed unable to find the words that would convey his meaning.
+
+'Now I want you to tell me plainly, what do you think of Nancy?'
+
+'Think of her, sir?'
+
+'No, no--don't speak in that way. I don't want you to call me
+'sir'; it isn't necessary; we've known each other so long, and I
+think of you as a friend, a very good friend. Think of me in the
+same way, and speak naturally. I want to know your opinion of
+Nancy.'
+
+The listener had a face of grave attention: it signified no
+surprise, no vulgar self-consciousness, but perhaps a just
+perceptible pleasure. And in replying she looked steadily at her
+master for a moment.
+
+'I really don't feel I can judge her, Mr. Lord. It's true, in a way,
+I ought to know her very well, as I've seen her day by day since she
+was a little thing. But now she's a well-educated and clever young
+lady, and she has got far beyond me--'
+
+'Ay, there it is, there it is!' Stephen interrupted with bitterness.
+'She's got beyond us--beyond me as well as you. And she isn't what
+I meant her to be, very far from it. I haven't brought them up as I
+wished. I don't know--I'm sure I don't know why. It was in own
+hands. When they were little children, I said to myself: hey shall
+grow up plain, good, honest girl and boy. I said that I wouldn't
+educate them very much; I saw little good that came of it, in our
+rank of life. I meant them to be simple-minded. I hoped Nancy would
+marry a plain countryman, like the men I used to know when I was a
+boy; a farmer, or something of that kind. But see how it's come
+about. It wasn't that I altered my mind about what was best. But I
+seemed to have no choice. For one thing, I made more money at
+business than I had expected, and so--and so it seemed that they
+ought to be educated above me and mine. There was my mother, did a
+better woman ever live? She had no education but that of home. She
+could have brought up Nancy in the good, old-fashioned way, if I had
+let her. I wish I had, yes, I wish I had.'
+
+'I don't think you could have felt satisfied,' said the listener,
+with intelligent sympathy.
+
+'Why not? If she had been as good and useful a woman as _you_ are--'
+
+'Ah, you mustn't think in that way, Mr. Lord. I was born and bred to
+service. Your daughter had a mind given her at her birth, that would
+never have been content with humble things. She was meant for
+education and a higher place.'
+
+'What higher place is there for her? She thinks herself too good for
+the life she leads here, and yet I don't believe she'll ever find a
+place among people of a higher class. She has told me herself it's
+my fault. She says I ought to have had a big house for her, so that
+she might make friends among the rich. Perhaps she's right. I have
+made her neither one thing nor another. Mary, if I had never come to
+London, I might have lived happily. My place was away there, in the
+old home. I've known that for many a year. I've thought: wait till
+I've made a little more money, and I'll go back. But it was never
+done; and now it looks to me as if I had spoilt the lives of my
+children, as well as my own. I can't trust Nancy, that's the worst
+of it. You don't know what she did on Jubilee night. She wasn't with
+Mr. Barmby and the others--Barmby told me about it; she pretended
+to lose them, and went off somewhere to meet a man she's never
+spoken to me about. Is that how a good girl would act? I didn't
+speak to her about it; what use? Very likely she wouldn't tell me
+the truth. She takes it for granted I can't understand her. She
+thinks her education puts her above all plain folk and their ways--
+that's it.'
+
+Mary's eyes had fallen, and she kept silence.
+
+'Suppose anything happened to me, and they were left to themselves.
+I have money to leave between them, and of course they know it. How
+could it do them anything but harm? Do you know that Horace wants to
+marry that girl Fanny French--a grinning, chattering fool--if
+not worse. He has told me he shall do as he likes. Whether or no it
+was right to educate Nancy, I am very sure that I ought to have done
+with _him_ as I meant at first. He hasn't the brains to take a good
+position. When his schooling went on year after year, I thought at
+last to make of him something better than his father--a doctor, or
+a lawyer. But he hadn't the brains: he disappointed me bitterly. And
+what use can he make of my money, when I'm in my grave? If I die
+soon he'll marry, and ruin his life. And won't it be the same with
+Nancy? Some plotting, greedy fellow--the kind of man you see
+everywhere now-a-days, will fool her for the money's sake.'
+
+'We must hope they'll be much older and wiser before they have to
+act for themselves,' said Mary, looking into her master's troubled
+face.
+
+'Yes!' He came nearer to her, with a sudden hopefulness. 'And
+whether I live much longer or not, I can do something to guard them
+against their folly. They needn't have the money as soon as I am
+gone.'
+
+He seated himself in front of his companion.
+
+'I want to ask you something, Mary. If they were left alone, would
+you be willing to live here still, as you do now, for a few more
+years?'
+
+'I shall do whatever you wish--whatever you bid me, Mr. Lord,'
+answered the woman, in a voice of heartfelt loyalty.
+
+'You would stay on, and keep house for them?'
+
+'But would they go on living here?'
+
+'I could make them do so. I could put it down as a condition, in my
+will. At all events, I would make Nancy stay. Horace might live
+where he liked--though not with money to throw about. They have no
+relatives that could be of any use to them. I should wish Nancy to
+go on living here, and you with her; and she would only have just a
+sufficient income, paid by my old friend Barmby, or by his son. And
+that till she was--what? I have thought of six-and-twenty. By that
+time she would either have learnt wisdom, or she never would. She
+must be free sooner or later.'
+
+'But she couldn't live by herself, Mr. Lord.'
+
+'You tell me you would stay,' he exclaimed impulsively.
+
+'Oh, but I am only her servant. That wouldn't be enough.'
+
+'It would be. Your position shall be changed. There's no one living
+to whom I could trust her as I could to you. There's no woman I
+respect so much. For twenty years you have proved yourself worthy of
+respect--and it shall be paid to you.'
+
+His vehemence would brook no opposition.
+
+'You said you would do as I wished. I wish you to have a new
+position in this house. You shall no longer be called a servant; you
+shall be our housekeeper, and our friend. I will have it, I tell
+you!' he cried angrily. 'You shall sit at table with us, and live
+with us. Nancy still has sense enough to acknowledge that this is
+only your just reward; from her, I know, there won't be a word of
+objection. What can you have to say against it?'
+
+The woman was pale with emotion. Her reserve and sensibility shrank
+from what seemed to her an invidious honour, yet she durst not
+irritate the sick man by opposition.
+
+'It will make Nancy think,' he pursued, with emphasis. 'It will help
+her, perhaps, to see the difference between worthless women who put
+themselves forward, and the women of real value who make no
+pretences. Perhaps it isn't too late to set good examples before
+her. I've never found her ill-natured, though she's wilful; it isn't
+her heart that's wrong--I hope and think not--only her mind,
+that's got stuffed with foolish ideas. Since her grandmother's death
+she's had no guidance. You shall talk to her as a woman can; not all
+at once, but when she's used to thinking of you in this new way.'
+
+'You are forgetting her friends,' Mary said at length, with eyes of
+earnest appeal.
+
+'Her friends? She's better without such friends. There's one thing I
+used to hope, but I've given it up. I thought once that she might
+have come to a liking for Samuel Barmby, but now I don't think she
+ever will, and I believe it's her friends that are to blame for it.
+One thing I know, that she'll never meet with any one who will make
+her so good a husband as he would. We don't think alike in every
+way; he's a young man, and has the new ideas; but I've known him
+since he was a boy, and I respect his character. He has a
+conscience, which is no common thing now-a-days. He lives a clean,
+homely life--and you won't find many of his age who do. Nancy
+thinks herself a thousand times too good for him; I only hope he
+mayn't prove a great deal too good for _her_. But I've given up that
+thought. I've never spoken to her about it, and I never shall; no
+good comes of forcing a girl's inclination. I only tell you of it,
+Mary, because I want you to understand what has been going on.'
+
+They heard a bell ring; that of the front door.
+
+'It'll be Miss. Nancy,' said Mary, rising.
+
+'Go to the door then. If it's Nancy, tell her I want to speak to
+her, and come back yourself.'
+
+'Mr. Lord--'
+
+'Do as I tell you--at once!'
+
+All the latent force of Stephen's character now declared itself. He
+stood upright, his face stern and dignified. In a few moments, Nancy
+entered the room, and Mary followed her at a distance.
+
+'Nancy,' said the father, 'I want to tell you of a change in the
+house. You know that Mary has been with us for twenty years. You
+know that for a long time we haven't thought of her as a servant,
+but as a friend, and one of the best possible. It's time now to show
+our gratitude. Mary will continue to help us as before, but
+henceforth she is one of our family. She will eat with us and sit
+with us; and I look to you, my girl, to make the change an easy and
+pleasant one for her.'
+
+As soon as she understood the drift of her father's speech, Nancy
+experienced a shock, and could not conceal it. But when silence
+came, she had commanded herself. An instant's pause; then, with her
+brightest smile, she turned to Mary and spoke in a voice of
+kindness.
+
+'Father is quite right. Your place is with us. I am glad, very
+glad.'
+
+Mary looked from Mr. Lord to his daughter, tried vainly to speak, and
+left the room.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 2
+
+
+
+
+His father's contemptuous wrath had an ill effect upon Horace. Of an
+amiable disposition, and without independence of character, he might
+have been guided by a judicious parent through all the perils of his
+calf-love for Fanny French; thrown upon his own feeble resources, he
+regarded himself as a victim of the traditional struggle between
+prosaic age and nobly passionate youth, and resolved at all hazards
+to follow the heroic course--which meant, first of all, a cold
+taciturnity towards his father, and, as to his future conduct, a
+total disregard of the domestic restraints which he had hitherto
+accepted. In a day or two he sat down and wrote his father a long
+letter, of small merit as a composition, and otherwise illustrating
+the profitless nature of the education for which Stephen Lord had
+hopefully paid. It began with a declaration of rights. He was a man;
+he could no longer submit to childish trammels. A man must not be
+put to inconvenience by the necessity of coming home at early hours.
+A man could not brook cross-examination on the subject of his
+intimacies, his expenditure, and so forth. Above all, a man was
+answerable to no one but himself for his relations with the other
+sex, for the sacred hopes he cherished, for his emotions and
+aspirations which transcended even a man's vocabulary.--With much
+more of like tenor.
+
+To this epistle, delivered by post, Mr. Lord made no answer.
+
+Horace flattered himself that he had gained a victory. There was
+nothing like 'firmness,' and that evening, about nine, he went to De
+Crespigny Park. As usual, he had to ring the bell two or three times
+before any one came; the lively notes of a piano sounded from the
+drawing-room, intimating, no doubt, that Mrs. Peachey had guests. The
+door at length opened, and he bade the servant let Miss. Fanny know
+that he was here; he would wait in the dining-room.
+
+It was not yet dark, but objects could only just be distinguished;
+the gloom supplied Horace with a suggestion at which he laughed to
+himself. He had laid down his hat and cane, when a voice surprised
+him.
+
+'Who's that?' asked some one from the back of the room.
+
+'Oh, are _you_ there, Mr. Peachey?--I've come to see Fanny. I
+didn't care to go among the people.'
+
+'All right. We'd better light the gas.'
+
+With annoyance, Horace saw the master of the house come forward, and
+strike a match. Remains of dinner were still on the table. The two
+exchanged glances.
+
+'How is your father?' Peachey inquired. He had a dull, depressed
+look, and moved languidly to draw down the blind.
+
+'Oh, he isn't quite up to the mark. But it's nothing serious, I
+think.'
+
+'Miss. Lord quite well?--We haven't seen much of her lately.'
+
+'I don't know why, I'm sure.--Nobody can depend upon her very
+much.'
+
+'Well, I'll leave you,' said the other, with a dreary look about the
+room. 'The table ought to have been cleared by now--but that's
+nothing new.'
+
+'Confounded servants,' muttered Horace.
+
+'Oh yes, the servants,' was Peachey's ironical reply.
+
+As soon as he was left alone, Horace turned out the gas. Then he
+stood near the door, trembling with amorous anticipation. But
+minutes went by; his impatience grew intolerable; he stamped, and
+twisted his fingers together. Then of a sudden the door opened.
+
+'Why, it's dark, there's nobody here.'
+
+Fanny discovered her mistake. She was seized and lifted off her
+feet.
+
+'Oh! Do you want to eat me? I'll hit you as hard as I can, I will!
+You're spoiling my dress?'
+
+The last remonstrance was in a note that Horace did not venture to
+disregard.
+
+'Strike a light, silly! I know you've done something to my dress.'
+
+Horace pleaded abjectly to be forgiven, and that the room might
+remain shadowed; but Fanny was disturbed in temper.
+
+'If you don't light the gas, I'll go at once.'
+
+'I haven't any matches, darling.'
+
+'Oh, just like you! You never have anything. I thought every man
+carried matches.'
+
+She broke from him, and ran out. Wretched in the fear that she might
+not return, Horace waited on the threshold. In the drawing-room some
+one was singing 'The Maid of the Mill.' It came to an end, and there
+sounded voices, which the tormented listener strove to recognise.
+For at least ten minutes he waited, and was all but frantic, when
+the girl made her appearance, coming downstairs.
+
+'Never do that again,' she said viciously. 'I've had to unfasten my
+things, and put them straight. What a nuisance you are!'
+
+He stood cowed before her, limp and tremulous.
+
+'There, light the gas. Why couldn't you come into the drawing-room,
+like other people do?'
+
+'Who is there?' asked the young man, when he had obeyed her.
+
+'Go and see for yourself.'
+
+'Don't be angry, Fanny.' He followed her, like a dog, as she walked
+round the table to look at herself in the mirror over the fireplace.
+'It was only because I'm so fond of you.'
+
+'Oh, what a silly you are!' she laughed, seating herself on the arm
+of an easy-chair. 'Go ahead! What's the latest?'
+
+'Well, for one thing, I've had a very clear understanding with the
+gov'nor about my independence. I showed him that I meant having my
+own way, and he might bully as much as he liked.'
+
+It was not thus that Horace would naturally have spoken, not thus
+that he thought of his father. Fanny had subdued him to her own
+level, poisoned him with the desires excited by her presence. And he
+knew his baseness; he was not ignorant of the girl's ignoble nature.
+Only the fury of a virgin passion enabled him to talk, and sometimes
+think, as though he were in love with ideal purity.
+
+'I didn't think you had the pluck,' said Fanny, swinging one of her
+feet as she tittered.
+
+'That shows you haven't done me justice.'
+
+'And you're going to stay out late at night?'
+
+'As late as I like,' Horace answered, crossing his arms.
+
+'Then where will you take me to-morrow?'
+
+It happened that Horace was in funds just now; he had received his
+quarter's salary. Board and lodging were no expense to him; he
+provided his own clothing, but, with this exception, had to meet no
+serious claim. So, in reply to Fanny's characteristic question, he
+jingled coins.
+
+'Wherever you like.--"Dorothy," "Ruddigore--"'
+
+Delighted with his assent, she became more gracious, permitted a
+modest caress, and presently allowed herself to be drawn on to her
+lover's knee. She was passive, unconcerned; no second year graduate
+of the pavement could have preserved a completer equanimity; it did
+not appear that her pulse quickened ever so slightly, nor had her
+eyelid the suspicion of a droop. She hummed 'Queen of my Heart,' and
+grew absent in speculative thought, whilst Horace burned and panted
+at the proximity of her white flesh.
+
+'Oh, how I do love you, Fanny!'
+
+She trod playfully on his toe.
+
+'You haven't told the old gentleman yet?'
+
+'I--I'm thinking about it. But, Fanny, suppose he was to--to
+refuse to do anything for us. Would it make any difference? There
+are lots of people who marry on a hundred and fifty a year--oh
+lots!'
+
+The maiden arched her brows, and puckered her lips. Hitherto it had
+been taken for granted that Mr. Lord would be ready with subsidy;
+Horace, in a large, vague way, had hinted that assurance long ago.
+Fanny's disinclination to plight her troth--she still deemed
+herself absolutely free--had alone interfered between the young
+man and a definite project of marriage.
+
+'What kind of people?' she asked coldly.
+
+'Oh--respectable, educated people, like ourselves.'
+
+'And live in apartments? Thank you; I don't quite see myself. There
+isn't a bit of hurry, dear boy. Wait a bit.' She began to sing 'Wait
+till the clouds roll by.'
+
+'If you thought as much of me as I do of you--'
+
+Tired of her position, Fanny jumped up and took a spoonful of sweet
+jelly from a dish on the table.
+
+'Have some?'
+
+'Come here again. I've something more to tell you. Something very
+important.'
+
+She could only be prevailed upon to take a seat near him. Horace,
+beset with doubts as to his prudence, but unable to keep the secret,
+began to recount the story of his meeting with Mrs. Damerel, whom he
+had now seen for the second time. Fanny's curiosity, instantly
+awakened, grew eager as he proceeded. She questioned with skill and
+pertinacity, and elicited many more details than Nancy Lord had been
+able to gather.
+
+'You'll promise me not to say a word to any one?' pleaded Horace.
+
+'I won't open my lips. But you're quite sure she's as old as you
+say?'
+
+'Old enough to be my mother, I assure you.'
+
+The girl's suspicions were not wholly set at rest, but she made no
+further display of them.
+
+'Now just think what an advantage it might be to you, to know her,'
+Horace pursued. 'She'd introduce you at once to fashionable society,
+really tip-top people. How would you like that?'
+
+'Not bad,' was the judicial reply.
+
+'She must have no end of money, and who knows what she might do for
+me!'
+
+'It's a jolly queer thing,' mused the maiden.
+
+'There's no denying that. We must keep it close, whatever we do.'
+
+'You haven't told anybody else?'
+
+'Not a soul!' Horace lied stoutly.
+
+They were surprised by the sudden opening of the door; a servant
+appeared to clear the table. Fanny reprimanded her for neglecting to
+knock.
+
+'We may as well go into the drawing-room. There's nobody particular.
+Only Mrs. Middlemist, and Mr. Crewe, and--'
+
+In the hall they encountered Crewe himself, who stood there
+conversing with Beatrice. A few words were exchanged by the two men,
+and Horace followed his enchantress into the drawing-room, where he
+found, seated in conversation with Mrs. Peachey, two persons whom he
+had occasionally met here. One of them, Mrs. Middlemist, was a stout,
+coarse, high-coloured woman, with fingers much bejewelled. Until a
+year or two ago she had adorned the private bar of a public-house
+kept by her husband; retired from this honourable post, she now
+devoted herself to society and the domestic virtues. The other
+guest, Mrs. Murch by name, proclaimed herself, at a glance, of less
+prosperous condition, though no less sumptuously arrayed. Her face
+had a hungry, spiteful, leering expression; she spoke in a shrill,
+peevish tone, and wriggled nervously on her chair. In eleven years
+of married life, Mrs. Murch had borne six children, all of whom died
+before they were six months old. She lived apart from her husband,
+who had something to do with the manufacture of an Infants' Food.
+
+Fanny was requested to sing. She sat down at the piano, rattled a
+prelude, and gave forth an echo of the music-halls:
+
+'_It's all up with poor Tommy now.
+I shall never more be happy, I vow.
+It's just a week to-day
+Since my Sairey went away,
+And it's all up with poor Tommy now_.'
+
+Mrs. Middlemist, who prided herself upon serious vocal powers,
+remarked that comic singing should be confined to men.
+
+'You haven't a bad voice, my dear, if you would only take pains with
+it. Now sing us "For Ever and for Ever."'
+
+This song being the speaker's peculiar glory, she was of course
+requested to sing it herself, and, after entreaty, consented. Her
+eyes turned upward, her fat figure rolling from side to side, her
+mouth very wide open, Mrs. Middlemist did full justice to the erotic
+passion of this great lyric:
+
+'_Perchawnce if we 'ad never met,
+We 'ad been spared this mad regret,
+This hendless striving to forget--
+For hever--hand--for he-e-e-ver!_'
+
+Mrs. Murch let her head droop sentimentally. Horace glanced at Fanny,
+who, however, seemed absorbed in reflections as unsentimental as
+could be.
+
+In the meanwhile, on a garden seat under the calm but misty sky, sat
+Luckworth Crewe and Beatrice French. Crewe smoked a cigar placidly;
+Beatrice was laying before him the suggestion of her great
+commercial scheme, already confided to Fanny.
+
+'How does it strike you?' she asked at length.
+
+'Not bad, old chap. There's something in it, if you're clever enough
+to carry it through. And I shouldn't wonder if you are.' 'Will you
+help to set it going?'
+
+'Can't help with money,' Crewe replied.
+
+'Very well; will you help in other ways? Practical hints, and so
+on?'
+
+'Of course I will. Always ready to encourage merit in the
+money-making line. What capital are you prepared to put into it?'
+
+'Not much. The public must supply the capital.'
+
+'A sound principle,' Crewe laughed. 'But I shouldn't go on the old
+lines. You didn't think of starting a limited company? You'd find
+difficulties. Now what you want to start is a--let us call it the
+South London Dress Supply Association, or something of that kind.
+But you won't get to that all at once. You ought to have premises to
+begin with.'
+
+'I'm aware of it.'
+
+'Can you raise a thousand or so?'
+
+'Yes, I could--if I chose.'
+
+'Now, look here. Your notion of the Fashion Club is a deuced good
+one, and I don't see why it shouldn't be pretty easily started. Out
+of every five hundred women, you can reckon on four hundred and
+ninety-nine being fools; and there isn't a female fool who wouldn't
+read and think about a circular which promised her fashionable
+dresses for an unfashionable price. That's a great and sound basis
+to start on. What I advise is, that you should first of all
+advertise for a dress-making concern that would admit a partner with
+a small capital. You'll have between ten and twelve hundred replies,
+but don't be staggered; go through them carefully, and select a shop
+that's well situated, and doing a respectable trade. Get hold of
+these people, and induce them to make changes in their business to
+suit your idea. Then blaze away with circulars, headed "South London
+Fashion Club;" send them round the whole district, addressed to
+women. Every idiot of them will, at all events, come and look at the
+shop; that can be depended upon; in itself no bad advertisement.
+Arrange to have a special department--special entrance, if
+possible--with "The Club" painted up. Yes, by jingo! Have a big
+room, with comfortable chairs, and the women's weekly papers lying
+about, and smart dresses displayed on what-d'ye-call-'ems, like they
+have in windows. Make the subscription very low at first, and give
+rattling good value; never mind if you lose by it. Then, when you've
+got hold of a lot of likely people, try them with the share project.
+By-the-bye, if you lose no time, you can bring in the Jubilee
+somehow. Yes, start with the "Jubilee Fashion Club." I wonder
+nobody's done it already.'
+
+Beatrice was growing elated.
+
+'The public has to wait for its benefactors,' she replied.
+
+'I'll tell you what, would you like me to sketch you out a
+prospectus of the Club?'
+
+'Yes, you might do that if you like. You won't expect to be paid?'
+
+'Hang it! what do you take me for?'
+
+'Business is business,' Miss. French remarked coldly.
+
+'So it is. And friendship is friendship. Got a match?' He laughed.
+'No, I suppose you haven't.'
+
+'I'll go and get you one if you like.'
+
+'There's a good fellow. I'll think in the meantime.'
+
+Beatrice rose lazily, and was absent for several minutes. When she
+returned, Crewe re-lit his cigar.
+
+'Why shouldn't I start the shop on my own account?' Beatrice asked.
+
+'You haven't capital enough. A little place wouldn't do.'
+
+'I think I can get Fanny to join me.'
+
+'Can you? What will young Lord have to say to that?'
+
+'Psh! That's all fooling. It'll never come to anything. Unless, of
+course, the old man turned up his toes, and left the boy a tidy sum.
+But he won't just yet. I've told Fanny that if she'll raise
+something on her houses, I'll guarantee her the same income she has
+now.'
+
+'Take my advice,' said Crewe weightily, 'and hook on to an
+established business. Of course, you can change the name if you
+like; and there'd have to be alterations, and painting up, to give a
+new look.'
+
+'It's risky, dealing with strangers. How if they got hold of my
+idea, and then refused to take me in?'
+
+'Well now, look here. After all, I'll make a bargain with you, old
+chap. If I can introduce you to the right people, and get you safely
+started, will you give me all your advertising, on the usual
+commission?'
+
+'You mean, give it to Bullock and Freeman?'
+
+'No, I don't. It's a secret just yet, but I'm going to start for
+myself.'
+
+Beatrice was silent. They exchanged a look in the gloom, and Crewe
+nodded, in confirmation of his announcement.
+
+'How much have you got?' Miss. French inquired carelessly.
+
+'Not much. Most of the capital is here.' He touched his forehead.
+'Same as with you.'
+
+The young woman glanced at him again, and said in a lower voice:
+
+'You'd have had more by now, if--'
+
+Crewe waited, puffing his cigar, but she did not finish.
+
+'Maybe,' he replied impartially. 'Maybe not.'
+
+'Don't think I'm sorry,' Beatrice hastened to add. 'It was an idea,
+like any other.'
+
+'Not half a bad idea. But there were obstacles.'
+
+After a pause, Beatrice inquired:
+
+'Do you still think the same about women with money?'
+
+'Just the same,' Crewe replied at once, though with less than his
+usual directness; the question seemed to make him meditative. 'Just
+the same. Every man looks at it in his own way, of course. I'm not
+the sort of chap to knuckle under to my wife; and there isn't one
+woman in a thousand, if she gave her husband a start, could help
+reminding him of it. It's the wrong way about. Let women be as
+independent as they like as long as they're not married. I never
+think the worse of them, whatever they do that's honest. But a wife
+must play second fiddle, and think her husband a small god almighty
+--that's my way of looking at the question.'
+
+Beatrice laughed scornfully.
+
+'All right. We shall see.--When do you start business?'
+
+'This side Christmas. End of September, perhaps.'
+
+'You think to snatch a good deal from B. & F., I daresay?'
+
+Crewe nodded and smiled.
+
+'Then you'll look after this affair for me?' said Beatrice, with a
+return to the tone of strict business.
+
+'Without loss of time. You shall be advised of progress. Of course I
+must debit you with exes.'
+
+'All right. Mind you charge for all the penny stamps.'
+
+'Every one--don't you forget it.'
+
+He stood up, tilted forward on his toes, and stretched himself.
+
+'I'll be trotting homewards. It'll be time for by-by when I get to
+Kennington.'
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 3
+
+
+
+
+Nancy was undisturbed by the promotion of Mary Woodruff. A short
+time ago it would have offended her; she would have thought her
+dignity, her social prospects, imperilled. She was now careless on
+that score, and felt it a relief to cast off the show of domestic
+authority. Henceforth her position would be like that of Horace. All
+she now desired was perfect freedom from responsibility,--to be,
+as it were, a mere lodger in the house, to come and go unquestioned
+and unrestrained by duties.
+
+Thus, by aid of circumstance, had she put herself into complete
+accord with the spirit of her time. Abundant privilege; no
+obligation. A reference of all things to her sovereign will and
+pleasure. Withal, a defiant rather than a hopeful mood; resentment
+of the undisguisable fact that her will was sovereign only in a poor
+little sphere which she would gladly have transcended.
+
+Now-a-days she never went in the direction of Champion Hill,
+formerly her favourite walk. If Jessica Morgan spoke of her
+acquaintances there, she turned abruptly to another subject. She
+thought of the place as an abode of arrogance and snobbery. She
+recalled with malicious satisfaction her ill-mannered remark to
+Lionel Tarrant. Let him think of her as he would; at all events he
+could no longer imagine her overawed by his social prestige. The
+probability was that she had hurt him in a sensitive spot; it might
+be hoped that the wound would rankle for a long time.
+
+Her personal demeanour showed a change. So careful hitherto of
+feminine grace and decorum, she began to affect a mannishness of
+bearing, a bluntness of speech, such as found favour at De Crespigny
+Park. In a few weeks she had resumed friendly intercourse with Mrs.
+Peachey and her sisters, and spent an occasional evening at their
+house. Her father asked no questions; she rarely saw him except at
+meals. A stranger must have observed the signs of progressive malady
+in Mr. Lord's face, but Nancy was aware of nothing to cause
+uneasiness; she thought of him as suffering a little from 'gout;'
+elderly people were of course subject to such disorders. On most
+days he went to business; if he remained at home, Mary attended him
+assiduously, and he would accept no other ministration.
+
+Nancy was no longer inclined to study, and cared little for reading
+of any sort. That new book on Evolution, which she had brought from
+the library just before Jubilee Day, was still lying about; a dozen
+times she had looked at it with impatience, and reminded herself
+that it must be returned. Evolution! She already knew all about
+Darwinism, all she needed to know. If necessary she could talk about
+it--oh, with an air. But who wanted to talk about such things?
+After all, only priggish people,--the kind of people who lived at
+Champion Hill. Or idiots like Samuel Bennett Barmby, who bothered
+about the future of the world. What was it to _her_--the future of
+the world? She wanted to live in the present, to enjoy her youth. An
+evening like that she had spent in the huge crowd, with a man like
+Crewe to amuse her with his talk, was worth whole oceans of
+'culture.'
+
+'Culture' she already possessed, abundance of it. The heap of books
+she had read! Last winter she had attended a course of lectures,
+delivered by 'a young University gentleman with a tone of bland
+omniscience, on 'The History of Hellenic Civilisation;' her written
+answers to the little 'test papers' had been marked 'very
+satisfactory.' Was it not a proof of culture achieved? Education
+must not encroach upon the years of maturity. Nature marked the time
+when a woman should begin to live.
+
+There was poor Jessica. As July drew on, Jessica began to look
+cadaverous, ghostly. She would assuredly break down long before the
+time of her examination. What a wretched, what an absurd existence!
+Her home, too, was so miserable. Mrs. Morgan lay ill, unable to
+attend to anything; if she could not have a change of air, it must
+soon be all over with her. But they had no money, no chance of going
+to the seaside.
+
+It happened at length that Mr. Lord saw Jessica one evening, when she
+had come to spend an hour in Grove Lane. After her departure, he
+asked Nancy what was the matter with the girl, and Nancy explained
+the situation.
+
+'Well, why not take her with you, when you go away?'
+
+'I didn't know that I was going away, father. Nothing has been said
+of it.'
+
+'It's your own business. I leave you to make what plans you like.'
+
+Nancy reflected.
+
+'_You_ ought to have a change,' she said considerately. 'It would do
+you good. Suppose we all go to Teignmouth? I should think that would
+suit you.'
+
+'Why Teignmouth?'
+
+'I enjoyed it last year. And the lodgings were comfortable. We could
+have the same, from the first week in August.'
+
+'How do you know?'
+
+'I wrote the other day, and asked,' Nancy replied with a smile.
+
+But Mr. Lord declined to leave home. Mary Woodruff did her best to
+persuade him, until he angrily imposed silence. In a day or two he
+said to Nancy:
+
+'If you wish to go to Teignmouth, take Jessica and her mother.
+People mustn't die for want of a five-pound note. Make your
+arrangements, and let me know what money you'll need.'
+
+'It's very kind of you, father.'
+
+Mr. Lord turned away. His daughter noticed that he walked feebly, and
+she felt a moment's compunction.
+
+'Father--you are not so well to-day.'
+
+Without looking round, he replied that he would be well enough if
+left alone; and Nancy did not venture to say more.
+
+A few days later, she called in De Crespigny Park after dinnertime.
+Mrs. Peachey and Fanny were at Brighton; Beatrice had preferred to
+stay in London, being very busy with her great project. Whilst she
+talked of it with Nancy, Peachey and Luckworth Crewe came in
+together. There was sprightly conversation, in which the host,
+obviously glad of his wife's absence, took a moderate part.
+Presently, Miss. Lord and he found themselves gossiping alone; the
+other two had moved aside, and, as a look informed Nancy, were deep
+in confidential dialogue.
+
+'What do you think of that business?' she asked her companion in an
+undertone.
+
+'I shouldn't wonder if it answers,' said the young man, speaking as
+usual, with a soft, amiable voice. 'Our friend is helping, and he
+generally knows what he's about.'
+
+Crewe remained only for half-an-hour; on shaking hands with him,
+Nancy made known that she was going to the seaside next Monday for a
+few weeks, and the man of business answered only with 'I hope you'll
+enjoy yourself.' Soon afterwards, she took leave. At the junction of
+De Crespigny Park and Grove Lane, some one approached her, and with
+no great surprise Nancy saw that it was Crewe.
+
+'Been waiting for you,' he said. 'You remember you promised me
+another walk.'
+
+'Oh, it's much too late.'
+
+'Of course it is. I didn't mean now. But to-morrow.'
+
+'Impossible.' She moved on, in the direction away from her home. 'I
+shall be with friends in the evening, the Morgans.'
+
+'Confound it! I had made up my mind to ask you for last Saturday,
+but some country people nabbed me for the whole of that day. I took
+them up the Monument, and up St Paul's.'
+
+'I've never been up the Monument,' said Nancy.
+
+'Never? Come to-morrow afternoon then. You can spare the afternoon.
+Let's meet early somewhere. Take a bus to London Bridge. I'll be at
+the north end of London Bridge at three o'clock.'
+
+'All right; I'll be there,' Nancy replied off-hand.
+
+'You really will? Three, sharp. I was never late at an appointment,
+business or pleasure.'
+
+'Which do you consider this?' asked his companion, with a shrewd
+glance.
+
+'Now that's unkind. I came here to-night on business, though. You
+quite understand that, didn't you? I shouldn't like you to make any
+mistake. Business, pure and simple.'
+
+'Why, of course,' replied Nancy, with an ingenuous air. 'What else
+could it be?' And she added, 'Don't come any further. Ta-ta!'
+
+Crewe went off into the darkness.
+
+The next afternoon, Nancy alighted at London Bridge a full quarter
+of an hour late. It had been raining at intervals through the day,
+and clouds still cast a gloom over the wet streets. Crewe, quite
+insensible to atmospheric influence, came forward with his wonted
+brisk step and animated visage. At Miss. Lord's side he looked rather
+more plebeian than when walking by himself; his high-hat, not of the
+newest, utterly misbecame his head, and was always at an
+unconventional angle, generally tilting back; his clothes, of no
+fashionable cut, bore the traces of perpetual hurry and multifarious
+impact. But he carried a perfectly new and expensive umbrella, to
+which, as soon as he had shaken hands with her, he drew Nancy's
+attention.
+
+'A present this morning, from a friend of mine in the business. I
+ran into his shop to get shelter. Upon my word, I had no intention;
+didn't think anything about it. However, he owed me an
+acknowledgment; I've sent him three customers from our office since
+I saw him last. By-the-bye, I shall have half a day at the seaside
+on Monday. There's a sale of building-plots down at Whitsand. The
+estate agents run a complimentary special train for people going
+down to bid, and give a lunch before the auction begins. Not bad
+business.'
+
+'Are _you_ going to bid?' asked Nancy.
+
+'I'm going to have a look, at all events; and if I see anything that
+takes my fancy--. Ever been to Whitsand? I'm told it's a growing
+place. I should like to get hold of a few advertising stations.--
+Where is it you are going to on Monday? Teignmouth? I don't know
+that part of the country. Wish I could run down, but I shan't have
+time. I've got my work cut out for August and September. Would you
+like to come and see the place where I think of opening shop?'
+
+'Is it far?'
+
+'No. We'll walk round when we've been up the Monument. You don't
+often go about the City, I daresay. Nothing doing, of course, on a
+Saturday afternoon.'
+
+Nancy made him moderate his pace, which was too quick for her. Part
+of the pleasure she found in Crewe's society came from her sense of
+being so undeniably his superior; she liked to give him a sharp
+command, and observe his ready obedience. To his talk she listened
+with a good-natured, condescending smile, occasionally making a
+remark which implied a more liberal view, a larger intelligence,
+than his. Thus, as they stood for a moment to look down at the
+steamboat wharf, and Crewe made some remark about the value of a
+cargo just being discharged, she said carelessly:
+
+'I suppose that's the view you take of everything? You rate
+everything at market price.'
+
+'Marketable things, of course. But you know me well enough to
+understand that I'm not always thinking of the shop. Wait till I've
+made money.--Now then, clumsy!'
+
+A man, leaning over the parapet by Nancy's side, had pushed against
+her. Thus addressed he glared at the speaker, but encountered a
+bellicose look which kept him quiet.
+
+'I shall live in a big way,' Crewe continued, as they walked on
+towards Fish Street Hill. 'Not for the swagger of it; I don't care
+about that, but because I've a taste for luxury. I shall have a
+country house, and keep good horses. And I should like to have a
+little farm of my own, a model farm; make my own butter and cheese,
+and know that I ate the real thing. I shall buy pictures. Haven't I
+told you I like pictures? Oh yes. I shall go round among the
+artists, and encourage talent that hasn't made itself known.'
+
+'Can you recognise it?' asked Nancy.
+
+'Well, I shall learn to. And I shall have my wife's portrait painted
+by some first-rate chap, never mind what it costs, and hung in the
+Academy. That's a great idea of mine--to see my wife's portrait in
+the Academy.'
+
+His companion laughed.
+
+'Take care, then, that your wife is ornamental.'
+
+'I'll take precious good care of that!' Crewe exclaimed merrily. 'Do
+you suppose I should dream of marrying a woman who wasn't
+good-looking?'
+
+'Don't shout, please. People can hear you.'
+
+'I beg your pardon.' His voice sank to humility. 'That's a bad habit
+of mine. But I was going to say--I went to the Academy this year
+just to look at the portraits of men's wives. There was nothing
+particular in that line. Not a woman I should have felt particularly
+proud of. Tastes differ, of course. Mine has altered a good deal in
+the last ten years. A man can't trust himself about women till he's
+thirty or near it.'
+
+'Talk of something else,' Nancy commanded.
+
+'Certainly. There's the sun coming out. You see, I was afraid it
+would keep on raining, and you would have an excuse for staying at
+home.'
+
+'I needed no excuse,' said Nancy. 'If I hadn't wished to come, you
+may be sure I should have said so.'
+
+Crewe flashed a look at her.
+
+'Ah, that's how I like to hear you speak! That does one good. Well,
+here we are. People used to be fond of going up, they say, just to
+pitch themselves down. A good deal of needless trouble, it seems to
+me. Perhaps they gave themselves the off-chance of changing their
+minds before they got to the top.'
+
+'Or wanted to see if life looked any better from up there,'
+suggested Nancy.
+
+'Or hoped somebody would catch them by the coat-tails, and settle a
+pension on them out of pity.'
+
+Thus jesting, they began the ascent. Crewe, whose spirits were at
+high pressure, talked all the way up the winding stairs; on issuing
+into daylight, he became silent, and they stood side by side, mute
+before the vision of London's immensity. Nancy began to move round
+the platform. The strong west wind lashed her cheeks to a glowing
+colour; excitement added brilliancy to her eyes. As soon as she had
+recovered from the first impression, this spectacle of a world's
+wonder served only to exhilarate her; she was not awed by what she
+looked upon. In her conceit of self-importance, she stood there,
+above the battling millions of men, proof against mystery and dread,
+untouched by the voices of the past, and in the present seeing only
+common things, though from an odd point of view. Here her senses
+seemed to make literal the assumption by which her mind had always
+been directed: that she--Nancy Lord--was the mid point of the
+universe. No humility awoke in her; she felt the stirring of envies,
+avidities, unavowable passions, and let them flourish unrebuked.
+
+Crewe had his eyes fixed upon her; his lips parted hungrily.
+
+'Now _that's_ how I should like to see you painted,' he said all at
+once. 'Just like that! I never saw you looking so well. I believe
+you're the most beautiful girl to be found anywhere in this London!'
+
+There was genuine emotion in his voice, and his sweeping gesture
+suited the mood of vehemence. Nancy, having seen that the two or
+three other people on the platform were not within hearing, gave an
+answer of which the frankness surprised even herself.
+
+'Portraits for the Academy cost a great deal, you know.'
+
+'I know. But that's what I'm working for. There are not many men
+down yonder,' he pointed over the City, 'have a better head for
+money-making than I have.'
+
+'Well, prove it,' replied Nancy, and laughed as the wind caught her
+breath.
+
+'How long will you give me?'
+
+She made no answer, but walked to the side whence she could look
+westward. Crewe followed close, his features still set in the hungry
+look, his eyes never moving from her warm cheek and full lips.
+
+'What it must be,' she said, 'to have about twenty thousand a year!'
+
+The man of business gave a gasp. In the same moment he had to clutch
+at his hat, lest it should be blown away.
+
+'Twenty thousand a year?' he echoed. 'Well, it isn't impossible. Men
+get beyond that, and a good deal beyond it. But it's a large order.'
+
+'Of course it is. But what was it you said? The most beautiful girl
+in all London? That's a large order, too, isn't it? How much is she
+worth?'
+
+'You're talking for the joke now,' said Crewe. 'I don't like to hear
+that kind of thing, either. You never think in that way.'
+
+'My thoughts are my own. I may think as I choose.'
+
+'Yes. But you have thoughts above money.'
+
+'Have I? How kind of you to say so.--I've had enough of this wind;
+we'll go down.'
+
+She led the way, and neither of them spoke till they were in the
+street again. Nancy felt her hair.
+
+'Am I blown to pieces?' she asked.
+
+'No, no; you're all right. Now, will you walk through the City?'
+
+'Where's the place you spoke of?'
+
+'Farringdon Street. That'll bring you round to Blackfriars Bridge,
+when you want to go home. But there's plenty of time yet.'
+
+So they rambled aimlessly by the great thoroughfares, and by hidden
+streets of which Nancy had never heard, talking or silent as the
+mood dictated. Crewe had stories to tell of this and that thriving
+firm, of others struggling in obscurity or falling from high estate;
+to him the streets of London were so many chapters of romance, but a
+romance always of to-day, for he neither knew nor cared about
+historic associations. Vast sums sounded perpetually on his lips; he
+glowed with envious delight in telling of speculations that had
+built up great fortunes. He knew the fabulous rents that were paid
+for sites that looked insignificant; he repeated anecdotes of calls
+made from Somerset House upon men of business, who had been too
+modest in returning the statement of their income; he revived
+legends of dire financial disaster, and of catastrophe barely
+averted by strange expedients. To all this Nancy listened with only
+moderate interest; as often as not, she failed to understand the
+details which should have excited her wonder. None the less, she
+received an impression of knowledge, acuteness, power, in the
+speaker; and this was decidedly pleasant.
+
+'Here's the place where I think of starting for myself,' said Crewe,
+as he paused at length before a huge building in Farringdon Street.
+
+'This?--Can you afford such a rent?'
+
+Her companion burst into laughter.
+
+'I don't mean the whole building. Two or three rooms, that's all,
+somewhere upstairs.'
+
+Nancy made a jest of her mistake.
+
+'An advertising agent doesn't want much space,' said Crewe. 'I know
+a chap who's doing a pretty big business in one room, not far from
+here.--Well, we've had a long walk; now you must rest a bit, and
+have a cup of tea.'
+
+'I thought you were going to propose champagne.'
+
+'Oh--if you like--'
+
+They went to a restaurant in Fleet Street, and sat for half an hour
+over the milder beverage. Crewe talked of his projects, his
+prospects; and Nancy, whom the afternoon had in truth fatigued a
+little, though her mind was still excited, listened without remark.
+
+'Well,' he said at length, leaning towards her, 'how long do you
+give me?'
+
+She looked away, and kept silence.
+
+'Two years:--just to make a solid start; to show that something
+worth talking 'about is to come?'
+
+'I'll think about it.'
+
+He kept his position, and gazed at her.
+
+'I know it isn't money that would tempt you.' He spoke in a very low
+voice, though no one was within earshot. 'Don't think I make any
+mistake about _that_! But I have to show you that there's something
+in me. I wouldn't marry any woman that thought I made love to her
+out of interest.'
+
+Nancy began to draw on her gloves, and smiled, just biting her lower
+lip.
+
+'Will you give me a couple of years, from to-day? I won't bother
+you. It's honour bright!'
+
+'I'll think about it,' Nancy repeated.
+
+'Whilst you're away?'
+
+'Yes, whilst I'm away at Teignmouth.'
+
+'And tell me when you come back?'
+
+'Tell you--how long. Yes.'
+
+And she rose.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 4
+
+
+
+
+From the mouth of Exe to the mouth of Teign the coast is
+uninteresting. Such beauty as it once possessed has been destroyed
+by the railway. Cliffs of red sandstone drop to the narrow beach,
+warm between the blue of sky and sea, but without grandeur, and
+robbed of their native grace by navvy-hewing, which for the most
+part makes of them a mere embankment: their verdure stripped away,
+their juttings tunnelled, along their base the steel parallels of
+smoky traffic. Dawlish and Teignmouth have in themselves no charm;
+hotel and lodging-house, shamed by the soft pure light that falls
+about them, look blankly seaward, hiding what remains of farm or
+cottage in the older parts. Ebb-tide uncovers no fair stretch of
+sand, and at flood the breakers are thwarted on a bulwark of piled
+stone, which supports the railway, or protects a promenade.
+
+But inland these discontents are soon forgotten; there amid tilth
+and pasture, gentle hills and leafy hollows of rural Devon, the eye
+rests and the mind is soothed. By lanes innumerable, deep between
+banks of fern and flower; by paths along the bramble-edge of scented
+meadows; by the secret windings of copse and brake and stream-worn
+valley--a way lies upward to the long ridge of Haldon, where
+breezes sing among the pines, or sweep rustling through gorse and
+bracken. Mile after mile of rustic loveliness, ever and anon the
+sea-limits blue beyond grassy slopes. White farms dozing beneath
+their thatch in harvest sunshine; hamlets forsaken save by women and
+children, by dogs and cats and poultry, the labourers afield. Here
+grow the tall foxgloves, bending a purple head in the heat of noon;
+here the great bells of the convolvulus hang thick from lofty
+hedges, massing their pink and white against dark green leafage;
+here amid shadowed undergrowth trail the long fronds of lustrous
+hartstongue; wherever the eye falls, profusion of summer's glory.
+Here, in many a nook carpeted with softest turf, canopied with
+tangle of leaf and bloom, solitude is safe from all intrusion--
+unless it be that of flitting bird, or of some timid wild thing that
+rustles for a moment and is gone. From dawn to midnight, as from
+midnight to dawn, one who would be alone with nature might count
+upon the security of these bosks and dells.
+
+By Nancy Lord and her companions such pleasures were unregarded. For
+the first few days after their arrival at Teignmouth, they sat or
+walked on the promenade, walked or sat on the pier, sat or walked on
+the Den--a long, wide lawn, decked about with shrubs and
+flower-beds, between sea-fronting houses and the beach. Nancy had no
+wish to exert herself, for the weather was hot; after her morning
+bathe with Jessica, she found amusement enough in watching the
+people--most of whom were here simply to look at each other, or in
+listening to the band, which played selections from Sullivan varied
+with dance music, or in reading a novel from the book-lender's,--
+that is to say, gazing idly at the page, and letting such
+significance as it possessed float upon her thoughts.
+
+She was pleasantly conscious that the loungers who passed by, male
+and female, gave something of attention to her face and costume.
+Without attempting to rival the masterpieces of fashion which
+invited envy or wonder from all observers, she thought herself
+nicely dressed, and had in fact, as always, made good use of her
+father's liberality. Her taste in garments had a certain timidity
+that served her well; by avoiding the extremes of mode, and in
+virtue of her admirable figure, she took the eye of those who looked
+for refinement rather than for extravagance. The unconsidered grace
+of her bearing might be recognised by all whom such things
+concerned; it by no means suggested that she came from a small house
+in Camberwell. In her companions, to be sure, she was unfortunate;
+but the over-modest attire and unimpressive persons of Mrs. Morgan
+and Jessica at least did her the office of relief by contrast.
+
+Nancy had made this reflection; she was not above it. Yet her actual
+goodness of heart saved her from ever feeling ashamed of the
+Morgans. It gratified her to think that she was doing them a
+substantial kindness; but for her, they would have dragged through a
+wretched summer in their unwholesome, jimcrack house, without a
+breath of pure air, without a sight of the free heaven. And to both
+of them that would probably have meant a grave illness.
+
+Mrs. Morgan was a thin, tremulous woman, with watery eyes and a
+singular redness about the prominent part of her face, which seemed
+to indicate a determination of blood to the nose. All her married
+life had been spent in a cheerless struggle to maintain the
+externals of gentility. Not that she was vain or frivolous--indeed
+her natural tendencies made for homeliness in everything--but, by
+birth and by marriage connected with genteel people, she felt it
+impossible to abandon that mode of living which is supposed to
+distinguish the educated class from all beneath it. She had brought
+into the world three sons and three daughters; of the former, two
+were dead, and of the latter, one,--in each case, poverty of diet
+having proved fatal to a weak constitution. For close upon thirty
+years the family had lived in houses of which the rent was out of
+all reasonable proportion to their means; at present, with a total
+income of one hundred and sixty pounds (Mr. Morgan called himself a
+commission agent, and seldom had anything to do), they paid in rent
+and rates a matter of fifty-five, and bemoaned the fate which
+neighboured them with people only by courtesy to be called
+gentlefolk. Of course they kept a servant,--her wages nine pounds
+a year. Whilst the mother and elder daughter were at Teignmouth, Mr
+Morgan, his son, and the younger girl felt themselves justified in
+making up for lack of holiday by an extra supply of butcher's meat.
+
+Well-meaning, but with as little discretion in this as in other
+things, Mrs. Morgan allowed scarce an hour of the day to pass without
+uttering her gratitude to Nancy Lord for the benefit she was
+enjoying. To escape these oppressive thanks, Nancy did her best
+never to be alone with the poor lady; but a _tete-a-tete_ was
+occasionally unavoidable, as, for instance, on the third or fourth
+day after their arrival, when Mrs. Morgan had begged Nancy's company
+for a walk on the Den, whilst Jessica wrote letters. At the end of a
+tedious hour Jessica joined them, and her face had an unwonted
+expression. She beckoned her friend apart.
+
+'You'll be surprised. Who do you think is here?'
+
+'No one that will bore us, I hope.'
+
+'Mr. Tarrant. I met him near the post-office, and he stopped me.'
+
+Nancy frowned.
+
+'Are they all here again?'
+
+'No; he says he's alone.--One minute, mamma; please excuse us.'
+
+'He was surprised to see you?' said Nancy, after reflecting.
+
+'He said so. But--I forgot to tell you--in a letter to Mrs. Baker
+I spoke of our plans. She had written to me to propose a pupil for
+after the holidays.--Perhaps she didn't mention it to Mr. Tarrant.'
+
+'Evidently not!' Nancy exclaimed, with some impatience. 'Why should
+you doubt his word?'
+
+'I can't help thinking'--Jessica smiled archly--'that he has
+come just to meet--somebody.'
+
+'Somebody? Who do you mean?' asked her friend, with a look of
+sincere astonishment.
+
+'I may be mistaken'--a glance completed the suggestion.
+
+'Rubbish!'
+
+For the rest of that day the subject was unmentioned. Nancy kept
+rather to herself, and seemed meditative. Next morning she was in
+the same mood. The tide served for a bathe at eleven o'clock;
+afterwards, as the girls walked briskly to and fro near the seat
+where Mrs. Morgan had established herself with a volume of Browning,
+--Jessica insisted on her reading Browning, though the poor mother
+protested that she scarcely understood a word,--they came full
+upon the unmistakable presence of Mr. Lionel Tarrant. Miss. Morgan, in
+acknowledging his salute, offered her hand; it was by her that the
+young man had stopped. Miss. Lord only bent her head, and that
+slightly. Tarrant expected more, but his half-raised hand dropped in
+time, and he directed his speech to Jessica. He had nothing to say
+but what seemed natural and civil; the dialogue--Nancy remained
+mute--occupied but a few minutes, and Tarrant went his way,
+sauntering landwards.
+
+As Mrs. Morgan had observed the meeting, it was necessary to offer
+her an explanation. But Jessica gave only the barest facts
+concerning their acquaintance, and Nancy spoke as though she hardly
+knew him.
+
+The weather was oppressively hot; in doors or out, little could be
+done but sit or lie in enervated attitudes, a state of things
+accordant with Nancy's mood. Till late at night she watched the blue
+starry sky from her open window, seeming to reflect, but in reality
+wafted on a stream of fancies and emotions. Jessica's explanation of
+the arrival of Lionel Tarrant had strangely startled her; no such
+suggestion would have occurred to her own mind. Yet now, she only
+feared that it might not be true. A debilitating climate and
+absolute indolence favoured that impulse of lawless imagination
+which had first possessed her on the evening of Jubilee Day. With
+luxurious heedlessness she cast aside every thought that might have
+sobered her; even as she at length cast off all her garments, and
+lay in the warm midnight naked upon her bed.
+
+The physical attraction of which she had always been conscious in
+Tarrant's presence seemed to have grown stronger since she had
+dismissed him from her mind. Comparing him with Luckworth Crewe, she
+felt only a contemptuous distaste for the coarse vitality and
+vigour, whereto she had half surrendered herself, when hopeless of
+the more ambitious desire.
+
+Rising early, she went out before breakfast, and found that a little
+rain had fallen. Grass and flowers were freshened; the air had an
+exquisite clearness, and a coolness which struck delightfully on the
+face, after the close atmosphere within doors. She had paused to
+watch a fishing-boat off shore, when a cheery voice bade her
+'good-morning,' and Tarrant stepped to her side.
+
+'You are fond of this place,' he said.
+
+'Not particularly.'
+
+'Then why do you choose it?'
+
+'It does for a holiday as well as any other.'
+
+He was gazing at her, and with the look which Nancy resented, the
+look which made her feel his social superiority. He seemed to
+observe her features with a condescending gratification. Though
+totally ignorant of his life and habits, she felt a conviction that
+he had often bestowed this look upon girls of a class below his own.
+
+'How do you like those advertisements of soaps and pills along the
+pier?' he asked carelessly.
+
+'I see no harm in them.'
+
+Perversity prompted her answer, but at once she remembered Crewe,
+and turned away in annoyance. Tarrant was only the more
+good-humoured.
+
+'You like the world as it is? There's wisdom in that. Better be in
+harmony with one's time, advertisements and all.' He added, 'Are you
+reading for an exam?'
+
+'I? You are confusing me with Miss. Morgan.'
+
+'Oh, not for a moment! I couldn't possibly confuse you with any one
+else. I know Miss. Morgan is studying professionally; but I thought
+you were reading for your own satisfaction, as so many women do
+now-a-days.'
+
+The distinction was flattering. Nancy yielded to the charm of his
+voice and conversed freely. It began to seem not impossible that he
+found some pleasure in her society. Now and then he dropped a word
+that made her pulses flutter; his eyes were constantly upon her
+face.
+
+'Don't you go off into the country sometimes?' he inquired, when she
+had turned homewards.
+
+'We are thinking of having a drive to-day.'
+
+'And I shall most likely have a ride; we may meet.'
+
+Nancy ordered a carriage for the afternoon, and with her friends
+drove up the Teign valley; but they did not meet Tarrant. But next
+morning he joined them on the pier, and this time Jessica had no
+choice but to present him to her mother. Nancy felt annoyed that
+this should have come about; Tarrant, she supposed, would regard
+poor Mrs. Morgan with secret ridicule. Yet, if that were his
+disposition, he concealed it perfectly; no one could have behaved
+with more finished courtesy. He seated himself by Mrs. Morgan, and
+talked with her of the simplest things in a pleasant, kindly humour.
+Yesterday, so he made known, he had ridden to Torquay and back,
+returning after sunset. This afternoon he was going by train to
+Exeter, to buy some books.
+
+Again he strolled about with Nancy, and talked of idle things with
+an almost excessive amiability. As the girl listened, a languor
+crept upon her, a soft and delicious subdual of the will to dreamy
+luxury. Her eyes were fixed on the shadows cast by her own figure
+and that of her companion. The black patches by chance touched. She
+moved so as to part them, and then changed her position so that they
+touched again--so that they blended.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 5
+
+
+
+
+Nancy had written to her father, a short letter but affectionate,
+begging him to let her know whether the improvement in his health,
+of which he had spoken before she left home, still continued. The
+answer came without delay. On the whole, said Mr. Lord, he was doing
+well enough; no need whatever to trouble about him. He wrote only a
+few lines, but closed with 'love to you, my dear child,' an unwonted
+effusiveness.
+
+At the same time there came a letter from Horace.
+
+'You will be surprised,' it began, 'at the address I write from. As
+you know, I had planned to go to Brighton; but on the day before my
+holiday commenced I heard from F. F., saying that she and Mrs.
+Peachey had had a quarrel, and she was tired of Brighton, and was
+coming home. So I waited a day or two, and then, as I had half
+promised, I went to see Mrs. D. We had a long talk, and it ended in
+my telling her about F., and all the row there's been. Perhaps you
+will think I had better have kept it to myself, but Mrs. D. and I are
+on first-rate terms, and she seems to understand me better than any
+one I ever met. We talked about my holiday, and she persuaded me to
+come to Scarborough, where she herself was going for a week or two.
+It's rather an expensive affair, but worth the money. Of course I
+have lodgings of my own. Mrs. D. is at a big hotel, where friends of
+hers are staying. I have been introduced to two or three people,
+great swells, and I've had lunch with Mrs. D. at the hotel twice.
+This kind of life suits me exactly. I don't think I get on badly
+with the swells. Of course I say not a word about my position, and
+of course nobody would think of asking questions. You would like
+this place; I rather wish you were here. Of course father thinks I
+have come on my own hook. It's very awkward having to keep a secret
+of this kind; I must try and persuade Mrs. D. to have a talk with
+father. But one thing I can tell you,--I feel pretty sure that she
+will get me, somehow or other, out of that beastly City life; she's
+always talking of things I might do. But not a word to any one about
+all this--be sure.'
+
+This news caused Nancy to ponder for a long time. The greater part
+of the morning she spent at home, and in her own room; after lunch,
+she sat idly on the promenade, little disposed for conversation.
+
+It was the second day since Tarrant had told her that he was going
+to Exeter, and they had not again met; the Morgans had not seen him
+either. The next morning, however, as all three were sitting in one
+of their favourite places, Tarrant approached them. Mrs. Morgan, who
+was fluttered by the natural supposition of a love affair between
+Miss. Lord and the interesting young man, made it easy for them to
+talk together.
+
+'Did you get your books?' Nancy asked, when silence followed on
+trivialities.
+
+'Yes, and spent half a day with them in a favourite retreat of mine,
+inland. It's a very beautiful spot. I should like you to see it.
+Indeed, you ought to.'
+
+Nancy turned her eyes to the sea.
+
+'We might walk over there one afternoon,' he added.
+
+'Mrs. Morgan can't walk far.'
+
+'Why should we trouble her? Are you obliged to remain under Mrs.
+Morgan's wing?'
+
+It was said jestingly, but Nancy felt piqued.
+
+'Certainly not. I am quite independent.'
+
+'So I should have supposed. Then why not come?'
+
+He seemed perfectly self-possessed, but the voice was not quite his
+own. To Nancy, her eyes still looking straight forward, it sounded
+as though from a distance; it had an effect upon her nerves similar
+to that she had experienced three days ago, when they were walking
+about the pier. Her hands fell idly; she leaned back more heavily on
+the seat; a weight was on her tongue.
+
+'A country ramble of an hour or two,' pursued the voice, which
+itself had become languorous. 'Surely you are sometimes alone? It
+isn't necessary to give a detailed account of your time?'
+
+She answered impatiently. 'Of course not.' In this moment her
+thoughts had turned to Luckworth Crewe, and she was asking herself
+why this invitation of Tarrant's affected her so very differently
+from anything she had felt when Crewe begged her to meet him in
+London. With him she could go anywhere, enjoying a genuine
+independence, a complete self-confidence, thinking her
+unconventional behaviour merely good fun. Tarrant's proposal
+startled her. She was not mistress of the situation, as when
+trifling with Crewe. A sense of peril caused her heart to beat
+quickly.
+
+'This afternoon, then,' the voice was murmuring.
+
+She answered mechanically. 'It's going to rain, I think.'
+
+'I think not. But, if so, to-morrow.'
+
+'To-morrow is Sunday.'
+
+'Yes. Monday, then.'
+
+Nancy heard him smother a laugh. She wished to look at him, but
+could not.
+
+'It won't rain,' he continued, still with the ease of one who speaks
+of everyday matters. 'We shall see, at all events. Perhaps you will
+want to change your book at the library.' A novel lay on her lap.
+'We'll leave it an open possibility--to meet there about three
+o'clock.'
+
+Nancy pointed out to sea, and asked where the steamer just passing
+might be bound for. Her companion readily turned to this subject.
+
+The rain--she half hoped for it--did not come. By luncheon-time
+every doubtful cloud had vanished. Before sitting down to table, she
+observed the sky at the open window.
+
+'Lovely weather!' sighed Mrs. Morgan behind her. 'But for you, dear
+Nancy, I should have been dreaming and wishing--oh, how vainly!--
+in the stifling town.'
+
+'We'll have another drive this afternoon,' Nancy declared.
+
+'Oh, how delightful! But pray, pray, not on our account--'
+
+'Jessica,'--Nancy turned to her friend, who had just entered the
+room,--'we'll have the carriage at three. And a better horse than
+last time; I'll take good care of that. Pen, ink, and paper!' she
+cried joyously. 'The note shall go round at once.'
+
+'You're a magnificent sort of person,' said Jessica. 'Some day, no
+doubt, you'll keep a carriage and pair of your own.'
+
+'Shan't I, just! And drive you down to Burlington House, for your
+exams. By-the-bye, does a female Bachelor of Arts lose her degree if
+she gets married?'
+
+Nancy was sprightlier than of late. Her mood maintained itself
+throughout the first half of the drive, then she seemed to be
+overcome by a sudden weariness, ceased to talk, and gave only a
+listless look at things which interested her companions. By when
+they reached home again, she had a pale troubled countenance. Until
+dinner nothing more was seen of her, and after the meal she soon
+excused herself on the plea of a headache.
+
+Again there passed two days, Sunday and Monday, without Tarrant's
+appearing. Mrs. Morgan and Jessica privately talked much of the
+circumstance. Sentimental souls, they found this topic
+inexhaustible; Jessica, having her mind thus drawn away from
+Burlington House, benefited not a little by the mystery of her
+friend's position; she thought, however, that Nancy might have
+practised a less severe reticence. To Mrs. Morgan it never occurred
+that so self-reliant a young woman as Miss. Lord stood in need of
+matronly counsel, of strict chaperonage; she would have deemed it an
+impertinence to allow herself the most innocent remark implying such
+a supposition.
+
+On Wednesday afternoon, about three o'clock, Nancy walked alone to
+the library. There, looking at books and photographs in the window,
+stood Lionel Tarrant. He greeted her as usual, seemed not to remark
+the hot colour in her cheeks, and stepped with her into the shop.
+She had meant to choose a novel, but, with Tarrant looking on, felt
+constrained to exhibit her capacity for severe reading. The choice
+of grave works was not large, and she found it difficult to command
+her thoughts even for the perusal of titles; however, she ultimately
+discovered a book that promised anything but frivolity, Helmholtz's
+'Lectures on Scientific Subjects,' and at this she clutched.
+
+Two loudly-dressed women were at the same time searching the
+shelves.
+
+'I wonder whether this is a pretty book?' said one to the other,
+taking down a trio of volumes.
+
+'Oh, it looks as if it might be pretty,' returned her friend,
+examining the cover.
+
+They faced to the person behind the counter.
+
+'Is this a pretty book?' one of them inquired loftily.
+
+'Oh yes, madam, that's a very pretty book--very pretty.'
+
+Nancy exchanged a glance with her companion and smiled. When they
+were outside again Tarrant asked:
+
+'Have you found a pretty book?'
+
+She showed the title of her choice.
+
+'Merciful heavens! You mean to read that? The girls of to-day! What
+mere man is worthy of them? But--I must rise to the occasion.
+We'll have a chapter as we rest.'
+
+Insensibly, Nancy had followed the direction he chose. His words
+took for granted that she was going into the country with him.
+
+'My friends are on the pier,' she said, abruptly stopping.
+
+'Where doubtless they will enjoy themselves. Let me carry your book,
+please. Helmholtz is rather heavy.'
+
+'Thanks, I can carry it very well. I shall turn this way.'
+
+'No, no. My way this afternoon.'
+
+Nancy stood still, looking up the street that led towards the sea.
+She was still bright-coloured; her lips had a pathetic expression, a
+child-like pouting.
+
+'There was an understanding,' said Tarrant, with playful firmness.
+
+'Not for to-day.'
+
+'No. For the day when you disappointed me. The day after, I didn't
+think it worth while to come here; yesterday I came, but felt no
+surprise that I didn't meet you. To-day I had a sort of hope. This
+way.'
+
+She followed, and they walked for several minutes in silence.
+
+'Will you let me look at Helmholtz?' said the young man at length.
+'Most excellent book, of course. "Physiological Causes of Harmony in
+Music," "Interaction of Natural Forces," "Conservation of Force."--
+You enjoy this kind of thing?'
+
+'One must know something about it.'
+
+'I suppose so. I used to grind at science because everybody talked
+science. In reality I loathed it, and now I read only what I like.
+Life's too short for intellectual make-believe. It is too short for
+anything but enjoyment. Tell me what you read for pure pleasure.
+Poetry?'
+
+They had left the streets, and were pursuing a road bordered with
+gardens, gardens of glowing colour, sheltered amid great laurels,
+shadowed by stately trees; the air was laden with warm scents of
+flower and leaf. On an instinct of resistance, Nancy pretended that
+the exact sciences were her favourite study. She said it in the tone
+of superiority which habit had made natural to her in speaking of
+intellectual things. And Tarrant appeared to accept her declaration
+without scepticism; but, a moment after, he turned the talk upon
+novels.
+
+Thus, for half an hour and more, they strolled on by upward ways,
+until Teignmouth lay beneath them, and the stillness of meadows all
+about. Presently Tarrant led from the beaten road into a lane all
+but overgrown with grass. He began to gather flowers, and offered
+them to Nancy. Personal conversation seemed at an end; they were
+enjoying the brilliant sky and the peaceful loveliness of earth.
+They exchanged simple, natural thoughts, or idle words in which was
+no thought at all.
+
+Before long, they came to an old broken gate, half open; it was the
+entrance to a narrow cartway, now unused, which descended windingly
+between high thick hedges. Ruts of a foot in depth, baked hard by
+summer, showed how miry the track must be in the season of rain.
+
+'This is our way,' said Tarrant, his hand on the lichened wood.
+'Better than the pier or the promenade, don't you think?'
+
+'But we have gone far enough.'
+
+Nancy drew back into the lane, looked at her flowers, and then
+shaded her eyes with them to gaze upward.
+
+'Almost. Another five minutes, and you will see the place I told you
+of. You can't imagine how beautiful it is.'
+
+'Another day--'
+
+'We are all but there--'
+
+He seemed regretfully to yield; and Nancy yielded in her turn. She
+felt a sudden shame in the thought of having perhaps betrayed
+timidity. Without speaking, she passed the gate.
+
+The hedge on either side was of hazel and dwarf oak, of hawthorn and
+blackthorn, all intertwined with giant brambles, and with briers
+which here and there met overhead. High and low, blackberries hung
+in multitudes, swelling to purple ripeness. Numberless the trailing
+and climbing plants. Nancy's skirts rustled among the greenery; her
+cheeks were touched, as if with a caress, by many a drooping
+branchlet; in places, Tarrant had to hold the tangle above her while
+she stooped to pass.
+
+And from this they emerged into a small circular space, where the
+cartway made a turn at right angles and disappeared behind thickets.
+They were in the midst of a plantation; on every side trees closed
+about them, with a low and irregular hedge to mark the borders of
+the grassy road. Nancy's eyes fell at once upon a cluster of
+magnificent foxgloves, growing upon a bank which rose to the foot of
+an old elm; beside the foxgloves lay a short-hewn trunk, bedded in
+the ground, thickly overgrown with mosses, lichens, and small fungi.
+
+'Have I misled you?' said Tarrant, watching her face with frank
+pleasure.
+
+'No, indeed you haven't. This is very beautiful!'
+
+'I discovered it last year, and spent hours here alone. I couldn't
+ask you to come and see it then,' he added, laughing.
+
+'It is delightful!'
+
+'Here's your seat,--who knows how many years it has waited for
+you?'
+
+She sat down upon the old trunk. About the roots of the elm above
+grew masses of fern, and beneath it a rough bit of the bank was
+clothed with pennywort, the green discs and yellowing fruity spires
+making an exquisite patch of colour. In the shadow of bushes near at
+hand hartstongue abounded, with fronds hanging to the length of an
+arm.
+
+'Now,' said Tarrant, gaily, 'you shall have some blackberries. And
+he went to gather them, returning in a few minutes with a large leaf
+full. He saw that Nancy, meanwhile, had taken up the book from where
+he dropped it to the ground; it lay open on her lap.
+
+'Helmholtz! Away with him!'
+
+'No; I have opened at something interesting.'
+
+She spoke as though possession of the book were of vital importance
+to her. Nevertheless, the fruit was accepted, and she drew off her
+gloves to eat it. Tarrant seated himself on the ground, near her,
+and gradually fell into a half-recumbent attitude.
+
+'Won't you have any?' Nancy asked, without looking at him.
+
+'One or two, if you will give me them.'
+
+She chose a fine blackberry, and held it out. Tarrant let it fall
+into his palm, and murmured, 'You have a beautiful hand.' When, a
+moment after, he glanced at her, she seemed to be reading Helmholtz.
+
+The calm of the golden afternoon could not have been more profound.
+Birds twittered softly in the wood, and if a leaf rustled, it was
+only at the touch of wings. Earth breathed its many perfumes upon
+the slumberous air.
