MARY OLIVIER:

A LIFE

BY

MAY SINCLAIR

1919

CONTENTS

BOOK ONE INFANCY (1865-1869)

BOOK TWO CHILDHOOD (1869-1875)

BOOK THREE ADOLESCENCE (1876-1879)

BOOK FOUR MATURITY (1879-1900)

BOOK FIVE MIDDLE AGE (1900-1910)

BOOK ONEINFANCY (1865-1869)

I

I. 

The curtain of the big bed hung down beside the cot. 

When old Jenny shook it the wooden rings rattled on the pole and greymen with pointed heads and squat, bulging bodies came out of the foldson to the flat green ground. If you looked at them they turned intosquab faces smeared with green. 

Every night, when Jenny had gone away with the doll and the donkey, you hunched up the blanket and the stiff white counterpane to hide thecurtain and you played with the knob in the green painted iron railingof the cot. It stuck out close to your face, winking and grinning atyou in a friendly way. You poked it till it left off and turned greyand went back into the railing. Then you had to feel for it with yourfinger. It fitted the hollow of your hand, cool and hard, with a bluntnose that pushed agreeably into the palm. 

In the dark you could go tip-finger along the slender, lashingflourishes of the ironwork. By stretching your arm out tight you couldreach the curlykew at the end. The short, steep flourish took you tothe top of the railing and on behind your head. 

Tip-fingering backwards that way you got into the grey lane where theprickly stones were and the hedge of little biting trees. When thedoor in the hedge opened you saw the man in the night-shirt. He hadonly half a face. From his nose and his cheek-bones downwards hisbeard hung straight like a dark cloth. You opened your mouth, butbefore you could scream you were back in the cot; the room was light;the green knob winked and grinned at you from the railing, and behindthe curtain Papa and Mamma were lying in the big bed. 

One night she came back out of the lane as the door in the hedge wasopening. The man stood in the room by the washstand, scratching his longthigh. He was turned slantwise from the nightlight on the washstand sothat it showed his yellowish skin under the lifted shirt. The whitehalf-face hung by itself on the darkness. When he left off scratchingand moved towards the cot she screamed. 

Mamma took her into the big bed. She curled up there under the shelterof the raised hip and shoulder. Mamma's face was dry and warm andsmelt sweet like Jenny's powder-puff. Mamma's mouth moved over her wetcheeks, nipping her tears. 

Her cry changed to a whimper and a soft, ebbing sob. 

Mamma's breast: a smooth, cool, round thing that hung to your handsand slipped from them when they tried to hold it. You could feel thelittle ridges of the stiff nipple as your finger pushed it back intothe breast. 

Her sobs shook in her throat and ceased suddenly. 

II. 

The big white globes hung in a ring above the dinner table. At first, when she came into the room, carried high in Jenny's arms, she couldsee nothing but the hanging, shining globes. Each had a light insideit that made it shine. 

Mamma was sitting at the far end of the table. Her face and neck shonewhite above the pile of oranges on the dark blue dish. She was dippingher fingers in a dark blue glass bowl. 

When Mary saw her she strained towards her, leaning dangerously out ofJenny's arms. Old Jenny said "Tchit-tchit!" and made her arms tightand hard and put her on Papa's knee. 

Papa sat up, broad and tall above the table, all by himself. He wasdressed in black. One long brown beard hung down in front of him andone short beard covered his mouth. You knew he was smiling because hischeeks swelled high up his face so that his eyes were squeezed intonarrow, shining slits. When they came out again you saw scarlet specksand smears in their corners. 

Papa's big white hand was on the table, holding a glass filled withsome red stuff that was both dark and shining and had a queer, sharpsmell. 

"Porty-worty winey-piney, " said Papa. 

The same queer, sharp smell came from between his two beards when hespoke. 

Mark was sitting up beside Mamma a long way off. She could see themlooking at each other. Roddy and Dank were with them. 

They were making flowers out of orange peel and floating them in thefinger bowls. Mamma's fingers were blue and sharp-pointed in the waterbehind the dark blue glass of her bowl. The floating orange-peelflowers were blue. She could see Mamma smiling as she stirred themabout with the tips of her blue fingers. 

Her underlip pouted and shook. She didn't want to sit by herself onPapa's knee. She wanted to sit in Mamma's lap beside Mark. She wantedMark to make orange-peel flowers for her. She wanted Mamma to lookdown at her and smile. 

Papa was spreading butter on biscuit and powdered sugar on the butter. 

"Sugary--Buttery--Bippery, " said Papa. 

She shook her head. "I want to go to Mamma. I want to go to Mark. "

She pushed away the biscuit. "No. No. Mamma give Mary. Mark giveMary. "

"Drinky--winky, " said Papa. 

He put his glass to her shaking mouth. She turned her head away, andhe took it between his thumb and finger and turned it back again. Herneck moved stiffly. Her head felt small and brittle under the weightand pinch of the big hand. The smell and the sour, burning taste ofthe wine made her cry. 

"Don't tease Baby, Emilius, " said Mamma. 

"I never tease anybody. "

He lifted her up. She could feel her body swell and tighten under thebands and drawstrings of her clothes, as she struggled and choked, straining against the immense clamp of his arms. When his wet red lipspushed out between his beards to kiss her she kicked. Her toes drummedagainst something stiff and thin that gave way and sprang out againwith a cracking and popping sound. 

He put her on the floor. She stood there all by herself, crying, tillMark came and took her by the hand. 

"Naughty Baby. Naughty Mary, " said Mamma. "Don't kiss her, Mark. "

"No, Mamma. "

He knelt on the floor beside her and smiled into her face and wiped itwith his pocket-handkerchief. She put out her mouth and kissed him andstopped crying. 

"Jenny must come, " Mamma said, "and take Mary away. "

"No. Mark take Mary. "

"Let the little beast take her, " said Papa. "If he does he shan't comeback again. Do you hear that, sir?"

Mark said, "Yes, Papa. "

They went out of the room hand in hand. He carried her upstairspickaback. As they went she rested her chin on the nape of his neckwhere his brown hair thinned off into shiny, golden down. 

III. 

Old Jenny sat in the rocking-chair by the fireguard in the nursery. She wore a black net cap with purple rosettes above her ears. Youcould look through the black net and see the top of her head laid outin stripes of grey hair and pinky skin. 

She had a grey face, flattened and wide-open like her eyes. She heldit tilted slightly backwards out of your way, and seemed to be alwaysstaring at something just above your head. Jenny's face had tinycreases and crinkles all over it. When you kissed it you could feelthe loose flesh crumpling and sliding softly over the bone. There wasalways about her a faint smell of sour milk. 

No use trying to talk to Jenny. She was too tired to listen. Youclimbed on to her lap and stroked her face, and said "Poor Jenny. DearJenny. Poor Jenny-Wee so tired, " and her face shut up and went tosleep. Her broad flat nose drooped; her eyelids drooped; her long, grey bands of hair drooped; she was like the white donkey that livedin the back lane and slept standing on three legs with his ears lyingdown. 

Mary loved old Jenny next to Mamma and Mark; and she loved the whitedonkey. She wondered why Jenny was always cross when you stroked hergrey face and called her "Donkey-Jenny. " It was not as if she mindedbeing stroked; because when Mark or Dank did it her face woke upsuddenly and smoothed out its creases. And when Roddy climbed up withhis long legs into her lap she hugged him tight and rocked him, singing Mamma's song, and called him her baby. 

He wasn't. _She_ was the baby; and while you were the baby you couldsit in people's laps. But old Jenny didn't want her to be the baby. 

The nursery had shiny, slippery yellow walls and a brown floor, and ablack hearthrug with a centre of brown and yellow flowers. The greyishchintz curtains were spotted with small brown leaves and crimsonberries. There were dark-brown cupboards and chests of drawers, andchairs that were brown frames for the yellow network of the cane. Softbits of you squeezed through the holes and came out on the other side. That hurt and made a red pattern on you where you sat down. 

The tall green fireguard was a cage. When Jenny poked the fire youpeeped through and saw it fluttering inside. If you sat still youcould sometimes hear it say "teck-teck, " and sometimes the fire wouldfly out suddenly with a soft hiss. 

High above your head you could just see the gleaming edge of the brassrail. 

"Jenny--where's yesterday and where's to-morrow?"

IV. 

When you had run a thousand hundred times round the table you came tothe blue house. It stood behind Jenny's rocking-chair, where Jennycouldn't see it, in a blue garden. The walls and ceilings were blue;the doors and staircases were blue; everything in all the rooms wasblue. 

Mary ran round and round. She loved the padding of her feet on thefloor and the sound of her sing-song:

"The pussies are blue, the beds are blue, the matches are blue and themousetraps and all the litty mouses!"

Mamma was always there dressed in a blue gown; and Jenny was there, all in blue, with a blue cap; and Mark and Dank and Roddy were there, all in blue. But Papa was not allowed in the blue house. 

Mamma came in and looked at her as she ran. She stood in the doorwaywith her finger on her mouth, and she was smiling. Her brown hair wasparted in two sleek bands, looped and puffed out softly round herears, and plaited in one plait that stood up on its edge above herforehead. She wore a wide brown silk gown with falling sleeves. 

"Pretty Mamma, " said Mary. "In a blue dress. "

V. 

Every morning Mark and Dank and Roddy knocked at Mamma's door, and ifPapa was there he called out, "Go away, you little beasts!" If he wasnot there she said, "Come in, darlings!" and they climbed up the bigbed into Papa's place and said "Good morning, Mamma!"

When Papa was away the lifted curtain spread like a tent over Mary'scot, shutting her in with Mamma. When he was there the drawn curtainhung straight down from the head of the bed. 

II

I. 

White patterns on the window, sharp spikes, feathers, sprigs withfurled edges, stuck flat on to the glass; white webs, crinkled likethe skin of boiled milk, stretched across the corner of the pane;crisp, sticky stuff that bit your fingers. 

Out of doors, black twigs thickened with a white fur; white powdersprinkled over the garden walk. The white, ruffled grass stood outstiffly and gave under your feet with a pleasant crunching. The airsmelt good; you opened your mouth and drank it in gulps. It went downlike cold, tingling water. 

Frost. 

You saw the sun for the first time, a red ball that hung by itself onthe yellowish white sky. Mamma said, "Yes, of course it would fall ifGod wasn't there to hold it up in his hands. "

Supposing God dropped the sun--

II. 

The yellowish white sky had come close up to the house, a dirtyblanket let down outside the window. The tree made a black pattern onit. Clear glass beads hung in a row from the black branch, each blacktwig was tipped with a glass bead. When Jenny opened the window therewas a queer cold smell like the smell of the black water in the butt. 

Thin white powder fluttered out of the blanket and fell. A thickpowder. A white fluff that piled itself in a ridge on the window-silland curved softly in the corner of the sash. It was cold, and meltedon your tongue with a taste of window-pane. 

In the garden Mark and Dank and Roddy were making the snow man. 

Mamma stood at the nursery window with her back to the room. Shecalled to Mary to come and look at the snow man. 

Mary was tired of the snow man. She was making a tower with Roddy'sbricks while Roddy wasn't there. She had to build it quick before hecould come back and take his bricks away, and the quicker you built itthe sooner it fell down. Mamma was not to look until it was finished. 

"Look--look, Mamma! M-m-mary's m-m-made a tar. And it's _not_ falleddown!"

The tower reached above Jenny's knee. 

"Come and look, Mamma--" But Mamma wouldn't even turn her head. 

"I'm looking at the snow man, " she said. 

Something swelled up, hot and tight, in Mary's body and in her face. She had a big bursting face and a big bursting body. She struck thetower, and it fell down. Her violence made her feel light and smallagain and happy. 

"Where's the tower, Mary?" said Mamma. 

"There isn't any tar. I've knocked it down. It was a nashty tar. "

III. 

Aunt Charlotte--

Aunt Charlotte had sent the Isle of Skye terrier to Dank. 

There was a picture of Aunt Charlotte in Mamma's Album. She stood on astrip of carpet, supported by the hoops of her crinoline; her blacklace shawl made a pattern on the light gown. She wore a little hatwith a white sweeping feather, and under the hat two long black curlshung down straight on each shoulder. 

The other people in the Album were sulky, and wouldn't look at you. The gentlemen made cross faces at somebody who wasn't there; theladies hung their heads and looked down at their crinolines. AuntCharlotte hung her head too, but her eyes, tilted up straight underher forehead, pointed at you. And between her stiff black curls shewas smiling--smiling. When Mamma came to Aunt Charlotte's picture shetried to turn over the page of the Album quick. 

Aunt Charlotte sent things. She sent the fat valentine with the lacepaper border and black letters printed on sweet-smelling white satinthat Papa threw into the fire, and the white china doll with blackhair and blue eyes and no clothes on that Jenny hid in the nurserycupboard. 

The Skye terrier brought a message tied under his chin: "Tib. For mydear little nephew Dan with Aunt Charlotte's fond love. " He hadhigh-peaked, tufted ears and a blackish grey coat that trailed on thefloor like a shawl that was too big for him. When you tried to strokehim the shawl swept and trailed away under the table. You saw nothingbut shawl and ears until Papa began to tease Tib. Papa snapped hisfinger and thumb at him, and Tib showed little angry eyes and whiteteeth set in a black snarl. 

Mamma said, "Please don't do that again, Emilius. "

And Papa did it again. 

IV. 

"What are you looking at, Master Daniel?" said Jenny. 

"Nothing. "

"Then what are you looking like that for? You didn't ought to. "

Papa had sent Mark and Dank to the nursery in disgrace. Mark leanedover the back of Jenny's chair and rocked her. His face was red buttight; and as he rocked he smiled because of his punishment. 

Dank lay on the floor on his stomach, his shoulders hunched, raised onhis elbows, his chin supported by his clenched fists. He was a darkand white boy with dusty eyelashes and rough, doggy hair. He hadpuckered up his mouth and made it small; under the scowl of histwisted eyebrows he was looking at nothing. 

"It's no worse for you than it is for Master Mark, " said Jenny. 

"_Isn't_ it? Tib was my dog. If he hadn't been my dog Papa wouldn't haveteased him, and Mamma wouldn't have sent him back to Aunt Charlotte, andAunt Charlotte wouldn't have let him be run over. "

"Yes. But what did you say to your Papa?"

"I said I wish Tib _had_ bitten him. So I do. And Mark said it wouldhave served him jolly well right. "

"So it would, " said Mark. 

Roddy had turned his back on them. Nobody was taking any notice ofhim; so he sang aloud to himself the song he was forbidden to sing:

 "John Brown's body lies a-rotting in his grave, John Brown's body lies a-rotting in his grave--"

The song seemed to burst out of Roddy's beautiful white face; his pinklips twirled and tilted; his golden curls bobbed and nodded to the tune. 

 "John Brown's body lies a-rotting in his grave, As we go marching on!"

"When I grow up, " said Dank, "I'll kill Papa for killing Tibby. I'llbore holes in his face with Mark's gimlet. I'll cut pieces out of him. I'll get the matches and set fire to his beard. I'll--I'll _hurt_ him. "

"I don't think _I_ shall, " said Mark. "But if I do I shan't kick up asilly row about it first. "

"It's all very well for you. You'd kick up a row if Tibby was your dog. "

Mary had forgotten Tibby. Now she remembered. 

"Where's Tibby? I want him. "

"Tibby's dead, " said Jenny. 

"What's 'dead'?"

"Never you mind. "

Roddy was singing:

 "'And _from_ his nose and _to_ his chin The worms crawled out and the worms crawled in'--

"_That's_ dead, " said Roddy. 

V. 

You never knew when Aunt Charlotte mightn't send something. She forgotyour birthday and sometimes Christmas; but, to make up for that, sheremembered in between. Every time she was going to be married sheremembered. 

Sarah the cat came too long after Mark's twelfth birthday to be hisbirthday present. There was no message with her except that AuntCharlotte was going to be married and didn't want her any more. Whenever Aunt Charlotte was going to be married she sent you somethingshe didn't want. 

Sarah was a white cat with a pink nose and pink lips and pink padsunder her paws. Her tabby hood came down in a peak between her greeneyes. Her tabby cape went on along the back of her tail, tapering tothe tip. Sarah crouched against the fireguard, her haunches raised, herhead sunk back on her shoulders, and her paws tucked in under herwhite, pouting breast. 

Mark stooped over her; his mouth smiled its small, firm smile; his eyesshone as he stroked her. Sarah raised her haunches under the caressinghand. 

Mary's body was still. Something stirred and tightened in it when shelooked at Sarah. 

"I want Sarah, " she said. 

"You can't have her, " said Jenny. "She's Master Mark's cat. "

She wanted her more than Roddy's bricks and Dank's animal book orMark's soldiers. She trembled when she held her in her arms and kissedher and smelt the warm, sweet, sleepy smell that came from the top ofher head. 

"Little girls can't have everything they want, " said Jenny. 

"I wanted her before you did, " said Dank. "You're too little to have acat at all. "

He sat on the table swinging his legs. His dark, mournful eyes watchedMark under their doggy scowl. He looked like Tibby, the terrier thatMamma sent away because Papa teased him. 

"Sarah isn't your cat either, Master Daniel. Your Aunt Charlotte gaveher to your Mamma, and your Mamma gave her to Master Mark. "

"She ought to have given her to me. She took my dog away. "

"_I_ gave her to you, " said Mark. 

"And I gave her to you back again. "

"Well then, she's half our cat. "

"I want her, " said Mary. She said it again and again. 

Mamma came and took her into the room with the big bed. 

The gas blazed in the white globes. Lovely white lights washed likewater over the polished yellow furniture: the bed, the great highwardrobe, the chests of drawers, the twisted poles of thelooking-glass. There were soft rounds and edges of blond light on thewhite marble chimney-piece and the white marble washstand. The drawncurtains were covered with shining silver patterns on a sleek greenground that shone. All these things showed again in the long, flashingmirrors. 

Mary looked round the room and wondered why the squat grey men had goneout of the curtains. 

"Don't look about you, " said Mamma. "Look at me. Why do you wantSarah?"

She had forgotten Sarah. 

"Because, " she said, "Sarah is so sweet. "

"Mamma gave Sarah to Mark. Mary mustn't want what isn't given her. Markdoesn't say, 'I want Mary's dollies. ' Papa doesn't say, 'I want Mamma'sworkbox. '"

"But _I_ want Sarah. "

"And that's selfish and self-willed. "

Mamma sat down on the low chair at the foot of the bed. 

"God, " she said, "hates selfishness and self-will. God is grieved everytime Mary is self-willed and selfish. He wants her to give up herwill. "

When Mamma talked about God she took you on her lap and you played withthe gold tassel on her watch chain. Her face was solemn and tender. Shespoke softly. She was afraid that God might hear her talking about himand wouldn't like it. 

Mary knelt in Mamma's lap and said "Gentle Jesus, meek and mild, " and"Our Father, " and played with the gold tassel. Every day began andended with "Our Father" and "Gentle Jesus, meek and mild. "

"What's hallowed?"

"Holy, " said Mamma. "What God is. Sacred and holy. "

Mary twisted the gold tassel and made it dance and run through the loopof the chain. Mamma took it out of her hands and pressed them togetherand stooped her head to them and kissed them. She could feel the kisstingling through her body from her finger-tips, and she was suddenlydocile and appeased. 

When she lay in her cot behind the curtain she prayed: "Please God keepme from wanting Sarah. "

In the morning she remembered. When she looked at Sarah she thought:"Sarah is Mark's cat and Dank's cat. "

She touched her with the tips of her fingers. Sarah's eyes werereproachful and unhappy. She ran away and crept under the chest ofdrawers. 

"Mamma gave Sarah to Mark. "

Mamma was sacred and holy. Mark was sacred and holy. Sarah was sacredand holy, crouching under the chest of drawers with her eyes gleamingin the darkness. 

VI. 

It was a good and happy day. 

She lay on the big bed. Her head rested on Mamma's arm. Mamma's facewas close to her. Water trickled into her eyes out of the wet pad ofpocket-handkerchief. Under the cold pad a hot, grinding pain came fromthe hole in her forehead. Jenny stood beside the bed. Her face hadwaked up and she was busy squeezing something out of a red sponge intoa basin of pink water. 

When Mamma pressed the pocket-handkerchief tight the pain groundharder, when she loosened it blood ran out of the hole and thepocket-handkerchief was warm again. Then Jenny put on the sponge. 

She could hear Jenny say, "It was the Master's fault. She didn't oughtto have been left in the room with him. "

She remembered. The dining-room and the sharp spike on the fender andPapa's legs stretched out. He had told her not to run so fast and shehad run faster and faster. It wasn't Papa's fault. 

She remembered tripping over Papa's legs. Then falling on the spike. Then nothing. 

Then waking in Mamma's room. 

She wasn't crying. The pain made her feel good and happy; and Mamma wascalling her her darling and her little lamb. Mamma loved her. Jennyloved her. 

Mark and Dank and Roddy came in. Mark carried Sarah in his arms. Theystood by the bed and looked at her; their faces pressed close. Roddyhad been crying; but Mark and Dank were excited. They climbed on to thebed and kissed her. They made Sarah crouch down close beside her andheld her there. They spoke very fast, one after the other. 

"We've brought you Sarah. "

"We've given you Sarah. "

"She's your cat. "

"To keep for ever. "

She was glad that she had tripped over Papa's legs. It was a good andhappy day. 

VII. 

The sun shone. The polished green blades of the grass glittered. Thegravel walk and the nasturtium bed together made a broad orange blaze. Specks like glass sparkled in the hot grey earth. On the grey flagstonethe red poppy you picked yesterday was a black thread, a purple stain. 

She was happy sitting on the grass, drawing the fine, sharp bladesbetween her fingers, sniffing the smell of the mignonette that tingledlike sweet pepper, opening and shutting the yellow mouths of thesnap-dragon. 

The garden flowers stood still, straight up in the grey earth. Theywere as tall as you were. You could look at them a long time withoutbeing tired. 

The garden flowers were not like the animals. The cat Sarah bumped hersleek head under your chin; you could feel her purr throbbing under herribs and crackling in her throat. The white rabbit pushed out his noseto you and drew it in again, quivering, and breathed his sweet breathinto your mouth. 

The garden flowers wouldn't let you love them. They stood still intheir beauty, quiet, arrogant, reproachful. They put you in the wrong. When you stroked them they shook and swayed from you; when you heldthem tight their heads dropped, their backs broke, they shrivelled upin your hands. All the flowers in the garden were Mamma's; they weresacred and holy. 

You loved best the flowers that you stooped down to look at and theflowers that were not Mamma's: the small crumpled poppy by the edge ofthe field, and the ears of the wild rye that ran up your sleeve andtickled you, and the speedwell, striped like the blue eyes of Meta, thewax doll. 

When you smelt mignonette you thought of Mamma. 

It was her birthday. Mark had given her a little sumach tree in a redpot. They took it out of the pot and dug a hole by the front door stepsoutside the pantry window and planted it there. 

Papa came out on to the steps and watched them. 

"I suppose, " he said, "you think it'll _grow_?"

Mamma never turned to look at him. She smiled because it was herbirthday. She said, "Of course it'll grow. "

She spread out its roots and pressed it down and padded up the earthabout it with her hands. It held out its tiny branches, stiffly, like atoy tree, standing no higher than the mignonette. Papa looked at Mammaand Mark, busy and happy with their heads together, taking no notice ofhim. He laughed out of his big beard and went back into the housesuddenly and slammed the door. You knew that he disliked the sumachtree and that he was angry with Mark for giving it to Mamma. 

When you smelt mignonette you thought of Mamma and Mark and the sumachtree, and Papa standing on the steps, and the queer laugh that came outof his beard. 

When it rained you were naughty and unhappy because you couldn't go outof doors. Then Mamma stood at the window and looked into the frontgarden. She smiled at the rain. She said, "It will be good for mysumach tree. "

Every day you went out on to the steps to see if the sumach tree hadgrown. 

VIII. 

The white lamb stood on the table beside her cot. 

Mamma put it there every night so that she could see it first thing inthe morning when she woke. 

She had had a birthday. Suddenly in the middle of the night she wasfive years old. 

She had kept on waking up with the excitement of it. Then, in the darktwilight of the room, she had seen a bulky thing inside the cot, leaning up against the rail. It stuck out queerly and its weightdragged the counterpane tight over her feet. 

The birthday present. What she saw was not its real shape. When shepoked it, stiff paper bent in and crackled; and she could feelsomething big and solid underneath. She lay quiet and happy, trying toguess what it could be, and fell asleep again. 

It was the white lamb. It stood on a green stand. It smelt of dried hayand gum and paint like the other toy animals, but its white coat had adull, woolly smell, and that was the real smell of the lamb. Its large, slanting eyes stared off over its ears into the far corners of theroom, so that it never looked at you. This made her feel sometimes thatthe lamb didn't love her, and sometimes that it was frightened andwanted to be comforted. 

She trembled when first she stroked it and held it to her face, andsniffed its lamby smell. 

Papa looked down at her. He was smiling; and when she looked up at himshe was not afraid. She had the same feeling that came sometimes whenshe sat in Mamma's lap and Mamma talked about God and Jesus. Papa wassacred and holy. 

He had given her the lamb. 

It was the end of her birthday; Mamma and Jenny were putting her tobed. She felt weak and tired, and sad because it was all over. 

"Come to that, " said Jenny, "your birthday was over at five minutespast twelve this morning. "

"When will it come again?"

"Not for a whole year, " said Mamma. 

"I wish it would come to-morrow. "

Mamma shook her head at her. "You want to be spoiled and petted everyday. "

"No. No. I want--I want--"

"She doesn't know what she wants, " said Jenny. 

"Yes. I do. I _do_. "

"Well--"

"I want to love Papa every day. 'Cause he gave me my lamb. "

"Oh, " said Mamma, "if you only love people because they give youbirthday presents--"

"But I don't--I don't--really and truly--"

"You didn't ought to have no more birthdays, " said Jenny, "if they makeyou cry. "

Why couldn't they see that crying meant that she wanted Papa to besacred and holy every day?

The day after the birthday when Papa went about the same as ever, looking big and frightening, when he "Baa'd" into her face and calledout, "Mary had a little lamb!" and "Mary, Mary, quite contrary, " shelooked after him sorrowfully and thought: "Papa gave me my lamb. "

IX. 

One day Uncle Edward and Aunt Bella came over from Chadwell Grange. They were talking to Mamma a long time in the drawing-room, and whenshe came in they stopped and whispered. 

Roddy told her the secret. Uncle Edward was going to give her a livelamb. 

Mark and Dank said it couldn't be true. Uncle Edward was not a realuncle; he was only Aunt Bella's husband, and he never gave youanything. And anyhow the lamb wasn't born yet and couldn't come forweeks and weeks. 

Every morning she asked, "Has my new lamb come? When is it coming? Doyou think it will come to-day?"

She could keep on sitting still quite a long time by merely thinkingabout the new lamb. It would run beside her when she played in thegarden. It would eat grass out of her hand. She would tie a ribbonround its neck and lead it up and down the lane. At these moments sheforgot the toy lamb. It stood on the chest of drawers in the nursery, looking off into the corners of the room, neglected. 

By the time Uncle Edward and Aunt Bella sent for her to come and seethe lamb, she knew exactly what it would be like and what would happen. She saw it looking like the lambs in the Bible Picture Book, fat, andcovered with thick, pure white wool. She saw Uncle Edward, with hisyellow face and big nose and black whiskers, coming to her across thelawn at Chadwell Grange, carrying the lamb over his shoulder likeJesus. 

It was a cold morning. They drove a long time in Uncle Edward'scarriage, over the hard, loud roads, between fields white with frost, and Uncle Edward was not on his lawn. 

Aunt Bella stood in the big hall, waiting for them. She looked muchlarger and more important than Mamma. 

"Aunt Bella, have you got my new lamb?"

She tried not to shriek it out, because Aunt Bella was nearly alwayspoorly, and Mamma told her that if you shrieked at her she would beill. 

Mamma said "Sh-sh-sh!" And Aunt Bella whispered something and she heardMamma answer, "Better not. "

"If she _sees_ it, " said Aunt Bella, "she'll understand. "

Mamma shook her head at Aunt Bella. 

"Edward would like it, " said Aunt Bella. "He wanted to give it herhimself. It's _his_ present. "

Mamma took her hand and they followed Aunt Bella through the servants'hall into the kitchen. The servants were all there, Rose and Annie andCook, and Mrs. Fisher, the housekeeper, and Giles, the young footman. They all stared at her in a queer, kind way as she came in. 

A low screen was drawn close round one corner of the fireplace; UncleEdward and Pidgeon, the bailiff, were doing something to it with ayellow horse-cloth. 

Uncle Edward came to her, looking down the side of his big nose. He ledher to the screen and drew it away. 

Something lay on the floor wrapped in a piece of dirty blanket. WhenUncle Edward pushed back the blanket a bad smell came out. He said, "Here's your lamb, Mary. You're just in time. "

She saw a brownish grey animal with a queer, hammer-shaped head andlong black legs. Its body was drawn out and knotted like an enormousmaggot. It lay twisted to one side and its eyes were shut. 

"That isn't my lamb. "

"It's the lamb I always said Miss Mary was to have, isn't it, Pidgeon?"

"Yes, Squoire, it's the lamb you bid me set asoide for little Missy. "

"Then, " said Mary, "why does it look like that?"

"It's very ill, " Mamma said gently. "Poor Uncle Edward thought you'dlike to see it before it died. You _are_ glad you've seen it, aren'tyou?"

"No. "

Just then the lamb stirred in its blanket; it opened its eyes andlooked at her. 

She thought: "It's my lamb. It looked at me. It's _my_ lamb and it'sdying. My _lamb's_ dying. "

The bad smell came again out of the blanket. She tried not to think ofit. She wanted to sit down on the floor beside the lamb and lift it outof its blanket and nurse it; but Mamma wouldn't let her. 

When she got home Mamma took down the toy lamb from the chest ofdrawers and brought it to her. 

She sat quiet a long time holding it in her lap and stroking it. 

The stiff eyes of the toy lamb stared away over its ears. 

III

I. 

Jenny was cross and tugged at your hair when she dressed you to go toChadwell Grange. 

"Jenny-Wee, Mamma says if I'm not good Aunt Bella will be ill. Do youthink it's really true?"

Jenny tugged. "I'd thank you for some of your Aunt Bella's illness, "she said. 

"I mean, " Mary said, "like Papa was in the night. Every time I get'cited and jump about I think she'll open her mouth and begin. "

"Well, if she was to you'd oughter be sorry for her. "

"I _am_ sorry for her. But I'm frightened too. "

"That's not being good, " said Jenny. But she left off tugging. 

Somehow you knew she was pleased to think you were not really good atAunt Bella's, where Mrs. Fisher dressed and undressed you and you wereallowed to talk to Pidgeon. 

Roddy and Dank said you ought to hate Uncle Edward and Pidgeon and Mrs. Fisher, and not to like Aunt Bella very much, even if she was Mamma'ssister. Mamma didn't really like Uncle Edward; she only pretendedbecause of Aunt Bella. 

Uncle Edward had an ugly nose and a yellow face widened by his blackwhiskers; his mouth stretched from one whisker to the other, and hisblack hair curled in large tufts above his ears. But he had no beard;you could see the whole of his mouth at once; and when Aunt Bella cameinto the room his little blue eyes looked up off the side of his noseand he smiled at her between his tufts of hair. It was dreadful tothink that Mark and Dank and Roddy didn't like him. It might hurt himso much that he would never be happy again. 

About Pidgeon she was not quite sure. Pidgeon was very ugly. He hadlong stiff legs, and a long stiff face finished off with a fringe ofred whiskers that went on under his chin. Still, it was not nice tothink of Pidgeon being unhappy either. But Mrs. Fisher was large andrather like Aunt Bella, only softer and more bulging. Her round facehad a high red polish on it always, and when she saw you coming hereyes twinkled, and her red forehead and her big cheeks and her mouthsmiled all together a fat, simmering smile. When you got to the blackand white marble tiles you saw her waiting for you at the foot of thestairs. 

She wanted to ask Mrs. Fisher if it was true that Aunt Bella would beill if she were naughty; but a squeezing and dragging came under herwaist whenever she thought about it, and that made her shy and ashamed. It went when they left her to play by herself on the lawn in front ofthe house. 

Aunt Bella's house was enormous. Two long rows of windows stared out atyou, their dark green storm shutters folded back on the yellow brickwalls. A third row of little squeezed-up windows and little squeezed-upshutters blinked in the narrow space under the roof. All summer a sweetsmell came from that side of the house where cream-coloured roses hungon the yellow walls between the green shutters. There was a cedar treeon the lawn and a sun-dial and a stone fountain. Goldfish swam in theclear greenish water. The flowers in the round beds were stiff andshining, as if they had been cut out of tin and freshly painted. Whenyou thought of Aunt Bella's garden you saw calceolarias, brown velvetpurses with yellow spots. 

She could always get away from Aunt Bella by going down the dark walkbetween the yew hedge and the window of Mrs. Fisher's room, and throughthe stable-yard into the plantation. The cocks and hens had their blacktimber house there in the clearing, and Ponto, the Newfoundland, livedall by himself in his kennel under the little ragged fir trees. 

When Ponto saw her coming he danced on his hind legs and strained athis chain and called to her with his loud, barking howl. He played withher, crawling on his stomach, crouching, raising first one big paw andthen the other. She put out her foot, and he caught it and held itbetween his big paws, and looked at it with his head on one side, smiling. She squealed with delight, and Ponto barked again. 

The stable bell would ring while they played in the plantation, andUncle Edward or Pidgeon or Mrs. Fisher would come out and find her andtake her back into the house. Ponto lifted up his head and howled afterher as she went. 

At lunch Mary sat quivering between Mamma and Aunt Bella. The squeezingand dragging under her waist had begun again. There was a pattern ofgreen ivy round the dinner plates and a pattern of goats round thesilver napkin rings. She tried to fix her mind on the ivy and the goatsinstead of looking at Aunt Bella to see whether she were going to beill. She _would_ be if you left mud in the hall on the black and whitemarble tiles. Or if you took Ponto off the chain and let him get intothe house. Or if you spilled the gravy. 

Aunt Bella's face was much pinker and richer and more important thanMamma's face. She thought she wouldn't have minded quite so much ifAunt Bella had been white and brown and pretty, like Mamma. 

There--she had spilled the gravy. 

Little knots came in Aunt Bella's pink forehead. Her face loosened andswelled with a red flush; her mouth pouted and drew itself in again, pulled out of shape by something that darted up the side of her noseand made her blink. 

She thought: "I know--I know--I _know_ it's going to happen. "

It didn't. Aunt Bella only said, "You should look at your plate andspoon, dear. "

After lunch, when they were resting, you could feel naughtiness comingon. Then Pidgeon carried you on his back to the calf-shed; or Mrs. Fisher took you up into her bedroom to see her dress. 

In Mrs. Fisher's bedroom a smell of rotten apples oozed through therosebud pattern on the walls. There were no doors inside, only placesin the wall-paper that opened. Behind one of these places there was acupboard where Mrs. Fisher kept her clothes. Sometimes she would takethe lid off the big box covered with wall-paper and show you her Sundaybonnet. You sat on the bed, and she gave you peppermint balls to suckwhile she peeled off her black merino and squeezed herself into herblack silk. You watched for the moment when the brooch with the blacktomb and the weeping willow on it was undone and Mrs. Fisher's chincame out first by the open collar and Mrs. Fisher began to swell. Whenshe stood up in her petticoat and bodice she was enormous; her breastsand hips and her great arms shook as she walked about the room. 

Mary was sorry when she said good-bye to Uncle Edward and Aunt Bellaand Mrs. Fisher. 

For, always, as soon as she got home, Roddy rushed at her with the samequestions. 

"Did you let Uncle Edward kiss you?"

"Yes. "

"Did you talk to Pidgeon?"

"Yes. "

"Did you kiss Mrs. Fisher?"

"Yes. "

And Dank said, "Have they taken Ponto off the chain yet?"

"No. "

"Well, then, that shows you what pigs they are. "

And when she saw Mark looking at her she felt small and silly andashamed. 

II. 

It was the last week of the midsummer holidays. Mark and Dank had goneto stay for three days at Aunt Bella's, and on the second day they hadbeen sent home. 

Mamma and Roddy were in the garden when they came. They were killingsnails in a flower-pot by putting salt on them. The snails turned overand over on each other and spat out a green foam that covered them likesoapsuds as they died. 

Mark's face was red and he was smiling. Even Dank looked proud ofhimself and happy. They called out together, "We've been sent home. "

Mamma looked up from her flower-pot. 

"What did you _do_?" she said. 

"We took Ponto off the chain, " said Dank. 

"Did he get into the house?"

"Of course he did, " said Mark. "Like a shot. He got into Aunt Bella'sbedroom, and Aunt Bella was in bed. "

"Oh, _Mark_!"

"Uncle Edward came up just as we were getting him out. He was in anawful wax. "

"I'm afraid, " Dank said, "I cheeked him. "

"What did you say?"

"I told him he wasn't fit to have a dog. And he said we weren't to comeagain; and Mark said that was all we _had_ come for--to let Pontoloose. "

Mamma put another snail into the flower-pot, very gently. She wassmiling and at the same time trying not to smile. 

"He went back, " said Mark, "and raked it up again about our chasing hissheep, ages ago. "

"_Did_ you chase the sheep?"

"No. Of course we didn't. They started to run because they saw Pidgeoncoming, and Roddy ran after them till we told him not to. The meanbeast said we'd made Mary's lamb die by frightening its mother. When heonly gave it her because he knew it wouldn't live. _Then_ he said we'dfrightened Aunt Bella. "

Mary stared at them, fascinated. 

"Oh, Mark, was Aunt Bella ill?"

"Of course she wasn't. She only says she's going to be to keep youquiet. "

"Well, " said Mamma, "she won't be frightened any more. He'll not askyou again. "

"We don't care. He's not a bit of good. He won't let us ride his horsesor climb his trees or fish in his stinking pond. "

"Let Mary go there, " said Dank. "_She_ likes it. She kisses Pidgeon. "

"I don't, " she cried. "I hate Pidgeon. I hate Uncle Edward and AuntBella. I hate Mrs. Fisher. "

Mamma looked up from her flower-pot, and, suddenly, she was angry. 

"For shame! They're kind to _you_, " she said. "You little naughty, ungrateful girl. "

"They're _not_ kind to Mark and Dank. That's why I hate them. "

She wondered why Mamma was not angry with Mark and Dank, who had letPonto loose and frightened Aunt Bella. 

IV

I. 

That year when Christmas came Papa gave her a red book with a goldholly wreath on the cover. The wreath was made out of three words: _TheChildren's Prize_, printed in letters that pretended to be hollysprigs. Inside the holly wreath was the number of the year, in fat goldletters: 1869. 

Soon after Christmas she had another birthday. She was six years old. She could write in capitals and count up to a hundred if she were leftto do it by herself. Besides "Gentle Jesus, " she could say "Cock-Robin"and "The House that Jack Built, " and "The Lord is my Shepherd" and "TheSlave in the Dismal Swamp. " And she could read all her own story books, picking out the words she knew and making up the rest. Roddy never madeup. He was a big boy, he was eight years old. 

The morning after her birthday Roddy and she were sent into thedrawing-room to Mamma. A strange lady was there. She had chosen thehigh-backed chair in the middle of the room with the Berlin wool-workparrot on it. She sat very upright, stiff and thin between the twistedrosewood pillars of the chair. She was dressed in a black gown made ofa great many little bands of rough crape and a few smooth stretches ofmerino. Her crape veil, folded back over her hat, hung behind her headin a stiff square. A jet necklace lay flat and heavy on her smallchest. When you had seen all these black things she showed you, suddenly, her white, wounded face. 

Mamma called her Miss Thompson. 

Miss Thompson's face was so light and thin that you thought it wouldbreak if you squeezed it. The skin was drawn tight over her jaw and thebridge of her nose and the sharp naked arches of her eye-bones. Shelooked at you with mournful, startled eyes that were too large fortheir lids; and her flat chin trembled slightly as she talked. 

"This is Rodney, " she said, as if she were repeating a lesson afterMamma. 

Rodney leaned up against Mamma and looked proud and handsome. She hadher arm round him, and every now and then she pressed it tighter todraw him to herself. 

Miss Thompson said after Mamma, "And this is Mary. "

Her mournful eyes moved and sparkled as if she had suddenly thought ofsomething for herself. 

"I am sure, " she said, "they will be very good. "

Mamma shook her head, as much as to say Miss Thompson must not build onit. 

Every weekday from ten to twelve Miss Thompson came and taught themreading, writing and arithmetic. Every Wednesday at half-past eleventhe boys' tutor, Mr. Sippett, looked in and taught Rodney "_Mensa_: atable. "

Mamma told them they must never be naughty with Miss Thompson becauseher mother was dead. 

They went away and talked about her among the gooseberry bushes at thebottom of the garden. 

"I don't know how we're going to manage, " Rodney said. "There's nosense in saying we mustn't be naughty because her mother's dead. "

"I suppose, " Mary said, "it would make her think she's deader. "

"We can't help that. We've got to be naughty some time. "

"We mustn't begin, " Mary said. "If we begin we shall have to finish. "

They were good for four days, from ten to twelve. And at a quarter pasttwelve on the fifth day Mamma found Mary crying in the dining-room. 

"Oh, Mary, have you been naughty?"

"No; but I shall be to-morrow. I've been so good that I can't keep onany longer. "

Mamma took her in her lap. She lowered her head to you, holding itstraight and still, ready to pounce if you said the wrong thing. 

"Being good when it pleases you isn't being good, " she said. "It's notwhat Jesus means by being good. God wants us to be good all the time, like Jesus. "

"But--Jesus and me is different. He wasn't able to be naughty. And I'mnot able to be good. Not _all_ the time. "

"You're not able to be good of your own will and in your own strength. You're not good till God makes you good. "

"Did God make me naughty?"

"No. God couldn't make anybody naughty. "

"Not if he tried _hard_?"

"No. But, " said Mamma, speaking very fast, "he'll make you good if youask him. "

"Will he make me good if I don't ask him?"

"No, " said Mamma. 

II. 

Miss Thompson--

She was always sure you would be good. And Mamma was sure you wouldn'tbe, or that if you were it would be for some bad reason like beingsorry for Miss Thompson. 

As long as Roddy was in the room Mary was sorry for Miss Thompson. Andwhen she was left alone with her she was frightened. The squeezing anddragging under her waist began when Miss Thompson pushed her gentle, mournful face close up to see what she was doing. 

She was afraid of Miss Thompson because her mother was dead. 

She kept on thinking about Miss Thompson's mother. Miss Thompson'smother would be like Jenny in bed with her cap off; and she would belike the dead field mouse that Roddy found in the lane. She would lieon the bed with her back bent and her head hanging loose like the dearlittle field mouse; and her legs would be turned up over her stomachlike his, toes and fingers clawing together. When you touched her shewould be cold and stiff, like the field mouse. They had wrapped her upin a white sheet. Roddy said dead people were always wrapped up inwhite sheets. And Mr. Chapman had put her into a coffin like the one hewas making when he gave Dank the wood for the rabbit's house. 

Every time Miss Thompson came near her she saw the white sheet andsmelt the sharp, bitter smell of the coffin. 

If she was naughty Miss Thompson (who seemed to have forgotten) wouldremember that her mother was dead. It might happen any minute. 

It never did. For Miss Thompson said you were good if you knew yourlessons; and at the same time you were not naughty if you didn't knowthem. You might not know them to-day; but you would know them to-morrowor the next day. 

By midsummer Mary could read the books that Dank read. If it had notbeen for Mr. Sippett and "_Mensa_: a table, " she would have known asmuch as Roddy. 

Almost before they had time to be naughty Miss Thompson had gone. Mammasaid that Roddy was not getting on fast enough. 

V

I. 

The book that Aunt Bella had brought her was called _The Triumph OverMidian_, and Aunt Bella said that if she was a good girl it wouldinterest her. But it did not interest her. That was how she heard AuntBella and Mamma talking together. 

Mamma's foot was tapping on the footstool, which showed that she wasannoyed. 

"They're coming to-morrow, " she said, "to look at that house atIlford. "

"To live?" Aunt Bella said. 

"To live, " Mamma said. 

"And is Emilius going to allow it? What's Victor thinking of, bringingher down here?"

"They want to be near Emilius. They think he'll look after her. "

"It was Victor who _would_ have her at home, and Victor might lookafter her himself. She was his favourite sister. "

"He doesn't want to be too responsible. They think Emilius ought totake his share. "

Aunt Bella whispered something. And Mamma said, "Stuff and nonsense! Nomore than you or I. Only you never know what queer thing she'll donext. "

Aunt Bella said, "She was always queer as long as I remember her. "

Mamma's foot went tap, tap again. 

"She's been sending away things worse than ever. Dolls. Those nakedones. "

Aunt Bella gave herself a shake and said something that sounded like"Goo-oo-sh!" And then, "Going to be married?"

Mamma said, "Going to be married. "

And Aunt Bella said "T-t-t. "

They were talking about Aunt Charlotte. 

Mamma went on: "She's packed off all her clothes. Her new ones. Sentthem to Matilda. Thinks she won't have to wear them any more. "

"You mustn't expect me to have Charlotte Olivier in my house, " AuntBella said. "If anybody came to call it would be most unpleasant. "

"I wouldn't mind, " Mamma said, tap-tapping, "if it was only Charlotte. But there's Lavvy and her Opinions. "

Aunt Bella said "Pfoo-oof!" and waved her hands as if she were clearingthe air. 

"All I can say is, " Mamma said, "that if Lavvy Olivier brings herOpinions into this house Emilius and I will walk out of it. "

To-morrow--they were coming to-morrow, Uncle Victor and Aunt Lavvy andAunt Charlotte. 

II. 

They were coming to lunch, and everybody was excited. 

Mark and Dank were in their trousers and Eton jackets, and Roddy in hisnew black velvet suit. The drawing-room was dressed out in its greensummer chintzes that shone and crackled with glaze. Mamma had moved thebig Chinese bowl from the cabinet to the round mahogany table and filledit with white roses. You could see them again in the polish; blurredwhite faces swimming on the dark, wine-coloured pool. You held out yourface to be washed in the clear, cool scent of the white roses. 

When Mark opened the door a smell of roast chicken came up the kitchenstairs. 

It was like Sunday, except that you were excited. 

"Look at Papa, " Roddy whispered. "Papa's excited. "

Papa had come home early from the office. He stood by the fireplace inthe long tight frock-coat that made him look enormous. He had twirledback his moustache to show his rich red mouth. He had put something onhis beard that smelt sweet. You noticed for the first time how thefrizzed, red-brown mass sprang from a peak of silky golden hair under hispouting lower lip. He was letting himself gently up and down with thetips of his toes, and he was smiling, secretly, as if he had just thoughtof something that he couldn't tell Mamma. Whenever he looked at Mamma sheput her hand up to her hair and patted it. 

Mamma had done her hair a new way. The brown plait stood up farther backon the edge of the sloping chignon. She wore her new lavender and whitestriped muslin. Lavender ribbon streamed from the pointed opening of herbodice. A black velvet ribbon was tied tight round her neck; a jet crosshung from it and a diamond star twinkled in the middle of the cross. Shepushed out her mouth and drew it in again, like Roddy's rabbit, and thetip of her nose trembled as if it knew all the time what Papa wasthinking. 

She was so soft and pretty that you could hardly bear it. Mark stoodbehind her chair and when Papa was not looking he kissed her. Thebehaviour of her mouth and nose gave you a delicious feeling that withAunt Lavvy and Aunt Charlotte you wouldn't have to be so very good. 

The front door bell rang. Papa and Mamma looked at each other, as much asto say, "_Now_ it's going to begin. " And suddenly Mamma looked small andfrightened. She took Mark's hand. 

"Emilius, " she said, "what am I to say to Lavinia?"

"You don't say anything, " Papa said. "Mary can talk to Lavinia. "

Mary jumped up and down with excitement. She knew how it would be. Inanother minute Aunt Charlotte would come in, dressed in her black laceshawl and crinoline, and Aunt Lavvy would bring her Opinions. Andsomething, something that you didn't know, would happen. 

III. 

Aunt Charlotte came in first with a tight, dancing run. You knew her bythe long black curls on her shoulders. She was smiling as she smiled inthe album. She bent her head as she bent it in the album, and her eyeslooked up close under her black eyebrows and pointed at you. Pretty--pretty blue eyes, and something frightening that made you look atthem. And something queer about her narrow jaw. It thrust itself forward, jerking up her smile. 

No black lace shawl and no crinoline. Aunt Charlotte wore a blue andblack striped satin dress, bunched up behind, and a little hat perched onthe top of her chignon and tied underneath it with blue ribbons. 

She had got in and was kissing everybody while Aunt Lavvy and UncleVictor were fumbling with the hat stand in the hall. 

Aunt Lavvy came next. A long grey face. Black bands of hair parted on herbroad forehead. Black eyebrows; blue eyes that stuck out wide, thatdidn't point at you. A grey bonnet, a grey dress, a little white shawlwith a narrow fringe, drooping. 

She walked slowly--slowly, as if she were still thinking of somethingthat was not in the room, as if she came into a quiet, empty room. 

You thought at first she was never going to kiss you, she was so tall andher face and eyes held themselves so still. 

Uncle Victor. Dark and white; smaller than Papa, smaller than Aunt Lavvy;thin in his loose frock-coat. His forehead and black eyebrows weretwisted above his blue, beautiful eyes. He had a small dark brownmoustache and a small dark brown beard, trimmed close and shaped prettilyto a point. He looked like something, like somebody; like Dank when hewas mournful, like Dank's dog, Tibby, when he hid from Papa. He said, "Well, Caroline. Well, Emilius. "

Aunt Charlotte gave out sharp cries of "Dear!" and "Darling!" andsmothered them against your face in a sort of moan. 

When she came to Roddy she put up her hands. 

"Roddy--yellow hair. No. No. What have you done with the blue eyes andblack hair, Emilius? That comes of letting your beard grow so long. "

Then they all went into the dining-room. 

It was like a birthday. There was to be real blancmange, and preservedginger, and you drank raspberry vinegar out of the silver christeningcups the aunts and uncles gave you when you were born. Uncle Victor hadgiven Mary hers. She held it up and read her own name on it. 

 MARY VICTORIA OLIVIER 1863. 

They were all telling their names. Mary took them up and chanted them:"Mark Emilius Olivier; Daniel Olivier; Rodney Olivier; Victor JustusOlivier; Lavinia Mary Olivier; Charlotte Louisa Olivier. " She liked thesound of them. 

She sat between Uncle Victor and Aunt Lavvy. Roddy was squeezed into thecorner between Mamma and Mark. Aunt Charlotte sat opposite her betweenMark and Daniel. She _had_ to look at Aunt Charlotte's face. There werefaint grey smears on it as if somebody had scribbled all over it withpencil. 

A remarkable conversation. 

"Aunt Lavvy! Aunt Lavvy! Have you brought your Opinions?"

"No, my dear, they were not invited. So I left them at home. "

"I'm glad to hear it, " Papa said. 

"Will you bring them next time?"

"No. Not next time, nor any other time, " Aunt Lavvy said, lookingstraight at Papa. 

"Did you shut them up in the stair cupboard?"

"No, but I may have to some day. "

"Then, " Mary said, "if there are any little ones, may I have one?"

"May she, Emilius?"

"Certainly not, " Papa said. "She's got too many little opinions of herown. "

"What do you know about opinions?" Uncle Victor said. 

Mary was excited and happy. She had never been allowed to talk so much. She tried to eat her roast chicken in a business-like, grown-up manner, while she talked. 

"I've read about them, " she said. "They are dear little animals with longfurry tails, much bigger than Sarah's tail, and they climb up trees. "

"Oh, they climb up trees, do they?" Uncle Victor was very polite andattentive. 

"Yes. There's their picture in Bank's Natural History Book. Next to theOrnythrincus or Duck-billed Plat-i-pus. If they came into the house Mammawould be frightened. But I would not be frightened. I should strokethem. "

"Do you think, " Uncle Victor said, still politely, "you _quite_ know whatyou mean?"

"_I_ know, " Daniel said, "she means opossums. "

"Yes, " Mary said. "Opossums. "

"What _are_ opinions?"

"Opinions, " Papa said, "are things that people put in other people'sheads. Nasty, dangerous things, opinions. "

She thought: "That was why Mamma and Papa were frightened. "

"You won't put them into Mamma's head, will you, Aunt Lavvy?"

Mamma said, "Get on with your dinner. Papa's only teasing. "

Aunt Lavvy's face flushed slowly, and she held her mouth tight, as if shewere trying not to cry. Papa was teasing Aunt Lavvy. 

"How do you like that Ilford house, Charlotte?" Mamma asked suddenly. 

"It's the nicest little house you ever saw, " Aunt Charlotte said. "Butit's too far away. I'd rather have any ugly, poky old den that was nextdoor. I want to see all I can of you and Emilius and Dan and littledarling Mary. Before I go away. "

"You aren't thinking of going away when you've only just come?"

"That's what Victor and Lavinia say. But you don't suppose I'm going tostay an old maid all my life to please Victor and Lavinia. "

"I haven't thought about it at all, " Mamma said. 

"_They_ have. _I_ know what they're thinking. But it's all settled. I'mgoing to Marshall and Snelgrove's for my things. There's a silver-greypoplin in their window. If I decide on it, Caroline, you shall have mygrey watered silk. "

"You needn't waggle your big beard at me, Emilius, " Aunt Charlotte said. 

Papa pretended that he hadn't heard her and began to talk to UncleVictor. 

"Did you read John Bright's speech in Parliament last night?"

Uncle Victor said, "I did. "

"What did you think of it?"

Uncle Victor raised his shoulders and his eyebrows and spread out histhin, small hands. 

"A man with a face like that, " Aunt Charlotte said, "oughtn't to _be_ inParliament. "

"He's the man who saved England, " said Papa. 

"What's the good of that if he can't save himself? Where does he expectto go to with the hats he wears?"

"Where does Emilius expect to go to, " Uncle Victor said, "when his JohnBright and his Gladstone get their way?"

Suddenly Aunt Charlotte left off smiling. 

"Emilius, " she said, "do you uphold Gladstone?"

"Of course I uphold Gladstone. There's nobody in this country fit toblack his boots. "

"I know nothing about his boots. But he's an infidel. He wants to pulldown the Church. I thought you were a Churchman?"

"So I am, " Papa said. "I've too good an opinion of the Church to imaginethat it can't stand alone. "

"You're a nice one to talk about opinions. "

"At any rate I know what I'm talking about. "

"I'm not so sure of that, " said Aunt Charlotte. 

Aunt Lavvy smiled gently at the pattern of the tablecloth. 

"Do you agree with him, Lavvy?" Mamma had found something to say. 

"I agree with him better than he agrees with himself. "

A long conversation about things that interested Papa. Blanc-mange goinground the table, quivering and shaking and squelching under the spoon. 

"There's a silver-grey poplin, " said Aunt Charlotte, "at Marshall andSnelgrove's. "

The blanc-mange was still going round. Mamma watched it as it went. Shewas fascinated by the shivering, white blanc-mange. 

"If there was only one man in the world, " Aunt Charlotte said in a loudvoice, "and he had a flowing beard, I wouldn't marry him. "

Papa drew himself up. He looked at Mark and Daniel and Roddy as if hewere saying, "Whoever takes notice leaves the room. "

Roddy laughed first. He was sent out of the room. 

Papa looked at Mark. Mark clenched his teeth, holding his laugh downtight. He seemed to think that as long as it didn't come out of his mouthhe was safe. It came out through his nose like a loud, tearing sneeze. Mark was sent out of the room. 

Daniel threw down his spoon and fork. 

"If he goes, I go, " Daniel said, and followed him. 

Papa looked at Mary. 

"What are _you_ grinning at, you young monkey?"

"Emilius, " said Aunt Charlotte, "if you send another child out of theroom, I go too. "

Mary squealed, "Tee-he-he-he-he-_hee_! Te-_hee_!" and was sent out of theroom. 

She and Aunt Charlotte sat on the stairs outside the dining-room door. Aunt Charlotte's arm was round her; every now and then it gave her asudden, loving squeeze. 

"Darling Mary. Little darling Mary. Love Aunt Charlotte, " she said. 

Mark and Dank and Roddy watched them over the banisters. 

Aunt Charlotte put her hand deep down in her pocket and brought out alittle parcel wrapped in white paper. She whispered:

"If I give you something to keep, will you promise not to show it toanybody and not to tell?"

Mary promised. 

Inside the paper wrapper there was a match-box, and inside the match-boxthere was a china doll no bigger than your finger. It had blue eyes andblack hair and no clothes on. Aunt Charlotte held it in her hand andsmiled at it. 

"That's Aunt Charlotte's little baby, " she said. "I'm going to be marriedand I shan't want it any more. 

"There--take it, and cover it up, quick!"

Mamma had come out of the dining-room. She shut the door behind her. 

"What have you given to Mary?" she said. 

"Butter-Scotch, " said Aunt Charlotte. 

IV. 

All afternoon till tea-time Papa and Uncle Victor walked up and down thegarden path, talking to each other. Every now and then Mark and Marylooked at them from the nursery window. 

