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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Mrs. Day's Daughters, by Mary E. Mann
+
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+
+Title: Mrs. Day's Daughters
+
+Author: Mary E. Mann
+
+Release Date: April, 2005  [EBook #7941]
+[This file was first posted on June 3, 2003]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO Latin-1
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, MRS. DAY'S DAUGHTERS ***
+
+
+
+
+Stan Goodman, Beth Trapaga, Tonya Allen, and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team.
+
+
+
+MRS. DAY'S DAUGHTERS
+
+By
+
+MARY E. MANN
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+  "The common growth of Mother Earth
+  Suffices me--her tears, her mirth,
+  Her humblest mirth and tears."
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+CHAPTER
+I      Their Large Hours
+II     Something Wrong At The Office
+III    Forcus's Family Ale
+IV     Disaster
+V      Deleah's Errand
+VI     Sour Misfortune
+VII    Husband And Father
+VIII   The Way Out
+IX     For The Widow And The Fatherless
+X      Exiles From Life's Revels
+XI     The Attractive Bessie
+XII    The Attractive Deleah
+XIII   The Gay, Gilded Scene
+XIV    A Tea-Party In Bridge Street
+XV     The Manchester Man
+XVI    For Bernard
+XVII   What Is It Now?
+XVIII  The Dangerous Scrooge
+XIX    When Beauty Calls
+XX     Sir Francis Makes A Call
+XXI    In For It!
+XXII   The Importunate Mr. Gibbon
+XXIII  Deleah Has No Dignity
+XXIV   The Cold-Hearted Fates
+XXV    To Make Reparation
+XXVI   A Householder
+XXVII  Promotion For Mrs. Day
+XXVIII At Laburnum Villa
+XXIX   A Prohibition Cancelled
+XXX    Deleah Grows Up
+XXXI   Bessie's Hour
+XXXII  The Man With The Mad Eyes
+XXXIII The Moment Of Triumph
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+Their Large Hours
+
+
+It was three o'clock in the morning when the guests danced Sir Roger de
+Coverley at Mrs. William Day's New Year's party. They would as soon have
+thought of having supper without trifle, tipsy-cake, and syllabub, in those
+days, as of finishing the evening without Sir Roger. Dancing had begun at
+seven-thirty. The lady at the piano was drooping with weariness. Violin and
+'cello yawned over their bows; only spasmodically and half-heartedly the
+thrum and jingle of the tambourine fell on the ear.
+
+The last was an instrument not included in the small band of the
+professional musicians, but was twisted and shaken and thumped on hand and
+knee and toe by no less an amateur than Mr. William Day himself.
+
+The master of the house was too stout for dancing, of too restless and
+irritable a temperament for the role of looker-on. He loved noise, always;
+above all, noise made by himself. He thought no entertainment really
+successful at which you could hear yourself speak. He would have preferred
+a big drum whereby to inspirit the dancers, but failing that, clashed the
+bells of the tambourine in their ears.
+
+"The tambourine is such fun!" the dancers always said, who, out of breath
+from polka, or schottische, or galop, paused at his side. "A dance at your
+house would not be the same thing at all without your tambourine, Mr. Day."
+
+He banged it the louder for such compliments, turned it on his broad thumb,
+shook it over his great head with its shock of sand-coloured and grey hair;
+making, as the more saturnine of his guests confided in each other, "a most
+infernal row."
+
+But an exercise of eight hours is long enough for even the most agreeable
+performance, and by the time Sir Roger de Coverley had brought the
+programme to an end the clash and rattle of the tambourine was only
+fitfully heard. Perceiving which, Deleah Day, younger daughter of the
+house, a slight, dark-haired, dark-eyed girl of sixteen, left her place in
+one of the two sides of the figure, extending nearly the length of the
+room, ran to her father, and taking the tambourine from him pulled upon his
+hands.
+
+"Yes, papa! Yes!" she urged him. "Every year since I was able to toddle you
+have danced Sir Roger with me--and you shall!"
+
+He shouted his protest, laughed uproariously when he yielded, and all in
+the noisy way, which to his thinking contributed to enjoyment. Presently,
+standing opposite the upright, pretty figure of his daughter, he was
+brawling to her what a naughty rogue she was, and calling on all to witness
+that he was about to make an exhibition of himself for the pleasure of his
+tyrant--his little Deleah. Then, turning, with his hands on the shoulders
+of the young man before him, he was racing down the room to join hands with
+the laughing Deleah at the end of the procession, ducking his heavy,
+short-necked head, to squeeze his broad figure with her slight one under
+the archway of raised arms, dashing to his place opposite his daughter at
+the top of the room again. Breathless, laughing, spluttering, stamping, he
+went through it all.
+
+And now he and his little partner are themselves top-couple, and must
+dance the half length of the room to be swung round by the pair dancing
+to meet them; must be swung by right hand, by left, by both hands; must
+dance to bow, dance to caper with the opposite couple, back to back. And
+William Day, who had loved dancing till he grew too fat to dance, and was
+extraordinarily light on his feet for such a big, heavily-made man, never
+cried for mercy, but cheered on his companions, and footed it to the end.
+
+"Never again!" he declared when the dance was over, and he stood smacking
+his chest, panting, struggling for breath with which to bid his guests
+good-night, "You'll never any of you catch me making such a fool of myself
+again."
+
+"Why, papa, you danced it beautifully! Every single year you shall dance
+Sir Roger de Coverley, and you shall always dance it with me."
+
+He shouted that he would not. He always shouted. He would have felt himself
+falling behind himself on this festive occasion if he had been less
+boisterous to the end.
+
+"I think it has been the nicest of all our parties," Deleah declared to her
+sister, as the girls went to their room.
+
+"I've certainly enjoyed it the most," said Bessie. "And Reggie said so had
+he."
+
+"You danced six times with Reggie, Bess. I counted."
+
+"It is a pity you were not better employed. You wanted to dance with him
+yourself, I suppose?"
+
+"Why, I did!" Deleah cried, and laughed "I danced the Lancers with
+him--_twice_. And in the grand chain he lifted me off my feet. He's most
+beautifully strong, Reggie is! Did he lift you off your feet, Bess?"
+
+"Reggie would know better than to take such a liberty," Bess said, who was
+not dark and _petite_ like her sister, but plump and fair and somewhat
+heavily built. "And you're too old for such romping, yourself, Deleah; and
+you've nicely spoilt your frock with it!"
+
+"Yards of frilling gone," Deleah said happily, as if the loss of so much
+material was a merit. "Just a teeny bit came off to start with; Tom Marston
+caught his toe in it, and went, galloping the whole length of the room
+carrying it with him and his partner before I could stop him. Oh, _how_ I
+laughed!"
+
+"Mama won't laugh! She said you must wear the same frock at the Arkwrights'
+dance next week."
+
+"The white silk, underneath, is all right--look! Only a new net skirt over
+it. Mama won't mind it in the least."
+
+"If you have a new net over-skirt I shall have one too. You're not to have
+an evening frock more than me. So come! I shall have blue again. Blue
+tarlatan with white frillings on the flounces. Blue is my colour. Reggie
+said so to-night."
+
+"I suppose he admired you in that wreath of forget-me-nots?"
+
+"He didn't say I was to tell you, if he did! You go to bed, and to sleep,
+Deleah; and don't interfere."
+
+"I'm getting out of my clothes as fast as I can. Why aren't you getting out
+of yours, Bess?"
+
+"I'm not going to bed yet. I'm waiting for mama. I've something to say to
+her."
+
+"What about? Oh, Bess, do tell! I always tell you everything."
+
+She paused, stepped out of her dress which lay a heap of shining silk and
+billowy net upon the floor, looked at her sister. "It's something about
+Reggie," she declared with eager interest. "Yes, it is! Oh, Bessie, tell me
+first. Your face is as red as red! Tell me first!"
+
+You mind your own business, Deda; and brush your hair."
+
+"I'm not going to brush it, to-night: I can't. It's so tangly. I'm just
+going to say my prayers, and hop into bed."
+
+"Mama won't like it if you don't brush your hair. I shall tell her if you
+don't, Deda."
+
+"Tell her, then!" Deda challenged, and hurried into her nightgown, and
+flung herself on her knees by the side of her bed, and hid her face in her
+hands, preparatory to making her devotions.
+
+A soft tapping on the door before it opened, and Mrs. Day, candlestick in
+hand, appeared. A pretty woman of medium height, middle-aged, as women
+allowed themselves to be frankly, fifty years ago. She wore a handsome
+dress of green satin, a head-dress of white lace, green velvet and pink
+roses almost covering her plentiful dark hair.
+
+"Not in bed yet?" she whispered, and looked at the small white kneeling
+figure of the younger girl, her hair hanging in a dusky mass of waves and
+curls and tangles upon her back. Deleah was hurrying conscientiously
+through the established form of her orisons, trying to achieve the
+prescribed sum of her supplications before her mother left.
+
+"Can I speak to you for a minute, mama?" Bess demanded, with an air of
+importance. "Not here," glancing at Deleah; "outside; just a minute."
+
+"Pray God bless dear papa and mama, sister and brothers, and friends. Make
+us all good and bring us safe to heaven at last. Amen," Deleah gabbled, her
+face upon the white quilt, her ears open.
+
+"Certainly, dear." Mrs. Day stepped back, closing the door behind her
+daughter and herself.
+
+"I don't want Deda to know. She's such a blab, mama."
+
+"Oh, my dear, I don't like to hear you say that!"
+
+"But she is. And she listens to things." Here Bessie pushed the door behind
+her open, to reveal the culprit in her white nightgown on the other side of
+it. "I should be ashamed to be a Paul Pry!" Bessie said with indignation
+and scorn.
+
+Deleah was not at all abashed. "Mama, I don't see why, when nice,
+interesting things happen, I should not know them as well as Bessie!" she
+complained.
+
+She was sent to bed, however, and tucked up there, and kissed, and enjoined
+by an indulgent, reproving mother to be a good girl, and to go quietly to
+sleep. What mother could be angry with Deleah, looking at her rose and
+white face amid the tumult of tossed dark curls upon her pillow!
+
+Then Bessie led her mother into an unoccupied room, hard by, upon the
+landing, and began to unfold her tale.
+
+"Mama, it is about Reggie." The room was only lit by the flame of the
+candle Mrs. Day held, but there was light enough to show the blushes on
+Bessie's young plump cheeks. "Mama, he has said something about _that_
+again. _You_ know."
+
+"About his being engaged to you?"
+
+Bessie, cheeks and eyes aglow and alight, ecstatically nodded; her fair
+bosom in its garniture of white tulle and forget-me-nots, rose and fell.
+"What two pretty daughters I have!" Mrs. Day said to herself, and, being a
+devout woman, gave thanks accordingly.
+
+"Well, dear, and what did you say?"
+
+"I said--I don't know what I said, mama. We were dancing that last
+galop--the Orlando Furioso one, you know--and the room was so full, and
+other couples were rushing down upon us--people are so horribly selfish
+when they dance, and some of them dance so boisterously."
+
+"It would be a very nice engagement for you, Bessie. I suppose there was
+not a girl here to-night who would not gladly take him."
+
+"I know that. I know that, mama. So does he--Reggie."
+
+"He did not say so, I hope?"
+
+"No. Reggie does not always want exactly to _say_ things."
+
+"But what did he say to you, dear? Is the matter any forwarder than it was
+the last time you spoke of it to me?"
+
+"Well, I suppose so, mama."
+
+"You mean you and Reggie Forcus consider yourselves engaged?"
+
+"I think so. But it was so difficult to catch every word in that galop. If
+he did not say the _exact words_ he said as much."
+
+"Did he say anything about speaking to papa?"
+
+"No. But I said it."
+
+"_You_ said it, Bessie?"'
+
+"Well, mama! Reggie did not seem to wish to be bothered."
+
+"I see."
+
+"Not quite yet, you understand."
+
+"I see."
+
+In the pause that followed the mother's large eyes, surrounded by dark
+rings, and set rather deeply in the dusky paleness of her well-featured
+face, dwelt consideringly upon her daughter's round cheeks with their fair
+smooth skin, upon her grey-green eyes, and smooth fair hair.
+
+"It is not very satisfactory, I'm afraid, Bessie," she said reluctantly at
+length.
+
+Bessie's face fell. "I thought I'd better tell you."
+
+"Certainly, my dear."
+
+"I wonder what we ought to do, mama?"
+
+"To do, Bessie?"
+
+"I thought, perhaps, if Reggie does not speak to papa, that papa might
+speak to Reggie?"
+
+Mrs. Day shook a sharply dissenting head. "That would not be the same thing
+at all, my dear child."
+
+"What ought we to do, then? I thought you would know. Mothers have to
+arrange these things, haven't they?"
+
+"Well, you see, Bessie, usually the young man--"
+
+"I know. But Reggie does not wish to. If you must know, mama, he said so,
+in so many words."
+
+"Then, Bessie--!"
+
+"But I think that something ought to be done. You ought to do something--or
+papa. _Everything_ can't be left to me!"
+
+The tip of Bessie's nose grew pink, her lip quivered, tears showed in her
+pale blue eyes. Mrs. Day laid a soothing hand upon her arm.
+
+"We won't talk of it any more now," she said. "We are both tired. We will
+sleep on it, Bessie. Go to bed, dear, and leave everything till the
+morning."
+
+Her silver candlestick in her hand, Mrs. Day trailed her rich green satin
+across the landing, pausing at the door of Bernard, her second-born, coming
+between Bessie and Deleah. She listened a moment, then rapped upon the
+door. "In bed, dear?"
+
+"Yes, mother."
+
+"Lights out?"
+
+"A half hour ago."
+
+"Not smoking, Bernard?"
+
+"Of course not. Go away."
+
+To the bedside of the youngest child she betook herself next. Franky, who
+had been sent to bed several hours before the rest, was sound asleep.
+There were nine years between this child and Deleah; Franky was the baby,
+the darling of them all. The mother, tired as she was with the duties and
+responsibilities of the evening, stood long to look upon the sleeping
+face of the boy. His dark hair, allowed, through mother's pride in its
+beauty, to grow longer than was fitting for a boy, curled damply about
+his brow, his small, dark, delicately aquiline features were like the
+pretty Deleah's. The elder boy and girl, fair of skin, with straight hair
+of a pale, lustreless gold, resembled their father; Mrs. William Day was
+not so far blinded by love of her husband as not to rejoice in secret
+that at least two of her children "favoured" herself.
+
+The mother sat for a few minutes on the bed, her candle shaded by her
+hand, to watch the child's regular breathing. "My darling Franky!" she
+whispered aloud; and to herself she said, "If only they could all always
+keep Franky's age!" She smiled as she sighed, thinking of Bessie and her
+love affair, about which she had many doubts; of Bernard, who, in spite
+of prayers and chidings, would smoke in bed, and had once set fire to his
+bedclothes; of Deleah, even, who, schoolgirl as she was, had, and held
+to, her own ideas, and was not so easy to manage as she had been. If a
+mother could always keep her children about her, to be no older, no more
+difficult to make happy than Franky!
+
+She sighed, kissed the child, pushed from his face the admired curls, then
+dragged her rich, voluminous draperies to her own room, where her husband
+was already, by his silence she judged, asleep.
+
+There was a pier-glass in the large, handsomely furnished bedroom. Mrs. Day
+caught her reflection in it as she approached, and paused before it. Bessie
+had thought her new green satin might have been made a yard or so fuller in
+the skirt. Did it really need that alteration, she wondered? She lit the
+candles branching from the long glass and standing before it seriously
+debated the point with herself. Walking away from the glass, her head
+turned over her shoulder, she examined the back effect; walked to meet
+herself, gravely doubtful still; gathered the fullness of the skirt in her
+hand, released it, spreading out the rich folds. Then, something making her
+turn her head sharply to the big bed with its red moreen curtains hanging
+straightly down beside its four carved posts, her eyes met the wide open
+eyes of the man lying there.
+
+"Oh!" she cried. "How you startled me, William! I thought you were asleep.
+How silly you must have thought me!"
+
+"Not more than usual," William growled. He held the idea--it was more
+prevalent perhaps at that period than this--that wives were the better for
+being snubbed and insulted.
+
+"I was deciding if to have my evening dress altered or not."
+
+"You are never in want of an excuse for posturing before the glass. What
+does it matter at your time of life how your dress looks? Come to bed, and
+give me a chance to get to sleep."
+
+Mrs. Day extinguished again the candles she had lit, and began docilely to
+unrobe herself. As she did so she talked.
+
+"It all went off very well to-night, I think, William?"
+
+"First-rate. Champagne-cup ran short."
+
+"There should have been enough. The Barkers at their party never have
+champagne at all."
+
+"When you're about it, do the thing well. What's a few pounds more here and
+there, when the end comes!"
+
+"The end, William?"
+
+"The end of the year. When the bills come in."
+
+"How did you think Bessie looked to-night?"
+
+"I thought my little Deleah was the belle of the ball."
+
+"Deleah is a child only. You never have eyes but for Deleah."
+
+"Bess was all right."
+
+"I thought she looked so fair and sweet. Her neck and arms are like milk,
+William. I wonder if Reggie Forcus--means anything?"
+
+"Ba-a! Not he! No such luck."
+
+"I really don't see why. I don't see why our girls should not have as good
+luck as other people's. Reggie will marry some one, I suppose."
+
+"Now, don't be a silly fool if you can help it; and don't encourage the
+girl to run her head at any such nonsense. Francis Forcus will no more
+allow his brother to marry your daughter than the queen will allow him to
+marry one of hers. I told you that before."
+
+"But Bessie--poor child--thinks differently."
+
+"Tell Bessie not to be an ass then; and come to bed."
+
+She went to bed; and, spite of her disturbing thoughts of Bessie and her
+love affair, went to sleep.
+
+"Oh, dear!" she said as she lay down. "What a lot of bother there'll be for
+the servants, getting the house straight, tomorrow; and they so late to
+bed! The drawing-room carpet to put down again, and all the furniture to
+move into place. And it only seems the other day since we went through the
+same thing on last New Year's Eve."
+
+"Turning the house upside down is what women like. It's what they're made
+for."
+
+"I wonder how many more dances we shall have to give before both the girls
+are married, and off our hands! I'm sure I shall never take the trouble to
+give one for the boys."
+
+"Shan't you, indeed!"
+
+"Why do you speak like that, William? I don't know that I have said
+anything for you to jeer at."
+
+"Oh, go to sleep! And let's hope you won't have any worse troubles than the
+laying down or taking up of a carpet."
+
+The old servant Emily, who had lived with the Days since their marriage,
+and was as much friend as servant to her mistress and the young people, had
+once, in speaking of her master, made the memorable pronouncement that he
+was "Apples abroad and crabs at home." This speech, being interpreted,
+meant that the noisy, boisterous good temper and high spirit which his
+acquaintances witnessed in him did not always characterise the deportment
+of the head of the house in the bosom of his family.
+
+He lay for a time, staring at the dying fire which was on his side of the
+room. He lay still, to let his wife believe he was asleep, but was too
+irritable and restless to lie so for long. He turned about on his pillow,
+cautiously at first, so as not to wake her; yet when she did not awake was
+aggrieved, and sharply called her name.
+
+"You sleep like a pig," he said. "I have not closed my eyes since I came to
+bed."
+
+The fact that she could sleep and he could not was to him a grievance which
+dated from their marriage, twenty years ago. Poor Mrs. Day had grown to
+think her predilection to indulge in slumber when she went to bed was a
+failing to be apologised for and hidden, if possible. She was often driven
+fictitiously to protest that she also had lain wakeful. He received a like
+statement when she made it now in contemptuous silence.
+
+"I have been thinking about what you tell me of Bess and young Forcus," the
+father said. "Of course, if there were, by chance, anything in it it would
+be a very good thing for the girl."
+
+"I am glad you see it in that light at last, William. I have always, of
+course, known that it would be a good thing."
+
+"What I have been thinking is, perhaps I had better go and see Francis
+Forcus about it."
+
+"Reggie's brother? Oh, no, William! I would not do that."
+
+"And why not, pray? You and I can never look at a thing in the same light
+for two minutes at a time. If I want to rest on my oars you're badgering me
+to be up and doing. If I begin to see it's time for me to interfere, it's
+'Oh, no, William!' There never was your equal for contradiction."
+
+"All the same I should not go to Sir Francis."
+
+"And why not? What's your reason? What is there against it? If his brother,
+who is dependent on him for the present as if he were his son, is going to
+marry my daughter, he and I will have to talk it over, I suppose?"
+
+"Yes. But not until Reggie has spoken to you. At present he has not said a
+word, except to Bessie. I think Reggie should. I think--"
+
+"Never mind what you think. Let's come to facts. Is there or is there not
+anything serious in this affair?"
+
+"Bessie says there is."
+
+"Can't you give a plain answer to a plain question? Is young Forcus, who is
+always hanging about the place, making love to my girl or is he not?"
+
+"He has certainly paid her attention."
+
+"Is he engaged to her?"
+
+"Bessie considers herself engaged. But as I tell Bessie--"
+
+"I don't want that. What you think, or what you tell Bessie. I want facts
+to go upon. Without facts you can't expect me to act."
+
+"I really do not wish you to act, William."
+
+"Leave that to me. I am not asking what you wish," William snapped at her;
+and then turning on his side he seemed to go to sleep.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+Something Wrong At The Office
+
+
+Mrs. Day had decided to spend the first morning of the New Year in
+superintending the relaying of the drawing-room carpet and the reducing
+her house to its habitual order after the dance. Bessie had decided
+otherwise. She had decided that she should be driven in the carriage, her
+mother beside her, to some flooded and frozen meadows, three miles out of
+the town, where many of the young people who had danced last night had
+arranged to go to skate. Deleah and the boys had started to walk there
+immediately after breakfast. Bessie, who could not skate, wished to be
+there also, but did not choose to walk, and could not be allowed to be in
+the carriage alone.
+
+The girl, very fair and pretty in her velvet jacket with the ermine
+collar and cuffs, seated in the victoria by her mother's side, eagerly
+scanned the broad expanse of ice for the familiar figure of the young man
+who had paid her such particular attention during the memorable galop.
+She looked in vain. There were several of last night's partners who came
+to the side of the carriage and asked for the ladies' health after the
+fatigue of the dance, and descanted on their own freedom, or otherwise,
+from weariness. Deleah, her face the colour of a wild rose, her loose
+dark hair curling crisply in the frosty air, shouted greetings to her
+mother as she flew past, a little erect, graceful figure keeping her
+elegant poise with the ease of the young and fearless. Now and again she
+was seen to be fleeing, laughing as she went, from the pursuit of a
+skater who wished to make a circuit of the flooded meadow holding
+Deleah's hand. The girl was at once a romp and shy. She laughed with
+dancing eyes as she flew ahead; but captured, had a frightened, anxious
+look, her eyes appealing to her mother as she passed in protest and for
+protection.
+
+"Deleah will be a flirt when she grows up," Bessie said, who knew that her
+mother was regarding the pretty child with admiration.
+
+"Do you think so, my dear? I hope not, Bessie."
+
+"She will! And she wants looking after. I thought, for a girl not yet
+'out,' she was very forward last night. Reggie thought so too."
+
+"I'm afraid you put it into his head, Bessie."
+
+"As if Reggie had not got ideas of his own! Without my even so much as
+_hinting_ he said he supposed she knew she was pretty."
+
+"Reggie isn't here to-day, Bessie."
+
+"I think he will come. He said he would come, and as I could not skate he
+promised to push me in a chair on the ice. We need not go home yet, mama. I
+like watching the skating."
+
+But she only watched the arrivals; and Reggie Forcus was never among them.
+
+"Perhaps he's gone to speak to papa," she said brightly after a silence."
+No doubt he thought, after all, it would be better to get things settled. I
+expect that is what Reggie has done, mama."
+
+"I would not think so much about it, if I were you, my dear. Wait until
+matters have arranged themselves."
+
+"Yes, but ought not we to do something to arrange them?" Bessie persisted.
+
+"It is not usual, Bessie."
+
+"But, mama, am I to lose Reggie for any nonsense of that sort? Usual or not
+usual I think you or papa should speak to him."
+
+To pacify her the mother admitted that her father had even thought of doing
+so.
+
+"Then I hope papa will have the sense to do it; and to get the whole thing
+settled," Bessie said.
+
+She awaited in feverish expectancy the return of her father from his
+office, that evening, welcoming him with bright eyes and eager looks,
+trying to read in his face that which she longed to hear from his lips. But
+Mr. Day had arrived home in a temper of mind the reverse of encouraging. In
+gloomy silence he sat through the meal which families of the upper middle
+classes then took instead of dinner at the dinner hour. A comfortable,
+informal meal at which a big silver tea-tray and great silver tea-urn and
+heavily embossed tea-services, took a prominent part; where rolls and
+patties and huge hams and much-decorated tongues were present; and hot
+toast and muffins and many cakes. No servants waited; there was no
+centre-piece of flowers; but the gas from the many branches of the great
+chandelier of scintillating cut glass overhead shone on the silver and
+china and the appetising viands to which the Days always did such ample
+justice in a very agreeable way.
+
+But to-night the master of the house, seated opposite his wife at her
+tea-tray, ate nothing of the generous fare. He had a black look on his
+heavy face, and short snarling replies for those who ventured to address
+him. Such a mood was not altogether unusual with him; when it was
+understood among them that something had gone wrong at the office and
+that it was safest to leave him alone. But Bessie, whose characteristic
+it was never, for a moment, under whatever stress of circumstances, to
+forget her own individual interests, kept whispering to her mother, by
+whose side she sat, urging her to ask of her father that which she
+desired to know.
+
+"Ask him, mama. Do ask him!"
+
+"H'sh, my dear!" a frown and a cautioning glance in the direction of the
+scowling face.
+
+Bessie's foot upon her mother's beneath the table. "Mama, why are you so
+silly? Ask him! Ask him!"
+
+The mother was never for long proof against the entreaties or commands of
+her offspring. "Have you seen anything of Reggie Forcus to-day, William?"
+presently she asked.
+
+The man at the other end of the table glared upon her for a moment with
+angry eyes. "No!" he thundered. "But I have seen Francis Forcus, which was
+quite enough for me."
+
+A silence fell. Bessie's heart beat loudly, the colour left her face. Her
+father turned to her as he said the last words. "Yes, papa?" she faltered.
+
+"Your mother sent me to him on a fool's errand," he said. Then, scowling
+upon daughter and wife, he gulped down a cup of tea, pushed his chair
+noisily back and went from the room.
+
+As the door closed behind him, Bessie burst into tears.
+
+The boys and Deleah looked at her in consternation. "What's up now?" they
+asked of each other with lifted eyebrows.
+
+"Bessie, my dear child! You must not give way so. You really must summon up
+a little pride," the mother chided.
+
+"It's all very well for you!" Bessie retorted chokingly, and sobbed on.
+She felt for her handkerchief, and having none of her own grabbed without
+any thanks that which Deleah threw across the table. Deleah, shocked at
+the spectacle, watched her sister. "Whatever happened I would not cry
+before every one like that," she said to herself. Bernard, the elder boy,
+who lived in a chronic state of quarrelling with Bessie, openly giggled.
+Franky, having pulled his mother's face down to his own, was whispering,
+"What is it, mama? What is the matter with Bessie, now? Does she feel
+sick?" To feel sick was Franky's idea of the greatest earthly misery.
+
+Having wiped her eyes on Deleah's handkerchief Bessie rolled it into a
+ball and flung it across the table, with greater force of will than
+directness of aim, at Bernard's face. "You beast!" she choked. "Mama,
+Bernard's laughing at me. Oughtn't Bernard to know how to behave better?
+Because I'm so unhappy isn't a reason I should be laughed at."
+
+Whereat they all laughed--Bessie was so ridiculous, they thought; and Mrs.
+Day, putting out a kind hand to the angrily sobbing girl, led her from the
+room. "You're all too bad," she said, looking back at the sniggering group.
+"Bernard, you should know better."
+
+"Bessie's such an old ass!" the boy excused himself. "I want some more tea,
+mother. I won't have this her sopping handkerchief fell in. All her beastly
+tears in my cup!"
+
+"Deleah must pour it out for you," the mother said, and closed the door
+behind herself and her daughter.
+
+"I won't be called an ass by Bernard! I won't be made fun of by them all!"
+Bessie cried. "You should go back, and punish them, mama."
+
+Mrs. Day, murmuring words of soothing, led her to the foot of the stairs,
+and watched the girl mounting slowly to her room, crying audibly, childish
+fashion, as she went. "You must try to have more self-control," she said.
+
+"But why did papa look at me in such a horrible manner?"
+
+"You know what your father is, Bessie. So often irritable at home when
+things have gone wrong at the office. Go to your room till your tears are
+dry; I will see your father and find out if there is anything to tell you."
+
+Mr. Day was in the room they called the breakfast-room. Looking upon it
+with the housewife's desire for neatness Mrs. Day often spoke of it as the
+Pig-sty, but it was the room they all of them loved best in the house. It
+was here the children learned their lessons for school, the ladies worked,
+Franky played. It was spacious and cheerful, and held nothing that rough
+usage would spoil. All the most comfortable chairs in the house were pulled
+up to the hearth, upon which Franky's cats were allowed to lie, and
+Bernard's dog. A canary, Deleah's especial protégée, hung in the window.
+
+Mr. Day had pulled a chair too small for his huge bulk in front of the
+fire, and sat, looking huddled and uncomfortable, his feet drawn up beneath
+his chair, his knees dropped, staring at the bars.
+
+"Is anything the matter, William?" his wife asked. "Aren't you going out
+again, this evening?"
+
+Every night of his life, except the Sunday night, when on no account would
+he have missed going to church with his family, he went to a club in the
+town where whist and three-card loo were played--for higher stakes, it was
+whispered, than most of its members could spare.
+
+"You have taken off your boots, William: aren't you going to your club?"
+
+"No; I'm not going to my club."
+
+"In heaven's name why?"
+
+"Because my club's seen the last of me."
+
+She looked at him aghast, hearing the news with real dismay. She never
+would have admitted, even to herself, being a kind woman and a dutiful
+wife, that she preferred her husband out of her presence rather than in
+it--her children would not have whispered such a disloyalty; yet if he was
+going to pass his evenings in the bosom of his family, for the future, each
+of them would know in his or her heart that the peacefullest and most
+enjoyable hours of the day would be spoilt.
+
+"Have you had any unpleasantness over cards, William?"
+
+He turned savagely upon her where she stood by the corner of the
+mantelpiece. "What the devil did you send me on that fool's errand to
+Francis Forcus for?" he asked.
+
+"_I_ send you, William?"
+
+"I went because of the lying report you brought me."
+
+"William, I--!"
+
+"You led me to believe Bessie and young Forcus were engaged. Now did you or
+did you not lead me to believe it? Speak the truth if you can. Did you or
+did you not?"
+
+"I only--"
+
+"Did you lead me to believe it?"
+
+"Yes, then; if you will have it so."
+
+"And made me look a fool! I thought it was too good to be true--only you
+stuck to it. You were so d--d sure. You would have it so. Nothing would
+turn you."
+
+"William, you must remember I advised you not to go."
+
+"Did I ask your advice? Did I ever stoop to ask for it? I acted on
+information which you gave me. Went--and got kicked out."
+
+"Kicked out? William!"
+
+"Practically. I don't mean to say the man actually used his boot. If he
+had he couldn't have expressed plainer what he meant. Francis Forcus
+never had a civil word to fling at me in all his life. But for your
+infernal, silly cackle I'd as soon have gone to the devil as to him. If
+I'd only had myself and my own feeling to think about--Bessie or no
+Bessie--I'd have hanged myself sooner than have gone to him. But I'd got
+more than that."
+
+His voice had fallen from its bullying key to a toneless melancholy. Mrs.
+Day, who had been standing hitherto, seated herself in the chair by the
+chimney corner, and looked at her husband's blunt profile as he sat
+before the fire with a sick feeling of impending disaster, and a dismayed
+inquiry in her dark eyes.
+
+"I'd got you and the children to think about," the man added.
+
+"What could Sir Francis have said to you, William?"
+
+Her husband turned savagely upon her. "Say? He said there was no engagement
+between his brother--his '_young_ brother'--and my daughter. That such an
+engagement would never receive his sanction. That he was not aware his
+'_young_ brother'--he's always sticking the word down your throat; the
+sanctimonious prig--I longed to kick him!--was on terms of intimacy with
+any one in my family."
+
+"William!" Mrs. Day, cut to the quick, called protestingly upon her
+husband's name. "I hope you answered him there. I hope you did!"
+
+"I said the young beggar was always hanging about my house. That he had
+danced half the night with my daughter--and--and made love to her."
+
+"And then? And then, William?"
+
+"He said, 'I wish all acquaintanceship to cease. I beg you not to invite my
+young brother to your house again.'"
+
+"He said that?"
+
+"Damn him! Yes."
+
+"But that was an insult!" The poor woman was pale with surprise and dismay.
+She stared breathlessly upon her husband. "Didn't you show him you felt it
+was an insult, William?"
+
+William moved his huge shoulders. "What do you think?"
+
+"Tell me what you said to him."
+
+"I swore at him for ten minutes. He didn't know if he stood on his head or
+his heels when I'd done with him. Then I came away."
+
+"I don't think that _swearing_ would improve matters."
+
+"Perhaps you'll tell me what would improve them? It's what I want to hear,
+and more than I know."
+
+"Poor Bessie! Oh, poor, poor Bessie!"
+
+"Ah!" poor Bessie's father said, and his short-necked head fell upon his
+breast, and he gazed drearily at the fire again.
+
+Mrs. Day got up and stood, her white hand glittering with its rings laid
+upon the black marble of the mantelpiece, thinking of Bessie.
+
+"I would go to the club, William," presently she advised. "It can't make
+matters any better to sit at home and mope over them."
+
+"Didn't I tell you I wasn't going to the club? D'you think I'm like a
+woman, and don't know my own mind?"
+
+"I thought it would be pleasanter for you," she said; and then she left
+him. Her mind was full of Bessie, and the blow which must be given to
+Bessie's hopes.
+
+"I don't know how I shall ever find the heart to tell her," she said to
+herself as she went from the room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+Forcus's Family Ale
+
+
+It was the period when to rob a poor man--or a rich one, for that
+matter--of his beer would have been a crime to arouse to furious expression
+the popular sense of justice; when beer was on the master's table as well
+as in the servants' hall; when every cellar of the well-to-do held its
+great cask for family consumption, and no one had thought of attempting to
+convert the poor man from indulgence in his national beverage. It was the
+period when brewers made huge fortunes--and that in spite of the fact that
+they used good malt and hops in their brewings--nor dreamed, save, perhaps,
+in their worst nightmare, of the interference of Government in their
+monopoly. In Brockenham and its county the liquor brewed at the Hope
+Brewery was considered the best tipple procurable. Nothing slipped down the
+local throat so satisfactorily as Forcus and Son's Family Ale; and the
+present representatives of the firm were easily the wealthiest people in
+the town.
+
+There were but two of them at the time: Francis Forcus--Sir Francis, for
+the last twelve months, he having been knighted in the second year of his
+mayoralty on the visit of a Royal Personage to his native town--and
+Reginald, his brother, born twenty years after himself of his father's
+second marriage, and now in his twenty-fourth year. Very good-looking, very
+good-natured, very gay and friendly and accessible the younger brother was.
+Perhaps the most admired and popular young man in the town. His
+simple-minded pursuit of pleasure occupied a great deal of his time, and
+prevented his spending much of it at the Brewery where his brother made it
+a point of honour to pass three or four hours every day. But now and again
+Mr. Reginald appeared at the enormous pile of buildings, rising out of the
+slow-flowing river on which Brockenham stands, and where the famous Family
+Ale was composed. Now and then he would amuse himself for an hour,
+sauntering in the sunshine about the wide, brightly gravelled yards,
+inspecting the huge dray-horses in their stables, exchanging "the top of
+the morning," as he facetiously called it to them, with the draymen. He was
+seldom tempted to appear where the brewing operations were actually in
+process, but he never took his departure without looking in upon his
+brother in the spacious and comfortable room overlooking the river in which
+that gentleman sat conscientiously for three or four hours a day to read
+the _Times_ and the local newspaper.
+
+He paid his call upon the senior partner earlier than usual on the morning
+after Mrs. Day's New Year's Dance, but not so early that Sir Francis Forcus
+had not received a visitor before him. A visitor who had upset the
+equanimity of that always outwardly unruffled, and carefully self-contained
+person.
+
+"You are up with the worm, this morning, Reggie," he said.
+
+He was not at all a typical brewer in appearance, his tall, imposing figure
+being clothed in no superfluous flesh, his face, with its peculiarly set
+expression, being pale and handsome. His black hair, worn rather long,
+after the fashion of the day, was brushed smoothly from his temples; he was
+shaved but for the close-growing whiskers, which reached half-way down his
+cheeks.
+
+"To what are we indebted for the honour of so early a call?" he inquired
+with a twist of his in-drawn lips.
+
+"You were off before I was down this morning," the young man said. "I just
+looked in to tell you I was going out. That's all."
+
+"You look in rather frequently on the same errand, I believe. Would it be
+indiscreet on my part to ask where you are going?"
+
+"Not in the least," Reggie declared easily. He lifted for his brother's
+inspection a pair of skates which he had held dangling at his side.
+"They've flooded the meadows at Tooley. The ice ought to be in first-rate
+order, this morning."
+
+"So it is in the moat at home. Half a score people were skating there
+already as I drove away this morning. Tooley is five miles off. Why need
+you take the trouble to go to Tooley?"
+
+"Several people, last night, said they were going. I thought I might as
+well go too."
+
+"Where were you last night, Reggie? I don't want to tie you at home, by any
+means, but sometimes I like to know where you have been."
+
+"All right, Francis. Of course. There was a dance at the Days' in Queen
+Anne Street. I've gone to it every New Year's Night, for years. I went
+there."
+
+"I see." The light hazel eyes of Sir Francis, according strangely with his
+black hair and palely dusky complexion, considered his brother's cheerful
+countenance.
+
+"I'm going to ask you not to go to the Days' in Queen Anne Street any more,
+Reggie," he said.
+
+Reggie widely stared. "I don't think my going there, when I wish, and they
+ask me, can do any harm to any one," he protested.
+
+"Sit down, will you?" his brother said, and pointed to the chair on the
+other side of the table by which he sat.
+
+"I think not, now. I think I'll be off. The ice mayn't keep--"
+
+The other still pointed to the chair. "What I want to say to you won't
+keep--emphatically. Sit down," he said, and down Reggie sat.
+
+He was by no means embarrassed, or afraid. His brother had stood to him in
+place of a father since his own father had died when he was a boy at
+school, but he lectured him as little as possible, and very rarely thwarted
+him. "Get over it as quick as you can, Francis," was all he said.
+
+"Did you meet Mr. Day going away as you came in?"
+
+"Mr. Day? No."
+
+"He has just left me. He came to tell me that you," he looked during a
+moment's pause in Reggie's wide eyes, "were engaged to be married to his
+daughter."
+
+"Well! Come! That's a good 'un!" Reggie was surprised, his brother saw, but
+not so satisfactorily taken aback as he had hoped.
+
+"Is it so?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Then, what did the man mean by daring to say it to me?"
+
+Reggie maintained an instant's quite undisconcerted silence; then, "You
+see, she says it too," he said.
+
+"She?"
+
+"Bessie."
+
+"Day's daughter? She must be stopped saying it."
+
+"Oh, I don't know. Girls do say that sort of thing."
+
+"I think not. Unless they are privileged to say it. Miss Day, you say, has
+nothing to go upon?"
+
+"Oh, well, you know!" Reggie sat back from the table, putting his hands in
+his pockets, leaning in his chair at his ease, with the air of talking as
+one man of the world to another.
+
+"But I do not know. I am waiting for you to tell me."
+
+"You don't want me to go into detail, I suppose?"
+
+"You mean you have indulged in a flirtation with this girl, and she has
+tried to grab you?"
+
+Reggie gave the subject a moment's thought. "I won't quite admit that," he
+said conscientiously. "She, somehow, seems to think I've gone further than
+I have gone. She said something to me last night about my speaking to her
+father."
+
+"Instead of which her father is sent to speak to me. Now, look here,
+Reggie, you and I have never, so far, had any unpleasantness--have we? Do
+not let us have it over this. A daughter of William Day's is about the last
+person on earth it would be desirable for you to marry."
+
+"I'm not thinking of marrying any one yet, Francis."
+
+"I should hope not! Were you going to meet Miss Day on the ice?"
+
+"Well, she said she'd be there. A whole lot of them were going."
+
+"Stay away, will you? To oblige me?"
+
+"If you put it that way--"
+
+"Thank you. I don't want our name"--he was as proud of the brewery as if it
+had been a dukedom; he said "our name" as though he spoke of a sacred
+thing--"mixed up with the name of Mr. William Day."
+
+"He's a nice, good-natured old fellow. You should have heard him banging
+away with his tambourine, last night."
+
+"I'm going to tell you something in confidence. On the strength of your
+engagement to his daughter--wait! I know you are not engaged to her--Mr.
+William Day came here to borrow five hundred pounds of me."
+
+"Good-night!"
+
+"I refused him the loan, of course. Wait a minute! What I was going to say
+is this: I happen to know why he wanted that money. Why it was important
+for him to get it at once. It was to pacify a certain client of his who is
+pressing him. She authorised him to sell some shares, which he did; but she
+can't get a settlement."
+
+"I say! That's pretty bad, isn't it?"
+
+"And it's the one case of which I happen to know the history. There are
+others, I am told, and more flagrant than this."
+
+"Will he have to smash up?"
+
+"I hope it will be no worse. I hope--well, we shall see. I have told you
+this to show you how specially distasteful to me was what the man said to
+me to-day. You understand, don't you?"
+
+Reggie said he understood. "It was quite premature," he declared. "Quite!"
+But he looked very thoughtful.
+
+"You will keep clear of them, remember."
+
+"I think I'm best out of their way for the present."
+
+"Instead of skating this morning I wish you'd go over to Runnydale and have
+a look at that thorough-bred Candy is breaking for me."
+
+Sir Francis knew his man. If Bessie Day had held for him ten times her
+attraction an errand which had a horse for its objective would have proved
+more attractive still to Reginald Forcus. With hardly a pang he assented.
+
+The young man spent a happy and profitable day at Runnydale with old Candy,
+a horse-dealer, much affected by the well-to-do youth of the neighbourhood,
+he having a racy tongue, and a fund of anecdote, and a pleasant, joking,
+familiar way of transferring money from their pockets to his own. He
+returned in time for dinner at Cashelthorpe, his brother's country-house a
+few miles out of Brockenham, which the younger man also made his home. The
+two dined alone, as was usual of late, the delicate health of Lady Forcus
+compelling her often to keep her room.
+
+"You remember what I told you about Day's affairs this morning?" Sir
+Francis asked, looking across the table at his brother as they sat down to
+their soup.
+
+Of course Reggie remembered.
+
+"Where do you suppose Mr. William Day is spending his evening?"
+
+Reggie paused with his spoon on its way to his mouth to say he hoped in the
+bosom of Mr. William Day's family.
+
+"He is spending it in prison."
+
+The spoon fell back into its plate, and Reggie's face grew white. "It can't
+be true! I'll never believe it!"
+
+"What did you expect, after what I told you? Unless he had made a bolt of
+it."
+
+"Oh, poor old fellow! But what's the poor old fellow done, then?"
+
+"Done? Fraudulently appropriated his clients' money and adapted it to his
+own uses."
+
+"Poor old Day! Oh, poor old devil!"
+
+"Well, get your dinner, my dear boy."
+
+"He was slapping me on the shoulder, and I was drinking his champagne, last
+night!"
+
+The younger Forcus recovered sufficiently to eat the fish, but his soup had
+to be removed untasted. He sat, with both hands gripping his table-napkin
+as it lay across his knees, his eyes on the table-cloth, seeing the pretty
+Deleah and her fat but agile father dancing down the gay ball-room. In
+prison! Some one he had known, and touched hands with! Prison!
+
+"I wonder of what the poor old fellow was thinking as he banged away at his
+tambourine last night!" Reggie said.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+Disaster
+
+
+Shortly after Mrs. Day had left her husband sitting in his stocking-feet
+over the breakfast-room fire, she, in the midst of her children at their
+several occupations but attentive to what went on beyond, heard his heavy
+step in the hall, heard the front door open and close.
+
+"Your father has gone to the club, after all," she said, and gave a sigh of
+relief as she worked away at her embroidery, making holes in a strip of
+muslin and stitching round them, for the adornment of the elder daughter's
+petticoat. She was a timid woman, in spite of her fine and handsome
+appearance, with a great fear of the unusual. It was her husband's habit to
+go out. The thought of him sitting alone and idle in the other room had
+been weighing on her mind.
+
+The children paid no attention; they were all a little tired and languid
+and disinclined for their usual amusements after the excitement of last
+night's dance and the exertion of their morning on the ice. Even Deleah,
+the reader of the family, neglected her book to lie back in her chair and
+gaze into the fire, the music of galop, and rattle of her father's
+tambourine humming in her ears; before her eyes figures chasing each other
+over the blue sheet of ice or flying rhythmically over polished boards.
+
+Franky having temporarily deserted his paint-box and the _Illustrated News_
+he had designed to colour for many tinted sheets of gelatine, saved from
+the crackers on last night's supper table, now held them in turn before his
+eyes. "Mama, you're all red--all lovely red, like roses," or "Bessie,
+you're frightful--you're white as if you felt sick," he cried, accordingly
+as a red or a green transparency was before his eyes.
+
+The game called "Tactics," over which Bessie and Bernard nightly
+quarrelled, had been so far neglected; a circumstance not to be regretted,
+since Bessie generally played a losing game in tears, and signalised
+Bernard's victory by upsetting the board and flinging the red and white
+ivory pegs in his face.
+
+For, the last night's dance, which had been an engrossing topic for several
+weeks before it had come off, now that it was over must still be talked
+about.
+
+How silly Deleah had looked when her white satin shoe had come off and shot
+across the slippery floor in the last waltz; and she would not stop, for
+all that, but finished the dance without it.
+
+"Were your shoes too big, Deleah?"
+
+"A little, mama. They were a pair of Bessie's last year's ones, that were
+too small for her."
+
+"There you go! At me again!" Bessie cried. "Deda is proud because her foot
+is smaller than mine, mama. If you're a little weed of a thing like Deda,
+of course your feet are narrow and small. They have to be. There's no merit
+in it."
+
+"And I suppose Deleah danced her silk stockings into holes?"
+
+"No, mama! Mr. Frost, I was waltzing with, held me up most beautifully; so
+that after the shoe came off my feet never once touched the floor."
+
+"Lucky it wasn't you, Bessie! It would have been the finish of poor Frost
+to have tried to carry such a lump as you."
+
+"Mama, will you speak to Bernard, and ask him not to be always saying rude
+things about me."
+
+"Hush, Bessie! Nonsense! Bernard, my dear, do try to be more polite to your
+sister."
+
+"Mama, here's a motter I rather like in this green cracker.
+
+ "'What I most admire in you
+  Are your eyes of lovely blue.'
+
+"What would you have done, Deleah, if a gentleman had pulled the cracker
+with you? Because your eyes aren't blue; they're yellow-brown."
+
+"I should have passed it on to Bernard."
+
+"And why wouldn't you have passed it on to me, pray, miss. My eyes are as
+blue as Bernard's, I suppose?"
+
+"Your eyes are green," from a Bernard ever ready for the fray.
+
+"Mama! Mama! He's at me again! Bernard is at me again! He says my eyes are
+green!"
+
+"Come, come, children! Hush, Bessie! You are too bad, Bernard. Now then,
+we have not yet decided who was the belle of the ball, last night."
+
+It was while they gave their opinion on this momentous subject that Franky
+fell asleep over his cracker papers and was sent to bed, an hour before
+his time, his mother going up to hear him say his prayers, as was her
+nightly custom. She was crossing the hall on her return when the front
+door opened and the master of the house, to his wife's astonishment,
+reappearing, stepped in again.
+
+"Lydia!" he whispered, and with an odd shrinking from him, she noticed
+that there was something furtive in his manner, and that his voice, wont
+to sound alarmingly through the house on his return to it, was husky and
+hushed. "Lydia, how much money have you in the house?"
+
+"Money!" his wife repeated, and gazed upon him with alarm in her eyes.
+
+"Money--I gave you a cheque for ten pounds on Monday. How much of it is
+left?"
+
+Most of it had gone in expenses for the dance. "I have only about thirty
+shillings left, William." Without knowing why, her voice, like his, had
+sunk to the tone of mystery.
+
+"Give it me, then. Quick!"
+
+She hesitated, fearfully questioning: "Has anything--?"
+
+"Never mind now. Get it. Get all you can lay your hands on. Quick!"
+
+Her purse was in the pocket hidden in the many folds of her silk dress.
+There was not quite so much in it as she had reckoned; she slipped the
+sovereign and few shillings with trembling fingers into his hand.
+
+"I could ask Bernard, and Bessie, William."
+
+"No! I won't take their money," he said. "This will get me to London."
+
+"To London?"
+
+"I am going up by the mail."
+
+"But why in this hurry?"
+
+Not the prospect of the sudden journey, but the something secret and
+horribly unfamiliar in his manner frightened her. He came a step further
+into the hall and picking up a dark muffler from a chair, wound it round
+his neck. She saw that his face was livid, and looked suddenly flabby, and
+that his hands were shaking.
+
+"Business," he whispered. "Don't worry."
+
+As he turned to the door, she laid a hand on his arm. "Something is wrong.
+I have felt it all the evening. Tell me, have you had losses, William?"
+
+He nodded, without looking at her. "That's about the tune of it."
+
+"You should have told me."
+
+"I've told you now. You'll hear about it soon enough."
+
+She gripped his arm. "Don't go like this! Whatever it is, don't run away.
+Is it very bad? Is it--" the word that stood for the worst business
+misfortune she could imagine, trembled and died on her lips--"is it
+_Failure_?"
+
+He pulled his muffler about his face, his hat lower upon his brow: "You've
+hit it," he said. "It's that."
+
+Her hand slid from his coat-sleeve, he slipped through the half-open door,
+and shuffled down the three white steps which led to the silent street.
+Then, as white, half-stupefied, she watched him, he turned and climbed the
+steps again and stood beside her.
+
+"You had better go to George Boult," he said. "Boult will tell you what to
+do. Are you listening? Go to Boult."
+
+"But aren't you coming back to-morrow, William? You can't leave us like
+this! You must come back!"
+
+He was going down the steps again. There was a moon clear in a frosty sky.
+How white the steps shone! For all her life she remembered the big,
+unwieldy figure of her husband shuffling down them.
+
+"I don't know what my movements may be. Just at present they are
+uncertain." Arrived on the pavement he turned his miserable, furtive eyes
+on her as she stood in the open door, the brightly-lit hall of home behind
+her. "Shut the door," he said with something of his old passionate
+irritability of manner. "I don't want all the world to know I'm going away
+to-night. Shut the door!"
+
+She obeyed him, as ever when he used that tone to her, with nervous haste.
+William Day waited a moment to hear the bolts slipping into place. It was
+a duty he performed himself every night of his life as he went up to bed.
+The door was bolted with him on the wrong side of it, now. Never, he knew,
+in all the years to come would he turn the lock of security on the
+sleeping house and shuffle upstairs, bed-candle in hand, to warmth and
+comfort and peaceful sleep again.
+
+Mrs. Day, going back into the hall, came to a standstill beneath the
+hanging lamp, trying to collect her thoughts, trying to realise, but
+totally unable to do so, that ruin had come upon her home, her children,
+herself. Ruin which she had seen visit the homes of other people,
+devastate them; but whose shadow she had never imagined falling on the
+fortunes of her own.
+
+On the William Days; so well-to-do; so respected in the place; who had
+their annual dance last night, all the nicest, most desirable people of
+the town present. No one's dance was so nicely managed, so spirited, so
+successful as theirs.
+
+She was actually thinking of the dance as she stood there, dazed, in the
+gas-lit hall. They would never give another New Year's dance.
+
+William, with all his faults, was never mean. "Don't spoil the ship for a
+ha'po'rth of tar," was a favourite motto of his. She had ever thought it a
+proverb both pleasant and wise. She was not an extravagant woman, but she
+also liked to have things well done, and had no sympathy with
+cheese-paring ways. The house was well and handsomely furnished, she and
+the children had plenty of dress, their table was an excellent one, all of
+them indulging in an amused contempt of the domestic economies of their
+friends. Servants stayed with them for years, and it was easy to fill
+their places when they left. They kept one more of them than was needed,
+for comfort's sake. She was a good mistress; he, for all his passionate
+rating of his dependents at times, was a good master.
+
+Was all this finished now? Was it possible? The old pleasant, natural
+order of things--the only order to which she had ever been accustomed.
+Finished now?
+
+And if so what would follow?
+
+Furniture sale. Dust of strange feet in the familiar rooms. People she
+would never have dreamed of admitting there pulling about her carpets,
+poking her feather-beds, turning up their noses at the breakfast-room
+chair-covers which were shabby, there was no good in denying it; and with
+her not by to explain they preferred them so. No more expensive
+paint-boxes and toys for Franky; Bessie and darling Deleah in shabby hats;
+Bernard without pocket-money, made a banker's clerk, perhaps--she had
+heard her husband say bank-clerks had no prospects, poor beggars!
+Bernard--her handsome Bernard to be a "poor beggar"--!
+
+A sudden vertigo seized her: the hall was whirling round; she stretched a
+hand blindly for support, and pulled over an umbrella-stand which fell
+with a crash and clatter.
+
+The girls and Bernard came running out. "What on earth are you doing,
+mama? Have you hurt yourself? What is it?"
+
+She had subsided upon a hall-chair, her face was ghastly, all her strength
+seemed gone. "I felt faint. I am better," she got out, and looked
+strangely round upon them all. Her gaze wandered lingeringly from object
+to object in the hall as if she had never seen it before. She shivered
+violently with deadly cold. "I will go to bed," she said.
+
+The children helped her upstairs. She leant on Bessie's arm, the arm of
+Deleah was round her waist. The stairway was broad, there was room for all
+three. Bernard stood on the mat below and watched with an anxious face.
+
+"Sure I can't do anything, mother?" he kept saying.
+
+They were all so fond of her, so frightened if for a moment she seemed to
+fail them. She could not get rid of them till they had undressed her and
+put her to bed. Until they themselves went to bed they kept coming back
+and peeping in at her. "Papa will be back soon; mind you send him for us
+if you feel at all ill," they adjured her.
+
+"Mama, you are sure it is not because I worried you about Reggie Forcus?"
+a contrite Bessie asked. "Because he is sure to come to-morrow--you think
+so, don't you?--and we shall make it all right, in spite of Sir Francis.
+Promise not to worry, mama."
+
+Twice in the night Deleah slipped from her own warm bed to stand, an
+anxious little figure, shivering in her nightgown, her dark curls
+streaming down her back, a suspensive ear to the keyhole of her mother's
+door. People fainted because they had heart disease. Of heart disease they
+also died. She dared not go in, because papa was there, but waited,
+trembling with cold and fear, until her mother's sigh reassured her.
+
+In the morning the mistress of the house came down with a pale face and
+dark rings about her deeply-set large eyes. She could not smile, she could
+not eat, she hardly spoke, but she was better, she said.