+
+'You know,' said Tarrant, after a long pause, and speaking as though
+he feared to break the hush, 'that Keats once stayed at Teignmouth.'
+
+Nancy did not know it, but said 'Yes.' The name of Keats was
+familiar to her, but of his life she knew hardly anything, of his
+poetry very little. Her education had been chiefly concerned with
+names.
+
+'Will you read me a paragraph of Helmholtz?' continued the other,
+looking at her with a smile. 'Any paragraph, the one before you.'
+
+She hesitated, but read at length, in an unsteady voice, something
+about the Conservation of Force. It ended in a nervous laugh.
+
+'Now I'll read something to you,' said Tarrant. And he began to
+repeat, slowly, musically, lines of verse which his companion had
+never heard:
+
+'_O what can ail thee, Knight-at-arms,
+Alone and palely loitering?
+The sedge has wither'd from the lake,
+And no birds sing_.'
+
+He went through the poem; Nancy the while did not stir. It was as
+though he murmured melody for his own pleasure, rather than recited
+to a listener; but no word was inaudible. Nancy knew that his eyes
+rested upon her; she wished to smile, yet could not. And when he
+ceased, the silence held her motionless.
+
+'Isn't it better?' said Tarrant, drawing slightly nearer to her.
+
+'Of course it is.'
+
+'I used to know thousands of verses by heart.'
+
+'Did you ever write any?'
+
+'Half-a-dozen epics or so, when I was about seventeen. Yet, I don't
+come of a poetical family. My father--'
+
+He stopped abruptly, looked into Nancy's face with a smile, and said
+in a tone of playfulness:
+
+'Do you remember asking me whether I had anything to do with--'
+
+Nancy, flushing over all her features, exclaimed, 'Don't! please
+don't! I'm ashamed of myself!'
+
+'I didn't like it. But we know each other better now. You were quite
+right. That was how my grandfather made his money. My father, I
+believe, got through most of it, and gave no particular thought to
+me. His mother--the old lady whom you know--had plenty of her
+own--to be mine, she tells me, some day. Do you wish to be
+forgiven for hurting my pride?' he added.
+
+'I don't know what made me say such a thing--'
+
+She faltered the words; she felt her will subdued. Tarrant reached a
+hand, and took one of hers, and kissed it; then allowed her to draw
+it away.
+
+'Now will you give me another blackberry?'
+
+The girl was trembling; a light shone in her eyes. She offered the
+leaf with fruit in it; Tarrant, whilst choosing, touched the blue
+veins of her wrist with his lips.
+
+'What are you going to do?' she asked presently. 'I mean, what do
+you aim at in life?'
+
+'Enjoyment. Why should I trouble about anything else. I should be
+content if life were all like this: to look at a beautiful face, and
+listen to a voice that charms me, and touch a hand that makes me
+thrill with such pleasure as I never knew.'
+
+'It's waste of time.'
+
+'Oh, never time was spent so well! Look at me again like that--
+with the eyes half-closed, and the lips half-mocking. Oh, the
+exquisite lips! If I might--if I might--'
+
+He did not stir from his posture of languid ease, but Nancy, with a
+quick movement, drew a little away from him, then rose.
+
+'It's time to go back,' she said absently.
+
+'No, no; not yet. Let me look at you for a few minutes more!'
+
+She began to walk slowly, head bent.
+
+'Well then, to-morrow, or the day after. The place will be just as
+beautiful, and you even more. The sea-air makes you lovelier from
+day to day.'
+
+Nancy looked back for an instant. Tarrant followed, and in the deep
+leafy way he again helped her to pass the briers. But their hands
+never touched, and the silence was unbroken until they had issued
+into the open lane.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 6
+
+
+
+
+The lodgings were taken for three weeks, and more than half the time
+had now elapsed.
+
+Jessica, who declared herself quite well and strong again, though
+her face did not bear out the assertion, was beginning to talk of
+matters examinational once more. Notwithstanding protests, she
+brought forth from their hiding-place sundry arid little manuals and
+black-covered notebooks; her thoughts were divided between algebraic
+formulae and Nancy's relations with Lionel Tarrant. Perhaps because
+no secret was confided to her, she affected more appetite for the
+arid little books than she really felt. Nancy would neither speak of
+examinations, nor give ear when they were talked about; she, whether
+consciously or not, was making haste to graduate in quite another
+school.
+
+On the morning after her long walk with Tarrant, she woke before
+sunrise, and before seven o'clock had left the house. A high wind
+and hurrying clouds made the weather prospects uncertain. She
+strayed about the Den, never losing sight for more than a minute or
+two of the sea-fronting house where Tarrant lived. But no familiar
+form approached her, and she had to return to breakfast unrewarded
+for early rising.
+
+Through the day she was restless and silent, kept alone as much as
+possible, and wore a look which, as the hours went on, darkened from
+anxiety to ill-humour. She went to bed much earlier than usual.
+
+At eleven next morning, having lingered behind her friends, she
+found Tarrant in conversation with Mrs. Morgan and Jessica on the
+pier. His greeting astonished her; it had precisely the gracious
+formality of a year ago; a word or two about the weather, and he
+resumed his talk with Miss. Morgan--its subject, the educational
+value of the classics. Obliged to listen, Nancy suffered an anguish
+of resentful passion. For a quarter of an hour she kept silence,
+then saw the young man take leave and saunter away with that air
+which, in satire, she had formerly styled majestic.
+
+And then passed three whole days, during which Lionel was not seen.
+
+The evening of the fourth, between eight and nine o'clock, found
+Nancy at the door of the house which her thoughts had a thousand
+times visited. A servant, in reply to inquiry, told her that Mr
+Tarrant was in London; he would probably return to-morrow.
+
+She walked idly away--and, at less than a hundred yards' distance,
+met Tarrant himself. His costume showed that he had just come from
+the railway station. Nancy would gladly have walked straight past
+him, but the tone in which he addressed her was a new surprise, and
+she stood in helpless confusion. He had been to London--called
+away on sudden business.
+
+'I thought of writing--nay, I did write, but after all didn't post
+the letter. For a very simple reason--I couldn't remember your
+address.'
+
+And he laughed so naturally, that the captive walked on by his side,
+unresisting. Their conversation lasted only a few minutes, then
+Nancy resolutely bade him good-night, no appointment made for the
+morrow.
+
+A day of showers, then a day of excessive heat. They saw each other
+several times, but nothing of moment passed. The morning after they
+met before breakfast.
+
+'To-morrow is our last day,' said Nancy.
+
+'Yes, Mrs. Morgan told me.' Nancy herself had never spoken of
+departure. 'This afternoon we'll go up the hill again.'
+
+'I don't think I shall care to walk so far. Look at the mist; it's
+going to be dreadfully hot again.'
+
+Tarrant was in a mood of careless gaiety; his companion appeared to
+struggle against listlessness, and her cheek had lost its wonted
+colour.
+
+'You have tea at four or five, I suppose. Let us go after that, when
+the heat of the day is over.'
+
+To this, after various objections, Nancy consented. Through the
+hours of glaring sunshine she stayed at home, lying inert, by an
+open window. Over the tea-cups she was amiable, but dreamy. When
+ready to go out, she just looked into the sitting-room, where
+Jessica bent over books, and said cheerfully:
+
+'I may be a little late for dinner. On no account wait--I forbid
+it!'
+
+And so, without listening to the answer, she hurried away.
+
+In the upward climbing lanes, no breeze yet tempered the still air;
+the sky of misted sapphire showed not a cloud from verge to verge.
+Tarrant, as if to make up for his companion's silence, talked
+ceaselessly, and always in light vein. Sunshine, he said, was
+indispensable to his life; he never passed the winter in London; if
+he were the poorest of mortals, he would, at all events, beg his
+bread in a sunny clime.
+
+'Are you going to the Bahamas this winter?' Nancy asked, mentioning
+the matter for the first time since she heard of it at Champion
+Hill.
+
+'I don't know. Everything is uncertain.'
+
+And he put the question aside as if it were of no importance.
+
+They passed the old gate, and breathed with relief in the
+never-broken shadow of tangled foliage. Whilst pushing a bramble
+aside, Tarrant let his free arm fall lightly on Nancy's waist. At
+once she sprang forward, but without appearing to notice what had
+happened.
+
+'Stay--did you ever see such ivy as this?'
+
+It was a mass of large, lustrous leaves, concealing a rotten trunk.
+Whilst Nancy looked on, Tarrant pulled at a long stem, and tried to
+break it away.
+
+'I must cut it.'
+
+'Why?'
+
+'You shall see.'
+
+He wove three stems into a wreath.
+
+'There now, take off your hat, and let me crown you. Have I made it
+too large for the little head?'
+
+Nancy, after a moment's reluctance, unfastened her hat, and stood
+bareheaded, blushing and laughing.
+
+'You do your hair in the right way--the Greek way. A diadem on the
+top--the only way when the hair and the head are beautiful. It
+leaves the outline free--the exquisite curve that unites neck and
+head. Now the ivy wreath; and how will you look?'
+
+She wore a dress of thin, creamy material, which, whilst seeming to
+cumber her as little as garments could, yet fitted closely enough to
+declare the healthy beauty of her form. The dark green garland, for
+which she bent a little, became her admirably.
+
+'I pictured it in my letter,' said Tarrant, 'the letter you never
+got.'
+
+'Where is it?'
+
+'Oh, I burnt it.'
+
+'Tell me what was in it.'
+
+'All sorts of things--a long letter.'
+
+'I think that's all nonsense about forgetting my address.'
+
+'Mere truth. In fact, I never knew it.'
+
+'Be so good as to tell me,' she spoke as she walked on before him,
+'what you meant by your behaviour that morning before you went to
+London.'
+
+'But how did I behave?'
+
+'Very strangely.'
+
+Tarrant affected not to understand; but, when she again turned,
+Nancy saw a mischievous smile on his face.
+
+'A bit of nonsense.--Shall I tell you?' He stepped near, and
+suddenly caught both her hands,--one of them was trailing her
+sunshade. 'Forgive me in advance--will you?'
+
+'I don't know about that.' And she tried, though faintly, to get
+free.
+
+'But I will make you--now, refuse!'
+
+His lips had just touched hers, just touched and no more. Rosy red,
+she trembled before him with drooping eyelids.
+
+'It meant nothing at all, really,' he pursued, his voice at its
+softest. 'A sham trial--to see whether I was hopelessly conquered
+or not. Of course I was.'
+
+Nancy shook her head.
+
+'You dare to doubt it?--I understand now what the old poet meant,
+when he talked of bees seeking honey on his lady's lips. That fancy
+isn't so artificial as it seemed.'
+
+'That's all very pretty'--she spoke between quick breaths, and
+tried to laugh--'but you have thrown my hat on the ground. Give it
+me, and take the ivy for yourself.'
+
+'I am no Bacchus.' He tossed the wreath aside. 'Take the hat; I like
+you in it just as well.--You shall have a girdle of woodbine, instead.'
+
+'I don't believe your explanation,' said Nancy.
+
+'Not believe me?'
+
+With feigned indignation, he moved to capture her again; but Nancy
+escaped. Her hat in her hand, she darted forward. A minute's run
+brought her into the open space, and there, with an exclamation of
+surprise, she stopped. Tarrant, but a step or two behind her, saw at
+almost the same moment the spectacle which had arrested her flight.
+Before them stood two little donkeys munching eagerly at a crop of
+rosy-headed thistles. They--the human beings--looked at each
+other; Tarrant burst into extravagant laughter, and Nancy joined
+him. Neither's mirth was spontaneous; Nancy's had a note of nervous
+tension, a ring of something like recklessness.
+
+'Where can they come from?' she asked.
+
+'They must have strayed a long way. I haven't seen any farm or
+cottage.--But perhaps some one is with them. Wait, I'll go on a
+little, and see if some boy is hanging about.'
+
+He turned the sharp corner, and disappeared. For two or three
+minutes Nancy stood alone, watching the patient little grey beasts,
+whose pendent ears, with many a turn and twitch, expressed their joy
+in the feast of thistles. She watched them in seeming only; her eyes
+beheld nothing.
+
+A voice sounded from behind her--'Nancy!' Startled, she saw
+Tarrant standing high up, in a gap of the hedge, on the bank which
+bordered the wood.
+
+'How did you get there?'
+
+'Went round.' He showed the direction with his hand. 'I can see no
+one, but somebody may come. It's wonderful here, among the trees.
+Come over.'
+
+'How can I?--We will drive the donkeys away.'
+
+'No; it's much better here; a wild wood, full of wonderful things.
+The bank isn't too steep. Give me your hand, and you can step up
+easily, just at this place.'
+
+She drew near.
+
+'Your sunshade first.'
+
+'Oh, it's too much trouble,' she said languidly, all but
+plaintively. 'I'd rather be here.'
+
+'Obey!--Your sunshade--'
+
+She gave it.
+
+'Now, your hand.'
+
+He was kneeling on the top of the bank. With very little exertion,
+Nancy found herself beside him. Then he at once leapt down among the
+brushwood, a descent of some three feet.
+
+'We shall be trespassing,' said Nancy.
+
+'What do I care? Now, jump!'
+
+'As if you could catch me!' Again she uttered her nervous laugh. 'I
+am heavy.'
+
+'Obey! Jump!' he cried impatiently, his eyes afire.
+
+She knelt, seated herself, dropped forward. Tarrant caught her in
+his arms.
+
+'You heavy! a feather weight! Why, I can carry you; I could run with
+you.'
+
+And he did carry her through the brushwood, away into the shadow of
+the trees.
+
+At dinner-time, Mrs. Morgan and her daughter were alone. They agreed
+to wait a quarter of an hour, and sat silent, pretending each to be
+engaged with a book. At length their eyes met.
+
+'What does it mean, Jessica?' asked the mother timidly.
+
+'I'm sure I don't know. It doesn't concern us. She didn't mean to be
+back, by what she said.'
+
+'But--isn't it rather--?'
+
+'Oh, Nancy is all right. I suppose she'll have something to tell
+you, to-night or to-morrow. We must have dinner; I'm hungry.'
+
+'So am I, dear.--Oh, I'm quite afraid to think of the appetites
+we're taking back. Poor Milly will be terrified.'
+
+Eight o'clock, nine o'clock. The two conversed in subdued voices;
+Mrs. Morgan was anxious, all but distressed. Half-past nine. 'What
+_can_ it mean, Jessica? I can't help feeling a responsibility. After
+all, Nancy is quite a young girl; and I've sometimes thought she
+might be steadier.'
+
+'Hush! That was a knock.'
+
+They waited. In a minute or two the door was opened a few inches,
+and a voice called 'Jessica!'
+
+She responded. Nancy was standing in the gloom.
+
+'Come into my room,' she said curtly.
+
+Arrived there, she did not strike a light. She closed the door, and
+took hold of her friend's arm.
+
+'We can't go back the day after to-morrow, Jessica. We must wait a
+day longer, till the afternoon of Friday.'
+
+'Why? What's the matter, Nancy?'
+
+'Nothing serious. Don't be frightened, I'm tired, and I shall go to
+bed.'
+
+'But why must we wait?'
+
+'Listen: will you promise me faithfully--as friend to friend,
+faith fully--not to tell the reason even to your mother?'
+
+'I will, faithfully.'
+
+'Then, it's this. On Friday morning I shall be married to Mr
+Tarrant.'
+
+'Gracious!'
+
+'I may tell you more, before then; but perhaps not. We shall be
+married by licence, and it needs one day between getting the licence
+and the marriage. You may tell your mother, if you like, that I want
+to stay longer on _his_ account. I don't care; of course she
+suspects something. But not a syllable to hint at the truth. I have
+been your best friend for a long time, and I trust you.'
+
+She spoke in a passionate whisper, and Jessica felt her trembling.
+
+'You needn't have the least fear of me, dear.'
+
+'I believe it. Kiss me, and good-night!'
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Part III: Into Bontage
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 1
+
+
+
+
+During his daughter's absence, Stephen Lord led a miserable life.
+The wasting disease had firm hold upon him; day by day it consumed
+his flesh, darkened his mind. The more need he had of nursing and
+restraint, the less could he tolerate interference with his habits,
+invasion of his gloomy solitude. The doctor's visits availed
+nothing; he listened to advice, or seemed to listen, but with a
+smile of obstinate suspicion on his furrowed face which conveyed too
+plain a meaning to the adviser.
+
+On one point Mary had prevailed with him. After some days'
+resistance, he allowed her to transform the cabin-like arrangements
+of his room, and give it the appearance of a comfortable
+bed-chamber. But he would not take to his bed, and the suggestion of
+professional nursing excited his wrath.
+
+'Do you write to Nancy?' he asked one morning of his faithful
+attendant, with scowling suspicion.
+
+'No.'
+
+'You are telling me the truth?'
+
+'I never write to any one.'
+
+'Understand plainly that I won't have a word said to her about me.'
+
+This was when Horace had gone away to Scarborough, believing, on his
+father's assurance, that there was no ground whatever for anxiety.
+Sometimes Mr. Lord sat hour after hour in an unchanging position, his
+dull eyes scarcely moving from one point. At others he paced his
+room, or wandered about the house, or made an attempt at gardening
+--which soon ended in pain and exhaustion. Towards night he became
+feverish, his hollow cheeks glowing with an ominous tint. In the
+morning he occasionally prepared himself as if to start for his
+place of business; he left the house, and walked for perhaps a
+couple of hundred yards, then slackened his pace, stopped, looked
+about him in an agony of indecision, and at length returned. After
+this futile endeavour, he had recourse to the bottles in his
+cupboard, and presently fell into a troubled sleep.
+
+At the end of the second week, early one evening, three persons came
+to him by appointment: his partner Samuel Barmby, Mr. Barmby, senior,
+and a well-dressed gentleman whom Mary--she opened the door to
+them--had never seen before. They sat together in the drawing-room
+for more than an hour; then the well-dressed gentleman took his
+leave, the others remaining for some time longer.
+
+The promoted servant, at Mr. Lord's bidding, had made a change in her
+dress; during the latter part of the day she presented the
+appearance of a gentlewoman, and sat, generally with needlework,
+sometimes with a book, alone in the dining-room. On a Sunday, whilst
+Nancy and her brother were away, the Barmby family--father, son,
+and two daughters--came to take tea and spend the evening, Mary
+doing the honours of the house; she bore herself without
+awkwardness, talked simply, and altogether justified Mr. Lord's
+opinion of her. When the guests were gone, Stephen made no remark,
+but, in saying good-night to her, smiled for an instant--the first
+smile seen upon his face for many days.
+
+Mary remained ignorant of the disease from which he was suffering;
+in the matter of his diet, she consulted and obeyed him, though
+often enough it seemed to her that his choice suited little with the
+state of an invalid. He ate at irregular times, and frequently like
+a starving man. Mary suspected that, on the occasions when he went
+out for half-an-hour after dark, he brought back food with him: she
+had seen him enter with something concealed beneath his coat. All
+his doings were to her a subject of ceaseless anxiety, of a profound
+distress which, in his presence, she was obliged to conceal. If she
+regarded him sadly, the sufferer grew petulant or irate. He would
+not endure a question concerning his health.
+
+On the day which was understood to be Nancy's last at Teignmouth, he
+brightened a little, and talked with pleasure, as it seemed, of her
+return on the morrow. Horace had written that he would be home this
+evening, but Mr. Lord spoke only of his daughter. At about six
+o'clock he was sitting in the garden, and Mary brought him a letter
+just delivered; he looked at the envelope with a smile.
+
+'To tell us the train she's coming by, no doubt.'
+
+Mary waited. When Mr. Lord had read the brief note, his face
+darkened, first with disappointment, then with anger.
+
+'Here, look at it,' he said harshly. 'What else was to be expected?'
+
+'Dearest Father,' wrote Nancy, 'I am sorry that our return must be
+put off; we hope to get back on Friday evening. Of course this will
+make no difference to you.--With best love, dear father, and
+hoping I shall find you much better--'
+
+'What does she mean by behaving in this way?' resumed the angry
+voice, before Mary had read to the end. 'What does she mean by it?
+Who gave her leave to stay longer? Not a word of explanation. How
+does she know it will make no difference to me? What does she mean
+by it?'
+
+'The fine weather has tempted them,' replied Mary. 'I daresay they
+want to go somewhere.'
+
+'What right has she to make the change at a moment's notice?'
+vociferated the father, his voice suddenly recovering its old power,
+his cheeks and neck suffused with red wrath. 'And hopes she will
+find me better. What does _she_ care whether she finds me alive or
+dead?'
+
+'Oh, don't say that! You wouldn't let her know that you were worse.'
+
+'What does it mean? I hate this deceitful behaviour! She knew
+before, of course she knew; and she left it to the last moment, so
+that I couldn't write and prevent her from staying. As if I should
+have wished to! As if I cared a brass farthing how long she stays,
+or, for that matter, whether I ever see her again!'
+
+He checked the course of his furious speech, and stood staring at
+the letter.
+
+'What did you say?' He spoke now in a hoarse undertone. 'You thought
+they were going somewhere?'
+
+'Last year there used to be steamers that went to places on certain
+days--'
+
+'Nonsense! She wouldn't alter all their plans for that. It's
+something I am not to know--of course it is. She's deceitful--
+like all women.'
+
+He met Mary's eye, suddenly turned upon him. His own fell before it,
+and without speaking again he went into the house.
+
+In half-an-hour's time his bell rang, and not Mary, but the young
+servant responded. According to her directions, she knocked at the
+door, and, without opening it, asked her master's pleasure. Mr. Lord
+said that he was going out, and would not require a meal till late
+in the evening.
+
+It was nearly ten o'clock when he returned. Mary, sitting in the
+front room, rose at his entrance.
+
+'I want nothing,' he said. 'I've been to the Barmbys'.' Voice and
+movements proved how the effort had taxed him. In sitting down, he
+trembled; fever was in his eyes, and pain in every line of his
+countenance.
+
+Mary handed him a letter; it came from Horace, and was an intimation
+that the young gentleman would not return to-night, but to-morrow.
+When Mr. Lord had read it, he jerked a contemptuous laugh, and threw
+the sheet of note-paper across the table.
+
+'There you are. Not much to choose between daughter and son. He's
+due at business in the morning; but what does that matter? It
+doesn't suit his lordship to keep time.'
+
+He laughed again, his emphasis on 'lordship' showing that he
+consciously played with the family name.
+
+'But I was a fool to be angry. Let them come when they will.'
+
+For a few minutes he lay back in the chair, gazing at vacancy.
+
+'Has the girl gone to bed?'
+
+'I'll tell her she can go.'
+
+Mary soon returned, and took up the book with which she had been
+engaged. In a low voice, and as if speaking without much thought,
+Stephen asked her what she was reading. It was a volume of an old
+magazine, bought by Mr. Lord many years ago.
+
+'Yes, yes. Nancy laughs at it--calls it old rubbish. These young
+people are so clever.'
+
+His companion made no remark. Unobserved, he scrutinised her face
+for a long time, and said at length:
+
+'Don't let _us_ fall out, Mary. You're not pleased with me, and I
+know why. I said all women were deceitful, and you took it too
+seriously. You ought to know me better. There's something comes on
+me every now and then, and makes me say the worst I can no matter
+who it hurts. Could I be such a fool as to think ill of _you_?'
+
+'It did hurt me,' replied the other, still bent over her book. 'But
+it was only the sound of it. I knew you said more than you meant.'
+
+'I'm a fool, and I've been a fool all my life. Is it likely I should
+have wise children? When I went off to the Barmbys', I thought of
+sending Samuel down to Teignmouth, to find out what they were at.
+But I altered my mind before I got there. What good would it have
+done? All I _can_ do I've done already. I made my will the other
+day; it's signed and witnessed. I've made it as I told you I should.
+I'm not much longer for this world, but I've saved the girl from
+foolishness till she's six-and-twenty. After that she must take care
+of herself.'
+
+They sat silent whilst the clock on the mantelpiece ticked away a
+few more minutes. Mr. Lord's features betrayed the working of turbid
+thought, a stern resentment their prevailing expression. When
+reverie released him, he again looked at his companion.
+
+'Mary, did you ever ask yourself what sort of woman Nancy's mother
+may have been?'
+
+The listener started, like one in whom a secret has been surprised.
+She tried to answer, but after all did not speak.
+
+'I'll tell you,' Stephen pursued. 'Yes, I'll tell you. You must know
+it. Not a year after the boy's birth, she left me. And I made myself
+free of her--I divorced her.'
+
+Their eyes just met.
+
+'You needn't think that it cost me any suffering. Not on her
+account; not because I had lost my wife. I never felt so glad,
+before or since, as on the day when it was all over, and I found
+myself a free man again. I suffered only in thinking how I had
+fooled away some of the best years of my life for a woman who
+despised me from the first, and was as heartless as the stones of
+the street. I found her in beggary, or close upon it. I made myself
+her slave--it's only the worthless women who accept from a man,
+who expect from him, such slavish worship as she had from me. I gave
+her clothing; she scarcely thanked me, but I thought myself happy. I
+gave her a comfortable home, such as she hadn't known for years; for
+a reward she mocked at my plain tastes and quiet ways--but I
+thought no ill of it--could see nothing in it but a girlish,
+lighthearted sort of way that seemed one of her merits. As long as
+we lived together, she pretended to be an affectionate wife; I
+should think no one ever matched her in hypocrisy. But the first
+chance she had--husband, children, home, all flung aside in a
+moment. Then I saw her in the true light, and understood all at once
+what a blind fool I had been.'
+
+He breathed quickly and painfully. Mary sat without a movement.
+
+'I thought I had done a great thing in marrying a wife that was born
+above me. Her father had been a country gentleman; horse-racing and
+such things had brought him down, and from her twelfth year his
+daughter lived--I never quite knew how, but on charity of some
+kind. She grew up without trying to earn her own living; she thought
+herself too good for that, thought she had a claim to be supported,
+because as a child she was waited upon by servants. When I asked her
+once if she couldn't have done something, she stared at me and
+laughed in my face. For all that she was glad enough to marry a man
+of my sort--rough and uneducated as I was. She always reminded me
+of it, though--that I had no education; I believe she thought that
+she had a perfect right to throw over such a husband, whenever she
+chose. Afterwards, I saw very well that _her_ education didn't
+amount to much. How could it, when she learnt nothing after she was
+twelve? She was living with very poor people who came from my part
+of the country--that's how I met her. The father led some sort of
+blackguard life in London, but had no money for her, nor yet for his
+other girl, who went into service, I was told, and perhaps made
+herself a useful, honest woman. He died in a hospital, and he was
+buried at my expense--not three months before his daughter went
+off and left me.'
+
+'You will never tell your children,' said Mary, when there had been
+a long pause.
+
+'I've often thought it would only be right if I told them. I've
+often thought, the last year or two, that Nancy ought to know. It
+might make her think, and do her good.'
+
+'No, no,' returned the other hurriedly. 'Never let her know of it--
+never. It might do her much harm.'
+
+'You know now, Mary, why I look at the girl so anxiously. She's not
+like her mother; not much like her in face, and I can't think she's
+like her in heart. But you know what her faults are as well as I do.
+Whether I've been right or wrong in giving her a good education, I
+shall never know. Wrong, I fear--but I've told you all about
+that.'
+
+'You don't know whether she's alive or not?' asked Mary, when once
+more it was left to her to break silence.
+
+'What do I care? How should I know?'
+
+'Don't be tempted to tell them--either of them!' said the other
+earnestly.
+
+'My friend Barmby knows. Whether he's told his son, I can't say;
+it's twenty years since we spoke about it. If he _did_ ever mention
+it to Samuel, then it might somehow get known to Horace or the girl,
+when I'm gone.--I won't give up the hope that young Barmby may be
+her husband. She'll have time to think about it. But if ever she
+should come to you and ask questions--I mean, if she's been told
+what happened--you'll set me right in her eyes? You'll tell her
+what I've told you?'
+
+'I hope it may never--'
+
+'So do I,' Stephen interrupted, his voice husky with fatigue. 'But I
+count on you to make my girl think rightly of me, if ever there's
+occasion. I count on you. When I'm dead, I won't have her think that
+I was to blame for her mother's ill-doing. That's why I've told you.
+You believe me, don't you?'
+
+And Mary, lifting her eyes, met his look of appeal with more than a
+friend's confidence.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 2
+
+
+
+
+From chambers in Staple Inn, Lionel Tarrant looked forth upon the
+laborious world with a dainty enjoyment of his own limitless
+leisure. The old gables fronting upon Holborn pleased his fancy; he
+liked to pass under the time-worn archway, and so, at a step,
+estrange himself from commercial tumult,--to be in the midst of
+modern life, yet breathe an atmosphere of ancient repose.
+
+He belonged to an informal club of young men who called themselves,
+facetiously, the Hodiernals. _Vixi hodie_! The motto, suggested by
+some one or other after a fifth tumbler of whisky punch, might bear
+more than a single interpretation. Harvey Munden, the one member of
+this genial brotherhood who lived by the sweat of his brow, proposed
+as a more suitable title, Les Faineants; that, however, was judged
+pedantic, not to say offensive. For these sons of the Day would not
+confess to indolence; each deemed himself, after his own fashion, a
+pioneer in art, letters, civilisation. They had money of their own,
+or were supported by some one who could afford that privilege; most
+of them had, ostensibly, some profession in view; for the present,
+they contented themselves with living, and the weaker brethren read
+in their hodiernity an obligation to be 'up to date.'
+
+Tarrant professed himself critical of To-day, apprehensive of
+To-morrow; he cast a backward eye. None the less, his avowed
+principle was to savour the passing hour. When night grew mellow,
+and the god of whisky inspired his soul, he shone in a lyrical
+egoism which had but slight correspondence with the sincerities of
+his solitude. His view of woman--the Hodiernals talked much of
+woman--differed considerably from his thoughts of the individual
+women with whom he associated; protesting oriental sympathies, he
+nourished in truth the chivalry appropriate to his years and to his
+education, and imaged an ideal of female excellence whereof the
+prime features were moral and intellectual.
+
+He had no money of his own. What could be saved for him from his
+father's squandered estate--the will established him sole
+inheritor--went in the costs of a liberal education, his
+grandmother giving him assurance that he should not go forth into
+the world penniless. This promise Mrs. Tarrant had kept, though not
+exactly in the manner her grandson desired. Instead of making him a
+fixed allowance, the old lady supplied him with funds at uncertain
+intervals; with the unpleasant result that it was sometimes
+necessary for him to call to her mind his dependent condition. The
+cheques he received varied greatly in amount,--from handsome
+remittances of a hundred pounds or so, down to minim gifts which
+made the young man feel uncomfortable when he received them. Still,
+he was provided for, and it could not be long before this dependency
+came to an end.
+
+He believed in his own abilities. Should it ever be needful, he
+could turn to journalism, for which, undoubtedly, he had some
+aptitude. But why do anything at all, in the sense of working for
+money? Every year he felt less disposed for that kind of exertion,
+and had a greater relish of his leisurely life. Mrs. Tarrant never
+rebuked him; indeed she had long since ceased to make inquiry about
+his professional views. Perhaps she felt it something of a dignity
+to have a grandson who lived as gentleman at large.
+
+But now, in the latter days of August, the gentleman found himself,
+in one most important particular, at large no longer. On returning
+from Teignmouth to Staple Inn he entered his rooms with a confused,
+disagreeable sense that things were not as they had been, that his
+freedom had suffered a violation, that he could not sit down among
+his books with the old self-centred ease, that his prospects were
+completely, indescribably changed, perchance much for the worse. In
+brief, Tarrant had gone forth a bachelor, and came back a married
+man.
+
+Could it be sober fact? Had he in very deed committed so gross an
+absurdity?
+
+He had purposed no such thing. Miss. Nancy Lord was not by any means
+the kind of person that entered his thoughts when they turned to
+marriage. He regarded her as in every respect his inferior. She
+belonged to the social rank only just above that of wage-earners;
+her father had a small business in Camberwell; she dressed and
+talked rather above her station, but so, now-a-days, did every
+daughter of petty tradesfolk. From the first he had amused himself
+with her affectation of intellectual superiority. Miss. Lord
+represented a type; to study her as a sample of the pretentious
+half-educated class was interesting; this sort of girl was turned
+out in thousands every year, from so-called High Schools; if they
+managed to pass some examination or other, their conceit grew
+boundless. Craftily, he had tested her knowledge; it seemed all
+sham. She would marry some hapless clerk, and bring him to
+bankruptcy by the exigencies of her 'refinement.'
+
+So had he thought of Nancy till a few months ago. But in the
+spring-time, when his emotions blossomed with the blossoming year,
+he met the girl after a long interval, and saw her with changed
+eyes. She had something more than prettiness; her looks undeniably
+improved. It seemed, too, that she bore herself more gracefully, and
+even talked with, at times, an approximation to the speech of a
+lady. These admissions signified much in a man of Tarrant's social
+prejudice--so strong that it exercised an appreciable effect upon
+his every-day morals. He began to muse about Miss. Lord, and the
+upshot of his musing was that, having learnt of her departure for
+Teignmouth, he idly betook himself in the same direction.
+
+But as for marriage, he would as soon have contemplated taking to
+wife a barmaid. Between Miss. Lord and the young lady who dispenses
+refreshment there were distinctions, doubtless, but none of the
+first importance. Then arose the question, in what spirit, with what
+purpose, did he seek her intimacy? The answer he simply postponed.
+
+And postponed it very late indeed. Until the choice was no longer
+between making love in idleness, and conscientiously holding aloof;
+but between acting like a frank blackguard, and making the amends of
+an honest man.
+
+The girl's fault, to be sure. He had not credited himself with this
+power of fascination, and certainly not with the violence of passion
+which recklessly pursues indulgence. Still, the girl's fault; she
+had behaved--well, as a half-educated girl of her class might be
+expected to behave. Ignorance she could not plead; that were
+preposterous. Utter subjugation by first love; that, perhaps; she
+affirmed it, and possibly with truth; a flattering assumption, at
+all events. But, all said and done, the issue had been of her own
+seeking. Why, then, accuse himself of blackguardly conduct, if he
+had turned a deaf ear to her pleading? Not one word of marriage had
+previously escaped his lips, nor anything that could imply a
+promise.
+
+Well, there was the awkward and unaccountable fact that he _felt_
+himself obliged to marry her; that, when he seemed to be preparing
+resistance, downright shame rendered it impossible. Her face--her
+face when she looked at him and spoke! The truth was, that he had
+not hesitated at all; there was but one course open to him. He gave
+glances in the other direction; he wished to escape; he reviled
+himself for his folly; he saw the difficulties and discontents that
+lay before him; but choice he had none.
+
+Love, in that sense of the word which Tarrant respected, could not
+be said to influence him. He had uttered the word; yes, of course he
+had uttered it; as a man will who is goaded by his raging blood. But
+he was as far as ever from loving Nancy Lord. Her beauty, and a
+certain growing charm in her companionship, had lured him on; his
+habitual idleness, and the vagueness of his principles, made him
+guilty at last of what a moralist would call very deliberate
+rascality. He himself was inclined to see his behaviour in that
+light; yet why had Nancy so smoothed the path of temptation?
+
+That _her_ love was love indeed, he might take for granted. To a
+certain point, it excused her. But she seemed so thoroughly able to
+protect herself; the time of her green girlhood had so long gone by.
+For explanation, he must fall back again on the circumstances of her
+origin and training. Perhaps she illustrated a social peril, the
+outcome of modern follies. Yes, that was how he would look at it. A
+result of charlatan 'education' operating upon crude character.
+
+Who could say what the girl had been reading, what cheap
+philosophies had unsettled her mind? Is not a little knowledge a
+dangerous thing?
+
+Thus far had he progressed in the four and twenty hours which
+followed his--or Nancy's--conquest. Meanwhile he had visited the
+office of the registrar, had made his application for a marriage
+licence, a proceeding which did not tend to soothe him. Later, when
+he saw Nancy again, he experienced a revival of that humaner mood
+which accompanied his pledge to marry her, the mood of regret, but
+also of tenderness, of compassion. A tenderness that did not go very
+deep, a half-slighting compassion. His character, and the features
+of the case, at present allowed no more; but he preferred the
+kindlier attitude.
+
+Of course he preferred it. Was he not essentially good-natured?
+Would he not, at any ordinary season, go out of his way to do a
+kindness? Did not his soul revolt against every form of injustice?
+Whom had he ever injured? For his humanity, no less than for his
+urbanity, he claimed a noteworthy distinction among young men of the
+time.
+
+And there lay the pity of it. But for Nancy's self-abandonment, he
+might have come to love her in good earnest. As it was, the growth
+of their intimacy had been marked with singular, unanticipated
+impulses on his side, impulses quite inconsistent with heartless
+scheming. In the compunctious visitings which interrupted his
+love-making at least twice, there was more than a revolt of mere
+honesty, as he recognised during his brief flight to London. Had she
+exercised but the common prudence of womanhood!
+
+Why, that she did not, might tell both for and against her. Granting
+that she lacked true dignity, native refinement, might it not have
+been expected that artfulness would supply their place? Artful
+fencing would have stamped her of coarse nature. But coarseness she
+had never betrayed; he had never judged her worse than
+intellectually shallow. Her self-surrender might, then, indicate a
+trait worthy of admiration. Her subsequent behaviour undeniably
+pleaded for respect. She acquainted him with the circumstances of
+her home life, very modestly, perhaps pathetically. He learnt that
+her father was not ill to do, heard of her domestic and social
+troubles, that her mother had been long dead, things weighing in her
+favour, to be sure.
+
+If only she had loved him less!
+
+It was all over; he was married. In acting honourably, it seemed
+probable that he had spoilt his life. He must be prepared for
+anything. Nancy said that she should not, could not, tell her
+father, yet awhile; but that resolution was of doubtful stability.
+For his own part, he thought it clearly advisable that the fact
+should not become known at Champion Hill; but could he believe
+Nancy's assurance that Miss. Morgan remained in the dark? Upon one
+catastrophe, others might naturally follow.
+
+Here, Saturday at noon, came a letter of Nancy's writing. A long
+letter, and by no means a bad one; superior, in fact, to anything he
+thought she could have written. It moved him somewhat, but would
+have moved him more, had he not been legally bound to the writer. On
+Sunday she could not come to see him; but on Monday, early in the
+afternoon--
+
+Well, there were consolations. A wise man makes the best of the
+inevitable.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 3
+
+
+
+
+Since his return he had seen no one, and none of his friends knew
+where he had been. A call from some stray Hodiernal would be very
+unseasonable this Monday afternoon; but probably they were all
+enjoying their elegant leisure in regions remote from town. As the
+hour of Nancy's arrival drew near, he sat trying to compose himself
+--with indifferent success. At one moment his thoughts found
+utterance, and he murmured in a strange, bewildered tone--'My
+wife.' Astonishing words! He laughed at their effect upon him, but
+unmirthfully. And his next murmur was--'The devil!' A mere
+ejaculation, betokening his state of mind.
+
+He reached several times for his pipe, and remembered when he had
+touched it that the lips with which he greeted Nancy ought not to be
+redolent of tobacco. In outward respect, at all events, he would not
+fall short.
+
+Just when his nervousness was becoming intolerable, there sounded a
+knock. The knock he had anticipated--timid, brief. He stepped
+hastily from the room, and opened. Nancy hardly looked at him, and
+neither of them spoke till the closing of two doors had assured
+their privacy.
+
+'Well, you had no difficulty in finding the place?'
+
+'No--none at all.'
+
+They stood apart, and spoke with constraint. Nancy's bosom heaved,
+as though she had been hastening overmuch; her face was deeply
+coloured; her eyes had an unwonted appearance, resembling those of a
+night-watcher at weary dawn. She cast quick glances about the room,
+but with the diffidence of an intruder. Her attitude was marked by
+the same characteristic; she seemed to shrink, to be ashamed.
+
+'Come and sit down,' said Tarrant cheerfully, as he wheeled a chair.
+
+She obeyed him, and he, stooping beside her, offered his lips. Nancy
+kissed him, closing her eyes for the moment, then dropping them
+again.
+
+'It seems a long time, Nancy--doesn't it?'
+
+'Yes--a very long time.'
+
+'You couldn't come on Sunday?'
+
+'I found my father very ill. I didn't like to leave home till
+to-day.'
+
+'Your father ill?--You said nothing of it in your letter.'
+
+'No--I didn't like to--with the other things.'
+
+A singular delicacy this; Tarrant understood it, and looked at her
+thoughtfully. Again she was examining the room with hurried glance;
+upon him her eyes did not turn. He asked questions about Mr. Lord.
+Nancy could not explain the nature of his illness; he had spoken of
+gout, but she feared it must be something worse; the change in him
+since she went away was incredible and most alarming. This she said
+in short, quick sentences, her voice low. Tarrant thought to himself
+that in her too, a very short time had made a very notable change;
+he tried to read its significance, but could reach no certainty.
+
+'I'm sorry to hear all this--very sorry. You must tell me more
+about your father. Take off your hat, dear, and your gloves.'
+
+Her gloves she removed first, and laid them on her lap; Tarrant took
+them away. Then her hat; this too he placed on the table. Having
+done so, he softly touched the plaits of her hair. And, for the
+first time, Nancy looked up at him.
+
+'Are you glad to see me?' she asked, in a voice that seemed subdued
+by doubt of the answer.
+
+'I am--very glad.'
+
+His hand fell to her shoulder. With a quick movement, a stifled
+exclamation, the girl rose and flung her arms about him.
+
+'Are you really glad?--Do you really love me?'
+
+'Never doubt it, dear girl.'
+
+'Ah, but I can't help. I have hardly slept at night, in trying to
+get rid of the doubt. When you opened the door, I felt you didn't
+welcome me. Don't you think of me as a burden? I can't help
+wondering why I am here.'
+
+He took hold of her left hand, and looked at it, then said
+playfully:
+
+'Of course you wonder. What business has a wife to come and see her
+husband without the ring on her finger?'
+
+Nancy turned from him, opened the front of her dress, unknotted a
+string of silk, and showed her finger bright with the golden
+circlet.
+
+'That's how I must wear it, except when I am with you. I keep
+touching--to make sure it's there.'
+
+Tarrant kissed her fingers.
+
+'Dear,'--she had her face against him--'make me certain that you
+love me. Speak to me like you did before. Oh, I never knew in my
+life what it was to feel ashamed!'
+
+'Ashamed? Because you are married, Nancy?'
+
+'Am I really married? That seems impossible. It's like having dreamt
+that I was married to you. I can hardly remember a thing that
+happened.'
+
+'The registry at Teignmouth remembers,' he answered with a laugh.
+'Those books have a long memory.'
+
+She raised her eyes.
+
+'But wouldn't you undo it if you could?--No, no, I don't mean
+that. Only that if it had never happened--if we had said good-bye
+before those last days--wouldn't you have been glad now?'
+
+'Why, that's a difficult question to answer,' he returned gently.
+'It all depends on your own feeling.'
+
+For whatever reason, these words so overcame Nancy that she burst
+into tears. Tarrant, at once more lover-like, soothed and fondled
+her, and drew her to sit on his knee.
+
+'You're not like your old self, dear girl. Of course, I can
+understand it. And your father's illness. But you mustn't think of
+it in this way. I do love you, Nancy. I couldn't unsay a word I said
+to you--I don't wish anything undone.'
+
+'Make me believe that. I think I should be quite happy then. It's
+the hateful thought that perhaps you never wanted me for your wife;
+it _will_ come, again and again, and it makes me feel as if I would
+rather have died.'
+
+'Send such thoughts packing. Tell them your husband wants all your
+heart and mind for himself.'
+
+'But will you never think ill of me?'
+
+She whispered the words, close-clinging.
+
+'I should be a contemptible sort of brute.'
+
+'No. I ought to have--. If we had spoken of our love to each
+other, and waited.'
+
+'A very proper twelvemonth's engagement,--meetings at five o'clock
+tea,--fifty thousand love-letters,--and all that kind of thing.
+Oh, we chose a better way. Our wedding was among the leaves and
+flowers. You remember the glow of evening sunlight between the red
+pine and the silver birch? I hope that place may remain as it is all
+our lives; we will go there--'
+
+'Never! Never ask me to go there. I want to forget--I hope some
+day I may forget.'
+
+'If you hope so, then I will hope the same.'
+
+'And you love me--with real, husband's love--love that will
+last?'
+
+'Why should _I_ answer all the questions?' He took her face between
+his hands. What if the wife's love should fail first?'
+
+'You can say that lightly, because you know--'
+
+'What do I know?'
+
+'You know that I am _all_ love of you. As long as I am myself, I
+must love you. It was because I had no will of my own left, because
+I lived only in the thought of you day and night--'
+
+Their lips met in a long silence.
+
+'I mustn't stay past four o'clock,' were Nancy's next words. 'I
+don't like to be away long from the house. Father won't ask me
+anything, but he knows I'm away somewhere, and I'm afraid it makes
+him angry with me.' She examined the room. 'How comfortable you are
+here! what a delightful old place to live in!'
+
+'Will you look at the other rooms?'
+
+'Not to-day--when I come again. I must say good-bye very soon--
+oh, see how the time goes! What a large library you have! You must
+let me look at all the books, when I have time.'
+
+'Let you? They are yours as much as mine.'
+
+Her face brightened.
+
+'I should like to live here; howl should enjoy it after that hateful
+Grove Lane! Shall I live here with you some day?'
+
+'There wouldn't be room for two. Why, your dresses would fill the
+whole place.'
+
+She went and stood before the shelves.
+
+'But how dusty you are! Who cleans for you?'
+
+'No one. A very rickety old woman draws a certain number of
+shillings each week, on pretence of cleaning.'
+
+'What a shame! She neglects you disgracefully. You shall go away
+some afternoon, and leave me here with a great pile of dusters.'
+
+'You can do that kind of thing? It never occurred to me to ask you:
+are you a domestic person?'
+
+She answered with something of the old confident air.
+
+'That was an oversight, wasn't it? After all, how little you know
+about me!'
+
+'Do you know much more of me?'
+
+Her countenance fell.
+
+'You are going to tell me--everything. How long have you lived
+here?'
+
+'Two years and a half.'
+
+'And your friends come to see you here? Of course they do. I meant,
+have you many friends?'
+
+'Friends, no. A good many acquaintances.'
+
+'Men, like yourself?'
+
+'Mostly men, fellows who talk about art and literature.'
+
+'And women?' Nancy faltered, half turning away.
+
+'Oh, magnificent creatures--Greek scholars--mathematicians--
+all that is most advanced!'
+
+'That's the right answer to a silly question,' said Nancy humbly.
+
+Whereat, Tarrant fixed his gaze upon her.
+
+'I begin to think that--'
+
+He checked himself awkwardly. Nancy insisted on the completion of
+his thought.
+
+'That of all the women I know, you have the most sense.'
+
+'I had rather hear you say that than have a great fortune.' She
+blushed with joy. 'Perhaps you will love me some day, as I wish to
+be loved.'
+
+'How?'
+
+'I'll tell you another time. If it weren't for my father's illness,
+I think I could go home feeling almost happy. But how am I to know
+what you are doing?'
+
+'What do you wish me to do?'
+
+'Just tell me how you live. What shall you do now, when I'm gone?'
+
+'Sit disconsolate,'--he came nearer--'thinking you were just a
+little unkind.'
+
+'No, don't say that.' Nancy was flurried. 'I have told you the real
+reason. Our housekeeper says that father was disappointed and angry
+because I put off my return from Teignmouth. He spoke to me very
+coldly, and I have hardly seen him since. He won't let me wait upon
+him; and I have thought, since I know how ill he really is, that I
+must seem heartless. I will come for longer next time.'
+
+To make amends for the reproach he had uttered in spite of himself,
+Tarrant began to relate in full the events of his ordinary day.
+
+'I get my own breakfast--the only meal I have at home. Look,
+here's the kitchen, queer old place. And here's the dining-room.
+Cupboards everywhere, you see; we boast of our cupboards. The green
+paint is _de rigueur_; duck's egg colour; I've got to like it. That
+door leads into the bedroom. Well, after breakfast, about eleven
+o'clock that's to say, I light up--look at my pipe-rack--and
+read newspapers. Then, if it's fine, I walk about the streets, and
+see what new follies men are perpetrating. And then--'
+
+He told of his favourite restaurants, of his unfashionable club, of
+a few houses where, at long intervals, he called or dined, of the
+Hodiernals, of a dozen other small matters.
+
+'What a life,' sighed the listener, 'compared with mine!'
+
+'We'll remedy that, some day.'
+
+'When?' she asked absently.
+
+'Wait just a little.--You don't wish to tell your father?'
+
+'I daren't tell him. I doubt whether I shall ever dare to tell him
+face to face.'
+
+'Don't think about it. Leave it to me.'
+
+'I must have letters from you--but how? Perhaps, if you could
+promise always to send them for the first post--I generally go to
+the letter-box, and I could do so always--whilst father is ill.'
+
+This was agreed upon. Nancy, whilst they were talking, took her hat
+from the table; at the same moment, Tarrant's hand moved towards it.
+Their eyes met, and the hand that would have checked her was drawn
+back. Quickly, secretly, she drew the ring from her finger, hid it
+somewhere, and took her gloves.
+
+'Did you come by the back way?' Tarrant asked, when he had bitten
+his lips for a sulky minute.
+
+'Yes, as you told me.'
+
+He said he would walk with her into Chancery Lane; there could be no
+risk in it.
+
+'You shall go out first. Any one passing will suppose you had
+business with the solicitor underneath. I'll overtake you at
+Southampton Buildings.'
+
+Impatient to be gone, she lingered minute after minute, and broke
+hurriedly from his restraining arms at last. The second outer door,
+which Tarrant had closed on her entrance, surprised her by its
+prison-like massiveness. In the wooden staircase she stopped
+timidly, but at the exit her eyes turned to an inscription above,
+which she had just glanced at when arriving: _Surrexit e flammis_,
+and a date. Nancy had no Latin, but guessed an interpretation from
+the last word. Through the little court, with its leafy plane-trees
+and white-worn cobble-stones, she walked with bent head, hearing the
+roar of Holborn through the front archway, and breathing more freely
+when she gained the quiet garden at the back of the Inn.
+
+Tarrant's step sounded behind her. Looking up she asked the meaning
+of the inscription she had seen.
+
+'You don't know Latin? Well, why should you? _Surrexit e flammis_,
+"It rose again from the flames."
+
+'I thought it might be something like that. You will be patient with
+my ignorance?'
+
+A strange word upon Nancy's lips. No mortal ere this had heard her
+confess to ignorance.
+
+'But you know the modern languages?' said Tarrant, smiling.
+
+'Yes. That is, a little French and German--a very little German.'
+
+Tarrant mused, seemingly with no dissatisfaction.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 4
+
+
+
+
+In her brother's looks and speech Nancy detected something
+mysterious. Undoubtedly he was keeping a secret from her, and there
+could be just as little doubt that he would not keep it long.
+Whenever she questioned him about the holiday at Scarborough, he put
+on a smile unlike any she had ever seen on his face, so profoundly
+thoughtful was it, so loftily reserved. On the subject of Mrs.
+Damerel he did not choose to be very communicative; Nancy gathered
+little more than she had learnt from his letter. But very plainly
+the young man held himself in higher esteem than hitherto; very
+plainly he had learnt to think of 'the office' as a burden or
+degradation, from which he would soon escape. Prompted by her own
+tormenting conscience, his sister wondered whether Fanny French had
+anything to do with the mystery; but this seemed improbable. She
+mentioned Fanny's name one evening.
+
+'Do you see much of her?'
+
+'Not much,' was the dreamy reply. 'When are you going to call?'
+
+'Oh, not at present,' said Nancy.
+
+'You've altered again, then?'
+
+She vouchsafed no answer.
+
+'There's something I think I ought to tell you,' said Horace,
+speaking as though he were the elder and felt a responsibility.
+'People have been talking about you and Mr. Crewe.'
+
+'What!' She flashed into excessive anger. 'Who has been talking?'
+
+'The people over there. Of course I know it's all nonsense. At
+least'--he raised his eyebrows--'I suppose it is.'
+
+'_I_ should suppose so,' said Nancy, with vehement scorn.
+
+Their father's illness imposed a restraint upon trifling
+conversation. Mary Woodruff, now attending upon Mr. Lord under the
+doctor's directions, had held grave talk with Nancy. The Barmbys,
+father and son, called frequently, and went away with gloomy faces.
+Nancy and her brother were summoned, separately, to the invalid's
+room at uncertain times, but neither was allowed to perform any
+service for him; their sympathy, more often than not, excited
+irritation; the sufferer always seemed desirous of saying more than
+the few and insignificant words which actually passed his lips, and
+generally, after a long silence, he gave the young people an abrupt
+dismissal. With his daughter he spoke at length, in language which
+awed her by its solemnity; Nancy could only understand him as
+meaning that his end drew near. He had been reviewing, he said, the
+course of her life, and trying to forecast her future.
+
+'I give you no more advice; it would only be repeating what I have
+said hundreds of times. All I can _do_ for your good, I have done.
+You will understand me better if you live a few more years, and I
+think, in the end, you will be grateful to me.'
+
+Nancy, sitting by the bedside, laid a hand upon her father's and
+sobbed. She entreated him to believe that even now she understood
+how wisely he had guided her.
+
+'Tried to, Nancy; tried to, my dear. Guidance isn't for young people
+now-a-days. Don't let us shirk the truth. I have never been
+satisfied with you, but I have loved you--'
+
+'And I you, dear father--I have! I have!--I know better now how
+good your advice was. I wish--far, far more sincerely than you
+think--that I had kept more control upon myself--thought less of
+myself in every way--'
+
+Whilst she spoke through her tears, the yellow, wrinkled face upon
+the pillow, with its sunken eyes and wasted lips, kept sternly
+motionless.
+
+'If you won't mock at me,' Stephen pursued, 'I will show you an
+example you would do well to imitate. It is our old servant, now my
+kindest, truest friend. If I could hope that you will let her be
+_your_ friend, it would help to put my mind at rest. Don't look down
+upon her,--that's such a poor way of thinking. Of all the women I
+have known, she is the best. Don't be too proud to learn from her,
+Nancy. In all these twenty years that she has been in my house,
+whatever she undertook to do, she did well;--nothing too hard or
+too humble for her, if she thought it her duty. I know what that
+means; I myself have been a poor, weak creature, compared with her.
+Don't be offended because I ask you to take pattern by her. I know
+her value now better than I ever knew it before. I owe her a debt I
+can't pay.'
+
+Nancy left the room burdened with strange and distressful thoughts.
+When she saw Mary she looked at her with new feelings, and spoke to
+her less familiarly than of wont. Mary was very silent in these
+days; her face had the dignity of a profound unspoken grief.
+
+To his son, Mr. Lord talked only of practical things, urging sound
+advice, and refraining, now, from any mention of their differences.
+Horace, absorbed in preoccupations, had never dreamt that this
+illness might prove fatal; on finding Nancy in tears, he was
+astonished.
+
+'Do you think it's dangerous?' he asked.
+
+'I'm afraid he will never get well.'
+
+It was Sunday morning. The young man went apart and pondered. After
+the mid-day meal, having heard from Mary that his father was no
+worse, he left home without remark to any one, and from Camberwell
+Green took a cab to Trafalgar Square. At the Hotel Metropole he
+inquired for Mrs. Damerel; her rooms were high up, and he ascended by
+the lift. Sunk in a deep chair, her feet extended upon a hassock,
+Mrs. Damerel was amusing herself with a comic paper; she rose
+briskly, though with the effort of a person who is no longer slim.
+
+'Here I am, you see!--up in the clouds. Now, _did_ you get my
+letter?'
+
+'No letter, but a telegram.'
+
+'There, I thought so. Isn't that just like me? As soon as I had sent
+out the letter to post, I said to myself that I had written the
+wrong address. What address it _was_, I couldn't tell you, to save
+my life, but I shall see when it comes back from the post-office. I
+rather suspect it's gone to Gunnersbury; just then I was thinking
+about somebody at Gunnersbury--or somebody at Hampstead, I can't
+be sure which. What a good thing I wired!--Oh, now, Horace, I
+_don't_ like that, I don't really!'
+
+The young man looked at her in bewilderment.
+
+'What don't you like?'
+
+'Why, that tie. It won't do at all. Your taste is generally very
+good, but that tie! I'll choose one for you to-morrow, and let you
+have it the next time you come. Do you know, I've been thinking that
+it might be well if you parted your hair in the middle. I don't care
+for it as a rule; but in your case, with your soft, beautiful hair,
+I think it would look well. Shall we try? Wait a minute; I'll run
+for a comb.'
+
+'But suppose some one came--'
+
+'Nobody will come, my dear boy. Hardly any one knows I'm here. I
+like to get away from people now and then; that's why I've taken
+refuge in this cock-loft.'
+
+She disappeared, and came back with a comb of tortoise-shell.
+
+'Sit down there. Oh, what hair it is, to be sure! Almost as fine as
+my own. I think you'll have a delicious moustache.'
+
+Her personal appearance was quite in keeping with this vivacity.
+Rather short, and inclining--but as yet only inclining--to
+rotundity of figure, with a peculiarly soft and clear complexion,
+Mrs. Damerel made a gallant battle against the hostile years. Her
+bright eye, her moist lips, the admirable smoothness of brow and
+cheek and throat, bore witness to sound health; as did the rows of
+teeth, incontestably her own, which she exhibited in her frequent
+mirth. A handsome woman still, though not of the type that commands
+a reverent admiration. Her frivolity did not exclude a suggestion of
+shrewdness, nor yet of capacity for emotion, but it was difficult to
+imagine wise or elevated thought behind that narrow brow. She was
+elaborately dressed, with only the most fashionable symbols of
+widowhood; rings adorned her podgy little hand, and a bracelet her
+white wrist. Refinement she possessed only in the society-journal
+sense, but her intonation was that of the idle class, and her
+grammar did not limp.
+
+'There--let me look. Oh, I think that's an improvement--more
+_distingue_. And now tell me the news. How is your father?'
+
+'Very bad, I'm afraid,' said Horace, when he had regarded himself in
+a mirror with something of doubtfulness. 'Nancy says that she's
+afraid he won't get well.'
+
+'Oh, you don't say that! Oh, how very sad! But let us hope. I can't
+think it's so bad as that.'
+
+Horace sat in thought. Mrs. Damerel, her bright eyes subduing their
+gaiety to a keen reflectiveness, put several questions regarding the
+invalid, then for a moment meditated.
+
+'Well, we must hope for the best. Let me know to-morrow how he gets
+on--be sure you let me know. And if anything _should_ happen--
+oh, but that's too sad; we won't talk about it.'
+
+Again she meditated, tapping the floor, and, as it seemed, trying
+not to smile.
+
+'Don't be downcast, my dear boy. Never meet sorrow half-way--if
+you knew how useful I have found it to remember that maxim. I have
+gone through sad, sad things--ah! But now tell me of your own
+affairs. Have you seen _la petite_?'
+
+'I just saw her the other evening,' he answered uneasily.
+
+'Just? What does that mean, I wonder? Now you don't look anything
+like so well as when you were at Scarborough. You're worrying; yes,
+I know you are. It's your nervous constitution, my poor boy. So you
+just saw her? No more imprudences?'
+
+She examined his face attentively, her lips set with tolerable
+firmness.
+
+'It's a very difficult position, you know,' said Horace, wriggling
+in his chair. 'I can't get out of it all at once. And the truth is,
+I'm not sure that I wish to.'
+
+Mrs. Damerel drew her eyebrows together, and gave a loud tap on the
+floor.
+
+'Oh, that's weak--that's very weak! After promising me! Now
+listen; listen seriously.' She raised a finger. 'If it goes on, I
+have nothing--more--whatever to do with you. It would distress
+me very, very much; but I can't interest myself in a young man who
+makes love to a girl so very far beneath him. Be led by me, Horace,
+and your future will be brilliant. Prefer this young lady of
+Camberwell, and lose everything.'
+
+Horace leaned forward and drooped his head.
+
+'I don't think you form anything like a right idea of her,' he said.
+
+The other moved impatiently.
+
+'My dear boy, I know her as well as if I'd lived with her for years.
+Oh, how silly you are! But then you are so young, so very young.'
+
+With the vexation on her face there blended, as she looked at him, a
+tenderness unmistakably genuine.
+
+'Now, I'll tell you what. I have really no objection to make Fanny's
+acquaintance. Suppose, after all, you bring her to see me one of
+these days. Not just yet. You must wait till I am in the mood for
+it. But before very long.'
+
+Horace looked up with pleasure and gratitude.
+
+'Now, that's really kind of you!'
+
+'Really? And all the rest is only pretended kindness? Silly boy!
+Some day you will know better. Now, think, Horace; suppose you were
+so unhappy as to lose your father. Could you, as soon as he was
+gone, do something that you know would have pained him deeply?'
+
+The pathetic note was a little strained; putting her head aside, Mrs.
+Damerel looked rather like a sentimental picture in an
+advertisement. Horace did not reply.
+
+'You surely wouldn't,' pursued the lady, with emphasis, watching him
+closely; 'you surely wouldn't and couldn't marry this girl as soon
+as your poor father was in his grave?'
+
+'Oh, of course not.'
+
+Mrs. Damerel seemed relieved, but pursued her questioning.
+
+'You couldn't think of marrying for at least half a year?'
+
+'Fanny wouldn't wish it.'
+
+'No, of course not,--well now, I think I must make her
+acquaintance. But how weak you are, Horace! Oh, those nerves! All
+finely, delicately organised people, like you, make such blunders in
+life. Your sense of honour is such a tyrant over you. Now, mind, I
+don't say for a moment that Fanny isn't fond of you,--how could
+she help being, my dear boy? But I do insist that she will be very
+much happier if you let her marry some one of her own class. You,
+Horace, belong to a social sphere so far, far above her. If I could
+only impress that upon your modesty. You are made to associate with
+people of the highest refinement. How deplorable to think that a
+place in society is waiting for you, and you keep longing for
+Camberwell!'
+
+The listener's face wavered between pleasure in such flattery and
+the impulse of resistance.
+
+'Remember, Horace, if anything _should_ happen at home, you are your
+own master. I could introduce you freely to people of wealth and
+fashion. Of course you could give up the office at once. I shall be
+taking a house in the West-end, or a flat, at all events. I shall
+entertain a good deal--and think of your opportunities! My dear
+boy, I assure you that, with personal advantages such as yours, you
+might end by marrying an heiress. Nothing more probable! And you can
+talk of such a girl as Fanny French--for shame!
+
+'I mustn't propose any gaieties just now,' she said, when they had
+been together for an hour. 'And I shall wait so anxiously for news
+of your father. If anything _did_ happen, what would your sister do,
+I wonder?'
+
+'I'm sure I don't know--except that she'd get away from
+Camberwell. Nancy hates it.'
+
+'Who knows? I may be able to be of use to her. But, you say she is
+such a grave and learned young lady? I am afraid we should bore each
+other.'
+
+To this, Horace could venture only an uncertain reply. He had not
+much hope of mutual understanding between his sister and Mrs.
+Damerel.
+
+At half-past five he was home again, and there followed a cheerless
+evening. Nancy was in her own room until nine o'clock. She came down
+for supper, but had no appetite; her eyes showed redness from
+weeping; Horace could say nothing for her comfort. After the meal,
+they went up together to the drawing-room, and sat unoccupied.
+
+'If we lose father,' said Nancy, in a dull voice very unlike her
+ordinary tones, 'we shall have not a single relative left, that is
+anything to us.'
+
+Her brother kept silence.
+
+'Has Mrs. Damerel,' she continued, 'ever said anything to you about
+mother's family?'
+
+After hesitation, Horace answered, 'Yes,' and his countenance showed
+that the affirmative had special meaning. Nancy waited with an
+inquiring look.
+
+'I haven't told you,' he added, 'because--we have had other things
+to think about. But Mrs. Damerel is mother's sister, our aunt.'
+
+'How long have you known that?'
+
+'She told me at Scarborough.'
+
+'But why didn't she tell you so at first?'
+
+'That's what I can't understand. She says she was afraid I might
+mention it; but I don't believe that's the real reason.'
+
+Nancy's questioning elicited all that was to be learnt from her
+brother, little more than she had heard already; the same story of a
+disagreement between Mrs. Damerel and their father, of long absences
+from England, and a revival of interest in her relatives, following
+upon Mrs. Damerel's widowhood.
+
+'She would be glad to see you, if you liked. But I doubt whether you
+would get on very well.'
+
+'Why?'
+
+'She doesn't care about the same things that you do. She's a woman
+of society, you know.'
+
+'But if she's mother's sister. Yes, I should like to know her.'
+Nancy spoke with increasing earnestness. 'It makes everything quite
+different. I must see her.'
+
+'Well, as I said, she's quite willing. But you remember that I'm
+supposed not to have spoken about her at all. I should have to get
+her to send you a message, or something of that kind. Of course, we
+have often talked about you.'
+
+'I can't form an idea of her,' said Nancy impatiently. 'Is she good?
+Is she really kind? Couldn't you get her portrait to show me?'
+
+'I should be afraid to ask, unless she had given me leave to speak
+to you.'
+
+'She really lives in good society?'
+
+'Haven't I told you the sort of people she knows? She must be very
+well off; there can't be a doubt of it.'
+
+I don't care so much about that,' said Nancy in a brooding voice.
+'It's herself,--whether she's kind and good and wishes well to us.
+
+The next day there was no change in Mr. Lord's condition; a deep
+silence possessed the house. In the afternoon Nancy went to pass an
+hour with Jessica Morgan; on her return she met Samuel Barmby, who
+was just leaving after a visit to the sick man. Samuel bore himself
+with portentous gravity, but spoke only a few commonplaces,
+affecting hope; he bestowed upon Nancy's hand a fervent pressure,
+and strode away with the air of an undertaker who had called on
+business.
+
+Two more days of deepening gloom, then a night through which Nancy
+sat with Mary Woodruff by her father's bed. Mr. Lord was unconscious,
+but from time to time a syllable or a phrase fell from his lips,
+meaningless to the watchers. At dawn, Nancy went to her chamber,
+pallid, exhausted. Mary, whose strength seemed proof against
+fatigue, moved about the room, preparing for a new day; every few
+minutes she stood with eyes fixed on the dying face, and the tears
+she had restrained in Nancy's presence flowed silently.
+
+When the sun made a golden glimmer upon the wall, Mary withdrew, and
+was absent for a quarter of an hour. On returning, she bent at once
+over the bed; her eyes were met by a grave, wondering look.
+
+'Do you know me?' she whispered.
+
+The lips moved; she bent lower, but could distinguish no word. He
+was speaking; the murmur continued; but she gathered no sense.
+
+'You can trust me, I will do all I can.'
+
+He seemed to understand her, and smiled. As the smile faded away,
+passing into an austere calm, Mary pressed her lips upon his
+forehead.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 5
+
+
+
+
+After breakfast, and before Arthur Peachey's departure for business,
+there had been a scene of violent quarrel between him and his wife.
+It took place in the bed-room, where, as usual save on Sunday
+morning, Ada consumed her strong tea and heavily buttered toast; the
+state of her health--she had frequent ailments, more or less
+genuine, such as afflict the indolent and brainless type of woman--
+made it necessary for her to repose till a late hour. Peachey did
+not often lose self-control, though sorely tried; the one occasion
+that unchained his wrath was when Ada's heedlessness or ill-temper
+affected the well-being of his child. This morning it had been
+announced to him that the nurse-girl, Emma, could no longer be
+tolerated; she was making herself offensive to her mistress, had
+spoken insolently, disobeyed orders, and worst of all, defended
+herself by alleging orders from Mr. Peachey. Hence the outbreak of
+strife, signalled by furious shrill voices, audible to Beatrice and
+Fanny as they sat in the room beneath.
+
+Ada came down at half-past ten, and found Beatrice writing letters.
+She announced what any who did not know her would have taken for a
+final resolve.
+
+'I'm going--I won't put up with that beast any longer. I shall go
+and live at Brighton.'
+
+Her sister paid not the slightest heed; she was intent upon a
+business letter of much moment.
+
+'Do you hear what I say? I'm going by the first train this
+afternoon.'
+
+'All right,' remarked Beatrice placidly. 'Don't interrupt me just
+now.
+
+The result of this was fury directed against Beatrice, who found
+herself accused of every domestic vice compatible with her position.
+She was a sordid creature, living at other people's expense,--a
+selfish, scheming, envious wretch--
+
+'If I were your husband,' remarked the other without looking up, 'I
+should long since have turned you into the street--if I hadn't
+broken your neck first.'
+
+Exercise in quarrel only made Ada's voice the clearer and more
+shrill. It rose now to the highest points of a not inconsiderable
+compass. But Beatrice continued to write, and by resolute silence
+put a limit to her sister's railing. A pause had just come about,
+when the door was thrown open, and in rushed Fanny, hatted and
+gloved from a walk.
+
+'He's dead!' she said excitedly. 'He's dead!'
+
+Beatrice turned with a look of interest. 'Who? Mr. Lord?'
+
+'Yes. The blinds are all down. He must have died in the night.'
+
+Her cheeks glowed and her eyes sparkled, as though she had brought
+the most exhilarating news.
+
+'What do I care?' said Mrs. Peachey, to whom her sister had addressed
+the last remark.
+
+'Just as much as I care about your affairs, no doubt,' returned
+Fanny, with genial frankness.
+
+'Don't be in too great a hurry,' remarked Beatrice, who showed the
+calculating wrinkle at the corner of her eye. 'Because he's dead,
+that doesn't say that your masher comes in for money.'
+
+'Who'll get it, then?'
+
+'There may be nothing worth speaking of to get, for all we know.'