That night she dreamed that she saw Aunt Charlotte standing at the footof the kitchen stairs taking off her clothes and wrapping them in whitepaper; first, her black lace shawl; then her chemise. She stood upwithout anything on. Her body was polished and shining like an enormouswhite china doll. She lowered her head and pointed at you with her eyes. 

When you opened the stair cupboard door to catch the opossum, you found awhite china doll lying in it, no bigger than your finger. That was AuntCharlotte. 

In the dream there was no break between the end and the beginning. Butwhen she remembered it afterwards it split into two pieces with a darkgap between. She knew she had only dreamed about the cupboard; but AuntCharlotte at the foot of the stairs was so clear and solid that shethought she had really seen her. 

Mamma had told Aunt Bella all about it when they talked together thatday, in the drawing-room. She knew because she could still see themsitting, bent forward with their heads touching, Aunt Bella in the bigarm-chair by the hearth-rug, and Mamma on the parrot chair. 

END OF BOOK ONE

BOOK TWOCHILDHOOD (1869-1875)

VI

I. 

When Christmas came Papa gave her another _Children's Prize_. This timethe cover was blue and the number on it was 1870. Eighteen-seventy wasthe name of the New Year that was coming after Christmas. It meant thatthe world had gone on for one thousand eight hundred and seventy yearssince Jesus was born. Every year she was to have a _Children's Prize_with the name of the New Year on it. 

Eighteen-seventy was a beautiful number. It sounded nice, and there was aseven in it. Seven was a sacred and holy number; so was three, because ofthe three Persons, the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, and because ofthe seven stars and the seven golden candlesticks. When you saidgood-night to Mamma you kissed her either three times or seven times. Ifyou went past three you had to go on to seven, because something dreadfulwould happen if you didn't. Sometimes Mamma stopped you; then you stoopeddown and finished up on the hem of her dress, quick, before she could seeyou. 

She was glad that the _Children's Prize_ had a blue cover, because bluewas a sacred and holy colour. It was the colour of the ceiling in St. Mary's Chapel at Ilford, and it was the colour of the Virgin Mary'sdress. 

There were golden stars all over the ceiling of St. Mary's Chapel. Roddyand she were sent there after they had had chicken-pox and when theirwhooping-cough was getting better. They were not allowed to go to thechurch at Barkingside for fear of giving whooping-cough to the childrenin Dr. Barnardo's Homes; and they were not allowed to go to AldboroughHatch Church because of Mr. Propart's pupils. But they had to go tochurch somewhere, whooping-cough or no whooping-cough, in order to get toHeaven; so Mark took them to the Chapel of Ease at Ilford, where theVirgin Mary in a blue dress stood on a sort of step over the door. Mammasaid you were not to worship her, though you might look at her. She was agraven image. Only Roman Catholics worshipped graven images; they wereheretics; that meant that they were shut outside the Church of England, which was God's Church, and couldn't get in. And they had only half aSunday. In Roman Catholic countries Sunday was all over at twelveo'clock, and for the rest of the day the Roman Catholics could do justwhat they pleased; they danced and went to theatres and played games, asif Sunday was one of their own days and not God's day. 

She wished she had been born in a Roman Catholic country. 

Every night she took the _Children's Prize_ to bed with her to keep hersafe. It had Bible Puzzles in it, and among them there was a picture ofthe Name of God. A shining white light, shaped like Mamma's vinaigrette, with black marks in the middle. Mamma said the light was the light thatshone above the Ark of the Covenant, and the black marks were letters andthe word was the real name of God. She said he was sometimes calledJehovah, but that was not his real name. His real name was a secret namewhich nobody but the High Priest was allowed to say. 

When you lay in the dark and shut your eyes tight and waited, you couldsee the light, shaped like the vinaigrette, in front of you. It quiveredand shone brighter, and you saw in the middle, first, a dark blue colour, and then the black marks that were the real name of God. She was glad shecouldn't read it, for she would have been certain to let it out some daywhen she wasn't thinking. 

Perhaps Mamma knew, and was not allowed to say it. Supposing she forgot?

At church they sang "Praise Him in His name Jah and rejoice before Him. "Jah was God's pet-name, short for Jehovah. It was a silly name--Jah. Somehow you couldn't help thinking of God as a silly person; he wasalways flying into tempers, and he was jealous. He was like Papa. Danksaid Papa was jealous of Mark because Mamma was so fond of him. There wasa picture of God in the night nursery. He had a big flowing beard, and avery straight nose, like Papa, and he was lying on a sort of sofa thatwas a cloud. Little Jesus stood underneath him, between the Virgin Maryand Joseph, and the Holy Ghost was descending on him in the form of adove. His real name was Jesus Christ, but they called him Emmanuel. 

 "There is a fountain filled with blood Drawn from Emmanuel's veins; And sinners plunged beneath that flood Lose all their guilty stains. "

That was another frightening thing. It would be like thefountain in Aunt Bella's garden, with blood in it instead ofwater. The goldfishes would die. 

Mark was pleased when she said that Sarah wouldn't be allowed to go toHeaven because she would try to catch the Holy Ghost. 

Jesus was not like God. He was good and kind. When he grew up he wasalways dressed in pink and blue, and he had sad dark eyes and a little, close, tidy beard like Uncle Victor. You could love Jesus. 

Jenny loved him. She was a Wesleyan; and her niece Catty was a Wesleyan. Catty marched round and round the kitchen table with the dish-cloth, drying the plates and singing:

 "'I love Jesus, yes, I do, _For_ the Bible tells me _to_!'"

and

 "'I am so glad that my Father in Heaven Tells of His love in the book He has given-- I am so glad that Jesus loves me, Jesus loves me, Jesus loves even me!'"

On New Year's Eve Jenny and Catty went to the Wesleyan Chapel at Ilfordto sing the New Year in. Catty talked about the Old Year as if it washorrid and the New Year as if it was nice. She said that at twelveo'clock you ought to open the window wide and let the Old Year go out andthe New Year come in. If you didn't something dreadful would happen. 

Downstairs there was a party. Uncle Victor and Aunt Lavvy and AuntCharlotte were there, and the big boys from Vinings and the Vicarage atAldborough Hatch. Mark and Dank and Roddy were sitting up, and Roddy hadpromised to wake her when the New Year was coming. 

He left the door open so that she could hear the clock strike twelve. Shegot up and opened the windows ready. There were three in Mamma's room. She opened them all. 

The air outside was like clear black water and very cold. You couldn'tsee the garden wall; the dark fields were close--close against the house. One--Two--Three. 

Seven--When the last stroke sounded the New Year would have come in. 

Ten--Eleven--Twelve. 

The bells rang out; the bells of Ilford, the bells of Barkingside, andfar beyond the flats and the cemetery there would be Bow bells, andbeyond that the bells of the City of London. They clanged together andshe trembled. The sounds closed over her; they left off and began again, not very loud, but tight--tight, crushing her heart, crushing tears outof her eyelids. When the bells stopped there was a faint whirring sound. That was the Old Year, that was eighteen sixty-nine, going out by itselfin the dark, going away over the fields. 

Mamma was not pleased when she came to bed and found the door and windowsopen and Mary awake in the cot. 

II. 

At the end of January she was seven years old. Something was bound tohappen when you were seven. 

She was moved out of Mamma's room to sleep by herself on the top floor inthe night nursery. And the day nursery was turned into the boys'schoolroom. 

When you were little and slept in the cot behind the curtain Mamma wouldsometimes come and read you to sleep with the bits you wanted: "The Lordis my Shepherd, " and "Or ever the silver cord be loosed or the goldenbowl be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the fountain or the wheelbroken at the cistern, " and "the city had no need of the sun, neither ofthe moon, to shine in it; for the glory of God did lighten it, and theLamb is the light thereof. "

When you were frightened she taught you to say, "He that dwelleth in thesecret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of theAlmighty.... He shall cover thee with His feathers and under His wingsshalt thou trust.... Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night. "And you were allowed to have a night-light. 

Now it was all different. You went to bed half an hour later, while Mammawas dressing for dinner, and when she came to tuck you up the bell rangand she had to run downstairs, quick, so as not to keep Papa waiting. Youhung on to her neck and untucked yourself, and she always got away beforeyou could kiss her seven times. And there was no night-light. You had toread the Bible in the morning, and it always had to be the bits Mammawanted, out of Genesis and the Gospel of St. John. 

You had to learn about the one God and the three Persons. The one God wasthe nice, clever, happy God who made Mamma and Mark and Jenny and the sunand Sarah and the kittens. He was the God you really believed in. 

At night when you lay on your back in the dark you thought about beingborn and about arithmetic and God. The sacred number three went intoeighteen sixty-nine and didn't come out again; so did seven. She likednumbers that fitted like that with no loose ends left over. Mr. Sippettsaid there were things you could do with the loose ends of numbers tomake them fit. That was fractions. Supposing there was somewhere in theworld a number that simply wouldn't fit? Mr. Sippett said there was nosuch number. But queer things happened. You were seven years old, yet youhad had eight birthdays. There was the day you were born, January thetwenty-fourth, eighteen sixty-three, at five o'clock in the morning. Whenyou were born you weren't any age at all, not a minute old, not a second, not half a second. But there was eighteen sixty-two and there was Januarythe twenty-third and the minute just before you were born. You couldn'treally tell when the twenty-third ended and the twenty-fourth began;because when you counted sixty minutes for the hour and sixty seconds forthe minute, there was still the half second and the half of that, and soon for ever and ever. 

You couldn't tell when you were really born. And nobody could tell youwhat being born was. Perhaps nobody knew. Jenny said being born was justbeing born. Sarah's grandchildren were born in the garden under the wallwhere the jasmine grew. Roddy shouted at the back door, and when you ranto look he stretched out his arms across the doorway and wouldn't let youthrough. Roddy was excited and frightened; and Mamma said he had beenvery good because he stood across the door. 

There was being born and there was dying. If you died this minute therewould be the minute after. Then, if you were good, your soul was inHeaven and your body was cold and stiff like Miss Thompson's mother. Andthere was Lazarus. "He hath been in the grave four days and by this timehe stinketh. " That was dreadfully frightening; but they had to say it toshow that Lazarus was really dead. That was how you could tell. 

"'Lord, if thou hadst been here our brother had not died. '"

That was beautiful. When you thought of it you wanted to cry. 

Supposing Mamma died? Supposing Mark died? Or Dank or Roddy? Or evenUncle Victor? Even Papa?

They couldn't. Jesus wouldn't let them. 

When you were frightened in the big dark room you thought about God andJesus and the Holy Ghost. They didn't leave you alone a single minute. God and Jesus stood beside the bed, and Jesus kept God in a good temper, and the Holy Ghost flew about the room and perched on the top of thelinen cupboard, and bowed and bowed, and said, "Rook-ke-heroo-oo!Rook-ke-keroo-oo!"

And there was the parroquet. 

Mark had given her the stuffed parroquet on her birthday, and Mamma hadgiven her the Bible and the two grey china vases to make up, with a birdpainted on each. A black bird with a red beak and red legs. She had setthem up on the chimney-piece under the picture of the Holy Family. Sheput the Bible in the middle and the parroquet on the top of the Bible andthe vases one on each side. 

She worshipped them, because of Mamma and Mark. 

She said to herself: "God won't like _that_, but I can't help it. Thekind, clever God won't mind a bit. He's much too busy making things. Andit's not as if they were graven images. "

III. 

Jenny had taken her for a walk to Ilford and they were going home to thehouse in Ley Street. 

There were only two walks that Jenny liked to go: down Ley Street toBarkingside where the little shops were; and up Ley Street to Ilford andMr. Spall's, the cobbler's. She liked Ilford best because of Mr. Spall. She carried your boots to Mr. Spall just as they were gettingcomfortable; she was always ferreting in Sarah's cupboard for a pair totake to him. Mr. Spall was very tall and lean; he had thick blackeyebrows rumpled up the wrong way and a long nose with a red knob at theend of it. A dirty grey beard hung under his chin, and his long, shavedlips curled over in a disagreeable way when he smiled at you. 

When Jenny and Catty went to sing the New Year in at the Wesleyan Chapelhe brought them home. Jenny liked him because his wife was dead, andbecause he was a Wesleyan and Deputy Grand Master of the IndependentOrder of Good Templars. You had to shake hands with him to say good-bye. He always said the same thing: "Next time you come, little Missy, I'llshow you the Deputy Regalia. " But he never did. 

To-day Jenny had made her stand outside in the shop, among the old bootsand the sheets of leather, while she and Mr. Spall went into the backparlour to talk about Jesus. The shop smelt of leather and feet andonions and of Mr. Spall, so that she was glad when they got out again. She wondered how Jenny could bear to sit in the back parlour with Mr. Spall. 

Coming home at first she had to keep close by Jenny's side. Jenny wastired and went slowly; but by taking high prancing and dancing steps shecould pretend that they were rushing along; and once they had turned thecrook of Ley Street she ran on a little way in front of Jenny. Then, walking very fast and never looking back, she pretended that she had goneout by herself. 

When she had passed the row of elms and the farm, and the small brownbrick cottages fenced off with putty-coloured palings, she came to thelow ditches and the flat fields on either side and saw on her left thebare, brown brick, pointed end of the tall house. It was called FiveElms. 

Further down the road the green and gold sign of The Green Man and thescarlet and gold sign of the Horns Tavern hung high on white standardsset up in the road. Further down still, where Ley Street swerved slightlytowards Barkingside, three tall poplars stood in the slant of the swerve. 

A queer white light everywhere, like water thin and clear. Wide fields, flat and still, like water, flooded with the thin, clear light; greyearth, shot delicately with green blades, shimmering. Ley Street, a greyroad, whitening suddenly where it crossed open country, a hard causewaythrown over the flood. The high trees, the small, scattered cottages, thetwo taverns, the one tall house had the look of standing up in water. 

She saw the queer white light for the first time and drew in her breathwith a sharp check. She knew that the fields were beautiful. 

She saw Five Elms for the first time: the long line of its old red-tiledroof, its flat brown face; the three rows of narrow windows, four at thebottom, with the front door at the end of the row, five at the top, fivein the middle; their red brick eye-brows; their black glassy starebetween the drawn-back curtains. She noticed how high and big the houselooked on its slender plot of grass behind the brick wall that held upthe low white-painted iron railing. 

A tall iron gate between brown brick pillars, topped by stone balls. Aflagged path to the front door. Crocuses, yellow, white, white andpurple, growing in the border of the grass plot. She saw them for thefirst time. 

The front door stood open. She went in. 

The drawing-room at the back was full of the queer white light. Thingsstood out in it, sharp and suddenly strange, like the trees and houses inthe light outside: the wine-red satin stripes in the grey damask curtainsat the three windows; the rings of wine-red roses on the grey carpet; thetarnished pattern on the grey wall-paper; the furniture shining like darkwine; the fluted emerald green silk in the panel of the piano and thehanging bag of the work-table; the small wine-red flowers on the palegreen chintz; the green Chinese bowls in the rosewood cabinet; the blueand red parrot on the chair. 

Her mother sat at the far end of the room. She was sorting beads intotrays in a box lined with sandal wood. 

Mary stood at the doorway looking in, swinging her hat in her hand. Suddenly, without any reason, she was so happy that she could hardly bearit. 

Mamma looked up. She said, "What are you doing standing there?"

She ran to her and hid her face in her lap. She caught Mamma's hands andkissed them. They smelt of sandal wood. They moved over her hair withslight quick strokes that didn't stay, that didn't care. 

Mamma said, "There. That'll do. That'll do. "

She climbed up on a chair and looked out of the window. She could seeMamma's small beautiful nose bending over the tray of beads, and herbright eyes that slid slantwise to look at her. And under the window shesaw the brown twigs of the lilac bush tipped with green. 

Her happiness was sharp and still like the white light. 

Mamma said, "What did you see when you were out with Jenny to-day?"

"Nothing. "

"Nothing? And what are you looking at?"

"Nothing, Mamma. "

"Then go upstairs and take your things off. Quick!"

She went very slowly, holding herself with care, lest she should jar herhappiness and spill it. 

One of the windows of her room was open. She stood a little while lookingout. 

Beyond the rose-red wall of the garden she saw the flat furrowed field, stripes of grey earth and vivid green. In the middle of the field thefive elms in a row, high and slender; four standing close together, oneapart. Each held up a small rounded top, fine as a tuft of feathers. 

On her left towards Ilford, a very long row of high elms screened off thebare flats from the village. Where it ended she saw Drake's Farm; blacktimbered barns and sallow haystacks beside a clump of trees. Behind thefive elms, on the edge of the earth, a flying line of trees set wideapart, small, thin trees, flying away low down under the sky. 

She looked and looked. Her happiness mixed itself up with the queer lightand with the flat fields and the tall, bare trees. 

She turned from the window and saw the vases that Mamma had given herstanding on the chimney-piece. The black birds with red beaks and redlegs looked at her. She threw herself on the bed and pressed her faceinto the pillow and cried "Mamma! Mamma!"

IV. 

Passion Week. It gave you an awful feeling of something going to happen. 

In the long narrow dining-room the sunlight through the three windowsmade a strange and solemn blue colour in the dark curtains. Mamma sat upat the mahogany table, looking sad and serious, with the Prayer Book openbefore her at the Litany. When you went in you knew that you would haveto read about the Crucifixion. Nothing could save you. 

Still you did find out things about God. In the Epistle it said:"'Wherefore art thou red in thine apparel and thy garments like him thattreadeth the wine-fat? I have trodden the wine-press alone, and of thepeople there was none with me: for I will tread them in my anger, andtrample them in my fury, and their blood shall be sprinkled upon mygarments, and I will stain all my raiment. '"

The Passion meant that God had flown into another temper and that Jesuswas crucified to make him good again. Mark said you mustn't say that toMamma; but he owned that it looked like it. Anyhow it was easier to thinkof it that way than to think that God sent Jesus down to be crucifiedbecause you were naughty. 

There were no verses in the Prayer-Book Bible, only long grey slabs liketombstones. You kept on looking for the last tombstone. When you came tothe one with the big black letters, THE KING OF THE JEWS, you knew thatit would soon be over. 

"'They clothed him with purple, and platted a crown of thorns and put iton his head.... '" She read obediently: "'And when the sixth hour wascome ... And when the sixth hour was come there was darkness over the wholeland until the ninth hour. And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out with aloud voice.... And Jesus cried with a loud voice ... With a loud voice, and gave up the ghost. '"

Mamma was saying that the least you could do was to pay attention. Butyou couldn't pay attention every time. The first time it was beautifuland terrible; but after many times the beauty went and you were onlyfrightened. When she tried to think about the crown of thorns she thoughtof the new hat Catty had bought for Easter Sunday and what Mr. Spall didwhen he ate the parsnips. 

Through the barred windows of the basement she could hear Catty singingin the pantry:

 "'I am so glad that Jesus loves me, Jesus loves me, Jesus loves me.... '"

Catty was happy when she sang and danced round and round with thedish-cloth. And Jenny and Mr. Spall were happy when they talked aboutJesus. But Mamma was not happy. She had had to read the Morning Prayerand the Psalms and the Lessons and the Litany to herself every morning;and by Thursday she was tired and cross. 

Passion Week gave you an awful feeling. 

Good Friday would be the worst. It was the real day that Jesus died. There would be the sixth hour and the ninth hour. Perhaps there would bea darkness. 

But when Good Friday came you found a smoking hot-cross bun oneverybody's plate at breakfast, tasting of spice and butter. And you wentto Aldborough Hatch for Service. She thought: "If the darkness does comeit won't be so bad to bear at Aldborough Hatch. " She liked the newwhite-washed church with the clear windows, where you could stand on thehassock and look out at the green hill framed in the white arch. That wasChigwell. 

 "'There is a green hill far a-a-way Without a city wall--'"

The green hill hadn't got any city wall. Epping Forest and HainaultForest were there. You could think of them, or you could look at Mr. Propart's nice clean-shaved face while he read about the Crucifixion andpreached about God's mercy and his justice. He did it all in a soothing, inattentive voice; and when he had finished he went quick into the vestryas if he were glad it was all over. And when you met him at the gate hedidn't look as if Good Friday mattered very much. 

In the afternoon she forgot all about the sixth hour and the ninth hour. Just as she was going to think about them Mark and Dank put her in thedirty clothes-basket and rolled her down the back stairs to make herhappy. They shut themselves up in the pantry till she had stoppedlaughing, and when Catty opened the door the clock struck and Mark saidthat was the ninth hour. 

It was all over. And nothing had happened. Nothing at all. 

Only, when you thought of what had been done to Jesus, it didn't seemright, somehow, to have eaten the hot-cross buns. 

V. 

Grandmamma and Grandpapa Olivier were buried in the City of LondonCemetery. A long time ago, so long that even Mark couldn't remember it, Uncle Victor had brought Grandmamma in a coffin all the way fromLiverpool to London in the train. 

On Saturday afternoon Mamma had to put flowers on the grave for EasterSunday, because of Uncle Victor and Aunt Lavvy. She took Roddy and Marywith her. They drove in Mr. Parish's wagonette, and called for Aunt Lavvyat Uncle Victor's tall white house at the bottom of Ilford High Street. Aunt Lavvy was on the steps, waiting for them, holding a big cross ofwhite flowers. You could see Aunt Charlotte's face at the dining-roomwindow looking out over the top of the brown wire blind. She had her haton, as if she had expected to be taken too. Her eyes were sharp andangry, and Uncle Victor stood behind her with his hand on her shoulder. 

Aunt Lavvy gave Mary the flower cross and climbed stiffly into thewagonette. Mary felt grown up and important holding the big cross on herknee. The white flowers gave out a thick, sweet smell. 

As they drove away she kept on thinking about Aunt Charlotte, and aboutUncle Victor bringing Grandmamma in a coffin in the train. It was very, very brave of him. She was sorry for Aunt Charlotte. Aunt Charlotte hadwanted to go to the cemetery and they hadn't let her go. Perhaps she wasstill looking over the blind, sharp and angry because they wouldn't lether go. 

Aunt Lavvy said, "We couldn't take Charlotte. It excited her too muchlast time. " As if she knew what you were thinking. 

The wagonette stopped by the railway-crossing at Manor Park, and they gotout. Mamma told Mr. Parish to drive round to the Leytonstone side andwait for them there at the big gates. They wanted to walk through thecemetery and see what was to be seen. 

Beyond the railway-crossing a muddy lane went along a field of coarsegrass under a hedge of thorns and ended at a paling. Roddy whisperedexcitedly that they were in Wanstead Flats. The hedge shut off thecemetery from the flats; through thin places in the thorn bushes youcould see tombstones, very white tombstones against very dark trees. There was a black wooden door in the hedge for you to go in by. The laneand the thorn bushes and the black door reminded Mary of something shehad seen before somewhere. Something frightening. 

When they got through the black door there were no tombstones. Whatshowed through the hedge were the tops of high white pillars standing upamong trees a long way off. They had come into a dreadful, bare, clay-coloured plain, furrowed into low mounds, as if a plough had gonecriss-cross over it. 

You saw nothing but mounds. Some of them were made of loose earth; somewere patched over with rough sods that gaped in a horrible way. Perhapsif you looked through the cracks you would see down into the grave wherethe coffin was. The mounds had a fresh, raw look, as if all the people inthe City of London had died and been buried hurriedly the night before. And there were no stones with names, only small, flat sticks at one endof each grave to show where the heads were. 

Roddy said, "We've got to go all through this to get to the other side. "

They could see Mamma and Aunt Lavvy a long way on in front picking theirway gingerly among the furrows. If only Mark had been there instead ofRoddy. Roddy _would_ keep on saying: "The great plague of London. Thegreat plague of London, " to frighten himself. He pointed to a heap ofearth and said it was the first plague pit. 

In the middle of the ploughed-up plain she saw people in black walkingslowly and crookedly behind a coffin that went staggering on black legsunder a black pall. She tried not to look at them. 

When she looked again they had stopped beside a heap that Roddy said wasthe second plague pit. Men in black crawled out from under the coffin asthey put it down. She could see the bulk of it flattened out under theblack pall. Against the raw, ochreish ground the figures of two mutesstood up, black and distinct in their high hats tied in the bunched out, streaming weepers. There was something filthy and frightful about thefigures of the mutes. And when they dragged the pall from the coffinthere was something filthy and frightful about the action. 

"Roddy, " she said, "I'm frightened. "

Roddy said, "So am I. I say, supposing we went back? By ourselves. AcrossWanstead Flats. " He was excited. 

"We mustn't. That would frighten Mamma. "

"Well, then, we'll have to go straight through. "

They went, slowly, between the rows of mounds, along a narrow path ofyellow clay that squeaked as their boots went in and out. Roddy held herhand. They took care not to tread on the graves. Every step brought themnearer to the funeral. They hadn't pointed it out to each other. They hadpretended it wasn't there. Now it was no use pretending; they could seethe coffin. 

"Roddy--I can't--I can't go past the funeral. "

"We've got to. "

He looked at her with solemn eyes, wide open in his beautiful face. Hewas not really frightened, he was only trying to be because he liked it. 

They went on. The tight feeling under her waist had gone; her body feltloose and light as if it didn't belong to her; her knees were soft andsank under her. Suddenly she let go Roddy's hand. She stared at thefuneral, paralysed with fright. 

At the end of the path Mamma and Aunt Lavvy stood and beckoned to them. Aunt Lavvy was coming towards them, carrying her white flower cross. Theybroke into a stumbling, nightmare run. 

The bare clay plain stretched on past the place where Mamma and AuntLavvy had turned. The mounds here were big and high. They found Mamma andAunt Lavvy standing by a very deep and narrow pit. A man was climbing upout of the pit on a ladder. You could see a pool of water shining fardown at the bottom. 

Mamma was smiling gently and kindly at the man and asking him why thegrave was dug so deep. He said, "Why, because this 'ere lot and thatthere what you've come acrost is the pauper buryin' ground. We shovel 'emin five at a time this end. "

Roddy said, "Like they did in the great plague of London. "

"I don't know about no plague. But there's five coffins in each of thesehere graves, piled one atop of the other. "

Mamma seemed inclined to say more to the grave-digger; but Aunt Lavvyfrowned and shook her head at her, and they went on to where a path ofcoarse grass divided the pauper burying ground from the rest. They werenow quite horribly near the funeral. And going down the grass path theysaw another that came towards them; the palled coffin swaying on headlessshoulders. They turned from it into a furrow between the huddled mounds. The white marble columns gleamed nearer among the black trees. 

They crossed a smooth gravel walk into a crowded town of dead people. Tombstones as far as you could see; upright stones, flat slabs, roundedslabs, slabs like coffins, stone boxes with flat tops, broken columns;pointed pillars. Rows of tall black trees. Here and there a single treesticking up stiffly among the tombstones. Very little trees that werequeer and terrifying. People in black moving about the tombstones. Abroad road and a grey chapel with pointed gables. Under a black tree asquare plot enclosed by iron railings. 

Grandmamma and Grandpapa Olivier were buried in one half of the plotunder a white marble slab. In the other half, on the bare grass, a whitemarble curb marked out a place for another grave. 

Roddy said, "Who's buried there?"

Mamma said, "Nobody. Yet. That's for--"

Mary saw Aunt Lavvy frown again and put her finger to her mouth. 

She said, "Who? For who?" An appalling curiosity and fear possessed her. And when Aunt Lavvy took her hand she knew that the empty place wasmarked out for Mamma and Papa. 

Outside the cemetery gates, in the white road, the black funeral horsestossed their heads and neighed, and the black plumes quivered on thehearses. In the wagonette she sat close beside Aunt Lavvy, with AuntLavvy's shawl over her eyes. 

She wondered how she knew that you were frightened when Mamma didn't. Mamma couldn't, because she was brave. She wasn't afraid of the funeral. 

When Roddy said, "She oughtn't to have taken us, she ought to have knownit would frighten us, " Mark was angry with him. He said, "She thoughtyou'd like it, you little beast. Because of the wagonette. "

Darling Mamma. She had taken them because she thought they would like it. Because of the wagonette. Because she was brave, like Mark. 

VI. 

Dead people really did rise. Supposing all the dead people in the City ofLondon Cemetery rose and came out of their graves and went about thecity? Supposing they walked out as far as Ilford? Crowds and crowds ofthem, in white sheets? Supposing they got into the garden?

"Please, God, keep me from thinking about the Resurrection. Please God, keep me from dreaming about coffins and funerals and ghosts and skeletonsand corpses. " She said it last, after the blessings, so that God couldn'tforget. But it was no use. 

If you said texts: "Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night. ""Yea, though I walk through the City of London Cemetery. " It was no use. 

 "The trumpet shall sound and the dead shall arise ... Incorruptible. "

That was beautiful. Like a bright light shining. But you couldn't thinkabout it long enough. And the dreams went on just the same: the dream ofthe ghost in the passage, the dream of the black coffin coming round theturn of the staircase and squeezing you against the banister; the dreamof the corpse that came to your bed. She could see the round back and thecurled arms under the white sheet. 

The dreams woke her with a sort of burst. Her heart was jumping about andthumping; her face and hair were wet with water that came out of herskin. 

The grey light in the passage was like the ghost-light of the dreams. 

Gas light was a good light; but when you turned it on Jenny came up andput it out again. She said, "Goodness knows when you'll get to sleep with_that_ light flaring. "

There was never anybody about at bedtime. Jenny was dishing up thedinner. Harriet was waiting. Catty only ran up for a minute to undo thehooks and brush your hair. 

When Mamma sent her to bed she came creeping back into the dining-room. Everybody was eating dinner. She sickened with fright in the steam andsmell of dinner. She leaned her head against Mamma and whimpered, andMamma said in her soft voice, "Big girls don't cry because it's bed-time. Only silly baby girls are afraid of ghosts. "

Mamma wasn't afraid. 

When she cried Mark left his dinner and carried her upstairs, past theplace where the ghost was, and stayed with her till Catty came. 

VII

I. 

"Minx! Minx! Minx!"

Mark had come in from the garden with Mamma. He was calling to Mary. Minxwas the name he had given her. Minx was a pretty name and she loved itbecause he had given it her. Whenever she heard him call she left whatshe was doing and ran to him. 

Papa came out of the library with Boag's Dictionary open in his hand. "'Minx: A pert, wanton girl. A she-puppy. ' Do you hear that, Caroline? Hecalls his sister a wanton she-puppy. " But Mamma had gone back into thegarden. 

Mark stood at the foot of the stairs and Mary stood at the turn. She hadone hand on the rail of the banister, the other pressed hard against thewall. She leaned forward on tiptoe, measuring her distance. When shelooked at the stairs they fell from under her in a grey dizziness, sothat Mark looked very far away. 

They waited till Papa had gone back into the library--Mark held out hisarms. 

"Jump, Minky! Jump!"

She let go the rail and drew herself up. A delicious thrill of dangerwent through her and out at her fingers. She flung herself into space andMark caught her. His body felt hard and strong as it received her. Theydid it again and again. 

That was the "faith-jump. " You knew that you would be killed if Markdidn't catch you, but you had faith that he would catch you; and healways did. 

Mark and Dan were going to school at Chelmsted on the thirteenth ofSeptember, and it was the last week in August now. Mark and Mamma werealways looking for each other. Mamma would come running up to theschoolroom and say, "Where's Mark? Tell Mark I want him"; and Mark wouldgo into the garden and say, "Where's Mamma? I want her. " And Mamma wouldput away her trowel and gardening gloves and go walks with him which shehated; and Mark would leave Napoleon Buonaparte and the plan of theBattle of Austerlitz to dig in the garden (and he loathed digging) withMamma. 

This afternoon he had called to Mary to come out brook-jumping. Markcould jump all the brooks in the fields between Ilford and Barkingside, and in the plantations beyond Drake's Farm; he could jump the Pool ofSiloam where the water from the plantations runs into the lake belowVinings. Where there was no place for a little girl of seven to cross hecarried her in his arms and jumped. He would stand outside in the laneand put his hands on the wall and turn heels over head into the garden. 

She said to herself: "In six years and five months I shall be fourteen. Ishall jump the Pool of Siloam and come into the garden head over heels. "And Mamma called her a little humbug when she said she was afraid to gofor a walk with Jenny lest a funeral should be coming along the road. 

II. 

The five elm trees held up their skirts above the high corn. The flatsurface of the corn-tops was still. Hot glassy air quivered like a thinsteam over the brimming field. 

The glazed yellow walls of the old nursery gave out a strong light andheat. The air indoors was dry and smelt dusty like the hot, crackling airabove the corn. The children had come in from their play in the fields;they leaned out of the windows and talked about what they were going tobe. 

Mary said, "I shall paint pictures and play the piano and ride in acircus. I shall go out to the countries where the sand is and tamezebras; and I shall marry Mark and have thirteen children with blue eyeslike Meta. "

Roddy was going to be the captain of a cruiser. Dan was going to Texas, or some place where Papa couldn't get at him, to farm. Mark was going tobe a soldier like Marshal McMahon. 

It was Grandpapa and Grandmamma's fault that he was not a soldier now. 

"If, " he said, "they'd let Papa marry Mamma when he wanted to, I mighthave been born in eighteen fifty-two. I'd be eighteen by this time. Ishould have gone into the French Army and I should have been with McMahonat Sedan now. "

"You might have been killed, " Mary said. 

"That wouldn't have mattered a bit. I should have been at Sedan. Nothingmatters, Minky, as long as you get what you want. "

"If you were killed Mamma and me would die, too, the same minute. Papawould be sorry, then; but not enough to kill him, so that we should go toheaven together without him and be happy. "

"Mamma wouldn't be happy without him. We couldn't shut him out. "

"No, " Mary said; "but we could pray to God not to let him come up toosoon. "

III. 

Sedan--Sedan--Sedan. 

Papa came out into the garden where Mamma was pulling weeds out of thehot dry soil. He flapped the newspaper and read about the Battle ofSedan. Mamma left off pulling weeds out and listened. 

Mark had stuck the picture of Marshal McMahon over the schoolroomchimney-piece. Papa had pinned the war-map to the library door. Mark wasrestless. He kept on going into the library to look at the war-map andPapa kept on turning him out again. He was in a sort of mysteriousdisgrace because of Sedan. Roddy was excited about Sedan. Dan followedMark as he went in and out; he was furious with Papa because of Mark. 

Mamma had been a long time in the library talking to Papa. They sent forMark just before dinner-time. When Mary ran in to say good-night shefound him there. 

Mark was saying, "You needn't think I want your beastly money. I shallenlist. "

Mamma said, "If he enlists, Emilius, it'll kill me. "

And Papa, "You hear what your mother says, sir. Isn't that enough foryou?"

Mark loved Mamma; but he was not going to do what she wanted. He wasgoing to do something that would kill her. 

IV. 

Papa walked in the garden in the cool of the evening, like the Lord God. And he was always alone. When you thought of him you thought of Jehovah. 

There was something funny about other people's fathers. Mr. Manisty, ofVinings, who rode along Ley Street with his two tall, thin sons, as if hewere actually proud of them; Mr. Batty, the Vicar of Barkingside, whocalled his daughter Isabel his "pretty one"; Mr. Farmer, the curate ofSt. Mary's Chapel, who walked up and down the room all night with thebaby; and Mr. Propart, who went about the public roads with Humphrey andArthur positively hanging on him. Dan said Humphrey and Arthur were tameand domestic because they were always going about with Mr. Propart andtalking to him as if they liked it. Mark had once seen Mr. Propart tryingto jump a ditch on the Aldborough Road. It was ridiculous. Humphrey andArthur had to grab him by the arms and pull him over. Mary was sorry forthe Propart boys because they hadn't got a mother who was sweet andpretty like Mamma and a father called Emilius Olivier. Emilius couldn'tjump ditches any more than Mr. Propart; but then he knew he couldn't, andas Mark said, he had the jolly good sense not to try. You couldn't beJehovah and jump ditches. 

Emilius Olivier was everything a father ought to be. 

Then suddenly, for no reason at all, he left off being Jehovah and begantrying to behave like Mr. Batty. 

It was at dinner, the last Sunday before the thirteenth. Mamma had movedRoddy and Mary from their places so that Mark and Dan could sit besideher. Mary was sitting at the right hand of Papa in the glory of theFather. The pudding had come in; blanc-mange, and Mark's pudding withwhipped cream hiding the raspberry jam. It was Roddy's turn to be helped;his eyes were fixed on the snow-white, pure blanc-mange shuddering in theglass dish, and Mamma had just asked him which he would have when Papasent Mark and Dan out of the room. You couldn't think why he had done itthis time unless it was because Mark laughed when Roddy said in hisproud, dignified voice, "I'll have a little piece of the Virgin's womb, please, first. " Or it may have been because of Mark's pudding. He neverliked it when they had Mark's pudding. Anyhow, Mark and Dan had to go, and as they went he drew Mary's chair closer to him and heaped her platewith cream and jam, looking very straight at Mamma as he did it. 

"You might have left them alone, " Mamma said, "on their last Sunday. Theywon't be here to annoy you so very long. "

Papa said, "There are three days yet till the thirteenth. "

"Three days! You'll count the hours and the minutes till you've got whatyou want. "

"What I want is peace and quiet in my house and to get a word inedgeways, sometimes, with my own wife. "

"You've no business to have a wife if you can't put up with your ownchildren. "

"It isn't my business to have a wife, " Papa said. "It's my pleasure. Mybusiness is to insure ships. And you see me putting up with Mary verywell. I suppose she's my own child. "

"Mark and Dan are your own children first. "

"_Are_ they? To judge by your infatuation I should have said theyweren't. 'Mary, Mary, quite contrary, how does your garden grow? Silverbells and cockle shells, and chocolate creams all in a row. '"

He took a large, flat box of chocolates out of his pocket and laid itbeside her plate. And he looked straight at Mamma again. 

"If those are the chocolates I reminded you to get for--for the hamper, Iwon't have them opened. "

"They are _not_ the chocolates you reminded me to get for--the hamper. Isuppose Mark's stomach _is_ a hamper. They are the chocolates I remindedmyself to get for Mary. "

Then Mamma said a peculiar thing. 

"Are you trying to show me that you're not jealous of Mary?"

"I'm not trying to show you anything. You know I'm not jealous of Mary. And you know there's no reason why I should be. "

"To hear you, Emilius, anybody would think I wasn't fond of my owndaughter. Mary darling, you'd better run away. "

"And Mary darling, " he mocked her, "you'd better take your chocolateswith you. "

Mary said: "I don't want any chocolates, Papa. "

"Is that her contrariness, or just her Mariness?"

"Whatever it is it's all the thanks _you_ get, and serve you right, too, "said Mamma. 

She went upstairs to persuade Dan that Papa didn't mean it. It was justhis way, and they'd see he would be different to-morrow. 

But to-morrow and the next day and the next he was the same. He didn'tactually send Mark and Dan out of the room again, but he tried to pretendto himself that they weren't there by refusing to speak to them. 

"Do you think, " Mark said, "he'll keep it up till the last minute?"

He did; even when he heard the sound of Mr. Parish's wagonette in theroad, coming to take Mark and Dan away. They were sitting at breakfast, trying not to look at him for fear they should laugh, or at Mamma forfear they should cry, trying not to look at each other. Catty brought inthe cakes, the hot buttered Yorkshire cakes that were never served forbreakfast except on Christmas Day and birthdays. Mary wondered whetherPapa would say or do anything. He couldn't. Everybody knew those cakeswere sacred. Catty set them on the table with a sort of crash and ran outof the room, crying. Mamma's mouth quivered. 

Papa looked at the cakes; he looked at Mamma; he looked at Mark. Mark wasstaring at nothing with a firm grin on his face. 

"The assuagers of grief, " Papa said. "Pass round the assuagers. "

The holy cakes were passed round. Everybody took a piece except Dan. 

Papa pressed him. "Try an assuager. Do. "

And Mamma pleaded, "Yes, Dank. "

"Do you hear what your mother says?"

Dan's eyes were red-rimmed. He took a double section of cake and tried tobite his way through. 

At the first taste tears came out of his eyes and fell on his cake. Andwhen Mamma saw that she burst out crying. 

Mary put her piece down untasted and bit back her sobs. Roddy pushed hispiece away; and Mark began to eat his, suddenly, bowing over it with anaffectation of enjoyment. 

Outside in the road Mr. Parish was descending from the box of hiswagonette. Papa looked at his watch. He was going with them to Chelmsted. 

And Mamma whispered to Mark and Dan with her last kiss, "He'll be allright in the train. "

It was all over. Mary and Roddy sat in the dining-room where Mamma hadleft them. They had shut their eyes so as not to see the empty chairspushed back and the pieces of the sacred cakes, bitten and abandoned. They had stopped their ears so as not to hear the wheels of Mr. Parish'swagonette taking Mark and Dan away. 

Hours afterwards Mamma came upon Mary huddled up in a corner of thedrawing-room. 

"Mamma--Mamma--I _can't_ bear it. I can't live without Mark. And Dan. "

Mamma sat down and took her in her arms and rocked her, rocked herwithout a word, soothing her own grief. 

Papa found them like that when he came back from Chelmsted. He stood inthe doorway looking at them for a moment, then slunk out of the room asif he were ashamed of himself. When Mamma sent Mary out to say good-byeto him, he was standing beside the little sumach tree that Mark gaveMamma on her birthday. He was smiling at the sumach tree as if he lovedit and was sorry for it. 

And Mamma got a letter from Mark in the morning to say she was right. Papa had been quite decent in the train. 

V. 

After Mark and Dan had gone a great and very remarkable change came overPapa and Mamma. Mamma left off saying the funny things that Mary couldnot understand, and Papa left off teasing and flying into tempers andlooking like Jehovah and walking by himself in the cool of the evening. He followed Mamma about the garden. He hung over her chair, like Mark, asshe sat sewing. You came upon him suddenly on the stairs and in thepassages, and he would look at you as if you were not there, and say, "Where's your mother? Go and tell her I want her. " And Mamma would putaway her trowel and her big leather gloves and go to him. She would sitfor hours in the library while he flapped the newspaper and read to herin a loud voice about Mr. Gladstone whom she hated. 

Sometimes he would come home early from the office, and Mamma and Marywould be ready for him, and they would all go together to call at Viningsor Barkingside Vicarage or on the Proparts. 

Or Mr. Parish's wagonette would be ordered, and Mamma and Mary would puton their best clothes very quick and go up to London with him, and hewould take them to St. Paul's or Maskelyne and Cooke's, or the NationalGallery or the British Museum. Or they would walk slowly, very slowly, upRegent Street, stopping at the windows of the bonnet shops while Mammapicked out the bonnet she would buy if she could afford it. And perhapsthe next day a bonnet would come in a bandbox, a bonnet that frightenedher when she put it on and looked at herself in the glass. She wouldpretend it was one of the bonnets she had wanted; and when Papa hadforgotten about it she would pull all the trimming off and put it all onagain a different way, and Papa would say it was an even more beautifulbonnet than he had thought. 

You might have supposed that he was sorry because he was thinking aboutMark and Dan and trying to make up for having been unkind to them. But hewas not sorry. He was glad. Glad about something that Mamma had done. Hewould go about whistling some gay tune, or you caught him stroking hismoustache and parting it over his rich lips that smiled as if he werethinking of what Mamma had done to make him happy. The red specks andsmears had gone from his eyes, they were clear and blue, and they lookedat you with a kind, gentle look, like Uncle Victor's. His very beard washappy. 

"You may not know it, but your father is the handsomest man in Essex, "Mamma said. 

Perhaps it wasn't anything that Mamma had done. Perhaps he was only happybecause he was being good. Every Sunday he went to church at Barkingsidewith Mamma, kneeling close to her in the big pew and praying in a great, ghostly voice, "Good Lord, deliver us!" When the psalms and hymns beganhe rose over the pew-ledge, yards and yards of him, as if he stood onmany hassocks, and he lifted up his beard and sang. All these times theair fairly tingled with him; he seemed to beat out of himself and spreadaround him the throb of violent and overpowering life. And in theevenings towards sunset they walked together in the fields, and Maryfollowed them, lagging behind in the borders where the sharlock and wildrye and poppies grew. When she caught up with them she heard themtalking. 

Once Mamma said, "Why can't you always be like this, Emilius?"

And Papa said, "Why, indeed!"

And when Christmas came and Mark and Dan were back again he was as crueland teasing as he had ever been. 

VI. 

Eighteen seventy-one. 

One cold day Roddy walked into the Pool of Siloam to recover his sailingboat which had drifted under the long arch of the bridge. 

There was no Passion Week and no Good Friday and no Easter that spring, only Roddy's rheumatic fever. Roddy in bed, lying on his back, his facewhite and sharp, his hair darkened and glued with the sweat that pouredfrom his hair and soaked into the bed. Roddy crying out with pain whenthey moved him. Mamma and Jenny always in Roddy's room, Mr. Spall'ssister in the kitchen. Mary going up and down, tiptoe, on messages, trying not to touch Roddy's bed. 

Dr. Draper calling, talking in a low voice to Mamma, and Mamma crying. Dr. Draper looking at you through his spectacles and putting a thing likea trumpet to your chest and listening through it. 

"You're quite right, Mrs. Olivier. There's nothing wrong with the littlegirl's heart. She's as sound as a bell. "

A dreadful feeling that you had no business to be as sound as a bell. Itwasn't fair to Roddy. 

Something she didn't notice at the time and remembered afterwards whenRoddy was well again. Jenny saying to Mamma, "If it had to be one of themit had ought to have been Miss Mary. "

And Mamma saying to Jenny, "It wouldn't have mattered so much if it hadbeen the girl. "

VII. 

You knew that Catty loved you. There was never the smallest uncertaintyabout it. Her big black eyes shone when she saw you coming. You kissedher smooth cool cheeks, and she hugged you tight and kissed you backagain at once; her big lips made a noise like a pop-gun. When she tuckedyou up at night she said, "I love you so much I could eat you. "

And she would play any game you liked. You had only to say, "Let's playthe going-away game, " and she was off. You began: "I went away to the bighot river where the rhinoceroses and hippopotamuses are"; or: "I wentaway to the desert where the sand is, to catch zebras. I rode on adromedary, flump-flumping through the sand, " and Catty would follow it upwith: "I went away with the Good Templars. We went in a row-boat on alake, and we landed on an island where there was daffodillies growing. Wehad milk and cake; and it blew such a cool breeze. "

Catty was full of love. She loved her father and mother and her littlesister Amelia better than anything in the whole world. Her home was inWales. Tears came into her eyes when she thought about her home and herlittle sister Amelia. 

"Catty--how much do you love me?"

"Armfuls and armfuls. "

"As much as your mother?"

"Very near as much. "

"As much as Amelia?"

"Every bit as much. "

"How much do you think Jenny loves me?"

"Ever so much. "

"No. Jenny loves Roddy best; then Mark; then Dank; then Mamma; then Papa;then me. That isn't ever so much. "

Catty was vexed. "You didn't oughter go measuring people's love, MissMary. "

Still, that was what you did do. With Catty and Jenny you could measuretill you knew exactly where you were. 

Mamma was different. 

You knew _when_ she loved you. You could almost count the times: the timewhen Papa frightened you; the time when you cut your forehead; the timethe lamb died; all the whooping-cough and chicken-pox times, and whenMeta, the wax doll, fell off the schoolroom table and broke her head; andwhen Mark went away to school. Or when you were good and said every wordof your lessons right; when you watched Mamma working in the garden, planting and transplanting the flowers with her clever hands; and whenyou were quiet and sat beside her on the footstool, learning to knit andsew. On Sunday afternoons when she played the hymns and you sang:

 "There's a Friend for little children Above the bright blue sky, "

quite horribly out of tune, and when you listened while she sang herself, "Lead, kindly light, " or "Abide with me, " and her voice was so sweet andgentle that it made you cry. Then you knew. 

Sometimes, when it was not Sunday, she played the Hungarian March, thatwent, with loud, noble noises:

 Droom--Droom--Droom-era-room Droom--Droom--Droom-era-room Droom rer-room-room droom-room-room Droom--Droom--Droom. 

It was wonderful. Mamma was wonderful. She swayed and bowed to the beatof the music, as if she shook it out of her body and not out of thepiano. She smiled to herself when she saw that you were listening. Yousaid "Oh--Mamma! Play it again, " and she played it again. When she hadfinished she stooped suddenly and kissed you. And you knew. 

But she wouldn't say it. You couldn't make her. 

"Say it, Mamma. Say it like you used to. "

Mamma shook her head. 

"I want to hear you say it. "

"Well, I'm not going to. "

"I love you. I ache with loving you. I love you so much that it hurts meto say it. "

"Why do you do it, then?"

"Because it hurts me more not to. Just once. 'I love you. ' Just a weenyonce. "

"You're going to be like your father, tease, tease, tease, all day long, till I'm worn out. "

"I'm not going to be like Papa. I don't tease. It's you that's teasing. How'm I to know you love me if you won't say it?"

Mamma said, "Can't you see what I'm doing?"

"No. "

She was not interested in the thin white stuff and the lace--Mamma'sneedle-work. 

"Well, then, look in the basket. "

The basket was full of tiny garments made of the white stuff, petticoats, drawers and nightgown, sewn with minute tucks and edged with lace. Mammaunfolded them. 

"New clothes, " she said, "for your new dolly. "

"Oh--oh--oh--I love you so much that I can't bear it; you little holyMamma!"

Mamma said, "I'm not holy, and I won't be called holy. I want deeds, notwords. If you love me you'll learn your lessons properly the nightbefore, not just gabble them over hot from the pan. "

"I will, Mamma, I will. Won't you say it?"

"No, " Mamma said, "I won't. "

She sat there with a sort of triumph on her beautiful face, as if shewere pleased with herself because she hadn't said it. And Mary wouldbring the long sheet that dragged on her wrist, and the needle thatpricked her fingers, and sit at Mamma's knee and sew, making a thin trailof blood all along the hem. 

"Why do you look at me so kindly when I'm sewing?"

"Because I like to see you behaving like a little girl, instead oftearing about and trying to do what boys do. "

And Mamma would tell her a story, always the same story, going on and on, about the family of ten children who lived in the farm by the forest. There were seven boys and three girls. The six youngest boys worked onthe farm with their father--yes, he was a _very_ nice father--and theeldest boy worked in the garden with his mother, and the three girlsworked in the house. They could cook and make butter and cheese, and bakebread; and even the youngest little girl could knit and sew. 

"Had they any children?"

"No, they were too busy to think about having children. They were allvery, very happy together, just as they were. "

The story was like the hem, there was never any end to it, for Mamma wasalways finding something else for the three girls to do. She smiled asshe told it, as if she saw something that pleased her. 

Mary felt that she could go on sewing at the hem and pricking her fingerfor ever if Mamma would only keep that look on her face. 

VIII

I. 

"I can't, Jenny, I can't. I know there's a funeral coming. "

Mary stood on the flagstone inside the arch of the open gate. She lookedup and down the road and drew back again into the garden. Jenny, tiredand patient, waited outside. 

"I've told you, Miss Mary, there isn't any funeral. "

"If there isn't there will be. There! I can see it. "

"You see Mr. Parish's high 'at a driving in his wagonette. "

It _was_ Mr. Parish's high hat. When he put the black top on hiswagonette it looked like a hearse. 

They started up Ley Street towards Mr. Spall's cottage. 

Jenny said, "I thought you was going to be such a good girl when MasterRoddy went to school. But I declare if you're not twice as tiresome. "

Roddy had gone to Chelmsted after midsummer. She had to go for walks onthe roads with Jenny now at the risk of meeting funerals. 

This week they had been every day to Ilford to call at Mr. Spall'scottage or at Benny's, the draper's shop in the High Street. 

Jenny didn't believe that a big girl, nine next birthday, could really beafraid of funerals. She thought you were only trying to be tiresome. Shesaid you could stop thinking about funerals well enough when you wanted. You did forget sometimes when nice things happened; when you went to seeMrs. Farmer's baby undressed, and when Isabel Batty came to tea. Isabelwas almost a baby. It felt nice to lift her and curl up her stiff, barley-sugar hair and sponge her weak, pink silk hands. And there werethings that you could do. You could pretend that you were not MaryOlivier but somebody else, that you were grown-up and that the baby andIsabel belonged to you and were there when they were not there. But allthe time you knew there would be a funeral on the road somewhere, andthat some day you would see it. 

When they got into the High Street the funeral was coming along theBarking Road. She saw, before Jenny could see anything at all, the mutes, sitting high, and their black, bunched-up weepers. She turned and ran outof the High Street and back over the railway bridge. Jenny called afterher, "Come back!" and a man on the bridge shouted "Hi, Missy! Stop!" asshe ran down Ley Street. Her legs shook and gave way under her. Once shefell. She ran, staggering, but she ran. People came out of their cottagesto look at her. She thought they had come out to look at the funeral. 

After that she refused to go outside the front door or to look throughthe front windows for fear she should see a funeral. 

They couldn't take her and carry her out; so they let her go for walks inthe back garden. When Papa came home she was sent up to the schoolroom toplay with the doll's house. You could see the road through the high barsof the window at the end of the passage, so that even when Catty lit thegas the top floor was queer and horrible. 

Sometimes doubts came with her terror. She thought: "Nobody loves meexcept Mark. And Mark isn't here. " Mark's image haunted her. She shut hereyes and it slid forward on to the darkness, the strong body, the brave, straight up and down face, the steady, light brown eyes, shining; thefirm, sweet mouth; the sparrow-brown hair with feathery golden tips. Shecould hear Mark's voice calling to her: "Minx! Minky!"

And there was something that Mamma said. It was unkind to be afraid ofthe poor dead people. Mamma said, "Would you run away from Isabel if yousaw her lying in her little coffin?"

II. 

Jenny's new dress had come. 

It was made of grey silk trimmed with black lace, and it lay spread outon the bed in the spare room. Mamma and Aunt Bella stood and looked atit, and shook their heads as if they thought that Jenny had no businessto wear a silk dress. 

Aunt Bella said, "She's a silly woman to go and leave a good home. At herage. "

And Mamma said, "I'd rather see her in her coffin. It would be lessundignified. She meant to do it at Easter; she was only waiting tillRoddy went to school. She's waiting now till after the Christmasholidays. "

Jenny was going to do something dreadful. 

She was going to be married. The grey silk dress was her wedding-dress. She was going to marry Mr. Spall. Even Catty thought it was ratherdreadful. 

But Jenny was happy because she was going to wear the grey silk dress andlive in Mr. Spall's cottage and talk to him about Jesus. Only one half ofher face drooped sleepily; the other half had waked up, and lookedexcited; there was a flush on it as bright as paint. 

III. 

Mary's bed stood in a corner of the night nursery, and beside it was thehigh yellow linen cupboard. When the doors were opened there was a faintindia-rubbery smell from the mackintosh sheet that had been put away onthe top shelf. 

One night she was wakened by Catty coming into the room and opening thecupboard doors. Catty climbed on a chair and took something from the topshelf. She didn't answer when Mary asked what she was doing, but hurriedaway, leaving the door on the latch. Her feet made quick thuds along thepassage. A door opened and shut, and there was a sound of Papa goingdownstairs. Somebody came up softly and pulled the door to, and Mary wentto sleep again. 

When she woke the room was full of the grey light that frightened her. But she was not frightened. She woke sitting up on her pillow, staringinto the grey light, and saying to herself, "Jenny is dead. "

But she was not afraid of Jenny. The stillness in her heart spread intothe grey light of the room. She lay back waiting for seven o'clock whenCatty would come and call her. 

At seven o'clock Mamma came. She wore the dress she had worn last night, and she was crying. 

Mary said, "You haven't got to say it. I know Jenny is dead. "

The blinds were drawn in all the windows when she and Mark went into thefront garden to look for snowdrops in the border by the kitchen area. Sheknew that Jenny's dead body lay on the sofa under the kitchen windowbehind the blind and the white painted iron bars. She hoped that shewould not have to see it; but she was not afraid of Jenny's dead body. Itwas sacred and holy. 

She wondered why Mamma sent her to Uncle Edward and Aunt Bella. From thetop-storey windows of Chadwell Grange you could look beyond AldboroughHatch towards Wanstead Flats and the City of London Cemetery. They weregoing to bury Jenny there. She stood looking out, quiet, not crying. Sheonly cried at night when she thought of Jenny, sitting in the low nurserychair, tired and patient, drawing back from her violent caresses, and ofthe grey silk dress laid out on the bed in the spare room. 

She was not even afraid of the City of London Cemetery when Mark took herto see Jenny's grave. Jenny's grave was sacred and holy. 

IX

I. 

You had to endure hardness after you were nine. You learnt out of Mrs. Markham's "History of England, " and you were not allowed to read theconversations between Richard and Mary and Mrs. Markham because they madehistory too amusing and too easy to remember. For the same reason youtranslated only the tight, dismal pages of your French Reader, andanything that looked like an interesting story was forbidden. You were tolearn for the sake of the lesson and not for pleasure's sake. Mamma saidyou had enough pleasure in play-time. She put it to your honour not toskip on to the more exciting parts. 

When you had finished Mrs. Markham you began Dr. Smith's "History ofEngland. " Honour was safe with Dr. Smith. He made history very hard toread and impossible to remember. 