+
+The children would have to know; but she could not bring herself to tell
+them. That their father was not in the house they did not perceive, but
+put down his absence from the breakfast-table to the fact that he had
+over-slept himself.
+
+A great fire blazed on the hearth. A stack of muffins was being kept warm
+in a silver dish on a brass stand before it. Fish, and broiled kidneys
+were on the table; a ham, and a brawn, and a glazed tongue on the
+sideboard. Mrs. Day always drank coffee at her breakfast, Deleah liked
+cocoa, the rest took tea; all three were served.
+
+Mrs. Day surveyed these signs of comfort and luxury with a numb feeling at
+her heart. All this, and such as this, would have to go. How would the
+children endure life without it. Was this lavish amount of food
+"extravagance"? she asked herself, for the first time. Was it possible
+she, with her well-filled table on which she had prided herself, had
+conduced to the misfortune? She was a woman whose conscience was very
+easily touched, and she began to blame herself. "But I never dreamed!" she
+said, "I never dreamed!"
+
+Bessie could eat neither fish nor kidneys, that morning. "Mama, there was
+some game-pie left, last night. Mayn't I have some of it?"
+
+The servant was rung for to bring the game-pie. "If there are any oyster
+patties we might have them in, mother," Bernard suggested.
+
+The mother, sadly gazing, assented. Nothing would she have denied them,
+that morning--her poor children who were so soon to be deprived of
+game-pies and oysters for ever!
+
+They were in the midst of breakfast, their voices a little subdued because
+mama was not well, yet with an enjoyable sense of freedom because papa,
+who was so often irritable at that meal, had not yet come down, when
+suddenly the door opened and without any announcement Mr. George Boult
+walked in.
+
+He was a man they all knew as a friend and associate of the master of the
+house, but he had never been held in favour by its mistress nor her
+children, who indeed had but the slightest acquaintance with him. He had
+been a school-fellow of William Day's at the Brockenham Grammar School; a
+kind of comradeship had existed between the two from that time till now.
+George Boult had assumed for years the habit of dropping in at Queen Anne
+Street on Sunday afternoons to smoke a cigar and drink a glass of wine
+with the lawyer, but it was a function the men had enjoyed _tête-à-tête_:
+as an intimate in the family circle he had not been admitted.
+
+Boult could have bought up all the superior people who turned up their
+noses at him, his friend frequently declared; it had been a standing
+grievance of his against his wife that she declined to put Mr. Boult's
+name on the list of people invited to her parties.
+
+George Boult was a self-made man; the process of manufacture recent, and
+unfortunately fresh in people's minds. "If I invite the man who keeps the
+draper's shop the professional people won't come to meet him," Mrs. Day
+pointed out, and remained obdurate on the point. But because he, who did
+not in the least wish to go to her parties, could not be invited to them,
+a little awkwardness in the relations of her husband's Sunday afternoon
+visitor and Mrs. Day had arisen.
+
+His appearance thus early in the morning, and in the midst of their meal
+was a matter more than a little surprising to them all. He was a short,
+rather podgy man, with fair whiskers curled upon red cheeks, a common,
+up-turned, broad-nostrilled nose, a wide, thick-lipped mouth; quick,
+observant, but by no means beautiful eyes, a protruding chin, and a roll
+of flesh which showed above his collar at the back of his neck. Well and
+carefully he was dressed, however, and wore that air of conscious
+prosperity to be observed in the man who has carved his own fortunes and
+is proud of the fact.
+
+He grasped, in his broad, short-fingered, red one, the white hand of Mrs.
+Day, who went forward to meet him. "I got a verbal message from your
+husband last night, asking me to look you up the first thing this
+morning," he said. "This is a sad business for you all; I am sorry--very
+sorry."
+
+Mrs. Day took her place behind her tea-cups again, lacking the strength to
+stand.
+
+"Do the children know?" he asked, in a tone, muffled indeed, but quite
+audible in the children's ears.
+
+Mrs. Day shook her head. "But they must know," she said.
+
+"Know what?" they all asked, alert for news, but suspecting no evil. Even
+Franky looked up from his toast and marmalade with an inquiring glance.
+Perhaps the circus was coming, and there would be another procession, with
+elephants and camels walking through the streets, and unseen but loudly
+roaring lions dragged in their cages.
+
+"There is bad news, my dears," Mrs. Day began, but very faintly; she
+clasped her hands upon the edge of the tea-tray, the cups and saucers
+jingled with their shaking. "Poor papa is in trouble. Tell them," she
+whispered to the man who stood beside her. "I can't tell them."
+
+Mr. Boult fixed Bessie with the gaze of his slightly protruding eyes of
+stone-coloured blue. She was the eldest, the only one who could really be
+said to be grown up. For all his tail coat and smart neckties, Bernard at
+seventeen was only a boy still.
+
+"What is the matter with papa? Where is papa?" Bessie asked him.
+
+"Just at present--we hope only for a short time until we can bail him
+out--your papa is in prison," George Boult said.
+
+He had known it would be a blow to them, but he was a man entirely without
+imagination, and therefore quite incapable of putting himself in another
+person's place. Rumours had been afloat in the business world. Money,
+which the jog-trot profession of law alone could never have brought him
+in, had been spent: more than once the suspicion of what would be the end
+of his old school-friend had crossed his mind. But that the possibility of
+such a, to them, hideous calamity, had never presented itself to the man's
+wife and children he had not considered, nor was he capable of
+appreciating the sorrow and shame they would suffer by such a disgrace.
+
+He had not a high opinion of William Day's wife and family; they were
+people who thought the world a place for play rather than hard work, who
+frequented theatres and concert-rooms, and dances. It was not likely they
+could feel anything very much. He was unprepared for the effect of his
+words.
+
+They were young, they were undisciplined, they were quite unused to
+misfortune. The children met the news of its appearance among them by a
+loud yell of terrified protest. Mrs. Day had flung herself upon him,
+grasped him, clung to him.
+
+"Not William! Not my husband! No! No! No!" she shrieked.
+
+"I thought you knew! I thought you knew!" George Boult said. The woman
+hurt him by her grip upon his arms; what a din was in his ears!
+
+"Papa! Oh, papa! Papa!" Bessie screamed.
+
+Franky was screaming too. He had got down from the table and rushed round
+to his younger sister, who, white, and shaking like a leaf, took the child
+in her arms. Bernard had risen, ashen-faced, staring. "It isn't true!" he
+shouted savagely at his father's traducer. "It's a lie!"
+
+"Didn't you know?" George Boult kept saying to the poor woman who was
+shaking him by the force of her trembling as she clung to him. "I would
+have prepared you--I thought you knew."
+
+"I thought it was bankruptcy," she got out between her chattering teeth.
+"I didn't know it was--disgrace. Are you sure? Quite sure?"
+
+"Quite. There is not the shadow of a chance it is not true. A police
+officer brought me a message from him from the station-house last night."
+
+She let go his arms, and sank into her chair again; and Franky, who could
+find no comfort in Deleah's embrace, left her, and still screaming his
+terrified "Papa! papa! papa!" flew to hang upon his mother's neck.
+
+Deleah crept round to Bernard. "Oh, Bernard, what can we do?" she said.
+"What ought we to do?"
+
+Bernard, who had sunk into his chair, only laid his arms upon the table,
+his head upon his arms, and sobbed.
+
+George Boult thought they were taking it very badly. "This comes of too
+much pleasuring," he told himself. He looked round upon the miserable
+group, feeling shocked and helpless. He had gone there to see if he could
+be of use. How was it possible to help people who behaved like this! He
+was a widower, but had no children of his own. If he had been more
+fortunate in that respect what serious-minded, well-conducted boys and
+girls they would have been: not squeaking over misfortune, but standing up
+to it when it came; looking about them, open-eyed, for ways of making
+money, marrying money, and getting on. The children of William Day and
+their mother were acting like a set of lunatics only fit for Bedlam.
+
+"I'm sorry to have to spring it upon you suddenly. I thought your mama
+knew," he said again. "But it's a thing that had to be known--and perhaps
+as well one time as another. It's a thing that has got to be borne, too,
+and made the best of."
+
+It was quite easy to play the philosopher if only they would have
+listened, but they would not. Mrs. Day was rocking herself backwards and
+forwards in her chair, the screaming Franky in her arms; Bessie had flung
+herself upon the floor and was beating it with her palms and calling upon
+the name of papa. George Boult was sorry for their misfortune, but he
+looked on and listened with distaste. To have no more spunk than that!
+
+"Which of you can I speak to?" he asked sharply at last. He crossed the
+room and touched Bernard's heaving shoulders. "Come out," he said; and
+Bernard, openly blubbering, got up, and followed his father's friend from
+the room. In the hall George Boult laid a steadying hand upon the poor
+boy's arm. "You must bear this like a man, Bernard," he said. "You're not
+a child, nor a woman; try to be a man."
+
+"What's he done? What's my father done?" the boy asked. He blew his nose
+and wiped his eyes, and made an effort to hold himself upright.
+
+"It's a question of some money belonging to a client."
+
+"To a client, sir?"
+
+"Your father invested a large sum of money for her, then sold the shares,
+and did not buy others or give her the money."
+
+"But--he would have done--in time. He--meant to do it."
+
+"Your father has got to prove that."
+
+"My father will do it," with a sob.
+
+"I hope so. There's another matter we need not go into now. Her signature
+authorising the sale she disputes."
+
+"My father--will explain."
+
+"Perhaps. He'll be up before the magistrates to-day. I shall attend, and
+shall offer myself to go bail for him. They'll probably want two. Who is
+there you can ask?"
+
+Bernard did not know. He had not his wits sufficiently about him even to
+think. "I can ask my mother," he said. He was sobbing again, fallen limply
+against the wall, his face hidden.
+
+"Do remember you've got to play the man," George Boult said. He felt
+helpless in the presence of such surprising helplessness. He looked at the
+heaving shoulders of the youth with an astonished distaste. What was to be
+done with material so soft as this! "I am sorry I have been the bearer of
+such ill news, but there is no good in my stopping now. I'll drop in, tell
+your mother, when you're all more used to it. Wonderful how quickly people
+do get used to things! Meantime, remember, I'll stand bail for your father
+if you can find another. And there's no time to lose. You must shake
+yourself together and set about it at once."
+
+"Helpless set!" he said to himself as he let himself out and passed down
+the three glistening white steps into the quiet street. "Hysterical,
+useless, helpless set! Fit only for pleasure-seeking and money-spending.
+What is to become of them now?"
+
+They were certainly helpless. When Bernard went back to the room where
+breakfast--the meal to be for ever unfinished--stood about, and told them
+they had, there and then, to find some one willing to bail out his father,
+none of them understood, or knew what to do.
+
+"Do you know of any one we could ask, mother?" Mrs. Day sat, her brow
+clasped tightly in her two hands as if she really feared her head would
+split. "Let me think! Let me think!" she said piteously, but was incapable
+of thinking.
+
+"Would any of the people who were here at the dance--the Challises, the
+Hollingsbys, the Buttifers, the Frosts, do it? Which of them shall we
+ask?"
+
+"I don't think one of them would do it. They would not care."
+
+"But they're often here--to dinner, and so on."
+
+"Don't ask them."
+
+"Who then, mama?" Deleah questioned. She had made less noise than the
+others, and there was about her an air of purpose, lacking in the rest,
+although her childish face looked stricken.
+
+"There is no one I should like you to ask a favour of."
+
+"But we must ask some one."
+
+"Let it be some one we do not know, then."
+
+"Could we ask Sir Francis Forcus? He is very rich."
+
+"I will go somewhere--I will ask--some one," Mrs. Day said; but, trying to
+stand, she fell back in her chair, and her frightened children saw that
+she had fainted.
+
+They laid her on the sofa, and over her prostrate body renewed the subject
+of the bail.
+
+"Bessie must go," Deleah said.
+
+"Then, I won't, miss!" said Bessie, and sobbed and choked and screamed at
+her sister: "I won't! I won't!"
+
+"Bernard must go."
+
+"It would come better from a woman," Bernard said.
+
+In the end it was Deleah who went--the little petted, sheltered Deleah,
+who had never gone before on any errand of more moment than for the
+matching of Berlin wools, or for the changing of the three-volume novel at
+the Public Library.
+
+"Deleah can't go--Deleah mustn't!" the prostrate mother on the sofa
+gasped. She looked like a corpse beneath the cloths soaked in
+eau-de-cologne-and-water which Bessie had arranged over her brow. "We
+can't ask Sir Francis. Call Deleah back. Stop her."
+
+But Deleah would not be stopped. It was a question of getting her father
+out of prison, and they had been told to lose no time. While Bessie and
+her mother and Bernard were still declaring she must not go she had run up
+to her room for her hat and jacket; and lest they should catch and stop
+her, she would not stay in the house to put them on, but flung them anyhow
+upon her when once outside the door. Then, with her little wild white face
+almost lost in the masses of loose dark hair escaped from the net she wore
+in the morning, and falling anyhow beneath her hat, and her small bare
+hands grasping the jacket she would not stop to button at her throat, she
+ran through the streets.
+
+Was that really Deleah running there, and on that errand? Deleah, who at
+that hour was usually walking sedately to school; saying over to herself
+her French poetry, perhaps, as she went, or taking a last peep in her
+geography book, to make sure once again of the latitude and longitude of
+Montreal, or to impress more firmly on her mind the imports and exports of
+Prussia.
+
+To get to her school she had to pass her father's office; and sometimes,
+if it pleased him to start early enough, he would walk there with his
+little daughter, her hand tucked within his arm. With her he was never
+savage, and rarely irritable; on these walks his mood would be playful and
+jocose, and they would incite each other to play the truant from office
+and school, and pretend they were off on a holiday jaunt together.
+
+And now her laughing, noisy, loving, boisterous father was in prison--in
+prison!--and she was running to beg the help of a stranger to take him
+out.
+
+She gave no thought to the man to whom she was going, nor to the words she
+would say to him. The difficulty of asking such a favour of such a
+stranger did not distress her. Her father--her father--her father! was her
+only thought.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+Deleah's Errand
+
+
+It chanced that Sir Francis Forcus drove to the Brewery an hour earlier
+than usual that morning, and--a circumstance of rare occurrence--that
+Reginald was pleased to drive with him. Both men came together into the
+private room of the elder, where Deleah, for an hour which had seemed a
+lifetime, awaited them.
+
+If Sir Francis had ever seen William Day's little daughter, he had
+forgotten her. It was Reggie, at whom Deleah never looked, who called her
+name in his pleasant, good-natured tone of welcome.
+
+"Why, it is Deleah!" he cried out, as if Deleah, of all the people in the
+world, was the person he most wanted to see. "This is Deleah Day,
+Francis."
+
+He liked little Deleah--what young man with eyes in his head did not like
+her!--she was so pretty; far and away prettier than Bessie, who had in
+Francis's word tried to grab him. She was the jolliest little thing to
+laugh with and to dance with; light as a feather--you could sweep her off
+her feet and dance on with her, never feeling her weight upon your arm.
+
+He held out his hand to her now, but she did not see it. Her own hands
+were clasped. Without clasping them she would not have knelt to ask
+anything of God. She went across the room and lifted her little white
+stricken face to Sir Francis above the clasped hands, and gazed at him
+with an agony of prayer in her eyes.
+
+"My papa is in prison," she said. "I have come to ask you to take him
+out."
+
+Sir Francis looked at her in astonishment, not unmoved; at the back of his
+mind the thought that this was one of a family who had impertinently
+intruded on him, with whom, emphatically, he wished to have nothing to do.
+Because this girl was so young and pretty they had sent her!
+
+"Will you take my papa out of prison?"
+
+"My poor child, I fear that is beyond me. Beyond any one now."
+
+She squeezed the clasped hands painfully together, her eyes clung to his
+face: "No: you can! You can! I heard them say so," she said. "Mr. George
+Boult and you can take him out if you will. You can do it with money. He
+said so. You can do it to-day."
+
+"She means go bail for him," Reginald explained under his breath.
+
+"But why should I do that?" Sir Francis asked, turning upon his brother.
+"Her father was no friend--not even an acquaintance--of mine." He was most
+anxious that point should be established. "People in--in Mr. Day's
+position get their friends to bail them," he said to the girl. "And I
+shall not be present; I am going out of town to-day."
+
+"No! you must not go!" Deleah sobbed. "You must do it. There is no one
+else. I don't know where to go--I don't know what to do. We none of us
+know. You must! You must!"
+
+Half because her strength was failing her, and half because it was the
+attitude of prayer, she went to her knees, her head thrown back, looking
+up at him, her clasped hands beneath her upturned chin.
+
+How could any man, however cold, reserved, remote, inimical to her cause,
+even, turn a deaf ear to such an appeal, remain adamant before her
+helplessness, her trustfulness, her childish beauty and self-abandonment!
+
+"Who sent you to me?" he asked.
+
+"No one. I came," she whispered. The change in his tone had weakened her,
+she began to shake from head to foot.
+
+"They should have picked on a fitter person for such an errand. It is a
+cruelty to have sent such a child as you," he said.
+
+He held out his hand to raise her; but Reggie went to her and lifted her
+and placed her in a comfortable chair. "It'll be all right. He'll do it.
+Don't you fret," he whispered, soothing her.
+
+She did not heed him, her eyes were on the elder man, who had gone to a
+cupboard in the room from whence he produced a decanter of sherry. It was
+in that primitive time when in trouble of mind or body, to "take a glass
+of wine" was the customary thing. He was always stiff and distant in
+bearing, and just now he was annoyed and aggrieved to feel that he was
+being "had," as the word of a later age puts it. But his heart was sound.
+To look on that trembling, frightened child, and to remember the errand on
+which she had been sent he found to be an upsetting thing.
+
+"Sip a little sherry," he said, and passed the glass to his brother to
+hold to her lips.
+
+But Deleah took no notice of the glass, she seemed unaware of the presence
+of Reggie, her eyes clinging to the face of Reggie's brother: "Will you do
+it? Will you save him? Will you?" she implored.
+
+Then, with a gloomy brow, Sir Francis consented. "Very well. I will be in
+the way, this afternoon. You say Mr. Boult also will be in the way? If we
+can do anything we will."
+
+"It's all right, Deleah," Reggie said. "I told you it would be all right."
+
+"And, remember," Sir Francis adjured her, "that what I do, I do for
+you--and for you alone."
+
+Her petition, she understood, was granted; her clasped hands fell from
+their attitude of prayer, but her strained eyes still clung to Sir
+Francis's face. She did not attempt to thank him; words were inadequate to
+express what she felt--she did not think of using them; but there was
+adoration of him in her eyes.
+
+With his promise to help, resentment had died out of the man. He took the
+glass which Reggie had put down, and himself held it to her lips. "Sip a
+little; it will give you strength," he said in the voice of authority; and
+she obediently sipped.
+
+"I'll go," she said, but held him with her adoring child's eyes for a
+minute still, then slipped from the chair and went to the door. But there
+she turned, and with her head pitifully lifted faced the two men. "My papa
+has done nothing wrong," she said. "They have put him in prison, but it is
+a mistake. Papa has done nothing wrong."
+
+"Poor child!" Sir Francis said, and turned away. The scene had been
+painful. He was anxious that it should be over.
+
+Reginald had gone to the door and opened it for her. "You keep your
+spirits up," he said coaxingly. "Don't you go and be unhappy, Deleah." He
+was passing through the door with her, whispering cheery words, but his
+brother called him sharply back.
+
+"Reggie, come here!"
+
+"In a minute."
+
+"No, now. I want you."
+
+There were certain tones of his brother's voice which the younger man had,
+so far, never dreamed of disregarding. He reappeared in the room and
+closed the door on Deleah's retreating figure.
+
+"Where were you going?"
+
+"Nowhere, in particular. To walk part of the way home with that poor
+little girl."
+
+"Stop here, will you? I want you."
+
+Sir Francis Forcus was not going to allow his brother to be seen in the
+streets of Brockenham with any member of Mr. William Day's family, that
+morning.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+Sour Misfortune
+
+
+Mrs. Day, in looking back over the miserable weeks and months and years
+that succeeded her last New Year's party, was inclined to award the palm
+for wretchedness to the weeks which intervened between her husband's
+appearance before the magistrates and the Spring Assizes at which his
+trial came on. It is more than possible that if George Boult and Sir
+Francis Forcus had refused to stand bail for him, and he had remained for
+those ten weeks in prison, he would have been less unhappy there than was
+possible to him, a consciously guilty man, in the changed atmosphere of
+his home.
+
+What had happened had changed for him for ever his relations with wife and
+children. Among the latter he sat as one beaten, cowed, estranged. With
+Franky, alone, for ever again, did he approach to any intimacy. Franky,
+who, now that that strange talk of his father being in prison was over,
+and his father here at home once more, holding no apprehension of the
+future, troubled his head no further about the matter. Him he sometimes
+took upon his knee, as of old. To Franky he would give languid advice
+about the pictures he was colouring, about the amount of cobbler's wax to
+affix to the skipjack he was making, about the rigging of his walnut
+ships.
+
+Of Deleah--Deleah, who had been his pet, whom he had acknowledged openly
+to be his favourite child--he was shy. He had been told how it had been
+she who had arranged the matter of his bail. His little Deleah, to have
+gone on such an errand for him! He would have liked never to meet again
+those pretty trusting eyes of hers that had been full of pride in and love
+for him.
+
+When he had first come home she had cried heart-brokenly against him, had
+hung with her arms about his neck, sobbing out that she knew--she
+knew--she knew he had done nothing wrong. He had had to push her roughly
+from him. He did not wish to go through a scene like that again!
+
+To Bessie and his son, who maintained a sullen condemnatory attitude
+towards him, he never spoke if he could avoid doing so.
+
+Towards his wife he held an altogether different demeanour.
+
+The troubles which had come upon him had been induced by his good-natured
+desire to meet the heavy expenses of an extravagant household. Money which
+he could not earn in the legitimate exercise of his profession, nor come
+by honestly, had been spent. Who had had the spending of it but she--his
+wife? Of his grievous undoing, then, it was she who was the sole cause.
+
+Of this explanation he delivered himself to her in the first hour of his
+return to his home.
+
+She was too stricken, too dumbfounded, too much overwhelmed with shame and
+sorrow for him to resent the attack upon herself, or to attempt reprisals.
+Of her defenceless submission he took advantage, and presently had brought
+himself honestly to believe that on his wife's shoulders lay the
+responsibility of his downfall.
+
+His counsel advised him to plead guilty. There was not in any one's mind a
+doubt of what the verdict must be. The few who cared for him could only
+hope for a light sentence.
+
+When Deleah heard he was not even to deny his guilt she hid herself in her
+bedroom, and lay there for hours, face downwards upon the floor. The
+carpet was wet with her tears, its scent in her nostrils. For all her life
+that snuffy, stuffy smell brought back to her the time of her
+uncontrolled, rebellious anguish and her cruel shame.
+
+Was it true? Was it possible? Could this horrible thing have happened in
+her home? Deleah's, who had known there only careless, happy days? Was
+this man who was to plead guilty to forgery, who had robbed a poor woman
+of every farthing she possessed, who was to pass years, perhaps, in
+prison, really her father? Who had been sometimes so affectionate to them
+all, always so loving and indulgent to her; who had sat in the square
+family pew with them all on the Sunday morning, and said grace every day
+at meals; who had often told them funny tales, shouting with laughter over
+his own jokes; who had banged the tambourine and joined in Sir Roger de
+Coverley only a few nights ago?
+
+Bessie and Bernard, drawn together by their misfortune, and forgetting to
+torment one another, talked, their heads close together, over the tragedy
+which had befallen. They were angry, outraged, seeing what their father
+had done as it affected themselves, and they did not spare him. Sometimes
+to them--the elder boy and girl--Mrs. Day felt constrained to talk. It was
+a relief to pent-up feelings to talk, if only to say, "What will become of
+us? How are we to live? What, in the name of God, are we to do?" To these
+three, from companionship in misfortune, some consolation was afforded.
+
+But Deleah spoke no word--except to the carpet.
+
+All of them had much leisure. Mrs. Day and Bessie would not show their
+faces out of doors. Bernard, who was spending a last quarter at school in
+order to pass the Senior Cambridge Exam. before going into his father's
+office, decided to work for it at home, rather than at school, where all
+the other fellows _knew_. A letter was received from the head-mistress of
+the Establishment, "all of whose pupils were the daughters of professional
+men," and where Deleah was receiving her education, saying that, until the
+dark cloud was lifted which at present overshadowed her family, it would
+be better for Deleah Day to take a holiday.
+
+"In any case, I would not have gone there again," Deleah said. "The girls
+are always talking about who their fathers are, and looking down on each
+other. Not but what there were some upon whose fathers I also looked down.
+The Clarks--the wholesale shoe-makers--you could hardly call them
+_professional_, could you? But now--oh, what nonsense it all seems now!"
+
+The education of Franky had been carried on hitherto by Bessie. In a
+lamentably desultory fashion it is true; but now that, for economy's sake,
+they had restricted themselves to a fire in only one sitting-room the poor
+child's tuition had to be abandoned. It would have been impossible to live
+within the four walls wherein the elder daughter and the younger son
+fought through the difficulties of imparting and acquiring knowledge.
+Either Franky, on his back, on the floor, was screaming and dangerously
+waving his legs, or an infuriate Bessie was chasing him round the table.
+The spelling-book was more often used as a weapon of attack than a primer,
+and Bessie's voice screaming out the information that C A T spelt Cat
+could be heard in the street.
+
+Economies in coal, economies in every direction they had to practise.
+Money, where it had been so plentiful was all at once painfully scarce;
+credit, which had seemed unlimited, there was none. George Boult, taking
+things in hand, and trying to bring some order out of chaos, handed over
+weekly to Mrs. Day two pounds for housekeeping. The change from lavishness
+to penury bewildered the poor woman, and the change from a table loaded
+with good things to one that was nearly bare was not skilfully made. For a
+time, until experience taught her, things they could have done without she
+continued to buy, and that which was really necessary they went without.
+And that allowance, poor as it seemed to her, could not go on for long. It
+was by no means certain that enough legally remained to them to repay Mr.
+Boult for these disbursements. If they had been willing to live upon his
+means he was not at all a generous man; he did not encourage them to
+expect pecuniary help from him.
+
+"What do you advise? Have you no plan? What are we all to do?" Mrs. Day
+asked of her husband.
+
+"You must hang on till I come out. If we're lucky it will only be a matter
+of a few months."
+
+"But even for a few months, William, what are we to do?"
+
+"You must work," William said. "Earn something. It will be a change for
+you. I've kept the lot of you in idleness till now. Now you'll learn what
+it is to work. It won't do you any harm."
+
+"All that is so easy to say. But what work are we to do? Where are we to
+work? I cannot see that we shall have a roof over our heads."
+
+Then the wretched man, who knew no more than she what would become of them
+all, and was infinitely the more wretched on that account, broke into a
+torrent of oaths. "Haven't I enough to bear?" he asked her. "Haven't I
+myself to think about? Is mine such a pleasant prospect, that you come to
+pester me, giving me no peace? How do other women manage? Women that have
+never had husbands to slave for them as I have slaved for you."
+
+Poor Mrs. Day, the least pugnacious of women, who at the best of times had
+scarcely known how to hold her own with him, fled before the unreasonable,
+miserable man.
+
+Bessie, in talking to her brother over the hopelessness of their position,
+used the child's time-honoured reproach against the parent. "Papa and mama
+should not have had children if they were going to make such a muddle as
+this," she argued. Bessie had not wanted to be born, she declared. Her
+father and mother were responsible. They must at least say what was to be
+done. Papa, she declared to Bernard, should be made to say.
+
+"Papa, when Deleah and I want our hats and dresses for the spring, what
+are we to do?" she asked her father, with that note of aggression in her
+voice with which he had become familiar from her.
+
+"Do? Go without them," he promptly replied.
+
+"You know very well we can't go without clothes, papa."
+
+"Then go to the devil," papa said, and getting up slouched from the room.
+
+Bernard, too, who was more afraid of the altered man than Bessie, and for
+long shrank from any conversation with him, was at last induced by his
+mother to consult his father as to his own future.
+
+"There isn't much use that I can see, sir, in my sweating away at my books
+for this exam," he said.
+
+"Oh? Why not?"
+
+"Supposing that I get through it, what am I to do then?"
+
+"You must do the best you can. This Senior Cambridge Exam, they tell me,
+is a door to any of the professions."
+
+"But you want money to enter a profession, sir. From what I hear we have
+none."
+
+"Your hearing has not played you false in that direction. What I had you
+managed to spend, among you. I was the goose that laid the golden egg; now
+circumstances forbid my laying any more--for a time. You must look after
+yourselves."
+
+"But if you could only give us some idea of how to set about it."
+
+Then, upon him, too, his father, having shown a greater measure of
+forbearance so far than he accorded the mere women of his family, turned
+savagely. The poor wretch did not know how to help them, did not know what
+to advise them to do: to frighten them was his only resource.
+
+"Haven't I got enough to think about?" he shouted at the boy. "You and
+your mother and sisters come and badger--and badger me--"
+
+"All right, sir. I won't badger you any more."
+
+"All I ask is to be let alone--to be granted a little peace. You have no
+mercy--none!"
+
+But after that conversation the boy gave up even the pretence of studying.
+"Where's the good?" he asked of Bessie. "If I passed the blessed thing,
+where's the good? I shall have to be an errand boy, I suppose, or sweep a
+crossing. I don't want a Senior Cambridge Certificate for that."
+
+The womankind did their best to persuade him to persevere, but he declared
+that he could not study in his bedroom without a fire, nor could he so
+much as drive a word into his head if he had to sit in the same room as
+his father.
+
+That room where their pleasant evenings had been passed while Mr. Day
+played his cards at the club, presented altogether a different aspect in
+these sad times when that unhappy man formed part of the circle. The poor,
+bulky wretch sat always over the fire--literally over it, his chair-feet
+touching the fender, his own feet as often as not on the bars; the rest of
+the family withdrawn as much as possible from the hearth. If there was
+talk among them as they sat at their table with their sewing, their
+painting, their books--and being young they talked, and even sometimes
+laughed--he resented the fact that they could do so, and sometimes snarled
+round upon them with a request for silence. But equally, it seemed, did he
+resent their silence when it fell, and would make sarcastic remarks to
+them when they withdrew on the liveliness of the society they provided for
+him.
+
+An undue amount of the weekly two pounds for housekeeping money went to
+find the master of the house tobacco. There was some good port wine in the
+cellar; he might as well drink it while he had the chance, William Day
+thought. What else had he to do but smoke and drink; and he did both, all
+day long.
+
+He had not been a drinking man, although he had ever taken his share of
+the good things of life, nor an idle one. His family looked on now at his
+altered habits with fear and a growing disgust. It was surprising how, in
+the loss of his own self-respect and the knowledge that he had lost the
+respect of those who had loved him, the man altered. With astonishment
+they, who had known him all their lives, saw him in a few short weeks
+become selfish, greedy, unmannerly, even unclean. The ash from his pipe
+fell on his coat, he would not brush it away; he had evidently given up
+the use of a nail-brush; his hair hung over his forehead; his untrimmed
+beard and whiskers stuck out round the big face which was flabby now, and
+unwholesome.
+
+Missing the luxuries from his table, he forgot the niceties he had
+hitherto observed there. When he came to his meals with unwashed hands,
+took to himself, with apparently no thought for the rest, the best of what
+he found there, the elder boy and girl would look at each other with angry
+condemnation in their eyes. Such lapses from a hitherto observed code of
+good manners Mrs. Day bore with an apparently apathetic indifference. For
+years, truth to tell, she had ceased to love the man, and the little
+deviations, which read so trivially but mean in daily life so much, were
+almost unnoticed by her in the stupefying sense of the misfortune which
+had befallen them all.
+
+It was only Deleah, devotedly loving her father, who perceived the real
+tragedy at the back of this neglect of personal and family obligations;
+only she who dimly understood that this disfiguring outward alteration was
+but the sign of an inner, more pitiful change; only she who had the
+insight to read in her father's savage ways the despair, the scorn of
+himself, the rage with destiny, the bitter enmity against a world in which
+he was no longer to exist. Only Deleah felt in her heart the sorrow of it
+all--Deleah who was a reader of Thackeray, of Trollope, of Dickens, of
+Tennyson; whose eyes had wept for imaginary woes before these bitter drops
+had been wrung from them for her own; who had learnt that tears were not
+the only signs of an anguished heart; and knew that the love of position,
+of home, of a fair name even were not the chief things for which they as a
+family should have mourned.
+
+And so the slow weeks, even the slow months passed. The muddy, narrow
+pavements of Brockenham grew dry and dusty in the biting east winds.
+People at whom Mrs. Day and her daughters peeped through curtained windows
+walked by with snowdrops, with violets, and presently with cowslips in
+their hands. Spring, so slow in coming, yet so dreaded by them all, was
+coming at last. Easter was here. Easter too soon was here!--and the Easter
+Assizes.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+Husband And Father
+
+
+On the evening before the morning on which his trial was to take place, a
+different creature seemed to be in the place lately occupied by William
+Day.
+
+For one thing, his appearance was improved. A barber, sent for, that
+afternoon, had cut off the greasy, disguising locks of sand-coloured hair,
+and trimmed the wildly luxuriant beard which had given the man such a
+slovenly, unfamiliar appearance. His upper lip was once more shaved.
+
+"I don't mind kissing you now, papa," Franky said, who had shirked
+saluting the stubbly face.
+
+This improvement being completed, he made a change in his clothes, and at
+their tea-time appeared among them all in his black cloth, long-skirted
+coat, his "pepper and salt" trousers. As another outward sign of his moral
+degradation he had dispensed with linen at throat and wrists lately, but
+now his heavy chin sank once more into the enclosure of a collar whose
+stiffly starched points reached to the middle of his cheeks. The pin which
+adorned his thickly padded necktie was large in size, consisting of a
+gold-rimmed glass case in which was exhibited, braided and intertwined,
+hair cut from the heads of his four children. They had all of them clubbed
+together to prepare this offering for papa on last St. Valentine's Day.
+
+And with the resumption of a more careful toilette the poor man had gone
+back to the decent demeanour of happier days. He said nothing; was,
+indeed, in a state of black depression which he made no attempt to hide,
+but he outraged no longer the sensitive feelings of his family by his
+behaviour.
+
+"Papa is just like what he used to look," Franky said, when he beheld the
+renovation of his parent's appearance. "Shall we paint pictures this
+evening, papa?"
+
+They tried to hush the child, but Franky saw no reason why he should not
+make his request, nor why it should be refused. He fetched his paint-box
+and a store of pictures he had cut from some old papers.
+
+"You do sunsets so much more beautifully than me, papa. If you'd just do
+the sunsets for me!"
+
+And presently the father had drawn a chair by the side of his little
+son's, and was showing him how to mix his colours, and admonishing him not
+to suck his paintbrushes, as on the happy winter evenings before the
+crash.
+
+It was a landscape with mill and marshland and water, the child had
+chosen, and there was a large space to be occupied with the sunset at
+which his parent excelled, and much scraping and mixing of carmine and
+yellow ochre and cobalt blues. So that Franky's bed-time was here before
+the picture was finished. He was sent off as usual, protesting and in
+tears.
+
+"You'll help me to finish it to-morrow night, papa? Promise you'll help me
+to-morrow night!" he entreated, through his weeping. But Bessie, whose
+task it was to see him to bed, pulled the child relentlessly from the
+room, and slammed the door upon them both.
+
+George Boult had come in, for a last talk with his friend. His presence
+was never desired by the family, but it relieved the tension, somewhat, of
+that sad evening.
+
+The two men sat with their pipes, and a bottle of that much diminished
+store of "eighteen forty-sevens" was broached. But presently it was
+noticed that although William Day held his pipe in his hand he did not
+smoke. With the other hand he shaded his eyes from the gas light, and he
+said nothing. One by one the young people crept off to bed, and presently
+Mrs. Day, whose attempt to keep up a conversation with the visitor had
+quickly failed, also stood up to go.
+
+"Are you leaving us, Lydia?" the husband said when he became aware of her
+intention.
+
+"I will not go if you wish me to stay, William."
+
+"No, no. Go, and get some sleep."
+
+Then, as for a moment she stood, hesitating at the door, longing to escape
+from that sad presence, yet miserable to go: "Do the best you can for my
+poor wife," Day said to his friend. "She has been a good wife to me."
+
+She had lived with him for twenty years, and had, perhaps, never heard a
+word of praise from him before. When at last it came it was too much for
+her to bear, and she went, sobbing loudly, from the room.
+
+An hour later when the unhappy master of the house had for the last time
+attended his friend to the hall-door, watched him down the steps into the
+quiet street, given a silent nod to the other's silent gesture of farewell
+as he turned to walk down the echoing pavement; when he had put out the
+gas in the sitting-room and hall, and dragged himself--who can divine with
+what heaviness of heart?--heavily up the stairs, he came upon a little
+white night-gowned figure, watching for him on the landing, outside his
+bedroom door.
+
+It was Deleah who had waited for him there.
+
+"It is only I, papa," she said when he stopped short at sight of her.
+"Only your little Deleah that I--I--loves you so."
+
+"Be off to bed, this instant," he said, and pointed an angry finger in the
+direction of her room.
+
+But she put her arms about his neck and clung to him with stifled sobbing,
+till with the choke of his own sobbing she felt his great chest heave
+beneath her clinging form.
+
+When he had flung himself upon the bed beside his wife he was choking and
+sobbing still, in a fashion dreadful to hear.
+
+"William!" she said timidly, and put a shaking hand upon his shoulder. "Is
+there anything I can do or say that can help you, William?"
+
+He did not answer her, but the bed shook with his rending sobs; and she
+lay and sobbed beside him.
+
+When at length such calm as comes from exhaustion fell: "I did it for you
+and the children," he said. "I thought, with luck, I could have put it
+right. But it was for all of you I did it. You will remember that?"
+
+"I will remember it while I live," she said. "You may be quite sure that
+neither your children nor I will ever forget."
+
+"Deleah upset me. She should have been in bed"--it was so he excused his
+tears to her--"I should not have broken down like this if she had not
+unmanned me. The child should have gone to bed."
+
+She heard him swallow down his tears, and then he began again: "Deleah and
+Franky have always been--have always been--"
+
+"The dearest," she supplied, understanding him. "The dearest of your
+children, William?"
+
+"Tell them that--after to-morrow, will you?"
+
+She promised. "Bessie and Bernard have not such winning ways, perhaps, but
+they love you, William, I am sure."
+
+To this he made no answer. After a time she spoke to him again: "Have you
+anything else to say to me, William? There have been too few words between
+us of late. It has been my fault, perhaps. But now, have you anything to
+say that might comfort us both to remember?"
+
+"Nothing." He said the word drearily, but not unkindly, and she did not
+resent his silence. Full well she knew that volumes, if he could have
+spoken them, could not have lightened her helplessness in the present and
+terror of the future, nor his despair.
+
+She lay for a few minutes, the tears pouring down her cheeks, unchecked in
+the darkness, then she forced herself to say the only few words she could
+think of which might comfort him in the time to come.
+
+"William, I won't talk to you, I won't disturb you. I want you to go to
+sleep, to get a night's rest, if you can; but just this one thing I do
+wish to say to you--I do want you to remember. It is that you must be sure
+never to think I feel any anger against you. Only pity--only pity,
+William; and such a sorrow for you that I cannot put it into words. I have
+wanted to tell you all along, but--"
+
+She left it there, and he received what she said in silence.
+
+Only once again he spoke. "This has been Hell," he said, and she knew he
+spoke of the weeks he had spent, an alien in his own home, awaiting his
+trial. "Hell! Whatever comes, I am glad this is over."
+
+Then he turned on his side, away from her, and lay quite quiet; and
+presently she knew with thanksgiving that he slept.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+The Way Out
+
+
+The prisoner in accordance with his counsel's advice pleaded Guilty. It
+was only a question of the length of the sentence, therefore, and the
+judge before whom William Day appeared did not err on the side of mercy.
+The heaviest sentence that it was in his power to allot to a malefactor of
+that class he passed upon William Day.
+
+None of his own were present, but the Court was filled with people to whom
+the prisoner was a familiar figure of everyday life.
+
+It was all but impossible to look upon this big, important-looking man in
+the well-cut clothes, holding till the last few weeks among them the
+position of gentleman, and believe that it was a criminal standing before
+their eyes. The attraction of gazing at, of gloating upon, such a
+phenomenon was great. He had been a hectoring kind of man, walking very
+noisily among his fellows, taking to himself a great deal of room. Such an
+one gives offence frequently if unconsciously. There was none who saw
+William Day standing up for his sentence in the dock that day who bore a
+grudge, or remembered.
+
+With some there he had assumed an insolent superiority, with other few,
+whose position entitled them to choose their acquaintance, he had been
+unwarrantably familiar. For the minute he held his place after sentence
+was pronounced his eyes travelled slowly but with a dreadful look of
+appeal over the familiar faces. Over faces of tradespeople, with whom he
+had dealt; of clients for whom he had done business; of people with whom
+he had dined and whom he had entertained in return; of men who had driven
+him in cabs, blacked his boots, carried his portmanteaux. The slowly
+travelling gaze had in it something of a sick despair, something of a wild
+appeal. The men over whom it passed, bore it in absolute, breathless
+silence, but they never forgot it.
+
+The great cheeks that had seemed ready to burst with good-living, hung
+loose and flabby now, the hands that had been prompt with the grasp of
+friendship, that had waved greetings from window or pavement, that had
+ever been generous in giving, clung to the rail of the dock, the knuckles
+whitened with the tension. The tongue that had been so loud in dispute, so
+rough in anger, so boisterous in welcome, lay dry and silent in the mouth
+which had lopped open.
+
+There was a feeling upon many of those who momentarily encountered the
+dreadful gaze that they were responsible; they longed to exonerate
+themselves, to say to him, "I, at least, had nothing to do with it. I am
+sorry, William Day. Indeed I am sorry." It was a relief when he turned, at
+the warder's touch on his arm, and went below.
+
+In the room where he was allowed to sit for a time before being driven to
+prison his lawyer came to speak to him; the confidential clerk from his
+own office; his friend, George Boult.
+
+"It is very severe," George Boult kept saying with nervous reiteration.
+"Very severe."
+
+The prisoner did not speak. He was wearing, arranged across his heavy
+paunch, a handsome chain of gold. With fingers stiff from their hold upon
+the dock-rail he began, bunglingly, to detach this chain from his
+waistcoat. His watch came out with it--a big watch, with a double gold
+case. He opened the outer case in an aimless way, mechanically, and for no
+object, it seemed, for he did not look at the time. Then, without a word
+he held out the watch and chain to his friend, and lifted the fingers
+which had fumbled with the watch-case to his lead-coloured lips.
+
+Within a quarter of an hour from the time that William Day had listened to
+his heavy sentence of penal servitude he lay on his back, dead.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+For The Widow And The Fatherless
+
+
+At the initiative of George Boult a subscription was opened for "the widow
+and children of the late William Day, who had left them without any means
+of support."
+
+This sad and irrefutable statement was made in an advertisement in the
+local newspaper, and was written, in Mr. Boult's own round and clerkly
+hand, on the top of the list of subscribers hanging in conspicuous places
+in the Banks, the Public Library, the principal shops of the town.
+
+It was said by those competent to form an opinion that the engineering of
+this scheme to help poor Mrs. Day and her children should have been in
+other hands. That George Boult's social position in the town did not
+entitle him to head the list. A banker's name should have figured there,
+or the name of the M. P. for Brockenham, or Sir Francis Forcus's name.
+With such an influential person to lead the way it was argued that the
+smaller fry would have been more willing to follow suit. It was also
+whispered that one of such persons of wealth and note would have led off
+with at least a hundred pounds. George Boult's name was down for fifty.
+
+It was a large amount for him to give--not because he could not well have
+afforded more, but because he was all unaccustomed to giving. He had been
+known to be the unhappy man's friend, and because he headed the list with
+his fifty pounds it was said that no one liked to outdo that donation. Sir
+Francis Forcus, in order to avoid hurting those sensitive feelings with
+which Mr. Boult was accredited, had the happy thought to put his own name
+down for fifty pounds, and those of his wife and his young brother, each
+for the same amount.
+
+There were two more names down for like sums, after which came a few for
+ten pounds, a few more for five pounds; there were numerous donations of
+one pound; after which the subscriptions dropped to ten shillings, to
+five--
+
+Poor Mrs. Day, casting a sick eye down the list as it continued to appear,
+once a week, in the local paper, felt ashamed by the paltriness of the
+amounts which were being amassed in her behalf. "Collected by a
+well-wisher, six and nine." Several people, modestly content that their
+initials only should appear, presented two and six.
+
+"Sympathy" was down for a shilling. How degraded she felt as she read!
+Though, why a gift of a shilling should have hurt her more than the gift
+of fifty pounds she could not have explained.
+
+When, after dragging on far several weeks, the subscription list was
+closed the sum collected only amounted to a little over six hundred
+pounds.
+
+George Boult had been ready to pledge himself that it would have risen to
+a thousand. He had spared no trouble in the collection of the sum. The
+list of subscribers hung in a conspicuous place in his shop. He never
+failed to call to it the attention of his well-to-do customers. A case
+more needing help was never before the public of Brockenham, he would
+point out to them.
+
+But the public of Brockenham, severely shocked by the tragic circumstances
+of William Day's death, recovered quickly from the blow, to say that the
+death had been the best thing which could happen to the family. To be rid
+of such a man, to have no more attaching to them the reproach of a father
+and husband in prison, removed half the woeful load of misfortune from the
+case. That the children were mostly of an age to earn their own livings,
+their mother still fairly young and strong, were facts also remembered.
+Then the word began to be passed about from mouth to mouth--spoken in a
+whisper at first, but presently a word which might be spoken without fear
+of rebuke in any ear--that the Day family had always been eaten up with
+pride, and that the lawyer's troubles had come about through the
+extravagance of his wife.
+
+The sum of six hundred and forty-nine pounds being collected, what to do
+with it was the next thing to decide.
+
+The day after the subscription list was closed Mrs. Day went to an
+interview with George Boult in order to set before him a proposition, the
+result of the unanimous conclusion to which she and her children after
+many tearful consultations had come.
+
+"Of course I must have some plan to put before him," the mother had said,
+pathetically conscious that however helpless she felt she must by no means
+appear to be so. "It would not do for us to have made no plans, after the
+interest Mr. Boult has taken; and his fifty pounds."
+
+"I wish we could chuck it in his face," Bernard said; he was well on his
+way, poor boy, to exemplify the truth of the proverb that scornful dogs
+eat dirty puddings.
+
+"Of all the people who have given, Mr. Boult is the one I would most love
+to send his money back to," Bessie agreed. "We may be able to wipe the
+rest off our minds in time, but we shall never be allowed to forget the
+fifty pounds of the detestable Boult."
+
+"He was poor papa's friend--the only one. He was good to papa," Deleah
+said, but to herself alone. For in that unhappy household was a law,
+unwritten, unspoken, but binding none the less, that the name of the
+husband and father should never be spoken.
+
+"We must remember that the fifty pounds seems a great deal to him," Mrs.
+Day reminded them. "The least we can do is to pay him the compliment of
+telling him what we intend to do with the money."
+
+However, she found, on interviewing George Boult, that no such delicate
+attention was expected from her. The money he had raised was money for him
+to handle--for the benefit of Mrs. Day and her children of course, but
+without reference to what might be their feelings in the matter.
+
+He was not a man to doubt his own wisdom, or to seek to confirm an opinion
+with the approval of others, or to hesitate in the pursuit of a course
+which to his perceptions appeared desirable. Also, having mapped out his
+plan or set out on his chosen path he never afterwards allowed to himself
+that there were others. A simple method which reduced to nothing for him
+the chances of regret or mental worry.
+
+He was an eminently successful tradesman. His draper's business, which had
+been on a par with the businesses of half a dozen drapers when he had
+originally started in Brockenham, was now easily the first of its kind,
+not only in the town but in the county. It was natural that he should
+believe in trade--natural that he should fix his faith to nothing else as
+a means of money-making.
+
+"There's nothing like business," he said to Mrs. Day.
+
+She was seated in his private counting-room on the upper floor of the big
+shop--it was half a dozen shops joined into one now. To reach that room
+she had to pass through an ante-room full of entering clerks, busy at
+their desks. They lifted their heads from their quill-driving to look at
+the poor woman as she went by. She went with hanging head, her thick
+widow's veil over her face, the thought in her mind, "Perhaps among the
+poor clerks that collection of six shillings and ninepence had been made."
+Perhaps one of the chilblain-fingered girls behind the counters down below
+had been the "Sympathiser" to whom she had been indebted for a shilling.
+
+She was humbled to the earth. It was so she would have described her
+condition, as she walked to her interview with George Boult. If she had
+been told that her heart, on the contrary, was filled with pride, and
+beating high with rebellion, and that it was just the want of humility
+within her, who yet contrived to present a humble bearing, which made
+everything so unnecessarily painful, she would not have believed.
+
+When, seated opposite to him at the small square leather-covered
+writing-table in the draper's counting-house, she turned back her veil, he
+noticed at once the ravages which grief and shame and anxiety had made in
+her face. He was quick to notice, because, practical, hard-working,
+hard-headed widower as he was, he had an eye for female beauty, and the
+handsome dark face of his friend's wife--the woman who, in the days of her
+haughtiness, had turned her back on him and kept him at arm's length--he
+had unwillingly admired.
+
+The face of Lydia Day now was that of a woman who had been plump but was
+so no longer. The cheeks which had been firm and full were pendulous, the
+healthily pale but brunette complexion was of a leaden pallor; in the
+darkened skin beneath the deep-set, large dark eyes, little puckers
+showed. Her figure, too, had fallen away. She had lost her proud,
+self-assured carriage.
+
+"It's finished her off, as far as looks go," George Boult said to himself,
+not entirely without satisfaction. He was one of those who firmly believed
+his friend's ruin lay at her door. William Day had robbed to minister to
+his wife's extravagance and pride. It was well that she should be humbled.
+
+"There is nothing like business," he repeated. "And I have decided to
+invest the little capital of six hundred and forty-nine pounds and a few
+odd shillings I have raised for you, in a business which will yield a good
+return, and enable you to make a living for your two younger children. A
+groshery business, in short."
+
+"Grocery?" repeated Mrs. Day, gazing blankly at him.
+
+"Groshery," he said shortly, and looked hardily at her with his lips set,
+his chin stuck out, and his quick observant eyes on her face.
+
+"Grocery?" she reiterated faintly, at a loss for anything else to say.
+
+"You know that nice bright little business in Bridge Street? Carr's. Old
+Jonas Carr's. He is retiring, you know--or perhaps you don't know--it's
+been kept secret for business purposes. I am glad to have got hold of it
+in the nick of time, and I am putting your little capital into the
+business."
+
+"Indeed!"
+
+"It's a stroke of wonderful luck, I consider--its falling in, just now."
+
+"But I do not quite understand. Will someone who is taking the shop allow
+a good interest, do you mean?"
+
+"Not exactly that, ma'am." He gave a sound that might have been caused by
+a smothered chuckle, or have been meant for a snort of contempt, and going
+from the table, placed himself upon the hearthrug, where he paused, making
+a prayer perhaps for patience to be given him to deal with this fool in
+her untrained, untaught folly.
+
+"Not exactly," he went on. "I am taking the business for you to work,
+ma'am. Jonas Carr is an old man now, but he has lived out of the business,
+and brought up his children out of it, and this with only antiquated
+methods. With new life put into the concern, and with altogether
+up-to-date management, there is the making there, in my opinion--and I
+think I may say my opinion on such a matter is of value--of an excellent
+little business."
+
+"For me to work?" Mrs. Day asked in feeble protest. "Me? A _grocery_
+business?"
+
+"Why not?" He eyed her relentlessly, biting his finger nails. "What did
+you think you were going to do with the money which I have collected for
+you? Spend it? And collect again?"
+
+"Not that, Mr. Boult. Certainly not that." She looked down at the
+black-gloved hands which lay in her lap. They trembled; to keep them
+steady she caught them one in the other. "I have been talking it over with
+my children, and we have decided, if you approve, to take a good-sized
+house by the sea, where we could all live together, and take in lodgers.
+That would be a way of making a living which would come easier to my girls
+and me than any other."
+
+"Easier? Yes. The misfortune is, ma'am, that the things which are easier
+in the beginning are always difficult to finish up. We'll begin the other
+way round, if you please." He bit the nail a minute longer, looked at it,
+put it out of sight behind his coat tails. "Ah no; that scheme won't do at
+all," he said, quite pleasantly. "I know these lodgings, and the miserable
+women who keep them, and can only make ends meet by thieving the lodgers'
+mutton. The groshery line is altogether on another shelf. You and your
+daughters can not only make a living at it, you can make money. Make
+money."
+
+Mrs. Day lifted her head, tried to capture something of her old bearing,
+tried to get a note of firmness into her voice. "I do not really think I
+could keep a shop," she said. "Above all, a grocery shop. I could not
+undertake it, Mr. Boult; and I am sure the girls would not like it at all;
+nor my son."
+
+"What then?" he asked her, very quiet.
+
+"I think my own plan. The house by the sea. We should escape from
+Brockenham, which we much wish to do; we should begin again where
+we--where our story--is not known. For the children's sake it would be
+best. For us all it would be more--suitable."
+
+"But I have told you, ma'am, the plan is out of the question." He turned
+from her and kicked the coal in the grate, working off his irritation in
+that harmless fashion. Then, facing the poor lady again he adopted a tone
+intended to show her he was not to be trifled with. "Understand at once,
+Mrs. Day, I will be no party to the money subscribed on the tacit
+understanding that it is to be properly invested for you and your
+children, being thrown away in any such hopeless, silly fashion. Your
+husband asked me to stand your friend; to do my best for you. As I
+understand the position, you have no one else to look to?"
+
+He paused, but she said nothing. William Day's relatives had been poorer,
+less well placed than he. As he had risen he had left them behind,
+forgotten them. Mrs. Day had been the only child of parents long since
+dead.
+
+"Since there is no one else, I am willing to be your friend--within
+limits, of course. I have been instrumental in securing for you this sum
+of money--many fortunes have been made with less. To begin with I did not
+have half the capital. In doing so I made myself responsible for its being
+put to a proper use. I intend to see that it is done."
+
+Mrs. Day was mute. The eyes looking out from their dark-stained orbits
+were hopeless.
+
+Mr. Boult having paused for the reply which did not come, went on in a
+lighter tone. "There is a very good-sized house over Carr's shop. I went
+over it, and in deed into everything before deciding. There are six
+bed-rooms and a living room of unusual size. This gives you the
+opportunity of taking a lodger. I have already spoken to my new buyer
+about it. My Manchester man. He is anxious to board with a pleasant
+family, he tells me. So there you have a lodger ready to your hand, ma'am;
+since you fancy lodgers."
+
+Mrs. Day had a feeling of oppression in the breathless air of the
+counting-house, of being smothered by George Boult. She untied the broad
+strings of ribbon and crape of her widow's bonnet, and looked round
+anxiously for a window. There was none, the counting-house being lighted
+by a sky-light. Two big tears rolled down her cheeks, she drew a long
+breath like a great sigh.
+
+"I am giving my Manchester man a good salary," the draper went on. "He
+would easily be able to spare you thirty shillings a week for board and
+lodging, and I should not advise you to take a penny less."