+
+Beatrice had not as yet gained Fanny's co-operation in the
+commercial scheme now being elaborated; though of far more amiable
+nature than Mrs. Peachey, she heartily hoped that the girl might be
+disappointed in her expectations from Mr. Lord's will. An hour later,
+she walked along Grove Lane, and saw for herself that Fanny's
+announcement was accurate; the close-drawn blinds could mean but one
+thing.
+
+To-day there was little likelihood of learning particulars, but on
+the morrow Fanny might perchance hear something from Horace Lord.
+However, the evening brought a note, hand-delivered by some
+stranger. Horace wrote only a line or two, informing Fanny that his
+father had died about eight o'clock that morning, and adding:
+'Please be at home to-morrow at twelve.'
+
+At twelve next day Fanny received her lover alone in the
+drawing-room. He entered with the exaggerated solemnity of a very
+young man who knows for the first time a grave bereavement, and
+feels the momentary importance it confers upon him. Fanny, trying to
+regard him without a smile, grimaced; decorous behaviour was at all
+times impossible to her, for she neither understood its nature nor
+felt its obligation. In a few minutes she smiled unrestrainedly, and
+spoke the things that rose to her lips.
+
+'I've been keeping a secret from you,' said Horace, in the low voice
+which had to express his sorrow,--for he could not preserve a
+gloomy countenance with Fanny before him. 'But I can tell you now.'
+
+'A secret? And what business had you to keep secrets from me?'
+
+'It's about Mrs. Damerel. When I was at the seaside she told me who
+she really is. She's my aunt--my mother's sister. Queer, isn't it?
+Of course that makes everything different. And she's going to ask
+you to come and see her. It'll have to be put off a little--now;
+but not very long, I dare say, as she's a relative. You'll have to
+do your best to please her.'
+
+'I'm sure I shan't put myself out of the way. People must take me as
+they find me.'
+
+'Now don't talk like that, Fanny. It isn't very kind--just now. I
+thought you'd be different to-day.'
+
+'All right.--Have you anything else to tell me?'
+
+Horace understood her significant glance, and shook his head.
+
+'I'll let you know everything as soon as I know myself.'
+
+Having learnt the day and hour of Mr. Lord's funeral, Ada and Fanny
+made a point of walking out to get a glimpse of it. The procession
+of vehicles in Grove Lane excited their contempt, so far was it from
+the splendour they had anticipated.
+
+'There you are!' said Ada; 'I shouldn't wonder if it's going to be a
+jolly good take in for you, after all. If he'd died worth much, they
+wouldn't have buried him like that.'
+
+Fanny's heart sank. She could conceive no other explanation ofa
+simple burial save lack of means, or resentment in the survivors at
+the disposition made of his property by the deceased. When, on the
+morrow, Horace told her that his father had strictly charged Mr
+Barmby to have him buried in the simplest mode compatible with
+decency, she put it down to the old man's excessive meanness.
+
+On this occasion she learnt the contents of Mr. Lord's will, and
+having learnt them, got rid of Horace as soon as possible that she
+might astonish her sisters with the report.
+
+In the afternoon of that day, Beatrice had an appointment with
+Luckworth Crewe. She was to meet him at the office he had just taken
+in Farringdon Street, whence they would repair to a solicitor's in
+the same neighbourhood, for the discussion of legal business
+connected with Miss. French's enterprise. She climbed the staircase
+of a big building, and was directed to the right door by the sound
+of Crewe's voice, loudly and jocularly discoursing. He stood with
+two men in the open doorway, and at the sight of Beatrice waved a
+hand to her.
+
+'Take your hook, you fellows; I have an engagement.' The men,
+glancing at Miss. French facetiously, went their way. 'How do, old
+chum? It's all in a mess yet; hold your skirts together. Come along
+this way.'
+
+Through glue-pots and shavings and an overpowering smell of paint,
+Beatrice followed to inspect the premises, which consisted of three
+rooms; one, very much the smallest, about ten feet square. Three
+workmen were busy, and one, fitting up shelves, whistled a melody
+with ear-piercing shrillness.
+
+'Stop that damned noise!' shouted Crewe. 'I've told you once
+already. Try it on again, my lad, and I'll drop you down the well of
+the staircase--you've too much breath, you have.'
+
+The other workmen laughed. It was evident that Crewe had made
+friends with them all.
+
+'Won't be bad, when we get the decks cleared,' he remarked to
+Beatrice. 'Plenty of room to make twenty thousand a year or so.'
+
+He checked himself, and asked in a subdued voice, 'Seen anything of
+the Lords?'
+
+Beatrice nodded with a smile. 'And heard about the will. Have you?'
+
+'No, I haven't. Come into this little room.'
+
+He closed the door behind them, and looked at his companion with
+curiosity, but without show of eagerness.
+
+'Well, it's a joke,' said Miss. French.
+
+'Is it? How?'
+
+'Fanny's that mad about it! She'd got it into her silly noddle that
+Horace Lord would drop in for a fortune at once. As it is, he gets
+nothing at all for two years, except what the Barmbys choose to give
+him. And if he marries before he's four-and-twenty, he loses
+everything--every cent!'
+
+Crewe whistled a bar of a street-melody, then burst into laughter.
+
+'That's how the old joker has done them, is it? Quite right too. The
+lad doesn't know his own mind yet. Let Fanny wait if she really
+wants him--and if she can keep hold of him. But what are the
+figures?'
+
+'Nothing startling. Of course I don't know all the ins and outs of
+it, but Horace Lord will get seven thousand pounds, and a sixth
+share in the piano business. Old Barmby and his son are trustees.
+They may let Horace have just what they think fit during the next
+two years. If he wants money to go into business with, they may
+advance what they like. But for two years he's simply in their
+hands, to be looked after. And if he marries--pop goes the
+weasel!'
+
+'And Miss. Lord?' asked Crewe carelessly.
+
+Beatrice pointed a finger at him.
+
+'You want to know badly, don't you? Well, it's pretty much the same
+as the other. To begin with, if she marries before the age of
+six-and-twenty, she gets nothing whatever. If she doesn't marry,
+there's two hundred a year to live on and to keep up the house.--
+Oh, I was forgetting; she must not only keep single to twenty-six,
+but continue to live where she does now, with that old servant of
+theirs for companion. At six-and-twenty she takes the same as her
+brother, about seven thousand, and a sixth share in Lord and
+Barmby.'
+
+Again Crewe whistled.
+
+'That's about three years still to live in Grove Lane,' he said
+thoughtfully. 'Well, the old joker has pinned them, and no mistake.
+I thought he had more to leave.'
+
+'Of course you did,' remarked Beatrice significantly.
+
+'Look here, old fellow, don't talk to me like that,' he replied
+good-humouredly, but with a reproof not to be mistaken. 'I thought
+nothing about it in the way that _you_ mean. But it isn't much,
+after living as he has done. I suppose you don't know how the money
+lies?'
+
+'I have it all from Fanny, and it's a wonder she remembered as much
+as she did.'
+
+'Oh, Fanny's pretty smart in L. s. d. But did she say what becomes
+of the money if either of them break the terms?'
+
+'Goes to a girl's orphanage, somewhere in the old man's country. But
+there's more than I've accounted for yet. Young Barmby's sisters get
+legacies--a hundred and fifty apiece. And, last of all, the old
+servant has an annuity of two hundred. He made her a sort of
+housekeeper not long ago, H. L. says; thought no end of her.'
+
+'Don't know anything about her,' said Crewe absently. 'I should like
+to know the business details. What arrangement was made, I wonder,
+when he took Barmby into partnership?'
+
+'I shouldn't be surprised if he simply gave him a share. Old Barmby
+and Lord were great chums. Then, you see, Samuel Barmby has a third
+of his profits to pay over, eventually.'
+
+Beatrice went on to speak of the mysterious Mrs. Damerel, concerning
+whom she had heard from Fanny. The man of business gave particular
+ear to this story, and asked many questions. Of a sudden, as if
+dismissing matters which hardly concerned him, he said mirthfully:
+
+'You've heard about the row at Lillie Bridge yesterday?'
+
+'I saw something about it in the paper.'
+
+'Well, I was there. Pure chance; haven't been at that kind of place
+for a year and more. It was a match for the Sprint Championship and
+a hundred pounds. Timed for six o'clock, but at a quarter past the
+chaps hadn't come forward. I heard men talking, and guessed there
+was something wrong; they thought it a put-up job. When it got round
+that there'd be no race, the excitement broke out, and then--I'd
+have given something for you to see it! First of all there was a
+rush for the gate-money; a shilling a piece, you know, we'd all
+paid. There were a whole lot of North-of-England chaps, fellow
+countrymen of mine, and I heard some of them begin to send up a roar
+that sounded dangerous. I was tumbling along with the crowd, quite
+ready for a scrimmage--I rather enjoy a fight now and then,--and
+all at once some chap sang out just in front, 'Let's burst up the
+blooming show!'--only he used a stronger word. And a lot of us
+yelled hooray, and to it we went. I don't mean I had a hand in the
+pillaging and smashing,--it wouldn't have done for a man just
+starting in business to be up at the police-court,--but I looked
+on and laughed--laughed till I could hardly stand! They set to
+work on the refreshment place. It was a scene if you like! Fellows
+knocking off the heads of bottles, and drinking all they could, then
+pouring the rest on the ground. Glasses and decanters flying right
+and left,--sandwiches and buns, and I don't know what, pelting
+about. They splintered all the small wood they could lay their hands
+on, and set fire to it, and before you could say Jack Robinson the
+whole place was blazing. The bobbies got it pretty warm--bottles
+and stones and logs of wood; I saw one poor chap with the side of
+his face cut clean open. It does one good, a real stirring-up like
+that; I feel better to-day than for the last month. And the swearing
+that went on! It's a long time since I heard such downright, hearty,
+solid swearing. There was one chap I kept near, and he swore for a
+full hour without stopping, except when he had a bottle at his
+mouth; he only stopped when he was speechless with liquor.'
+
+'I wish I'd been there,' said Miss. French gaily. 'It must have been
+no end of fun.'
+
+'A right down good spree. And it wasn't over till about eight
+o'clock. I stayed till the police had cleared the grounds, and then
+came home, laughing all the way. It did me good, I tell you!'
+
+'Well, shall we go and see the lawyer?' suggested Beatrice.
+
+'Right you are.--Have a drink first? Nice quiet place round in
+Fleet Street--glass of wine. No? As you please, old chum.--Think
+this shop 'll do, don't you? You must come round when it's finished.
+But I daresay you'll be here many a time--on biz.'
+
+'Oh, I daresay.'
+
+And as they went down the stairs, Crewe laughed again at his
+recollections of yesterday's sport.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 6
+
+
+
+
+Gusts of an October evening swept about the square of the old Inn,
+and made rushes at the windows; all the more cosy seemed it here in
+Tarrant's room, where a big fire, fed into smokeless placidity,
+purred and crackled. Pipe in mouth, Tarrant lay back in his big
+chair, gracefully indolent as ever. Opposite him, lamp-light
+illuminating her face on one side, and fire-gloom on the other,
+Nancy turned over an illustrated volume, her husband's gift today.
+Many were the presents he had bestowed upon her, costly some of
+them, all flattering the recipient by a presumption of taste and
+intelligence.
+
+She had been here since early in the afternoon, it was now near
+seven o'clock.
+
+Nancy looked at the pictures, but inattentively, her brows slightly
+knitted, and her lips often on the point of speech that concerned
+some other matter. Since the summer holiday she had grown a trifle
+thinner in face; her beauty was no longer allied with perfect
+health; a heaviness appeared on her eyelids. Of course she wore the
+garb of mourning, and its effect was to emphasise the maturing
+change manifest in her features.
+
+For several minutes there had passed no word; but Tarrant's face, no
+less than his companion's, signalled discussion in suspense. No
+unfriendly discussion, yet one that excited emotional activity in
+both of them. The young man, his pipe-hand falling to his knee,
+first broke silence.
+
+'I look at it in this way. We ought to regard ourselves as married
+people living under exceptionally favourable circumstances. One has
+to bear in mind the brutal fact that man and wife, as a rule, see a
+great deal too much of each other--thence most of the ills of
+married life: squabblings, discontents, small or great disgusts,
+leading often enough to _altri guai_ People get to think themselves
+victims of incompatibility, when they are merely suffering from a
+foolish custom--the habit of being perpetually together. In fact,
+it's an immoral custom. What does immorality mean but anything that
+tends to kill love, to harden hearts? The common practice of man and
+wife occupying the same room is monstrous, gross; it's astounding
+that women of any sensitiveness endure it. In fact, their
+sensitiveness is destroyed. Even an ordinary honeymoon generally
+ends in quarrel--as it certainly ought to. You and I escape all
+that. Each of us lives a separate life, with the result that we like
+each other better as time goes on; I speak for myself, at all
+events. I look forward to our meetings. I open the door to you with
+as fresh a feeling of pleasure as when you came first. If we had
+been ceaselessly together day and night--well, you know the result
+as well as I do.'
+
+He spoke with indulgent gravity, in the tone of kindness to which
+his voice was naturally attuned. And Nancy's reply, though it
+expressed a stronger feeling, struck the same harmonious note.
+
+'I can agree with all that. But it applies to people married in the
+ordinary way. I was speaking of ourselves, placed as we are.'
+
+'I don't pretend to like the concealment,' said Tarrant. 'For one
+thing, there's a suggestion of dishonour about it. We've gone over
+all that--'
+
+'Oh, I don't mean that for a moment. It isn't really dishonourable.
+My father could never have objected to _you_ for my husband. He only
+wanted to guard me--Mary says so, and he told her everything. He
+thought me a silly, flighty girl, and was afraid I should be trapped
+for the sake of my money. I wish--oh how I wish I had had the
+courage to tell him! He would have seen you, and liked and trusted
+you--how could he help?'
+
+'It might have been better--but who knows whether he would have
+seen me with your eyes, Nancy?'
+
+'Yes, yes. But I was going to say----'
+
+She hesitated.
+
+'Say on.'
+
+'There are so many difficulties before us, dear.'
+
+'Not if we continue to think of each other as we do now. Do you mean
+it might be discovered?'
+
+'Yes, through no fault of ours.'
+
+She hesitated again.
+
+'Quite sure you haven't told anybody?'
+
+'No one.'
+
+Tarrant had a doubt on this point. He strongly suspected that
+Jessica Morgan knew the truth, but he shrank from pressing Nancy to
+an avowal of repeated falsehood.
+
+'Then it's very unlikely we should be found out. Who would dream of
+tracking you here, for instance? And suppose we were seen together
+in the street or in the country, who would suspect anything more
+than love-making? and that is not forbidden you.'
+
+'No. But--'
+
+'But?'
+
+'But suppose I--'
+
+She rose, crossed to him, seated herself on his knee and put an arm
+about his neck. Before she had spoken another word, Tarrant
+understood; the smile on his face lost its spontaneity; a bitter
+taste seemed to distort his lips.
+
+'You think--you are afraid--'
+
+He heard a monosyllable, and sat silent. This indeed had not entered
+into his calculations; but why not? He could hardly say; he had
+ignored the not unimportant detail, as it lurked among
+possibilities. Perhaps had willingly ignored it, as introducing a
+complication oppressive to his indolence, to his hodiernal
+philosophy. And now he arraigned mother-nature, the very divinity
+whom hitherto he had called upon to justify him. All at once he grew
+cold to Nancy. The lulled objections to matrimony awoke in him
+again; again he felt that he had made a fool of himself. Nancy was
+better than he had thought; he either loved her, or felt something
+towards her, not easily distinguishable from love. His inferior she
+remained, but not in the sense he had formerly attributed to the
+word. Her mind and heart excelled the idle conception he had formed
+of them. But Nancy was not his wife, as the world understands that
+relation; merely his mistress, and as a mistress he found her
+charming, lovable. What she now hinted at, would shatter the
+situation. Tarrant thought not of the peril to her material
+prospects; on that score he was indifferent, save in so far as Mr
+Lord's will helped to maintain their mutual independence. But he
+feared for his liberty, in the first place, and in the second,
+abhorred the change that must come over Nancy herself. Nancy a
+mother--he repelled the image, as though it degraded her.
+
+Delicacy, however, constrained him to a disguise of these emotions.
+He recognised the human sentiments that should have weighed with
+him; like a man of cultivated intelligence, he admitted their force,
+their beauty. None the less, a syllable on Nancy's lips had arrested
+the current of his feelings, and made him wish again that he had
+been either more or less a man of honour down at Teignmouth.
+
+'And yet,' he said to himself, 'could I have resisted an appeal for
+marriage _now_? That comes of being so confoundedly humane. It's a
+marvel that I didn't find myself married to some sheer demirep long
+ago.'
+
+Nancy was speaking.
+
+'Will it make you love me less?'
+
+'I have always refused to prophesy about love,' he answered, with
+forced playfulness.
+
+'But you wouldn't--you wouldn't?'
+
+'We should find ourselves in a very awkward position.'
+
+'I know,' said Nancy hurriedly. 'I can't see what would be done. But
+you seem colder to me all at once, Lionel. Surely it oughtn't to--
+to turn you away from me. Perhaps I am mistaken.'
+
+This referred to the alarming possibility, and Tarrant caught at
+hope. Yes, she might be mistaken; they wouldn't talk about it; he
+shook it away.
+
+'Let me fill my pipe again. Yes, you can do it for me. That reminds
+me of a story Harvey Munden tells. A man he knew, a doctor, got
+married, and there was nothing his wife wouldn't do for him. As he
+sat with her one evening, smoking, a patient called him into the
+consulting-room. He had only just lighted a fresh pipe, and laid it
+down regretfully. 'I'll keep it in for you,' said his wife. And she
+did so, with dainty and fearful puffs, at long intervals. But the
+doctor was detained, and when he came back--well, the poor wife
+had succumbed to her devotion. She never kept in his pipe again.
+
+Nancy tried to laugh. She was in her own chair again, and sat
+resting her cheek upon her hand, gazing at the fire.
+
+'How is it, Lionel, that no one ever knocks at your door when I'm
+here.'
+
+'Oh, very simple. I sport the oak--as you know.'
+
+'But don't you think some friend of yours might see a light in your
+window, and come up?'
+
+'If so, _il respecte la consigne_.'
+
+'No, no; I don't like you when you begin to use French words. I
+think it reminds me of once when you did it a long time ago,--and
+I thought you--never mind.'
+
+Tarrant laughed.
+
+'Weren't they strange--those meetings of ours at Champion Hill?
+What did you think me? Arrogant? Insolent? That is my tendency with
+strangers, I admit.'
+
+'But I was asking you a question,' said Nancy. 'You mean that no one
+would knock, if he saw your outer door closed. But what would they
+think?'
+
+'No doubt--that I was working. I am supposed to be secretly
+engaged on some immortal composition.'
+
+Nancy pondered.
+
+'I do hope no one that knows you will ever see me coming or going.'
+
+'What could it matter? They wouldn't know who you were.'
+
+'But to have such things thought. I should feel it just as if they
+knew me. I believe I could never come again.'
+
+'Why, what's the matter with you?' Tarrant asked. 'You have tears in
+your eyes. You're not well to-day.' He checked himself on an
+unwelcome thought, and proceeded more carelessly. 'Do you suppose
+for a moment that any friend of mine is ass enough to think with
+condemnation of a girl who should come to my rooms--whatever the
+circumstances? You must get rid of that provincialism--let us call
+it Camberwellism.'
+
+'They wouldn't think it any harm--even if--?'
+
+'My dear girl, we have outgrown those ancestral prejudices.'
+Tarrant's humour never quite deserted him, least of all when he
+echoed the talk of his world; but his listener kept a grave face.
+'We have nothing to do with Mrs. Grundy's morals.'
+
+'But you believe in a morality of some kind?' she pursued with
+diffidence. 'You used the word "immoral" just now.'
+
+Nancy felt no consciousness of the gulf that yawned between herself
+as she spoke now and the old self which had claimed 'superiority.'
+Her mind was so completely unsettled that she never tried to connect
+its present state with its earlier phases. For the most part, her
+sensations and her reflections were concerned with the crude
+elements of life; the exceptional moments she spent in a world of
+vague joys and fears, wherein thought, properly speaking, had no
+share. Before she could outlive the shock of passion which seemed at
+once to destroy and to re-create her, she was confronted with the
+second supreme crisis of woman's existence,--its natural effects
+complicated with the trials of her peculiar position. Tarrant's
+reception of her disclosure came as a new disturbance--she felt
+bewildered and helpless.
+
+He, preoccupied with the anxiety he affected to dismiss, had no
+inclination to debate ethical problems. For a while he talked
+jestingly, and at length fell into a mood of silence. Nancy did not
+stay much longer; they parted without mention of the subject
+uppermost in their thoughts.
+
+They had no stated times of meeting. Tarrant sent an invitation
+whenever it pleased him. When the next arrived, in about a week,
+Nancy made reply that she did not feel well enough to leave home. It
+was the briefest letter Tarrant had yet received from her, and the
+least affectionate. He kept silence for a few days, and wrote again.
+This time Nancy responded as usual, and came.
+
+To the involuntary question in his eyes, hers answered unmistakably.
+For the first few minutes they said very little to each other.
+Tarrant was struggling with repulsions and solicitudes of which he
+felt more than half ashamed; Nancy, reticent for many reasons, not
+the least of them a resentful pride, which for the moment overcame
+her fondness, endeavoured to speak of trivial things. They kept
+apart, and at length the embarrassment of the situation held them
+both mute.
+
+With a nervous movement, the young man pushed forward the chair on
+which Nancy usually sat.
+
+'I see that you don't look well.'
+
+Nancy turned to the window. She had unbuttoned her jacket, and taken
+off her gloves, but went no further in the process of preparing
+herself for the ordinary stay of some hours.
+
+'Did something in my letter displease you?' inquired her husband.
+
+'You mean--because I didn't come? No; I really didn't feel well
+enough.'
+
+Tarrant hesitated, but the softer feeling prevailed with him. He
+helped to remove her jacket, seated her by the fire, and led her to
+talk.
+
+'So there's no doubt of it?'
+
+Her silence made answer.
+
+'Then of course there's just as little doubt as to what we must do.'
+
+His voice had not a convincing sincerity; he waited for the reply.
+
+'You mean that we can't keep the secret?'
+
+'How is it possible?'
+
+'But you are vexed about it. You don't speak to me as you used to. I
+don't think you ever will again.'
+
+'It will make no change in _me_,' said Tarrant, with resolute good
+humour. 'All I want to be sure of is that you are quite prepared for
+the change in your prospects.'
+
+'Are _you_, dear?'
+
+Her tone and look deprived the inquiry of unpleasant implication. He
+answered her with a laugh.
+
+'You know exactly how I regard it. In one way I should feel relief.
+Of course I don't like the thought that I shall have caused you to
+suffer such a loss.'
+
+'I should never have that thought. But are you quite sure about the
+result to yourself? You remember saying that you couldn't be certain
+how--'
+
+'How it will be taken at Champion Hill? I was going to tell you the
+latest report from there. It is very doubtful whether I should ever
+have to break the news.'
+
+They did not look at each other.
+
+'Everything, in that quarter, must be long since settled. Pray
+remember that I have no vast expectations. Quite certainly, it won't
+be a large fortune; very likely not more than your own. But enough
+to live on, no doubt. I know the value of money--no man better. It
+would be pleasant enough to play with thousands a year. But I don't
+grumble so long as I have a competency.'
+
+Nancy meditated, and sighed.
+
+'Oh, it's a pity. Father never meant me to be penniless if I married
+wisely.'
+
+'I suppose not.'
+
+'Of course not!'
+
+They both meditated.
+
+'It wouldn't be possible--would it?'
+
+'Why,' he answered with a laugh, 'last time you were here you spoke
+in quite the other way. You were utterly miserable at the thought of
+living through it alone.'
+
+'Yes--I don't know whether I could--even if--'
+
+'What are you thinking of?'
+
+'I've been talking with Mary,' she replied, after an uneasy pause.
+'She has lived with us so long; and since father's death it seems
+quite natural to make a friend of her. No one could be more devoted
+to me than she is. I believe there's nothing she wouldn't do. I
+believe I might trust her with any secret.'
+
+The obvious suggestion demanded thought.
+
+'By-the-bye,' said Tarrant, looking up, 'have you seen your aunt
+again?'
+
+Nancy's face changed to a cold expression.
+
+'No. And I don't think I shall.'
+
+'Probably you were as little sympathetic to her as she to you.'
+
+'I don't like her,' was the brief reply.
+
+'I've had curious thoughts about that lady,' said Tarrant, smiling.
+'The mystery, it seems to me, is by no means solved. You think she
+really _is_ your aunt?'
+
+'Impossible to doubt it. Any one could see her likeness to Horace at
+once.'
+
+'Ah, you didn't mention that. I had a fear that she might be simply
+an adventuress, with an eye to your brother's money.'
+
+'She is what she says, I'm sure. But I shall never ask her to come
+and see me again, and I don't think she'll want to. That would be
+fortunate if--if we wished--'
+
+Tarrant nodded. At the same moment they heard a sound that startled
+them.
+
+'That's a knock at the door,' said Nancy, rising as if to escape.
+
+'So it is. Banging with a stick. Let him bang. It must be a
+stranger, or he'd respect the oak.'
+
+They sat listening. The knock sounded again, loud and prolonged.
+Tarrant joked about it; but a third time came the summons.
+
+'I may as well go and see who it is.'
+
+'Oh--you won't let any one--'
+
+'Of course not. Sit quietly.'
+
+He went out, closing the room-door behind him, and opened the heavy
+door which should have ensured his privacy. For five minutes he was
+absent, then returned with a face portending news.
+
+'It was Vawdrey. He knew my habit of sporting the oak, and wouldn't
+go away till he had made sure. My grandmother is dying. They
+telegraphed to Vawdrey in the City, and he came here at once to tell
+me. I must go. Perhaps I shall be too late.'
+
+'What did he think of your keeping him outside?'
+
+'I made some sort of excuse. He's a good-natured fellow; it didn't
+matter. Stay a little after I'm gone; stay as long as you like, In
+fact. You can pull to the inner door when you go.'
+
+'What did the telegram say?'
+
+'Mrs. Tarrant sinking. Come immediately.' Of course we expected it.
+It's raining hard: wait and see if it stops; you must take care of
+yourself.'
+
+For this, Nancy was not slow in exhibiting her gratitude, which
+served as mask of the pleasure she could not decently betray. When
+her husband had hastened off, she sat for a few minutes in thought;
+then, alone here for the first time, she began to walk about the
+rooms, and to make herself more intimately acquainted with their
+contents.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 7
+
+
+
+
+Whilst she was thus occupied, darkness came on. She did not care to
+light the lamp, so made herself ready, and stole forth.
+
+The rain had ceased. Walking alone at night was a pleasure in which
+she now indulged herself pretty frequently; at such times Mary
+Woodruff believed her in the company of Miss. Morgan. The marked
+sobriety of her demeanour since Mr. Lord's death, and the
+friendliness, even the affection, she evinced in their common life
+at home, had set Mary's mind at ease concerning her. No murmur at
+her father's will had escaped Nancy, in this respect very unlike her
+brother, who, when grief was forgotten, declared himself ill-used;
+she seemed perfectly content with the conditions laid upon her, and
+the sincerity of her mourning could not be doubted. Anxious to
+conciliate the girl in every honest way, Mary behaved to her with
+the same external respect as ever, and without a hint of express
+guardianship. The two were on excellent terms. It seemed likely that
+before long they would have the house to themselves; already Horace
+had spoken of taking lodgings in a part of London more congruous
+with the social aspirations encouraged by his aunt, Mrs. Damerel.
+
+From Chancery Lane she passed into Fleet Street, and sauntered along
+with observation of shop-windows. She was unspeakably relieved by
+the events of the afternoon; it would now depend upon her own choice
+whether she preserved her secret, or declared herself a married
+woman. Her husband had proved himself generous as well as loving;
+yes, she repeated to herself, generous and loving; her fears and
+suspicions had been baseless. Mrs. Tarrant's death freed them from
+all sordid considerations. A short time, perhaps a day or two, might
+put an end to irregularities, and enable her to hold up her head
+once more.
+
+Feeling hungry, she entered a restaurant, and dined. Not carelessly,
+but with fastidious choice of viands. This was enjoyable; she began
+to look more like herself of a few months ago.
+
+She would return to Camberwell by train from Ludgate Hill. At the
+circus, crowding traffic held her back for a minute or two; just as
+she ran forward, a familiar voice caused her to stop again. She
+became flurried, lost her head, stood still amid a tumult of
+omnibuses, cabs and carts; but a hand grasped her by the arm, and
+led her safely to the opposite pavement.
+
+'What do you mean by shouting at me in the street?' were her first
+words.
+
+The person addressed was Luckworth Crewe; he had by no means
+anticipated such wrathful greeting, and stood in confusion.
+
+'I beg your pardon, Miss. Lord. I didn't think I shouted. I only
+meant to call your attention.'
+
+'Why should you call my attention?' Her cheeks were flushed with
+anger; she regarded him as though he were a stranger guilty of mere
+insolence. 'I don't wish to speak to you.'
+
+With astonishment, Crewe found himself alone. But a rebuff such as
+this, so irrational as he thought it, so entirely out of keeping
+with Miss. Lord's behaviour, he could by no means accept. Nancy was
+walking towards the railway-station; he followed. He watched her as
+she took a ticket, then put himself in her way, with all the
+humility of countenance he could command.
+
+'I'm so sorry I offended you. It wasn't the right thing to do; I
+ought to have waited till you were across. I'm a blundering sort of
+fellow in those things. Do let me beg your pardon, and forgive me.'
+
+She was calmer now, though still tremulous. But for the attack of
+nervousness, she would have met Crewe with nothing worse than a
+slight reserve, to mark a change in their relations. Very soon after
+her father's death he had written a becoming letter, though it
+smacked of commercial phraseology. To the hope expressed in it, that
+he might be allowed to call upon her in a few weeks' time, Nancy
+made no reply. A fortnight later he wrote again, this time reminding
+her, with modest propriety, of what had occurred between them before
+she left town in August. Nancy responded, and in grave, friendly
+language, begged him to think of her no more; he must not base the
+slightest hope upon anything she might have said. To her surprise,
+Crewe held his peace, and she saw him now for the first time since
+their ascent of the Monument.
+
+'I'm ashamed that I lost my temper, Mr. Crewe. I am in a hurry to get
+home.'
+
+In the booking-office at Ludgate Hill it is not easy to detain, by
+chivalrous discourse, a lady bent on escaping; but Crewe attempted
+it. He subdued his voice, spoke rapidly and with emotion, implored
+that he might be heard for a moment. Would she not permit him to
+call upon her? He had waited, respecting her seclusion. He asked for
+nothing whatever but permission to call, as any acquaintance might.
+
+'Have you heard I have opened an office in Farringdon Street? I
+should so like to tell you all about it--what I'm doing--'
+
+'No one calls to see me,' said Nancy, with firmness. 'I wish to live
+quite alone. I'm very sorry to seem unfriendly.'
+
+'Is it anything I've done?'
+
+'No--nothing whatever. I assure you, nothing. Let us say good-bye;
+I can't stop another moment.'
+
+They shook hands and so parted.
+
+'You're back early,' said Mary, when Nancy entered the drawing-room.
+
+'Yes. I left Jessica to her books sooner than usual. The examination
+draws near.'
+
+Quiet, sad, diligent ever, Mary kept unchanged the old domestic
+routine. There was the same perfect order, the same wholesome
+economy, as when she worked under the master's eyes. Nancy had
+nothing to do but enjoy the admirable care with which she was
+surrounded; she took it all as a matter of course, never having
+considered the difference between her own home and those of her
+acquaintances.
+
+Horace had dined, and was gone out again. They talked of him; Mary
+said that he had spoken of moving into lodgings very soon.
+
+'Of course he doesn't tell us everything,' said Nancy. 'I feel
+pretty sure that he's going to leave the office, but how he means to
+live I don't understand. Perhaps Mrs. Damerel will give him money, or
+lend it him. I only hope she may break it off between him and
+Fanny.'
+
+'Hasn't he told you that Fanny is often with Mrs. Damerel?'
+
+'With her?' Nancy exclaimed. 'He never said a word of it to me.'
+
+'He said so to me this evening, and laughed when I looked
+surprised.'
+
+'Well then, I don't pretend to understand what's going on. We can't
+do anything.'
+
+About nine o'clock the servant entered the room, bringing Miss. Lord
+a note, which had just been left by a cab-driver. Nancy, seeing that
+the address was in Tarrant's hand, opened it with a flutter of joy;
+such a proceeding as this, openly sending a note by a messenger,
+could only mean that her husband no longer cared to preserve
+secrecy. To her astonishment, the envelope contained but a hurried
+line.
+
+'Not a word yet to any one. Without fail, come to-morrow afternoon,
+at four.'
+
+With what show of calmness she could command, she looked up at her
+companion.
+
+'The idea of his sending in this way! It's that Mr. Crewe I've told
+you of. I met him as I was coming home, and had to speak to him
+rather sharply to get rid of him. Here comes his apology, foolish
+man!'
+
+Living in perpetual falsehood, Nancy felt no shame at a fiction such
+as this. Mere truth-telling had never seemed to her a weighty matter
+of the law. And she was now grown expert in lies. But Tarrant's
+message disturbed her gravely. Something unforeseen must have
+happened--something, perhaps, calamitous. She passed a miserable
+night.
+
+When she ascended the stairs at Staple Inn, next afternoon, it
+wanted ten minutes to four. As usual at her coming, the outer door
+stood open, exposing the door with the knocker. She had just raised
+her hand, when, with a sound of voices from inside, the door opened,
+and Tarrant appeared in company with a stranger. Terror-stricken,
+she stepped back. Tarrant, after a glance, paid no attention to her.
+
+'All right,' he was saying to his friend, 'I shall see you in a day
+or two. Good-bye, old man.'
+
+The stranger had observed Nancy, but withheld his eyes from her, and
+quickly vanished down the stairs.
+
+'Who was that?' she whispered.
+
+'I told you four o'clock.'
+
+'It is four.'
+
+'No--ten minutes to at least. It doesn't matter, but if you had
+been punctual you wouldn't have had a fright.'
+
+Nancy had dropped into a chair, white and shaking. Tarrant's voice,
+abruptly reproachful, affected her scarcely less than the preceding
+shock. In the struggle to recover herself she sobbed and choked, and
+at length burst into tears. Tarrant spoke impatiently.
+
+'What's the matter? Surely you are not so childish'--
+
+She stood up, and went into the bedroom, where she remained for
+several minutes, returning at length without her jacket, but with
+her hat still on.
+
+'I couldn't help it; and you shouldn't speak to me in that way. I
+have felt ill all the morning.'
+
+Looking at her, the young man said to himself, that love was one
+thing, wedded life another. He could make allowance for Nancy's
+weakness--but it was beyond his power to summon the old warmth and
+tenderness. If henceforth he loved her, it must be with husband's
+love--a phrase which signified to him something as distinct as
+possible from the ardour he had known; a moral attachment instead of
+a passionate desire.
+
+And there was another reason for his intolerant mood.
+
+'You hadn't spoken to any one before you got my note?'
+
+'No.--Why are you treating me like this? Are you ashamed that your
+friend saw me?'
+
+'Ashamed? not at all.'
+
+'Who did he think I was?'
+
+'I don't know. He doesn't know anything about you, at all events. As
+you may guess, I have something not very pleasant to tell. I didn't
+mean to be unkind; it was only the surprise at seeing you when I
+opened the door. I had calculated the exact time. But never mind.
+You look cold; warm yourself at the fire. You shall drink a glass of
+wine; it will put your nerves right again.'
+
+'No, I want nothing. Tell me at once what it is.'
+
+But Tarrant quietly brought a bottle and glass from his cupboard.
+Nancy again refused, pettishly.
+
+'Until you have drunk,' he said, with a smile of self-will, 'I shall
+tell you nothing.'
+
+'I don't know what I've done to make you like this.'
+
+Her sobs and tears returned. After a moment of impatience, Tarrant
+went up to her with the glass, laid a hand upon her shoulder, and
+kissed her.
+
+'Now, come, be reasonable. We have uncommonly serious things to talk
+about.'
+
+'What did your friend think of me?'
+
+'That you were one of the prettiest girls he had ever been
+privileged to see, and that I was an enviable fellow to have such a
+visitor. There now, another sip, and let us have some colour back
+into your cheeks. There's bad news, Nancy; confoundedly bad news,
+dear girl. My grandmother was dead when I got there. Well, the
+foolish old woman has been muddling her affairs for a long time,
+speculating here and there without taking any one's advice, and so
+on; and the result is that she leaves nothing at all.'
+
+Nancy was mute.
+
+'Less than nothing, indeed. She owed a few hundreds that she had no
+means of paying. The joke of the thing is, that she has left an
+elaborate will, with legacies to half-a-dozen people, myself first
+of all. If she had been so good as to die two years ago, I should
+have come in for a thousand a year or so. No one suspected what was
+going on; she never allowed Vawdrey, the one man who could have been
+useful to her, to have an inkling of the affair. An advertising
+broker got her in his clutches. Vawdrey's lawyer has been going
+through her papers, and finds everything quite intelligible. The
+money has gone in lumps, good after bad. Swindling, of course, but
+perfectly legal swindling, nothing to be done about it. A minute or
+two before her death she gasped out some words of revelation to the
+nurse, enough to set Vawdrey on the track, when he was told.'
+
+Still the listener said nothing.
+
+'Well, I had a talk with Vawdrey. He's a blackguard, but not a bad
+fellow. Wished he could help me, but didn't quite see how, unless I
+would go into business. However, he had a suggestion to make.'
+
+For Nancy, the pause was charged with apprehensions. She seemed to
+discover in her husband's face a purpose which he knew would excite
+her resistance.
+
+'He and I have often talked about my friend Sutherland, in the
+Bahamas, and Vawdrey has an idea that there'll be a profitable
+opening in that quarter, before long. Sutherland has written to me
+lately that he thinks of bestirring himself in the projects I've
+told you about; he has got the old man's consent to borrow money on
+the property. Now Vawdrey, naturally enough, would like Sutherland
+to join him in starting a company; the thoughts of such men run only
+on companies. So he offers, if I will go out to the Bahamas for a
+month or two, and look about me, and put myself in a position to
+make some kind of report--he offers to pay my expenses. Of course
+if the idea came to anything, and a company got floated, I should
+have shares.'
+
+Again he paused. The listener had wide, miserable eyes.
+
+'Well, I told him at once that I would accept the proposal. I have
+no right to refuse. All I possess in the world, at this moment, is
+about sixty pounds. If I sold all my books and furniture, they might
+bring another sixty or so. What, then, is to become of me? I must
+set to work at something, and here's the first work that comes to
+hand. But,' his voice softened, 'this puts us face to face with a
+very grave question; doesn't it? Are we to relinquish your money,
+and be both of us penniless? Or is there any possibility of saving
+it?'
+
+'How _can_ we? How could the secret be kept?'
+
+Voice and countenance joined in utter dismay.
+
+'It doesn't seem to me,' said Tarrant slowly, 'a downright
+impossibility. It _might_ be managed, with the help of your friend
+Mary, and granting that you yourself have the courage. But'--he
+made a large gesture--'of course I can't exact any such thing of
+you. It must seem practicable to you yourself.'
+
+'What are we to do if my money is lost?'
+
+'Don't say _we_.' He smiled generously, perhaps too generously. 'A
+man must support his wife. I shall arrange it somehow, of course, so
+that _you_ have no anxiety. But--'
+
+His voice dropped.
+
+'Lionel!' She sprang up and approached him as he stood by the
+fireplace. 'You won't leave me, dear? How can you think of going so
+far away--for months--and leaving me as I am now? Oh, you won't
+leave me!'
+
+He arched his eyebrows, and smiled gently.
+
+'If that's how you look at it--well, I must stay.'
+
+'You can do something here,' Nancy continued, with rapid pleading.
+'You can write for the papers. You always said you could--yes, you
+did say so. We don't need very much to live upon--at first. I
+shall be content--'
+
+'A moment. You mean that the money must be abandoned.'
+
+She had meant it, but under his look her confused thoughts took a
+new direction.
+
+'No. We needn't lose it. Only stay near me, and I will keep the
+secret, through everything. You will only need, then, just to
+support yourself, and that is so easy. I will tell Mary how it is.
+She can be trusted, I am sure she can. She would do anything for me.
+She knows that father was not thinking of a man such as you. It
+would be cruelly wrong if I lost everything. I will tell her, and
+she will help me. Scarcely any one comes to the house, as it is; and
+I will pretend to have bad health, and shut myself up. And then,
+when the time comes, Mary will go away with me, and--and the child
+shall be taken care of by some people we can trust to be kind to it.
+Horace is going to live in lodgings; and Mrs. Damerel, I am sure,
+won't come to see me again; and I can get rid of other people. The
+Barmbys shall think I am sulking about the will; I'm sure they think
+already that I dislike them because of it. Let them think it; I will
+refuse, presently, to see them at all. It's only a few months. If I
+tell people I'm not well, nobody will feel surprised if I go away
+for a month or two--now--soon. Mary would go with me, of course.
+I might go for December and January. Father didn't mean I was never
+to have change of air. Then there would be February and March at
+home. And then I might go away again till near the end of May. I'm
+sure we can manage it.'
+
+She stopped, breathless. Tarrant, who had listened with averted
+face, turned and spoke judicially.
+
+'There's one thing you're forgetting, Nancy. Do you propose that we
+shall never acknowledge the child? Remember that even if you were
+bold enough, after our second marriage, to acknowledge it in the
+face of scandal--that wouldn't be safe. Any one, if suspicion is
+aroused, can find out when we were actually married.'
+
+'We can't think of that. The child may not live.'
+
+Tarrant moved, and the movement startled Nancy. It meant that she
+had pained him, perhaps made him think of her with repugnance.
+
+'I hardly know what I am saying. You know I don't wish that. But all
+I can think of now is to keep you near me. I can't bear to be
+separated from you. I love you so much more than you love me.'
+
+'Let me just tell you what I had in mind, Nancy. Supposing the
+secret can be kept, we must eventually live abroad, that is to say,
+if our child is not to grow up a stranger to us, which neither you
+nor I could wish. Now, at Nassau, the capital of the Bahamas, a lot
+of Americans always spend the winter. If I made acquaintances among
+them, it might be a very useful step, it would be preparing for the
+future.'
+
+To Nancy this sounded far from convincing. She argued against it in
+a perfectly natural way, and as any one else would have done who
+knew Tarrant. More than once he had declared to her that he would
+rather die than drag out his life in one of the new countries, that
+he could not breathe in an atmosphere of commercialism unrelieved by
+historic associations. Nancy urged that it would be better to make a
+home on the continent, whither they could go, at any moment, without
+a sense of exile.
+
+'So it comes to this,' he interrupted, with an air of resignation.
+'I must refuse Vawdrey's offer, and, in doing so, refuse an
+excellent chance of providing for our future, _if_--what is by no
+means improbable--the secret should be discovered. I must turn to
+journalism, or be a clerk. Well and good. My wife decrees it.'
+
+And he began to hum an air, as if the matter were dismissed. There
+was a long silence.
+
+'How long would you be away?' murmured Nancy, at length.
+
+'I suppose two months at most.'
+
+'November--December.'
+
+'The second of those months you might be spending, as you said, away
+from London. Down in Devon, perhaps. I can't blame your thoughts
+about it; but it seems--doesn't it?--a trifle inconsiderate,
+when you think what may result from my journey.'
+
+'Would you promise me to be back by the end of the year?'
+
+'Not promise, Nancy. But do my best. Letters take fourteen days,
+that's all. You should hear by every mail.'
+
+'Why not promise?'
+
+'Because I can't foresee how much I may have to do there, and how
+long it will take me. But you may be very sure that Vawdrey won't
+pay expenses for longer than he can help. It has occurred to me that
+I might get materials for some magazine articles. That would help to
+float me with the editors, you know, if it's necessary.'
+
+Nancy sighed.
+
+'If I consented--if I did my best not to stand in your way--
+would you love me better when you came back?'
+
+The answer was a pleased laugh.
+
+'Why, there,' he cried, 'you've given in a nutshell the whole duty
+of a wife who wishes to be loved!'
+
+Nancy tried to laugh with him.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 8
+
+
+
+
+He must be a strong man whom the sudden stare of Penury does not
+daunt and, in some measure, debase. Tarrant, whatever the
+possibilities of his nature, had fallen under a spell of indolent
+security, which declared its power only when he came face to face
+with the demand for vigorous action. The moment found him a sheer
+poltroon. 'What! Is it possible that I--_I_--am henceforth
+penniless? I, to whom the gods were so gracious? I, without warning,
+flung from sheltered comfort on to the bare road side, where I must
+either toil or beg?' The thing seemed unintelligible. He had never
+imagined such ruin of his hopes.
+
+For the first time, he turned anxious thoughts upon the money to
+which his wife was--would be--might be--entitled. He computed
+the chances of success in the deception he and she were practising,
+and knew with shame that he must henceforth be party to a vulgar
+fraud. Could Nancy be trusted to carry through this elaborate
+imposition--difficult for the strongest-minded woman? Was it not a
+certainty that some negligence, or some accident, must disclose her
+secret? Then had he a wife and child upon his hands, to support even
+as common men support wife and child, by incessant labour. The
+prospect chilled him.
+
+If he went to the West Indies, his absence would heighten the
+probability of Nancy's detection. Yet he desired to escape from her.
+Not to abandon her; of that thought he was incapable; but to escape
+the duty--repulsive to his imagination--of encouraging her
+through the various stages of their fraud. From the other side of
+the Atlantic he would write affectionate, consolatory letters; face
+to face with her, could he support the show of tenderness, go
+through an endless series of emotional interviews, always reminding
+himself that the end in view was hard cash? Not for love's sake; he
+loved her less than before she proved herself his wife in earnest.
+Veritable love--no man knew better--would have impelled him to
+save himself and her from a degrading position.
+
+Was he committing himself to a criminality which the law would
+visit? Hardly that--until he entered into possession of money
+fraudulently obtained.
+
+In miserable night-watchings, he fell to the most sordid
+calculations. Supposing their plot revealed, would Nancy in fact be
+left without resources? Surely not,--with her brother, her aunt,
+her lifelong friends the Barmbys, to take thought for her. She could
+not suffer extremities. And upon this he blushed relief.
+
+Better to make up his mind that the secret must inevitably out. For
+the moment, Nancy believed she had resigned herself to his
+departure, and that she had strength to go through with the long
+ordeal. But a woman in her situation cannot be depended upon to
+pursue a consistent course. It is Nature's ordinance that motherhood
+shall be attained through phases of mental disturbance, which leave
+the sufferer scarce a pretence of responsibility. Nancy would play
+strange pranks, by which, assuredly, he would be driven to
+exasperation if they passed under his eyes. He had no mind to be
+called father; perhaps even his humanity might fail under the test
+to which, as a lover, he had given scarce a casual thought. By
+removing himself, and awaiting the issue afar off, he gained time
+and opportunity for reflection. Of course his wife could not come to
+want; that, after all, was the one clearly comforting thought. Her
+old servant would take good care of her, happen what might.
+
+He must taste of liberty again before sinking into the humdrum of
+married life. The thought of an ocean voyage, of the new life amid
+tropic splendours, excited his imagination all the more because it
+blended with the thought of recovered freedom. Marriage had come
+upon him with unfair abruptness; for such a change as that, even the
+ordinary bachelor demands a season preparative; much more, then, the
+young man who revelled in a philosophic sense of detachment, who
+wrote his motto 'Vixi hodie!' For marriage he was simply unfit;
+forced together, he and his wife would soon be mutually detestable.
+A temporary parting might mature in the hearts of both that
+affection of which the seed was undeniably planted. With passion
+they had done; the enduring tenderness of a reasonable love must now
+unite them, were they to be united at all. And to give such love a
+chance of growing in him, Tarrant felt that he must lose sight of
+Nancy until her child was born.
+
+Yes, it had begun already, the trial he dreaded. A letter from
+Nancy, written and posted only an hour or two after her return home
+--a long, distracted letter. Would he forgive her for seeming to be
+an obstacle in the way of what he had proposed? Would he promise her
+to be faithful? Would he--
+
+He had hardly patience to read it through.
+
+The next evening, on returning home about ten o'clock, he was
+startled by the sight of Nancy's figure at the foot of his
+staircase.
+
+'What has happened?'
+
+'Nothing--don't be frightened. But I wanted to see you tonight.'
+
+She gripped his hand.
+
+'How long have you waited? What! Hours? But this is downright
+madness--such a night as this! Couldn't you put a note for me in
+the letter-box?'
+
+'Don't--don't speak so! I wanted to see you.' She hurried her
+words, as if afraid he would refuse to listen. 'I have told Mary--
+I wanted you to know--'
+
+'Come in. But there's no fire, and you're chilled through. Do you
+want to be ill? What outrageous silliness!'
+
+Her vitality was indeed at a low ebb, and reproaches made her weep.
+Tarrant half carried her up to his room, made a light, and fell to
+his knees at fire-building.
+
+'Let me do it,' Nancy exclaimed. 'Let me wait upon you--'
+
+'If you don't sit still and keep quiet, you'll make me angry in
+earnest.'
+
+'Then you're not _really_ angry with me? I couldn't help it.'
+
+'No, I'm afraid you couldn't,' Tarrant muttered cheerlessly.
+
+'I wanted to tell you that Mary will be our friend. She was
+speechless with astonishment; at first I didn't know what she would
+say; she looked at me as she had never looked before--as if she
+were the mistress, and I the servant. But see what I have come to;
+all I felt was a dread lest she should think it her duty to cast me
+off. I haven't a bit of pride left. I could have fallen on my knees
+before her; I almost did. But she was very good and kind and gentle
+at last. She'll do everything she can for me.'
+
+The fire in a blaze, Tarrant stood up and regarded it gloomily.
+
+'Well, did she think it possible?' he asked at length.
+
+'Yes, she did. She said it would be very difficult, but the secret
+might be kept--if I were strong enough. And I _am_ strong enough
+--I _will_ be--'
+
+'It doesn't look like it,' said Tarrant, taking the edge off his
+words with a smile.
+
+'I won't come again in this way. Where have you been tonight?'
+
+'Oh, with friends.'
+
+'Which friends? where?'
+
+He moved impatiently.
+
+'People you don't know, Nancy, and wouldn't care about if you did.
+Do you know what time it is?'
+
+'Do tell me where you have been. It isn't prying into your affairs.
+Your friends ought to be mine; at least, I mean, I ought to know
+their names, and something about them. Suppose I were to tell you I
+had been spending the evening with friends--'
+
+'My dear girl, I shouldn't ask a question, unless you invited it.
+However, it's better to tell you that I have been making
+arrangements to sublet these chambers. I can't afford to keep them,
+even if there were any use in it. Harvey Munden has introduced me to
+a man who is likely to relieve me of the burden. I shall warehouse
+my books and furniture--'
+
+'Then you are going? Really going to leave England?'
+
+He affected astonishment; in truth, nothing now could surprise him.
+
+'But wasn't it all decided between us? Didn't you repeat it in your
+letter?'
+
+'Yes--I know--but I didn't think it would come so soon.'
+
+'We won't talk about it to-night,' said Tarrant firmly. 'For one
+thing, there's no time. Come closer to the fire, and get warm
+through; then I must see you home.'
+
+Nancy hung her head. When, in a few moments, she looked up again, it
+was to say drily:
+
+'There's no need for you to see me home.'
+
+'I'm going to, at all events.'
+
+'Why? You don't care much about me. I might as well be run over--
+or anything--'
+
+To this remark no sort of answer was vouchsafed. Nancy sat with her
+feet on the fender, and Tarrant kept up a great blaze with chips,
+which sputtered out their moisture before they began to crackle. He
+and she both seemed intent on this process of combustion.
+
+'Now you're quite warm,' said the young man, as if speaking to a
+child, 'and it's time to go.'
+
+Nancy rose obediently, gazed at him with dreaming eyes, and suffered
+herself to be led away by the arm. In Chancery Lane, Tarrant hailed
+a crawling hansom. When they were driving rapidly southward, Nancy
+began to question him about the date of his departure; she learnt
+that he might be gone in less than a week.
+
+'If you could behave quietly and sensibly, we would have an evening
+to make final arrangements.'
+
+'I can,' she answered, with a calm that surprised him. 'If you go
+without letting me see you again, I don't know what I might do. But
+I can be as sensible as you are, if I'm treated fairly.'
+
+He grasped her hand.
+
+'Remember, dear girl, that I have a good deal to worry me just now.
+Do you suppose I leave you with a light heart?'
+
+'If you can persuade me that you care--'
+
+'I care a good deal more than I can easily say. Your position is a
+very hard one,--harder than mine. But I'm going away to work for
+your future. I see clearly that it's the best thing I could do.
+Whether Vawdrey's ideas come to anything or not, I shall make profit
+out of the journey; I mean to write,--I think it's all I can do to
+any purpose,--and the material I shall get together over there
+will give me a start. Don't think I am cold-hearted because I talk
+in this way; if I broke down, so much the worse for both of us. The
+time has come for serious work.'
+
+'But we shan't lose my money. I've made up my mind we shan't.'
+
+'It's impossible for you to guard against every danger. We must be
+prepared for the worst, and that responsibility rests on me. Try and
+keep your mind at ease; whatever happens, to protect you is my duty,
+and I shall not fail in it.'
+
+Speaking thus, Tarrant felt the glow of virtue. His words were
+perfectly sincere, but had reference to a future which his thoughts
+left comfortably vague.
+
+They were to meet again, probably for the definite parting, three
+days hence. Tarrant, whose desire for escape had now become
+incontrollable, used the intervening time in a rush of preparations.
+He did not debate with himself as to the length of his sojourn in
+the West Indies; that must be determined by circumstances.
+Explicitly he had avoided a promise on the subject. What money he
+possessed he would take with him; it might be to his interest, for
+Nancy's likewise, to exceed the term of absence provided for in his
+stipulations with Mr. Vawdrey. But all he deliberately thought of was
+the getting away. Impatient with Nancy, because of the vagaries
+resultant from her mental and physical state, he himself exhibited a
+flagrant triumph of instinct over reason. Once in enjoyment of
+liberty, he would reflect, like a practical man, on the details of
+his position, review and recognise his obligations, pay his debt to
+honour; but liberty first of all. Not his the nature to accept
+bondage; it demoralised him, made him do and say things of which he
+was ashamed. Only let him taste the breezes of ocean, and the
+healthful spirit which is one with rectitude would again inspire
+him.
+
+Much to his surprise, he neither saw nor heard from Nancy until the
+hour appointed. She came very punctually. On opening the door to
+her, with an air of resolute cheerfulness, he saw something in her
+face that removed the necessity for playing a part. It was the look
+which had so charmed him in their love-days, the indescribable look,
+characteristic of Nancy, and of her alone; a gleam between smile and
+laughter, a glance mingling pride with submission, a silent note of
+personality which thrilled the senses and touched the heart.
+
+'What now?' he asked, holding her hand and gazing at her. 'Some good
+news?'
+
+'None that I know of. How hot your room is! Why, you look glad to
+see me!'
+
+'Was I ever anything else?'
+
+She answered him with a smile.
+
+'It's a very pleasant surprise,' he continued, watching her as she
+threw off her out-door things. 'I expected a doleful visage, eyes
+red with weeping.'
+
+'Did you? See how much a man thinks of himself! If you choose to go
+away, I choose to think as little of you as possible. That's common
+sense--isn't it?'
+
+'I don't want you to cry about it.'
+
+'Oh yes, you do. It flatters you, and you like flattery. But I've
+been too obliging. I feel myself again, and there's no more flattery
+for you--till you come back. I don't ask you when that will be. I
+ask you nothing at all. I am independent of you.'
+
+Tarrant grew uneasy. He feared that this mood of jest would change
+only too suddenly, and her collapse into feminine feebleness be the
+more complete.
+
+'Be as independent as you like,' he said; 'only keep your love for
+me.'
+
+'Oh, indeed! It's your experience, is it, that the two things can go
+together? That's the difference between man and woman, I suppose. I
+shall love you just as little as possible--and how little that
+will be, perhaps I had better not tell you.'
+
+Still he stood gazing at her.
+
+'You look very beautiful to-day.'
+
+'I know. I saw it for myself before I left home. But we won't talk
+about that. When do you go?'
+
+'My goods will be warehoused to-morrow, and the next day I go to
+Liverpool.'
+
+'I'm glad it's so soon. We shan't need to see each other again.
+Smoke your pipe. I'm going to make a cup of tea.'
+
+'Kiss me first. You forgot when you came in.'
+
+'You get no kiss by ordering it. Beg for it prettily, and we'll
+see.'
+
+'What does it all mean, Nancy? How can you have altered like this?'
+
+'You prefer me as I was last time?'
+
+'Not I, indeed. You make me feel that it will be very hard to leave
+you. I shall carry away a picture of you quite different from the
+dreary face that I had got to be afraid of.'
+
+Nancy laughed, and of a sudden held out her hands to him.
+
+'Haven't I thought of that? These were the very words I hoped to
+hear from you. Now beg for a kiss, and you shall have one.'
+
+Never, perhaps, had they spent together so harmonious an evening.
+Nancy's tenderness took at length a graver turn, but she remained
+herself, face and speech untroubled by morbid influence.
+
+'I won't see you again,' she said, 'because I mightn't be able to
+behave as I can to-day. To-day I am myself; for a long time I have
+been living I don't know how.'
+
+Tarrant murmured something about her state of health.
+
+'Yes, I know all about that. A strange thought came to me last
+night. When my father was alive I fretted because I couldn't be
+independent; I wanted to be quite free, to live as I chose; I looked
+forward to it as the one thing desirable. Now, I look back on that
+as a time of liberty. I am in bondage, now--threefold bondage.'
+
+'How threefold?'
+
+'To you, because I love you, and couldn't cease loving you, however
+I tried. Then, to my father's will, which makes me live in hiding,
+as if I were a criminal. And then--'
+
+'What other tyranny?'
+
+'You mustn't expect all my love. Before long some one else will rule
+over me.--What an exchange I have made! And I was going to be so
+independent.'
+
+To the listener, her speech seemed to come from a maturer mind than
+she had hitherto revealed. But he suffered from the thought that
+this might be merely a pathological phase. In reminding him of her
+motherhood, she checked the flow of his emotion.
+
+'You'll remember,' Nancy went on, 'that I'm not enjoying myself
+whilst you are away. I don't want you to be unhappy--only to think
+of me, and keep in mind what I'm going through. If you do that, you
+won't be away from me longer than you can help.'
+
+It was said with unforced pathos, and Tarrant's better part made
+generous reply.
+
+'If you find it too hard, dear, write to me, and tell me, and there
+shall be an end of it.'
+
+'Never. You think me wretchedly weak, but you shall see--'
+
+'It's of your own free will you undertake it?'
+
+'Yes, of my own free will,' she answered firmly. 'I won't come to
+you penniless. It isn't right I should do so. My father didn't mean
+that. If I had had the sense and the courage to tell him, all this
+misery would have been spared. That money is mine by every right,
+and I won't lose it. Not only for your sake and my own--there is
+some one else to think of.'
+
+Tarrant gave her a kind look.
+
+'Don't count upon it. Trust to me.'
+
+'I like to hear you say that, but I don't wish you to be put to
+proof. You are not the kind of man to make money.'
+
+'How do you mean it?'
+
+'As you like to take it. Silly boy, don't I love you just because
+you are _not_ one of the money-making men? If you hadn't a penny in
+the world, I should love you just the same; and I couldn't love you
+more if you had millions.'
+
+The change which Tarrant expected did not come. To the end, she was
+brave and bright, her own best self. She said good-bye without a
+tear, refused to let him accompany her, and so, even as she had
+resolved, left in her husband's mind an image beckoning his return.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Part IV: The Veiled Figure
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 1
+
+
+
+
+Before his admission to a partnership in Mr. Lord's business, Samuel
+Barmby lived with his father and two sisters in Coldharbour Lane.
+Their house was small, old and crumbling for lack of repair; the
+landlord, his ground-lease having but a year or two to run, looked
+on with equanimity whilst the building decayed. Under any
+circumstances, the family must soon have sought a home elsewhere,
+and Samuel's good fortune enabled them to take a house in Dagmar
+Road, not far from Grove Lane; a new and most respectable house,
+with bay windows rising from the half-sunk basement to the second
+storey. Samuel, notwithstanding his breadth of mind, privately
+admitted the charm of such an address as 'Dagmar Road,' which looks
+well at the head of note-paper, and falls with sonority from the
+lips.
+
+The Barmby sisters, Lucy and Amelia by name, were unpretentious
+young women, without personal attractions, and soberly educated.
+They professed a form of Dissent; their reading was in certain
+religious and semi-religious periodicals, rarely in books; domestic
+occupations took up most of their time, and they seldom had any
+engagements. At appointed seasons, a festivity in connection with
+'the Chapel' called them forth; it kept them in a flutter for many
+days, and gave them a headache. In the strictest sense their life
+was provincial; nominally denizens of London, they dwelt as remote
+from everything metropolitan as though Camberwell were a village of
+the Midlands. If they suffered from discontent, no one heard of it;
+a confession by one or the other that she 'felt dull' excited the
+sister's surprise, and invariably led to the suggestion of 'a little
+medicine.'
+
+Their brother they regarded with admiration, tempered by anxiety.
+'Great talents,' they knew by report, were often perilous to the
+possessor, and there was reason to fear that Samuel Bennett Barmby
+had not resisted all the temptations to which his intellect exposed
+him. At the age of one-and-twenty he made a startling announcement;
+'the Chapel' no longer satisfied the needs of his soul, and he found
+himself summoned to join the Church of England as by law
+established. Religious intolerance not being a family
+characteristic, Mr. Barmby and his daughters, though they looked
+grave over the young man's apostasy, admitted his freedom in this
+matter; their respected friend Mr. Lord belonged to the Church, and
+it could not be thought that so earnest-minded a man walked in the
+way to perdition. At the same time, Samuel began to exhibit a liking
+for social pleasures, which were, it might be hoped, innocent, but,
+as they kept him from home of evenings, gave some ground for
+uneasiness. He had joined a society of young men who met for
+intellectual debate, and his success as an orator fostered the
+spiritual pride already discernible in him. His next step could not
+be regarded without concern, for he became a member of the National
+Sunday League. Deceptive name! At first the Miss. Barmbys supposed
+this was a union for safe-guarding the Sabbath-day; it appalled them
+to discover that the League had quite an opposite tendency, that its
+adherents sallied forth together on 'Sunday excursions,' that they
+received tickets for Sunday admission to picture galleries, and in
+various other ways offended orthodox feeling. But again the father
+and sisters gave patient ear to Samuel's elaborate arguments. They
+became convinced that he had no evil intentions. The elder girl,
+having caught up a pregnant phrase in some periodical she approved,
+began to remark that Samuel had 'a modern mind;' and this eventually
+consoled them.
+
+When it began to be observed that Samuel talked somewhat frequently
+of Miss. Lord, the implied suggestion caused a tremor of confused
+feeling. To the Miss. Barmbys, Nancy seemed an enigmatic person; they
+had tried to like her, but could not; they objected to her
+assumption of superiority, and were in grave doubt as to her
+opinions on cardinal points of faith and behaviour. Yet, when it
+appeared a possibility that their brother might woo Miss. Lord and
+win her for a wife, the girls did their best to see her in a more
+favourable light. Not for a moment did it occur to them that Nancy
+could regard a proposal from Samuel as anything but an honour; to
+_them_ she might behave slightingly, for they were of her own sex,
+and not clever; but a girl who prided herself on intellectual
+attainments must of course look up to Samuel Bennett with reverence.
+In their unworldliness--of a truth they were good, simple
+creatures--the slight difference of social position seemed
+unimportant. And with Samuel's elevation to a partnership, even that
+one shadowy obstacle was removed. Henceforth they would meet Nancy
+in a conciliatory spirit, and, if she insisted upon it, bow down
+before her.
+
+Mr. Barmby, senior, whose years drew nigh to three-score, had a great
+advantage in point of physical health over his old friend Stephen
+Lord, and his mind enjoyed a placidity which promised him length of
+days. Since the age of seventeen he had plied a pen in the office of
+a Life Assurance Company, where his salary, by small and slow
+increments, had grown at length to two hundred and fifty a year.
+Himself a small and slow person, he had every reason to be satisfied
+with this progress, and hoped for no further advance. He was of
+eminently sober mind, profoundly conscientious, and quite devoid of
+social ambition,--points of character which explained the long
+intimacy between him and Stephen Lord. Yet one habit he possessed
+which foreshadowed the intellectual composition of his son,--he
+loved to write letters to the newspapers. At very long intervals one
+of these communications achieved the honour of type, and then Mr
+Barmby was radiant with modest self-approval. He never signed such
+letters with his own name, but chose a pseudonym befitting the
+subject. Thus, if moved to civic indignation by pieces of
+orange-peel on the pavement, he styled himself 'Urban Rambler;' if
+anxious to protest against the overcrowding of 'bus or
+railway-carriage, his signature was 'Otium cum Dignitate.' When he
+took a holiday at the seaside, unwonted leisure and novel
+circumstances prompted him to address local editors at considerable
+length. The preservation of decency by bathers was then his
+favourite topic, and he would sign 'Pudor,' or perchance
+'Paterfamilias.' His public epistles, if collected, would have made
+an entertaining and lnstructive volume, so admirably did they
+represent one phase of the popular mind. 'No, sir,'--this sentence
+frequently occurred,--'it was not thus that our fathers achieved
+national and civic greatness.' And again: 'All the feelings of an
+English parent revolt,' &c. Or: 'And now, sir, where is this to
+end?'--a phrase applied at one moment to the prospects of religion
+and morality, at another to the multiplication of muffin-bells.
+
+On a Sunday afternoon, Mr. Barmby often read aloud to his daughters,
+and in general his chosen book was 'Paradise Lost.' These
+performances had an indescribable solemnity, but it unfortunately
+happened that, as his fervour increased, the reader became
+regardless of aspirates. Thus, at the culmination of Satanic
+impiety, he would give forth with shaking voice--
+
+'_Ail, orrors, ail! and thou profoundest Ell,
+Receive thy new possessor!'_
+
+This, though it did not distress the girls, was painful to Samuel
+Bennett, who had given no little care to the correction of similar
+lapses in his own speech.
+
+Samuel conceived himself much ahead of his family. Quite uneducated,
+in any legitimate sense of the word, he had yet learnt that such a
+thing as education existed, and, by dint of busy perusal of penny
+popularities, had even become familiar with names and phrases, with
+modes of thought and of ambition, appertaining to a world for ever
+closed against him. He spoke of Culture, and imagined himself far on
+the way to attain it. His mind was packed with the oddest jumble of
+incongruities; Herbert Spencer jostled with Charles Bradlaugh,
+Matthew Arnold with Samuel Smiles; in one breath he lauded George
+Eliot, in the next was enthusiastic over a novel by Mrs. Henry Wood;
+from puerile facetiae he passed to speculations on the origin of
+being, and with equally light heart. Save for Pilgrim's Progress and
+Robinson Crusoe, he had read no English classic; since boyhood,
+indeed, he had probably read no book at all, for much diet of
+newspapers rendered him all but incapable of sustained attention.
+Whatever he seemed to know of serious authors came to him at second
+or third hand. Avowing his faith in Christianity when with orthodox
+people, in the society of sceptics he permitted himself to smile at
+the old faiths,--though he preferred to escape this temptation,
+the Nonconformist conscience still reigning within him. At home he
+posed as a broad-minded Anglican, and having somewhere read that
+Tennyson's 'In Memoriam' represented this attitude, he spoke of the
+poem as 'one of the books that have made me what I am.'
+
+His circle of acquaintances lay apart from that in which the Lords
+moved; it consisted for the most part of young men humbly endowed in
+the matter of income, and making little pretence of social dignity.
+When others resorted to theatre or public-house, or places not so
+readily designated, Samuel and his friends met together to discourse
+on subjects of which they knew somewhat less than nothing. Some of
+them occasionally held audacious language, especially when topics
+such as the relations of the sexes invited their wisdom; they had
+read something somewhere which urged them to cast off the trammels
+of conventional thought; they 'ventured to say' that in a very few
+years 'surprising changes of opinion would come about.' These
+revolutionaries, after startling the more sober of their hearers,
+went quietly home to mother or landlady, supped on cheese and cocoa,
+and next day plied the cleric pen with exemplary zeal.
+
+Samuel believed himself in love. That he should conceive matrimonial
+intentions with regard to Stephen Lord's daughter was but the
+natural issue of circumstance; from that conception resulted an
+amorous mood, so much inflamed by Nancy's presence that a young man,
+whose thoughts did not often transgress decorum, had every reason to
+suppose himself her victim. When Nancy rejected his formal offer of
+devotion, the desire to wed her besieged him more vigorously; Samuel
+was piqued at the tone of lofty trifling in which the girl answered
+his proposal; for assuredly he esteemed himself no less remarkable a
+person than he appeared in the eyes of his sisters, and his vanity
+had been encouraged by Mr. Lord's favour. Of his qualities as a man
+of business there was no doubt; in one direction or another, he
+would have struck the road to fortune; why Nancy should regard him
+with condescension, and make him feel at once that his suit was
+hopeless, puzzled him for many a day. He tried flattery, affecting
+to regard her as his superior in things of the intellect, but only
+with the mortifying result that Miss. Lord accepted his humility as
+quite natural. Then he held apart in dignified reserve, and found no
+difficulty in maintaining this attitude until after Mr. Lord's death.