The Bible got harder, too. You knew all the best Psalms by heart, and thestories about Noah's ark and Joseph and his coat of many colours, andDavid, and Daniel in the lions' den. You had to go straight through theBible now, skipping Leviticus because it was full of things you couldn'tunderstand. When you had done with Moses lifting up the serpent in thewilderness you had to read about Aaron and the sons of Levi, and thewave-offerings, and the tabernacle, and the ark of the covenant wherethey kept the five golden emerods. Mamma didn't know what emerods were, but Mark said they were a kind of white mice. 

You learnt Old Testament history, too, out of a little book that was allgrey slabs of print and dark pictures showing the earth swallowing upKorah, Dathan and Abiram, and Aaron and the sons of Levi with their longbeards and high hats and their petticoats, swinging incense in fits oftemper. You found out queerer and queerer things about God. God made theearth swallow up Korah, Dathan and Abiram. He killed poor Uzzah becausehe put out his hand to prevent the ark of the covenant falling out of thecart. Even David said he didn't know how on earth he was to get the arkalong at that rate. And there were the Moabites and the Midianites andall the animals: the bullocks and the he-goats and the little lambs andkids. When you asked Mamma why God killed people, she said it was becausehe was just as well as merciful, and (it was the old story) he hated sin. Disobedience was sin, and Uzzah had been disobedient. 

As for the lambs and the he-goats, Jesus had done away with all that. Hewas God's son, and he had propitiated God's anger and satisfied hisjustice when he shed his own blood on the cross to save sinners. Withoutshedding of blood there is no remission of sins. You were not to botherabout the blood. 

But you couldn't help bothering about it. You couldn't help being sorryfor Uzzah and the Midianites and the lambs and the he-goats. 

Perhaps you had to sort things out and keep them separate. Here was theworld, here were Mamma and Mark and kittens and rabbits, and all thethings you really cared about: drawing pictures, and playing theHungarian March and getting excited in the Easter holidays when the whiteevenings came and Mark raced you from the Green Man to the Horns Tavern. Here was the sudden, secret happiness you felt when you were by yourselfand the fields looked beautiful. It was always coming now, with a sort ofrush and flash, when you least expected it. 

And _there_ was God and religion and duty. The nicest part of religionwas music, and knowing how the world was made, and the beautiful soundingbits of the Bible. You could like religion. But duty was doing all thethings you didn't like because you didn't like them. And you couldn'thonestly say you liked God. God had to be propitiated; your righteousnesswas filthy rags; so you couldn't propitiate him. Jesus had to do it foryou. All you had to do was to believe, really believe that he had doneit. 

But supposing you hadn't got to believe it, supposing you hadn't got tobelieve anything at all, it would be easier to think about. The thingsyou cared for belonged to each other, but God didn't belong to them. Hedidn't fit in anywhere. You couldn't help feeling that if God was love, and if he was everywhere, he ought to have fitted in. Perhaps, after all, there were two Gods; one who made things and loved them, and one whodidn't; who looked on sulking and finding fault with what the clever kindGod had made. 

When the midsummer holidays came and brook-jumping began she left offthinking about God. 

II. 

"Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown"--

The picture in the _Sunday At Home_ showed the old King in bed and PrinceHal trying on his crown. But the words were not the _Sunday At Home_;they were taken out of Shakespeare. Mark showed her the place. 

Mark was in the schoolroom chanting his home-lessons:

 "'Yet once more, oh ye laurels, and once more, Ye myrtles brown with ivy never sere'"--

That sounded nice. "Say it again, Mark, say it again. " Mark said itagain. He also said:

 "'Achilles' wrath, to Greece the direful spring Of woes unnumbered, heavenly goddess, sing!'"

The three books stood on the bookshelf in the schoolroom, the thinShakespeare in diamond print, the small brown leather Milton, the verysmall fat Pope's _Iliad_ in the red cover. Mark gave them to her for herown. 

She made Catty put her bed between the two windows, and Mark made abookshelf out of a piece of wood and some picture cord, and hung itwithin reach. She had a happy, excited feeling when she thought of thethree books; it made her wake early. She read from five o'clock tillCatty called her at seven, and again after Catty had tucked her up andleft her, till the white light in the room was grey. 

She learnt _Lycidas_ by heart, and

 "I thought I saw my late espoused wife Brought to me like Alcestis from the grave, "--

and the bits about Satan in _Paradise Lost_. The sound of the lines gaveher the same nice feeling that she had when Mrs. Propart played the Marchin Scipio after Evening Service. She tried to make lines of her own thatwent the same way as the lines in Milton and Shakespeare and Pope's_Iliad_. She found out that there was nothing she liked so much as makingthese lines. It was nicer even than playing the Hungarian March. Shethought it was funny that the lines like Pope's _Iliad_ came easiest, though they had to rhyme. 

"Silent he wandered by the sounding sea, " was good, but the Greek linethat Mark showed her went: "Be d'akeon para thina poluphloisboiothalasses"; that was better. "Don't you think so, Mark?"

"Clever Minx. Much better. "

"Mark--if God knew how happy I am writing poetry he'd make the earth openand swallow me up. "

Mark only said, "You mustn't say that to Mamma. Play 'Violetta. '"

Of all hateful and disgusting tunes the most disgusting and the mosthateful was "Violetta, " which Mr. Sippett's sister taught her. But ifMark would promise to make Mamma let her learn Greek she would play it tohim twenty times running. 

When Mark went to Chelmsted that autumn he left her his brown _GreekAccidence_ and Smith's _Classical Dictionary_, besides Macaulay's _Laysof Ancient Rome_. She taught herself Greek in the hour after breakfastbefore Miss Sippett came to give her her music lesson. She was alwayscareful to leave the Accidence open where Miss Sippett could see it andrealise that she was not a stupid little girl. 

But whether Miss Sippett saw the Accidence or not she always behaved asif it wasn't there. 

III. 

When Mamma saw the Accidence open on the drawing-room table she shut itand told you to put it in its proper place. If you talked about it hermouth buttoned up tight, and her eyes blinked, and she began tapping withher foot. 

There was something queer about learning Greek. Mamma did not actuallyforbid it; but she said it must not be done in lesson time or sewingtime, or when people could see you doing it, lest they should think youwere showing off. You could see that she didn't believe you _could_ learnGreek and that she wouldn't like it if you did. But when lessons wereover she let you read Shakespeare or Pope's _Iliad_ aloud to her whileshe sewed. And when you could say:

 "Lars Porsena of Clusium By the nine Gods he swore"--

straight through without stopping she went into London with Papa andbrought back the _Child's First History of Rome_. A Pinnock's _Catechismof Mythology_ in a blue paper cover went with the history to tell you allabout the gods and goddesses. What Pinnock didn't tell you you found outfrom Smith's _Classical Dictionary_. It had pictures in it so beautifulthat you were happy just sitting still and looking at them. There wassuch a lot of gods and goddesses that at first they were rather hard toremember. But you couldn't forget Apollo and Hermes and Aphrodite andPallas Athene and Diana. They were not like Jehovah. They quarrelledsometimes, but they didn't hate each other; not as Jehovah hated all theother gods. They fitted in somehow. They cared for all the things youliked best: trees and animals and poetry and music and running races andplaying games. Even Zeus was nicer than Jehovah, though he reminded youof him now and then. He liked sacrifices. But then he was honest aboutit. He didn't pretend that he was good and that he _had_ to have thembecause of your sins. And you hadn't got to believe in him. That was thenicest thing of all. 

X

I. 

Mary was ten in eighteen seventy-three. 

Aunt Charlotte was ill, and nobody was being kind to her. She had givenher Sunday bonnet to Harriet and her Sunday gown to Catty; so you knewshe was going to be married again. She said it was prophesied that sheshould be married in eighteen seventy-three. 

The illness had something to do with being married and going continuallyto Mr. Marriott's church and calling on Mr. Marriott and writing lettersto him about religion. You couldn't say Aunt Charlotte was not religious. But Papa said he would believe in her religion if she went to Mr. Batty'schurch or Mr. Farmer's or Mr. Propart's. They had all got wives and Mr. Marriott hadn't. Papa had forbidden Aunt Charlotte to go any more to Mr. Marriott's church. 

Mr. Marriott had written a nice letter to Uncle Victor, and Uncle Victorhad taken Papa to see him, and the doctor had come to see Aunt Charlotteand she had been sent to bed. 

Aunt Charlotte's room was at the top of the tall, thin white house in theHigh Street. There was whispering on the stairs. Mamma and Aunt Lavvystood at the turn; you could see their vexed faces. Aunt Charlotte calledto them to let Mary come to her. Mary was told she might go if she werevery quiet. 

Aunt Charlotte was all by herself sitting up in a large white bed. ABible propped itself open, leaves downwards, against the mound she made. There was something startling about the lengths of white curtain and thestretches of white pillow and counterpane, and Aunt Charlotte's veryblack eyebrows and hair and the cover of the Bible, very black, and herblue eyes glittering. 

She was writing letters. Every now and then she took up the Bible andpicked out a text and wrote it down. She wrote very fast, and as shefinished each sheet she hid it under the bed-clothes, and made a sign toshow that what she was doing was a secret. 

"Love God and you'll be happy. Love God and you'll be happy, " she said. 

Her eyes pointed at you. They looked wise and solemn and excited. 

A wide flat piece of counterpane was left over from Aunt Charlotte. Maryclimbed up and sat in it with her back against the foot-rail and lookedat her. Looking at Aunt Charlotte made you think of being born. 

"Aunt Charlotte, do _you_ know what being born is?"

Aunt Charlotte looked up under her eyebrows, and hid another sheet ofpaper. "What's put that in your head all of a sudden?"

"It's because of my babies. Catty says I couldn't have thirteen all underthree years old. But I could, couldn't I?"

"I'm afraid I don't think you could, " Aunt Charlotte said. 

"Why not? Catty _won't_ say why. "

Aunt Charlotte shook her head, but she was smiling and looking wiser andmore solemn than ever. "You mustn't ask too many questions, " she said. 

"But you haven't told me what being born is. I know it's got something todo with the Virgin Mary. "

Aunt Charlotte said, "Sh-sh-sh! You mustn't say that. Nice little girlsdon't think about those things. "

Her tilted eyes had turned down and her mouth had stopped smiling. So youknew that being born was not frightening. It had something to do with thethings you didn't talk about. 

And ye--how could it? There was the Virgin Mary. 

"Aunt Charlotte, don't you _wish_ you had a baby?"

Aunt Charlotte looked frightened, suddenly, and began to cry. 

"You mustn't say it, Mary, you mustn't say it. Don't tell them you saidit. They'll think I've been talking about the babies. The little babies. Don't tell them. Promise me you won't tell. "

II. 

"Aunt Lavvy--I wish I knew what you thought about Jehovah?"

When Aunt Lavvy stayed with you Mamma made you promise not to ask herabout her opinions. But sometimes you forgot. Aunt Lavvy looked more thanever as if she was by herself in a quiet empty room, thinking ofsomething that wasn't there. You couldn't help feeling that she knewthings. Mamma said she had always been the clever one, just as AuntCharlotte had always been the queer one; but Aunt Bella said she was nobetter than an unbeliever, because she was a Unitarian at heart. 

"Why Jehovah in particular?" Aunt Lavvy was like Uncle Victor; shelistened politely when you talked to her, as if you were saying somethinginteresting. 

"Because he's the one you've got to believe in. Do you really think he isso very good?"

"I don't think anything. I don't know anything, except that God is love. "

"Jehovah wasn't. "

"Jehovah--" Aunt Lavvy stopped herself. "I mustn't talk to you aboutit--because I promised your mother I wouldn't. "

It was very queer. Aunt Lavvy's opinions had something to do withreligion, yet Mamma said you mustn't talk about them. 

"I promised, too. I shall have to confess and ask her to forgive me. "

"Then, " said Aunt Lavvy, "be sure you tell her that I didn't talk to you. Promise me you'll tell her. "

That was what Aunt Charlotte had said. Talking about religion was liketalking about being born. 

XI

I. 

Nobody has any innate ideas. Children and savages and idiots haven't any, so grown-up people can't have, Mr. Locke says. 

But how did he know? You might have them and forget about them, and onlyremember again after you were grown up. 

She sat up in the drawing-room till nine o'clock now, because she waseleven years old. She had taken the doll's clothes out of the old woodenbox and filled it with books: the Bible, Milton, and Pope's Homer, theGreek Accidence, and _Plutarch's Lives_, and the Comedies from Papa'sillustrated Shakespeare in seven volumes, which he never read, and twovolumes of _Pepys' Diary_, and Locke _On the Human Understanding_. Shewished the Bible had been bound in pink calf like Pepys instead of theshiny black leather that made you think of wet goloshes. Then it wouldhave looked new and exciting like the other books. 

She sat on a footstool with her box beside her in the corner behindMamma's chair. She had to hide there because Mamma didn't believe youreally liked reading. She thought you were only shamming and showing off. Sometimes Mr. And Mrs. Farmer would come in, and Mr. Farmer would playchess with Papa while Mrs. Farmer talked to Mamma about how troublesomeand independent the tradespeople were, and how hard it was to getservants and to keep them. Mamma listened to Mrs. Farmer as if she weresaying something wonderful and exciting. Sometimes it would be theProparts; or Mr. Batty would come in alone. And sometimes they would allcome together with the aunts and uncles, and there would be a party. 

Mary always hoped that Uncle Victor would notice her and say, "Mary isreading Locke _On the Human Understanding_, " or that Mr. Propart wouldcome and turn over the books and make some interesting remark. But theynever did. 

At half-past eight Catty would bring in the tea-tray; the white and greyand gold tea-cups would be set out round the bulging silver tea-pot thatlifted up its spout with a foolish, pompous expression, like a hen. Mammawould move about the table in her mauve silk gown, and there would be ascent of cream and strong tea. Every now and then the shimmering silk andthe rich scent would come between her and the grey, tight-pressed, difficult page. 

"'The senses at first let in particular ideas and furnish the yet emptycabinet: and the mind growing by degrees familiar with some of them, theyare lodged in the memory and names got to them. '

"Then how--Then how?--"

The thought she thought was coming wouldn't come, and Mamma was tellingher to get up and hand round the bread and butter. 

II. 

"Mr. Ponsonby, do you remember your innate ideas?"

"My _how_ much?" said Mr. Ponsonby. 

"The ideas you had before you were born?"

Mr. Ponsonby said, "Before I was born? Well--" He really seemed to beconsidering it. 

Mamma's chair, pushed further along the hearthrug, had driven her backand back, till the box was hidden behind the curtain. 

Mr. Ponsonby was Mark's friend. Mark was at the Royal Military Academy atWoolwich now. Every Saturday Mr. Ponsonby came home with Mark and stayedtill Sunday evening. You knew that sooner or later he would find you outbehind Mamma's chair. 

"I mean, " she said, "the ideas you were born with. "

"Seems to me, " said Mr. Ponsonby, "I was born with precious few. Anyhow Ican't say I remember them. "

"I was afraid you'd say that. It's what Mr. Locke says. "

"Mr. How much?"

"Mr. Locke. You can look at him if you like. "

She thought: "He won't. He won't. They never, never do. "

But Mr. Ponsonby did. He looked at Mr. Locke, and he looked at Mary, andhe said, "By Gum!" He even read the bits about the baby and the emptycabinet. 

"You don't mean to say you _like_ this sort of thing?"

"I like it most awfully. Of course I don't mean as much as brook-jumping, but almost as much. "

And Mr. Ponsonby said, "Well--I must say--of _all_--you _are_--by Gum!"

He made it sound like the most delicious praise. 

Mr. Ponsonby was taller and older than Mark. He was nineteen. She thoughthe was the nicest looking person she had ever seen. 

His face was the colour of thick white honey; his hair was very dark, andhe had long blue eyes and long black eyebrows like bars, drawn close downon to the blue. His nose would have been hooky if it hadn't been sostraight, and his mouth was quiet and serious. When he talked to you hismouth and eyes looked as if they liked it. 

Mark came and said, "Minky, if you stodge like that you'll get allflabby. "

It wasn't nice of Mark to say that before Mr. Ponsonby, when he knewperfectly well that she could jump her own height. 

"_Me_ flabby? Feel my muscle. "

It rose up hard under her soft skin. 

"Feel it, Mr. Ponsonby. "

"I say--_what_ a biceps!"

"Yes, but, " Mark said, "you should feel his. "

His was even bigger and harder than Mark's. "Mine, " she said sorrowfully, "will never be as good as his. "

Then Mamma came and told her it was bed-time, and Mr. Ponsonby said, "Oh, Mrs. Olivier, _not_ yet. "

"Five minutes more, then. "

But the five minutes were never any good. You just sat counting them. 

And when it was all over and Mr. Ponsonby strode across the drawing-roomand opened the door for her she went laughing; she stood in the doorwayand laughed. When you were sent to bed at nine the only dignified thingwas to pretend you didn't care. 

And Mr. Ponsonby, holding the door so that Mamma couldn't see him, lookedat her and shook his head, as much as to say, "You and I know it isn't ajoke for either of us, this unrighteous banishment. "

III. 

"What on earth are you doing?"

She might have known that some day Mamma would come up and find herputting the children to bed. 

She had seven. There was Isabel Batty, and Mrs. Farmer's red-haired baby, and Mark in the blue frock in the picture when he was four, and Dank inhis white frock and blue sash, and the three very little babies you madeup out of your head. Six o'clock was their bed-time. 

"You'd no business to touch those baby-clothes, " Mamma said. 

The baby-clothes were real. Every evening she took them from the drawerin the linen cupboard; and when she had sung the children to sleep sheshook out the little frocks and petticoats and folded them in a neat pileat the foot of the bed. 

"I thought you were in the schoolroom learning your lessons?"

"So I was, Mamma. But--you know--six o'clock is their bed-time. "

"Oh Mary! you told me you'd given up that silly game. "

"So I did. But they won't let me. They don't want me to give them up. "

Mamma sat down, as if it was too much for her. 

"I hope, " she said, "you don't talk to Catty or anybody about it. "

"No, Mamma. I couldn't. They're my secret. "

"That was all very well when you were a little thing. But a great girl oftwelve--You ought to be ashamed of yourself. "

Mamma had gone. She had taken away the baby-clothes. Mary lay facedownwards on her bed. 

Shame burned through her body like fire. Hot tears scalded her eyelids. She thought: "How was I to know you mustn't have babies?" Still, shecouldn't give them all up. She _must_ keep Isabel and the red-hairedbaby. 

But what would Mr. Ponsonby think of her if he knew?

IV. 

"Mr. Ponsonby. Mr. Ponsonby! Stay where you are and look!"

From the window at the end of the top corridor the side of the house wentsheer down into the lane. Mary was at the window. Mr. Ponsonby was in thelane. 

She climbed on to the ledge and knelt there. Grasping the bottom of thewindow frame firmly with both hands and letting her knees slide from theledge, she lowered herself, and hung for one ecstatic moment, and drewherself up again by her arms. 

"What did you do it for, Mary?"

Mr. Ponsonby had rushed up the stairs and they were sitting there. He wasso tall that he hung over her when he leaned. 

"It's nothing. You ought to be able to pull up your own weight. "

"You mustn't do it from top-storey windows. It's dangerous. "

"Not if you've practised on the banisters first. Where's Mark?"

"With your Mater. I say, supposing you and I go for a walk. "

"We must be back at six o'clock, " she said. 

When you went for walks with Mark or Mr. Ponsonby they always raced youdown Ley Street and over the ford at the bottom. They both gave you thesame start to the Horn's Tavern; the only difference was that with Mr. Ponsonby you were over the ford first. 

They turned at the ford into the field path that led to Drake's Farm andthe plantation. He jumped all the stiles and she vaulted them. She couldsee that he respected her. And so they came to the big water jump intothe plantation. Mr. Ponsonby went over first and held out his arms. Shehurled herself forward and he caught her. And this time, instead ofputting her down instantly, he lifted her up in his arms and held hertight and kissed her. Her heart thumped violently and she had a suddenhappy feeling. Neither spoke. 

Humphrey Propart had kissed her once for a forfeit. And she had boxed hisears. Mr. Ponsonby's was a different sort of kiss. 

They tore through the plantation as if nothing had happened, clearing allthe brooks in a business-like way. Mr. Ponsonby took brook-jumping as theserious and delightful thing it was. 

Going home across the fields they held each other's hands, like children. "Minky, " he said, "I don't like to think of you hanging out of top-storeywindows. "

"But it's so jolly to feel your body come squirming up after your arms. "

"It is. It is. All the same, promise me you won't do it any more. "

"Why?"

"Because I'm going to India when I've passed out, and I want to find youalive when I come back. Promise me, Minky. "

"I will, if you're really going. But you're the only person I allow tocall me Minky, except Mark. "

"Am I? I'm glad I'm the only person. "

They went on. 

"I'm afraid, " she said, "my hand is getting very hot and horrid. "

He held it tighter. "I don't care how hot and horrid it gets. And I thinkyou might call me Jimmy. "

It was long after six o'clock. She had forgotten the children and theirbed-time. After that day she never played with them again. 

V. 

"If I were you, " Mamma said, "I should put away that box of books. You'llbe no use if you read--read--read all day long. "

"You oughtn't to say that, Mamma. I _am_ of use. You know I can make thesewing-machine go when you can't. "

Mamma smiled. She knew it. 

"And which would you rather took you over the crossing at the Bank? Me orPapa?"

Mamma smiled again. She knew she was safer with Mary at a crossing, because Papa teased her and frightened her before he dragged her over. But Mary led her gently, holding back the noses of the horses. 

"There's that Locke on the human understanding, " said Mamma. "Poor Jimmywas frightened when he found you reading it. "

"He wasn't. He was most awfully pleased and excited. "

"He was laughing at you. "

"He wasn't. He wasn't. "

"Of course he was laughing at you. What did you think he was doing?"

"I thought he was interested. "

"He wasn't, then. Men, " Mamma said, "are _not_ interested in littlebook-worms. He told me it was very bad for you. "

Shame again. Hot, burning and scalding shame. He was only laughing ather. 

"Mark doesn't laugh at me, " she said. The thought of Mark and of his lovefor her healed her wound. 

"A precious deal, " Mamma said, "you know about Mark. "

Mamma was safe. Oh, she was safe. She knew that Mark loved her best. 

VI. 

On the cover of Pinnock's Catechism there was a small black picture ofthe Parthenon. And under it was written:

"Abode of gods whose shrines no longer burn. "

Supposing the candles in St. Mary's Chapel no longer burned?

Supposing Barkingside church and Aldborough Hatch church fell to bits andthere were no more clergymen? And you only read in history books aboutpeople like Mr. Batty and Mr. Propart and their surplices and the thingsthey wore round their necks?

Supposing the Christian religion passed away?

It excited you to think these things. But when you heard the "Magnificat"in church, or when you thought of Christ hanging so bravely on the crossyou were sorry and you stopped thinking. 

What a pity you couldn't ever go on without having to stop. 

END OF BOOK TWO

BOOK THREEADOLESCENCE (1876-1879)

XII

I. 

Mary went slowly up the lane between the garden wall and the thorn hedge. 

The air, streaming towards her from the flat fields, had the tang ofcold, glittering water; the sweet, grassy smell of the green corn bladesswam on it. The young thorn leaves smelt of almonds and of their ownbitter green. 

The five trees stood up, thin and black, in an archway of golden whitefire. The green of their young leaves hung about them like an emanation. 

A skylark swung himself up, a small grey ball, spinning over the treetops to the arch of the sunset. His song pierced and shook, like thegolden white light. With each throb of his wings he shrank, smaller andgreyer, a moth, a midge, whirling in the luminous air. A grey balldropped spinning down. 

By the gate of the field her sudden, secret happiness came to her. 

She could never tell when it was coming, nor what it would come from. Ithad something to do with the trees standing up in the golden white light. It had come before with a certain sharp white light flooding the fields, flooding the room. 

It had happened so often that she received it now with a shock ofrecognition; and when it was over she wanted it to happen again. Shewould go back and back to the places where it had come, looking for it, thinking that any minute it might happen again. But it never came twiceto the same place in the same way. 

Catty was calling to her from the bottom of the lane. She stood still bythe gate, not heeding Catty, holding her happiness. When she had turnedfrom the quiet fields it would be gone. 

II. 

Sometimes she had queer glimpses of the persons that were called MaryOlivier. There was Mrs. Olivier's only daughter, proud of her power overthe sewing-machine. When she brought the pile of hemmed sheets to hermother her heart swelled with joy in her own goodness. There was MarkOlivier's sister, who rejoiced in the movements of her body, the strainof the taut muscles throbbing on their own leash, the bound forwards, thepush of the wind on her knees and breast, the hard feel of the groundunder her padding feet. And there was Mary Olivier, the little girl ofthirteen whom her mother and Aunt Bella whispered about to each otherwith mysterious references to her age. 

Her secret happiness had nothing to do with any of these Mary Oliviers. It was not like any other happiness. It had nothing to do with Mamma orDan or Roddy, or even Mark. It had nothing to do with Jimmy. 

She had cried when Jimmy went away, and she would cry again to-night whenshe thought about him. Jimmy's going away was worse than anything thathad happened yet or could happen till Mark went to India. That would bethe worst thing. 

Jimmy had not gone to India as he had said. He had had to leave Woolwichbecause of something he had done, and his father had sent him toAustralia. He had gone without saying good-bye, and he was never comingback. She would never in all her life see Jimmy again. 

Jimmy had done something dreadful. 

Nobody but Mamma and Papa and Mark knew what he had done; but from theway they talked you could see that it was one of those things you mustn'ttalk about. Only Mark said he didn't believe he really had done it. 

Last Sunday she had written a letter to him which Mark posted:

"Dear Jimmy, --I think you might have come to say good-bye to us, even ifPapa and Mamma do think you've done something you oughtn't to. I want youto know that Mark and I don't believe you did it, and even if you did itwon't make any difference. I shall always love you just the same, nextbest to Mark. You can't expect me to love you really best, because hewill always come first as long as I live. I hope you will be very happyin Australia. I shall keep my promise just the same, though it'sAustralia and not India you've gone to. 

"With love, ever your loving

"Minky. 

"P. S. No. 1. --I'm reading a new poet--Byron. There was a silly woman whosaid she'd rather have the fame of Childe Harold than the immortality ofDon Juan. But I'd rather have the immortality, wouldn't you?

"P. S. No. 2. --Do you think that you will keep Kangaroos? They might helpto make you happy. "

III. 

Mary was picking French beans in the kitchen garden when Mamma and AuntBella came along the path, talking together. The thick green walls of therunners hid her. 

"Mary is getting very precocious, " said Mamma. 

"That comes from being brought up with boys, " said Aunt Bella. "She oughtto see more girls of her own age. "

"She doesn't like them. "

Mary shouted "Cuckoo!" to warn them, but they wouldn't stop. 

"It's high time, " Aunt Bella said, "that she should learn to like them. The Draper girls are too old. But there's that little Bertha Mitchison. "

"I haven't called on Mrs. Mitchison for two years. "

"And why haven't you, Caroline?"

"Because I can't afford to be always hiring wagonettes to go to WoodfordBridge. "

"Cuckoo!"

"Caroline--do you think she could have heard?"

"Cuckoo, Aunt Bella! Cuckoo!"

IV. 

On the high road the white dust had a clear, sharp, exciting smell. Atthe wet edges of the ford it thickened. 

When you shut your eyes you could still see Bertha's scarlet frock on thewhite bridge path and smell the wet earth at the edges of the ford. 

You were leaning over the white painted railing of the bridge when shebegan. The water flowed from under the little tunnel across the road intothe field beyond. Deep brown under the tunnel, tawny in the shallow ford, golden patches where the pebbles showed through, and the water itself, asheet of thin crystal, running over the colours, sliding through them, running and sliding on and on. 

There was nothing in the world so beautiful as water, unless it waslight. But water was another sort of light. 

Bertha pushed her soft sallow face into yours. Her big black eyes bulgedout under her square fringe. Her wide red mouth curled and glistened. There were yellowish stains about the roots of her black hair. Her mouthand eyes teased you, mocked you, wouldn't let you alone. 

Bertha began: "I know something you don't know. "

You listened. You couldn't help listening. You simply had to know. It wasno use to say you didn't believe a word of it. Inside you, secretly, youknew it was true. You were frightened. You trembled and went hot and coldby turns, and somehow that was how you knew it was true; almost as if youhad known all the time. 

"Oh, shut up! I don't _want_ to hear about it. "

"Oh, don't you? You did a minute ago. "

"Of course I did, when I didn't know. Who wouldn't? I don't want to knowany more. "

"I like that. After I've told you everything. What's the good of puttingyour fingers in your ears _now_?"

There was that day; and there was the next day when she was sick ofBertha. On the third day Bertha went back to Woodford Bridge. 

V. 

It was dreadful and at the same time funny when you thought of Mr. Battyand Mr. Propart with their little round hats and their black coats andtheir stiff, dignified faces. And there was Uncle Edward and hiswhiskers. It couldn't be true. 

Yet all true things came like that, with a queer feeling, as if youremembered them. 

Jenny's wedding dress. It would be true even of Jenny. Mamma had said shewould rather see her in her coffin than married to Mr. Spall. That waswhy. 

But--if it was true of everybody it would be true of Mamma and Papa. Thatwas what you hated knowing. If only you had gone on looking at the waterinstead of listening to Bertha--

Mamma's face, solemn and tender, when you said your prayers, playing withthe gold tassel of her watch-chain. Papa's face, on your birthday, whenhe gave you the toy lamb. She wouldn't like you to know about her. Markwouldn't like it. 

Mark: her mind stood still. Mark's image stood still in clean emptyspace. When she thought of her mother and Mark she hated Bertha. 

And there was Jimmy. That was why they wouldn't talk about him. 

Jimmy. The big water-jump into the plantation. Jimmy's arms, the throb ofthe hard muscles as he held you. Jimmy's hand, your own hand lying in it, light and small. Jimmy's eyes, looking at you and smiling, as if theysaid, "It's all right, Minky, it's all right. "

Perhaps when Papa was young Mamma thought about him as you thought aboutJimmy; so that it couldn't be so very dreadful, after all. 

XIII

I. 

Mary was glad when Bertha went away to school. When the new year came andshe was fourteen she had almost forgotten Bertha. She even forgot forlong stretches of time what Bertha had told her. But not altogether. 

Because, if it was true, then the story of the Virgin Mary was not true. Jesus couldn't have been born in the way the New Testament said he wasborn. There was no such thing as the Immaculate Conception. You couldhardly be expected to believe in it once you knew why it couldn't havehappened. 

And if the Bible could deceive you about an important thing like that, itcould deceive you about the Incarnation and the Atonement. You were nolonger obliged to believe in that ugly business of a cruel, bungling Godappeased with bloodshed. You were not obliged to believe anything justbecause it was in the Bible. 

But--if you didn't, you were an Infidel. 

She could hear Aunt Bella talking to Uncle Edward, and Mrs. Farmer andMrs. Propart whispering: "Mary is an Infidel. "

She thought: "If I _am_ I can't help it. " She was even slightly elated, as if she had set out on some happy, dangerous adventure. 

II. 

Nobody seemed to know what Pantheism was. Mr. Propart smiled when youasked him and said it was something you had better not meddle with. Mr. Farmer said it was only another word for atheism; you might as well haveno God at all as be a pantheist. But if "pan" meant "all things, " and"theos" was God--

Perhaps it would be in the _Encyclopaedia Britannica_. The Encyclopaediatold you all about Australia. There was even a good long bit about Byron, too. 

Panceput--Panegyric--Pantheism! There you were. Pantheism is "thatspeculative system which by absolutely identifying the Subject and Objectof thought, reduces all existence, mental and material, to phenomenalmodifications of one eternal, self-existent Substance which is called bythe name of God.... All things are God. "

When you had read the first sentence five or six times over and looked up"Subject" and "Object" and "Phenomenal, " you could see fairly well whatit meant. Whatever else God might be, he was not what they said, something separate and outside things, something that made your minduncomfortable when you tried to think about it. 

"This universe, material and mental, is nothing but the spectacle of thethoughts of God. "

You might have known it would be like that. The universe, going on insideGod, as your thoughts go on inside you; the universe, so close to Godthat nothing could be closer. The meaning got plainer and plainer. 

There was Spinoza. ("Spinning--Spinoza. ") The Encyclopaedia man said thatthe Jewish priests offered him a bribe of two thousand florins to takeback what he had said about God; and when he refused to take back a wordof it, they cursed him and drove him out of their synagogue. 

Spinoza said, "There is no substance but God, nor can any other beconceived. " And the Encyclopaedia man explained it. "God, as the infinitesubstance, with its infinity of attributes is the _natura naturans_. Asthe infinity of modes under which his attributes are manifested, he isthe _natura naturata_. "

Nature naturing would be the cause, and Nature natured would be theeffect. God was both. 

"God is the immanent"--indwelling--"but not the transient cause of allthings" ... "Thought and Extension are attributes of the one absolutesubstance which is God, evolving themselves in two parallel streams, soto speak, of which each separate body and spirit are but the waves. Bodyand Soul are apparently two, but really one and they have no independentexistence: They are parts of God.... Were our knowledge of God capable ofpresent completeness we might attain to perfect happiness but such is notpossible. Out of the infinity of his attributes only two, Thought andExtension, are accessible to us while the modes of these attributes, being essentially infinite, escape our grasp. "

So this was the truth about God. In spite of the queer words it was verysimple. Much simpler than the Trinity. God was not three incomprehensiblePersons rolled into one, not Jesus, not Jehovah, not the Father creatingthe world in six days out of nothing, and muddling it, and coming downfrom heaven into it as his own son to make the best of a bad job. He waswhat you had felt and thought him to be as soon as you could think abouthim at all. The God of Baruch Spinoza was the God you had wanted, theonly sort of God you cared to think about. Thinking about him--after theChristian God--was like coming out of a small dark room into an immenseopen space filled with happy light. 

And yet, as far back as you could remember, there had been a regularconspiracy to keep you from knowing the truth about God. Even theEncyclopaedia man was in it. He tried to put you off Pantheism. He gotinto a temper about it and said it was monstrous and pernicious andprofoundly false and that the heart of man rose up in revolt against it. He had begun by talking about "attempts to transgress the fixedboundaries which One wiser than we has assigned to our intellectualoperations. " Perhaps he was a clergyman. Clergymen always put you offlike that; so that you couldn't help suspecting that they didn't reallyknow and were afraid you would find them out. They were like poor littlefrightened Mamma when she wouldn't let you look at the interesting bitsbeyond the place she had marked in your French Reader. And they werealways apologising for their God, as if they felt that there wassomething wrong with him and that he was not quite real. 

But to the pantheists the real God was so intensely real that, comparedwith him, being alive was not quite real, it was more like dreaming. 

Another thing: the pantheists--the Hindu ones and the Greeks, and BaruchSpinoza--were heathen, and the Christians had tried to make you believethat the heathen went to hell because they didn't know the truth aboutGod. You had been told one lie on the top of another. And all the timethe truth was there, in the _Encyclopaedia Britannica_. 

Who would have thought that the Encyclopaedia could have been soexciting?

The big puce-coloured books stood in a long row in the bottom shelfbehind her father's chair. Her heart thumped when she gripped the volumesthat contained the forbidden knowledge of the universe. The rough moroccocovers went Rr-rr-rimp, as they scraped together; and there was the sharpthud as they fell back into their place when she had done with them. These sounds thrilled her with a secret joy. When she was away from thebooks she liked to think of them standing there on the hidden shelf, waiting for her. The pages of "Pantheism" and "Spinoza" were white andclean, and she had noticed how they had stuck together. Nobody had openedthem. She was the first, the only one who knew and cared. 

III. 

She wondered what Mark and her mother would say when they knew. PerhapsMark would say she ought not to tell her mother if it meant letting outthat the Bible said things that were not really true. His idea might bethat if Mamma wanted to believe in Jehovah and the Atonement throughChrist's blood, it would be unkind to try and stop her. But who on earth_would_ want to believe that dreadful sort of thing if they could helpit? Papa might not mind, because as long as he knew that he and Mammawould get into heaven all right he wouldn't worry so much about otherpeople. But Mamma was always worrying about them and making you give upthings to them; and she must be miserable when she thought of themburning in hell for ever and ever, and when she tried to reconcile God'sjustice with his mercy. To say nothing of the intellectual discomfort shewas living in. When you had found out the real, happy truth about God, itdidn't seem right to keep it to yourself. 

She decided that she would tell her mother. 

Mark was in the Royal Field Artillery now. He was away at Shoeburyness. If she put it off till he came home again she might never do it. WhenMamma had Mark with her she would never listen to anything you had tosay. 

Next Sunday was Epiphany. Sunday afternoon would be a good time. 

But Aunt Lavvy came to stay from Saturday to Monday. And it rained. Allmorning Mamma and Aunt Lavvy sat in the dining-room, one on each side ofthe fireplace. Aunt Lavvy read James Martineau's _Endeavours After theChristian Life_, and Mamma read "The Pulpit in the Family" out of the_Sunday At Home_. Somehow you couldn't do it with Aunt Lavvy in the room. 

In the afternoon when she went upstairs to lie down--perhaps. 

But in the afternoon Mamma dozed over the _Sunday At Home_. She was soinnocent and pretty, nodding her head, and starting up suddenly, andlooking round with a smile that betrayed her real opinion of Sunday. Youcouldn't do it while she dozed. 

Towards evening it rained again and Aunt Lavvy went off to Ilford for theEvening Service, by herself. Everybody else stayed at home, and there washymn-singing instead of church. Mary and her mother were alone together. When her mother had sung the last hymn, "Lead, Kindly Light, " then shewould do it. 

Her mother was singing:

 "'Jesu, Lover of my soul, Let me to Thy bosom fly, While the nearer wa-a-ters roll, While the tempest still is high'"--

She could see the stiff, slender muscles straining in her mother's neck. The weak, plaintive voice tore at her heart. She knew that her mother'svoice was weak and plaintive. Its thin, sweet notes unnerved her. 

 "'Other refuge ha-ave I none: Hangs my helpless soul on Thee'"--

Helpless--Helpless. Mamma was helpless. It was only her love of Mark andJesus that was strong. Something would happen if she told her--somethingawful. She could feel already the chill of an intolerable separation. Shecould give up Jesus, the lover of her soul, but she could not give up hermother. She couldn't live separated from Mamma, from the weak, plaintivevoice that tore at her. 

She couldn't do it. 

IV. 

Catty's eyes twinkled through the banisters. She caught Mary comingdownstairs and whispered that there was cold boiled chicken and triflefor supper, because of Aunt Lavvy. 

Through the door Mary could see her father standing at the table, and thecalm breasts of the cold chicken smoothed with white sauce and decoratedwith beetroot stars. 

There was a book beside Papa's plate, the book Aunt Lavvy had beenreading. She had left it open on the drawing-room table when she went tochurch. She was late for supper and they sat there waiting for her. Shecame in, slowly as usual, and looking at the supper things as though theywere not there. When she caught sight of the book something went up andflickered in her eyes--a sort of triumph. 

You couldn't help thinking that she had left it lying about on purpose, so that Papa should see it. 

He stood waiting till she had sat down. He handed the book to her. Hiseyes gleamed. 

"When you come here, " he said, "you will be good enough to leave JamesMartineau behind you. "

Mamma looked up, startled. "You don't mean to say you've brought thatman's books into the house?"

"You can see for yourself, Caroline, " said Aunt Lavvy. 

"I don't want to see. No, Mary, it has nothing to do with you. "

Mamma was smiling nervously. You would have supposed that she thoughtJames Martineau funny, but the least bit improper. 

"But look, Mamma, it's his _Endeavours After the Christian Life_. "

Her mother took up the book and put it down as if it had bitten her. 

"Christian Life, indeed! What right has James Martineau to call himself aChristian? When he denies Christ--the Lord who bought him! And makes nosecret of it. How can you respect an infidel who uses Christ's name tocover up his blasphemy?"

Aunt Lavvy was smiling now. 

"I thought you said he made no secret of it?"

Mamma said, "You know very well what I mean. "

"If you knew Dr. Martineau--"

"You've no business to know him, " Emilius said, "when your brother Victorand I disapprove of him. "

Emilius was carving chicken. He had an air of kindly, luscioushospitality, hesitating between the two flawless breasts. 

"Dr. Martineau is the wisest and holiest man I ever knew, " said AuntLavvy. 

"I daresay your sister Charlotte thinks Mr. Marriott the wisest and theholiest man _she_ ever knew. "

He settled the larger breast on Aunt Lavvy's plate and laid on it oneperfect star of beetroot. He could do that while he insulted her. 

"Oh--Papa--you _are_ a br--"

Aunt Lavvy shook her gentle head. 

"Lavinia dear" (Mamma's voice was gentle), "did you have a nice service?"

"Very nice, thank you. "

"Did you go to Saint Mary's, or the Parish church?"

Aunt Lavvy's straight, flat chin trembled slightly. Her pale eyeslightened. "I went to neither. "

"Then---where did you go?"

"If you insist on knowing, Caroline, I went to Mr. Robson's church. "

"You went to Mr. --to the Unitarian Chapel?"

"To the Unitarian Chapel. "

"Emilius--" You would have thought that Aunt Lavvy had hit Mamma and hurther. 

Emilius took up his table napkin and wiped his moustache carefully. Hewas quite horribly calm. 

"You will oblige me by not going there again, " he said. 

"You forget that I went every Sunday when we were in Liverpool. "

"You forget that is the reason why you left Liverpool. "

"Only one of the reasons, I think. "

"Can you tell me what reason you have for going now? Beyond your desireto make yourself different from other people. "

"Aren't Unitarians other people?"

She poured out a glass of water and drank. She was giving herself time. 

"My reason, " she said, "is that I have joined the Unitarian Church. "

Mamma put down her knife and fork. Her lips opened and her face turnedsuddenly sharp and sallow as if she were going to faint. 

"You don't mean to say you've gone over? Then God help poor Charlotte!"

Emilius steadied himself to speak. "Does Victor know?" he said. 

"Yes. He knows. "

"You have consulted him, and you have not consulted me?"

"You made me promise not to talk about it. I have kept my promise. "

Mary was sure then that Aunt Lavvy had left the book open on purpose. Shehad laid a trap for Emilius, and he had fallen into it. 

"If you will hold infamous opinions you must be made to keep them toyourself. "

"I have a perfect right to my opinions. "

"You have no right to make an open profession of them. "

"The law is more tolerant than you, Emilius. "

"There is a moral law and a law of honour. You are not living byyourself. As long as you are in Victor's house the least you can do is toavoid giving offence. Have you no consideration for your family? You sayyou came here to be near us. Have you thought of us? Have you thought ofthe children? Do you expect Caroline to go to Victor's house if she's tomeet the Unitarian minister and his wife?"

"You will be cutting yourself off completely, Lavinia, " Mamma said. 

"From what?"

"From everybody. People don't call on Nonconformists. If there were nohigher grounds--"

"Oh--Caroline--" Aunt Lavvy breathed it on a long sigh. 

"It's all very well for you. But you might think of your sisterCharlotte, " Mamma said. 

Papa's beard jerked. He drew in his breath with a savage guttural noise. "A-ach! What's the good of talking?"

He had gone on eating all the time. There was a great pile of chickenbones on his plate. 

Aunt Lavvy turned. "Emilius--for thirty-three years"--her voice broke asshe quivered under her loaded anguish--"for thirty-three years you'veshouted me down. You haven't let me call my soul my own. Yet it _is_ myown--"

"There, please--_please_, " Mamma said, "don't let us have any more ofit, " just as Aunt Lavvy was beginning to get a word in edgeways. 

"Mamma, that isn't fair, you must let her speak. "

"Yes. You must let me speak. " Aunt Lavvy's voice thickened in her throat. 

"I won't have any discussion of Unitarianism here, " said Papa. 

"It's you who have been discussing it, not I. "

"It is, really, Papa. First you began. Then Mamma. "

Mamma said, "If you've finished your supper, Mary, you can go. "

"But I haven't. I've not had any trifle yet. "

She thought: "They don't want me to hear them; but I've a right to sithere and eat trifle. They know they can't turn me out. I haven't doneanything. "

Aunt Lavvy went on. "I've only one thing to say, Emilius. You've asked meto think of Victor and Charlotte, and you and Caroline and the boys andMary. Have you once--in thirty-three years--for a single minute--thoughtof _me_?"

"Certainly I have. It's partly for your own sake I object to yourdisgracing yourself. As if your sister Charlotte wasn't disgrace enough. "

Aunt Lavvy drew herself up stiff and straight in her white shawl like amartyr in her flame. "You might keep Charlotte out of it, I think. "

"I might. Charlotte can't help herself. You can. "

At this point Mamma burst into tears and left the room. 

"Now, " he said, "I hope you're satisfied. "

Mary answered him. 

"I think _you_ ought to be, Papa, if you've been bullying Aunt Lavvy forthirty-three years. Don't you think it's about time you stopped?"

Emilius stared at his daughter. His face flushed slowly. "I think, " hesaid, "it's time you went to bed. "

"It isn't my bed-time for another hour yet. "

(A low murmur from Aunt Lavvy: "Don't, Mary, don't. ")

She went on. "It was you who made Mamma cry, not Aunt Lavvy. It alwaysfrightens her when you shout at people. You know Aunt Lavvy's a perfectsaint, besides being lots cleverer than anybody in this house, exceptMark. You get her by herself when she's tired out with Aunt Charlotte. You insult her religion. You say the beastliest things you can thinkof--"

Her father pushed back his chair; they rose and looked at each other. 

"You wouldn't dare to do it if Mark was here!"

He strode to the door and opened it. His arm made a crescent gesture thatcleared space of her. 

"Go! Go upstairs. Go to bed!"

"I don't care where I go now I've said it. "

Upstairs in her bed she still heard Aunt Lavvy's breaking voice:

"For thirty-three years--for thirty-three years--"

The scene rose again and swam before her and fell to pieces. Ideas--echoes--images. Religion--the truth of God. Her father's voicebooming over the table. Aunt Lavvy's voice, breaking--breaking. A pile ofstripped chicken bones on her father's plate. 

V. 

Aunt Lavvy was getting ready to go away. She held up her night gown toher chin, smoothing and folding back the sleeves. You thought of hergoing to bed in the ugly, yellow, flannel night gown, not caring, lyingin bed and thinking about God. 

Mary was sorry that Aunt Lavvy was going. As long as she was thereyou felt that if only she would talk everything would at once becomemore interesting. She thrilled you with that look of having something--something that she wouldn't talk about--up her sleeve. The Encyclopaediaman said that Unitarianism was a kind of Pantheism. Perhaps that was it. Perhaps she knew the truth about God. Aunt Lavvy would know whether sheought to tell her mother. 

"Aunt Lavvy, if you loved somebody and you found out that their religionwasn't true, would you tell them or wouldn't you?"

"It would depend on whether they were happy in their religion or not. "

"Supposing you'd found out one that was more true and much morebeautiful, and you thought it would make them happier?"

Aunt Lavvy raised her long, stubborn chin. In her face there was a coldexaltation and a sudden hardness. 

"No religion was ever more true or more beautiful than Christianity, " shesaid. 

"There's Pantheism. Aren't Unitarians a kind of Pantheists?"

Aunt Lavvy's white face flushed. "Unitarians Pantheists? Who's beentalking to you about Pantheism?"

"Nobody. Nobody knows about it. I had to find out. "

"The less you find out about it the better. "

"Aunt Lavvy, you're talking like Mr. Propart. Supposing I honestly thinkPantheism's true?"

"You've no right to think anything about it, " Aunt Lavvy said. 

"Now you're talking like Papa. And I did so hope you wouldn't. "

"I only meant that it takes more time than you've lived to find out whathonest thinking _is_. When you're twenty years older you'll know whatthis opinion of yours is worth. "

"I know what it's worth to me, now, this minute. "

"Is it worth making your mother miserable?"

"That's what Mark would say. How did you know I was thinking of Mamma?"

"Because that's what my brother Victor said to me. "

VI. 

The queer thing was that none of them seemed to think the truth couldpossibly matter on its own account, or that anything mattered besidesbeing happy or miserable. Yet everybody, except Aunt Lavvy, wasdetermined that everybody else should be happy in their way by believingwhat they believed; and when it came to Pantheism even Aunt Lavvycouldn't live and let live. You could see that deep down inside her itmade her more furious than Unitarianism made Papa. 

Mary saw that she was likely to be alone in her adventure. It appeared toher more than ever as a journey into a beautiful, quiet yet excitingcountry where you could go on and on. The mere pleasure of being able tomove enchanted her. But nobody would go with her. Nobody knew. Nobodycared. 

There was Spinoza; but Spinoza had been dead for ages. Now she came tothink of it she had never heard anybody, not even Mr. Propart, speak ofSpinoza. It would be worse for her than it had ever been for Aunt Lavvywho had actually known Dr. Martineau. Dr. Martineau was not dead; and ifhe had been there were still lots of Unitarian ministers alive all overEngland. And in the end Aunt Lavvy had broken loose and gone into herUnitarian Chapel. 

She thought: "Not till after Grandmamma was dead. Till years afterGrandmamma was dead. "

She thought: "Of course I'd die rather than tell Mamma. "

VII. 

Aunt Lavvy had gone. Mr. Parish had taken her away in his wagonette. 

At lessons Mamma complained that you were not attending. But she was notattending herself, and when sewing time came she showed what she had beenthinking about. 

"What were you doing in Aunt Lavvy's room this morning?"

She looked up sharply over the socks piled before her for darning. 

"Only talking. "

"Was Aunt Lavvy talking to you about her opinions?"

"No, Mamma. "

"Has she ever talked to you?"

"Of course not. She wouldn't if she promised not to. I don't know evennow what Unitarianism is.... What _do_ Unitarians believe in?"

"Goodness knows, " her mother said. "Nothing that's any good to them, youmay be sure. "

Mary went on darning. The coarse wool of the socks irritated her fingers. It caught in a split nail, setting her teeth on edge. 

If you went on darning for ever--if you went on darning--Mamma would bepleased. She had not suspected anything. 

VIII. 

 "'Full fathom five thy father lies, Of his bones are coral made, Those are pearls that were his eyes. Nothing of him that doth fade But doth suffer a sea-change Into something rich and strange. '"

Between the lovely lines she could hear Mamma say, "They all scamp theirwork. You would require a resident carpenter and a resident glazier--"

And Mrs. Farmer's soft drawl spinning out the theme: "And a residentplumber. Yes, Mrs. Olivier, you really wou-ould. "

Mr. And Mrs. Farmer had called and stayed to tea. Across the room youcould see his close, hatchet nose and straggly beard. Every now and thenhis small, greenish eyes lifted and looked at you. 

Impossible that you had ever enjoyed going to Mrs. Farmer's to see thebaby. It was like something that had happened to somebody else, a longtime ago. Mrs. Farmer was always having babies, and always asking you togo and see them. She couldn't understand that as you grew older you leftoff caring about babies. 

 "'--We are such stuff As dreams are made of--'"

"The Bishop--Confirmation--opportunity. "

Even Mamma owned that Mr. Farmer never knew when it was time to go. 

 "'As dreams are made of, and our little life Is rounded with a sleep--'"

The universe is nothing but the spectacle of the dreams of God. Or was itthe thoughts of God?

"Confirmation--Parish Church--Bishop--"

Confirmation. She had seen a Confirmation once, years ago. Girls in whitedresses and long white veils, like brides, shining behind the squareblack windows of the broughams. Dora and Effie Draper. Effie leanedforward. Her pretty, piercing face looked out through the black pane, notseeing anything, trying greedily to be seen. Big boys and girls kneltdown in rows before the Bishop, and his sleeves went flapping up and downover them like bolsters in the wind. 

Mr. Farmer was looking at her again, as if he had an idea in his head. 

IX. 

The Church Service was open at the Thirty-Nine Articles. Mamma had pushedDr. Smith's "History of England" away. 

"Do you think, " she said, "you could say the Catechism and the AthanasianCreed straight through without stopping?"

"I daresay I could if I tried. Why?"

"Because Mr. Farmer will want to examine you. "

"Whatever for?"

"Because, " her mother said, "there's going to be a Confirmation. It'stime you were thinking about being confirmed. "

"Confirmed? _Me_?"

"And why not you?"

"Well--I haven't got to be, have I?"

"You will have, sooner or later. So you may as well begin to think aboutit now. "

Confirmation. She had never thought about it as a real thing that mighthappen to her, that would happen, sooner or later, if she didn't dosomething to stop Mr. Farmer and Mamma. 

"I _am_ thinking. I'm thinking tight. "

Tight. Tight. Her mind, in agony, pinned itself to one point: how shecould stop her mother without telling her. 

Beyond that point she couldn't see clearly. 

"You see--you see--I don't _want_ to be confirmed. "

"You don't want? You might as well say you didn't want to be aChristian. "

"Don't worry, Mamma darling. I only want to stay as I am. "

"I must worry. I'm responsible for you as long as you're not confirmed. You forget that I'm your godmother as well as your mother. "

She had forgotten it. And Papa and Uncle Victor were her godfathers. "What did your godfathers and godmothers then for you?--They did promiseand vow three things in my name--" they had actually done it. "First:that I should renounce"--renounce--renounce--"Secondly: that I shouldbelieve all the Articles of the Christian Faith--"

The Christian Faith--the Catholic Faith. "Which Faith except everyone dokeep whole and undefiled, without doubt he shall perish everlastingly"--

--"And the Catholic Faith is this: That we worship one God in Trinity andTrinity in Unity. "

They had promised and vowed all that. In her name. What right had they?What right had they?

"You're not a baby any more, " her mother said. 

"That's what I mean. I was a baby when you went and did it. I knewnothing about it. You _can't_ make me responsible. "

"It's we who are responsible, " her mother said. 

"I mean for your vows and promises, Mamma darling. If you'll let me offmy responsibility I'll let you off yours. "

"Now, " her mother said, "you're prevaricating. "

"That means you'll never let me off. If I don't do it now I'll have to doit next year, or the next?"

"You may feel more seriously about it next year. Or next week, " hermother said. "Meanwhile you'll learn the Thirty-Nine Articles. Read themthrough first. "

"--'Nine. Of Original or Birth-sin. Original Sin ... Is the fault andcorruption of the Nature of every man ... Whereby man is far gone fromoriginal righteousness and is of his own nature inclined to evil, so thatthe flesh lusteth always contrary to the spirit; and therefore in everyperson born into this world it deserveth God's wrath and damnation. '"

"Don't look like that, " her mother said, "as if your wits werewool-gathering. "

"Wool?" She could see herself smiling at her mother, disagreeably. 

Wool-gathering. Gathering wool. The room was full of wool; wool flyingabout; hanging in the air and choking you. Clogging your mind. Old greywool out of pew cushions that people had sat on for centuries, full ofdirt. 

Wool, spun out, wound round you, woven in a net. You were tangled andstrangled in a net of unclean wool. They caught you in it when you were ababy a month old. Mamma, Papa and Uncle Victor. You would have to cut andtug and kick and fight your way out. They were caught in it themselves, they couldn't get out. They didn't want to get out. The wool stoppedtheir minds working. They hated it when their minds worked, whenanybody's mind worked. Aunt Lavvy's--yours. 

"'Thirteen. Of Works before Justification. Works done before the grace ofChrist, and the Inspiration of His Spirit, are not pleasant to God, forasmuch as they spring not of faith in Jesus Christ... : yea, rather, for that they are not done as God hath willed and commanded them to bedone, we doubt not but they have the nature of sin. '"

"Do you really believe that, Mamma?"

"Of course I believe it. All our righteousness is filthy rags. "

--People's goodness. People's kindness. The sweet, beautiful things theydid for each other. The brave, noble things, the things Mark did: filthyrags. 

_This_--this religion of theirs--was filthy; ugly, like the shiny blackcovers of their Bibles where their fingers left a grey, greasy smear. Filthy and frightful; like funerals. You might as well be buried alive, five coffins deep in a pit of yellow clay. 

Mamma couldn't really believe it. You would have to tell her it wasn'ttrue. Not telling her meant that you didn't think she cared about thetruth. You insulted her if you supposed she didn't care. Mark would sayyou insulted her. Even if it hurt her a bit at first, you insulted her ifyou thought she couldn't bear it. And afterwards she would be happy, because she would be free. 

"It's no use, Mamma. I shan't ever want to be confirmed. "

"Want--want--want! You ought to want, then. You say you believe theChristian Faith--"

Now--now. A clean quick cut. No jagged ends hanging. 

"That's it. I don't believe a single word of it. "

She couldn't look at her mother. She didn't want to see her cry. 

"You've found that out, have you? You've been mighty quick about it. "

"I found it out ages ago. But I didn't mean to tell you. "

Her mother was not crying. 

"You needn't tell me now, " she said. "You don't suppose I'm going tobelieve it?"

Not crying. Smiling. A sort of cunning and triumphant smile. 

"You just want an excuse for not learning those Thirty-Nine Articles. "

XIV

I. 

Mamma was crying. 

Papa had left the dining-room. Mary sat at the foot of the table, and hermother at the head. The space between was covered and piled with Mark'skit: the socks, the pocket-handkerchiefs, the vests, the fine whitepyjamas. The hanging white globes of the gaselier shone on them. All dayMary had been writing "M. E. Olivier, M. E. Olivier, " in clear, hardletters, like print. The iridescent ink was grey on the white linen andlawn, black when you stamped with the hot iron: M. E. Olivier. Mamma wasembroidering M. E. O. In crimson silk on a black sock. 