+
+Mrs. Day with an effort pulled herself together. "The man who is to manage
+the shop would want a room in the house, I suppose?" she suggested.
+
+"Manage the shop? What shop?"
+
+"The shop you have been speaking of--the grocer's shop."
+
+"You yourself will manage it," Boult said. "Nice bright little concern as
+it is, the business won't keep a man; you will manage it, assisted on busy
+days by your eldest daughter."
+
+But although Mrs. Day could not fight for herself, she was capable of
+defending her children. "To that I could not consent," she said; "I would
+never allow Bessie--Bessie!--to wait in a grocer's shop."
+
+"It would not hurt her, ma'am. It would do her good."
+
+Mrs. Day was silent, but her silence was eloquent. With shaking fingers
+she tied her bonnet strings--the wide black strings that wanted pulling
+out, the narrow white ones which must be arranged above them.
+
+Boult, seeing that she was preparing to depart, assumed a more friendly
+tone. "You must not feel that you are being hustled into this thing," he
+said. "The money is, of course, in a sense, yours, although I have had to
+decide what to do with it."
+
+Mrs. Day rose to go, Boult came forward with his hand extended.
+
+"Anything that has to do with the people's food or drink _pays_," he said
+encouragingly. "If I had my time over again I would take up with the
+groshery line instead of the drapery. People must have food, ma'am. They
+must have it, even before frocks and furbelows."
+
+"About Bernard?" Mrs. Day asked, waiving, not without dignity, the other
+subject.
+
+"I have thought of sending Bernard to Ingleby. I have opened a branch
+there. It is not a big concern at present, of course, but the boy can
+learn the business there, and if he has anything in him--I shall keep my
+eye on him--he can come to us later."
+
+Then he grasped the hand she unwillingly extended.
+
+"You see I promised poor William," he told her, by way of explaining his
+kind interest in her affairs. "And however thankless the task may be, I
+shall keep my word."
+
+She could not answer him, but when he released her hand she bowed her head
+and went away.
+
+
+
+
+Before Mrs. Day betook herself home she turned her feet in the direction
+of Bridge Street. It was situated in a busy part of the town, but was only
+a short and not by any means prosperous thoroughfare connecting two of the
+principal streets. Standing on the opposite pavement Mrs. Day contemplated
+the grocer's shop from which Mr. Jonas Carr was retiring. His name in
+small white letters was painted on the black lintel of the door: "Jonas
+Carr, licensed to sell tobacco and snuff." A dingy-looking little shop;
+not such a shop as any of those on which the wife of William Day had
+bestowed her custom, and she had never been within its door.
+
+The three windows above the shop looked dirty, and closely over them were
+stretched dirty lace curtains. The windows on the higher floor were
+dirtier still, and in place of the lace curtains were crooked-hanging
+blinds.
+
+Poor Mrs. Day set her lips tightly as she looked. Then she crossed the
+street and entered the shop. Mr. Carr, behind the counter, a toothless,
+unpleasant-looking old man, was exhibiting in an apathetic manner a piece
+of fat bacon to a customer.
+
+"You can have the streaky if you prefer it," he said.
+
+The customer did prefer the streaky, and took it, half wrapped, under her
+shawl, and went.
+
+"And what for you, pray?"
+
+Mrs. Day asked for a quarter of a pound of tea, and while he served her
+looked about at the dark little dirty shop with its mingled odours.
+
+When she left the establishment of Jonas Carr her spirits had risen. The
+whole thing was ludicrous. Imagine the name of Lydia Day, "licensed to
+sell tobacco and snuff," painted over the door! Imagine her--her!--behind
+the counter of that squalid little shop! Imagine Bessie, and her exquisite
+young Deleah passing their lives in that upper room behind the net
+curtains! It was ridiculous, grotesque, impossible, and could not be.
+
+But she was to find with astonishingly small waste of time that it could
+be.
+
+And it was.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+Exiles From Life's Revels
+
+
+For the first year that Mrs. Day waited behind the counter of the Bridge
+Street shop more trade was done there than in the most prosperous period
+of old Jonas Carr's tenancy. Quite half the ladies of Brockenham left
+their particular grocers to bestow their custom on the widow. From
+kindness of heart, from curiosity, from the impulse to do as others were
+doing, people flocked to purchase their tea and sugar of Lydia Day,
+licensed also to supply them, if desired, with tobacco and snuff. George
+Boult's prognostications of the success of the venture seemed to be more
+than fulfilled.
+
+Bessie stoutly refusing to go into the shop--it took more than George
+Boult to manage Bessie!--he was constrained to sanction the engaging of a
+youth to assist behind the counter. Mr. Pretty, therefore--he was called
+"Mr." for business purposes, his tender years hardly entitling him to the
+designation--and a boy to go errands, composed the staff.
+
+From eight in the morning till eight at night the shop was open; and even
+when it was supposed to be closed, Mrs. Day could not enjoy an undisturbed
+rest with her daughters and Franky in their upstairs sitting-room. For the
+neighbouring tradesmen, all of whom had stretched out friendly hands to
+the poor lady so unwillingly becoming one of them, had the bad habit of
+forgetting to make their purchases till after shop hours, when they would
+send their maids-of-all-work to the private door for the supper cheese, or
+the breakfast coffee they had too late discovered they were "out of."
+
+Bessie and Deleah fought against the humouring of these out-of-season
+customers. Often they attempted to hold their tired mother forcibly in her
+chair when she would arise to go to them. "Let people get their goods at
+regulation hours, or refuse to serve them," said the Manchester man, now
+an inmate of the Day household. But when the grievance was put before
+George Boult he was of a different opinion.
+
+"Refuse to serve them over-night, and they go somewhere else in the
+morning," he asserted. "The maxim I have held by all my life is, 'Business
+is Never Done.' And you may take my word for it, ma'am, _successful_
+business never is done. Write that out on a card, Miss Bessie, and hang it
+over your mantelpiece."
+
+"No, thank you," from a scornful Bessie with an averted head. "As it
+happens I don't at all agree with you, Mr. Boult."
+
+So poor Mrs. Day, who did not grumble, but who nevertheless knew herself
+to be a martyr, would rise from her delicious rest in her chair over the
+fire, accompanied by Deleah to hold the candle, would descend to the
+cellar to cut the cheese--both the women were terrified of the cellar, the
+unilluminated caves and corners, the beetles, the rats. In the shop again,
+they would take down one of the monster green canisters, purchased of the
+retiring Jonas Carr for the purpose of striking awe into the bosoms of
+customers, but a few of which did, of a truth, hold tea, and select the
+special mixture to the taste of the laggard customer. It was an
+aggravation of the hardship when, in place of the maid, the mistress would
+run in. In that case Mrs. Day must stand for a half hour to listen to talk
+of the neighbour's children's colds, the neighbour's servant's
+delinquencies, the neighbour's husband's shortcomings.
+
+Bessie was always cross with her mother when she returned. "It makes
+everything so uncomfortable and spoils the evening," she complained. "The
+only time we have for comfort, mama. You might remember!"
+
+As the Christmas season approached Mr. Boult was inspired with an idea
+which was productive of good commercial results, but was the cause of
+added extreme discomfort to them all. Mrs. Day, he ordained, was not only
+to advertise home-made mincemeat, but to make the mincemeat at home, and
+of a quality not procurable in shops. The housewives of Brockenham made
+their own mincemeat because the article on the market was not palatable,
+the tyrant of the family declared. Every one of them would be glad to be
+saved trouble. Then, let Mrs. Day, for whom he had procured an excellent
+receipt, make it for them. The sale would be enormous.
+
+So they advertised the precious stuff from the beginning of December; and
+from a fortnight before this time to the end of the second week in
+January, the little family worked at stoning raisins (there were no
+machines to make the task easy then), chopping almonds and suet and apples
+and orange peel, late into the night, and sometimes on into the early
+hours of the morning.
+
+For the sale, as predicted, was great. It taxed the powers of the women to
+their utmost to keep up the supply. Orders poured in, orders were
+repeated; customers called to assure Mrs. Day that while she lived to do
+it for them they would never be bothered to make the stuff again. Others
+came with the intention to wheedle the receipt from the shop-woman. Such
+was the unbusiness-like disposition of the poor creature, she would at
+once have surrendered it, had the prescription been hers to give. But
+George Boult, knowing with whom he had to deal, had laid an embargo on the
+property.
+
+It was during the stress of that first Christmas in Bridge Street that the
+relations between the Days and their boarder, the Manchester man, hitherto
+somewhat strained and distant, became easy and familiar.
+
+Beside the comfortable chair in the chimney corner which had been
+apportioned him, a small table was drawn up which held, always ready to
+his use, his tobacco jar, his pipe, his book, his papers. To this, the
+evening meal which he shared with the family over, he would retire,
+preferring silence and, generally pretended, absorption in his book to the
+obtrusion of his conversation on the widow and her daughters. But in the
+harassment of the time of mincemeat the lodger's shyness evaporated or his
+reserve broke down. He could not see women, dropping with sleep and
+weariness, working themselves half to death over their hated tasks while
+he sat at ease with his pipe and his newspaper.
+
+"Why should you ladies spend your evenings in the kitchen?" he asked. "It
+is comfortabler in here. Chop your plums and grate your nutmegs and things
+here. You won't disturb me."
+
+Bessie at once demurred. "We will keep our sitting-room, at least, free of
+the shop, thank you," she said.
+
+"If Mr. Gibbon doesn't like being in here alone, mayn't he bring his pipe
+and see us chop in the kitchen," Franky suggested.
+
+The lodger had become possessed of a pistol, bought second-hand, with a
+view to practise on the stray cats who made a happy meeting-place of the
+Days' back yard. But, one of the girls proving tender-hearted on the
+subject of cats, bottles were substituted, Franky being admitted to the
+perfect joy of seeing Mr. Gibbon try to hit them from his bedroom window.
+An honour and privilege highly appreciated by the child.
+
+Mr. Gibbon would not bring his pipe, but presently he appeared among them,
+and drew up a chair to the table between Bessie and Deleah, and proceeded
+quite cleverly to cut up the orange and lemon peel, a task allotted him by
+Deleah.
+
+"It is quite the nicest and least messy of all the things," she told him.
+
+Deleah was careful at all times to show little special politeness to their
+boarder. She had it on her mind that he lived among them, lonely and
+apart, and often anxiously she pondered in her own mind the question did
+poor Mr. Gibbon get his money's worth?
+
+"Deleah always chops the candied peel herself," Bessie explained. "She
+eats it, and feeds Franky on it. Mama, I should think Deda will soon take
+all the profit off your mincemeat if she eats the citron peel."
+
+"Don't eat the citron peel, my dear," mama dutifully admonished the pretty
+younger daughter.
+
+"Only the tiniest little bit, mama. Kind of hard bits that you can't cut
+up. Bessie can take my place, and I can grate the nutmegs if she likes."
+
+"But last night, Miss Deleah grated her thumb as well. We can't have any
+of your thumbs, Miss Deleah, in the mincemeat."
+
+It was Emily who made that observation. Emily who had gone into the family
+nineteen years ago as nurse to the eldest child. She had stuck by them in
+their reverse of fortune--indeed it had never entered either her mind or
+theirs, so completely had the long service made her one of them, that she
+could do anything else--and she now occupied the position of "general" in
+the upstairs kitchen of Bridge Street. She was chopping suet at the
+present moment, standing apart, at a side table, because Bessie had
+declared that to see the suet cut made her feel ill.
+
+"Miss Bessie's more nice than wise," Emily commented; but she removed her
+material from the young lady's vicinity.
+
+"I'm glad to know that I'm nice, at any rate," Bessie said, with her head
+on one side. "So long as I'm nice, Emily--?"
+
+"Oh there's more than me in the world that think you that, I suppose, Miss
+Bessie."
+
+"I don't know, I'm sure," Miss Bessie languidly murmured. "I only know I'm
+very tired."
+
+"Give up for to-night then, dear, and go to bed."
+
+"Nonsense, mama. As if I could leave you all! Why should not I work as
+well as poor Mr. Gibbon, for instance?"
+
+"Some are made for work and some aren't, I suppose," that gentleman said,
+with a side glance at Bessie's white hands. "I'm one of the workers. I
+don't mind tackling your nutmegs after I've finished my lemons, if you'll
+say the word, Miss Bessie."
+
+"Mama, I wonder what Mr. Boult would say if he came in now and found me
+working like a slave at ten o'clock at night?"
+
+"Nothing complimentary, dear, I fear."
+
+"Horrid, rude man! Yesterday afternoon he found me sitting over the fire
+reading. I was in your comfortable chair, Mr. Gibbon--I hope you don't
+mind?"
+
+"I hope you'll always do it the honour of sitting in it, Miss Bessie; and
+you, Miss Deleah--"
+
+"I was gloriously comfortable; and Mr. Boult took upon him to lecture me."
+
+"Well, he doesn't stop at much! but how he ever screws up his courage to
+lecture _you_, Miss Bessie, passes everything," said the polite Manchester
+man.
+
+"I thought you'd be surprised," and Miss Day smiled obliquely at the
+nutmegs. "He called me names, too."
+
+"Names, Bessie! Surely not! What can you mean by 'names'?"
+
+"He called me a drone, mama. A drone in a busy hive."
+
+"And how did you answer him, Bessie?"
+
+"I just went on, toasting my toes at the fire, and reading my book."
+
+"And what then, Miss Bessie?"
+
+"Oh, then he sat down opposite to me and preached me a sermon. A sermon of
+five minutes, by the clock. He said--"
+
+"We don't want to hear any sermons, thank you," from a petulant, tired
+Franky. In the stress of their work the poor child's hour for retiring was
+often overlooked.
+
+"Go to bed, Franky. Go off, this minute. Mama, send Franky to bed."
+
+"Oh, go at once to bed, my darling boy."
+
+Franky, crying that he wanted to sit by Deleah and see her cut the citron
+peel, was removed: "I hate Bessie," he announced at the door.
+
+"Go! spoilt little wretch!" cried Bessie, threatening him with the nutmeg
+grater. "Mama, Franky is becoming as rude as a horrid little street boy."
+
+"Never mind, my dear. Tell me what Mr. Boult said in the sermon."
+
+"He said my happiness as well as my duty was to work. He said my
+'peevishness,' and my 'nervy fits'--wasn't it rude of him!--came from
+idleness. He did, Mr. Gibbon, he said it in so many words."
+
+"I hope you gave him one for hisself, Miss Bessie?"
+
+"Oh, I hope not!" from an alarmed mother.
+
+"It is what he wants, ma'am; and it is what he never gets. It is bully,
+bully, bully, all the day, with the governor. And unless Miss Bessie
+stands up to him--"
+
+"You may trust me not to be afraid. All the rest are afraid. Not I! I just
+raised my eyes to him, and said 'I wonder you dare to use such words to
+me, Mr. Boult!' You should have seen him look! 'It's because I take an
+interest in you,' he said; quite quiet, like any other man. It does him
+good to snub him, mama."
+
+"It was kind of him to say he takes an interest," Deleah put in.
+
+"Now if he was only a handsome young gentleman, and Miss Bessie could take
+an interest in him, there'd be more sense," Emily remarked from her side
+table.
+
+"Don't be such a ridiculous old thing, Emily!"
+
+"Well, he've got his kerridge!"
+
+"And a pretty sight he looks driving in it! podgy, fat, vulgar man!"
+
+"Miss Bessie would never look twice in that direction, I'm sure," Mr.
+Gibbon declared, and Mrs. Day gave one of her now seldom heard laughs.
+
+"How can you all talk such nonsense?" she said.
+
+"Oh, do let us do it!" Deleah pleaded. "It so helps with the citron peel,
+mama."
+
+Deleah said very little in those days. The shock, the grief for the cruel
+end of a father, for all his faults most dearly loved, told more on her
+than on any of his other children. She had not felt the sense of injury
+against him which had helped Bessie to support the tragedy of his death,
+nor had she Bessie's engrossing preoccupations with herself, her looks,
+her fancies, her love affairs. Bernard at George Boult's little branch
+shop in the country town of Ingleby, chained body and soul to the heavy
+drudgery of uncongenial occupation, thought of his father only with rage
+and resentment. Franky, childlike, had apparently forgotten.
+
+Deleah could not forget. Night by night her pillow was wet with tears shed
+for him on whose neck she had sobbed for those never-to-be-forgotten
+minutes of his last night on earth. She tortured herself with a secret,
+unearned remorse. Forgetting her habitual love and dutifulness, her mind
+would dwell on some remembered occasion when she told herself she had
+failed him. When she had pretended not to notice a hand held out for hers,
+or had shirked some little service she might have done him.
+
+Of none such small sins against him had the father been aware, but she was
+tormented by the belief that she had wounded him. He seemed ever to be
+looking at her with reproachful eyes. She forgot his ill temper, his
+unlovableness, his want of consideration for any one but himself, during
+the last wretched weeks of his sojourn among them, and saw him only as he
+had been upon that last night before his trial, heard always the great sob
+which had seemed to rend his chest as she had leant upon it.
+
+Her seventeenth birthday was past now, and it seemed to her mother that
+her young daughter had grown of a still more exceeding prettiness. Poor
+Mrs. Day often longed for a sympathetic ear into which to breathe her
+maternal admiration. With Bessie the subject of Deleah's beauty was like a
+red rag to a bull. Emily, the general and confidential friend of the
+family, was not an altogether satisfactory confidante on that matter,
+because in her eyes, blinded by affection, the whole family was equally
+beautiful.
+
+"You've got handsome children, ma'am. I've knowed it since folk used to
+crowd round my pram to have a look at them when I wheeled 'em out, times
+gone by, as babies. Ofttimes the pavement got blocked, as you've heard me
+mention before. There's no two opinions about their looks, and we know
+which side they got them from."
+
+There were no two opinions about that, at any rate. Not even the most
+charitable critic could have credited poor William Day with good looks;
+and the tired pathetic face of his widow was a handsome face still.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+The Attractive Bessie
+
+
+Having been permitted to take his place among them, and to chop material
+for mincemeat at their kitchen table, it was felt by them all that their
+boarder could never be a stranger to the widow and her children again.
+Through pride and through shyness they had held him at arm's length, but
+now that they had joked together about George Boult's peculiarities, and
+he had ventured with playful force to take the nutmeg grater from Bessie's
+weary fingers, valiantly completing her task himself, it would have been
+impossible, even if desirable, to return to their earlier relations.
+
+Bessie, who had treated him with a carefully masked hauteur in the
+beginning, was among the first to place him on terms of easy familiarity.
+She had strongly resented the inclusion of a stranger in their family
+circle, and presently was welcoming his presence there as supplying the
+one item of interest in the _ménage_.
+
+"A year ago, mama, we should not have admitted Mr. Boult's Manchester man
+to the same table with us. And now, here we are keeping his plates hot, if
+he comes in late, and telling him all our secrets."
+
+"Mama and I don't tell Mr. Gibbon any secrets," Deleah said.
+
+"I dare say Mr. Gibbon does not want to hear them. As for me I find, when
+you live in the same house with a man, it's impossible to keep him at
+arm's length."
+
+"Who wants to keep him at arm's length? I only mentioned I did not feel
+called upon to tell him any secrets."
+
+"And I only said he wouldn't care to hear your secrets--if you have any."
+
+"I haven't," Deleah admitted, laughing.
+
+"I have, then. And I shall tell them to who I like, spite of Deda's
+pertness, mama."
+
+"Say to 'whom you like,' Bessie."
+
+"Mama, will you speak to Deleah? She is being impertinent to me again."
+
+How impossible it would have been to entertain Reggie Forcus and Mr.
+Gibbon at the same board, Bessie often felt. But the days when Reggie had
+dropped in to meals with the prosperous Days in Queen Anne Street were
+over for ever. Half a loaf was better than no bread. To know that a male
+creature, who could not be indifferent to her, was an inmate of the house
+was as she often said to herself--something.
+
+She took no interest in him, of course. A young man out of a draper's
+shop! But it was more amusing to subjugate even such an one as he than to
+have no one at her feet.
+
+So, at the hour when Boult's great shutters went up over the front of the
+six shops in Market Street, and the Manchester man was free to go to his
+evening meal, Bessie took an extreme care to be ready to receive him. She
+had allowed herself to become a little slovenly over her appearance in the
+day-time--who was there to look at her, or care what she wore in the
+sitting-room over the shop? But by supper-time she would have changed into
+her most becoming frock, would have arranged her hair to the greatest
+advantage, would have rubbed with a rough towel, or beaten with a
+hair-brush the plump, fair cheeks she considered too pale.
+
+There was always an irregularity about the meals in the Day family. The
+shopkeeper was often kept below for an hour after the time she should have
+been seated at the board above, and when she was detained in such a way,
+Deleah would always stay too, to help her mother. But Bessie had ordained
+that the meal should go on without them. It was not right that a man, at
+work all day, should be kept waiting for his food at night. And so it
+often happened that he and she would sit, _tête-à-tête_, over the cold
+meat and pickles, of which, with the addition of bottled beer for the
+boarder, the meal consisted.
+
+Many intimate items of her own heart history did Bessie confide to the
+politely attentive ear of Mr. Charles Gibbon. She did not receive
+confidences in return, or ask for them. What could the young shopman have
+to relate to compare with the interest attending Bessie's revelations?
+
+He was no prince in disguise as it would have been so pleasant to discover
+him to be--this short, thickly-made, middle-aged man, with the prominent,
+bright, dark eyes, the large dark head, the knobbly red forehead, whose
+parents had kept a small draper's shop in a small market-town in the
+county.
+
+What could a man so born and nurtured have to give Bessie in return for
+the stories of the high life to which she had been accustomed? But he must
+consider himself flattered by Bessie's condescension, he must see how
+attractive she looked seated beneath the three-branched bronze gas-burner
+to preside at his supper.
+
+Emily, bringing in the hot sweet pudding to replace the cold meat, would
+wag a facetiously warning head at the young lady behind the back of the
+unconscious Mr. Gibbon. "Don't you go leading that nice young chap on to
+make a fool of hisself over you, Miss Bessie," she would caution the girl,
+the next day.
+
+"He can take care of himself. Make your mind quite easy," Bessie would
+answer, well pleased. She loved to discuss such topics with her devoted
+admirer, Emily, and liked to be accused of breaking hearts.
+
+"We shall be late for supper again," Mrs. Day, busy with daybook and
+ledger in the shop, would say to the young daughter beside her.
+
+"Never mind, mama. Perhaps it is charity not to hurry," Deleah on one
+occasion responded.
+
+"Oh, nonsense, dear!" said Mrs. Day, looking up with alarm in her tired
+eyes.
+
+"Well, if Mr. Gibbon is in love with Bessie?"
+
+"'If,' indeed!"
+
+"That will be the end of it. You'll see."
+
+"The end indeed, Deleah!"
+
+"You think Bessie would not take him?"
+
+"Bessie will, at least, wait till he asks her."
+
+"But should you object, mama? He is not a gentleman, I suppose; Bessie
+says he's not. But I think we've got to accept things and people and our
+place, as we are; not always to be looking back to what used to be. I
+often wish Bessie would see it like that, mama."
+
+"We should be all happier if we could, I have no doubt," poor Mrs. Day
+sighed. The poor lady could not always keep before her mind the fate of
+Lot's wife, and often cast longing eyes towards the pleasant, easeful land
+that had been home.
+
+"And I am not always inclined to take Bessie's opinion as to what is a
+lady or what is a gentleman."
+
+"Bessie does not think so much as you do, Deleah."
+
+"I don't know that I think: I feel," Deleah explained.
+
+While she waited for her mother to finish her books she was weighing out
+and making up into half-ounce packets the tobacco Lydia Day was licensed
+to sell. She dropped her voice to a more confidential tone, although she
+and her mother were alone in the shop, where they were doing their
+evening's work by the aid of the one melancholy gas-burner, to which they
+restricted themselves after business hours. It gave insufficient light for
+the low-ceilinged, narrow length of the place.
+
+"Do you think, mama, Bessie ought to be always saying horrid things about
+Mr. Boult? Making fun of him, mimicking him, complaining of everything he
+does; not only to you and me, but to Mr. Gibbon? to Emily--to any one who
+will listen? Do you think a lady--what you and I think a lady, not what
+Bessie thinks--would do that?"
+
+"Bessie is sensitive--and very proud. We must not forget that--poor
+Bessie! And Mr. Boult's methods are not always pleasant, Deleah."
+
+"No. But he has been our friend. He has stuck to us. Who else has, of all
+the people with whom we were friendly? And we were never nice to him, in
+the old days--not asking him to our parties, you remember, and never being
+friendly to him on Sunday afternoons. Oh, how I wish we had been, mama!"
+
+Mrs. Day acquiesced, but not with enthusiasm. She did not like George
+Boult well enough to regret having kept him at arm's length while she
+could.
+
+"I am sure we ought to be grateful to him," Mrs. Day admitted. She was
+very tired; the scent of the tobacco Deleah was pulling about, staining
+the tips of her small white fingers, was in her nostrils; she did not feel
+especially grateful.
+
+"Then, when Bessie is laying down the law about what a lady should do I
+wish you would remind her, mama, that a lady must show gratitude for
+kindness."
+
+"And why, my dear, are you suddenly fighting the battles of poor Mr.
+Boult?"
+
+"That is a secret," Deleah said. "But one day, if you are good, I will
+tell you."
+
+
+
+
+The sitting-room, with supper nicely laid, with Bessie nicely dressed,
+fair and plump and attractive in the gas light, happily chatting to Mr.
+Gibbon, looked a Paradise of Rest in the eyes of poor wearied Mrs. Day.
+The room was in fact a very pleasant one; long, low, with broad seats
+before each of the three windows looking into the street; with a tall and
+narrow oak mantelpiece opposite the three windows; with panelled oak
+walls, heavy oak rafters, supporting the low ceiling, old brass finger
+plates high up on the oaken door--all as in the days when old Jonas Carr's
+grandfather first kept shop in Bridge Street. It was made sweet with
+flowers too. A basket of pink tulips set in moss occupied the central
+position on the supper-table, and some pots of primulas, fully in bloom,
+were on the window-seats; above that window upon the corner of whose seat
+Miss Deleah Day liked to sit, her slight and supple body curled into as
+small as possible a space in order not to incommode the primulas, a brass
+birdcage holding a canary was hung.
+
+Bessie was carrying on an animated but evidently confidential conversation
+with the boarder, as mother and daughter came into the room.
+
+"He was riding past again to-day," she was saying. "I took care that he
+should not have the pleasure of thinking I was looking out for him; but
+peeping behind the curtains I could see him gazing up at the window. What
+consolation the poor thing finds in just looking at a window I'm sure I
+don't know."
+
+"He sees you there, Miss Bessie. Or hopes to see you."
+
+"You can't see me from the street."
+
+"From the opposite pavement you can. I know, because I have seen Miss
+Deleah sitting there; with her book, and the bird, and the flowers."
+
+Bessie's attention was caught by that piece of intelligence. "Can you? Are
+you sure?" she asked; and at that moment, unpropitious for her, Deleah
+appeared with her mother.
+
+"Mama! When Deda sits on the window-seat in the corner she can be seen
+from the street!"
+
+"Well, my dear?"
+
+"Well, mama! You don't wish Deda to make herself conspicuous, I suppose?"
+
+"Who says I make myself conspicuous?" an ireful Deleah demands. "Who has
+been saying anything about me?"
+
+"I," the Manchester man hurriedly admits. "I did not say you were
+conspicuous, Miss Deleah. I only said I had seen you sitting there with
+your book--among the flowers."
+
+"She is not to sit there again, mama. Will you please say so? Deda, you
+are not to sit in the window again. We can't help living above a grocer's
+shop, but we need not make a display of ourselves."
+
+"If it offends Mr. Gibbon he does not need to look at the window. I shall
+certainly sit there if I wish."
+
+"Come, come, my dears. There is enough about it. Pray let us have supper
+in peace."
+
+"You've had a tiring day, ma'am," says Mr. Gibbon. "Let me persuade you to
+have a glass of ale with your beef, to-night. Just to revive you. Forcus's
+Family Ale is the finest pick-me-up."
+
+"Reggie Forcus has ridden past three times this afternoon, mama," Bessie
+informed her parent. Then turned sharply on her sister, "You were at
+school, miss."
+
+"I met him as I came away," said Deleah, seating herself at the table. "I
+wish the pleasure had been yours instead of mine, Bessie."
+
+"Did he stop to speak?"
+
+"Of course he stopped. He always stops."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"He asked for you."
+
+"He always does, I suppose?"
+
+"Always."
+
+"There!" said Bessie on the note of triumph, looking round.
+
+"There!" echoed Deleah as she helped herself to the mustard Mr. Gibbon was
+offering her.
+
+"Mama, do you hear Deda? She is not to mock me."
+
+"Bread, Miss Deleah? Pickles, Mrs. Day?" hastily interposes an obsequious
+Mr. Gibbon. He was assiduous in his attentions on the ladies, ever
+anxiously polite and kind. That he found his happiness among them and was
+eager to gain and to retain their favour he plainly showed. If he
+sometimes jarred on their fastidiousness he did not know it.
+
+"Any interesting incident in the day's trade, ma'am?" he asked, as he
+busied himself in supplying their wants.
+
+Nothing much. The Quaker lady had been again for sugar. Again Mrs. Day had
+unconditionally pledged herself that the canes from which it had been
+derived had not been grown by slaves.
+
+"And have they?" Deleah asked.
+
+"I'm sure, my dear, I don't know if they have or they haven't," a harassed
+grocer-woman acknowledged. Her conscience was becoming blunted in the
+stress and strain of business life. "She took a pound of it as usual, and
+that's all I can say about it."
+
+"But, mama! For the sake of the profit on a pound of sugar!"
+
+"There's no profit on it at all, Bessie. If she had taken a quarter of a
+pound of tea with it there would have been three-ha'pence into our
+pockets. But she did not. So you see I perjured myself for nothing."
+
+"Don't let the thought trouble you for an instant, ma'am," Mr. Gibbon
+advised. "None of us can afford to be too nice in trade. We've got to
+live, Miss Bessie. Customers don't think so--they'd skin us if they
+could--but we have. I'm of Mr. Boult's mind on that subject, although
+there isn't much I uphold him in. 'Let us do our best for the public while
+it pays reasonable prices,' he says, 'and when it won't, let us _do_ the
+public.'"
+
+"All that is so low, Mr. Gibbon."
+
+"But it's business, Miss Bessie. Business is low."
+
+"Oh, don't let us talk about it now," Deleah pleads.
+
+"Deleah has a secret. She's dying to tell us all," Deleah's mother said.
+
+"It's something Deleah's been up to!"
+
+"No, Bess. Calm yourself. Calm all yourselves."
+
+"But how can we? Out with it, darling."
+
+"It's nothing, mama."
+
+"Nothing?"
+
+"Only an idea of mine."
+
+"Something you've been and made up, Deda!"
+
+"Something I'm as sure of, Bessie, as I am that you're always dying to
+find fault with me. Thank you, Mr. Gibbon, I've got _three_ pieces of
+bread already, look!"
+
+"You've handed Deleah bread three times in as many minutes, Mr. Gibbon."
+
+"Hand the bread _only_ to Bessie, Mr. Gibbon. (Mama, I _must_ answer
+_sometimes_.")
+
+"We're waiting for the secret, dear."
+
+"It's about our mysterious presents, mama. Mr. Gibbon, you have heard us
+talk about our unknown benefactor who loads us with delightful things, and
+yet is so ungenerous he won't give us the pleasure of saying 'thank you.'"
+
+Yes. Mr. Gibbon had heard that there was some one who sometimes sent Miss
+Deleah flowers.
+
+"They're always sent to Deleah--but I suppose they're meant for all of
+us," Bessie said.
+
+"And because they came in my name only, gave me the first clue," Deleah
+said. "Let me see, we began with violets, didn't we? And in January, when
+they were scarce and expensive. Lovely bunches of violets 'for Miss
+Deleah.' Miss Deleah's name done in printing characters, so that no one
+should discover by the handwriting. Then we went on to a basket of
+sweets--sweets of my very most particular kind, such as none of us can
+afford any longer to look at. Oh, my mouth waters to think of them even
+now! No, I didn't ask for any more water in my glass, thank you, Mr.
+Gibbon."
+
+"We all know what you had, Deleah; we thought we were going to hear who
+sent them."
+
+"Patience! Patience, good people all! Let me see, what came next? Oh, the
+bird in the cage. And there he is still in his cage for you all to see,"
+and Deleah leant back in her chair, and threw her pretty head over her
+shoulder to look at the canary hanging above the left-hand window where
+was her favourite seat. "Then the azalea. The lovely rose-pink azalea; and
+after that--oh, I forget. But always something coming--something that we
+cannot afford to buy, but which has made our sitting-room delightful; and
+horrid Bridge Street a bearable place to live in. Now you have all been
+dying to find out who it is that has given us these delightful things; but
+I have always known; and at last I am going to tell you."
+
+"Then, if you knew you should have told us. Deda ought not to have been so
+sly about it, mama, if she knew."
+
+"We shall each have one guess; and Bessie, as a reward for her
+good-nature, shall have the first. Now, Bessie?"
+
+"I've known all along, too, miss. And what's more, I've known that
+although they were sent to you, they were meant for me. Reggie Forcus."
+
+"Wrong. Here is Emily with the pudding. Emily, you shall have a guess; who
+is it who sends the flowers, and the books and the birds in the cages--?"
+
+"One of the masters at the school that has fell in love with you, Miss
+Deleah." Emily gave her opinion without hesitation, going on with her
+business of changing the plates.
+
+"Wrong again, Mr. Gibbon? Now, I give you a tip. Think of the least likely
+person in all the world."
+
+"The Quaker lady who objects to slave-grown sugar."
+
+Deleah laughed as she shook her head. "That is most ingenious. And would
+be delightful; but it is wrong. Now, mama. The least likely person in all
+the world, remember."
+
+"Mr. George Boult."
+
+"Mama has it. It is Mr. Boult."
+
+"Oh, my dear child, I hope not!"
+
+"Scrooge?" cried Bessie. "Never!" Bessie herself had bestowed the name of
+Scrooge on the successful draper, to whom, as far as his personal
+appearance went, it was absurdly inappropriate.
+
+"It is Scrooge;--a converted Scrooge; and I, I suppose, am Tiny Tim. And
+he has heaped benefits on me, mama; meaning thereby to benefit the
+family."
+
+"Oh, my dear, it can't be! I am sure you are wrong, Deleah. Mr. Gibbon, do
+say she is wrong. It can't possibly be Mr. Boult."
+
+Mr. Gibbon only threw back his head and loudly laughed.
+
+Deleah was a little hurt that the boarder should have forgone his usual
+careful politeness to receive the exposition of her idea with ridicule.
+She contemplated him gravely till he stopped laughing and gazed with an
+apologetic, anxious gravity in his protruding, extraordinarily speaking
+eyes back at her. Then she turned from him to her mother.
+
+"Why do you think it impossible, mama? Because Mr. Boult can't _say_
+agreeable things is no reason he cannot do them. Don't you know that there
+are poor shut-up souls who want to be nice, who long to be loved--who have
+to speak in the dumb language because they can't articulate?"
+
+"Miss Deleah is right. That is so. That is so!" Mr. Gibbon eagerly
+affirmed.
+
+"Well, then, Mr. Boult isn't blessed with a tongue to say smooth things;
+but the bird in the cage, the basket of sweets, the rose-pink azalea--they
+are his kind and polite speeches."
+
+"My dear, what nonsense!" cried Mrs. Day, who did not wish to believe in
+Mr. Boult as the author of such agreeable attentions.
+
+But the Manchester man assented with enthusiasm: "Miss Deleah is right,
+ma'am," he said. "A man who could not get at Miss Deleah to say things to
+her might try to say them so."
+
+"And you think Mr. Boult wants to say things to Deleah?" a scornful Bessie
+demanded.
+
+"No, I don't, since you ask me. No, Miss Bessie."
+
+"I should think not! And why, pray, should he have pitched on Deda?"
+
+"Oh, why should any one pitch on me?" Deleah asks, lays down knife and
+fork, spreads hands abroad, as if inviting with exaggerated humility an
+inspection of her poor claims to favouritism.
+
+"But--if it were Mr. Boult I think I can understand why it might be
+Deleah," Mrs. Day said slowly, looking down. She was remembering how her
+poor husband had made no secret of the fact that the younger girl was his
+pet; and she recalled also that for her father's sake it was Deleah who
+treated the arrogant, tyrannical man with unfailing respect and courtesy.
+
+"Yes. And I can understand it too, mama," Deleah softly said.
+
+"Well, them that live'll see," Emily remarked sententiously as she removed
+the remains of the sago pudding.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+The Attractive Deleah
+
+
+An engagement had been secured for Deleah Day as assistant English
+governess at a ladies' school. At Miss Chaplin's seminary she was employed
+in hearing lessons learnt by heart from Brewers' _Guide to Knowledge,
+Mangnall's Questions_, Mrs. Markham's _History of England_; in reading
+aloud while her pupils tatted or crocheted mats and antimacassars; in
+struggling with them through the intricacies, never mastered by herself,
+of Rule of Three and Vulgar Fractions, from nine every morning till five
+every afternoon; with the exception of the Wednesday, when there was a
+half-holiday, and the Saturday, when there was no school at all.
+
+The slightness of Deleah's figure and the fragility of her small face,
+with its innocent, unconscious allurement, were increased by the black
+garments she still wore. To cast off her mourning for her unhappy father
+would be, she felt, a slight to him.
+
+"It is as if Bessie had forgotten," she said to herself, seeing her sister
+in the blues and pinks in which she began as summer came on again to array
+herself, for supper and the Manchester man. "I do not forget."
+
+Black was not a fashionable wear in that age, only being used for
+mourning. A woman wearing black did it to proclaim she sorrowed for the
+dead. The sentiment attached to her sable garments heightened the interest
+awakened by Deleah's slight form and her winsome face;--made her clear
+skin paler; made her eyes shine more jewel-like beneath the fine line of
+her black brows.
+
+Among the members of her own sex were, at the period of her eighteenth
+birthday, all the captives to her charms of which Deleah was aware. There
+is no such ardent lover as a schoolgirl when she conceives a passion for
+another girl at school; and half a dozen of the little pupils at Miss
+Chaplin's were head over ears in love with Deleah Day. They sighed at her,
+their adoring eyes clung to her face, they suffered agonies of jealousy
+through her. They were cast down by a word, elated by a smile.
+
+One of the girls then acquiring a polite education at Miss Chaplin's
+seminary remembers to this day how she slept, night after night, with a
+glove--such a worn and shabby glove--of the young English teacher beneath
+her pillow. She possesses still an album called "The Deleah Book," wherein
+is pasted an atrocious photograph--all photographs (cartes-de-visite they
+were called)--were libellous and atrocious in those days--of a girl in a
+black frock, the skirt a little distended at the feet by the small hoop of
+the day, a short black jacket, with black hair parted in the middle over a
+smudge of a face and gathered into a net at the back of the neck. Beneath
+it is written Deleah's name and the date.
+
+In "The Deleah Book," too, are treasured, scrawled there in the schoolgirl
+writing, the words of wit and wisdom gathered from the idol's lips,
+together with such precious items of information and memorabilia as the
+following:
+
+"Tennyson is the favourite poet of D. D."
+
+"Of all flowers the rose is the Queen, and is the best loved of D. D."
+
+"To remember to keep back unkind words. D. D."
+
+"If we knew all we should find there are excuses for all. D. D."
+
+"(Note). Burnt almonds are the favourite sweet of D. D. and 'Abide with
+Me' is D. D.'s favourite hymn."
+
+Their ways lying in the same direction, it was this young devotee who was
+privileged to walk home with the passionately admired D. D. On a certain
+afternoon as they made their way through the quiet streets of the old town
+their talk was of a long-advertised concert to take place that evening, at
+which a great singer was to appear.
+
+"How much you will enjoy it, Kitty," Deleah was saying with a little
+girlish longing. "Not only the concert, but everything. Let me picture it.
+You will run home when you leave me--me in horrid Bridge Street!--and in
+your bedroom there will be a fire lit, and on the bed your pretty evening
+frock will be spread, and your lace petticoat, and your silk stockings--"
+
+"Oh, how do you know all that, Miss Day? You know everything! But I shan't
+enjoy the concert a bit. I shall not. Do you know why? Because you will
+not be there."
+
+"Oh, nonsense, Kitty! Nonsense! Nonsense!"
+
+"I shall be thinking of you all the time, and wishing--oh wishing! Miss
+Day, do you believe it is true that if we keep on wishing with all our
+strength--not a selfish pig of a wish, you know, but something nice for
+another person--the wish ever, _ever_ comes true?"
+
+"Every wish is as a prayer with God," quoted Deleah, unquestioning in her
+child's heart the literal truth of the words.
+
+"Then, Miss Day, this is not Kitty Miller walking with you any longer, but
+one big solid Wish--Oh, there he is again, Miss Day! There is young Mr.
+Forcus--look!"
+
+"I see him. I am not going to stop. Let us walk on quicker, Kitty."
+
+"Isn't it strange that he should always be riding here, just when we come
+out of school, Miss Day?"
+
+"Never mind. No; you are not to look round, Kitty."
+
+"How _beautifully_ he pulls off his hat! He had a most dreadfully
+disappointed look when you would not stop, Miss Day. I think you are very
+cruel."
+
+"Never mind. No, Kitty! Don't, dear. No lady looks back when a gentleman
+passes her."
+
+(A new entry appeared in "The Deleah Book" that night: "No lady looks
+round when a gentleman passes her. D. D.")
+
+"Miss Day!"--with a soft, irrepressible giggle--"He has turned his horse
+and is riding after us."
+
+"Never mind. Let us hurry on."
+
+But when the mare was pulled up beside her, her hoofs clattering on the
+cobble-stones of the street, Miss Day, in spite of herself, must stop.
+
+"How do, Deleah?" Kitty Miller had again the privilege of seeing how
+beautifully the hat came off, exposing for quite an appreciable time the
+young man's fair, smooth head. "Whoa, Nance!" to the satin-skinned, black
+mare, who objected to being pulled into the gutter running by the side of
+the pavement. "I say--there was something I particularly wanted to say to
+you, Deleah. Whoa! Steady, old girl! I say--how's Bessie?"
+
+"Bessie is very well, thank you, Mr. Forcus."
+
+"'Mr. Forcus?' Come, I say, Deleah! you aren't going to put me at arm's
+length, that fashion! I was going to ask you--How is Bessie?"
+
+"Very well, thank you."
+
+"I haven't seen Bessie for ages."
+
+"Is it so long?"
+
+"I was wondering if I might look in sometimes on Mrs. Day--"
+
+"Mama is always busy, thank you."
+
+"At your place, then?--Just to see--Bessie?"
+
+"I'm sure I don't know. You'd better ask Bessie herself."
+
+"I'll ask her when I call. Whoa! Steady, you fool! Steady! What time could
+I come when I shouldn't be in the way?"
+
+"We're always busy. Always. I think perhaps you'd better not come at all."
+
+"Thank you! Why?"
+
+"You used to come, if you remember; and you gave up coming," Deleah said.
+The small face turned to him was unsmiling and proud. The clear eyes of
+pale hazel looked past the fine young man on the beautiful fidgeting
+horse.
+
+"I'm more my own master now," he said. "I should like to look in upon you
+all again, Deleah."
+
+"You had better not. Good-bye."
+
+"Wait! Wait! One minute! I say, are you going to this concert to-night?"
+
+"Of course. All of us. Even Franky. Half-guinea places. Why need you ask?"
+
+"But if I get you some tickets? You and Bessie and Mrs. Day? I will, you
+know. I will, Deleah, if you'll say you'll go--"
+
+"The tickets were all sold a fortnight ago. You're too late," she said;
+and then she smiled her winning smile, in spite of herself, upon him and
+moved on.
+
+Kitty was waiting for the older girl a few paces farther on. "There!" she
+said, her eyes wide with awe. "There, Miss Day! My wish nearly came true!
+Oh, if he could have got you tickets and you would have gone, how
+heavenly, heavenly everything would have been to-night!"
+
+
+
+
+Tea was ready in the sitting-room above the shop when Deleah reached home.
+Tea with thick bread-and-butter, dry toast, water-cress, little dishes of
+sliced ham, and pastry-tarts made in Emily's best fashion; and Bessie and
+Franky were already seated at the table.
+
+By Deleah's plate a letter was lying. A letter at which she looked
+dubiously, shrinking a little from opening it; for it was addressed, in a
+fashion which had become embarrassingly familiar to her, in carefully
+printed characters.
+
+"It's money, this time, we think," Franky cried, jumping in his chair.
+"Make haste, Deda."
+
+"We're simply dying to know what he's sent you. How slow you are!" Bessie
+scolded.
+
+Reluctantly Deleah broke the envelope and drew forth two tickets for the
+evening's concert.
+
+"The ten-shilling places!" Bessie cried. "We'll go, Deleah. We'll go!"
+
+Deleah looked with a little distrust at the tickets lying beside her
+plate. "It's all very well, but I should so much prefer presents without
+all this mystery about them. Months ago I would have thanked Mr. Boult if
+you and mama would have allowed me. I am sure it would have been better. I
+am sure we ought to thank him."
+
+"That doesn't matter now. We've got to think about the concert. I'm going
+to it, and I can't go without you."
+
+"I don't know if we ought to go, Bessie--"
+
+"Why not, pray?"
+
+Deleah was silent.
+
+"Because of papa? He's been dead nearly two years. Are we never to show
+our noses among other people again? You do carry things to extremes,
+Deda!"
+
+Deleah accepted the reproach meekly, having nothing to say--nothing, that
+is, which Bessie would understand.
+
+Then the boarder came in, for it was early closing afternoon, and took his
+place by the side of Franky.
+
+"Some more mysterious presents," Bessie said, smiling upon him. "Very
+useful ones, this time, and just what I should have wished for."
+
+"Tickets for the concert," Deleah explained, pushing them across to him.
+"Ten-shilling ones. Poor Mr. Boult hates music. I heard him say once that
+he believed every one hated it, and that when they pretended to like it it
+was only affectation and humbug. What pleasure can he possibly get in
+giving us these tickets for which we may not even thank him?"
+
+"He'll have the pleasure of knowing that you are happy, and that he has
+made you so, Miss Deleah. And you too, of course, Miss Bessie."
+
+"But Mr. Boult no more sent those tickets, than he sent the bird in the
+cage, or the--!"
+
+"Oh, you're thinking of Reggie Forcus again," Deleah interrupted
+impatiently. "Such nonsense, Bessie!"
+
+"She thinks a lot more of him than he does of her," Franky announced,
+munching his bread-and-butter.
+
+Bessie got up from her place at the tea-tray and with purpose in her eyes
+walked round the table. "You take that for impertinence, sir!" she said,
+and administered a stinging slap to Franky's cheek. His intention of
+immediate retaliation was frustrated by Mr. Gibbon's seizing the tea-spoon
+he was about to hurl at his assailant.
+
+"I hate Bessie," Franky said; but he was used to having his face slapped
+by his elder sister, and went on munching his bread-and-butter and
+water-cress, not much the worse.
+
+"We can't go to the concert, Bessie," Deleah was presently saying. "We've
+got no evening frocks."
+
+"Oh, but we have!" Bessie quickly reminded her. "The frocks which were new
+for our party and never worn again."
+
+"We _can't_ wear them!" Deleah pleaded. She felt that she could never
+endure even to look at those garments again.
+
+"But we can, and we will," Bessie declared. She was a very practical
+person in matters connected with millinery and dressmaking, and in a
+minute had planned the slight alterations and additional furbishings
+required for their party frocks. Black ribbons instead of blue run in the
+lace of the bodices. Deleah's skirt would be short, but who would see that
+if Deleah were sitting down?
+
+Deleah drooped as she listened, leaving the tea in her cup and the
+bread-and-butter untouched on her plate.
+
+"Elbows off the table, Deda," Franky reminded her, who was frequently
+commanded to remove his own.
+
+Deleah took no heed. She sat with brow leaning upon the hand which
+screened her face, looking back upon that evening before the shadow of
+misfortune and disgrace had touched them all; when she had worn her new
+white silk frock, and papa had played the tambourine.
+
+Bessie had gone, leaving her tea also, untasted; hurrying away to Emily,
+who would help her to pull off the forget-me-nots from her frock, and to
+substitute the black ribbon which would be more decorous. Bessie's pale,
+full cheeks were pink with excitement, her eyes shone.
+
+"Black will look better than blue, even--although that _was_ your
+colour--against your white skin," Emily encouraged her.
+
+Mr. Gibbon had made himself a neat sandwich of water-cress and thin
+bread-and-butter. He paused in the act of daintily sprinkling it with salt
+pinched in finger and thumb, and looked at Deleah across the table, her
+hand hiding her face. So long he looked at her, so long she remained
+unconscious of him, that Franky ventured in their preoccupation to help
+himself to a third piece of cake, his allowance being two.
+
+"Miss Deleah, if you don't want to go to this concert to-night, why go?" at
+length the boarder ventured to ask. Deleah dropped the shielding hand; she
+had for the moment forgotten the presence of Mr. Charles Gibbon.
+
+"Bessie wants to go. Of course, I must go with her," she said.
+
+"But why 'of course,' if you don't wish? Whoever sent those tickets--"
+
+"Mr. Boult sent them."
+
+"Well, then, Mr. Boult sent them to make you happy; not unhappier."
+
+"I know. I am really quite grateful, Mr. Gibbon. It was only those
+dresses. We wore them at a dance at our house--the evening
+before--everything. I can't think how Bessie can! But she does not feel
+things as I do. She never did feel like--dying--of pity--and sorrow--as I
+did." She lifted her cup to her lips to hide the fact that tears were
+rolling down her face.
+
+Mr. Gibbon sighed heavily. He pushed his own cup away from him as a signal
+perhaps that for him also the tea was spoilt. "But why need you go in that
+particular frock, Miss Deleah?"
+
+"I haven't another."
+
+"The one you have on."
+
+"This one? Oh!"
+
+She laughed with the tears in her eyes, and looked down at her school
+frock--a black skirt and a white muslin "garibaldi" (the garment so called
+at that time being extremely like the shirt blouse, or waist, as the
+Americans have it, of to-day). "Oh, how funny men are!" she said. "To
+think I could go in the half-guinea places in such a dress!"
+
+"It's a beautiful dress, isn't it! It seems so to me. And I don't think it
+matters at all what you wear, Miss Deleah."
+
+He spoke in a hushed voice, as if conscious of saying something of
+tremendous import. Deleah accepted the remark as a simple statement of a
+fact.
+
+"It doesn't matter, perhaps, really. But Bessie thinks differently. Most
+people do. I shall have to wear what Bessie wishes."
+
+"I notice you are always the one to give way, Miss Deleah."
+
+"No--not always, Mr. Gibbon."
+
+"Can I do anything? I would do _anything_--" He spoke in the same hushed
+voice; with his arms extended on each side of his plate, he was gripping
+the edge of the table tightly, "Anything!"
+
+"I know. I know you are a true friend. I know she talks to you. She talks
+about Mr. Reggie Forcus. Bessie can't see that things are different with
+us--at least she sees, of course, but she does not realise that they must
+be different; not only now, but for ever. She never sees us with other
+people's eyes. It never comes home to her that the friends we had we can
+never have again. What have people like the Forcuses to do with us!"
+
+"I think that Mr. Reggie Forcus, mighty as he thinks hisself, or the
+Prince of Wales, come to that, might feel hisself honoured to be taken
+notice of by you, Miss Deleah--or by Miss Bessie."
+
+Deleah laughed in spite of herself. "You are too kind, Mr. Gibbon."
+
+She got up from her chair and picked up the concert tickets and twisted
+them about in her fingers with a little distaste of them. "All this is
+very kind of Mr. Boult, of course," she said: "and one likes to be sure
+there is a generous heart beneath that--well, that atrocious manner of
+his. But we're under mountains of obligation to people already, and we can
+do without concert tickets. We can do without--" She was going to say
+without flowers, but she leant across the table and stooped her face above
+the pot of heliotrope that graced the centre of the humble board, then
+lifted it, shaking her head. "No; we could not do without the flowers,"
+she said. "I do thank the good man for his flowers; and I shall tell him
+so the first time I see him. I have made up my mind."
+
+"I would not if I were you, Miss Deleah."
+
+"But why not? Do tell me why not?"
+
+"Mr. Boult is a good business man. He's my chief, and I'm not going to
+speak against him; but I don't quite see him buying you flowers."
+
+"You know he loved my poor father, don't you?" she asked him in a lowered
+voice. She had never mentioned the dead man's name to him before; her
+cheek paled, he saw, as she did so now. "And I was my father's pet. You
+will not think me vain for saying that, will you? Mama will tell you it is
+not my selfish fancy alone. Mama will tell you it is true."
+
+"Indeed, Miss Deleah, I can quite believe it."
+
+"He was a good father to us all, and fond of us all, but of me he would
+talk always if he could get any to listen. He liked me to sit on his
+knee--I was younger then--to walk with him, and wait on him--" Her voice
+broke; she waited a minute before she went on. "And so I suppose Mr. Boult
+sends these things to me for papa's sake. I could not explain before; but
+you understand, do you not?"
+
+He quite understood her point of view, Mr. Gibbon said, looking at the
+tablecloth.
+
+"I knew you would, when I could explain. I think poor Mr. Boult likes me
+to take what he sends, for papa's sake--as if it really came from papa.
+You see what I mean? And I can't help thinking there is something
+beautiful in that thought of his."
+
+Mr. Gibbon reflectively agreed. It was a beautiful thought, come to think
+of it, he said.
+
+"Well, then--?" said Deleah.
+
+"Well then, Miss Deleah, don't you think by mentioning the matter to him,
+you'll spoil all that? His intention, his beautiful thought, and the rest
+of it."
+
+"Perhaps!" Deleah acquiesced seriously. "I must think about what you say."
+
+"You've done me a great honour to mention it, Miss Deleah. You won't think
+I'm taking upon myself in any way to give you my opinion?"
+
+"Oh, Mr. Gibbon! How could I ever think such a thing!" Deleah said, but
+began at once to be a little ashamed of the confidence she had made. With
+a man who could ask if he was "taking upon himself" she ought to have been
+more reserved, she thought.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+The Gay, Gilded Scene
+
+
+Mrs. Day, being told that her daughters proposed to go unchaperoned to the
+Assembly Rooms that night, declared that for them to do so was unheard-of
+and not to be sanctioned. But, under the strain of adversity the poor
+woman's will, never a strong one, had weakened. She was painfully
+conscious of her own helplessness in the grip of circumstances, and was
+always troubled with doubts as to the wisdom of her own judgment. By the
+time her day's work was over she was too tired to stand up against any
+power she came into collision with. In all that concerned Bessie she was
+absolutely feeble. Bessie was victor always, not by reason of superior
+strength but through fractiousness, through stubbornness, through a
+hysterical determination to talk the opposing voices down, through her
+habit of crying like a baby when contradicted, and flinging things about.
+
+So, on this particular occasion, the elder daughter avowing in a high,
+excited voice that not many pleasures came in her way, and that when one
+did come she meant to take it, let her mother be pleased or let her be
+teased, the objections were speedily silenced.
+
+Leaving the shop for once in the care of Mr. Pretty, Mrs. Day went
+upstairs for the pleasure of seeing her girls once more in gala attire.