+Of course he did not let his relatives know of the repulse he had
+suffered, but, when speaking to them of what had happened on Jubilee
+night, he made it appear that his estimate of Miss. Lord was
+undergoing modification. 'She has lost him, all through her
+flightiness,' said the sisters to each other. They were not sorry,
+and felt free again to criticise Nancy's ideas of maidenly modesty.
+
+The provisions of Mr. Lord's will could not but trouble the
+intercourse between Grove Lane and Dagmar Road. Mr. Barmby, senior,
+undertook with characteristic seriousness the guardianship conferred
+upon him. He had long interviews with Horace and Nancy, in which he
+acquitted himself greatly to his own satisfaction. Samuel, equally a
+trustee, showed his delicacy by holding aloof save when civility
+dictated a call upon the young people. But his hopes had revived; he
+was quite willing to wait three years for Nancy, and it seemed to
+him more than probable that this period of reflection would bring
+the young lady to a sense of his merits. In the meantime, he would
+pursue with energy the business now at his sole direction, and make
+it far more lucrative than when managed on Mr. Lord's old-fashioned
+principles.
+
+As the weeks went on, it seemed more clear than at first that Nancy
+resented the authority held by Samuel and his father. They were not
+welcome at the house in Grove Lane; the Miss. Barmbys called several
+times without being admitted, though they felt sure that Nancy was
+at home. Under these circumstances, it became desirable to discover
+some intermediary who would keep them acquainted with the details of
+Nancy's life and of her brother's. Such intermediary was at hand, in
+the person of Miss. Jessica Morgan.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 2
+
+
+
+
+Until of late there had existed a bare acquaintance between Jessica
+and the Barmby family. The two or three hours which she perforce
+spent in Samuel's company on Jubilee night caused Jessica no little
+embarrassment; as a natural result, their meetings after that had a
+colour of intimacy, and it was not long before Miss. Morgan and the
+Miss. Barmbys began to see more of each other. Nancy, on a motive
+correspondent with that which actuated her guardians, desired
+Jessica's familiarity with the household in Dagmar Road; her friend
+could thus learn and communicate sundry facts of importance, else
+hidden from her in the retirement to which she was now condemned.
+How did the Barmbys regard her behaviour to them? Did they, in their
+questioning, betray any suspicion fraught with danger? Jessica,
+enjoying the possession of a most important secret, which she had
+religiously guarded even from her mother, made time to accept the
+Barmbys' invitations pretty frequently, and invited the girls to her
+own home as often as she could afford a little outlay on cakes and
+preserves.
+
+It made a salutary distraction in her life. As December drew near,
+she exhibited alarming symptoms of over-work, and but for the
+romance which assured to her an occasional hour of idleness, she
+must have collapsed before the date of her examination. As it was,
+she frightened one of her pupils, at the end of a long lesson, by
+falling to the floor and lying there for ten minutes in
+unconsciousness. The warning passed unheeded; day and night she
+toiled at her insuperable tasks, at times half frenzied by the
+strangest lapses of memory, and feeling, the more she laboured, only
+the more convinced that at the last moment every fact she had
+acquired would ruthlessly desert her.
+
+Her place of abode favoured neither health nor mental tranquillity.
+It was one of a row of new houses in a new quarter. A year or two
+ago the site had been an enclosed meadow, portion of the land
+attached to what was once a country mansion; London, devourer of
+rural limits, of a sudden made hideous encroachment upon the old
+estate, now held by a speculative builder; of many streets to be
+constructed, three or four had already come into being, and others
+were mapped out, in mud and inchoate masonry, athwart the ravaged
+field. Great elms, the pride of generations passed away, fell before
+the speculative axe, or were left standing in mournful isolation to
+please a speculative architect; bits of wayside hedge still shivered
+in fog and wind, amid hoardings variegated with placards and
+scaffolding black against the sky. The very earth had lost its
+wholesome odour; trampled into mire, fouled with builders' refuse
+and the noisome drift from adjacent streets, it sent forth, under
+the sooty rain, a smell of corruption, of all the town's
+uncleanliness. On this rising locality had been bestowed the title
+of 'Park.' Mrs. Morgan was decided in her choice of a dwelling here
+by the euphonious address, Merton Avenue, Something-or-other Park.
+
+The old mansion--not very old, and far from beautiful, but stoutly
+built--stood grim and desolate, long dismantled, and waiting only
+to be torn down for the behoof of speculative dealers in old
+material. What aforetime was a tree-bordered drive, now curved
+between dead stumps, a mere slushy cartway; the stone pillars, which
+had marked the entrance, damaged in the rending away of metal with a
+market value, drooped sideways, ready at a touch to bury themselves
+in slime.
+
+Through summer months the Morgans had suffered sufficiently from the
+defects of their house; with the coming on of winter, they found
+themselves exposed to miseries barely endurable. At the first slight
+frost, cistern and water-pipes went to ruin; already so damp that
+unlovely vegetation had cropped up on cellar walls, the edifice was
+now drenched with torrents of water. Plaster fell from the ceilings;
+paper peeled away down the staircase; stuccoed portions of the front
+began to crack and moulder. Not a door that would close as a door
+should; not a window that would open in the way expected of it; not
+a fireplace but discharged its smoke into the room, rather than by
+the approved channel. Everywhere piercing draughts, which often
+entered by orifices unexplained and unexplainable. From cellar floor
+to chimney-pot, no square inch of honest or trustworthy workmanship.
+So thin were the parti-walls that conversation not only might, but
+must, be distinctly heard from room to room, and from house to
+house; the Morgans learnt to subdue their voices, lest all they said
+should become common property of the neighbourhood. For the
+privilege of occupying such a residence, 'the interior,' said
+advertisement, 'handsomely decorated,' they were racked with an
+expenditure which, away in the sweet-scented country, would have
+housed them amid garden graces and orchard fruitfulness.
+
+At this time, Mr. Morgan had joined an acquaintance in the
+establishment of a debt-collecting agency; his partner provided the
+modest capital needful for such an enterprise, and upon himself fell
+the disagreeable work. A man of mild temper and humane instincts, he
+spent his day in hunting people who would not or could not pay the
+money they owed, straining his wits to circumvent the fraudulent,
+and swooping relentlessly upon the victims of misfortune. The
+occupation revolted him, but at present he saw no other way of
+supporting the genteel appearances which--he knew not why--were
+indispensable to his life. He subsisted like a bird of prey; he was
+ever on the look out for carrion which the law permitted him to
+seize. From the point of view forced upon him, society became a mere
+system of legalised rapine. 'You are in debt; behold the bond.
+Behold, too, my authority for squeezing out of you the uttermost
+farthing. You must beg or starve? I deplore it, but I, for my part,
+have a genteel family to maintain on what I rend from your grip.' He
+set his forehead against shame; he stooped to the basest chicanery;
+he exposed himself to insult, to curses, to threats of violence.
+Sometimes a whole day of inconceivably sordid toil resulted in the
+pouching of a few pence; sometimes his reward was a substantial sum.
+He knew himself despised by many of the creditors who employed him.
+'Bad debts? For how much will you sell them to me?' And as often as
+not he took away with his bargain a glance which was equivalent to a
+kick.
+
+The genteel family knew nothing of these expedients. Mrs. Morgan
+talked dolorously to her friends of 'commercial depression,' and
+gave it to be vaguely understood that her husband had suffered great
+losses because he conducted his affairs in the spirit of a
+gentleman. Her son was in an office;' her elder daughter was
+attempting the art of fiction, which did not promise to be
+lucrative; Jessica, more highly educated, would shortly matriculate
+at the University of London--a consoling prospect, but involving
+the payment of a fee that could with difficulty be afforded.
+
+Every friend of the family held it a matter of course that Jessica
+would succeed in the examination. It seemed probable that she would
+have a place in Honours.
+
+And, meanwhile, the poor girl herself was repenting of the
+indiscreet boastfulness with which she had made known her purpose.
+To come out in an inferior class would be painful enough; how
+support the possibility of absolute failure? Yet she knew only too
+well that in certain 'subjects' she was worse than shaky. Her Greek
+--her Chemistry--her Algebra--
+
+By way of propitiating the stern fates, she began to talk with Lucy
+and Amelia Barmby in a tone of diffidence. Half a year ago, she
+would have held her head very high in such company; now the simple
+goodness of the old-fashioned girls made an appeal to her aching
+heart, and their homely talk soothed her exhausted brain.
+
+'It's fearfully difficult,' she said to them one evening, as she sat
+in their parlour. 'And I lose so much time with my pupils. Really,
+you know, I haven't a fair chance. I was showing Nancy Lord the
+Algebra paper set last summer, and she confessed she could hardly do
+a single question.'
+
+'She couldn't?' exclaimed one of the sisters in astonishment. 'But
+we always thought she was so very clever.'
+
+'So she is--in many things. But she never dreamt of going in for
+such an examination as this.'
+
+'And do you really know more than she does?'
+
+Jessica smiled with affected modesty.
+
+'Oh, I have studied so much more.'
+
+It was sweet to gain this triumph over her friend, whose progress in
+the school of life she watched with the jealousy of a girl condemned
+to sterile passions.
+
+Their talk was interrupted by the entrance of Samuel Barmby, and his
+elder sister, addressing him without reflection, said wonderingly:
+
+'Sam, did you know that Nancy Lord couldn't pass the examination
+that Miss. Morgan is going in for?'
+
+Jessica blushed, and hastened to extenuate this crude statement.
+
+'Oh, I didn't say that. Only that she would have to study very hard
+if she went in for the matriculation.'
+
+'Of course she would,' Samuel assented, largely, as he took his
+stand before the fireplace and beamed upon the female trio. 'Miss
+Lord goes in for broad culture; that's quite a different thing from
+studying for examinations.'
+
+To the hearers, Jessica not excepted, this seemed to argue the
+spirit of broad culture in Samuel himself. Miss. Morgan pursued
+nervously:
+
+'Examinations are nothing. I believe very stupid people often do
+well in them, and clever people often fail.'
+
+Her voice sank on the last word, and she tried to read Barmby's face
+without meeting his look. Of late, a change had come about in her
+estimation of Samuel. Formerly she spoke of him with contemptuous
+amusement, in the tone set by Nancy; since she had become a friend
+of the family, his sisters' profound respect had influenced her way
+of thinking, and in secret she was disposed rather to admire 'the
+Prophet.' He had always struck her as a comely man, and, her
+education notwithstanding, she never perceived in his remarks that
+downright imbecility which excited Nancy's derision. On Jubilee
+night he was anything but a tedious companion; apart from her
+critical friend, Jessica had listened without impatience to his
+jests, his instructive facts, his flowing rhetoric. Now-a-days, in
+her enfeebled state of body and mind, she began to look forward with
+distinct pleasure to her occasional meetings with Samuel, pleasure
+which perhaps was enhanced by the air of condescension wherewith he
+tempered his courtesy. Morbid miseries brought out the frailty of
+her character. Desiring to be highly esteemed by Mr. Barmby, she
+found herself no less willing to join his sisters in a chorus of
+humbly feminine admiration, when he discoursed to them from an
+altitude. At moments, after gazing upon his eloquent countenance,
+she was beset by strange impulses which brought blood to her cheek,
+and made her dread the Miss. Barmbys' scrutiny.
+
+'I look upon examinations,' Samuel was saying, 'as a professional
+matter. I never went in for them myself, simply because I--I
+turned my energies in another direction.'
+
+'You _could_ have passed them,' remarked one of his sisters, 'easily
+enough.'
+
+'In Miss. Morgan's presence,'--he stroked his chin, and smiled with
+delicious fatuity--'I prefer to say nothing on that point.'
+
+'Oh but of course you could, Mr. Barmby,' sounded Jessica's voice, in
+an unsteady falsetto, whilst her eyes were turned upon the floor.
+'You would have thought nothing of this matriculation, which seems
+to me so dreadful.'
+
+Profoundly flattered, Samuel addressed the girl in his suavest
+tones.
+
+'I have a theory, Miss. Morgan, that young ladies ought not to
+undergo these ordeals. The delicacy of their nervous system unfits
+them for such a strain. I'm sure we shall all feel very glad when
+you are successfully through the trial. After it, you ought to have
+a long rest.'
+
+'Oh, you ought--indeed you ought,' assented the girls.
+
+'By the bye,' said Samuel, 'my father has heard from Miss. Lord that
+she is going away for a month or two. She says her health requires
+it.'
+
+Jessica sat silent, still with downcast eyes.
+
+'But it's a new thing, isn't it,' remarked Amelia, 'for Miss. Lord to
+be in bad health?'
+
+'She has suffered a good deal, I'm afraid,' said Jessica, 'since her
+father's death. The doctor tells her she oughtn't to live in that
+dull house through the winter.'
+
+'In that case,' Samuel exclaimed, 'of course she must go at once--
+of course!'
+
+He never spoke of Nancy but with stress of unctuous generosity.
+This, if his hearers knew what he had suffered at her hands, must
+tell greatly to his credit; if they were not aware of the
+circumstances, such a tone would become him as the young lady's
+hopeful admirer.
+
+'I fear her nerves are affected,' pursued Jessica. 'She can't bear
+society. So unlike her, isn't it? She goes out very little indeed,
+--sometimes not for days together. And really she sees nobody. I'm
+getting quite anxious about her.'
+
+The subject was an awkward one in this house, and it soon gave place
+to freer conversation. On her way home, though mechanically
+repeating dates and formulae, Jessica could not resist the tendency
+of her thoughts, to dwell on Samuel's features and Samuel's
+eloquence. This was a new danger; she had now little more than a
+fortnight for her final 'cram,' and any serious distraction meant
+ruin.
+
+In a day or two she took leave of Nancy, who had chosen for her
+winter retreat no less remote a spot than Falmouth. Horace having
+settled himself in lodgings, the house was to be shut up; Mary
+Woodruff of course went down into Cornwall. Nancy had written a
+letter to Mr. Barmby, senior, excusing herself for not being able to
+see him before her departure; it was an amiable letter, but
+contained frank avowal of pain and discontent at the prospect of her
+long pupilage. 'Of course I submit to the burden my father chose to
+lay upon me, and before long, I hope, I shall be able to take things
+in a better spirit. All I ask of you, dear Mr. Barmby, is to have
+forbearance with me until I get back my health and feel more
+cheerful. You know that I could not be in better hands whilst Mary
+is with me. I shall write frequently, and give you an account of
+myself. Let me hear sometimes, and show me that you make allowance
+for my very trying position.'
+
+Jessica heard the letter discussed by its recipient and his family.
+Samuel spoke with his wonted magnanimity; his father took a liberal
+view of the matter. And in writing to her friend a few days later,
+Jessica was able to say: 'I think you may safely stay at Falmouth
+for the whole winter. You will not be interfered with if you write
+nicely. I shouldn't wonder if they would let you keep out of their
+reach _as long as it is necessary_.'
+
+The week of Jessica's ordeal was now at hand. She had had another
+fainting-fit; her sleep was broken every night with hideous dreams;
+she ate scarce enough to keep herself alive; a perpetual fever
+parched her throat and burned at her temples.
+
+On the last day of 'cram,' she sat from morning to night in her
+comfortless little bedroom, bending over the smoky fire, reading
+desperately through a pile of note-books. The motive of vanity no
+longer supported her; gladly she would have crept away into a life
+of insignificance; but the fee for the examination was paid, and she
+must face the terrors, the shame, that waited her at Burlington
+House. No hope of 'passing.' Perhaps at the last moment a stroke of
+mortal illness would come to her relief.
+
+Not so. She found herself in the ghastly torture-hall, at a desk on
+which lay sheets of paper, not whiter than her face. Somebody gave
+her a scroll, stereotyped in imitation of manuscript--the
+questions to be answered. For a quarter of an hour she could not
+understand a word. She saw the face of Samuel Barmby, and heard his
+tones--'The delicacy of a young lady's nervous system unfits her
+for such a strain.'
+
+That evening she went home with a half-formed intention of poisoning
+herself.
+
+But the morrow saw her seated again before another scroll of
+stereotype, still thinking of Samuel Barmby, still hearing his
+voice. The man was grown hateful to her; he seemed to haunt her
+brain malignantly, and to paralyse her hand.
+
+Day after day in the room of torture, until all was done. Then upon
+her long despair followed a wild, unreasoning hope. Though it
+rained, she walked all the way home, singing, chattering to herself,
+and reached the house-door without consciousness of the distance she
+had traversed. Her mother and sister came out into the hall; they
+had been watching for her.
+
+'I did a good paper to-day--I think I've passed after all--yes,
+I feel sure I've passed!'
+
+'You look dreadful,' exclaimed Mrs. Morgan. 'And you're wet through--'
+
+'I did a good paper to-day--I feel sure I've passed!'
+
+She sat down to a meal, but could not swallow.
+
+'I feel sure I've passed--I feel sure--'
+
+And she fell from the chair, to all appearances stone-dead.
+
+They took her upstairs, undressed her, sent for the doctor. When he
+came, she had been lying for half-an-hour conscious, but mute. She
+looked gravely at him, and said, as if repeating a lesson:
+
+'The delicacy of a young lady's nervous system unfits her for such a
+strain.'
+
+'Undoubtedly,' repeated the doctor, with equal gravity.
+
+'But,' she added eagerly, 'let Mr. Barmby know at once that I have
+passed.'
+
+'He shall know at once,' said the doctor.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 3
+
+
+
+
+A lady who lived at Kilburn, and entertained largely in a house not
+designed for large entertainment, was 'at home' this evening. At
+eleven o'clock the two drawing-rooms contained as many people as
+could sit and stand with semblance of comfort; around the hostess,
+on the landing, pressed a crowd, which grew constantly thicker by
+affluence from the staircase. In the hall below a 'Hungarian band'
+discoursed very loud music. Among recent arrivals appeared a troupe
+of nigger minstrels, engaged to give their exhilarating
+entertainment--if space could be found for them. Bursts of
+laughter from the dining-room announced the success of an American
+joker, who, in return for a substantial cheque, provided amusement
+in fashionable gatherings. A brilliant scene. The air, which
+encouraged perspiration, was rich with many odours; voices
+endeavouring to make themselves audible in colloquy, swelled to a
+tumultuous volume that vied with the Hungarian clangours.
+
+In a corner of the staircase, squeezed behind two very fat women in
+very low dresses, stood Horace Lord. His heated countenance wore a
+look of fretful impatience; he kept rising upon his toes in an
+endeavour to distinguish faces down in the hall. At length his
+expression changed, and with eager eyes he began to force a way for
+himself between the fat women. Not unrewarded with glaring glances,
+and even with severe remarks, he succeeded in gaining the foot of
+the staircase, and came within reach of the persons for whom he had
+been waiting. These were Mrs. Damerel and Fanny French. The elder
+lady exhibited a toilet of opulence corresponding with her mature
+charms; the younger, as became a _debutante_, wore graceful white,
+symbol of her maiden modesty.
+
+'You promised to be early,' said Horace, addressing Mrs. Damerel, but
+regarding Fanny, who stood in conversation with a florid man of
+uncertain age.
+
+'Couldn't get here before, my dear boy.'
+
+'Surely you haven't brought that fellow with you?'
+
+'Hush! You mustn't talk in that way. We met at the door. Mrs. Dane
+knows him. What does it matter?'
+
+Horace moved aside to Fanny. Flushed with excitement, her hair
+adorned with flowers, she looked very pretty.
+
+'Come along,' he said, gripping her hand more violently than he
+intended. 'Let us get upstairs.'
+
+'Oh, you hurt me! Don't be so silly.'
+
+The man beside her gave Horace a friendly nod. His name was
+Mankelow. Horace had met him once or twice of late at Mrs. Damerel's,
+but did not like him, and felt still less disposed to do so now that
+Mankelow was acquainted with Fanny French. He suspected that the two
+were more familiar than Fanny pretended. With little ceremony, he
+interposed himself between the girl and this possible rival.
+
+'Why didn't you make her come earlier?' he said to Fanny, as they
+began a slow upward struggle in the rear of Mrs. Damerel.
+
+'It isn't fashionable to come early.'
+
+'Nonsense! Look at the people here already.'
+
+Fanny threw up her chin, and glanced back to see that Mankelow was
+following. In his vexation, Horace was seized with a cough--a
+cough several times repeated before he could check it.
+
+'Your cold's no better,' said Fanny. 'You oughtn't to have come out
+at night.'
+
+'It _is_ better,' he replied sharply. 'That's the first time I've
+coughed to-day. Do you mean you would rather not have found me
+here?'
+
+'How silly you are! People will hear what you're saying.'
+
+It was Fanny's 'first season,' but not her first 'at home.' Mrs.
+Damerel seemed to be taking an affectionate interest in her, and had
+introduced her to several people. Horace, gratified in the
+beginning, now suffered from jealousy; it tortured him to observe
+Fanny when she talked with men. That her breeding was defective,
+mattered nothing in this composite world of pseudo-elegance. Young
+Lord, who did not lack native intelligence, understood by this time
+that Mrs. Damerel and her friends were far from belonging to a high
+order of society; he saw vulgarity rampant in every drawing-room to
+which he was admitted, and occasionally heard things which startled
+his suburban prejudices. But Fanny, in her wild enjoyment of these
+novel splendours, appeared to lose all self-control. She flirted
+outrageously, and before his very eyes. If he reproached her, she
+laughed at him; if he threatened to free himself, she returned a
+look which impudently bade him try. Horace had all her faults by
+heart, and no longer tried to think that he respected her, or that,
+if he married such a girl, his life could possibly be a happy one;
+but she still played upon his passions, and at her beck he followed
+like a dog.
+
+The hostess, Mrs. Dane, a woman who looked as if she had once been
+superior to the kind of life she now led, welcomed him with peculiar
+warmth, and in a quick confidential voice bade him keep near her for
+a few minutes.
+
+'There's some one I want to introduce you to--some one I'm sure
+you will like to know.'
+
+Obeying her, he soon lost sight of Fanny; but Mrs. Dane continued to
+talk, at intervals, in such a flattering tone, that his turbid
+emotions were soothed. He had heard of the Chittles? No? They were
+very old friends of hers, said Mrs. Dane, and she particularly wanted
+him to know them. Ah, here they came; mother and daughter. Horace
+observed them. Mrs. Chittle was a frail, worn, nervous woman, who
+must once have been comely; her daughter, a girl of two-and-twenty,
+had a pale, thin face of much sweetness and gentleness. They seemed
+by no means at home in this company; but Mrs. Chittle, when she
+conversed, assumed a vivacious air; the daughter, trying to follow
+her example, strove vainly against an excessive bashfulness, and
+seldom raised her eyes. Why he should be expected to pay special
+attention to these people, Horace was at a loss to understand; but
+Mrs. Chittle attached herself to him, and soon led him into familiar
+dialogue. He learnt from her that they had lived for two or three
+years in a very quiet country place; they had come up for the
+season, but did not know many people. She spoke of her daughter, who
+stood just out of earshot,--her eyes cast down, on her face a sad
+fixed smile,--and said that it had been necessary almost to force
+her into society. 'She loves the country, and is so fond of books;
+but at her age it's really a shame to live like a nun--don't you
+think so, Mr. Lord?' Decidedly it was, said Horace. 'I'm doing my
+best,' pursued Mrs. Chittle, 'to cure her of her shyness. She is
+really afraid of people--and it's such a pity. She says that the
+things people talk about don't interest her; but _all_ people are
+not frivolous--are they, Mr. Lord?' Horace hoped not; and presently
+out of mere good-nature he tried to converse with the young lady in
+a way that should neither alarm her shyness nor prove distasteful to
+her intelligence. But with very little success. From time to time
+the girl glanced at him with strange timidity, yet seemed quite
+willing to listen as long as he chose to talk.
+
+Fanny, being at a considerable distance from home, was to return to
+the boarding-house where her chaperon now lived, and have a room
+there for the night. Horace disliked this arrangement, for the
+objectionable Mankelow lived in the same house. When he was able to
+get speech with Fanny, he tried to persuade her to go with him all
+the way home to Camberwell in a cab. Miss. French would not listen to
+the suggestion.
+
+'Who ever heard of such a thing? It wouldn't be proper.'
+
+'Proper! Oh, I like that!' he replied, with scathing irony.
+
+'You can either like it or not. Mrs. Damerel wouldn't dream of
+allowing it. I think she's quite as good a judge of propriety as you
+are.'
+
+They were in a corner of the dining-room. Fanny, having supped much
+to her satisfaction, had a high colour, and treated her lover with
+more than usual insolence. Horace had eaten little, but had not
+refrained from beverages; he was disposed to assert himself.
+
+'It seems to me that we ought to have an understanding. You never do
+as I wish in a single thing. What do you mean by it?'
+
+'Oh, if you're going to be nasty--'
+
+She made the gesture of a servant-girl who quarrels with her young
+man at the street-corner.
+
+'I can't stand the kind of treatment you've given me lately,' said
+Horace, with muffled anger.
+
+'I've told you I shall do just as I like.'
+
+'Very well. That's as much as to say that you care nothing about me.
+I'm not going to be the slave of a girl who has no sense of honour
+--not even of decency. If you wish me to speak to you again you
+must speak first.'
+
+And he left her, Fanny laughing scornfully.
+
+It drew towards one o'clock when, having exhausted the delights of
+the evening, and being in a decidedly limp condition, Mrs. Damerel
+and her protegee drove home. Fanny said nothing of what had passed
+between her and Horace. The elder lady, after keeping silence for
+half the drive, spoke at length in a tone of indulgent playfulness.
+
+'So you talked a good deal with Mr. Mankelow?'
+
+'Not for long. Now and then. He took me down to supper--the first
+time.'
+
+'I'm afraid somebody will be a little jealous. I shall get into
+trouble. I didn't foresee this.'
+
+'Somebody must treat me in a reasonable way,' Fanny answered, with a
+dry laugh.
+
+'I'm quite sure he will,' said Mrs. Damerel suavely. 'But I feel
+myself a little responsible, you know. Let me put you on your guard
+against Mr. Mankelow. I'm afraid he's rather a dangerous man. I have
+heard rather alarming stories about him. You see he's very rich, and
+very rich men, if they're rather handsome as well, say and do things
+--you understand?'
+
+'Is he really very rich?'
+
+'Well, several thousands a year, and a prospect of more when
+relatives die. I don't mean to say that he is a bad man. He belongs
+to a very good family, and I believe him perfectly honourable. He
+would never do any one any harm--or, if he happened to, without
+meaning it, I'm quite sure he'd repair it in the honourable way.'
+
+'You said he was dangerous--'
+
+'To a young lady who is already engaged. Confess that you think him
+rather good-looking.'
+
+Having inflamed the girl's imagination, Mrs. Damerel presently
+dropped the subject, and fell again into weary silence.
+
+At noon of the next day she received a call from Horace, who found
+her over tea and toast in her private sitting-room. The young man
+looked bilious; he coughed, too, and said that he must have caught
+fresh cold last night.
+
+'That house was like an oven. I won't go to any more such places.
+That isn't my idea of enjoying myself.'
+
+Mrs. Damerel examined him with affectionate solicitude, and reflected
+before speaking.
+
+'Haven't you been living rather fast lately?'
+
+He avoided her eyes.
+
+'Not at all.'
+
+'Quite sure? How much money have you spent this last month?'
+
+'Not much.'
+
+By careful interrogation--the caressing notes of her voice seemed
+to convey genuine feeling--Mrs. Damerel elicited the fact that he
+had spent not less than fifty pounds in a few weeks. She looked very
+grave.
+
+'What would our little Fanny say to this?'
+
+'I don't care what she would say.'
+
+And he unburdened himself of his complaints against the frivolous
+charmer, Mrs. Damerel listening with a compassionate smile.
+
+'I'm afraid it's all too true, dear boy. But didn't I warn you?'
+
+'You have made her worse. And I more than half believe you have
+purposely put her in the way of that fellow Mankelow. Now I tell you
+plainly'--his voice quivered--'if I lose her, I'll raise all the
+money I can and play the very devil.'
+
+'Hush! no naughty words! Let us talk about something else till you
+are quieter.--What did you think of Mrs. Chittle?'
+
+'I thought nothing of her, good or bad.'
+
+'Of her daughter, then. Isn't she a sweet, quiet girl? Do you know
+that she is rich? It's perfectly true. Mrs. Chittle is the widow of a
+man who made a big fortune out of a kind of imitation velvet. It
+sold only for a few years, then something else drove it out of the
+market; but the money was made. I know all about it from Mrs. Dane.'
+
+'It's nothing to me,' said Horace peevishly.
+
+But Mrs. Damerel continued:
+
+'The poor girl has been very unfortunate. In the last year of her
+father's life they lived in good style, town-house and
+country-house. And she fell in love with somebody who--who treated
+her badly; broke it off, in fact, just before the wedding. She had a
+bad illness, and since then she has lived as her mother told you.'
+
+'How do you know she told me?'
+
+'I--oh, I took it for granted. She said you had had a long talk.
+You can see, of course, that they're not ordinary people. Didn't
+Winifred--her name is Winifred--strike you as very refined and
+lady-like?'
+
+'She hardly spoke half-a-dozen words.'
+
+'That's her nervousness. She has quite got out of the habit of
+society. But she's very clever, and so good. I want you to see more
+of her. If she comes here to tea, will you--just to please me--
+look in for half-an-hour?'
+
+She bent her head aside, wistfully. Horace vouchsafed no reply.
+
+'Dear boy, I know very well what a disappointment you are suffering.
+Why not be quite open with me? Though I'm only a tiresome old aunt,
+I feel every bit as anxious for your happiness as if I were your
+mother--I do indeed, Horace. You believe me, don't you?'
+
+'You have been very kind, in many ways. But you've done harm to
+Fanny--'
+
+'No harm whatever, Horace--believe me. I have only given her an
+opportunity of showing what she really is. You see now that she
+thinks of nothing at all but money and selfish pleasures. Compare
+her, my dear, with such a girl as Winifred Chittle. I only mean--
+just to show you the difference between a lady and such a girl as
+Fanny. She has treated you abominably, my poor boy. And what would
+she bring you? Not that I wish you to marry for money. I have seen
+too much of the world to be so foolish, so wicked. But when there
+_are_ sweet, clever, lady-like girls, with large incomes--! And a
+handsome boy like you! You may blush, but there's no harm in telling
+the truth. You are far too modest. You don't know how you look in
+the eyes of an affectionate, thoughtful girl--like Winifred, for
+instance. It's dreadful to think of you throwing yourself away! My
+dear, it may sound shocking to you, but Fanny French isn't the sort
+of girl that men _marry_.'
+
+Horace showed himself startled.
+
+'You are so young,' pursued the mature lady, with an indulgent
+smile. 'You need the advice of some one who knows the world. In
+years to come, you will feel very grateful to me. Now don't let us
+talk any more of that, just now; but tell me something about Nancy.
+How much longer does she mean to stay in Cornwall?'
+
+He answered absently.
+
+'She talks of another month or two.'
+
+'But what have her guardians to say to that? Why, she has been away
+for nearly half a year. How can that be called living at the old
+house?'
+
+'It's no business of mine.'
+
+'Nor of mine, you mean to say. Still, it does seem rather strange. I
+suppose she is quite to be trusted?'
+
+'Trusted? What harm can come to her? She's keeping out of Sam
+Barmby's way, that's all. I believe he plagued her to marry him. A
+nice husband for Nancy!'
+
+'I wish we had taken to each other,' said Mrs. Damerel musingly. 'I
+think she was a little jealous of the attention I had paid to _you_.
+But perhaps we shall do better some day. And I'm quite content so
+long as _you_ care a little for me, dear boy. You'll never give me
+up, will you?'
+
+It was asked with unusual show of feeling; she leaned forward, her
+eyes fixed tenderly upon the boy's face.
+
+'You would never let a Fanny French come between us, Horace dear?'
+
+'I only wish you hadn't brought her among your friends.'
+
+'Some day you will be glad of what I did. Whatever happens, I am
+your best friend--the best and truest friend you will ever have.
+You will know it some day.'
+
+The voice impressed Horace, its emotion was so true. Several times
+through the day he recalled and thought of it. As yet he had felt
+nothing like affection for Mrs. Damerel, but before their next
+meeting an impulse he did not try to account for caused him to write
+her a letter--simply to assure her that he was not ungrateful for
+her kindness. The reply that came in a few hours surprised and
+touched him, for it repeated in yet warmer words all she had spoken.
+'Let me be in the place of a mother to you, dear Horace. Think of me
+as if I were your mother. If I were your mother indeed, I could not
+love you more.' He mused over this, and received from it a sense of
+comfort which was quite new to him.
+
+All through the winter he had been living as a gentleman of assured
+independence. This was managed very simply. Acting on Mrs. Damerel's
+counsel he insured his life, and straightaway used the policy as
+security for a loan of five hundred pounds from a friend of Mrs.
+Damerel's. The insurance itself was not effected without a
+disagreeable little episode. As a result of the medical examination,
+Horace learnt, greatly to his surprise, that he would have to pay a
+premium somewhat higher than the ordinary. Unpleasant questions were
+asked: Was he quite sure that he knew of no case of consumption in
+his family? Quite sure, he answered stoutly, and sincerely. Why? Did
+the doctor think _him_ consumptive? Oh dear no, but--a slight
+constitutional weakness. In fine, the higher premium must be
+exacted. He paid it with the indifference of his years, but said
+nothing to Mrs. Damerel.
+
+And thereupon began the sowing of wild oats. At two-and-twenty,
+after domestic restraint and occupations that he detested, he was
+let loose upon life. Five hundred pounds seemed to him practically
+inexhaustible. He did not wish to indulge in great extravagance;
+merely to see and to taste the world.
+
+Ah, the rapture of those first nights, when he revelled amid the
+tumult of London, pursuing joy with a pocket full of sovereigns!
+Theatres, music-halls, restaurants and public-houses--he had seen
+so little of these things, that they excited him as they do a lad
+fresh from the country. He drew the line nowhere. Love of a worthy
+woman tells for chastity even in the young and the sensual; love of
+a Fanny French merely debauches the mind and inflames the passions.
+Secure in his paganism, Horace followed where the lures of London
+beckoned him; he knew not reproach of conscience; shame offered but
+thin resistance to his boiling blood. By a miracle he had as yet
+escaped worse damage to health than a severe cold, caught one night
+after heroic drinking. That laid him by the heels for a time, and
+the cough still clung to him.
+
+In less than two years he would command seven thousand pounds, and a
+share in the business now conducted by Samuel Barmby. What need to
+stint himself whilst he felt able to enjoy life? If Fanny deceived
+him, were there not, after all, other and better Fannys to be won by
+his money? For it was a result of this girl's worthlessness that
+Horace, in most things so ingenuous, had come to regard women with
+unconscious cynicism. He did not think he could be loved for his own
+sake, but he believed that, at any time, the show of love, perhaps
+its ultimate sincerity, might be won by display of cash.
+
+Midway in the month of May he again caught a severe cold, and was
+confined to the house for nearly three weeks. Mrs. Damerel, who
+nursed him well and tenderly, proposed that he should go down for
+change of air to Falmouth. He wrote to Nancy, asking whether she
+would care to see him. A prompt reply informed him that his sister
+was on the point of returning to London, so that he had better
+choose some nearer seaside resort.
+
+He went to Hastings for a few days, but wearied of the place, and
+came back to his London excitements. Nancy, however, had not yet
+returned; nor did she until the beginning of July.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 4
+
+
+
+
+This winter saw the establishment of the South London Fashionable
+Dress Supply Association--the name finally selected by Beatrice
+French and her advisers. It was an undertaking shrewdly conceived,
+skilfully planned, and energetically set going. Beatrice knew the
+public to which her advertisements appealed; she understood exactly
+the baits that would prove irresistible to its folly and greed. In
+respect that it was a public of average mortals, it would believe
+that business might be conducted to the sole advantage of the
+customer. In respect that it consisted of women, it would give eager
+attention to a scheme that permitted each customer to spend her
+money, and yet to have it. In respect that it consisted of ignorant
+and pretentious women, this public could be counted upon to deceive
+itself in the service of its own vanity, and maintain against all
+opposition that the garments obtained on this soothing system were
+supremely good and fashionable.
+
+On a basis of assumptions such as these, there was every possibility
+of profitable commerce without any approach to technical fraud.
+
+By means of the familiar 'goose-club,' licensed victuallers make
+themselves the bankers of people who are too weak-minded to save
+their own money until they wish to spend it, and who are quite
+content to receive in ultimate return goods worth something less
+than half the deposit. By means of the familiar teapot, grocers
+persuade their customers that an excellent trade can be done by
+giving away the whole profit on each transaction. Beatrice French,
+an observant young woman, with a head for figures, had often noted
+and reflected upon these two egregious illustrations of human
+absurdity. Her dressmaking enterprise assimilated the features of
+both, and added novel devices that sprang from her own fruitful
+brain. The 'Fashion Club,' a wheel within a wheel, was merely the
+goose-club; strictly a goose-club, for the licensed victualler
+addresses himself to the male of the species. The larger net, cast
+for those who lacked money or a spirit of speculation, caught all
+who, in the realm of grocery, are lured by the teapot. Every
+sovereign spent with the Association carried a bonus, paid not in
+cash but in kind. These startling advantages were made known through
+the medium of hand-bills, leaflets, nicely printed little pamphlets,
+gorgeously designed placards; the publicity department, being in the
+hands of Mr. Luckworth Crewe, of Farringdon Street, was most ably and
+vigorously conducted.
+
+Thanks also to Luckworth Crewe, Beatrice had allied herself with
+partners, who brought to the affair capital, experience, and
+activity. Before Christmas--an important point--the scene of
+operations was ready: a handsome shop, with the new and attractive
+appendages (so-called 'club-room,' refreshment-bar, &c.) which Crewe
+and Beatrice had visioned in their prophetic minds. Before the close
+of the year substantial business had been done, and 1888 opened with
+exhilarating prospects.
+
+The ineptitude of uneducated English women in all that relates to
+their attire is a fact that it boots not to enlarge upon. Beatrice
+French could not be regarded as an exception; for though she
+recognised monstrosities, she very reasonably distrusted her own
+taste in the choice of a garment. For her sisters, monstrosities had
+a distinct charm, and to this class of women belonged all customers
+of the Association who pretended to think for themselves as to
+wherewithal they should be clothed. But women in general came to the
+shop with confessed blankness of mind; beyond the desire to buy
+something that was modish, and to pay for it in a minus quantity,
+they knew, felt, thought nothing whatever. Green or violet, cerulean
+or magenta, all was one to them. In the matter of shape they sought
+merely a confident assurance from articulate man or woman--
+themselves being somewhat less articulate than jay or jackdaw--
+that this or that was 'the feature of the season.' They could not
+distinguish between a becoming garment and one that called for the
+consuming fires of Heaven. It is often assumed as a commonplace that
+women, whatever else they cannot do, may be trusted to make up their
+minds about habiliments. Nothing more false, as Beatrice French was
+abundantly aware. A very large proportion of the servant-keeping
+females in Brixton, Camberwell, and Peckham could not, with any
+confidence, buy a chemise or a pair of stockings; and when it came
+to garments visible, they were lost indeed.
+
+Fanny French began to regret that she had not realised her capital,
+and put it into the Association. Wishing at length to do so, she met
+with a scornful rebuff. Beatrice would have none of her money, but
+told her she might use the shop like any other customer, which of
+course Fanny did.
+
+Mrs. Peachey, meanwhile, kept declaring to both her sisters that they
+must not expect to live henceforth in De Crespigny Park on the old
+nominal terms. Beatrice was on the way to wealth; Fanny moved in
+West End society, under the chaperonage of a rich woman; they ought
+to be ashamed of themselves for not volunteering handsome
+recognition of the benefits they had received beneath their sister's
+roof. But neither Beatrice nor Fanny appeared to see the matter in
+this light. The truth was, that they both had in view a change of
+domicile. The elder desired more comfort and more independence than
+De Crespigny Park could afford her; the younger desired a great many
+things, and flattered herself that a very simple step would put her
+in possession of them.
+
+The master of the house no longer took any interest in the fortunes
+of his sisters-in-law. He would not bid them depart, he would not
+bid them stay, least of all would he demand money from them. Of
+money he had no need, and he was the hapless possessor of a
+characteristic not to be found in any other member of his household
+--natural delicacy.
+
+Arthur Peachey lived only for his child, the little boy, whose newly
+prattling tongue made the sole welcome he expected or cared for on
+his return from a hard day's work. Happily the child had good
+health, but he never left home without dread of perils that might
+befall it in his absence. On the mother he counted not at all; a
+good-tempered cow might with more confidence have been set to watch
+over the little one's safety. The nurse-girl Emma, retained in spite
+of her mistress's malice, still seemed to discharge her duties
+faithfully; but, being mortal, she demanded intervals of leisure
+from time to time, and at such seasons, as Peachey too well knew,
+the child was uncared for. Had his heart been resolute as it was
+tender, he would long ago have carried out a project which haunted
+him at every moment of anger or fear. In the town of Canterbury
+lived a sister of his who for several years had been happily wedded,
+but remained childless. If the worst came to the worst, if his wife
+compelled him to the breaking-up of a home which was no home, this
+married sister would gladly take the little boy into her motherly
+care. He had never dared to propose the step; but Ada might
+perchance give ready assent to it, even now. For motherhood she had
+no single qualification but the physical. Before her child's coming
+into the world, she snarled at the restraints it imposed upon her;
+at its birth, she clamoured against nature for the pains she had to
+undergo, and hated her husband because he was the intermediate cause
+of them. The helpless infant gave her no pleasure, touched no
+emotion in her heart, save when she saw it in the nurse's care, and
+received female compliments upon its beauty. She rejected it at
+night because it broke her sleep; in the day, because she could not
+handle it without making it cry. When Peachey remonstrated with her,
+she stared in insolent surprise, and wished that _he_ had had to
+suffer all her hardships of the past year.
+
+Peachey could not be said to have any leisure. On returning from
+business he was involved forthwith in domestic troubles and broils,
+which consumed the dreary evening, and invaded even his sleep. Thus
+it happened that at long intervals he was tempted, instead of going
+home to dinner, to spend a couple of hours at a certain small
+eating-house, a resort of his bachelor days, where he could read the
+newspapers, have a well-cooked chop in quietude, and afterwards, if
+acquaintances were here, play a game of chess. Of course he had to
+shield this modest dissipation with a flat falsehood, alleging to
+his wife that business had kept him late. Thus on an evening of
+June, when the soft air and the mellow sunlight overcame him with a
+longing for rest, he despatched a telegram to De Crespigny Park, and
+strolled quietly about the streets until the hour and his appetite
+pointed him tablewards. The pity of it was that he could not dismiss
+anxieties; he loathed the coward falsehood, and thought more of home
+than of his present freedom. But at least Ada's tongue was silent.
+
+He seated himself in the familiar corner, and turned over
+illustrated papers, whilst his chop hissed on the grid. Ah, if he
+were but unmarried, what a life he might make for himself now that
+the day's labour brought its ample reward! He would have rooms in
+London, and a still, clean lodging somewhere among the lanes and
+fields. His ideals expressed the homeliness of the man. On intellect
+he could not pride himself; his education had been but of the
+'commercial' order; he liked to meditate rather than to read;
+questions of the day concerned him not at all. A weak man, but of
+clean and kindly instincts. In mercantile life he had succeeded by
+virtue of his intensely methodical habits--the characteristic
+which made him suffer so from his wife's indolence, incapacity, and
+vicious ill-humour.
+
+Before his marriage he had thought of women as domestic beings. A
+wife was the genius of home. He knew men who thanked their wives for
+all the prosperity and content that they enjoyed. Others he knew who
+told quite a different tale, but these surely were sorrowful
+exceptions. Nowadays he saw the matter in a light of fuller
+experience. In his rank of life married happiness was a rare thing,
+and the fault could generally be traced to wives who had no sense of
+responsibility, no understanding of household duties, no love of
+simple pleasures, no religion.
+
+Yes, there was the point--no religion. Ada had grown up to regard
+church-going as a sign of respectability, but without a shadow of
+religious faith. Her incredible ignorance of the Bible story, of
+Christian dogmas, often amazed him. Himself a believer, though
+careless in the practice of forms, he was not disturbed by the
+modern tendency to look for morals apart from faith; he had not the
+trouble of reflecting that an ignorant woman is the last creature to
+be moralised by anything but the Christian code; he saw straight
+into the fact--that there was no hope of impressing Ada with ideas
+of goodness, truthfulness, purity, simply because she recognised no
+moral authority.
+
+For such minds no moral authority--merely as a moral authority--
+is or can be valid. Such natures are ruled only by superstition--
+the representative of reasoned faith in nobler beings. Rob them of
+their superstition, and they perish amid all uncleanliness.
+
+Thou shalt not lie--for God consumes a liar in the flames of hell!
+Ada Peachey could lend ear to no admonition short of that. And,
+living when she did, bred as she was, only a John Knox could have
+impressed her with this menace--to be forgotten when the echoes of
+his voice had failed.
+
+He did not enjoy his chop this evening. In the game of chess that
+followed he played idly, with absent thoughts. And before the glow
+of sunset had died from the calm heaven he set out to walk homeward,
+anxious, melancholy.
+
+On approaching the house he suffered, as always, from quickened
+pulse and heart constricted with fear. Until he knew that all was
+well, he looked like a man who anticipates dread calamity. This
+evening, on opening the door, he fell back terror-stricken. In the
+hall stood a police-constable, surrounded by a group of women: Mrs.
+Peachey, her sisters, Emma the nurse-girl, and two other servants.
+
+'Oh, here you are at last!' exclaimed his wife, in a voice exhausted
+with rage. 'You're just in time to see this beast taken off to the
+lock-up. Perhaps you'll believe me now!'
+
+'What is it? What has she done?'
+
+'Stolen money, that's what she's done--your precious Emma! She's
+been at it for a long time; I've told you some one was robbing me.
+So I marked some coins in my purse, and left it in the bedroom
+whilst we were at dinner; and then, when I found half-a-crown gone
+--and it was her evening out, too--I sent for a policeman before
+she knew anything, and we made her turn out her pockets. And there's
+the half-crown! Perhaps you'll believe it this time!'
+
+The girl's face declared her guilt; she had hardly attempted denial.
+Then, with a clamour of furious verbosity, Ada enlightened her
+husband on other points of Emma's behaviour. It was a long story,
+gathered, in the last few minutes, partly from the culprit herself,
+partly from her fellow-servants. Emma had got into the clutches of a
+jewellery tallyman, one of the fellows who sell trinkets to
+servant-girls on the pay-by-instalment system. She had made several
+purchases of gewgaws, and had already paid three or four times their
+value, but was still in debt to the tallyman, who threatened all
+manner of impossible proceedings if she did not make up her arrears.
+Bottomless ignorance and imbecile vanity had been the girl's ruin,
+aided by a grave indiscretion on Peachey's part, of which he was to
+hear presently.
+
+Some one must go to the police-station and make a formal charge. Ada
+would undertake this duty with pious eagerness, enjoying it all the
+more because of loud wailings and entreaties which the girl now
+addressed to her master. Peachey looked at his sisters-in-law, and
+in neither face perceived a compassionate softening. Fanny stood by
+as at a spectacle provided for her amusement, without rancour, but
+equally without pity. Beatrice was contemptuous. What right, said
+her countenance, had a servant-girl to covet jewellery? And how
+pitiable the spirit that prompted to a filching of half-crowns! For
+the criminals of finance, who devastate a thousand homes, Miss
+French had no small admiration; crimes such as the present were mean
+and dirty.
+
+Ada reappeared, hurriedly clad for going forth; but no one had
+fetched a cab. Incensed, she ordered her husband to do so.
+
+'Who are you speaking to?' he replied wrathfully. 'I am not your
+servant.'
+
+Fanny laughed. The policeman, professionally calm, averted a smiling
+face.
+
+'It's nothing to me,' said Mrs. Peachey. 'I'm quite willing to walk.
+Come along, constable.'
+
+Her husband interposed.
+
+'The girl doesn't go from my house until she's properly dressed.' He
+turned to the other servants. 'Please to blow the whistle at the
+door, or get a cab somehow. Emma, go upstairs and put your things
+on.'
+
+'It was about time you behaved like a man,' fell quietly from
+Beatrice.
+
+'You're right.' He looked sternly at the speaker. 'It _is_ time, and
+that you shall all know.'
+
+The culprit, suddenly silent, obeyed his order. The constable went
+out at the front door, and there waited whilst a cab-summoning
+whistle shrilled along De Crespigny Park.
+
+Ada had ascended to the first landing, to make sure that the culprit
+did not escape her. Beatrice and Fanny retired into the
+drawing-room. After a lapse of some ten minutes two cabs rattled up
+to the door from opposite directions, each driver lashing his horse
+to gain the advantage. So nearly were they matched, that with
+difficulty the vehicles avoided a collision. The man who had secured
+a place immediately in front of the doorsteps, waved his whip and
+uttered a shout of insulting triumph; his rival answered with
+volleys of abuse, and drove round as if meditating an assault; it
+was necessary for the policeman to interfere. Whereupon the defeated
+competitor vowed that it was sanguinary hard lines; that for the
+sanguinary whole of this sanguinary day had he waited vainly for a
+sanguinary fare, and but for a sanguinary stumble of his sanguinary
+horse--
+
+Tired of waiting, and suspicious of the delay, Ada went up to the
+room where the servant was supposed to be making ready. It was a
+little room, which served as night-nursery; by the girl's bed stood
+a cot occupied by the child. Ada, exclaiming 'Now, come along!'
+opened the door violently. A candle was burning; the boy, awake but
+silent, sat up in his cot, and looked about with sleepy, yet
+frightened eyes.
+
+'Where are you?'
+
+Emma could not be seen. Astonished and enraged, Ada rushed forward;
+she found the girl lying on the floor, and after bending over her,
+started back with a cry half of alarm, half of disgust.
+
+'Come up here at once!' she screamed down the staircase. 'Come up!
+The wretch has cut her throat!'
+
+There was a rush of feet. Peachey, the first to enter, saw a gash on
+the neck of the insensible girl; in her hand she held a pair of
+scissors.
+
+'I hope you're satisfied,' he said to his wife.
+
+The police-officer, animated by a brisk succession of events such as
+he could not hope for every day, raised the prostrate figure, and
+speedily announced that the wound was not mortal.
+
+'She's fainted, that's all. Tried to do for herself with them
+scissors, and didn't know the way to go about it. We'll get her off
+sharp to the surgeon.'
+
+'It'll be attempted suicide, now, as well as stealing,' cried Ada.
+
+Terrified by the crowd of noisy people, the child began to cry
+loudly. Peachey lifted him out of the cot, wrapped a blanket about
+him, and carried him down to his own bedroom. There, heedless of
+what was going on above, he tried to soothe the little fellow,
+lavishing caresses and tender words.
+
+'My little boy will be good? He'll wait here, quietly, till father
+comes back? Only a few minutes, and father will come back, and sit
+by him. Yes--he shall sleep here, all night--'
+
+Ada burst into the room.
+
+'I should think you'd better go and look after your dear Emma. As if
+I didn't know what's been going on! It's all come out, so you
+needn't tell me any lies. You've been giving her money. The other
+servants knew of it; she confessed it herself. Oh, you're a nice
+sort of man, you are! Men of your sort are always good at preaching
+to other people. You've given her money--what does _that_ mean? I
+suspected it all along. You wouldn't have her sent away; oh no! She
+was so good to the child--and so good to somebody else! A dirty
+servant! I'd choose some one better than that, if I was a man. How
+much has she cost you? As much, no doubt, as one of the swell women
+in Piccadilly Circus--'
+
+Peachey turned upon her, the sweat beading on his ghastly face.
+
+'Go!--Out of this room--or by God I shall do something fearful!
+--Out!'
+
+She backed before him. He seized her by the shoulders, and flung her
+forth, then locked the door. From without she railed at him in the
+language of the gutter and the brothel. Presently her shouts were
+mingled with piercing shrieks; they came from the would-be-suicide,
+who, restored to consciousness, was being carried down for removal
+in the cab. Peachey, looking and feeling like a man whom passion had
+brought within sight of murder, stopped his ears and huddled himself
+against the bedside. The child screamed in terror.
+
+At length came silence. Peachey opened the door, and listened. Below,
+voices sounded in quiet conversation.
+
+'Who is down there?' he called.
+
+'All of us except Ada,' replied Beatrice. 'The policeman said she
+needn't go unless she liked, but she _did_ like.'
+
+'Very well.'
+
+He ran up to the deserted bedroom, carefully gathered together his
+child's day-garments, and brought them down. Then, as well as he
+could, he dressed the boy.
+
+'Is it time to get up?' inquired the little three-year-old,
+astonished at all that was happening, but soothed and amused by the
+thought that his father had turned nurse. 'It isn't light yet.'
+
+'You are going somewhere with father, dear. Somewhere nice.'
+
+The dialogue between them, in sweet broken words such as the child
+had not yet outgrown, and the parent did not wish to abandon for
+common speech, went on until the dressing was completed.
+
+'Now, will my boy show me where his clothes are for going out? His
+cap, and his coat--'
+
+Oh yes, they were up in the nursery; boy would show father--and
+laughed merrily that he knew something father didn't. A few minutes
+more, and the equipment was completed.
+
+'Now wait for me here--only a minute. My boy won't cry, if I leave
+him for a minute?'
+
+'Cry! of course not!' Peachey descended to the drawing-room, closed
+the door behind him, and stood facing his sisters-in-law.
+
+'I want to tell you that I am going away, and taking the child with
+me. Ada needn't expect me back to-night--nor ever. As long as I
+live I will never again be under the same roof with her. You,
+Beatrice, said it was about time I behaved like a man. You were
+right. I've put up long enough with things such as no man ought to
+endure for a day. Tell your sister that she may go on living here,
+if she chooses, for another six months, to the end of the year--
+not longer. She shall be supplied with sufficient money. After
+Christmas she may find a home for herself where she likes; money
+will be paid to her through a lawyer, but from this day I will
+neither speak nor write to her. You two must make your own
+arrangements; you have means enough. You know very well, both of
+you, why I am taking this step; think and say about me what you
+like. I have no time to talk, and so I bid you good-bye.'
+
+They did not seek to detain him, but stood mute whilst he left the
+room.
+
+The little boy, timid and impatient, was at the head of the stairs.
+His father enveloped him warmly in a shawl, and so they went forth.
+It was not long before they met with a vacant cab. Half-an-hour's
+drive brought them to the eating-house where Peachey had had his
+chop that evening, and here he obtained a bedroom for the night.
+
+By eleven o'clock the child slept peacefully. The father, seated at
+a table, was engaged in writing to a solicitor.
+
+At midnight he lay softly down by the child's side, and there, until
+dawn, listened to the low breathing of his innocent little
+bedfellow. Though he could not sleep, it was joy, rather than any
+painful excitement, that kept him wakeful. A great and loathsome
+burden had fallen from him, and in the same moment he had rescued
+his boy out of an atmosphere of hated impurity. At length he could
+respect himself, and for the first time in four long years he looked
+to the future with tranquil hope.
+
+Careless of the frank curiosity with which the people of the house
+regarded him, he went down at seven o'clock, and asked for a railway
+time-table. Having found a convenient train to Canterbury, he
+ordered breakfast for himself and the child to be laid in a private
+room. It was a merry meal. Sunshine of midsummer fell warm and
+bright upon the table; the street below was so full of busy life
+that the little boy must needs have his breakfast by the window,
+where he could eat and look forth at the same time. No such
+delightful holiday had he ever enjoyed. Alone with father, and going
+away by train into wonderful new worlds.
+
+'Is Emma coming?' he asked.
+
+It was significant that he did not speak of his mother.
+
+They drove to the railway station, Peachey no less excited than the
+child. From here he despatched a telegram to his partners, saying
+that he should be absent for a day or two.
+
+Then the train, struggling slowly out of London's welter, through
+the newest outposts of gloom and grime, bore them, hearts
+companioned in love and blamelessness, to the broad sunny meadows
+and the sweet hop-gardens of Kent.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 5
+
+
+
+
+'Serves her jolly well right,' said Beatrice.
+
+'A lot _she'll_ care,' said Fanny. 'I should think myself precious
+lucky. She gets rid of him, and of the kid too, and has as much as
+she wants to live on. It's better than she deserves.--Do you
+believe he's been carrying on with that girl?'
+
+Miss. French laughed contemptuously.
+
+'Not he!'
+
+'Well, there's been a jolly good row to-night, if we never see
+another. We shall all be in the papers!' The prospect had charms for
+Fanny. 'What are you going to do? Live here till Christmas?'
+
+Beatrice was quietly reviewing the situation. She kept silence, and
+her sister also became meditative. Suddenly Fanny inquired:
+
+'What sort of a place is Brussels?'
+
+'Brussels? Why? I know nothing about it. Not much of a place, I
+think; sprouts come from there, don't they?'
+
+'It's a big town,' said the other, 'and a lively sort of place, they
+say.
+
+'Why do you ask me, if you know? What about it?'
+
+As usual when performing the operation which, in her, answered to
+thought, Fanny shuffled with her hands on her waist. At a distance
+from Beatrice she stood still, and said:
+
+'Some one I know is going there. I've a good mind to go too. I want
+to see abroad.'
+
+Her sister asked several searching questions, but Fanny would not
+make known whether the friend was male or female.
+
+'I shouldn't be much surprised,' remarked the woman of business,
+indifferently, 'if you go and make a fool of yourself before long.
+That Mrs. Damerel is up to some game with you; any one could see it
+with half an eye. I suppose it isn't Lord that's going to Brussels?'
+
+Fanny sputtered her disdain.
+
+'If you had any common sense,' pursued her sister, 'you'd stick to
+him; but you haven't. Oh yes, you think you can do better. Very
+well, we shall see. If you find yourself in a hole one of these
+days, don't expect _me_ to pull you out. I wouldn't give you a penny
+to save you from the workhouse.'
+
+'Wait till you're asked. I know where all _your_ money 'll go to.
+And that's into Crewe's pocket. He'll fool you out of all you have.'
+
+Beatrice reddened with wrath. But, unlike the other members of her
+family, she could command her tongue. Fanny found it impossible to
+draw another word from her.
+
+On returning from the police-station, haggard and faint with
+excitement, but supported by the anticipation of fresh attacks upon
+her husband, Ada immediately learnt what had happened. For the first
+moment she could hardly believe it. She rushed upstairs, and saw
+that the child was really gone; then a blind frenzy took hold upon
+her. Alarming and inexplicable sounds drew her sisters from below;
+they found her, armed with something heavy, smashing every breakable
+object in her bedroom--mirrors, toilet-ware, pictures,
+chimney-piece ornaments.
+
+'She's gone mad!' shrieked Fanny. 'She'll kill us!'
+
+'That beast shall pay for it!' yelled Ada, with a frantic blow at
+the dressing-table.
+
+Wanton destruction of property revolted all Beatrice's instincts.
+Courageous enough, she sprang upon the wild animal, and flung her
+down.
+
+Now indeed the last trace of veneer was gone, the last rag of
+pseudo-civilisation was rent off these young women; in physical
+conflict, vilifying each other like the female spawn of Whitechapel,
+they revealed themselves as born--raw material which the mill of
+education is supposed to convert into middle-class ladyhood. As a
+result of being held still by superior strength Ada fell into
+convulsions, foamed at the mouth, her eyes starting from their
+sockets; then she lay as one dead.
+
+'You've killed her,' cried the terrified Fanny.
+
+'No fear. Give me some water to pitch over her.'
+
+With a full jug from another bedroom, she drenched the prostrate
+figure. When Ada came round she was powerless; even her rancorous
+lips could utter only a sound of moaning. The sisters stripped her
+stark naked on the floor, made a show of drying her with towels, and
+tumbled her into bed. Then Beatrice brewed a great jorum of hot
+whisky-punch, and after drinking freely to steady her shaken nerves,
+poured a pint or so down Mrs. Peachey's throat.
+
+'There won't be a funeral just yet,' she remarked, with a laugh.
+'Now we'll have supper; I feel hungry.'
+
+They went to bed at something after midnight. The servants, having
+stolen a bottle of spirits from the cupboard, which Beatrice left
+open, both got drunk, and slept till morning upon the kitchen-floor.
+
+On the morrow, Miss. French, attired as a walking advertisement of
+the South London Fashionable Dress Supply Association, betook
+herself to Farringdon Street for an interview with her commercial
+friend. Crewe was absent, but one of three clerks, who occupied his
+largest room, informed her that it could not be very long before he
+returned, and being so familiar a figure here, she was permitted to
+wait in the agent's sanctum. When the door closed upon her, the
+three young men discussed her character with sprightly freedom.
+Beatrice, the while, splendidly indifferent to the remarks she could
+easily divine, made a rapid examination of loose papers lying on
+Crewe's desk, read several letters, opened several books, and found
+nothing that interested her until, on turning over a slip of paper
+with pencilled figures upon it, she discovered a hotel-bill, the
+heading: Royal Hotel, Falmouth. It was for a day and night's
+entertainment, the debtor 'Mr. Crewe,' the date less than a week gone
+by. This document she considered attentively, her brows knitted, her
+eyes wide. But a sound caused her to drop it upon the desk again.
+Another moment, and Crewe entered.
+
+He looked keenly at her, and less good-humouredly than of wont.
+These persons never shook hands, and indeed dispensed, as a rule,
+with all forms of civility.
+
+'What are you staring at?' asked Crewe bluffly.
+
+'What are _you_ staring at?'
+
+'Nothing, that I know.' He hung up his hat, and sat down. 'I've a
+note to write; wait a minute.'
+
+The note written, and given to a clerk, Crewe seemed to recover
+equanimity. His visitor told him all that happened in De Crespigny
+Park, even to the crudest details, and they laughed together
+uproariously.
+
+'I'm going to take a flat,' Beatrice then informed him. 'Just find
+me something convenient and moderate, will you? A bachelor's flat.'
+
+'What about Fanny?'
+
+'She has something on; I don't know what it is. Talks about going to
+Brussels--with a friend.'
+
+Crewe looked astonished.
+
+'You ought to see after her. I know what the end 'll be. Brussels?
+I've heard of English girls going there, but they don't usually come
+back.'
+
+'What can I do? I'm pretty certain that Damerel woman has a game on
+hand. She doesn't want Fanny to marry her nephew--if Lord _is_ her
+nephew. She wants his money, that's my idea.'
+
+'Mine, too,' remarked the other quietly. 'Look here, old chap, it's
+your duty to look after your little damned fool of a sister; I tell
+you that plainly. I shan't think well of you if you don't.'
+
+Beatrice displayed eagerness to defend herself. She had done her
+best; Fanny scorned all advice, and could not be held against her
+will.
+
+'Has she given up all thought of Lord?'
+
+'I'm not sure, but I think so. And it looks as if he was going his
+own way, and didn't care much. He never writes to her now. Of course
+it's that woman's doing.'
+
+Crewe reflected.
+
+'I shall have to look into Mrs. Damerel's affairs. Might be worth
+while. Where is she living?' He made a note of the information.
+'Well, anything else to tell me?'
+
+Beatrice spoke of business matters, then asked him if he had been
+out of town lately. The question sounded rather abrupt, and caused
+Crewe to regard her with an expression she privately interpreted.
+
+'A few short runs. Nowhere particular.'
+
+'Oh?--Not been down into Cornwall?'
+
+He lost his temper.
+
+'What are you after? What business is it of yours? If you're going
+to spy on me, I'll soon let you know that I won't stand that kind of
+thing.'
+
+'Don't disturb yourself,' said Beatrice, with a cold smile. 'I
+haven't been spying, and you can go where you like for anything I
+care. I guessed you _had_ been down there, that's all.'
+
+Crewe kept silence, his look betraying uneasiness as well as anger.
+Speaking at length, he fixed her with keen eyes.
+
+'If it's any satisfaction to you, you're welcome to know that I have
+been into Cornwall--and to Falmouth.'
+
+Beatrice merely nodded, and still he searched her face.
+
+'Just answer me a plain question, old chap. Come, there's no
+nonsense between us; we know each other--eh?'
+
+'Oh yes, we know each other,' Miss. French answered, her lips
+puckering a little.
+
+'What do you know about _her_? What has she been doing all this
+time?'
+
+Beatrice laughed.
+
+'I know just as little about her as I care.'
+
+'You care a good deal more than you'll confess. I wouldn't be up to
+women's tricks, if I were you.'
+
+She revolted.
+
+'After all, I suppose I _am_ a woman?'
+
+'Well, I suppose so.' Crewe grinned good-naturedly. 'But that isn't
+in the terms of our partnership, you remember. You can be a
+reasonable fellow enough, when you like. Just tell me the truth.
+What do you know about Nancy Lord?' Beatrice assumed an air of
+mystery.
+
+'I'll tell you that, if you tell me what it is you want of her. Is
+it her money?'
+
+'Her money be damned!'
+
+'It's herself, then.'
+
+'And what if it is? What have _you_ to say to it?'
+
+Her eyes fell, and she muttered 'Nothing.'
+
+'Just bear that in mind, then. And now that I've answered your
+question, answer mine. What have you heard about her? Or what have
+you found out?'
+
+She raised her eyes again and again, but in a mocking voice said,
+'Nothing.'
+
+'You're telling me a lie.'
+
+'You're a brute to say so!'
+
+They exchanged fierce glances, but could not meet each other's eyes
+steadily. Crewe, mastering his irritation, said with a careless
+laugh:
+
+'All right, I believe you. Didn't mean to offend you, old chap.'
+
+'I won't be called that!' She was trembling with stormy emotions.
+'You shall treat me decently.'
+
+'Very well. Old girl, then.'
+
+'I'm a good deal younger than you are. And I'm a good deal better
+than you, in every way. I'm a lady, at all events, and you can't
+pretend to be a gentleman. You're a rough, common fellow--'
+
+'Holloa! Holloa! Draw it mild.'
+
+He was startled, and in some degree abashed; his eyes, travelling to
+the door, indicated a fear that this singular business-colloquy
+might be overheard. But Beatrice went on, without subduing her
+voice, and, having delivered herself of much plain language, walked
+from the room, leaving the door open behind her.
+
+As a rule, she returned from her day's occupations to dinner, in De
+Crespigny Park, at seven o'clock. To-day her arrival at home was
+considerably later. About three o'clock she made a call at the
+boarding-house where Mrs. Damerel lived, but was disappointed in her
+wish to see that lady, who would not be in before the hour of
+dining. She called again at seven, and Mrs. Damerel received her very
+graciously. It was the first time they had met. Beatrice, in no mood
+for polite grimaces, at once disclosed the object of her visit; she
+wanted to talk about Fanny; did Mrs. Damerel know anything of a
+proposed journey to Brussels? The lady professed utter ignorance of
+any such intention on Fanny's part. She had not seen Fanny for at
+least a fortnight.
+
+'How can that be? She told me she dined here last Sunday.'
+
+'That's very strange,' answered Mrs. Damerel, with suave concern.
+'She certainly did not dine here.'
+
+'And the Sunday before?'
+
+'Your sister has dined here only once, Miss. French, and that was
+three months ago.'
+
+'Then I don't understand it. Haven't you been taking her to
+theatres, and parties, and that kind of thing?'
+
+'I have taken her once to a theatre, and twice to evening "at
+homes." The last time we were together anywhere was at Mrs. Dane's,
+about the middle of May. Since then I have seen her hardly at all.
+I'm very much afraid you are under some misconception. Thinking your
+sister was engaged to marry my nephew, Mr. Lord, I naturally desired
+to offer her a few friendly attentions. But it came out, at length,
+that she did not regard the engagement as serious. I was obliged to
+speak gravely to my young nephew, and beg him to consider his
+position. There is the second dinner-bell, but I am quite at your
+service, Miss. French, if you wish to question me further.'
+
+Beatrice was much inclined to resent this tone, and to use her
+vernacular. But it seemed only too probable that Fanny had been
+deceiving her, and, as she really feared for the girl's safety,
+prudence bade her be civil with Mrs. Damerel.
+
+'Can't you help me to find out what Fanny has really been doing?'
+
+'I'm afraid it's quite out of my power. She never confided in me,
+and it is so long since I have seen anything of her at all.'
+
+'It's best to speak plainly,' said Beatrice, in her business tone.
+'Can't you think of any man, in the society you introduced her to,
+who may be trying to lead her astray?'
+
+'Really, Miss. French! The society in which I move is not what you
+seem to suppose. If your sister is in any danger of _that_ kind, you
+must make your inquiries elsewhere--in an inferior rank of life.'
+
+Beatrice no longer contained herself.
+
+'Perhaps I know rather more than you think about your kind of
+society. There's not much to choose between the men and the women.'
+
+'Miss. French, I believe you reside in a part of London called
+Camberwell. And I believe you are engaged in some kind of millinery
+business. This excuses you for ill-manners. All the same, I must beg
+you to relieve me of your presence.' She rang the bell. 'Good
+evening.'
+
+'I dare say we shall see each other again,' replied Beatrice, with
+an insulting laugh. 'I heard some one say to-day that it might be as
+well to find out _who you really are_. And if any harm comes to
+Fanny, I shall take a little trouble about that inquiry myself.'
+
+Mrs. Damerel changed colour, but no movement betrayed anxiety. In the
+attitude of dignified disdain, she kept her eyes on a point above
+Miss. French's head, and stood so until the plebeian adversary had
+withdrawn.