Mark was in the Army now; in the Royal Field Artillery. He was going toIndia. In two weeks, before the middle of April, he would be gone. Theyhad known this so long that now and then they could forget it; they couldbe glad that Mark should have all those things, so many more, and morebeautiful, than he had ever had. They were appeased with their labour offorming, over and over again, the letters, clear and perfect, of hisname. 

Then Papa had come in and said that Dan was not going to live at home anymore. He had taken rooms in Bloomsbury with young Vickers. 

Dan had not gone to Cambridge when he left Chelmsted, as Mamma hadintended. There hadn't been enough money. 

Uncle Victor had paid for Mark's last year at Woolwich and for his outfitnow. Some day Mamma would pay him back again. 

Dan had gone first into Papa's office; then into Uncle Edward's office. He was in Uncle Victor's office now. Sometimes he didn't get home tillafter midnight. Sometimes when you went into his room to call him in themorning he wasn't there; but there were the bed-clothes turned down asCatty had left them, with his nightshirt folded on the top. 

Her mother said: "I hope you're content now you've finished your work. "

"_My_ work?" her father said. 

"Yes, yours. You couldn't rest till you'd got the poor boy out of youroffice, and now you've turned him out of the house. I suppose you thoughtthat with Mark going you'd better make a clean sweep. It'll be Roddynext. "

"I didn't turn him out of the house. But it was about time he went. Theyoung cub's temper is getting unbearable. "

"I daresay. You ruined Dan's temper with your sillytease--tease--tease--from morning till night. You can't see a dog withoutwanting to make it snap and snarl. It was the same with all the children. And when they turned you bullied them. Just because you couldn't breakMark's spirit you tried to crush Dan's. It's a wonder he has any temperleft. "

Emilius stroked his beard. 

"That's right. Stroke your beard as if nothing mattered but yourpleasure. You'll be happy enough when Mark's gone. "

Emilius left off stroking his beard. 

"You say I turned him out of the office, " he said. "Did he stay withEdward?"

"Nobody could stay with Edward. You couldn't yourself. "

"Ask Victor how long he thinks he'll keep him. "

"What do you mean, Emilius?"

He didn't answer. He stood there, his lips pouting between his moustacheand beard, his eyes smiling wickedly, as if he had just found out hecould torment her more by not saying what he meant. 

"If Dan went to the bad, " she said, "I wouldn't blame him. It would serveyou right. 

"Unless, " she added, "that's what you want. "

And she began to cry. 

She cried as a child cries, with spasms of sobbing, her pretty mouthspoiled, stretched wide, working, like india-rubber; dull red blotchescreeping up to the brown stains about her eyes. Her tears splashed on tothe fine, black silk web of the sock and sparkled there. 

Emilius had gone from the room, leaving the door open. Mary got up andshut it. She stood, hesitating. The helpless sobbing drew her, frightenedher, stirred her to exasperation that was helpless too. Her mother hadnever been more intolerably dear. 

She went to her. She put her arm round her. 

"Don't, Mamma darling. Why do you let him torture you? He didn't turn Danout of the office. He let him go because he can't afford to pay himenough. "

"I know that as well as you, " her mother said surprisingly. 

She drew herself from the protecting arm. 

"Well, then--But, oh, what a brute he is. _What_ a brute!"

"For shame to talk that way of your father. _You've_ no right. You're theone that always goes scot-free. "

And, beginning to cry again, she rose and went out, grasping Mark's sockin her convulsive hand. 

"Mary, did you hear your mother say I bullied you?"

Her father had come back into the room. 

"Yes, " she said. 

"Have I ever bullied you?"

She looked at him steadily. 

"No. You would have done if Mamma had loved me as much as she loves Mark. I wish you had. I wish you'd bullied the life out of me. I shouldn't havecared. I wish you'd hated me. Then I should have known she loved me. "

He looked at her in silence, with round, startled eyes. He understood. 

II. 

"Ubique--"

The gunner's motto. Mark's motto, stamped on all the letters he wouldwrite. A blue gun on a blue gun-carriage, the muzzle pointing to theleft. The motto waving underneath:

"UBIQUE. "

At soldiers' funerals the coffin was carried on a gun-carriage andcovered with a flag. 

"_Ubique quo fas et gloria ducunt_. " All through the excitement of theevening it went on sounding in her head. 

It was Mark's coming of age party in the week before he went. The firsttime she could remember being important at a party. Her consciousness ofbeing important was intense, exquisite. She was Sub-Lieutenant MarkOlivier's sister. His only one. 

And, besides, she looked nice. 

Last year's white muslin, ironed out, looked as good as new. The bluesash really was new; and Mamma had lent her one of her necklets, aturquoise heart on a thin gold chain. In the looking-glass she could seeher eyes shining under her square brown fringe: spots of gold dartingthrough brown crystal. Her brown hair shone red on the top and goldunderneath. The side pieces, rolled above her ears and plaited behind, made a fillet for her back hair. Her back hair was too short. She triedto make it reach to her waist by pulling the curled tips straight; butthey only sprang back to her shoulder-blades again. It was unfortunate. 

Catty, securing the wonderful fillet with a blue ribbon told her not tobe unhappy. She would "do. "

Mamma was beautiful in her lavender-grey silk and her black jet crosswith the diamond star. They all had to stand together, a little behindher, near the door, and shake hands with the people as they came in. Marywas surprised that they should shake hands with her before they shookhands with Mark; it didn't seem right, somehow, when it was his birthday. 

Everybody had come except Aunt Charlotte; even Mr. Marriott, though hewas supposed to be afraid of parties. (You couldn't ask Aunt Charlottebecause of Mr. Marriott. ) There were the two Manistys, looking taller andleaner than ever. And there was Mrs. Draper with Dora and Effie. Mrs. Draper, black hawk's eyes in purple rings; white powder over crushedcarmines; a black wing of hair folded over grey down. Effie's pretty, piercing face; small head poised to strike. Dora, a young likeness ofMrs. Draper, an old likeness of Effie, pretty when Effie wasn't there. 

When they looked at you you saw that your muslin was not as good as new. When they looked at Mamma you saw that her lavender silk wasold-fashioned and that nobody wore black jet crosses now. You were frillyand floppy when everybody else was tight and straight in Princessdresses. 

Mamma was more beautiful than Mrs. Draper; and her hair, anyhow, was inthe fashion, parted at the side, a soft brown wing folded over her leftear. 

But that made her look small and pathetic--a wounded bird. She ought notto have been made to look like that. 

You could hear Dora and Effie being kind to Mamma. "Dear Mrs. Olivier"--Indulgence--Condescension. As if to an unfortunate and ratherfoolish person. Mark could see that. He was smiling: a hard, angry smile. 

Mrs. Draper was Mamma's dearest friend. They could sit and talk to eachother about nothing for hours together. In the holidays Mrs. Draper usedto be always coming over to talk to Mamma, always bringing Dora and Effiewith her, always asking Mark and Dan and Roddy to her house, alwayswondering why Mark never went. 

Dan went. Dan seemed as if he couldn't keep away. 

This year Mrs. Draper had left off asking Mark and Dan and Roddy. She hadleft off bringing Dora and Effie with her. 

Mary wondered why she had brought them now, and why her mother had askedthem. 

The Manistys. She had brought them for the Manistys. She wanted Mamma tosee what she had brought them for. And Mamma had asked them because shedidn't care, and wanted them to see that she didn't care, and that Markdidn't care either. 

If they only knew how Mark detested them with their "_Dear_ Mrs. Olivier"!

Something was going on. She heard Uncle Victor saying to Aunt Lavvy, "Mark's party is a bit rough on Dan. "

Dan was trying to get to Effie through a gap in the group formed by theManistys and two young subalterns, Mark's friends. Each time he did itMrs. Draper stopped him by moving somehow so as to fill the gap. He gaveit up at last, to sit by himself at the bottom of the room, jammed into acorner between the chimney-piece and the rosewood cabinet, where hestared at Effie with hot, unhappy eyes. 

Supper. Mamma was worried about the supper. She would have liked to havegiven them a nicer one, but there wasn't enough money; besides, she wasafraid of what Uncle Victor would think if they were extravagant. Thatwas the worst of borrowing, Mark said; you couldn't spend so muchafterwards. Still, there was enough wine yet in the cellar for fiftyparties. You could see, now, some advantage in Papa's habit of neverdrinking any but the best wine and laying in a large stock of it while hecould. 

Mary noticed that Papa and Dan drank the most. Perhaps Dan drank morethan Papa. The smell of wine was over all the supper, spoiling it, sending through her nerves a reminiscent shiver of disgust. 

Mark brought her back into the dining-room for the ice she hadn't had. Dan was there, by himself, sitting in the place Effie had just left. Effie's glass had still some wine in it. You could see him look for thewet side of the rim and suck the drops that had touched her mouth. Something small and white was on the floor beside him. Effie'spocket-handkerchief. He stooped for it. You could hear him breathing upthe scent on it with big, sighing sobs. 

They slunk back into the drawing-room. 

Mark asked her to play something. 

"Make a noise, Minky. Perhaps they'll go. "

"The Hungarian March. " She could play it better than Mamma. Mamma nevercould see that the bass might be even more important than the treble. Shewas glad that she could play it better than Mamma, and she hated herselffor being glad. 

Mark stood by the piano and looked at her as she played. They talkedunder cover of the "Droom--Droom--Droom-era-room. "

"Mark, am I looking too awful?"

"No. Pretty Minx. Very pretty Minx. "

"We mustn't, Mark. They'll hear us. They'll think us idiots. "

"I don't care if they do. Don't you wish they'd go? Clever Minx. Cleverpaws. "

Mamma passed and looked at them. Her face shrank and sharpened under thedropped wing of her hair. She must have heard what Mark said. She hatedit when Mark talked and looked like that. She hated it when you played_her_ music. 

Beethoven, then. The "Sonata Eroica" was bound up with "Violetta, " the"Guards" and "Mabel" Waltzes and the "Pluie des Perles. "

"_Ubique quo fas et gloria ducunt_. " That was the meaning of the noble, serious, passionate music. 

Roddy called out, "Oh, _not that_ dull old thing. "

No. Not that. There was the Funeral March in it: _sulle morte d'un eroe_. Mark was going away. 

"Waldteufel, " then. _One_--two--three. _One_--two--three. Sustained thrumin the bass. One--two--three. Thursday--Friday--_One_--two--three. Saturday--Sunday. Beat of her thoughts, beat of the music in a sort ofsyncopated time. _One_--two--three, Monday. 

On Tuesday Mark would be gone. 

His eyes made her break off to look round. Dan had come back into theroom, to his place between the cabinet and the chimney-piece. He stoopedforward, his head hanging as if some weight dragged it. His eyes, turnedup, staring at Effie, showed half circles of blood-shot white. His facewas flushed. A queer, leaden grey flush. 

Aunt Lavvy sat beside him. She had her hand on his arm, to keep him quietthere in his corner. 

"Mark--what's the matter with Dan?"

_One_--two--three. _One_--two--three. Something bumped against the glassdoor of the cabinet. A light tinkling crash of a broken pane. She couldsee slantwise as she went on playing. Dan was standing up. He swayed, feeling for the ledge of the cabinet. Then he started to come down theroom, his head lowered, thrust forward, his eyes heavy with some earnest, sombre purpose. 

He seemed to be hours coming down the room by himself. Hours standing inthe middle of the room, holding on to the parrot chair. 

"Mark!"

"Go on playing. "

He went to him. Roddy sprang up from somewhere. Hours while they weregetting Dan away from the parrot chair to the door beside the piano. Hours between the opening and sudden slamming of the door. 

But she had not played a dozen bars. She went on playing. 

"Wait a minute, Effie. "

Effie was standing beside her with her hand on the door. 

"I've lost my pocket-handkerchief. I must have left it in the dining-room. I _know_ I left it in the dining-room, " she said, fussing. 

Mary got up. "All right. I'll fetch it. "

She opened the door and shut it again quickly. 

"I can't go--yet. "

III. 

Friday, Saturday and Sunday passed, each with a separate, hurrying pacethat quickened towards bed-time. 

Mark's last night. She had left her door open so that she could hear himcome upstairs. He came and sat on her bed as he used to do years ago whenshe was afraid of the ghost in the passage. 

"I shan't be away for ever, Minky. Only five years. "

"Yes, but you'll be twenty-six then, and I shall be nineteen. We shan'tbe ourselves. "

"I shall be my self. Five years isn't really long. "

"You--you'll like it, Mark. There'll be jungles with bisons and tigers. "

"Yes. Jungles. "

"And polo. "

"Shan't be able to go in for polo. "

"Why not?"

"Ponies. Too expensive. "

They sat silent. 

"What I _don't_ like, " Mark said in a sleepy voice, "is leaving Papa. "

"Papa?"

He really meant it. "Wish I'd been decenter to him, " he said. 

And then: "Minky--you'll be kind to little Mamma. "

"Oh, Mark--aren't I?"

"Not always. Not when you say funny things about the Bible. "

"You say funny things yourself. "

"Yes; but she thinks I don't mean them, so it doesn't matter. "

"She thinks I don't mean them, either. "

"Well--let her go on thinking it. Do what she wants--even when it'sbeastly. "

"It's all very well for you. She doesn't want _you_ to learn theThirty-Nine Articles. What would you do if she did?"

"Learn them, of course. Lie about them, if that would please her. "

She thought: "Mamma didn't want him to be a soldier. "

As if he knew what she was thinking, he said, "She doesn't really mind mygoing into the Army. I knew she wouldn't. Besides, I had to. "

"Yes. "

"I'll make it up to her, " he said. "I won't do any other thing shewouldn't like. I won't marry. I won't play polo. I'll live on my pay andgive poor Victor back his money. And there's one good thing about it. Papa'll be happier when I'm not here. "

IV. 

"Mark!"

"Minky!"

"He had said good-night and gone to his room and come back again to holdher still tighter in his arms. 

"What?"

"Nothing, " he said. "Only--good-night. "

To-morrow no lingering and no words. Mark's feet quick in the passage. Adoor shut to, a short, crushing embrace before he turned from her to hermother. 

Her mother and she alone together in the emptied room, turning from eachother, without a word. 

V. 

The wallflowers had grown up under the south side of the garden wall; ahedge of butterfly-brown and saffron. They gave out a hot, velvet smell, like roses and violets laced with mignonette. 

Mamma stood looking at the wallflowers, smiling at them, happy, as ifMark had never gone. 

As if Mark had never gone. 

XV

I. 

Mamma whispered to Mrs. Draper, and Aunt Bella whispered to Mamma:"Fourteen. " They always made a mystery about being fourteen. They oughtto have told her. 

Her thoughts about her mother went up and down. Mamma was not helpless. She was not gentle. She was not really like a wounded bird. She waspowerful and rather cruel. You could only appease her with piles ofhemmed sheets and darned stockings. If you didn't take care she would gethold of you and never rest till she had broken you, or turned and twistedyou to her own will. She would say it was God's will. She would think itwas God's will. 

They might at least have told you about the pain. The knives of pain. Youhad to clench your fists till the fingernails bit into the palms. Overthe ear of the sofa cushions she could feel her hot eyes looking at hermother with resentment. 

She thought: "You had no business to have me. You had no business to haveme. "

Somebody else's eyes. Somebody else's thoughts. Not yours. Not yours. 

Mamma got up and leaned over you and covered you with the rug. Her whiteface quivered above you in the dusk. Her mouth pushed out to yours, making a small sound like a moan. You heard yourself cry: "Mamma, Mamma, you are adorable!"

That was you. 

II. 

And as if Mark had never gone, as if that awful thing had never happenedto Dan, as if she had never had those thoughts about her mother, herhidden happiness came back to her. Unhappiness only pushed it to a longerrhythm. Nothing could take it away. Anything might bring it: the smell ofthe white dust on the road; the wind when it came up out of nowhere andbrushed the young wheat blades, beat the green flats into slopes wherethe white light rippled and ran like water, set the green field shakingand tossing like a green sea; the five elm trees, stiff, ecstaticdancers, holding out the broken-ladder pattern of their skirts; hauntingrhymes, sudden cadences; the grave "_Ubique_" sounding through theBeethoven Sonata. 

Its thrill of reminiscence passed into the thrill of premonition, ofsomething about to happen to her. 

XVI

I. 

Poems made of the white dust, of the wind in the green corn, of the fivetrees--they would be the most beautiful poems in the world. 

Sometimes the images of these things would begin to move before her withpersistence, as if they were going to make a pattern; she could hear athin cling-clang, a moving white pattern of sound that, when she tried tocatch it, broke up and flowed away. The image pattern and the soundpattern belonged to each other, but when she tried to bring them togetherthey fell apart. 

That came of reading too much Byron. 

How was it that patterns of sound had power to haunt and excite you? Likethe "potnia, potnia nux" that she found in the discarded Longfellow, stuck before his "Voices of the Night. "

Potnia, potnia nux, hypnodoteira ton polyponon broton, erebothen ithi, mole, mole katapteros ton Agamemnonion epi domon. 

She wished she knew Greek; the patterns the sounds made were so hard andstill. 

And there were bits of patterns, snapt off, throbbing wounds of soundthat couldn't heal. Lines out of Mark's Homer. 

Mark's Greek books had been taken from her five years ago, when Rodneywent to Chelmsted. And they had come back with Rodney this Easter. Theystood on the shelf in Mark's bedroom, above his writing-table. 

One day she found her mother there, dusting and arranging the books. Besides the little shabby Oxford Homers there were an Aeschylus, aSophocles, two volumes of Aristophanes, clean and new, three volumes ofEuripides and a Greek Testament. On the table a well-preserved GreekAnthology, bound in green, with the owner's name, J. C. Ponsonby, stampedon it in gilt letters. She remembered Jimmy giving it to Mark. 

She took the _Iliad_ from its place and turned over the torn, discolouredpages. 

Her mother looked up, annoyed and uneasy, like a child disturbed in thepossession of its toys. 

"Mark's books are to be kept where Mark put them, " she said. 

"But, Mamma, I want them. "

Never in her life had she wanted anything so much as those books. 

"When will you learn not to want what isn't yours?"

"Mark doesn't want them, or he'd have taken them. He'd give them me if hewas here. "

"He isn't here. I won't have them touched till he comes back. "

"But, Mamma darling, I may be dead. I've had to wait five years as itis. "

"Wait? What for, I should like to know?"

"To learn Greek, of course. "

Her mother's face shivered with repugnance. It was incredible thatanybody should hate a poor dead language so. 

"Just because Mark learnt Greek, you think _you_ must try. I thoughtyou'd grown out of all that tiresome affectation. It was funny when youwere a little thing, but it isn't funny now. "

Her mother sat down to show how tired she was of it. 

"It's just silly vanity. "

Mary's heart made a queer and startling movement, as if it turned overand dashed itself against her ribs. There was a sudden swelling andaching in her throat. Her head swam slightly. The room, Mark's room, withMark's white bed in one corner and Dan's white bed in the other, hadchanged; it looked like a room she had never been in before. She hadnever seen that mahogany washstand and the greyish blue flowers on thejug and basin. The person sitting on the yellow-painted bedroom chair wasa stranger who wore, unaccountably, a brown dress and a gold watch-chainwith a gold tassel that she remembered. She had an odd feeling that thisperson had no right to wear her mother's dress and her chain. 

The flash of queerness was accompanied by a sense of irreparabledisaster. Everything had changed; she heard herself speaking, speakingsteadily, with the voice of a changed and unfamiliar person. 

"Mark doesn't think it's vanity. You only think it is because you wantto. "

The mind of this unfamiliar self had a remorseless lucidity that seemedto her more shocking than anything she could imagine. It went on as ifurged by some supreme necessity. "You're afraid. Afraid. "

It seemed to her that her mother really was afraid. 

"Afraid? And what of?" her mother said. 

The flash went out, leaving her mind dark suddenly and defeated. 

"I don't know what _of_. I only know you're afraid. "

"That's an awful thing for any child to say to any mother. Just because Iwon't let you have your own way in everything. Until your will isresigned to God's will I may well be afraid. "

"How do you know God doesn't want me to know Greek? He may want it asmuch as I do. "

"And if you did know it, what good would it do you?"

She stood staring at her mother, not answering. She knew the soundpatterns were beautiful, and that was all she knew. Beauty. Beauty couldbe hurt and frightened away from you. If she talked about it now shewould expose it to outrage. Though she knew that she must appear to hermother to be stubborn and stupid, even sinful, she put her stubbornness, her stupidity, her sinfulness, between it and her mother to defend it. 

"I can't tell you, " she said. 

"No. I don't suppose you can. "

Her mother followed up the advantage given her. "You just go aboutdreaming and mooning as if there was nothing else in the wide world foryou to do. I can't think what's come over you. You used to be content tosit still and sew by the hour together. You were more help to me when youwere ten than you are now. The other day when I asked you to darn a holein your own stocking you looked as if I'd told you to go to your funeral. 

"It's time you began to take an interest in looking after the house. There's enough to keep you busy most of your time if you only did thehalf of it. "

"Is that what you want me to be, Mamma? A servant, like Catty?"

"Poor Catty. If you were more like Catty, " her mother said, "you'd behappier than you are now, I can tell you. Catty is never disagreeable ordisobedient or discontented. "

"No. But perhaps Catty's mother thinks she is. "

She thought: She _is_ afraid. 

"Do you suppose, " her mother said, "it's any pleasure to me to find faultwith my only daughter? If you weren't my only daughter, perhaps Ishouldn't find fault. "

Her new self answered again, implacable in its lucidity. "You mean, ifyou'd had a girl you could do what you liked with you'd have let mealone? You'd have let me alone if you could have done what you liked withMark?"

She noticed, as if it had a separate and significant existence, hermother's hand lying on the green cover of the Greek Anthology. 

"If you were like Mark--if you were only like him!"

"If I only were!"

"Mark never hurt me. Mark never gave me a minute's trouble in his life. "

"He went into the Army. "

"He had a perfect right to go into the Army. "

Silence. "Minky--you'll be kind to little Mamma. " A hard, light sound;the vexed fingers tap-tapping on the book. Her mother rose suddenly, pushing the book from her. 

"There--take Mark's books. Take everything. Go your own way. You alwayshave done; you always will. Some day you'll be sorry for it. "

She was sorry for it now, miserable, utterly beaten. Her new self seemedto her a devil that possessed her. She hated it. She hated the books. Shehated everything that separated her and made her different from hermother and from Mark. 

Her mother went past her to the door. 

"Mamma--I didn't mean it--Mamma--"

Before she could reach the door it shut between them. 

II. 

The library at Five Elms was very small. Emilius used it as asmoking-room; but it was lined with books. Where the rows of shelves metthe shutter cases a fold of window-curtain overlapped their ends. 

On the fifth shelf, covered by the curtain, she found the four volumes ofShelley's _Poetical Works_, half-bound in marble-paper and black leather. She had passed them scores of times in her hunt for something to read. Percy Bysshe Shelley. Percy Bysshe--what a silly name. She had thoughtof him as she thought of Allison's _History of Europe_ in seventeenvolumes, and the poems of Cornwall and Leigh Hunt. Books you wouldn'tread if you were on a desert island. 

There was something about Shelley in Byron's _Life and Letters_. Something she had read and forgotten, that persisted, struggled to makeitself remembered. 

Shelley's Pantheism. 

The pages of Shelley were very clean; they stuck together lightly at theedges, like the pages of the Encyclopaedia at "Pantheism" and "Spinoza. "Whatever their secret was, you would have to find it for yourself. 

Table of Contents--Poems written in 1816--"Hymn to Intellectual Beauty. "She read that first. 

 "Sudden thy shadow fell on me:-- I shrieked, and clasped my hands in ecstasy!"

It had happened to Shelley, too. He knew how you felt when it happened. (Only you didn't shriek. ) It was a real thing, then, that did happen topeople. 

She read the "Ode to a Skylark, " the "Ode to the West Wind" and"Adonais. "

All her secret happiness was there. Shelley knew about the queerness ofthe sharp white light, and the sudden stillness, when the grey of thefields turns to violet: the clear, hard stillness that covers the excitedthrob-throbbing of the light. 

 "Life, like a dome of many-coloured glass, Stains the white radiance of eternity"--

Colours were more beautiful than white radiance. But that was because ofthe light. The more light there was in them the more beautiful they were;it was their real life. 

One afternoon Mr. Propart called. He came into the library to borrow abook. 

"And what are _you_ so deep in?" he said. 

"Shelley. "

"Shelley? Shelley?" He looked at her. A kind, considering look. She likedhis grey face with its tired keenness. She thought he was going to saysomething interesting about Shelley; but he only smiled his thin, drooping smile; and presently he went away with his book. 

Next morning the Shelleys were not in their place behind the curtain. Somebody had moved them to the top shelf. Catty brought the step-ladder. 

In the evening they were gone. Mr. Propart must have borrowed them. 

III. 

"To this, then, comes our whole argument respecting the fourth kind ofmadness, on account of which anyone, who, on seeing the beauty in thislower world, being reminded of the true, begins to recover his wings, and, having recovered them, longs to soar aloft, but, being unable to doit, looks upwards like a bird, and despising things below, is deemed tobe affected with madness. "

Beauty in itself. In itself--Beauty in beautiful things. She had neverthought about it that way before. It would be like the white light in thecolours. 

Plato, discovered in looking for the lost Shelleys, thus consoled her. The Plato of Bohn's Library. Cary's English for Plato's Greek. Slab uponslab. No hard, still sound-patterns. Grey slabs of print, shining with aninner light--Plato's thought. 

Her happiness was there, too. 

XVII

I. 

The French nephew was listening. He had been listening for quite a longtime, ten minutes perhaps; ever since they had turned off the railwaybridge into Ley Street. 

They had known each other for exactly four hours and seventeen minutes. She had gone to the Drapers for tea. Rodney had left her on theirdoorstep and he had found her there and had brought her into thedining-room. That, he declared, was at five o'clock, and it was nowseventeen minutes past nine by his watch which he showed her. 

It had begun at tea-time. When he listened he turned round, excitedly, inhis chair; he stooped, bringing his eyes level with yours. When he talkedhe tossed back his head and stuck out his sharp-bearded chin. She was notsure that she liked his eyes. Hot black. Smoky blurs like breath onglass. Old, tired eyelids. Or his funny, sallowish face, narrowing to theblack chin-beard. Ugly one minute, nice the next. 

It moved too much. He could say all sorts of things with it and with hisshoulders and his hands. Mrs. Draper said that was because he was halfFrench. 

He was showing her how French verse should be read when Rodney came forher, and Dr. Draper sent Rodney away and kept her for dinner. 

The French nephew was taking her home now. They had passed the crook ofthe road. 

"And all this time, " she said, "I don't know your name. "

"Maurice. Maurice Jourdain. I know yours--Mary Olivier. I like it. "

"You wouldn't if you were me and your father kept on saying, 'Mary, Mary, quite contrary, ' and 'Mary had a little lamb. '"

"Fathers will do these cruel things. It's a way they have. "

"Papa isn't cruel. Only he's so awfully fond of Mamma that he can't thinkabout _us_. He doesn't mind me so much. "

"Oh--he doesn't mind you so much?"

"No. It's Mark he can't stand. "

"Who is Mark?"

"My brother. Mark is a soldier--Royal Artillery. "

"Lucky Mark. I was to have been a soldier. "

"Why weren't you?"

"My mother wouldn't have liked it. So I had to give it up. "

"How you must have loved her. Mark loves my mother more than anything;but he couldn't have done that. "

"Perhaps Mark hasn't got to provide for his mother and his sisters. Ihad. And I had to go into a disgusting business to do it. "

"Oh-h--"

He was beautiful inside. He did beautiful things. She was charmed, suddenly, by his inner, his immaterial beauty. She thought: "He must beever so old. "

"But it's made them love you awfully, hasn't it?" she said. 

His shoulders and eyebrows lifted; he made a queer movement with hishands, palms outwards. He stood still in the path, turned to her, straight and tall. He looked down at her; his lips jerked; the hard, sharp smile bared narrow teeth. 

"The more you do for people the less they love you, " he said. 

"Your people must be very funny. "

"No. No. They're simply pious, orthodox Christians, and I don't believein Christianity. I'm an atheist. I don't believe their God exists. I hopehe doesn't. They wouldn't mind so much if I were a villain, too, butit's awkward for them when they find an infidel practising any of theChristian virtues. My eldest sister, Ruth, would tell you that I _am_ avillain. "

"She doesn't really think it. "

"Doesn't she! My dear child, she's got to think it, or give up herbelief. "

She could see the gable end of Five Elms now. It would soon be over. Whenthey got to the garden gate. 

It _was_ over. 

"I suppose, " he said, "I must shut the prison door. "

They looked at each other through the bars and laughed. 

"When shall I see you again?" he said. 

II. 

She had seen him again. She could count the times on the fingers of onehand. Once, when he came to dinner with Dr. And Mrs. Draper; once atSunday supper with the Drapers after Church; once on a Saturday when Mrs. Draper asked her to tea again; and once when he called to take her for awalk in the fields. 

Mamma had lifted her eyebrows and Mrs. Draper said, "Nonsense. He's oldenough to be her father. "

The green corn stood above her ankles then. This was the fifth time. Thecorn rose to her waist. The ears were whitening. 

"You're the only person besides Mark who listens. There was Jimmy. Butthat was different. He didn't know things. He's a darling, but he doesn'tknow things. "

"Who is Jimmy?"

"Mark's friend and mine. "

"_Where_ is he?"

"In Australia. He can't ever come back, so I shall never see him again. "

"I'm glad to hear it. "

A sudden, dreadful doubt. She turned to him in the narrow path. 

"You aren't laughing at me, are you? You don't think I'm shamming andshowing off?"

"I? I? Laughing at you? My poor child--No--"

"They don't understand that you can really love words--beautiful sounds. And thoughts. Love them awfully, as if they were alive. As if they werepeople. "

"They are alive. They're better than people. You know the best of yourShelley and Plato and Spinoza. Instead of the worst. "

"I should have liked to have known them, too. Sometimes I pretend that Ido know them. That they're alive. That they're here. Saying things andlistening. They're kind. They never misunderstand. They never lose theirtempers. "

"You mustn't do that, " he said sharply. 

"Why not?"

"It isn't good for you. Talk to me. I'm alive. I'm here, I'll listen. I'll never misunderstand. I'll never lose my temper. "

"You aren't always here. "

He smiled, secretly, with straight lips, under the funny, frizzy, Frenchmoustache. And when he spoke again he looked old and wise, like an uncle. 

"Wait, " he said. "Wait a bit. Wait three years. "

"Three years?" she said. "Three years before we can go for another walk?"

He shouted laughter and drew it back with a groan. 

She couldn't tell him that she pretended he was there when he was notthere; that she created situations. 

He was ill, and she nursed him. She could feel the weight of his headagainst her arm, and his forehead--hot--hot under her hand. She had felther hands to see whether they would be nice enough to put on Mr. Jourdain's forehead. They were rather nice; cool and smooth; the palmsbrushed together with a soft, swishing sound like fine silk. 

He was poor and she worked for him. 

He was in danger and she saved him. From a runaway horse; from a furiousdog; from a burning house; from a lunatic with a revolver. 

It made her sad to think how unlikely it was that any of these thingswould ever happen. 

III. 

"Mr. Jourdain, I am going to school. "

The corn was reaped and carried. The five elms stood high above theshallow stubble. 

"My poor Mary, is it possible?"

"Yes. Mamma says she's been thinking of it for a long time. "

"Don't be too hard on your mother till you're quite sure it wasn't myaunt. "

"It may have been both of them. Anyhow, it's awful. Just--just when I wasso happy. "

"Just when I was so happy, " he said. "But that's the sort of thing theydo. "

"I knew you'd be sorry for me. "

XVIII

I. 

She was shut up with Papa, tight, in the narrow cab that smelt of themews. Papa, sitting slantways, nearly filled the cab. He was quiet andsad, almost as if he were sorry she was going. 

His sadness and quietness fascinated her. He had a mysterious, wonderful, secret life going on in him. Funny you should think of it for the firsttime in the cab. Supposing you stroked his hand. Better not. He mightn'tlike it. 

Not forty minutes from Liverpool Street to Victoria. If only cabs didn'tsmell so. 

II. 

The small, ugly houses streamed past, backs turned to the train, stucktogether, rushing, rushing in from the country. 

Grey streets, trying to cut across the stream, getting nowhere, carriedpast sideways on. 

Don't look at the houses. Shut your eyes and remember. 

Her father's hand on her shoulder. His face, at the carriage window, looking for her. A girl moving back, pushing her to it. "Papa!"

Why hadn't she loved him all the time? Why hadn't she liked his beard?His nice, brown, silky beard. His poor beard. 

Mamma's face, in the hall, breaking up suddenly. Her tears in your mouth. Her arms, crushing you. Mamma's face at the dining-room window. Tears, pricking, cutting your eyelids. Blink them back before the girls seethem. Don't think of Mamma. 

The Thames. Barking Creek goes into the Thames and the Roding goes intoBarking Creek. Yesterday, the last walk with Roddy, across Barking Flatsto the river, over the dry, sallow grass, the wind blowing in theirfaces. Roddy's face, beautiful, like Mamma's, his mouth, white at theedges. Roddy gasping in the wind, trying to laugh, his heart thumping. Roddy was excited when he saw the tall masts of the ships. He had wantedto be a sailor. 

Dan's face, when he said good-bye; his hurt, unhappy eyes; the littledark, furry moustache trying to come. Tibby's eyes. Dank wanted to marryEffie. Mark was the only one who got what he wanted. 

Better not think of Dank. 

She looked shyly at her companions. The stout lady in brown, sittingbeside her; kind, thin mouth, pursed to look important; dull kind eyestrying to be wise and sharp behind spectacles, between curtains of deadhair. A grand manner, excessively polite, on the platform, to Papa--MissLambert. 

The three girls, all facing them. Pam Quin; flaxen pigtail; grown upnose; polite mouth, buttoned, little flaxen and pink old lady, Pam Quin, talking about her thirteenth birthday. 

Lucy Elliott, red pig-tail, suddenly sad in her corner, innocentwhite-face, grey eyes blinking to swallow her tears. Frances Elliott, haycoloured pig-tail, very upright, sitting forward and talking fast to hideher sister's shame. 

Mamma's face--Don't think of it. 

Green fields and trees rushing past now. Stop a tree and you'll changeand feel the train moving. Plato. You can't trust your senses. Thecave-dwellers didn't see the things that really moved, only the shadowsof the images of the things. Is the world in your mind or your mind inthe world? Which really moves? Perhaps the world stands still and youmove on and on like the train. If both moved together that would feellike standing still. 

Grass banks. Telegraph wires dipping and rising like sea-waves. At Doverthere would be the sea. 

Mamma's face--Think. Think harder. The world was going on before yourmind started. Supposing you lived before, would that settle it? No. Awhite chalk cutting flashed by. God's mind is what both go on in. Thatsettles it. 

The train dashed into a tunnel. A long tunnel. She couldn't remember whatshe was thinking of the second before they went in. Something thatsettled it. Settled what? She couldn't think any more. 

Dover. The girls standing up, and laughing. They said she had gone tosleep in the train. 

III. 

There was no sea; only the Maison Dieu Road and the big square house inthe walled garden. Brown wire blinds half way up the schoolroom windows. An old lady with grey hair and a kind, blunt face, like Jenny; sheunpacked your box in the large, light bedroom, folding and unfolding yourthings with little gentle, tender hands. Miss Haynes. She hoped you wouldbe happy with them, hoped you wouldn't mind sleeping alone the firstnight, thought you must be hungry and took you down to tea in the longdining-room. 

More girls, pretending not to look at you; talking politely to MissLambert. 

After tea they paired off, glad to see each other. She sat in the cornerof the schoolroom reading the new green Shakespeare that Roddy had givenher. Two girls glanced at her, looked at each other. "Is she doing it forfun?" "Cheek, more likely. "

Night. A strange white bed. Two empty beds, strange and white, in thelarge, light room. She wondered what sort of girls would be sleepingthere to-morrow night. A big white curtain: you could draw it across theroom and shut them out. 

She lay awake, thinking of her mother, crying now and then; thinking ofRoddy and Dan. Mysterious, measured sounds came through the open window. That was the sea. She got up and looked out. The deep-walled garden layunder the window, black and clear like a well. Calais was over there. AndParis. Mr. Jourdain had written to say he was going to Paris. She had hisletter. 

In bed she felt for the sharp edge of the envelope sticking out under thepillow. She threw back the hot blankets. The wind flowed to her, runningcold like water over the thin sheet. 

A light moved across the ceiling. Somebody had waked her. Somebody wasputting the blankets back again, pressing a large, kind hand to herforehead. Miss Lambert. 

IV. 

"Mais--mais--de grâce! ça ne finira jamais--jamais, s'il faut répondre àtes sottises, Marie. Recommençons. "

Mademoiselle, golden top-knot shining and shaking, blue eyes rollingbetween black lashes. 

 "De ta tige détachée, Pauvre feuille dessechée"--

Détachée--desséchée. They didn't rhyme. Their not rhyming irritated herdistress. 

She hated the schoolroom: the ochreish wall-paper, the light soiled bythe brown wire gauze; the cramped classes, the faint odour of girl'sskin; girl's talk in the bedroom when you undressed. 

The queer she-things had a wonderful, mysterious life you couldn't touch. 

Clara, when she walked with you, smiling with her black-treacle eyes andbad teeth, glad to be talked to. Clara in bed. You bathed her foreheadwith eau-de-cologne, and she lay there, happy, glad of her headache thatmade them sorry for her. Clara, waiting for you at the foot of thestairs, looking with dog's eyes, imploring. "Will you walk with me?" "Ican't. I'm going with Lucy. " She turned her wounded dog's eyes and slunkaway, beaten, humble, to walk with the little ones. 

Lucy Elliott in the bathing machine, slipping from the cloak of thetowel, slender and straight; sea water gluing red weeds of hair to herwhite skin. Sweet eyes looking towards you in the evening at sewing-time. 

"Will you sit with me at sewing?"

"I'm sitting with Rose Godwin. "

Sudden sweetness; sudden trouble; grey eyes dark and angry behind suddentears. She wouldn't look at you; wouldn't tell you what you had done. 

Rose Godwin, strong and clever; fourteen; head of the school. Honey-whiteRoman face; brown-black hair that smelt like Brazilian nuts. Rose Godwinwalking with you in the garden. 

"You must behave like other people if you expect them to like you. "

"I don't expect them. How do I behave?"

"It isn't exactly behaving. It's more the way you talk and look atpeople. As if you saw slap through them. Or else as if you didn't seethem at all. That's worse. People don't like it. "

"Anything else?"

"Yes. It was cheeky of you to tell Mademoiselle that those French versesdidn't rhyme. "

"But they didn't. "

"Who cares?"

"I care. I care frightfully. "

"There you go. That's exactly what I mean, " Rose said. "Who cares if youcare? And there's another thing. You're worrying Miss Lambert. Thisschool of hers has got a name for sound religious teaching. You may notlike sound religious teaching, but she's got fifteen of us to look afterbesides you. If you want to be an atheist, go and be it by yourself. "

"I'm not an atheist. "

"Well, whatever silly thing you are. You mustn't talk about it to thegirls. It isn't fair, " Rose said. 

"All right. I won't. "

"On your honour?"

"On my honour. "

V. 

A three-cornered note on her dressing-table at bed-time:

Sept. 20th, 1878. Maison Dieu Lodge. 

"My dear Mary: Our talk was not satisfactory. Unless you can assure me byto-morrow morning that you believe in the Blessed Trinity and all theother truths of our most holy religion, I fear that, _much as we loveyou_, we dare not keep you with us, for your school-fellows' sake. 

"Think it over, my dear child, and let me know. Pray to God _to-night_ tochange your heart and mind and give you His Holy Spirit. 

"Affectionately yours, "Henrietta Lambert. "

The Trinity. A three-cornered note. 

"My dear Miss Lambert: I am very sorry; but it really isn't any good, andif it was it couldn't be done in the time. You wouldn't like it if I toldyou lies, would you? That's why I can't join in the prayers and say theCreed and bow; in Church or anywhere. Rose made me promise not to talkabout it, and I won't. 

"If you must send me away to-morrow morning, you must. But I'm glad youlove me. I was afraid you didn't. 

"With love, your very affectionate

"Mary Olivier. "

"P. S. --I've folded my clothes all ready for packing. "

To-morrow the clothes were put back again in their drawers. She wasn'tgoing. Miss Lambert said something about Rose and Lucy and "kindness topoor Clara. "

VI. 

Rose Godwin told her that home-sickness wore off. It didn't. It camebeating up and up, like madness, out of nothing. The French verbs, grey, slender as little verses on the page, the French verbs swam together andsank under the clear-floating images of home-sickness. Mamma's face, Roddy's, Dan's face. Tall trees, the Essex fields, flat as water, fallingaway behind them. Little feathery trees, flying low on the sky-line. Outside the hallucination the soiled light shut you in. 

The soiled light; odours from the warm roots of girl's hair; and Sunday. Sunday; stale odours of churches. You wrote out the sermon you had notlistened to and had not heard. Somebody told you the text, and you amusedyourself by seeing how near you could get to what you would have heard ifyou had listened. After tea, hymns; then church again. Your heartlaboured with the strain of kneeling, arms lifted up to the high pewledge. You breathed pew dust. Your brain swayed like a bladder, brittle, swollen with hot gas-fumes. After supper, prayers again. Sunday was over. 

On Monday, the tenth day, she ran away to Dover Harbour. She had thoughtshe could get to London with two weeks' pocket-money and what was left ofUncle Victor's tip after she had paid for the eau-de-cologne; but theticket man said it would only take her as far as Canterbury. She hadfrightened Miss Lambert and made her tremble: all for nothing, except thesight of the Harbour. It was dreadful to see her tremble. Even theHarbour wasn't worth it. 

A miracle would have to happen. 

Two weeks passed and three weeks. And on the first evening of the fourthweek the miracle happened. Rose Godwin came to her and whispered: "You'rewanted in the dining-room. "

Her mother's letter lay open on the table. A tear had made a glazedsnail's track down Miss Lambert's cheek; and Mary thought that one ofthem was dead--Roddy--Dan--Papa. 

"My dear, my dear--don't cry. You're going home. "

"Why? Why am I going?"

She could see the dull, kind eyes trying to look clever. 

"Because your mother has sent for you. She wants you back again. "

"Mamma? What does she want me for?"

Miss Lambert's eyes turned aside slantways. She swallowed something inher throat, making a funny noise: qualk-qualk. 

"It isn't _you_? You aren't sending me away?"

"No; we're not sending you. But we think it's best for you to go. Wecan't bear to see your dear, unhappy little face going about thepassages. "

"Does it mean that Mamma isn't happy without me?"

"Well--she _would_ miss her only daughter, wouldn't she?"

The miracle. The shining, lovely miracle. 

"Mary Olivier is going! Mary Olivier is going!"

Actually the girls were sorry. Too sorry. The compassion in Rose Godwin'sface stirred a doubt. Doubt of the miracle. 

She carried her books to the white curtained room where Miss Haynes kneltby her trunk, packing her clothes with little gentle, tender hands. 

"Miss Haynes" (suddenly), "I'm not expelled, am I?"

"Expelled? My dear child, who's talking about expulsion?"

As if she said, When miracles are worked for you, accept them. 

She lay awake, thinking what she should say to her mother when she gothome. She would have to tell her that just at first she very nearly _was_expelled. Then her mother would believe in her unbelief and not think shewas shamming. 

And she would have to explain about her unbelief. And about Pantheism. 

VII. 

She wondered how she would set about it. It wouldn't do to start suddenlyby saying you didn't believe in Jesus or the God of the Old Testament orHell. That would hurt her horribly. The only decent thing would be to lether see how beautiful Spinoza's God was and leave it to her to make thecomparison. 

You would have to make it quite clear to yourself first. It was likethis. There were the five elm trees, and there was the happy white lighton the fields. God was the trees. He was the happy light and he was yourhappiness. There was Catty singing in the kitchen. God was Catty. 

Oh--and there was Papa and Papa's temper. God would have to be Papa too. 

Spinoza couldn't have meant it that way. 

He meant that though God was all Papa, Papa was not all God. He was onlya bit of him. He meant that if God was the only reality, Papa wouldn't bequite real. 

But if Papa wasn't quite real then Mamma and Mark were not quite realeither. 

If Spinoza had meant that--

But perhaps he hadn't. Perhaps he meant that parts of Papa, the parts yousaw most of--his beard, for instance, and his temper--were not quitereal, but that some other part of him, the part you couldn't see, mightbe real in the same way that God was. That would be Papa himself, and itwould be God too. And if God could be Papa, he would have no difficultyat all in being Mamma and Mark. 

Surely Mamma would see that, if you had to have a God, Spinoza's was byfar the nicest God, besides being the easiest to believe in. Surely itwould please her to think like that about Papa, to know that his temperwas not quite real, and that your sin, when you sinned, was not quitereal, so that not even your sin could separate you from God. All yourlife Mamma had dinned into you the agony of separation from God, and thenecessity of the Atonement. She would feel much more comfortable if sheknew that there never had been any separation, and that there needn't beany Atonement. 

Of course she might not like the idea of sin being somehow inside God. She might say it looked bad. But if it wasn't inside God, it would haveto be outside him, supporting itself and causing itself, and then wherewere you? You would have to say that God was not the cause of all things, and that would be much worse. 

Surely if you put it to her like that--? But somehow she couldn't hearherself saying all that to her mother. Supposing Mamma wouldn't listen?

And she couldn't hear herself talking about her happiness, the sudden, secret happiness that more than anything was like God. When she thoughtof it she was hot and cold by turns and she had no words for it. Sheremembered the first time it had come to her, and how she had found hermother in the drawing-room and had knelt down at her knees and kissed herhands with the idea of drawing her into her happiness. And she rememberedher mother's face. It made her ashamed, even now, as if she had beensilly. She thought: I shall never be able to talk about it to Mamma. 

Yet--perhaps--now that the miracle had happened--

VIII. 

In the morning Miss Lambert took her up to London. She had a sort of ideathat the kind lady talked to her a great deal, about God and theChristian religion. But she couldn't listen; she couldn't talk; shecouldn't think now. 

For three hours, in the train, in the waiting-room at Victoria, whileMiss Lambert talked to Papa outside, in the cab, alone with Papa--MissLambert must have said something nice about her, for he looked pleased, as if he wouldn't mind if you did stroke his hand--in Mr. Parish'swagonette, she sat happy and still, contemplating the shining, lovelymiracle. 

IX. 

She saw Catty open the front door and run away. Her mother was comingslowly down the narrow hall. 

She ran up the flagged path. 

"Mamma!" She flung herself to the embrace. 

Her mother swerved from her, staggering back and putting out her handsbetween them. Aware of Mr. Parish shouldering the trunk, she turned intothe open dining-room. Mary followed her and shut the door. 

Her mother sat down, helplessly. Mary saw that she was crying; she hadbeen crying a long time. Her soaked eyelashes were parted by her tearsand gathered into points. 

"Mamma--what is it?"

"What is it? You've disgraced yourself. Everlastingly. You've disgracedyour father, and you've disgraced me. That's what it is. "

"I haven't done anything of the sort, Mamma. "

"You don't think it's a disgrace, then, to be expelled? For infidelity. "

"But I'm not expelled. "

"You are expelled. And you know it. "

"No. They said I wasn't. They didn't want me to go. They told me youwanted me back again. "

"Is it likely I should want you when you hadn't been gone three weeks?"

She could hear herself gasp, see herself standing there, open-mouthed, idiotic. 

Nothing could shake her mother in her belief that she had been expelled. 

"Of course, if it makes you happier to believe it, " she said at last, "do. Will you let me see Miss Lambert's letter?"

"No, " her mother said. "I will not. "

Suddenly she felt hard and strong, grown-up in her sad wisdom. Her motherdidn't love her. She never had loved her. Nothing she could ever do wouldmake her love her. Miracles didn't happen. 

She thought: "I wonder why she won't let me see Miss Lambert's letter?"

She went upstairs to her room. She leaned on the sill of the open window, looking out, drinking in the sweet air of the autumn fields. The fiveelms raised golden heads to a blue sky. 

Her childhood had died with a little gasp. 

Catty came in to unpack her box. Catty, with wet cheeks, kissed a deadchild. 

XIX

I. 

In the train from Bristol to Paddington for the last time: July, eighteen-eighty. 

She would never see any of them again: Ada and Geraldine; Mabel andFlorrie and little Lena and Kate; Miss Wray with her pale face and angryeyes; never hear her sudden, cold, delicious praise. Never see the bare, oblong schoolroom with the brown desks, seven rows across for the lowerschool, one long form along the wall for Class One where she and Ada andGeraldine sat apart. Never look through the bay windows over the lea tothe Channel, at sunset, Lundy Island flattened out, floating, gold ongold in the offing. Never see magenta valerian growing in hot white greywalls. 

Never hear Louie Prichard straining the little music room with Chopin's_Fontana_ Polonaise. Never breathe in its floor-dust with the _Adagio_ ofthe "Pathetic Sonata. "

She was glad she had seen it through to the end when the clergymen's andsquires' daughters went and the daughters of Bristol drapers andpublicans and lodging-house keepers came. 

("What do you think! Bessie Parson's brother marked all herunderclothing. In the shop!")

But they taught you quite a lot of things: Zoology, Physiology, Paley'sEvidences, British Law, Political Economy. It had been a wonderful schoolwhen Mrs. Propart's nieces went to it. And they kept all that up when thesmash came and the butter gave out, and you ate cheap bread that tastedof alum, and potatoes that were fibrous skeletons in a green pulp. Oh--she had seen it through. A whole year and a half of it. 

Why? Because you promised Mamma you'd stick to the Clevehead Schoolwhatever it was like? Because they taught you German and let you learnGreek by yourself with the old arithmetic master? (Ada Clark said it wasa mean trick to get more marks. ) Because of the Beethoven and Schumannand Chopin, and Lundy Island, and the valerian? Because nothing mattered, not even going hungry?

She was glad she hadn't told about that, nor why she asked for the "roomto herself" that turned out to be a servants' garret on a deserted floor. You could wake at five o'clock in the light mornings and read Plato, orsnatch twenty minutes from undressing before Miss Payne came for yourcandle. The tall sycamore swayed in the moonlight, tapping on the windowpane; its shadow moved softly in the room like a ghost. 

II. 

She would like to see the valerian again, though. Mamma said it didn'tgrow in Yorkshire. 

Funny to be going back to Ilford after Roddy and Papa and Mamma had leftit. Funny to be staying at Five Elms with Uncle Victor. Nice UncleVictor, buying the house from Papa and making Dan live with them. Thatwas to keep him from drinking. Uncle Victor was hurt because Papa andMamma would go to Morfe when he wanted you all to live with him. But youcouldn't imagine Emilius and Victor living together or Mamma and AuntLavvy. 

Bristol to Paddington. This time next week it would be King's Cross toReyburn for Morfe. 

She wondered what it would be like. Aunt Bella said it was adead-and-alive place. Morfe--Morfe. It did sound rather as if people diedin it. Aunt Bella was angry with Mrs. Waugh and Miss Frewin for makingMamma go there. But Aunt Bella had never liked Mrs. Waugh and MissFrewin. That was because they had been Mamma's friends at school and notAunt Bella's. 

She wondered what they would be like, and whether they would disapproveof her. They would if they believed she had been expelled from Dover andhad broken Mamma's heart. All Mamma's friends thought that. 

She didn't mind going to Morfe so much. The awful thing was leavingIlford. Ilford was part of Mark, part of her, part of her and Marktogether. There were things they had done that never in all their livesthey could do again. Waldteufel Waltzes played on the old Cramer piano, standing in its place by the door, waltzes that would never sound thesame in any other place in any other room. And there was the sumach tree. It would die if you transplanted it. 

III. 

The little thin, sallow old man, coming towards her on the platform atPaddington, turned out to be Uncle Victor. She had not seen him sinceChristmas, for at Easter he had been away somewhere on business. 

He came slowly, showing a smile of jerked muscles, under cold fixed eyes. He was not really glad to see her. That was because he disapproved ofher. They all believed she had been expelled from the Dover school, andthey didn't seem able to forget it. Going down from Liverpool Street toIlford he sat bowed and dejected in his corner, not looking at her unlesshe could help it. 

"How's Aunt Charlotte?" She thought he would be pleased to think that shehad remembered Aunt Charlotte; but he winced as if she had hit him. 

"She is--not so well. " And then: "How have you been getting on?"

"Oh, all right. I've got the Literature prize again, and the French prizeand the German prize; and I might have got the Good Conduct prize too. "

"And why didn't you get it?"

"Because I gave it up. Somebody else had to have a prize, and Miss Wraysaid she knew it was the one I could best bear to part with. "

Uncle Victor frowned as if he were displeased. 

"You don't seem to consider that I gave it up, " she said. But he hadturned his eyes away. He wasn't listening any more, as he used to listen. 

The train was passing the City of London Cemetery. She thought: "I mustgo and see Jenny's grave before I leave. I wish I hadn't teased her so tolove me. " She thought: "If I die I shall be put in the grass plot besideGrandpapa and Grandmamma Olivier. Papa will bring me in a coffin all theway from Morfe in the train. " Little birch bushes were beginning to growamong the graves. She wondered how she could ever have been afraid ofthose graves and of their dead. 

Uncle Victor was looking at the graves too; queerly, with a sombre, passionate interest. When the train had passed them he sighed and shuthis eyes, as if he wanted to keep on seeing them--to keep on. 

As Mr. Parish's wagonette drove up Ley Street he pointed to a field wherea street of little houses had begun. 

"Some day they'll run a street over Five Elms. But I shan't know anythingabout it, " he said. 

"No. It won't be for ages. "

He smiled queerly. 

They drew up at the gate. "You must be prepared for more changes, " hesaid. 

Aunt Lavvy was at the gate. She was sweet as if she loved you, and sad asif she still remembered your disgrace. 

"No. Not that door, " she said. 

The dining-room and drawing-room had changed places, and both were filledwith the large mahogany furniture that had belonged to Grandpapa. 

"Why, you've turned it back to front. "

Strips of Mamma's garden shone between the dull maroon red curtains. Inside the happy light was dead. 

There seemed to her something sinister about this change. Only the twospare rooms still looked to the front. They had put her in one of theminstead of her old room on the top floor; Dan had the other instead ofhis. It was very queer. 

Aunt Lavvy sat in Mamma's place at the head of the tea-table. A tall, iron-grey woman in an iron-grey gown stood at her elbow holding a littletray. She looked curiously at Mary, as if her appearance there surprisedand interested her. Aunt Lavvy put a cup of tea on the tray. 

"Where's Aunt Charlotte?"

"Aunt Charlotte is upstairs. She isn't very well. "

The maid was saying, "Miss Charlotte asked for a large piece of plumcake, ma'am, " and Aunt Lavvy added a large piece of plum cake to theplate of thin bread and butter. 

Mary thought: "There can't be much the matter with her if she can eat allthat. "

"Can I see her?" she said. 

She heard the woman whisper, "Better not. " She was glad when she left theroom. 

"Has old Louisa gone, then?"

"No, " Aunt Lavvy said. She added presently, "That is Aunt Charlotte'smaid. "

IV. 

Aunt Charlotte looked out through the bars of the old nursery window. Shenodded to Mary and called to her to come up. 

Aunt Lavvy said it did her good to see people. 

There was a door at the head of the stairs, in a matchboard partitionthat walled the well of the staircase. You rang a bell. The corridor wasvery dark. Another partition with a door in it shut off the servants'rooms and the back staircase. They had put the big yellow linen cupboardbefore the tall window, the one she used to hang out of. 

Some of the old things had been left in the nursery schoolroom, so thatit looked much the same. Britton, the maid, sat in Jenny's low chair bythe fireguard. Aunt Charlotte sat in an armchair by the window. 

Her face was thin and small; the pencil lines had deepened; the longblack curls hung from a puff of grey hair rolled back above her ears. Hereyes pointed at you--pointed. They had more than ever their look ofwisdom and excitement. She was twisting and untwisting a string of whitetulle round a sprig of privet flower. 

"Don't you believe a word of it, " she said. "Your father hasn't gone. He's here in this house. He's in when Victor's out. 

"He says he's sold the house to Victor. That's a lie. He doesn't want itknown that he's hidden me here to prevent my getting married. "

"I'm sure he hasn't, " Mary said. Across the room Britton looked at herand shook her head. 

"It's all part of a plan, " Aunt Charlotte said. "To put me away, my dear. Dr. Draper's in it with Victor and Emilius. 

"They may say what they like. It isn't the piano-tuner. It isn't the manwho does the clocks. They know who it is. It isn't that Marriott man. I've found out something about _him_ they don't know. He's got a falsestomach. It goes by clockwork. 

"As if I'd look at a clock-tuner or a piano-winder. I wouldn't, would I, Britton?"

She meditated, smiling softly. "They make them so beautifully now, youcan't tell the difference. 

"He's been to see me nine times in one week. Nine times. But your UncleVictor got him away before he could speak. But he came again and again. He wouldn't take 'No' for an answer. Britton, how many times did Mr. Jourdain come?"

Britton said, "I'm sure I couldn't say, Miss Charlotte. " She made a signto Mary to go. 