+
+"I have taken the liberty of ordering a fly for the young ladies," Mr.
+Gibbon said as he and the mother sat awaiting the appearance of the pair.
+
+"Oh, Mr. Gibbon, if you would go with them, and see them safe to the
+Assembly Rooms I should be so much obliged."
+
+Mr. Gibbon, with great solemnity of mien, thoroughly realising the
+responsibility of the office, undertook to do so. He, for his part, was
+going to take his chance of hearing the great singer with the expenditure
+of a shilling only. He would be in the Promenade, but his eyes should be
+on the Miss Days, and if protection were required by them he would be at
+hand.
+
+Mrs. Day was by no means sure in her anxious heart that her daughters
+might not need the strong arm of the male to defend them. She thought as
+she surveyed them while they awaited the arrival of the fly that no mother
+had ever possessed such treasures to guard. Bessie was always especially
+comely in evening dress. Her plump, clearly pale cheeks were now pink with
+excitement. Her white skin against the black ribbon round her throat and
+threaded through the lace over her ample young bosom was dazzlingly fair.
+
+"Mama, I'm afraid my frock is dreadfully short; even now that Emily has
+let down the hem," Deleah said, looking anxiously toward her extremities.
+"It shows _all_ my feet!"
+
+It showed the ankles too, truth to say; but what did that _matter_ when
+the feet were so small and pretty, and the ankles so elegantly slim?
+
+The wonder to the mother was to see how, since that white silk dress had
+been worn before, the girl's beauty had grown to perfection.
+
+"Do you think it looks ridiculous, mama?" referring anxiously to the
+scantiness of the skirt and the unblushing exposure of the feet.
+
+"Not at all ridiculous, my dear." What did any imperfection of raiment
+matter with a face and head like Deleah's; as exquisitely moulded, as
+delicately poised on her slender throat as a flower on its stalk? "There's
+a tiny bit of hair awry," the mother said, caught the girl's little chin
+in her hand and passed her fingers over the shadowy black hair for the
+mere pleasure of caressing it.
+
+When Mr. Gibbon came in presently it was seen he had changed into
+dress-clothes, in which attire he had never before appeared.
+
+"But, Mr. Gibbon, you need not have taken the trouble to dress for the
+shilling places!" Mrs. Day told him.
+
+"I am to have the honour of escorting the two young ladies," he said.
+
+He was red in the face, and appeared bashful and ill at ease in the
+costume which they saw was a new one.
+
+"To think of his a-gettin' hisself up like that!" Emily said with an
+amused scorn of the poor man as the cab containing the three drove off.
+"There's no doubt what he've set his mind on, 'm. But Miss Bessie ain't
+for such as him. She'll look higher."
+
+When Mr. Reginald Forcus came into the Assembly Rooms with his brother and
+the sister who since the death of Lady Forcus kept house at Cashelthorpe,
+and made his way to seats not very far removed from those the sisters
+occupied, Bessie impulsively seized a bit of Deleah's bare arm in her
+finger and thumb. She pinched it unconsciously but with such painful
+emphasis that in the morning Deleah discovered the place to be black and
+blue.
+
+"There he is! Quite close to us! _Now_ perhaps you will believe! I always
+knew it was he who sent the tickets, and sent all the flowers and things!
+and he sent them for me--only you always took them to yourself, Deda."
+
+She was very smiling, very happy and excited and flushed, through the
+concert. She looked so pretty, so like the Bessie of the "party" days of
+old, that Deleah thought not only Reginald Forcus but every man who saw
+her must admire her pretty sister.
+
+When the "half" arrived, and the ten minutes in which the audience is
+permitted to stretch its legs and crane its neck, and acknowledge the
+presence of its acquaintance, behold the younger Forcus eagerly
+recognising the sisters, and bowing in response to Miss Bessie's delighted
+smiles and nods.
+
+"Oh, what a pretty girl!" a woman's voice said. There had come a sudden
+lull in the buzz of talk, and the exclamation reached the ears of many
+more than his for whom it was intended.
+
+Deleah felt sure it was Bessie who was being admired. She looked quickly
+at the speaker. It was that middle-aged sister with the pleasant, kind
+face who had come to take the place of Sir Francis Forcus's dead wife. It
+was to Sir Francis she had spoken, but she might have been proclaiming the
+fact of her discovery of a pretty girl, for the general benefit; so
+complete had been the temporary calm into which her speech had broken.
+Heads were turned, and several pairs of eyes were fixed upon Deleah.
+
+By a good many present the sisters were recognised, and here and there a
+smile was turned on them, and here and there a cool, discreet little bow
+was made. And more often the people who knew them, having involuntarily
+looked, looked away again; for them the girls' presence there, in a
+fashionable company and the most expensive seats, was an offence.
+
+"People we were asked a little time ago to keep from starving!" they said
+to themselves. "If Mrs. Day's daughters can afford this sort of thing, we
+might as well have kept our guineas in our pockets."
+
+When the audience resumed their seats Bessie kept her eyes pretty
+constantly directed upon the smooth fair head of Reggie Forcus. Perhaps he
+was conscious of her gaze and found it a compelling one, for again and
+again he turned round to look at the sisters, and always Bessie's eyes
+caught and held his.
+
+Except to the accompaniment of the singing of her own heart the poor girl
+was unconscious of the music. If it was to the evening's nightingale she
+listened or to the twittering of the inferior songstresses of the grove
+who lifted up their voices when the queen was silent she could hardly have
+said; the melody her heart was chanting triumphantly drowned every note of
+theirs.
+
+"It has been heavenly," she said, when it was all over, and they stood up
+for the singing of "God Save the Queen." "In all my life, Deleah, I have
+never enjoyed a concert so much before."
+
+While she said it she was lingering in her place, stopping the gangway for
+people anxious to make their way out, pretending to arrange her own cloak
+and her sister's, in the endeavour to time their exit to that of the
+Forcus family. She did manage it too; and in the crush as they all
+approached the door Bessie's happy shoulder was rubbing against the
+shoulder of the attractive Reggie.
+
+"It's been first-rate, hasn't it?" he said, as if the two years in which
+he had had no speech with the girl were as nothing, and they had parted
+yesterday. "Wasn't _She_ fine! Glad I came. I wouldn't have missed her for
+anything."
+
+"Heavenly!" Bessie acquiesced, then quickly introduced the personal note.
+"I wonder you knew me! I thought I was quite forgotten, and was surprised
+when you bowed."
+
+"Ages since we met, isn't it? I did think about coming to call, but I
+suppose Mrs. Day is busy?"
+
+"I'm not busy. And I'm always at home. Do come."
+
+"Rather! Shall I call your carriage?"
+
+"Will you?"
+
+So the words "Miss Days' carriage" were passed from mouth to mouth; men
+yelled it in the street, the officials in the porch of the Hall bawled it
+to one another, a man in the crowd nearer the door turned his head and
+shouted "Miss Days' carriage" into the concert room. The air was
+reverberating with the cry, it seemed to poor Deleah. How could Bessie
+have made them conspicuous in that way!
+
+Sir Francis Forcus had been looking with some curiosity at the girl to
+whom his brother was speaking, wedged into the crowd just in front of him;
+the younger girl at her sister's back was by his side. He glanced at her
+now, and saw it was she to whose loveliness his sister had called public
+attention. The Days, of course! He remembered when he heard the name
+called; remembered all about them.
+
+"Good-evening. How do you do?" he said, looking down upon Deleah.
+
+And Deleah, recalling the last occasion on which she had heard his voice,
+lifted a pale and speechless face to him, for all her answer.
+
+Some big and important Person at the back, impatient of the delay, here
+attempted to battle her way through the crowd congested by the too narrow
+doors. Sir Francis turned and looked at her reprovingly.
+
+"It's no good, Lady Elizabeth. You'll have to wait like the rest of us.
+It's only a matter of a few minutes."
+
+"Oh, do hurry up in front there!" Lady Elizabeth called back to him,
+laughing, but imperious. The pressure she and her party were making still
+continued, with the result that Deleah was driven roughly forward.
+
+"Gently! Gently!" Sir Francis called again, and Deleah felt that his hands
+were on her shoulders and he was shielding her with his arms as much as
+possible from the crushing of the crowd.
+
+A minute, and they were through the doorway into the spacious porch, where
+individual movement was possible, and the fresh night air blew, and Deleah
+could see the light from the big lamp over the archway flaring on the top
+of her shabby old fly, while behind it was a long line of handsome
+carriages whose drivers vituperated the driver of the cab, in his broken
+hat. At the window was Bessie's face. Bessie's excited voice was heard
+shrilly calling on Deleah's name.
+
+"Deda! Deda! Where _on earth_ have you got to?"
+
+"Miss Days' carriage stops the way"--the cry which made one Miss Day long
+to hide her minished head in the earth--woke the echoes again.
+
+Deleah half turned her head on its long neck, whispered a shy "thank you"
+to the tall gentleman at her back; and darted away.
+
+"Oh here you are, Deleah! Come along," Reggie Forcus cried, appearing
+before her. "We thought we'd lost you. Take my arm."
+
+But before Deleah could comply another arm was proffered, and proffered in
+a manner so brusque and so determined that the young Forcus fell back
+involuntarily.
+
+"Thank you. Miss Deleah is in my charge," a voice said; and Deleah felt
+herself dragged through the crowded porch, and over the pavement to the
+cab-door, on the arm of Mr. Charles Gibbon.
+
+"You'll excuse me," he said, looking in upon the sisters through the cab
+window when the door was shut. "I hope you young ladies did not think I
+intruded. But your mother had asked me to keep an eye on you."
+
+"And pray why didn't you come with Reggie?" Bessie demanded indignantly as
+the fly at last moved on.
+
+Deleah laughed hysterically. "I was torn away from him," she said. "He all
+but knocked Reggie down, and seized upon me." She indicated the form of
+Mr. Gibbon, dimly seen, seated sentinel on the box beside the
+broken-hatted driver.
+
+"Impertinence!" Bessie said. "We have to be civil to him at home, but when
+we are among other people I think he might leave us to our friends."
+
+"Reggie Forcus hasn't been much of a friend."
+
+"He is going to be for the future. He asked leave to call. It is a little
+awkward as you are always at the school, and mama is always
+downstairs"--(Bessie had never yet brought herself to say "Mother is in
+the shop") "I would have asked him to come in the evenings, but _he_"
+(again a nod towards the figure of the guardian-angel on the box-seat) "is
+always there."
+
+"Well, why not?"
+
+"Can't you understand that Reggie might not care to meet a young man out
+of a draper's shop?"
+
+"But he comes to call on people in a gro--"
+
+"That's different," Bessie quickly announced. "We weren't always there,
+remember."
+
+"Wednesday afternoons I am at home after three. Saturdays I am at home all
+day."
+
+"I know," Bessie said, but did not promise to avail herself of the
+protection offered by her sister's presence on those occasions.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+A Tea-Party In Bridge Street
+
+
+His time being so fully occupied in his own business during the week, and
+those hours he had been wont to pass with his friend William Day being
+still unfilled, Mr. George Boult had fallen into the evil habit of coming
+to hold a business consultation with the widow on the Sunday afternoons.
+The Day family complained bitterly of this custom. The poor grocer-woman's
+one blessed day was no longer hers, to be passed from morn to eve in the
+midst of her children, in rest and peace and forgetfulness of business
+worries.
+
+She was too tired for church, she always pleaded; but it was not fatigue
+alone which kept her from public worship. She was accustomed to her place
+behind the counter now, and in the work-days of the week was too busy for
+regret, too anxious to sell her goods to feel any shame in the occupation.
+But on that day when the rest of the world of women went forth with
+husbands and children to take their places, dressed in their best, in
+family pews, she felt that she lacked the courage to show her face. She
+who had queened it with the best of them; she who was the widow of a man
+who had killed himself to escape from prison! She for whom "sympathisers"
+and "well-wishers" had collected their sixpenny-pieces that she and hers
+might be saved from starving.
+
+So she sent the girls to church with Franky, on the Sunday morning, while
+she, prayer-book in hand, would sit in Deleah's favourite window-seat,
+beneath the canary's cage, to watch the smart and prosperous Sabbath
+people airing their newest clothes on the opposite pavement of the street.
+
+Presently Emily, her preparations for dinner made, would come to stand
+beside her mistress's chair, to turn a critical eye upon the passers-by
+beneath. Emily knew the names of most of the people of any consideration
+who passed; knew, and could at length relate the history of themselves and
+their domestic economies.
+
+"There's Mrs. Hamley, m'm. I haven't never seen her in that black lace
+shawl before."
+
+"Perhaps she's laid it by from last summer," Mrs. Day would suggest.
+
+"Not she!" Here Emily would lean over the back of her mistress's chair and
+crane her neck to get a better view of the raiment in question. "Bran'
+new, I'll lay a guinea! And her still fifteen pound in your debt!"
+
+"Here come the Briggses! Look out, m'm!" presently she would cry. "Well,
+and ain't they figged out! The whole four of the girls--and every one of
+'em in a new bonnet! And them buyin' a pound-and-a-half of butter a week
+for the whole fam'ly! Tha's what I always say, m'm; the Briggses is a
+fam'ly that save out of their insides to put it on their bids. Now, here
+come the best-lookin' young ladies and young gentleman we have set eyes on
+yet." And then Mrs. Day's own daughters, with Franky clinging to Deleah's
+arm, would be seen to approach.
+
+"We think so, don't we, Emily? It's because they're our own, you know,"
+the mistress would say, with her deprecating smile. "It's because they're
+ours, that they seem to look so nice."
+
+But in her heart she heartily agreed with Emily that hers was indeed a
+charming family.
+
+In the evening Bessie would go off to church again, escorted by Emily, but
+Deleah would stay with her mother. They would sit together in peaceful,
+delicious idleness over the winter fire, or, it being summer, they would
+go forth, escaping by backways and narrow lanes of the old town from the
+crowded pavements to the quiet roads with their formal rows of trees,
+their flower-packed gardens and trim hedges. Slowly they would pace along,
+enjoying the sweeter air of the suburbs, or, gardenless themselves, would
+stand to peep through garden-gates at the well-ordered array of geranium,
+calceolaria, verbena; sniffing the fragrance from the serried rows of
+stocks, the patches of mignonette, or the blossoming lime-trees overhead.
+
+When on that scented Sabbath peacefulness the warm dark would begin to
+descend, it sometimes happened that the boarder, Charles Gibbon, who also
+loved the scent of flower and of shrub, and enjoyed the soft air of
+evening upon his cheek, would meet or overtake Mrs. Day and her daughter
+as they sauntered homewards; and in a very friendly and pleasant way the
+three would finish their walk together.
+
+But about the Sunday afternoons there was a less agreeable tale to tell.
+The young ladies retired with their books to their bedrooms, on those
+occasions; Franky took refuge with Emily in the kitchen, a store of
+oranges and nuts having been laid in by that faithful retainer for his
+entertainment there. The Manchester man saw more than enough of his
+employer on week-days, and would have preferred to pass a Sabbath
+afternoon in the cellar with the coals, to spending that portion of his
+precious holiday with his employer. Poor Mrs. Day was compelled therefore
+to receive her taskmaster and benefactor alone.
+
+Then had her books to be produced, her order-sheet criticised; then was
+comparison made between this week's takings and those of the corresponding
+week last year. If, as too often happened, alas! the sales had been less,
+the poor apologetic tradeswoman had to suffer for it.
+
+"You are losing custom. You must not lose it," the tradesman would
+bluster. Or "Your expenses are too much. You are eaten up with expenses,"
+he would insist. "You don't see how you can reduce them? Do with less
+help, my good lady. What do people do who can't afford help? Go without
+it, and do the work themselves. It's what you must do. It is indeed, I do
+assure you. Cut down your expenses. Cut them down! Cut them down!"
+
+"It is easier to say that than to do it," poor Mrs. Day would demur. "We
+have nothing superfluous."
+
+"You will be surprised how much you can do without if you really make the
+effort. Get rid of your assistant in the shop. Get rid of your servant. A
+servant is a very pleasant possession, but if we can't afford to keep one,
+we can't. What is Miss Bessie doing all day long?"
+
+"Bessie is useful in the house. Bessie is not strong," Bessie's mother
+would plead; and George Boult would snort the suggestion to scorn.
+
+"A little extra work would be the best physic for Miss Bessie." She had
+put on a good stone of flesh since he had seen her last, he would declare.
+Work never killed half the women that idleness killed.
+
+On a Sunday afternoon soon after that concert to which the girls had been
+escorted by the lodger, George Boult, his business exhortation finished,
+sprang on the poor mother the news that her son at the branch shop at
+Ingleby was not giving satisfaction.
+
+A complaint of incivility to a customer had come to the ear of the local
+manager, who had reported to the Head at Brockenham, delivering himself of
+the opinion at the same time that the young man played billiards at the
+Rose and Crown more than was consistent with his means, or the devotion he
+should have shown to his employer's interests.
+
+Lydia Day listened, her dark, handsome face of a lead white, while the man
+seated at the table opposite to her condemned her son utterly as one who
+was flinging away a fine chance. He, George Boult, had been thrown, at
+Bernard's age, on his own resources. Never that he could recall had a
+helping hand been held to him. (Men of the stamp of George Boult never
+recognise the helping hand.) Work had been his pleasure. Had he played
+billiards? Had he shown temper before a customer? No! Or thought of his
+own pleasure before his employer's advantage? Never!
+
+Very eloquent he was on the strenuous period of his own youth, recounting
+the virtues he had displayed and the vices he had shunned, holding up his
+shining example before the dimmed eyes of the poor mother, listening with
+sick politeness, her heart so heavy in her breast. The excuses she made
+for her Bernard to herself she dared not put forward. The fact that he was
+his father's son; the contrast between the life he had known and that he
+was called on to live; his youth; his exile from home and home influences;
+his empty pockets; his tastes which had been formed when money seemed
+plentiful.
+
+"I implore you to be patient with the boy," was about all she thought it
+wise to say; that and the promise she made to write at once to Bernard to
+beg of him to consider his circumstances and Mr. Boult's goodness, and to
+change what was amiss.
+
+Bernard, her darling, handsome son! While she said it she saw him in a
+thousand pictures stored in her mother's heart. All that was desirable he
+had seemed to her; she had never thought of wishing him to change!
+
+"Let him know he is on his trial," George Boult said.
+
+"He is being carefully watched and reported on. Do not tell him this, but
+tell him the impression he has made on Adams" (Adams was the manager at
+Ingleby) "is not a satisfactory one; and Adams is a man whose opinions I
+hold very high. Tell him he is having the chance of his life; warn him not
+to abuse it."
+
+He was still trampling the poor woman's heart beneath the prancings of his
+own eloquence, when the ringing of the street-door bell created a
+diversion.
+
+Downstairs went Miss Bessie, her fair hair ruffled, her cheek flushed from
+its pressure upon her pillow, to take in, as she imagined, in the absence
+of Emily, the afternoon's milk.
+
+It was not the anticipated milk, however, that Bessie found upon the
+doorstep, but no less a delightful surprise than the exquisite person of
+Mr. Reginald Forcus.
+
+"Ah, how do, Bessie? I thought I'd give you a look. I hope I am not _de
+trop?_" he asked. He pronounced the last words as they are spelt, not
+because he did not know better, but because he liked to be amusing, and
+the mispronunciation of words was the kind of fun he appreciated.
+
+With effusion, Bessie bade him enter; but in her mind were distracting
+thoughts of the condition of her chignon, and the present occupancy of the
+only sitting-room.
+
+"There's some one upstairs with mama," she told him, anxiously smiling
+upon him, her grey-green eyes glinting with pleasure. "The Mr. Boult, you
+know, who helps her with her books and things when she'll let him. You
+won't mind?"
+
+"Happy, I'm sure. You're all alone, week-days," he said as he mounted the
+stairs behind her--stairs very dark and very steep, starting from the
+almost unmitigated blackness of the hall upon which the front door opened.
+"I thought if I looked in on the Sunday afternoons I should find the
+others as well, perhaps."
+
+"You'll find mama," Bessie said, wondering a little at his concern for the
+proprieties. "Here is Reggie, mama," she said. And Mrs. Day, her heart
+full of her own unhappy boy, went forward with a weary step, and
+smilelessly held out a welcoming hand.
+
+"You are very kind to come, Reggie," she said. "This is our good friend,
+Mr. George Boult; Mr. Reginald Forcus."
+
+"I take it young Mr. Forcus and I don't need any introduction," the draper
+said.
+
+The Forcus family did not deal at his shop; the deference therefore which
+the draper never failed to pay his customers was not needed here. He shook
+poor Reggie's hand mercilessly, and inquired after Sir Francis. Mr. George
+Boult had recently been made a magistrate; Sir Francis and he sat on the
+same bench.
+
+"You are extremely well known to me by sight," he went on, still
+exercising the visitor's hand. "I should say there are few people in
+Brockenham better known to me by sight."
+
+"I go past your place pretty often," Reggie admitted.
+
+"You'd see me four or five times a day if you were looking out."
+
+"Oh, I'm not always behind my own shop window," Mr. Boult said, not too
+well pleased. When he was not talking to a customer why should he be
+reminded of the shop? Since he had been able to write J.P. after his name,
+he had more than once been secretly desirous of temporarily forgetting the
+successful drapery establishment.
+
+He was always disposed to lose himself in wonder at his own marvellous
+achievements. Time was when the members of the great brewery firm were as
+far above his head as the stars of heaven above the pebbles of the street.
+Yet here he was now, to all intents and purposes on a par with them. Where
+was the difference? A successful business man, he was--what more were
+they? Still, since Sir Francis had taken to addressing him as "Boult"
+without any prefix to the name, when they met in the magisterial room, the
+desire to ingratiate himself with any member of the Forcus family was very
+warm within him.
+
+"Whenever I do see you, I am struck with the handsomeness of the animal
+you ride, Mr. Forcus," he was saying presently. "I think this young
+gentleman rides the handsomest animal in the town, Miss Bessie. I'm a
+great admirer of handsome animals, Mr. Forcus."
+
+"Is that so? Really?" said Reggie, supremely indifferent. He had no
+objection whatever to make the acquaintance of old Boult, the
+linen-draper--although, of course, that difference between a successful
+draper and a successful brewer which Mr. Boult was incapable of discerning
+was quite clear to him--but he was not in the least interested in him; and
+what should the old fellow know about a horse?
+
+"Isn't Deleah at home to-day? I thought I should have caught Deleah. That
+is why I dropped in on the Sunday."
+
+Deleah was out walking with Franky, Mrs. Day told him, thankful that
+Bessie, who had slipped away with a view to the adjustment of the
+disarranged chignon, was not present to hear that explanation.
+
+"I meet Deleah sometimes as she comes home from school," the young man
+artlessly continued. "I dare say she's told you I sometimes meet her?"
+
+No, Mrs. Day did not remember hearing Deleah mention that interesting
+fact.
+
+"No harm in that, I suppose, Mrs. Day? You don't object, if Deleah
+doesn't?"
+
+"Harm?" repeated Mrs. Day, only half conscious of what was said, thinking
+of Bernard going wretchedly about his hated work with a "sharp watch" set
+on his doings.
+
+"I mean I wouldn't do anything to annoy you or Deleah--"
+
+It was a relief that at that moment Bessie descended, her hair in order, a
+look of pleasant excitement on her plump face. No one need half-heartedly
+try to carry on a conversation with Reggie when once Bessie was present to
+monopolise him.
+
+And then Deleah and Franky, their cheeks rosy from exercise, appeared.
+Franky went to his mother and climbed on her lap, and Deleah sat close to
+her side, a little too apparently, perhaps, leaving the young man and
+Bessie to carry on their sparkling conversation uninterrupted.
+
+When Emily came in, to lay the tea-table, the two men got up to go. "Mama,
+Reggie will stay if you ask him," Bessie said. How triumphant she felt,
+how her eyes sparkled when Reggie said at once he should like to--rather!
+
+"And Mr. Boult will stay to tea too, mama," Deleah said quickly. She did
+not need the heavy silence which fell to tell she had offended; not
+Bessie's warning scowl, nor her mother's piteous look of appeal. As no one
+seconded the invitation, "Do stay," Deleah said. And he gracefully
+yielded.
+
+"Since you are so polite, I don't mind if I do," he said. He really felt
+honoured by the invitation, the first he had ever received in that house.
+The long low-ceilinged sitting-room above the grocer's shop was tenanted
+by ladies of whom in days gone by he had felt a certain awe. Down in the
+world as they were now, he never forgot that ancient attitude of theirs.
+Even when he bullied Mrs. Day, and advised her daughters to do the work of
+servants, he had not forgotten. Perhaps at such times he remembered it
+more than ever.
+
+His wife, dead for the last seven years, had been of a different make from
+these women. Finding nothing in himself to debar him from being an
+ornament in any society, he saw very well that the late Mrs. George Boult
+had been, as he put it, "of another kidney." He had been fairly content
+with her while he had her; she had been a good housekeeper; and had not
+crossed him in his wish to save money; but looking back upon the poor
+woman, he saw plainly that she had not the appearance of these ladies, nor
+had she spoken like them, nor possessed the ways of them. She had been all
+very well for his then condition, but times had changed for him; and here
+he was, well pleased to be sitting at the board of people who would not at
+one time have received the late Mrs. Boult under their roof, on terms of
+equality with Sir Francis Forcus's brother!
+
+He was a rich man himself, and going, he would see to it, to be richer,
+but the income of the Forcuses he knew was perhaps seven times as much as
+his own; and he was one of that large body of good sort of people who love
+to be in the society of men richer than themselves.
+
+"We so much enjoyed the concert, Mr. Boult," Deleah said to him.
+
+"The concert?" Mr. Boult repeated. He wished to talk to Bessie, having it
+on his conscience to advise her to do without a servant, and he did not
+feel called upon to exert himself "to do the polite," as he phrased it, to
+the younger girl.
+
+"Some kind friend sent us stalls for the concert," explained Deleah,
+flushing. "It was so kind of the unknown person, and such a delightful
+treat."
+
+"Stalls? The half-guinea places, do you mean?" There was astonished
+disapproval in eyes and voice.
+
+"Wasn't it sweet of Someone?" Deleah went on, bent on expressing her
+gratitude to the shy donor. "It was the same Someone, I suppose, who sent
+the lilies-of-the-valley, yesterday, and my darling canary; look! It is
+Someone to whom we can never be grateful enough!"
+
+"Better keep your gratitude for the more substantial benefits you have all
+received." He was thinking, Mrs. Day knew, of the fifty pounds which had
+headed the subscription-list. "Lilies were sixpence the bunch in the
+market yesterday."
+
+"But it isn't the cost," Deleah explained; her face was rose-red with her
+effort to say that which she had determined should be said to the man they
+all disliked, but who was showing himself by the thoughtful little
+attentions to which she alluded, in his true colours. "It isn't the cost
+alone, it is the kind thought for which we are so grateful."
+
+"Oh, come, Deleah!" Reggie interrupted. "I offered you tickets, you
+remember, and you weren't a bit grateful for the kind thought. And as for
+the lilies, I dare say I could send you flowers every morning from the
+conservatories at home, if you'd care for them."
+
+"I should not in the least care for them from your conservatories. Don't
+send them, Reggie, or we should have to send them back."
+
+"Why, pray? Speak for yourself, please," Bessie cried. "If you've any
+flowers going begging I'm not above taking them, Reggie, remember."
+
+"The flowers aren't mine," Reggie reminded her at once. "They grow
+there--tons of them--and no one to look at them now, but Francis and Ada.
+Yet, if I want to send a few to a girl there's questions asked, and a
+sickening fuss made. I order them from the nurseryman rather than have the
+fag of it."
+
+"Well--?"
+
+"Oh, all right. I'll order some for you, Bessie."
+
+Then, when tea was all but finished, a step was heard upon the stairs, and
+presently Mr. Gibbon came in. At the sight of the other two men his face
+fell perceptibly. To him also the Sabbath was a precious time. The hour,
+especially, which brought the meal over which they need not hurry for any
+evening work; in the room made sweet with flowers; in the company of the
+three charming ladies; on the table the extra delicacies Emily always
+provided for the occasion.
+
+Boult! Forcus! The two men whom, least on earth, he desired to see there.
+
+"Hallo, Gibbon!" his chief said; and the man addressed felt in his bones
+that the tone was unmistakably that of the employer to the employed. "Been
+getting forward for to-morrow, I suppose?"
+
+No, Gibbon said, he had not; and he spoke curtly, and kept his heavy head
+up, and drew his brows together, and was somewhat offensive in manner, in
+the effort to show he was not subservient. He bowed sulkily to Mr.
+Reginald Forcus, when Mrs. Day murmured that gentleman's name. The fact
+that the young man when he came of an age to take the third share which
+was to be his in the brewery would be rolling in money, was nothing to
+him, and he wished to show to all present it was not! At the concert he,
+who was ugly, and short, and poor, and of no account in the world, had had
+the best of the elegant young man with his fortune and the name which was
+one to conjure with in Brockenham. He had wrested Deleah from him, and
+pushed him on one side. He did not propose to smile amiably at him across
+the tea-table after that.
+
+He was going to Lancashire to buy goods for his department to-morrow--he
+was absent there for four or five days every three weeks. This was his
+last evening of Paradise for a while; and the Serpent had entered there!
+
+"You are late," Bessie rebuked him sweetly. "And you must wait for more
+tea to be made. Where have you been, pray? Give an account of yourself."
+
+He had walked out five miles, he told her, to the garden of a friend who
+had a small conservatory. He had hoped to be rewarded with some flowers to
+return with, but had only been accorded the three roses he held in his
+hand.
+
+"Very sweet of you to bring them for me, all the same," Bessie said,
+smiling graciously.
+
+Gibbon was, however, shy or sullen this evening, for he seemed by no means
+anxious to relinquish the flowers; and when he did so he laid them between
+his plate and Deleah's, who promptly put them into Bessie's extended hand.
+When pinned in the bosom of her grey frock the flowers had a charming
+effect, to which she called the attention of all present.
+
+"Aren't they sweet, mama! Mr. Boult, Reggie, aren't they simply sweet! And
+poor Mr. Gibbon to have walked so many miles for them!"
+
+And so, at cross purposes, with heart-burnings and some bitterness of
+spirit, they got through their Sunday tea.
+
+"It would have been delightful if you had not invited your old Scrooge,"
+Bessie, who, at any rate, had thoroughly enjoyed herself, flung at her
+sister.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+The Manchester Man
+
+
+Mrs. Day had retired to write her letter to Bernard in the privacy of her
+own room, and Bessie, in radiant spirits, had gone off to dress for
+evening service, where she was to go escorted by Franky and Emily. Deleah
+was left in charge of the boarder.
+
+It was a point of honour with them all that the young man should have his
+money's worth while under their roof, and above all, should have his meals
+in comfort. The cup which Bessie had poured out for him stood cold and
+untasted by his side. Deleah took it from him. Certainly he should not
+have the dregs of the tea-pot; she would brew a fresh pot for him.
+
+"I beg you will not trouble, Miss Deleah. It is my fault in being late."
+
+He, who held the creed that a gentleman must never allow a lady to wait on
+him (unless she was his mother, or he was married to her), must follow
+Miss Deleah to the kitchen, also on the upper floor, must watch her rinse
+the tea-pot, must advise with her as to the amount of tea required to make
+the three large cups he always drank, must himself pour the boiling water,
+she, with many exhortations from him to be very careful lest she scalded
+her fingers, holding the tea-pot. There was something delightfully
+homelike and familiar in this sharing of simple duties.
+
+Deleah, returned to the sitting-room where she sat to fill his cup and to
+cut him bread-and-butter, was as lovely a vision as any man could desire
+to see at his board. Pleasantly and gaily she chattered, waiting on him
+with her dainty hands. He, tongue-tied, answering little, embarrassed and
+ill at ease in that sweet society.
+
+For a year and a half he had lived in the dingy house above the shop in
+Bridge Street. He had for eighteen months enjoyed that propinquity, that
+familiar intercourse, which is all that is necessary to make many an ugly
+woman beautiful in the eyes of the man in enjoyment of her society. It is
+small wonder then, if the poor Manchester man exaggerated in his own mind
+those unusual charms which Deleah incontestably possessed.
+
+A year and a half! And in all that time he could never recall an occasion
+when he had been left for any length of time alone with Deleah, before. It
+was Bessie who had constituted herself his especial friend, had seized on
+him, talked to him, made confidences to him, and satisfied herself it was
+his wish to talk to her. Deleah, he knew, had looked on him as Bessie's
+property. He had resented this assumption, but had not known how to
+dispute it.
+
+Besides being of a loveliness which he had come to think unsurpassed, she
+was so gentle, so tender-hearted, so pitiful, this young Deleah; so
+adorably kind. She had learnt in that grief and shame which he knew had
+befallen her a lesson, taught her he was sure by the pitying angels of
+God; to think no sorrow too trivial to be despised, to be tender even to
+the scratched finger, the bruised shins of the poor men and women
+scrambling painfully along the tough and thorny path of life.
+
+He was a short and broad and ugly man, approaching middle age; of a
+commonplace cut of features, of poor birth, of mean fortunes, of small
+account in the scheme of things; but he had an eye for beauty; he had a
+soul; and his eye was filled with a beauty completely satisfying his
+conception; and with his soul he worshipped the soul of Deleah.
+
+"I am sorry," he suddenly said, cutting across some little triviality of
+hers with which she was striving to cover his silence--"sorry you did not
+have even one of the roses I walked ten miles to get for you."
+
+"I?" she glanced fleetingly at him. "Oh, it does not matter, of course.
+Bessie has them, and she loves them so. I had far rather Bessie had them."
+
+He gazed upon her, reproachful but silent.
+
+"Bessie so loves flowers," she said, remembering how Bessie had pounced
+upon the poor roses before they had been offered. It had not been a pretty
+sight--but Bessie--poor Bessie!--did such things.
+
+"Miss Bessie so loves them to wear in her dress," he corrected.
+
+And at that moment Miss Bessie burst into the room, attired for conquest
+and for church, the flowers which the boarder had walked so far to
+procure, pinned, as was the mode of the day, beneath the collar of her
+jacket. Gibbon glanced grudgingly at them, nestling becomingly enough
+under Bessie's plump chin.
+
+"Oh, how glum you look!" cried Bessie in the best of spirits.
+
+"Not glum at all," said Mr. Gibbon with something less than his usual
+politeness of tone.
+
+"Only cross? Ah! I am so afraid of you! I must run away."
+
+She beckoned to Deleah, who followed her to the tiny landing. "The
+Honourable Charles has got his back up because of Reggie," she whispered,
+"and Reggie is furious because of the Honourable Charles's flowers. Did
+you hear how he snapped at me just now?"
+
+"Why should Mr. Gibbon be angry because of Reggie?"
+
+"Oh, my dear innocent babe! Don't you know that men are sometimes jealous?"
+
+"Yes. I know it. And I know another thing: and that is you were doing your
+best to make them jealous."
+
+Bessie laughed delightedly as at a compliment: "I leave one of them to
+you. Try to get him into a better frame of mind before I come back," she
+said, and turned to run downstairs.
+
+Deleah leaned over the railing of the tiny landing, lit by a single
+gas-jet above her head, to watch her go. She liked to see Bessie
+good-tempered and in good spirits, and if to believe that every man she
+knew was in love with her made her so, Deleah was willing to humour her.
+About the devotion of young Forcus for Bessie she had her doubts, but that
+of the lodger she took as a matter of course.
+
+He was still seated at the table when she returned to him; the
+bread-and-butter she had cut for him untouched on his plate, his tea
+untasted.
+
+"I thought perhaps you were not coming back," he said. He sighed, as if
+relieved from an anxiety which had been painful. "Miss Deleah, I wish very
+much to speak to you."
+
+There were a few things in the matter of deportment he had learnt since
+living over the grocer's shop; one was that a man must not sit while a
+lady is standing. So he stood up in his place now, and waited till she had
+taken hers again behind the tea-urn.
+
+"Oh, but, Mr. Gibbon, do eat your tea!"
+
+He pushed his plate away: "I don't want to eat. I want to talk to you."
+
+Glancing at him she saw that his face, ordinarily of a deep-diffused red,
+was as pale as it is possible for such a face to become. Often when she
+had felt his eyes upon her and had looked up frankly to meet them, she had
+noticed how quickly he had averted them, almost as if detected in a crime.
+Now she found them fixed upon her face.
+
+"There is something I have made up my mind to tell you," he said.
+
+"It won't take long, I hope? Because as Emily is at church I have to clear
+the tea-things."
+
+She jumped up at once and began to do so. "He is going to tell me about
+Bessie," she said to herself. She did not particularly desire his
+confidence, and with a little more clatter and fussiness than was
+necessary to the task, she put the cups and plates on the tray.
+
+In a preoccupied manner he helped her to do this, took the tray from her,
+when it was laden, to the kitchen, while she carried the eatables. Coming
+back, together they folded the tablecloth. A pleasant enough occupation to
+be shared with a pretty girl; but it was evident, although his trade had
+made his blunt fingers deft at the handling of material, and he was
+carefully observant of the practice which must be followed in the art,
+that he was thinking of other things than maintaining the creases in the
+tablecloth.
+
+"There!" said Deleah, as an announcement that their light labours were
+finished. She had put the cloth away in the press, and turned to find the
+Honourable Charles, as she and Bessie to themselves always called their
+boarder, standing with his back to the little dresser at which Emily made
+her pastry, his arms crossed upon his chest.
+
+"Now you can go and sit down in comfort, and smoke the pipe of peace on my
+special window-seat--I give you permission--and watch the good people
+going to church."
+
+"That is, if you are coming."
+
+"I think I'll go first and see what has become of mama."
+
+"This will do, for a few minutes, Miss Deleah. We will stop here," he
+said.
+
+So Deleah, there being no escape, perched herself on the corner of the
+table where the plates and tea-cups were collected until Emily should
+return to wash them, and waited for what he had to say.
+
+He found some difficulty in beginning apparently, and frowned upon the
+matting covering the floor.
+
+"It's about myself," at length he began with an effort painful to see; his
+hands seemed to be pulling tensely upon his folded arms, the blunt fingers
+of the broad red hands showed white upon the coat-sleeves, his face was
+still of the muddy pink which with him stood for pallor.
+
+"I hope you won't think it intruding of me to talk about myself."
+
+"Which in other words means about Bessie," said Deleah to herself, strung
+up, now that it was inevitable, for the revelation.
+
+"It's about my prospects. Perhaps you think I haven't got any, Miss
+Deleah. Or any position, to speak of? I have not, I know. Not like your
+friend, Mr. Forcus. He's got this thousands a year, where at most I can
+hope for hundreds, I suppose."
+
+Deleah divined the sore feeling in his mind and hastened to bring the
+balm: "Reggie Forcus might have millions where he will have thousands--and
+the more he had the less likely would he be to affect any of us. He has
+been here this afternoon, and if he remembers he may come again. But that
+is simply the whim of an idle young man who at the moment can think of
+nothing more amusing to do."
+
+"I thought he seemed to take a good deal of interest. I caught him
+looking--"
+
+"At Bessie? He likes her, of course, and there was once a great
+friendship. If--things--hadn't happened, I dare say it might have come to
+more than friendship. But they did happen, and--" She broke off. Never
+could she without suffering and difficulty allude to the tragedy which had
+cost them so dear.
+
+"I assure you, Mr. Gibbon," she began again, and smiled encouragingly upon
+him, "you are of far more importance to us than Mr. Reginald Forcus is
+ever likely to be."
+
+"I thank you for telling me that," he said, and his fingers strained
+tighter upon his coat-sleeves.
+
+Then he lifted his eyes and looked at her as she sat, perched with ease
+and grace among the tea-cups on the kitchen table. Every movement of hers
+was made, every posture taken, with ease and grace. It happened, for
+Deleah's fortune, to be the day of the small woman; the day when she of
+inches was pronounced a gawk, and she of five feet and a little--slim of
+waist, of foot, of hand, of ankle--slid with ease and naturalness into a
+man's heart.
+
+"Thank you for that," said the Manchester man again, with a kind of hoarse
+fervour in his voice. "You are always kind. I don't think the angels in
+heaven are kinder than you."
+
+A statement at which Deleah among the tea-cups laughed light-heartedly.
+
+"No. Don't laugh," he said almost fiercely. "It is true! I believe it with
+all my soul."
+
+He looked from her to the floor at his feet again, frowning upon it,
+striving for the calmness to proceed with that which he had to say in the
+order he had taught himself to believe was best for his case.
+
+"I'm getting two hundred a year," he said. "This year, come Christmas, I'm
+to have a rise to two hundred and fifty. Next year"--he paused, set his
+lips tightly--"next year I mean to ask for a share in the business."
+
+"Do you?" said Deleah with polite interest. "Do you really think you will
+get it, Mr. Gibbon?"
+
+"I shall get it, fast enough. I shall get it, for this reason: if Boult
+doesn't give it me I shall leave him. Boult can't afford to lose me. I
+don't want to boast, but it's true. He can't afford to lose me, and he
+knows it. Do you know," and he lifted his head, speaking more naturally
+and looking at her with pride in his achievement, "in the two years I have
+been in the concern I have _doubled_ the takings in my department?"
+
+"Really? How very clever of you, Mr. Gibbon! You _must_ be pleased!"
+
+He looked at her, and laughed hopelessly. "You don't understand these
+things, Miss Deleah. You don't realise that what I have done means much."
+
+"Oh, but I do, Mr. Gibbon! I have always thought that you must be a quite
+wonderful business man; so quiet, so regular, thinking of nothing but your
+work."
+
+"I do think of other things," he said fervidly. "I want to get on. I want
+to improve myself, and my position. There's an end I'm working for. If a
+man sets an end before him, and works for all he's worth to get it, does
+he get it, Miss Deleah?"
+
+"He gets it. Never doubt it!"
+
+"Well then, see! When I get my share of the business I shall work the
+whole show up as I have worked my own department. The other establishments
+in the same line can put their shutters up. It's the biggest drapery
+business in the town now--Boult is proud enough to ram that fact down your
+throat--but I shall make it the biggest drapery business in the Eastern
+Counties."
+
+"How splendid of you, Mr. Gibbon! And supposing Mr. Boult won't give you
+the share?"
+
+"I am not sure it would not be better. In that case I shall start on my
+own. Not in a shop. I shall open a warehouse for the sale of my goods,
+alone."
+
+"Those calicoes, and prints, and 'drabbets,' you go to Manchester to buy?"
+put in Deleah, anxious to show that she understood.
+
+"Manchester goods. I shall carry with me all the little customers who come
+to me now to take my advice what they shall buy, and a lot of shopkeepers
+of a better class, who will deal with a wholesale mean but will not buy
+their goods of Boult."
+
+"Poor Mr. Boult!"
+
+"He must look after hisself. I heard Miss Bessie say the other day that
+the wholesale line was genteeler than retail--." He broke off and looked
+questioningly at Deleah, who had formed no opinion on the subject.
+
+"Bessie knows about these things," she assured him. "Then, you will become
+a very rich man, Mr. Gibbon. And will go away, and never help us to make
+mincemeat any more, or to clear the table after Sunday tea. You will drive
+your carriage with a _pair_ of horses--not one miserable screw like Mr.
+Boult--and you will live in a fine house, and grow roses, and build
+conservatories; won't you?"
+
+"Yes," he assented solemnly. Then he unfolded his arms and' stretching
+them sideways gripped with each hand the ledge of the dresser against
+which he leant. "I shall want you to come with me," he said.
+
+"Me!" said Deleah. The shock of the surprise made her for a moment
+breathless. She sat and gazed at him with wide eyes for what seemed an
+age, saying nothing; and he also, for the moment incapable of further
+speech, gazed back. At last "Bessie?" Deleah got out. "You mean Bessie?"
+
+"Why should I mean Bessie? _Bessie!_" he said, and flung the thought of
+her from him with scorn. "Why should I mean Bessie? I mean you--you--you!"
+he said, and endured her silence with eyes that clung desperately to her
+face.
+
+"When I leave here, to go into that fine house--with the carriage
+and--conservatories--will you come too?"
+
+"Oh, no!" Deleah said, whispering, with drooping head.
+
+Then they sat opposite each other on table and dresser and were silent,
+while the blood sang loudly in Deleah's ears, and beat with such cruel
+throbbing in the man's temples that he did not know how to endure the
+agony, and thought that his head must burst.
+
+When Deleah at last lifted her eyes and looked at him the change in his
+face frightened her, his breath came hard and noisily as if he had been
+running. Was it possible he could feel like that--this quiet, inoffensive,
+uninteresting, middle-aged boarder, who had never appeared to feel
+anything particularly before? About her?
+
+"I am so sorry," she said in genuine distress, horribly grieved at and
+ashamed of her part in his pain. "I thought it was Bessie."
+
+"You have refused me? You mean it--absolutely? There is no hope for me?"
+
+Deleah shivered. It was the regulation phrase used by the rejected lover
+in the novel of the day. It had thrilled Deleah a hundred times as she had
+read it. There was nothing stilted or theatrical in the words as Charles
+Gibbon said them, but they brought home to her the unwelcome fact that he
+was in deadly earnest, that he loved her, and she was dealing him a cruel
+blow. She felt miserable, humiliated, ashamed. It was preposterous, out of
+all proportion, that he should have had to ask such a question, in such a
+tone, of little Deleah Day.
+
+"I am so very sorry, Mr. Gibbon," she said again, and he heard in a
+silence that made her heart ache.
+
+"Shall you go away?" she asked him presently. In books the lover being
+rejected removed himself for a time in order to recover from the blow. She
+was relieved to find in the boarder's case this was not considered
+necessary.
+
+"Why should I go away?" he asked.
+
+"It will be better to go on just the same," she advised eagerly. "Bessie
+need never know."
+
+"Bessie!" he said again contemptuously; he loosed his grip of the dresser,
+and swung round, standing with his back to her, that she might not see his
+face. "You've crushed every hope I had; you've--broken me; and you talk to
+me of Bessie. What, in the name of heaven or hell, do you suppose I care
+for _Bessie_; or whether she knows or not?"
+
+Deleah, keeping her place on the table, listened to the altered, choked
+voice of him with astonishment. Their unfailingly polite--too polite! and
+retiring boarder! Was it really he, standing with his back to her,
+speaking of Bessie--Bessie!--in such a tone!
+
+"You see, I never knew! I never guessed," she excused herself helplessly.
+
+"No. I don't suppose you gave me a thought. Morning, noon and night you
+were everything to me. There was nothing else. I have worked for you,
+lived for you--"
+
+His back was towards her--the horrible thought that he was crying came to
+her; his voice was rough and broken.
+
+"If I had only guessed--" she said in hideous distress and embarrassment.
+She had thought, as all girls do, of one day getting an offer of marriage;
+that it could ever be such a miserable experience as this she had not
+imagined. If it had only been a stranger, she thought foolishly; some one
+outside her life, of whom she had seen little! But Mr. Gibbon--their
+boarder! The sight of him in their home circle had become as familiar to
+her as might have been the sight of her brother: she could not reconcile
+herself to the thought that this man in the horribly unfamiliar guise was
+he. "If I had only guessed--!"
+
+"And if you had?" he asked, but hopelessly, without turning round.
+
+"I could have told you the sooner. There wouldn't have been such
+a--waste."
+
+She slipped off the table, and stood beside it in a painful state of
+indecision. She longed to get away from the sight of him, to escape; but
+at the same time, being Deleah, she also longed to comfort.
+
+"I shall not even tell mama," she promised. "We shall go on just as usual.
+And soon--soon we shall forget it has happened."
+
+"Shall we?"
+
+"Oh, yes! It is astonishing how we can put things away, in the back of our
+minds, and go on as if they weren't there at all. Quite astonishing."
+
+"We oughtn't to make a piece of work about our sorrows if we can get along
+with them as easily as that!"
+
+"Oh, not our sorrows, of course." She remembered how the sorrow of her
+father's dreadful end was with her still and would be while she lived.
+"Our sorrow, of course, Mr. Gibbon, we cannot forget. But a little thing
+that goes amiss like this--a little disappointment--"
+
+"I see," he said. Then he gave a sound, half choke, half hiccough, that
+was meant for a laugh; and presently he turned round. "Then, we will go on
+as before, Miss Deleah. You need not be afraid any one will learn of
+this--'little disappointment'--from me. I am pretty well used to hiding
+what I feel. It comes easy when you've once learnt that nobody cares."
+
+"Oh, Mr. Gibbon. Don't please say that. I care."
+
+"No, you don't. You don't care like I want you to. What's the good of
+anything else? Have we finished clearing away the tea-things, Miss Deleah?
+Anything more that I can help you with?"
+
+She shook her head, looking at him with eyes which implored him not to be
+bitter or unhappy. And as she looked, seeing the familiar red face and
+squat strong figure of him in a new light an idea struck her.
+
+"Mr. Gibbon," she said, "it was _you_ who sent the concert tickets, and
+all the flowers and fruit, and the canary in its lovely cage. It was
+you--you!"
+
+"No, no! Mr. Boult, of course, Miss Deleah. You found out who it was, long
+ago. Kind, generous Mr. Boult!"
+
+"And I took them all, and never thanked you--!" She put out a hand to
+delay him as he walked past her to the door; but he took no heed, and
+without another word she let him go.
+
+"What have you done with your roses?" Deleah asked. Bessie tucked in her
+plump chin and looked down upon the place beneath her jacket collar where
+they had been pinned. "I must have lost them coming out of church!" she
+said. "Pray do not let the Honourable Charles hear of it."
+
+The three poor roses! Deleah's roses, the boarder had tramped the ten
+miles to get for her!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+For Bernard
+
+
+Sir Francis Forcus was standing with his back to the empty fireplace in
+his private room at the Brewery, a copy of the local daily newspaper in
+his hand. It was a pleasant room, although the view from the two open
+windows was only of the tall black wharves and warehouses across the way.
+You must lean from the window to catch sight of the black river flowing
+beneath, upon which the Brewery was built; of the great wherries and
+barges unloading below; to see the canoes and pleasure boats, escaping
+from the polluted waters, the bricks and mortars of the locality, to the
+sunlit stream flowing between fair gardens and green pastures of the
+country, a half-mile farther on.
+
+From a window in one of the black, ill-looking wharves across the way an
+imprisoned lark was singing, rewarding man for his cruel treatment with
+the best he had to give, after the manner of the brute creation, whose
+avenging is not yet. A ray of sunlight straggling in--in more open, more
+favoured localities, the sun lay broadly over all on that spring
+morning--touched the face of Sir Francis, which wore a by no means
+well-pleased expression. In the paper he was reading, wet from the press,
+was an account of a steeplechase in which his brother's name had largely
+figured. He had not won the race, nor distinguished himself in any way,
+except by the number and severity of his falls, and the fact that he had
+killed his horse; but the _Brockenham Star_ was, to a large extent, the
+property of the firm of big brewers, and had therefore made the most of
+the young man's exploits.
+
+"The boy will break his neck yet," the reader said to himself. He was not
+largely in his brother's confidence. The death of the horse was news to
+him; he had not even known there was a steeplechase.
+
+"What good is he doing with all this?" Sir Francis asked of himself,
+sternly looking off the paper. "He takes no interest in the Brewery. He is
+a man in years, and has never done a half-hour's work in his life."
+
+Sir Francis's own half-hours of work would not have totalled up to much,
+but he had business ability, nevertheless. At certain hours of the day he
+was always to be found, as now, at his post, and what he did not do
+himself he took care that those he paid should do efficiently.
+
+Above the mantelpiece hung the portrait of the founder of the Brewery, or
+rather of the man who had worked up the business already founded into a
+phenomenally successful one. Often as the elder partner looked upon the
+sensible, kindly, handsome-featured face, he reminded himself how very
+dear to his father in his old age had been this unbusiness-like,
+pleasure-loving, steeplechase-riding younger son, who had been but a boy
+at school when the old man had died. Very frequently it was necessary for
+him to remind himself of the fact; for between the duty-loving,
+serious-minded, middle-aged, sorrowing widower and his half-brother was
+very little in common.
+
+A clerk opening the door announced that a lady had called who was waiting
+to see Sir Francis.
+
+"A lady? My sister--Miss Forcus?"
+
+"A young lady. She didn't give her name."
+
+"Ask it, please."
+
+Back came the clerk with a slip of paper on which was written a name Sir
+Francis read to himself, and then aloud, looking questioningly upon the
+clerk, "Miss Deleah Day. Miss Deleah Day?"
+
+The clerk, having no information to give or suggestion to offer, continued
+to look respectfully at his employer's boots.
+
+"Show her in, please," Sir Francis said; and in a minute the door was
+opened and Deleah appeared.
+
+Sir Francis, the _Brockenham Star_ depending from his left hand, bowed in
+his solemn fashion to the girl, and going forward turned a chair round
+from the writing-table, in which be indicated his desire that she should
+sit. How white and frightened she looked; what a young, little,
+extraordinary pretty thing! Full well he remembered the last occasion of
+her presence in his room. What had sent her to him now? What did she want?
+He recalled how Reggie, whose name, it seemed to him, was always being
+mentioned in some undesirable connection or other, had got himself mixed
+up with this girl's objectionable family. Reggie, he wondered? Or was it
+that the mother's wretched grocery business had failed, as he had always
+expected it to do, and he was to be asked for another contribution towards
+setting her going again?
+
+With those thoughts passing through his mind, he went back to his old
+position by the fireplace, standing up stiff and straight and tall, upon
+the hearth, to survey his visitor from there.
+
+"You were so kind once," Deleah said, and he heard that she had a
+difficulty in keeping her voice steady, and saw that her lips shook "--so
+very kind when I came to you before, that I have come again."
+
+Too apprehensive of what her errand might be to say that he was glad to
+see her, he bowed his head in sign of courteous attention, and waited.
+
+As she had come on her hateful errand, she had thought of how she would
+prepare the ground, in some way leading up to the petition she had to
+make, but speech was too difficult, and she could barely deliver herself
+of the necessary words: "I have come to ask you to give me fifty pounds,"
+she said.
+
+Sir Francis's eyes opened largely upon her, but he did not speak. To say
+at once that he would give the poor child--the tool no doubt of her
+family, sent by them to work upon him because she was so pretty and young
+and appealing--fifty pounds without further explanation would be simply
+silly: to say that he would not did not enter his head.
+
+She had waited for an encouraging word; none coming; painfully she
+laboured on: "I say 'give' because I am not sure I could ever pay you--I
+earn so very little money. But if I ever can pay you, you may trust me
+that I shall."
+
+"I am sure you will," the rich man said, and waited for her to go on with
+her story. But she sat in an embarrassed silence before him, her head
+drooping, frightened and ashamed.
+
+"We will call it 'lent,' shall we?" presently he said. "You will feel
+happier so. And there will be no hurry. No hurry, at all."
+
+"Oh thank you! I do thank you so much. I want to tell you--"
+
+"No, no," he said and held up a hand to check the words upon her lips. It
+was ridiculous to give away money in such a fashion, but he had a feeling
+that if he knew its destination he should give it with more reluctance.
+
+"But I must tell you, please. I wanted to tell you before, but--" Her eyes
+avoided his face and wandered distressedly round the room. How well she
+remembered it! It was here she had come to beg this man--this
+stranger!--to keep her father out of prison. And now her brother--now
+Bernard! Was there any girl in all the world so overwhelmed with shame as
+she! "It is my brother--" she got out. "He--I have brought his letter."