+
+Then she sat down, and for a few minutes communed with herself. In
+the end, instead of going to dinner, she rang her bell again. A
+servant appeared.
+
+'Is Mr. Mankelow in the dining-room?'
+
+'Yes, ma'am.'
+
+'Ask him to be kind enough to come here for a moment.'
+
+With little delay, Mr. Mankelow answered the summons which called him
+from his soup. He wore evening dress; his thin hair was parted down
+the middle; his smooth-shaven and rather florid face expressed the
+annoyance of a hungry man at so unseasonable an interruption.
+
+'Do forgive me,' began Mrs. Damerel, in a pathetic falsetto. 'I have
+been so upset, I felt obliged to seek advice immediately, and no one
+seemed so likely to be of help to me as you--a man of the world.
+Would you believe that a sister of that silly little Miss. French has
+just been here--a downright. virago--declaring that the girl has
+been led astray, and that I am responsible for it? Can you imagine
+such impertinence? She has fibbed shockingly to the people at home
+--told them she was constantly here with me in the evenings, when
+she must have been--who knows where. It will teach me to meddle
+again with girls of that class.'
+
+Mankelow stood with his hands behind him, and legs apart, regarding
+the speaker with a comically puzzled air.
+
+'My dear Mrs. Damerel,'--he had a thick, military sort of voice,--
+'why in the world should this interpose between us and dinner?
+Afterwards, we might--'
+
+'But I am really anxious about the silly little creature. It would
+be extremely disagreeable if my name got mixed up in a scandal of
+any kind. You remember my telling you that she didn't belong exactly
+to the working-class. She has even a little property of her own; and
+I shouldn't wonder if she has friends who might make a disturbance
+if her--her vagaries could be in any way connected with me and my
+circle. Something was mentioned about Brussels. She has been
+chattering about some one who wanted to take her to Brussels--'
+
+The listener arched his eyebrows more and more.
+
+'What _can_ it matter to you?'
+
+'To be sure, I have no acquaintance with any one who could do such
+things--'
+
+'Why, of course not. And even if you had, I understand that the girl
+is long out of her teens--'
+
+'Long since.'
+
+'Then it's her own affair--and that of the man who cares to
+purchase such amusement. By-the-bye, it happens rather oddly that I
+myself have to run over to Brussels on business; but I trust'--he
+laughed--'that my years and my character--'
+
+'Oh, Mr. Mankelow, absurd! It's probably some commercial traveller,
+or man of that sort, don't you think? The one thing I _do_ hope is,
+that, if anything like this happens, the girl will somehow make it
+clear to her friends that _I_ had no knowledge whatever of what was
+going on. But that can hardly be hoped, I fear!--'
+
+Their eyes crossed; they stood for a moment perusing vacancy.
+
+'Yes, I think it might be hoped,' said Mankelow airily. 'She seemed
+to me a rather reckless sort of young person. It's highly probable
+she will write letters which release every one but herself from
+responsibility. In fact'--he gazed at her with a cynical smile--
+'my knowledge of human nature disposes me to assure you that she
+certainly will. She might even, I should say, write a letter to
+_you_--perhaps a cheeky sort of letter, which would at once set
+your mind at ease.'
+
+'Oh, if you really take that view--'
+
+'I do indeed. Don't you think we might dismiss the matter, and
+dine?'
+
+They did so.
+
+Until noon of to-day, Mrs. Peachey had kept her bed, lying amid the
+wreck wrought by last night's madness. She then felt well enough to
+rise, and after refreshment betook herself by cab to the offices of
+Messrs Ducker, Blunt & Co., manufacturers of disinfectants, where
+she conversed with one of the partners, and learnt that her husband
+had telegraphed his intention to be absent for a day or two. Having,
+with the self-respect which distinguished her, related her story
+from the most calumnious point of view, she went home again to nurse
+her headache and quarrel with Fanny. But Fanny had in the meantime
+left home, and, unaccountable fact, had taken with her a large tin
+box and a dress-basket; heavily packed, said the servants. Her
+direction to the cabman was merely Westminster Bridge, which
+conveyed to Mrs. Peachey no sort of suggestion.
+
+When Beatrice came back, and learnt this event, she went apart in
+wrathful gloom. Ada could not engage her in a quarrel. It was a
+wretchedly dull evening.
+
+They talked next morning, and Beatrice announced her purpose of
+going to live by herself as soon as possible. But she would not
+quarrel. Left alone, Ada prepared to visit certain of their
+relatives in different parts of London, to spread among them the
+news of her husband's infamy.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 6
+
+
+
+
+When Mary Woodruff unlocked the house-door and entered the little
+hall, it smelt and felt as though the damp and sooty fogs of winter
+still lingered here, untouched by the July warmth. She came alone,
+and straightway spent several hours in characteristic activity--
+airing, cleaning, brightening. For a few days there would be no
+servant; Mary, after her long leisure down in Cornwall, enjoyed the
+prospect of doing all the work herself. They had reached London last
+evening, and had slept at a family hotel, where Nancy remained until
+the house was in order for her.
+
+Unhappily, their arrival timed with a change of weather, which
+brought clouds and rain. The glories of an unshadowed sky would have
+little more than availed to support Nancy's courage as she passed
+the creaking little gate and touched the threshold of a home to
+which she returned only on compulsion; gloom overhead, and puddles
+underfoot, tried her spirit sorely. She had a pale face, and thin
+cheeks, and moved with languid step.
+
+Her first glance was at the letter-box.
+
+'Nothing?'
+
+Mary shook her head. During their absence letters had been
+re-addressed by the post-office, and since the notice of return
+nothing had come.
+
+'I'm quite sure a letter has been lost.'
+
+'Yes, it may have been. But there'll be an answer to your last very
+soon.'
+
+'I don't think so. Most likely I shall never hear again.'
+
+And Nancy sat by the window of the front room, looking, as she had
+looked so many a time, at the lime tree opposite and the house
+visible through wet branches. A view unchanged since she could
+remember; recalling all her old ambitions, revolts, pretences, and
+ignorances; recalling her father, who from his grave still oppressed
+her living heart.
+
+Somewhere near sounded the wailing shout of a dustman. It was like
+the voice of a soul condemned to purge itself in filth.
+
+'Mary!' She rose up and went to the kitchen. 'I can't live here! It
+will kill me if I have to live in this dreadful place. Why, even you
+have been crying; I can see you have. If _you_ give way, think what
+it must be to me!'
+
+'It's only for a day or two, dear,' answered Mary. 'We shall feel at
+home again very soon. Miss. Morgan will come this evening, and
+perhaps your brother.'
+
+'I must do something. Give me some work.'
+
+Mary could not but regard this as a healthy symptom, and she
+suggested tasks that called for moderate effort. Sick of reading--
+she had read through a whole circulating library in the past six
+months--Nancy bestirred herself about the house; but she avoided
+her father's room.
+
+Horace did not come to-day; a note arrived from him, saying that he
+would call early to-morrow morning. But at tea-time Jessica
+presented herself. She looked less ghostly than half a year ago; the
+grave illness through which she had passed seemed to have been
+helpful to her constitution. Yet she was noticeably changed. In her
+letters Nancy had remarked an excessive simplicity, a sort of
+childishness, very unlike Jessica's previous way of writing; and the
+same peculiarity now appeared in her conversation. By turns she was
+mawkish and sprightly, tearful and giggling. Her dress, formerly
+neglected to the point of untidiness, betrayed a new-born taste for
+fashionable equipment; she suddenly drew attention to it in the
+midst of serious talk, asking with a bashful smirk whether Nancy
+thought it suited her.
+
+'I got it at Miss. French's place--the Association, you know. It's
+really wonderful how cheap things are there. And the very best cut,
+by dressmakers from Paris.'
+
+Nancy wondered, and felt that her diminishing regard for Miss. Morgan
+had suffered a fresh blow.
+
+There was much news to receive and impart. In writing from Falmouth,
+Nancy had referred to the details of her own life with studied
+ambiguity. She regretted having taken Jessica into her confidence,
+and avoided penning a word which, if read by any one but her
+correspondent, would betray the perilous secret. Jessica, after her
+illness, was inclined to resent this extreme caution, which
+irritated her curiosity; but in vain she assured Nancy that there
+was not the least fear of her letters falling into wrong hands. For
+weeks at a time she heard nothing, and then would come a letter,
+long indeed, but without a syllable of the information she desired.
+Near the end of May she received a line or two, 'I have been really
+ill, but am now much better. I shall stay here only a few weeks
+more. Don't be anxious; I am well cared for, and the worst is over.'
+
+She heard the interpretation from Nancy's lips, and laughed and
+cried over it.
+
+'What you must have suffered, my poor dear! And to be separated from
+the little darling! Oh, it's too cruel! You are sure they will be
+kind to it?'
+
+'Mary has every confidence in the woman. And I like the look of her;
+I don't feel uneasy. I shall go there very often, of course.'
+
+'And when is _he_ coming back? He oughtn't to have kept away all
+this time. How unkind!'
+
+'Not at all,' Nancy replied, with sudden reserve. 'He is acting for
+the best. You mustn't ask me about that; you shall know more some
+day.'
+
+Jessica, whose face made legible presentment of her every thought,
+looked disappointed and peevish.
+
+'And you are really going in for the examination again?' Nancy
+asked.
+
+'Oh, of course I am!' answered the other perkily; 'but not till
+summer of next year. I'm not allowed to study much yet; the doctor
+says I might do my brain a serious injury. I read a great deal;
+books that rest the mind--poetry and fiction; of course only the
+very best fiction. I shall soon be able to begin teaching again; but
+I must be very careful. Only an hour or two a day at first, and
+perhaps quite young children.'
+
+Evidently the girl felt a certain pride in what she had undergone.
+Her failure to matriculate was forgotten in the sense that she
+offered a most interesting case of breakdown from undue mental
+exertion. The doctor had declared his astonishment that she held up
+until the examination was over.
+
+'He simply wouldn't believe me when I told him the hours I worked.
+He said I ought to be on my trial for attempted suicide!'
+
+And she laughed with extravagant conceit.
+
+'You have quite made friends with the Barmbys,' said Nancy, eyeing
+her curiously.
+
+'They are very nice people. Of course the girls quite understand
+what a difference there is between themselves and me. I like them
+because they are so modest; they would never think of contradicting
+my opinion about anything.'
+
+'And what about the Prophet?'
+
+'I don't think you ever quite understood him,' Jessica replied, with
+an obvious confusion which perplexed her friend. 'He isn't at all
+the kind of man you thought.'
+
+'No doubt I was wrong,' Nancy hastened to say. 'It was prejudice.
+And you remember that I never had any fault to find with his--his
+character.'
+
+'You disliked him,' said the other sharply. 'And you still dislike
+him. I'm sure you do.'
+
+So plainly did Jessica desire a confirmation of this statement, that
+Nancy allowed herself to be drawn into half avowing a positive
+dislike for Samuel. Whereupon Jessica looked pleased, and tossed her
+head in a singular way.
+
+'I needn't remind you,' fell from Nancy, after a moment of troubled
+reflection, 'how careful you must be in talking about me to the
+Barmbys.'
+
+'Oh, don't have the slightest fear.'
+
+'Weren't you delirious in your illness?'
+
+'I should think I was indeed! For a long time.'
+
+'I hope you said nothing--'
+
+'About you? Oh, not a word; I'm quite sure. I talked all the time
+about my studies. The doctor heard me one day repeating a long bit
+of Virgil. And I kept calling for bits of paper to work out problems
+in Geometrical Progression. Just fancy! I don't think most girls are
+delirious in that way. If I had said anything about you that sounded
+queer, of course mother would have told me afterwards. Oh, it was
+quite an intellectual delirium.'
+
+Had Jessica, since her illness, become an insufferable simpleton? or
+--Nancy wondered--was it she herself who, through experience and
+sorrows, was grown wiser, and saw her friend in a new light? It
+troubled her gravely that the preservation of a secret more than
+ever momentous should depend upon a person with so little sense. The
+girl's departure was a relief; but in the silence that followed upon
+silly talk, she had leisure to contemplate this risk, hitherto
+scarce taken into account. She spoke of it with Mary, the one friend
+to whom her heart went out in absolute trust, from whom she
+concealed but few of her thoughts, and whose moral worth, only
+understood since circumstances compelled her reliance upon it, had
+set before her a new ideal of life. Mary, she well knew, abhorred
+the deceit they were practising, and thought hard things of the man
+who made it a necessity; so it did not surprise her that the devoted
+woman showed no deep concern at a new danger.
+
+'It's more the shame than anything else, that I fear now,' said
+Nancy. 'If I have to support myself and my child, I shall do it.
+How, I don't know; but other women find a way, and I should. If he
+deserts me, I am not such a poor creature as to grieve on that
+account; I should despise him too much even to hate him. But the
+shame of it would be terrible. It's common, vulgar cheating--such
+as you read of in the newspapers--such as people are punished for.
+I never thought of it in that way when he was here. Yet he felt it.
+He spoke of it like that, but I wouldn't listen.'
+
+Mary heard this with interest.
+
+'Did he wish you to give it up?' she asked. 'You never told me
+that.'
+
+'He said he would rather we did. But that was when he had never
+thought of being in want himself. Afterwards--yes, even then he
+spoke in the same way; but what could we do?'
+
+'Don't fear that he will forsake you,' said Mary. 'You will hear
+from him very soon. He knows the right and the wrong, and right will
+be stronger with him in the end.'
+
+'If only I were sure that he has heard of his child's birth. If he
+_has_, and won't even write to me, then he is no man, and it's
+better we should never see each other again.'
+
+She knew the hours of postal delivery, and listened with throbbing
+heart to the double knocks at neighbouring houses. When the last
+postman was gone by, she sat down, sick with disappointment.
+
+At bedtime she said to Mary, 'My little baby is asleep; oh, if I
+could but see it for a moment!' And tears choked her as she turned
+away.
+
+It was more than two months since she had heard from her husband.
+
+At first Tarrant wrote as frequently as he had promised. She learnt
+speedily of his arrival at New York, then that he had reached
+Nassau, the capital of the Bahamas, then that he was with his friend
+Sutherland on the little island amid the coral reefs. Subsequent
+letters, written in buoyant spirits, contained long descriptions of
+the scenery about him, and of the life he led. He expressed a firm
+confidence in Sutherland's enterprises; beyond a doubt, there was no
+end of money to be made by an energetic man; he should report most
+favourably to Mr. Vawdrey, whose co-operation would of course be
+invaluable. For his own part, whether he profited or not from these
+commercial schemes, he had not been mistaken in foreseeing material
+for journalism, even for a book. Yes, he should certainly write a
+book on the Bahamas, if only to expose the monstrous system of
+misgovernment which accounted for the sterility into which these
+islands had fallen. The climate, in winter at all events, was
+superb. Sutherland and he lay about in delicious sunshine, under a
+marvellous sky, smoking excellent cigars, and talking over old
+Oxford days. He quoted Tennyson: 'Larger constellations burning,'
+&c.
+
+At the end of December, when Nancy, according to their agreement,
+began to hope for his return, a letter in a very different tone
+burdened her with dismal doubts. Tarrant had quarrelled with his
+friend. He had discovered that Sutherland was little better than a
+swindler. 'I see that the fellow's professed energy was all sham. He
+is the laziest scamp imaginable; lazier even than his boozing old
+father. He schemes only to get money out of people; and his
+disappointment on finding that _I_ have no money to lose, has shown
+itself at length in very gross forms. I find he is a gambler; there
+has just been a tremendous row between him and an American, whom he
+is said to have cheated at cards. Last year he was for several weeks
+in Mexico City, a place notorious for gambling, and there lost a
+large sum of money that didn't belong to him.' The upshot was that
+he could no longer advise Mr. Vawdrey to have anything to do with
+Sutherland. But he must not leave the Bahamas yet; that would be
+most unwise, as he was daily gathering most valuable information.
+Vawdrey might be induced to lend him a hundred pounds or so. But he
+would write again very soon.
+
+It was the close of January when he dated his next letter. Vawdrey
+had sent him fifty pounds; this, however, was to include the cost of
+his return to England. 'See, then, what I have decided. I shall make
+a hurried tour through the West Indian Islands, then cross to the
+States, and travel by land to New York or Boston, seeing all I can
+afford to on the way. If I have to come home as a steerage
+passenger, never mind; that, too, will be valuable experience.'
+There followed many affectionate phrases, but Nancy's heart remained
+cold.
+
+He wrote next from Washington, after six weeks' silence.
+Difficulties of which he would speak at length in another letter had
+caused him to postpone answering the two letters he had received.
+Nancy must never lose faith in him; his love was unshaken; before
+the birth of her child he would assuredly be back in England. Let
+her address to New York. He was well, but could not pretend to be
+very cheerful. However, courage! He had plans and hopes, of which
+she should soon hear.
+
+After that, Nancy knew nothing of him, save that he was living in
+New York. He wrote two or three times, but briefly, always promising
+details in the next epistle. Then he ceased to correspond. Not even
+the announcement of the child's birth elicited a word from him. One
+subsequent letter had Nancy despatched; this unanswered, she would
+write no more.
+
+She was herself surprised at the calmness with which she faced so
+dreadful a possibility as desertion by the man she had loved and
+married, the father of her baby. It meant, perhaps, that she could
+not believe such fate had really befallen her. Even in Tarrant's
+last short letter sounded a note of kindness, of truthfulness,
+incompatible, it seemed to her, with base cruelty. 'I dreamt of you
+last night, dearest, and woke up with a heart that ached for your
+suffering.' How could a man pen those words, and be meditating
+dastardly behaviour to the woman he addressed? Was he ill, then? or
+had fatal accident befallen him? She feared such explanation only in
+her weakest moments. If, long ago, he could keep silence for six
+weeks at a time, why not now for months? As for the news she had
+sent him--does a man think it important that a little child has
+been born into the world? Likely enough that again he merely
+'postponed' writing. Of course he no longer loved her, say what he
+might; at most he thought of her with a feeling of compassion--not
+strong enough to overcome his dislike of exertion. He would come
+back--when it pleased him.
+
+Nancy would not sully her mind by thinking that he might only return
+when her position made it worth his while. He was not a man of that
+stamp. Simply, he had ceased to care for her; and having no means of
+his own, whilst she was abundantly provided, he yielded to the
+temptation to hold aloof from a woman whose claim upon him grew
+burdensome. Her thoughts admitted no worse accusation than this. Did
+any grave ill befall her; if, for instance, the fact of her marriage
+became known, and she were left helpless; her letter to New York
+would not be disregarded. To reflect thus signified a mental balance
+rare in women, and remarkable in one situated as Nancy was. She
+talked with her companion far less consistently, for talk served to
+relieve the oppression of her heart and mind.
+
+When, next morning, Horace entered the sitting-room, brother and
+sister viewed each other with surprise. Neither was prepared for the
+outward change wrought in both by the past half-year. Nancy looked
+what she in truth had become, a matronly young woman, in uncertain
+health, and possessed by a view of life too grave for her years;
+Horace, no longer a mere lad, exhibited in sunken cheeks and eyes
+bright with an unhappy recklessness, the acquisition of experience
+which corrupts before it can mature. Moving to offer her lips, Nancy
+was checked by the young man's exclamation.
+
+'What on earth has been the matter with you? I never saw any one so
+altered.'
+
+His voice, with its deepened note, and the modification of his very
+accent, due to novel circumstances, checked the hearer's
+affectionate impulse. If not unfeeling, the utterance had nothing
+fraternal. Deeply pained, and no less alarmed by this warning of the
+curiosity her appearance would excite in all who knew her, Nancy
+made a faltering reply.
+
+'Why should you seem astonished? You know very well I have had an
+illness.'
+
+'But what sort of illness? What caused it? You used always to be
+well enough.'
+
+'You had better go and talk to my medical attendant,' said Nancy, in
+a cold, offended voice.
+
+Horace resumed with irritability.
+
+'Isn't it natural for me to ask such questions? You're not a bit
+like yourself. And what did you mean by telling me you were coming
+back at once, when I wanted to join you at Falmouth?'
+
+'I meant to. But after all, I had to stay longer.'
+
+'Oh well, it's nothing to me.'
+
+They had not even shaken hands, and now felt no desire to correct
+the omission, which was at first involuntary. Horace seemed to have
+lost all the amiability of his nature; he looked about him with
+restless, excited eyes.
+
+'Are you in a hurry?' asked his sister, head erect.
+
+'No hurry that I know of.--You haven't heard what's been going
+on?'
+
+'Where?'
+
+'Of course it won't interest you. There's something about you I
+can't understand. Is it father's will that has spoilt your temper,
+and made you behave so strangely?'
+
+'It is not _my_ temper that's spoilt. And as for behaving strangely--.'
+She made an effort to command herself. 'Sit down, Horace, and
+let me know what is the matter with you. Why we should be
+unfriendly, I really can't imagine. I have suffered from ill health,
+that's all. I'm sorry I behaved in that way when you talked of
+coming to Falmouth; it wasn't meant as you seem to think. Tell me
+what you have to tell.'
+
+He could not take a reposeful attitude, but, after struggling with
+some reluctance, began to explain the agitation that beset him.
+
+'Mrs. Damerel has done something I didn't think any woman would be
+capable of. For months she has been trying to ruin Fanny, and now it
+has come--she has succeeded. She made no secret of wanting to
+break things off between her and me, but I never thought her
+plotting could go as far as this. Fanny has run away--gone to the
+Continent with a man Mrs. Damerel introduced to her.'
+
+'Perhaps they are married,' said Nancy, with singular impulsiveness.
+
+'Of course they're not. It's a fellow I knew to be a scoundrel the
+first time I set eyes on him. I warned Fanny against him, and I told
+Mrs. Damerel that I should hold her responsible if any harm came of
+the acquaintance she was encouraging between him and Fanny. She did
+encourage it, though she pretended not to. Her aim was to separate
+me and Fanny--she didn't care how.'
+
+He spoke in a high, vehement note; his cheeks flushed violently, his
+clenched fist quivered at his side.
+
+'How do you know where she is gone?' Nancy asked.
+
+'She as good as told her sister that she was going to Brussels with
+some one. Then one day she disappeared, with her luggage. And that
+fellow--Mankelow's his name--has gone too. He lived in the same
+boarding-house with Mrs. Damerel.'
+
+'That is all the evidence you have?'
+
+'Quite enough,' he replied bitterly.
+
+'It doesn't seem so to me. But suppose you're right, what proof have
+you that Mrs. Damerel had anything to do with it? If she is our
+mother's sister--and you say there can be no doubt of it--I
+won't believe that she could carry out such a hateful plot as this.'
+
+'What does it matter who she is? I would swear fifty times that she
+has done it. You know very well, when you saw her, you disliked her
+at once. You were right in that, and I was wrong.'
+
+'I can't be sure. Perhaps it was she that disliked me, more than I
+did her. For one thing, I don't believe that people make such plots.
+And what plotting was needed? Couldn't any one have told you what a
+girl like Fanny French would do if she lost her head among people of
+a higher class?'
+
+'Then Mrs. Damerel must have foreseen it. That's just what I say. She
+pretended to be a friend to the girl, on purpose to ruin her.'
+
+'Have you accused her of it?'
+
+'Yes, I have.' His eyes flashed. Nancy marvelled at this fire, drawn
+from a gentle nature by what seemed to her so inadequate, so
+contemptible a cause. 'Of course she denied it, and got angry with
+me; but any one could see she was glad of what had happened. There's
+an end between us, at all events. I shall never go to see her again;
+she's a woman who thinks of nothing but money and fashion. I dislike
+her friends, every one of them I've met. I told her that what she
+had done ought to be a punishable crime.'
+
+Nancy reflected, then said quietly:
+
+'Whether you are right or wrong, I don't think you would have got
+any good from her. But will you tell me what you are going to do? I
+told you that I thought borrowing money only to live on it in
+idleness was very foolish.'
+
+Her brother stiffened his neck.
+
+'You must allow me to judge for myself.'
+
+'But have you judged for yourself? Wasn't it by Mrs. Damerel's advice
+that you gave up business?'
+
+'Partly. But I should have done it in any case.'
+
+'Have you any plans?'
+
+'No, I haven't,' he answered. 'You can't expect a man to have plans
+whose life has been thoroughly upset.'
+
+Nancy, reminded of his youthfulness by the tone in which he called
+himself a 'man,' experienced a revival of natural feeling. Though
+revolting against the suggestion that a woman akin to them had been
+guilty of what her brother believed, she was glad to think that
+Fanny French had relinquished all legitimate claim upon him, and
+that his connection with 'smart' society had come to an end. Obvious
+enough were the perils of his situation, and she, as elder sister,
+recognised a duty towards him; she softened her voice, and
+endeavoured to re-establish the confidence of old time. Impossible
+at once, though with resolution she might ultimately succeed.
+Horace, at present, was a mere compound of agitated and inflamed
+senses. The life he had been leading appeared in a vicious
+development of his previously harmless conceit and egoism. All his
+characteristics had turned out, as it were, the seamy side; and
+Nancy with difficulty preserved her patience as he showed point
+after point of perverted disposition. The result of their talk was a
+careless promise from Horace that he would come to Grove Lane not
+seldomer than once a week.
+
+He stayed only an hour, resisting Nancy's endeavour to detain him at
+least for the mid-day meal. To Mary he spoke formally, awkwardly, as
+though unable to accept her position in the house, and then made his
+escape like one driven by an evil spirit.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 7
+
+
+
+
+With the clearing of the sky, Nancy's spirit grew lighter. She went
+about London, and enjoyed it after her long seclusion in the little
+Cornish town; enjoyed, too, her release from manifold restraints and
+perils. Her mental suffering had made the physical harder to bear;
+she was now recovering health of mind and body, and found with
+surprise that life had a new savour, independent of the timorous joy
+born with her child. Strangely, as it seemed to her, she grew
+conscious of a personal freedom not unlike what she had vainly
+desired in the days of petulant girlhood; the sense came only at
+moments, but was real and precious; under its influence she forgot
+everything abnormal in her situation, and--though without
+recognising this significance--knew the exultation of a woman who
+has justified her being.
+
+A day or two of roaming at large gave her an appetite for activity.
+Satisfied that her child was safe and well cared for, she turned her
+eyes upon the life of the world, and wished to take some part in it
+--not the part she had been wont to picture for herself before
+reality supplanted dreams. Horace's example on the one hand, and
+that of Jessica Morgan on the other, helped her to contemn mere
+social excitement and the idle vanity which formerly she styled
+pursuit of culture. Must there not be discoverable, in the world to
+which she had, or could obtain, access, some honest, strenuous
+occupation, which would hold in check her unprofitable thoughts and
+soothe her self-respect?
+
+That her fraud, up to and beyond the crucial point, had escaped
+detection, must be held so wonderful, that she felt justified in an
+assurance of impunity. The narrowest escape of which she was aware
+had befallen only a few weeks ago. On the sixth day after the birth
+of the child, there was brought to her lodgings at Falmouth a note
+addressed to 'Miss. Lord.' Letters bearing this address had arrived
+frequently, and by the people of the house were supposed to be for
+Mary Woodruff, who went by the name of 'Miss. Lord,' Nancy having
+disguised herself as 'Mrs. Woodruff;' but they had always come by
+post, and the present missive must be from some acquaintance
+actually in the town. Nancy could not remember the handwriting.
+Breaking open the envelope as she lay in bed, she saw with alarm the
+signature 'Luckworth Crewe.' He was at Falmouth on business, Crewe
+wrote, and, before leaving London, he had ventured to ask Miss
+Lord's address from her brother, whom he casually met somewhere.
+Would Nancy allow him to see her, were it but for a minute or two?
+Earnestly he besought this favour. He desired nothing more than to
+see Miss. Lord, and to speak with her in the way of an ordinary
+acquaintance. After all this time, she had, he felt sure, forgiven
+his behaviour at their last meeting. Only five minutes of
+conversation--
+
+All seemed lost. Nancy was silent in despair. But Mary faced the
+perilous juncture, and, to all appearances, averted catastrophe. She
+dressed herself, and went straight to the hotel where Crewe had put
+up, and where he awaited an answer. Having made known who she was,
+she delivered a verbal message: Miss. Lord was not well enough to see
+any one to-day, and, in any case, she could not have received Mr
+Crewe; she begged him to pardon her; before long, they might perhaps
+meet in London, but, for her own part, she wished Mr. Crewe would
+learn to regard her as a stranger. Of course there followed a
+dialogue; and Mary, seeming to speak with all freedom, convinced
+Crewe that his attempt to gain an interview was quite hopeless. She
+gave him much information concerning her mistress--none of it
+false, but all misleading--and in the end had to resist an offer
+of gold coins, pressed upon her as a bribe for her good word with
+Nancy.
+
+The question was--had Crewe been content to leave Falmouth without
+making inquiries of other people? To a man of his experience,
+nothing was easier than such investigation. But, with other grounds
+of anxiety, this had ceased to disturb Nancy's mind. Practically,
+she lived as though all danger were at an end. The task immediately
+before her seemed very simple; she had only to resume the old
+habits, and guard against thoughtless self-betrayal in her everyday
+talk. The chance that any one would discover her habit of visiting a
+certain house at the distance of several miles from Camberwell, was
+too slight for consideration.
+
+She wrote to Mr. Barmby, senior, informing him of her return, in
+improved health, to Grove Lane, and thanking him once more for his
+allowing her to make so long a stay in Cornwall. If he wished to see
+her, she would be at home at any time convenient to him. In a few
+days the old gentleman called, and for an hour or two discoursed
+well-meaning commonplace. He was sorry to observe that she looked a
+trifle pale; in the autumn she must go away again, and to a more
+bracing locality--he would suggest Broadstairs, which had always
+exercised the most beneficial effect upon his own health. Above all,
+he begged her to refrain from excessive study, most deleterious to a
+female constitution. Then he asked questions about Horace, and
+agreed with Nancy that the young man ought to decide upon some new
+pursuit, if he had definitely abandoned the old; lack of steady
+occupation was most deleterious at his age. In short, Mr. Barmby
+rather apologised for his guardianship than sought to make assertion
+of it; and Nancy, by a few feminine devices, won a better opinion
+than she had hitherto enjoyed. On the day following, Samuel Barmby
+and his sisters waited upon Miss. Lord; all three were surprisingly
+solemn, and Samuel talked for the most part of a 'paragraph' he had
+recently read, which stated that the smoke of London, if properly
+utilised, would be worth a vast sum of money. 'The English are a
+wasteful people,' was his conclusion; to which Nancy assented with a
+face as grave as his own.
+
+Not a little to her astonishment, the next day brought her a long
+letter in Samuel's fair commercial hand. It began by assuring her
+that the writer had no intention whatever of troubling her with the
+renewal of a suit so firmly rejected on more than one occasion; he
+wished only to take this opportunity of her return from a long
+absence to express the abiding nature of his devotion, which years
+hence would be unbroken as to-day. He would never distress her by
+unwelcome demonstrations; possibly she might never again hear from
+his lips what he now committed to paper. Enough for him, Samuel, to
+cherish a love which could not but exalt and purify him, which was
+indeed, 'in the words of Shakespeare, "a liberal education."' In
+recompense of his self-command, he only besought that Miss. Lord
+would allow him, from time to time, to look upon her face, and to
+converse with her of intellectual subjects. 'A paper,' he added,
+'which I read last week at our Society, is now being printed--
+solely at the request of friends. The subject is one that may
+interest you, "The Influence of Culture on Morality." I beg that you
+will accept the copy I shall have the pleasure of sending you, and
+that, at some future date, you will honour me with your remarks
+thereon.'
+
+Which epistle Nancy cruelly read aloud to Mary, with a sprightliness
+and sarcastic humour not excelled by her criticisms of 'the Prophet'
+in days gone by. Mary did not quite understand, but she saw in this
+behaviour a proof of the wonderful courage with which Nancy faced
+her troubles.
+
+A week had passed, and no news from America.
+
+'I don't care,' said Nancy. 'Really and truly, I don't care.
+Yesterday I never once thought of it--never once looked for the
+postman. The worst is over now, and he may write or not, as he
+likes.'
+
+Mary felt sure there would be an explanation of such strange
+silence.
+
+'Only illness or death would explain it so as to make me forgive
+him. But he isn't ill. He is alive, and enjoying himself.'
+
+There was no bitterness in her voice. She seemed to have outlived
+all sorrows and anxieties relative to her husband.
+
+Mary suggested that it was always possible to call at Mr. Vawdrey's
+house and make inquiries of Mrs. Baker.
+
+'No, I won't do that. Other women would do it, but I won't. So long
+as I mayn't tell the truth, I should only set them talking about me;
+you know how. I see the use, now, of having a good deal of pride.
+I'm only sorry for those letters I wrote when I wasn't in my senses.
+If he writes now, I shall not answer. He shall know that I am as
+independent as he is. What a blessed thing it is for a woman to have
+money of her own! It's because most women haven't, that they're such
+poor, wretched slaves.'
+
+'If he knew you were in want,' said her companion, 'he would never
+have behaved like this.'
+
+'Who can say?--No, I won't pretend to think worse of him than I
+do. You're quite right. He wouldn't leave his wife to starve. It's
+certain that he hears about me from some one. If I were found out,
+and lost everything, some one would let him know. But I wouldn't
+accept support from him, now. He might provide for his child, but he
+shall never provide for me, come what may--never!'
+
+It was in the evening, after dinner. Nancy had a newspaper, and was
+reading the advertisements that offered miscellaneous employment.
+
+'What do you think this can be?' she asked, looking up after a long
+silence. '"To ladies with leisure. Ladies desiring to add to their
+income by easy and pleasant work should write"'--&c. &c.
+
+'I've no faith in those kind of advertisements,' said Mary.
+
+'No; of course it's rubbish. There's no easy and pleasant way of
+earning money; only silly people expect it. And I don't want
+anything easy or pleasant. I want honest hard work. Not work with my
+hands--I'm not suited for that, but real work, such as lots of
+educated girls are doing. I'm quite willing to pay for learning it;
+most likely I shall have to. Who could I write to for advice?'
+
+They were sitting upstairs, and so did not hear a visitor's knock
+that sounded at the front door. The servant came and announced that
+Miss. French wished to see Miss. Lord.
+
+'Miss. French? Is it the younger Miss. French?'
+
+The girl could not say; she had repeated the name given to her.
+Nancy spoke to her friend in a low voice.
+
+'It may be Fanny. I don't think Beatrice would call, unless it's to
+say something about her sister. She had better come up here, I
+suppose?'
+
+Mary retired, and in a few moments there entered, not Fanny, but
+Beatrice. She was civilly, not cordially, welcomed. Her eye, as she
+spoke the words natural at such a meeting, dwelt with singular
+persistency on Nancy's face.
+
+'You are quite well again?'
+
+'Quite, thank you.'
+
+'It has been a troublesome illness, I'm afraid.'
+
+Nancy hesitated, detecting a peculiarity of look and tone which
+caused her uneasiness.
+
+'I had a sort of low fever--was altogether out of sorts--"below
+par," the doctor said. Are you all well?'
+
+Settling herself comfortably, as if for a long chat, Beatrice
+sketched with some humour the course of recent events in De
+Crespigny Park.
+
+'I'm out of it all, thank goodness. I prefer a quiet life. Then
+there's Fanny. You know all about _her_, I dare say?'
+
+'Nothing at all,' Nancy replied distantly.
+
+'But your brother does. Hasn't he been to see you yet?'
+
+Nancy was in no mood to submit to examination.
+
+'Whatever I may have heard, I know nothing about Fanny's, affairs,
+and, really, they don't concern me.
+
+'I should have thought they might,' rejoined the other, smiling
+absently. 'She has run away from her friends'--a pause--'and is
+living somewhere rather mysteriously'--another pause--'and I
+think it more than likely that she's _married_.'
+
+The listener preserved a face of indifference, though the lines were
+decidedly tense.
+
+'Doesn't that interest you?' asked Beatrice, in the most genial
+tone.
+
+'If it's true,' was the blunt reply.
+
+'You mean, you are glad if she has married somebody else, and not
+your brother?'
+
+'Yes, I am glad of that.'
+
+Beatrice mused, with wrinkles at the corner of her eye. Then, fixing
+Nancy with a very keen look, she said quietly:
+
+'I'm not sure that she's married. But if she isn't, no doubt she
+ought to be.'
+
+On Nancy's part there was a nervous movement, but she said nothing.
+Her face grew rigid.
+
+'I have an idea who the man is,' Miss. French pursued; 'but I can't
+be quite certain. One has heard of similar cases. Even _you_ have,
+no doubt?'
+
+'I don't care to talk about it,' fell mechanically from Nancy's
+lips, which had lost their colour.
+
+'But I've come just for that purpose.'
+
+The eyes of mocking scrutiny would not be resisted. They drew a gaze
+from Nancy, and then a haughty exclamation.
+
+'I don't understand you. Please say whatever you have to say in
+plain words.'
+
+'Don't be angry with me. You were always too ready at taking
+offence. I mean it in quite a friendly way; you can trust me; I'm
+not one of the women that chatter. Don't you think you ought to
+sympathise a little with Fanny? She has gone to Brussels, or
+somewhere about there. But she _might_ have gone down into Cornwall
+--to a place like Falmouth. It was quite far enough off--don't
+you think?'
+
+Nancy was stricken mute, and her countenance would no longer
+disguise what she suffered.
+
+'No need to upset yourself,' pursued the other in smiling
+confidence. 'I mean no harm. I'm curious, that's all; just want to
+know one or two things. We're old friends, and whatever you tell me
+will go no further, depend upon that.'
+
+'What do you mean?'
+
+The words came from lips that moved with difficulty. Beatrice, still
+smiling, bent forward.
+
+'Is it any one that I know?'
+
+'Any one--? Who--?'
+
+'That made it necessary for you to go down into Cornwall, my dear.'
+
+Nancy heaved a sigh, the result of holding her breath too long. She
+half rose, and sat down again. In a torture of flashing thoughts,
+she tried to determine whether Beatrice had any information, or
+spoke conjecturally. Yet she was able to discern that either case
+meant disaster; to have excited the suspicions of such a person, was
+the same as being unmasked; an inquiry at Falmouth, and all would at
+once be known.
+
+No, not all. Not the fact of her marriage; not the name of her
+husband.
+
+Driven to bay by such an opponent, she assumed an air wholly
+unnatural to her--one of cynical effrontery.
+
+'You had better say what you know.'
+
+'All right. Who was the father of the child born not long ago?'
+
+'That's asking a question.'
+
+'And telling what I know at the same time. It saves breath.'
+
+Beatrice laughed; and Nancy, become a mere automaton, laughed too.
+
+'That's more like it,' said Miss. French cheerfully. 'Now we shall
+get on together. It's very shocking, my dear. A person of my strict
+morality hardly knows how to look you in the face. Perhaps you had
+rather I didn't try. Very well. Now tell me all about it,
+comfortably. I have a guess, you know.'
+
+'What is it?'
+
+'Wait a little. I don't want to be laughed at. Is it any one I
+know?'
+
+'You have never seen him, and I dare say never heard of him.'
+
+Beatrice stared incredulously.
+
+'I wouldn't tell fibs, Nancy.'
+
+'I'm telling the truth.'
+
+'It's very queer, then.'
+
+'Who did you think--?'
+
+The speaking automaton, as though by defect of mechanism, stopped
+short.
+
+'Look straight at me. I shouldn't have been surprised to hear that
+it was Luckworth Crewe.'
+
+Nancy's defiant gaze, shame in anguish shielding itself with the
+front of audacity, changed to utter astonishment. The blood rushed
+back into her cheeks; she voiced a smothered exclamation of scorn.
+
+'The father of my child? Luckworth Crewe?'
+
+'I thought it not impossible,' said Beatrice, plainly baffled.
+
+'It was like you.' Nancy gave a hard laugh. 'You judged me by
+yourself. Have another guess!'
+
+Surprised both at the denial, so obviously true, and at the
+unexpected tone with which Nancy was meeting her attack, Miss. French
+sat meditative.
+
+'It's no use guessing,' she said at length, with complete
+good-humour. 'I don't know of any one else.'
+
+'Very well. You can't expect me to tell you.'
+
+'As you please. It's a queer thing; I felt pretty sure. But if
+you're telling the truth, I don't care a rap who the man is.'
+
+'You can rest in peace,' said Nancy, with careless scorn.
+
+'Any way of convincing me, except by saying it?'
+
+'Yes. Wait here a moment.'
+
+She left the room, and returned with the note which Crewe had
+addressed to her from the hotel at Falmouth.
+
+'Read that, and look at the date.'
+
+Beatrice studied the document, and in silence canvassed the
+possibilities of trickery. No; it was genuine evidence. She
+remembered the date of Crewe's journey to Falmouth, and, in this new
+light, could interpret his quarrelsome behaviour after he had
+returned. Only the discovery she had since made inflamed her with a
+suspicion which till then had never entered her mind.
+
+'Of course, you didn't let him see you?'
+
+'Of course not.'.
+
+'All right. Don't suppose I wanted to insult you. I took it for
+granted you were married. Of course it happened before your father's
+death, and his awkward will obliged you to keep it dark?'
+
+Again Nancy was smitten with fear. Deeming Miss. French an
+unscrupulous enemy, she felt that to confess marriage was to abandon
+every hope. Pride appealed to her courage, bade her, here and now,
+have done with the ignoble fraud; but fear proved stronger. She
+could not face exposure, and all that must follow.
+
+She spoke coldly, but with down-dropt eyes.
+
+'I am not married.'
+
+The words cost her little effort. Practically, she had uttered them
+before; her overbold replies were an admission of what, from the
+first, she supposed Beatrice to charge her with--not secret
+wedlock, but secret shame. Beatrice, however, had adopted that line
+of suggestion merely from policy, hoping to sting the proud girl
+into avowal of a legitimate union; she heard the contrary
+declaration with fresh surprise.
+
+'I should never have believed it of Miss. Lord,' was her half
+ingenuous, half sly comment.
+
+Nancy, beginning to realise what she had done, sat with head bent,
+speechless.
+
+'Don't distress yourself,' continued the other. 'Not a soul will
+hear of it from me. If you like to tell me more, you can do it quite
+safely; I'm no blabber, and I'm not a rascal. I should never have
+troubled to make inquiries about you, down yonder, if it hadn't been
+that I suspected Crewe. That's a confession, you know; take it in
+return for yours.'
+
+Nancy was tongue-tied. A full sense of her humiliation had burst
+upon her. She, who always condescended to Miss. French, now lay
+smirched before her feet, an object of vulgar contempt.
+
+'What does it matter?' went on Beatrice genially. 'You've got over
+the worst, and very cleverly. Are you going to marry him when you
+come in for your money?'
+
+'Perhaps--I don't know--'
+
+She faltered, no longer able to mask in impudence, and hardly
+restraining tears. Beatrice ceased to doubt, and could only wonder
+with amusement.
+
+'Why shouldn't we be good friends, Nancy? I tell you, I am no
+rascal. I never thought of making anything out of your secret--not
+I. If it had been Crewe, marriage or no marriage--well, I might
+have shown my temper. I believe I have a pretty rough side to my
+tongue; but I'm a good enough sort if you take me in the right way.
+Of course I shall never rest for wondering who it can be--'
+
+She paused, but Nancy did not look up, did not stir.
+
+'Perhaps you'll tell me some other time. But there's one thing I
+should like to ask about, and it's for your own good that I should
+know it. When Crewe was down there, don't you think he tumbled to
+anything?'
+
+Perplexed by unfamiliar slang, Nancy raised her eyes.
+
+'Found out anything, you mean? I don't know.'
+
+'But you must have been in a jolly fright about it?'
+
+'I gave it very little thought,' replied Nancy, able now to command
+a steady voice, and retiring behind a manner of frigid indifference.
+
+'No? Well, of course I understand that better now I know that you
+can't lose anything. Still, it is to be hoped he didn't go asking
+questions. By-the-bye, you may as well just tell me: he has asked
+you to marry him, hasn't he?'
+
+'Yes.'
+
+Beatrice nodded.
+
+'Doesn't matter. You needn't be afraid, even if he got hold of
+anything. He isn't the kind of man to injure you out of spite.'
+
+'I fear him as little as I fear you.'
+
+'Well, as I've told you, you needn't fear me at all. I like you
+better for this--a good deal better than I used to. If you want
+any help, you know where to turn; I'll do whatever I can for you;
+and I'm in the way of being useful to my friends. You're cut up just
+now; it's natural. I won't bother you any longer. But just remember
+what I've said. If I can be of any service, don't be above making
+use of me.'
+
+Nancy heard without heeding; for an anguish of shame and misery once
+more fell upon her, and seemed to lay waste her soul.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Part V: Compassed Round
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 1
+
+
+
+
+There needed not Mary Woodruff's suggestion to remind Nancy that no
+further away than Champion Hill were people of whom, in extremity,
+she might inquire concerning her husband. At present, even could she
+have entertained the thought, it seemed doubtful whether the Vawdrey
+household knew more of Tarrant's position and purposes than she
+herself; for, only a month ago, Jessica Morgan had called upon the
+girls and had ventured a question about their cousin, whereupon they
+answered that he was in America, but that he had not written for a
+long time. To Mrs. Baker, Jessica did not like to speak on the
+subject, but probably that lady could have answered only as the
+children did.
+
+Once, indeed, a few days after her return, Nancy took the familiar
+walk along Champion Hill, and glanced, in passing, at Mr. Vawdrey's
+house; afterwards, she shunned that region. The memories it revived
+were infinitely painful. She saw herself an immature and foolish
+girl, behaving in a way which, for all its affectation of reserve
+and dignity, no doubt offered to such a man as Lionel Tarrant a hint
+that here, if he chose, he might make a facile conquest. Had he not
+acted upon the hint? It wrung her heart with shame to remember how,
+in those days, she followed the lure of a crude imagination. A year
+ago? Oh, a lifetime!
+
+Unwilling, now, to justify herself with the plea of love; doubtful,
+in very truth, whether her passion merited that name; she looked
+back in the stern spirit of a woman judging another's frailty. What
+treatment could she have anticipated at the hands of her lover save
+that she had received? He married her--it was much; he forsook her
+--it was natural. The truth of which she had caught troublous
+glimpses in the heyday of her folly now stood revealed as pitiless
+condemnation. Tarrant never respected her, never thought of her as a
+woman whom he could seriously woo and wed. She had a certain power
+over his emotions, and not the sensual alone; but his love would not
+endure the test of absence. From the other side of the Atlantic he
+saw her as he had seen her at first, and shrank from returning to
+the bondage which in a weak moment he had accepted.
+
+One night about this time she said to herself:
+
+'I was his mistress, never his wife.'
+
+And all her desperate endeavours to obscure the history of their
+love, to assert herself as worthy to be called wife, mother, had
+fallen fruitless. Those long imploring letters, despatched to
+America from her solitude by the Cornish sea, elicited nothing but a
+word or two which sounded more like pity than affection. Pity does
+not suffice to recall the wandering steps of a man wedded against
+his will.
+
+In her heart, she absolved him of all baseness. The man of ignoble
+thought would have been influenced by her market value as a wife.
+Tarrant, all the more because he was reduced to poverty, would
+resolutely forget the crude advantage of remaining faithful to her.
+
+Herein Nancy proved herself more akin to her father than she had
+ever seemed when Stephen Lord sought eagerly in her character for
+hopeful traits.
+
+The severity of her self-judgment, and the indulgence tempering her
+attitude towards Tarrant, declared a love which had survived its
+phase of youthful passion. But Nancy did not recognise this symptom
+of moral growth. She believed herself to have become indifferent to
+her husband, and only wondered that she did not hate him. Her heart
+seemed to spend all its emotion on the little being to whom she had
+given life--a healthy boy, who already, so she fancied, knew a
+difference between his mother and his nurse, and gurgled a peculiar
+note of contentment when lying in her arms. Whether wife or not, she
+claimed every privilege of motherhood. Had the child been a
+weakling, she could not have known this abounding solace: the defect
+would have reproached her. But from the day of his birth he
+manifested so vigorous a will to live, clung so hungrily to the
+fountain-breast, kicked and clamoured with such irresistible
+self-assertion, that the mother's pride equalled her tenderness. 'My
+own brave boy! My son!' Wonderful new words: honey upon the lips and
+rapture to the ear. She murmured them as though inspired with speech
+never uttered by mortal.
+
+The interval of a day between her journeys to see the child taxed
+her patience; but each visit brought a growth of confidence. No harm
+would befall him: Mary had chosen wisely.
+
+Horace kept aloof and sent no message. When at length she wrote to
+him a letter all of sisterly kindness, there came a stinted reply.
+He said that he was going away for a holiday, and might be absent
+until September. 'Don't bother about me. You shall hear again before
+long. There's just a chance that I may go in for business again,
+with prospect of making money. Particulars when I see you.'
+
+Nancy found this note awaiting her after a day's absence from home,
+and with it another. To her surprise, Mrs. Damerel had written. 'I
+called early this afternoon, wishing particularly to see you. Will
+you please let me know when I should find you at home? It is about
+Horace that I want to speak.' It began with 'My dear Nancy,' and
+ended, 'Yours affectionately.' Glad of the opportunity thus offered,
+she answered at once, making an appointment for the next day.
+
+When Mrs. Damerel came, Nancy was even more struck than at their
+former meeting with her resemblance to Horace. Eyes and lips
+recalled Horace at every moment. This time, the conversation began
+more smoothly. On both sides appeared a disposition to friendliness,
+though Nancy only marked her distrust in the hope of learning more
+about this mysterious relative and of being useful to her brother.
+
+'You have a prejudice against me,' said the visitor, when she had
+inquired concerning Nancy's health. 'It's only natural. I hardly
+seem to you a real relative, I'm afraid--you know so little about
+me; and now Horace has been laying dreadful things to my charge.'
+
+'He thinks you responsible for what has happened to Fanny French,'
+Nancy replied, in an impartial voice.
+
+'Yes, and I assure you he is mistaken. Miss. French deceived him and
+her own people, leading them to think that she was spending her time
+with me, when really she was--who knows where? To you I am quite
+ready to confess that I hoped something might come between her and
+Horace; but as for plotting--really lam not so melodramatic a
+person. All I did in the way of design was to give Horace an
+opportunity of seeing the girl in a new light. You can imagine very
+well, no doubt, how she conducted herself. I quite believe that
+Horace was getting tired and ashamed of her, but then came her
+disappearance, and that made him angry with me.'
+
+Even the voice suggested Horace's tones, especially when softened in
+familiar dialogue. Nancy paid closer attention to the speaker's
+looks and movements than to the matter of what she said. Mrs. Damerel
+might possibly be a well-meaning woman--her peculiarities might
+result from social habits, and not from insincerity; yet Nancy could
+not like her. Everything about her prompted a question and a doubt.
+How old was she? Probably much older than she looked. What was her
+breeding, her education? Probably far less thorough than she would
+have one believe. Was she in good circumstances? Nancy suspected
+that her fashionable and expensive dress signified extravagance and
+vanity rather than wealth.
+
+'I have brought a letter to show you which she has sent me from
+abroad. Read it, and form your own conclusion. Is it the letter of
+an injured innocent?'
+
+A scrawl on foreign note-paper, which ran thus:
+
+DEAR MRS DAMEREL,--Just a word to console you for the loss of my
+society. I have gone to a better world, so dry your tears. If you
+see my masher, tell him I've met with somebody a bit more like a
+man. I should advise him to go to school again and finish his
+education. I won't trouble you to write. Many thanks for the
+kindness you _didn't_ mean to do me.--Yours in the best of spirits
+(I don't mean Cognac),
+
+FANNY (_nee_) FRENCH.
+
+Nancy returned the paper with a look of disgust, saying, 'I didn't
+think she was as bad as that.'
+
+'No more did I. It really gave me a little shock of surprise.'
+
+'Do you think it likely she is married?'
+
+Mrs. Damerel pursed her lips and arched her eyebrows with so
+unpleasant an effect on Nancy that she looked away.
+
+'I have no means whatever of forming an opinion.'
+
+'But there's no more fear for Horace,' said Nancy.
+
+'I hope not--I think not. But my purpose in coming was to consult
+with you about the poor boy. He has renounced me; he won't answer my
+letters; and I am so dreadfully afraid that a sort of despair--it
+sounds ridiculous, but he is so very young--may drive him into
+reckless living. You have taken part with him against me, I fear--'
+
+'No, I haven't. I told him I was quite sure the girl had only
+herself to blame, whatever happened.'
+
+'How kind of you!' Mrs. Damerel sank her voice to a sort of cooing,
+not unmelodious, but to Nancy's ear a hollow affectation. 'If we
+could understand each other! I am so anxious for your dear brother's
+happiness--and for yours, believe me. I have suffered greatly
+since he told me I was his enemy, and cast me off.'
+
+Here sounded a note of pathos which impressed the critical listener.
+There was a look, too, in Mrs. Damerel's eyes quite unlike any that
+Nancy had yet detected.
+
+'What do you wish him to do?' she asked. 'If I must tell you the
+truth, I don't think he'll get any good in the life of society.'
+
+Society's representative answered in a tone of affectionate
+frankness:
+
+'He won't; I can see that. I don't wish him to live idly. The
+question is, What ought he to do? I think you know a gentleman of
+his acquaintance, Mr. Crewe?'
+
+The question was added rather abruptly, and with a watchful gaze.
+
+'I know him a little.'
+
+'Something has been said, I believe, about Horace investing money in
+Mr. Crewe's business. Do you think it would be advisable?'
+
+Surprise kept Nancy silent.
+
+'Is Mr. Crewe trustworthy? I understand he has been in business for
+himself only a short time.'
+
+Nancy declared herself unable to judge Mr. Crewe, whether in private
+or in commercial life. And here she paused, but could not refrain
+from adding the question whether Mrs. Damerel had personal knowledge
+of him.
+
+'I have met him once.'
+
+Immediately, all Nancy's suspicions were revived. She had felt a
+desire to talk of intimate things, with mention of her mother's
+name; but the repulsion excited in her by this woman's air of
+subtlety, by looks, movements, tones which she did not understand,
+forbade it. She could not speak with satisfaction even of Horace,
+feeling that Mrs. Damerel's affection, however genuine, must needs be
+baleful. From this point her part in the dialogue was slight.
+
+'If any of Miss. French's relatives,' said the visitor presently,
+'should accuse me to you, you will be able to contradict them. I am
+sure I can depend upon you for that service?'
+
+'I am not likely to see them; and I should have thought you would
+care very little what was said about you by people of that kind.'
+
+'I care little enough,' rejoined Mrs. Damerel, with a curl of the
+lips. 'It's Horace I am thinking of. These people will embitter him
+against me, so long as they have any ground to go upon.'
+
+'But haven't you let him know of that letter?'
+
+Mrs. Damerel seemed to fall into abstraction, answered with a vague
+'Yes,' and after surveying the room, said softly:
+
+'So you must live here alone for another two or three years?'
+
+'It isn't compulsory: it's only a condition.'
+
+Another vague 'Yes.' Then:
+
+'I do so wish Horace would come back and make his home here.'
+
+'I'm afraid you have spoilt him for that,' said Nancy, with relief
+in this piece of plain speaking.
+
+Mrs. Damerel did not openly resent it. She looked a mild surprise,
+and answered blandly:
+
+'Then I must undo the mischief. You shall help me. When he has got
+over this little trouble, he will see who are his true friends. Let
+us work together for his good.'
+
+Nancy was inclined, once more, to reproach herself, and listened
+with patience whilst her relative continued talking in grave kindly
+tones. Lest she should spoil the effect of these impressive remarks,
+Mrs. Damerel then took leave. In shaking hands, she bent upon the
+girl a gaze of affection, and, as she turned away, softly sighed.
+
+Of what had passed in the recent interview with Beatrice French,
+Nancy said nothing to her faithful companion. This burden of shame
+must be borne by herself alone. It affected profoundly the
+courageous mood which had promised to make her life tolerable;
+henceforth, she all but abandoned the hope of gaining that end for
+which she had submitted to so deep a humiliation. Through Beatrice,
+would not her secret, coloured shamefully, become known to Luckworth
+Crewe, and to others? Already, perchance, a growing scandal attached
+to her name. Fear had enabled her to endure dishonour in the eyes of
+one woman, but at any moment the disgrace might front her in an
+intolerable shape; then, regardless of the cost, she would proclaim
+her marriage, and have, in return for all she had suffered, nothing
+but the reproach of an attempted fraud.
+
+To find employment, means of honourable support, was an urgent
+necessity.
+
+She had written in reply to sundry advertisements, but without
+result. She tried to draw up an advertisement on her own account,
+but found the difficulty insuperable. What was there she could do?
+Teach children, perhaps; but as a visiting governess, the only
+position of the kind which circumstances left open to her, she could
+hope for nothing more than the paltriest remuneration. Be somebody's
+'secretary'? That sounded pleasant, but very ambitious: a sense of
+incompetency chilled her. In an office, in a shop, who would dream
+of giving her an engagement?
+
+Walking about the streets of London in search of suggestions, she
+gained only an understanding of her insignificance. In the battle of
+life every girl who could work a sewing-machine or make a matchbox
+was of more account than she. If she entered a shop to make
+purchases, the young women at the counter seemed to smile
+superiority. Of what avail her 'education,' her 'culture'? The roar
+of myriad industries made mocking laughter at such futile
+pretensions. She shrank back into her suburban home.
+
+A little book on 'employments for women,' which she saw advertised
+and bought, merely heightened her discouragement. Here, doubtless,
+were occupations she might learn; but, when it came to choosing, and
+contemplating the practical steps that must be taken, her heart
+sank. She was a coward; she dreaded the world; she saw as never yet
+the blessedness of having money and a secure home.
+
+The word 'home' grew very sweet to her ears. A man, she said to
+herself, may go forth and find his work, his pleasure, in the
+highways; but is not a woman's place under the sheltering roof? What
+right had a mother to be searching abroad for tasks and duties? Task
+enough, duty obvious, in the tending of her child. Had she but a
+little country cottage with needs assured, and her baby cradled
+beside her, she would ask no more.
+
+How idle all the thoughts of her girlhood! How little she knew of
+life as it would reveal itself to her mature eyes!
+
+Fatigued into listlessness, she went to the lending-library, and
+chose a novel for an hour's amusement. It happened that this story
+was concerned with the fortunes of a young woman who, after many an
+affliction sore, discovered with notable suddenness the path to
+fame, lucre, and the husband of her heart: she became at a bound a
+successful novelist. Nancy's cheek flushed with a splendid thought.
+Why should not _she_ do likewise? At all events--for modesty was
+now her ruling characteristic--why should she not earn a little
+money by writing Stories? Numbers of women took to it; not a few
+succeeded. It was a pursuit that demanded no apprenticeship, that
+could be followed in the privacy of home, a pursuit wherein her
+education would be of service. With imagination already fired by the
+optimistic author, she began to walk about the room and devise
+romantic incidents. A love story, of course--and why not one very
+like her own? The characters were ready to her hands. She would
+begin this very evening.
+
+Mary saw the glow upon her face, the delightful frenzy in her eyes,
+and wondered.
+
+'I have an idea,' said Nancy. 'Don't ask me about it. Just leave me
+alone. I think I see my way.'
+
+Daily she secluded herself for several hours; and, whatever the
+literary value of her labour, it plainly kept her in good spirits,
+and benefited her health. Save for the visits to her baby, regular
+as before, she hardly left home.
+
+Jessica Morgan came very often, much oftener than Nancy desired; not
+only was her talk wearisome, but it consumed valuable time. She much
+desired to see the baby, and Nancy found it difficult to invent
+excuses for her unwillingness. When importunity could not be
+otherwise defeated, she pretended a conscientious scruple.
+
+'I have deceived my husband in telling him that no one knows of our
+marriage but Mary. If I let you see the child, I should feel that I
+was deceiving him again. Don't ask me; I can't.'
+
+Not unnaturally this struck Jessica as far-fetched. She argued
+against it, and became petulant. Nancy lost patience, but remembered
+in time that she was at Jessica's mercy, and, to her mortification,
+had to adopt a coaxing, almost a suppliant, tone, with the result
+that Miss. Morgan's overweening conceit was flattered into arrogance.
+Her sentimental protestations became strangely mixed with a
+self-assertiveness very galling to Nancy's pride. Without the
+slightest apparent cause for ill-humour, she said one day:
+
+'I do feel sorry for you; it must be a dreadful thing to have
+married a man who has no sense of honour.'
+
+Nancy fired up.
+
+'What do you mean?'
+
+'How can he have, when he makes you deceive people in this way for
+the sake of the money he'll get?'
+
+'He doesn't! It's my own choice.'
+
+'Then he oughtn't let you do it. No honourable man would.'
+
+'That has nothing to do with you,' Nancy exclaimed, anger blanching
+her cheek. 'Please don't talk about my husband. You say things you
+ought to be ashamed of.'
+
+'Oh, don't be angry!' The facile tears started in Jessica's eyes.
+'It's because I feel indignant on your account, dear.'
+
+'I don't want your indignation. Never mention this subject again, or
+I shall feel sure you do it on purpose to annoy me.'
+
+Jessica melted into mawkishness; none the less, Nancy felt a slave
+to her former friend, who, for whatever reason, seemed to have grown
+hypocritical and spiteful. When next the girl called, she was told
+that Miss. Lord had left home for the day, a fiction which spared
+Nancy an hour's torment. Miss. Morgan made up for it by coming very
+early on the next Sunday afternoon, and preparing herself avowedly
+for a stay until late in the evening. Resolute to avoid a long
+_tete-a-tete_, which was sure to exasperate her temper, Nancy kept
+Mary in the room, and listened to no hint from Jessica that they
+should retire for the accustomed privacy.
+
+At four o'clock they were joined by Samuel Barmby, whom, for once,
+Nancy welcomed with pleasure. Samuel, who had come in the hope of
+finding Miss. Lord alone, gave but the coldest attention to Jessica;
+Mary, however, he greeted with grave courtesy, addressing to her
+several remarks which were meant as a recognition of social equality
+in the quondam servant. He was dressed with elaborate care. Snowy
+cuffs concealed half his hands; his moustache, of late in training,
+sketched the graceful curl it would presently achieve; a faint
+perfume attended the drawing forth of his silk handkerchief.
+
+Samuel never lacked a subject for the display of eloquence. Today it
+was one that called for indignant fervour.
+
+'A most disgraceful fact has come under my notice, and I am sorry to
+say, Miss. Lord, that it concerns some one with whom you are
+acquainted.'
+
+'Indeed?' said Nancy, not without tremor. 'Who is that?'
+
+'Mr. Peachey, of De Crespigny Park. I believe you are on terms of
+friendship with the family.'
+
+'Oh, you can hardly call it friendship. I know them.'
+
+'Then I may speak without fear of paining you. You are aware that Mr
+Peachey is a member of the firm of Ducker, Blunt & Co., who
+manufacture disinfectants. Now, if any manufacture should be carried
+on in a conscientious spirit--as of course _all_ manufactures
+should--surely it is that of disinfectants. Only think what
+depends upon it! People who make disinfectants ought to regard
+themselves as invested with a sacred trust. The whole community
+looks to them for protection against disease. The abuse of such
+confidence cannot be too severely condemned, all the more so, that
+there is absolutely no legal remedy against the adulteration of
+disinfectants. Did you know that, Miss. Lord? The law guards against
+adulteration of food, but it seems--I have been making inquiry
+into the matter--that no thought has ever been given by the
+legislature to the subject of disinfectants!'
+
+Nancy saw that Jessica was watching the speaker with jealous eyes,
+and, in spite of prudence, she could not help behaving to Mr. Barmby
+more graciously than usual; a small revenge for the treatment she
+had suffered at the hands of Miss. Morgan.
+
+'I could point out a great number of such anomalies,' pursued
+Samuel. 'But this matter of disinfectants is really one of the
+gravest. My father has written to _The Times_ about it, and his
+letter will probably be inserted to-morrow. I am thinking of
+bringing it before the attention of our Society.'
+
+'Do Mr. Peachey's people adulterate their disinfectants?' inquired
+Nancy.
+
+'I was going to tell you. Some acquaintances of ours have had a
+severe illness in their house, and have been using disinfectants
+made by Ducker, Blunt & Co. Fortunately they have a very good
+medical man, and through him it has been discovered that these
+pretended safeguards are all but absolutely worthless. He had the
+stuff analysed. Now, isn't this shameful? Isn't this abominable? For
+my own part, I should call it constructive murder.'
+
+The phrase came by haphazard to Samuel's tongue, and he uttered it
+with gusto, repeating it twice or thrice.
+
+'Constructive murder--nothing short of that. And to think that
+these people enjoy a positive immunity--impunity.' He corrected
+himself quickly; then, uncertain whether he had really made a
+mistake, reddened and twisted his gloves. 'To think'--he raised
+his voice--'that they are capable of making money out of disease
+and death! It is one of the worst illustrations of a corrupt spirit
+in the commercial life of our times that has yet come under my
+observation.'
+
+He remained for a couple of hours, talking ceaselessly. A glance
+which he now and then cast at Miss. Morgan betrayed his hope that she
+would take her leave before the necessary time of his own departure.
+Jessica, perfectly aware of this desire, sat as though no less at
+home than Nancy. Every remark she made was a stroke of malice at her
+friend, and in her drawn features appeared the passions by which she
+was tormented.
+
+As soon as Mr. Barmby had regretfully withdrawn, Nancy turned upon
+the girl with flashing eyes.
+
+'I want to speak to you. Come downstairs.'
+
+She led the way to the dining-room. Jessica followed without a word.
+
+'Why are you behaving like this? What has come to you?'
+
+The feeble anaemic creature fell back before this outbreak of
+wholesome wrath; her eyes stared in alarm.
+
+'I won't put up with it,' cried Nancy. 'If you think you can insult
+me because I trusted you when you were my only friend, you'll find
+your mistake. A little more, and you shall see how little your power
+over me is worth. Am I to live at _your_ mercy! I'd starve rather.
+What do you mean by it?'
+
+'Oh--Nancy--to think you should speak to me like this.'
+
+'You are to be allowed to spit poison at me--are you? And I must
+bear it? No, that I won't! Of course I know what's the matter with
+you. You have fallen in love with Samuel Barmby.--You have! Any
+one can see it. You have no more command of yourself than a child.
+And because he prefers me to you, you rage against me. Idiot! What
+is Samuel Barmby to me? Can I do more to keep him off? Can I say to
+him, "Do have pity on poor Miss. Morgan, who--"'
+
+She was interrupted by a scream, on which followed a torrent of
+frenzied words from Jessica.
+
+'You're a bad-hearted woman! You've behaved disgracefully yourself
+--oh! I know more than you think; and now you accuse me of being as
+bad. Why did you get married in such a hurry? Do you think I didn't
+understand it? It's you who have no command over yourself. If the
+truth were known, no decent woman would ever speak to You again. And
+you've got your reward. Pretend as you like, I know your husband has
+deserted you. What else could you expect? That's what makes you hate
+every one that hasn't fallen into the mud. I wouldn't have such a
+character as yours! All this afternoon you've been looking at that
+man as no married woman could who respected herself. You encourage
+him; he comes here often--'
+
+Hysterical passion strangled her voice, and before she could recover
+breath, Nancy, terrible in ire, advanced upon her.
+
+'Leave this house, and never dare to show yourself here again! Do
+what you like, I'll endure you no longer--be off!'
+
+Jessica retreated, her bloodless lips apart, her eyes starting as in
+suffocation. She stumbled against a chair, fell to the ground, and,
+with a cry of anguish, threw herself upon her knees before Nancy.
+
+'What did I say? I didn't mean it--I don't know what I have been
+saying--it was all madness. Oh, do forgive me! That isn't how I
+really think of you--you know it isn't--I'm not so wicked as
+that. We have been friends so long--I must have gone mad to speak
+such words. Don't drive me away from you, dear, dear Nancy! I
+implore you to forgive me! Look, I pray to you on my knees to forget
+it. Despise me for being such a weak, wicked creature, but don't
+drive me away like that! I didn't mean one word I said.'
+
+'Rubbish! Of course you meant it. You have thought it every day, and
+you'll say it again, behind my back, if not to my face. Stand up,
+and don't make yourself sillier than you are.'
+
+'You can't call me anything too bad--but don't drive me away. I
+can't bear it. You are the only friend I have in the world--the
+only, only friend. No one was ever kind and good to me but you, and
+this is how I have repaid you. Oh, I hate myself! I could tear my
+tongue out for saying such things. Only say that you'll try to
+forgive me--dear Nancy--dear--'
+
+She fell with face upon the carpet, and grovelled there in anguish
+of conflicting passions, a lamentable object. Unable to bear the
+sight of her, Nancy moved away, and stood with back turned, perforce
+hearing the moans and sobs and half-articulate words which lasted
+until the fit of hysteria left its victim in mute exhaustion. Then,
+contemptuously pitiful, she drew near again to the prostrate figure.
+
+'Stand up at once, and let us have an end of this vulgar folly.
+Stand up, or I'll leave you here, and never speak to you again.'
+
+'Nancy--can you forgive me?'
+
+'I believe you have never got over your illness. If I were you, I
+should see the doctor again, and try to be cured. You'll end in an
+asylum, if you don't mind.'
+
+'I often feel almost mad--I do really. Will you forget those
+dreadful words I spoke? I know you can't forgive me at once--'
+
+'Only stand up, and try to behave like a reasonable being. What do I
+care for your words?'