Aunt Lavvy was waiting for her at the foot of the stairs. She took herinto her bedroom, Mamma's old room, and asked her what Aunt Charlotte hadsaid. Mary told her. 

"Poor Mary--I oughtn't to have let you see her. "

Aunt Lavvy's chin trembled. "I'm afraid, " she said, "the removal's upsether. I said it would. But Emilius would have it. He could always makeVictor do what he wanted. "

"It might have been something you don't know about. "

Grown-up and strong, she wanted to comfort Aunt Lavvy and protect her. 

"No, " Aunt Lavvy said. "It's the house. I knew it would be. She's beentrying to get away. She never did that before. "

(The doors and the partitions, the nursery and its bars, the big cupboardacross the window, to keep her from getting away. )

"Aunt Lavvy, did Mr. Jourdain really call?"

Aunt Lavvy hesitated. "Yes. He called. "

"Did he see Aunt Charlotte?"

"She was in the room when he came in, but your uncle took him out atonce. "

"She didn't talk to him? Did he hear her talking?"

"No, my dear, I'm sure he didn't. "

"Are you sure he didn't see her?"

Aunt Lavvy smiled. "He didn't look. I don't think he saw any of us veryclearly. "

"How many times did he come?"

"Three or four times, I believe. "

"Did he ask to see me?"

"No. He asked to see your Uncle Victor. "

"I didn't know he knew Uncle Victor. "

"Well, " Aunt Lavvy said, "he knows him now. "

"Did he leave any message for me?"

"No. None. "

"You don't like him, Aunt Lavvy. "

"No, Mary, I do not. And I don't know anybody who does. "

"I like him, " Mary said. 

Aunt Lavvy looked as if she hadn't heard. "I oughtn't to have let you seeAunt Charlotte. "

V. 

Mary woke up suddenly. It was her third night in the spare room at FiveElms. 

She had dreamed that she saw Aunt Charlotte standing at the foot of thebasement stairs, by the cat's cupboard where the kittens were born, taking her clothes off and hiding them. She had seen that before. Whenshe was six years old. She didn't know whether she had been dreamingabout something that had really happened, or about a dream. Only, thistime, she saw Aunt Charlotte open her mouth and scream. The scream wokeher. 

She remembered her mother and Aunt Bertha in the drawing-room, talking, their faces together. That wasn't a dream. 

There was a sound of feet overhead. Uncle Victor's room. A sound of adoor opening and shutting. And then a scream, muffled by the shut door. Her heart checked; turned sickeningly. She hadn't dreamed that. 

Uncle Victor shouted down the stair to Dan. She could hear Dan's feet inthe next room and his door opening. 

The screaming began again: "I-ihh! I-ihh! I-ihh!" Up and up, tearing yourbrain. Then: "Aah-a-o-oh!" Tearing your heart out. "Aa-h-a-o-oh!" and"Ahh-ahh!" Short and sharp. 

She threw off the bed-clothes, and went out to the foot of the stairs. The cries had stopped. There was a sound of feet staggering andshuffling. Somebody being carried. 

Dan came back down the stair. His trousers were drawn up over hisnight-shirt, the braces hanging. He was sucking the back of his hand andspitting the blood out on to his sleeve. 

"Dan--was that Aunt Charlotte?"

"Yes. "

"Was it pain?"

"No. " He was out of breath. She could see his night-shirt shake with thebeating of his heart. 

"Have you hurt your hand?"

"No. "

"Can I do anything?"

"No. Go back to bed. She's all right now. "

She went back. Presently she heard him leave his room and go upstairsagain. The bolt of the front door squeaked; then the hinge of the gate. Somebody going out. She fell asleep. 

The sound of hoofs and wheels woke her. The room was light. She got upand went to the open window. Dr. Draper's black brougham stood at thegate. 

The sun blazed, tree-high, on the flat mangold field across the road. Thegreen leaves had the cold glitter of wet, pointed metal. To thenorth-east a dead smear of dawn. The brougham didn't look like itself, standing still in that unearthly light. As if it were taking part in afuneral, the funeral of some dreadful death. She put on her dressing-gownand waited, looking out. She _had_ to look. Downstairs the hall clockstruck a half-hour. 

The front door opened. Britton came out first. Then Aunt Charlotte, between Uncle Victor and Dr. Draper. They were holding her up by herarm-pits, half leading, half pushing her before them. Her feet made abrushing noise on the flagstones. 

They lifted her into the brougham and placed themselves one on each sideof her. Then Britton got in, and they drove off. 

A string of white tulle lay on the garden path. 

END OF BOOK THREE

BOOK FOURMATURITY (1879-1900)

XX

I. 

The scent of hay came through the open window of her room. Clearer andfiner than the hay smell of the Essex fields. 

She shut her eyes to live purely in that one sweet sense; and opened themto look at the hill, the great hill heaved up against the east. 

You had to lean far out of the window to see it all. It came on from thehidden north, its top straight as a wall against the sky. Then the longshoulder, falling and falling. Then the thick trees. A further hill cutthe trees off from the sky. 

Roddy was saying something. Sprawling out from the corner of thewindow-seat, he stared with sulky, unseeing eyes into the little room. 

"Roddy, what did you say that hill was?"

"Greffington Edge. You aren't listening. "

His voice made a jagged tear in the soft, quiet evening. 

"And the one beyond it?"

"Sarrack. Why can't you listen?"

Greffington Edge. Sarrack. Sarrack. 

Green fields coming on from the north, going up and up, netted in withthe strong net of the low grey walls that held them together, that keptthem safe. Above them thin grass, a green bloom on the grey face of thehill. Above the thin grass a rampart of grey cliffs. 

Roddy wouldn't look at the hill. 

"I tell you, " he said, "you'll loathe the place when you've lived a weekin it. "

The thick, rich trees were trying to climb the Edge, but they couldn'tget higher than the netted fields. 

The lean, ragged firs had succeeded. No. Not quite. They stood outagainst the sky, adventurous mountaineers, roped together, leaningforward with the effort. 

"It's Mamma's fault, " Roddy was saying. "Papa would have gone anywhere, but she _would_ come to this damned Morfe. "

"Don't. Don't--" Her mind beat him off, defending her happiness. He wouldkill it if she let him. Coming up from Reyburn on the front seat of theMorfe bus, he had sulked. He smiled disagreeable smiles while the driverpointed with his whip and told her the names of the places. Renton Moor. Renton Church. Morfe, the grey village, stuck up on its green platformunder the high, purple mound of Karva Hill. 

Garthdale in front of it, Rathdale at its side, meeting in the fieldsbelow its bridge. 

Morfe was beautiful. She loved it with love at first sight, faithless toIlford. 

Straight, naked houses. Grey walls of houses, enclosing the wide oblongGreen. Dark grey stone roofs, close-clipped lest the wind should liftthem. On the Green two grey stone pillar fountains; a few wooden benches;telegraph poles. Under her window a white road curling up to theplatform. Straight, naked houses, zigzagging up beside it. Down below, where the white road came from, the long grey raking bridge, guarded by atall ash-tree. 

Roddy's jabbing voice went on and on:

"I used to think Mamma was holy and unselfish. I don't think so any more. She says she wants to do what Papa wants and what we want; but she alwaysends by doing what she wants herself. It's all very well for her. As longas she's got a garden to poke about in she doesn't care how awful it isfor us. "

She hated Roddy when he said things like that about Mamma. 

"I don't suppose the little lamb thought about it at all. Or if she didshe thought we'd like it. "

She didn't want to listen to Roddy's grumbling. She wanted to look andlook, to sniff up the clear, sweet, exciting smell of the fields. 

The roofs went criss-crossing up the road--straight--slant--straight. They threw delicate violet-green shadows on to the sage-green fieldbelow. That long violet-green pillar was the shadow of the ash-tree bythe bridge. 

The light came from somewhere behind the village, from a sunset youcouldn't see. It made the smooth hill fields shine like thin velvet, stretched out, clinging to the hills. 

"Oh, Roddy, the light's different. Different from Ilford. Look--"

"I've been looking for five weeks, " Roddy said. "You haven't, that's all. _I_ was excited at first. "

He got up. He stared out of the window, not seeing anything. 

"I didn't mean what I said about Mamma. Morfe _makes_ you say things. Soon it'll make you mean them. You wait. "

She was glad when he had left her. 

The cliffs of Greffington Edge were violet now. 

II. 

At night, when she lay in bed in the strange room, the Essex fields beganto haunt her; the five trees, the little flying trees, low down, lowdown; the straight, narrow paths through the corn, where she walked withMark, with Jimmy, with Mr. Jourdain; Mr. Jourdain, standing in the pathand saying: "Talk to me. I'm alive. I'm here. I'll listen. "

Mark and Mamma planting the sumach tree by the front door; Papa saying itwouldn't grow. It had grown up to the dining-room window-sill. 

Aunt Bella and Uncle Edward; the Proparts and the Farmers and Mr. Batty, all stiff and disapproving; not nearly so nice to you as they used to beand making you believe it was your fault. 

The old, beautiful drawing-room. The piano by the door. 

Dan staggering down the room at Mark's party. Mark holding her there, inhis arms. 

Dawn, and Dr. Draper's carriage waiting in the road beside the mangoldfields. And Aunt Charlotte carried out, her feet brushing the flagstones. 

She mustn't tell them. Mamma couldn't bear it. Roddy couldn't bear it. Aunt Charlotte was Papa's sister. He must never know. 

The sound of the brushing feet made her heart ache. 

She was glad to wake in the small, strange room. It had taken a snip offMamma's and Papa's room on one side of the window, and a snip off thespare room on the other. That made it a funny T shape. She slept in thetail of the T, in a narrow bed pushed against the wall. When you sat upyou saw the fat trees trying to get up the hill between the washstand andthe chest of drawers. 

This room would never be taken from her, because she was the only one whowas small enough to fit the bed. 

She would be safe there with her hill. 

III. 

The strange houses fascinated her. They had the simplicity and theprecision of houses in a very old engraving. On the west side of theGreen they made a long straight wall. Morfe High Row. An open space ofcobblestones stretched in front of it. The market-place. 

Sharp morning light picked out the small black panes of the windows inthe white criss-cross of their frames, and the long narrow signs of theKing's Head and the Farmer's Arms, black on grey. The plaster joints ofthe walls and the dark net of earth between the cobbles showed thick andclear as in a very old engraving. The west side had the sky behind it andthe east side had the hill. 

Grey-white cart roads slanted across the Green, cutting it into vividtriangular grass-plots. You went in and out of Morfe through the opencorners of its Green. Her father's house stood at the south-west corner, by itself. A projecting wing at that end of the High Row screened it fromthe market-place. 

The strange houses excited her. 

Wonderful, unknown people lived in them. You would see them and know whatthey were like: the people in the tall house with the rusty stones, inthe bright green ivy house with the white doors, in the small grey, humble houses, in the big, important house set at the top of the Green, with the three long rows of windows, the front garden and the iron gate. 

People you didn't know. You would be strange and exciting to them as theywere strange and exciting to you. They might say interesting things. There might be somebody who cared about Plato and Spinoza. 

Things would happen that you didn't know. Anything might happen anyminute. 

If you knew what was happening in the houses _now_--some of them hadhard, frightening faces. Dreadful things might have happened in them. Herfather's house had a good, simple face. You could trust it. 

Five windows in the rough grey wall, one on each side of the white door, three above. A garden at the side, an orchard at the back. In front acobbled square marked off by a line of thin stones set in edgeways. 

A strange house, innocent of unhappy memories. 

Catty stood at the door, looking for her. She called to her to come in tobreakfast. 

IV. 

Papa was moving restlessly about the house. His loose slippers shuffledon the stone flags of the passages. 

Catty stopped gathering up the breakfast cups to listen. 

Catty was not what she used to be. Her plump cheeks were sunk andflattened. Some day she would look like Jenny. 

Papa stood in the doorway. He looked round the small dining-room as if hewere still puzzled by its strangeness. Papa was not what he used to be. Astreak of grey hair showed above each ear. Grey patches in his brownbeard. Scarlet smears in the veined sallow of his eyes. His bursting, violent life had gone. He went stooping and shuffling. The house was toosmall for Papa. He turned in it as a dog turns in his kennel, feeling fora place to stretch himself. 

He said, "Where's your mother? I want her. "

Mary went to find her. 

She knew the house: the flagged passage from the front door. Thedining-room on the right. The drawing-room on the left. In there thechairs and tables drew together to complain of Morfe. View of theblacksmith's house and yard from the front window. From the side windowMamma's garden. Green grass-plot. Trees at the far end. Flowers in theborders: red roses, cream roses, Canterbury bells, white and purple, under the high walls. In a corner an elder bush frothing greenish whiteon green. 

Behind the dining-room Papa's tight den. Stairs where the passage turnedto the left behind the drawing-room. Glass door at the end, holding thegreen of the garden, splashed with purple, white and red. The kitchenhere in a back wing like a rough barn run out into the orchard. 

Upstairs Catty's and Cook's room in the wing; Papa's dressing-room abovethe side passage; Roddy's room above Papa's den. Then the three rooms infront. The one above the drawing-room was nearly filled with the yellowbirch-wood wardrobe and bed. The emerald green of the damask was fadinginto the grey. 

Her mother was there, sitting in the window-seat, reading the fourteenthchapter of St. John. 

"Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are many mansions--"

Mamma was different, too, as if she had shrunk through living in thecramped rooms. She raised her head. The head of a wounded bird, verygentle. 

"Why are you sitting up here all alone?"

"Because sometimes I want to be alone. "

"Shall I spoil the aloneness?"

"Not if you're a good girl and keep quiet. "

Mary sat on the bed and waited till the chapter should be ended. 

She thought: "She talks to me still as though I were a child. What wouldshe say if I told her about Aunt Charlotte? She wouldn't know what it wasreally like. She wasn't there. 

"I shall never tell her. "

She was thrilled at the thought of her grown-up hardness, her grown-upsilence, keeping her mother safe. 

Mamma looked up and smiled; the chapter was ended; they went downstairs. 

Papa stood in the doorway of his den and called to Mamma in a queer lowvoice. 

The letters--

She went into the dining-room and waited--ten minutes--twenty. 

Her mother came to her there. She sat down in her armchair by thewindow-seat where the old work-basket stood piled with socks ready fordarning. She took a sock and drew it over her hand, stretching it to findthe worn places. Mary took its fellow and began to darn it. The coarsewool, scraping her finger-tips, sent through her a little light, creeping, disagreeable shock. 

She was afraid to look at her mother's face. 

"Well, Mary--poor Aunt Charlotte might have been carried away in hercoffin, and we shouldn't have known if it had been left to you to tellus. "

"I didn't because I thought it would frighten you. "

Mamma was not frightened. They couldn't have told her what it was reallylike. 

Papa's slippers shuffled in the passage. Mamma left off darning to listenas Catty had listened. 

V. 

On Greffington Edge. 

Roddy was looking like Mark, with his eyes very steady and his mouth firmand proud. His face was red as if he were angry. That was when he saw thetall man coming towards them down the hill road. 

Roddy walked slowly, trying not to meet him at the cattle-gate. The tallman walked faster, and they met. Roddy opened the gate. 

The tall man thanked him, said "Good day, " looked at her as he passedthrough, then stopped. 

"My sister--Mr. Sutcliffe. "

Mr. Sutcliffe, handsome with his boney, high-jointed nose and narrow jaw, thrust out, incongruously fierce, under his calm, clean upper lip, shavedto show how beautiful it was. His black blue eyes were set as carefullyin their lids as a woman's. He wore his hair rather long. One lock hadgot loose and hung before his ear like a high whisker. 

He was asking Roddy when he was coming to play tennis, and whether hissister played. They might turn up tomorrow. 

The light played on his curling, handsome smile. He hoped she likedRathdale. 

"She only came yesterday, " Roddy said. 

"Well--come along to-morrow. About four o'clock. I'll tell my wife. "

And Roddy said, "Thanks, " as if it choked him. 

Mr. Sutcliffe went on down the hill. 

"We can't go, " Roddy said. 

"Why not?"

"Well--"

"Let's. He looked so nice, and he sounded as if he really wanted us. "

"He doesn't. He can't. You don't know what's happened. "

"_Has_ anything happened?"

"Yes. I don't want to tell you, but you'll have to know. It happened atthe Sutcliffes'. "

"Who _are_ the Sutcliffes?"

"Greffington Hall. The people who own the whole ghastly place. We weredining there. And Papa was funny. "

"Funny? Funny what way?"

"Oh, I don't know. --Like Dan was at Mark's party. '

"Oh Roddy--" She was listening now. 

"Not quite so awful; but that sort of thing. We had to come away. "

"I didn't know he did. "

"No more did I. Mamma always said it wasn't that. But it was this time. And he chose that evening. "

"Does Mamma mind frightfully?" she said. 

"Yes. But she's angry with the Sutcliffes. "

"Why?"

"Because they've _seen_ him. "

"How many Sutcliffes are there?"

"Only him and Mrs. Sutcliffe. The son's in India. 

"They'll never ask him again, and Mamma won't go without him. She says wecan go if we like, but you can see she'll think us skunks if we do. "

"Well--then we can't. "

She had wanted something to happen, and something had happened, somethingthat would bring unhappiness. Unhappiness. Her will rose up, hard andstubborn, pushing it off. 

"Will it matter so very much? Do the Sutcliffes matter?"

"They matter this much, that there won't be anything to do. They've gotall the shooting and fishing and the only decent tennis court in theplace. You little know what you're in for. "

"I don't care, Roddy. I don't care a bit as long as I have you. "

"Me? Me?"

He had stopped on the steep of the road; her feet had been lagging tokeep pace with him. He breathed hard through white-edged lips. She hadseen him look like that before. The day they had walked to the Thames, tolook at the ships, over the windy Flats. 

He looked at her. A look she hadn't seen before. A look of passionateunbelief. 

"I didn't think you cared about me. I thought it was Mark you caredabout. Like Mamma. "

"Can't you care about more than one person?"

"Mamma can't--"

"Oh Roddy--"

"What's the good of saying 'Oh Roddy' when you know it?"

They were sitting on a ledge of stone and turf. Roddy had ceased tostruggle with the hill. 

"We're all the same, " he said. "I'd give you and Dan up any day for Mark. Dan would give up you and me. Mark would give up all of us for Mamma. AndMamma would give up all of us for Mark. "

Roddy had never said anything like that before. 

"I'll stick to you, anyhow, " she said. 

"It's no use your sticking. I shan't be here. I shall have to clear outand do something, " he said. 

On his face there was a look of fear. 

VI. 

She was excited because they were going to the ivy house for tea. Itlooked so pretty and so happy with its green face shining in the sun. Nothing could take from her her belief in happiness hiding behind certainunknown doors. It hid behind the white doors of the ivy house. When youwent in something wonderful would happen. 

The ivy house belonged to Mrs. Waugh and Miss Frewin. 

The photographs in Mamma's old album showed how they looked when they andMamma were young. Modest pose of dropped arms, holding mushroom hats infront of them as a protection, the narrow ribbons dangling innocently. Ellen Frewin, small and upright, slender back curved in to the set ofshawl and crinoline, prim head fixed in the composure of gentle disdain, small mouth saying always "Oh, " Meta, the younger sister, very tall, headbent in tranquil meditation, her mantle slanting out from the fall of thethin shoulders. 

They rose up in the small, green lighted drawing-room. Their heads bentforward to kiss. 

Ellen Waugh: the photographed face still keeping its lifted posture ofgentle disdain, the skin stretched like a pale tight glove, a slightdownward swelling of the prim oval, like the last bulge of a suckedpeppermint ball, the faded mouth still making its small "oh. " She was thewidow of a clergyman. 

Meta, a beautiful nose leaping out at you in a high curve; narrow, delicate cheeks thinned away so that they seemed part of the nose; sweetrodent mouth smiling up under its tip; blurred violet eyes archingvaguely. 

Princess gowns stiffened their shawl and crinoline gestures. 

"So this is Mary. She's not like her mother, Caroline. Meta, can you seeany likeness?"

Miss Frewin arched her eyes and smiled, without looking at you. 

"I can't say I do. "

Their heads made little nodding bows as they talked. Miss Frewin's bowwas sidelong and slow, Mrs. Waugh's straight and decisive. 

"She's not like Rodney, " Mrs. Waugh said. "And she's not like Emilius. Who is she like?"

Mary answered. "I'm rather like Dan and a good bit like Mark. But I'mmost of all like myself. "

Mrs. Waugh said "Oh. " Her mouth went on saying it while she looked atyou. 

"She is not in the least like Mark, " Mamma said. 

They settled down, one on each side of Mamma, smiling at her with theirsmall, faded mouths as you smile at people you love and are happy with. You could see that Mamma was happy, too, sitting between them, safe. 

Mrs. Waugh said, "I see you've got Blenkiron in again?"

"Well, he's left his ladder in the yard. I suppose that means he'll mendthe kitchen chimney some time before winter. "

"The Yorkshire workmen are very independent, " Mrs. Waugh said. 

"They scamp their work like the rest. You'd need a resident carpenter, and a resident glazier, and a resident plumber--"

"Yes, Caroline, you would indeed. "

Gentle voices saying things you had heard before in the drawing-room atFive Elms. 

Miss Frewin had opened a black silk bag that hung on her arm, and takenout a minute pair of scissors and a long strip of white stuff with astitched pattern on it. She nicked out the pattern into little holesoutlined by the stitches. Mary watched her, fascinated by the delicatemovements of the thin fingers and the slanted, drooping postures of thehead. 

"Do you _like_ doing it?"

"Yes. "

She thought: "What a fool she must think me. As if she'd do it if shedidn't like it. "

The arching eyes and twitching mouth smiled at your foolishness. 

Mrs. Waugh's voice went on. It came smoothly, hardly moving her small, round mouth. That was her natural voice. Then suddenly it rose, like avoice that calls to you to get up in the morning. 

"Well, Mary--so you've left school. Come home to be a help to yourmother. "

A high, false cheerfulness, covering disapproval and reproach. 

Their gentleness was cold to her and secretly inimical. They had askedher because of Mamma. They didn't really want her. 

Half-past six. It was all over. They were going home across the Green. 

"Mary, I wish you could learn to talk without affectation. Telling Mrs. Waugh you 'looked like yourself'! If you could only manage to forgetyourself. "

Your self? Your self? Why should you forget it? You had to remember. Theywould kill it if you let them. 

What had it done? What _was_ it that they should hate it so? It had beenhappy and excited about _them_, wondering what they would be like. Andquiet, looking on and listening, in the strange, green-lighted, green-dark room, crushed by the gentle, hostile voices. 

Would it always have to stoop and cringe before people, hushing its ownvoice, hiding its own gesture?

It crouched now, stung and beaten, hiding in her body that walked besideher mother with proud feet, and small lifted head. 

VII. 

Her mother turned at her bedroom door and signed to her to come in. 

She sat down in her low chair at the head of the curtained bed. Mary satin the window-seat. 

"There's something I want to say to you. "

"Yes, Mamma. "

Mamma was annoyed. She tap-tapped with her foot on the floor. 

"Have you given up those absurd ideas of yours?"

"What absurd ideas?"

"You know what I mean. Calling yourself an unbeliever. "

"I _can't_ say I believe things I don't believe. "

"Have you tried?"

"Tried?"

"Have you ever asked God to help your unbelief?"

"No. I could only do that if I didn't believe in my unbelief. "

"You mean if you didn't glory in it. Then it's simply your self-will andyour pride. Self-will has been your besetting sin ever since you were alittle baby crying for something you couldn't have. You kicked before youcould talk. 

"Goodness knows I've done everything I could to break you of it. "

"Yes, Mamma darling. "

She remembered. The faded green and grey curtains and the yellowbirchwood furniture remembered. Mamma sat on the little chair at the footof the big yellow bed. You knelt in her lap and played with the goldtassel while Mamma asked you to give up your will. 

"I brought you up to care for God and for the truth. "

"You did. And I care so awfully for both of them that I won't believethings about God that aren't true. "

"And how do you know what's true and what isn't? You set up your littlejudgment against all the wise and learned people who believe as you weretaught to believe. I wonder how you dare. "

"It's the risk we're all taking. We may every single one of us be wrong. Still, if some things are true other things can't be. Don't look sounhappy, Mamma. "

"How can I be anything else? When I think of you living without God inthe world, and of what will happen to you when you die. "

"It's your belief that makes you unhappy, not me. "

"That's the cruellest thing you've said yet. "

"You know I'd rather die than hurt you. "

"Die, indeed! When you hurt me every minute of the day. If it had beenanything but unbelief. If I even saw you humble and sorry about it. Butyou seem to be positively enjoying yourself. "

"I can't help it if the things I think of make me happy. And you don'tknow how nice it feels to be free. "

"Precious freedom!--to do what you like and think what you like, withoutcaring. "

"There's a part of me that doesn't care and there's a part that caresfrightfully. "

The part that cared was not free. Not free. Prisoned in her mother'sbedroom with the yellow furniture that remembered. Her mother's face thatremembered. Always the same vexed, disapproving, remembering face. Andher own heart, sinking at each beat, dragging remembrance. A dead child, remembering and returning. 

"I can't think where you got it from, " her mother was saying. "Unlessit's those books you're always reading. Or was it that man?"

"What man?"

"Maurice Jourdain. "

"No. It wasn't. What made you think of him?"

"Never you mind. "

Actually her mother was smiling and trying not to smile, as if she werethinking of something funny and improper. 

"There's one thing I must beg of you, " she said, "that whatever youchoose to think, you'll hold your tongue about it. "

"All my life? Like Aunt Lavvy?"

"There was a reason why then; and there's a reason why now. Your fatherhas been very unfortunate. We're here in a new place, and the less wemake ourselves conspicuous the better. "

"I see. "

She thought: "Because Papa drinks Mamma and Roddy go proud and angry; butI must stoop and hide. It isn't fair. "

"You surely don't want, " her mother said, "to make it harder for me thanit is. "

Tears. She was beaten. 

"I don't want to make it hard for you at all. "

"Then promise me you won't talk about religion. "

"I won't talk about it to Mrs. Waugh. "

"Not to anybody. "

"Not to anybody who wouldn't like it. Unless they make me. Will that do?"

"I suppose it'll have to. "

Mamma held her face up, like a child, to be kissed. 

VIII. 

The Sutcliffes' house hid in the thick trees at the foot of GreffingtonEdge. You couldn't see it. You could pretend it wasn't there. You couldpretend that Mr. Sutcliffe and Mrs. Sutcliffe were not there. You couldpretend that nothing had happened. 

There were other houses. 

IX. 

The long house at the top of the Green was gay with rows of pink andwhite sun-blinds stuck out like attic roofs. The poplars in the gardenplayed their play of falling rain. 

You waited in the porch, impatient for the opening of the door. 

"Mamma--what _will_ it be like?"

Mamma smiled a naughty, pretty smile. She knew what it would be like. 

There was a stuffed salmon in a long glass case in the hall. He swam, over a brown plaster river bed, glued to a milk-blue plaster stream. 

You waited in the drawing-room. Drab and dying amber and the dapple ofwalnut wood. Chairs dressed in pallid chintz, holding out their skirtswith an air of anxiety. Stuffed love-birds on a branch under a tall glassshade. On the chimney-piece sand-white pampas grass in clear blood-redvases, and a white marble clock supporting a gilt Cupid astride over agilt ball. 

Above the Cupid, in an oval frame, the tinted crayon portrait of a younggirl. A pink and blond young girl with a soft nuzzling mouth and nose. She was dressed in a spencer and a wide straw hat, and carried a basketof flowers on her arm. She looked happy, smiling up at the ceiling. 

Across the passage a door opening. Voices in the passage, a smell likerotten apples, a tray that clattered. 

Miss Kendal rustled in; tall elegant stiffness girded in black silk. 

"How good of you to come, Mrs. Olivier. And to bring Miss Mary. "

Her sharp-jointed body was like the high-backed chair it sat on. Yet yousaw that she had once been the young girl in the spencer; head carriedhigh with the remembered tilt of the girl's head; jaw pushed out at thechin as if it hung lightly from the edge of the upper lip; the nuzzlingmouth composed to prudence and propriety. A lace cap with pink ribbonsperched on her smooth, ashy blond hair. 

Miss Kendal talked to Mamma about weather and gardens; she asked afterthe kitchen chimney as if she really cared for it. Every now and then shelooked at you and gave you a nod and a smile to show that she rememberedyou were there. 

When she smiled her eyes were happy like the eyes of the young girl. 

The garden-gate clicked and fell to with a clang. A bell clamouredsuddenly through the quiet house. 

Miss Kendal nodded. "The Doctor has come to tea. To see Miss Mary. "

She put her arm in yours and led you into the dining-room, gaily, gaily, as if she had known you for a long time, as if she were taking you withher to some brilliant, happy feast. 

The smell of rotten apples came towards you through the open door of thedining-room. You saw the shining of pure white damask, the flashing ofsilver, a flower-bed of blue willow pattern cups, an enormous pink andwhite cake. You thought it was a party. 

Three old men were there. 

Old Dr. Kendal, six feet of leanness doubled up in an arm-chair. OldWellington face, shrunk, cheeks burning in a senile raddle. Glassy blueeyes weeping from red rims. 

Dr. Charles Kendal, his son; a hard, blond giant; high cheeks, rawruddied; high bleak nose jutting out with a steep fall to the long upperlip; savage mouth under a straight blond fringe, a shark's keen toothpointing at the dropped jaw. Arched forehead drooping to the spread ears, blond eyebrows drooping over slack lids. 

And Mr. James. 

Mr. James was the only short one. He stood apart, his eyes edging offfrom his limp hand-shaking. Mr. James had a red face and high bleak noselike his brother; he was clean-shaved except for short auburn whiskersbrushed forward in flat curls. His thin Wellington lips went out and in, pressed together, trying hard not to laugh at you. 

He held his arms bowed out stiffly, as if the arm-holes of his coat weretoo tight for him. 

The room was light at the far end, where the two windows were, and darkat the door-end where the mahogany sideboard was. The bright, loadedtable stretched between. 

Old Dr. Kendal sat behind it by the corner of the fireplace. Though itwas August the windows were shut and a fire burned in the grate. Twotabby cats sat up by the fender, blinking and nodding with sleep. 

"Here's Father, " Miss Kendal said. "And here's Johnnie and Minnie. "

He had dropped off into a doze. She woke him. 

"You know Mrs. Olivier, Father. And this is Miss Olivier. "

"Ay. Eh. " From a red and yellow pocket-handkerchief he disentangled astringy claw-like hand and held it up with an effort. 

"Ye've come to see the old man, have ye? Ay. Eh. "

"He's the oldest in the Dale, " Miss Kendal said. "Except Mr. Peacock ofSarrack. "

"Don't you forget Mr. Peacock of Sarrack, or he'll be so set-up there'llbe no bearing him, " Dr. Charles said. 

"Miss Mary, will you sit by Father?"

"No, she won't. Miss Mary will sit over here by me. "

Though Dr. Charles was not in his own house he gave orders. He took Mr. James's place at the foot of the table. He made her sit at his left handand Mamma at his right; and he slanted Mamma's chair and fixed a basketscreen on its back so that she was shielded both from the fire and fromthe presence of the old man. 

Dr. Charles talked. 

"Where did you get that thin face, Miss Mary? Not in Rathdale, I'll bebound. "

He looked at you with small grey eyes blinking under weak lids and baredthe shark's tooth, smiling. A kind, hungry shark. 

"They must have starved you at your school. No? Then they made you studytoo hard. Kate--what d'you think Bill Acroyd's done now? Turned thisyear's heifers out along of last year's with the ringworm. And asks mehow I think they get it. This child doesn't eat enough to keep a mouse, Mrs. Olivier. "

He would leave off talking now and then to eat, and in the silenceremarkable noises would come from the armchair. When that happened MissKendal would look under the table and pretend that Minnie and Johnniewere fighting. "Oh, those bad pussies, " she would say. 

When her face kept quiet it looked dead beside the ruddy faces of thethree old men; dead and very quietly, very softly decomposing intobleached purple and sallow white. Then her gaiety would come popping upagain and jerk it back into life. 

Mr. James sat at her corner, beside Mary. He didn't talk, but hisWellington mouth moved perpetually in and out, and his small reddish eyestwinkled, twinkled, with a shrewd, secret mirth. You thought every minutehe would burst out laughing, and you wondered what you were doing toamuse him so. 

Every now and then Miss Kendal would tell you something about him. 

"What do you think Mr. James did to-day? He walked all the way to Garthand back again. Over nine miles!"

And Mr. James would look gratified. 

Tea was over with the sacrifice of the pink and white cake. Miss Kendaltook your arm again and led you, gaily, gaily back to the old man. 

"Here's Miss Mary come to talk to you, Father. "

She set a chair for you beside him. He turned his head slowly to you, waking out of his doze. 

"What did she say your name was, my dear?"

"Olivier. Mary Olivier. "

"I don't call to mind anybody of that name in the Dale. But I suppose Ibrought you into the world same as the rest of 'em. "

Miss Kendal gave a little bound in her chair. "Does anybody know wherePussy is?"

The claw hand stirred in the red and yellow pocket-handkerchief. 

"Ye've come to see the old man, have ye? Ay. Eh. "

When he talked he coughed. A dreadful sound, as if he dragged up out ofhimself a long, rattling chain. 

It hurt you to look at him. Pity hurt you. 

Once he had been young, like Roddy. Then he had been middle-aged, withhanging jaw and weak eyelids, like Dr. Charles. Now he was old, old; hesat doubled up, coughing and weeping, in a chair. But you could see thatMiss Kendal was proud of him. She thought him wonderful because he kepton living. 

Supposing he was _your_ father and you had to sit with him, all yourlife, in a room smelling of rotten apples, could you bear it? Could youbear it for a fortnight? Wouldn't you wish--wouldn't you wish--supposingPapa--all your life. 

But if you couldn't bear it that would mean--

No. No. She put her hand on the arm of his chair, to protect him, toprotect him from her thoughts. 

The claw fingers scrabbled, groping for her hand. 

"Would ye like to be an old man's bed-fellow?"

"Pussy says it isn't her bed-time yet, Father. "

When you went away Miss Kendal stood on the doorstep looking after you. The last you saw of her was a soft grimace of innocent gaiety. 

X. 

The Vicar of Renton. He wanted to see her. 

Mamma had left her in the room with him, going out with an air ofself-conscious connivance. 

Mr. Spencer Rollitt. Hard and handsome. Large face, square-cut, clean-shaved, bare of any accent except its eyebrows, its mouth a thinstraight line hardly visible in its sunburn. Small blue eyes standingstill in the sunburn, hard and cold. 

When Mr. Rollitt wanted to express heartiness he had to fall back ongesture, on the sudden flash of white teeth; he drew in his breath, sharply, between the straight, close lips, with a sound: "Fivv-vv!"

She watched him. Under his small handsome nose his mouth and chintogether made one steep, straight line. This lower face, flat and naked, without lips, stretched like another forehead. At the top of the realforehead, where his hat had saved his skin, a straight band, white, likea scar. Yet Mr. Spencer Rollitt's hair curled and clustered out at theback of his head in perfect innocence. 

He was smiling his muscular smile, while his little hard cold eyes heldher in their tight stare. 

"Don't you think you would like to take a class in my Sunday School?"

"I'm afraid I wouldn't like it at all. "

"Nothing to be afraid of. I should give you the infants' school. "

For a long time he sat there, explaining that there was nothing to beafraid of, and that he would give her the infants' school. You felt himfilling the room, crushing you back and back, forcing his will on you. There was too much of his will, too much of his face. Her will rose upagainst his will and against his face, and its false, muscular smile. 

"I'm sure my mother didn't say I'd like to teach in a Sunday School. "

"She said she'd be very glad if I could persuade you. "

"She'd say _that_. But she knows perfectly well I wouldn't really do it. "

"It was not Mrs. Olivier's idea. "

He got up. When he stood his eyes stared at nothing away over your head. He wouldn't lower them to look at you. 

"It was Mrs. Sutcliffe's. "

"How funny of Mrs. Sutcliffe. She doesn't know me, either. "

"My dear young lady, you were at school when your father and mother dinedat Greffington Hall. "

He was looking down at her now, and she could feel herself blushing; hot, red waves of shame, rushing up, tingling in the roots of her hair. 

"Mrs. Sutcliffe, " he said, "is very kind. "

She saw it now. He had been at the Sutcliffes that evening. He had seenPapa. He was trying to say, "Your father was drunk at Greffington Hall. He will never be asked there again. He will not be particularly welcomeat the Vicarage. But you are very young. We do not wish you to suffer. This is our kindness to you. Take it. You are not in a position torefuse. "

"And what am I to say to Mrs. Sutcliffe?"

"Oh, anything you like that wouldn't sound too rude. "

"Shall I say that you're a very independent young lady, and that she hadbetter not ask you to join her sewing-class? Would that sound too rude?"

"Not a bit. If you put it nicely. But you would, wouldn't you?"

He looked down at her again. His thick eyes had thawed slightly; they letout a twinkle. But he was holding his lips so tight that they haddisappeared. A loud, surprising laugh forced them open. 

He held out his hand with a gesture, drawing back his laugh in atremendous "Fiv-v-v-v. "

When he had gone she opened the piano and played, and played. Through thewindow of the room Chopin's Fontana Polonaise went out after him, joyous, triumphant and defiant, driving him before it. She exulted in her powerover the Polonaise. Nothing could touch you, nothing could hurt you whileyou played. If only you could go on playing for ever--

Her mother came in from the garden. 

"Mary, " she said, "if you _will_ play, you must play gently. "

"But Mamma--I can't. It goes like that. "

"Then, " said her mother, "don't play it. You can be heard all over thevillage. "

"Bother the village. I don't care. I don't care if I'm heard all overeverywhere!"

She went on playing. 

But it was no use. She struck a wrong note. Her hands trembled and losttheir grip. They stiffened, dropped from the keys. She sat and staredidiotically at the white page, at the black dots nodding on their stems, at the black bars swaying. 

She had forgotten how to play Chopin's Fontana Polonaise. 

XI. 

Stone walls. A wild country, caught in the net of the stone walls. 

Stone walls following the planes of the land, running straight along thevalleys, switchbacking up and down the slopes. Humped-up, grey spines ofthe green mounds. 

Stone walls, piled loosely, with the brute skill of earth-men, buildingcenturies ago. They bulged, they toppled, yet they stood firm, holdingthe wild country in their mesh, knitting the grey villages to the greyfarms, and the farms to the grey byres. Where you thought the net hadended it flung out a grey rope over the purple back of Renton, the greenshoulder of Greffington. 

Outside the village, the schoolhouse lane, a green trench sunk betweenstone walls, went up and up, turning three times. At the top of the lastturn a gate. 

When you had got through the gate you were free. 

It led on to the wide, flat half-ring of moor that lay under Karva. Themoor and the high mound of the hill were free; they had slipped from thenet of the walls. 

Broad sheep-drives cut through the moor. Inlets of green grass forkedinto purple heather. Green streamed through purple, lapped againstpurple, lay on purple in pools and splashes. 

Burnt patches. Tongues of heather, twisted and pointed, picked clean byfire, flickering grey over black earth. Towards evening the black andgrey ran together like ink and water, stilled into purple, the blackpurple of grapes. 

If you shut your eyes you could see the flat Essex country spread in athin film over Karva. Thinner and thinner. But you could remember what ithad been like. Low, tilled fields, thin trees; sharp, queer, uncertainbeauty. Sharp, queer, uncertain happiness, coming again and again, nevertwice to the same place in the same way. It hurt you when you rememberedit. 

The beauty of the hills was not like that. It stayed. It waited for you, keeping faith. Day after day, night after night, it was there. 

Happiness was there. You were sure of it every time. Roddy's uneasy eyes, Papa's feet, shuffling in the passage, Mamma's disapproving, rememberingface, the Kendals' house, smelling of rotten apples, the old man, coughing and weeping in his chair, they couldn't kill it; they couldn'ttake it away. 

The mountain sheep waited for you. They stood back as you passed, staringat you with their look of wonder and sadness. 

Grouse shot up from your feet with a "Rek-ek-ek-kek!" in sudden, explosive flight. 

Plovers rose, wheeling round and round you with sharper and sharper criesof agitation. "_Pee_-vit--_pee_-vit--_pee_-vit! Pee-_vitt_!" Theyswooped, suddenly close, close to your eyes; you heard the drummingvibration of their wings. 

Away in front a line of sheep went slowly up and up Karva. The hill madetheir bleating mournful and musical. 

You slipped back into the house. In the lamp-lighted drawing-room theothers sat, bored and tired, waiting for prayer-time. They hadn't noticedhow long you had been gone. 

XII. 

"Roddy, I wish you'd go and see where your father is. "

Roddy looked up from his sketch-book. He had filled it with pictures ofcavalry on plunging chargers, trains of artillery rushing into battle, sailing ships in heavy seas. 

Roddy's mind was possessed by images of danger and adventure. 

He flourished off the last wave of battle-smoke, and shut the sketch-bookwith a snap. 

Mamma knew perfectly well where Papa was. Roddy knew. Catty and Maggiethe cook knew. Everybody in the village knew. Regularly, about sixo'clock in the evening, he shuffled out of the house and along the HighRow to the Buck Hotel, and towards dinner-time Roddy had to go and bringhim back. Everybody knew what he went for. 

He would have to hold Papa tight by the arm and lead him over thecobblestones. They would pass the long bench at the corner under theKendals' wall; and Mr. Oldshaw, the banker, and Mr. Horn, the grocer, andMr. Acroyd, the shoemaker, would be sitting there talking to Mr. Belk, who was justice of the peace. And they would see Papa. The young mensquatting on the flagstones outside the "Farmer's Arms" and the "King'sHead" would see him. And Papa would stiffen and draw himself up, tryingto look dignified and sober. 

When he was very bad Mamma would cry, quietly, all through dinner-time. But she would never admit that he went to the Buck Hotel. He had justgone off nobody knew where and Roddy had got to find him. 

August, September and October passed. 

XIII. 

"Didn't I tell you to wait? You know them all now. You see what they'relike. "

In Roddy's voice there was a sort of tired, bitter triumph. 

She knew them all now: Mrs. Waugh and Miss Frewin, and the Kendals; Mr. Spencer Rollitt, and Miss Louisa Wright who had had a disappointment; andold Mrs. Heron. They were all old. 

Oh, and there was Dorsy Heron, Mrs. Heron's niece. But Dorsy was old too, twenty-seven. She was no good; she couldn't talk to Roddy; she could onlylook at him with bright, shy eyes, like a hare. 

Roddy and Mary were going up the Garthdale road. At the first turn theysaw Mrs. Waugh and her son coming towards them. (She had forgotten NormanWaugh. )

Rodney groaned. "_He's_ here again. I say, let's go back. "

"We can't. They've seen us. "

"Everybody sees us, " Roddy said. 

He began to walk with a queer, defiant, self-conscious jerk. 

Mrs. Waugh came on, buoyantly, as if the hoop of a crinoline still heldher up. 

"Well, Mary, going for another walk?"

She stopped, in a gracious mood to show off her son. When she looked atRoddy her raised eyebrows said, "Still here, doing nothing?"

"Norman's going back to work on Monday, " she said. 

The son stood aside, uninterested, impatient, staring past them, beatingthe road with his stick. He was thickset and square. He had the stoopinghead and heavy eyes of a bull. Black hair and eyebrows grew bushily fromhis dull-white Frewin skin. 

He would be an engineer. Mr. Belk's brother had taken him into his worksat Durlingham. He wasn't seventeen, yet he knew how to make engines. Hehad a strong, lumbering body. His heart would go on thump-thumping withregular strokes, like a stupid piston, not like Roddy's heart, excited, quivering, hurrying, suddenly checking. His eyes drew his mother away. You were glad when they were gone. 

"You can see what they think, " Roddy said. "Everybody thinks it. "

"Everybody thinks what?"

"That I'm a cad to be sticking here, doing nothing, living on Mamma'smoney. "

"It doesn't matter. They've no business to think. "

"No. But Mamma thinks it. She says I ought to get something to do. Shetalks about Mark and Dan. She can't see--" He stopped, biting his lip. 

"If I were like Mark--if I could do things. That beast Norman Waugh cando things. He doesn't live on his mother's money. She sees that.... 

"She doesn't know what's the matter with me. She thinks it's only myheart. And it isn't. It's me. I'm an idiot. I can't even do office worklike Dan.... She thinks I'll be all right if I go away far enough, whereshe won't see me. Mind you, I _should_ be all right if I'd gone into theNavy. She knows if I hadn't had that beastly rheumatic fever I'd havebeen in the Navy or the Merchant Service now. It's all rot not passingyou. As if walking about on a ship's deck was worse for your heart thandigging in a garden. It certainly couldn't be worse than farming inCanada. "

"Farming? In Canada?"

"That's her idea. It'll kill me to do what _I_ want. It won't kill me todo what _she_ wants. "

He brooded. 

"Mark did what he wanted. He went away and left her. Brute as I am, Iwouldn't have done that. She doesn't know that's why I'm sticking here. I_can't_ leave her. I'd rather die. "

Roddy too. He had always seemed to go his own way without caring, livinghis secret life, running, jumping, grinning at you. And he, too, wascompelled to adore Mark and yet to cling helplessly, hopelessly, toMamma. When he said things about her he was struggling against her, trying to free himself. He flung himself off and came back, to clingharder. And he was nineteen. 

"After all, " he said, "why shouldn't I stay? It's not as if I didn't digin the garden and look after Papa. If I went she'd have to get somebody. "

"I thought you wanted to go?" she said. 

"So I did. So I do, for some things. But when it comes to the point--"

"When it comes to the point?"

"I funk it. "

"Because of Mamma?"

"Because of me. That idiocy. Supposing I _had_ to do something I couldn'tdo?... That's why I shall have to go away somewhere where it won'tmatter, where she won't know anything about it. "

The frightened look was in his eyes again. 

In her heart a choking, breathless voice talked of unhappiness, coming, coming. Unhappiness that no beauty could assuage. Her will hardened toshut it out. 

When the road turned again they met Mr. James. He walked with queer, jerky steps, his arms bowed out stiffly. 

As he passed he edged away from you. His mouth moved as if he were tryingnot to laugh. 

They knew about Mr. James now. His mind hadn't grown since he was fiveyears old. He could do nothing but walk. Martha, the old servant, dressedand undressed him. 

"I shall have to go, " Roddy said. "If I stay here I shall look like Mr. James. I shall walk with my arms bowed out, Catty'll dress and undressme. "

XXI

I. 

They hated the piano. They had pushed it away against the dark outsidewall. Its strings were stiff with cold, and when the rain came its woodenhammers swelled so that two notes struck together in the bass. 

The piano-tuner made them move it to the inner wall in the large, brightplace that belonged to the cabinet. Mamma was annoyed because Mary hadtaken the piano-tuner's part. 

Mamma loved the cabinet. She couldn't bear to see it standing in thepiano's dark corner where the green Chinese bowls hardly showed behindthe black glimmer of the panes. The light fell full on the ragged, fadedsilk of the piano, and on the long scar across its lid. It was like apoor, shabby relation. 

It stood there in the quiet room, with its lid shut, patient, reproachful, waiting for you to come and play on it. 

When Mary thought of the piano her heart beat faster, her fingerstwitched, the full, sensitive tips tingled and ached to play. When shecouldn't play she lay awake at night thinking of the music. 

She was trying to learn the Sonato _Appassionata_, going through it barby bar, slowly and softly, so that nobody outside the room should hearit. That was better than not playing it at all. But sometimes you wouldforget, and as soon as you struck the loud chords in the first movementPapa would come in and stop you. And the Sonata would go on soundinginside you, trying to make you play it, giving you no peace. 

Towards six o'clock she listened for his feet in the flagged passage. When the front door slammed behind him she rushed to the piano. Theremight be a whole hour before Roddy fetched him from the Buck Hotel. Ifyou could only reach the last movement, the two thundering chords, andthen--the _Presto_. 

The music beat on the thick stone walls of the room and was beaten back, its fine, live throbbing blunted by overtones of discord. You longed toopen all the doors and windows of the house, to push back the stone wallsand let it out. 

Terrible minutes to six when Mamma's face watched and listened, when sheknew what you were thinking. You kept on looking at the clock, youwondered whether this time Papa would really go. You hoped--

Mamma's eyes hurt you. They said, "She doesn't care what becomes of himso long as she can play. "

II. 

Sometimes the wounded, mutilated _Allegro_ would cry inside you all day, imploring you to finish it, to let it pour out its life in joy. 

When it left off the white sound patterns of poems came instead. Theyfloated down through the dark as she lay on her back in her hard, narrowbed. Out of doors, her feet, muffled in wet moor grass, went to a beat, aclang. 

She would never play well. At any minute her father's voice or hermother's eyes would stiffen her fingers and stop them. She knew what shewould do; she had always known. She would make poems. They couldn't hearyou making poems. They couldn't see your thoughts falling into soundpatterns. 

Only part of the pattern would appear at once while the rest of it wenton sounding from somewhere a long way off. When all the parts cametogether the poem was made. You felt as if you had made it long ago, andhad forgotten it and remembered. 

III. 

The room held her close, cold and white, a nun's cell. If you counted thewindow-place it was shaped like a cross. The door at the foot, the windowat the head, bookshelves at the end of each arm. A kitchen lamp with atin reflector, on a table, stood in the breast of the cross. Its flamewas so small that she had to turn it on to her work like a lantern. 

"Dumpetty, dumpetty dum. Tell them that Bion is dead; he is dead, youngBion, the shepherd. And with him music is dead and Dorian poetryperished--"

She had the conceited, exciting thought: "I am translating Moschus, theFuneral Song for Bion. "

Moschus was Bion's friend. She wondered whether he had been happy orunhappy, making his funeral song. 

If you could translate it all: if you could only make patterns out ofEnglish sounds that had the hardness and stillness of the Greek. 

 "'Archet', Sikelikai, to pentheos, archet' Moisai, adones hai pukinoisin oduramenai poti phullois. '"

The wind picked at the pane. Through her thick tweed coat she could feelthe air of the room soak like cold water to her skin. She curved heraching hands over the hot globe of the lamp. 

--Oduromenai. Mourning? No. You thought of black crape, bunched upweepers, red faces. 

The wick spluttered; the flame leaned from the burner, gave a skip andwent out. 

Oduromenai--Grieving; perhaps. 

Suddenly she thought of Maurice Jourdain. 

She saw him standing in the field path. She heard him say "Talk to _me_. I'm alive. I'm here. I'll listen. I'll never misunderstand. " She saw hisworn eyelids; his narrow, yellowish teeth. 

Supposing he was dead--

She would forget about him for months together; then suddenly she wouldremember him like that. Being happy and excited made you remember. Shetried not to see his eyelids and his teeth. They didn't matter. 

IV. 

The season of ungovernable laughter had begun. 

"Roddy, they'll hear us. We m-m-mustn't. "

"I'm not. I'm blowing my nose. "

"I wish _I_ could make it sound like that. "

They stood on the Kendals' doorstep, in the dark, under the snow. Snowpowdered the flagstone path swept ready for the New Year's party. 

"Think, " she said, "their poor party. It would be awful of us. "

Roddy rang. As they waited they began to laugh again. Helpless, ruinous, agonising laughter. 

"Oh--oh--I can hear Martha coming. _Do_ something. You might beunbuckling my snow-shoes. "

The party was waiting for them in the drawing-room. Dr. Charles. MissLouisa Wright, stiff fragility. A child's face blurred and delicatelyweathered; features in innocent, low relief. Pale hair rolled into aninsubstantial puff above each ear. Speedwell eyes, fading milkily. Hurteyes, disappointed eyes. Dr. Charles had disappointed her. 

Dorsy Heron, tall and straight. Shy hare's face trying to look austere. 

Norman Waugh, sulky and superior, in a corner. 

As Roddy came in everybody but Norman Waugh turned round and stared athim with sudden, happy smiles. He was so beautiful that it made peoplehappy to look at him. His very name, Rodney Olivier, sounded morebeautiful than other people's names. 

Dorsy Heron's shy hare's eyes tried to look away and couldn't. Her littlehigh, red nose got redder. 

And every now and then Dr. Charles looked at Rodney, a grave, consideringlook, as if he knew something about him that Rodney didn't know. 

V. 

"She shall play what she likes, " Mr. Sutcliffe said. He had come in late, without his wife. 

She was going to play to them. They always asked you to play. 

She thought: "It'll be all right. They won't listen; they'll go ontalking. I'll play something so soft and slow that they won't hear it. Ishall be alone, listening to myself. "

She played the first movement of the Moonlight Sonata. A beating heart, agrieving voice; beautiful, quiet grief; it couldn't disturb them. 

Suddenly they all left off talking. They were listening. Each notesounded pure and sweet, as if it went out into an empty room. They cameclose up, one by one, on tiptoe, with slight creakings and rustlings, Miss Kendal, Louisa Wright, Dorsy Heron. Their eyes were soft and quietlike the music. 

Mr. Sutcliffe sat where he could see her. He was far away from the placewhere she heard herself playing, but she could feel his face turned onher like a light. 

The first movement died on its two chords. Somebody was saying "Howbeautifully she plays. " Life and warmth flowed into her. Exquisite, tingling life and warmth. "Go on. Go on. " Mr. Sutcliffe's voice soundedmiles away beyond the music. 

She went on into the lovely _Allegretto_. She could see their hushedfaces leaning nearer. You could make them happy by playing to them. Theyloved you because you made them happy. 

Mr. Sutcliffe had got up; he had come closer. 

She was playing the _Presto agitato_. It flowed smoothly under herfingers, at an incredible pace, with an incredible certainty. 

Something seemed to be happening over there, outside the place where sheheard the music. Martha came in and whispered to the Doctor. The Doctorwhispered to Roddy. Roddy started up and they went out together. 

She thought: "Papa again. " But she was too happy to care. Nothingmattered so long as she could listen to herself playing the MoonlightSonata. 

Under the music she was aware of Miss Kendal stooping over her, pressingher shoulder, saying something. She stood up. Everybody was standing up, looking frightened. 

Outside, in the hall, she saw Catty, crying. She went past her over theopen threshold where the snow lay like a light. She couldn't stay to findher snow-shoes and her coat. 

The track across the Green struck hard and cold under her slippers. Thetickling and trickling of the snow felt like the play of cold lightfingers on her skin. Her fear was a body inside her body; it ached anddragged, stone cold and still. 

VI. 

The basin kept on slipping from the bed. She could see itspattern--reddish flowers and green leaves and curlykews--under thesplashings of mustard and water. She felt as if it must slip from herfingers and be broken. When she pressed it tighter to the edge of themattress the rim struck against Papa's breast. 

He lay stretched out on the big yellow birchwood bed. The curtains weredrawn back, holding the sour smell of sickness in their fluted folds. 

Papa's body made an enormous mound under the green eiderdown. It didn'tmove. A little fluff of down that had pricked its way through the coverstill lay where it had settled; Papa's head still lay where it haddropped; the forefinger still pointed at the fluff of down. 

Papa's head was thrown stiffly back on the high pillows; it sank in, weighted with the blood that flushed his face. Around it on the whitelinen there was a spatter and splash of mustard and water. His beardclung to his chin, soaked in the yellowish stain. He breathed with aloud, grating and groaning noise. 

Her ears were so tired with listening to this noise that sometimes theywould go to sleep for a minute or two. Then it would wake them suddenlyand she would begin to cry again. 

You could stop crying if you looked steadily at the little fluff of down. At each groaning breath it quivered and sank and quivered. 

Roddy sat by the dressing-table. He stared, now at his clenched hands, now at his face in the glass, as if he hated it, as if he hated himself. 

Mamma was still dressed. She had got up on the bed beside Papa andcrouched on the bolster. She had left off crying. Every now and then shestroked his hair with tender, desperate fingers. It struck out betweenthe white ears of the pillow-slip in a thin, pointed crest. 

Papa's hair. His poor hair. These alterations of the familiar person, theblood-red flush, the wet, clinging beard, the pointed hair, stirred inher a rising hysteria of pity. 

Mamma had given him the mustard and water. She could see the dregs in thetumbler on the night-table, and the brown hen's feather they had tickledhis throat with. 

They oughtn't to have done it. Dr. Charles would not have let them do itif he had been there. They should have waited. They might have known thechoking and the retching would kill him. Catty ought to have known. Somewhere behind his eyes his life was leaking away through the torn netof the blood vessels, bleeding away over his brain, under his hair, underthe tender, desperate fingers. 

She fixed her eyes on the pattern of the wall-paper. A purplish rose-budin a white oval on a lavender ground. She clung to it as to some firm, safe centre of being. 

VII. 

The first day. The first evening. 

She went on hushed feet down the passage to let Dan in. The squeak of thelatch picked at her taut nerves. 

She was glad of the cold air that rushed into the shut-up, soundlesshouse, the sweet, cold air that hung about Dan's face and tingled in thecurling frieze of his overcoat. 

She took him into the lighted dining-room where Roddy and Mamma waitedfor him. The callous fire crackled and spurted brightness. The table wasset for Dan's supper. 

Dan knew that Papa was dead. He betrayed his knowledge by the crampedstare of his heavy, gentle eyes and by the shamed, furtive movements ofhis hands towards the fire. But that was all. His senses were stilluncontaminated by _their_ knowledge. He had not seen Papa. He had notheard him. 