+
+She found her pocket, and brought forth the letter which had come to her
+by the morning post, ravaging her heart, turning the sunshine black,
+making the song of the imprisoned lark opposite into a dirge, plunging her
+back into the woe which had been hers at the time of her father's
+disgrace. She drew the miserable letter from its envelope and held it to
+Sir Francis in trembling fingers.
+
+"No," he said, and waved it away. "It is perhaps something that your
+brother would rather not have known. Something which can remain between
+you and him. And this--this fifty pounds"--he had gone to his
+writing-table, pulled a cheque-book from a drawer, was writing within it
+as he spoke--"this also is between you and me. No one, besides, needs ever
+to know a word of it."
+
+The chair he had arranged for her to sit in was by the writing-table; he,
+sitting on the opposite side of it, lifted his eyes to her face without
+lifting his head: "You wish this made out to your brother or yourself?"
+
+"To my brother."
+
+"Will you tell me his name?"
+
+"Bernard William."
+
+She watched his strong white hand move over the paper, writing so easily
+the words that were of such moment to her. How the great ruby in the ring
+he wore on the hand which held the pen seemed to glow and burn in the
+sunlight. On the little finger of his other hand was a plain small circlet
+she knew to be from the finger of his dead wife. She noticed in the strong
+light from the window how the smooth black hair had grown grey about the
+ears, how lines which had not been there before had graved themselves in
+the handsome, impassive face. Was he very unhappy too, Deleah wondered, in
+the midst of her own trouble? Did he still mourn, as they said he had
+done, so heavily, for the lost wife?
+
+He pushed the cheque across the table to her. "There!" he said.
+
+He had caught her gaze fixed with its sorrowful questioning upon his face,
+and he put away from him his doubt, his annoyance, and in spite of himself
+smiled encouragement into her pleading, beautiful, innocently worshipping
+eyes.
+
+"Do not be unhappy," he said. "This will put things right, we will hope;
+and set your brother on his feet again. You must not look so sad."
+
+At the words--he had been wrong to speak so kindly--the clear hazel of her
+eyes was suffused with tears. The eyes were doubly beautiful so.
+
+"'I'll not believe but Desdemona's honest'" he found himself replying to
+that annoying little voice which kept whispering, "Have they put her on to
+me?"
+
+Deleah kept her wet eyes strained upon him, lest in lowering them the
+tears should overflow. "I don't know what you can think of me," she said
+falteringly. "I don't know how I had courage to come. I only had Bernard's
+letter this morning; he said--it--must be done to-day. My mother must not
+know: there is no one else: I had no one to ask. You had been so good to
+me once--I thought of you."
+
+"I quite understand. Quite. Quite."
+
+"I was a child then," she laboured on, forcing herself to try to express
+what she felt ought to be said; "and although I had no right to trouble
+you, to a child things may be forgiven. But now--but now--!"
+
+"But now," he repeated, and smiled his faint smile again. To him she was
+but a child still, and his tone conveyed that message.
+
+"I am very much ashamed," she said. "And so--so grateful."
+
+She folded the cheque, put it in her cheap, little-used purse, and stood
+up. So humiliated she felt, she hesitated to put out her hand, lest he
+should think it presumptuous on her part to expect him to shake hands with
+her.
+
+"Where is this brother of yours? What is he doing?" he asked.
+
+"He is at Ingleby. Mr. George Boult put him into one of his shops in the
+country."
+
+"Oh! George Boult?"
+
+Something in tone depreciatory of the man caused Deleah to say quickly,
+"He has been very good to us. He helped mama about the grocer's shop; and
+advises her."
+
+"So I have heard." He was thinking to himself if the unsatisfactory
+brother had to look for mercy for any misdoings to George Boult he would
+be in a sorry case.
+
+"He is very young--my poor brother," Deleah put in. "And I suppose he has
+made bad friends. He never has a holiday. He can never come home to mama
+and us--"
+
+"Ah, that is bad. And can't you go over to him? I am sure that you could
+do him good." For the thought came to him, as he looked down upon the
+sorrowful girl in her neat, cheap frock, standing so shyly before him,
+that he had never seen goodness written so legibly on the face of any
+human being as on that of this daughter of a thief and sister of a
+never-do-well.
+
+"Railway travelling is expensive, and we are obliged to live very
+carefully," Deleah said. "Poor mama has made one or two bad debts lately.
+And so many people, who pay in the end, are so very slow to do so." Deleah
+shook her head slowly and sorrowfully over these sluggards. "Also, I am
+occupied, of course, all day long."
+
+"May I know in what way?"
+
+"I teach," Deleah said, and lifted her head with a kind of pride in the
+avowal which was very pretty. "I am second English governess at Miss
+Chaplin's school for young ladies. I earn enough there to buy my own
+clothes and Franky's."
+
+Her courage was coming back to her; instead of the difficulty she had
+experienced in dragging out the words necessary to explain and condone her
+errand, she now had the impulse to tell him things, to make him
+confidences.
+
+"And who is Franky?"
+
+"He is my little brother. Very much younger than the rest, and the pet
+with all of us. Mama says, but for Franky, she thinks she could never have
+survived the troubles she has had. I think we all felt that. We could not
+be always crying and melancholy in the company of a little boy who does
+not understand, and who wants so much to enjoy himself. For Franky's sake
+we have to be cheerful. He is only nine. Only seven when--all
+that--happened to papa."
+
+"Franky must not go into one of George Boult's shops," Sir Francis said.
+"When Franky is old enough to leave school--to begin to earn his
+living--come and tell me, will you?"
+
+Her face lit, till it was lovely as a sun-kissed flower. "Oh, I will! Oh,
+thank you," she said; and then she did put out her hand, and for an
+instant her fingers closed with all their soft strength round the hand he
+gave her. "Oh, thank you!" she said again.
+
+Then he opened the door for her, and she went.
+
+
+
+
+Deleah, when she had sent off the cheque, whose receipt must have
+surprised him exceedingly, to her brother, felt herself to be almost
+bursting with the desire to confide in some one the history of her visit
+to the rich brewer. She longed to descant on his looks, to repeat his
+words, above all to tell of the heavenly promise contained in that last
+divine sentence concerning Franky. No one must be told; but Deleah was
+over young to be burdened with a secret; it made her restless. She could
+not sit with Bessie, to hear her discuss the pattern of the sleeve she was
+cutting out for a new Sunday frock. She ran down to the shop, for the
+relief of being near her mother.
+
+Mrs. Day glanced at her with welcoming eyes and turned at once again
+attentively upon her customer, a good lady difficult to please in the
+matter of candles.
+
+"A tallow candle will do very well for the servants to gutter down, in the
+kitchen," she was irritably declaring. "But neither my daughter nor me can
+abide the smell of tallow; and your wax ones are a cruel price. Cruel,
+Mrs. Day! I suppose you could not make a reduction by my taking two
+packets?"
+
+Mrs. Day shook a patient head. "We really get almost nothing out of them,
+as it is," she sadly protested. "These candles--called composite--ladies
+are beginning to buy them for servants' use as well as their own. I sell
+more composites now than either wax or tallow."
+
+"You couldn't oblige me with one or two to try?--Oh, good afternoon, Miss
+Day. So you are not above coming into the shop sometimes, to bear your
+mama company?"
+
+"Above it!" said Deleah; and because she had to be as sweet as sugar to
+her mother's customers, she smiled upon Mrs. Potter, who turned from the
+counter to engage her in talk.
+
+"What for you, my dear?" Mrs. Day's next customer was a very shabby, very
+small boy, his grimy, eager face appearing just above the counter.
+
+"A ha'p'r' o' acids, like th' last." He held up the coin in his fist to
+assure her of the good faith of the transaction.
+
+"You give me more 'n that, last time, for a ha'p'ny. You ha'n't weighed
+'em," the customer grumbled.
+
+"Lucky for you I have not! Here! Take your ha'penny and be off."
+
+Many customers of that unremunerative order had the widow. When the ragged
+little ones happened to be about the age of Franky they were sure of
+bouncing weight, and of getting their money returned. She smiled upon the
+scaramouch now, who was watched from the door by half a dozen
+confederates. The ha'penny was common property apparently, for each was
+presently clamouring for his share.
+
+These screws of sweets and quarter pounds of broken biscuits given to the
+children of the very poor afforded her the only pleasure Mrs. Day got out
+of her long hours behind the grocery counter. For, in spite of the greed
+and selfishness of human nature, perhaps the most keenly felt deprivations
+of the one who has been rich and now is poor is the inability to put the
+hand lightly in the pocket, and with no thought if it can be afforded or
+no, to give to those who ask.
+
+While Mrs. Day had been attending to her own customers with one ear, she
+had been hearing with the other a discussion going on at the opposite
+corner as to the price and the quality of the butter.
+
+"Ours is from the best dairy," young--very young!--Mr. Pretty was assuring
+the poor, respectable woman who was hanging back from putting his
+assertion to the test. "Fresh in, every day, mum. Like to put a bit on
+your tongue to try it?"
+
+The woman did so, tasting the morsel with an anxious look. "But I can't
+afford to give you one-and-two the pound, if I can buy it a penny less,
+only a little way down the street."
+
+"You don't get butter there like this, ma'am;" and young Mr. Pretty, who
+should have been Master Pretty surely, by rights, conveyed a piece of
+butter to his own tongue, and tasted it loudly, looking very wise.
+
+"'Best quality, one and a penny.' I see it ticketed up as I come by
+Coman's." She turned round to the mistress of the shop. "I have always
+dealt along of you for butter, ma'am," she said. "I haven't no wish to
+leave you, but where I buy my butter--stand to reason I must buy the rest
+of my grosheries."
+
+"If Coman is down to that; you shall have it for the same sum;" Mrs. Day
+promised. Her butter had already been "dropped" twice before, that day, in
+order to keep pace with the passion for underselling of the new grocer,
+who had, for the undoing of the widow and the orphan, opened a shop lower
+down the street. Our poor retailer was selling her sugars, too, for less
+than she gave for them.
+
+"You must do so for a time," George Boult had informed her. "Coman can't
+go on like this for ever. He'll get tired of the game soon--if I know
+anything of trade and tradesmen--then you can stick it on to your goods
+again."
+
+While the subject of the butter was being debated, the child Franky came
+in from afternoon school. He was day-boarder at a cheap academy to which
+other small tradesmen's sons were sent--a school very inferior to that to
+which Bernard had gone. Companionship with rough, common children had not
+improved the manners of Franky, nor his habit of speech. He dashed in,
+with no thought of the deference due to customers, pushed out of his way
+the lady just deciding to let Mrs. Day try to procure in the town a candle
+more to her taste, rushed round the counter to his mother.
+
+"C'n I go in to tea with Willy Spratt? Willy Spratt's ma says I may go to
+tea with 'm. I wish to, very much. C'n I go?"
+
+"No, my dear. We like you to have tea with us. We can't spare you."
+
+"C'n I go, ma? C'n I go? Willy Spratt's waitin' outside."
+
+Willy Spratt was the son of the cutler and his wife, across the way. Very
+good customers of Mrs. Day, very good people; but--
+
+"You haven't spoken to Mrs. Potter, Franky," Deleah said to divert the
+child's mind. "You know Mrs. Potter, sir. Where are your manners?"
+
+"Quite 'ell, I thank ye," said Franky without a glance in the direction of
+the good lady in question, who had not the intention to inquire for his
+health. "C'n I go, ma? Willy's waitin' outside; and c'n I go?"
+
+"Oh go!" his poor mother said. "Go! But, Franky dear, _don't_ pull your
+cap in that hideous fashion over your eyes."
+
+But Franky had ducked his head from beneath his mother's hand, dashed
+round the counter, and was away to the society of the expectant Willy.
+
+In an interregnum of peace between the going and coming of customers Mrs.
+Day moaned to Deleah over the grievous subject of Franky's deterioration.
+"He even brushes his hair, and wears his cap, in the fashion of that
+dreadful Willy Spratt. Being so young he does not stand a chance. He must
+grow into just a common little boy."
+
+"Never, mama!" Deleah, the unfailing comforter, declared. "Why, Franky
+looks like a creature of a different mould from Willy Spratt. Franky, with
+that dear little nose of his, is distinctly aristocratic. Don't laugh! He
+is indeed. You and he are, you know; and any one can see it."
+
+"Nonsense, my dear," the mother said, but smiled and was comforted on that
+score. "It is inevitable, I suppose," she went on, "that we fall into the
+way of speech of those around us. But it vexes me. Have you noticed that
+even Bessie habitually speaks of Mr. Gibbon now without the 'Mr.'?
+'Gibbon' said this or 'Gibbon' did that. I don't like to mention it to
+her, but it offends my ear."
+
+"I wouldn't say anything," Deleah counselled. "We know that Bessie is--so
+very easily upset."
+
+"Poor Bessie!" the mother said. Both of them had a vision of Bessie
+drumming her heels on the floor in the hysterics into which a few
+thwarting words would throw her. "What about Bessie's love affairs?" Mrs.
+Day presently asked. "I should be so thankful to see Bessie with a home of
+her own. She would be so happy, married. But--?"
+
+She paused questioningly upon the "but," knowing it to be a very large
+one.
+
+"I don't think Reggie means anything, mama."
+
+"No," acquiesced Mrs. Day, sadly shaking her head. "I can't think how
+Bessie can be so blind. Yet, if it were otherwise, what an escape out of
+Bridge Street it would be for her."
+
+Deleah was silent.
+
+"Or for you?"
+
+Deleah laughed with her colour high: "I would not marry Reggie Forcus if
+he were stuffed with gold, mama."
+
+Mrs. Day turned away to wait upon the untidy little servant girl from over
+the way whose family had suddenly "run out of vinegar."
+
+Her eyes had been sharp enough to see on which of her daughters' faces it
+was that Reginald Forcus's gaze dwelt; she had divined the attraction
+which drew the pleasure-loving, much sought young man to sit patiently for
+hours in the evening, watching the girls at their work. She looked,
+drearily, the vinegar being measured and the customer gone, between the
+intervening biscuit tins and pickle jars into the street. She had begun to
+cherish a dream that if not Bessie it might be her pretty Deleah who,
+through Reggie, should find a way out.
+
+"Supposing he really wanted to marry either of us you would not surely
+like it, would you, mama?"
+
+And Mrs. Day was obliged to admit with a kind of shame that she would.
+
+"That silly, irresponsible, baby of a young man; without two ideas in his
+head!"
+
+But the mother knew if his head was empty, his pocket was not. He might
+not be clever, or have much stability of character, but oh, how many
+things which made life pleasant he possessed! She who had had them, and
+had lost them, was not one to underrate the value of worldly goods.
+
+"I suppose the end will be Bessie must marry Mr. Gibbon," she said, with
+an effort at resignation and putting away from her unwillingly the golden
+dream. "I should not blame Bessie," she went on judicially. "He is a good
+and steady-going man, although so very quiet. Have you noticed, my dear,
+how very quiet Mr. Gibbon has become?"
+
+"Yes, mama."
+
+"I suppose it is love which makes him so quiet."
+
+She supposed so, Deleah said. That he had been quieter still would have
+pleased her better. She could have spared his fierce "I love you,"
+whispered behind the tablecloth when he and she had stooped simultaneously
+to pick up a knife which had fallen yesterday; his impassioned "Only look
+at me!" fiercely breathed last night over the candlestick he put into her
+hand. Both Bessie and her mother looked on the Honourable Charles as
+Bessie's property. Deleah was frightened at, and ashamed of, these
+irregular demonstrations.
+
+"He is a commonplace, uninteresting looking man--but for something there
+in his eyes. I don't know if you have noticed what I mean, Deleah?--Yet he
+will make a safe husband, with no thought in his head but for Bessie; and
+I suppose we must make up our minds to the sacrifice."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+What Is It Now?
+
+
+"Any message for your son, ma'am?" Mr. Gibbon inquired one night at
+supper-time of the widow, and announced that business called him to
+Ingleby on the next morning.
+
+He did not add that he went with special instructions to inquire into
+complaints again made of Bernard Day by the manager of the branch shop,
+and to bring back a report on which George Boult could act.
+
+"The boy will have to be removed from Ingleby," the draper said. "I want
+to know if I am justified in discharging him on the spot, or whether I may
+risk giving him another chance."
+
+Mr. Boult had stayed his hand from dealing summarily with the young man,
+as it had been his instinct to do. After all, he was William Day's son;
+the son of the one friend whom, in all his life, he had made. The son of
+the widow of Bridge Street, also; and he, George Boult, had been the
+arbiter of her destiny, of the destiny of her children, and was proud of
+the fact. The result had not been altogether satisfactory. No amount of
+teaching or of bullying would ever make a business woman of the mother;
+but then he knew that he had enjoyed the teaching and bullying. He felt
+a glow of satisfaction, when he read her name in the small white letters
+on a black ground above the shop door, "Lydia Day, licensed to sell tobacco
+and snuff," and remembered it was he who had caused that legend to be
+written there. It pleased him to recall the handsome woman in her silks
+and laces, who had extended a patronising hand to him, now and again, on
+those Sunday afternoons he had spent with her husband--the haughty-looking,
+dark-skinned, dark-eyed beauty, as he conjured her to his mind's eye--and
+then to enter the gloomy little shop, and to see this same woman--was it
+in truth the same?--her black gown covered by a large white, bibbed apron,
+white sleeves to her elbows, standing behind the counter, to weigh treacle
+into a customer's jar, or to descant on the merits of various scrubbing
+soaps.
+
+"My doing," George Boult said to himself, and was pleased.
+
+His mother had many messages for Bernard, of course. A parcel of a couple
+of shirts for him too, which she and the girls had made for him, stitching
+busily together after the day's work was done. He was to write oftener. He
+was to send her his socks to mend. To take long walks into the country;
+and not by any means to be tempted to spend his evenings at the horrid
+hotel which Mr. Boult had complained to his mother he frequented.
+
+In the morning a little parcel was put into the boarder's hand, with the
+request that he would give it to Bernard. It contained a sovereign the
+poor woman, who had not a penny to spare, had taken from a sum due to meet
+a certain account, that day. The boy's salary was so very, very small; the
+wholesale house must wait for payment.
+
+When Deleah arrived home from her school on the afternoon of that day, she
+found the shop in charge of Mr. Pretty alone, a state of things never
+permitted except at meal-times. Deleah went into the house and ran
+upstairs with a foreboding mind. Reaching the dark landing upon which the
+sitting-room opened, her heart sank within her at the sound of loud
+weeping proceeding from that room. Her mother was dying, or dead, bemoaned
+by Bessie, she decided, her thoughts leaping to the worst that could
+befall.
+
+It was a relief to her, therefore, to see Mrs. Day seated in her
+accustomed chair, grey and stricken of face, but alive, and as she
+maintained an upright position, presumably well. The mother was looking
+straight before her with blindly staring eyes, paying no heed to Bessie,
+stretched upon the sofa, uttering howl upon howl.
+
+"What is it now?" Deleah asked, standing in the doorway as if struck
+there. "Tell me quickly what it is." Her mind flew afield in search of
+awful possibilities. "Is Bernard dead?" she asked.
+
+"Oh, I wish he were! I wish he were!" Bessie cried, and flung herself into
+a sitting position. "I wish he were. Bernard is worse, far worse than
+dead. Bernard has enlisted for a soldier!"
+
+Deleah shut the door and came forward into the room. "Is that all?" she
+asked. Her poor little face was white, her eyes wild with fear. That
+Bernard was in prison had been what she dreaded to hear. "Oh, mama, if
+that is all, it is not so terrible."
+
+Then there came a knock at the door and Charles Gibbon came in. Deleah
+turned upon him: "You should not have told them; you should have told me,"
+she reproached him.
+
+"I don't think so," he said bluntly. "Why should you bear the brunt of
+everything?"
+
+Mrs. Day was incapable of speech, her poor lips shaking, the hands
+twitching which lay helpless on her lap.
+
+Bessie looked at her. "Poor mama! Poor mama!" she moaned. "This will kill
+mama! The disgrace will kill her!"
+
+"Hush!" said the Honourable Charles, and turned upon her, shocking her
+into silence. "You should have more control over yourself, Miss Bessie.
+Hysterics never helped any one in the world, yet."
+
+"Hysterics!" repeated Bessie, but was so astonished that she ceased to
+moan.
+
+"Mrs. Day," the boarder went on, "I told you the news about your son a
+little abruptly perhaps, but I did not consider I was telling you bad
+news. Many"--he was going to say "better men" but changed it into--"many
+better off than he have done the same thing, and it has been the making of
+them. I tell you straight, under all the circumstances, I think he has
+done the best thing he could."
+
+"I must buy him off, of course," Mrs. Day said, paying no heed. "Do you
+know how to set about it, Mr. Gibbon; and what it costs?"
+
+If Mr. Gibbon knew he did not say.
+
+"To think of Bernard being a common soldier--a private!" Bessie began
+again, and shook once more with sobs. "If he comes here, Deleah, do you
+think he will expect us to walk out with him? We can never be seen with
+Bernard again--never! Never! Never!"
+
+She had quarrelled continually with Bernard, but she had been fond of him,
+and proud of his good looks. Poor Bessie's grief was selfishly shown, but
+it was genuine grief all the same.
+
+"Discipline will be the best thing in the world for him," the boarder
+promised. "A friend of mine who also went to the b---- who also enlisted,
+for certain reasons, is an officer now."
+
+"Bernard will have no luck," Bessie declared. "No luck ever comes our
+way."
+
+"There's no good waiting for luck, Miss Bessie--"
+
+"Will Mr. Boult buy him off?" the widow interrupted. No argument weighed
+with her. She listened to no attempt at comfort. "I must go to Mr. Boult
+at once, and ask him to do it."
+
+"If you take my advice, you won't, ma'am. If you ask him ever so, he
+won't."
+
+"I will beg him, on my knees," the poor lady said.
+
+Deleah followed Gibbon to the landing. "Is there anything you are keeping
+back?" she whispered to him. "You can tell me. I am not Bessie."
+
+"The boy's been a fool--but there's nothing that can't be hushed up."
+
+Her eyes full of fear clung to his face; she was determined to hear the
+worst. "You must tell me," she persisted.
+
+"A couple of bills were paid over the counter; only for small amounts.
+Your brother did not--did not--"
+
+"You mean he took the money for himself?"
+
+How white her face was! The sound of Bessie's sighs and moans came from
+the sitting-room. Deleah opened another door on the landing. It was that
+of her mother's bedroom, but she cared nothing for that. With a hand on
+the boarder's arm she led him in there, and shut the door.
+
+"Bernard stole the money?" she whispered. She had no thought of herself,
+or of who it was she held by the arm, had forgotten that he loved her. To
+know the worst, and to know it at once, so that in some way her mother
+might be spared the knowledge, was what she wanted.
+
+She had no pity on herself, but he had pity for her--abounding,
+overwhelming pity; the brave little white-faced girl, who did not moan,
+nor fling herself about, nor talk nonsense; who had courage, who faced
+things.
+
+"Your brother gave the receipts all right," he said slowly, "but he
+omitted to enter the accounts as paid in the ledger."
+
+"And the money? What did he do with the money?"
+
+"The money is all right. The firm loses nothing."
+
+"How do you mean? Tell me."
+
+"The money was found in his room."
+
+"Who found it?"
+
+"I found it. It was only for a small amount."
+
+"And paid it in? So that they lose nothing? So that they all know that
+Bernard had only been careless? That he was not a thief?"
+
+"It's all right," he assured her. "There's nothing for you to worry
+about--now."
+
+"You are sure you are keeping nothing back? You would not deceive me?
+There is nothing more?"
+
+Gibbon hesitated; he was not a man who told lies; and there was something
+more. "It seems he made debts--debts that out of his salary it was
+impossible for your brother to pay."
+
+"Yes?"
+
+"But he did pay them."
+
+"He did? Then--?"
+
+"You see, Miss Deleah, they're wishful to know where he got the money from
+to pay with."
+
+She looked at him with knit brows anxiously for a minute, then her face
+cleared and a glad light was in her eyes. "Why, I can tell them!" she
+said, "I sent him the money to pay the debts."
+
+"It was fifty pounds--about. _You_ sent it?"
+
+"Oh, the money was not mine. It was Sir Francis Forcus's money. I asked
+him for it. You can tell them I sent it, Mr. Gibbon; but tell them no
+more. Sir Francis wished it to be a secret between him and me."
+
+"Oh!" Gibbon said, and roughly shook her hand from his arm.
+
+"You don't believe me?"
+
+"I believe you fast enough; oh, yes."
+
+"Then why are you angry?"
+
+"You might have come to me. Why didn't you come to me?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know," Deleah said. The several reasons she could have given
+it seemed kinder to withhold.
+
+He pounced upon her, his eyes blazing. "I don't like these '_secrets_'
+between a man and a girl."
+
+Deleah drew back with a little offence. "If you knew at all what Sir
+Francis is like you would not say such a thing as that, Mr. Gibbon."
+
+"What is he like?"
+
+"Infinitely--infinitely above everything that is not kind and
+generous--and noble."
+
+"He is just like any other man, except that he has more money."
+
+Deleah put on her little air of dignity. "I thank you for telling me
+everything about my brother," she said. "I am so relieved that there was
+nothing worse to hear."
+
+He watched her as she walked across the gloomy little square of landing
+and entered the other room. When she held her small head so poised on its
+long graceful throat, when the corners of her lips were ever so little
+turned down, the small rounded chin turned up, and the wonderful black
+eyelashes swept her cheeks he was afraid of her, little bit of a girl of
+less than half his age as she was; a girl who had been a child but two
+years ago, when he had come to the house. A girl whose lips as far as he
+had ever heard had never spoken one ungentle word; a girl who had pity on
+drowning flies, and carefully turned away her foot from the abject worm.
+But then he was always trembling before her, either with love or fear.
+
+The impulse to tell her that the purse-proud brewer was not the only man
+who had done the wretched brother a service for her sake possessed him.
+The few pounds he had put, in order that he might find them there, in
+Bernard's room, had been infinitely more to him than the fifty pounds to
+Sir Francis Forcus. And he was one who saved his money anxiously for the
+end he had in view. Would she call him "kind and generous and noble" if he
+told her? He more than doubted it.
+
+"We can't possibly walk about with Bernard in the dress of a private
+soldier," Bessie was saying when Deleah returned to the sitting-room. "We
+have come down, mama, I know, but we have not come down so low as that;
+and Bernard can't expect it of us."
+
+"I shall buy him off, if I have to sell the clothes off my back," Mrs. Day
+said, oblivious of the fact that her wardrobe in the market might perhaps
+have fetched the sum of thirty shillings.
+
+"I would not be in too great a hurry, mama."
+
+"You think nothing about the sufferings of your poor brother, Deleah. My
+darling son."
+
+"I do think of him. I think he will be very angry if this is done at once.
+You must wait until he has had time to get sick of it."
+
+"As soon as the shop is closed I shall go to Mr. Boult and beg of him to
+help me to buy him off," Mrs. Day persisted.
+
+She rose up stiffly from her chair and stood beside it, her hand grasping
+its back, waiting for the strength to come to her to take up the burthen
+of business again. Ah, if only she had leisure for grieving, if she might
+lie on the sofa and cry, as Bessie was doing, what a luxury it would have
+been!
+
+The assistant had been left to "get up" an order for her most important
+customer in her absence. He had put the wrong sugars into parcels, and the
+wrong tea. In reaching the tin of "foy grass" from the top shelf, he had
+knocked down and broken a bottle of piccalilli, catching its contents in
+the crystallised sugar drawer. Mrs. Day was very gentle with him, who was
+younger even than poor Bernard.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+The Dangerous Scrooge
+
+
+Mrs. Day was spared the errand to Mr. George Boult on which she had been
+bent, for that gentleman, before the time for putting up shutters was
+reached, having had an interview with his Manchester man, sought the widow
+in her shop.
+
+Since having been made a magistrate, it was to be observed that certain
+changes had taken place in the appearance and the attire of the successful
+draper. He affected now the light-coloured tweed suit of the country
+gentlemen, rather than the black decorous garments of trade. A deerstalker
+replaced the tall hat to which his head was accustomed, and he wore it, as
+was the fashion among the younger generation at that period, ever so
+little on one side. His short beard was trimmed to a point, his moustache
+turned upwards at the ends, on his hands were gloves of tawny-coloured
+leather. Altogether he now presented a figure which, in spite of the undue
+protuberance of stomach, and the shortness and thickness of neck, he had
+the satisfaction of knowing to be strangely rejuvenated and quite
+up-to-date.
+
+"Business not very lively to-day, ma'am?" he said in his quick, hard way,
+looking round upon the empty shop.
+
+It was about everybody's tea-time. A slack hour, Mrs. Day reminded him.
+
+"Coman's was full, as I came by," he told her. "He's got a sugar in his
+window at three-ha'pence; one great placard quoting primest butter at
+elevenpence; another setting forth that a quarter pound of tea would be
+given away with every half-crown spent in the shop."
+
+Mrs. Day sighed despondently. "We can't cope with him," she said. "There
+is no good in trying."
+
+"What do you intend to do then? Do you suppose families will buy their
+groshery" (he was always pronouncing it "groshery") "of you when they can
+buy it cheaper, a few shops farther down? Why should they, ma'am, come to
+think of it?"
+
+"They won't, of course," Mrs. Day acquiesced, "but we may as well be
+ruined through lack of custom as through selling our goods for less than
+we give for them."
+
+"I'll tell you what will ruin you," he said brusquely. "And that is lack
+of spunk." He derived a pleasure from the belief, apparently; he announced
+it with so much gusto. "In business you must not be a coward, ma'am. You
+must go for the man that's 'underselling' you, stand up to him, pay him
+out of his own coin."
+
+Poor Mrs. Day heard him with a fainting spirit, dreary-eyed. What did she
+care for paying out Coman, down the street! Her heart was full of Bernard.
+
+"Now look here, ma'am; _re_-dress your window. Where's your young man?
+Where's Pretty?" Pretty, who cordially loathed George Boult, reluctantly
+appeared. "Look here, young man; to-night, when you've up-shuttered, clear
+out half your window. Shove it full of the best sugar you've got. Put a
+card on it--one that'll shout at 'em as they pass. Letters that long, do
+you see, and black--_black_. 'Our three-ha'penny sugar. Comparisons
+invited.' Just that. See? And, look here again, ma'am, stick a ha'penny,
+or a penny a pound, on to your other goods, to make up. Understand?"
+
+Mrs. Day faintly admitted that she understood.
+
+"Oh, these things are easy enough to manage, get the hang of 'em. I don't
+object to this underselling on Coman's part. A little conflict in trade
+wakes interest, stirs us all up, customers and salesmen. We're too much
+inclined in Brockenham to go to sleep. We must wake up, Mrs. Day. That's
+our motter."
+
+Then, with hardly a pause, and with no change of tone, he went on to the
+subject so near to her heart. "I have come in to speak to you, ma'am,
+about this boy of yours. He has conducted himself towards me with the
+basest ingratitude--but that we need not refer to, that don't matter,
+although I must say, considering what I have done for you all--"
+
+Mrs. Day glanced towards Mr. Pretty, pricking his ears, and dismissed him
+to his task of grinding coffee in the cellar.
+
+"Mr. Boult, if you would spare me!" she pleaded with a pitiful kind of
+dignity. "We owe you a great deal, I know; not one of us is ungrateful.
+But I beg you to be so considerate as to spare me complaints of my son."
+
+"I don't forget you are his mother, ma'am. I don't forget it for a moment.
+Otherwise--"
+
+"What Bernard has done is the cause of the greatest grief to me--grief I
+do not really know how to support. I was coming to see you, Mr. Boult.
+Coming to ask you--to beg of you--"
+
+He lifted his square-looking hand, clad in the new orange-coloured glove,
+to silence her. "Don't ask it," he said. "I know what you want me to do.
+Gibbon prepared me. You wish me to buy off this ungain-doing son. Not a
+penny of my money shall go to do it. Not a penny!"
+
+He brought the hand down smartly upon the counter, to emphasize the words.
+Mrs. Day, gazing sad-eyed at him, said nothing.
+
+"The boy has behaved like an ill-conditioned, ignorant cub--Well! I'll
+spare you. We know how he's behaved. Let him pay for it. He'll get a
+sickener, I don't doubt. Serve him right. Serve him well right."
+
+"But, Mr. Boult--he is my son."
+
+"What difference does that make, my dear lady? Every ungain-doing boy is
+some mother's son."
+
+"If Bernard could have one more chance!"
+
+"He's got it. By buying him off you are trying to do away with his chance.
+The boy's been brought up too soft. Give him hardships; it's the best
+physic for him."
+
+"Think of the forced companionship with those he must associate with!"
+
+"When he could pick his companions he chose the worst he could find. He's
+amongst a rougher crew now, but a far and away better one for him."
+
+The tears were running down Mrs. Day's cheeks. She wiped them away
+furtively with her hand, but he saw them. Saw, and resented them with the
+impatient sense of injury a woman's tears arouse in that order of man. He
+turned his back upon her, and began fingering the lemons displayed in a
+box on the other counter.
+
+"Think over what I've said, ma'am. Words of wisdom you've heard, and every
+one of 'em for your good. And see that your young man carries out my
+suggestion for the window to-morrow, will you? Miss Bessie upstairs?"
+
+Mrs. Day, staring into the street through her tears, said she believed her
+daughter was in the sitting-room.
+
+"I'll just run up and pay my respects to Miss Bessie, then."
+
+He had adopted the habit, of late, of going up to pay his respects in that
+quarter after every business interview in the shop. Bessie pretended to
+look upon the predilection for her society as presumption on George
+Boult's part.
+
+"A man as old as my own father!" she often said to Emily, with whom she
+had many confidences.
+
+"All the more reason for him to come fascinatin' round you," Emily
+declared.
+
+How this ill-favoured, more than middle-aged spinster came to be an
+authority on affairs of the heart she would have found it difficult to
+explain; but she had ever an opinion to offer on such matters, and she
+gave it with a weightiness and a conclusiveness which rendered it final.
+
+"It's when they gets past the time that females is likely to cast an eye
+to them that they're dangerous--so madly are they then overcome with
+love," she asserted.
+
+"I don't think old Scrooge will ever be dangerous," Bessie regretfully
+demurred. She was much interested. "What do you mean by 'dangerous,'
+Emily?"
+
+Emily would not descend to detail. She nodded a wise head. "You look out!"
+she counselled. "And remember, Miss Bessie, I'm always at hand when he's
+near."
+
+The idea that the elderly draper might suddenly become riotous, gave
+always a zest to the _tête-à-tête_ which otherwise it might have lacked.
+She was, truth to tell, a little disappointed to find him after each visit
+no more alarming than he had been before. She even tried to pique him into
+an exhibition of the "dangerous" symptom, treating him with the caprice
+and the disdain she dared not have shown but for Emily's repeated
+assurance she could play as she liked with him and he would never take
+offence. The mother, Deleah, even little Franky, had to mind their "P's
+and Q's" with the man who, as he himself had phrased it, "stood at the
+back of them." Bessie was on a different plane, she told herself, and
+could do as she liked.
+
+"I've been bullying your mother about that ill-doing brother of yours," he
+said. "I thought I'd better say a word or two to you on the same subject."
+
+"Thank you, Mr. Boult. You have forgotten to take off your hat."
+
+He took it off with reluctance, because it concealed the bald top of his
+head, and without being asked to do so, seated himself in the chair
+opposite hers.
+
+Every man carries about with him his ideal of what a woman should look
+like, although he probably changes it a good many times before he arrives
+at the age, in Emily's opinion, dangerous for a lover. At the mature age
+of fifty-five, George Boult's ideal happened to be realised by Bessie Day.
+Fair-skinned she was, and very plump. Her waist was small, exceedingly, as
+was in accordance with the taste of that day, but her hips and bust were
+large; there was a promise of a double chin to come later. The necklace of
+Venus showed alluringly in her full young throat, and in the knuckles of
+her small white hands were dimples.
+
+"Is that how you pass your days?" George Boult asked her, pointing to the
+book she still held in her hands.
+
+"Reading? A part of my day. A very good way, too, to pass it. Don't you
+think so?"
+
+"I call it a sinful way. A sinful waste of time."
+
+"Oh, Mr. Boult! But it is only stupid, uncultured people who don't read."
+
+"I read my newspaper every day," he said, as if she had accused him. "It
+is all that business people have time for."
+
+"I'm so glad I'm not a business person, then."
+
+"You never will be! One of the idle ones of the earth, Miss Bessie. Those
+that toil not neither do they spin."
+
+"A lily of the field," Bessie reminded him.
+
+"I have told you before, a fine, healthy young woman like you has no right
+to be sitting over the fire in idleness."
+
+"What do you suggest I should do?"
+
+"Go down and wait in the shop. Why not? If you would do so your mother
+could get rid of Pretty."
+
+Bessie turned on him a face flushed with anger: "I will never wait in the
+shop," she said. "I hate the shop. I hate all shops, except to spend money
+in."
+
+"Ah, you'd do that, I don't doubt," he said, with a certain bitterness. He
+utterly condemned the fat, lazy girl. He would have liked to see her down
+on her knees scrubbing the boards. He would have enjoyed the chance to
+punish her for her frivolity, the impertinence, the nonsense, that yet in
+some unaccountable way attracted him. He looked angrily at her, and Bessie
+watched him. Perhaps he was going to show the "dangerousness" incident to
+his time of life at last.
+
+"As you're all going on now, I'm afraid you won't have much money to
+spend," he contented himself with saying; and then he began on the other
+subject. "And what about this wretched boy?"
+
+"I'll thank you not to call him a wretched boy to me, Mr. Boult."
+
+"What else is he? He is a wretched boy."
+
+"He is my brother."
+
+"Yah, yah!" said Mr. Boult, unable to find articulate expression for his
+contempt. "More's the pity for you! Your mother's running her head at
+buying the young ass off. I've told her I would not give her a farthing
+for any such purpose."
+
+"Did she ask you for a farthing?"
+
+"All I ever intend to do for Master Bernard I have done. I give you all
+notice. If you choose to get him home here, to dangle about, eating you
+women out of house and home, don't look to me to help you."
+
+"Mr. Boult, we are unfortunate, but we aren't quite friendless."
+
+"I'm glad to hear it. It's news."
+
+"Let me tell you that there are others--"
+
+"Pity they didn't come forward sooner!"
+
+In his soul he believed that no family had ever possessed such a guide,
+philosopher and friend as he had been to them. For much he would not have
+credited the suggestion that he must share the honour of having befriended
+them with another.
+
+"If you've got another friend like me up your sleeve you'd best bring him
+forward, and let him put a little more money into the business. That's
+what's wanted, Miss Bessie."
+
+He got up from his chair and advanced a step upon her: "Who are these
+mighty friends then? Out with them."
+
+"Suppose I don't choose to tell you?"
+
+"I should expect you've got your reasons. I will bid you good-afternoon,
+Miss Bessie." He thrust out his hand to her.
+
+"What is that for?" Bessie inquired, looking with disdainful curiosity
+upon the yellow dogskin. "You shouldn't shake hands with a lady with your
+glove on, Mr. Boult."
+
+At that he drew back the hand, put on his hat, and walked away.
+
+"Good-afternoon, Mr. Boult."
+
+"Yah! Yah!" Mr. Boult responded from the landing.
+
+And as he went down the dark staircase and out at the private door he said
+to himself some words the reverse of complimentary to Miss Bessie.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+When Beauty Calls
+
+
+"Oh, Reggie!" Deleah said in a tone of supreme annoyance.
+
+She regarded the young man walking to meet her--his rather dandified but
+sufficiently handsome figure resplendent in the latest and best cut of
+coat, waistcoat and hat, the newest thing in neckties about his throat,
+the ropiest arrangement of gold chain looped across his person--with a
+severe expression of disapproval on her face.
+
+"Now, what are you doing here?" she demanded of him as he turned and
+walked by her side. "Isn't it too bad of you, Reggie! I told you that Miss
+Chaplin had heard of your 'hanging about' for me, as she called it; and
+that I had promised it should not occur again. I have gone a longer way
+home, through far less pleasant streets, to escape you--yet here you are,
+waylaying me again."
+
+"Don't be angry with me, dear; I can't help it," the young man pleaded.
+
+"Can't help it!" she repeated, softly scornful. "You'll get me dismissed
+from the school. That will be our next misfortune."
+
+"I wish the old woman would dismiss you. I wish she'd turn you out, so
+that you hadn't a penny except what I could give you; or anywhere to go
+except to come to me."
+
+"How many times have I asked you not to say that sort of thing?"
+
+"But, hang it all, why shouldn't I? A man knows his own mind at my age, I
+suppose--?"
+
+"You thought you knew it a year ago when all the town was talking of you
+and Harriet Hart. You thought you knew it two--or was it three years
+before that?--when you said you were in love with Bessie."
+
+"Parcel of silly rot, Deleah! They tell you anything, my dear. Don't you
+believe it. I've never been in love--not head over ears, as I am now--in
+all my life before. You may believe it."
+
+"I don't wish to believe it. Let us forget it. Do, Reggie!"
+
+"No; let's have it out. You know what I mean. I mean I want you to marry
+me, dear."
+
+"Nonsense!"
+
+"I can tell you there's no nonsense about it. It's downright, deadly
+earnest. And I'll tell you another thing, Deleah, since you have dragged
+in Bessie: that you've no need to be jealous of her--"
+
+"Jealous! Really, Reggie! Oh, what a conceited young man!"
+
+"Hold on. I'll come to that presently. I'm telling you that even when I
+seemed sweet on Bessie, years ago, I used to think about you. I used to
+think you were the prettiest little girl I'd ever set eyes on. And so you
+were; I used to think what a beauty you'd be; and you are. There's no one
+among the girls I've seen to touch you. You top the lot. You needn't
+laugh, dear. I mean it."
+
+"But if you do--I'm much obliged to you--but it makes no difference,
+Reggie."
+
+"And as to my being conceited--you're always hinting I'm conceited--I'm no
+more so than any young man would be in my place, with a lot of girls
+trying to catch him--Ah, there you go! Don't jump on me, Deleah. You know
+what I mean. Lots of girls are looking out to get married, and I've got
+money, and I've got a name--"
+
+"On the Brewers' carts. 'Forcus and Sons; Brewers.'"
+
+"It's a name I ain't ashamed of, and one that's pretty well known, at any
+rate!"
+
+"And my name, or my mother's name, is over a shop-doorway, 'licensed to
+sell tobacco and snuff'; and it's a name that we can't be proud of,
+Reggie."
+
+"But I'll put up with it, Deleah. I've made up my mind, and I'll go
+through with it. The name wouldn't be yours any longer, dear, when you'd
+taken mine; and as for the grocer's shop--"
+
+"Why, here it is!" Deleah said. "And so good-bye, Reggie."
+
+"I was coming in with you."
+
+"You can't unless I ask you."
+
+"And you're not going to? You're not very polite or kind to me, Deleah,
+upon my word!"
+
+"Indeed, I am very, very kind, Reggie. And that you'll say when you are
+wiser. And so, good-bye. Run away and get wiser, Reggie."
+
+
+
+
+"Deleah, something must be done for Bernard," Mrs. Day said with
+desperation in her tone. She had called the girl into her bedroom to hold
+conference away from the excitable Bessie. "Something I must do for my
+poor boy, or I feel that I shall go out of my senses. You must help me to
+do something, Deleah. Look at this."
+
+From her pocket she drew forth a letter received that morning from the
+unhappy son. Deleah read it with a painful mingling of pity and contempt.
+
+It was indeed an afflicting letter for any mother to receive; and Mrs. Day
+had too long been fed on the bread of affliction.
+
+"You see, he begs of me to do something--to buy him off."
+
+"Yes. I think his letter is abject."
+
+"Don't, dear! Your blaming him makes it worse for me to bear, not better.
+Somehow this thing must be done--_somehow_, if I am to know any peace, to
+be able to go on. Deleah, Reggie Forcus would do anything for you. Ask
+Reggie Forcus to do this."
+
+"Oh, mama! No!"
+
+"My account is overdrawn at the Bank. I dare not ask for a further amount.
+What would these few pounds be to him? He spends as much on a dinner for a
+few men at the Royal."
+
+"I can't ask him. Can't you see I must not?"
+
+"I see what you mean. But oh, Deleah, we seem to have come to the bottom
+of things. What to us, in the very depths, are all those rules and
+niceties that happier people observe? You see what my boy says? He is 'in
+hell.' He says it in so many words. My boy! My Bernard!"
+
+With that Mrs. Day flung her arms upon the table by which she was sitting,
+and her head upon her arms, and gave way to bitter weeping: "My boy! My
+boy! My poor dear, precious Bernard!" she sobbed despairingly.
+
+The sight made Deleah almost desperate: "I can't do what you ask. I can't
+possibly ask Reggie. But--there is another person--"
+
+She stopped there, saying to herself, "The third time The third time! I
+can't ask him for money the third time!"
+
+"Bernard! My Bernard!" cried the mother, her face hidden on her arms.
+
+"Mama, pray do not cry so dreadfully--you break my heart. I can't do what
+you ask, but I will do what I can," Deleah promised.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+Sir Francis Makes A Call
+
+
+The letter in which Deleah, in her most careful handwriting and in formal
+language, set forth her prayer that for her mother's sake Sir Francis
+Forcus, who had already shown her family such generous kindness, should
+buy off her brother Bernard; he, having left Mr. George Boult's shop at
+Ingleby, and now enlisted in such and such a regiment--was addressed to
+that gentleman at his private residence, The Court, Cashelthorpe.
+
+He read the letter among others as he ate his breakfast, gave a shrug and
+a snort of impatience, and put it aside on a little heap of those which
+required answering.
+
+Before starting for town he singled it out from the rest and read it
+again. Then, standing up, the letter still in his hand, he gave vent to
+his feelings on the subject, for the enlightenment of his sister.
+
+"They've put that pretty child on to me again," he said. "This is from
+that little Day girl you fell in love with, last year, in the Assembly
+Rooms, Ada." He tossed the letter into her lap.
+
+"That sweetly pretty little thing at the concert?" She read the letter.
+"What shall you do?" she asked.
+
+"Decline."
+
+"Oh, Francis! Why?"
+
+"Because the boy is a ne'er-do-well. I have heard of him before. He is
+safest where he is."
+
+"She'll think it so unkind, poor child."
+
+"It can't be helped."
+
+"Would it cost much to buy him off?"
+
+"It isn't the money."
+
+"The principle?"
+
+"No. Nor yet, altogether, the principle."
+
+"It would be kind and good-natured to do what the poor little thing asks."
+
+"Yes. But for the sake of seeming good-natured I'm not going to be made a
+tool of."
+
+"You'll simply write back, then, that you won't do it?" She laughed a
+little, looking across at him as he stood up, tall and solemn and
+handsome, with his back to the fire. "To do that will cost you more than
+just enclosing the money."
+
+"That is not the question, Ada. I shall write, or"--he paused a minute,
+putting his lips together as his habit was when making up his mind to a
+course which did not altogether please him--"I'll go and see her," he
+finished.
+
+"That will be kinder," the sister said. To be kind was Ada Forcus's
+religion; it is possible she could not have professed a better one, or one
+more likely to benefit mankind.
+
+"They live at the shop, I suppose?" he asked.
+
+"Over the shop, poor things. I am so very sorry for that poor Mrs. Day."
+
+"You deal with her, don't you? You do what you can?"
+
+"I tell them to get _some_ things there every week."
+
+"And they do?"
+
+"You know how difficult servants are. Mrs. Twiss makes a grievance of it.
+They won't drink the tea in the kitchen; the currants are not so good. She
+always gets the matches there, and the blacking. Everything else Mrs.
+Twiss finds so much better at Wolsey's--"
+
+"And Wolsey, no doubt, gives her a percentage on her order. However--."
+
+Sir Francis fulfilled his intention of calling to see Deleah on the
+subject of her letter on the afternoon of that same day.
+
+Miss Deleah was not home from school yet, he was informed by Emily,
+answering the door. She would not most likelies be many minutes. Would he
+walk in, and wait?
+
+The gentleman, acquiescing, was shown up the steep staircase and across
+the dark landing. Emily had no need to ask his name--there was not a soul
+in Brockenham probably who did not know by sight the rich brewer. With a
+feeling of proud satisfaction the old servant threw open the sitting-room
+door and announced on a sounding note of triumph, "Sir Francis Forcus."
+
+Emerging from the gloom of hall, staircase and landing his eyes were
+almost dazzled by the unexpected brightness and pleasantness of the long
+room, lit at the street end by the three deep-seated windows. Everywhere
+were evidences of occupation by refined women. The street below was hot
+and squalid and dusty, but the room with its shaded wide-open windows was
+cool. In one of them Deleah's bird was singing, and the plants in bloom on
+the wide seats beneath had been pushed on one side to make room for
+Deleah's little pile of books. Bessie's workbox was open on the table. A
+picture or two of no commercial value, but saved with the solid, handsome
+furniture from the prosperous days of the family, hung on the panelled and
+painted walls.
+
+By the side of the rosewood workbox with its over-flowing contents of
+muslin and ribbon to be used in the concoction of an afternoon apron which
+she was engaged on, Miss Day was sitting. Near by, his hands on the raised
+sash of Deleah's special window, leaning forward to look into the street,
+her companion stood. It was not until Bessie had come forward to greet the
+unexpected, astounding visitor, that Sir Francis, turning to look at the
+other occupant of the room, recognised his brother.
+
+Whatever surprise he may have felt he did not show.
+
+"Hullo!" Reggie said, turning round, and looking a little foolish. He
+raised a finger to his fair, smooth hair, in mock-respectful salutation.
+
+"Oh, it's you!" Sir Francis said, and paid the young brother no further
+attention.
+
+The very opposite in manner to the ever-popular Reggie, with his easy
+manners and his never-failing good temper, Sir Francis, cool, reserved,
+spare of speech, and in uncongenial society, truth to tell, unconquerably
+shy, was a difficult person with whom to make talk. He said a few
+constrained words to Bessie, with whose presence on the scene he had not
+reckoned any more than with that of his brother; and Bessie, struggling
+valiantly to appear at ease with him, and failing utterly, answered them
+according to her kind.
+
+"Very warm, to-day."
+
+Bessie was afraid he felt it so in this stuffy, airless street.
+
+"But you are delightfully in the shade here."
+
+Bessie, straightening her back and pouting her vivid lips, told how the
+weather made her long for a garden, a river, and waving trees, or the
+sea-shore.
+
+"Or anything you can't get," Sir Francis commented to himself, looking
+with distaste at the plump, foolish, pink and white face of the young
+woman with whom he had been entrapped into intercourse. "You have some
+roses, I see," he said aloud.
+
+"They are sent to me," smiled a conscious Bessie. She did not consider
+herself to be lying. What was sent to Deleah she continued to persuade
+herself was intended for her.
+
+"I know whose money goes for that," Sir Francis inwardly ejaculated. He
+glanced at his brother, hanging his foolish head from the window again.
+"I'm glad I came, after all. I'll put a stop to this," he resolved.
+
+"Your gardens at Cashelthorpe must be charming now, Sir Francis."
+
+Sir Francis admitted without emotion that they were charming.
+
+"That's why you're leaving them, and going off to Scotland next week,"
+Reggie supposed, drawing in his head from the window.
+
+"It must be delightful to travel," gushed Bessie, seizing on the topic.
+She exacted a programme from him, punctuated by her "Delightful!
+Delightful!" of the places he was intending to visit.
+
+And so for a few minutes, Bessie struggling with all her poor wits to do
+so, they kept up a painfully lagging conversation. And all the time the
+poor girl was desperately supplying improbable, and impossible reasons to
+account to herself for the bewildering fact of his visit; all the time Sir
+Francis was wondering how quickly without incivility he could get away;
+all the time Reggie, as he watched for the figure of Deleah coming down
+the street, was muttering to himself, "He's on my track again, hang him!"
+
+At the end of the difficult ten minutes Sir Francis rose: "Coming my way?"
+he inquired of Reggie.
+
+"Not just this minute, old man," said Reggie, who knew better.
+
+"Mind you don't tumble downstairs," he called after his departing brother.
+
+Sir Francis gazing stonily in his direction did not deign to thank him for
+the not all unnecessary caution. Emily awaiting him in the little hall at
+the bottom of the stairs, had set the outer door open to light the
+distinguished visitor upon his way.
+
+"Miss Deleah should be in by now, sir," she said as he passed out. Fain
+would she have all Brockenham to see him issuing from that door, yet fain
+would she have kept him there for Deleah.
+
+"It is of no consequence, I will write," he said, and departed with a
+sense of escape.
+
+"Well!" Bessie breathed, as the door closed on the visitor. "Wasn't that
+extraordinary! What on earth--?"
+
+Her feelings would not allow her to finish the sentence. She looked the
+rest at Reggie, eyes and mouth open, the fluster into which the visit had
+thrown her still visibly palpitating in all her person.
+
+"Oh, the dear old boy came to look after me," Reggie explained, calmly
+indifferent. "I shall get it hot now."
+
+"But _why_?"
+
+"He won't like my being at home here, like this, you know," the ingenuous
+youth admitted.
+
+"But, Reggie, you're your own master, aren't you?"
+
+Reggie said he jolly well was, and leaned his head out of the window, to
+look for Deleah again. He knew very well why she was so long in coming,
+she had gone ever so far out of her way in order to escape from his
+attendance on her. It was not very flattering to his _amour propre_, but
+it piqued him, in his indolent, spoilt habit. Bessie would have run into
+his arms, he knew right well, not away from them, and so would three or
+four other pretty girls be knew. But he did not want Bessie or the others.
+It was Deleah he wanted. And--Bessie was right there--he was his own
+master.
+
+Sir Francis as he walked away was making plans to frustrate those resolves
+for his own management of his affairs which Reggie was making in the
+window overhead. He had turned aside quite easily the young man's foolish
+bent in this direction, once before. It might be more difficult now, but
+he would spare no effort to do it effectually again. He was not favourably
+impressed by the young woman he had just left; her plump prettiness had
+not appealed to him; nor the mauve-coloured ribbons streaming down her
+back. As for her family history it was not only undesirable, it was
+disreputable.
+
+So, walking with his usually composed mien through the streets of his
+native town, perhaps its best known and most imposing figure, but in a
+ruffled and indignant frame of mind, he forgot all about Deleah Day and
+his errand to her until he saw her come, hurrying along the pavement in
+his direction.
+
+Of all the people in the world she least desired to meet Sir Francis
+Forcus until he had answered the letter it had cost her so much to write.
+Would he let her pass him? She redoubled her pace, and making him a shy
+little bow, tried to hurry by, but with a word of apology he stopped her.
+
+"I got your letter, Miss Day," he said; and then looking at her, at her
+youth, her beauty, her helplessness, the shrinking grace of her figure,
+the fear of him that was expressed in her down-dropped head and averted
+gaze, the rich man's heart failed him; he found that he could not tell her
+he would not grant her request. "I wanted to tell you I will do what you
+ask," he found himself lamely substituting for the firm refusal he had
+intended. "But at the same time you will forgive my saying I think you are
+wrong."
+
+"You mean mama should not buy Reggie off?"
+
+"I am sure she would be far wiser not to do so."
+
+"Then I will tell mama what you say. Other people have told her so; but
+coming from you it might carry more weight." Deleah, in her innocent way
+was a flatterer, he perceived; but she did not gush like Bessie. He
+thanked his lucky stars for that.