+
+The girl raised herself, threw her arms over a chair, and wept
+miserably.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 2
+
+
+
+
+On an afternoon at the end of October, Samuel Barmby, returned from
+business, found Miss. Morgan having tea with his sisters. For a month
+or two after Midsummer the Barmbys had scarcely seen her; now their
+friendly intercourse was renewed, and Jessica came at least once a
+week. She had an engagement at a girls' school in this
+neighbourhood, and, though her health threatened another collapse,
+she talked of resuming study for the Matriculation of next year.
+
+Samuel, perfectly aware of the slavish homage which Miss. Morgan paid
+him, took pleasure in posing before her. It never entered his mind
+to make any return beyond genial patronage, but the incense of a
+female devotee was always grateful to him, and he had come to look
+upon Jessica as a young person peculiarly appreciative of
+intellectual distinction. A week ago, walking with her to the
+omnibus after an evening she had spent in Dagmar Road, he had
+indulged a spirit of confidence, and led her to speak of Nancy Lord.
+The upshot of five minutes' conversation was a frank inquiry, which
+he could hardly have permitted himself but for the shadow of night
+and the isolating noises around them. As an intimate friend, did she
+feel able to tell him whether or not Miss. Lord was engaged to be
+married? Jessica, after a brief silence, answered that she did _not_
+feel at liberty to disclose what she knew on the subject; but the
+words she used, and her voice in uttering them, left no doubt as to
+her meaning. Samuel said no more. At parting, he pressed the girl's
+hand warmly.
+
+This afternoon, they began by avoiding each other's look. Samuel
+seemed indisposed for conversation; he sipped at a cup of tea with
+an abstracted and somewhat weary air, until Miss. Morgan addressed
+him.
+
+'To-morrow is the evening of your lecture, isn't it, Mr. Barmby?'
+
+'To-morrow.'
+
+By the agency of a friend who belonged to a society of mutual
+improvement at Pentonville, Samuel had been invited to go over and
+illumine with his wisdom the seekers after culture in that remote
+district, a proposal that flattered him immensely, and inspired him
+with a hope of more than suburban fame. For some months he had
+spoken of the engagement. He was to discourse upon 'National
+Greatness: its Obligations and its Dangers.'
+
+'Of course it will be printed afterwards?' pursued the devotee.
+
+'Oh, I don't know. It's hardly worth that.'
+
+'Oh, I'm sure it will be!'
+
+And Jessica appealed to the sisters, who declared that certain
+passages they had been privileged to hear seemed to them very
+remarkable.
+
+Ladies were to be admitted, but the Miss. Barmbys felt afraid to
+undertake so long a journey after dark.
+
+'I know some one who would very much like to go,' said Jessica,
+steadying her voice. 'Could you spare me a ticket to give away, Mr
+Barmby?'
+
+Samuel smiled graciously, and promised the ticket.
+
+Of course it was for Jessica's own use. On the following evening,
+long before the hour which would have allowed her ample time to
+reach Pentonville by eight o'clock, she set forth excitedly. Unless
+Samuel Barmby were accompanied by some friend from Camberwell,--
+only too probable,--she might hope to make the return journey
+under his protection. Perhaps he would speak again of Nancy Lord,
+and this time he should be answered with less reserve. What harm if
+she even told him the name of the man whom Nancy was 'engaged' to
+marry?
+
+Nancy was no longer her friend. A show of reconciliation had
+followed that scene on the Sunday afternoon three months ago; but
+Jessica well knew that she had put herself beyond forgiveness, nor
+did she desire it. Even without the memory of her offence, by this
+time she must needs have regarded Nancy with steadfast dislike.
+Weeks had gone by since their last meeting, which was rendered so
+unpleasant by mutual coldness that a renewal of intercourse seemed
+out of the question.
+
+She would not be guilty of treachery. But, in justice to herself,
+she might give Samuel Barmby to understand how hopeless was his
+wooing.
+
+To her disappointment, the lecture-room was small and undignified;
+she had imagined a capacious hall, with Samuel Bennett Barmby
+standing up before an audience of several hundred people. The
+cane-bottomed chairs numbered not more than fifty, and at eight
+o'clock some of them were still unoccupied. Nor did the assembly
+answer to her expectation. It seemed to consist of young shopmen,
+with a few females of their kind interspersed. She chose a place in
+the middle of the room, where the lecturer could hardly fail to
+observe her presence.
+
+With Barmby's entrance disillusion gave way before the ardours of
+flesh and spirit. The whole hour through she never took her eyes
+from him. His smooth, pink face, with its shining moustache,
+embodied her ideal of manly beauty; his tall figure inflamed her
+senses; the words that fell from his lips sounded to her with
+oracular impressiveness, conveying a wisdom before which she bowed,
+and a noble enthusiasm to which she responded in fervent exaltation.
+And she had been wont to ridicule this man, to join in mockery of
+his eloquence with a conceited wanton such as Nancy Lord! No, it
+never came from her heart; it was moral cowardice; from the first
+she had recognised Samuel Barmby's infinite superiority to the
+ignoble, the impure girl who dared to deride him.
+
+He saw her; their eyes met once, and again, and yet again. He knew
+that she alone in the audience could comprehend his noble morality,
+grasp the extent of his far-sighted speculations. To her he spoke.
+And in his deep glowing heart he could not but thank her for such
+evidence of sympathy.
+
+There followed a tedious debate, a muddy flow of gabble and
+balderdash. It was over by ten o'clock. With jealous eyes she
+watched her hero surrounded by people who thought, poor creatures,
+that they were worthy of offering him congratulations. At a distance
+she lingered. And behold, his eye once more fell upon her! He came
+out from among the silly chatterers, and walked towards her.
+
+'You played me a trick, Miss. Morgan. I should never have allowed you
+to come all this way to hear me.'
+
+'If I had come ten times the distance, I should have been repaid!'
+
+His round eyes gloated upon the flattery.
+
+'Well, well, I mustn't pretend that I think the lecture worthless.
+But you might have had the manuscript to read. Are you quite alone?
+Then I must take care of you. It's a wretched night; we'll have a
+cab to King's Cross.'
+
+He said it with a consciousness of large-handed generosity.
+Jessica's heart leapt and throbbed.
+
+She was by his side in the vehicle. Her body touched his. She felt
+his warm breath as he talked. In all too short a time they reached
+the railway station.
+
+'Did you come this way? Have you a ticket? Leave that to me.'
+
+Again largely generous, he strode to the booking-office.
+
+They descended and stood together upon the platform, among hurrying
+crowds, in black fumes that poisoned the palate with sulphur. This
+way and that sped the demon engines, whirling lighted waggons full
+of people. Shrill whistles, the hiss and roar of steam, the bang,
+clap, bang of carriage-doors, the clatter of feet on wood and stone
+--all echoed and reverberated from a huge cloudy vault above them.
+High and low, on every available yard of wall, advertisements
+clamoured to the eye: theatres, journals, soaps, medicines,
+concerts, furniture, wines, prayer-meetings--all the produce and
+refuse of civilisation announced in staring letters, in daubed
+effigies, base, paltry, grotesque. A battle-ground of
+advertisements, fitly chosen amid subterranean din and reek; a
+symbol to the gaze of that relentless warfare which ceases not,
+night and day, in the world above.
+
+For the southward train they had to wait ten minutes. Jessica,
+keeping as close as possible to her companion's side, tried to
+converse, but her thoughts were in a tumult like to that about her.
+She felt a faintness, a quivering in her limbs.
+
+'May I sit down for a moment?' she said, looking at Barmby with a
+childlike appeal.
+
+'To be sure.'
+
+She pointed in a direction away from the crowd.
+
+'I have something to say--it's quieter--'
+
+Samuel evinced surprise, but allowed himself to be led towards the
+black mouth of the tunnel, whence at that moment rushed an engine
+with glaring lights upon its breast.
+
+'We may not be alone in the train,' continued Jessica. 'There's
+something you ought to know I must tell you to-night. You were
+asking me about Nancy Lord.'
+
+She spoke with panting breath, and looked fixedly at him. The
+eagerness with which he lent ear gave her strength to proceed.
+
+'You asked me if she was engaged.'
+
+'Yes--well?'
+
+He had even forgotten his politeness; he saw in her a mere source of
+information. Jessica moved closer to him on the bench.
+
+'Had you any reason for thinking she was?'
+
+'No particular reason, except something strange in her behaviour.'
+
+'Would you like to know the whole truth?'
+
+It was a very cold night, and a keen wind swept the platform; but
+Jessica, though indifferently clad, felt no discomfort from this
+cause. Yet she pressed closer to her companion, so that her cheek
+all but touched his shoulder.
+
+'Of course I should,' Barmby answered. 'Is there any mystery?'
+
+'I oughtn't to tell.'
+
+'Then you had better not. But why did you begin?'
+
+'You ought to know.'
+
+'Why ought I to know?'
+
+'Because you--.' She broke off. A sudden chill made her teeth
+chatter.
+
+'Well--why?' asked Samuel, with impatience.
+
+'Are you--are you in love with her?'
+
+Voice and look embarrassed him. So did the girl's proximity; she was
+now all but leaning on his shoulder. Respectable Mr. Barmby could not
+be aware that Jessica's state of mind rendered her scarcely
+responsible for what she said or did.
+
+'That's a very plain question,' he began; but she interrupted him.
+
+'I oughtn't to ask it. There's no need for you to answer. I know you
+have wanted to marry her for a long time. But you never will.'
+
+'Perhaps not--if she has promised somebody else.'
+
+'If I tell you--will you be kind to me?'
+
+'Kind?'
+
+'I didn't mean that,' she added hurriedly. 'I mean--will you
+understand that I felt it a duty? I oughtn't to tell a secret; but
+it's a secret that oughtn't to be kept. Will you understand that I
+did it out of--out of friendship for you, and because I thought it
+right?'
+
+'Oh, certainly. After going so far, you had better tell me and have
+done with it.'
+
+Jessica approached her lips to his ear, and whispered:
+
+'She is married.'
+
+'What? Impossible!'
+
+'She was married at Teignmouth, just before she came back from her
+holiday, last year.'
+
+'Well! Upon my word! And that's why she has been away in Cornwall?'
+
+Again Jessica whispered, her body quivering the while:
+
+'She has a child. It was born last May.'
+
+'Well! Upon my word! Now I understand. Who could have imagined!'
+
+'You see what she is. She hides it for the sake of the money.'
+
+'But who is her husband?' asked Samuel, staring at the bloodless
+face.
+
+'A man called Tarrant, a relative of Mr. Vawdrey, of Champion Hill.
+She thought he was rich. I don't know whether he is or not, but I
+believe he doesn't mean to come back to her. He's in America now.'
+
+Barmby questioned, and Jessica answered, until there was nothing
+left to ask or to tell,--save the one thing which rose suddenly to
+Jessica's lips.
+
+'You won't let her know that I have told you?'
+
+Samuel gravely, but coldly, assured her that she need not fear
+betrayal.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 3
+
+
+
+
+It was to be in three volumes. She saw her way pretty clearly to the
+end of the first; she had ideas for the second; the third must take
+care of itself--until she reached it. Hero and heroine ready to
+her hand; subordinate characters vaguely floating in the background.
+After an hour or two of meditation, she sat down and dashed at
+Chapter One.
+
+Long before the end of the year it ought to be finished.
+
+But in August came her baby's first illness; for nearly a fortnight
+she was away from home, and on her return, though no anxiety
+remained, she found it difficult to resume work. The few chapters
+completed had a sorry look; they did not read well, not at all like
+writing destined to be read in print. After a week's disheartenment
+she made a new beginning.
+
+At the end of September baby again alarmed her. A trivial ailment as
+before, but she could not leave the child until all was well. Again
+she reviewed her work, and with more repugnance than after the
+previous interruption. But go on with it she must and would. The
+distasteful labour, slow, wearisome, often performed without
+pretence of hope, went on until October. Then she broke down. Mary
+Woodruff found her crying by the fireside, feverish and unnerved.
+
+'I can't sleep,' she said. 'I hear the clock strike every hour,
+night after night.'
+
+But she would not confess the cause. In writing her poor novel she
+had lived again through the story enacted at Teignmouth, and her
+heart failed beneath its burden of hopeless longing. Her husband had
+forsaken her. Even if she saw him again, what solace could be found
+in the mere proximity of a man who did not love her, who had never
+loved her? The child was not enough; its fatherless estate enhanced
+the misery of her own solitude. When the leaves fell, and the sky
+darkened, and the long London winter gloomed before her, she sank
+with a moan of despair.
+
+Mary's strength and tenderness were now invaluable. By sheer force
+of will she overcame the malady in its physical effects, and did
+wonders in the assailing of its moral source. Her appeal now, as
+formerly, was to the nobler pride always struggling for control in
+Nancy's character. A few days of combat with the besieging
+melancholy that threatened disaster, and Nancy could meet her
+friend's look with a smile. She put away and turned the key upon her
+futile scribbling; no more of that. Novel-writing was not her
+vocation; she must seek again.
+
+Early in the afternoon she made ready to go forth on the only
+business which now took her from home. It was nearly a week since
+she had seen her boy.
+
+Opening the front door, she came unexpectedly under two pairs of
+eyes. Face to face with her stood Samuel Barmby, his hand raised to
+signal at the knocker, just withdrawn from him. And behind Barmby
+was a postman, holding a letter, which in another moment would have
+dropped into the box.
+
+Samuel performed the civil salute.
+
+'Ha!--How do you do, Miss. Lord?--You are going out, I'm afraid.'
+
+'Yes, I am going out.'
+
+She replied mechanically, and in speaking took the letter held out
+to her. A glance at it sent all her blood rushing upon the heart.
+
+'I want to see you particularly,' said Samuel. 'Could I call again,
+this afternoon?'
+
+Nancy gazed at him, but did not hear. He saw the sudden pallor of
+her cheeks, and thought he understood it. As she stood like a
+statue, he spoke again.
+
+'It is very particular business. If you could give me an appointment--'
+
+'Business?--Oh, come in, if you like.'
+
+She drew back to admit him, but in the passage stood looking at her
+letter. Barmby was perplexed and embarrassed.
+
+'You had rather I called again?'
+
+'Called again? Just as you like.'
+
+'Oh, then I will stay,' said Samuel bluntly. For he had things in
+mind which disposed him to resent this flagrant discourtesy.
+
+His voice awakened Nancy. She opened the door of the dining-room.
+
+'Will you sit down, Mr. Barmby, and excuse me for a few minutes?'
+
+'Certainly. Don't let me inconvenience you, Miss. Lord.'
+
+At another time Nancy would have remarked something very unusual in
+his way of speaking, especially in the utterance of her name. But
+for the letter in her hand she must have noticed with uneasiness a
+certain severity of countenance, which had taken the place of
+Barmby's wonted smile. As it was, she scarcely realised his
+presence; and, on closing the door of the room he had entered, she
+forthwith forgot that such a man existed.
+
+Her letter! His handwriting at last. And he was in England.
+
+She flew up to her bedroom, and tore open the envelope. He was in
+London; 'Great College Street, S. W.' A short letter, soon read.
+
+DEAREST NANCY,--I am ashamed to write, yet write I must. All your
+letters reached me; there was no reason for my silence but the
+unwillingness to keep sending bad news. I have still nothing good to
+tell you, but here I am in London again, and you must know of it.
+
+When I posted my last letter to you from New York, I meant to come
+back as soon as I could get money enough to pay my passage. Since
+then I have gone through a miserable time, idle for the most part,
+ill for a few weeks, and occasionally trying to write something that
+editors would pay for. But after all I had to borrow. It has brought
+me home (steerage, if you know what that means), and now I must earn
+more.
+
+If we were to meet, I might be able to say something else. I can't
+write it. Let me hear from you, if you think me worth a letter.--
+Yours ever, dear girl,
+
+L.
+
+For a quarter of an hour she stood with this sheet open, as though
+still reading. Her face was void of emotion; she had a vacant look,
+cheerless, but with no more decided significance.
+
+Then she remembered that Samuel Barmby was waiting for her
+downstairs. He might have something to say which really concerned
+her. Better see him at once and get rid of him. With slow step she
+descended to the dining-room. The letter, folded and rolled, she
+carried in her hand.
+
+'I'm sorry to have kept you waiting, Mr. Barmby.'
+
+'Don't mention it. Will you sit down?'
+
+'Yes, of course.' She spoke abstractedly, and took a seat not far
+from him. 'I was just going out, but--there's no hurry.'
+
+'I hardly know how to begin. Perhaps I had better prepare you by
+saying that I have received very strange information.'
+
+His air was magisterial; he subdued his voice to a note of profound
+solemnity.
+
+'What sort of information?' asked Nancy vaguely, her brows knitted
+in a look rather of annoyance than apprehension.
+
+'Very strange indeed.'
+
+'You have said that already.'
+
+Her temper was failing. She felt a nervous impulse to behave rudely,
+to declare the contempt it was always difficult to disguise when
+talking with Barmby.
+
+'I repeat it, because you seem to have no idea what I am going to
+speak of. I am the last person to find pleasure in such a
+disagreeable duty as is now laid upon me. In that respect, I believe
+you will do me justice.'
+
+'Will you speak plainly? This roundabout talk is intolerable.'
+
+Samuel drew himself up, and regarded her with offended dignity. He
+had promised himself no small satisfaction from this interview, had
+foreseen its salient points. His mere aspect would be enough to
+subdue Nancy, and when he began to speak she would tremble before
+him. Such a moment would repay him for the enforced humility of
+years. Perhaps she would weep; she might even implore him to be
+merciful. How to act in that event he had quite made up his mind.
+But all such anticipations were confused by Nancy's singular
+behaviour. She seemed, in truth, not to understand the hints which
+should have overwhelmed her.
+
+More magisterial than ever, he began to speak with slow emphasis.
+
+'Miss. Lord,--I will still address you by that name,--though for
+a very long time I have regarded you as a person worthy of all
+admiration, and have sincerely humbled myself before you, I cannot
+help thinking that a certain respect is due to me. Even though I
+find that you have deceived me as to your position, the old feelings
+are still so strong in me that I could not bear to give you needless
+pain. Instead of announcing to my father, and to other people, the
+strange facts which I have learnt, I come here as a friend,--I
+speak with all possible forbearance,--I do my utmost to spare you.
+Am I not justified in expecting at least courteous treatment?'
+
+A pause of awful impressiveness. The listener, fully conscious at
+length of the situation she had to face, fell into a calmer mood.
+All was over. Suspense and the burden of falsehood had no longer to
+be endured. Her part now, for this hour at all events, was merely to
+stand by whilst Fate unfolded itself.
+
+'Please say whatever you have to say, Mr. Barmby,' she replied with
+quiet civility. 'I believe your intention was good. You made me
+nervous, that was all.'
+
+'Pray forgive me. Perhaps it will be best if I ask you a simple
+question. You will see that the position I hold under your father's
+will leaves me no choice but to ask it. Is it true that you are
+married?'
+
+'I will answer if you tell me how you came to think that I was
+married.'
+
+'I have been credibly informed.'
+
+'By whom?'
+
+'You must forgive me. I can't tell you the name.'
+
+'Then I can't answer your question.'
+
+Samuel mused. He was unwilling to break a distinct promise.
+
+'No doubt,' said Nancy, 'you have undertaken not to mention the
+person.'
+
+'I have.'
+
+'If it is some one who used to be a friend of mine, you needn't have
+any scruples. She as good as told me what she meant to do. Of course
+it is Miss. Morgan?'
+
+'As you have yourself spoken the name--'
+
+'Very well. She isn't in her senses, and I wonder she has kept the
+secret so long.'
+
+'You admit the truth of what she has told me?'
+
+'Yes. I am married.'
+
+She made the avowal in a tone very like that in which, to Beatrice
+French, she had affirmed the contrary.
+
+'And your true name is Mrs. Tarrant?'
+
+'That is my name.'
+
+The crudely masculine in Barmby prompted one more question, but some
+other motive checked him. He let his eyes wander slowly about the
+room. Even yet there was a chance of playing off certain effects
+which he had rehearsed with gusto.
+
+'Can you imagine,'--his voice shook a little,--'how much I
+suffer in hearing you say this?'
+
+'If you mean that you still had the hopes expressed in your letter
+some time ago, I can only say, in my defence, that I gave you an
+honest answer.'
+
+'Yes. You said you could never marry me. But of course I couldn't
+understand it in this sense. It is a blow. I find it very hard to
+bear.'
+
+He rose and went to the window, as if ashamed of the emotion he
+could not command. Nancy, too much occupied with her own troubles to
+ask or care whether his distress was genuine, laid Tarrant's letter
+upon a side-table, and began to draw off her gloves. Then she
+unbuttoned her jacket. These out-of-door garments oppressed her.
+Samuel turned his head and came slowly back.
+
+'There are things that might be said, but I will not say them. Most
+men in my position would yield to the temptation of revenge. But for
+many years I have kept in view a moral ideal, and now I have the
+satisfaction of conquering my lower self. You shall not hear one
+word of reproach from my lips.'
+
+He waited for the reply, the expected murmur of gratitude. Nancy
+said nothing.
+
+'Mrs. Tarrant,'--he stood before her,--'what do you suppose must
+be the result of this?'
+
+'There can only be one.'
+
+'You mean the ruin of your prospects. But do you forget that all the
+money you have received since Mr. Lord's death has been obtained by
+false pretences? Are you not aware that this is a criminal offence?'
+
+Nancy raised her eyes and looked steadily at him.
+
+'Then I must bear the punishment.'
+
+For a minute Barmby enjoyed her suffering. Of his foreseen effects,
+this one had come nearest to succeeding. But he was not satisfied;
+he hoped she would beseech his clemency.
+
+'The punishment might be very serious. I really can't say what view
+my father may take of this deception.'
+
+'Is there any use in talking about it? I am penniless--that's all
+you have to tell me. What else I have to bear, I shall know soon
+enough.'
+
+'One thing I must ask. Isn't your husband in a position to support
+you?'
+
+'I can't answer that. Please to say nothing about my husband.'
+
+Barmby caught at hope. It might be true, as Jessica Morgan believed,
+that Nancy was forsaken. The man Tarrant might be wealthy enough to
+disregard her prospects. In that case an assiduous lover, one who,
+by the exercise of a prudent generosity, had obtained power over the
+girl, could yet hope for reward. Samuel had as little of the villain
+in his composition as any Camberwell householder. He cherished no
+dark designs. But, after the manner of his kind, he was in love with
+Nancy, and even the long pursuit of a lofty ideal does not render a
+man proof against the elementary forces of human nature.
+
+'We will suppose then,' he said, with a certain cheerfulness, 'that
+you have nothing whatever to depend upon but your father's will.
+What is before you? How can you live?'
+
+'That is my own affair.'
+
+It was not said offensively, but in a tone of bitter resignation.
+Barmby sat down opposite to her, and leaned forward.
+
+'Do you think for one moment,'--his voice was softly melodious,--
+'that I--I who have loved you for years--could let you suffer
+for want of money?'
+
+He had not skill to read her countenance. Trouble he discerned, and
+shame; but the half-veiled eyes, the quivering nostril, the hard,
+cold lips, spoke a language beyond Samuel's interpretation. Even had
+he known of the outrages previously inflicted upon her pride, and
+that this new attack came at a moment when her courage was baffled,
+her heart cruelly wounded, he would just as little have comprehended
+the spirit which now kept her mute.
+
+He imagined her overcome by his generosity. Another of his great
+effects had come off with tolerable success.
+
+'Put your mind at rest,' he pursued mellifluously. 'You shall suffer
+no hardships. I answer for it.'
+
+Still mute, and her head bowed low. Such is the power of nobility
+displayed before an erring soul!
+
+'You have never done me justice. Confess that you haven't!'
+
+To this remarkable appeal Nancy perforce replied:
+
+'I never thought ill of you.'
+
+When she had spoken, colour came into her cheeks. Observing it,
+Samuel was strangely moved. Had he impressed her even more
+profoundly than he hoped to do? Jessica Morgan's undisguised
+subjugation had flattered him into credulity respecting his
+influence over the female mind.
+
+'But you didn't think me capable of--of anything extraordinary?'
+Even in her torment, Nancy marvelled at this revelation of fatuity.
+She did not understand the pranks of such a mind as Barmby's when
+its balance is disturbed by exciting circumstance.
+
+'What are you offering me?' she asked, in a low voice. 'How could I
+take money from you?'
+
+'I didn't mean that you should. Your secret has been betrayed to me.
+Suppose I refuse to know anything about it, and leave things as they
+were?'
+
+Nancy kept her eyes down.
+
+'Suppose I say: Duty bids me injure this woman who has injured _me_;
+but no, I will not! Suppose I say: I can make her regret bitterly
+that she married that other man; but no, I will not! Suppose,
+instead of making your secret known, I do my utmost to guard it!
+What would be your opinion of this behaviour?'
+
+'I should think it was kindly meant, but useless.'
+
+'Useless? Why?'
+
+'Because it isn't in your power to guard the secret. Jessica Morgan
+won't leave her work half done.'
+
+'If that's all, I say again that you can put your mind at rest. I
+answer for Miss. Morgan. With her my will is law.'
+
+Samuel smiled. A smile ineffable. The smile of a suburban deity.
+
+'Why should you take any trouble about me?' said Nancy. 'I can do
+nothing for you in return.'
+
+'You can.'
+
+She looked anxiously at him, for his voice sounded ominous.
+
+'What?'
+
+'You can acknowledge that you never did me justice.'
+
+'It's true that I didn't,' she answered languidly; speaking as
+though the concession mattered little.
+
+Barmby brightened. His hands were upon his knees; he raised his
+chin, and smiled at vacancy.
+
+'You thought me unworthy of you. You can confess to me that you were
+mistaken.'
+
+'I didn't know you as I do now,' fell from the expressionless lips.
+
+'Thank you for saying that! Well, then, your anxiety is at an end.
+You are not in the hands of a mercenary enemy, but of a man whose
+principles forbid him to do anything ignoble, who has an ideal of
+life, the result of much study and thought. You have never heard me
+speak about religion, but you would be gravely mistaken if you
+thought I had no religious convictions. Some day I shall treat that
+subject before our Society, and it is probable that my views will
+give rise to a good deal of discussion. I have formed a religion for
+myself; when I write my essay, I think I shall call it "The Religion
+of a Man of Business." One of the great evils of the day is the
+vulgar supposition that commerce has nothing to do with religious
+faith. I shall show how utterly wrong that is. It would take too
+long to explain to you my mature views of Christianity. I am not
+sure that I recognise any of the ordinary dogmas; I think I have
+progressed beyond them. However, we shall have many opportunities of
+talking about these things.'
+
+Nancy uttered a mere 'Yes.' She was looking at Tarrant's letter on
+the side-table, and wishing to be alone that she might read it
+again.
+
+'In the meantime,' Samuel pursued, 'whatever difficulty arises,
+confide it to me. Probably you will wish to tell me more before
+long; you know that I am not unworthy to be your adviser. And so let
+us shake hands, in sign of genuine friendship.'
+
+Nancy gave her fingers, which felt very cold upon Barmby's warm,
+moist palm.
+
+'This conversation has been trying to you,' he said, 'but relief of
+mind will soon follow. If anything occurs to me that may help to
+soothe you, I will write.'
+
+'Thank you.'
+
+'At the beginning of our interview you didn't think it would end
+like this?'
+
+There was something of the boy in Samuel, perhaps the wholesomest
+part of him. Having manifested his admirable qualities, he felt a
+light-hearted pleasure in asking for renewed assurance of the good
+opinion he had earned.
+
+'I hardly cared,' said Nancy, as she rose with a sigh of weariness.
+
+'But you have got over that. You will be quite cheerful now?'
+
+'In time, no doubt.'
+
+'I shall call again--let us say on Wednesday evening. By that time
+I shall be able to put you entirely at ease with regard to Miss
+Morgan.'
+
+Nancy made no reply. In shaking hands, she regarded the radiant
+Samuel with a dreamy interest; and when he had left her, she still
+gazed for a few moments at the door.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 4
+
+
+
+
+The habit of confidence prompted Nancy to seek Mary Woodruff, and
+show her the long-expected letter. But for Barmby's visit she would
+have done so. As it was, her mind sullenly resisted the natural
+impulse. Forlorn misery, intensified by successive humiliations,
+whereof the latest was the bitterest, hardened her even against the
+one, the indubitable friend, to whom she had never looked in vain
+for help and solace. Of course it was not necessary to let Mary know
+with what heart-breaking coldness Tarrant had communicated the fact
+of his return; but she preferred to keep silence altogether. Having
+sunk so low as to accept, with semblance of gratitude, pompous
+favours, dishonouring connivance, at the hands of Samuel Barmby, she
+would now stand alone in her uttermost degradation. Happen what
+might, she would act and suffer in solitude.
+
+Something she had in mind to do which Mary, if told of it, would
+regard with disapproval. Mary was not a deserted and insulted wife;
+she could reason and counsel with the calmness of one who
+sympathised, but had nothing worse to endure. Even Mary's sympathy
+was necessarily imperfect, since she knew not, and should never
+know, what had passed in the crucial interviews with Beatrice
+French, with Jessica Morgan, and with Samuel Barmby. Bent on
+indulging her passionate sense of injury, hungering for a taste of
+revenge, however poor, Nancy executed with brief delay a project
+which had come into her head during the hour of torture just
+elapsed.
+
+She took a sheet of notepaper, and upon it wrote half-a-dozen lines,
+thus:
+
+'As your reward for marrying me is still a long way off, and as you
+tell me that you are in want, I send you as much as I can spare at
+present. Next month you shall hear from me again.'
+
+Within the paper she folded a five-pound note, and placed both in an
+envelope, which she addressed to Lionel Tarrant, Esq., at his
+lodgings in Westminster. Having posted this at the first pillar-box
+she walked on.
+
+Her only object was to combat mental anguish by bodily exercise, to
+distract, if possible, the thoughts which hammered upon her brain by
+moving amid the life of the streets. In Camberwell Road she passed
+the place of business inscribed with the names 'Lord and Barmby'; it
+made her think, not of the man who, from being an object of her
+good-natured contempt, was now become a hated enemy, but of her
+father, and she mourned for him with profounder feeling than when
+her tears flowed over his new-made grave. But for headstrong folly,
+incredible in the retrospect, that father would have been her dear
+and honoured companion, her friend in every best sense of the word,
+her guide and protector. Many and many a time had he invited her
+affection, her trust. For long years it was in her power to make him
+happy, and, in doing so, to enrich her own life, to discipline her
+mind as no study of books, even had it been genuine, ever could. Oh,
+to have the time back again--the despised privilege--the
+thwarted embittered love! She was beginning to understand her
+father, to surmise with mature intelligence the causes of his
+seeming harshness. To her own boy, when he was old enough, she would
+talk of him and praise him. Perhaps, even thus late, his spirit of
+stern truthfulness might bear fruit in her life and in her son's.
+
+The tender memory and pure resolve did not long possess her. They
+soon yielded before the potency of present evil, and for an hour or
+more she walked along the sordid highway, nursing passions which
+struck their venom into her heart.
+
+It was one of those cold, dry, clouded evenings of autumn, when
+London streets affect the imagination with a peculiar
+suggestiveness. New-lit lamps, sickly yellow under the dying day,
+stretch in immense vistas, unobscured by fog, but exhibit no detail
+of the track they will presently illumine; one by one the
+shop-fronts grow radiant on deepening gloom, and show in silhouette
+the figures numberless that are hurrying past. By accentuating a
+pause between the life of daytime and that which will begin after
+dark, this grey hour excites to an unwonted perception of the city's
+vastness and of its multifarious labour; melancholy, yet not dismal,
+the brooding twilight seems to betoken Nature's compassion for
+myriad mortals exiled from her beauty and her solace. Noises far and
+near blend into a muffled murmur, sound's equivalent of the
+impression received by the eye; it seems to utter the weariness of
+unending ineffectual toil.
+
+Nancy had now walked as far as Newington, a district unfamiliar to
+her, and repulsive. By the Elephant and Castle she stood watching
+the tumultuous traffic which whirls and roars at this confluence of
+six highways; she had neither a mind to go on, nor yet to return.
+The conductor of an omnibus close at hand kept bellowing 'London
+Bridge!' and her thoughts wandered to that day of meeting with
+Luckworth Crewe, when he took her up the Monument. She had never
+felt more than an idle interest in Crewe, and whenever she
+remembered him nowadays, it was only to reflect with bitterness that
+he doubtless knew a part of her secret,--the part that was known
+to Beatrice French,--and on that account had ceased to urge his
+suit; yet at this moment she wished that she had pledged herself to
+him in good faith. His behaviour argued the steadfast devotion of an
+honest man, however lacking in refinement. Their long engagement
+would have been brightened with many hopes; in the end she might
+have learned to love him, and prosperity would have opened to her a
+world of satisfactions, for which she could no longer hope.
+
+It grew cold. She allowed the movements of a group of people to
+direct her steps, and went eastward along New Kent Road. But when
+the shops were past, and only a dreary prospect of featureless
+dwellings lay before her, she felt her heart sink, and paused in
+vacillating wretchedness.
+
+From a house near by sounded a piano; a foolish jingle, but it smote
+her with a longing for companionship, for friendly, cheerful talk.
+And then of a sudden she determined that this life of intolerable
+isolation should come to an end. Her efforts to find employment that
+would bring her among people had failed simply because she applied
+to strangers, who knew nothing of her capabilities, and cared
+nothing for her needs. But a way offered itself if she could
+overcome the poor lingering vestiges of pride and shame which
+hitherto had seemed to render it impossible. In this hour her
+desolate spirit rejected everything but the thought of relief to be
+found in new occupation, fresh society. She had endured to the limit
+of strength. Under the falling night, before the grey vision of a
+city which, by its alien business and pleasure, made her a mere
+outcast, she all at once found hope in a resource which till now had
+signified despair.
+
+Summoning the first empty cab, she gave an address known to her only
+by hearsay, that of the South London Fashionable Dress Supply
+Association, and was driven thither in about a quarter of an hour.
+The shop, with its windows cunningly laid out to allure the female
+eye, spread a brilliant frontage between two much duller places of
+business; at the doorway stood a commissionaire, distributing some
+newly printed advertisements to the persons who entered, or who
+paused in passing. Nancy accepted a paper without thinking about it,
+and went through the swing doors held open for her by a stripling in
+buttons; she approached a young woman at the nearest counter, and in
+a low voice asked whether Miss. French was on the premises.
+
+'I'm not sure, madam. I will inquire at once.'
+
+'She calls me "madam,"' said Nancy to herself whilst waiting. 'So do
+shopkeepers generally. I suppose I look old.'
+
+The young person (she honeyed a Cockney twang) speedily came back to
+report that Miss. French had left about half-an-hour ago, and was not
+likely to return.
+
+'Can you give me her private address?'
+
+Not having seen Miss. French since the latter's unwelcome call in
+Grove Lane, she only knew that Beatrice had left De Crespigny Park
+to inhabit a flat somewhere or other.
+
+'I wish to see her particularly, on business.'
+
+'Excuse me a moment, madam.'
+
+On returning, the young person requested Nancy to follow her up the
+shop, and led into a glass-partitioned office, where, at a table
+covered with fashion-plates, sat a middle-aged man, with a bald head
+of peculiar lustre. He rose and bowed; Nancy repeated her request.
+
+'Could I despatch a message for you, madam?'
+
+'My business is private.'
+
+The bald-headed man coughed urbanely, and begged to know her name.
+
+'Miss. Lord--of Grove Lane.'
+
+Immediately his countenance changed from deprecating solemnity to a
+broad smile of recognition.
+
+'Miss. Lord! Oh, to be sure; I will give you the address at once.
+Pray pardon my questions; we have to be so very careful. So many
+people desire private interviews with Miss. French. I will jot down
+the address.'
+
+He did so on the back of an advertisement, and added verbal
+directions. Nancy hurried away.
+
+Another cab conveyed her to Brixton, and set her down before a block
+of recently built flats. She ascended to the second floor, pressed
+the button of a bell, and was speedily confronted by a girl of the
+natty parlour-maid species. This time she began by giving her name,
+and had only a moment to wait before she was admitted to a small
+drawing-room, furnished with semblance of luxury. A glowing fire and
+the light of an amber-shaded lamp showed as much fashionable
+upholstery and bric-a-brac as could be squeezed into the narrow
+space. Something else was perceptible which might perhaps have been
+dispensed with; to wit, the odour of a very savoury meal, a meal in
+which fried onions had no insignificant part. But before the visitor
+could comment to herself upon this disadvantage attaching to flats,
+Beatrice joined her.
+
+'I could hardly believe it! So you have really looked me up? Awfully
+jolly of you! I'm quite alone; we'll have a bit of dinner together.'
+
+Miss. French was in her most expansive mood. She understood the call
+as one of simple friendliness.
+
+'I wasn't sure that you knew the address. Got it at the shop? They
+don't go telling everybody, I hope--'
+
+'Some one there seemed to know my name,' said Nancy, whom the warmth
+and light and cheery welcome encouraged in the step she had taken.
+And she explained.
+
+'Ah, Mr. Clatworthy--rum old cove, when you get to know him. Yes,
+yes; no doubt he has heard me speak of you--in a general way, you
+know. Come into my snooze-corner, and take your things off.'
+
+The snooze-corner, commonly called a bedroom, lacked one detail of
+comfort--pure air. The odour of dinner blending with toilet
+perfumes made an atmosphere decidedly oppressive. Beatrice remarked
+on the smallness of the chamber, adding archly, 'But I sleep
+single.'
+
+'What's your brother doing?' she asked, while helping to remove
+Nancy's jacket. 'I passed him in Oxford Street the other day, and he
+either didn't see me, or didn't want to. Thought he looked rather
+dissipated.'
+
+'I know very little about him,' answered the visitor, who spoke and
+acted without reflection, conscious chiefly at this moment of
+faintness induced by fatigue and hunger.
+
+'Fanny's in Paris,' pursued Miss. French. 'Writes as if she was
+amusing herself. I think I shall run over and have a look at her.
+Seen Ada? She's been playing the fool as usual. Found out that
+Arthur had taken the kid to his sister's at Canterbury; went down
+and made a deuce of a kick-up; they had to chuck her out of the
+house. Of course she cares no more about the child than I do; it's
+only to spite her husband. She's going to law with him, she says.
+She won't leave the house in De Crespigny Park, and she's running up
+bills--you bet!'
+
+Nancy tried to laugh. The effort, and its semi-success, indicated
+surrender to her companion's spirit rather than any attention to the
+subject spoken of.
+
+They returned to the drawing-room, but had not time to begin a
+conversation before the servant summoned them to dinner. A very
+satisfying meal it proved; not badly cooked, as cooking is
+understood in Brixton, and served with more of ceremony than the
+guest had expected. Fried scallops, rump steak smothered in onions,
+an apple tart, and very sound Stilton cheese. Such fare testified to
+the virile qualities of Beatrice's mind; she was above the feminine
+folly of neglecting honest victuals. Moreover, there appeared two
+wines, sherry and claret.
+
+'Did you ever try this kind of thing?' said the hostess finally,
+reaching a box of cigarettes.
+
+'I?--Of course not,' Nancy replied, with a laugh.
+
+'It's expected of a sensible woman now-a-days. I've got to like it.
+Better try; no need to make yourself uncomfortable. Just keep the
+smoke in your mouth for half-a-minute, and blow it out prettily. I
+buy these in the Haymarket; special brand for women.'
+
+'And you dine like this, by yourself, every day?'
+
+'Like this, but not always alone. Some one or other drops in.
+Luckworth Crewe was here yesterday.'
+
+Speaking, she watched Nancy, who bore the regard with carelessness,
+and replied lightly:
+
+'It's an independent sort of life, at all events.'
+
+'Just the kind of life that suits me. I'm my own mistress.'
+
+There was a suggested allusion in the sly tone of the last phrase;
+but Nancy, thinking her own thoughts, did not perceive it. As the
+servant had left them alone, they could now talk freely. Beatrice,
+by her frequent glance of curiosity, seemed to await some
+explanation of a visit so unlooked-for.
+
+'How are things going with you?' she asked at length, tapping the
+ash of her cigarette over a plate.
+
+'I want something to do,' was the blunt reply.
+
+'Too much alone--isn't that it?'
+
+'Yes.'
+
+'Just what I thought. You don't see him often?'
+
+Nancy had ceased her pretence of smoking, and leaned back. A flush
+on her face, and something unwonted in the expression of her eyes,
+--something like a smile, yet touched with apathy,--told of
+physical influences which assisted her resolve to have done with
+scruple and delicacy. She handled her wine-glass, which was half
+full, and, before answering, raised it to her lips.
+
+'No, I don't see him often.'
+
+'Well, I told you to come to me if I could be any use. What's your
+idea?'
+
+'Do you know of anything I could do? It isn't so much to earn money,
+as to--to be occupied, and escape from loneliness. But I must have
+two afternoons in the week to myself.'
+
+Beatrice nodded and smiled.
+
+'No,--not for that,' Nancy added hastily. 'To see my boy.'
+
+The other appeared to accept this correction.
+
+'All right. I think I can find you something. We're opening a
+branch.' She mentioned the locality. 'There'll be a club-room, like
+at headquarters, and we shall want some one ladylike to sit there
+and answer questions. You wouldn't be likely to see any one that
+knows you, and you'd get a good deal of fun out of it. Hours from
+ten to five, but Saturday afternoon off, and Wednesday after three,
+if that would do?'
+
+'Yes, that would do very well. Any payment, at first?'
+
+'Oh, we wouldn't be so mean as all that. Say ten shillings a week
+till Christmas, and afterwards we could see'--she laughed--
+'whether you're worth more.'
+
+'I know nothing about fashions.'
+
+'You can learn all you need to know in an hour. It's the ladylike
+appearance and talk more than anything else.'
+
+Nancy sipped again from her wine-glass.
+
+'When could I begin?'
+
+'The place 'll be ready on Monday week. Next week you might put in a
+few hours with us. Just sit and watch and listen, that's all; to get
+the hang of the thing.'
+
+'Thank you for being so ready to help me.'
+
+'Not a bit of it. I haven't done yet. There's a condition. If I fix
+up this job for you, will you tell me something I want to know?'
+
+Nancy turned her eyes apprehensively.
+
+'You can guess what it is. I quite believe what you told me some
+time ago, but I shan't feel quite easy until I know--'
+
+She finished the sentence with a look. Nancy's eyes fell.
+
+'Curiosity, nothing else,' added the other. 'Just to make quite sure
+it isn't anybody I've thought of.'
+
+There was a long silence. Leaning forward upon the table, Nancy
+turned her wine-glass about and about. She now had a very high
+colour, and breathed quickly.
+
+'Is it off, then?' said Beatrice, in an indifferent tone.
+
+Thereupon Nancy disclosed the name of her husband--her lover, as
+Miss. French thought him. Plied with further questions, she told
+where he was living, but gave no account of the circumstances that
+had estranged them. Abundantly satisfied, Beatrice grew almost
+affectionate, and talked merrily.
+
+Nancy wished to ask whether Luckworth Crewe had any knowledge of her
+position. It was long before her lips could utter the words, but at
+length they were spoken. And Beatrice assured her that Crewe, good
+silly fellow, did not even suspect the truth.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 5
+
+
+
+
+'For a man,' said Tarrant, 'who can pay no more than twelve and
+sixpence a week, it's the best accommodation to be found in London.
+There's an air of civilisation about the house. Look; a bath, and a
+little book-case, and an easy-chair such as can be used by a man who
+respects himself. You feel you are among people who tub o' mornings
+and know the meaning of leisure. Then the view!'
+
+He was talking to his friend Harvey Munden, the journalist. The room
+in which they stood might with advantage have been larger, but as a
+bed-chamber it served well enough, and only the poverty of its
+occupant, who put it to the additional use of sitting-room and
+study, made the lack of space particularly noticeable. The window
+afforded a prospect pleasant enough to eyes such as theirs. Above
+the lower houses on the opposite side of the way appeared tall
+trees, in the sere garb of later autumn, growing by old Westminster
+School; and beyond them, grey in twilight, rose the towers of the
+Abbey. From this point of view no vicinage of modern brickwork
+spoilt their charm; the time-worn monitors stood alone against a sky
+of ruddy smoke-drift and purple cloud.
+
+'The old Adam is stronger than ever in me,' he pursued. 'If I were
+condemned for life to the United States, I should go mad, and perish
+in an attempt to swim the Atlantic.'
+
+'Then why did you stay so long?'
+
+'I could have stayed with advantage even longer. It's something to
+have studied with tolerable thoroughness the most hateful form of
+society yet developed. I saw it at first as a man does who is living
+at his ease; at last, as a poor devil who is thankful for the
+institution of free lunches. I went first-class, and I came back as
+a steerage passenger. It has been a year well spent.'
+
+It had made him, in aspect, more than a twelve-month older. His
+lounging attitude, the spirit of his talk, showed that he was
+unchanged in bodily and mental habits; but certain lines new-graven
+upon his visage, and an austerity that had taken the place of
+youthful self-consciousness, signified a more than normal progress
+in experience.
+
+'Do you know,' said Munden slyly, 'that you have brought back a
+trans-Atlantic accent?'
+
+'Accent? The devil! I don't believe it.'
+
+'Intonation, at all events.'
+
+Tarrant professed a serious annoyance.
+
+'If that's true, I'll go and live for a month in Limerick.'
+
+'It would be cheaper to join a Socialist club in the East End. But
+just tell me how you stand. How long can you hold out in these
+aristocratic lodgings?'
+
+'Till Christmas. I'm ashamed to say how I've got the money, so don't
+ask. I reached London with empty pockets. And I'll tell you one
+thing I have learnt, Munden. There's no villainy, no scoundrelism,
+no baseness conceivable, that isn't excused by want of money. I
+understand the whole "social question." The man who has never felt
+the perspiration come out on his forehead in asking himself how he
+is going to keep body and soul together, has no right to an opinion
+on the greatest question of the day.'
+
+'What particular scoundrelism or baseness have you committed?' asked
+the other.
+
+Tarrant averted his eyes.
+
+'I said I could understand such things.'
+
+'One sees that you have been breathed upon by democracy.'
+
+'I loathe the word and the thing even more than I did, which is
+saying a good deal.'
+
+'Be it so. You say you are going to work?'
+
+'Yes, I have come back to work. Even now, it's difficult to realise
+that I must work or starve. I understand how fellows who have
+unexpectedly lost their income go through life sponging on relatives
+and friends. I understand how an educated man goes sinking through
+all the social grades, down to the common lodging-house and the
+infirmary. And I honestly believe there's only one thing that saves
+me from doing likewise.'
+
+'And what's that?'
+
+'I can't tell you--not yet, at all events.'
+
+'I always thought you a very fine specimen of the man born to do
+nothing,' said Munden, with that smile which permitted him a
+surprising candour in conversation.
+
+'And you were quite right,' returned Tarrant, with a laugh. 'I am a
+born artist in indolence. It's the pity of pities that circumstances
+will frustrate Nature's purpose.'
+
+'You think you can support yourself by journalism?'
+
+'I must try.--Run your eye over that.'
+
+He took from the table a slip of manuscript, headed, 'A Reverie in
+Wall Street.' Munden read it, sat thoughtful for a moment, and
+laughed.
+
+'Devilish savage. Did you write it after a free lunch?'
+
+'Wrote it this morning. Shall I try one of the evening papers with
+it,--or one of the weeklies?'
+
+Munden suggested a few alterations, and mentioned the journal which
+he thought might possibly find room for such a bit of satire.
+
+'Done anything else?'
+
+'Here's a half-finished paper--"The Commercial Prospects of the
+Bahamas."'
+
+'Let me look.'
+
+After reading a page or two with critically wrinkled forehead,
+Munden laid it down.
+
+'Seems pretty solid,--libellous, too, I should say. You've more
+stuff in you than I thought. All right: go ahead.--Come and dine
+with me to-morrow, to meet a man who may be useful.'
+
+'To-morrow I can't. I dine at Lady Pollard's.'
+
+'Who is she?'
+
+'Didn't you know Pollard of Trinity?--the only son of his mother,
+and she a widow.'
+
+'Next day, then.'
+
+'Can't. I dine with some people at Bedford Park.'
+
+Munden lifted his eyebrows.
+
+'At this rate, you may live pretty well on a dress suit. Any more
+engagements?'
+
+'None that I know of. But I shall accept all that offer. I'm hungry
+for the society of decent English people. I used to neglect my
+acquaintances; I know better now. Go and live for a month in a cheap
+New York boarding-house, and you'll come out with a wholesome taste
+for English refinement.'
+
+To enable his friend to read, Tarrant had already lit a lamp.
+Munden, glancing about the room, said carelessly:
+
+'Do you still possess the furniture of the old place?'
+
+'No,' was the answer, given with annoyance. 'Vawdrey had it sold for
+me.'
+
+'Pictures, books, and all the nick-nacks?'
+
+'Everything.--Of course I'm sorry for it; but I thought at the
+time that I shouldn't return to England for some years.'
+
+'You never said anything of that kind to me.'
+
+'No, I didn't,' the other replied gloomily. And all at once he fell
+into so taciturn a mood, that his companion, after a few more
+remarks and inquiries, rose from his chair to leave.
+
+From seven to nine Tarrant sat resolutely at his table, and covered
+a few pages with the kind of composition which now came most easily
+to him,--a somewhat virulent sarcasm. He found pleasure in the
+work; but after nine o'clock his thoughts strayed to matters of
+personal interest, and got beyond control. Would the last post of
+the evening bring him an answer to a letter he had despatched this
+morning? At length he laid down his pen, and listened nervously for
+that knock which, at one time or another, is to all men a
+heart-shaking sound.
+
+It came at the street door, and was quickly followed by a tap at his
+own. Nancy had lost no time in replying. What her letter might
+contain he found it impossible to conjecture. Reproaches? Joyous
+welcome? Wrath? Forgiveness? He knew her so imperfectly, that he
+could not feel sure even as to the probabilities of the case. And
+his suspense was abundantly justified. Her answer came upon him with
+the force of a shock totally unexpected.
+
+He read the lines again and again; he stared at the bank-note. His
+first sensation was one of painful surprise; thereupon succeeded
+fiery resentment. Reason put in a modest word, hinting that he had
+deserved no better; but he refused to listen. Nothing could excuse
+so gross an insult. He had not thought Nancy capable of this
+behaviour. Tested, she betrayed the vice of birth. Her imputation
+upon his motive in marrying her was sheer vulgar abuse, possible
+only on vulgar lips. Well and good; now he knew her; all the torment
+of conscience he had suffered was needless. And for the moment he
+experienced a great relief.
+
+In less than ten minutes letter and bank-note were enclosed in a new
+envelope, and addressed back again to the sender. With no word of
+comment; she must interpret him as she could, and would. He went
+out, and threw the offensive packet into the nearest receptacle for
+such things.
+
+Work was over for to-night. After pacing in the obscurity of Dean's
+Yard until his pulse had recovered a normal beat, he issued into the
+peopled ways, and turned towards Westminster Bridge.
+
+Despite his neglect of Nancy, he had never ceased to think of her
+with a tenderness which, in his own judgment, signified something
+more than the simple fidelity of a married man. Faithful in the
+technical sense he had not been, but the casual amours of a young
+man caused him no self-reproach; Nancy's image remained without
+rival in his mind; he had continued to acknowledge her claims upon
+him, and, from time to time, to think of her with a lover's longing.
+As he only wrote when prompted by such a mood, his letters, however
+unsatisfying, were sincere. Various influences conflicted with this
+amiable and honourable sentiment. The desire of independence which
+had speeded him away from England still accompanied him on his
+return; he had never ceased to regret his marriage, and it seemed to
+him that, without this legal bondage, it would have been much easier
+to play a manly part at the time of Nancy's becoming a mother. Were
+she frankly his mistress, he would not be keeping thus far away when
+most she needed the consolation of his presence. The secret marriage
+condemned him to a course of shame, and the more he thought of it,
+the more he marvelled at his deliberate complicity in such a fraud.
+When poverty began to make itself felt, when he was actually
+hampered in his movements by want of money, this form of indignity,
+more than any galling to his pride, intensified the impatience with
+which he remembered that he could no longer roam the world as an
+adventurer. Any day some trivial accident might oppress him with the
+burden of a wife and child who looked to him for their support.
+Tarrant the married man, unless he were content to turn simple rogue
+and vagabond, must make for himself a place in the money-earning
+world. His indolence had no small part in his revolt against the
+stress of such a consideration. The climate of the Bahamas by no
+means tended to invigorate him, and in the United States he found so
+much to observe,--even to enjoy,--that the necessity of effort
+was kept out of sight as long as, by one expedient and another, he
+succeeded in procuring means to live upon without working.
+
+During the homeward voyage--a trial such as he had never known,
+amid squalid discomforts which enraged even more than they disgusted
+him--his heart softened in anticipation of a meeting with Nancy,
+and of the sight of his child. Apart from his fellow-travellers,--
+in whom he could perceive nothing but coarseness and vileness,--he
+spent the hours in longing for England and for the home he would
+make there, in castigating the flagrant faults of his character,
+moderating his ambitions, and endeavouring to find a way out of the
+numerous grave difficulties with which his future was beset.
+
+Landed, he rather forgot than discarded these wholesome meditations.
+What he had first to do was so very unpleasant, and taxed so rudely
+his self-respect, that he insensibly fell back again into the
+rebellious temper. Choice there was none; reaching London with a few
+shillings in his pocket, of necessity he repaired forthwith to Mr
+Vawdrey's office in the City, and made known the straits into which
+he had fallen.
+
+'Now, my dear fellow,' said Mr. Vawdrey, with his usual good-humour,
+'how much have you had of me since you started for the Bahamas?'
+
+'That is hardly a fair question,' Tarrant replied, endeavouring not
+to hang his head like an everyday beggar. 'I went out on a
+commission--'
+
+'True. But after you ceased to be a commissioner?'
+
+'You have lent me seventy pounds. Living in the States is expensive.
+What I got for my furniture has gone as well, yet I certainly
+haven't been extravagant; and for the last month or two I lived like
+a tramp. Will you make my debt to you a round hundred? It shall be
+repaid, though I may be a year or two about it.'
+
+The loan was granted, but together with a great deal of unpalatable
+counsel. Having found his lodging, Tarrant at once invested ten
+pounds in providing himself with a dress suit, and improving his
+ordinary attire,--he had sold every garment he could spare in New
+York. For the dress suit he had an immediate use; on the very
+platform of Euston Station, at his arrival, a chance meeting with
+one of his old college friends resulted in an invitation to dine,
+and, even had not policy urged him to make the most of such
+acquaintances, he was in no mood for rejecting a summons back into
+the world of civilisation. Postponing the purposed letter to Nancy
+(which, had he written it sooner, would have been very unlike the
+letter he subsequently sent), he equipped himself once more as a
+gentleman, and spent several very enjoyable hours in looking up the
+members of his former circle--Hodiernals and others. Only to
+Harvey Munden did he confide something of the anxieties which lay
+beneath his assumed lightheartedness. Munden was almost the only man
+he knew for whom he had a genuine respect.
+
+Renewal of intercourse with people of good social standing made him
+more than ever fretful in the thought that he had clogged himself
+with marriage. Whatever Nancy's reply to his announcement that he
+was home again, he would have read it with discontent. To have the
+fact forced upon him (a fact he seriously believed it) that his wife
+could not be depended upon even for elementary generosity of
+thought, was at this moment especially disastrous; it weighed the
+balance against his feelings of justice and humanity, hitherto, no
+matter how he acted, always preponderant over the baser issues of
+character and circumstance.
+
+He stood leaning upon the parapet of Westminster Bridge, his eyes
+scanning the dark facade of the Houses of Parliament.
+
+How would the strong, unscrupulous, really ambitious man act in such
+a case? What was to prevent him from ignoring the fact that he was
+married, and directing his course precisely as he would have done if
+poverty had come upon him before his act of supreme foolishness?
+Journalism must have been his refuge then, as now; but Society would
+have held out to him the hope of every adventurer--a marriage with
+some woman whose wealth and connections would clear an upward path
+in whatever line he chose to follow. Why not abandon to Nancy the
+inheritance it would degrade him to share, and so purchase back his
+freedom? The bargain might be made; a strong man would carry it
+through, and ultimately triumph by daring all risks.
+
+Having wrought himself to this point of insensate revolt, he quitted
+his musing-station on the bridge, and walked away.
+
+Nancy did not write again. There passed four or five days, and
+Tarrant, working hard as well as enjoying the pleasures of Society,
+made up his mind not to see her. He would leave events to take their
+course. A heaviness of heart often troubled him, but he resisted it,
+and told himself that he was becoming stronger.
+
+After a long day of writing, he addressed a packet to a certain
+periodical, and went out to post it. No sooner had he left the house
+than a woman, who had been about to pass him on the pavement,
+abruptly turned round and hurriedly walked away. But for this
+action, he would not have noticed her; as it was, he recognised the
+figure, and an impulse which allowed of no reflection brought him in
+a moment to her side. In the ill-lighted street a face could with
+difficulty be observed, but Nancy's features were unmistakable to
+the eye that now fell upon them.
+
+'Stop, and let me speak to you,' he exclaimed.
+
+She walked only the more quickly, and he was obliged to take her by
+the arm.
+
+'What do you want?'
+
+She spoke as if to an insolent stranger, and shook off his grasp.
+
+'If you have nothing to say to me, why are you here?'
+
+'Here? I suppose the streets are free to me?'
+
+'Nothing would bring you to Great College Street if you didn't know
+that I was living here. Now that we have met, we must talk.'
+
+'I have nothing at all to say to you.'
+
+'Well, then _I_ will talk.--Come this way; there's a quiet place
+where no one will notice us.'
+
+Nancy kept her eyes resolutely averted from him; he, the while,
+searched her face with eagerness, as well as the faint rays of the
+nearest lamp allowed it.
+
+'If you have anything to say, you must say it here.'
+
+'It's no use, then. Go your way, and I'll go mine.'
+
+He turned, and walked slowly in the direction of Dean's Yard. There
+was the sound of a step behind him, and when he had come into the
+dark, quiet square, Nancy was there too.
+
+'Better to be reasonable,' said Tarrant, approaching her again. 'I
+want to ask you why you answered a well-meant letter with vulgar
+insult?'
+
+'The insult came from you,' she answered, in a shaking voice.
+
+'What did I say that gave you offence?'
+
+'How can you ask such a question? To write in that way after never
+answering my letter for months, leaving me without a word at such a
+time, making me think either that you were dead or that you would
+never let me hear of you again--'
+
+'I told you it was a mere note, just to let you know I was back. I
+said you should hear more when we met.'
+
+'Very well, we have met. What have you to say for yourself?'
+
+'First of all, this. That you are mistaken in supposing I should
+ever consent to share your money. The thought was natural to you, no
+doubt; but I see things from a different point of view.'
+
+His cold anger completely disguised the emotion stirred in him by
+Nancy's presence. Had he not spoken thus, he must have given way to
+joy and tenderness. For Nancy seemed more beautiful than the memory
+he had retained of her, and even at such a juncture she was far from
+exhibiting the gross characteristics attributed to her by his
+rebellious imagination.
+
+'Then I don't understand,' were her next words, 'why you wrote to me
+again at all.'
+
+'There are many things in me that you don't understand, and can't
+understand.'
+
+'Yes, I think so. That's why I see no use in our talking.'
+
+Tarrant was ashamed of what he had said--a meaningless retort,
+which covered his inability to speak as his heart prompted.
+
+'At all events I wanted to see you, and it's fortunate you passed
+just as I was coming out.'
+
+Nancy would not accept the conciliatory phrase.
+
+'I hadn't the least intention of seeing you,' she replied. 'It was a
+curiosity to know where you lived, nothing else. I shall never
+forgive you for the way in which you have behaved to me, so you
+needn't try to explain yourself.'
+
+'Here and now, I should certainly not try. The only thing I will say
+about myself is, that I very much regret not having made known that
+you were married to me when plain honesty required it. Now, I look
+upon it as something over and done with, as far as I am concerned. I
+shall never benefit by the deception--'
+
+She interrupted him.
+
+'How do you know that _I_ shall benefit by it? How can you tell what
+has been happening since you last heard from me in America?'
+
+'I have taken it for granted that things are the same.'
+
+'Then you didn't even take measures to have news of me from any one
+else?'
+
+'What need? I should always have received any letter you sent.'
+
+'You thought it likely that I should appeal to you if I were in
+difficulties.'
+
+He stood silent, glad of the obscurity which made it needless for
+him to command his features. At length:
+
+'What is the simple fact? Has your secret been discovered, or not?'
+
+'How does it concern you?'
+
+'Only in this way: that if you are to be dependent upon any one, it
+must be upon me.'
+
+Nancy gave a scornful laugh.
+
+'That's very generous, considering your position. But happily you
+can't force me to accept your generosity, any more than I can compel
+you to take a share of my money.'
+
+'Without the jibe at my poverty,' Tarrant said, 'that is a
+sufficient answer. As we can't even pretend to be friendly with each
+other, I am very glad there need be no talk of our future relations.
+You are provided for, and no doubt will take care not to lose the
+provision. If ever you prefer to forget that we are legally bound, I
+shall be no obstacle.'
+
+'I have thought of that,' replied Nancy, after a pause, her voice
+expressing satisfaction. 'Perhaps we should do better to make the
+understanding at once. You are quite free; I should never
+acknowledge you as my husband.'
+
+'You seriously mean it?'
+
+'Do I seem to be joking?'
+
+'Very well. I won't say that I should never acknowledge you as my
+wife; so far from that, I hold myself responsible whenever you
+choose to make any kind of claim upon me. But I shall not dream of
+interfering with your liberty. If ever you wish to write to me, you
+may safely address to the house at Champion Hill.--And remember
+always,' he added sternly, 'that it was not I who made such a
+parting necessary.'
+
+Nancy returned his look through the gloom, and said in like tone:
+
+'I shall do my best never to think of it at all. Fortunately, my
+time and my thoughts are occupied.'
+
+'How?' Tarrant could not help asking, as she turned away; for her
+tone implied some special significance in the words.
+
+'You have no right to ask anything whatever about me,' came from
+Nancy, who was already moving away.
+
+He allowed her to go.
+
+'So it is to be as I wished,' he said to himself, with mock courage.
+'So much the better.'
+
+And he went home to a night of misery.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 6
+
+
+
+
+Not long after the disappearance of Fanny French, Mrs. Damerel called
+one day upon Luckworth Crewe at his office in Farringdon Street.
+Crewe seldom had business with ladies, and few things could have
+surprised him more than a visit from this lady in particular, whom
+he knew so well by name, and regarded with such special interest.
+She introduced herself as a person wishing to find a good investment
+for a small capital; but the half-hour's conversation which followed
+became in the end almost a confidential chat. Mrs. Damerel spoke of
+her nephew Horace Lord, with whom, she understood, Mr. Crewe was on
+terms of intimacy; she professed a grave solicitude on his account,
+related frankly the unhappy circumstances which had estranged the
+young man from her, and ultimately asked whether Crewe could not
+make it worth his own while to save Horace from the shoals of
+idleness, and pilot him into some safe commercial haven. This
+meeting was the first of many between the fashionable lady and the
+keen man of affairs. Without a suspicion of how it had come about,
+Horace Lord presently found himself an informal partner in Crewe's
+business; he invested only a nominal sum, which might be looked upon
+as a premium of apprenticeship; but there was an understanding that
+at the close of the term of tutelage imposed by his father's will,
+he should have the offer of a genuine partnership on very inviting
+terms.
+
+Horace was not sorry to enter again upon regular occupation. He had
+considerably damaged his health in the effort to live up to his
+ideal of thwarted passion, and could no longer entertain a hope that
+Fanny's escapade was consistent with innocence. Having learnt how
+money slips through the fingers of a gentleman with fastidious
+tastes, he welcomed a prospect of increased resources, and applied
+himself with some energy to learning his new business. But with Mrs.
+Damerel he utterly refused to be reconciled, and of his sister he
+saw very little. Nancy, however, approved the step he had taken, and
+said she would be content to know that all was well with him.
+
+Upon a Sunday morning, when the church bells had ceased to clang,
+Luckworth Crewe, not altogether at his ease in garb of flagrant
+respectability, sat by the fireside of a pleasant little room
+conversing with Mrs. Damerel. Their subject, as usual at the
+beginning of talk, was Horace Lord.
+
+'He won't speak of you at all,' said Crewe, in a voice singularly
+subdued, sympathetic, respectful. 'I have done all I could, short of
+telling him that I know you. He's very touchy still on that old
+affair.'
+
+'How would he like it,' asked the lady, 'if you told him that we are
+acquaintances?'
+
+'Impossible to say. Perhaps it would make no difference one way or
+another.'
+
+Mrs. Damerel was strikingly, yet becomingly, arrayed. The past year
+had dealt no less gently with her than its predecessors; if
+anything, her complexion had gained in brilliancy, perhaps a
+consequence of the hygienic precautions due to her fear of becoming
+stout. A stranger, even a specialist in the matter, might have
+doubted whether the fourth decade lay more than a month or two
+behind her. So far from seeking to impress her visitor with a pose
+of social superiority, she behaved to him as though his presence
+honoured as much as it delighted her; look, tone, bearing, each was
+a flattery which no obtuseness could fail to apprehend, and Crewe's
+countenance proved him anything but inappreciative. Hitherto she had
+spoken and listened with her head drooping in gentle melancholy;
+now, with a sudden change intended to signify the native buoyancy of
+her disposition, she uttered a rippling laugh, which showed her
+excellent teeth, and said prettily:
+
+'Poor boy! I must suffer the penalty of having tried to save him
+from one of my own sex.--Not,' she added, 'that I foresaw how that
+poor silly girl would justify my worst fears of her. Perhaps,' her
+head drooping again, 'I ought to reproach myself with what
+happened.'
+
+'I don't see that at all,' replied Crewe, whose eyes lost nothing of
+the exhibition addressed to them. 'Even if you had been the cause of
+it, which of course you weren't, I should have said you had done the
+right thing. Every one knew what Fanny French must come to.'
+
+'Isn't it sad? A pretty girl--but so ill brought up, I fear. Can
+you give me any news of her sister, the one who came here and
+frightened me so?'
+
+'Oh, she's going on as usual.'
+
+Crewe checked himself, and showed hesitation.
+
+'She almost threatened me,' Mrs. Damerel pursued, with timid
+sweetness. 'Do you think she is the kind of person to plot any harm
+against one?'
+
+'She had better not try it on,' said Crewe, in his natural voice.
+Then, as if recollecting himself, he pursued more softly: 'But I was
+going to speak of her. You haven't heard that Miss. Lord has taken a
+position in the new branch of that Dress Supply Association?'
+
+Mrs. Damerel kept an astonished silence.
+
+'There can't be any doubt of it; I have been told on the best
+authority. She is in what they call the "club-room," a
+superintendent. It's a queer thing; what can have led her to it?'
+
+'I must make inquiries,' said Mrs. Damerel, with an air of concern.
+'How sad it is, Mr. Crewe, that these young relatives of mine,--
+almost the only relatives I have,--should refuse me their
+confidence and their affection. Pray, does Horace know of what his
+sister is doing?'
+
+'I thought I wouldn't speak to him about it until I had seen you.'
+
+'How very kind! How grateful I am to you for your constant
+thoughtfulness!'
+
+Why Crewe should have practised such reticence, why it signified
+kindness and thoughtfulness to Mrs. Damerel, neither he nor she could
+easily have explained. But their eyes met, with diffident admiration
+on the one side, and touching amiability on the other. Then they
+discussed Nancy's inexplicable behaviour from every point of view;
+or rather, Mrs. Damerel discussed it, and her companion made a
+pretence of doing so. Crewe's manner had become patently artificial;
+he either expressed himself in trivial phrases, which merely avoided
+silence, or betrayed an embarrassment, an abstraction, which caused
+the lady to observe him with all the acuteness at her command.
+
+You haven't seen her lately?' she asked, when Crewe had been staring
+at the window for a minute or two.
+
+'Seen her?--No; not for a long time.'
+
+'I think you told me you haven't called there since Mr. Lord's
+death?'
+
+'I never was there at all,' he answered abruptly.
+
+'Oh, I remember your saying so. Of course there is no reason why she
+shouldn't go into business, if time is heavy on her hands, as I dare
+say it may be. So many ladies prefer to have an occupation of that
+kind now-a-days. It's a sign of progress; we are getting more
+sensible; Society used to have such silly prejudices. Even within my
+recollection--how quickly things change!--no lady would have
+dreamt of permitting her daughter to take an engagement in a shop or
+any such place. Now we have women of title starting as milliners and
+modistes, and soon it will be quite a common thing to see one's
+friends behind the counter.'
+
+She gave a gay little laugh, in which Crewe joined unmelodiously,--
+for he durst not be merry in the note natural to him,--then raised
+her eyes in playful appeal.
+
+'If ever I should fall into misfortune, Mr. Crewe, would you put me
+in the way of earning my living.'
+
+'You couldn't. You're above all that kind of thing. It's for the
+rough and ready sort of women, and I can't say I have much opinion
+of them.'
+
+'That's a very nice little compliment; but at the same time, it's
+rather severe on the women who are practical.--Tell me frankly: Is
+my--my niece one of the people you haven't much opinion of?'
+
+Crewe shuffled his feet.
+
+'I wasn't thinking of Miss. Lord.'
+
+'But what is really your opinion of her?' Mrs. Damerel urged softly.
+
+Crewe looked up and down, smiled in a vacant way, and appeared very
+uncomfortable.
+
+'May I guess the truth?' said his playful companion.
+
+'No, I'll tell you. I wanted to marry her, and did my best to get
+her to promise.'