"What was it?"

"Apoplexy. "

His eyes widened. Innocent, vague eyes that didn't see. 

Their minds fastened on Dan, to get immunity for themselves out of hisunconsciousness. As long as they could keep him downstairs, in hisinnocence, their misery receded from them a little way. 

But Mamma would not have it so. She looked at Dan. Her eyes were dull andhad no more thought in them. Her mouth quivered. They knew that she wasgoing to say something. Their thread of safety tightened. In anotherminute it would snap. 

"Would you like to see him?" she said. 

They waited for Dan to come down from the room. He would not be the sameDan. He would have seen the white sheet raised by the high mound of thebody and by the stiff, upturned feet, and he would have lifted thehandkerchief from the face. He would be like them, and his consciousnesswould put a sharper edge on theirs. He would be afraid to look at them, as they were afraid to look at each other, because of what he had seen. 

VIII. 

She lay beside her mother in the strange spare room. 

She had got into bed straight from her undressing. On the other side ofthe mattress she had seen her mother's kneeling body like a dwarfed thingtrailed there from the floor, and her hands propped up on the edge of theeiderdown, ivory-white against the red and yellow pattern, and herdarling bird's head bowed to her finger-tips. 

The wet eyelids had lifted and the drowned eyes had come to life again ina brief glance of horror. Mamma had expected her to kneel down and pray. In bed they had turned their backs on each other, and she had the feelingthat her mother shrank from her as from somebody unclean who had omittedto wash herself with prayer. She wanted to take her mother in her armsand hold her tight. But she couldn't. She couldn't. 

Suddenly her throat began to jerk with a hysterical spasm. She thought:"I wish I had died instead of Papa. "

She forced back the jerk of her hysteria and lay still, listening to hermother's sad, obstructed breathing and her soft, secret blowing of hernose. 

Presently these sounds became a meaningless rhythm and ceased. She was achild, dreaming. She stood on the nursery staircase at Five Elms; thecoffin came round the turn and crushed her against the banisters; onlythis time she was not afraid of it; she made herself wake because ofsomething that would happen next. The flagstones of the passage were hardand cold to her naked feet; that was how you could tell you were awake. The door of the Morfe drawing-room opened into Mamma's old bedroom atFive Elms, and when she came to the foot of the bed she saw her fatherstanding there. He looked at her with a mocking, ironic animosity, sothat she knew he was alive. She thought:

"It's all right. I only dreamed he was dead. I shall tell Mamma. "

When she really woke, two entities, two different and discordantmemories, came together with a shock. 

Her mother was up and dressed. She leaned over her, tucking the blanketsround her shoulders and saying, "Lie still and go to sleep again, there'sa good girl. "

Her memory cleared and settled, filtering, as the light filtered throughthe drawn blinds. Mamma and she had slept together because Papa was dead. 

IX. 

"Mary, do you know why you're crying?"

Roddy's face was fixed in a look of anger and resentment, and of anxietyas if he were afraid that at any minute he would be asked to do somethingthat he couldn't do. 

They had come down together from the locked room, and gone into thedrawing-room where the yellow blinds let in the same repulsive, greyish, ochreish light. 

Her tears did not fall. They covered her eyes each with a shaking lens;the chairs and tables floated up to her as if she stood in an aquarium ofthick, greyish, ochreish light. 

"You think it's because you care, " he said. "But it's because you don'tcare.... You're not as bad as I am. I don't care a bit. "

"Yes, you do, or you wouldn't think you didn't. "

"No. None of us really cares. Except Mamma. And even she doesn't as muchas she thinks she does. If we cared we'd be glad to sit in there, doingnothing, thinking about him.... That's why we keep on going upstairs tolook at him, to make ourselves feel as if we cared. "

She wondered. Was that really why they did it? She thought it was becausethey couldn't bear to leave him there, four days and four nights, alone. She said so. But Roddy went on in his hard, flat voice, beating out histruth. 

"We never did anything to make him happy. "

"He _was_ happy, " she said. "When Mark went. He had Mamma. "

"Yes, but he must have known about us. He must have known about us allthe time. "

"What did he know about us?"

"That we didn't care. 

"Don't you remember, " he said, "the things we used to say about him?"

She remembered. She could see Dan in the nursery at Five Elms, scowlingand swearing he would kill Papa. She could see Roddy, and Mark with hisred tight face, laughing at him. She could see herself, a baby, kickingand screaming when he took her in his arms. For months she hadn't thoughtabout him except to wish he wasn't there so that she could go on playing. When he was in the fit she had been playing on the Kendals' piano, conceited and happy, not caring. 

Supposing all the time, deep down, in his secret mysterious life, _he_had cared?

"We must leave off thinking about him, " Roddy said. "If we keep onthinking we shall go off our heads. "

"We _are_ off our heads, " she said. 

Their hatred of themselves was a biting, aching madness. She hated theconceited, happy self that hadn't cared. The piano, gleaming sombrely inthe hushed light, reminded her of it. 

She hated the piano. 

They dragged themselves back into the dining-room where Mamma and Dan satdoing nothing, hiding their faces from each other. The afternoon went on. Utter callousness, utter weariness came over them. 

Their mother kept looking at the clock. "Uncle Victor will have got toDurlingham, " she said. An hour ago she had said, "Uncle Victor will havegot to York. " Their minds clung to Uncle Victor as they had clung, fourdays ago, to Dan, because of his unconsciousness. 

X. 

Uncle Victor had put his arm on her shoulder. He was leaning ratherheavily. 

He saw what she saw: the immense coffin set up on trestles at the foot ofthe bed; the sheeted body packed tight in the padded white lining, thehands, curling a little, smooth and stiff, the hands of a wax figure; thefirm, sallowish white face; the brown stains, like iodine, about thenostrils; the pale under lip pushed out, proudly. 

A cold, thick smell, like earth damped with stagnant water, came up tothem, mixed with the sharp, piercing smell of the coffin. The vigilant, upright coffin-lid leaned with its sloping shoulders against thechimney-piece, ready. 

In spite of his heavy hand she was aware that Uncle Victor'sconsciousness of these things was different from hers. He did not appearto be in the least sorry for Papa. On his face, wistful, absorbed, therewas a faint, incongruous smile. He might have been watching a childplaying some mysterious game. 

He sighed. His eyes turned from the coffin to the coffin-lid. He staredat the black letters on the shining brass plate. 

 Emilius Olivier. Born November 13th, 1827. Died January 2nd, 1881. 

The grip on her shoulder tightened. 

"He was faithful, Mary. "

He said it as if he were telling her something she couldn't possibly haveknown. 

XI. 

The funeral woke her. A line of light slid through the chink of the door, crooked itself and staggered across the ceiling, a blond trianglethrowing the shadows askew. That was Catty, carrying the lamp for thebearers. 

It came again. There was a shuffling of feet in the passage, a secretmuttering at the head of the stairs, the crack of a banister, a thud asthe shoulder of the coffin butted against the wall at the turn. Then thegrinding scream of the brakes on the hill, the long "Shr-issh" of thechecked wheels ploughing through the snow. 

She could see her mother's face on the pillow, glimmering, with shuteyes. At each sound she could hear her draw a shaking, sobbing breath. She turned to her and took her in her arms. The small, stiff body yieldedto her, helpless, like a child's. 

"Oh Mary, what shall I do? To send him away like that--in a train--allthe way.... Your Grandmamma Olivier tried to keep him from me, and nowhe's gone back to her. "

"You've got Mark. "

"What's that you say?"

"Mark. Mark. Nobody can keep Mark from you. He'll never want anybody butyou. He said so. "

How small she was. You could feel her little shoulder-blades, weak andfine under your fingers, like a child's; you could break them. To behappy with her either you or she had to be broken, to be helpless andlittle like a child. It was a sort of happiness to lie there, holdingher, hiding her from the dreadful funeral dawn. 

Five o'clock. 

The funeral would last till three, going along the road to ReyburnStation, going in the train from Reyburn to Durlingham, from Durlinghamto King's Cross. She wondered whether Dan and Roddy would keep on feelingthe funeral all the time. The train was part of it. Not the worst part. Not so bad as going through the East End to the City of London Cemetery. 

When it came to the City of London Cemetery her mind stopped with a jerkand refused to follow the funeral any further. 

Ten o'clock. Eleven. 

They had shut themselves up in the dining-room, in the yellow-ochreishlight. Mamma sat in her arm-chair, tired and patient, holding her Bibleand her Church Service on her knees, ready. Every now and then she dozed. When this happened Mary took the Bible from her and read where it opened:"And he made the candlestick of pure gold: of beaten work made he thecandlestick; his shaft, and his branch, his bowls, his knops, and hisflowers, were of the same.... And in the candlestick were four bowls madelike almonds, his knops and his flowers: And a knop under two branches ofthe same, and a knop under two branches of the same, and a knop under twobranches of the same, according to the six branches going out of it. Their knops and their branches were of the same: all of it was one beatenwork of pure gold. "

At two o'clock the bell of Renton Church began to toll. Her mother sat upin a stiff, self-conscious attitude and opened the Church Service. Thebell went on tolling. For Papa. 

It stopped. Her mother was saying something. 

"Mary--I can't see with the blind down. Do you think you could read it tome?"

 * * * * *

"'I am the Resurrection and the Life--'"

A queer, jarring voice burst out violently in the dark quiet of the room. It carried each sentence with a rush, making itself steady and hard. 

"'... He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.... 

"'I said, I will take heed to my ways: that I offend not with mytongue--'"

"Not that one, " her mother said. 

"'O Lord, Thou hast been our refuge; from one generation to another. 

"'Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever the earth and theworld were made--'"

(Too fast. Much too fast. You were supposed to be following Mr. Propart;but if you kept up that pace you would have finished the Service beforehe had got through the Psalm. )

"'Lord God most holy--'"

"I can't _hear_ you, Mary. "

"I'm sorry. 'O Lord most mighty, O holy and most merciful Saviour, deliver us not into the bitter pains of eternal death. 

"'Thou knowest, Lord, the secrets of our hearts: shut not Thy mercifulears to our prayers: but spare us, Lord most holy, O God most Mighty, Oholy and merciful Saviour--'"

(Prayers, abject prayers for themselves. None for him. Not one word. Theywere cowards, afraid for themselves, afraid of death; their funk had madethem forget him. It was as if they didn't believe that he was there. And, after all, it was _his_ funeral. )

"'Suffer us not, at our last hour--'"

The hard voice staggered and dropped, picked itself and continued on anote of defiance. 

"'... For on pains of death, to fall from Thee.... '"

(They would have come to the grave now, by the black pointed cypresses. There would be a long pit of yellow clay instead of the green grass andthe white curb. Dan and Roddy would be standing by it. )

"'Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God of His mercy to take untoHimself the soul of our dear brother--'"

The queer, violent voice stopped. 

"I can't--I can't. "

Mamma seemed gratified by her inability to finish the Order for theBurial of the Dead. 

XII. 

"You can say _that_, with your poor father lying in this grave--"

It was the third evening after the funeral. A minute ago they were atperfect peace, and now the everlasting dispute about religion had begunagain. There had been no Prayers since Papa died, because Mamma couldn'ttrust herself to read them without breaking down. At the same time, itwas inconceivable to her that there should be no Prayers. 

"I should have thought, if you could read the Burial Service--"

"I only did it because you asked me to. "

"Then you might do this because I ask you. "

"It isn't the same thing. You haven't got to believe in the BurialService. But either you believe in Prayers or you don't believe in them. If you don't you oughtn't to read them. You oughtn't to be asked to readthem. "

"How are we going on, I should like to know? Supposing I was to be laidaside, are there to be no Prayers, ever, in this house because you've setyourself up in your silly self-conceit against the truth?"

The truth. The truth about God. As if anybody really knew it; as if itmattered; as if anything mattered except Mamma. 

Yet it did matter. It mattered more than anything in the whole world, thetruth about God, the truth about anything; just the truth. Papa's deathhad nothing to do with it. It wasn't fair of Mamma to talk as if it had;to bring it up against you like that. 

"Let's go to bed, " she said. 

Her mother took no notice of the suggestion. She sat bolt upright in herchair; her face had lost its look of bored, weary patience; it flushedand flickered with resentment. 

"I shall send for Aunt Bella, " she said. 

"Why Aunt Bella?"

"Because I must have someone. Someone of my own. "

XIII. 

It was three weeks now since the funeral. 

Mamma and Aunt Bella sat in the dining-room, one on each side of thefireplace. Mamma looked strange and sunken and rather yellow in a widow'scap and a black knitted shawl, but Aunt Bella had turned herself into alarge, comfortable sheep by means of a fleece of white shawl and anice-wool hood peaked over her cap. 

There was a sweet, inky smell of black things dyed at Pullar's. Marypicked out the white threads and pretended to listen while Aunt Bellatalked to Mamma in a woolly voice about Aunt Lavvy's friendship with theUnitarian minister, and Uncle Edward's lumbago, and the unreasonablenessof the working classes. 

She thought how clever it was of Aunt Bella to be able to keep it up likethat. "I couldn't do it to save my life. As long as I live I shall neverbe any good to Mamma. "

The dining-room looked like Mr. Metcalfe, the undertaker. Funerealhypocrisy. She wondered whether Roddy would see the likeness. 

She thought of Roddy's nervous laugh when Catty brought in the firstYorkshire cakes. His eyes had stared at her steadily as he bit into hispiece. They had said: "You don't care. You don't care. If you reallycared you couldn't eat. "

There were no more threads to pick. 

She wondered whether she would be thought unfeeling if she were to take abook and read. 

Aunt Bella began to talk about Roddy. Uncle Edward said Roddy ought to goaway and get something to do. 

If Roddy went away there would be no one. No one. 

She got up suddenly and left them. 

XIV. 

The air of the drawing-room braced her like the rigour of a cold bath. Her heartache loosened and lost itself in the long shiver of chilledflesh. 

The stone walls were clammy with the sweat of the thaw; they gave out asour, sickly smell. Grey smears of damp dulled the polished lid of thepiano. 

They hadn't used the drawing-room since Papa died. It was so bright, soheartlessly cheerful compared with the other rooms, you could see thatMamma would think you unfeeling if you wanted to sit in it when Papa wasdead. She had told Catty not to light the fire and to keep the door shut, for fear you should be tempted to sit in it and forget. 

The piano. Under the lid the keys were stiffening with the damp. Thehammers were swelling, sticking together. She tried not to think of thepiano. 

She turned her back on it and stood by the side window that looked out onto the garden. Mamma's garden. It mouldered between the high wallsblackened by the thaw. On the grass-plot the snow had sunk to a thincrust, black-pitted. The earth was a black ooze through ulcers of greysnow. 

She had a sudden terrifying sense of desolation. 

Her mind clutched at this feeling and referred it to her father. It sentout towards him, wherever he might be, a convulsive emotional cry. 

"You were wrong. I do care. Can't you see that I can never be happyagain? Yet, if you could come back I would be happy. I wouldn't mindyour--your little funny ways. "

It wasn't true. She _would_ mind them. If he were really there he wouldknow it wasn't true. 

She turned and looked again at the piano. She went to it. She opened thelid and sat down before it. Her fingers crept along the keyboard; theyflickered over the notes of the Sonata _Appassionata_, a ghostly, furtiveplaying, without pressure, without sound. 

And she was ashamed as if the piano were tempting her to some cruel, abominable sin. 

XXII

I. 

The consultation had lasted more than an hour. 

From the cobbled square outside you could see them through the window, Mamma, Uncle Edward, Uncle Victor and Farmer Alderson, sitting round thedining-room table and talking, talking, talking about Roddy. 

It was awful to think that things--things that concerned you--could go onand be settled over your head without your knowing anything about it. Sheonly knew that Papa had made Uncle Victor and Uncle Edward the trusteesand guardians of his children who should be under age at his death (sheand Roddy were under age), and that Mamma had put the idea of farming inCanada into Uncle Edward's head, and that Uncle Victor had said hewouldn't hear of letting Roddy go out by himself, and that the landlordof the Buck Hotel had told Victor that Farmer Alderson's brother Ben hada big farm somewhere near Montreal and young Jem Alderson was going outto him in March and they might come to some arrangement. 

They were coming to it now. 

Roddy and she, crouching beside each other on the hearthrug in thedrawing-room, waited till it should be over. Through the shut doors theycould still distinguish Uncle Edward's smooth, fat voice from UncleVictor's thin one. The booming and baying were the noises made by FarmerAlderson. 

"I can't think what they want to drag _him_ in for, " Roddy said. "It'llonly make it more unpleasant for them. "

Roddy's eyes had lost their fear; they were fixed in a wise, mournfulstare. He stared at his fate. 

"They don't know yet quite _how_ imbecile I am. If I could have gone outquietly by myself they never need have known. Now they'll _have_ to. Alderson'll tell them. He'll tell everybody.... I don't care. It's theirown look-out. They'll soon see I was right. "

"Listen, " she said. 

The dining-room door had opened. Uncle Edward's voice came out first, sounding with a sort of complacent finality. They must have settled it. You could hear Farmer Alderson stumping his way to the front door. Hisvoice boomed from the step. 

"Ah doan't saay, look ye, 'e'll mak mooch out of en t' farst ye-ear--"

"Damn him, you can hear his beastly voice all over the place. "

"Ef yore yoong mon's dead set to larn fa-armin', an' ef 'e've got a headon 'is shoulders our Jem can larn 'en. Ef 'e '_aven't_, ah tall yostra-aight, Mr. Ollyveer, ye med joost's well tak yore mooney and trow itin t' mistal. "

Roddy laughed. "_I_ could have told them that, " he said. 

"Money?"

"Rather. They can't do it under two hundred pounds. I suppose Victor'llstump up as usual. "

"Poor Victor. "

"Victor won't mind. He'll do anything for Mamma. They can call it apremium if it makes them any happier, but it simply means that they'repaying Alderson to get rid of me. "

"No. They've got it into their heads that it's bad for you sticking heredoing nothing. "

"So it is. But being made to do what I can't do's worse.... I'm notlikely to do it any better with that young beast Alderson looking at meall the time and thinking what a bloody fool I am.... They ought to haveleft it to me. It would have come a lot cheaper. I was going anyhow. Ionly stayed because of Papa. But I can't tell _them_ that. After all, Iwas the only one who looked after him. If I'd gone you'd have had to. "

"Yes. "

"It would even come cheaper, " he said, "if I stayed. I can prove it. "

He produced his pocket sketch-book. The leaves were scribbled over withsums, sums desperately begun and left unfinished, sums that were notquite sure of themselves, sums scratched out and begun again. He crossedthem all out and started on a fresh page. 

"Premium, two hundred. Passage, twenty. Outfit, say thirty. Two hundredand fifty. 

"Land cheap, lumber cheap. Labour expensive. Still, Alderson would be sopleased he might do the job himself for a nominal sum and only charge youfor the wood. Funeral expenses, say ten dollars. 

"How much does it cost to keep me here?"

"I haven't an idea. "

"No, but think. "

"I can't think. "

"Well, say I eat ten shillings' worth of food per week, that's twenty-sixpounds a year. Say thirty. Clothes, five. Thirty-five. Sundries, perhapsfive. Forty. But I do the garden. What's a gardener's wages? Twenty?Fifteen?

"Say fifteen. Fifteen from forty, fifteen from forty--twenty-five. Howmuch did Papa's funeral come to?"

"Oh--Roddy--I don't know. "

"Say thirty. Twenty-five from two hundred and fifty, two hundred andtwenty-five. Deduct funeral. One hundred and ninety-five. 

"There you are. One hundred and ninety-five pounds for carting me toCanada. "

"If you feel like that about it you ought to tell them. They can't makeyou go if you don't want to. "

"They're not making me go. I'm going. I couldn't possibly stay after thebeastly things they've said. "

"What sort of things?"

"About my keep and my being no good and making work in the house. "

"They didn't--they couldn't. "

"Edward did. He said if it wasn't for me Mamma wouldn't have to haveMaggie. Catty could do all the work. And when Victor sat on him and saidMamma was to have Maggie whatever happened, he jawed back and said shecouldn't afford both Maggie and me. "

"Catty could do Maggie's work and I could do Catty's, if you'd stop. Itwould be only cleaning things. That's nothing. I'd rather clean the wholehouse and _have_ you. "

"You wouldn't. You only think you would. "

"I would, really. I'll tell them. "

"It's no use, " he said. "They won't let you. "

"I'll make them. I'll go and tell Edward and Victor now. "

She had shot up from the floor with sudden energy, and stood looking downat Roddy as he still crouched there. Her heart ached for him. He didn'twant to go to Canada; he wanted to stay with Mamma, and Mamma was drivinghim away from her, for no reason except that Uncle Edward said he oughtto go. 

She could hear the dining-room door open and shut again. They werecoming. 

Roddy rose from the floor. He drew himself up, stretching out his arms ina crucified attitude, and grinned at her. 

"Do you suppose, " he said, "I'd let you?"

He grinned at Uncle Edward and Uncle Victor as they came in. 

"Uncle Victor, " she said, "Why should Roddy go away? If it's Maggie, wedon't really want her. I'll do Catty's work and he'll do the garden. Sohe can stay, can't he?"

"He _can_, Mary, but I don't think he will. "

"Of course I won't. If you hadn't waited to mix me up with Alderson Icould have cleared out and got there by this time. You don't suppose Iwas going to sponge on my mother for ever, do you?"

He stood there, defying Uncle Edward and Uncle Victor, defying theirthoughts of him. She wondered whether he had forgotten the two hundredpounds and whether they were thinking of it. They didn't answer, andRoddy, after fixing on them a look they couldn't meet, strode out of theroom. 

She thought: How like Mark he is, with his tight, squared shoulders, holding his head high. His hair was like Mark's hair, golden brown, closeclipped to the nape of his neck. When he had gone it would be like Mark'sgoing. 

"It's better he should go, " Uncle Victor said. "For his own sake. "

Uncle Edward said, "Of course it is. "

His little blue eyes glanced up from the side of his nose, twinkling. Hismouth stretched from white whisker to white whisker in a smile ofrighteous benevolence. But Uncle Victor's eyes slunk away as if he wereashamed of himself. 

It was Uncle Victor who had paid the two hundred pounds. 

II. 

"Supposing there's something the matter with him, will he still have togo?"

"I don't see why you should suppose there's anything the matter withhim, " her mother said. "Is it likely your Uncle Victor would be payingall that money to send him out if he wasn't fit to go?"

It didn't seem likely that Victor would have done anything of the sort;any more than Uncle Edward would have let Aunt Bella give him an overcoatlined with black jennet. 

They were waiting for Roddy to come back from the doctor's. Before UncleVictor left Morfe he had made Roddy promise that for Mamma's satisfactionhe would go and be overhauled. And it was as if he had said "You'll seethen how much need there is to worry. "

You might have kept on hoping that something would happen to preventRoddy's going but for the size and solidity and expensiveness of thepreparations. You might forget that his passage was booked for the firstSaturday in March, that to-day was the first Wednesday, that Victor's twohundred pounds had been paid to Jem Alderson's account at the bank inMontreal, and still the black jennet lining of the overcoat shouted atyou that nothing _could_ stop Roddy's going now. Uncle Victor might bereckless, but Uncle Edward and Aunt Bella took no risks. 

Unless, after all, Dr. Kendal stopped it--if he said Roddy mustn't go. 

She could hear Roddy's feet coming back. They sounded like Mark's feet onthe flagged path outside. 

He came into the room quickly. His eyes shone, he looked pleased andexcited. 

Mamma stirred in her chair. 

"That's a bright face. We needn't ask if you've got your passport, " shesaid. 

He looked at her, a light, unresting look. 

"How right you are, " he said. "And wise. "

"Well, I didn't suppose there was much the matter with you. "

"There isn't. "

He went to the bookshelf where he kept his drawing-blocks. 

"I wouldn't sit down and draw if I were you. There isn't time. "

"There'll be less after Saturday. "

He sat down and began to draw. He was as absorbed and happy as if none ofthem had ever heard of Canada. 

He chanted:

 "'Cannon to right of them, Cannon to left of them, Cannon in front of them Volleyed and thundered. '"

The pencil moved excitedly. Volumes of smoke curled and rolled andwrithed on the left-hand side of the sheet. The guns of Balaclava. 

 "'Into the jaws of Death, Into the mouth of Hell, Rode the six hundred. '"

A rush of hoofs and heads and lifted blades on the right hand. The horsesand swords of the Light Brigade. 

 "'Theirs not to make reply, Theirs not to reason why, Theirs but to do and die'"--

"You ought to be a soldier, Roddy, like Mark, not a farmer. "

"Oh wise! Oh right!

 "'Forward, the Light Brigade! Was there a man dismayed? Not though the soldier knew Someone had blundered. '"

III. 

She was going up the schoolhouse lane towards Karva, because Roddy andshe had gone that way together on Friday, his last evening. 

It was Sunday now; six o'clock: the time he used to bring Papa home. Hisship would have left Queenstown, it would be steering to the west. 

She wondered how much he had really minded going. Perhaps he had onlybeen afraid he wouldn't be strong enough; for after he had seen thedoctor he had been different. Pleased and excited. Perhaps he didn'tmind so very much. 

If she could only remember how he had looked and what he had said. He hadtalked about the big Atlantic liner, and the Canadian forests. With luckthe voyage might last eleven or twelve clear days. You could shoot mooseand wapiti. Wapiti and elk. Elk. With his eyes shining. He was not quitesure about the elk. He wished he had written to the High Commissioner forCanada about the elk. That was what the Commissioner was there for, toanswer questions, to encourage you to go to his beastly country. 

She could hear Roddy's voice saying these things as they walked overKarva. He was turning it all into an adventure, his imagination playinground and round it. And on Saturday morning he had been sick and couldn'teat his breakfast. Mamma had been sorry, and at the same time vexed andirritable as if she were afraid that the arrangements might, after all, be upset. But in the end he had gone off, pleased and excited, with JemAlderson in the train. 

She could see Jem's wide shoulders pushing through the carriage doorafter Roddy. He had a gentle, reddish face and long, hanging moustacheslike a dying Gladiator. Little eyes that screwed up to look at you. Hewould be good to Roddy. 

It would be all right. 

She stood still in the dark lane. A disturbing memory gnawed its waythrough her thoughts that covered it: the way Roddy had looked at Mamma, that Wednesday, the way he had spoken to her. "Oh wise. Oh right!"

That was because he believed she wanted him to go away. He couldn'tbelieve that she really cared for him; that Mamma really cared foranybody but Mark; he couldn't believe that anybody cared for him. 

 "'Into the jaws of Death, Into the mouth of Hell, Rode the six hundred. '"

Roddy's chant pursued her up the lane. 

The gate at the top fell to behind her. Moor grass showed grey amongblack heather. She half saw, half felt her way along the sheep tracks. There, where the edge of the round pit broke away, was the place whereRoddy had stopped suddenly in front of her. 

"I wouldn't mind a bit if I hadn't been such a brute to little Mamma. Why_are_ we such brutes to her?" He had turned in the narrow moor-track andfaced her with his question: "Why?"

 "'Forward, the Light Brigade! Was there a man dismayed? Not though the soldier knew Someone had blundered'"--

Hunderd--blundered. Did Tennyson really call hundred hunderd?

The grey curve of the high road glimmered alongside the moor. From thepoint where her track joined it she could see three lights, two moving, one still. The still light at the turn came from the Aldersons' house. The moving lights went with the klomp-klomp of hoofs on the road. 

Down in the darkness beyond the fields Garthdale lay like a ditch underthe immense wall of Greffington Edge. Roddy hated Greffington Edge. Hehated Morfe. He _wanted_ to get away. 

It would be all right. 

The klomp-klomping sounded close behind her. Two shafts of light shot outin front, white on the grey road. Dr. Kendal drove past in his dog-cart. He leaned out over the side, peering. She heard him say something tohimself. 

The wheels slowed down with a grating noise. The lights stood still. Hehad pulled up. He was waiting for her. 

She turned suddenly and went back up the moor by the way she had come. She didn't want to see Dr. Kendal. She was afraid he would say somethingabout Roddy. 

XXIII

I. 

The books stood piled on the table by her window, the books Miss Wray ofClevehead had procured for her, had given and lent her. Now Roddy hadgone she had time enough to read them: Hume's _Essays_, the fat maroonSchwegler, the two volumes of Kant in the hedgesparrow-green papercovers. 

"_Kritik der reinen Vernunft. Kritik der reinen Vernunft_. " She said itover and over to herself. It sounded nicer than "_The Critique of PureReason_. " At the sight of the thick black letters on thehedgesparrow-green ground her heart jumped up and down with excitement. Lucky it was in German, so that Mamma couldn't find out what Kant wasdriving at. The secret was hidden behind the thick black bars of theletters. 

In Schwegler, as you went on you went deeper. You saw thought folding andunfolding, thought moving on and on, thought drawing the universe toitself, pushing the universe away from itself to draw it back again, closer than close. 

Space and Time were forms of thought. They were infinite. So thought wasinfinite; it went on and on for ever, carrying Space, carrying Time. 

If only you knew what the Thing-in-itself was. 

II. 

"Mamma--"

The letter lay between them on the hall table by the study door. Hermother put her hand over it, quick. A black, long-tailed M showed betweenher forefinger and her thumb. 

They looked at each other, and her mother's mouth began to pout and smileas it used to when Papa said something improper. She took the letter andwent, with soft feet and swinging haunches like a cat carrying a mouse, into the study. Mary stared at the shut door. 

Maurice Jourdain. Maurice Jourdain. What on earth was he writing to Mammafor?

Five minutes ago she had been quiet and happy, reading Kant's _Critiqueof Pure Reason_. Now her heart beat like a hammer, staggering with itsown blows. The blood raced in her brain. 

III. 

"Mamma, if you don't tell me I shall write and ask him. " Her motherlooked up, frightened. 

"You wouldn't do that, Mary?"

"Oh, wouldn't I though! I'd do it like a shot. "

She wondered why she hadn't thought of it an hour ago. 

"Well--If there's no other way to stop you--"

Her mother gave her the letter, picking it up by one corner, as though ithad been a dirty pocket-handkerchief. 

"It'll show you, " she said, "the sort of man he is. "

Mary held the letter in both her hands, gently. Her heart beat gently nowwith a quiet feeling of happiness and satisfaction. She looked a longtime at the characters, the long-tailed M's, the close, sharp v's, thet's crossed with a savage, downward stab. She was quiet as long as sheonly looked. When she read the blood in her brain raced faster andconfused her. She stopped at the bottom of the first page. 

"I can't think what he means. "

"It's pretty plain what he means, " her mother said. 

"About all those letters. What letters?"

"Letters he's been writing to your father and me and your Uncle Victor. "

"When?"

"Ever since you left school. You were sent to school to keep you out ofhis way; and you weren't back before he began his persecuting. If youwant to know why we left Ilford, _that's_ why. He persecuted your poorfather. He persecuted your Uncle Victor. And now he's persecuting me. "

"Persecuting?"

"What is it but persecuting? Threatening that he won't answer for theconsequences if he doesn't get what he wants. He's mistaken if he thinksthat's the way to get it. "

"What--_does_ he want?"

"I suppose, " her mother said, "he thinks he wants to marry you. "

"Me? He doesn't say that. He only says he wants to come and see me. Whyshouldn't he?"

"Because your father didn't wish it, and your uncle and I don't wish it. "

"You don't like him. "

"Do _you_?"

"I--love him. "

"Nonsense. You don't know what you're talking about. You'd have forgottenall about him if you hadn't seen that letter. "

"I thought he'd forgotten me. You ought to have told me. It was cruel notto tell me. He must have loved me all the time. He said I was to waitthree years and I didn't know what he meant. He must have loved me thenand I didn't know it. "

The sound of her voice surprised her. It came from her whole body; itvibrated like a violin. 

"How could he love you? You were a child then. "

"I'm not a child now. You'll have to let him marry me. "

"I'd rather see you in your coffin. I'd rather see you married to poorNorman Waugh. And goodness knows I wouldn't like that. "

"Your mother didn't like your marrying Papa. "

"You surely don't compare Maurice Jourdain with your father?"

"He's faithful. Papa was faithful. I'm faithful too. "

"Faithful! To a horrid man like that!"

"He isn't horrid. He's kind and clever and good. He's brave, like Mark. He'd have been a soldier if he hadn't had to help his mother. And he'shonourable. He said he wouldn't see me or write to me unless you let him. And he hasn't seen me and he hasn't written. You can't say he isn'thonourable. "

"I suppose, " her mother said, "he's honourable enough. "

"You'll have to let him come. If you don't, I _shall go to him_. "

"I declare if you're not as bad as your Aunt Charlotte. "

IV. 

Incredible; impossible; but it had happened. 

And it was as if she had known it--all the time, known that she wouldcome downstairs that morning and see Maurice Jourdain's letter lying onthe table. She always had known that something, some wonderful, beautiful, tremendous thing would happen to her. This was it. 

It had been hidden in all her happiness. Her happiness was it. MauriceJourdain. 

When she said "Maurice Jourdain" she could feel her voice throb in herbody like the string of a violin. When she thought of Maurice Jourdainthe stir renewed itself in a vague, exquisite vibration. The edges of hermouth curled out with faint throbbing movements, suddenly sensitive, likeeyelids, like finger-tips. 

Odd memories darted out at her. The plantation at Ilford. Jimmy's mouthcrushing her face. Jimmy's arms crushing her chest. A scarlet frock. Thewhite bridge-rail by the ford. Bertha Mitchison, saying things, thingsyou wouldn't think of if you could help it. But she was mainly aware of asurpassing tenderness and a desire to immolate herself, in someremarkable and noble fashion, for Maurice Jourdain. If only she could seehim, for ten minutes, five minutes, and tell him that she hadn'tforgotten him. He belonged to her real life. Her self had a secret placewhere people couldn't get at it, where its real life went on. He was theonly person she could think of as having a real life at all like her own. She had thought of him as mixed up for ever with her real life, so thatwhether she saw him or not, whether she remembered him or not, he wouldbe there. He was in the songs she made, he was in the Sonata_Appassionata_; he was in the solemn beauty of Karva under the moon. Inthe _Critique of Pure Reason_ she caught the bright passing of his mind. 

Perhaps she had forgotten a little what he looked like. Smoky black eyes. Tired eyelids. A crystal mind, shining and flashing. A mind like a bigroom, filled from end to end with light. Maurice Jourdain. 

V. 

"I don't think I should have known you, Mary. "

Maurice Jourdain had come. In the end Uncle Victor had let him. He wassitting there, all by himself, on the sofa in the middle of the room. 

It was his third evening. She had thought it was going to pass exactlylike the other two, and then her mother had got up, with an incrediblesuddenness, and left them. 

Through the open window you could hear the rain falling in the garden;you could see the garden grey and wet with rain. 

She sat on the edge of the fender, and without looking up she knew thathe was watching her from under half-shut eyelids. 

His eyelids were so old, so tired, so very tired and old. 

"What did you cut it all off for?"

"Oh, just for fun. "

Without looking at him she knew that he had moved, that his chin haddropped to his chest; there would be a sort of puffiness in his cheeksand about his jaw under the black, close-clipped beard. When she saw itshe felt a little creeping chill at her heart. 

But that was unfaithfulness, that was cruelty. If he knew it--poorthing--how it would hurt him! But he never would know. She would behaveas though she hadn't seen any difference in him at all. 

If only she could set his mind moving; turn the crystal about; make itflash and shine. 

"What have they been doing to you?" he said. "You used to be clever. Iwonder if you're clever still. "

"I don't think I am, very. "

She thought: "I'm stupid. I'm as stupid as an owl. I never felt so stupidin all my life. If only I could _think_ of something to say to him. "

"Did they tell you what I've come for?"

"Yes. "

"Are you glad?"

"Very glad. "

"Why do you sit on the fender?"

"I'm cold. "

"Cold and glad. "

A long pause. 

"Do you know why your mother hates me, Mary?"

"She doesn't. She only thought you'd killed Papa. "

"I didn't kill him. It wasn't my fault if he couldn't control histemper.... That isn't what she hates me for.... Do you know why you weresent to school--the school my aunt found for you?"

"Well--to keep me from seeing you. "

"Yes. And because I asked your father to let me educate you, since hewasn't doing it himself. I wanted to send you to a school in Paris fortwo years. "

"I didn't know. They never told me. What made you want to do all that forme?"

"It wasn't for you. It was for the little girl who used to go for walkswith me.... She was the nicest little girl. She said the jolliest thingsin the dearest little voice. 'How can a man like _you_ care to talk to achild like _me_?'"

"Did I say that? I don't remember. "

"_She_ said it. "

"It sounds rather silly of her. "

"She wasn't silly. She was clever as they make them. And she was prettytoo. She had lots of hair, hanging down her back. Curling.... And theytake her away from me and I wait three years for her. She knew I waswaiting. And when I come back to her she won't look at me. She sits onthe fender and stares at the fire. She wears horrible black clothes. "

"Because Papa's dead. "

"She goes and cuts her hair all off. That isn't because your father'sdead. "

"It'll grow again. "

"Not for another three years. And I believe I hear your mother comingback. "

His chin dropped to his chest again. He brooded morosely. Presently Cattycame in with the coffee. 

The next day he was gone. 

VI. 

"It seems to me, " her mother said, "you only care for him when he isn'tthere. "

He had come again, twice, in July, in August. Each time her mother hadsaid, "Are you sure you want him to come again? You know you weren't veryhappy the last time. " And she had answered, "I know I'm going to be thistime. "

"You see, " she said, "when he _isn't_ there you remember, and when he_is_ there he makes you forget. "

"Forget what?"

"What it used to feel like. "

Mamma had smiled a funny, contented smile. Mamma was different. Her facehad left off being reproachful and disapproving. It had got back thetender, adorable look it used to have when you were little. She hatedMaurice Jourdain, yet you felt that in some queer way she loved youbecause of him. You loved her more because of Maurice Jourdain. 

The engagement happened suddenly at the end of August. You knew it wouldhappen some day; but you thought of it as happening to-morrow or the dayafter rather than to-day. At three o'clock you started for a walk, neverknowing how you might come back, and at five you found yourself sittingat tea in the orchard, safe. He would slouch along beside you, for miles, morosely. You thought of his mind swinging off by itself, shining whereyou couldn't see it. You broke loose from him to run tearing along theroad, to jump water-courses, to climb trees and grin down at him throughthe branches. Then he would wake up from his sulking. Sometimes he wouldbe pleased and sometimes he wouldn't. The engagement happened just afterhe had not been pleased at all. 

She could still hear his voice saying "What do you _do_ it for?" and herown answering. 

"You must do _something_. "

"You needn't dance jigs on the parapets of bridges. "

They slid through the gap into the fields. In the narrow path he stoppedsuddenly and turned. 

"How can a child like _you_ care for a man like _me_?" Mocking hersing-song. 

He stooped and kissed her. She shut her eyes so as not to see thepuffiness. 

"Will you marry me, Mary?"

VII. 

After the engagement, the quarrel. It lasted all the way up theschoolhouse lane. 

"I _do_ care for you, I do, really. "

"You don't know what you're talking about. You may care for me as a childcares. You don't care as a woman does. No woman who cared for a man wouldwrite the letters you do. I ask you to tell me about yourself--whatyou're feeling and thinking--and you send me some ghastly screed aboutSpinoza or Kant. Do you suppose any man wants to hear what his sweetheartthinks about Space and Time and the Ding-an-sich?"

"You used to like it. "

"I don't like it now. No woman would wear those horrible clothes if shecared for a man and wanted him to care for her. She wouldn't cut her hairoff. "

"How was I to know you'd mind so awfully? And how do you know what womendo or don't do?"

"Has it never occurred to you that I might know more women than you knowmen? That I might have women friends?"

"I don't think I've thought about it very much. "

"Haven't you? Men don't live to be thirty-seven without getting to knowwomen; they can't go about the world without meeting them.... There's alittle girl down in Sussex. A dear little girl. She's everything a manwants a woman to be. "

"Lots of hair?"

"Lots of hair. Stacks of it. And she's clever. She can cook and sew andmake her own clothes and her sisters'. She's kept her father's housesince she was fifteen. Without a servant. "

"How awful for her. And you like her?"

"Yes, Mary. "

"I'm glad you like her. Who else?"

"A Frenchwoman in Paris. And a German woman in Hamburg. And anEnglishwoman in London; the cleverest woman I know. She's unhappy, Mary. Her husband behaves to her like a perfect brute. "

"Poor thing. I hope you're nice to her. "

"She thinks I am. "

Silence. He peered into her face. 

"Are you jealous of her, Mary?"

"I'm not jealous of any of them. You can marry them all if you want to. "

"I was going to marry one of them. "

"Then why didn't you?"

"Because the little girl in Essex wouldn't let me. "

"Little beast!"

"So you're jealous of _her_, are you? You needn't be. She's gone. Shetried to swallow the _Kritik der reinen Vernunft_ and it disagreed withher and she died. 

 "'Nur einmal doch mächt' ich dich sehen, Und sinken vor dir auf's Knie, Und sterbend zu dir sprechen, Madam, ich liebe Sie!'"

"What's that? Oh, what's that?"

"_That_--Madam--is Heine. "

VIII. 

"My dearest Maurice--"

It was her turn for writing. She wondered whether he would like to hearabout the tennis party at the Vicarage. Mr. Spencer Rollitt's nephew, Harry Craven, had been there, and the two Acroyd girls from Renton Lodge, and Norman Waugh. 

Harry Craven's fawn face with pointed chin; dust-white face with blackaccents. Small fawn's mouth lifting upwards. Narrow nostrils slantingupwards. Two lobes of white forehead. Half-moons of parted, brushed-backhair. 

He smiled: a blunt V opening suddenly on white teeth, black eyesfluttering. He laughed: all his features made sudden, upward movementslike raised wings. 

The Acroyds. Plump girls with pink, blown cheeks and sulky mouths. Youthought of sullen, milk-fed babies, of trumpeting cherubs disgusted withtheir trumpets. They were showing their racquets to Harry Craven, bendingtheir heads. You could see the backs of their privet-white necks, fat, with no groove in the nape, where their hair curled in springy wires, Minna's dark, Sophy's golden. They turned their backs when you spoke andpretended not to hear you. 

She thought she would like Maurice to know that Harry Craven and she hadbeaten Minna Ackroyd and Norman Waugh. A love set. 

Afterwards--Harry Craven playing hide-and-seek in the dark. The tennisnet, coiled like a grey snake on the black lawn. "Let's hide together. "Harry Craven, hiding, crouching beside you under the currant bushes. Thescramble together up the water-butt and along the scullery roof. The lastrush across the lawn. 

"I say, you run like the wind. "

He took your hand. You ran faster and faster. You stood together, underthe ash tree, panting, and laughing, safe. He still held your hand. 

Funny that you should remember it when you hadn't noticed it at the time. Hands were funny things. His hand had felt like Mark's hand, or Roddy's. You didn't think of it as belonging to him. It made you want to have Markand Roddy back again. To play with them. 

Perhaps, after all, it wouldn't be kind to tell Maurice about the tennisparty. He couldn't have played like that. He couldn't have scrambled upthe water-butt and run with you along the scullery roof. 

"My dearest Maurice: Nothing has happened since you left, except thatthere was a tennis party at the Vicarage yesterday. You know what tennisparties are like. You'll be shocked to hear that I wore my old blackjersey--the one you hated so--"

IX. 

"'Mein Kind, wir waren Kinder. '"

She shut her eyes. She wanted nothing but his voice. His voice was alive. It remembered. It hadn't grown old and tired. "My child, we once werechildren, two children happy and small; we crept in the little hen-houseand hid ourselves under the straw. "

 "Kikeriküh! sie glaubten Es wäre Hahnen geschrei. "

"... It's all very well, Mary, I can't go on reading Heine to you forever. And--_après_?"

He had taken her on his knees. That happened sometimes. She kept one footon the floor so as not to press on him with her whole weight. And sheplayed with his watch chain. She liked to touch the things he wore. Itmade her feel that she cared for him; it staved off the creeping, sickening fear that came when their hands and faces touched. 

"Do you know, " he said, "what it will be like--afterwards?"

She began, slowly, to count the buttons of his waistcoat. 

"Have you ever tried to think what it will be like?"

"Yes. "

Last night, lying awake in the dark, she had tried to think. She hadthought of shoulders heaving over her, of arms holding her, of a facelooking into hers, a honey-white, beardless face, blue eyes, blackeyebrows drawn close down on to the blue. Jimmy's face, not MauriceJourdain's. 

That was in September. October passed. She began to wonder when he wouldcome again. 

He came on the last day of November. 

X. 

"Maurice, you're keeping something from me. Something's happened. Something's made you unhappy. "

"Yes. Something's made me unhappy. "

The Garthdale road. Before them, on the rise, the white highway showedlike a sickle curving into the moor. At the horn of the sickle a tall ashtree in the wall of the Aldersons' farm. Where the road dipped theyturned. 

He slouched slowly, his head hung forward, loosening the fold of fleshabout his jaw. His eyes blinked in the soft November sunshine. Hiseyelids were tight as though they had been tied with string. 

"Supposing I asked you to release me from our engagement?"

"For always?"

"Perhaps for always. Perhaps only for a short time. Till I've settledsomething. Till I've found out something I want to know. Would you, Mary?"

"Of course I would. Like a shot. "

"And supposing--I never settled it?"

"That would be all right. I can go on being engaged to you; but youneedn't be engaged to me. "

"You dear little thing.... I'm afraid, I'm afraid that wouldn't do. "

"It would do beautifully. Unless you're really keeping something backfrom me. "

"I am keeping something back from you.... I've no right to worry you withmy unpleasant affairs. I was fairly well off when I asked you to marryme, but, the fact is, it looks as if my business was going to bits. I maybe able to pull it together again. I may not--"

"Is _that_ all? I'm glad you've told me. If you'd told me before it wouldhave saved a lot of bother. "

"What sort of bother?"

"Well, you see, I wasn't quite sure whether I really wanted to marryyou--just yet. Sometimes I thought I did, sometimes I thought I didn't. And now I know I do. "

"That's it. I may not be in a position to marry you. I can't ask you toshare my poverty. "

"I shan't mind that. I'm used to it. "

"I may not be able to keep a wife at all. "

"Of course you will. You're keeping a housekeeper now. And a cook and ahousemaid. "

"I may have to send two of them away. "

"Send them all away. I'll work for you all my life. I shall never want todo anything else. It's what I always wanted. When I was a child I used toimagine myself doing it for you. It was a sort of game I played. "

"It's a sort of game you're playing now, my poor Mary.... No. No. Itwon't do. "

"What do you think I'm made of? No woman who cared for a man could givehim up for a thing like that. "

"There are other things. Complications.... I think I'd better write toyour mother. Or your brother. "

"Write to them--write to them. They won't care a rap about your business. We're not like that, Maurice. "

XI. 

"You'd better let me see what he says, Mamma. "

Her mother had called to her to come into the study. She had MauriceJourdain's letter in her hand. She looked sad and at the same time happy. 

"My darling, he doesn't want you to see it. "

"Is it as bad as all that?"

"Yes. If I'd had my way you should never have had anything to do withhim. I'd have forbidden him the house if your Uncle Victor hadn't saidthat was the way to make you mad about him. He seemed to think thatseeing him would cure you. And so it ought to have done.... 

"He says you know he wants to break off the engagement, but he doesn'tthink he has made you understand why. "

"Oh, yes, he did. It's because of his business. "

"He doesn't say a word about his business. I'm to break it to you that hedoesn't care for you as he thought he cared. As if he wasn't old enoughto know what he wanted. He might have made up his mind before he droveyour father into his grave. "

"Tell me what he says. "

"He just says that. He says he's in an awful position, and whatever hedoes he must behave dishonourably.... I admit he's sorry enough. And he'sdoing the only honourable thing. "

"He _would_ do that. "

She fixed her mind on his honour. You could love that. You could lovethat always. 

"He _says_ he asked you to release him. Did he?"

"Yes. "

"Then why on earth didn't you?"

"I did. But I couldn't release myself. "

"But that's what you ought to have done. Instead of leaving him to doit. "

"Oh, no. That would have been dishonourable to myself. "

"You'd rather be jilted?"

"Much rather. It's more honourable to be jilted than to jilt. "

"That's not the world's idea of honour. "

"It's my idea of it.... And, after all, he _was_ Maurice Jourdain. "

XII. 

The pain hung on to the left side of her head, clawing. When she left offreading she could feel it beat like a hammer, driving in a warm nail. 

Aunt Lavvy sat on the parrot chair, with her feet on the fender. Herfingers had left off embroidering brown birds on drab linen. 

In the dying light of the room things showed fuzzy, headachy outlines. Itmade you feel sick to look at them. 

Mamma had left her alone with Aunt Lavvy. 

"I suppose you think that nobody was ever so unhappy as you are, " AuntLavvy said. 

"I hope nobody is. I hope nobody ever will be. "

"Should you say _I_ was unhappy?"

"You don't look it. I hope you're not. "

"Thirty-three years ago I was miserable, because I couldn't have my ownway. I couldn't marry the man I cared for. "

"Oh--_that_. Why didn't you?"

"My mother and your father and your Uncle Victor wouldn't let me. "

"I suppose he was a Unitarian?"

"Yes. He was a Unitarian. But whatever he'd been I couldn't have marriedhim. I couldn't do anything I liked. I couldn't go where I liked or staywhere I liked. I wanted to be a teacher, but I had to give it up. "

"_Why_?"

"Because your Uncle Victor and I had to look after your Aunt Charlotte. "

"You could have got somebody else to look after Aunt Charlotte. Somebodyelse has to look after her now. "

"Your Grandmamma made us promise never to send her away as long as it waspossible to keep her. That's why your Uncle Victor never married. "

"And all the time Aunt Charlotte would have been better and happier withDr. Draper. Aunt Lavvy--t's too horrible. "

"It wasn't as bad as you think. Your Uncle Victor couldn't have marriedin any case. "

"Didn't he love anybody?"

"Yes, Mary; he loved your mother. "

"I see. And she didn't love him. "

"He wouldn't have married her if she had loved him. He was afraid. "

"Afraid?"

"Afraid of going like your Aunt Charlotte. Afraid of what he might handon to his children. "

"Papa wasn't afraid. He grabbed. It was poor little Victor and you whogot nothing. "

"Victor has got a great deal. "

"And you--you?"

"I've got all I want. I've got all there is. When everything's takenaway, then God's there. "

"If he's there, he's there anyhow. "

"Until everything's taken away there isn't room to _see_ that he'sthere. "

When Catty came in with the lamp Aunt Lavvy went out quickly. 

Mary got up and stretched herself. The pain had left off hammering. Shecould think. 

Aunt Lavvy--to live like that for thirty-three years and to be happy atthe end. She wondered what happiness there could be in that dullsurrender and acquiescence, that cold, meek love of God. 

 "Kikeriküh! sie glaubten Es wäre Hahnen geschrei. "

XXIV

I. 

Everybody in the village knew you had been jilted. Mrs. Waugh and MissFrewin knew it, and Mr. Horn, the grocer, and Mr. Oldshaw at the bank. And Mr. Belk, the Justice of the Peace--little pink and flaxen gentleman, carrying himself with an air of pompous levity--eyes slewing round as youpassed; and Mrs. Belk--hard, tight rotundity, little iron-grey eyestwinkling busily in a snub face, putty-skinned with a bilious gleam;curious eyes, busy eyes saying, "I'd like to know what she did to bejilted. "

Minna and Sophy Acroyd, with their blown faces and small, disgustedmouths: you could see them look at each other; they were saying, "Here'sthat awful girl again. " They were glad you were jilted. 

Mr. Spencer Rollitt looked at you with his hard, blue eyes. His mouthclosed tight with a snap when he saw you coming. He had disapproved ofyou ever since you played hide-and-seek in his garden with his nephew. Hethought it served you right to be jilted. 

And there was Dr. Charles's kind look under his savage, shaggy eyebrows, and Miss Kendal's squeeze of your hand when you left her, and the suddenstart in Dorsy Heron's black hare's eyes. They were sorry for you becauseyou had been jilted. 

Miss Louisa Wright was sorry for you. She would ask you to tea in herlittle green-dark drawing-room; she lived in the ivy house next door toMrs. Waugh; the piano would be open, the yellow keys shining; from thewhite title page enormous black letters would call to you across theroom: "Cleansing Fires. " That was the song she sang when she was thinkingabout Dr. Charles. First you played for her the Moonlight Sonata, andthen she sang for you with a feverish exaltation:

 "For as gold is refined in the _fi_-yer, So a heart is tried by pain. "

She sang it to comfort you. 

Her head quivered slightly as she shook the notes out of her throat inecstasy. 

She was sorry for you; but she was like Aunt Lavvy; she thought it was agood thing to be jilted; for then you were purified; your soul was setfree; it went up, writhing and aspiring, in a white flame to God. 

II. 

"Mary, why are you always admiring yourself in the glass?"

"I'm not admiring myself. I only wanted to see if I was better-lookingthan last time. "

"Why are you worrying about it? You never used to. "

"Because I used to think I was pretty. "

Her mother smiled. "You were pretty. " And took back her smile. "You'd bepretty always if you were happy, and you'd be happy if you were good. There's no happiness for any of us without Christ. "

She ignored the dexterous application. 

"Do you mean I'm not, then, really, so very ugly?"

"Nobody said you were ugly. "

"Maurice Jourdain did. "

"You don't mean to say you're still thinking of that man?"

"Not thinking exactly. Only wondering. Wondering what it was he hatedso. "

"You wouldn't wonder if you knew the sort of man he is. A man who couldthreaten you with his infidelity. "

"He never threatened me. "

"I suppose it was me he threatened, then. "

"What did he say?"

"He said that if his wife didn't take care to please him there were otherwomen who would. "

"He ought to have said that to me. It was horrible of him to say it toyou. "

She didn't know why she felt that it was horrible. 

"I can tell you _one_ thing, " said her mother, as if she had not told heranything. "It was those books you read. That everlasting philosophy. Hesaid it was answerable for the whole thing. "

"Then it was the--_the whole thing_ he hated. "

"I suppose so, " her mother said, dismissing a matter of small interest. "You'd better change that skirt if you're going with me to Mrs. Waugh's. "

"Do you mind if I go for a walk instead?"

"Not if it makes you any more contented. "

"It might. Are you sure you don't mind?"

"Oh, go along with you!"

Her mother was pleased. She was always pleased when she scored a pointagainst philosophy. 

III. 

Mr. And Mrs. Belk were coming along High Row. She avoided them by turningdown the narrow passage into Mr. Horn's yard and the Back Lane. From theBack Lane you could get up through the fields to the school-house lanewithout seeing people. 

She hated seeing them. They all thought the same thing: that you wantedMaurice Jourdain and that you were unhappy because you hadn't got him. They thought it was awful of you. Mamma thought it was awful, like--likeAunt Charlotte wanting to marry the piano-tuner, or poor Jenny wanting tomarry Mr. Spall. 

Maurice Jourdain knew better than that. He knew you didn't want to marryhim any more than he wanted to marry you. He nagged at you about yourhair, about philosophy--she could hear his voice nag-nagging now as shewent up the lane--he could nag worse than a woman, but he knew. _She_knew. As far as she could see through the working of his dark mind, firsthe had cared for her, cared violently. Then he had not cared. 

That would be because he cared for some other woman. There were twoof them. The girl and the married woman. She felt no jealousy and nointerest in them beyond wondering which of them it would be and whatthey would be like. There had been two Mary Oliviers; long-haired--short-haired, and she had been jealous of the long-haired one. Jealousof herself. 

There had been two Maurice Jourdains, the one who said, "I'll understand. I'll never lose my temper"; the one with the crystal mind, shining andflashing, the mind like a big room filled from end to end with light. Buthe had never existed. 

Maurice Jourdain was only a name. A name for intellectual beauty. Youcould love that. Love was "the cle-eansing _fi_-yer!" There was the loveof the body and the love of the soul. Perhaps she had loved MauriceJourdain with her soul and not with her body. No. She had _not_ loved himwith her soul, either. Body and soul; soul and body. Spinoza said theywere two aspects of the same thing. _What_ thing? Perhaps it was silly toask what thing; it would be just body _and_ soul. Somebody talked about asoul dragging a corpse. Her body wasn't a corpse; it was strong andactive; it could play games and jump; it could pick Dan up and carry himround the table; it could run a mile straight on end. It could exciteitself with its own activity and strength. It dragged a corpse-like soul, dull and heavy; a soul that would never be excited again, never liftitself up again in any ecstasy. 

If only he had let her alone. If only she could go back to her real life. But she couldn't. She couldn't feel any more her sudden, secrethappiness. Maurice Jourdain had driven it away. It had nothing to do withMaurice Jourdain. He ought not to have been able to take it from you. 

She might go up to Karva Hill to look for it; but it would not be there. She couldn't even remember what it had been like. 

IV. 

New Year's night. She was lying awake in her white cell. 

She hated Maurice Jourdain. His wearily searching eyes made her restless. His man's voice made her restless with its questions. "Do you know whatit will be like--afterwards?" "Do you really want me?"

She didn't want him. But she wanted Somebody. Somebody. Somebody. He hadleft her with this ungovernable want. 