+
+She stood before him, plainly longing to escape, her light figure almost
+poised for flight. Overwhelmed she was by the consciousness of the
+shabbiness of her school frock and worn gloves; pitilessly the sun shone
+on them, bringing out the poorness of their quality, and all the defects
+of long use and age. It shone on him almost blindingly it seemed to her;
+so that to look at him, so fine, so grave, so grand, as he stood before
+her hurt her eyes. They had met in one of the principal streets of the
+town; the men who passed them looked such miserable creatures, she
+thought, beside his tall figure. How had she the presumption to have
+pestered him with her degrading troubles!
+
+"Mama was in such sorrow about Bernard," she was impelled to excuse
+herself. "Mama wished me to ask your brother, who knew Bernard very well;
+but I thought it better not to trouble him. I thought it better, as you
+had helped me before, to ask you to help again."
+
+"It is better to come to me," he said with great gravity.
+
+"Your brother is very generous," she went on saying in her nervousness
+anything that came into her head. "He would have given us the money
+without a thought as to whether it was right or wrong. I should have felt
+we were taking advantage of him. It did not seem to me to be right to ask
+him."
+
+He wondered as he heard her how she had come to be a Day; and then he too
+found himself plunging into a subject he had not, a moment before,
+intended to mention.
+
+"I called to see you at your house, just now. I found my brother there.
+May I ask if he is a frequent visitor?"
+
+The small face which had been so clearly pale was suddenly like a scarlet
+rose. "Just lately a very frequent visitor," she said; and, in spite of
+her shyness, she lifted her head and looked him straight in the face.
+
+"A young man who is idle can never understand that other people are busy,"
+he said. "I am sure that you are all too much occupied to wish to have my
+brother always hanging about."
+
+Deleah looked at him in silence. She understood perfectly what he meant.
+What was there for her to say?
+
+"I shall try and waken him to the perception that he is trespassing on
+valuable time, and making a bore of himself," he said; smiled to make his
+words acceptable, raised his hat to go on his way; yet delayed for a
+minute still.
+
+"In the matter of your brother, you understand, I will do what you ask."
+
+"I shall persuade mama to give up her idea of buying him off."
+
+"What is his regiment?" She told him, and that it was at Aldershot. A
+couple of years ago it happened to have been quartered at Brockenham. "I
+know several of the officers," Sir Francis remembered. "I could write to
+Colonel Greene about your brother. If it did him no good it couldn't do
+him any harm; and there is the chance that Greene would take an interest
+in him."
+
+Deleah said with an averted head that that would be very good of him; and
+making him a grave little bow hurried away.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+In For It!
+
+
+"I shall keep out of his way for a day or two--put up at the Royal instead
+of going home," Reggie had explained to Bessie in the quarter of an hour
+he was _tête-à-tête_ with her before Deleah came in. "By the time he sees
+me again he'll have forgotten all about finding me here."
+
+"I suppose you don't see that all this fuss about being 'found' in our
+house is not very complimentary to us?" Bessie said.
+
+"Oh hang!" said Reggie. "How can I help it if he objects? You all know
+very well you're good enough for me."
+
+He was not a clever nor a tactful young man, although quite good-natured.
+He did not intend to offend, and never understood why he sometimes did so.
+Bessie was "touchy," as he often declared, but she bore no malice. So long
+as she had the young man dangling around, so long as she could dress for
+him, put on her long mauve ribbons for him, do up her hair for him in a
+chignon whose dimensions should surpass those of any other chignon in
+Brockenham, so long as Emily continued to make him the subject for her
+winks and nods and innuendoes, she lived in her Paradise and was fairly
+content.
+
+But by putting up at the Royal Reggie did not long evade the discussion he
+foresaw might be unpleasant; for on the very next morning, before he had
+arisen from his bed he received a message from his brother asking for his
+presence at a certain hour at the Brewery.
+
+"I'm in for it now," he said to himself when he got the message; but he
+did not dream of disregarding it.
+
+He presented himself, therefore, punctually enough, in the pleasant
+private room which looked out upon the river flowing black and oily so far
+beneath; where the portrait of the father of the two men hung above Sir
+Francis's head as he stood upon the hearthrug.
+
+"Oh, there you are, Reggie! Good-morning."
+
+"Here I am. Sharp as a new pin, and bright as a button."
+
+"I hope I have not upset any plans for the day by sending for you;
+but--You have not been overworking yourself of late, have you?"
+
+"Thank you, no," Reggie said, choosing to ignore the sarcasm, if any were
+intended.
+
+"You're looking very nice, and fit, I'm sure. That brown velvet coat is
+the latest, I suppose? Looks a little as if you were thinking of giving up
+Beer for the Arts, eh? I've been wondering if you'd like to travel for a
+year?"
+
+Reggie sat down and stared at his brother, with a perplexed vacuity of
+eye. This was not at all what he had expected. He thought of Deleah in a
+flash. If Deleah would marry him and go with him, the very thing!
+
+"You haven't been about the world very much," the brother went on.
+"Neither have I, you will say. But I can't be spared. You--perhaps--can.
+We will try, at any rate, to carry on the business without you."
+
+Reggie, accepting the remark in all seriousness, nodded a solemn head in
+silence.
+
+"You might even combine business with pleasure, which I am sure would meet
+with your approval."
+
+"When do you want me to go? I can't be ready for some little time."
+
+"Why not? If you go at all I want you to go at once."
+
+"What do you call at once?"
+
+"Next week, at latest."
+
+Reggie shook his head. He couldn't be sure of Deleah in that time. How
+long would it take to get married, he wondered.
+
+"No, thank you. I really don't care for it. I couldn't possibly get away
+so soon."
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"There are the Widdimouth races next week, and I've booked several
+engagements for the week after."
+
+"The fact is I want you to get away for a time, Reggie. This place is all
+very well if you've got a business or a profession to attend to, but
+simply to idle away your time here isn't healthy."
+
+"What's wrong with Brockenham?" Reggie asked, who had a great admiration
+for his native town. "Any one been gossiping about me again?"
+
+"No one has mentioned you to me. But Ada was hearing an interesting piece
+of news about you, yesterday."
+
+"Ada's as bad as the other old women."
+
+"Nonsense. You had better go, Reggie. I mean it."
+
+Reggie passed a ringed hand over his smooth, fair hair, felt his
+moustache, opening his mouth beneath the caressing fingers as he did so.
+
+"The engagements you mention are negligible ones?"
+
+Reggie nodded, gazing at his brother, busy with the corners of the
+moustache, making up his mind for a plunge. "Fact is," he got out, "I'm
+thinking of settling down."
+
+Sir Francis left his position on the hearthrug, walked across to the
+table, to arrange more symmetrically some papers which lay there;
+returning, took up his place on the hearth again. "Getting married, you
+mean?" he asked.
+
+Reggie nodded, still holding his mouth open, the more satisfactorily to
+handle the moustache.
+
+"My dear fellow, that intention need not deter you. You have held it so
+often before. Go away for twelve months, at least. Get engaged, if you are
+still so inclined, when you come home."
+
+"Perhaps," amended Reggie artlessly, "if I were to put off going for a
+month, or even a couple of months, we might get married, and she could go
+too."
+
+"Who is the lady at the present moment, may I ask?"
+
+"I expect you've formed a pretty good guess," said Reggie, bold as a lion.
+"You saw me there yesterday."
+
+"A daughter of Mrs. Day, at the grocer's shop; widow of----? But we
+needn't go into that."
+
+"It doesn't seem necessary. Her daughter."
+
+"Well--!" said Sir Francis slowly. "You have given me one reason more, my
+dear boy, and that a supreme one, for hastening your departure. Take my
+advice--you will never regret it--and go to-morrow."
+
+"No," Reggie said, and then both were silent.
+
+When the elder again began, he had changed his easy, almost indifferent
+tone for one firmer and less indulgent.
+
+"What you propose is impossible," he said.
+
+"I don't see it."
+
+"Have you thought what you would be marrying? The grocer's shop, the
+debts, the helpless mother, the disreputable private soldier of a brother
+(he enlisted, I am told, to save himself from prison, as the father killed
+himself for the same purpose). A charming family with which to ally
+yourself, truly!"
+
+"I don't intend to marry the family. I should allow the mother--not a bad
+sort at all. I'm fond of her--a hundred a year, to shut the shop up. I
+should--"
+
+"Nonsense! The idea is ridiculous; monstrous. Get married if you must, but
+take a girl of your own position in life. Easy enough to find--"
+
+"I don't care a hang about position!"
+
+"Then, more fool you. But if you don't, at least marry a woman that has
+honest blood in her veins--for your children's sake."
+
+Reggie turned away his head sulkily. "The Days were good enough for me
+before they fell into trouble," he said.
+
+His brother lifted his head and squared his shoulders, standing up tall
+and imposing before the empty grate. "William Day was never good enough
+for me," he said.
+
+"I don't see that a girl is to be made to suffer all her life because her
+father was not good enough for you," Reggie said sulkily.
+
+"Try not to be an ass, my dear fellow. You don't suppose you can be
+allowed to do a mad thing like this without my telling you what I think of
+it. You know, I have never had much opinion of your judgment--except,
+perhaps, in the matter of horses; but in your admiration for this Miss Day
+your taste is to my thinking astoundingly bad. I call her a commonplace,
+almost vulgar young woman."
+
+"Vulgar? _Vulgar!_"
+
+"She is pretentious, she is affected, she is gushing--what is that but to
+be vulgar? She is not even pretty--"
+
+"Not pretty!" Reggie cried, and started up from his chair. "Not pretty!
+Deleah Day!"
+
+"Deleah! The young one?"
+
+"I've been telling you so, all along, haven't I? Who did you think it
+was?"
+
+"It was the other, when we spoke of the Days before," Sir Francis reminded
+him, but flatly, and his face had fallen.
+
+Here was more serious matter. Not that flaunting extravagant queen, not
+Bessie with her plump prettiness, her cheap wiles, her nets that were
+spread in the sight of man; but Deleah, the dainty, charmingly pretty
+child. The marriage would be none the less hideously undesirable on the
+social side, and from the point of view of the family; but it would be
+infinitely more difficult to stop. Sir Francis, in his widowed estate,
+with twenty years more of experience on his head, was yet not so old but
+that he could picture how deeply, how dangerously in love a young man of
+his brother's age could imagine himself with Deleah Day.
+
+Reggie was recalling attention to himself by a loud snort of contempt.
+"I'm not very likely to have thought of Bessie when Deleah was on the
+spot," he said.
+
+"Except that the younger sister has a more attractive appearance, all the
+objections remain the same in either case."
+
+"The Days are down-pins, I admit," Reggie said dispassionately; "and the
+father and brother were rotten; but no one'll think of those things when
+they look at Deleah. I'm not afraid."
+
+Sir Francis contemplated his young brother meditatively. "Let us know
+precisely how we stand, Reggie. Are you actually engaged to this girl?"
+
+"Oh, yes! I'm engaged to her, right enough."
+
+"What does being 'engaged right enough' mean exactly?" There had been a
+something indicating a want of confidence in Reggie's tone.
+
+"There's no doubt about me. I'm running straight."
+
+"But the girl? What has she to say to it?"
+
+"The fact is, she's afraid of Bessie. She can't get over it that I was
+once considered to be Bessie's property--by Bessie. I never was; but
+Bessie chose to lay claim to me."
+
+"So, although you are engaged to Miss Deleah Day, Miss Deleah Day, so far
+as I understand the matter, is not engaged to you?"
+
+"That's about how we stand at present, I suppose."
+
+"I see," Sir Francis said.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+The Importunate Mr. Gibbon
+
+
+The news that the addresses of young Mr. Forcus were being paid not to her
+but to her younger sister could not altogether have come as a surprise to
+Bessie. She must have noticed the direction of the young man's admiring
+glances; she must have known why, when alone with her, he watched the
+street till Deleah came in; she must in a measure have been prepared for
+the fact that he had now declared himself Deleah's lover, and had even
+sought the approval of Mrs. Day on his suit.
+
+But Bessie had no dignity. She gave herself away without reserve whenever
+occasion offered. She abused Deleah, she scolded her mother, she wept
+noisily over her wrongs. She declared that there was positive indecency on
+Deleah's part in encouraging the love-making of a young man who had once,
+however long ago it was, made love to her.
+
+"I don't think Deleah did encourage him, Bessie."
+
+"Would he have done it without? You remember what Reggie was in those
+days, mama, and how he _wanted_ encouragement--"
+
+"My dear, Deleah has far too much self-respect--"
+
+"There you go! Always Deleah. I suppose if Deleah took up a dinner-knife
+and stabbed me to the heart you would make excuses for her!"
+
+"Oh, Bessie, do not be unjust."
+
+"It is you that are unjust. It is you that have spoilt Deleah, with
+petting and praising and telling her how pretty she is--"
+
+"My dear Bessie!"
+
+"You don't say it in so many words, but you are always _looking it_ at
+her. You are, mama! I see you doing it. And when Deda comes home I shall
+tell her what I think of the way she has behaved to me--the sneaky way; I
+shan't spare her. She shall hear it all. And then if we live together for
+twenty years I won't speak to Deleah again. I won't, mama! I won't! I
+won't!"
+
+Poor Mrs. Day hurried away, carrying her harassed face and all her
+maternal cares into the even more perplexing area of business worries; but
+Emily having heard the raised voice of her young mistress--Bessie was
+always shrill when unhinged--went at once to her assistance.
+
+Bessie had taken to the sofa--that mid-Victorian sanctuary for the
+afflicted fair--and encouraged by the sympathy of the faithful servant,
+must begin to cry, must begin to laugh, must go on to screaming and
+pommelling the horsehair with her heels, as was her custom when moved.
+Emily, postponing for the purpose the washing up of her dinner-things, sat
+beside the sofa till Bessie grew calm enough to become attentive, when,
+she sympathetically listened, and flattered, and soothed.
+
+"There's others as is ready to die for you, and ask no better, if Deleah
+have snatched away this one," Emily declared. "There's one of 'em, that to
+my mind, for real affection and stiddiness, is worth a dozen of your
+Forcuses." And Bessie, listening greedily, knew that the family boarder,
+George Boult's Manchester man, was indicated. "There's him to your hand.
+You can have him for the taking," Emily promised; and Bessie quieted down,
+meditating.
+
+"You've treated this one cruel, Miss Bessie. You have that! And him
+sittin' by, his heart fit to fly out at you, sayin' nothin'; while this
+other young chap, his flower in his button-hole, his horse a-pawin' up the
+stones in the street down below, is a-carryin' on."
+
+"I have neglected the poor Honourable Charles lately, I admit," said
+Bessie with a remorseful sigh.
+
+"And him that patient--that faithful! Well, now, Miss Bessie, you listen
+to me. Turn your back on Reggie--give him the cold shoulder--see how he'll
+like it! And you pay your addresses to our young man. The mistress was
+a-telling me how he's made a partner with Mr. Boult an'll be rich as him,
+if not richer, some day. You'd drive your kerridge, my dear; and Reggie
+hisself couldn't give you more."
+
+Bessie stretched herself complacently, and feigned a yawn, to indicate
+that the subject was rather beneath her notice: "I dare say I might do
+worse," she admitted.
+
+By such judicious means was the injured Bessie restored to something of
+her former calm.
+
+Mrs. Day, running up presently to see how her daughter was bearing up,
+found her sitting up on the sofa, drinking tea, her plump cheeks flushed,
+the light of excitement in her eyes.
+
+"Mama," she said, "there is something I have been wanting to ask you.
+Should you object very much if I and the Honourable Charles made a match
+of it, after all?"
+
+Mrs. Day looked doubtfully at the girl without answering. She had her own
+ideas on the subject of the Honourable Charles's intentions.
+
+"I mean should you think I am marrying beneath me, and that kind of
+thing?"
+
+"No, my dear. I should certainly not make any objection on that score. Has
+something occurred, then, to put the idea into your head, to-day?"
+
+"I suppose you can understand, mama, that I do not wish to see my younger
+sister married before me? If Deleah thinks she is going to put that kind
+of slight on me she's mistaken. It's what I won't put up with from her,
+and so I tell her; and so I tell you. It's--it's--"
+
+"Yes, yes, my dear. Pray don't excite yourself again, Bessie."
+
+"So, if Deleah persists in taking Reggie--and she'll richly deserve all
+she'll get with him--I shall make up my mind to Gibbon."
+
+"_Mr._ Gibbon, Bessie."
+
+"Mr. Gibbon, then. I don't think he's a man to be ashamed of, do you?"
+
+"Certainly not. I believe he is quite a steady and honourable young man. A
+little moody, perhaps--"
+
+"There's a cause for that. And if Deleah, when she's Mrs. Forcus, is
+ashamed of him it won't matter to me, because I'm ashamed of Deleah, and
+so I mean to tell her when she comes home."
+
+"And you think that Mr. Gibbon _means_--?"
+
+Bessie gave a scornful laugh: "If you haven't eyes in your head to see,
+mama, ask Emily!"
+
+Ah, if these things might be! Mrs. Day thought as she descended again to
+her duties behind the counter. If only her girls could find homes for
+themselves, how thankful she would be. For the business was doing badly;
+all the customers who were worth keeping had fallen away; the little
+capital she had had in hand had dwindled, disappeared. In that morning's
+paper she had read that the regiment in which Bernard had enlisted was
+ordered to India. Too late now to buy him off, even if she had been
+permitted to do so. If she had not been compelled to show a calm face
+above her counter she would have passed the day in tears at the thought of
+the privations and sufferings before her boy. Her poor young Bernard.
+
+So tired she was of it all: of smiling, with tears raining upon her heart,
+of listening to the complaints of customers, the grievance of poor Bessie
+upstairs--poor unreasonable, self-centred Bessie, whom yet she so
+loved--when she was herself like to drown in trouble. If only the girls
+could find homes--Deleah she knew would provide for Franky--she would shut
+up the hateful shop, would give up the humiliating struggle--she being an
+earthen vessel--to swim with the hateful Coman who was of iron. She would
+then, she thought, go to bed and to sleep, and would sleep and sleep, and
+never get up again. Orthodox Christian as she was, in her anxious,
+worried, and wearied existence the joys of Heaven did not tempt her so
+much as the possibility of enjoying a long, uninterrupted sleep.
+
+She was kept late in the shop that night, and when at length she went
+upstairs she found only a glum family party already at the supper-table
+awaiting her.
+
+Franky, who generally talked, whoever else was silent, was conspicuous by
+his absence, he having been ordered out of the room by his sister Bessie
+because his clothes smelt.
+
+This was a constant source of grievance and friction between the eldest
+and youngest hope of the house. The poor boy had not many changes of
+raiment, and he being of an age to dabble in any mess that came handy
+without reference to his sister's olfactory nerves, there was no denying
+the fact that his little brown tunic, his worn little trousers had
+acquired a very _boyey_ smell. Unless under the protection of his mother's
+presence, therefore, he was often exiled to the kitchen to get his meals
+with Emily. He never went without protest and tears and often kicks, on
+his own part, and fisticuffs on Bessie's, who remained behind, after such
+encounters, flustered by victory, and ready to quarrel with any one on the
+spot.
+
+To-night, however, ignoring the presence of Deleah, she had intended to be
+very gracious to the boarder, who as ill-luck would have it did not come
+in to his supper at all. Under the discouraging influence of Bessie's
+silence conversation fell flat between Deleah and her mother. The meal
+over, Mrs. Day, more than, usually tired, announced her intention of going
+to bed, an example quickly followed by Bessie, who wished to avoid at that
+moment a _tête-à-tête_ with Deleah.
+
+It happened to-night, that as soon as mother and sister had gone, and
+before Deleah had finished clearing away the books and work and Franky's
+painting things, which had been in use earlier in the evening, the boarder
+came in.
+
+It was extraordinarily seldom that the Honourable Charles found himself
+alone with the younger daughter of the house--whether by chance, her
+management, or the management of others, he could not tell.
+
+Deleah Day, in her cotton frock of white with tiny black spots, a wide,
+embroidered collar tied with black ribbon at her throat, her black,
+thickly waving hair brushed behind her ears and gathered at the back of
+her small head, was an agreeable figure at the hearth to greet any poor
+worker on his return to rest and fireside.
+
+He did not want any supper, would have none. His appetite was poor of
+late, he came down in the mornings looking as if he had not slept all
+night. Business, now that his interest in it had increased, seemed to be
+making too great demands on his time and health.
+
+"You must smoke," Deleah said, and put the tobacco jar at his elbow. She
+always touched it with lingering fingers: it was that out of which William
+Day had been wont to fill his evening pipe. She placed by him the little
+decanter of whisky from which the boarder, by the admixture of lemon and
+hot water, would brew himself a nightcap. He appeared to ignore these
+preparations for his comfort.
+
+"I was just clearing away, before going to bed," she told him.
+
+She did wish to go--ardently. But the more desirous she was to avoid a
+_tête-à-tête_, the more she knew in her kind heart that she must not show
+her anxiety. So she sat down at the corner of the table opposite to him,
+and began hurriedly to show how perfectly at ease she was by telling him
+of mama's headache; and how she believed it was due to the fact that poor
+mama was worried about business; which, since the horrid Coman had opened
+opposite for the express purpose, it seemed, of underselling Mrs. Day, had
+been so unsatisfactory.
+
+The Manchester man had nothing encouraging to say on that theme. Indeed,
+his utterances on any subject they had all found to be irritatingly
+constrained and limited of late.
+
+He made use to-night of an oft-repeated phrase of his when talk had been
+made of Mrs. Day's difficulties. "I know nothing of the grocery line. It's
+altogether distinct from the drapery, of course."
+
+"I wish you'd gone in for grocery, Mr. Gibbon. Then you could have helped
+us."
+
+"You've heard, I suppose, I've fixed it up with the Governor, the way I
+spoke to you about? You've heard I'm to be taken into partnership at
+Michaelmas?"
+
+"I am very glad."
+
+"I wonder if you are?"
+
+"Why not? Of course."
+
+"You remember what you said about the fine house I was to live in?"
+
+"When are you going to take it, Mr. Gibbon?"
+
+"When will you come to live in it, Miss Deleah?"
+
+She was sitting in a low chair and leaning negligently upon the table, her
+cheek in her hand, her fingers lost in the masses of her black waving
+hair, her eyes turned with polite interest upon his face. She dropped them
+now, and looked at the tablecloth without speaking.
+
+"When?" he repeated, and was breathless again in the horrible way she
+remembered.
+
+"I told you: I am not going to live in it at all, Mr. Gibbon."
+
+He leaned towards her, throwing himself forward on his arms that were
+folded upon the table; she felt his eyes glowering upon her down-bent
+face: "Oh, yes, Miss Deleah!" he implored.
+
+"I told you before," she said; and then distressedly like a child wearied
+by importunities, "Oh I wish you--I wish every one would leave me alone!"
+
+It was all very well to be pretty and admired, but not much gratification,
+thanks to Bessie's jealousy, and untoward circumstances, had Deleah
+experienced so far from looks or lovers.
+
+There was a young assistant music-master, coming twice a week to Miss
+Chaplin's, who had taken to blushing and paling when Deleah spoke to him.
+To her great embarrassment a rosebud or a spray of forget-me-not would be
+found deposited on the chair in which she sat to play propriety when the
+pupils took their lessons. On the days when with great difficulty she
+managed to elude Reggie, a lout of a grammar-school sixth-form boy, whose
+name even she did not know, would watch her exit from the school, and
+stalk at her heels, keeping sentinel over her, in a way that she felt was
+making her ridiculous, to her own door. She had caught Mr. Pretty peeping
+between the biscuit tins to watch her down the street. He would leave any
+customer he was serving to rush forward with hateful assiduousness with a
+stool for her to sit on, as soon as she entered the shop. He would entice
+Franky, who had a great admiration for Mr. Pretty, to sit in the cellar
+with him of evenings to talk about the younger sister. There was Reggie
+always pestering; and now here again were the unwelcome attentions of the
+Honourable Charles.
+
+"I do so much wish you would all leave me alone!"
+
+"How can I leave you alone when I so much love you, Deleah."
+
+"Oh!" said Deleah, impatiently sighing.
+
+She knew how young ladies comported themselves under such circumstances in
+the delightful books of her dear Anthony Trollope; but she was neither
+angry, nor frightened, nor particularly shy; nor did she feel the
+inclination to throw herself into any man's arms, and to rest her head on
+his shoulder. She was uncomfortable under these declarations of love, and
+felt that she was being made ludicrous; that was all.
+
+"You know it, don't you, Deleah?"
+
+"Yes. I know it; since you tell me so."
+
+"And believe in it? Believe in my desperate love?"
+
+"I am sure you don't tell stories, Mr. Gibbon."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"I think it is a pity."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"I think you might love some one else."
+
+"No! I want you."
+
+"You can't have me," said Deleah, pettishly, and feeling more hopelessly
+inadequate than ever.
+
+"I can," Gibbon said, and he said it quite fiercely. "I can! I can! I can!
+Do you hear?"
+
+"I think I will go to bed." Deleah sprang up; she so longed for flight;
+she looked anxiously to the closed door which was on his side of the
+table.
+
+Gibbon also rose to his feet. "Look at me, Deleah," he said. She looked,
+and saw the paleness of his face. It made her sick as well as sorry to see
+how pale the man had become. "Does this mean Mr. Reginald Forcus?"
+
+"Certainly not!"
+
+"You are not engaged to him?"
+
+"Certainly not!"
+
+"Look at me; keep on looking." His eyes held hers, she was compelled to
+look. "Do you like him better than me? He is the best chance, out and out;
+but for all that he mayn't be the best man. Do you like him the best?"
+
+"I don't know that I do."
+
+"Now. I've something else to ask you."
+
+"No! I think you are too bad. I am very tired. Let me go to bed, Mr.
+Gibbon."
+
+"Answer me first. How about the other one?"
+
+"The _other_ one! I don't know what you mean."
+
+"Sir Francis--that gave you the fifty pound. How about him?"
+
+Deleah's eyes, staring into his, dilated, her face grew whiter than his
+own. "I don't know what you can mean," she said. "Sir Francis Forcus and
+me? Me! _Me!_ Deleah Day!" She whispered the words in a kind of awe.
+Almost there seemed sacrilege in them.
+
+"Why not? Why not?"
+
+"I think you must be mad, Mr. Gibbon."
+
+"I am. I often am. Quite mad. Mad with love of you."
+
+"Oh!"
+
+"Why do you sigh like that?"
+
+"I so much wish you wouldn't."
+
+"Wouldn't what?"
+
+"Be so ridiculous."
+
+"Is that all you have to say to me?"
+
+"That--and good-night."
+
+"I did not think you could be so cruel."
+
+"I am not cruel," Deleah said; and then, quite unexpected by her, a sob
+rose in her throat, and it was all that she could do to keep the tears of
+self-pity back. "I am not cruel, but you so torment me. I want to be kind
+to you, but I do not want to hear about all this--which sounds so
+ridiculous to me. You are older than I am--you should know better. You
+should know how silly it is to talk to a girl like me such nonsense. And I
+want to go to bed, Mr. Gibbon. Will you please stand away and let me go to
+bed?"
+
+He put his hand on the door-knob as if to open it for her, but held it
+there. "This isn't the end," he said.
+
+"Oh, no!" she sighed with dreary prescience.
+
+"I am working for you from morning till night--only for you--so that I can
+put you in a nice house, and make a lady of you. Only for you! And all
+night long I can't rest for thinking of you. Mine'll be an awful night,
+to-night."
+
+"Oh, Mr. Gibbon, I'm so dreadfully sorry!"
+
+"Then, can't you say a word to me before you go? Can't you say you'll
+think of it?"
+
+"Of course I shall think of it; I can't help thinking of it. But I don't
+wish to talk of it any more. Let me go now, will you? Let me go to bed!
+Good-night, Mr. Gibbon."
+
+"Say 'Good-night, Charlie.' They call me 'Charlie' at home."
+
+There was no help for it if she wished to escape. "Good-night, Charlie,"
+she mumbled, and rushed away to her own room, in a condition between
+laughing and crying which recalled Bessie's attacks.
+
+"It is all so ridiculous!" she kept saying to herself as she undressed.
+"'Good-night, Charlie!' Imagine my having called him 'Charlie.' Charlie,
+indeed!" She set her teeth at the remembrance. "I would rather have hit
+him than called him Charlie!"
+
+But as she undressed herself the more serious side of the position
+presented itself for consideration. Her mother wanted her to get
+married--she had owned as much, and she had an absolute faith in her
+mother's wisdom. Did girls marry men feeling about them as she felt about
+this man and Reggie Forcus, she wondered? It was indisputable that men,
+"horrider than they," as she phrased it to herself, found quite nice girls
+to marry them. Ought she to take one or the other? She did not wish
+to--but ought she?
+
+She got into her night-dress, brushed her hair, even said her prayers--the
+self-same prayers in the identical words she had said by her bedside in
+Queen Anne Street on the night of the New Year's party, long ago; she had
+not even left her father's name out of her petitions--debating these
+things. She slept in a tiny bedroom through Mrs. Day's, and when she got
+up from her knees she took her candle and went into her mother's room. "I
+will hear what mama has to say about it," she told herself.
+
+Mrs. Day was lying awake in the darkness, thinking of Bernard and the
+dangers of India.
+
+"Mama," Deleah said, holding the candle aloft to peer at her mother. Its
+light fell on her own charming face half hidden in the loose waves of
+curling black hair. "You aren't asleep, are you? Of course you aren't! I
+believe you lie there all night, staring into the shadows and thinking of
+miserable things! I wonder if it would really make things better, if you
+would like it very much, that she also has made up her mind to marry Mr.
+Gibbon!"
+
+Deleah stared for a minute, and then she laughed; and Mrs. Day saw that
+she laughed whole-heartedly. "Bessie takes all my young men!" she said.
+"You see, mama, with the best will in the world to please you, I can't get
+married; so there's an end of it; and I may as well go to bed."
+
+"Come and kiss me, dear."
+
+Mrs. Day put a detaining arm round the girl's shoulders. "Nothing of this
+makes you unhappy, Deleah?"
+
+"It only makes me want to laugh," Deleah said.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+Deleah Has No Dignity
+
+
+A day or so after her encounter with the local magnate in the principal
+street of Brockenham, Deleah found herself, to her extreme surprise, on
+her way to the Hope Brewery, in response to a letter from Sir Francis
+Forcus, asking her to call on him there on a matter of business. He had
+named the afternoon hour in which she was released from school.
+
+"I sent for you, because I wished to see you alone, and I thought it might
+be difficult to do so at your own house," Sir Francis said.
+
+His address was more formal, his appearance more formidable than ever, she
+thought, as he indicated the chair in which he wished her to sit, and took
+his own seat, entrenched behind his writing-table, at some distance from
+her. "I hope it is not objectionable to you to come to me here, my own
+house being so far away?"
+
+Deleah shyly, but quite honestly, said that she did not mind in the least.
+"He is going to tell me that, after all, he has decided to buy Bernard
+off," she told herself, but was not allowed to maintain that illusion
+long.
+
+"I have a word or two I wished to say to you about my young brother,
+Reginald," he said, plunging into his subject.
+
+He sat, his face a little averted from her, looking down at the papers on
+his desk, and spoke in a tone as cold and non-committal as if he read what
+he had to say to her, written there.
+
+Deleah receiving his communication in uncomfortable silence, he went on:
+"For several reasons--some of them business ones--it has been arranged for
+my brother to leave Brockenham for a year. To travel!"
+
+Pausing there, she still finding nothing to say, he added, looking closer
+at the paper on the desk, "He will not go."
+
+"I am sorry," Deleah shyly said.
+
+"He won't go, because of you." Then he turned his face to her, and Deleah
+saw that his face expressed cold disapproval. "I am quite sure you do not
+wish to stand in Reginald's light, Miss Day?"
+
+"Oh no."
+
+"I was sure of it. And therefore I was encouraged to send for you. It will
+be better that we talk matters over a little. You have influence over
+Reggie?"
+
+"I think not." Once or twice she had tried to impose her own ideas of what
+was right and fitting upon the young man, and had failed. Why should she
+pretend to any influence?
+
+"But of course you have. I want to ask you to be unselfish enough to exert
+it for my brother's good."
+
+"I would do that gladly if I could."
+
+"Then, send him away. It will be doing him an inestimable benefit."
+
+"I can tell him it would be better for him to go; but he is not easily
+made to do a thing he does not like.
+
+"He tells me--without any engagement on your part--he considers himself
+bound to you."
+
+She shook her head quickly, her face rose-red: "Oh no!"
+
+"He is always being engaged to--somebody: poor Reggie!"
+
+"Is he?" she asked innocently.
+
+"Reginald is my brother," he went on, and he turned his gaze from her face
+and looked at the finger-nails of his left hand with an absorbed
+attention. "He is, however, so much younger than myself that he has almost
+been like my son. You will give me credit, I am sure, for not wishing to
+disparage Reginald, when I tell you that this is not by any means the
+first time Reginald has thought of marriage." He paused, and smiled awry
+to himself as he contemplated the finger-nails. "Or, rather, I should put
+it, not the first time he has talked to young ladies of being engaged to
+them."
+
+Deleah sat silent, determined not to speak till speech was absolutely
+demanded of her.
+
+"It has not cost my brother much to change his mind," Sir Francis said,
+and dropped his hand and looked at the pretty girl sitting before him.
+
+"Since he has to do it so often, that is well," Deleah said.
+
+"It is well, in a way," Sir Francis agreed. "But supposing that he took an
+irretrievable step, and then changed his mind?"
+
+"That would be more serious," Deleah admitted.
+
+"You understand what I mean, Miss Day?"
+
+"Perfectly. You mean, supposing he married me and then repented, not
+having been given time to repent beforehand. Having been taken at his word
+as soon as he spoke--and snatched up."
+
+"That is putting the case more strongly than I had thought of doing;
+but--"
+
+"But it is what you mean?"
+
+"You are not offended, I hope?"
+
+"No; because I quite understand. It would be surprising if you did not
+feel as you do about it."
+
+Her voice shook a little, and Sir Francis felt compunction. After all,
+from the girl's side of the question, what a sacrifice this was he was so
+coolly demanding of her. He felt suddenly ashamed, and half afraid of what
+he had taken upon himself to do.
+
+"I hope you believe I am actuated by no feeling antagonistic to yourself,
+Miss Day?"
+
+"I think I understand that," she said gently.
+
+And he knew that she comprehended, and was grateful to her that she did
+not say, "You hate, not me, but the grocer's shop; but the idea of an
+alliance with my father's daughter, my brother's sister." "After all the
+girl is a lady," he said to himself, and the thought crossed his mind: was
+his empty-headed young brother likely to marry a better woman than this?
+All the same, his duty in the matter was clear before him.
+
+"And you will do what I ask? You will help me to send the boy away?"
+
+"He won't go for my telling, I fear."
+
+"He won't go unless you tell him;" and he permitted himself to smile
+persuasively on her.
+
+"Then I will tell him," she said gravely; and feeling that was all he
+wanted with her she got up and turned to the door.
+
+He reached it before her. "Mine has been an ungracious task," he said. "It
+has seemed to me that it was demanded of me. I hope you will forgive me."
+He said it quite earnestly, quite humbly, all his grand formality of
+manner laid aside for the moment. And the anger and the hurt pride which
+had been in her heart melted from it.
+
+"You have been very kind to me, always. If there was anything to forgive I
+would forgive you," she said simply; and her face was charming with its
+look of innocent confidence in him, its wavering, shy smile.
+
+"What I have said has been for my brother's sake," he assured her,
+compunction stirring at his heart. "But I believe it to be equally good
+for yours. You may not think so to-day, but you may take my word for it
+that you will come to think so."
+
+He clasped her hand reassuringly for a moment; then she went.
+
+
+
+
+The letter from Sir Francis Forcus had been on Deleah's breakfast plate.
+The family had the bad habit of expecting to see each other's letters.
+They all knew who it was who had written, and what he had asked. At
+supper, when the family met again it was expected of Deleah to describe
+the interview, and publicly proclaim what had taken place.
+
+Preferring to keep the matter to herself, she had eluded her mother and
+sister by going without her tea, gaining only by the delay the addition,
+to those already agog for her news, of the innocent Franky, of the
+ever-curious Emily, of an Honourable Charles consumed with jealous fears.
+
+They would not even let her take her place at table before they were upon
+her. "Well?" inquired Bessie, alert, her suspicious, bright eyes upon her
+sister, who appeared a little pale of face, a little languid of manner,
+the effect of going without her tea, perhaps.
+
+"Well?" Deleah echoed.
+
+"I don't suppose it's a secret. Mama, I don't suppose Deleah has been sent
+for by Sir Francis Forcus for anything she can't tell!"
+
+Emily, pouring out the lodger's supper beer, remarked that Miss Deleah was
+always one to keep things to herself, even when she had been a baby.
+
+"I can't imagine, Deleah, what he can have wanted with you," Mrs. Day
+said, in answer to Bessie's appeal.
+
+"It was nothing much, mama."
+
+"It couldn't have been _nothing_. At least say if it was good or bad,"
+persisted the elder sister. "I don't see why Deda need be so affected and
+silly, mama."
+
+"Oh, do let me get some supper first," Deleah prayed.
+
+"Thank you, Mr. Gibbon. Some beef, please."
+
+Those prominent, burning eyes of the boarder, the eyes which Mrs. Day and
+Bessie had discovered rescued his face from the commonplace, were upon her
+face, with a desperately eager questioning. In his heart he believed that
+Sir Francis had sent for her to beg her to marry either himself or his
+brother. Supposing she had consented! Supposing she was going to say it
+now! His red, square-looking hands shook pitiably as he carved the beef
+and put it on her plate.
+
+"Perhaps Miss Deleah would rather keep her news till I'm gone," he forced
+himself to say.
+
+"Oh no," Deleah, who would infinitely have preferred to do so, but must
+not hurt his feelings, declared.
+
+"It is about Reggie, I know," said Bessie, her eyes, filled with fierce
+questioning, on the girl.
+
+It was not till Emily had reluctantly withdrawn that Deleah confessed that
+Bessie was right, and told her news defiantly, in a sentence. "Sir Francis
+sent for me to ask me not to marry his brother," she said, and applied
+herself to the contents of her plate as if she were really enjoying them.
+
+For a minute, speechless with surprise, they gazed upon her.
+
+"But _were_ you going to marry him?" Bessie at length inquired.
+
+"No," said Deleah; "I was not."
+
+"And did you tell him so."
+
+"No."
+
+"My dear Deleah!" from her mother. "You should have told him, of course."
+
+"I didn't. I don't know why. I felt I could not. I hardly said anything, I
+think."
+
+"But now I _would_ marry him!" Bessie cried. "No man should put an insult
+like that on me for nothing." Her face had flushed pink. She felt the
+insult to the family very keenly. "Now you've _got_ to marry him, Deleah.
+Mama, tell Deleah that for her own pride's sake she's got to marry Reggie
+now."
+
+"No!" said Mr. Gibbon. He laid down his knife and fork with a clatter, and
+fixed angry eyes on Bessie.
+
+"No!" he said, and having stared at her till, astonished, she averted her
+eyes, he turned a protecting gaze on Deleah. "Miss Deleah need do nothing
+of the sort," he said reassuringly.
+
+"I certainly shall not," Deleah said.
+
+"Are we to sit down tamely under such rudeness, then?" Bessie asked at
+large. "You never assert yourself, Deda--you and mama. That's why people
+dare to treat you so. Sir Francis would not have sent for me like a
+servant, to give me his orders. What did you do, Deda? Stood there meekly,
+like an idiot, to listen, I suppose?"
+
+"Miss Deleah did what was right. Least said soonest mended," the boarder
+declared. He had never openly stood as Deleah's champion before.
+
+"I'm on Deda's side too," Franky said. "Deda's got the most on her side.
+C'n I have another piece of tart, ma?"
+
+"No, you can't," said Bessie promptly. "Mama, Franky cried out in his
+sleep the last time he had two pieces of tart."
+
+"C'n I have another piece of tart, ma?"
+
+Mrs. Day explained to Franky that instead of having more tart, at that
+time of night, he must go to bed; and Bessie with excitement started a new
+idea.
+
+"I suppose that was what he came here for," she cried.
+
+"Sir Francis called, and found Reggie Forcus with me," she explained,
+turning to the boarder. "He came here spying upon me. No doubt he meant to
+say to me what he's said to Deleah, but he found a different person to
+deal with. I didn't give him any chance to put an insult on me, I can tell
+you! So he sent for Deleah, who can't defend herself."
+
+"Poor little Deleah!" the mother said, fondly regarding the girl,
+indisposed to defend herself at that moment evidently, and apparently busy
+with her supper.
+
+"Miss Deleah could find them that would defend her if she'd say the word,"
+Gibbon said, greatly daring; the beef was untasted on his plate, but his
+eyes devoured Deleah.
+
+Bessie gave him a glance of astonished disapproval, and went on to
+expatiate on what would have been her own conduct in Deleah's place. How
+she would have listened to Sir Francis with apparent calm, saying nothing,
+leading him on to his own destruction, and then--
+
+"I did listen, I didn't say anything. I was thinking all the time how
+horrid it was for him to have to do what he did."
+
+"Well, my dear child, that was no concern of yours, you need not have been
+unhappy about it."
+
+"No, mama. But I was; and unhappy that I had to sit to listen to him. I
+wanted desperately to get away, that was all. I came the very instant that
+I could."
+
+"Instead of which, I should have said," explained the eager Bessie, "I
+should have said: 'Until this moment I have not given your brother a
+thought, Sir Francis. But now that you have dared--_dared_ to insult me
+and my family in such a way, I will tell you what I will do. I will marry
+him to-morrow morning. I'd have done it too," Bessie declared, looking
+round the table, eyes shining with strong self-approval.
+
+"My dear Bessie. Don't let your feelings run away with you so much," Mrs.
+Day reproved.
+
+"Deleah has no dignity, mama. Any one can see Deleah behaved without the
+least dignity."
+
+Deleah listened miserably, pretending not to hear. She did not agree with
+Bessie's idea of what was dignified, but she knew that she had cut a poor
+figure. She felt humiliated, hurt, helpless. Sir Francis Forcus had been
+for her her ideal of what a man and a gentleman should be. He had helped
+her in the day of her necessity, and she had set him at once as her hero
+on a pinnacle, and had looked up to him and worshipped him secretly, and
+from afar. She knew that she had sat before him this afternoon shamed, and
+helpless, and childish; filled with as much sorrow for him who was so
+clumsily wounding her as for herself. She had not desired to retaliate;
+she would not have been revenged on him if she could; the only effort of
+which she had been capable had been the effort to make him think that she
+had been as little wounded as possible, that the situation was not a
+horrible one to her.
+
+Yet when they asked her why she had not shown more spirit she could not
+explain. She could only sit silent and miserable, and let them talk.
+
+Even Mr. Gibbon, usually so preoccupied and silent now, talked. He said
+that he supposed Sir Francis Forcus called hisself a gentleman, but that
+he, the Manchester man, had always had his doubts on the subject, and that
+one day he hoped for the opportunity of telling him that he was a _snob_.
+And more, with unwanted, stammering loquacity, to that effect, with fire
+of eye, with un-called-for, excited repetition.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+The Cold-Hearted Fates
+
+
+When Mrs. Day and her daughters had retired that night, their boarder sat
+up writing a letter.
+
+Deleah found it pushed under her plate at breakfast the next morning,
+Gibbon always breakfasting early and alone.
+
+"I think you behaved nobly," the letter ran. "Do not heed what others in
+their spite and jealousy may say. The man Forcus is a purse-proud snob.
+But if as such he is too proud to receive you into his family, remember
+that there is another that have better taste. My family is highly
+respectable, but they would receive you gladly, for my sake. And as for
+me, I should always think you did me honour by becoming mine. Which honour
+I pray you, my beloved Deleah, to do me."
+
+Deleah crumpled the note in her hand--she was down before her mother and
+sister, that morning--and took it into the kitchen where Emily was making
+the breakfast toast, and rammed it, with the poker, and a good will, into
+the heart of the glowing coals.
+
+She thought as she did so of the talk with her mother the other night in
+which the name of the Honourable Charles had figured. She had only half
+meant what she had said then, but now--how could she ever so lightly have
+contemplated for one moment such a marriage!
+
+"And what young chap's love-letter are you a-burnin' of now, Miss Deleah?"
+Emily facetiously inquired, waving the round of toast gracefully before
+the bars.
+
+"The love-letter of a young chap who should never trust himself to write
+one," Deleah told her, calmly. "His love-letter was abominable, Emily."
+
+She had a love-letter of another sort that morning. It was brought to her,
+and given in the presence of her pupils at the mal à propos moment when
+Miss Chaplin had unexpectedly entered the little class-room in which the
+juniors were taught, and where was Deleah's domain. Miss Chaplin had
+thought that she had heard laughter issuing from this direction, and had
+burst into the room to beg of Miss Day to keep the children in order.
+
+Poor Miss Day was desperately anxious to retain her post in Miss Chaplin's
+Academy, and for that reason, and because Miss Chaplin was quite aware of
+the fact, she found it safe and convenient to make of the poor young
+teacher the scapegoat for whatever irregularities were committed in the
+school, to discharge upon her the pent-up irritabilities she dared not
+vent upon the more valuable assistants, who might resent such ebullitions
+at inconvenient times.
+
+She had received notice that morning that three pupils of whom she was
+proud, who did the school credit, were to leave next quarter. She had had
+a "brush" with the German governess, and Fräulein had been insolent. But
+Fräulein was valuable, and Miss Chaplin had bottled her wrath, to empty
+it on the innocent head of Deleah.
+
+"I must really ask you, Miss Day, to maintain better order in your class.
+I heard laughing. Frequently when I pass the door I hear laughing--"
+
+But where was Miss Day who should be responsible for such a terrible state
+of things?
+
+One of the tots of pupils had slipped off the form on which she sat, and
+rolled under the table, and Deleah had crept under the table too, in
+search of her, at which the other pupils had laughed. The abashed
+governess received the reproof of her principal on all fours.
+
+"Really, Miss Day!" cried the scandalised woman. "Yours is hardly a seemly
+attitude to assume before the pupils, is it?"
+
+And at that least opportune moment, the door of the class-room burst open
+again and Kitty Miller, that day scholar who sometimes walked home with
+Miss Day and kept "The Deleah Book," appeared. She flourished a letter in
+her hand.
+
+"What will you give me for this, Miss Day?" she cried, not till too late
+perceiving the awe-inspiring figure of Miss Chaplin.
+
+Deleah took the missive, and it would have been hard to decide whether she
+who gave it or she who took it had the guiltier look.
+
+The outraged voice of Miss Chaplin arrested Kitty Miller in the moment of
+ignominious flight. "Wait!" commanded the alarming tones. Kitty stood
+still, trembling as she heard. "Who employs you to convey letters to Miss
+Day, Kitty?"
+
+Kitty, the colour of beet-root, looked at Deleah, lily-white.
+
+"Who gave you that letter, Kitty?"
+
+And poor Kitty, looking piteously at Deleah, lied--futilely, but for the
+sake of her friend--and said she did not know.
+
+"Was it a gentleman?"
+
+Kitty, confounded and demoralised, stammered out that she had forgotten.
+
+Deleah came to her rescue. Deleah, who knew well that her hour had come:
+"It is from Mr. Reginald Forcus," she said. She had received warnings on
+the subject of Reginald Forcus before.
+
+"And what has that gentleman to write to you of such immediate importance
+that it must cause an interruption to class?" Miss Chaplin with head in
+air demanded.
+
+And Deleah looking at the note in its envelope, said she did not know.
+
+"Open it, and see," Miss Chaplin naturally recommended.
+
+When Deleah hesitated to comply, the schoolmistress held out her hand, but
+Deleah, choosing to disregard that gesture, put the letter in her pocket.
+
+The elder lady threw her thin lips into a tight line across her narrow
+face. She really thought it immoral for a girl to receive a letter from a
+gentleman, she really felt that the high tone of her school was endangered
+by that flagrant breach of manners made by Deleah Day. She had to punish
+iniquity, she had to protect from the evil effects of pernicious example,
+the unsullied young under her care.
+
+When Deleah, that afternoon, came upon Reggie waiting for her at the
+corner of the street, a fatuous expression of joy at her approach on his
+silly, good-looking face, she had received her dismissal from the school.
+
+She was filled with anger towards him as the cause of that which was to
+her a calamity.
+
+"I have been given notice to go. _You_ have done that, Reggie," she
+greeted him. "Your silly letter this morning was the finish."
+
+"A rattling good thing too," the irreverent Reggie declared. "I'm jolly
+glad to hear it."
+
+"And what do you suppose I am to do now?"
+
+"That's what I came to tell you. It's just spiffin' for my plans, as
+you'll see, dear."
+
+"It's not at all 'spiffin'' for mine."
+
+"You. wait! You and I will get married, Deleah. We'll bring it off at
+once, do you see?"
+
+"Oh, no, Reggie!"
+
+"Oh, yes, Deleah. See if we won't! I'm not doing anything underhand. I've
+told Francis, straight. He's no fool. He knows when I mean a thing. And
+I'm my own master."
+
+"But you're not mine, Reggie."
+
+"You wait a bit. We'll fight all that out afterwards. What I've got to say
+to you this afternoon is this: I want to put you up on horseback."
+
+"Absurd!"
+
+"Wait! Only wait! Where do you think I've been this afternoon? I've been
+over to Runnydale, to look at old Candy's little brown mare. It's the one
+his girl has been riding. She's married, and gone away; and I've got the
+promise of it for you. No! Now do wait a bit. That little mare's as safe
+as a donkey; a child might ride her. All the same, I'm not going to put
+you up on her till you've had lessons; and I've been and seen about that
+too."
+
+"Reggie!"
+
+"I have, right enough. I went round to Ben Steel's when I came back from
+Runnydale. He's arranged to take you out twice a week. I'm going with
+you--so as you don't feel strange. I told Ben you'd take to it like a duck
+to water. 'That young lady'll look stunning on horseback,' Steel said. A
+little cheeky of him, but he's privileged. I say, Deleah, what'll the old
+women of Brockenham say when they see you with me, a-cock-horse, riding
+side by side past their windows?"
+
+"They'll never see me doing it, Reggie. I'm not going to ride with you, my
+dear boy."
+
+"You wait! You'll change your mind when you see Laura Candy's little brown
+mare. Let me bring her up for you to see, to-morrow. Look here, I'm to
+send over for her to-night. Oh, hang it all, Deleah, we'll put off the
+marrying for a time if you like, but I've set my heart on having some
+rides together. You don't know how proud I shall be to ride with you
+beside me down Broad Street, and through the market-place, and up St.
+Margaret's Lane. It will give all the cackling old women something to talk
+about."
+
+It was with difficulty she made him understand that to help him to afford
+food for gossip was not her ambition, that she declined his escort on
+horseback through the streets of her native town, as well as his
+companionship through life. The events of the day had hardened her heart;
+and she succeeded in convincing him at last.
+
+"And, Reggie, you are not to come to our house any more; you are never to
+write me letters; you are not to waylay me in the streets."
+
+"Oh, I say, Deleah! Come! You can't mean it."
+
+"I mean every word."
+
+"But can't I sometimes meet you by accident even?"
+
+"If you do I shall cut you."
+
+"And if I won't be cut?"
+
+"I shall call a policeman."
+
+She laughed, but she made him see that she was in earnest. He walked by
+her side, crestfallen, a grieving look on his good-humoured, pleasant
+face. The hunting season was not here for several months. His head and his
+heart had been filled of late with Deleah, his time had been passed in
+riding down Bridge Street in the hope that she might be looking out of
+window, in waylaying her when she came from school, in sitting in the room
+over the shop with Bessie, to get rid of time till Deleah should appear.
+
+"If I'm to give up seeing you, and trying to see you, what on earth am I
+to do?" he asked.
+
+"You are to travel."
+
+"Why that is what Francis has been sticking into me!
+
+"There you are, then. Two people who know what is good for you, Reggie."
+
+"Francis is in a deuce of a hurry. He wants me to go next week."
+
+"And why not?"
+
+"I don't know why not--now," a miserable Reggie admitted.
+
+"Then go at once and tell him you are ready."
+
+For her word's sake to his brother she wrung a reluctant assent from him,
+and left him. But an hour later Emily bringing in the tea announced that a
+gentleman had called to see Miss Deleah.
+
+"You can guess who 'tis," Emily said, as she spread the cloth. "He's in
+his dog-cart at the door, and his horse that resty, he says he can't come
+in; but he won't keep Miss Deleah a minute."
+
+Bessie kneeling on the window-seat, was looking down into the street:
+"It's Reggie, of course," she said. Then she turned round to her sister.
+"Deleah," she said, "don't be silly; _take_ Reggie. Don't be put off by
+that stuck-up, conceited old brother; don't trouble any more about me, and
+things I've said. It's a real chance. The best you'll ever get. _Take
+it_."
+
+She had to call the last words over the balusters, for Deleah, paying no
+heed to her exhortation, was running down the stairs.
+
+Beside Reginald Forcus in his smart dog-cart little Franky Day, to his own
+delight and surprise, was sitting. He had come running down the street to
+his tea, when Reggie had accosted him with the agreeable attention of a
+whip-lash curved round his calves.
+
+"Hullo, youngster!" Reggie had greeted him.
+
+"Quite 'ell, I thank ye," Franky had responded.
+
+"Coming for a spin with me?"
+
+No further invitation had Franky required, but had clambered at once,
+great eyes sparkling, little heart beating high, into the vacant seat
+beside the driver. The exceeding honour was his to hold the reins, the
+groom standing at Black Michael's head, while Reggie got down to speak to
+Deleah at the door.
+
+"Deleah," he said, "I've come to tell you I've done all you asked of me.
+I've seen Francis, and I go away next week."
+
+"Good Reggie!"
+
+"I've done it because you asked me; and now I want you to do just one
+thing for me. I know it's all over, and there's no hope for me, and after
+to-night I shan't see you any more. I want you to come for a spin with me
+to-night."
+
+"No, Reggie."
+
+"Yes, Deleah. I've got to go to Runnydale, to tell old Candy I shan't want
+that little mare. Franky is coming. Franky can sit up between us,
+Deleah--"
+
+He was very proud of himself for his forethought in securing Franky.
+Deleah, chaperoned by Franky, could have no excuse.
+
+She refused him very gently, because of his subdued demeanour, and
+because, absurd as it was of him, his voice had faltered when he made his
+appeal, and his eyes had grown moist. "But you must not take Franky,
+Reggie," she said, and called on the child to descend, and come in to his
+tea.
+
+"Le'me go, Deda! Le'me go!" Franky pleaded.
+
+"Oh, Deleah, just to please me--this last time ever I shall see you--you
+come too!" the young man tried her again. When again she refused, he flung
+away from her in a rage, and mounted to his seat; the groom, leaving the
+tossing head of Black Michael, sprang up behind. She called again to
+Franky, but they were off without reply. Deleah, looking after them for a
+minute, could see the child's excited little face beaming with delight
+turned up with admiration to the young man beside him.
+
+Then she went back into the black little entry which did duty for hall,
+and mounted the steep, narrow stairs with a lagging step. How brightly the
+afternoon sun had shone on Reggie, his fair, smooth hair, vivid necktie,
+the flower in his coat. How the brass harness had glittered, and Black
+Michael's satin coat had shone; how spick and span was Odgers, the groom,
+in his green and buff livery; what an air of wealth and well-being about
+every appointment.