+
+'I thought so!' She paused on the note of arch satisfaction, and
+mused. 'How nice of you to confess!--And that's all past and
+forgotten, is it?'
+
+Never man more unlike himself than the bold advertising-agent in
+this colloquy. He was subdued and shy; his usual racy and virile
+talk had given place to an insipid mildness. He seemed bent on
+showing that the graces of polite society were not so strange to him
+as one might suppose. But under Mrs. Damerel's interrogation a
+restiveness began to appear in him, and at length he answered in his
+natural blunt voice:
+
+'Yes, it's all over--and for a good reason.'
+
+The lady's curiosity was still more provoked.
+
+'No,' she exclaimed laughingly, 'I am _not_ going to ask the reason.
+That would be presuming too far on friendship.'
+
+Crewe fixed his eyes on a corner of the room, and seemed to look
+there for a solution of some difficulty. When the silence had lasted
+more than a minute, he began to speak slowly and awkwardly.
+
+'I've half a mind to--in fact, I've been thinking that you ought
+to know.'
+
+'The good reason?'
+
+'Yes. You're the only one that could stand in the place of a mother
+to her. And I don't think she ought to be living alone, like she is,
+with no one to advise and help her.'
+
+'I have felt that very strongly,' said Mrs. Damerel. 'The old servant
+who is with her can't be at all a suitable companion--that is, to
+be treated on equal terms. A very strange arrangement, indeed. But
+you don't mean that you thought less well of her because she is
+living in that way?'
+
+'Of course not. It's something a good deal more serious than that.'
+
+Mrs. Damerel became suddenly grave.
+
+'Then I certainly ought to know.'
+
+'You ought. I think it very likely she would have been glad enough
+to make a friend of you, if it hadn't been for this--this affair,
+which stood in the way. There can't be any harm in telling you, as
+you couldn't wish anything but her good.'
+
+'That surely you may take for granted.'
+
+'Well then, I have an idea that she's trying to earn money because
+some one is getting all he can out of her--leaving her very little
+for herself; and if so, it's time you interfered.'
+
+The listener was so startled that she changed colour.
+
+'You mean that some man has her in his power?'
+
+'If I'm not mistaken, it comes to that. But for her father's will,
+she would have been married long ago, and--she ought to be.'
+
+Having blurted out these words, Crewe felt much more at ease. As Mrs.
+Damerel's eyes fell, the sense of sexual predominance awoke in him,
+and he was no longer so prostrate before the lady's natural and
+artificial graces.
+
+'How do you know this?' she asked, in an undertone.
+
+'From some one who had it from Miss. Lord herself.'
+
+'Are you quite sure that it isn't a malicious falsehood?'
+
+'As sure as I am that I sit here. I know the man's name, and where
+he lives, and all about him. And I know where the child is at nurse.
+
+'The child?--Oh--surely--never!'
+
+A genuine agitation possessed her; she had a frightened,
+pain-stricken look, and moved as if she must act without delay.
+
+'It's nearly six months old,' Crewe continued. 'Of course that's why
+she was away so long.'
+
+'But why haven't you told me this before? It was your duty to tell
+me--your plain duty. How long have you known?'
+
+'I heard of it first of all about three months ago, but it was only
+the other day that I was told the man's name, and other things about
+him.'
+
+'Is it known to many people? Is the poor girl talked about?'
+
+'No, no,' Crewe replied, with confidence. 'The person who told me is
+the only one who has found it out; you may depend upon that.'
+
+'It must be a woman,' said Mrs. Damerel sharply.
+
+'Yes, it's a woman. Some one _I_ know very well. She told me just
+because she thought I was still hoping to marry Miss. Lord, and--
+well, the truth is, though we're good friends, she has a little
+spite against me, and I suppose it amused her to tell me something
+disagreeable.'
+
+'I have no doubt,' said Mrs. Damerel, 'that the secret has been
+betrayed to a dozen people.'
+
+'I'll go bail it hasn't!' returned Crewe, falling into his
+vernacular.
+
+'I can hardly believe it at all. I should never have dreamt that
+such a thing was possible. What is the man's name? what is his
+position?'
+
+'Tarrant is his name, and he's related somehow to a Mr. Vawdrey, well
+known in the City, who has a big house over at Champion Hill. I have
+no notion how they came together, or how long it was going on. But
+this Mr. Tarrant has been in America for a year, I understand; has
+only just come back; and now he's living In poorish lodgings,--
+Great College Street, Westminster. I've made a few inquiries about
+him, but I can't get at very much. A man who knows Vawdrey tells me
+that Tarrant has no means, and that he's a loafing, affected sort of
+chap. If that's true,--and it seems likely from the way he's
+living,--of course he will be ready enough to marry Miss. Lord when
+the proper time has come; I'm only afraid that's all he had in view
+from the first. And I can't help suspecting, as I said, that she's
+supporting him now. If not, why should she go and work in a shop? At
+all events, a decent man wouldn't allow her to do it.'
+
+'A decent man,' said the listener, 'would never have allowed her to
+fall into disgrace.'
+
+'Certainly not,' Crewe assented with energy. 'And as for my keeping
+quiet about it, Mrs. Damerel, you've only to think what an awkward
+affair it was to mention. I'm quite sure you'll have a little
+feeling against me, because I knew of it--'
+
+'I beg you not to think that!' She returned to her manner of suave
+friendliness. 'I shall owe you gratitude for telling me, and nothing
+but gratitude. You have behaved with very great delicacy; I cannot
+say how highly I appreciate your feeling on the poor girl's behalf.'
+
+'If I can be of any use, I am always at your service.'
+
+'Thank you, dear Mr. Crewe, thank you! In you I have found a real
+friend,--and how rarely they are met with! Of course I shall make
+inquiries at once. My niece must be protected. A helpless girl in
+that dreadful position may commit unheard-of follies. I fear you are
+right. He is making her his victim. With such a secret, she is
+absolutely at his mercy. And it explains why she has shunned me. Oh,
+do you think her brother knows it?'
+
+'I'm quite sure he doesn't; hasn't the least suspicion.'
+
+'Of course not. But it's wonderful how she has escaped. Your
+informant--how did she find it out? You say she had the story from
+the girl's own lips. But why? She must have shown that she knew
+something.'
+
+Crewe imparted such details as had come to his knowledge; they were
+meagre, and left many obscurities, but Mrs. Damerel rewarded him with
+effusive gratitude, and strengthened the spell which she had cast
+upon this knight of Farringdon Street.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 7
+
+
+
+
+Every day Tarrant said to himself: 'I am a free man; I was only
+married in a dream.' Every night he thought of Nancy, and suffered
+heartache.
+
+He thought, too, of Nancy's child, his own son. That Nancy was a
+tender mother, he knew from the letter she had written him after the
+baby's birth,--a letter he would have liked to read again, but
+forbore. Must not the separation from her child be hard? If he saw
+the poor little mortal, how would the sight affect him? At moments
+he felt a longing perhaps definable as the instinct of paternity;
+but he was not the man to grow sentimental over babies, his own or
+other people's. Irony and sarcasm--very agreeable to a certain
+class of newspaper readers--were just now his stock-in-trade, and
+he could not afford to indulge any softer mode of meditation.
+
+His acquaintances agreed that the year of absence had not improved
+him. He was alarmingly clever; he talked well; but his amiability,
+the poetry of his mind, seemed to have been lost in America. He
+could no longer admire or praise.
+
+For his own part, he did not clearly perceive this change. It struck
+him only that the old friends were less interesting than he had
+thought them; and he looked for reception in circles better able to
+appreciate his epigrams and paradoxes.
+
+A few weeks of such life broke him so completely to harness, that he
+forgot the seasonable miseries which had been wont to drive him from
+London at the approach of November. When the first fog blackened
+against his windows, he merely lit the lamp and wrote on,
+indifferent. Two years ago he had declared that a London November
+would fatally blight his soul; that he must flee to a land of
+sunshine, or perish. There was little time, now, to think about his
+soul.
+
+One Monday morning arrived a letter which surprised and disturbed
+him. It ran thus:
+
+'Mrs. Eustace Damerel presents her compliments to Mr. Tarrant, and
+would take it as a great favour if he could call upon her, either
+to-morrow or Tuesday, at any hour between three and seven. She
+particularly desires to see Mr. Tarrant on a private matter of mutual
+interest.'
+
+Now this could have but one meaning. Mrs. Eustace Damerel was, of
+course, Nancy's relative; from Nancy herself, or in some other way,
+she must have learnt the fact of his marriage. Probably from Nancy,
+since she knew where he lived. He was summoned to a judicial
+interview. Happily, attendance was not compulsory.
+
+Second thoughts advised him that he had better accept the
+invitation. He must know what measures were in progress against him.
+If Nancy had already broken her word, she might be disposed to
+revenge herself in every way that would occur to an angry woman of
+small refinement; she might make life in London impossible for him.
+
+He sat down and penned a reply, saying that he would call upon Mrs.
+Damerel at five to-morrow. But he did not post this. After all, a
+day's delay would only irritate him; better to go this afternoon, in
+which case it was not worth while sending an answer.
+
+It seemed to him very probable that Nancy would be with her aunt, to
+confront him. If so,--if indeed she were going to act like any
+coarse woman, with no regard but for her own passions and Interests,
+--he would at least have the consolation of expelling from his
+mind, at once and for ever, her haunting image.
+
+Mrs. Damerel, who during the past twelve months had changed her abode
+half-a-dozen times, now occupied private lodgings in Tyburnia. On
+his admittance, Tarrant sat alone for nearly five minutes in a
+pretentiously furnished room--just the room in which he had
+expected to find Nancy's relative; the delay and the surroundings
+exasperated his nervous mood, so that, when the lady entered, he
+behaved with slighter courtesy than became his breeding. Nothing in
+her appearance surprised or interested him. There was a distant
+facial resemblance to Nancy, natural in her mother's sister; there
+was expensive, though not particularly tasteful dress, and a gait, a
+manner, distinguishable readily enough from what they aimed at
+displaying--the grace of a woman born to social privilege.
+
+It would be a humiliating conversation; Tarrant braced himself to go
+through with it. He stood stiffly while his hostess regarded him
+with shrewd eyes. She had merely bent her head.
+
+'Will you sit down, Mr. Tarrant?'
+
+He took a chair without speaking.
+
+'I think you know me by name?'
+
+'I have heard of a Mrs. Damerel.'
+
+'Some time ago, I suppose? And in that you have the advantage of me.
+I heard your name yesterday for the first time.'
+
+It was the sharp rejoinder of a woman of the world. Tarrant began to
+perceive that he had to do with intelligence, and would not be
+allowed to perform his share of the talking _de haut en bas._
+
+'In what can I be of service to you?' he asked with constrained
+civility.
+
+'You can tell me, please, what sort of connection there is between
+you and my niece, Miss. Lord.'
+
+Mrs. Damerel was obviously annoyed by his demeanour, and made little
+effort to disguise her feeling. She gave him the look of one who
+does not mean to be trifled with.
+
+'Really,' answered the young man with a smile, 'I don't know what
+authority you have to make such inquiries. You are not, I believe,
+Miss. Lord's guardian.'
+
+'No, but I am her only relative who can act on her behalf where
+knowledge of the world is required. As a gentleman, you will bear
+this in mind. It's quite true that I can't oblige you to tell me
+anything; but when I say that I haven't spoken even to my niece of
+what I have heard, and haven't communicated with the gentlemen who
+_are_ her guardians, I think you will see that I am not acting in a
+way you ought to resent.'
+
+'You mean, Mrs. Damerel, that what passes between us is in
+confidence?'
+
+'I only mean, Mr. Tarrant, that I am giving you an opportunity of
+explaining yourself--so that I can keep the matter private if your
+explanation is satisfactory.'
+
+'You have a charge of some kind to bring against me,' said Tarrant
+composedly. 'I must first of all hear what it is. The prisoner at
+the bar can't be prosecuting counsel at the same time.'
+
+'Do you acknowledge that you are on intimate terms with Miss. Lord?'
+
+'I have known her for a year or two.'
+
+Tarrant began to exercise caution. Nancy had no hand in this matter;
+some one had told tales about her, that was all. He must learn,
+without committing himself, exactly how much had been discovered.
+
+'Are you engaged to her?'
+
+'Engaged to marry her? No.'
+
+He saw in Mrs. Damerel's clear eye that she convicted him of
+ambiguities.
+
+'You have not even made her a promise of marriage?'
+
+'How much simpler, if you would advance a clear charge. I will
+answer it honestly.'
+
+Mrs. Damerel seemed to weigh the value of this undertaking. Tarrant
+met her gaze with steady indifference.
+
+'It may only be a piece of scandal,--a mistake, or a malicious
+invention. I have been told that--that you are in everything but
+law my niece's husband.'
+
+They regarded each other during a moment's silence. Tarrant's look
+indicated rapid and anxious thought.
+
+'It seems,' he said at length, 'that you have no great faith in the
+person who told you this.'
+
+'It is the easiest matter in the world to find out whether the story
+is true or not. Inquiries at Falmouth would be quite sufficient, I
+dare say. I give you the opportunity of keeping it quiet, that's
+all.'
+
+'You won't care to let me know who told you?'
+
+'There's no reason why I shouldn't,' said Mrs. Damerel, after
+reflection. 'Do you know Mr. Luckworth Crewe?'
+
+'I don't think I ever heard the name.'
+
+'Indeed? He is well acquainted with Miss. Lord. Some one he wouldn't
+mention gave him all the particulars, having learnt them from Miss
+Lord herself, and he thought it his duty to inform me of my niece's
+very painful position.'
+
+'Who is this man?' Tarrant asked abruptly.
+
+'I am rather surprised you have never heard of him. He's a man of
+business. My nephew, Mr. Horace Lord, is shortly to be in partnership
+with him.'
+
+'Crewe? No, the name is quite strange to me.'
+
+Tarrant's countenance darkened; he paused for an instant, then added
+impatiently:
+
+'You say he had "all the particulars." What were they, these
+particulars?'
+
+'Will one be enough? A child was born at Falmouth, and is now at a
+place just outside London, in the care of some stranger.'
+
+The source of this information might, or might not, be Nancy
+herself. In either case, there was no further hope of secrecy.
+Tarrant abandoned his reserve, and spoke quietly, civilly.
+
+'So far, you have heard the truth. What have you to ask of me, now?'
+
+'You have been abroad for a long time, I think?'
+
+'For about a year.'
+
+'Does that mean that you wished to see no more of her?'
+
+'That I deserted her, in plain words? It meant nothing of the kind.'
+
+'You are aware, then, that she has taken a place in a house of
+business, just as if she thought it necessary to earn her own
+living?'
+
+Tarrant displayed astonishment.
+
+'I am aware of no such thing. How long has that been going on?'
+
+'Then you don't see her?'
+
+'I have seen her, but she told me nothing of that.'
+
+'There's something very strange in this, Mr. Tarrant. You seem to me
+to be speaking the truth. No, please don't take offence. Before I
+saw you, you were a total stranger to me, and after what I had
+heard, I couldn't think very well of you. I may as well confess that
+you seem a different kind of man from what I expected. I don't wish
+to offend you, far from it. If we can talk over this distressing
+affair in a friendly way, so much the better. I have nothing
+whatever in view but to protect my niece--to do the best that can
+be done for her.'
+
+'That I have taken for granted,' Tarrant replied. 'I understand that
+you expected to meet a scoundrel of a very recognisable type. Well,
+I am not exactly that. But what particular act of rascality have you
+in mind? Something worse than mere seduction, of course.'
+
+'Will you answer a disagreeable question? Are you well-to-do?'
+
+'Anything but that.'
+
+'Indeed? And you can form no idea why Nancy has gone to work in a
+shop?'
+
+Tarrant raised his eyebrows.
+
+'I see,' he said deliberately. 'You suspect that I have been taking
+money from her?'
+
+'I _did_ suspect it; now it seems to me more unlikely.'
+
+'Many thanks,' he answered, with cold irony. 'So the situation was
+this: Miss. Lord had been led astray by a rascally fellow, who not
+only left her to get on as best she could, but lived on her income,
+so that she had at length to earn money for her own needs. There's
+something very clear and rounded, very dramatic, about that. What I
+should like to know is, whether Miss. Lord tells the story in this
+way.'
+
+'I can't say that she does. I think it was Mr. Crewe who explained
+things like that.'
+
+'I am obliged to Mr. Crewe. But he may, after all, only repeat what
+he has heard. It's a pity we don't know Miss. Lord's actual
+confidante.'
+
+'Of course you have _not_ received assistance from her?'
+
+Tarrant stared for a moment, then laughed unpleasantly.
+
+'I have no recollection of it.'
+
+'Another disagreeable question. Did you really go away and leave her
+to get on as best she could?'
+
+He looked darkly at her.
+
+'And if I did?'
+
+'Wasn't it rather unaccountable behaviour--in a gentleman?'
+
+'Possibly.'
+
+'I can't believe it. There is something unexplained.'
+
+'Yes, there _is_ something unexplained.--Mrs. Damerel, I should
+have thought you would naturally speak first to your niece. Why did
+you send for me before doing so?'
+
+'To find out what sort of man you were, so that I should be able to
+form my own opinion of what Nancy chose to tell me. Perhaps she may
+refuse to tell me anything at all--we are not like ordinary
+relatives, I am sorry to say. But I dare say you know better than I
+do how she thinks of me.'
+
+'I have heard her speak of you only once or twice. At all events,
+now that you are prepared, you will go and see her?'
+
+'I must. It would be wrong to stand by and do nothing.'
+
+'And you will see her guardians?'
+
+'That must depend. I certainly shall if she seems to be suffering
+hardships. I must know why she goes out to work, as if she were
+pinched for money. There is her child to support, of course, but
+that wouldn't make any difference to her; she is well provided for.'
+
+'Yes. There's no choice but to fall back upon the villain theory.'
+
+He rose, and took up his hat.
+
+'You mustn't go yet, Mr. Tarrant,' said his hostess firmly. 'I have
+said that I can't believe such things of you. If you would only
+explain--'
+
+'That's just what I can't do. It's as much a mystery to me as to you
+--her wishing to earn money.'
+
+'I was going to say--if you would only explain your intentions as
+to the future--'
+
+'My intentions will depend entirely on what I hear from your niece.
+I shall see her as soon as possible. Perhaps you can tell me at what
+hour she returns from business?'
+
+'No, I can't. I wish you would talk a little longer.'
+
+His eyes flashed angrily.
+
+'Mrs. Damerel, I have said all that I am willing to say. What you
+have heard is partly true; you probably won't have to wait very long
+for the rest of the story, but I have no time and no inclination to
+tell it. Go and see your niece to-morrow by all means,--or her
+guardians, if it seems necessary.
+
+'I am very sorry we are parting in this way.'
+
+'You must remember how difficult it is to keep one's temper under
+certain kinds of accusation.'
+
+'I don't accuse you.'
+
+'Well, then, to explain calmly that one couldn't commit this or that
+sordid rascality;--it comes to the same thing. However, I am
+obliged to you for opening my eyes. I have got into a very foolish
+position, and I promise you I will get out of it as quickly as may
+be.'
+
+Whereupon he bowed his leave-taking, and withdrew.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 8
+
+
+
+
+It was not yet dark, but street-lamps had begun to flare and flicker
+in the gust of a cold, damp evening. A thin and slippery mud smeared
+the pavement. Tarrant had walked mechanically as far as to the top
+of Park Lane before he began to consider his immediate course. Among
+the people who stood waiting for omnibuses, he meditated thus:
+
+'She may not get home until seven or half-past; then she will have a
+meal. I had better put it off till about half-past eight. That
+leaves me some four hours to dispose of. First of all I'll walk
+home, and--yes, by all the devils! I'll finish that bit of
+writing. A year ago I could no more have done it, under such
+circumstances, than have built a suspension bridge. To-day I will--
+just to show that I've some grit in me.'
+
+Down Park Lane, and by Buckingham Palace across to Westminster, he
+kept his thoughts for the most part on that bit of writing. Only
+thus could he save himself from an access of fury which would only
+have injured him--the ire of shame in which a man is tempted to
+beat his head against stone walls. He composed aloud, balancing many
+a pretty antithesis, and polishing more than one lively paradox.
+
+In his bedroom-study the fire had gone out. No matter; he would
+write in the cold. It was mere amanuensis work, penning at the
+dictation of his sarcastic demon. Was he a sybarite? Many a poor
+scribbler has earned bed and breakfast with numb fingers. The fire
+in his body would serve him for an hour or two.
+
+So he sat down, and achieved his task to the last syllable. He read
+it through, corrected it, made it up for post, and rose with the
+plaudits of conscience. 'Who shall say now that I am a fop and a
+weakling?'
+
+Half-past seven. Good; just time enough to appease his hunger and
+reach Grove Lane by the suitable hour. He went out to the little
+coffee-shop which was his resort in Spartan moods, ate with
+considerable appetite, and walked over Westminster Bridge to the
+Camberwell tram. To kill time on the journey he bought a halfpenny
+paper.
+
+As he ascended Grove Lane his heart throbbed more than the exercise
+warranted. At the door of the house, which he had never yet entered,
+and which he had not looked upon for more than a year, he stood to
+calm himself, with lips set and cheek pale in the darkness. Then a
+confident peal at the knocker.
+
+It was Mary who opened. He had never seen her, but knew that this
+grave, hard-featured person, not totally unlike a born gentlewoman,
+must be Mary Woodruff. And in her eyes he read a suspicion of his
+own identity.
+
+'Is Miss. Lord at home?' he asked, in a matter-of-fact way.
+
+'Yes.--What name shall I mention?'
+
+'Mr. Tarrant.'
+
+Her eyes fell, and she requested him to enter, to wait in the hall
+for a moment; then went upstairs. She was absent for a few minutes,
+and on returning asked him to follow her. She led to the
+dawing-room: on the way, Tarrant felt a surprise that in so small a
+house the drawing-room should be correctly situated on the upper
+floor.
+
+Here he had again to wait. A comfortable room, he thought, and with
+a true air of home about it. He knew how significant is this
+impression first received on entering a strange abode; home or
+encampment, attraction or repulsion, according to the mind of the
+woman who rules there. Was it Nancy, or Mary, who made the
+atmosphere of the house?
+
+The door opened, and he faced towards it.
+
+Nancy's dress had an emphasis of fashion formerly unknown to it;
+appropriate enough considering her new occupation. The flush upon
+her cheeks, the light of doubtful meaning in her eyes, gave
+splendour to a beauty matured by motherhood. In the dark street, a
+fortnight ago, Tarrant could hardly be said to have seen her; he
+gazed in wonder and admiration.
+
+'What has brought you here?'
+
+'A cause quite sufficient.--This is a little house; can we talk
+without being overheard?'
+
+'You can shout if you wish to,' she answered flippantly. 'The
+servant is Out, and Mary is downstairs.'
+
+Nancy did not seat herself, and offered no seat to the visitor.
+
+'Why have you made yourself a shop-girl?'
+
+'I didn't know that I had.'
+
+'I am told you go daily to some shop or other.'
+
+'I am engaged at a place of business, but I don't.--However, that
+doesn't matter. What business is it of yours?'
+
+'Who is Mr. Luckworth Crewe?'
+
+Nancy kept her eyes still more resolutely fronting his severe look.
+
+'A man I used to know.'
+
+'You don't see him now-a-days?'
+
+'It's many months since I saw him.'
+
+'Who, then, is the woman who has told him your whole story--with
+embellishments, and who says she has had it from you yourself?'
+
+Nancy was speechless.
+
+'I don't say there is any such person,' Tarrant continued. 'The man
+may have lied in that particular. But he has somehow got to know a
+good deal about you,--where and when your child was born, where it
+is now, where I live, and so on. And all this he has reported to
+your aunt, Mrs. Damerel.'
+
+'To her?--How do you know?'
+
+For answer he held out Mrs. Damerel's note of invitation, then added:
+
+'I have been with her this afternoon. She is coming to offer you her
+protection against the scoundrel who has ruined you, and who is now
+living upon you.'
+
+'What do you mean?'
+
+'That's the form the story has taken, either in Mr. Crewe's mind, or
+in that of the woman who told it to him.'
+
+'Don't they know that I am married?'
+
+'Evidently not.'
+
+'And they think you--are having money from me?'
+
+'That's how they explain your taking a place in a shop.'
+
+Nancy laughed, and laughed again.
+
+'How ridiculous!'
+
+'I'm glad you can get amusement out of it. Perhaps you can suggest
+how the joke began?'
+
+She moved a few steps, then turned again to him.
+
+'Yes, I know who the woman must be. It's Beatrice French.'
+
+'A bosom friend of yours, of course.'
+
+'Nothing of the kind.'
+
+'But you have taken her into your confidence--up to a certain
+point?'
+
+'Yes, I have told her. And she told Mr. Crewe? I understand that.
+Well, what does it matter?'
+
+Tarrant was at a loss to interpret this singular levity. He had
+never truly believed that reading of Nancy's character by means of
+which he tried to persuade himself that his marriage was an
+unmitigated calamity, and a final parting between them the best
+thing that could happen. His memories of her, and the letters she
+had written him, coloured her personality far otherwise. Yet was not
+the harsh judgment after all the true one?
+
+'It doesn't matter to you,' he said, 'that people think you an
+unmarried mother,--that people are talking about you with grins
+and sneers?'
+
+Nancy reddened in angry shame.
+
+'Let them talk!' she exclaimed violently. 'What does it matter, so
+long as they don't know I'm married?'
+
+'So long as they don't know?--How came you to tell this woman?'
+
+'Do you suppose I told her for amusement? She found out what had
+happened at Falmouth,--found out simply by going down there and
+making inquiries; because she suspected me of some secret affair
+with a man she wants to marry herself--this Mr. Crewe. The wonder
+of wonders is that no one else got to know of it in that way. Any
+one who cared much what happened to me would have seen the all but
+impossibility of keeping such a secret.'
+
+It is a notable instance of evolutionary process that the female
+mind, in wrath, flies to just those logical ineptitudes which most
+surely exasperate the male intelligence. Tarrant gave a laugh of
+irate scorn.
+
+'Why, you told me the other day that I cared particularly whether
+your secret was discovered or not--that I only married you in the
+hope of profiting by it?'
+
+'Wouldn't any woman think so?'
+
+'I hope not. I believe there are some women who don't rush naturally
+to a base supposition.'
+
+'Did I?' Nancy exclaimed, with a vehement passion that made her
+breast heave. 'Didn't I give you time enough--believe in you until
+I could believe no longer?'
+
+The note of her thrilling voice went to Tarrant's heart, and his
+head drooped.
+
+'That may be true,' he said gravely. 'But go on with your
+explanation. This woman came to you, and told you what she had
+discovered?'
+
+'Yes.'
+
+'And you allowed her to think you unmarried?'
+
+'What choice had I? How was my child to be brought up if I lost
+everything?'
+
+'Good God, Nancy! Did you imagine I should leave you to starve?'
+
+His emotion, his utterance of her name, caused her to examine him
+with a kind of wonder.
+
+'How did I know?--How could I tell, at that time, whether you were
+alive or dead?--I had to think of myself and the child.'
+
+'My poor girl!'
+
+The words fell from him involuntarily. Nancy's look became as
+scornful and defiant as before.
+
+'Oh, that was nothing. I've gone through a good deal more than
+that.'
+
+'Stop. Tell me this. Have you in your anger--anger natural enough
+--allowed yourself to speak to any one about me in the way I should
+never forgive? In the spirit of your letter, I mean. Did you give
+this Beatrice French any ground for thinking that I made a
+speculation of you?'
+
+'I said nothing of that kind.'
+
+'Nor to any one else?'
+
+'To no one.'
+
+'Yet you told this woman where I was living, and that I had been
+abroad for a long time. Why?'
+
+'Yes, I told her so much about you,' Nancy replied. 'Not when she
+first came to me, but afterwards--only the other day. I wanted
+employment, and didn't know how to get it, except through her. She
+promised me a place if I would disclose your name; not that she knew
+or cared anything about _you_, but because she still had suspicions
+about Mr. Crewe. I was desperate, and I told her.'
+
+'Desperate? Why?'
+
+'How can I make you understand what I have gone through? What do you
+care? And what do _I_ care whether you understand or not? It wasn't
+for money, and Beatrice French knew it wasn't.'
+
+'Then it must have been that you could not bear the monotony of your
+life.'
+
+Her answer was a short, careless laugh.
+
+'Where is this shop? What do you do?'
+
+'It's a dress-supply association. I advise fools about the fashions,
+and exhibit myself as a walking fashion-plate. I can't see how it
+should interest you.'
+
+'Whatever concerns you, Nancy, interests me more than anything else
+in the world.'
+
+Again she laughed.
+
+'What more do you want to know?'
+
+She was half turned from him, leaning at the mantelpiece, a foot on
+the fender.
+
+'You said just now that you have gone through worse things than the
+shame of being thought unmarried. Tell me about it all.'
+
+'Not I, indeed. When I was willing to tell you everything, you
+didn't care to hear it. It's too late now.'
+
+'It's not too late, happily, to drag you out of this wretched slough
+into which you are sinking. Whatever the cost, _that_ shall be
+done!'
+
+'Thank you, I am not disposed to let any one drag me anywhere. I
+want no help; and if I did, you would be the last person I should
+accept it from. I don't know why you came here after the agreement
+we made the other night.'
+
+Tarrant stepped towards her.
+
+'I came to find out whether you were telling lies about me, and I
+should never have thought it possible but for my bad conscience. I
+know you had every excuse for being embittered and for acting
+revengefully. It seems you have only told lies about yourself. As,
+after all, you are my wife, I shan't allow that.'
+
+Once more she turned upon him passionately.
+
+'I am _not_ your wife! You married me against your will, and shook
+me off as soon as possible. I won't be bound to you; I shall act as
+a free woman.'
+
+'Bound to me you are, and shall be--as I to you.'
+
+'You may say it fifty times, and it will mean nothing.--How bound
+to you? Bound to share my money?'
+
+'I forgive you that, because I have treated you ill. You don't mean
+it either. You know I am incapable of such a thought. But that shall
+very soon be put right. Your marriage shall be made known at once.'
+
+'Known to whom?'
+
+'To the people concerned--to your guardians.'
+
+'Don't trouble yourself,' she answered, with a smile. 'They know it
+already.'
+
+Tarrant half closed his eyes as he looked at her.
+
+'What's the use of such a silly falsehood?'
+
+'I told you I had gone through a good deal more than you imagined. I
+have struggled to keep my money, in spite of shames and miseries,
+and I will have it for myself--and my child! If you want to know
+the truth, go to Samuel Barmby, and ask him what he has had to do
+with me. I owe no explanation to _you_.'
+
+Tarrant could see her face only in profile. Marvelling at the
+complications she gradually revealed, he felt his blood grow warm
+with desire of her beauty. She was his wife, yet guarded as by
+maidenhood. A familiar touch would bring the colour to her cheeks,
+the light of resentment to her eyes. Passion made him glad of the
+estrangement which compelled a new wooing, and promised, on her
+part, a new surrender.
+
+'You don't owe it me, Nancy; but if I beg you to tell me all--
+because I have come to my senses again--because I know how foolish
+and cruel I have been--'
+
+'Remember what we agreed. Go your way, and let me go mine.'
+
+'I had no idea of what I was agreeing to. I took it for granted that
+your marriage was strictly a secret, and that you might be free in
+the real sense if you chose.'
+
+'Yes, and you were quite willing, because it gave you your freedom
+as well. I am as free as I wish to be. I have made a life for myself
+that satisfies me--and now you come to undo everything. I won't be
+tormented--I have endured enough.'
+
+'Then only one course is open to me. I shall publish your marriage
+everywhere. I shall make a home for you, and have the child brought
+to it; then come or not, as you please.'
+
+At mention of the child Nancy regarded him with cold curiosity.
+
+'How are you to make a home for me? I thought you had difficulty
+enough in supporting yourself.'
+
+'That is no concern of yours. It shall be done, and in a day or two.
+Then make your choice.'
+
+'You think I can be forced to live with a man I don't love?'
+
+'I shouldn't dream of living with a woman who didn't love me. But
+you are married, and a mother, and the secrecy that is degrading you
+shall come to an end. Acknowledge me or not, I shall acknowledge
+_you_, and make it known that I am to blame for all that has
+happened.'
+
+'And what good will you do?'
+
+'I shall do good to myself, at all events. I'm a selfish fellow, and
+shall be so to the end, no doubt.'
+
+Nancy glanced at him to interpret the speech by his expression. He
+was smiling.
+
+'What good will it do you to have to support me? The selfishness I
+see in it is your wishing to take me from a comfortable home and
+make me poor.'
+
+'That can't be helped. And, what's more, you won't think it a
+hardship.'
+
+'How do you know that? I have borne dreadful degradations rather
+than lose my money.'
+
+'That was for the child's sake, not for your own.'
+
+He said it softly and kindly, and for the first time Nancy met his
+eyes without defiance.
+
+'It was; I could always have earned my own living, somehow.'
+
+Tarrant paused a moment, then spoke with look averted.
+
+'Is he well, and properly cared for?'
+
+'If he were not well and safe, I shouldn't be away from him.'
+
+'When will you let me see him, Nancy?'
+
+She did not smile, but there was a brightening of her countenance,
+which she concealed. Tarrant stepped to her side.
+
+'Dear--my own love--will you try to forgive me? It was all my
+cursed laziness. It would never have happened if I hadn't fallen
+into poverty. Poverty is the devil, and it overcame me.'
+
+'How can you think that _I_ shall be strong enough to face it?' she
+asked, moving half a step away. 'Leave me to myself; I am contented;
+I have made up my mind about what is before me, and I won't go
+through all that again.'
+
+Tired of standing, she dropped upon the nearest chair, and lay back.
+
+'You can't be contented, Nancy, in a position that dishonours you.
+From what you tell me, it seems that your secret is no secret at
+all. Will you compel me to go to that man Barmby and seek
+information from him about my own wife?'
+
+'I have had to do worse things than that.'
+
+'Don't torture me by such vague hints. I entreat you to tell me at
+once the worst that you have suffered. How did Barmby get to know of
+your marriage? And why has he kept silent about it? There can't be
+anything that you are ashamed to say.'
+
+'No. The shame is all yours.'
+
+'I take it upon myself, all of it; I ought never to have left you;
+but that baseness followed only too naturally on the cowardice which
+kept me from declaring our marriage when honour demanded it. I have
+played a contemptible part in this story; don't refuse to help me
+now that I am ready to behave more like a man. Put your hand in
+mine, and let us be friends, if we mayn't be more.'
+
+She sat irresponsive.
+
+'You were a brave girl. You consented to my going away because it
+seemed best, and I took advantage of your sincerity. Often enough
+that last look of yours has reproached me. I wonder how I had the
+heart to leave you alone.'
+
+Nancy raised herself, and said coldly:
+
+'It was what I might have expected. I had only my own folly to
+thank. You behaved as most men would.'
+
+This was a harder reproach than any yet. Tarrant winced under it. He
+would much rather have been accused of abnormal villainy.
+
+'And I was foolish,' continued Nancy, 'in more ways than you knew.
+You feared I had told Jessica Morgan of our marriage, and you were
+right; of course I denied it. She has been the cause of my worst
+trouble.'
+
+In rapid sentences she told the story of her successive
+humiliations, recounted her sufferings at the hands of Jessica and
+Beatrice and Samuel Barmby. When she ceased, there were tears in her
+eyes.
+
+'Has Barmby been here again?' Tarrant asked sternly.
+
+'Yes. He has been twice, and talked in just the same way, and I had
+to sit still before him--'
+
+'Has he said one word that--?'
+
+'No, no,' she interrupted hastily. 'He's only a fool--not man
+enough to--'
+
+'That saves me trouble,' said Tarrant; 'I have only to treat him
+like a fool. My poor darling, what vile torments you have endured!
+And you pretend that you would rather live on this fellow's
+interested generosity--for, of course, he hopes to be rewarded--
+than throw the whole squalid entanglement behind you and be a free,
+honest woman, even if a poor one?'
+
+'I see no freedom.'
+
+'You have lost all your love for me. Well, I can't complain of that.
+But bear my name you shall, and be supported by me. I tell you that
+it was never _possible_ for me actually to desert you and the little
+one--never possible. I shirked a duty as long as I could; that's
+all it comes to. I loafed and paltered until the want of a dinner
+drove me into honesty. Try to forget it, dear Nancy. Try to forgive
+me, my dearest!'
+
+She was dry-eyed again, and his appeal seemed to have no power over
+her emotions.
+
+'You are forgetting,' she said practically, 'that I have lived on
+money to which I had no right, and that I--or you--can be forced
+to repay it.'
+
+'Repaid it must be, whether demanded or not. Where does Barmby live?
+Perhaps I could see him to-night.'
+
+'What means have you of keeping us all alive?'
+
+'Some of my work has been accepted here and there; but there's
+something else I have in mind. I don't ask you to become a
+poverty-stricken wife in the ordinary way. I can't afford to take a
+house. I must put you, with the child, into as good lodgings as I
+can hope to pay for, and work on by myself, just seeing you as often
+as you will let me. Even if you were willing, it would be a mistake
+for us to live together. For one thing, I couldn't work under such
+conditions; for another, it would make you a slave. Tell me: are you
+willing to undertake the care of the child, if nothing else is asked
+of you?'
+
+Nancy gave him a disdainful smile, a smile like those of her
+girlhood.
+
+'I'm not quite so feeble a creature as you think me.'
+
+'You would rather have the child to yourself, than be living away
+from him?'
+
+'If you have made up your mind, why trouble to ask such questions?'
+
+'Because I have no wish to force burdens upon you. You said just now
+that you could see little prospect of freedom in such a life as I
+have to offer you. I thought you perhaps meant that the care of the
+child would--'
+
+'I meant nothing,' Nancy broke in, with fretful impatience.
+
+'Where is he--our boy?'
+
+'At Dulwich. I told you that in my last letter.'
+
+'Yes--yes. I thought you might have changed.'
+
+'I couldn't have found a better, kinder woman. Can you guess how
+many answers I had to the advertisement? Thirty-two.'
+
+'Of course five-and-twenty of them took it for granted you would pay
+so much a week and ask no questions. They would just not have
+starved the baby,--unless you had hinted to them that you were
+willing to pay a lump sum for a death-certificate, in which case the
+affair would have been more or less skilfully managed.'
+
+'Mary knew all about that. She came from Falmouth, and spent two
+days in visiting people. I knew I could rely on her judgment. There
+were only four or five people she cared to see at all, and of these
+only one that seemed trustworthy.'
+
+'To be sure. One out of two-and-thirty. A higher percentage than
+would apply to mankind at large, I dare say. By-the-bye, I was
+afraid you might have found a difficulty in registering the birth.'
+
+'No. I went to the office myself, the morning that I was leaving
+Falmouth, and the registrar evidently knew nothing about me. It
+isn't such a small place that everybody living there is noticed and
+talked of.'
+
+'And Mary took the child straight to Dulwich?'
+
+'Two days before I came,--so as to have the house ready for me.
+
+'Perhaps it was unfortunate, Nancy, that you had so good a friend.
+But for that, I should have suffered more uneasiness about you.'
+
+She answered with energy:
+
+'There is no husband in the world worth such a friend as Mary.'
+
+At this Tarrant first smiled, then laughed. Nancy kept her lips
+rigid. It happened that he again saw her face in exact profile, and
+again it warmed the current of his blood.
+
+'Some day you shall think better of that.'
+
+She paid no attention. Watching her, he asked:
+
+'What are you thinking of so earnestly?'
+
+Her answer was delayed a little, but she said at length, with an
+absent manner:
+
+'Horace might lend me the money to pay back what I owe.'
+
+'Your brother?--If he can afford it, there would be less objection
+to that than to any other plan I can think of. But I must ask it
+myself; you shall beg no more favours. I will ask it in your
+presence.'
+
+'You will do nothing of the kind,' Nancy replied drily. 'If you
+think to please me by humiliating yourself, you are very much
+mistaken. And you mustn't imagine that I put myself into your hands
+to be looked after as though I had no will of my own. With the past
+you have nothing to do,--with _my_ past, at all events. Care for
+the future as you like.'
+
+'But I must see your guardians.'
+
+'No. I won't have that.'
+
+She stood up to emphasise her words.
+
+'I must. It's the only way in which I can satisfy myself--'
+
+'Then I refuse to take a step,' said Nancy. 'Leave all that to me,
+and I will go to live where you please, and never grumble, however
+poor I am. Interfere, and I will go on living as now, on Samuel
+Barmby's generosity.'
+
+There was no mistaking her resolution. Tarrant hesitated, and bit
+his lip.
+
+'How long, then, before you act?' he inquired abruptly.
+
+'When my new home is found, I am ready to go there.'
+
+'You will deal honestly with me? You will tell every one, and give
+up everything not strictly yours?'
+
+'I have done with lies,' said Nancy.
+
+'Thank heaven, so have I!'
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Part VI: A Virtue of Necessity
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 1
+
+
+
+
+Upon the final tempest in De Crespigny Park there followed, for
+Arthur Peachey, a calmer and happier season than he had ever known.
+To have acted with stern resolve is always a satisfaction,
+especially to the man conscious of weak good-nature, and condemned
+for the most part to yield. In his cheap lodging at Clapham, Peachey
+awoke each morning with a vague sense of joy, which became delight
+as soon as he had collected his senses. He was a free man. No snarl
+greeted him as he turned his head upon the pillow; he could lie and
+meditate, could rise quietly when the moment sounded, could go
+downstairs to a leisurely meal, cheered perhaps by a letter
+reporting that all was well with his dear little son. Simple,
+elementary pleasures, but how he savoured them after his years of
+sordid bondage!
+
+It was the blessedness of divorce, without squalid publicity. It was
+the vast relief of widowerhood, without dreary memories of death and
+burial.
+
+In releasing himself from such companionship, the man felt as though
+he had washed and become clean.
+
+Innocent of scientific speculation, he had the misfortune about this
+time to read in paper or magazine something on the subject of
+heredity, the idle verbiage of some half-informed scribbler. It set
+him anxiously thinking whether his son would develop the vices of
+the mother's mind, and from that day he read all the printed chatter
+regarding natural inheritance that he could lay his hands on. The
+benefit he derived from this course of study was neither more nor
+less than might have been expected; it supplied him with a new
+trouble, which sometimes kept him wakeful. He could only resolve
+that his boy should have the best education procurable for money, if
+he starved himself in providing it.
+
+He had begun to live with the utmost economy, and for a twofold
+reason: the business of Messrs Ducker, Blunt & Co. threatened a
+decline, and, this apart, he desired to get out of it, to obtain an
+interest in some more honourable concern. For a long time it had
+been known to him that the disinfectants manufactured by his firm
+were far from trustworthy, and of late the complaints of purchasers
+had become frequent. With the manufacturing department he had
+nothing to do; he tried to think himself free from responsibility;
+for, in spite of amiable qualities, he was a man of business, and
+saw a great part of life through the commercial spectacles commonly
+worn now-a-days. Nevertheless conscience unsettled him. One day he
+heard his partners joking over the legislative omission by virtue of
+which they were able to adulterate their disinfectants to any extent
+without fear of penalty; their laughter grated upon him, and he got
+out of the way. If he could lay aside a few thousands of pounds,
+assuredly his connection with the affair should be terminated. So he
+lived, for his own part, on a pound a week, and informed Ada through
+his solicitor that she must be satisfied with a certain very
+moderate allowance.
+
+Mrs. Peachey naturally laid herself out to give every one as much
+trouble as possible. Insulting post-cards showered upon her husband
+at his place of business. After a few weeks she discovered his
+lodging, and addressed the post-cards thither; but she made no
+attempt at personal molestation. The loss of her child gave her not
+the slightest concern, yet she determined to find out where the boy
+was living. She remembered that Peachey had relatives at Canterbury,
+and after a troublesome search succeeded in her purpose. An
+interview with her husband's married sister proved so unsatisfactory
+to Ada, that she had recourse to her familiar weapons, rage, insult,
+and menace; with the result that she was forcibly removed, and made
+a scandal in the quiet street.
+
+Then she consulted men of law, and found one who encouraged her to
+sue for restitution of conjugal rights. It came to nothing, however;
+for in the meantime she was growing tired of her solitary existence,
+--friends of course she had none,--and the spirit moved her to
+try a change of tactics.
+
+She wrote a long, long letter, penitent, tear-bestained. 'I have
+behaved outrageously to you, dearest Arthur; I must have been mad to
+say and do such things. The doctor tells me that my health has been
+in a very bad state for a long time, and I really don't remember
+half that has happened. You were quite right when you told me that I
+should be better if I didn't live such an idle life, and I have
+quite, quite made up my mind to be an industrious and a _good_
+woman. All yesterday I spent in needlework and crying. Oh, the tears
+that I have shed! My darling husband, what can I do to win your
+forgiveness? Do consider how lonely I am in this house. Beatrice has
+been horrid to me. If I said all I think about _her_, she wouldn't
+like to hear it; but I am learning to control my tongue. She lives
+alone in a flat, and has men to spend every evening with her; it's
+disgraceful! And there's Fanny, who I am sure is leading an immoral
+life abroad. Of course I shall never speak to her again. You were
+quite right when you said my sisters were worthless.'--Peachey had
+never permitted himself any such remark.--'I will have no one but
+you, my dear, good, sweet husband.'
+
+So on, over several pages. Reading it, the husband stood aghast at
+this new revelation of female possibilities; at the end, he
+hurriedly threw it into the fire, fearing, and with good reason,
+that weakness in his own character to which the woman addressed
+herself.
+
+Every day for a week there arrived a replica of this epistle, and at
+length he answered. It was the fatal concession. Though he wrote
+with almost savage severity, Ada replied in terms of exuberant
+gratitude. Oh, how delighted she was to see his dear handwriting
+once more! How it reminded her of happy days, when they loved each
+other so tenderly! Then came two strophes of a sentimental
+drawing-room song, and lastly, an impassioned appeal to be allowed
+to see her husband, were it only for five minutes.
+
+Another week of such besieging, and the poor fellow's foolish heart
+gave way. He would see the wretched woman, and tell her that, though
+never could he consent to live with her again, he had no malicious
+feeling, and was willing to be her friend at a distance. So, at six
+o'clock one evening, behold him tremulously approaching the house in
+De Crespigny Park,--tremulously, because he dreaded the assault
+upon his emotions to which he so recklessly exposed himself. He was
+admitted by a very young servant, in a very clean cap and apron.
+Silence possessed the dwelling; he did not venture to tread with
+natural step. He entered the drawing-room, and there, from amid a
+heap of household linen which required the needle, rose the penitent
+wife. Ostentatiously she drew from her finger a thimble, then
+advanced with head bent.
+
+'How kind of you, Arthur! How--how very--'
+
+And she was dissolved in tears--so genuine, that they marked pale
+rillets across the bloom of her cheeks.
+
+About a month after that the furniture was removed from De Crespigny
+Park to a much smaller house at Brixton, where Mr. and Mrs. Peachey
+took up their abode together. A medical man shortly called, and Ada,
+not without secret disgust, smilingly made known to her husband that
+she must now be very careful of her health.
+
+On one point only the man had held to a rational resolve; he would
+not allow his little son to be brought back to London, away from the
+home where he was happy and thriving. Out of mere self-will Ada
+strove for a long time to overcome this decision; finding argument
+and artifice of no avail, she dropped the matter. Peachey owed this
+triumph largely to the firm commonsense of his sister, who plainly
+refused to let the little fellow quit her care for that of such a
+woman as he was unfortunate enough to call mother.
+
+Christmas came, and with it an unanticipated call from Miss. Fanny
+French, who said she had lately recovered from a serious illness in
+Paris; the nature of her malady she did not specify; it had left her
+haggard and thin, but by no means deficient in vivacity. She was
+dressed with tawdry extravagance, wore a mass of false yellow hair,
+had her eyebrows dyed black,--piquant contrast,--and her cheeks
+and lips richly carmined. No veritable information as to her past
+and present could be gleaned from the mixture of French and English
+which she ceaselessly gabbled. She had come over for Christmas, that
+was all; could not dream of returning to live in wretched England.
+At Brussels and in Paris she had made hosts of friends, just the
+right sort of people.
+
+Ada told her all the news. Of most interest was that which related
+to Nancy Lord. Only a month ago it had become known that Nancy was
+married, and the mother of a child.
+
+'The Barmbys found it out somehow,' Ada narrated. 'She was married
+to a man called Tarrant, some one we never heard of, on the very day
+of her father's death, and, of course, before she knew anything
+about his will. Then, of course, it had to be kept dark, or she'd
+lose all her money. Her husband hadn't a farthing. She supported
+him, and they say he lived most of the time in her house. He's a
+regular scamp, a drinking, betting fellow. Well, it all came out,
+and the Barmbys turned her into the street at a moment's notice--
+serve her right!'
+
+Fanny shrieked with merriment.
+
+'And what is she doing?'
+
+'She went on her knees to Beatrice, and begged for a place at the
+shop, if it was only a few shillings a week. Nice come-down for
+Nancy Lord, wasn't it? Of course Beatrice sent her off with a flea
+in her ear. I don't know where she's living, but I've heard that her
+husband has gone to America, and left her to shift for herself, now
+there's nothing more to be got out of her.'
+
+For supplementary details of this racy narrative, Fanny sought out
+Beatrice; but to her astonishment and annoyance Beatrice would tell
+nothing. The elder sister urged Fanny to give an account of herself,
+and used some very plain speech of the admonitory kind.
+
+'What has become of that jackanapes, Horace Lord?' asked Fanny,
+after a contemptuous remark about 'sermons.'
+
+'I don't know. The question is, what's going to become of _you_?'
+
+Whereupon the girl grew vituperative in two languages, and made off.
+Her relatives saw no more of her for a long time.
+
+To Mrs. Peachey was born a daughter. Naturally, the months preceding
+this event had been, for her husband, a renewal of martyrdom; his
+one supporting solace lay in the thought of the little lad at
+Canterbury. All the old troubles were revived; from morning to night
+the house rang with brawls between mistress and servants; in the
+paroxysms favoured by her physical condition, Ada behaved like a
+candidate for Bedlam, and more than once obliged her husband to seek
+temporary peace in lodgings. He left home at eight o'clock every
+morning, and returned as late as possible. The necessity of passing
+long evenings made him haunt places of entertainment, and he
+sometimes had recourse to drink,--he by nature the soberest of
+men,--in fear of what awaited him on his tardy appearance at
+Brixton. A month after Ada's confinement he once more acted a sane
+part, and announced by letter that he would die rather than continue
+living with his wife. As it was fine autumn weather he went down to
+a seaside place, where his Canterbury relatives and the little boy
+joined him for a holiday of several weeks. Again Ada was to receive
+an allowance. She despatched a few very virulent post-cards, but
+presently grew quiet, and appeared to accept the situation.
+
+In early winter Fanny French came over to England. She had again
+been ill, and this time with results obviously graver. Her first
+call was upon Beatrice, who still occupied the flat at Brixton, and
+here she unbosomed herself of a dolorous story. All her money had
+vanished; stolen, most of it, Fanny declared; she was without
+resources, and, as any one could see, in a wretched state of health.
+Would Beatrice have compassion on her? Would she lend her money till
+she was well enough to 'look round'?
+
+Miss. French at once took the girl into her own home, and had her
+looked after. Fanny coughed in an alarming way; the doctor, speaking
+privately with Beatrice, made an unpleasant report; was it possible
+to send the patient to a mild climate for the winter months? Yes,
+Miss. French could manage that, and would. A suitable attendant
+having been procured, Fanny was despatched to Bournemouth, whence,
+in a day or two, she wrote to her sister thus:
+
+'You've been awfully kind to me, and I shan't forget it when I'm
+well again. Feel a good deal fitter already. Dullish place this, but
+I've got to put up with it. I've had a letter from Ada. If you see
+her, tell her she's a beast, and I wish Arthur would wring her
+scraggy neck. She says it's all my own fault; wait till I'm back
+again, and I'll pay her a call. My own fault indeed! It seems to me
+I'm very much to be pitied.'
+
+Walking one day along the sea-front by herself, Fanny observed a
+young man's figure a few paces in advance of her, which seemed to
+awaken recollections. Presently the young man turned and showed,
+beyond doubt, the countenance of Horace Lord. He met her eyes, gave
+a doubtful, troubled look, and was going past when Fanny accosted
+him.
+
+'Well, don't you know me?'
+
+'Why, it _is_--it really _is_! How glad I am to see you! But what
+on earth are you doing here?'
+
+'Amusing myself--_comme vous voyez_; and you?'
+
+'Oh, doing the same.'
+
+They had shaken hands, and were sauntering on together.
+
+'Anything wrong with your health?' Fanny asked, scrutinising the
+pale thin face, with its touch of warmth on the cheeks.
+
+'Oh, I've had a bit of a cold; nothing to speak of. You been out of
+sorts?'
+
+'A little run down. Over-study, they say.'
+
+Horace looked his surprise.
+
+'Why, I didn't know you went in for that kind of thing.'
+
+'Didn't you? I've been studying abroad for a long time. Thinking of
+taking a place as French teacher in some tip-top high school.'
+
+'I am very glad to hear it. Capital idea. Sure I hope you'll be
+successful.'
+
+'Thanks awf'ly. Tell me something about yourself. Why, it's two
+years since we saw each other, isn't it? Are you married yet?'
+
+Horace smiled and coloured.
+
+'No, no--not yet. I'm in business with Luckworth Crewe,--sort of
+sleeping partner just now.'
+
+'Are you really? And how's your sister?'
+
+The young man bent his brows uncomfortably.
+
+'Don't you know anything about her?' he asked.
+
+'I've heard she's married.'
+
+'Yes, a man called Tarrant. Very clever fellow; he writes for the
+papers.--I say, Miss. French, I generally have a glass of wine and
+a biscuit, at the confectioner's, about this time. Will you give me
+the pleasure of your company?'
+
+'_Charmee_, _Monsieur_! I generally go in for the same kind of
+thing.'
+
+So they repaired to the cake-shop, and sat talking for half-an-hour
+of trifles which made them laugh.
+
+'And you really didn't know me?' said Fanny, when her glass of wine
+was finished. 'Have I changed so much?'
+
+'A good deal. Not for the worse, oh dear no!'
+
+The girl giggled.
+
+'Well, I don't mind saying that _you_ have changed a good deal for
+the better.'
+
+Horace flushed at the compliment.
+
+'I'm much older,' he answered with a sigh, as though the years of a
+sexagenarian weighed upon him.
+
+'That's just what I like in you. You're so much more of a man. Don't
+be offended.'
+
+They went forth again into the sunshine. At the door both coughed,
+and both pretended that it wasn't a cough at all, but a voluntary
+little hem.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 2
+
+
+
+
+Mrs. Damerel was younger than ever. She had spent October abroad,
+with her friends Mrs. and Miss. Chittle, and the greater part of
+November at Brighton, with other friends. Back in town she
+established herself at one of the various boarding-houses honoured
+by her patronage, and prepared to enjoy the social life of winter.
+
+Half a year ago an unwonted depression had troubled her serene
+existence. At the close of the London season she seemed weary and
+spiritless, very unlike herself; having no invitation for the next
+two months, she withdrew to Whitsand, and there spent some cheerless
+weeks.
+
+Whitsand was the as yet unfashionable seaside place which had
+attracted the speculative eye of Luckworth Crewe. For the past two
+years he had been trying to inspire certain men of capital with his
+own faith in the possibilities of Whitsand; he owned a share in the
+new hotel just opened; whenever his manifold affairs allowed him a
+day's holiday, he spent it at Whitsand, pacing the small esplanade,
+and meditating improvements. That these 'improvements' signified the
+conversion of a pretty little old-world spot into a hideous brand
+new resort of noisy hordes, in no degree troubled Mr. Crewe's
+conscience. For his own part, he could appreciate the charms of
+Whitsand as it stood; he was by no means insensible to natural
+beauty and the ancient peace which so contrasted with his life of
+every day; but first and foremost in his mind came the necessity of
+making money; and to fill his pockets he would no more hesitate
+about destroying the loveliest spot on earth, than the starving
+hunter would stay his hand out of admiration for bird or beast.
+
+It was with much delight that he heard of Mrs. Damerel's retreat to
+Whitsand. To the note in which she acquainted him with her arrival
+there he replied effusively. 'The patronage of a few really
+fashionable people, such as yourself, would soon do wonders. We must
+have a special paragraph in the local paper, drawing attention to
+your being there'--and so on. An answer by return of post rather
+disappointed him. On no account, wrote Mrs. Damerel, must her name be
+specially mentioned in the paper. She had taken very simple
+lodgings, very inexpensive, and wished to live as quietly as
+possible. But, after seeing the place, she quite agreed with Mr
+Crewe that it had a future, and if he could run down some day,
+whilst she was here, it would give her great pleasure to hear his
+projects explained on the spot.
+
+Crewe ran down. In speaking of Mrs. Damerel as a 'really fashionable'
+person, he used no insincerity; from their first meeting he had seen
+in this lady his ideal of social distinction; she was, in fact, the
+only woman of skilfully pretentious demeanour with whom he had ever
+spoken. Her distant likeness to Nancy Lord interested and attracted
+him; her suave superiority awed his conscious roughness; she seemed
+to him exquisitely gracious, wonderfully sweet. And as, little by
+little, he attained the right to think of her almost as a friend,
+his humble admiration became blended with feelings he took
+particular care not to betray, lest he should expose himself to
+ridicule. That her age exceeded his own by some years he was of
+course aware, but this fact soon dropped out of his mind, and never
+returned to it. Not only did he think Mrs. Damerel a type of
+aristocratic beauty, he saw in her countenance all the freshness and
+the promise of youth.
+
+The slight mystery attaching to her position only increased his
+susceptibility to her charms. It seemed to him very probable that
+she had but a moderate income; perhaps she was not free from
+anxieties on that score. But such a woman would of course marry
+again, and marry well. The thought grew troublesome, and presently
+accounted for ebullitions of wrath, accompanied by more than usually
+vigorous language, when business matters went wrong.
+
+At Whitsand, Mrs. Damerel showed herself more than ever sweetly
+affable. The season, she said, had been rather too much for her; she
+must take care of her health; besides--and her smile played upon
+Crewe's pulses--there were troubles, cares, of which she could not
+speak _even_ to so valued a friend.
+
+'I'm afraid you're anxious about your nephew,' murmured the man of
+business; though at the same time he suspected other things, for the
+lodgings in which he found Mrs. Damerel were certainly modest.
+
+'Yes, I trouble a good deal about him. If only dear Horace would be
+reconciled to me. It seems such a long, long time. You know that we
+have corresponded, but he refuses to see me. It pains me deeply, Mr
+Crewe.'
+
+And, after a silence:
+
+'There's a special reason why I wish he would be friends with me,--
+a reason that concerns his own future. Why should I not tell you? I
+am sure you will respect my confidence.--He will very soon become
+independent, and then I do so fear he may make a foolish marriage.
+Yet all the time there is a chance waiting for him which would
+establish his fortune and his happiness for life. Did he ever speak
+to you of Miss. Chittle?'
+
+'I don't remember the name.'
+
+'Such a dear, sweet girl, and with really large means. He was
+introduced to her during the happy time when we saw so much of each
+other, and she at once became interested in him. Her dear mother
+assured me of it. She is a very shy, retiring girl, and has refused
+many offers, before and since then. Isn't it a pity? But I am losing
+all hope, and I so fear he may have formed some other attachment.'
+
+Crewe went back to London resolved that Horace Lord should no longer
+'play the fool.' And he was successful. Horace had all but lost his
+resentment against Mrs. Damerel; he kept aloof out of stubborn
+conceit--it had not dignity enough to be called pride; the same
+feeling that still estranged him from Nancy, though he would gladly
+have welcomed his sister's offer of affection. Persuaded, or
+commanded, by Luckworth Crewe, he took the train to Whitsand, and
+remained there for several days. Mrs. Damerel wrote her friend in
+Farringdon Street a letter of gratitude, which acted upon him like
+champagne. In a postscript she said: 'Mrs. Chittle and her daughter
+have consented to come here for a week or two. They will take rooms
+at the Imperial.'
+
+Before the end of September, Horace Lord was engaged to Winifred
+Chittle.
+
+Two years had made very little change in Miss. Chittle's appearance.
+She was still colourless and abnormally shy, still had the look of
+one who sheds secret tears, and her repugnance to Society had, if
+possible, increased. Horace thought her pretty, was impressed by her
+extreme gentleness and refinement, but she obtained no power over
+his emotions such as that formerly exercised by Fanny French. It
+struck him, too, as a very strange thing, that a young lady with a
+large fortune should be willing to marry a man of his social
+insignificance. 'My dear,' said Mrs. Damerel, 'it was a case of love
+at first sight.' But Horace, who had gained some experience of life,
+could not believe this. He wooed, and won; yet even when Winifred
+accepted him, he felt that she did it under some constraint. Her
+pale face declared no happiness.
+
+Had she chosen, Mrs. Damerel could have explained the mystery. She
+knew that, several years ago, Winifred's name had been blighted by a
+scandal, and that the girl's shrinking from every proposal of
+marriage was due, in part perhaps, to the memory of love betrayed,
+in part to a sense of honour, and to the suspicion that men, knowing
+her disgrace, condoned it for the sake of her wealth. Interest made
+Mrs. Damerel generous; she admitted every excuse for Winifred, and
+persuaded herself that in procuring Horace such a wife she was doing
+him only a nominal wrong. The young people could live apart from
+that corner of Society in which Miss. Chittle's name gave occasion to
+smiles or looks of perfunctory censure. If Winifred, after marriage,
+chose to make confession, why, that was her own affair, and Horace
+would be wise enough, all advantages considered, to take the matter
+philosophically.
+
+That was the view of a practical-minded observer. To read Winifred
+perfectly, there needed a much more subtle and sympathetic
+intelligence. The girl had, in truth, conceived a liking for Horace
+Lord, and it grew stronger when she learnt that neither by birth nor
+present circumstances did he belong to her own world. To please her
+mother she was willing to take a husband, but the husband must be of
+her own choice. She wished to enter upon a wholly new life, remote
+from the social conditions which of late years had crushed her
+spirit. From the men who had hitherto approached her, she shrank in
+fear. Horace Lord, good-looking and not uneducated, yet so far from
+formidable, suggested a new hope; even though he might be actuated
+by the ordinary motives, she discerned in him a softness, a
+pliability of nature, which would harmonise with her own timid
+disposition. To the thought of deceiving him on the subject of her
+past, she was reconciled by a resolve to make his happiness the sole
+object of her existence in the future. Horace was amiability itself,
+and seemed, if not to love her ardently (which, perhaps, she did not
+even desire), at least to regard her with an increasing affection.
+
+Nothing was said about the condition of the prospective bridegroom's
+health, though Horace had confided to Mrs. Damerel that he suffered
+from a troublesome cough, accompanied now and then by an alarming
+symptom. In her boundless exultation at the end achieved, Mrs.
+Damerel made light of this complaint. Horace was not free to marry
+until nearly the end of the year; for, though money would henceforth
+be no matter of anxiety, he might as well secure the small
+inheritance presently due to him. November and December he should
+spend at Bournemouth under the best medical care, and after that, if
+needful, his wife would go with him to Madeira or some such place.
+
+No wonder Mrs. Damerel could think of nothing but the great fact that
+Horace had secured a fortune. Her own resources were coming to an
+end, and but for the certainty that Horace would not grudge her an
+ample provision, she must at this moment have been racking her
+brains (even as through the summer) for help against the evil that
+drew near. Constitutional lightness of heart had enabled her to
+enjoy life on a steadily, and rapidly, diminishing fund. There had
+been hope in Nancy's direction, as well as in her brother's; but the
+disclosure of Nancy's marriage, and Horace's persistency in
+unfriendliness, brought Mrs. Damerel to a sense of peril. One offer
+of marriage she had received and declined; it came from a man of
+advanced years and small property. Another offer she might, or
+thought she might, at any moment provoke; but only in direst
+extremity could she think of bestowing her hand upon Luckworth
+Crewe. Crewe was in love with her, an amusing fact in itself, and
+especially so in regard to his former relations with Nancy Lord. He
+might become a wealthy man; on the other hand, he might not; and in
+any case he was a plebeian.
+
+All such miseries were now dismissed from her mind. She went abroad
+with the Chittles, enjoyed herself at Brighton, and came home to
+prepare for Horace's wedding, Horace himself being at Bournemouth.
+After her letter of gratitude to Crewe she had ceased to correspond
+with him; she did not trouble to acquaint him with Horace's
+engagement; and when Crewe, having heard the news from his partner,
+ventured to send her a letter of congratulation, Mrs. Damerel replied
+in two or three very civil but cold sentences. Back in London, she
+did not invite the man of projects to call upon her. The status she
+had lost when fears beset her must now be recovered. Let Crewe
+cherish a passion for her if he liked, but let him understand that
+social reasons made it laughably hopeless.
+
+Horace was to come up to London in the third week of December, and
+to be married on New Year's Day; the honeymoon would be spent at
+Ventnor, or somewhere thereabout. Afraid to lose sight of her
+relative for more than a week or two, Mrs. Damerel had already been
+twice to Bournemouth, and now she decided to go for a third time,
+just to talk quietly over the forthcoming event, and, whether Horace
+broached the subject or not, to apprise him of the straits into
+which she was drifting. Unannounced by letter, she reached
+Bournemouth early in the afternoon, and went straight to Horace's
+lodgings. The young man had just finished luncheon, and, all things
+considered, including the fact that it was a remarkably bright and
+warm day for the time of year, he might have been expected to
+welcome Mrs. Damerel cheerfully. Yet on seeing her his countenance
+fell; he betrayed an embarrassment which the lady noted with anxious
+suspicion.
+
+'Aren't you glad to see me, dear boy?' she began, with a kiss upon
+his cheek.
+
+'Yes--oh yes. I never dreamt of your appearing just now, that was
+all.'
+
+'I couldn't resist the temptation. Such a morning in London! Almost
+as fine as it is here. And how is your cough?'
+
+Even as she made the inquiry, he answered it by coughing very badly.
+
+'I don't think this place suits you, Horace,' said Mrs. Damerel
+gravely. 'You're not imprudent, I hope? Don't go out after dark?'
+
+Oh, it was nothing, Horace maintained; for several days he had
+hardly coughed at all. But with every word he uttered, Mrs. Damerel
+became more convinced of something unusual in his state of mind; he
+could not keep still, and, in trying to put himself at ease, assumed
+strange postures.
+
+'When did you hear from Winifred?' she asked.
+
+'Yesterday--no, the day before.'
+
+He shrank from her scrutiny, and an expression of annoyance began to
+disturb his features. Mrs. Damerel knew well enough the significance
+of that particular look; it meant the irritation of his self-will,
+the summoning of forces to resist something he disliked.
+
+'There has been no difference between you, I hope?'
+
+'No--oh no,' Horace replied, wriggling under her look.
+
+At that moment a servant opened the door.
+
+'Two ladies have called in a carriage, sir, and would like to see
+you.'
+
+'I'll go down. Excuse me for a moment, aunt.'
+
+'Who are they, Horace?' asked Mrs. Damerel, rising with an
+ill-concealed look of dismay.
+
+'Some friends I have made here. I'll just go and speak to them.'
+
+He hurried away. No sooner was he gone than Mrs. Damerel sprang to
+the window, where she could look down upon the carriage standing
+before the house; it was open, and in it sat two ladies, one
+middle-aged, the other much younger. To her vexation she could not,
+from this distance, clearly discern their faces; but on glancing
+rapidly round the room, she saw Horace's little binocular. An
+instant brought it into focus upon the carriage, and what she then
+saw gave Mrs. Damerel such a shock, that an exclamation escaped her.
+Still she gazed through the glasses, and only turned away when the
+vehicle drove on.
+
+Horace came up flushed and panting.
+
+'It's all right. They wanted me to go for a drive, but I explained--'
+
+He saw the binocular in Mrs. Damerel's hand, and at the same moment
+read detection on her countenance. She gazed at him; he answered the
+look with lowering challenge.
+
+'Horace, that was Fanny French.'
+
+'So it was, aunt.'
+
+'What is going on between you?'
+
+The young man took a seat on the edge of the table, and swung his
+leg. He looked suddenly obstinate.
+
+'We met by accident--here--the other day.'
+
+'How can I believe that, Horace?' said Mrs. Damerel, in a voice of
+soft reproach. And she drew near to him. 'Be truthful with me, dear.
+Do tell me the truth!--Is she anything to you?'
+
+'I have told you the truth, aunt. She came here, as I have done, for
+her health. I haven't seen her for two years.'
+
+'And you don't wish to renew acquaintance with her,--I'm sure you
+don't.'
+
+He looked away, and said nothing.
+
+'My dear, do you know her character?'
+
+'What about her?'
+
+The tone was startling, but Mrs. Damerel kept firm, though agitated.
+
+'She has led the most disgraceful life. I heard about her half a
+year after she ran away, but of course I wouldn't tell you such
+painful things.'
+
+Horace reddened with anger.
+
+'And who is to blame for it?' he cried passionately. 'Who drove her
+to it?'
+
+'Oh, don't, don't come back to that again, Horace!' pleaded the
+other. 'How can any one drive a girl into a life of scandalous
+immorality? It was in herself, dear. She took to it naturally, as so
+many women do. Remember that letter she wrote from Brussels, which I
+sent you a copy of--'
+
+'It was a forgery!' thundered Horace. 'I have asked her. She says
+she never wrote any such letter.'