Somebody. If you lay very still and shut your eyes he would come to you. You would see him. You knew what he was like. He had Jimmy's body andJimmy's face, and Mark's ways. He had the soul of Shelley and the mind ofSpinoza and Immanuel Kant. 

They talked to each other. Her reverie ran first into long, fascinatingconversations about Space and Time and the Thing-in-itself, and theTranscendental Ego. He could tell you whether you were right or wrong;whether Substance and the Thing-in-itself were the same thing ordifferent. 

"Die--If thou wouldst be with that which thou dost seek. " He wrote that. He wrote all Shelley's poems except the bad ones. He wrote Swinburne's_Atalanta in Calydon_. He could understand your wanting to know what theThing-in-itself was. If by dying to-morrow, to-night, this minute, youcould know what it was, you would be glad to die. Wouldn't you?

The world was built up in Space and Time. Time and Space were forms ofthought--ways of thinking. If there was thinking there would be athinker. Supposing--supposing the Transcendental Ego was theThing-in-itself?

That was _his_ idea. She was content to let him have the best ones. Youcould keep him going for quite a long time that way before you got tired. 

The nicest way of all, though, was not to be yourself, but to be him; tolive his exciting, adventurous, dangerous life. Then you could raise anarmy and free Ireland from the English, and Armenia from the Turks. Youcould go away to beautiful golden cities, melting in sunshine. You couldsail in the China Sea; you could get into Central Africa among savagepeople with queer, bloody gods. You could find out all sorts of things. 

You were he, and at the same time you were yourself, going about withhim. You loved him with a passionate, self-immolating love. There wasn'troom for both of you on the raft, you sat cramped up, huddled together. Not enough hard tack. While he was sleeping you slipped off. A shark gotyou. It had a face like Dr. Charles. The lunatic was running after himlike mad, with a revolver. You ran like mad. Morfe Bridge. When he raisedhis arm you jerked it up and the revolver went off into the air. The firewas between his bed and the door. It curled and broke along the floorlike surf. You waded through it. You picked him up and carried him out asSister Dora carried the corpses with the small-pox. A screw loosesomewhere. A tap turned on. Your mind dribbled imbecilities. 

She kicked. "I won't think. I won't think about it any more!"

Restlessness. It ached. It gnawed, stopping a minute, beginning again, only to be appeased by reverie, by the running tap. 

Restlessness. That was desire. It must be. 

Desire: imeros. Eros. There was the chorus in the Antigone:

 "Eros anikate machan, Eros os en ktaemasi pipteis. "

There was Swinburne:

 "... Swift and subtle and blind as a flame of fire, Before thee the laughter, behind thee the tears of desire. "

There was the song Minna Acroyd sang at the Sutcliffes' party. "Sigh-ingand sad for des-ire of the bee. " How could anybody sing such a sillysong?

Through the wide open window she could smell the frost; she could hear ittingle. She put up her mouth above the bedclothes and drank down theclear, cold air. She thought with pleasure of the ice in her bath in themorning. It would break under her feet, splintering and tinkling likeglass. If you kept on thinking about it you would sleep. 

V. 

Passion Week. 

Her mother was reading the Lessons for the Day. Mary waited till she hadfinished. 

"Mamma--what was the matter with Aunt Charlotte?"

"I'm sure I don't know. Except that she was always thinking about gettingmarried. Whatever put Aunt Charlotte in your head?"

Her mother looked up from the Prayer Book as she closed it. Sweet andpretty; sweet and pretty; young almost, as she used to look, andtranquil. 

"It's my belief, " she said, "there wouldn't have been anything the matterwith her if your Grandmamma Olivier hadn't spoiled her. Charlotte was asvain as a little peacock, and your Grandmamma was always petting andpraising her and letting her have her own way. "

"If she'd had her own way she'd have been married, and then perhaps shewouldn't have gone mad. "

"She might have gone madder, " said her mother. "It was a good thing foryou, my dear, you didn't get your way. I'd rather have seen you in yourcoffin than married to Maurice Jourdain. "

"Whoever it had been, you'd have said that. "

"Perhaps I should. I don't want my only daughter to go away and leave me. It would be different if there were six or seven of you. "

Her mother's complacence and tranquillity annoyed her. She hated hermother. She adored her and hated her. Mamma had married for her ownpleasure, for her passion. She had brought you into the world, withoutasking your leave, for her own pleasure. She had brought you into theworld to be unhappy. She had planned for you to do the things that shedid. She cared for you only as long as you were doing them. When you leftoff and did other things she left off caring. 

"I shall never go away and leave you, " she said. 

She hated her mother and she adored her. 

An hour later, when she found her in the garden kneeling by the violetbed, weeding it, she knelt down beside her, and weeded too. 

VI. 

April, May, June. 

One afternoon before post-time her mother called her into the study toshow her Mrs. Draper's letter. 

Mrs. Draper wrote about Dora's engagement and Effie's wedding. Dora wasengaged to Hubert Manisty who would have Vinings. Effie had broken offher engagement to young Tom Manisty; she was married last week to Mr. Stuart-Gore, the banker. Mrs. Draper thought Effie had been very wise togive up young Manisty for Mr. Stuart-Gore. She wrote in a postscript:"Maurice Jourdain has just called to ask if I have any news of Mary. Ithink he would like to know that that wretched affair has not made herunhappy. "

Mamma was smiling in a nervous way. "What am I to say to Mrs. Draper?"

"Tell her that Mr. Jourdain was right and that I am not at all unhappy. "

She was glad to take the letter to the post and set his mind at rest. 

It was in June last year that Maurice Jourdain had come to her: June thetwenty-fourth. To-day was the twenty-fifth. He must have remembered. 

The hayfields shone, ready for mowing. Under the wind the shimmering haygrass moved like waves of hot air, up and up the hill. 

She slipped through the gap by Morfe Bridge and went up the fields to theroad on Greffington Edge. She lay down among the bracken in the placewhere Roddy and she had sat two years ago when they had met Mr. Sutcliffecoming down the road. 

The bracken hid her. It made a green sunshade above her head. She shuther eyes. 

 "Kikeriküh! sie glaubten Es wäre Hahnen geschrei. "

That was all nonsense. Maurice Jourdain would never have crept in thelittle hen-house and hidden himself under the straw. He would never havecrowed like a cock. Mark and Roddy would. And Harry Craven and Jimmy. Jimmy would certainly have hidden himself under the straw. 

Supposing Jimmy had had a crystal mind. Shining and flashing. Supposinghe had never done that awful thing they said he did. Supposing he had hadMark's ways, had been noble and honourable like Mark--

The interminable reverie began. He was there beside her in the bracken. She didn't know what his name would be. It couldn't be Jimmy or Harry orany of those names. Not Mark. Mark's name was sacred. 

Cecil, perhaps. 

_Why_ Cecil? _Cecil_?--You ape! You drivelling, dribbling idiot! That wasthe sort of thing Aunt Charlotte would have thought of. 

She got up with a jump and stretched herself. She would have to run ifshe was to be home in time for tea. 

From the top hayfield she could see the Sutcliffes' tennis court; anemerald green space set in thick grey walls. She drew her left handslowly down her right forearm. The muscle was hardening and thickening. 

Mamma didn't like it when you went by yourself to play singles with Mr. Sutcliffe. But if Mr. Sutcliffe asked you you would simply have to go. You would have to play a great many singles against Mr. Sutcliffe if youwere to be in good form next year when Mark came home. 

VII. 

She was always going to the Sutcliffes' now. Her mother shook her headwhen she saw her in her short white skirt and white jersey, slashing atnothing with her racquet, ready. Mamma didn't like the Sutcliffes. Shesaid they hadn't been nice to poor Papa. They had never asked him again. You could see she thought you a beast to like them. 

"But, Mamma darling, I can't help liking them. "

And Mamma would look disgusted and go back to her pansy bed and dig hertrowel in with little savage thrusts, and say she supposed you wouldalways have your own way. 

You would go down to Greffington Hall and find Mr. Sutcliffe sittingunder the beech tree on the lawn, in white flannels, looking rather tiredand bored. And Mrs. Sutcliffe, a long-faced, delicate-nosed Beauty ofVictorian Albums, growing stout, wearing full skirts and white cashmereshawls and wide mushroomy hats when nobody else did. She had an air ofdoing it on purpose, to be different, like royalty. She would take yourhand and press it gently and smile her downward, dragging smile, and shewould say, "How is your mother? Does she mind the hot weather? She mustcome and see me when it's cooler. " That was the nice way she had, so thatyou mightn't think it was Mamma's fault, or Papa's, if they didn't seeeach other often. And she would look down at her shawl and gather itabout her, as if in spirit she had got up and gone away. 

And Mr. Sutcliffe would be standing in front of you, looking suddenlyyears younger, with his eyes shining and clean as though he had justwashed them. 

And after tea you would play singles furiously. For two hours you wouldtry to beat him. When you jumped the net Mrs. Sutcliffe would wave herhand and nod to you and smile. You had done something that pleased her. 

To-day, when it was all over, Mr. Sutcliffe took her back into the house, and there on the hall table were the books he had got for her from theLondon Library: The Heine, the Goethe's _Faust_, the Sappho, the Darwin's_Origin of Species_, the Schopenhauer, _Die Welt als Wille undVorstellung_. 

"Five? All at once?"

"I get fifteen. As long as we're here you shall have your five. "

He walked home with her, carrying the books. Five. Five. And when you hadfinished them there would be five more. It was unbelievable. 

"Why are you so nice to me? Why? _Why_?"

"I think it must be because I like you, Mary. "

Utterly unbelievable. 

"Do--you--_really_--like me?"

"I liked you the first day I saw you. With your brother. On GreffingtonEdge. "

"I wonder why. " She wondered what he was thinking, what, deep down insidehim, he was really thinking. 

"Perhaps it was because you wanted something I could give you.... Tennis.... You wanted it so badly. Everything you want you want sobadly. "

"And I never knew we were going to be such friends. "

"No more did I. And I don't know now how long it's going to last. "

"Why shouldn't it last?"

"Because next year 'Mark' will have come home and you'll have nothing tosay to me. "

"Mark won't make a scrap of difference. "

"Well--if it isn't 'Mark' ... You'll grow up, Mary, and it won't amuseyou to talk to me any more. I shan't know you. You'll wear long skirtsand long hair done in the fashion. "

"I shall always want to talk to you. I shall never do up my hair. I cutit off because I couldn't be bothered with it. But I was sold. I thoughtit would curl all over my head, and it didn't curl. "

"It curls at the tips, " Mr. Sutcliffe said. "I like it. Makes you looklike a jolly boy, instead of a dreadful, unapproachable young lady. Alittle San Giovanni. A little San Giovanni. "

That was his trick: caressing his own words as if he liked them. 

She wondered what, deep down inside him, he was really like. 

"Mr. Sutcliffe--if you'd known a girl when she was only fourteen, and youliked her and you never saw her again till she was seventeen, and thenyou found that she'd gone and cut her hair all off, would it give you anawful shock?"

"Depends on how much I liked her. "

"If you'd liked her awfully--would it make you leave off liking her?"

"I think my friendship could stand the strain. "

"If it wasn't just friendship? Supposing it was Mrs. Sutcliffe?"

"I shouldn't like my wife to cut her hair off. It wouldn't be at allbecoming to her. "

"No. But when she was young?"

"Ah--when she was young--"

"Would it have made any difference?"

"No. No. It wouldn't have made any difference at all. "

"You'd have married her just the same?"

"Just the same, Mary. Why?"

"Oh, nothing. I thought you'd be like that. I just wanted to make sure. "

He smiled to himself. He had funny, secret thoughts that you would neverknow. 

"Well, " she said, "I didn't beat you. "

"Form not good enough yet--quite. "

He promised her it should be perfect by the time Mark came home. 

VIII. 

"The pale pearl-purple evening--" The words rushed together. She couldn'ttell whether they were her own or somebody else's. 

There was the queer shock of recognition that came with your own realthings. It wasn't remembering though it felt like it. 

Shelley--"The pale purple even. " Not pearl-purple. Pearl-purple was whatyou saw. The sky to the east after sunset above Greffington Edge. Takeout "pale, " and "pearl-purple evening" was your own. 

The poem was coming by bits at a time. She could feel the rest throbbingbehind it, an unreleased, impatient energy. 

Her mother looked in at the door. "What are you doing it for, Mary?"

"Oh--for nothing. "

"Then for pity's sake come down into the warm room and do it there. You'll catch cold. "

She hated the warm room. 

The poem would be made up of many poems. It would last a long time, through the winter and on into the spring. As long as it lasted she wouldbe happy. She would be free from the restlessness and the endless idioticreverie of desire. 

IX. 

"From all blindness of heart; from pride, vain-glory and hypocrisy; fromenvy, hatred, and malice, and all uncharitableness, "_Good Lord, deliver us_. "

Mary was kneeling beside her mother in church. 

"From fornication, and all other deadly sin--"

Happiness, the happiness that came from writing poems; happiness thatother people couldn't have, that you couldn't give to them; happinessthat was no good to Mamma, no good to anybody but you, secret andselfish; that was your happiness. It was deadly sin. 

She felt an immense, intolerable compassion for everybody who wasunhappy. A litany of compassion went on inside her: For old Dr. Kendal, sloughing and rotting in his chair; for Miss Kendal; for all womenlabouring of child; for old Mrs. Heron; for Dorsy Heron; for allprisoners and captives; for Miss Louisa Wright; for all that weredesolate and oppressed; for Maggie's sister, dying of cancer; and forMamma, kneeling there, praying. 

Sunday after Sunday. 

And she would work in the garden every morning, digging in leaf mould andcarrying the big stones for the rockery; she would go to Mrs. Sutcliffe'ssewing parties; she would sit for hours with Maggie's sister, trying notto look as if she minded the smell of the cancer. You were no good unlessyou could do little things like that. You were no good unless you couldkeep on doing them. 

She tried to keep on. 

Some people kept on all day, all their lives. Still, it was not you somuch as the world that was wrong. It wasn't fair and right that Maggie'ssister should have cancer while you had nothing the matter with you. Oreven that Maggie had to cook and scrub while you made poems. 

Not fair and right. 

X. 

"Mamma, what is it? Why are you in the dark?"

By the firelight she could see her mother sitting with her eyes shut, andher hands folded in her lap. 

"I can't use my eyes. I think there must be something the matter withthem. "

"Your eyes? ... Do they hurt?"

(You might have known--you might have known that something would happen. While you were upstairs, writing, not thinking of her. You might haveknown. )

"_Something_ hurts. Just there. When I try to read. I must be goingblind. "

"Are you sure it isn't your glasses?"

"How can it be my glasses? They never hurt me before. "

But the oculist in Durlingham said it _was_ her glasses. She wasn't goingblind. It wasn't likely that she ever would go blind. 

For a week before the new glasses came Mamma sat, patient and gentle, inher chair, with her eyes shut and her hands folded in her lap. And youread aloud to her: the Bible and _The Times_ in the morning, and Dickensin the afternoon. And in the evening you played draughts and Mamma beatyou. 

Mamma said, "I shall be quite sorry when the new glasses come. "

Mary was sorry too. They had been so happy. 

XI. 

April. Mark's ship had left Port Said nine days ago. 

Mamma had come in with the letter. 

"I've got news for you. Guess. "

"Mark's coming to-day. "

"No.... Mr. Jourdain was married yesterday. "

"Who--to?"

"Some girl he used to see in Sussex. "

(That one. She was glad it was the little girl, the poor one. Nice ofMaurice to marry her. )

"Do you mind, Mary?"

"No, not a bit. I hope they'll be happy. I want them to be happy.... Now, you see--that was why he didn't want to marry me. "

Her mother sat down on the bed. There was something she was going to say. 

"Well--thank goodness that's the last of it. "

"Does Mark know?"

"No, he does not. You surely don't imagine anybody would tell him a thinglike that about his sister?"

"Like what?"

"Well--he wouldn't think it very nice of you. "

"You talk as if I was Aunt Charlotte.... Do you think I'm like her?"

"I never said you were like her.... "

"You think--you think and won't say. "

"Well, if you don't want to be thought like your Aunt Charlotte youshould try and behave a little more like other people. For pity's sake, do while Mark's here, or he won't like it, I can tell you. "

"I don't do anything Mark wouldn't like. "

"You do very queer things sometimes, though you mayn't think so.... I'mnot the only one that notices. If you really want to know, that was whatMr. Jourdain was afraid of--the queer things you say and do. You told meyourself you'd have gone to him if he hadn't come to you. "

She remembered. Yes, she had said that. 

"Did he know about Aunt Charlotte?"

"You may be sure he did. "

Mamma didn't know. She never would know what it had been like, thatnight. But there were things you didn't know, either. 

"What did Aunt Charlotte _do_?"

"Nothing. She just fell in love with every man she met. If she'd onlyseen him for five minutes she was off after him. Ordering her trousseauand dressing herself up. She was no more mad than I am except just onthat one point. "

"Aunt Lavvy said that was why Uncle Victor never married. He was afraidof something--something happening to his children. What do you think hethought would happen?"

Her mother's foot tapped on the floor. 

"I'm sure I can't tell you what he thought. And I don't know what therewas to be afraid of. I wish you wouldn't throw your stockings all aboutthe room. "

Mamma picked up the stockings and went away. You could see that she wasannoyed. Annoyed with Uncle Victor for having been afraid to marry. 

A dreadful thought came to her. "Does Mamma really think I'm like AuntCharlotte? I won't be like her. I won't.... I'm not. There was Jimmy andthere was Maurice Jourdain. But I didn't fall in love with the Propartsor the Manistys, or Norman Waugh, or Harry Craven, or Dr. Charles. Or Mr. Sutcliffe.... She _said_ I was as bad as Aunt Charlotte. Because I saidI'd go to Maurice.... I meant, just to see him. What did she think Imeant?... Oh, not _that_.... Would I really have gone? Got into the trainand gone? _Would_ I?"

She would never know. 

"I wish I knew what Uncle Victor was afraid of. "

Wondering what he had been afraid of, she felt afraid. 

XXV

I. 

She waited. 

Mamma and Mark had turned their backs to her as they clung together. Butthere was his sparrow-brown hair, clipped close into the nape of hisred-brown neck. If only Mamma wouldn't cry like that--

"Mark--"

"Is that Minky?"

They held each other and let go in one tick of the clock, but she hadstood a long time seeing his eyes arrested in their rush of recognition. Disappointed. 

The square dinner-table stretched itself into an immense white spacebetween her and Mark. It made itself small again for Mark and Mamma. Across the white space she heard him saying things: about Dan meeting himat Tilbury, and poor Victor coming to Liverpool Street, and Cox's. Lastnight he had stayed at Ilford, he had seen Bella and Edward and Pidgeonand Mrs. Fisher and the Proparts. "Do you remember poor Edward and hissheep? And Mary's lamb!"

Mark hadn't changed, except that he was firmer and squarer, and thinner, because he had had fever. And his eyes--He was staring at her with hisdisappointed eyes. 

She called to him. "You don't know me a bit, Mark. "

He laughed. "I thought I'd see somebody grown up. Victor said Mary wasdreadfully mature. What did he mean?"

Mamma said she was sure she didn't know. 

"What do you do with yourself all day, Minky?"

"Nothing much. Read--work--play tennis with Mr. Sutcliffe. "

"Mr. --Sutcliffe?"

"Never mind Mr. Sutcliffe. Mark doesn't want to hear about him. "

"Is there a _Mrs. _ Sutcliffe?"

"Yes. "

"Does _she_ play?"

"No. She's too old. Much older than he is. "

"That'll do, Mary. "

Mamma's eyes blinked. Her forehead was pinched with vexation. Her foottapped on the floor. 

Mark's eyes kept up their puzzled stare. 

"What's been happening?" he said. "What's the matter? Everywhere I gothere's a mystery. There was a mystery at Ilford. About Dan. And aboutpoor Charlotte. I come down here and there's a mystery about some peoplecalled Sutcliffe. And a mystery about Mary. " He laughed again. "Minkyseems to be in disgrace, as if she'd done something.... It's awfullyqueer. Mamma's the only person something hasn't happened to. "

"I should have thought everything had happened to me, " said Mamma. 

"That makes it queerer. "

Mamma went up with Mark into his room. Papa's room. You could hear herfeet going up and down in it, and the squeaking wail of the wardrobe dooras she opened and shut it. 

She waited, listening. When she heard her mother come downstairs she wentto him. 

Mark didn't know that the room had been Papa's room. He didn't know thatshe shivered when she saw him sitting on the bed. She had stood justthere where Mark's feet were and watched Papa die. She could feel thebasin slipping, slipping from the edge of the bed. 

Mark wasn't happy. There was something he missed, something he wanted. She had meant to say, "It's all right. Nothing's happened. I haven't doneanything, " but she couldn't think about it when she saw him sittingthere. 

"Mark--what is it?"

"I don't know, Minky. "

"_I_ know. You've come back, and it isn't like what you thought it wouldbe. "

"No, " he said, "it isn't.... I didn't think it would be so awful withoutPapa. "

II. 

The big package in the hall had been opened. The tiger's skin lay on thedrawing-room carpet. 

Mark was sorry for the tiger. 

"He was only a young cat. You'd have loved him, Minky, if you'd seen him, with his shoulders down--very big cat--shaking his haunches at you, andhis eyes shining and playing; cat's eyes, sort of swimming and shakingwith his fun. "

"How did you feel?"

"Beastly mean to go and shoot him when he was happy and excited. "

"Five years without any fighting.... Anything else happen?"

"No. No polo. No fighting. Only a mutiny in the battery once. "

"What was it like?"

"Oh, it just tumbled into the office and yelled and waved jabby thingsand made faces at you till you nearly burst with laughing. "

"You laughed?" Mamma said. "At a mutiny?"

"Anybody would. Minky'd have laughed if she'd been there. It frightenedthem horribly because they didn't expect it. The poor things never knowwhen they're being funny. "

"What happened, " said Mary, "to the mutiny?"

"That. "

"Oh--Mark--" She adored him. 

She went to bed, happy, thinking of the tiger and the mutiny. When Cattycalled her in the morning she jumped out of bed, quickly, to beginanother happy day. Everything was going to be interesting, to beexciting. 

At any minute anything might happen, now that Mark had come home. 

III. 

"Mark, are you coming?"

She was tired of waiting on the flagstones, swinging her stick. Shecalled through the house for him to come. She looked through the rooms, and found him in the study with Mamma. When they saw her they stoppedtalking suddenly, and Mamma drew herself up and blinked. 

Mark shook his head. After all, he couldn't come. 

Mamma wanted him. Mamma had him. As long as they lived she would havehim. Mamma and Mark were happy together; their happiness tingled, youcould feel it tingling, like the happiness of lovers. They didn't wantanybody but each other. You existed for them as an object in someunintelligible time and in a space outside their space. The onlydifference was that Mark knew you were there and Mamma didn't. 

She chose the Garthdale road. Yesterday she had gone that way with Mammaand Mark. She had not talked to him, for when she talked the pinched, vexed look came into Mamma's face though she pretended she hadn't heardyou. Every now and then Mark had looked at her over his shoulder andsaid, "Poor Minx. " It was as if he said, "I'm sorry, but you see how itis. I can't help it. "

And just here, where the moor track touched the road, she had left them, clearing the water-courses, and had gone up towards Karva. 

She had looked back and seen them going slowly towards the white sickleof the road, Mark very upright, taut muscles held in to his shortenedstride; Mamma pathetic and fragile, in her shawl, moving with a stiff, self-hypnotised air. 

Her love for them was a savage pang that cut her eyes and drew her throattight. 

Then suddenly she had heard Mark whooping, and she had run back, whoopingand leaping, down the hill to walk with them again. 

She turned back now, at the sickle. Perhaps Mark would come to meet her. 

He didn't come. She found them sitting close on the drawing-room sofa;the tea-table was pushed aside; they were looking at Mark's photographs. She came and stood by them to see. 

Mark didn't look up or say anything. He went on giving the photographs toMamma, telling her the names. "Dicky Carter. Man called St. John. Mancalled Bibby--Jonas Bibby. Allingham. Peters. Gunning, Stobart Hamilton. Sir George Limond, Colonel Robertson. "

Photographs of women. Mamma's fingers twitched as she took them, one byone. Women with smooth hair and correct, distinguished faces. She lookedat each face a long time; her mouth half-smiled, half-pouted at them. Shedidn't hand on the photographs to you, but laid them down on the sofa, one by one, as if you were not there. 

A youngish woman in a black silk gown; Mrs. Robertson, the Colonel'swife. A girl in a white frock; Mrs. Dicky Carter, she had nursed Markthrough his fever. A tall woman in a riding habit and a solar topee, standing very straight, looking very straight at you, under the shadow ofthe topee. Mamma didn't mind the others so much, but she was afraid ofthis one. There was danger under the shadow of the topee. 

"Lady Limond. " Mark had stayed with them at Simla. 

"Oh. Very handsome face. "

"Very handsome. "

You could see by Mark's face that he didn't care about Lady Limond. 

Mamma had turned again to the girl in the white frock who had nursed him. 

"Are those all, Mark?"

"Those are all. "

She took off her glasses and closed her eyes. Her face was smooth now:her hands were quiet. She had him. She would always have him. 

But when he went away for a fortnight to stay with the man called St. John, she was miserable till he had come back, safe. 

IV. 

Whit Sunday morning. She would walk home with Mark after church whileMamma stayed behind for the Sacrament. 

But it didn't happen. Mark scowled as he turned out into the aisle tomake way for her. He went back into the pew and sat there, looking stiffand stubborn. He would go up with Mamma to the altar rails. He would eatthe bread and drink the wine. 

That afternoon she took her book into the garden. Mark came to her there. Mamma, tired with the long service, dozed in the drawing-room. 

Mark read over her shoulder: "'Wir haben in der TranscendentalenAesthetik hinreichend bewiesen. ' Do it in English. "

"'In the Transcendental Aesthetic we have sufficiently proved that allthat is perceived in space or time, and with it all objects of anyexperience possible to us are mere Vorstellungen--Vorstellungen--ideas--presentations, which, so far as they are presented, whether asextended things or series of changes, have no existence grounded inthemselves outside our thoughts--'"

"Why have you taken to that dreadful stodge?"

"I'm driven to it. It's like drink; once you begin you've got to go on. "

"What on earth made you begin?"

"I wanted to know things--to know what's real and what isn't, and what'sat the back of everything, and whether there _is_ anything there or not. And whether you can know it or not. And how you can know anything at all, anyhow. I'd give anything ... Are you listening?"

"Yes, Minky, you'd give anything--"

"I'd give everything--everything I possess--to know what theThing-in-itself is. "

"I'd rather know Arabic. Or how to make a gun that would find its ownrange and feed itself with bullets sixty to the minute. "

"That would be only knowing a few; more things. I want _the_ thing. Reality, Substance, the Thing-in-itself. Spinoza calls it God. Kantdoesn't; but he seems to think it's all the God you'll ever get, andthat, even then, you can't know it. Transcendental Idealism is justanother sell. "

"Supposing, " Mark said, "there isn't any God at all. "

"Then I'd rather know _that_ than go on thinking there was one when therewasn't. "

"But you'd feel sold?"

"Sort of sold. But it's the risk--the risk that makes it so exciting ... Why? Do _you_ think there isn't any God?"

"I'm afraid I think there mayn't be. "

"Oh, Mark--and you went to the Sacrament. You ate it and drank it. "

"Why shouldn't I?"

"You don't believe in it any more than I do. "

"I never said anything about believing in it. "

"_You ate and drank it_. "

"Poor Jesus said he wanted you to do that and remember him. I did it andremembered Jesus. "

"I don't care. It was awful of you. "

"Much more awful to spoil Mamma's pleasure in God and Jesus. I did it tomake her happy. Somebody had to go with her. You wouldn't, so I did ... It doesn't matter, Minky. Nothing matters except Mamma. "

"Truth matters. You'd die rather than lie or do anything dishonourable. Yet that was dishonourable. "

"I'd die rather than hurt Mamma ... If you make her unhappy, Minky, Ishall hate you. "

V. 

"You can't go in that thing. "

They were going to the Sutcliffes' dance. Mamma hadn't told Mark shedidn't like them. She wanted Mark to go to the dance. He had said Morfewas an awful hole and it wasn't good for you to live in it. 

The frock was black muslin, ironed out. Mamma's black net Indian scarf, dotted with little green and scarlet flowers, was drawn tight over herhips to hide the place that Catty had scorched with the iron. The heavy, brilliant, silk-embroidered ends, green and scarlet, hung down behind. She felt exquisitely light and slender. 

Mamma was shaking her head at Mark as he stared at you. 

"If you knew, " he said, "what you look like ... That's the way the funnyladies dress in the bazaars--If you'd only take that awful thing off. "

"She can't take it off, " Mamma said. "He's only teasing you. "

Funny ladies in the bazaars--Funny ladies in the bazaars. Bazaars wereIndian shops ... Shop-girls ... Mark didn't mean shop-girls, though. Youcould tell that by his face and by Mamma's ... Was that what you reallylooked like? Or was he teasing? Perhaps you would tell by Mrs. Sutcliffe's face. Or by Mr. Sutcliffe's. 

Their faces were nicer than ever. You couldn't tell. They would never letyou know if anything was wrong. 

Mrs. Sutcliffe said, "What a beautiful scarf you've got on, my dear. "

"It's Mamma's. She gave it me. " She wanted Mrs. Sutcliffe to know thatMamma had beautiful things and that she would give them. The scarf wasbeautiful. Nothing could take from her the feeling of lightness andslenderness she had in it. 

Her programme stood: Nobody. Nobody. Norman Waugh. Dr. Charles. Mr. Sutcliffe. Mr. Sutcliffe. Nobody. Nobody again, all the way down to Mr. Sutcliffe, Mr. Sutcliffe, Mr. Sutcliffe. Then Mark. Mr. Sutcliffe hadwanted the last dance, the polka; but she couldn't give it him. Shedidn't want to dance with anybody after Mark. 

The big, long dining-room was cleared; the floor waxed. People had comefrom Reyburn and Durlingham. A hollow square of faces. Faces round thewalls. Painted faces hanging above them: Mr. Sutcliffe's ancestorslooking at you. 

The awful thing was she didn't know how to dance. Mark said you didn'thave to know. It would be all right. Perhaps it would come, suddenly, when you heard the music. Supposing it came like skating, only after youhad slithered a lot and tumbled down?

The feeling of lightness and slenderness had gone. Her feet stuck to thewaxed floor as if they were glued there. She was frightened. 

It had begun. Norman Waugh was dragging her round the room. Once. Twice. She hated the feeling of his short, thick body moving a little way infront of her. She hated his sullen bull's face, his mouth close to hers, half open, puffing. From the walls Mr. Sutcliffe's ancestors looked atyou as you shambled round, tied tight in your Indian scarf, like a funnylady in the bazaars. Raised eyebrows. Quiet, disdainful faces. She wasglad when Norman Waugh left her on the window-seat. 

Dr. Charles next. He was kind. You trod on his feet and he pretended hehad trodden on yours. 

"My dancing days are over. "

"And mine haven't begun. "

They sat out and she watched Mark. He didn't dance very well: he dancedtightly and stiffly as if he didn't like it; but he danced: with MissFrewin and Miss Louisa Wright, because nobody else would; with theAcroyds because Mrs. Sutcliffe made him; five dances with Dorsy Heron, because he liked her, because he was sorry for her, because he found herlooking sad and shy in a corner. You could see Dorsy's eyes turn andturn, restlessly, to look at Mark, and her nose getting redder as he cameto her. 

Dr. Charles watched them. You knew what he was thinking. "She's in lovewith him. She can't take her eyes off him. "

Supposing you told her the truth? "He won't marry you. He won't care foryou. He won't care for anybody but Mamma. Can't you see, by the way helooks at you, the way he holds you? It's no use your caring for him. It'll only make your little nose redder. "

He wouldn't mind her red nose; her little proud, high-bridged nose. Heliked her small face, trying to look austere with shy hare's eyes; hervague mouth, pointed at the corners in a sort of sharp tenderness; hersmooth, otter-brown hair brushed back and twisted in a tight coil at thenape of her neck. Dorsy was sweet and gentle and unselfish. He might havecared for Dorsy if it hadn't been for Mamma. Anyhow, for one evening inher life Dorsy was happy, dancing round and round, with her wild blackhare's eyes shining. 

Mr. Sutcliffe. She stood up. She would have to tell him. 

"I can't dance. "

"Nonsense. You can run and you can jump. Of course you can dance. "

"I don't know how to. "

"The sooner you learn the better. I'll teach you in two minutes. "

He steered her into the sheltered bay behind the piano. They practised. 

"Mark's looking at us. "

"Is he? What has he done to you, Mary? We'll go where he can't look atus. "

They went out into the hall. 

"That's it; your feet between mine. In and out. Don't throw yourshoulders back. Don't keep your elbows in. It's not a hurdle race. "

"I wish it was. "

"You won't in a minute. Don't count your steps. Listen for the beat. It'sthe beat that does it. "

She began to feel light and slender again. 

"Now you're off. You're all right. "

Off. Turning and turning. You steered through the open door; in and outamong the other dancers; you skimmed; you swam, whirling, to the steadytump-tump of the piano, and the queer, exciting squeak of the fiddles--

Whirling together, you and Mr. Sutcliffe and the piano and the twofiddles. One animal, one light, slender animal, whirling and playing. Every now and then his arm tightened round your waist with a sort ofimpatience. When it slackened you were one light, slender animal again, four feet and four arms whirling together, the piano was its heart, goingtump-tump, and the fiddles--

"Why did I think I couldn't do it?"

"Funk. Pure funk. You wanted to dance--you wanted to so badly that itfrightened you. "

His arm tightened. 

As they passed she could see Mrs. Sutcliffe sitting in an arm-chairpushed back out of the dancers' way. She looked tired and bored and alittle anxious. 

When the last three dances were over he took her back to Mark. 

Mark scowled after Mr. Sutcliffe. 

"What does he look at you like that for?"

"Perhaps he thinks I'm--a funny lady in a bazaar. "

"_That's_ the sort of thing you oughtn't to say. "

"_You_ said it. "

"All the more reason why you shouldn't. "

He put his arm round her and they danced. They danced. 

"You can do it all right now, " he said. 

"I've learnt. He taught me. He took me outside and taught me. I'm notfrightened any more. "

Mark was dancing better now. Better and better. His eyes shone down intoyours. He whispered. 

"Minky--Poor Minky--Pretty Minky. "

He swung you. He lifted you off your feet. He danced like mad, carryingyou on the taut muscle of his arm. 

Somebody said, "That chap's waked up at last. Who's the girl?"

Somebody said, "His sister. "

Mark laughed out loud. You could have sworn he was enjoying himself. 

But when he got home he said he hadn't enjoyed himself at all. And he hada headache the next day. It turned out that he hadn't wanted to go. Hehated dancing. Mamma said he had only gone because he thought you'd likeit and because he thought it would be good for you to dance like otherpeople. 

VI. 

"Why are you always going to the Sutcliffes'?" Mark said suddenly. 

"Because I like them. "

They were coming down the fields from Greffington Edge in sight of thetennis court. 

"You oughtn't to like them when they weren't nice to poor Papa. If Mammadoesn't want to know them you oughtn't to. "

Mark, too. Mark saying what Mamma said. Her heart swelled and tightened. She didn't answer him. 

"Anyhow, " he said, "you oughtn't to go about all over the place with oldSutcliffe. " When he said "old Sutcliffe" his eyes were merry and insolentas they used to be. "What do you do it for?"

"Because I like him. And because there's nobody else who wants to goabout with me. "

"There's Miss Heron. "

"Dorsy isn't quite the same thing. "

"Whether she is or isn't you've got to chuck it. "

"Why?"

"Because Mamma doesn't like it and I don't like it. That ought to beenough. " (Like Papa. )

"It isn't enough. "

"Minky--why are you such a brute to little Mamma?"

"Because I can't help it ... It's all very well for you--"

Mark turned in the path and looked at her; his tight, firm face tighterand firmer. She thought: "He doesn't know. He's like Mamma. He won't seewhat he doesn't want to see. It would be kinder not to tell him. But Ican't be kind. He's joined with Mamma against me. They're two to one. Mamma must have said something to make him hate me. " ... Perhaps shehadn't. Perhaps he had only seen her disapproving, reproachful face ... "If he says another word--if he looks like that again, I shall tell him. "

"It's different for you, " she said. "Ever since I began to grow up I feltthere was something about Mamma that would kill me if I let it. I've hadto fight for every single thing I've ever wanted. It's awful fightingher, when she's so sweet and gentle. But it's either that or go under. "

"Minky--you talk as if she hated you. "

"She does hate me. "

"You lie. " He said it gently, without rancour. 

"No. I found that out years ago. She doesn't _know_ she hates me. Shenever knows that awful sort of thing. And of course she loved me when Iwas little. She'd love me now if I stayed little, so that she could dowhat she liked with me; if I'd sit in a corner and think as she thinks, and feel as she feels and do what she does. "

"If you did you'd be a much nicer Minx. "

"Yes. Except that I _should_ be lying then, the whole time. Hiding myreal self and crushing it. It's your _real_ self she hates--the thing shecan't see and touch and get at--the thing that makes you different. Evenwhen I was little she hated it and tried to crush it. I rememberthings--"

"You don't love her. You wouldn't talk like that about her if you lovedher. "

"It's _because_ I love her. Her self. _Her_ real self. When she's workingin the garden, planting flowers with her blessed little hands, doing whatshe likes, and when she's reading the Bible and thinking about God andJesus, and when she's with _you_, Mark, happy. That's her real self. Iadore it. Selves are sacred. You ought to adore them. Anybody's self. Catty's.... I used to wonder what the sin against the Holy Ghost was. They told you nobody knew what it was. _I_ know. It's that. Not adoringthe self in people. Hating it. Trying to crush it. "

"I see. Mamma's committed the sin against the Holy Ghost, has she?"

"Yes. "

He laughed. "You mustn't go about saying those things. People will thinkyou mad. "

"Let them. I don't care--I don't care if _you_ think I'm mad. I onlythink it's beastly of you to say so. "

"You're not madder than I am. We're all mad. Mad as hatters. You and meand Dank and Roddy and Uncle Victor. Poor Charlotte's the sanest of thelot, and she's the only one that's got shut up. "

"Why do you say she's the sanest?"

"Because she knew what she wanted. "

"Yes. She knew what she wanted. She spent her whole life trying to getit. She went straight for that one thing. Didn't care a hang what anybodythought of her. "

"So they said poor Charlotte was mad. "

"She was only mad because she didn't get it. "

"Yes, Minx.... Would poor Minky like to be married?"

"No. I'm not thinking about that. I'd like to write poems. And to getaway sometimes and see places. To get away from Mamma. "

"You little beast. "

"Not more beast than you. You got away. Altogether. I believe you knew. "

"Knew what?"

Mark's face was stiff and red. He was angry now. 

"That if you stayed you'd be crushed. Like Roddy. Like me. "

"I knew nothing of the sort. "

"Deep down inside you you knew. You were afraid. That's why you wanted tobe a soldier. So as not to be afraid. So as to get away altogether. "

"You little devil. You're lying. Lying. "

He threw his words at you softly, so as not to hurt you. "Lying. Becauseyou're a beast to Mamma you'd like to think I'm a beast, too. "

"No--no. " She could feel herself making it out more and more. Flash afterflash. Till she knew him. She knew Mark. 

"You _had_ to. To get away from her, to get away from her sweetness andgentleness so that you could be yourself; so that you could be a man. "

She had a tremendous flash. 

"You haven't got away altogether. Half of you still sticks. It'll neverget away.... You'll never love anybody. You'll never marry. "

"No, I won't. You're right there. "

"Yes. Papa never got away. That was why he was so beastly to us. "

"He wasn't beastly to us. "

"He was. You know he was. You're only saying that because it's what Mammawould like you to say.... He couldn't help being beastly. He couldn'tcare for us. He couldn't care for anybody but Mamma. "

"That's why I care for _him_, " Mark said. 

"I know.... None of it would have mattered if we'd been brought up right. But we were brought up all wrong. Taught that our selves were beastly, that our wills were beastly and that everything we liked was bad. Taughtto sit on our wills, to be afraid of our selves and not trust them for asingle minute.... Mamma was glad when I was jilted, because that was onefor _me_. "

"Were you jilted?"

"Yes. She thought it would make me humble. I always was. I am. I'm afraidof my self _now_. I can't trust it. I keep on asking people what theythink when _I_ ought to _know_.... But I'm going to stop all that. I'mgoing to fight. "

"Fight little Mamma?"

"No. Myself. The bit of me that claws on to her and can't get away. Mybody'll stay here and take care of her all her life, but my _self_ willhave got away. It'll get away from all of them. It's got bits of themsticking to it, bits of Mamma, bits of Papa, bits of Roddy, bits of AuntCharlotte. Bits of you, Mark. I don't _want_ to get away from you, but Ishall have to. You'd kick me down and stamp on me if you thought it wouldplease Mamma. There mayn't be much left when I'm done, but at least it'llbe me. "

"Mad. Quite mad, Minx. You ought to be married. "

"And leave little Mamma? ... I'll race you from the bridge to the topof the hill. "

He raced her. He wasn't really angry. Deep down inside him he knew. 

VII. 

November, and Mark's last morning. He had got promotion. He was goingback to India with a new battery. He would be stationed at Poona, a placehe hated. Nothing ever happened as he wanted it to happen. 

She was in Papa's room, helping him to pack. The wardrobe door gave outits squeaking wail again and again as he opened it and threw his thingson to the bed. Her mother had gone away because she couldn't bear to seethem, his poor things. 

They were all folded now and pressed down into the boxes andportmanteaus. She sat on the bed with Mark's sword across her knees, rubbing vaseline on the blade. Mark came and stood before her, lookingdown at her. 

"Minky, I don't like going away and leaving Mamma with you.... When Iwent before you promised you'd be kind to her. "

"What do I do?"

There was a groove down the middle of the blade for the blood to run in. 

"Do? You do nothing. Nothing. You don't talk to her. You don't want totalk to her. You behave as if she wasn't there. "

The blade was blunt. It would have to be sharpened before Mark took itinto a battle. Mark's eyes hurt her. She tried to fix her attention onthe blade. 

"What makes you?"

"I don't know, " she said. "Whatever it is it was done long ago. "

"She hasn't got anybody, " he said. "Roddy's gone. Dan's no good to her. She won't have anybody but you. "

"I know, Mark. I shall never go away and leave her. "

"Don't talk about going away and leaving her!"

 * * * * *

He didn't want her to see him off at the train. He wanted to go awayalone, after he had said good-bye to Mamma. He didn't want Mamma to beleft by herself after he had gone. 

They stood together by the shut door of the drawing-room. She and hermother stood between Mark and the door. She had said good-bye a minuteago, alone with him in Papa's room. But there was something they hadmissed--

She thought: "We must get it now, this minute. He'll say good-bye toMamma last. He'll kiss her last. But I must kiss him again, first. "

She came to him, holding up her face. He didn't see her; but when his armfelt her hand it jerked up and pushed her out of his way, as he wouldhave pushed anything that stood there between him and Mamma. 

XXVI

I. 

Old Mr. Peacock of Sarrack was dead, and Dr. Kendal was the oldest man inthe Dale. He was not afraid of death; he was only afraid of dying beforeMr. Peacock died. Mamma had finished building the rockery in the garden. You had carried all the stones. There were no more stones to carry. Thatwas all that had happened in the year and nine months since Mark hadgone. 

To you nothing happened. Nothing ever would happen. At twenty-one and ahalf you were old too, and very wise. You had given up expecting thingsto happen. You put 1883 on your letters to Mark and Dan and Roddy, instead of 1882. Then 1884. You measured time by the poems you wrote andby the books you read and by the Sutcliffes' going abroad in January andcoming back in March. 

You had advanced from the Critique of Pure Reason to the Critique ofPractical Reason, and the Critique of Judgment and the Prolegomena. Andin the end you were cheated. You would never know the only thing worthknowing. Reality. For all you knew there was no Reality, no God, nofreedom, no immortality. Only doing your duty. "You can because youought. " Kant, when you got to the bottom of him, was no more excitingthan Mamma. "_Du kannst, weil du sollst_. "

Why not "You can because you shall"? It would never do to let Mamma knowwhat Kant thought. She would say "Your Bible could have told you that. "

There was Schopenhauer, though. _He_ didn't cheat you. There was "_reineAnschauung_, " pure perception; it happened when you looked at beautifulthings. Beautiful things were crystal; you looked through them and sawReality. You saw God. While the crystal flash lasted "_Wille undVorstellung_, " the Will and the Idea, were not divided as they are inlife; they were one. That was why beautiful things made you happy. 

And there was Mamma's disapproving, reproachful face. Sometimes you feltthat you couldn't stand it for another minute. You wanted to get awayfrom it, to the other end of the world, out of the world, to die. Whenyou were dead perhaps you would know. Or perhaps you wouldn't. Perhapsdeath would cheat you, too. 

II. 

"Oh--have I come too soon?"

She had found Mr. Sutcliffe at his writing-table in the library, a pileof papers before him. He turned in his chair and looked at her above thefine, lean hand that passed over his face as if it brushed cobwebs. 

"They didn't tell me you were busy. "

"I'm not. I ought to be, but I'm not. "

"You _are_. I'll go and talk to Mrs. Sutcliffe till you've finished. "

"No. You'll stay here and talk to me. Mrs. Sutcliffe really _is_ busy. "

"Sewing-party?"

"Sewing-party. "

She could see them sitting round the dining-room: Mrs. Waugh and MissFrewin, Mrs. Belk with her busy eyes, and Miss Kendal and Miss Louisa, Mrs. Oldshaw and Dorsy; and Mrs. Horn, the grocer's wife, very stiff in acorner by herself, sewing unbleached calico and hot red flannel, hotsunlight soaking into them. The library was dim, and leathery andtobaccoey and cool. 

The last time she came on a Wednesday Mrs. Sutcliffe had popped out ofthe dining-room and made them go round to the tennis court by the back, so that they might not be seen from the windows. She wondered why Mrs. Sutcliffe was so afraid of them being seen, and why she had not lookedquite pleased. 

And to-day--there was something about Mr. Sutcliffe. 

"You don't want to play?"

"After tea. When it's cooler. We'll have it in here. By ourselves. " Hegot up and rang the bell. 

The tea-table between them, and she, pouring out the tea. She was grownup. Her hair was grown up. It lay like a wreath, plaited on the top ofher head. 

He was smoothing out the wrinkles of one hand with the other, andsmiling. "Everybody busy except you and me, Mary.... How are you gettingon with Kant?"

"I've done with him. It's taken me four years. You see, either theGerman's hard or I'm awfully stupid. "

"German hard, I should imagine. Do you _like_ Kant?"

"I like him awfully when he says exciting things about Space and Time. Idon't like him when he goes maundering on about his old CategoricalImperative. You can because you ought--putting you off, like aclergyman. "

"Kant said that, did he? That shows what an old humbug he was.... And itisn't true, Mary, it isn't true. "

"If it was it wouldn't prove anything. That's what bothers me. "

"What bothers me is that it isn't true. If I did what I ought I'd be thebusiest man in England. I wouldn't be sitting here. If I even did what Iwant--Do you know what I should like to do? To farm my own land insteadof letting it out to these fellows here. I don't suppose you think meclever, but I've got ideas. "

"What sort of ideas?"

"Practical ideas. Ideas that can be carried out. That ought to be carriedout because they can. Ideas about cattle-breeding, cattle-feeding, chemical manuring, housing, labour, wages, everything that has to do withfarming. "

Two years ago you talked and he listened. Now that you were grown up hetalked to you and you listened. He had said it would make a difference. That was the difference it made. 

"Here I am, a landowner who can't do anything with his land. And I can'tdo anything for my labourers, Mary. If I keep a dry roof over their headsand a dry floor under their feet I'm supposed to have done my duty.... People will tell you that Mr. Sootcliffe's the great man of the place, but half of them look down on him because he doesn't farm his own land, and the other half kow-tow to him because he doesn't, because he's thelandlord. And they all think I'm a dangerous man. They don't like ideas. They're afraid of 'em.... I'd like to sell every acre I've got here andbuy land--miles and miles of it--that hasn't been farmed before. I'd showthem what farming is if you bring brains to it. "

"I see. You _could_ do that. "

"Could I? The land's entailed. I can't sell it away from my son. And_he_'ll never do anything with it. "

"Aren't there other things you could have done?"

"I suppose I could have got the farmers out. Turned them off the landthey've sweated their lives into. Or I could have sold my town houseinstead of letting it and bought land. "

"Of course you could. Oh--why didn't you?"

"Why didn't I? Ah--now you've got me. Because I'm a lazy old humbug, Mary. All my farming's in my head when it isn't on my conscience. "

"You don't really like farming: you only think you ought to. What do youreally like?"

"Going away. Getting out of this confounded country into the South ofFrance. I'm not really happy, Mary, till I'm pottering about my garden atAgaye. "

She looked where he was looking. Two drawings above the chimney-piece. Achain of red hills swung out into a blue sea. The Estérel. A pink andwhite house on the terrace of a hill. House and hill blazing outsunshine. 

Agaye. Agaye. Pottering about his garden at Agaye. He was happy there. 

"Well, you can get away. To Agaye. "

"Not as much as I should like. My wife can't stand more than six weeks ofit. "

"So that you aren't really happy at Agaye.... I thought I was the onlyperson who felt like that. Miserable because I've been doing my ownthings instead of sewing, or reading to Mamma. "

"That's the way conscience makes cowards of us all. "

"If it was even _my_ conscience. But it's Mamma's. And her conscience wasGrandmamma's. And Grandmamma's--"

"And mine?"

"Isn't yours a sort of landlord's conscience? Your father's?"

"No. No. It's mine all right. My youth had a conscience. "

"Are you sure it wasn't put off with somebody else's?"

"Perhaps. At Oxford we were all social reformers. The collectiveconscience of the group, perhaps. I wasn't strong enough to rise to it. Wasn't strong enough to resist it.... "

Don't you do that, my child. Find out what you want, and when you seeyour chance coming, take it. Don't funk it. "

"I don't see _any_ chance of getting away. "

"Where do you want to get away to?"

"There. Agaye. "

He leaned forward. His eyes glittered. "You'd like that?"

"I'd like it more than anything on earth. "

"Then, " he said, "some day you'll go there. "

"No. Don't let's talk about it. I shall never go. "

"I don't see why not. I don't really see why not. "

She shook her head. "No. That sort of thing doesn't happen. "

III. 

She stitched and stitched, making new underclothing. It was going tohappen. Summer and Christmas and the New Year had gone. In another weekit would happen. She would be sitting with the Sutcliffes in theParis-Lyons-Mediterranée express, going with them to Agaye. She had tohave new underclothing. They would be two days in Paris. They would pass, in the train, through Dijon, Avignon, Toulon and Cannes, then back toAgaye. She had no idea what it would be like. Only the sounds, Agaye, rose up out of the other sounds, like a song, a slender foreign song, bright and clear, that you could sing without knowing what it meant. Shewould stay there with the Sutcliffes, for weeks and weeks, in the pinkand white house on the terrace. Perhaps they would go on into Italy. 

Mr. Sutcliffe was going to send to Cook's for the tickets to-morrow. Expensive, well-fitting clothes had come from Durlingham, so that nothingcould prevent it happening. 

Mr. Sutcliffe was paying for her ticket. Uncle Victor had paid for theclothes. He had kept on writing to Mamma and telling her that she reallyought to let you go. Aunt Bella and Uncle Edward had written, and Mrs. Draper, and in the end Mamma had given in. 

At first she had said, "I won't hear of your going abroad with theSutcliffes, " and, "The Sutcliffes seem to think they've a right to takeyou away from me. They've only to say 'Come' and you'll go. " Then, "Isuppose you'll have to go, " and, "I don't know what your Uncle Victorthinks they'll do for you, but he shan't say I've stood in your way. " Andsuddenly her face left off disapproving and reproaching and behaved as itdid on Christmas Days and birthdays. 

She smiled now as she sat still and sewed, as she watched you sittingstill and sewing, making new underclothes. 

Aunt Bella would come and stay with Mamma, then Aunt Lavvy, then Mrs. Draper, so that she would not be left alone. 

Stitch--stitch. She wondered: Supposing they weren't coming? Couldshe have left her mother alone, or would she have given up going andstayed? No. She couldn't have given it up. She had never wanted anythingin her life as she wanted to go to Agaye with the Sutcliffes. With Mr. Sutcliffe. Mrs. Sutcliffe didn't count; she wouldn't do anything atAgaye, she would just trail about in the background, kind and smiling, in a shawl. She might almost as well not be there. 

The happiness was too great. She could not possibly have given it up. 

She went on stitching. Mamma went on stitching. Catty brought the lampin. 

Then Roddy's telegram came. From Queenstown. 

"Been ill. Coming home. Expect me to-morrow. Rodney. "

She knew then that she would not go to Agaye. 

IV. 

But not all at once. 

When she thought of Roddy it was easy to say quietly to herself, "Ishall have to give it up. " When she thought of Mr. Sutcliffe and theParis-Lyons-Mediterranée train and the shining, gold-white, unknowntowns, it seemed to her that it was impossible to give up going to Agaye. You simply could not do it. 

She shut her eyes. She could feel Mr. Sutcliffe beside her in the trainand the carriage rocking. Dijon, Avignon, Cannes. She could hear hisvoice telling her the names. She would stand beside him at the window, and look out. And Mrs. Sutcliffe would sit in her corner, and smile atthem kindly, glad because they were so happy. 

"Roddy doesn't say he _is_ ill, " her mother said. "I wonder what he'scoming home for. "

Supposing you had really gone? Supposing you were at Agaye when Roddy--

The thought of Roddy gave her a pain in her heart. The thought of notgoing to Agaye dragged at her waist and made her feel weak, suddenly, asif she were trying to stand after an illness. 

She went up to her room. The shoulder line of Greffington Edge was fixedacross the open window, immovable, immutable. Her knees felt tired. Shelay down on her bed, staring at the immovable, immutable white walls. Shetried to think of Substance, of the Reality behind appearances. She couldfeel her mind battering at the walls of her body, the walls of her room, the walls of the world. She could hear it crying out. 

She was kneeling now beside her bed. She could see her arms stretched outbefore her on the counterpane, and her hands, the finger-tips together. She pressed her weak, dragging waist tighter against the bed. 

"If Anything's there--if Anything's there--make me give up going. Makeme think about Roddy. Not about myself. About Roddy. _Roddy_. Make me notwant to go to Agaye. "

She didn't really believe that anything would happen. 

Her mind left off crying. Outside, the clock on the Congregational Chapelwas striking six. She was aware of a sudden checking and letting go, of ablack stillness coming on and on, hushing sound and sight and the touchof her arms on the rough counterpane, and her breathing and the beatingof her heart. There was a sort of rhythm in the blackness that caught youand took you into its peace. When the thing stopped you could almost hearthe click. 

She stood up. Her white room was grey. Across the window the shoulder ofthe hill had darkened. Out there the night crouched, breathing like animmense, quiet animal. She had a sense of exquisite security and clarityand joy. She was not going to Agaye. She didn't want to go. 

She thought: "I shall have to tell the Sutcliffes. Now, this evening. AndMamma. They'll be sorry and Mamma will be glad. "

But Mamma was not glad. Mamma hated it when you upset arrangements. Shesaid, "I declare I never saw anybody like you in my life. After all thetrouble and expense. "

But you could see it was Roddy she was thinking about. She didn't want tobelieve there was anything the matter with him. If you went that wouldlook as though he was all right. 

"What do you suppose the Sutcliffes will think? And your Uncle Victor?With all those new clothes and that new trunk?"

"He'll understand. "

"_Will_ he!"

"Mr. Sutcliffe, I mean. "

V. 

She went down to Greffington Hall that night and told him. He understood. 

But not quite so well as Mrs. Sutcliffe. She gave you a long look, sighed, and smiled. Almost you would have thought she was glad. _He_didn't look at you. He looked down at his own lean fine hands hanging infront of him. You could see them trembling slightly. And when you weregoing he took you into the library and shut the door. 

"Is this necessary, Mary?" he said. 

"Yes. We don't quite know what's wrong with Roddy. "

"Then why not wait and see?"

"Because I _do_ know. And Mamma doesn't. There's something, or hewouldn't have come home. "

A long pause. She noticed little things about him. The proud, handsomecorners of his mouth had loosened; his eyelids didn't fit nicely as theyused to do; they hung slack from the eyebone. 

"You care more for Roddy than you do for Mark, " he said. 

"I don't care for him half so much. But I'm sorry for him. You can't besorry for Mark.... Roddy wants me and Mark doesn't. He wants nobody butMamma. "

"He knows what he wants.... Well. It's my fault. I should have known whatI wanted. I should have taken you a year ago. "

"If you had, " she said, "it would have been all over now. "

"I wonder, would it?"

For the life of her she couldn't imagine what he meant. 

When she got home she found her mother folding up the work in thework-basket. 

"Well, anyhow, " Mamma said, "you've laid in a good stock ofunderclothing. "

VI. 

She was sitting in the big leather chair in the consulting-room. Thesmall grey-white window panes and the black crooked bough of the appletree across them made a pattern in her brain. Dr. Charles stood beforeher on the hearthrug. She saw his shark's tooth, hanging sharp in thesnap of his jaws. He was powerful, savage and benevolent. 