+
+Deleah would have liked very well to have sat behind the spirited horse by
+kind Reggie's side; to have dashed forth into the sweet-smelling
+country--away from cheese and coffee and their mingled odours, away from
+Bessie and her complaining over the chance Deleah had thrown away; away
+from the society of the boarder who looked at her with such burning eyes,
+beneath a penthouse of hand, watching her every movement, who whispered
+his recklessly fierce "I love you" when the least excuse could bring his
+head near to hers. Away from the thought of Miss Chaplin, and the
+necessity to set about finding a fresh situation.
+
+She had not wished to marry Reggie, but now that he was lost to her past
+recall, a value which for her he had not before possessed seemed to attach
+to him. How easy life would have been with him! Every day Franky might
+have gone for a drive; her mother could have turned her back on the
+grocer's shop--
+
+From the time she set her foot on the lower stair till she reached the
+landing Deleah almost allowed herself to believe she would call the young
+man, and all that he stood for to her and hers, back again. But before she
+had opened the door of the sitting-room, she had remembered Sir Francis,
+and his scorn of her and hers, and her face had burnt with shame.
+
+"Well?" questioned Bessie, as she entered, her eyes glittering with
+eagerness.
+
+"He wanted me to go for a drive. I would not go. He has taken Franky."
+
+"Franky, in his old school suit, and without having his collar changed?"
+
+Emily, lurking around, to hear the result of this short interview on the
+doorstep, was also horrified to think of the disgrace brought on the
+family by the condition of Franky. "His nails is that black when he come
+home from school, and often as not his face smudged. What a sight to set
+in front of Odgers."
+
+"Odgers has got his back to him."
+
+"For all that I'd have liked to scrape the top of the dirt off him. And
+he've got on the knickers with the patch at the back!"
+
+
+
+
+Mrs. Day, having been up for her tea and retired again to the shop, took
+her place behind the counter, and dispatched Mr. Pretty to his meal.
+
+No customers came in. She turned her sad and patient eyes upon the street,
+thinking--not of the cutler's over the way, with whose son Franky had
+formed such an undesirable friendship, nor of the passers by on the narrow
+pavement, nor of the tradesmen's carts rattling over the cobble stones;
+thinking of Bernard on his way to India and untold danger and privations,
+of Deleah and her dismissal from the school. Her pretty, good child, to
+have received such shabby treatment! Deleah, who if she had chosen might
+have queened it over them all. Of her steadily declining business, too,
+she thought, and of how impossible it was for her to cope with Coman's,
+down the street. To-morrow was the seventh, the day set apart in each
+month by Mr. Boult for going into her affairs; looking through her books,
+catechising her, cross-questioning her, giving her advice in his
+tyrannical, bullying way. From this her thoughts glanced off to the
+subject Bessie had held forth upon in her irritating, worrying fashion,
+through tea.
+
+"It is a pity the child did not have his face washed, certainly," she
+said.
+
+At last a customer! No, only the cutler's little boy, Franky's chum, from
+across the way.
+
+The cutler hired a strip of garden on one of the roads, and when tea was
+over, in the summer evenings, Franky and the cutler's son ran off together
+to their garden to get into what childish mischief was possible in the
+restricted space.
+
+"Franky isn't in, this evening," Mrs. Day told the boy. "He's gone for a
+drive with Mr. Forcus." She gave him a screw of acid-drops for himself,
+and the boy ran off.
+
+"All ri', thenk ye. Tell Franky I looked in," he called.
+
+The next comer was the fat little maid-of-all-work from the butcher's,
+near by. She was red-haired, with a large goitre over which her afternoon
+black frock would not quite button. She was hardly worked from early
+morning, to late evening, and Mrs. Day, ever full of compassion for the
+weak and oppressed, was kind and gentle to her.
+
+She was generally breathless with hurry and the trouble of the goitre, and
+Mrs. Day took no special notice of her panting condition now.
+
+"What for you to-night, Alice?" she asked her.
+
+"It's soap," Alice gasped. "Soap, and matches, and six eggs for the
+morning's breakfast, and I was to tell you, if you please, as you was to
+put in seven, steads of six, for one in the last lot was stale. And have
+you heard, please, there's been an accident with that there Mr. Forcus's
+tricky horse?"
+
+Mrs. Day's dark eyes gazed at the girl out of a face blanched to the
+pallor of the dead.
+
+"There have, then! Master, he jus' come in and said so. His horse is kilt;
+and the groom, he's cut about the face; and your little boy, what he took
+a ridin' with him, have got his neck broke."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+To Make Reparation
+
+
+"Of course we must do something for them," Sir Francis said. "The
+difficulty is to decide what."
+
+He and his sister had followed in their carriage the funeral of Franky
+Day. Sir Francis had wished, seeing that he must appear there, to appear
+unobtrusively, but Ada had thought that she also--painful as it was--must
+be present, and Ada could not go afoot. The Forcus carriage, therefore,
+had been conspicuous in the meagre procession following the little coffin
+to the cemetery.
+
+"We must remember that the poor things have seen better days, and be
+careful how we offer," Miss Forcus said. "I have no doubt we shall find
+they would rather starve than touch our money."
+
+"I hope they know Reggie has gone away; otherwise it might have looked
+heartless his not being there to-day."
+
+"They will understand. And Reggie could not have stood it. It was painful
+enough as it was," Sir Francis said.
+
+It had been very painful. He thought of the figure of the poor mother,
+tearless, looking down into the little grave; of the poor weeping girls
+clinging to her. Franky's common little school had attended, and stood,
+marshalled by the meagre young master in charge, at a distance, but the
+small son of the once despised cutler had advanced, pushed forwards
+encouragingly by his comrades, and dropped upon the coffin a bunch of
+flowers gathered from the garden on the road, where Franky and he had
+loved to play. No other flowers were there. It was before the day of
+floral memorial displays.
+
+"If they would let us bear the funeral expenses, or put up a little
+monument in the cemetery, or a window in their church?" Ada suggested.
+
+"If we could do something to help them to make a living," Sir Francis
+said.
+
+The day of Franky's funeral had been the first to bring home the fact that
+summer was gone. The chapel had been cold and bleak, and while they stood
+around the grave it began to rain. In the drawing-room at Cashelthorpe the
+fire had been lit, and tea awaited the brother and sister. Consoling as
+these comforts were they could not dispel the sadness which oppressed the
+kind heart of Ada Forcus.
+
+"I shall never forget those poor things, to-day. Never!" she said, and
+cried unashamedly into her tea-cup.
+
+The man, of course, did not cry, but he too appeared for the time
+overwhelmed with the shadow of what had befallen.
+
+"I spoke to their old servant to-day," he said. "It seems the child was
+called back; Reggie wouldn't listen; drove off with him."
+
+"I am horribly sorry for Reggie. But oh, I can't forget how _little_ the
+coffin looked. Francis, what a handsome family they are! I couldn't help
+noticing that, even when they cried, the girls were pretty."
+
+It was more than could have been said of Ada; and she knew it, but cried
+all the same.
+
+"The younger girl is extremely good-looking," the brother said, "and she
+is a conscientious and good girl, besides."
+
+He thought how certainly, if she had so wished it, she might have been
+going to be his sister-in-law, and the reflection again quickened the
+perception of the fact that something was due from the family of Forcus to
+that of Day.
+
+"I will go and see George Boult to-morrow," he said.
+
+"The draper, do you mean? Why?"
+
+"He is their adviser. Put the poor woman into that wretched shop. He will
+know what can be done for them."
+
+Sir Francis, however, did not find himself greatly helped in his
+benevolent project by Mr. George Boult, a circumstance surprising the man
+to whom the character of the successful draper was not unknown. That he
+would have accepted on the widow's behalf without scruple anything that
+could be got, was what was expected of him; instead of which he received
+all the rich man's propositions coldly, and did not even faintly encourage
+his charitable intentions.
+
+Through his brother--however blameless in the matter--a heavy sorrow had
+come upon these poor people. It would be a great relief to Sir Francis and
+his family if he could be allowed in any way to be of use to them. His
+name need not appear. Mr. Boult could arrange the transaction. He had
+heard that the grocer's business was not successful--?
+
+The shop must be given up. George Boult admitted the fact. The woman was
+too timid for trade. All women were. No blame to her, specially. She had
+been industrious, and careful. She was standing behind her counter that
+very morning. He had seen her there. But what customers would care to go
+to buy soap and candles of a woman half dead with grief?
+
+"She must not be allowed to remain there," Sir Francis said. "I can easily
+put in a man who will take entire charge and set Mrs. Day at liberty. I
+will send a man in, to-morrow."
+
+"I am putting one in to-day," George Boult said, who had decided to do so
+on the moment only. He swelled out his chest, settled his shoulders, shook
+his head in his low collar, and put on an important air. "No doubt it is
+common knowledge that Mrs. Day and her family have looked to me for advice
+and assistance, hitherto," he said.
+
+"I promised William Day I would look after them. I have kept my promise,
+and mean to keep it. I am obliged to you all the same."
+
+"My offer to help in any way possible holds good, you will remember," Sir
+Francis said. He would not give up his benevolent intention without a
+struggle. "Is there anything which could be done for the girls?" he asked.
+"The younger is teacher at a school, I believe?"
+
+"Got the sack!" said Mr. Boult easily; and then, seeing no reason why he
+should not do so, went on to explain that it was through the attentions of
+Mr. Reginald Forcus that misfortune had come about. "So Miss Bessie tells
+me," he finished, and inquired with the glance of a glistening eye at Sir
+Francis if he had the pleasure of Miss Bessie's acquaintance. "A
+remarkably fine-looking young lady is Miss Bessie," he pronounced.
+
+He nodded a familiar farewell to his visitor when, uncomfortable and
+crestfallen, the latter withdrew. The Forcuses were not even customers.
+Sir Francis and he sat on the magistrates' bench together. "We are on a
+par, about, now," he said to himself; and he reminded himself he also was
+now entitled to put a cockade on the frowsy hat of his coachman in the
+mildewed livery.
+
+Let the high and mighty brewer put up a widow of his own to play
+Providence to, and leave the especial property of George Boult alone!
+
+Sir Francis, for his part, was more troubled in mind than ever when he
+emerged from that interview. The girl dismissed from her school too! It
+seemed that all the misfortunes of the poor Days must be laid at his door.
+He, who hated to owe to any man, could not ease himself of that heavy
+debt.
+
+"I will go to see them," Ada said when he told the ill-success of his
+mission.
+
+"They will hate to see you."
+
+"I shall go. I am sure they are people of nice feeling."
+
+Of that visit, too, no very satisfactory account could be given. It had
+been very painful. Mrs. Day had not been present. She had sent a message
+thanking Miss Forcus for calling, and asking to be excused. There had been
+only the girls. She might say only the one girl, for the elder had started
+wildly crying at the appearance of Miss Forcus, and had not recovered when
+she left.
+
+"The poor little boy seems to have been their idol," Ada said with a sigh,
+miserably oppressed.
+
+The younger girl had pleased the lady very much by her demeanour; so
+composed, so unselfish, so evidently aware of the trying ordeal it was for
+the visitor, so sweetly striving to be gracious.
+
+Sir Francis nodded. "I have always liked the manner of that younger girl."
+
+"And she is quite lovely, Francis."
+
+He did not know about the loveliness, the brother said, but he believed
+her to be simple and conscientious and good. He looked at his sister's
+plain face: "Every woman who is that is lovely," he announced.
+
+"I am going there again," Ada said.
+
+"It won't seem an intrusion?"
+
+"I will risk it. They appear to have no friends."
+
+After the second visit she had something more definite to relate. "I hope
+you will approve, but if you don't it can't be helped," she said, "for the
+thing is arranged. That younger girl, Deleah, is coming here."
+
+"Here? On a visit, you mean?"
+
+"She is coming to be my companion. It is the only way I can discover in
+which we can be of use to them. The poor child has been receiving fifteen
+pounds a year. I can give her fifty--"
+
+"You haven't forgotten how that young fool, Reggie, made a bigger fool of
+himself over this girl. Would have married her, I suppose, but for the
+extraordinarily decent way the young woman behaved about it."
+
+"Luckily Reggie is away," Ada comforted herself. "He'll have been in love
+a dozen times over before he comes back again."
+
+"But what are you going to do with the girl? Won't it bore you to have her
+always about? You have never wanted a companion before."
+
+"How do you know I have not?" his sister asked him laughing. "I didn't
+know it myself, but I expect I've wanted one all the time. At last I'm
+going to have one."
+
+There was in Ada Forcus that ineradicable love of gaiety which some women
+carry to the grave. Since, at the death of his wife, she had gone to keep
+house for her brother small indulgence had been shown to this passion. In
+the grave of his wife, not only all Sir Francis's heart had been buried,
+but apparently the love of all that made for the brightness of life. By
+the time the poignancy of his sorrow had worn off, to be solemn and sad of
+demeanour, to shun the disturbing effects of social distraction, had
+become second nature to him. By no wish of his own, but naturally and
+irresistibly, that habit of melancholy which had fallen on its master
+seemed to enshroud his home. He liked his brother to be with him in the
+home in which he had been born, but he would not welcome his brother's
+friends. He was greatly attached to the sister, who was half a dozen years
+older than himself, but the idea that she could desire any other company
+than his own, had not apparently presented itself.
+
+"There are some things a man can never learn," the mid-Victorian Ada said
+to herself, when Sir Francis prophesied that she would find a companion a
+bore. "And one is that a woman, however happily situated in a man's house,
+must have another woman easy of access to talk with, to sew with, to
+whisper to."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+A Householder
+
+
+When it was explained to her that a man was to be put into the shop to
+give her a holiday, Mrs. Day refused the indulgence. Her heart was broken,
+but she was not ill. To have had a little time to give to Franky--to take
+him for walks in the country, to read to him, to help him with his
+favourite occupation of painting old numbers of the _Illustrated News_ and
+_Punch_ would have been a joy. Often she had longed for the leisure to do
+these things. But now that Franky was gone, where was the use of leisure?
+She did not even want the leisure to cry. She who had wept so often in
+this latest sorrow could shed no tears.
+
+Deleah cried, wetting the pillow nightly with her tears. When talking of
+matters quite unconnected with the lost child the tears would come welling
+up, drowning the beautiful hazel eyes; would tremble, as she tried to go
+on talking, on the thick black lashes; would roll, she pretending not to
+notice, down her cheeks.
+
+Bessie cried--howled, even, lying with her face buried in the sofa
+cushion, calling in a smothered voice upon Franky's name.
+
+Emily cried, cleaning with spirits of ammonia the shabby school suit whose
+odour had so offended the nostrils of the elder sister. Putting yet
+another patch in the hinder portions of the trousers, the only use of such
+labours being that it delayed the laying away of the little garments for
+ever.
+
+But the mother was denied such easy expression of sorrow that was beyond
+words and beyond tears. "I am not ill. Mr. Pretty and I can manage," she
+said, and the substitute supplied by George Boult was sent back.
+
+Mr. Pretty was very good to her, giving up, for the time being, his
+surreptitious smokes in the cellar, his skylarking with the youths of his
+own age who passed the door, giving his serious attention to duties he had
+consistently shirked hitherto.
+
+Every one who came near the bereaved mother committed the common mistake
+of ignoring her loss. Even her daughters did this as much as possible; so
+that in the place where the child's name had been on every lip it was no
+longer heard.
+
+Those who have endured such a loss know how the ear sickens for the sound
+of a name which yet the tongue refuses to utter; how the heart stirs to
+the music of it when at length it is pronounced.
+
+Mr. Pretty did not understand this, but also he did not know the accepted
+creed that of the newly dead it is kindest not to speak. He had not seemed
+very fond of the child, had often complained of him as a hindrance when
+Franky had wished to help him to grind the coffee or to clean the
+currants, yet he had laid by a store of sayings and doings which he drew
+on now for his mother's ear. Stories of Franky's naughtiness, even: of his
+partiality for the neighbourhood of a certain drawer which contained
+preserved cherries. Of his cheek in daring to address the assistant as
+"Pretty" without the Mr., and, the youth objecting, his ready substitution
+of an adjective which certainly was more descriptive of his appearance. Of
+his riding on Mr. Pretty's back when he, in pursuit of his duty, must
+crawl on all fours under the counter; his clinging to his legs when duty
+again called him to mount the steps for the topmost shelf. Nothing was too
+absurd, no tiny record too trivial to be precious in the mother's ears.
+
+A source of furtive interest to her were the movements of Willy Spratt,
+the cutler's son. Instructed thereto by his parents, who may have thought
+that the sight of him would be painful to the poor woman, the child gave
+up, going to the shop to spend his pennies. Looking in, a little wistfully
+at first, as he passed, he soon ran, singing or shouting, by the door,
+with no thought of the little companion who used to wait to join him
+there. When at length he took to coming in again for his screw of sweets,
+Mrs. Day would look away from him resentfully, leaving him to Mr. Pretty
+to serve. She could not bring herself to speak to the child who was alive
+and well, and happy with his acid-drops, while Franky lay in his grave.
+
+Of the company of Mr. Boult at that time the Days had more than enough.
+Mr. Gibbon used to get up and retire to his room or go out to walk the
+streets, when the head of his firm appeared. "I have enough of him in
+working hours," he would excuse himself afterwards. "Mr. Boult is all very
+well in his place."
+
+"I'm sure I wish he would keep there!" Bessie would declare. She thought
+the Honourable Charles was jealous; for with the elder daughter the draper
+had come to indulge in a kind of heavy badinage which may have gratified
+George Boult, and apparently was not displeasing to Bessie, but which
+those who looked on must have found fatiguing.
+
+Bessie always pretended to be bored by these encounters of wit with the
+fat, bald-headed man who had been her father's contemporary: "You have no
+right to yawn when I am talking to you, Miss Bessie," he would reprove
+her. "Why do you do it?"
+
+"Because I am tired."
+
+"You mean because you are tired of my company? That is not the reason you
+yawn, however. You yawn because you have indigestion."
+
+"I? Indigestion? What makes you think so, pray? Do I look like
+indigestion? Have I spots on my face, or a red nose?"
+
+"No, but you are growing fat. You eat too much."
+
+"Mr. Boult, how _dare_ you!"
+
+"You eat too much, and work too little. You don't take exercise enough to
+digest your food."
+
+"You are making personal remarks, Mr. Boult. No gentleman can make
+personal remarks to a lady unless they are complimentary--" and so on.
+
+When Deleah went away it seemed that Bessie blossomed out into greater
+attractiveness. Perhaps in the restricted spaces of Bridge Street there
+had not been room enough or air enough for the development of both
+sisters; or it may have been that Deleah, with her superior beauty and
+winsomeness, shone the other down, and that Bessie had been conscious of
+the fact. Certainly she grew more amiable, more useful, even grew prettier
+and more lovable. And George Boult came often, and more often. Hardly a
+night that he did not come.
+
+The business, not paying, must be disposed of; there was no absolute cause
+for hurry; Mrs. Day could hang on till an advantageous offer was made, Mr.
+Boult decided. The house, open to receive him whenever it pleased him to
+go, suited him. He liked the long narrow sitting-room above the shop, with
+its fireplace at one end, and its three deep-seated windows at the other,
+where he could sit now as in his own home, and talk to Bessie wilfully
+idle, or Bessie pretending to sew--always Bessie pleasant to look upon,
+and oddly stimulating, with her daring treatment of him.
+
+Deleah gone, Franky gone, it was very snug there, especially when the
+winter evenings came on, and the poor widow stayed late in her shop while
+he and Bessie sat and "chaffed," as he called it, alone.
+
+How she dared! he often asked himself. To think of all the benefits he had
+bestowed on the family, and that she dared!
+
+"What would have become of you all if I had not got up that
+subscription-list, and started you in business?" he asked her.
+
+"What's going to become of us now that the money is spent, and the
+business has failed?" she retorted.
+
+"You leave that to me," he told her, and as good as promised that the
+future of the family was safe with him. He expected her, perhaps, to be
+overcome with gratitude; instead of which she gave him a not unneeded
+lesson in manners, advising him that a person of so much importance should
+not demean himself by blowing his own trumpet.
+
+In the sitting-room over the shop was no attraction for Charles Gibbon,
+Deleah's light figure and darling face being absent from it. He could
+afford a house very well now. Not the grand house of which Deleah had
+spoken, but one which would suffice to his modest wants. A house with a
+big garden beyond, where, supposing a lady ever came to live there who was
+fond of flowers, roses might be grown, honeysuckle, jessamine trained. A
+garden where a bower could be constructed large enough for two who could
+eat their strawberries there, in season, or drink a glass of wine there,
+on a Sunday afternoon. Far out of the town, for choice, on a road at whose
+gate some one might stand watching the departure of the master, as he went
+to work in the morning, welcoming him when he returned at night.
+
+In his spare hours he occupied himself in looking for such a retreat, and
+when the ideal one was found he left his rooms in Bridge Street and went
+to live there.
+
+George Boult took the trouble to walk out one Sunday afternoon to the
+little trellis-covered house, a mile and a half away from the town, and
+discovered the junior partner in his shirt-sleeves rolling the gravel of
+the back-garden. Boult, a strict Sabbatarian, was more than a little
+shocked to observe that breach of decorum. The fact that the back-garden
+was not overlooked, set his mind at rest, however. "We've got to be
+careful about such things. Customers are often particular," he said.
+
+The patronage of the visitor who insisted on being taken over the small
+domain was trying to the temper of its proprietor, uneasily conscious
+already that the lawn was only half big enough for the croquet-hoops
+ostentatiously set forth thereon; that the furniture in the dining-room
+was much too big for it, and that in the drawing-room absolutely unsuited
+to its purpose. He wished to forget these defects, which the other thought
+it his duty conscientiously to point out.
+
+"Very nice. Very nice. Very suitable indeed," was the verdict finally
+pronounced. The Honourable Charles's soreness was not at all soothed
+thereby. Since the abode, obviously in Mr. Boult's eyes, left so much to
+be desired, it was no compliment to be told it was suitable. "A very nice
+little cage, Gibbon. Where is the bird?"
+
+"No hurry," Gibbon said, sullenly uncommunicative. Earnestly desiring his
+departure he had strolled with his visitor to the gate. To have him on
+Sunday as well as all the week was a little too much, he was saying to
+himself, aloud saying nothing. And at that moment a carriage was driven
+past, whose servants wore the green and tan liveries of the Forcuses. One
+of the two ladies seated in the carriage, with a look of surprise on her
+face, leant eagerly forward and bowed to the men at the gate. Mr. Boult,
+taken unaware, made a dash at his hat, Gibbon, bare-headed, did not so
+much as bend his neck in response to the salutation, but his face grew
+leaden-white.
+
+"Slap up turn-out! I suppose their carriages are always dashing by?" Mr.
+Boult said; for the road on which the Laburnums stood was that which led
+to Cashelthorpe.
+
+He was generally at work at the back of the house, and could not say how
+often they passed, Gibbon said.
+
+"You'd rather be looking at your three-yard-square of croquet-lawn than at
+Deleah Day in the Forcuses' carriage, Gibbon?"
+
+Gibbon plucked a leaf from the hedge and put it in his mouth, but made no
+reply to the facetious remark.
+
+"What are they doing, driving their horses, and dragging out their
+servants in the middle of a Sunday afternoon?"
+
+They went sometimes, in the afternoon, to a service at the Cathedral,
+Gibbon, who in spite of being habitually at the back of the house
+evidently knew something of the Forcuses' movements, was able to
+communicate.
+
+"Little Miss Deleah thinks a mighty lot of herself, seated up there in
+state."
+
+He should not think so, Gibbon said. "What is she but a servant there? She
+was a far greater lady, to my thinking, when she sat in the room over her
+mother's shop."
+
+"It's Bessie that should ride in her carriage," Mr. Boult declared.
+
+"Perhaps she will," said Gibbon, and looked at his partner, who met the
+other's eyes hardily.
+
+"If she does," he said with sudden bluster, "the fool that owns the
+carriage is a ruined man. Mark my words. Extravagant, idle young woman.
+Die in the workhouse--that's what Bessie Day will do. Look here, Gibbon;
+you know how things are; you know all I've done for them. I could put up
+the shutters of the shop to-morrow, and they could not help theirselves.
+Bessie knows it too. I have not made a secret of these things. She knows I
+hold them in the hollow of my hand. Yet to hear her cheek me! The daring
+of it! Gibbon," he touched the younger man's shoulder with the stiff
+finger of his thick hand, "I used to think that you--eh?"
+
+"No," said Gibbon, with decision.
+
+"Nice little place all ready--when you've spent a few pounds more--?"
+
+"No, thank you."
+
+"Is that so?" Boult said, and pressed his lips together, nodding his head
+and seeming to take time to turn the information over in his mind. Then he
+leant forward, and again touched the other's shoulder, tapping it two or
+three times by way of emphasis. "You're wise," he said, confidentially.
+"Take my word for it, Gibbon, you're wise. If I were a marrying man,
+which, thank Heaven, I am not, I wouldn't risk marrying Bessie Day if
+there was not another woman on earth."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+Promotion For Mrs. Day
+
+
+Deleah had lived for several months at Cashelthorpe as companion to Miss
+Forcus, when on a certain Thursday afternoon she excused herself, as it
+was often her habit to do, from attending on Miss Forcus, and went to pass
+the hour and a half of the early-closing day with her mother and sister.
+
+Mrs. Day was alone at the moment of her arrival, and that her mother was
+in unusually low spirits was quite obvious to Deleah.
+
+"Come for a walk with me, mama; it is not good for you to be shut up on
+such a day in this stuffy room."
+
+Mrs. Day declined, but she could not deny that the room was stuffy. No
+flowers were on the table now that Gibbon's offerings had ceased. No
+plants on the wide window seat. On a whatnot in a corner which had been
+devoted to the child's belongings were Franky's paint-box and some of his
+toys. The mother's eyes turned from Deleah, now well appointed in her
+pretty muslin and hat with its long ostrich feather, and rested on these
+mementoes.
+
+"But for what happened to him you would not be where you are, Deleah," she
+said.
+
+"But you wish me to be there, mama?"
+
+"Oh, I wish it, dear, since you are happy; only--"
+
+She did not put the thought into words--only Franky seemed to have died
+for this. Franky, who had come crying to her one day because a
+school-fellow had laughed at the patch on this trousers: Franky who had
+begged so hard only a few hours before his death for a little box of
+conjuring tools like Willy Spratt's, which had to be denied him. Her
+little Franky crushed to death beneath the wheels of the Forcus carriage!
+In her heart the mother would have liked Deleah to reject the good things
+offered her by the Forcus hand.
+
+"Of course I am not happy!" Deleah said. "How can I be happy, mama, if you
+are unhappy? And poor little Franky--do you think I forget him? And
+Bernard, and--poor papa? And again I'm not happy because I don't _earn_
+the money they pay me," Deleah said, and her cheeks grew pink at the
+thought. "It is out of charity they give it me. I _can't_ earn fifty
+pounds a year by just sitting in a carriage, or sewing beads on to canvas,
+giving a few messages to servants, writing a few letters! I wonder if they
+would be glad if I gave it all up, mama?"
+
+"We're leaving the shop," Mrs. Day told her. "You must try to keep where
+you are, for the time, Deleah. Miss Forcus is kind to you?"
+
+"Oh, so heavenly kind!"
+
+"And Sir Francis?"
+
+"I suppose he knows I am in the house. Yes. Sometimes he speaks to me
+quite ten words a day. Tell me about leaving the shop, mama."
+
+"Mr. Boult has proved to me that we are not solvent."
+
+"What does that mean? Not that we are bankrupt? Oh, mama! As if we had not
+had disgrace enough without that!"
+
+"There is no end to it," Mrs. Day said hopelessly. "But you, at least, are
+out of it, Deleah." She had a dreary air of detachment about her; the
+troubles that had beset them had been common to them all, but Mrs. Day
+sat, on this holiday afternoon, as if she were singled out and set apart,
+a queen of sorrows. Deleah resented that attitude.
+
+"Surely you don't think I want to be out of it, mama! Do you think I want
+to live in luxury while you and Bessie haven't a home?"
+
+And at that moment Bessie appeared, coming in from the kitchen and
+confidential confabulation with Emily. Her face was flushed, and her eyes
+glittered with an excitement too evidently not pleasurable.
+
+"Well! What do you think of it?" she burst forth.
+
+"It is bad news. But everything that happens to us is bad," said Deleah,
+with uncharacteristic despondency.
+
+"Bad?" echoed Bessie. "That depends on how you look at it."
+
+"Bankruptcy? To owe more than we can pay? I should have thought that there
+was only one way of looking at it."
+
+Bessie swung round to her mother. "You haven't told Deda!" she cried
+accusingly. "She hasn't told you! Mama is going to marry Mr. Boult,
+Deleah."
+
+"To _marry_ him!" Deleah cried, as if she might have cried "to _murder_
+him!" and sprang from her chair to stand before her mother. "Mama! Mama!"
+
+Mrs. Day, sitting huddled in her chair as if she lacked the spirit to hold
+herself upright, and looking all at once a dozen years older, shook a
+desponding head. "I can't!" she said. "I don't think I _can_ do it."
+
+"Well, you've got the chance," Bessie said, hardly. "And it's a good one.
+Good for all of us. He's rich. He has sat here bragging of his money to
+me--and that he might spend a couple of thousand a year if he liked. As if
+I cared! But if it's going to be yours, mama--two thousand a year--I do
+care. I do!"
+
+"But we can't think only of ourselves, Bessie," Deleah, horrified, put in.
+"We've got to think of mama. She could never endure it."
+
+"She should have thought of that before," Bessie said. "Mama should not
+have been so sly and underhand--"
+
+"Bessie! Bessie! You can't mean what you say."
+
+"I mean every word of it. Pretending to dislike him! Pretending to keep
+out of his way!"
+
+"Deleah, I have told your sister I nearly died of astonishment when he
+spoke to me. The idea had never entered my head." Poor Mrs. Day leant the
+head upon her hand and hid her face, in her misery.
+
+"Bessie, you are not to bully mama. Do be silent. Don't mind her, mama.
+What did you say to him?"
+
+"I didn't say one way or the other."
+
+"Such nonsense!" cried the irrepressible Bessie. "You'll have to say! and
+he isn't in any doubt about it. He came to me and told me he was going to
+be my papa. I could have felled him to the earth when he said it! But I
+did not. I said 'You may be a papa to me a hundred times over, I will
+never be a daughter to you. Never! Never! Never!'"
+
+"But if mama did this horrible thing, you'd have to be his daughter--you'd
+have to live in his house--"
+
+"I'd live there, but I'd make it warm for him!" Bessie cried; and then her
+feelings becoming too much for her, she dashed from the room, and slammed
+the door behind her.
+
+Deleah, left alone with her mother, did her best to strengthen her. "Never
+mind her, mama. Do not think of any of us in this; think of yourself
+alone. You could never do it."
+
+"Bessie and he would fight like cat and dog," Mrs. Day said. "They are
+always fighting now. She says such things to him, and he to her!
+Environment has told on Bessie. She says things no lady should say. My
+life would be unbearable."
+
+"It is not to be thought of for a moment."
+
+"But there are the debts I cannot pay. There is poor Bernard. I ought to
+do it, Deleah. I know I ought. But I have had miseries enough."
+
+When Deleah left her, Mrs. Day still sat a huddled heap upon the sofa. "I
+have had miseries enough," she repeated; and upon that text she spoke to
+herself--going over in faithful detail the troubles she had known--vainest
+and most useless occupation in which a woman can indulge.
+
+Her orphaned, dependent childhood; her marriage. It had been loveless on
+her part, but she had cared a little, believing that love on her husband's
+part would suffice. Was it love, ever at all? Is love possible where
+tenderness, courtesy, consideration do not exist? Time going on, daily she
+had suffered his incivility, the despite he did to her sense of what was
+due to her as his wife, the mother of his children, the mistress of his
+home. Habit, and love for her children, had made life tolerable. But for
+twenty years he and she had lived side by side in the outward union of
+inwardly divided minds.
+
+Then had come his crime, its awful expiation, the terror, the disgrace,
+the bitterness of the fall for her children and herself, the salt, salt
+taste of the bread of charity, the drudgery which had been humiliating all
+through, with failure at the end. The grievous sorrow of Bernard's
+blighted career, the cruel death of her innocent comfort and consoler, her
+little boy.
+
+Were not these things enough? Great God, was it possible she still had
+unspeakable agonies of mind and humiliation of body to go through? Her
+eyes, so pathetic in their subdued look of patience, wandered round the
+room which had been to her a haven of refuge from her sordid life in the
+grocer's shop. A hat Bessie had just discarded lay upon the table. Poor
+Bessie! poor undisciplined, unruly, never wholly grown-up Bessie! In the
+day of cataloguing the miseries of her life she was too sadly honest to
+pretend that Bessie could be a comfort to her.
+
+A picture of Bernard painted by a local artist at a time when father and
+mother were for once united in the opinion that a handsomer, more
+promising boy did not exist, hung on the wall. Poor Bernard, who by last
+mail from India had written to his mother that his life in barracks was a
+hell.
+
+The tired eyes wandered from that heart-breaking record of promise never
+to be fulfilled to the whatnot, holding Franky's toys. Was that dust on
+the lid of the paint-box?
+
+She crossed the room, mounted a chair, took down the precious box, dusted
+it tenderly with her handkerchief, looked within. Such broken odds and
+ends of his gamboge, his yellow ochre, his Indian ink of which he had
+prattled to his father, questioning whether carmine or vermilion should be
+used for the roofs of his absurd houses; if Prussian blue or ultramarine
+should be for his seas and skies. She saw again the huge man and the
+little child bending over their pictures on Sunday evenings of long ago,
+heard the very tones of their voices. Her tears dropped upon the shabby
+old box, upon the little earthen palette on which the colours Franky had
+rubbed still remained. All the bitterness had died out of her heart. Only
+sadness was left, and a sense of irreparable loss.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+At Laburnum Villa
+
+
+Deleah as she walked homeward that afternoon (for she had overstayed her
+allotted time in Bridge Street, and the carriage which was to have picked
+her up at a certain point had gone on without her) determined that she
+must leave Cashelthorpe. The words sounded in her own ears as if she were
+sentencing herself to leave heaven.
+
+Her mother could not be allowed to marry George Boult; she could not
+remain in the shop. How were she and Bessie to live? With the vanity of
+youth, which always sees itself in the foreground, Deleah thought she
+perceived that it was she who must get a living for them all.
+
+In her small distracted head she decided as she walked along that she
+would hire a little house, start a little school. Perhaps some one would
+pay the first quarter's rent, and she could pay it back when the pupils
+came.
+
+"Some one" in days gone by would have meant Sir Francis; but now, living
+under the same roof with him, seeing in what deference he was held even by
+his own sister, feeling his reserve, his aloofness from the low concerns
+of such as she, she had become extraordinarily shy of that great man.
+Through the daring of ignorance, trusting in that look of serenity and
+nobility in his face, she had formerly approached him. She believed in his
+goodness still as she believed in the goodness of God, but the awe of him
+she had always felt had descended, since she had lived beneath his roof,
+in a double measure upon her.
+
+Of his sister she had no fear. She would speak to kind Miss Forcus. Miss
+Forcus would tell her what to do.
+
+Simultaneously with the formation of this resolve she arrived at the
+neatly trimmed hedge of Laburnum Villa. For the moment she had forgotten
+that the place held any interest for her beyond that of the other little
+houses in their gay gardens she had passed. She glanced at the bright
+green of the trellis-work front, at the minute weeping willow in a corner
+of the grass-plot, at the roseplants destined to cover arches and to grow
+into a bower, by and by. By the front door a clematis had been planted,
+and the Honourable Charles was stooping over the plant, and striving to
+direct, in accordance with his own idea of how it should grow, the
+clinging of the tendrils.
+
+Her light step was perhaps the one step in the world whose music could
+have withdrawn his attention from that absorbing occupation. He rose to
+his feet, turning sharply round; and as she wished him good-evening he
+went swiftly to the gate and swung it open."
+
+"Come in," he said. "I have been waiting for this." He had at the moment
+such a commanding air, that Deleah had no thought but to obey him.
+
+"I wish to show you my little place," he explained.
+
+Deleah was late, as it was, and had yet some mile and a half to walk, but
+concluding from the dimensions of the place that no very long detention
+was threatened, did not demur. So long ago it seemed to her, who had since
+travelled miles along the road of Experience and Feeling, that the Bridge
+Street boarder had made love to her when he should have made love to
+Bessie. He had paid her the greatest compliment it was in his power to
+pay, and of late she had begun to understand something of what he might
+have suffered; she wished to be kind to him and to make amends.
+
+So, sweetly appreciative of all she saw, she walked at his side, down the
+little paths, helped him to remember the names of the annuals, admired the
+view of the back-yard through a vista of trellis-work arches.
+
+"Do you like it?" he asked her.
+
+Deleah, with her artless desire to please, declared that she liked it very
+much.
+
+He turned away with a long-drawn breath of content "Come indoors," he
+commanded. He walked in front to lead the way, but stopped suddenly on the
+little path and turned to ask her if she knew how long it was since he and
+she had talked together.
+
+"Quite a long time, isn't it?" Deleah answered him. "But I have not been
+living at home, you know; I--"
+
+He cut her short abruptly. "It is five months three weeks and two days,"
+he said. "But the time has not been long to me. Looking back it seems that
+the time has almost flown."
+
+Deleah could not have felt flattered that this was so, but she told him
+she was glad to know that he was so happy.
+
+"Not happy," he said, "but looking forward to happiness; working for it."
+With that he went on again, stopping at the hall-door. "I think I've
+remembered your taste," he said as he threw the door open. "I've carried
+it out everywhere as far as it was possible."
+
+At that Deleah drew back. "I will look over your house some other time,"
+she said. "It is late. I must be getting home now."
+
+"Do you call the Forcus's place your home?"
+
+"For the present. I am leaving there soon."
+
+"The sooner the better. Come in."
+
+He put a heavy and peremptory hand upon her arm and drew her over the
+threshold, across the tiny passage called the hall, into one of the two
+bow-windowed rooms.
+
+"This is the dining-room," he said. "Sit down."
+
+To free her arm from his hand she obeyed him, and with an effort to appear
+very much at her ease looked about her.
+
+"What a sweet little room!" she said.
+
+"You like it? I thought you would. Look at the picture over the
+sideboard."
+
+It was a large print--much too large for the room--of "The Last Sleep of
+Argyle," and was faced on the opposite wall by a reproduction of "The
+Execution of Montrose."
+
+"They're proof prints," he told her proudly. "I remember you went to see
+those pictures, years ago, when they were on show in Brockenham, and liked
+them. I've had the chairs covered with red leather 'stead of horsehair. It
+costs more, but you used to say red was cheerful."
+
+"It is so very nice, Mr. Gibbon."
+
+"In the drawing-room there is a piano. Come and see."
+
+She went, because of that strange new peremptoriness of manner which she
+felt she had not the moral courage to disobey. The drawing-room had fresh
+flowers in a vase upon the centre table.
+
+"Did you put the flowers there, Mr. Gibbon?"
+
+"I put them there every day. For you. I have been waiting for you to come
+to see them. Everything is always ready. You like it all?"
+
+"Yes, indeed."
+
+"It is yours, then. It is all for you. From cowl on the chimney-pot--the
+kitchen-chimney smoked; I thought it would be inconvenient--to the bunch
+of honeysuckle on the table. All yours."
+
+"Oh no, Mr. Gibbon."
+
+"All yours. Every carpet has been laid down for you, every chair and table
+bought. Every seed has been sown, every tree planted. For you."
+
+Deleah, speechless for the moment, looked at the man with eyes grown wide
+with dismay. His was no tragic figure. He wore the light-coloured, large
+checked suit affected at that period by young men escaping temporarily
+from the black-frocked livery of shop or office, his hair was brushed
+smoothly back and shone with brilliantine, his moustache was glossy with
+the same admired preparation. His face was extra pale, but Deleah knew it
+had the trick of paling suddenly and for small cause. She had seen it
+blanch at a chance encounter with her in the street, or accidental
+touching of her hand by his. She avoided meeting his eyes--those eyes said
+to hold something in their expression which redeemed his face from the
+commonplace--and the wild ardour of their gaze was lost upon her.
+
+"Everything is yours, Deleah; when will you come and take it over?"
+
+"Mr. Gibbon, I told you before. I have not changed."
+
+"Nor I." His lips were lead-coloured and trembling; he was indeed
+trembling all over. He crossed his arms upon his chest to keep them still.
+"You are going to be my wife or no one's, Deleah," he said.
+
+She got up nervously from her chair; she tried to speak lightly. "I am
+going to be no one's, Mr. Gibbon," she said. "As I walked along to-night I
+have been making up my mind what to do. I shall take a small house for us
+all, and try to keep a little school. You shall see how well I keep my
+pupils in order. And, now and then, you shall bring me a nosegay of
+flowers from your garden--"
+
+"That won't suit me," he said. "I give you no more flowers unless you take
+them all. Will you take them? Answer."
+
+"Oh, Mr. Gibbon!"
+
+"'Oh, Mr. Gibbon!'" and he mimicked her. "Is that the way to speak to me?
+After all the years of my worship, am I still 'Mr. Gibbon' to you?"
+
+"I suppose so," was all poor Deleah could say.
+
+He was standing with his back to the door. He turned swiftly and locked
+it, then holding the key in his shaking hand, crossed his arms again:
+"Now!" he said, facing her; "we come to realities now. No more 'Oh, Mr.
+Gibbon!' no more talk about flowers. Listen. I, Charles Gibbon, love you
+with a passionate and desperate love that is not going to be played with.
+Do you, Deleah Day, love me? Say it out, once for all; Gospel truth; as
+God is in heaven to hear it."
+
+"I don't love you."
+
+"Do you hate me?"
+
+Deleah was frightened, but she was angry too: "Just for the minute I think
+I do."
+
+"All the same, hating me, will you marry me, and come to live in the house
+I have made for you?"
+
+"No," said Deleah, pale and suddenly breathless. "I won't!"
+
+He listened, panting as if from long running; his chest laboured beneath
+the grip of his folded arms as if it must burst. For a long minute he
+glared at her, speechless; and Deleah, glaring back at him wondered was
+this man with the working, ashen face really their decorous boarder, who
+had been so assiduous in passing the mustard and pouring out the water?
+What had come to him? Had she done this? Did he mean to kill her?
+
+He came slowly nearer to her, and it took all the girl's courage to hold
+up her head, to face him. "I understand, at last," he said. "Now I want
+you to understand too. So listen to me; and remember; and see if I lie.
+You belong to me. Never mind what you feel about it. You are mine. You
+belong to me. Do you hear me?"
+
+"I hear you, Mr. Gibbon."
+
+"Say it after me."
+
+"I will not."
+
+"You belong to me. Belong to me. Belong to me. And while I live you shall
+belong to no one else."
+
+He turned round then, and unlocked the door. But as she, with a haste
+which was hardly dignified, would have passed him there, he threw his arms
+around her, and pulled her fiercely to him, and madly kissed her face.
+
+Frightened and outraged, she fought for liberty, and gaining it, dashed
+off. She flew down the little neatly rolled gravel path, and out through
+the freshly painted gate, and once on the road, as if more than life was
+endangered by delay, she rushed onward at break-neck speed.
+
+Sir Francis Forcus, solemn and serene of face, riding homeward, had his
+attention drawn to a little figure which flew ahead of him. Riding up to
+her, he found that she who thus fled lonely as the shades of evening fell
+along the deserted road, was that little girl, his sister's protégée, who
+should have been safe under the shelter of his own roof.
+
+She stood still, breathless and disordered, as he drew up alongside of
+her. "What has happened? Where is my sister? Why are you alone?" he asked,
+and looked with astonished disapproval at her scared little white face.
+
+"I was late, and missed the--carriage. I am--running--home," she panted.
+
+He saw that there was more behind, and dismounted. Girls were not trained
+for physical exertion in those days, they were not nurtured in the belief
+that they must not be cowards. Deleah was trembling with terror and
+exhaustion.
+
+"Sit down," he said, and she subsided on the bank. He stood silently by
+her for a minute, drawing his conclusions. "You have been frightened," he
+said. "Who frightened you?"
+
+"N-no one," gasped Deleah. "I--ran."
+
+"From what? From whom?" And Deleah could not reply, could only feel the
+blessed security of his protecting presence, could only look up at him
+with the trusting, adoring eyes of a child.
+
+He looked back upon the road they had both come; the daylight had not yet
+faded from the sky, although the shades of evening were beginning to fall;
+far down the road, where it curved towards the town, the lamps were being
+lit. By the gate of the last "villa-residence" on the road, a man stood,
+looking towards the pair by the bank.
+
+"Was that the man who frightened you? That man by the gate?"
+
+"N-no."
+
+She might have saved her soul the perjury. Sir Francis, leading his horse
+by the bridle, walked back in the direction of Laburnum Villa.
+
+"Come back! Oh, please come back!" Deleah cried; but Sir Francis, paying
+no heed, went on, till he stopped, bridle in one hand, riding-whip in the
+other, in front of the man standing on the pathway before his gate.
+
+"You frightened that lady."
+
+"That lady is no business of yours."
+
+"You are my business, you scoundrel," Sir Francis said, and lifted with a
+threatening gesture the hand that held the whip.
+
+The man did not flinch. He was no coward; he was much the smaller of the
+two; he was unarmed. "No," Sir Francis said. "Not to-night," and dropped
+his whip-hand. "But look out for yourself, sir. Take care. I shall have an
+eye on you."
+
+For a minute he stood confronting the man, who looked back hardily at him.
+What else he had to say he said by the glance of his eye, by the set of
+his lips, by his scornfully carried head; then he slowly turned his back,
+led his horse from path to roadway, and swung himself into his saddle. As
+he settled himself there, he found the other man by his stirrup.
+
+"Lucky for you you did not use your whip on me, Sir Francis Forcus," he
+said. "Sure as God, if you had done so I would have had your life."
+
+Sir Francis, looking down on him, cut a light stroke upon the man's
+shoulder with his whip.
+
+"You asked for it, and you have got it," he said. "Stand out of the way,
+will you?" and careless whether the other took that measure for
+self-preservation or not, rode on.
+
+Deleah, unable to see distinctly what occurred, was relieved to find the
+interview so short, and Sir Francis so quickly beside her again. She had
+got up from the bank, and was walking briskly homeward when he overtook
+her.
+
+"I hope you--were not unkind to him," she said timidly. "Mr. Gibbon lived
+in our house once--"
+
+"Was that Mr. Gibbon? That man with the mad eyes?"
+
+"He was our boarder. He was always very kind."
+
+"To you especially kind?"
+
+"To us all."
+
+"And am I to hear why, as he is so kind, you were running away from him,
+this evening?"
+
+"I had rather not tell."
+
+He was a man of so much reserve himself that he respected hers. "Very
+well," he said; and after a minute added, "I am quite sure you were not to
+blame."
+
+"I don't know," said Deleah, and hung her head, as she walked along.
+
+To blame or not, she was horribly ashamed. She felt always in his society
+as shy and _gauche_ as an awkward child, and was conscious that it was in
+such a light he regarded her. She would have died rather than that he
+should have known of that frantic struggle in Gibbon's arms, of that mad
+embrace.
+
+
+
+
+Deleah, who had no advantage of excellent training, happened to be
+naturally musical. She played no difficult music, but her touch on the
+piano was good. Her voice, by no means powerful, was true and pure and
+pleasing. To Miss Forcus, who, in spite of the advantages of education,
+loved the wrong things consistently in music, and liked to be moved to
+tears by the plaintive songs of Claribel, it was a great pleasure to lie
+back in her chair, book or embroidery fallen to the floor, and watch
+Deleah's fingers tripping through the variations of Brinsley Richards's
+masterpieces; to hear her tunefully lamenting that "she could not sing the
+old songs," or in cheerfuller mood announcing that she might "marry the
+Laird" if she would--"the Laird of high degree."
+
+The two ladies had the small drawing-room to themselves in the evening as
+a rule, but to-night, the fancy took Sir Francis to join them there.
+Deleah, nervous at playing and singing before him, was too shy to ask to
+be excused. She had been told that the dead wife had been a fine
+instrumental performer, and that every evening she had provided for her
+husband a genuine musical treat.
+
+"I'm afraid I don't play any good music," she said. But Sir Francis, truth
+to tell, shared his sister's lamentable taste, and if, as he sat silent
+and pensive, beneath the shaded lamp on the round centre table, while the
+girl at the piano went through her simple répertoire, his heart was
+filled with memories of his lost wife, he certainly was not lamenting the
+works of Mozart and Beethoven which she had so skilfully rendered.
+
+Deleah, however, did not know this, never doubting that her benefactor was
+a connoisseur of all the arts. Her fingers trembled upon wrong notes--all
+undetected, had she known--her sweet voice faltered through the songs she
+was wont to sing so pleasingly. She went off to bed, not daring to look
+the master of the house in the face, so shocked and jarred and weary she
+felt that he must be.
+
+"Isn't she charmingly pretty and sweet?" his sister demanded of him. She
+could never hear praise enough of this new acquisition of hers.
+
+"She has attractive manners, and seems a good young woman."
+
+"I don't allow her to touch any of poor Marion's music, Francis."
+
+"Oh!" he said deprecating such restrictions. "What harm would her playing
+Marion's music do?"
+
+"I'm afraid she is going to leave us."
+
+"Indeed? I have been looking on her as a fixture."
+
+"She has been telling me the mother's shop has to be given up."
+
+"It is a case of the shop giving up the mother, I fear."
+
+"This poor little thing says she can't be happy living with us in luxury
+while the mother and sister are in difficulties. She thinks of taking a
+quite small house, and getting together a school of little children. It
+seems a hopeless look-out, Francis."
+
+"It does," he acquiesced, and took up the book he had laid down.
+
+"But, Francis, I wish you would show a little interest. We decided when
+that poor boy was killed we owed them what reparation could be made. I
+feel deeply something should be done for this girl. She is too pretty, too
+young, too delicate and dainty, to fight such a hard fight alone."
+
+"She has her mother and sister."
+
+"Nice women, I am sure, but--helpless."
+
+"I would not call the mother helpless. She has held on, and done her best
+in that hopeless shop."
+
+"You will see that everything will be pushed on to the shoulders of this
+little girl!"
+
+"Well then--?" He looked questioningly at his sister's kind face over the
+top of the book he was reading. Then his eyes fell again to its pages. "I
+will think about it," he said.
+
+After Ada Forcus had gone to bed he kept his promise:--sitting motionless
+in his chair, his elbow on the arm of it, his head upon his hand--thinking
+about it.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+A Prohibition Cancelled
+
+
+"Any letter of interest?" Sir Francis asked of his sister, who, breakfast
+being over, was glancing again through the correspondence the morning's
+post had brought her.
+
+"One from Reggie."
+
+"He having a good time?"
+
+"He says not. He says he hates travelling. Mountains and churches and
+picture-galleries, he says, bore him till he cries. He talks about coming
+home. I shall write and remind him he went for a year, and has only been
+away eight months. A young man with money in his pocket who can't amuse
+himself somewhere on the Continent of Europe must be deficient, Francis."
+
+"Poor Reggie is not a very cultivated person. And I suppose he is--in
+love." He paused on that, seeming to turn something over in his mind. "He
+may as well come back," he finished. "I decided last night to tell him he
+can come back if he likes."
+
+"If he likes!" repeated an astonished Ada. "Then, of course he'll come,
+and at once! He is best away. Tell him to stay where he is."
+
+"I can't always expect to keep the boy in leading-strings. He has always
+been very decent in doing the things I wish; but, as a fact, I have no
+longer the slightest authority over him, or hold upon him, and he knows
+it."
+
+"Then, leave it. Say nothing. Don't write for him to come."
+
+"I decided, last night, to write to him."
+
+Miss Forcus was silent to show that she did not approve. She never argued
+with her brother. "It is fortunate, then, that Deleah Day is going," she
+said presently.
+
+"We could not possibly have Reggie here with her. That silly affair would
+be on again, in no time."
+
+"As to that, I withdraw my objection. The boy must play his own game."
+
+"Francis!" unbounded astonishment sat on the good, plain face of Ada
+Forcus.
+
+Her brother left his place on the hearthrug, and walked over to the broad
+window at the end of the room. He stood there, tall, and fine, and
+upright, his back to her, his hands lightly clasped behind him.
+
+"Deleah is a sweet girl, Francis; but in a marriage there is more than
+that to consider."
+
+"Yes. There is a good deal to consider; but it is for Reggie and the girl
+to consider--not for me."
+
+"But surely you, too, Francis!"
+
+"Well, then, I have considered."
+
+"It is not Reggie alone--but all of us. You must think for all of us,
+Francis. You always have done. It is not a connection to desire."
+
+"I agree with you. The last in the world to desire. But it concerns the
+pair of them, primarily. He is--he no doubt believes he is--in love with
+her; and she is, I suppose, in love with him. No one has the right to
+interfere."
+
+"Think how differently you married, Francis! A rich girl of high family."
+
+"I did not marry for that. It happened--that was all. I married Marion for
+the same reason that impels Reggie to marry this girl. I remember how
+little such things weighed with me in my marriage; how, once having felt
+the inclination to marry her, I should have married my wife all the same
+if she had been, say, the daughter of William Day. It is because I
+remember that I decline any longer to interfere, or to take upon my
+shoulders any responsibility in this matter."
+
+"You are wrong, Francis. Reggie won't thank you for it, later on."
+
+"Oh, do I want any one to thank me!" Sir Francis said with sudden, all
+unusual petulance, turning round on his astonished sister, who jumped in
+her chair at his tone, instantly repentant. To incur the anger of the head
+of her house was the thing of which she was most on earth afraid.
+
+"Do what you think right, of course, Francis."
+
+"Of course I shall do what I think right."
+
+He went to his own room, settled himself in his chair by the open window,
+tore open the morning paper which it was his custom to read there. The
+window opened upon a long oblong of flower-bordered lawn, enclosed by
+thick square-cut yew hedges on two sides; at the end a series of glass
+houses shut out the view. The eyes of Sir Francis strayed from the pages
+of the newspaper to the sunshine and shadow of the freshly-cut lawn. At
+the door of one of the greenhouses beyond, Deleah, in her black muslin
+dress and wide black hat, was standing in conversation with Jarvis, the
+head-gardener. Part of her duty, he had been told, was to wheedle Jarvis
+out of the flowers Miss Forcus liked to see in her rooms, but of which he
+resented the cutting.
+
+Sir Francis looked at the pair--they were too far off for him to read
+their faces, but he know how the girl would be playing her part, smiling
+shyly, with appealing eyes; how Jarvis was probably denying her, being
+human, for the mere delight of being asked. Presently the newspaper
+dropped from his hand, and he passed out into the morning sunshine, and
+walked down the flagged path dividing the lawn, the mosses growing grey
+and green between the stones.
+
+It was a morning of unclouded skies, the soft air laden with the scent of
+flowers. A morning to be alive in--yes, to be happy in, spite of regrets
+and doubts and cares; spite, even, of death and loss and buried love. On
+such a morning a man might think of his dead wife, perhaps. Might say to
+himself, "the pity of it!" but he could but be conscious that he, himself,
+was alive still; that in him, solemn, responsible, middle-aged as he might
+be, the fires of youth were not yet extinguished. He must feel the
+fragrant wind upon his cheek, the scent of delicious airs in his nostrils,
+must even, in spite of himself, use the eyes in his head to see what was
+fair and sweet and gracious.