+
+'Then she lies, as such creatures always do.'
+
+Bitterness of apprehension overcame Mrs. Damerel's prudence. With
+flashing eyes, she faced the young man and dared his wrath. As they
+stood thus, the two were astonishingly like each other, from
+forehead to chin.
+
+'It's no use, I'm not going to quarrel with you, aunt. Think what
+you like of Miss. French, _I_ know the truth about her.'
+
+He slipped from the table, and moved away.
+
+'I will say no more, Horace. You are independent, and must have your
+own acquaintances. But after you are married--'
+
+The other voice interrupted.
+
+'I had better tell you at once. I shall not marry Miss. Chittle. I am
+going to write this afternoon to break it off.'
+
+Mrs. Damerel went pale, and stood motionless.
+
+'Horace, you can't be so wicked as that!'
+
+'It's better,' he pursued recklessly, 'to break it off now, than to
+marry her and make her miserable. I don't love her, and I have never
+really thought I did. I was going to marry her only for her money.
+Why she wants to marry me, I don't know. There's something wrong;
+she doesn't really care for me.'
+
+'She does! I assure you she does!'
+
+'Then I can't help it.'
+
+Mrs. Damerel went close to him, and touched his arm.
+
+'My dear,'--her voice was so low that it seemed terror-stricken,
+--'you don't mean to marry--any one else?'
+
+He drew apart, she followed him.
+
+'Oh, that would be terrible! What can I say to open your eyes and
+show you what you are doing? Horace, have you no sense of honour?
+Can you find it in your heart to cast off a girl who loves you, and
+thinks that in so short a time she will be your wife?'
+
+'This again is your fault,' he replied, with a violence which proved
+the conflict of emotions in him. 'But for you, I should never have
+proposed to Winifred--never dreamt of such a thing. What do I want
+with her money? I have enough of my own, and I shall make more in
+business. Why have you driven me into this? Did you expect to get
+some profit out of it?'
+
+The blow struck home, and Mrs. Damerel flinched.
+
+'I had your happiness in view, my dear.'
+
+'My happiness! that's your view of things; that's why I couldn't
+really like you, from the first. You think of nothing but money. Why
+you objected to Fanny French at first was because you wished me to
+marry some one richer. I don't thank you for that kind of happiness;
+I had rather marry a woman I can love.'
+
+'And you can love such a creature as that?'
+
+Again she lost her self-command; the mere thought of Fanny's
+possible triumph exasperated her.
+
+'I won't hear her abused,' cried Horace, with answering passion.
+'You are the last person who ought to do it. Comparing her and you,
+I can't help saying--'
+
+An exclamation of pain checked his random words; he looked at Mrs.
+Damerel, and saw her features wrung with anguish.
+
+'You mustn't speak to me like that!' Once more she approached him.
+'If you only knew--I can't bear it--I've always been a worldly
+woman, but you are breaking my heart, Horace! My dear, my dear, if
+only out of pity for me--'
+
+'Why should I pity you?' he cried impatiently.
+
+'Because--Horace--give me your hand, dear; let me tell you
+something.--I am your mother.'
+
+She sobbed and choked, clinging to his arm, resting her forehead
+against it. The young man, stricken with amazement, stared at her,
+speechless.
+
+'I am your own mother, dear,' she went on, in a quivering voice.
+'Your mother and Nancy's. And neither of you can love me.'
+
+'How can that be?' Horace asked, with genuine perplexity. 'How could
+you have married some one else?'
+
+She passed an arm about his neck, and hid her face against him.
+
+'I left your father--and he made me free to marry again.'
+
+'You were divorced?'
+
+Horace did not mean to speak brutally; in his wonderment he merely
+pressed for a complete explanation. The answer was a sob, and for
+some moments neither of them spoke. Then the mother, her face still
+hidden, went on in a thick voice:
+
+'I married because I was poor--for no other reason--and then
+came the temptation. I behaved wickedly, I deserted my little
+children. Don't revenge yourself upon me now, darling! If only I
+could have told you this before--I did so want to, but I was
+afraid. I had to conceal half my love for you. You can't imagine how
+I have suffered from your anger, and from Nancy's coldness. You
+don't know me; I have never been able to let you see what I really
+think and feel. I am worldly; I can't live without luxuries and
+society and amusements; but I love you, my dear son, and it will
+break my heart if you ruin yourself. It's true I thought of
+Winifred's money, but she is very fond of you, Horace; her mother
+has told me she is. And it was because of my own position. I have
+spent nearly all my husband left me; it wasn't enough to supply me
+with an income; I could only hope that something--that you, dear,
+would forgive your poor mother, and help her. If you cast me off,
+what shall I do?'
+
+There was a silence. Then the young man spoke gravely:
+
+'You are welcome, mother, to half my income. But you must leave me
+free to marry as I like.'
+
+'Then I can't take a penny from you,' she answered, weeping. 'If you
+ruin yourself, you ruin me as well.'
+
+'The ruin would come if I married Winifred. I love Fanny; I love her
+with all my heart and soul, and have never ceased to love her. Tell
+me what you like about her, it will make no difference.'
+
+A fit of violent coughing stopped his speech; he turned away, and
+stood by the window, holding his handkerchief to his mouth.
+
+Mrs. Damerel sank upon a chair in mute misery.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 3
+
+
+
+
+Below the hill at Harrow, in a byway which has no charm but that of
+quietness, stands a row of small plain houses, built not long ago,
+yet at a time when small houses were constructed with some regard
+for soundness and durability. Each contains six rooms, has a little
+strip of garden in the rear, and is, or was in 1889, let at a rent
+of six-and-twenty pounds. The house at the far end of the row (as
+the inhabitants described it) was then tenanted by Mary Woodruff,
+and with her, as a lodger, lived Mrs. Tarrant.
+
+As a lodger, seeing that she paid a specified weekly sum for her
+shelter and maintenance; in no other respect could the wretched
+title apply to her. To occupy furnished lodgings, is to live in a
+house owned and ruled by servants; the least tolerable status known
+to civilisation. From her long experience at Falmouth, Nancy knew
+enough of the petty miseries attendant upon that condition to think
+of it with dread when the stress of heroic crisis compelled her
+speedy departure from the old home. It is seldom that heroic crisis
+bears the precise consequence presumed by the actors in it; supreme
+moments are wont to result in some form of compromise. So Nancy,
+prepared to go forth into the wilderness of landladies, babe in arm,
+found that so dreary a self-sacrifice neither was exacted of her,
+nor would indeed be permitted; she had to reckon with Mary Woodruff.
+Mary, thanks to her old master, enjoyed an income more than
+sufficient to her needs; if Nancy must needs go into lodgings,--
+inevitable, perhaps, as matters stood,--her friend was ready with
+kind and practical suggestion; to wit, that she should take and
+furnish a house for herself, and place a portion of it at Mrs.
+Tarrant's disposal. To this even Tarrant could offer no objection;
+he stipulated only that his wife should find a temporary refuge from
+the home she had occupied on false pretences until Mary had her new
+house in readiness. This was managed without difficulty. Nancy went
+to Dulwich, and for several weeks dwelt with the honest woman who
+took care of her child.
+
+Of the dealings between Nancy and her legal guardians Tarrant
+learned nothing, save the bare fact that her marriage was avowed,
+and all benefit under her father's will renounced. He did not visit
+the house at Dulwich, and only saw his child after the removal to
+Harrow. On this occasion he asked Nancy what arrangements had been
+made concerning the money that must be reimbursed to the Messrs
+Barmby; she replied that justice would be done, but the affair was
+hers alone, and to her must be left.
+
+Tarrant himself suggested the neighbourhood of Harrow for Nancy's
+abode. It united the conditions of being remote from Camberwell, of
+lying beyond the great smoke-area, and of permitting him, poor as he
+was, to visit his wife whenever he thought fit.
+
+In December, Nancy had lived thus for all but a twelvemonth, seeing
+the while none of her old acquaintances, and with very little news
+from her old world. What she heard came through Horace, who, after
+learning with astonishment the secret in his sister's life, came by
+degrees to something like the old terms of affection with her, and
+went over to Harrow pretty frequently. Of his engagement to Winifred
+Chittle he at once informed Nancy, who tried to be glad of it, but
+could have little faith in anything traceable to the influence of
+Mrs. Damerel. With that lady the Harrow household had no direct
+communication; Tarrant had written to her on the night of crisis,
+civilly requesting her to keep aloof, as her advice and assistance
+were m nowise needed. She answered him with good temper, and wrote
+kindly to Nancy; after that, silence on both sides.
+
+It wanted a few days to Christmas; with nightfall had come a roaring
+wind and sleety rain; the house-door was locked; within, lamps and
+fires burned cheerily. At half-past six, Nancy--she occupied the
+two front rooms--sat in her parlour, resting after the exertion of
+putting her son to bed. To judge from her countenance, she was well
+and happy. The furniture about her aimed at nothing but homely
+comfort; the pictures and books, being beyond dispute her own, had
+come from Grove Lane.
+
+Save when Tarrant was here, Nancy and Mary of course lived like
+friends who share a house, eating together and generally sitting
+together. During an hour or two each day the younger woman desired
+solitude, for a reason understood by her companion, who then looked
+after the baby. This present evening Nancy had proposed to spend
+alone; but, after sitting idly for a few minutes, she opened the
+door and called Mary--just then occupied in teaching a young
+servant how to iron.
+
+'I shall not write, after all,' she said, when her friend came. 'I'm
+too tired. Bring your sewing, or your book, here.'
+
+Mary was never talkative; Nancy kept a longer silence than usual.
+
+'How,' she exclaimed at length, 'do poor women with a lot of
+children manage? It really is a mystery to me. Here am I with one
+baby, and with the constant help of two people; yet he tires me out.
+Not a troublesome baby, either; healthy and good-tempered. Yet the
+thought and anxiety and downright hard labour for a good twelve
+hours out of the twenty-four! I feel that a second child would be
+too much for me.'
+
+She laughed, but looked seriously for the reply.
+
+'Poor mothers,' said Mary, 'can't give the same care to their
+children that you give to baby. The little ones grow up, or they
+don't grow up--that's what it comes to.'
+
+'Yes; that is to say, only the fit survive. A very good thing--
+when other people's children are in question. But I should kill
+myself in taking care of them, if I had a large family.'
+
+'I have known mothers who did,' Mary remarked.
+
+'It comes to this. Nature doesn't intend a married woman to be
+anything _but_ a married woman. In the natural state of things, she
+must either be the slave of husband and children, or defy her duty.
+She can have no time to herself, no thoughts for herself. It's a
+hard saying, but who can doubt that it is Nature's law? I should
+like to revolt against it, yet I feel revolt to be silly. One might
+as well'I revolt against being born a woman instead of a man.'
+
+Mary reflected, but held her peace.
+
+'Then comes in money,' pursued Nancy, 'and that alters the state of
+the case at once. The wife with money says to people: Come here, and
+be my slaves. Toil for me, whilst I am enjoying myself in ways that
+Dame Nature wouldn't allow. I want to read, to play music, to see my
+friends, to see the world. Unless you will slave for me, I can't
+budge from nursery and kitchen.--Isn't it a queer thing?'
+
+The less sophisticated woman had a difficulty in catching Nancy's
+point of view. She began to argue that domestic service was no
+slavery.
+
+'But it _comes_ to that,' Nancy insisted. 'And what I mean is, that
+the thought has made me far more contented than I was at first.
+After all, one can put up with a great deal, if you feel you're
+obeying a law of Nature. Now, I have brains, and I should like to
+use them; but Nature says that's not so important as bringing up the
+little child to whom I have given life. One thought that troubles me
+is, that every generation of women is sacrificed to the generation
+that follows; and of course that's why women are so inferior to men.
+But then again, Nature says that women are born _only_ to be
+sacrificed. I always come round to that. I don't like it, but I am
+bound to believe it.'
+
+'Children grow up,' said Mary, 'and then mothers are free.'
+
+'Free to do what? To think of what they _might_ have done in the
+best years of their life.'
+
+It was not said discontentedly; Nancy's mood seemed to be singularly
+calm and philosophical. She propped her chin on her hand, and gazed
+at the fire.
+
+'Well,' remarked Mary, with a smile, 'you, at all events, are not
+one of the poorest women. All seems to be going well, and you will
+be able, I am sure, to get all the help you need.'
+
+'Perhaps. But I shall never feel quiet in my conscience. I shall
+feel as if I had defeated Nature by a trick, and fear that she'll
+somehow be revenged on me.'
+
+This was quite beyond Mary's scope of thought, and she frankly said
+so.
+
+'One thing I'm quite sure of, Nancy,' she added, 'and that is, that
+education makes life very much harder to live. That's why I don't
+hold with educating the poor--not beyond reading and writing.
+Without education, life is very plain, though it may be a struggle.
+But from what I have seen of highly-taught people, I'm very sure
+they suffer worse in their minds than the poor ever do in their
+bodies.'
+
+Nancy interrupted her.
+
+'Hush! Was that baby?'
+
+'Only the wind, I think.'
+
+Not content, Nancy went to the foot of the stairs. Whilst she stood
+there listening, Mary came out, and said in a low voice:
+
+'There's a tap at the window.'
+
+'No!--You must have been mistaken.'
+
+'I'm sure it was a tap on the glass.'
+
+She withdrew to the back sitting-room, and Nancy, with quick step,
+went to open the house-door. A great gust of wind forced it against
+her as soon as she turned the handle; standing firm, she peeped into
+darkness.
+
+'Any one there?'
+
+'No enemy but winter and rough weather,' chanted a familiar voice.
+
+'Why, what brings you here, frightening lone women at this time of
+night? Shut and lock the door for me. The house will be blown out of
+the windows.'
+
+Nancy retreated to her parlour, and stood there in an attitude of
+joyous expectation. Without hurry Tarrant hung up his coat and hat
+in the passage, then came forward, wiping rain from his moustache.
+Their eyes met in a smile, frank and confident.
+
+'Why have you come, Lionel?'
+
+'No reason in particular. The fancy took me. Am I unwelcome?'
+
+For answer, his wife's arms were thrown about him. A lovers'
+meeting, with more of tenderness, and scarcely less of warmth, than
+when Nancy knocked at the door in Staple Inn.
+
+'Are you hungry?'
+
+'Only for what you have given me.'
+
+'Some tea, then, after that wretched journey.'
+
+'No. How's the boy?'
+
+He drew her upon his knee, and listened laughingly whilst the newest
+marvels of babyhood were laughingly related.
+
+'Anything from Horace?'
+
+'Not a word. He must be in London now; I shall write tomorrow.'
+
+Tarrant nodded carelessly. He had the smallest interest in his
+wife's brother, but could not help satisfaction in the thought that
+Horace was to be reputably, and even brilliantly, married. From all
+he knew of Horace, the probability had seemed that his marriage
+would be some culmination of folly.
+
+'I think you have something to tell me,' Nancy said presently, when
+her hand had been fondled for a minute or two.
+
+'Nothing much, but good as far as it goes. Bunbury has asked me to
+write him an article every week for the first six months of '90.
+Column and a half, at two guineas a column.'
+
+'Three guineas a week.'
+
+'O rare head!'
+
+'So there's no anxiety for the first half of next year, at all
+events,' said Nancy, with a sigh of relief.
+
+'I think I can count on a margin of fifty pounds or so by midsummer
+--towards the debt, of course.'
+
+Nancy bit her lip in vexation, but neither made nor wished to make
+any protest. Only a week or two ago, since entering upon his
+patrimony, Horace Lord had advanced the sum necessary to repay what
+Nancy owed to the Barmbys. However rich Horace was going to be, this
+debt to him must be cancelled. On that, as on most other points,
+Tarrant and his wife held a firm agreement of opinion. Yet they
+wanted money; the past year had been a time of struggle to make ends
+meet. Neither was naturally disposed to asceticism, and if they did
+not grumble it was only because grumbling would have been
+undignified.
+
+'Did you dine with the great people on Thursday?' Nancy asked.
+
+'Yes, and rather enjoyed it. There were one or two clever women.'
+
+'Been anywhere else?'
+
+'An hour at a smoking-concert the other evening. Pippit, the actor,
+was there, and recited a piece much better than I ever heard him
+speak anything on the stage. They told me he was drunk; very
+possibly that accounted for it.'
+
+To a number of such details Nancy listened quietly, with bent head.
+She had learned to put absolute faith in all that Tarrant told her
+of his quasi-bachelor life; she suspected no concealment; but the
+monotony of her own days lay heavy upon her whilst he talked.
+
+'Won't you smoke?' she asked, rising from his knee to fetch the pipe
+and tobacco-jar kept for him upon a shelf. Slippers also she brought
+him, and would have unlaced his muddy boots had Tarrant permitted
+it. When he presented a picture of masculine comfort, Nancy, sitting
+opposite, cautiously approached a subject of which as yet there had
+been no word between them.
+
+'Oughtn't you to get more comfortable lodgings?'
+
+'Oh, I do very well. I'm accustomed to the place, and I like the
+situation.'
+
+He had kept his room in Great College Street, though often obliged
+to scant his meals as the weekly rent-day approached.
+
+'Don't you think we might make some better--some more economical
+arrangement?'
+
+'How?'
+
+Nancy took courage, and spoke her thoughts.
+
+'It's more expensive to live separately than if we were together.'
+
+Tarrant seemed to give the point his impartial consideration.
+
+'H'm--no, I think not. Certainly not, with our present
+arrangements. And even if it were we pay for your comfort, and my
+liberty.'
+
+'Couldn't you have as much liberty if we were living under the same
+roof? Of course I know that you couldn't live out here; it would put
+a stop to your work at once. But suppose we moved. Mary might take a
+rather larger house--it needn't be much larger--in a part
+convenient for you. We should be able to pay her enough to set off
+against her increased expenses.'
+
+Smoking calmly, Tarrant shook his head.
+
+'Impracticable. Do you mean that this place is too dull for you?'
+
+'It isn't lively, but I wasn't thinking of the place. If _you_ lived
+here, it would be all I should wish.'
+
+'That sounds so prettily from your lips, Nancy, that I'm half
+ashamed to contradict it. But the truth is that you can only say
+such things because we live apart. Don't deceive yourself. With a
+little more money, this life of ours would be as nearly perfect as
+married life ever can be.'
+
+Nancy remembered a previous occasion when he spoke to the same
+purpose. But it was in the time she did not like to think of, and in
+spite of herself the recollection troubled her.
+
+'You must have more variety,' he added. 'Next year you shall come
+into town much oftener--'
+
+'I'm not thinking of that. I always like going anywhere with you;
+but I have plenty of occupations and pleasures at home.--I think
+we ought to be under the same roof.'
+
+'Ought? Because Mrs. Tomkins would cry _haro_! if her husband the
+greengrocer wasn't at her elbow day and night?'
+
+'Have more patience with me. I didn't mean _ought_ in the vulgar
+sense--I have as little respect for Mrs. Tomkins as you have. I
+don't want to interfere with your liberty for a moment; indeed it
+would be very foolish, for I know that it would make you detest me.
+But I so often want to speak to you--and--and then, I can't
+quite feel that you acknowledge me as your wife so long as I am
+away.'
+
+Tarrant nodded.
+
+'I quite understand. The social difficulty. Well, there's no doubt
+it is a difficulty; I feel it on your account. I wish it were
+possible for you to be invited wherever I am. Some day it will be,
+if I don't get run over in the Strand; but--'
+
+'I should like the invitations,' Nancy broke in, 'but you still
+don't understand me.'
+
+'Yes, I think I do. You are a woman, and it's quite impossible for a
+woman to see this matter as a man does. Nancy, there is not one wife
+in fifty thousand who retains her husband's love after the first
+year of marriage. Put aside the fools and the worthless; think only
+of women with whom you might be compared--brave, sensible,
+pure-hearted; they can win love, but don't know how to keep it.'
+
+'Why not put it the other way about, and say that men can love to
+begin with, but so soon grow careless?'
+
+'Because I am myself an instance to the contrary.'
+
+Nancy smiled, but was not satisfied.
+
+'The only married people,' Tarrant pursued, 'who can live together
+with impunity, are those who are rich enough, and sensible enough,
+to have two distinct establishments under the same roof. The
+ordinary eight or ten-roomed house, inhabited by decent middle-class
+folk, is a gruesome sight. What a huddlement of male and female!
+They are factories of quarrel and hate--those respectable,
+brass-curtain-rodded sties--they are full of things that won't
+bear mentioning. If our income never rises above that, we shall live
+to the end of our days as we do now.'
+
+Nancy looked appalled.
+
+'But how can you hope to make thousands a year?'
+
+'I have no such hope; hundreds would be sufficient. I don't aim at a
+house in London; everything there is intolerable, except the fine
+old houses which have a history, and which I could never afford. For
+my home, I want to find some rambling old place among hills and
+woods,--some house where generations have lived and died,--where
+my boy, as he grows up, may learn to love the old and beautiful
+things about him. I myself never had a home; most London children
+don't know what is meant by home; their houses are only more or less
+comfortable lodgings, perpetual change within and without.'
+
+'Your thoughts are wonderfully like my father's, sometimes,' said
+Nancy.
+
+'From what you have told me of him, I think we should have agreed in
+a good many things.'
+
+'And how unfortunate we were! If he had recovered from that illness,
+--if he had lived only a few months,--everything would have been
+made easy.'
+
+'For me altogether too easy,' Tarrant observed.
+
+'It has been a good thing for you to have to work,' Nancy assented.
+'I understand the change for the better in you. But'--she smiled
+--'you have more self-will than you used to have.'
+
+'That's just where I have gained.--But don't think that I find it
+easy or pleasant to resist your wish. I couldn't do it if I were not
+so sure that I am acting for your advantage as well as my own. A man
+who finds himself married to a fool, is a fool himself if he doesn't
+take his own course regardless of his wife. But I am in a very
+different position; I love you more and more, Nancy, because I am
+learning more and more to respect you; I think of your happiness
+most assuredly as much as I think of my own. But even if my own good
+weighed as nothing against yours, I should be wise to resist you
+just as I do now. Hugger-mugger marriage is a defilement and a
+curse. We know it from the experience of the world at large,--
+which is perhaps more brutalised by marriage than by anything else.
+--No need to test the thing once more, to our own disaster.'
+
+'What I think is, that, though you pay me compliments, you really
+have a very poor opinion of me. You think I should burden and worry
+you in endless silly ways. I am not such a simpleton. In however
+small a house, there could be your rooms and mine. Do you suppose I
+should interfere with your freedom in coming and going?'
+
+'Whether you meant to or not, you would--so long as we are
+struggling with poverty. However self-willed I am, I am not selfish;
+and to see you living a monotonous, imprisoned life would be a
+serious hindrance to me in my own living and working. Of course the
+fact is so at present, and I often enough think in a troubled way
+about you; but you are out of my sight, and that enables me to keep
+you out of mind. If I am away from home till one or two in the
+morning, there is no lonely wife fretting and wondering about me.
+For work such as mine, I must live as though I were not married at
+all.'
+
+'But suppose we got out of our poverty,' urged Nancy, 'you would be
+living the same life, I suppose; and how would it be any better for
+you or me that we had a large house instead of a small one?'
+
+'Your position will be totally changed. When money comes, friends
+come. You are not hiding away from Society because you are unfit for
+it, only because you can't live as your social equals do. When you
+have friends of your own, social engagements, interests on every
+hand, I shall be able to go my own way without a pang of conscience.
+When we come together, it will be to talk of your affairs as well as
+of mine. Living as you do now, you have nothing on earth but the
+baby to think about--a miserable state of things for a woman with
+a mind. I know it is miserable, and I'm struggling tooth and nail to
+help you out of it.'
+
+Nancy sighed.
+
+'Then there are years of it still before me.'
+
+'Heaven forbid! Some years, no doubt, before we shall have a home;
+but not before I can bring you in contact with the kind of people
+you ought to know. You shall have a decent house--socially
+possible--somewhere out west; and I, of course, shall still go on
+in lodgings.'
+
+He waited for Nancy's reply, but she kept silence.
+
+'You are still dissatisfied?'
+
+She looked up, and commanded her features to the expression which
+makes whatever woman lovely--that of rational acquiescence. On the
+faces of most women such look is never seen.
+
+'No, I am content. You are working hard, and I won't make it harder
+for you.'
+
+'Speak always like that!' Tarrant's face was radiant. 'That's the
+kind of thing that binds man to woman, body and soul. With the
+memory of that look and speech, would it be possible for me to
+slight you in my life apart? It makes you my friend; and the word
+friend is better to my ear than wife. A man's wife is more often
+than not his enemy. Harvey Munden was telling me of a poor devil of
+an author who daren't be out after ten at night because of the
+fool-fury waiting for him at home.'
+
+Nancy laughed.
+
+'I suppose she can't trust him.'
+
+'And suppose she can't? What is the value of nominal fidelity,
+secured by mutual degradation such as that? A rational woman would
+infinitely rather have a husband who was often unfaithful to her
+than keep him faithful by such means. Husband and wife should
+interfere with each other not a jot more than two friends of the
+same sex living together. If a man, under such circumstances,
+worried his friend's life out by petty prying, he would get his head
+punched. A wife has no more justification in worrying her husband
+with jealousies.'
+
+'How if it were the wife that excited suspicion?' asked Nancy.
+
+'Infidelity in a woman is much worse than in a man. If a man really
+suspects his wife, he must leave her, that's all; then let her
+justify herself if she can.'
+
+Nancy cared little to discuss this point. In argument with any one
+else, she would doubtless have maintained the equality of man and
+woman before the moral law; but that would only have been in order
+to prove herself modern-spirited. Tarrant's dictum did not revolt
+her.
+
+'Friends are equals,' she said, after a little thought. 'But you
+don't think me your equal, and you won't be satisfied with me unless
+I follow your guidance.'
+
+Tarrant laughed kindly.
+
+'True, I am your superior in force of mind and force of body. Don't
+you like to hear that? Doesn't it do you good--when you think of
+the maudlin humbug generally talked by men to women? We can't afford
+to disguise that truth. All the same, we are friends, because each
+has the other's interest at heart, and each would be ashamed to
+doubt the other's loyalty.'
+
+The latter part of the evening they spent with Mary, in whom Tarrant
+always found something new to admire. He regarded her as the most
+wonderful phenomenon in nature--an uneducated woman who was
+neither vulgar nor foolish.
+
+Baby slept in a cot beside Nancy's bed. For fear of waking him, the
+wedded lovers entered their room very softly, with a shaded candle.
+Tarrant looked at the curly little head, the little clenched hand,
+and gave a silent laugh of pleasure.
+
+On the breakfast-table next morning lay a letter from Horace. As
+soon as she had opened it, Nancy uttered an exclamation which
+prepared her companion for ill news.
+
+'Just what I expected--though I tried not to think so. "I write
+aline only to tell you that my marriage is broken off. You will know
+the explanation before long. Don't trouble yourself about it. I
+should never have been happy with Winifred, nor she with me. We may
+not see each other for some time, but I will write again soon." He
+doesn't say whether he or she broke it off. I hope it was Winifred.'
+
+'I'm afraid not,' said Tarrant, 'from the tone of that letter.'
+
+'I'm afraid not, too. It means something wretched. He writes from
+his London lodgings. Lionel, let me go back with you, and see him.'
+
+'By all means.'
+
+Her gravest fear Nancy would not communicate. And it hit the truth.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 4
+
+
+
+
+They parted at Baker Street, Tarrant for his lodgings and the work
+that awaited him there, Nancy to go westward by another train.
+
+When she reached the house from which her brother had dated his
+letter, it was half-past ten. At the door stood a cab, and a servant
+was helping the driver to hoist a big trunk on to the top.
+
+'Is Mr. Lord still here?' Nancy asked of the girl.
+
+'He's just this minute a-goin', miss. This is his luggage.'
+
+She sent her name, and was quickly led up to the first floor. There
+stood Horace, ready for departure.
+
+'Why have you come?' he asked, with annoyance.
+
+'What else could I do on hearing such news?'
+
+'I told you I should write again, and I said plainly that it was
+better we shouldn't see each other for some time.--Why will people
+pester me out of my life?--I'm not a child to be hunted like
+this!'
+
+On the instant, he had fallen into a state of excitement which
+alarmed his sister. There were drops of sweat on his forehead, and
+tears in his eyes; the blood had rushed to his cheeks, and he
+trembled violently.
+
+'I am so troubled about you,' said Nancy, with anxious tenderness.
+'I have been looking forward with such hope to your marriage,--and
+now--'
+
+'I can't tell you anything about it just now. It was all Mrs.
+Damerel's doing; the engagement, I mean. It's a good thing I drew
+back in time.--But I have a train to catch; I really mustn't stay
+talking.'
+
+'Are you going far, Horace?'
+
+'To Bournemouth again,--for the present. I've given up these
+rooms, and I'm taking all my things away. In a month or two I may go
+abroad; but I'll let you know.'
+
+Already he was out of the room; his sister had no choice but to
+follow him downstairs. He looked so ill, and behaved with such lack
+of self-restraint, that Nancy kept her eyes upon him in an
+awestricken gaze, as though watching some one on the headlong way to
+destruction. Pouring rain obliged her to put up her umbrella as she
+stepped down on to the pavement. Horace, having shouted a direction
+to the driver, entered the cab.
+
+'You haven't even shaken hands with me, Horace,' Nancy exclaimed,
+standing at the window.
+
+'Good-bye, dear; good-bye! You shouldn't have come in weather such
+as this. Get home as fast as you can. Good-bye!--Tell the fellow
+to drive sharp.'
+
+And the cab clattered away, sending spurts of mud on to Nancy's
+waterproof.
+
+She walked on for a few paces without reflection, until the vehicle
+disappeared round a corner. Coming to herself, she made for the
+railway again, which was at only a few minutes' distance, and there
+she sat down by the fire in the waiting-room. Her health for the
+last year had been sound as in the days of girlhood; it was rarely
+that she caught cold, and weather would have been indifferent to her
+but for the discomfort which hindered her free movement.
+
+Vexed at so futile a journey, she resolved not to return home
+without making another effort to learn something about Horace. The
+only person to whom she could apply was the one who would certainly
+be possessed of information,--Mrs. Damerel. At the time of Horace's
+engagement, Nancy had heard from Mrs. Damerel, and replied to the
+letter; she remembered her aunt's address, and as the distance was
+not great, the temptation to go there now proved irresistible. Her
+husband would dislike to hear of such a step, but he had never
+forbidden communication with Mrs. Damerel.
+
+By help of train and omnibus she reached her new destination in
+half-an-hour, and felt a relief on learning that Mrs. Damerel was at
+home. But it surprised her to be conducted into a room where lamps
+were burning, and blinds drawn close; she passed suddenly from
+cheerless day to cosy evening. Mrs. Damerel, negligently attired,
+received her with a show of warm welcome, but appeared nervous and
+out of spirits.
+
+'I am not very well,' she admitted, 'and that's why I have shut out
+the dreadful weather. Isn't it the most sensible way of getting
+through the worst of a London winter? To pretend that there is
+daylight is quite ridiculous, so one may as well have the comforts
+of night.'
+
+'I have come to speak about Horace,' said Nancy, at once. In any
+case, she would have felt embarrassment, and it was increased by the
+look with which Mrs. Damerel kept regarding her,--a look of
+confusion, of shrinking, of intense and painful scrutiny.
+
+'You know what has happened?'
+
+'I had a letter from him this morning, to say that his marriage was
+broken off--nothing else. So I came over from Harrow to see him.
+But he had hardly a minute to speak to me. He was just starting for
+Bournemouth.'
+
+'And what did he tell you?' asked Mrs. Damerel, who remained
+standing,--or rather had risen, after a pretence of seating
+herself.
+
+'Nothing at all. He was very strange in his manner. He said he would
+write.'
+
+'You know that he is seriously ill?'
+
+'I am afraid he must be.'
+
+'He has grown much worse during the last fortnight. Don't you
+suspect any reason for his throwing off poor Winifred?'
+
+'I wondered whether he had met that girl again. But it seemed very
+unlikely.'
+
+'He has. She was at Bournemouth for her health. She, too, is ill;
+consumptive, like poor Horace,--of course a result of the life she
+has been leading. And he is going to marry her.'Nancy's heart sank.
+She could say nothing. She remembered Horace's face, and saw in him
+the victim of ruthless destiny.
+
+'I have done my utmost. He didn't speak of me?'
+
+'Only to say that his engagement with Winifred was brought about by
+you.'
+
+'And wasn't I justified? If the poor boy must die, he would at least
+have died with friends about him, and in peace. I always feared just
+what has happened. It's only a few months ago that he forgave me for
+being, as he thought, the cause of that girl's ruin; and since then
+I have hardly dared to lose sight of him. I went down to Bournemouth
+unexpectedly, and was with him when that creature came to the door
+in a carriage. You haven't seen her. She looks what she is, the
+vilest of the vile. As if any one can be held responsible for that!
+She was born to be what she is. And if I had the power, I would
+crush out her hateful life to save poor Horace!'
+
+Nancy, though at one with the speaker in her hatred of Fanny French,
+found it as difficult as ever to feel sympathetically towards Mrs.
+Damerel. She could not credit this worldly woman with genuine
+affection for Horace; the vehemence of her speech surprised and
+troubled her, she knew not how.
+
+'He said nothing more about me?' added Mrs. Damerel, after a silence.
+
+'Nothing at all.'
+
+It seemed to Nancy that she heard a sigh of relief. The other's face
+was turned away. Then Mrs. Damerel took a seat by the fire.
+
+'They will be married to-morrow, I dare say, at Bournemouth--no
+use trying to prevent it. I don't know whether you will believe me,
+but it is a blow that will darken the rest of my life.'
+
+Her voice sounded slightly hoarse, and she lay back in the chair,
+with drooping head.
+
+'You have nothing to reproach yourself with,' said Nancy, yielding
+to a vague and troublous pity. 'And you have done as much as any one
+could on his behalf.'
+
+'I shall never see him again--that's the hardest thought. She will
+poison him against me. He told me I had lied to him about a letter
+that girl wrote from Brussels; she has made him think her a spotless
+innocent, and he hates me for the truth I told about her.'
+
+'However short his life,' said Nancy, 'he is only too likely to find
+out what she really is.'
+
+'I am not sure of that. She knows he is doomed, and it's her
+interest to play a part. He will die thinking the worst of me.--
+Nancy, if he writes to you, and says anything against me, you will
+remember what it means?'
+
+'My opinion of people is not affected by hearsay,' Nancy replied.
+
+It was a remark of dubious significance, and Mrs. Damerel's averted
+eyes seemed to show that she derived little satisfaction from it. As
+the silence was unbroken, Nancy rose.
+
+'I hope you will soon get rid of your cold.'
+
+'Thank you, my dear. I haven't asked how the little boy is. Well, I
+hope?'
+
+'Very well, I am glad to say.'
+
+'And your husband--he is prospering?'
+
+'I shouldn't like to say he is prospering; it seems to mean so much;
+but I think he is doing good work, and we are satisfied with the
+results.'
+
+'My dear, you are an admirable wife.'
+
+Nancy coloured; for the first time, a remark of Mrs. Damerel's had
+given her pleasure. She moved forward with hand offered for
+leave-taking. They had never kissed each other, but, as if
+overcoming diffidence, Mrs. Damerel advanced her lips; then, as
+suddenly, she drew back.
+
+'I had forgotten. I may give you my sore throat.'
+
+Nancy kissed her cheek.
+
+That night Mrs. Damerel was feverish, and the next day she kept her
+bed. The servant who waited upon her had to endure a good many sharp
+reproofs; trouble did not sweeten this lady's temper, yet she never
+lost sight of self-respect, and even proved herself capable of
+acknowledging that she was in the wrong. Mrs. Damerel possessed the
+elements of civilisation.
+
+This illness tried her patience in no slight degree. Something she
+had wished to do, something of high moment, was vexatiously
+postponed. A whole week went by before she could safely leave the
+house, and even then her mirror counselled a new delay. But on the
+third day of the new year she made a careful toilette, and sent for
+a cab,--the brougham she had been wont to hire being now beyond
+her means.
+
+She drove to Farringdon Street, and climbed to the office of Mr
+Luckworth Crewe. Her knowledge of Crewe's habits enabled her to
+choose the fitting hour for this call; he had lunched, and was
+smoking a cigar.
+
+'How delightful to see you here!' he exclaimed. 'But why did you
+trouble to come? If you had written, or telegraphed, I would have
+saved you the journey. I haven't even a chair that's fit for you to
+sit down on.'
+
+'What nonsense! It's a most comfortable little room. Haven't you
+improved it since I called?'
+
+'I shall have to look out for a bigger place. I'm outgrowing this.'
+
+'Are you really? That's excellent news. Ah, but what sad things have
+been happening!'
+
+'It's a bad business,' Crewe answered, shaking his head.
+
+'I thought I should have heard from you about it.'
+
+The reason of his silence she perfectly understood. Since Horace's
+engagement, there had been a marked change in her demeanour towards
+the man of business; she had answered his one or two letters with
+such cold formality, and, on the one occasion of his venturing to
+call, had received him with so marked a reserve, that Crewe, as he
+expressed it to himself, 'got his back up.' His ideas of chivalrous
+devotion were anything but complex; he could not bend before a
+divinity who snubbed him; if the once gracious lady chose to avert
+her countenance, he would let her know that it didn't matter much to
+him after all. Moreover, Mrs. Damerel's behaviour was too suggestive;
+he could hardly be wrong in explaining it by the fact that her
+nephew, about to be enriched by marriage, might henceforth be
+depended upon for all the assistance she needed. This, in the
+Americanism which came naturally to Crewe's lips, was 'playing it
+rather low down,' and he resented it.
+
+The sudden ruin of Horace Lord's prospects (he had learnt the course
+of events from Horace himself) amused and gratified him. How would
+the high and mighty Mrs. Damerel relish this catastrophe? Would she
+have the 'cheek' to return to her old graciousness? If so, he had
+the game in his hands; she should see that he was not to be made a
+fool of a second time.
+
+Yet the mere announcement of her name sufficed to shatter his
+resolve. Her smile, her soft accents, her polished manners, laid the
+old spell upon him. He sought to excuse himself for having forsaken
+her in her trial.
+
+'It really floored me. I didn't know what to say or do. I was afraid
+you might think I was meddling with what didn't concern me.'
+
+'Oh, how could I have thought that? It has made me ill; I have
+suffered more than I can tell you.'
+
+'You don't look quite the thing,' said Crewe, searching her face.
+
+'Have you heard all?'
+
+'I think so. He is married, and that's the end of it, I suppose.'
+
+Mrs. Damerel winced at this blunt announcement.
+
+'When was it?' she asked, in an undertone. 'I only knew he had made
+up his mind.'
+
+Crewe mentioned the date; the day after Nancy's call upon her.
+
+'And are they at Bournemouth?'
+
+'Yes. Will be for a month or so, he says.'
+
+'Well, we won't talk of it. As you say, that's the end. Nothing
+worse could have happened. Has he been speaking of me again like he
+used to?'
+
+'I haven't heard him mention your name.'
+
+She heaved a sigh, and began to look round the office.
+
+'Let us try to forget, and talk of pleasanter things. It seems such
+a long time since you told me anything about your business. You
+remember how we used to gossip. I suppose I have been so absorbed in
+that poor boy's affairs; it made me selfish--I was so overjoyed, I
+really could think of nothing else. And now--! But I must and will
+drive it out of my mind. I have been moping at home, day after day,
+in wretched solitude. I wanted to write to you, but I hadn't the
+heart--scarcely the strength. I kept hoping you might call--if
+only to ask howl was. Of course everything had to be explained to
+inquisitive people--how I hate them all! It's the nature of the
+world to mock at misfortunes such as this. It would really have done
+me good to speak for a few minutes with such a friend as you--a
+real friend. I am going to live a quiet, retired life. I am sick of
+the world, its falsity, and its malice, and its bitter, bitter
+disappointments.'
+
+Crewe's native wit and rich store of experience availed him nothing
+when Mrs. Damerel discoursed thus. The silvery accents flattered his
+ear, and crept into the soft places of his nature. He felt as when a
+clever actress in a pathetic part wrought upon him in the
+after-dinner mood.
+
+'You must bear up against it, Mrs. Damerel. And I don't think a
+retired life would suit you at all. You are made for Society.'
+
+'Don't seek for compliments. I am speaking quite sincerely. Ah,
+those were happy days that I spent at Whitsand! Tell me what you
+have been doing. Is there any hope of the pier yet?'
+
+'Why, it's as good as built!' cried the other. 'Didn't you see the
+advertisements, when we floated the company a month ago? I suppose
+you don't read that kind of thing. We shall begin at the works in
+early spring.--Look here!'
+
+He unrolled a large design, a coloured picture of Whitsand pier as
+it already existed in his imagination. Not content with having the
+mere structure exhibited, Crewe had persuaded the draughtsman to add
+embellishments of a kind which, in days to come, would be his own
+peculiar care; from end to end, the pier glowed with the placards of
+advertisers. Below, on the sands, appeared bathing-machines, and
+these also were covered with manifold advertisements. Nay, the very
+pleasure-boats on the sunny waves declared the glory of somebody's
+soap, of somebody's purgatives.
+
+'I'll make that place one of the biggest advertising stations in
+England--see if I don't! You remember the caves? I'm going to have
+them lighted with electricity, and painted all round with
+advertisements of the most artistic kind.'
+
+'What a brilliant idea!'
+
+'There's something else you might like to hear of. It struck me I
+would write a Guide to Advertising, and here it is.' He handed a
+copy of the book. 'It advertises _me_, and brings a little grist to
+the mill on its own account. Three weeks since I got it out, and
+we've sold three thousand of it. Costs nothing to print; the
+advertisements more than pay for that. Price, one shilling.'
+
+'But how you do work, Mr. Crewe! It's marvellous. And yet you look so
+well,--you have really a seaside colour!'
+
+'I never ailed much since I can remember. The harder I work, the
+better I feel.'
+
+'I, too, have always been rather proud of my constitution.' Her eyes
+dropped. 'But then I have led a life of idleness. Couldn't you make
+me useful in some way? Set me to work! I am convinced I should be so
+much happier. Let me help you, Mr. Crewe. I write a pretty fair hand,
+don't I?'
+
+Crewe smiled at her, made a sound as if clearing his throat, grasped
+his knee, and was on the very point of momentous utterance, when the
+door opened. Turning his head impatiently, he saw, not the clerk
+whose duty it was to announce people, but a lady, much younger than
+Mrs. Damerel, and more fashionably dressed, who for some reason had
+preferred to announce herself.
+
+'Why do you come in like that?' Crewe demanded, staring at her. 'I'm
+engaged.'
+
+'Are you indeed?'
+
+'You ought to send in your name.
+
+'They said you had a lady here, so I told them another would make no
+difference.--How do you do, Mrs. Damerel? It's so long since I had
+the pleasure of seeing you.'
+
+Beatrice French stepped forward, smiling ominously, and eyeing first
+Crewe then his companion with curiosity of the frankest
+impertinence. Mrs. Damerel stood up.
+
+'We will speak of our business at another time, Mr. Crewe.'
+
+Crewe, red with anger, turned upon Beatrice.
+
+'I tell you I am engaged--'
+
+'To Mrs. Damerel?' asked the intruder airily.
+
+'You might suppose,'--he addressed the elder lady,--'that this
+woman has some sort of hold upon me--'
+
+'I'm sure I hope not,' said Mrs. Damerel, 'for your own sake.'
+
+'Nothing of the kind. She has pestered me a good deal, and it began
+in this way.'
+
+Beatrice gave him so fierce a look, that his tongue faltered.
+
+'Before you tell that little story,' she interposed, 'you had better
+know what I've come about. It's a queer thing that Mrs. Damerel
+should be here; happens more conveniently than things generally do.
+I had something to tell you about her. You may know it, but most
+likely you don't.--You remember,' she faced the other listener,
+'when I came to see you a long time ago, I said it might be worth
+while to find out who you really were. I haven't given much thought
+to you since then, but I've got hold of what I wanted, as I knew I
+should.'
+
+Crewe did not disguise his eagerness to hear the rest. Mrs. Damerel
+stood like a statue of British respectability, deaf and blind to
+everything that conflicts with good-breeding; stony-faced, she had
+set her lips in the smile appropriate to one who is braving torture.
+
+'Do you know who she is--or not?' Beatrice asked of Crewe.
+
+He shuffled, and made no reply.
+
+'Fanny has just told me in a letter; she got it from her husband.
+Our friend here is the mother of Horace Lord and of Nancy. She ran
+away from her first husband, and was divorced. Whether she really
+married afterwards, I don't quite know; most likely not. At all
+events, she has run through her money, and wants her son to set her
+up again.'
+
+For a few seconds Mrs. Damerel bore the astonished gaze of her
+admirer, then, her expression scarcely changing, she walked steadily
+to the door and vanished. The silence was prolonged till broken by
+Beatrice's laugh.
+
+'Has she been bamboozling you, old man? I didn't know what was going
+on. You had bad luck with the daughter; shouldn't wonder if the
+mother would suit you better, all said and done.'
+
+Crewe seated himself and gave vent to his feelings in a phrase of
+pure soliloquy: 'Well, I'm damned!'
+
+'I cut in just at the right time, did I?--No malice. I've had my
+hit back at her, and that's enough.'
+
+As the man of business remained absorbed in his thoughts, Beatrice
+took a chair. Presently he looked up at her, and said savagely:
+
+'What the devil do you want?'
+
+'Nothing.'
+
+'Then take it and go.'
+
+But Beatrice smiled, and kept her seat.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 5
+
+
+
+
+Nancy stood before her husband with a substantial packet in brown
+paper. It was after breakfast, at the moment of their parting.
+
+'Here is something I want you to take, and look at, and speak about
+the next time you come.'
+
+'Ho, ho! I don't like the look of it.' He felt the packet. 'Several
+quires of paper here.'
+
+'Be off, or you'll miss the train.'
+
+'Poor little girl! _Et tu_!'
+
+He kissed her affectionately, and went his way. In the ordinary
+course of things Nancy would not have seen him again for ten days or
+a fortnight. She expected a letter very soon, but on the fourth
+evening Tarrant's fingers tapped at the window-pane. In his hand was
+the brown paper parcel, done up as when he received it.
+
+Nancy searched his face, her own perturbed and pallid.
+
+'How long have you been working at this?'
+
+'Nearly a year. But not every day, of course. Sometimes for a week
+or more I could get no time. You think it bad?'
+
+'No,'--puff--'not in any sense'--puff--'bad. In one sense,
+it's good. But'--puff--'that's a private sense; a domestic
+sense.'
+
+'The question is, dear, can it be sold to a publisher.'
+
+'The question is nothing of the kind. You mustn't even try to sell
+it to a publisher.'
+
+'Why not? You mean you would be ashamed if it came out. But I
+shouldn't put my own name to it. I have written it only in the hope
+of making money, and so helping you. I'll put any name to it you
+like.'
+
+Tarrant smoked for a minute or two, until his companion gave a sign
+of impatience. He wore a very good-humoured look.
+
+'It's more than likely you might get the thing accepted--'
+
+'Oh, then why not?' she interrupted eagerly, with bright eyes.
+
+'Because it isn't literature, but a little bit of Nancy's mind and
+heart, not to be profaned by vulgar handling. To sell it for hard
+cash would be horrible. Leave that to the poor creatures who have no
+choice. You are not obliged to go into the market.'
+
+'But, Lionel, if it is a bit of my mind and heart, it must be a good
+book. You have often praised books to me just on that account
+because they were genuine.'
+
+'The books I praised were literature. Their authors came into the
+world to write. It isn't enough to be genuine; there must be
+workmanship. Here and there you have a page of very decent English,
+and you are nowhere on the level of the ordinary female novelist.
+Indeed--don't take it ill--I was surprised at what you had
+turned out. But--'
+
+He finished the sentence in smoke wreaths.
+
+'Then I'll try again. I'll do better.'
+
+'Never _much_ better. It will never be literature.'
+
+'What does that matter? I never thought myself a Charlotte Bronte or
+a George Eliot. But so many women make money out of novels, and as I
+had spare time I didn't see why I shouldn't use it profitably. We
+want money, and if it isn't actually disgraceful--and if I don't
+use my own name--'
+
+'We don't want money so badly as all that. I am writing, because I
+must do something to live by, and I know of nothing else open to me
+except pen-work. Whatever trash I turned out, I should be justified;
+as a man, it's my duty to join in the rough-and-tumble for more or
+less dirty ha'pence. You, as a woman, have no such duty; nay, it's
+your positive duty to keep out of the beastly scrimmage.'
+
+'It seemed to me that I was _doing_ something. Why should a woman be
+shut out from the life of the world?'
+
+'It seems to me that your part in the life of the world is very
+considerable. You have given the world a new inhabitant, and you are
+shaping him into a man.'
+
+Nancy laughed, and reflected, and returned to her discontent.
+
+'Oh, every woman can do that.'
+
+'Not one woman in a thousand can bear a sound-bodied child; and not
+one in fifty thousand can bring up rightly the child she has borne.
+Leisure you must have; but for Heaven's sake don't waste it. Read,
+enjoy, sit down to the feast prepared for you.'
+
+'I wanted to _do_ something,' she persisted, refusing to catch his
+eye. 'I have read enough.'
+
+'Read enough? Ha, then there's no more to be said.'
+
+His portentous solemnity overcame her. Laughter lighted her face,
+and Tarrant, laying down his pipe, shouted extravagant mirth.
+
+'Am I to burn it then?'
+
+'You are not. You are to seal it with seven seals, to write upon it
+_peche de jeunesse_, and to lay it away at the back of a very
+private drawer. And when you are old, you shall some day bring it
+out, and we'll put our shaky heads together over it, and drop a tear
+from our dim old eyes.--By-the-bye, Nancy, will you go with me to
+a music-hall to-morrow night?'
+
+'A music-hall?'
+
+'Yes. It would do us both good, I think. I feel fagged, and you want
+a change.--Here's the end of March; please Heaven, another month
+shall see us rambling in the lanes somewhere; meantime, we'll go to
+a music-hall. Each season has its glory; if we can't hear the lark,
+let us listen to the bellow of a lion-comique.--Do you appreciate
+this invitation? It means that I enjoy your company, which is more
+than one man in ten thousand can say of his wife. The ordinary man,
+when he wants to dissipate, asks--well, not his wife. And I, in
+plain sober truth, would rather have Nancy with me than anyone
+else.'
+
+'You say that to comfort me after my vexation.'
+
+'I say it because I think it.--The day after to-morrow I want you
+to come over in the morning to see some pictures in Bond Street. And
+the next day we'll go to the theatre.'
+
+'You can't afford it.'
+
+'Mind your own business. I remembered this morning that I was young,
+and that I shall not be so always. Doesn't that ever come upon you?'
+
+The manuscript, fruit of such persevering toil, was hidden away, and
+its author spoke of it no more. But she suffered a grave
+disappointment. Once or twice a temptation flashed across her mind;
+if she secretly found a publisher, and if her novel achieved
+moderate success (she might alter the title), would not Tarrant
+forgive her for acting against his advice? It was nothing more than
+advice; often enough he had told her that he claimed no coercive
+right; that their union, if it were to endure, must admit a genuine
+independence on both sides. But herein, as on so many other points,
+she subdued her natural impulse, and conformed to her husband's idea
+of wifehood. It made her smile to think how little she preserved of
+that same 'genuine independence;' but the smile had no bitterness.
+
+Meanwhile, nothing was heard of Horace. The winter passed, and June
+had come before Nancy again saw her brother's handwriting. It was on
+an ordinary envelope, posted, as she saw by the office-stamp, at
+Brighton; the greater her surprise to read a few lines which coldly
+informed her that Horace's wife no longer lived. 'She took cold one
+evening a fortnight ago, and died after three days' illness.'
+
+Nancy tried to feel glad, but she had little hope of any benefit to
+her brother from this close of a sordid tragedy. She answered his
+letter, and begged that, as soon as he felt able to do so, he would
+come and see her. A month's silence on Horace's part had led her to
+conclude that he would not come, when, without warning, he presented
+himself at her door. It was morning, and he stayed till nightfall,
+but talked very little. Sitting in the same place hour after hour,
+he seemed overcome with a complete exhaustion, which made speech too
+great an effort and kept his thoughts straying idly. Fanny's name
+did not pass his lips; when Nancy ventured an inquiry concerning
+her, he made an impatient gesture, and spoke of something else.
+
+His only purpose in coming, it appeared, was to ask for information
+about the Bahamas.
+
+'I can't get rid of my cough, and I'm afraid it may turn to
+something dangerous. You said, I remember, that people with weak
+chests wintered in the Bahamas.'
+
+'Lionel can tell you all about it. He'll be here to-morrow. Come and
+have a talk with him.'
+
+'No.' He moved pettishly. 'Tell me as much as you know yourself. I
+don't feel well enough to meet people.'
+
+Looking at him with profound compassion, Nancy thought it very
+doubtful whether he would see another winter. But she told him all
+she could remember about Nassau, and encouraged him to look forward
+with pleasure and hopefulness to a voyage thither.
+
+'How are you going to live till then?'
+
+'What do you mean?' he answered, with a startled and irritated look.
+'I'm not so bad as all that.'
+
+'I meant--how are you going to arrange your life?' Nancy hastened
+to explain.
+
+'Oh, I have comfortable lodgings.'
+
+'But you oughtn't to be quite alone.--I mean it must be so
+cheerless.'
+
+She made a proposal that he should have a room in this little house,
+and use it as a home whenever he chose; but Horace so fretted under
+the suggestion, that it had to be abandoned. His behaviour was that
+of an old man, enfeebled in mind and body. Once or twice his manner
+of speaking painfully reminded Nancy of her father during the last
+days of his life.
+
+With a peevish sort of interest he watched his little nephew
+toddling about the room, but did not address a word to the child.
+
+A cab was sent for to convey him to the railway station. Nancy had
+known few such melancholy days as this.
+
+On the morning when, by agreement, she was to go into town to see
+her brother, there arrived a note from him. He had been advised to
+try a health-resort in Switzerland, and was already on the way.
+Sorry he could not let Nancy know before; would visit her on his
+return. Thus, in the style of telegraphy, as though he wrote in hot
+haste.
+
+From Switzerland came two letters, much more satisfactory in tone
+and contents. The first, written in July, announced a distinct
+improvement of health. No details being supplied, Nancy could only
+presume that her brother was living alone at the hotel from which he
+dated. The second communication, a month later, began thus: 'I think
+I forgot to tell you that I came here with Mrs. Damerel. She will
+stay till the end of the summer, and then, perhaps, go with me to
+the Bahamas, if that seems necessary. But I am getting wonderfully
+well and strong. Mrs. Damerel is kinder to me than any one in the
+world ever was. I shall tell you more about her some day.' The
+writer went on to describe a project he had of taking a small farm
+in Devonshire, and living upon it as a country gentleman.
+
+Tarrant warned his wife not to build hopes upon this surprising
+report, and a few weeks brought news that justified him. Horace
+wrote that he had suffered a very bad attack, and was only now
+sufficiently recovered to hold a pen. 'I don't know what we shall
+do, but I am in good hands. No one was ever better nursed, night and
+day--More before long.'
+
+Indeed, it was not long. A day or two after Nancy's return from a
+seaside holiday, Mary brought in a telegram. It came from Mrs.
+Damerel. 'Your brother died at ten o'clock last night, suddenly, and
+without pain. I am posting a letter he had written for you.'
+
+When the promised letter arrived, it was found to bear a date two
+months ago. An unwonted tenderness marked the opening words.
+
+MY DEAREST SISTER--What I am going to write is not to be sent to
+you at once. Sometimes I feel afraid that I can't live very long, so
+I have been making a will, and I want you to know why I have left
+you only half of what I have to leave. The other half will go to
+some one who has an equal claim on me, though you don't know it. She
+has asked me to tell you. If I get thoroughly well again, there will
+be no need of this letter, and I shall tell you in private something
+that will astonish you very much. But if I were to die, it will be
+best for you to learn in this way that Mrs. Damerel is much more to
+us than our mother's sister; she is our own mother. She told me at
+the time when I was behaving like an idiot at Bournemouth. It ought
+to have been enough to stop me. She confessed that she had done
+wrong when you and I were little children; that was how she came to
+marry again whilst father was still alive. Though it seemed
+impossible, I have come to love her for her great kindness to me. I
+know that I could trust you, dearest Nancy, to let her share
+whatever you have; but it will be better if I provide for her in my
+will. She has been living on a small capital, and now has little
+left. What I can give her is little enough, but it will save her
+from the worst extremities. And I beg you, dear sister, to forgive
+her fault, if only for my sake, because she has been so loving to a
+silly and useless fellow.
+
+I may as well let you know about my wife's death. She was
+consumptive, but seemed to get much better at Bournemouth; then she
+wanted to go to Brighton. We lived there at a boardinghouse, and she
+behaved badly, very badly. She made acquaintances I didn't like, and
+went about with them in spite of my objections. Like an obstinate
+fool, I had refused to believe what people told me about her, and
+now I found it all out for myself. Of course she only married me
+because I had money. One evening she made up her mind to go with
+some of her friends in a boat, by moonlight. We quarrelled about it,
+but she went all the same. The result was that she got inflammation
+of the lungs, and died. I don't pretend to be sorry for her, and I
+am thankful to have been released from misery so much sooner than I
+deserved.
+
+And now let me tell you how my affairs stand--
+
+At the first reading, Nancy gave but slight attention to this
+concluding paragraph. Even the thought of her brother's death was
+put aside by the emotions with which she learnt that her mother
+still lived. After brooding over the intelligence for half a day,
+she resolved to question Mary, who perhaps, during so long a
+residence in Grove Lane, had learnt something of the trouble that
+darkened her master's life. The conversation led to a disclosure by
+Mary of all that had been confided to her by Mr. Lord; the time had
+come for a fulfilment of her promise to the dead man.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 6
+
+
+
+
+Horace's letter Nancy sent by post to her husband, requesting him to
+let her know his thoughts about it in writing before they again met.
+Of her own feeling she gave no sign. 'I want you to speak of it just
+as if it concerned a stranger, plainly and simply. All I need say
+is, that I never even suspected the truth.'
+
+Tarrant did not keep her long in suspense, and his answer complied
+in reasonable measure with the desire she had expressed.
+
+'The disclosure has, of course, pained you. Equally, of course, you
+wish it were not necessary to let me know of it; you are in doubt as
+to how it will affect me; you perhaps fear that I shall--never
+mind about phrasing. First, then, a word on that point. Be assured
+once for all that nothing external to yourself can ever touch the
+feeling which I now have for you. "One word is too often profaned";
+I will say simply that I hold you in higher regard that any other
+human being.
+
+'Try not to grieve, my dearest. It is an old story, in both senses.
+You wish to know how I view the matter. Well, if a wife cannot love
+her husband, it is better she should not pretend to do so; if she
+love some one else, her marriage is at an end, and she must go.
+Simple enough--provided there be no children. Whether it is ever
+permissible for a mother to desert her children, I don't know. I
+will only say that, in you yourself, I can find nothing more
+admirable than the perfect love which you devote to your child.
+Forsake it, you could not.
+
+'In short, act as feeling dictates. Your mother lives; that fact
+cannot be ignored. In your attitude towards her, do not consult me
+at all; whatever your heart approves, I shall find good and right.
+Only, don't imagine that your feeling of to-day is final--I would
+say, make no resolve; they are worth little, in any concern of life.
+
+'Write to me again, and say when you wish to see me.
+
+After reading this, Nancy moved about with the radiance of a great
+joy on her countenance. She made no haste to reply; she let a day
+elapse; then, in the silence of a late hour, took pen and paper.
+
+'When do I wish to see you? Always; in every moment of my day. And
+yet I have so far conquered "the unreasonable female"--do you
+remember saying that?--that I would rather never see you again
+than bring you to my side except when it was your pleasure to be
+with me. Come as soon as you can--as soon as you will.
+
+'My mother--how shall I word it? She is nothing to me. I don't
+feel that Nature bids me love her. I could pardon her for leaving my
+father; like you, I see nothing terrible in that; but, like you, I
+_know_ that she did wrong in abandoning her little children, and her
+kindness to Horace at the end cannot atone for it. I don't think she
+has any love for _me_. We shall not see each other; at all events,
+that is how I feel about it at present. But I am very glad that
+Horace made provision for her--that of course was right; if he had
+not done it, it would have been my duty.
+
+'I had better tell you that Mary has known my mother's story for a
+long time--but not that she still lived. My father told her just
+before his death, and exacted her promise that, if it seemed well,
+she would repeat everything to me. You shall know more about it,
+though it is bad all through. My dear father had reason bitterly to
+regret his marriage long before she openly broke it.
+
+'But come and see me, and tell me what is to be done now that we are
+free to look round. There is no shame in taking what poor Horace has
+given us. You see that there will be at least three thousand pounds
+for our share, apart from the income we shall have from the
+business.'
+
+He was sure to come on the evening of the morrow. Nancy went out
+before breakfast to post her letter; light-hearted in the assurance
+that her husband's days of struggle were over, that her child's
+future no longer depended upon the bare hope that its father would
+live and thrive by a profession so precarious as that of literature,
+she gave little thought to the details of the new phase of life
+before her. Whatever Tarrant proposed would be good in her sight.
+Probably he would wish to live in the country; he might discover the
+picturesque old house of which he had so often spoken. In any case,
+they would now live together. He had submitted her to a probation,
+and his last letter declared that he was satisfied with the result.
+
+Midway in the morning, whilst she was playing with her little boy,
+--rain kept them in the house,--a knock at the front door
+announced some unfamiliar visit. Mary came to the parlour, with a
+face of surprise.
+
+'Who is it?'
+
+'Miss. Morgan.'
+
+'What? Jessica?'
+
+Mary handed an envelope, addressed to 'Mrs. Tarrant.' It contained a
+sheet of paper, on which was written in pencil: 'I beg you to see
+me, if only for a minute.'
+
+'Yes, I will see her,' said Nancy, when she had frowned in brief
+reflection.
+
+Mary led away the little boy, and, a moment after, introduced
+Jessica Morgan. At the appearance of her former friend, Nancy with
+difficulty checked an exclamation; Miss. Morgan wore the garb of the
+Salvation Army. Harmonious therewith were the features shadowed by
+the hideous bonnet: a face hardly to be recognised, bloodless, all
+but fleshless, the eyes set in a stare of weak-minded fanaticism.
+She came hurriedly forward, and spoke in a quick whisper.
+
+'I was afraid you would refuse to see me.'
+
+'Why have you come?'
+
+'I was impelled--I had a duty to perform.'
+
+Coldly, Nancy invited her to sit down, but the visitor shook her
+head.
+
+'I mustn't take a seat in your house. I am unwelcome; we can't
+pretend to be on terms of friendliness. I have come, first of all,'
+--her eyes wandered as she spoke, inspecting the room,--'to
+humble myself before you--to confess that I was a dishonourable
+friend,--to make known with my lips that I betrayed your secret--'
+
+Nancy interrupted the low, hurrying, panting voice, which distressed
+her ear as much as the facial expression that accompanied it did her
+eyes.
+
+'There's no need to tell me. I knew it at the time, and you did me
+no harm. Indeed, it was a kindness.'
+
+She drew away, but Jessica moved after her.
+
+'I supposed you knew. But it is laid upon me to make a confession
+before you. I have to ask your pardon, most humbly and truly.'
+
+'Do you mean that some one has told you to do this?'
+
+'Oh no!' A gleam of infinite conceit shot over the humility of
+Jessica's countenance. 'I am answerable only to my own soul. In the
+pursuit of an ideal which I fear you cannot understand, I subdue my
+pride, and confess how basely I behaved to you. Will you grant me
+your forgiveness?'
+
+She clasped her gloveless hands before her breast, and the fingers
+writhed together.
+
+'If it is any satisfaction to you,' replied Nancy, overcome with
+wonder and pity, 'I will say those words. But don't think that I
+take upon myself--'
+
+'Only say them. I ask your pardon--say you grant it.'
+
+Nancy uttered the formula, and with bowed head Jessica stood for a
+minute in silence; her lips moved.
+
+'And now,' she said at length, 'I must fulfil the second part of the
+duty which has brought me here.' Her attitude changed to one of
+authority, and her eyes fixed themselves on Nancy's, regarding her
+with the mild but severe rebuke of a spiritual superior. 'Having
+acknowledged my wrong-doing, I must remind you of your own. Let me
+ask you first of all--have you any religious life?'
+
+Nancy's eyes had turned away, but at these words they flashed
+sternly upon the speaker.
+
+'I shall let you ask no such question.'
+
+'I expected it,' Jessica sighed patiently. 'You are still in the
+darkness, out of which _I_ have been saved.'
+
+'If you have nothing more to say than this, I must refuse to talk
+any longer.'
+
+'There is a word I must speak,' pursued Jessica. 'If you will not
+heed it now, it will remain in your memory, and bear fruit at the
+appointed time. I alone know of the sin which poisons your soul, and
+the experiences through which I have passed justify me in calling
+you to repentance.'
+
+Nancy raised her hand.
+
+'Stop! That is quite enough. Perhaps you are behaving
+conscientiously; I will try to believe it. But not another word, or
+I shall speak as I don't wish to.'
+
+'It is enough. You know very well what I refer to. Don't imagine
+that because you are now a married woman--'
+
+Nancy stepped to the door, and threw it open.
+
+'Leave the house,' she said, in an unsteady tone. 'You said you were
+unwelcome, and it was true. Take yourself out of my sight!'
+
+Jessica put her head back, murmured some inaudible words, and with a
+smile of rancorous compassion went forth into the rain.
+
+On recovering from the excitement of this scene, Nancy regretted her
+severity; the poor girl in the hideous bonnet had fallen very low,
+and her state of mind called for forbearance. The treachery for
+which Jessica sought pardon was easy to forgive; not so, however,
+the impertinent rebuke, which struck at a weak place in Nancy's
+conscience. Just when the course of time and favour of circumstances
+seemed to have completely healed that old wound, Jessica, with her
+crazy malice grotesquely disguised, came to revive the
+half-forgotten pangs, the shame and the doubt that had seemed to be
+things gone by. It would have become her, Nancy felt, to treat her
+hapless friend of years ago in a spirit of gentle tolerance; that
+she could not do so proved her--and she recognised the fact--
+still immature, still a backward pupil in the school of life.--
+'And in the Jubilee year I thought myself a decidedly accomplished
+person!'
+
+Never mind. Her husband would come this evening. Of him she could
+learn without humiliation.
+
+His arrival was later than of wont. Only at eleven o'clock, when
+with disappointment she had laid aside her book to go to bed, did
+Tarrant's rap sound on the window.
+
+'I had given you up,' said Nancy.
+
+'Yet you are quite good-tempered.'
+
+'Why not?'
+
+'It is the pleasant custom of wives to make a husband uncomfortable
+if he comes late.'
+
+'Then I am no true wife!' laughed Nancy.
+
+'Something much better,' Tarrant muttered, as he threw off his
+overcoat.
+
+He began to talk of ordinary affairs, and nearly half-an-hour
+elapsed before any mention was made of the event that had bettered
+their prospects. Nancy looked over a piece of his writing in an
+evening paper which he had brought; but she could not read it with
+attention. The paper fell to her lap, and she sat silent. Clearly,
+Tarrant would not be the first to speak of what was in both their
+minds. The clock ticked; the rain pattered without; the journalist
+smoked his pipe and looked thoughtfully at the ceiling.
+
+'Are you sorry,' Nancy asked, 'that I am no longer penniless?'
+
+'Ah--to be sure. We must speak of that. No, I'm not sorry. If I
+get run over, you and the boy--'
+
+'Can make ourselves comfortable, and forget you; to be sure. But for
+the present, and until you do get run over?'
+
+'You wish to make changes?'
+
+'Don't you?'
+
+'In one or two respects, perhaps. But leave me out of the question.
+You have an income of your own to dispose of; nothing oppressively
+splendid, I suppose. What do you think of doing?'
+
+'What do you advise?'
+
+'No, no. Make your own suggestion.
+
+Nancy smiled, hesitated, and said at length:
+
+'I think we ought to take a house.'
+
+'In London?'
+
+'That's as you wish.'
+
+'Not at all. As _you_ wish. Do you want society?'
+
+'In moderation. And first of all, yours.
+
+Tarrant met her eyes.
+
+'Of my society, you have quite as much as is good for you,' he
+answered amiably. 'That you should wish for acquaintances, is
+reasonable enough. Take a house somewhere in the western suburbs.
+One or two men I know have decent wives, and you shall meet them.'
+
+'But you? You won't live with me?'
+
+'You know my view of that matter.'
+
+Nancy kept her eyes down, and reflected.
+
+'Will it be known to everybody that we don't live together?'
+
+'Well,' answered Tarrant, with a laugh, 'by way of example, I should
+rather like it to be known; but as I know _you_ wouldn't like it,
+let the appearances be as ordinary as you please.'
+
+Again Nancy reflected. She had a struggle with herself.
+
+'Just one question,' she said at length. 'Look me in the face. Are
+you--ever so little--ashamed of me?'
+
+He regarded her steadily, smiling.
+
+'Not in the least.'
+
+'You were--you used to be?'
+
+'Before I knew you; and before I knew myself. When, in fact, _you_
+were a notable young lady of Camberwell, and _I_--'
+
+He paused to puff at his pipe.
+
+'And you?'
+
+'A notable young fool of nowhere at all.'
+
+
+End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of In the Year of Jubilee
+by George Gissing
+
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