+
+Jarvis, with his finger to his cap, retreated to his carnation-house, the
+entrance of which he had been guarding.
+
+"So you are leaving us?" Sir Francis began at once, stopping before
+Deleah. "My sister has been telling me. We shall miss you very much."
+
+"I shall never forget how good you have both been to me," Deleah said in
+her shy voice, and playing with the flowers in her hands. "But I think I
+ought to go."
+
+"You will do what you think you ought, I am sure," he said; and her heart
+sank at the ease with which he acquiesced.
+
+She turned to walk towards the house, and he walked beside her. "You will
+come to me if I can help you?" he said.
+
+"If I might use your name in case no one will let me a house?"
+
+"Of course. But you are not going to-day?"
+
+She had not meant to do so, but since he seemed to expect it, found
+herself saying that she was.
+
+"There is another matter," he said, "and it is that I came out to speak
+about. My brother Reginald is coming home."
+
+"Really? Is that so?" She spoke without any show of interest. "I thought
+he had gone for a year."
+
+"That was the original plan. But he went because I wished it--at that
+time. He has always been to me a docile, dear fellow, and I fear I
+presumed on that. I had no right to order his goings and comings--to order
+his life. None."
+
+"I think it was Franky's death. I think he was glad to go--"
+
+"That is as may be. I am going to tell him, now, to come back."
+
+Deleah, feeling that this was a matter in which she had no concern, walked
+on, saying nothing.
+
+"And now," Sir Francis went on, "I am going to ask you to alter your mind
+about leaving us. Since Reggie is coming back to us, won't you stay?"
+
+Deleah lifted her head, and regarded him in silent astonishment.
+
+He went on. "You have not forgotten what I said to you on a certain matter
+some months ago, although you have sweetly held yourself as if you did not
+remember. I now wish to recall the words I said then."
+
+He waited. It was difficult to carry on a conversation in which she would
+take no part.
+
+"I see that I was wrong. That which I feared might be for Reggie's
+undoing, I now believe would be for his good. Will you do me the great
+kindness to forget that former talk we had; or if you cannot forget, to
+act as though it had not taken place?"
+
+Their walk had brought them opposite the morning-room window at which Miss
+Forcus was now standing looking out, wondering what Francis had found to
+say to the girl to whom he so seldom spoke.
+
+Deleah with an effort found her voice. "That time--when you spoke to me
+about your brother--I had not promised to marry him."
+
+"I know," he said very gently, for her voice showed him that she was
+distressed. "But Reggie wished it very much. And, perhaps, but for my
+having taken action, you would have done?"
+
+"I don't know," Deleah said, her head hung over the flowers in her hands.
+Her hat was big, he could not, if he would, see her face. "Mama and Bessie
+wished it--"
+
+"And--but for me--you would have wished it?"
+
+"I don't know."
+
+She gave him an instant's imploring glance. Surely he must understand how
+difficult it was for her to explain to him how she felt about Reggie! The
+Reggie he was so nobly offering her. The Reggie, that not only her mother
+and Bessie, but now Sir Francis himself wished her to marry, and that
+therefore, undoubtedly she would have to marry. She could not tell him
+this, could only stand before him--for they had come to a pause in the
+middle of the gravel sweep before the big hall door--with hanging head,
+pulling nervously at the stalks of her flowers, and repeat with a
+childishness he must despise, "I don't know."
+
+"Well, we shall see," he said encouragingly. "But at least you will not
+hurry away? You will stay with us until Reggie comes home? Go to my sister
+and tell her so. Will you?"
+
+"If you wish it," Deleah said.
+
+Miss Forcus, who under no circumstance could have been cold or
+inhospitable, received the intimation that Deleah was to stay until
+Reginald came home with less than accustomed warmth.
+
+"Of course, my dear! You know I hated the thought of your going; but why
+is it to be for Reggie especially? Were you and Reggie such friends?"
+
+Deleah admitted without enthusiasm that they were certainly friends.
+
+"Then, no doubt he will be glad to see you," Miss Forcus said, and thought
+to herself that now she was going to have the daughter of a felon for her
+sister-in-law.
+
+By way of solace to her family pride she turned from the impending,
+disastrous marriage of the step-brother to that satisfying alliance her
+own brother had made. The daughter of a baronet had been his wife--the
+sister-in-law of a peer. The baronet was a banker, and rich. If the little
+son had lived he would have inherited his grandfather's fortune which now
+had gone to the son of Lord Brace. Lord Brace, who was an Irish peer,
+wanted the money more than Francis, certainly, who had a sufficient
+fortune of his own, even without that considerable one his wife had
+received from her mother, and had left to him.
+
+All such facts, which Ada Forcus generally accepted as a matter of course,
+she now produced for the benefit of Deleah, meekly counting the stitches
+of the Madonna lily, which when worked in beads, grounded in amber silk
+and framed in gold, would be converted into a screen, to hang on the
+marble mantelpiece in the Cashelthorpe drawing-room.
+
+About the wife whom Sir Francis had loved and lost, who had lived for two
+years in this beautiful home, sitting to read, and eat, and sew, in her
+husband's company, walking the gardens by his side, cared for and tended
+and watched over by him, Deleah had dreamed many dreams. Beautiful as an
+angel she had pictured her, and with an angel's nature, to be so loved, so
+inexpressibly mourned by him. She had dreamed dreams, but had asked no
+questions. She asked them now.
+
+"Was she so very beautiful--Lady Forcus?"
+
+Not to say strictly beautiful; which had surprised them all, Francis
+having ever been a beauty lover. She had what was called a _dear_ face.
+And such manners! Such a dignity! Such an air of high-breeding! "I used to
+say to myself, 'Small wonder that Francis is your slave.'"
+
+"And was he?"
+
+"He was, indeed. Bound to her, hand and foot; with no thought but to
+please her, no wish but what was hers."
+
+Deleah sighed for very fullness of heart.
+
+"But only because of his love for her, understand. Not because she had him
+in the very least under her thumb."
+
+Deleah shook a sympathetic head. "I am sure he could not be that."
+
+"He has never been the same since her death. Never! And never will be
+again."
+
+"One would not wish him to be. It would spoil it," Deleah sighed.
+
+Miss Forcus echoed the sigh. "Well, I do not know," she admitted. "People
+die, but the world has to go on, Deleah. If the child had lived it would
+have been different; but it seems to me a pity there should be no one to
+come after Francis, to bear his name, and inherit his fortune. Of course
+there is Reggie; but--"
+
+She stopped there, remembering that in all probability the son of Reggie
+would be the grandson of William and Lydia Day--felon, and bankrupt
+grocer. The thought choked her. Had Francis remembered it? "Whoever
+marries Reggie will marry a rotten reed," she said impetuously. "I pity
+the girl who does it, from my heart."
+
+"So do I," said Deleah quietly, and knitted her brow, chasing a tiny
+fugitive bead with the point of her needle.
+
+Miss Forcus heard with surprise and satisfaction, yet was afraid to
+believe. What penniless girl, whose hand was her own to bestow, would
+refuse the wealthy young Forcus? Longing for further assurance, and
+greatly daring, she risked the question: "You knew Reggie so well, then,
+yet did not fall in love with him?"
+
+"I? Oh, no!" Deleah said. She lifted her head from the frame over which
+she was stooping and looked calmly in the other woman's face; and Miss
+Forcus was struck with the perception of what a gentle dignity the girl
+had. A dignity less arresting, perhaps, than that she had admired so much
+in Francis's wife, but as effective.
+
+"Ah, well!" she smiled, immensely relieved, and overjoyed to find she
+might again take her protégée to her heart. "We shall see who there is
+that will be good and great enough for you, Deleah. He will have to be
+both to deserve you."
+
+"He will have to be both before I love him," Deleah said calmly, but with
+the colour in her cheeks. She put her head on one side to contemplate the
+lily growing so slowly under her fingers. "'I needs must love the highest
+when I see it,'" she said, half to herself.
+
+For while she had been talking and listening she had been thinking of that
+sacrifice which she had but now thought was demanded of her; and she had
+made up her mind not to make it.
+
+When Sir Francis came in, that evening, he found lying on his
+writing-table a little note with the signature "Deleah Day." "I hope you
+will excuse me that I have altered my mind and decided to go home at
+once," it ran. "I think I am wanted there. I hope you will not think I do
+not feel all your kindness. I do feel it with all my heart."
+
+Carrying this scanty missive open in his hand, Sir Francis sought his
+sister.
+
+"Yes, she has gone," that lady said. "She evidently wished it, and I drove
+her back to-day."
+
+"Then how about Reggie?"
+
+"You were quite deceived about Reggie, Francis. You are, indeed. Deleah
+will never marry Reggie. She as good as told me so. I never was more
+thankful. It would have been so terribly unsuitable. She told me she was
+writing to you. What does she say?"
+
+Sir Francis did not choose to see the hand held out for Deleah's little
+note. He folded it, and walked to the window, looking out thoughtfully
+upon the garden, his hands behind his back, the letter, held by its corner
+in one of them, waggling up and down.
+
+"She told me she had written," Miss Forcus said again, by way of reminder.
+
+"She simply says she has gone."
+
+"I shall miss her dreadfully. She is the dearest girl. Never have I seen
+one so lovely and so little vain."
+
+"She is too lovely to be vain," Sir Francis said.
+
+And at the tone rather than the words Miss Forcus lifted a startled head,
+and gazed and gazed upon her brother's stately back, upon the hands
+clasped behind it, holding the letter, waggling up and down, he would not
+let out of his keeping.
+
+Over another letter which Sir Francis received the next morning, he
+laughed as he read. He tossed it across the table to his sister. "What a
+fellow!" he said.
+
+"From Reggie? I wish you had not written to him to come home, Francis."
+
+"He's not coming. Don't alarm yourself. He says the Worradykes have turned
+up at Nice--"
+
+"They followed him! They've no doubt taken Daisy. I would stake my
+existence they've taken Daisy!"
+
+"You are quite right. Daisy is there. Reggie has promised to go on with
+them to Rome."
+
+"_Now_ she'll catch him!" prophesied the lady. "Good gracious! Supposing
+things were as you thought and Deleah had waited to welcome him home! What
+a quandary we should have been in then, Francis!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX
+
+Deleah Grows Up
+
+
+It was Thursday afternoon: the day on which the shops of Brockenham closed
+at two. George Boult, who had taken to visiting Bridge Street on the
+Thursday half-holiday as well as the Sunday, must be expected this
+afternoon. One way or other Mrs. Day would have to answer that proposition
+of his which had filled her with such a misery of doubt.
+
+Very little on his part had been said at the time of the offer. He would
+be the happier for a lady at the head of his table, he had said; she and
+her daughters wanted a home. Both were perhaps too old for sentiment, both
+were old enough to take what chance of happiness and comfort life still
+offered them. "Think it over, ma'am," he had said. "I'll look in on
+Thursday. I don't anticipate you'll have thought of a better plan."
+
+She had not, unless to drown herself was a better plan.
+
+She had no impulse to suicide, but was a woman of unlimited selflessness,
+who, believing that her death would make life easier to her children,
+would have gone to it without any fuss.
+
+Sometimes, with little Franky, on a Sunday afternoon, she had walked by
+the side of the river where it ran away from the ugly black wharves upon
+its shores to the meadows where Franky loved to see the toads slip down
+through the weeds to the clear water, loved to get his boots wet in trying
+to catch the darting minnows in his hands, loved to gather the
+forget-me-nots, and river-mint, and ragged robin, to carry home to Deleah.
+She knew exactly the spot, where if she was only sure it would be best for
+Bessie, for Deleah, for poor, poor Bernard, she would slip down the
+shelving bank and go wading, wading in, till out of her depth and weighed
+down by her clothes she would sink out of sight, out of trouble, out of
+life. She had no illusions about the enfolding in the "cool and comforting
+arms of death." She knew quite well the horror of it, the choke, with the
+rank, foul-tasting river in her mouth, its weeds and offal winding her
+limbs. But that would pass, and she would be out of it. Far rather would
+she be dead at the bottom of the river than married to her benefactor, Mr.
+George Boult. If only she was sure it might be best for the children.
+
+"I wonder what's to become of me while you're having your interesting
+interview with Scrooge?" Bessie said at dinner-time. "It's raining, so I
+can't go out for a walk."
+
+"I am going for one," Mrs. Day said, having decided on that course at the
+instant of announcing the intention.
+
+"But I thought Scrooge was coming?"
+
+"I know. I can't see him. I really can't. You see him for me, Bessie."
+
+"Really, mama, how absurd! Is the old man wanting to marry me? Are you to
+have the billing and cooing by proxy?"
+
+There was no mistake about it, adversity had not improved Bessie; her
+mother had to admit to herself that she was even sometimes vulgar. "You
+might have spared me that, I think, Bessie," poor Mrs. Day said. She was
+deeply offended and hurt. She would not wait to finish her dinner, but
+went down into the shop and busied herself there till Mr. Pretty had put
+the shutters up. Then she dressed herself in the widow's bonnet she still
+wore, the shabby silk mantle with its deep border of crape, the black
+gloves so much the worse for wear, and saying no further word to Bessie
+went out.
+
+"Of course I know where she's gone," said Bessie to Emily, her unfailing
+confidante. "To Franky's grave. It isn't the place to make her a lively
+companion when she comes back again; and it isn't very cheerful for me to
+have to sit at home and think of her there."
+
+"'Tis mother-like, Miss Bessie." Franky's grave held attraction for Emily
+also, who visited it every Sunday of her life.
+
+"Yes, but, Emily, oughtn't mama to think of me as well as of Franky? And
+I've no patience with her. I think she ought to make up her mind, and have
+done with it. Quite young girls, with all their lives before them, make
+marriages for money, why should she make such a fuss?"
+
+"The young ones don't know what they're a-doing, perhaps; and your ma
+does," the sage Emily hazarded.
+
+"And if the old man comes to-day what do you suppose I'm to say to him?"
+
+"There never was a time yet when you didn't know what to say, Miss
+Bessie."
+
+"It's all very well. Why should I be mixed up in it? I shall just say
+nothing."
+
+"Then he can sit and look at you, and that's what he likes."
+
+Bessie's eyes glinted: "But if he likes it--and he has always acted as if
+he did--then why? why? why--?" She spread out the palms of her plump,
+white little hands, making the dramatic inquiry of Emily, who, with a
+black rag dipped in whitening, was polishing the "brights," as she called
+her tin and pewter ware.
+
+"Ah," Emily said; "he's one of your cautious ones, Boult is. Them that are
+young and fascinatin' aren't the best of housekeepers, per'aps."
+
+Bessie stood silent for a minute, watching the vigorous rubbing of a
+dish-cover. "You go and change your frock," Emily said, glancing up at
+her. "Put on that black-and-white muslin you look your nicest in--"
+
+"I ought to wear all black for a year, Emily."
+
+"You put on your black and white," coaxed Emily.
+
+Mrs. Day went to Franky's grave as had been foretold, but went a long way
+round to it, going first for that walk by the river, which the child and
+she had been wont to take together. Finding that particular spot on the
+riverbank which had been so much in her thoughts since Mr. Boult had made
+his offer, she sat down there with the deliberate intention of deciding
+which course to take, out of the three open to her. To be turned, with her
+children, homeless and penniless upon the world; to become Boult's wife;
+to drown in the river.
+
+An effort she made to keep her mind on these issues, but could only think,
+instead, of Franky. Not of Franky as he had played by the river, happily
+painted his pictures, rushed off noisily with the cutler's son to school,
+but of Franky sitting to eat his bread-and-butter and radishes, one spring
+afternoon, his plate on his knees, removed to a distance from the
+tea-table, because Bessie had declared that he smelt of putty.
+
+It was an absurd little incident, forgotten until now, when it awoke in
+her memory to wring the mother's heart without almost intolerable pain.
+Banished! Not good enough to sit at the table with Bessie--her Franky, her
+baby, her angel boy! In her heart she knew the boy had not cared, that, a
+few tears shed, his meal was as welcome to him in one part of the room as
+the other. Yet that picture of him, sitting lonely, munching in his
+corner, beset her with pain too deep for tears; the little uncomplaining
+figure bitterly accused her, she was reproached by the reproachless eyes.
+
+So she sat by the river and cried there, unable to turn her mind to the
+living children; to Bessie, so hard at times, but only because she was
+unawakened, did not understand; to pretty, pretty Deleah with her innocent
+allurements, her winning ways; to Bernard, who had written in his last
+miserable letter from India that he loved her best in the world. Of these
+she thought not at all; but only of the child eating his radishes in the
+corner, looking solemnly at her out of his big dark eyes.
+
+He called her from his grave, and presently she got up and went there.
+
+Deleah, dropped by the Forcus carriage at the private door in Bridge
+Street, went running up the stairs, and into the sitting-room. Bessie and
+Mr. Boult, sitting side by side on the sofa in that apartment, flew rather
+violently apart at the interruption of her entrance.
+
+"Well, Deleah! What a way to dash into the room!" Bessie said; a flurried
+Bessie with red cheeks, bursting into a scolding tone, to cover evident
+embarrassment.
+
+"Where is mama?" Deleah, gasping with astonishment, got out; and Bessie,
+in the flurry and perturbation of the moment, flung at her the sisterly
+advice to find out.
+
+Deleah, pale of face, eyes staring, gazed speechless from Bessie on the
+sofa, in the black-and-white muslin recommended by Emily, to Mr. Boult,
+now engaged in peering with sudden interest into the street. Then,
+shutting the door hastily upon the pair, she went to Emily, in the
+kitchen.
+
+"How long has Mr. Boult been here?"
+
+Emily had not looked at the clock.
+
+"Is he going to stay to tea?"
+
+Emily would set an extra cup, on the chance of it. "You'd best go and find
+your ma, Miss Deleah; she's gone to the cemetery, and have no right to be
+there alone."
+
+"I am going; and, Emily, I won't come into the house any more while that
+man is there; and mama shall not."
+
+"Now _you're_ going to make a heap of fuss!" the worried Emily said. "I
+never see sech goin's on as we get nowadays. No peace anywhere."
+
+"I'm not making any fuss. Only, you must tell Bessie to get rid of Mr.
+Boult before we come home."
+
+He did not go till Bessie, plump and attractive, a pink rose in her bosom,
+had poured out tea for him, but he had been gone half an hour when the
+mother and daughter returned. Mrs. Day, fagged with her long walk, was
+comforted by the holding of Deleah's warm young arm, strengthened by
+Deleah's brave talk. There would be another hard fight, but Deleah would
+not go away any more, they would fight together.
+
+"We can live on almost nothing, mama--you and I."
+
+There would be Bessie, her mother reminded her; but Deleah seemed
+indisposed to take Bessie into her calculations. She unfolded her scheme
+of the little house and the little school of quite little children such as
+she could teach.
+
+"We shall be far happier than we have ever been in the shop. Some eggs and
+milk for you and me, and now and then a little butcher's meat for Emily.
+What will it cost! Surely we can manage that, mama."
+
+"You are forgetting that there is Mr. Boult to settle with. That horrible
+proposition of his must be somehow answered, Deleah."
+
+"We will answer it to-night. I will help you to write the letter," Deleah
+promised.
+
+They wrote it between them, after Bessie had gone to bed, whither she
+quickly repaired upon their return. The composition was mostly Deleah's,
+and when finished it ran--
+
+  "I did not feel equal to an interview with you, and I am sure you will
+  excuse my having failed to keep the appointment. On thinking the matter
+  over I have decided that the arrangement you proposed to me the other day
+  is a quite unsuitable one, and I therefore write to decline. Having had
+  time for reflection, I have no doubt that you agree in the wisdom of this
+  decision."
+
+"That is all, mama."
+
+"My dear, no! It is so very cold."
+
+"Well, we feel cold--you and I."
+
+"But we must not forget what he did for us. We must always be grateful."
+
+"I know. Mama, I am so tired of being grateful." Mrs. Day sighed; she was
+tired of it too, truth to tell. "He is always throwing what he has done in
+our faces, rubbing it into our skins. It is our gratitude which has made
+him so detestable."
+
+"It was kind of him to give that fifty pounds, and--"
+
+"We will pay him back. We will pay him back to the last farthing, mama.
+Sir Francis Forcus is _my_ friend; he said he would be; I will go to him,
+and ask his advice. Only I hate--I hate to bother him."
+
+"Then, let us try to muddle on alone."
+
+"No. I am sure he would wish me." She waited, head on hand as she sat at
+the table, looking down at, but not seeing the letter she had written for
+her mother to copy. "He is such a sad man, mama," she said presently. "He
+still grieves, and grieves, and grieves, for his wife."
+
+"But he was kind to you, Deleah?"
+
+"Yes. When he remembered. When he knew I was there. He loved her so much.
+Miss Forcus has been telling me how he loved her. She was so beautiful, so
+grand in manner and appearance, with such a fine character, so great and
+good. There is a lovely monument to her in Cashelthrope churchyard. I went
+to look at it this morning, after Miss Forcus had been speaking of her. A
+white marble angel with a _heavenly_ face stands above the grave looking
+upwards, a lily in her hand. Do you know what I felt, mama. I felt I would
+die if I could give her back to him."
+
+"Deleah!"
+
+"I would," Deleah said, quite pale, and with a lip that trembled; "I would
+die gladly if that could bring her back to him, and make him happy again."
+
+Mrs. Day looked at her daughter with a rather startled attention, and
+Deleah, glancing up, and catching her mother's eye, smiled brightly.
+"Come, now let us send off this letter," she said.
+
+When it was ready she ran down with it, herself, to the red pillar-box,
+opposite the shop-door. "That matter is done with," she said as the letter
+disappeared within the box, and she turned to re-enter. The light from the
+street lamp fell on her mother's name, black letters on a white ground,
+above the shop door. "Lydia Day, licensed to sell tobacco and snuff." "And
+all that is nearly done with," she added, "and whatever happens I am not
+sorry."
+
+She felt curiously strong and capable; competent to work her way, afraid
+of no difficulties. "It is more than time I should grow up, and at last, I
+have done so," she said to herself. She went through the badly-lit little
+passage, and up the steep narrow stairs, with shoulders braced and head
+up. It was the having made, that day, a decision every worldly-wise person
+would have condemned, but that she felt in every fibre of her being to be
+a right one, which had given her that feeling of confidence in herself she
+had hitherto lacked. She had chosen between comfort, luxury, the approval
+and adulation of the world, with Reggie Forcus, and the hard up-hill fight
+for bare existence, with liberty and her own self-respect; and choosing,
+as she knew, well, she had felt herself to have grown in mental and
+spiritual stature.
+
+"What has happened to me?" she asked of herself. "I feel like going out to
+fight battles, to-night."
+
+"Mama," she said, going back into the sitting-room where her mother
+awaited her, "behold I am not a child any longer. I am grown up."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI
+
+Bessie's Hour
+
+
+For the best part of the week, Mrs. Day, attending in the vague and
+preoccupied manner which had been hers since Franky's death to her few
+customers, marvelled greatly and with supreme uneasiness of mind about Mr.
+Boult. He took no notice of her letter, he did not come to the house. "He
+is too much offended," she said to herself, wondering what form the
+vengeance she anticipated would take.
+
+At length, unable to keep silence any longer on the subject, she
+questioned Bessie.
+
+"I hope Mr. Boult was not very much annoyed at my leaving him on Thursday,
+Bessie?"
+
+"He didn't say he was," said Bessie, pertly.
+
+"But was he? You could judge from his manner, surely?"
+
+"If you ask me, then, I don't think he cared a ha'penny."
+
+"I wrote to him, you know, Bessie."
+
+"That finished it, I suppose?"
+
+"Well, I must say I expected an answer."
+
+"Mr. Boult has been in London lately. Perhaps it slipped his memory."
+
+"London? That explains it. But how do you know, my dear?"
+
+"I happen to know," Bessie said, and escaped from further questioning.
+
+On the morning of the day when Deleah and her mother were to look over the
+house which Deleah had chosen for the scene of their new start in life,
+the girl went down into the shop to help her mother take stock of her
+stores of teas and sugars and soaps. The enterprising Coman, having done
+his best to ruin the widow's trade, had intimated his willingness to take
+the business over as it stood, and at once; leaving the family at liberty
+to continue in the house until Christmas.
+
+Having her younger daughter with her behind the counter, made her morning
+in the shop a different thing to Mrs. Day. She lost the weary air of
+hopelessness she had worn since Franky's death, talked cheerfully to her
+customers, was brisk and alert over the business she and Deleah had to do.
+
+"It is surprising that Mr. Boult, who has always insisted on having a
+finger in everything, should leave all this to us," she once said. "Our
+letter must have mortally offended him, Deleah."
+
+"Never mind, mama; we will manage without him," Deleah promised. She felt
+such happy confidence in herself. "We will work," she said. "There never
+were two people who worked as you and I will work."
+
+"And I am sure, in her way, Bessie will help," Mrs. Day loyally added; but
+Deleah was not quick to admit Bessie to her scheme.
+
+"Twenty-five lemons," said Mrs. Day, having counted the stock of that
+commodity. "Two of them going bad. Say twenty-three, dear."
+
+"Twenty-three lemons," repeated Deleah, entering that number in the
+stocktaking book.
+
+"Three whole, and one half tin of ginger-nuts, at eight-pence the pound."
+
+"Three and a half tins--Oh, wait a minute, mama." She held her pen
+suspended to look through the shop-window. She looked carelessly at first,
+and then with intentness. A closed carriage was passing down the narrow
+street, the wheel grating against the pavement had caused her to look up.
+"There is some one, all in white, in that carriage," she said.
+
+"All in white? Have you got the ginger-nuts down, dear? Three and a half
+tins--"
+
+"It was some one so like Bessie. I believe it _was_ Bessie, mama."
+
+"Bessie isn't likely to be sitting in a carriage, all in white. Say
+'right' when you've got the items down, Deleah. Window sponges at
+sixpence. Put down nineteen sponges at sixpence, Deleah."
+
+"Wait a minute. I'd just like to run up to see what Bessie is doing. I
+only caught a glimpse, but--I'll be back in one minute, mama."
+
+Within that time she was back, a scared look on her face: "Bessie is not
+in the house, mama." Mrs. Day looked up in mild surprise. "And Emily is
+gone too."
+
+"Emily? Gone?"
+
+"The street door is locked, the key taken, and they are both gone."
+
+"Emily has no right to go off like that in the middle of the morning.
+Bessie should not allow it. I must speak to them both when they come home.
+We got as far as the sponges--"
+
+"Mama, it _was_ Bessie in white in that carriage--her face was turned
+away, but I felt nearly sure. Some one was with her on the side farther
+away; that was Emily." Deleah looked at her mother, as if questioning in
+her own mind how much of the truth she could bear, before she went on.
+"Don't be upset, mama. I was going to tell you something. I feel sure
+Bessie is gone to be married to-day; and Emily has gone with her."
+
+"Deleah!"
+
+"Sit down for a minute. They have been so mysterious, all the
+week--haven't you noticed?--and so busy; no one knew about what--"
+
+"Married! Married! How can she be married? There is no one for her to be
+married to."
+
+"Do sit down. There is nothing to look so white about. Haven't you
+guessed? I have guessed all along. It is Mr. Boult."
+
+"Boult! Mr. George Boult?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Mr. George Boult!"
+
+"Yes. Mr. George Boult. I keep telling you, mama. That day we wrote the
+letter, I ran upstairs unexpectedly, and they were sitting on the sofa,
+and that old man had got his arm round Bessie's waist."
+
+"George Boult's arm? Bessie? _Our_ Bessie?"
+
+"Yes. Now, don't faint, or begin to cry. I am certain they have gone to be
+married."
+
+"Bessie never would! She never would! It is _awful_ of her! It can't be!
+It can't be!"
+
+"It _is_. I am sure of it as if I were in the church, seeing it done. Oh,
+mama, _don't_ give way. _Don't!_ I have told you, so that when they come
+back, here as they will--they will! in half an hour, you may be quite
+brave, and not give way before them."
+
+Deleah called Mr. Pretty from the cellar to the shop, and taking her
+mother's arm led her to the sitting-room. "Now if you feel you _must_
+collapse or cry, mama," she adjured her parent with a touch of the scorn
+the younger generation felt for elders accustomed, in that day, to meet
+all crises with tears and faints, or at the least wild gesticulation--"if
+you _must_, do it now, and here; so that when they come you can be calm
+and dignified."
+
+"_Our_ Bessie!" Mrs. Day kept saying, wringing her hands and looking up
+with appealing eyes swimming in tears. "Our Bessie! Our pretty, attractive
+Bessie! And that man! That _old_ man!"
+
+"It won't do to go on like that when they come, mama," Deleah warned her.
+"You can't tell him he is old. You must not even tell Bessie so, now.
+Bessie isn't like you and me, remember, who would have been wretched and
+ashamed. She thinks of his money and his carriage. She does not think she
+has played an underhand game. She thinks she has been cleverer than the
+rest of us. She is pleased with herself, and proud, and Emily is proud of
+her. Well, if you must cry--cry, mama. Cry all you can now, so, on no
+account, you shed one tear before _them_."
+
+By the time Bessie appeared--she came without her bridegroom, who had
+thought a meeting with the mother of his bride would be, under the
+circumstances, awkward--Deleah's exhortations had had their effect.
+
+Bessie--partial to "scenes" and making them, of her own, on any
+occasion--expecting one now was disappointed. She came in, in her white
+dress and bonnet, her fair plump face flushed, her eyes twinkling in
+anticipation of the sensation she was about to create, and found mother
+and sister gravely awaiting her.
+
+"Here I am! I am married, mama," she announced.
+
+Instead of the outburst she had expected: "Yes, my dear, so I have been
+hearing," Mrs. Day said. "I don't know why you need have kept it secret
+from me, but now it is done, all I can do is to wish you every possible
+happiness, Bessie."
+
+It was disappointing: very flat and tame. Mrs. Day got up and kissed her
+daughter, and Deleah followed suit.
+
+"It would have been nicer for you to have mama and me with you at your
+wedding, I should have thought," Deleah said. "Isn't Mr. Boult coming to
+speak to us?"
+
+"No," said a slightly crestfallen Bessie. "He thought there would be a
+fuss."
+
+"It is too late to make a fuss, Bessie."
+
+"Well, we thought so; and that there was no good in his being bothered; so
+he's gone straight on to the station to wait for me. We go up to town by
+the 1.20. I join him in half an hour. The carriage will wait."
+
+"That's all right, dear. You'd better have something to eat before you
+go."
+
+Emily was summoned to bring refreshments. The tray was already, having
+been prepared before they left for church, and on it was a small
+wedding-cake bought with Emily's savings, and a bottle of port purchased
+from the same meagre fund.
+
+The white sugared cake was to be a surprise to Bessie:
+
+"A little present from me," Emily said as she set it on the table.
+
+"Oh, you dear old thing! You must stop to eat some. Cut the cake, Deleah."
+
+Deleah would not usurp the bride's privilege, and Bessie, attempting the
+operation without removing her glove, split it down the palm! "There, I've
+spoilt my glove!" she cried, and turned upon her sister. "That's your
+fault, Deleah. You should have cut the cake when I asked you." Then she
+began to cry. "I get married," she sobbed; "mama and Deda care no more
+than if I had gone out for a walk. No one cares. They sit there and stare,
+and won't say anything; no one cares."
+
+"Oh, Bessie, my poor girl, God knows I care!" the mother said. "But what
+can I say? It is done; what can I say?"
+
+"Say s-s-omething! Don't sit there!" Bessie sobbed. "Deda might sew up my
+glove, instead of s-s-sitting there."
+
+Deleah had already found needle and cotton. "Take your glove off, Bessie."
+
+Bessie tried to tear it from her hand. Her tears fell on the white kid.
+"It is tight. I shall never get it on again. Oh, what shall I do, mama? I
+have to be there in half an hour. What's the time now? No. I can't eat the
+cake, Emily. You can eat it, and Deleah, when I'm g-g-gone. Little Franky
+would have liked some. Poor little Franky. I--I always loved Franky, mama.
+I'm--I'm crying now because of Franky."
+
+They all cried then, and hushed and petted her, and made her drink a glass
+of poor Emily's wine, which still further flushed her cheeks, and made her
+laugh across her tears. Then they had to be stern with her, and scold her,
+lest she should be in hysterics. And through it all she kept looking at
+the clock on the mantelpiece. "Only five minutes more, mama! Deda, Emily,
+only five minutes more!"
+
+"Dear, you're going to see the London sights," Emily comforted her, the
+tears raining down her own leather-coloured cheeks. "And your own
+kerridge, and all! And your man in livery a-waiting at the door! And your
+gentleman that fond of you, he could eat you a'most!"
+
+But, in spite of these considerations, Bessie spent the last five minutes
+in the room she had so grumbled at having to live in on the sofa, her head
+buried in the pillow, her feet kicking, in the old ungoverned fashion,
+upon the horsehair cover.
+
+Deleah fetched her own hat and the cloak which was to cover Bessie's white
+muslin for travelling, and eau-de-cologne wherewith to dab the
+tear-stained cheeks. "I'm coming with you, Bessie, to the station," she
+promised. "Emily must come too."
+
+"I'm a-comin'," Emily, still in her bonnet and shawl, assured her. "Don't
+you never think I'm a-goin' to leave you, my dear, till I'm forced to it.
+And I may as well tell you, ma'am," she went on, turning to Mrs. Day,
+"that when my young lady and her husban' returns from their honeymooning,
+I'm a-goin' to live along of 'em. Sorry I am to part from you and Miss
+Deleah, but Bessie have always come first with me, and always will do."
+
+Then the five minutes were up: "Good-bye, mama dear."
+
+"Good-bye, my own precious Bessie."
+
+"I've got three new frocks, besides this; and I'm to have some more
+afterwards. The luggage was such a trouble to pack, without you and Deleah
+knowing! I hope I've got everything."
+
+"You'll write, Bessie?"
+
+"And you'll come and stay with me, mama? There'll be the carriage to drive
+out in. It will make a nice change."
+
+"It will indeed, dear."
+
+"Is my bonnet straight? I had the forget-me-not wreath put in because you
+always said blue was my colour."
+
+"Go now, darling. There is not another minute."
+
+"Oh, Mama! Mama! Mama!"
+
+"Go instantly, Bessie. Deleah, take her downstairs--"
+
+The bridegroom, dressed for the character in blue frock-coat, lavender
+trousers, with gloves and tie to match, and a flower in his buttonhole,
+was in waiting to help his bride to alight. He, who had never struck her
+as looking so before, suddenly appeared quite old to Deleah, in spite of
+his careful array, and the whiskers which had been oiled and curled.
+Bessie with the forget-me-nots surrounding her plump, fair-skinned face,
+looked almost a child in comparison.
+
+"Late!" he said, smiling upon the ladies. "But better late than never, eh,
+Sister Deleah?"
+
+"That depends on how you look at these things," said Deleah, for the first
+time in her life feeling the desire to be unpleasant.
+
+"We sprang a surprise on you, eh?"
+
+"We were not at all surprised, Mr. Boult."
+
+"It will have to be 'George' now, won't it? We can't have Sister Deleah
+'Mr. Boult-ing' me. Eh, Bess?"
+
+"You may call him 'George,' Deda," said a magnanimous Bessie.
+
+"Thank you," said Deleah, in the tone of one who is not at all grateful.
+She followed the happy pair to the platform. Both were too smartly dressed
+for ordinary travellers, and people, guessing them to be bride and
+bridegroom, looked at them with interest.
+
+"How they all stare! I hope they find us worth looking at."
+
+"I always have thought you were, my dear," Mr. Boult said gallantly.
+
+Quite a little crowd collected to see Bessie handed into the first-class
+carriage, on which the word 'engaged' had been pasted: "We shall be alone.
+I have seen to that," the bridegroom said, proud of his man-of-the-world
+ways.
+
+Deleah climbed into the carriage with her sister. "You wish you were
+coming with us?" Mr. Boult inquired facetiously.
+
+"Not at all!"
+
+"Your turn will come. How about Mr. Gibbon? Now that Bessie is out of the
+way you can have your chance."
+
+"Good-bye, Bessie. I do so hope you may be happy."
+
+"You're a lucky young lady, tha's what you are!" Emily said, putting her
+head into the carriage. "You couldn't marry all of 'em what was in love
+with you, Bessie; but you've made a wise ch'ice--"
+
+The guard cut her eloquence short by slamming the door. Mr. Boult,
+oblivious of the fact that Bessie might also have liked to show herself,
+filled up the window. Emily, determined that no item of the ritual proper
+to such ceremonies should be omitted, promptly threw a handful of rice in
+his face. It stung, half blinded him, but had the effect of driving him
+from his position, so that Bessie for one minute could appear. The poor
+face in the white tulle and forget-me-nots looked anxious, frightened,
+appealing; and as the train, rushing on, carried it from them the women
+left on the platform looked at each other through eyes blinded with tears.
+
+"Poor Bessie! She is such a child always," Deleah said.
+
+"She is that, Miss Deleah. I tell you how 'tis with me and Bessie--spite
+of her having such a way with her with the gentlemen, and such a will of
+her own--I have always felt I haven't never lost the little girl I had to
+wait on when first I come to service with your ma."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII
+
+The Man With The Mad Eyes
+
+
+The other women being employed in the daytime, the sitting-room had been
+more especially Bessie's domain. How strange and chilling was the thought
+it would be empty of Bessie for evermore. Her untidy work-basket peeped
+out from under the sofa where she always pushed it on the appearance of a
+visitor; the penny weekly paper in which she read of the fashions, and the
+romantic love-matches of which she had dreamed while making an absolutely
+sordid marriage herself, was tucked behind the cushion of her chair.
+Deleah stood within the doorway for a minute, without entering, feeling
+strangely bereaved and forlorn. Not much sympathy had been between the
+pair, but the ties of blood are stronger than is realised till "marriage
+or death or division" snaps the cord.
+
+With a lagging step Deleah went forward into the so pathetically empty
+room. On the table some flowers were lying. Two deep purple blooms of
+clematis. The creeper so carefully trained to climb beside a certain hall
+door came into her mind. She had noticed on an occasion she would fain
+have forgotten, without knowing she had done so, that it bore two buds.
+Deleah looked at the blossoms with an odd feeling of repulsion. She walked
+round the table to the side that was farthest from them. Then lifting her
+eyes, she saw that Charles Gibbon was standing by the opposite wall. The
+open door had screened him from her on entering.
+
+"Mr. Gibbon!" she said, and her voice faltered with dismay; only
+apprehension was in her eyes.
+
+He looked at her without speaking. It was curiously disturbing to see him
+standing there, his back to the wall, saying nothing; the broad, short
+figure, at one time so familiar in that room, now so alien and strange,
+the commonplace, plain-featured face, tragic with its new grey hue, the
+eyes--Deleah remembered with a shudder some words recently spoken about
+the eyes! They were fixed upon her face.
+
+"Won't you come and sit down, Mr. Gibbon?"
+
+He advanced a few steps, and stood at the table opposite her.
+
+She looked at the flowers. "You brought these?"
+
+"For you," he said, speaking thickly. "They are the only two the clematis
+had. If it had ten thousand they would have been for you."
+
+Deleah kept her eyes upon the flowers. She felt that she could not touch
+them. "You are very kind," she said.
+
+"You would say as much as that to any stranger in the street who had
+kicked a stone out of your path, and I--I--." He was stammering curiously
+in his thickened voice. It seemed that the words he wanted to speak would
+not come. "And I--after all that I suffer--only kind?" he got out at last.
+
+With something of the expression of a trapped creature in her eyes, Deleah
+looked past him to the door. He turned instantly, and shut it, and came
+back to his place opposite her at the table.
+
+"Your sister is married to Mr. Boult, to-day," he said. "At one time you
+could not marry me because of your sister. That impediment's gone. Another
+time, you had some other excuse. Again another. Come, what excuse have you
+to-day?" He leant across the table to bring his face closer to hers. "You
+don't intend to marry me, do you?"
+
+She gazed at him with fear in her eyes, but did not speak. "You let me
+live beside you, set my heart on you, till there was nothing else on earth
+or heaven for me but you. You let me slave to serve a man I hated as a
+means of getting you. You let me get ready my house--every brick in it,
+every pound of paint laid on it, for you. You--"
+
+"Mr. Gibbon, do wait! I think you are saying too much. I never deceived
+you. I never said I would marry you. I tried to make you understand."
+
+"Listen! Have you always hated me? When you took my flowers and fruit--all
+the presents I lavished on you--tell me, did you hate me then?"
+
+"Certainly I did not. I thought you very kind and generous."
+
+"Do you hate me now?" When she told him 'no' he stretched out a shaking
+hand to her across the table. "Then--?"
+
+Deleah stepped back from the hand and shook her head.
+
+"Why?"
+
+No answer.
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Oh, where would be the use of my telling you!"
+
+"But you shall tell me."
+
+"No."
+
+"Then I will tell you. You think you are going to marry some one else."
+
+Deleah lifted her head and looked at him with proud offence. "You are not
+to say that, Mr. Gibbon. It is not true."
+
+"You think so," he persisted. "But you are not. Do you know why? Because I
+will stop you. I know! know! know!" He mercilessly slapped one of his
+shaking hands upon the table. "And I will stop you."
+
+He turned away, walked to the door, stood staring at it for a moment, his
+back to her, then suddenly faced her again: "Sir Francis Forcus," he said.
+He walked to the table his eyes fixed on hers. "Sir Francis Forcus," he
+repeated. And once again, leaning across the table to bring his face close
+to hers, "Sir Francis Forcus."
+
+Then he laughed in the girl's frightened face, and went out of the room.
+
+Emily put an inquiring head in at the door.
+
+"He haven't gone? Mr. Gibbon haven't gone, Miss Deleah? Well, now, when
+the mistress told me he was up along of you, I hoped 'twas another weddin'
+comin' off. You shouldn't have let him go so quick, my dear."
+
+Deleah had a dazed look about the eyes. "He was horrible! I believe he is
+mad," she said.
+
+Emily clapped her hands together. "Bessie's marriage have done that! I
+always told Bessie she'd send some of 'em to the lunatic asylum, or their
+graves."
+
+"I believe he is mad. Which way did he go, Emily?" She ran down into the
+shop where Mrs. Day, if daughters were married or daughters were
+threatened, must never forget that she was licensed to sell tobacco and
+snuff, was still toiling away at her stocktaking. "Mama, did you see Mr.
+Gibbon go away?"
+
+"No. Is he gone, my dear?"
+
+Deleah dashed to the door, still open, although the windows were
+shuttered, and looked up and down the street.
+
+"Do you want to call him back?" her mother asked of her, in mild surprise.
+
+"I believe he is mad." Deleah was breathless, shaking with excitement or
+fear. "He was in the sitting-room--hiding behind the door--waiting for
+me."
+
+"Mr. Gibbon! My dear, he couldn't have been. Why should he do that?"
+
+"He was doing it. How did he get there?"
+
+"He came in just as usual--there is really nothing the matter with him,
+Deleah--to ask me if I knew where his pistol was that he and Franky used
+to shoot at bottles with when he first came, out of his bedroom window.
+You remember? I told him it was in his bedroom still, for all I knew; I
+told him to run up and get it?"
+
+"Did he get it? Had he a pistol in his pocket while he talked to me?"
+
+Emily had followed Deleah into the shop. "He'd no pistol," she put in
+confidently. "He'd never find it. I'd never liked the nasty dang'rous
+thing, with Franky into every mischief, and I hid it up on the top of the
+wardrobe. He'd never find it!"
+
+"Run and see," Mrs. Day said. She began to be impressed by the look of
+fear on Deleah's face; the girl was trembling violently, now, her teeth
+chattering as if with extreme cold.
+
+In less than a minute Emily was back. "He've got it," they heard her
+calling as she came. "The pistol's gone. He've got it. Sure as we're
+living, he's goin' to shoot hisself, on account of Bessie!"
+
+"Nonsense!" Mrs. Day cried sharply. "Deleah, there is really nothing to be
+frightened about, my dear. The pistol was Mr. Gibbon's own. He naturally
+wanted it."
+
+Deleah stood in the middle of the shop, lit by the half-open door and the
+jet of gas above Mrs. Day's desk. She was squeezing her hands together,
+her arms strained against her breast as if trying desperately to stop her
+trembling. "Could I get there?" she said to her mother. "Could I get there
+first?" Her body was bent forward as if with the impulse to run, but she
+waited, squeezing herself in her arms, her brow knit, trying to steady her
+thought. "If I can get there first--!" she said.
+
+"Where, dear? Get where? What is it you want to do, Deleah?"
+
+She seemed not to hear: "If I can get there first!" she said to herself;
+then, going stumblingly, reached the door, and was gone.
+
+The two women left, stared at each other's blank face in the mingled
+lights of the shop. "She isn't running after Mr. Gibbon, surely!" Mrs. Day
+said, helplessly perplexed.
+
+"There's no good in her a-doing that. Gibbon's heart's set on Bessie,"
+Emily declared.
+
+"Do go after her, and bring her back, Emily."
+
+The great yard of the Hope Brewery was nearly empty. A young clerk, his
+pen stuck in the bushy hair above his ears, his hands in his trousers
+pockets, was whistling as he walked across it, stepping lightly from the
+shadows cast by the huge buildings to the sunshine of the open spaces. An
+enormous drayman was backing a pair of powerful horses, in order to bring
+his wagon under that portion of the wall over which a barrel hung
+suspended; two other men also of gigantic proportions, with red-shining
+faces and aprons tied over their ample bodies, stood to watch the
+manoeuvres. A groom in charge of a saddle-horse by the entrance to the
+main building patted his horse's neck as he also looked on.
+
+Deleah, flinging herself from the door of the four-wheeler which had
+brought her, dashed through the yard, consciously seeing none of these
+things, which yet photographed themselves on her brain and remained
+indelibly printed there till her dying day. She knew her way to the
+private room of Sir Francis, and made towards it, without pausing to heed
+the one or two men who endeavoured to stop and question her. In the
+ante-room to the inner sanctum, a confidential clerk who always sat there
+flew up from his desk.
+
+"Excuse me, miss. A moment, please. You can't go in there. Sir Francis is
+particularly engaged."
+
+When she took no notice, he tried to reach the door before her; but
+Deleah, too quick for him, dashing forward, opened, and shut it in his
+face.
+
+Sir Francis was standing in his favourite position with his back to the
+mantelpiece, in riding dress, his gloves and whip in his hand. Deleah,
+bolting into the room, and falling back upon the door, the more
+effectually to close it upon the confidential clerk, had an instant's
+vision of him in his calm unassailableness, in that unruffled perfection
+of appearance, which, while it had always awakened her girlish admiration,
+had ever seemed to remove him to an immeasurable distance. The sight of
+him, even in what was to her a supreme moment, had its habitual effect of
+pouring cold waters of discouragement upon her mood, of making her
+doubtful of herself and any claim she could possibly make upon his
+attention. She had been presumptuous in pushing herself into his presence.
+Of course he was safe. Of course nothing could hurt him. The poor
+Honourable Charles, the erstwhile draper's assistant, with his common,
+thick-set figure, his hoarse voice, his unrefined accent--it was an
+offence even to think of him in the same breath with this elegant
+gentleman. How could this one on his high eminence of aloofness and
+security be endangered by such an one as that?
+
+To see and feel all this was the work of a moment. The moment in which she
+slammed the door on the protesting clerk, the moment in which also she
+felt the shock of awaking from her frenzied zeal that would have beaten
+down all obstacles to save this man's life, to the perception that her
+zeal would in his eyes seem an absurdity; that her presence there was
+superfluous if not impertinent; that she had made a fool of herself for
+nothing.
+
+Sir Francis suffered this inexplicable noisy invasion of his privacy with
+a look of annoyance and surprise breaking up the composure of his face.
+Then, seeing who it was who had thus burst upon him, who leant upon the
+door she had slammed, panting as if pursued, turning frightened, appealing
+eyes to him, the expression of his face changed, the whole man seemed to
+change. With a look such as Deleah had never dreamed it possible he could
+wear he went forward to her; in a tone she had not known his voice to
+take, he spoke her name.
+
+"Deleah!" he said.
+
+She looked at him; but in rapturous wonder at the light in his eyes,
+listening spellbound to the delight of her name so spoken, forgetting who
+she was, where she was, in the whirl of bliss where her senses momentarily
+swam. Then he held out his hands and took hers, and held them locked in
+his against his breast.
+
+"My dear child, I was coming to you," he said. "You have come to me
+instead, my little Deleah!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII
+
+The Moment Of Triumph
+
+
+"While you were in my house I reckoned up the years, many times." He
+smiled a little sadly, and shook his head, looking down at her. "They
+never grew any less, Deleah. There are twenty-five between you and me. It
+is too much! Too much!"
+
+"No!" breathed Deleah, with upturned, adoring eyes.
+
+"And, dear, they are not the only things between us--dividing me from you.
+A love I felt--a great love I thought never to feel again--in the past--"
+He looked away from her, over her head into the years that were gone. Then
+his eyes came back to the eyes that were lifted to him, and he grasped her
+hands tighter against his breast.
+
+"There was Reggie, too," he said. "Poor Reggie! But I made what reparation
+I could. I gave him his chance. Did he ever have a chance, Deleah?"
+
+She shook her head. "Never!"
+
+"What will he say to us?"
+
+There came a rap upon the door, and Sir Francis dropped the hands he held,
+and started back. "I am particularly engaged, Rogers," he said.
+
+The door was discreetly opened to admit not Rogers, but Rogers's voice: "I
+beg your pardon, sir, but there is a matter of some importance; if you
+could come for a few minutes."
+
+"I have told you I am engaged," the voice of authority protested. With a
+kind of discreet reluctance the door closed again, and Sir Francis, with
+the impatience of a lover whose ardour has received a momentary check,
+took the girl into his arms. With a hand pushed against his chest she held
+herself away from him.
+
+"Why?" he asked her. "You are not afraid of me, Deleah?"
+
+"Yes. Very much afraid."
+
+"Tell me why, my dearest child?"
+
+"Oh, you know," said Deleah, turning away her head.
+
+"No! It is I who should be afraid of you; you, with your youth and beauty,
+and sweet and gentle goodness. I confess it--all those months you lived in
+my house, I was afraid."
+
+"You said there were things between us--dividing us. You did not say what
+really is there. What papa did--"
+
+As she faltered over the words there came a louder knocking upon the door,
+which opened almost at the same minute. Mr. Rogers's deprecating face
+appeared there, and behind it the face of a policeman.
+
+"A minute, sir. I won't detain you a minute," the clerk said; and Sir
+Francis walked to the door with an impatient step and closed it behind
+him.
+
+Deleah, left to herself--was it for an hour? was it for a minute?--looked
+with eyes dazed with happiness upon the hands that had been crushed in
+his.
+
+"I used to think that to be loved by him would be heaven," she said. "And
+now--now I feel nothing. I am numb."
+
+He came back very grave, his face unusually pale. "Your cab is waiting. I
+will take you home, my dear child," he said.
+
+She crossed the big yard again at his side. The drayman was still at his
+horses' heads, the groom was taking the riding-horse round to the stables.
+On the opposite side of the yard beneath one of the arches of a heavy
+colonnade, a couple of policemen stood. One of them was making notes in a
+book. A group of workpeople stood near by; and Deleah remembered
+afterwards that there was about them and the rest an air of suspending
+something they were saying or doing while their chief and the girl at his
+side walked to the great entrance gates.
+
+"A cab was waiting, by good luck," Sir Francis said as he put her in it,
+and Deleah awoke, it seemed to her, for the first time since he had called
+her name as she leant against his door, to full consciousness.
+
+"It was mine," she said. "I took it to get to you quickly--before you
+started for home. I was afraid you might be hurt. A man--the man who used
+to lodge with us--came to me this afternoon, and he threatened you. I was
+so foolish--I believed he meant it. I was afraid. I thought, as you rode
+past his house to Cashelthorpe, he would wait there, behind the hedge, and
+shoot you. I seemed to see him doing it. So foolish of me! Of course he
+was simply frightening me; he would not dare--" She lifted the adoring
+eyes to his face as he sat beside her. Who would dare indeed to harm that
+Excellence! "I was afraid he had gone mad," she said, excusing the folly
+of her thought.
+
+"Poor fellow, I think he had," Sir Francis said. He held her face turned
+to him, its pure oval in his hand. "Was it love of you that made him mad,
+Deleah?"
+
+She was too shy of him yet, and too modest to answer the question by word
+of mouth; but he knew the answer.
+
+"He won't trouble you any more, Deleah," he said very gently. "He won't
+hurt me. He is dead."
+
+She would not believe it. It was impossible. "He can't be! He was with me
+half an hour ago. He was well as I am, and very strong. He can't be dead!"
+
+"He seems to have come to the Brewery-yard--why we shall never know.
+Perhaps with some mad intention towards me. Perhaps--. But it is all
+conjecture. All we know is that he is there now. Dead."
+
+"Was he there before me? Did he see me running through the yard--to you?"
+
+"No one knows. No one noticed him till they found him lying behind one of
+the pillars of the colonnade, shot through the head. I am going back there
+now. They want me."
+
+He lifted her from the cab and stood beside her till Emily opened the
+door: "I will be with you again as soon as I can, my darling child," he
+promised; and got into the cab again and drove away.
+
+Deleah, creeping up the stairs, shut the door of the sitting-room upon
+Emily, voluble of questions but getting no satisfactory answers. Shaken
+with emotion, weak and shivering, she stood looking round the empty room,
+peopling it with its familiar circle. There was Bessie's place, and there
+Franky's especial chair. There, by the little table on one side of the
+fire the boarder had sat every evening, book in hand, but eyes wandering
+ever in Deleah's direction. She spoke, or laughed, or sighed, and the
+change in his face showed that he listened. Bessie had to call his name
+sharply twice before his attention was gained. Franky would ask some
+question about the mixing of his paints. The man would answer with a kind
+of anxious politeness, getting up to look over the child's shoulder.
+Passing Deleah, he would stoop for the book he had purposely dropped by
+her chair. "I love you!" she would hear his fierce low whisper in her ear.
+
+She had been too depreciative of herself, too innocent of the workings of
+passion, to have felt anything but irritation and annoyance at the signs
+in him of a suffering she could not believe in or understand. Was it
+possible, after all, that she, Deleah, whose heart was so tender, whose
+ways so pitiful, who saved the drowning flies and would not willingly have
+afflicted the meanest of God's creatures, by means of a pale and pretty
+face only, had wrought that havoc?
+
+With a sob in her throat she came forward into the room. Upon the table
+were lying the two purple clematis flowers, backed by a spray of their own
+foliage and tied with the tendrils of the plant. Deleah recalled the
+repulsion with which she had seen them lying there. She put out her hand
+towards them, but drew it back. She could not touch them even now.
+
+To each of us, however mean our lives and obscure our history, living or
+dead, the moment of triumph comes. To Charles Gibbon his came, when
+Deleah, forgetful of her new-found bliss, and the Heaven of Happiness
+opening before her, laid her head upon the table beside the poor blooms of
+the clematis flower, and as if her heart were broken, cried for the fate
+of the Honourable Charles.
+
+
+
+
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