He had told her what was wrong with Roddy. 

"What--does--it--mean?"

The savage light went out of his eyes. They were dull and kind under hisred shaggy eyebrows. 

"It means that you won't have him with you very long, Mary. "

That Roddy would die. That Roddy would die. _Roddy_. That was what he hadcome home for. 

"He ought never to have gone out with his heart in that state. It beatsme how he's pulled through those five years. Five weeks of it were enoughto kill him.... Jem Alderson must have taken mighty good care of him. "

Jem Alderson. She remembered. The big shoulders, the little screwed upeyes, the long moustaches, the good, gladiator face. Jem Alderson hadtaken care of him. Jem Alderson had cared. 

"I don't know what your mother could have been thinking of to let himgo. "

"Mamma doesn't think of things. It wasn't her fault. She didn't know. Uncle Edward and Uncle Victor made him. "

"They ought to be hung for it. "

"They didn't know, either. It was my fault. _I_ knew. "

It seemed to her that she had known, that she had known all the time, that she remembered knowing. 

"Did he tell you?"

"He didn't tell anybody.... Did he know?"

"Yes, Mary. He came to me to be overhauled. I told him he wasn't fit togo. "

"I did _try_ to stop him. "

"Why?"

He looked at her sharply, as if he were trying to find out something, tofix responsibility. 

"Because I _knew_. "

"You couldn't have known if nobody told you. "

"I did know. If he dies I shall have killed him. I ought to have stoppedhim. I was the only one who knew. "

"You couldn't have stopped him. You were only a child yourself when ithappened. If anybody was to blame it was his mother. "

"It wasn't. She didn't know. Mamma never knows anything she doesn't wantto know. She can't see that he's ill now. She talks as if he ought to dosomething. She can't stand men who don't do things like Mark and Dan. "

"What on earth does she suppose he could do? He's no more fit to doanything than my brother James.... You'll have to take care of him, Mary. "

A sharp and tender pang went through her. It was like desire; like thefeeling you had when you thought of babies: painful and at the same timedelicious. 

"Could you?" said Dr. Charles. 

"Of course I can. "

"If he's taken care of he might live--"

She stood up and faced him. "How long?"

"I don't know. Perhaps--" He went with her to the door. "Perhaps, " hesaid, "quite a long time. "

(But if he didn't live she would have killed him. She had known all thetime, and she had let him go. )

Through the dining-room window she could see Roddy as he crouched overthe hearth, holding out his hands to the fire. 

He was hers, not Mamma's, to take care of. Sharp, delicious pain!

VII. 

"Oh, Roddy--look! Little, little grouse, making nice noises. "

The nestlings went flapping and stumbling through the roots of theheather. Roddy gazed at them with his fixed and mournful eyes. Hecouldn't share your excitement. He drew back his shoulders, bracinghimself to bear it; his lips tightened in a hard, bleak grin. He grinnedat the absurdity of your supposing that he could be interested inanything any more. 

Roddy's beautiful face was bleached and sharpened; the sallow, mauve-tinted skin stretched close over the bone; but below the edge ofhis cap you could see the fine spring of his head from his neck, like thespring of Mark's head. 

They were in April now. He was getting better. He could walk up the lowerslopes of Karva without panting. 

"Why are we ever out?" he said. "Supposing we went home?"

"All right. Let's. "

He was like that. When he was in the house he wanted to be on the moor;when he was on the moor he wanted to be back in the house. They startedto go home, and he turned again towards Karva. They went on till theycame to the round pit sunk below the track. They rested there, sitting onthe stones at the bottom of the pit. 

"Mary, " he said, "I can't stay here. I shall have to go back. To Canada, I mean. "

"You shall never go back to Canada, " she said. 

"I must. Not to the Aldersons. I can't go there again, because--I can'ttell you why. But if I could I wouldn't. I was no good there. They letyou know it. "

"Jem?"

"No. _He_ was all right. That beastly woman. "

"What woman?"

"His aunt. She didn't want me there. I wasn't fit for anything butdriving cattle and cleaning out their stinking pigsties.... She used tolook at me when I was eating. You could see she was thinking 'He isn'tworth his keep. ' ... Her mouth had black teeth in it, with horrible gummygaps between. The women were like that. I wanted to hit her on the mouthand smash her teeth.... But of course I couldn't. "

"It's all over. You mustn't think about it. "

"I'm not. I'm thinking about the other thing.... The thing I did. And thedog, Mary; the dog. "

She knew what was coming. 

"You can't imagine what that place was like. Their sheep-run was milesfrom the farm. Miles from anything. You had to take it in turns to sleepthere a month at a time, in a beastly hut. You couldn't sleep because ofthat dog. Jem _would_ give him me. He yapped. You had to put him in theshed to keep him from straying. He yapped all night. The yapping was theonly sound there was. It tore pieces out of your brain.... I didn't thinkI could hate a dog.... But I did hate him. I simply couldn't stand theyapping. And one night I got up and hung him. I hung him. "

"You didn't, Roddy. You know you didn't. The first time you told me thatstory you said you found him hanging. Don't you remember? He was a baddog. He bit the sheep. Jem's uncle hung him. "

"No. It was me. Do you know what he did? He licked my hands when I wastying the rope round his neck. He played with my hands. He was a yellowdog with a white breast and white paws.... And that isn't the worst. Thatisn't It. "

"It?"

"The other thing. What I did.... I haven't told you that. You couldn'tstand me if you knew. It was why I had to go. Somebody must have known. Jem must have known. "

"I don't believe you did anything. Anything at all. "

"I tell you I did. "

"No, Roddy. You only think you did. You only think you hung the dog. "

They got up out of the pit. They took the track to the schoolhouse lane. A sheep staggered from its bed and stalked away, bleating, with headthrown back and shaking buttocks. Plovers got up, wheeling round, sweeping close. "_Pee_-vit--_Pee_-vit. Pee-_vitt_!"

"This damned place is full of noises, " Roddy said. 

VIII. 

"The mind can bring it about, that all bodily modifications or images ofthings may be referred to the idea of God. "

The book stood open before her on the kitchen table, propped against thescales. As long as you were only stripping the strings from the Frenchbeans you could read. 

The mind can bring it about. The mind can bring it about. "He who clearlyand distinctly understands himself and his emotions loves God, and somuch the more in proportion as he more understands himself and hisemotions. "

Fine slices of French beans fell from the knife, one by one, into thebowl of clear water. Spinoza's thought beat its way out through the smellof steel, the clean green smell of the cut beans, the crusty, spicy smellof the apple pie you had made. "He who loves God cannot endeavour thatGod should love him in return. "

"'Shall we gather at the river--'" Catty sang as she went to and frobetween the kitchen and the scullery. Catty was happy now that Maggie hadgone and she had only you and Jesus with her in the kitchen. Through theopen door you could hear the clack of the hatchet and the thud on thestone flags as Roddy, with slow, sorrowful strokes, chopped wood in thebackyard. 

"Miss Mary--" Catty's thick, loving voice and the jerk of her black eyeswarned her. 

Mamma looked in at the door. 

"Put that book away, " she said. She hated the two brown volumes ofElwes's Spinoza you had bought for your birthday. "The dinner will beruined if you read. "

"It'll be ruined if I don't read. "

For then your mind raged over the saucepans and the fragrant, flourypasteboard, hungry and unfed. It couldn't bring anything about. Itsnatched at the minutes left over from Roddy and the house and Mamma andthe piano. You knew what every day would be like. You would get up earlyto practise. When the cooking and the housework was done Roddy would wantyou. You would play tennis together with Mr. Sutcliffe and Dorsy Heron. Or you would go up on to the moors and comfort Roddy while he talkedabout the "things" he had done in Canada and about getting away and aboutthe dog. You would say over and over again, "You know you didn't hanghim. It was Jem's uncle. He was a bad dog. He bit the sheep. " In thewinter evenings you would sew or play or read aloud to Mamma and Roddy, and Roddy would crouch over the fender, with his hands stretched out tothe fire, not listening. 

But Roddy was better. The wind whipped red blood into his cheeks. He saidhe would be well if it wasn't for the bleating of the sheep, and thecrying of the peewits and the shouting of the damned villagers. Andpeople staring at him. He would be well if he could get away. 

Then--he would be well if he could marry Dorsy. 

So the first year passed. And the second. And the third year. She wasfive and twenty. She thought: "I shall die before I'm fifty. I've livedhalf my life and done nothing. "

IX. 

Old Dr. Kendal was dead. He had had nothing more to live for. He hadbeaten Mr. Peacock of Sarrack. Miss Kendal was wearing black ribbons inher cap instead of pink. And Maggie's sister was dead of her cancer. 

The wall at the bottom of the garden had fallen down and Roddy had builtit up again. 

He had heaved up the big stones and packed them in mortar; he had laidthem true by the plumb-line; Blenkiron's brother, the stonemason, couldn't have built a better wall. 

It had all happened in the week when she was ill and went to stay withAunt Lavvy at Scarborough. Yesterday evening, when she got home, Roddyhad come in out of the garden to meet her. He was in his shirt sleeves;glass beads of sweat stood out on his forehead, his face was white withexcitement. He had just put the last dab of mortar to the last stone. 

In the blue and white morning Mary and her mother stood in the garden, looking at the wall. In its setting of clean white cement, Roddy's bitshowed like the map of South Africa. They were waiting for him to comedown to breakfast. 

"I must say, " Mamma said, "he's earned his extra half-hour in bed. "

She was pleased because Roddy had built the wall up and because he waswell again. 

They had turned. They were walking on the flagged path by theflower-border under the house. Mamma walked slowly, with meditativepauses, and bright, sidelong glances for her flowers. 

"If only, " she said, "he could work without trampling the flowers down. "

The sun was shining on the flagged path. Mamma was stooping over the bed;she had lifted the stalk of the daffodil up out of the sunk print ofRoddy's boot. Catty was coming down the house passage to the side door. Her mouth was open. Her eyes stared above her high, sallow cheeks. Shestood on the doorstep, saying something in a husky voice. 

"Miss Mary--will you go upstairs to Master Roddy? I think there'ssomething the matter with him. I think--"

Upstairs, in his narrow iron bed, Roddy lay on his back, his lips parted, his eyes--white slits under half-open lids--turned up to the ceiling. Hisarms were squared stiffly above his chest as they had pushed back thebedclothes. The hands had been clenched and unclenched; the fingers stillcurled in towards the palms. His face had a look of innocence andcandour. 

Catty's thick, wet voice soaked through his mother's crying. "MissMary--he went in his first sleep. His hair's as smooth as smooth. "

X. 

She was alone with Dan in the funeral carriage. 

Her heart heaved and dragged with the grinding of the brakes on the hill;the brake of the hearse going in front; the brake of their carriage; thebrake of the one that followed with Dr. Charles in it. 

When they left off she could hear Dan crying. He had begun as soon as hegot into the carriage. 

She tried to think of Dr. Charles, sitting all by himself in the backcarriage, calm and comfortable among the wreaths. But she couldn't. Shecouldn't think of anything but Dan and the black hearse in front of them. She could see it when the road turned to the right; when she shut hereyes she could see the yellow coffin inside it, heaped with whiteflowers; and Roddy lying deep down in the coffin. The sides were madehigh to cover his arms, squared over his chest as if he had been beatingsomething off. She could see Roddy's arms beating off his thoughts, andunder the fine hair Roddy's face, innocent and candid. 

Dr. Charles said it wasn't that. He had just raised them in surprise. Asort of surprise. He hadn't suffered. 

Dan's dark head was bowed forward, just above the level of her knees. Hisdeep, hot eyes were inflamed with grief; they kept on blinking, gushingout tears over red lids. He cried like a child, with loud sobs andhiccoughs that shook him. _Her_ eyes were dry; burning dry; the lidschoked with something that felt like hot sand, and hurt. 

(If only the carriage didn't smell of brandy. That was the driver. Hemust have sat in it while he waited. )

Dan left off crying and sat up suddenly. 

"What's that hat doing there?"

He had taken off his tall hat as he was getting into the carriage andlaid it on the empty seat. He pointed at the hat. 

"That isn't my hat, " he said. 

"Yes, Dank. You put it there yourself. "

"I didn't. My hat hasn't got a beastly black band on it. "

He rose violently, knocking his head against the carriage roof. 

"Here--I must get out of this. "

He tugged at the window-strap, hanging on to it and swaying as he tugged. She dragged him back into his seat. 

"Sit down and keep quiet. "

She put her hand on his wrist and held it. Down the road the bell ofRenton Church began tolling. He turned and looked at her unsteadily, hisdark eyes showing bloodshot as they swerved. 

"Mary--is Roddy really dead?"

A warm steam of brandy came and went with his breathing. 

"Yes. That's why you must keep quiet. "

Mr. Rollitt was standing at the open gate of the churchyard. He wassaying something that she didn't hear. Then he swung round solemnly. Shesaw the flash of his scarlet hood. Then the coffin. 

She began to walk behind it, between two rows of villagers, between DorsyHeron and Mr. Sutcliffe. She went, holding Dan tight, pulling him closerwhen he lurched, and carrying his tall hat in her hand. 

Close before her face the head of Roddy's coffin swayed and swung as thebearers staggered. 

XI. 

"Roddy ought never to have gone to Canada. "

Her mother had turned again, shaking the big bed. They would sleeptogether for three nights; then Aunt Bella would come, as she came whenPapa died. 

"But your Uncle Victor would have his own way. "

"He didn't know. "

She thought: "But _I_ knew. I knew and I let him go. Why did I?"

It seemed to her that it was because, deep down inside her, she hadwanted him to go. Deep down inside her she had been afraid of theunhappiness that would come through Roddy. 

"And I don't think, " her mother said presently, "it _could_ have beenvery good for him, building that wall. "

"You didn't know. "

She thought: "I'd have known. If I'd been here it wouldn't have happened. I wouldn't have let him. I'd no business to go away and leave him. Imight have known. "

"Lord, if Thou hadst been here our brother had not died. "

The yellow coffin swayed before her eyes, heaped with the white flowers. Yellow and white. Roddy's dog. His yellow dog with a white breast andwhite paws. And a rope round his neck. Roddy thought he had hanged him. 

At seven she got up and dressed and dusted the drawing-room. She dustedeverything very carefully, especially the piano. She would never want toplay on it again. 

The side door stood open. She went out. In the bed by the flagged pathshe saw the sunk print of Roddy's foot and the dead daffodil stalk lyingin it. Mamma had been angry. 

She had forgotten that. She had forgotten everything that happened in theminutes before Catty had come down the passage. 

She filled in the footprint and stroked the earth smooth above it, lestMamma should see it and remember. 

XXVII

I. 

Potnia, Potnia Nux--

 _Lady, our Lady, Night, You who give sleep to men, to men labouring and suffering-- Out of the darkness, come, Come with your wings, come down On the house of Agamemnon. _

Time stretched out behind and before you, time to read, to make music, tomake poems in, to translate Euripides, while Mamma looked after herflowers in the garden; Mamma, sowing and planting and weeding with afixed, vehement passion. You could hear Catty and little Alice, Maggie'sniece, singing against each other in the kitchen as Alice helped Cattywith her work. You needn't have been afraid. You would never haveanything more to do in the house. Roddy wasn't there. 

Agamemnon--that was where you broke off two years ago. He didn't keep youwaiting long to finish. You needn't have been afraid. 

Uncle Victor's letter came on the day when the gentians flowered. Oneminute Mamma had been happy, the next she was crying. When you saw herwith the letter you knew. Uncle Victor was sending Dan home. Dan was nogood at the office; he had been drinking since Roddy died. Three months. 

Mamma was saying something as she cried. "I suppose he'll be here, then, all his life, doing nothing. "

II. 

Mamma had given Papa's smoking-room to Dan. She kept on going in and outof it to see if he was there. 

"When you've posted the letters you might go and see what Dan's doing. "

Everybody in the village knew about Dan. The postmistress looked up fromstamping the letters to say, "Your brother was here a minute ago. " Mr. Horn, the grocer, called to you from the bench at the fork of the roads, "Ef yo're lookin' for yore broother, he's joost gawn oop daale. "

If Mr. Horn had looked the other way when he saw you coming you wouldhave known that Dan was in the Buck Hotel. 

The white sickle of the road; a light at the top of the sickle; theAldersons' house. 

A man was crossing from the moor-track to the road. He carried a stack ofheather on his shoulder: Jem's brother, Ned. He stopped and stared. Hewas thicker and slower than Jem; darker haired; fuller and redder in theface; he looked at you with the same little, kind, screwed-up eyes. 

"Ef yo're lookin' for yore broother, 'e's in t' oose long o' us. Wull yocoom in? T' missus med gev yo a coop o' tea. "

She went in. There was dusk in the kitchen, with a grey light in thesquare of the window and a red light in the oblong of the grate. A smallboy with a toasting-fork knelt by the hearth. You disentangled a smell ofstewed tea and browning toast from thick, deep smells of peat smoke andthe sweat drying on Ned's shirt. When Farmer Alderson got up you saw theround table, the coarse blue-grey teacups and the brown glazed teapot ona brown glazed cloth. 

Dan sat by the table. Dumpling, Ned's three-year-old daughter, sat onDan's knee; you could see her scarlet cheeks and yellow hair above thegrey frieze of his coat-sleeve. His mournful black-and-white face stoopedto her in earnest, respectful attention. He was taking a piece ofbutterscotch out of the silver paper. Dumpling opened her wet, red mouth. 

Rachel, Ned's wife, watched them, her lips twisted in a fond, wise smile, as she pressed the big loaf to her breast and cut thick slices ofbread-and-jam. She had made a place for you beside her. 

"She sengs ersen to slape wid a li'l' song she maakes, " Rachel said. "Tha'll seng that li'l' song for Mester Dan, wuntha?"

Dumpling hid her face and sang. You had to stoop to hear the cheepingthat came out of Dan's shoulder. 

 "Aw, dinny, dinny dy-Doomplin', Dy-Doomplin', dy-Doomplin', Dinny, dinny dy-Doomplin', Dy-Doomplin' daay. "

"Ef tha'll seng for Mester Dan, " Farmer Alderson said, "tha'llt seng fortha faather, wuntha, Doomplin'?"

"Naw. "

"For Graffer then?"

"Naw. "

Dumpling put her head on one side, butting under Dan's chin like a cat. Dan's arm drew her closer. He was happy there, in the Aldersons' kitchen, holding Dumpling on his knee. There was something in his happiness thathurt you as Roddy's unhappiness had hurt. All your life you had neverreally known Dan, the queer, scowling boy who didn't notice you, didn'tplay with you as Roddy played or care for you as Mark had cared. Andsuddenly you knew him; better even than Roddy, better than Mark. 

III. 

The grey byre was warm with the bodies of the cows and their grassy, milky breath. Dan, in his clean white shirt sleeves, crouched on Ned'smilking stool, his head pressed to the cow's curly red and white flank. His fingers worked rhythmically down the teat and the milk squirted andhissed and pinged against the pail. Sometimes the cow swung round herwhite face and looked at Dan, sometimes she lashed him gently with hertail. Ned leaned against the stall post and watched. 

"Thot's t' road, thot's t' road. Yo're the foorst straanger she a' letmilk 'er. She's a narvous cow. 'Er teats is tander. "

When the milking was done Dan put on his well-fitting coat and they wenthome over Karva to the schoolhouse lane. 

Dan loved the things that Roddy hated: the crying of the peewits, thebleating of the sheep, the shouts of the village children when they sawhim and came running to his coat pockets for sweets. He liked to trampover the moors with the shepherds; he helped them with the dipping andshearing and the lambing. 

"Dan, you ought to be a farmer. "

"I know, " he said, "that's why they stuck me in an office. "

IV. 

"If the killer thinks that he kills, if the killed thinks that he iskilled, they do not understand; for this one does not kill, nor is thatone killed. "

Passion Week, two years after Roddy's death; Roddy's death the measureyou measured time by still. 

Mamma looked up from her Bible; she looked over her glasses with eyestired of their everlasting reproach. 

"What have you got there, Mary?"

"The Upanishads from the Sacred Book of the East. "

"Tchtt! It was that Buddhism the other day. "

"Religion. "

"Any religion except your own. Or else it's philosophy. You're destroyingyour soul, Mary. I shall write to your Uncle Victor and tell him to askMr. Sutcliffe not to send you any more books from that library. "

"I'm seven and twenty, Mamma ducky. "

"The more shame for you then, " her mother said. 

The clock on the Congregational Chapel struck six. They put down theirbooks and looked at each other. 

"Dan not back?" Mamma knew perfectly well he wasn't back. 

"He went to Reyburn. "

"T't!" Mamma's chin nodded in queer, vexed resignation. She folded herhands on her knees and waited, listening. 

Sounds of wheels and of hoofs scraping up the hill. The Morfe bus, backfrom Reyburn. Catty's feet, running along the passage. The front dooropening, then shutting. Dan hadn't come with the bus. 

"Perhaps, " Mamma said, "Ned Anderson'll bring him. "

"Perhaps.... ('There is one eternal thinker, thinking non-eternalthoughts, who, though one, fulfils the desires of many.... ') Mamma--whywon't you let him go to Canada?"

"It was Canada that killed poor Roddy. "

"It won't kill Dan. He's different. "

"And what good would he be there? If your Uncle Victor can't keep him, who will, I should like to know?"

"Jem Alderson would. He'd take him for nothing. He told Ned he would. Tomake up for Roddy. "

"Make up! He thinks that's the way to make up! I won't have Dan's deathat my door. I'd rather keep him for the rest of my life. "

"How about Dan?"

"Dan's safe here. "

"He's safe on the moor with Alderson looking after the sheep, and he'ssafe in the cowshed milking the cows; but he isn't safe when Ned drivesinto Reyburn market. "

"Would it be safer in Canada?"

"Yes. He'd be thirty miles from the nearest pub. He'd be safer here ifyou didn't give him money. "

"The boy has to have money to buy clothes. "

"I could buy them. "

"I daresay! You can't treat a man of thirty as if he was a baby ofthree. "

She thought. "No. You can only treat a woman.... 'There is one eternalthinker'--"

A knock on the door. 

"There, " her mother said, "that's Dan. "

Mary went to the door. Ned Alderson stood outside; he stood slantways, not looking at her. 

"Ah tried to maake yore broother coom back long o' us, but 'e would na. "

"Hadn't I better go and meet him?"

"Naw. Ah would na. Ah wouldn' woorry; there's shepherds on t' road wi' t'sheep. Mebbe 'e'll toorn oop long o' they. Dawn' woorry ef tes laatelike. "

He went away. 

They waited, listening while the clock struck the hours, seven; eight;nine. At ten her mother and the servants went to bed. She sat up, andwaited, reading. 

"... My son, that subtle essence which you do not perceive there, ofthat very essence this great Nyagrodha tree exists.... That which is thesubtile essence, in it all that exists has its self. It is the True. Itis the Self, and thou, O Svetaketu, art it. "

Substance, the Thing-in-itself--You were It. Dan was It. You could thinkaway your body, Dan's body. One eternal thinker, thinking non-eternalthoughts. Dreaming horrible dreams. Dan's drunkenness. Why?

Eleven. A soft scuffle. The scurry of sheep's feet on the Green. A dogbarking. The shepherds were back from Reyburn. 

Feet shuffled on the flagstone. She went to the door. Dan leaned againstthe doorpost, bent forward heavily; his chin dropped to his chest. Something slimy gleamed on his shoulder and hip. Wet mud of the ditch hehad fallen in. She stiffened her muscles to his weight, to the pull andpush of his reeling body. 

Roddy's room. With one lurch he reached Roddy's white bed in the corner. 

She looked at the dressing-table. A strip of steel flashed under thecandlestick. The blue end of a matchbox stuck up out of the saucer. Therewould be more matches in Dan's coat pocket. She took away the matches andthe razor. 

Her mother stood waiting in the doorway of her room, small and piteous inher nightgown. Her eyes glanced off the razor, and blinked. 

"Is Dan all right?"

"Yes. He came back with the sheep. "

V. 

The Hegels had come: The _Logik_. Three volumes. The bristling Gothictext an ambush of secret, exciting, formidable things. The titles flamed;flags of strange battles; signals of strange ships; challenging, enticingto the dangerous adventure. 

After the first enchantment, the Buddhist Suttas and the Upanishads wereno good. Nor yet the Vedânta. You couldn't keep on saying, "This isThat, " and "Thou art It, " or that the Self is the dark blue bee and thegreen parrot with red eyes and the thunder-cloud, the seasons and theseas. It was too easy, too sleepy, like lying on a sofa and droppinglaudanum, slowly, into a rotten, aching tooth. Your teeth were sound andstrong, they had to have something hard to bite on. You wanted to think, to keep on thinking. Your mind wasn't really like a tooth; it was like arobust, energetic body, happy when it was doing difficult and dangerousthings, balancing itself on heights, lifting great weights of thought, following the long march into thick, smoky battles. 

"Being and Not-Being are the same": ironic and superb defiance. And thencommotion; as if the infinite stillness, the immovable Substance, had gotup and begun moving--Rhythm of eternity: the same for ever: for everdifferent: for ever the same. 

Thought _was_ the Thing-in-itself. 

This man was saying, over and over and all the time what you had wantedKant to say, what he wouldn't say, what you couldn't squeeze out of him, however you turned and twisted him. 

You jumped to where the name "Spinoza" glittered like a jewel on thelarge grey page. 

Something wanting. You knew it, and you were afraid. You loved him. Youdidn't want him to be found out and exposed, like Kant. He had given youthe first incomparable thrill. 

Hegel. Spinoza. She thought of Spinoza's murky, mysterious face. It said, "I live in you, still, as he will never live. You will never love thatold German man. He ran away from the cholera. He bolstered up the Trinitywith his Triple Dialectic, to keep his chair at Berlin. _I_ refused theirbribes. They excommunicated me. You remember? Cursed be Baruch Spinoza inhis going out and his coming in. "

You had tried to turn and twist Spinoza, too; and always he had refusedto come within your meaning. His Substance, his God stood still, ineternity. He, too; before the noisy, rich, exciting Hegel, he drew backinto its stillness; pure and cold, a little sinister, a little ironic. And you felt a pang of misgiving, as if, after all, he might have beenright. So powerful had been his hold. 

Dan looked up. "What are you reading, Mary?"

"Hegel. "

"Haeckel--that's the chap Vickers talks about. "

Vickers--she remembered. Dan lived with Vickers when he left Papa. 

"He's clever, " Dan said, "but he's an awful ass. "

"Who? Haeckel?"

"No. Vickers. "

"You mean he's an awful ass, but he's clever. "

VI. 

One Friday evening an unusual smell of roast chicken came through thekitchen door. Mary put on the slender, long-tailed white gown she worewhen she dined at the Sutcliffes'. 

Dan's friend, Lindley Vickers, was sitting on the sofa, talking to Mamma. When she came in he left off talking and looked at her with sudden happyeyes. She remembered Maurice Jourdain's disappointed eyes, and Mark's. Dan became suddenly very polite and attentive. 

All through dinner Mr. Vickers kept on turning his eyes away from Mammaand looking at her; every time she looked she caught him looking. Hisdark hair sprang in two ridges from the parting. His short, high-bridgednose seemed to be looking at you, too, with its wide nostrils, alert. Hisface did all sorts of vivid, interesting things; you wondered everyminute whether this time it would be straight and serious or crooked andgay, whether his eyes would stay as they were, black crystals, or moveand show grey rings, green speckled. 

He was alive, running over with life; no, not running over, vibratingwith it, holding it in; he looked as if he expected something delightfulto happen, and waited, excited, ready. 

He began talking, about Hegel. "'Plus ça change, plus c'est la mêmechose. '"

She heard herself saying something. Dan turned and looked at her with asombre, thoughtful stare. Mamma smiled, and nodded her chin as much as tosay "Did you ever hear such nonsense?" She knew that was the way to stopyou. 

Mr. Vickers's eyes were large and attentive. When you stopped his mouthgave such a sidelong leap of surprise and amusement that you laughed. Then he laughed. 

Dan said, "What's the joke?" And Mr. Vickers replied that it wasn't ajoke. 

In the drawing-room Mamma said, "I won't have any of those asides betweenyou and Mr. Vickers, do you hear?"

Mary thought that so funny that she laughed. She knew what Mamma wasthinking, but she was too happy to care. Her intelligence had found itsmate. 

You played, and at the first sound of the piano he came in and stood byyou and listened. 

You had only to play and you could make him come to you. He would get upand leave Dan in the smoking-room; he would leave Mamma in the garden. When you played the soft Schubert _Impromptu_ he would sit near you, veryquiet; when you played the _Appassionata_ he would get up and stand closebeside you. When you played the loud, joyful Chopin _Polonaise_ he wouldwalk up and down; up and down the room. 

Saturday evening. Sunday evening. (He was going on Monday very early. )

He sang, "'Es ist bestimmt in Gottes Rath Das man vom liebsten was man hat Muss scheiden. '"

Dan called out from his corner, "Translate. Let's know what it's allabout. "

He pounded out the accompaniment louder. "We won't, will we?" He jumpedup suddenly. "Play the _Appassionata_. "

She played and he talked. 

"I can't play if you talk. "

"Yes, you can. I wish I hadn't got to go to-morrow. "

"Have you" (false note) "got to go?"

"I suppose so. "

"If Dan asked you, would you stop?"

"Yes. "

He slept in Papa's room. When she heard his door shut she went to Dan. 

"Dan, why don't you ask him to stay longer?"

"Because I don't want him to. "

"I thought he was your friend. "

"He is my friend. The only one I've got. "

'Then--why--?"

"That's why. " He shut the door on her. 

She got up early. Dan was alone in the dining-room. 

He said, "What have you come down for?"

"To give you your breakfasts. "

"Don't be a little fool. Go back to your room. "

Mr. Vickers had come in. He stood by the doorway, looking at her andsmiling. "Why this harsh treatment?" he said. He had heard Dan. 

Now and then he smiled again at Dan, who sat sulking over his breakfast. 

Dan went with him to Durlingham. He was away all night. 

Next day, at dinner-time, they appeared again together. Mr. Vickers hadbrought Dan back. He was going to stay for another week. At the BuckHotel. 

VII. 

"Es ist bestimmt in Gottes Rath. " He had no business to sing it, to singit like that, so that you couldn't get the thing out of your head. Thatwouldn't have mattered if you could have got his voice out of your heart. It hung there, clawing, hurting. She resented this pain. 

"Das man vom liebsten was man hat, " the dearest that we have, "mussschei-ei-eden, muss schei-ei-eden. "

Her fingers pressed and crept over the keys, in guilty, shamed silence;it would be awful if he heard you playing it, if Dan heard you or Mamma. 

You had only to play and you could make him come. 

Supposing you played the Schubert _Impromptu_--She found herself playingit. 

He didn't come. He wasn't coming. He was going into Reyburn with Dan. Andon Monday he would be gone. This time he would really go. 

When you left off playing you could still hear him singing in your head. "Das man vom liebsten was man hat. " "Es ist bestimmt--" But if you feltlike that about it, then--

Her hands dropped from the keys. 

It wasn't possible. He only came on Friday evening last week. This wasSaturday morning. Seven days. It couldn't happen in seven days. He wouldbe gone on Monday morning. Not ten days. 

"I can't--I don't. "

Something crossing the window pane made her start and turn. NannieLearoyd's face, looking in. Naughty Nannie. You could see her big pinkcheeks and her scarlet mouth and her eyes sliding and peering. Poorpretty, naughty Nannie. Nannie smiled when she met you on the Green, asif she trusted you not to tell how you saw her after dark slinking aboutthe Back Lane waiting for young Horn to come out to her. 

The door opened. Nannie slid away. It was only Mamma. 

"Mary, " she said, "I wish you would remember that Mr. Vickers has come tosee Dan, and that he has only got two days more. "

"It's all right. He's going into Reyburn with him. "

"I'm sure, " her mother said, "I wish he'd stay here. "

She pottered about the room, taking things up and putting them downagain. Presently Catty came for her and she went out. 

Mary began to play the Sonata _Appassionata_. She thought: "I don't careif he doesn't come. I want to play it, and I shall. "

He came. He stood close beside her and listened. Once he put his hand onher arm. "Oh no, " he said. "_Not_ like that. "

She stood up and faced him. "Tell me the truth, shall I ever be any good?Shall I ever play?"

"Do you really want the truth?"

"Of course I do. "

Her mind fastened itself on her playing. It hid and sheltered itselfbehind her playing. 

"Let's look at your hands. "

She gave him her hands. He lifted them; he felt the small bones slidingunder the skin, he bent back the padded tips, the joints of the fingers. 

"There's no reason why you shouldn't have played magnificently, " he said. 

"Only I don't. I never have. "

"No, you never have. "

He came closer; she didn't know whether he drew her to him or whether hecame closer. A queer, delicious feeling, a new feeling, thrilled throughher body to her mouth, to her finger-tips. Her head swam slightly. Shekept her eyes open by an effort. 

He gave her back her hands. She remembered. They had been talking abouther playing. 

"I knew, " she said, "it was bad in places. "

"I don't care whether it's bad or good. It's you. The only part of youthat can get out. You're very bad in places, but you do something to meall the same. "

"What do I do?"

"You know what you do. "

"I don't. I don't really. Tell me. "

"If you don't know, I can't tell you--dear--"

He said it so thickly that she was not sure at the time whether he hadreally said it. She remembered afterwards. 

"There's Dan, " she whispered. 

He swung himself off from her and made himself a rigid figure at thewindow. Dan stood in the doorway. He was trying to took as if she wasn'tthere. 

"I say, aren't you coming to Reyburn?"

"No, I'm not. "

"Why not?"

"I've got a headache. "

"_What_?"

"Headache. "

Outside on the flagstones she saw Nannie pass again and look in. 

VIII. 

An hour later she was sitting on the slope under the hill road ofGreffington Edge. He lay on his back beside her in the bracken. LindleyVickers. 

Suddenly he pulled himself up into a sitting posture like her own. Shewas then aware that Mr. Sutcliffe had gone up the road behind them; hehad lifted his hat and passed her without speaking. 

"What does Sutcliffe talk to you about?"

"Farming. "

"And what do you do?"

"Listen. "

Below them, across the dale, they could see the square of Morfe on itsplatform. 

"How long have you lived in that place?"

"Ten years. No; eleven. "

"Women, " he said, "are wonderful. I can't think where you come from. Iknew your father, I know Dan and your mother, and Victor Olivier and youraunt--"

"Which aunt?"

"The Unitarian lady; and I knew Mark--and Rodney. They don't account foryou. "

"Does anybody account for anybody else?"

"Yes. You believe in heredity?"

"I don't know enough about it. "

"You should read Haeckel--_The History of Evolution_, and Herbert Spencerand Ribot's _Heredity_. It would interest you.... No, it wouldn't. Itwouldn't interest you a bit. "

"It sounds as if it would rather. "

"It wouldn't.... Look here, promise me you won't think about it, you'lllet it alone. Promise me. "

He was like Jimmy making you promise not to hang out of top-storeywindows. 

"No good making promises. "

"Well, " he said, "there's nothing in it.... I wish I hadn't said thatabout your playing. I only wanted to see whether you'd mind or not. "

"I don't mind. What does it matter? When I'm making music I think there'snothing but music in all the world; when I'm doing philosophy I thinkthere's nothing but philosophy in all the world; when I'm writing versesI think there's nothing but writing in all the world; and when I'mplaying tennis I think there's nothing but tennis in all the world. "

"I see. And when you suffer you think there's nothing but suffering inall the world. "

"Yes. "

"And when--and when--"

His face was straight and serious and quiet. His eyes covered her; firsther face, then her breasts; she knew he could see her bodice quiver withthe beating of her heart. She felt afraid. 

"Then, " he said, "you'll not think; you'll know. "

She thought: "He didn't say it. He won't. He can't. It isn't possible. "

"Hadn't we better go?"

He sprang to his feet. 

"Much better, " he said. 

IX. 

She would not see him again that day. Dan was going to dine with him atthe Buck Hotel. 

When Dan came back from Reyburn he said he wouldn't go. He had aheadache. If Vickers could have a headache, so could he. He sulked allevening in the smoking-room by himself; but towards nine o'clock hethought better of it and went round, he said, to look Vickers up. 

Her mother yawned over her book; and the yawns made her impatient; shewanted to be out of doors, walking, instead of sitting there listening toMamma. 

At nine o'clock Mamma gave one supreme yawn and dragged herself to bed. 

She went out through the orchard into the Back Lane. She could see NannieLearoyd sitting on the stone stairs of Horn's granary, waiting for youngHorn to come round the corner of his yard. Perhaps they would go up intothe granary and hide under the straw. She turned into the field track tothe schoolhouse and the highway. In the dark bottom the river lay like abroad, white, glittering road. 

She stopped by the schoolhouse, considering whether she would go up tothe moor by the high fields and come back down the lane, or go up thelane and come back down the fields. 

"Too dark to find the gaps if I come back by the fields. " She hadforgotten the hidden moon. 

There was a breaking twilight when she reached the lane. She came down ata swinging stride. Her feet went on the grass borders without a sound. 

At the last crook of the lane she came suddenly on a man and womanstanding in her path by the stone wall. It would be Nannie Learoyd andyoung Horn. They were fixed in one block, their faces tilted backwards, their bodies motionless. The woman's arms were round the man's neck, hisarms round her waist. There was something about the queer back-tiltedfaces--queer and ugly. 

As she came on she saw them break loose from each other and swing apart:Nannie Learoyd and Lindley Vickers. 

X. 

She lay awake all night. Her brain, incapable of thought, kept turninground and round, showing her on an endless rolling screen the images ofLindley and Nannie Learoyd, clinging together, loosening, swinging apart, clinging together. When she came down on Sunday morning breakfast wasover. 

Sunday--Sunday. She remembered. Last night was Saturday night. LindleyVickers was coming to Sunday dinner and Sunday supper. She would have toget away somewhere, to Dorsy or the Sutcliffes. She didn't want to seehim again. She wanted to forget that she ever had seen him. 

Her mother and Dan had shut themselves up in the smoking-room; she foundthem there, talking. As she came in they stopped abruptly and looked ateach other. Her mother began picking at the pleats in her gown withnervous, agitated fingers. Dan got up and left the room. 

"Well, Mary, you'll not see Mr. Vickers again. He's just told Dan heisn't coming. "

Then he knew that she had seen him in the lane with Nannie. 

"I don't want to see him, " she said. 

"It's a pity you didn't think of that before you put us in such aposition. "

She understood Lindley; but she wasn't even trying to understand hermother. The vexed face and picking fingers meant nothing to her. She wassaying to herself, "I can't tell Mamma I saw him with Nannie in the lane. I oughtn't to have seen him. He didn't know anybody was there. He didn'twant me to see him. I'd be a perfect beast to tell her. "

Her mother went on: "I don't know what to do with you, Mary. One wouldhave thought my only daughter would have been a comfort to me, but Ideclare you've given me more trouble than any of my children. "

"More than Dan?"

"Dan hadn't a chance. He'd have been different if your poor father hadn'tdriven him out of the house. He'd be different now if your Uncle Victorhad kept him.... It's hard for poor Dan if he can't bring his friends tothe house any more because of you. "

"Because of me?"

"Because of your folly. "

She understood. Her mother believed that she had frightened Lindley away. She was thinking of Aunt Charlotte. 

It would have been all right if she could have told her about Nannie;then Mamma would have seen why Lindley couldn't come. 

"I don't care, " she thought. "She may think what she likes. I can't tellher. "

XI. 

Lindley Vickers had gone. Nothing was left of him but Mamma's silence andDan's, and Nannie's flush as she slunk by and her obscene smirk ofsatisfaction. 

Then Nannie forgot him. As if nothing had happened she hung about Horn'syard and the Back Lane, waiting for young Horn. She smiled her trustingsmile again. As long as you lived in Morfe you would remember. 

Mary didn't blame her mother and Dan for their awful attitude. Shecouldn't blink the fact that she had begun to care for a man who was nobetter than young Horn, who had shown her that he didn't care for her bygoing to Nannie. If he could go to Nannie he was no better than youngHorn. 

She thought of Lindley's communion with Nannie as a part of him, essential, enduring. Beside it, her own communion with him was not quitereal. She remembered his singing; she remembered playing to him andsitting beside him on the bracken as you remember things that havehappened to you a long time ago (if they had really happened). Sheremembered phrases broken from their context (if they had ever had acontext): "Das man vom liebsten was man hat.... " "If you don't know Ican't tell you--Dear. " ... "And when--when--Then you won't think, you'll_know_. "

She said to herself, "I must have been mad. It couldn't have happened. Imust have made it up. "

But, if you made up things like that you _were_ mad. It was what AuntCharlotte had done. She had lived all her life in a dream of loving andbeing loved, a dream that began with clergymen and ended with thepiano-tuner and the man who did the clocks. Mamma and Dan knew it. UncleVictor knew it and he had been afraid. Maurice Jourdain knew it and hehad been afraid. Perhaps Lindley Vickers knew it, too. 

There must be something in heredity. She thought: "If there is I'd ratherface it. It's cowardly not to. "

Lindley Vickers had told her what to read. Herbert Spencer she knew. Haeckel and Ribot were in the London Library Catalogue at GreffingtonHall. And Maudsley: she had seen the name somewhere. It was perhaps luckythat Mr. Sutcliffe had gone abroad early this year; for he had begun tofollow her through Balzac and Flaubert and Maupassant, since when he hadsometimes interfered with her selection. 

The books came down in two days: Herbert Spencer's _First Principles_, the _Principles of Biology_, the _Principles of Psychology_; Haeckel's_History of Evolution_; Maudsley's _Body and Mind, Physiology andPathology of Mind, Responsibility in Mental Disease_; and Ribot's_Heredity_. Your instinct told you to read them in that order, controlling personal curiosity. 

For the first time in her life she understood what Spinoza meant by "theintellectual love of God. " She saw how all things work together for goodto those who, in Spinoza's sense, love God. If it hadn't been for AuntCharlotte and Lindley Vickers she might have died without knowinganything about the exquisite movements and connections of the live world. She had spent most of her time in the passionate pursuit of things underthe form of eternity, regardless of their actual behaviour in time. Shehad kept on for fifteen years trying to find out the reality--if therewas any reality--that hid behind appearances, piggishly obtuse to theinterest of appearances themselves. She had cared for nothing in them buttheir beauty, and its exciting play on her emotions. When life broughtugly things before her she faced them with a show of courage, butinwardly she was sick with fear. 

For the first time she saw the ugliest facts take on enchantment, asecret and terrible enchantment. Dr. Mitchell's ape-faced idiot; Dr. Browne's girl with the goose-face and goose-neck, billing her shoulderslike a bird. 

There was something in Heredity. But the sheer interest of it made youforget about Papa and Mamma and Aunt Charlotte; it kept you from thinkingabout yourself. You could see why Ribot was so excited about his laws ofHeredity: "They it is that are real.... " "To know a fact thoroughly is toknow the quality and quantity of the laws that compose it ... Facts arebut appearances, laws the reality. "

There was Darwin's Origin of Species. According to Darwin, it didn't seemlikely that anything so useless as insanity could be inherited at all;according to Maudsley and Ribot, it seemed even less likely that sanitycould survive. To be sure, after many generations, insanity was stampedout; but not before it had run its course through imbecility to idiocy, infecting more generations as it went. 

Maudsley was solemn and exalted in his desire that there should be nomistake about it. "There is a destiny made for a man by his ancestors, and no one can elude, were he able to attempt it, the tyranny of hisorganisation. "

You had been wrong all the time. You had thought of your family, Papa andMamma, perhaps Grandpapa and Grandmamma, as powerful, but independent andseparate entities, in themselves sacred and inviolable, working againstyou from the outside: either with open or secret and inscrutablehostility, hindering, thwarting, crushing you down. But always from theoutside. You had thought of yourself as a somewhat less powerful, butstill independent and separate entity, a sacred, inviolable self, struggling against them for completer freedom and detachment. Crusheddown, but always getting up and going on again; fighting a more and moresuccessful battle for your own; beating them in the end. But it was notso. There were no independent, separate entities, no sacred, inviolableselves. They were one immense organism and you were part of it; you werenothing that they had not been before you. It was no good struggling. Youwere caught in the net; you couldn't get out. 

And so were they. Mamma and Papa were no more independent and separatethan you were. Dan had gone like Papa, but Papa had gone like Grandpapaand Grandmamma Olivier. Nobody ever said anything about GrandpapaOlivier; so perhaps there had been something queer about him. Anyhow, Papa couldn't help drinking any more than Mamma could help being sweetand gentle; they hadn't had a choice or a chance. 

How senseless you had been with your old angers and resentments. Now thatyou understood, you could never feel anger or resentment any more. Aslong as you lived you could never feel anything but love for them andcompassion. Mamma, Papa and Aunt Charlotte, Dan and Roddy, they werecaught in the net. They couldn't get out. 

Dan and Roddy--But Mark had got out. Why not you?

They were not all alike. Papa and Uncle Victor were different; and AuntCharlotte and Aunt Lavvy. Papa had married and handed it on; he hadn'tcared. Uncle Victor hadn't married; he had cared too much; he had beenafraid. 

And Maurice Jourdain and Lindley Vickers had been afraid; everybody whoknew about Aunt Charlotte would be afraid, and if they didn't know youwould have to tell them, supposing--

You would be like Aunt Lavvy. You would live in Morfe with Mamma for yearsand years as Aunt Lavvy had lived with Grandmamma. First you would belike Dorsy Heron; then like Louisa Wright; then like Aunt Lavvy. 

No; when you were forty-five you would go like Aunt Charlotte. 

XII. 

Anyhow, she had filled in the time between October and March when theSutcliffes came back. 

If she could talk to somebody about it--But you couldn't talk to Mamma;she would only pretend that she hadn't been thinking about Aunt Charlotteat all. If Mark had been there--But Mark wasn't there, and Dan would onlycall you a little fool. Aunt Lavvy? She would tell you to love God. EvenAunt Charlotte could tell you that. 

She could see Aunt Charlotte sitting up in the big white bed and saying"Love God and you'll be happy, " as she scribbled letters to Mr. Marriottand hid them under the bedclothes. 

Uncle Victor? Uncle Victor was afraid himself. 

Dr. Charles--He looked at you as he used to look at Roddy. Perhaps heknew about Aunt Charlotte and wondered whether you would go like her. Or, if he didn't wonder, he would only give you the iron pills and arsenic hegave to Dorsy. 

Mrs. Sutcliffe? You couldn't tell a thing like that to Mrs. Sutcliffe. She wouldn't know what you were talking about; or if she did know shewould gather herself up, spiritually, in her shawl, and trail away. 

Mr. Sutcliffe--He would know. If you could tell him. You might take backMaudsley and Ribot and ask him if he knew anything about heredity, andwhat he thought of it. 

She went to him one Wednesday afternoon. He was always at home onWednesday afternoons. She knew how it would be. Mrs. Sutcliffe would beshut up in the dining-room with the sewing-party. You would go in. Youwould knock at the library door. He would be there by himself, in the bigarm-chair, smoking and reading; the small armchair would be waiting foryou on the other side of the fireplace. He would be looking rather oldand tired, and when he saw you he would jump up and pull himself togetherand be young again. 

The library door closed softly. She was in the room before he saw her. 

He was older and more tired than you could have believed. He stooped inhis chair; his long hands rested on his knees, slackly, as they haddropped there. Grey streaks in the curly lock of hair that _would_ fallforward and be a whisker. 

His mouth had tightened and hardened. It held out; it refused to becomeold and tired. 

"It's Mary, " she said. 

"My dear--"

He dragged himself to his feet, making his body very straight and stiff. His eyes glistened; but they didn't smile. Only his eyelids and his mouthsmiled. His eyes were different, their blue was shrunk and flattened anddrawn back behind the lense. 

When he moved, pushing forward the small arm-chair, she saw how lean andstiff he was. 

"I've been ill, " he said. 

"Oh--!"

"I'm all right now. "

"No. You oughtn't to have come back from Agaye. "

"I never do what I ought, Mary. "

She remembered how beautiful and strong he used to be, when he danced andwhen he played tennis, and when he walked up and down the hills. Hisbeauty and his strength had never moved her to anything but a happy, tranquil admiration. She remembered how she had seen Maurice Jourdaintired and old (at thirty-three), and how she had been afraid to look athim. She wondered, "Was that my fault, or his? If I'd cared should I haveminded? If I cared for Mr. Sutcliffe I wouldn't mind his growing tiredand old. The tireder and older he was the more I'd care. "

Somehow you couldn't imagine Lindley Vickers growing old and tired. 

She gave him back the books: Ribot's _Heredity_ and Maudsley's_Physiology and Pathology of Mind_. He held them in his long, thin hands, reading the titles. His strange eyes looked at her over the tops of thebindings. He smiled. 

"When did you order these, Mary?"

"In October. "

"That's the sort of thing you do when I'm away, is it?"

"Yes--I'm afraid you won't care for them very much. "

He still stood up, examining the books. He was dipping into Maudsley nowand reading him. 

"You don't mean to say you've _read_ this horrible stuff?"

"Every word of it. I _had_ to. "

"You had to?"

"I wanted to know about heredity. "

"And insanity?"

"That's part of it. I wanted to see if there was anything in it. Heredity, I mean. Do you think there is?"

She kept her eyes on him. He was still smiling. 

"My dear child, you know as much as I do. Why are you worrying your poorlittle head about madness?"

"Because I can't help thinking I may go mad. "

"I should think the same if I read Maudsley. I shouldn't be quite surewhether I was a general paralytic or an epileptic homicide. "

"You see--I'm not afraid because I've been reading him; I've been readinghim because I was afraid. Not even afraid, exactly. As a matter of factwhile you're reading about it you're so interested that you forget aboutyourself. It's only when you've finished that you wonder. "

"What makes you wonder?"

He threw Maudsley aside and sat down in the big armchair. 

"That's just what I don't think I can tell you. "

"You used to tell me things, Mary. I remember a little girl with shorthair who asked me whether cutting off her hair would make me stop caringfor her. "

"Not _you_ caring for _me_. "

"Precisely. So, if you can't tell me who _can_ you tell?"

"Nobody. "

"Come, then.... Is it because of your father? Or Dan?"

She thought: "After all, I can tell him. "

"No. Not exactly. But it's somebody. One of Papa's sisters--AuntCharlotte. You see. Mamma seems to think I'm rather like her. "

"Does Aunt Charlotte read Kant and Hegel and Schopenhauer, to find outwhether the Thing-in-itself is mind or matter? Does she read Maudsley andRibot to find out what's the matter with her mind?"

"I don't think she ever read anything. "

"What _did_ she do?"

"Well--she doesn't seem to have done much but fall in love with people. "

"She'd have been a very abnormal lady if she'd never fallen in love atall, Mary. "

"Yes; but then she used to think people were in love with her when theyweren't. "

"How old is Aunt Charlotte?"

"She must be ages over fifty now. "

"Well, my dear, you're just twenty-eight, and I don't think you've beenin love yet. "

"That's it. I have. "

"No. You've only thought you were. Once? Twice, perhaps? You may havebeen very near it--for ten minutes. But a man might be in love with youfor ten years, and you wouldn't be a bit the wiser, if he held his tongueabout it.... No. People don't go off their heads because their aunts do, or we should all of us be mad. There's hardly a family that hasn't gotsomebody with a tile loose. "

"Then you don't think there's anything in it?"

"I don't think there's anything in it in your case. Anything at all. "

"I'm glad I told you. "

She thought: "It isn't so bad. Whatever happens he'll be here. "

XIII. 

The sewing-party had broken up. She could see them going before her onthe road, by the garden wall, by the row of nine ash-trees in the field, round the curve and over Morfe Bridge. 

Bobbing shoulders, craning necks, stiff, nodding heads in funny hats, turning to each other. 

When she got home she found Mrs. Waugh, and Miss Frewin in thedrawing-room with Mamma. They had brought her the news. 

The Sutcliffes were going. They were trying to let Greffington Hall. Theagent, Mr. Oldshaw, had told Mr. Horn. Mr. Frank, the Major, would beback from India in April. He was going to be married. He would live inthe London house and Mr. And Mrs. Sutcliffe would live abroad. 

Mamma said, "If their son's coming back they've chosen a queer time to goaway. "

XIV. 

It couldn't be true. 

You knew it when you dined with them, when you saw the tranquil Regencyfaces looking at you from above the long row of Sheraton chairs, thepretty Gainsborough lady smiling from her place above the sideboard. 

As you sat drinking coffee out of the dark blue coffee cups with goldlinings you knew it couldn't be true. You were reassured by the patternof the chintzes--pink roses and green leaves on a pearl-grey ground--bythe crystal chains and pendants of the chandelier, by the round blackmirror sunk deep in the bowl of its gilt frame. 

They couldn't go; for if they went, the quiet, gentle life of thesethings would be gone. The room had no soul apart from the two utterlybeloved figures that sat there, each in its own chintz-covered chair. 

"It isn't true, " she said, "that you're going?"

She was sitting on the polar bear hearthrug at Mrs. Sutcliffe's feet. 

"Yes, Mary. "

The delicate, wrinkled hand came out from under the cashmere shawl tostroke her arm. It kept on stroking, a long, loving, slow caress. It madeher queerly aware of her arm--white and slender under the big puff of thesleeve--lying across Mrs. Sutcliffe's lap. 

"He'll be happier in his garden at Agaye. "

She heard herself assenting. "_He_'ll be happier. " And breaking out. "ButI shall never be happy again. "

"You mustn't say that, my dear. "

The hand went on stroking. 

"There's no place on earth, " she said, "where I'm so happy as I am here. "

Suddenly the hand stopped; it stiffened; it drew back under the cashmereshawl. 

She turned her head towards Mr. Sutcliffe in his chair on the other sideof the hearthrug. 

His face had a queer, strained look. His eyes were fixed, fixed on thewhite, slender arm that lay across his wife's lap. 

And Mrs. Sutcliffe's eyes were fixed on the queer, strained face. 

XV. 

Uncle Victor's letter was almost a relief. 

She had not yet allowed herself to imagine what Morfe would be likewithout the Sutcliffes. And, after all, they wouldn't have to live in it. If Dan accepted Uncle Victor's offer, and if Mamma accepted hisconditions. 

Uncle Victor left no doubt as to his conditions. He wouldn't take Danback unless Mamma left Morfe and made a home for him in London. He wantedthem all to live together at Five Elms. 

The discussion had lasted from a quarter-past nine till half-past ten. Mamma still sat at the breakfast-table, crumpling and uncrumpling theletter. 

"I wish I knew what to do, " she said. 

"Better do what you want, " Dan said. "Stay here if you want to. Go backto Five Elms if you want to. But for God's sake don't say you're doing iton my account. "

He got up and went out of the room. 

"Goodness knows I don't want to go back to Five Elms. But I won't standin Dan's way. If your Uncle Victor thinks I ought to make the sacrifice, I shall make it. "

"And Dan, " Mary said, "will make the sacrifice of going back to Victor'soffice. It would be simpler if he went to Canada. "

"Your uncle can't help him to go to Canada. He won't hear of it.... Isuppose we shall have to go. "

They were going. You could hear Mrs. Belk buzzing round the village withthe news. "The Oliviers are going. "

One day Mrs. Belk came towards her, busily, across the Green. 

She stopped to speak, while her little iron-grey eyes glanced offsideways, as if they saw something important to be done. 

The Sutcliffes were not going, after all. 

XVI. 

When it was all settled and she thought that Dan had gone into Reyburn afortnight ago to give notice to the landlord's solicitors, one evening, as she was coming home from the Aldersons' he told her that he hadn'tbeen to the solicitors at all. 

He had arranged yesterday for his transport on a cattle ship sailing nextweek for Montreal. 

He said he had always meant to go out to Jem Alderson when he had learntenough from Ned. 

"Then why, " she said, "did you let Mamma tell poor Victor--"

"I wanted her to have the credit of the sacrifice, " he said. 

And then: "I don't like leaving you here--"

An awful thought came to her. 

"Are you sure you aren't going because of me?"

"You? What on earth are you thinking of?"

"That time--when you wouldn't ask Lindley Vickers to stop on. "

"Oh ... I didn't ask him because I knew he wanted to stop altogether. AndI don't approve of him. "

She turned and stared at him. "Then it wasn't that you didn't approve of_me_?"

"What put that in your head?"

"Mamma. She told me you couldn't ask anybody again because of me. Shesaid I'd frightened Lindley Vickers away. Like Aunt Charlotte. "

Dan smiled, a sombre, reminiscent smile. 

"You don't mean to say you still take Mamma seriously? _I_ never did. "

"But--Mark--"

"Or him either. "

It hurt her like some abominable blasphemy. 

XVII

Nothing would ever happen. She would stay on in Morfe, she and Mamma:without Mark, without Dan, without the Sutcliffes.... 

They were going.... 

They were gone. 

XXVIII

I. 

She lay out on the moor, under the August sun. Her hands were pressedlike a bandage over her eyes. When she lifted them she caught the faintpink glow of their flesh. The light throbbed and nickered as she pressedit out, and let it in. 

The sheep couched, panting, in the shade of the stone covers. She lay sostill that the peewits had stopped their cry. 

Something bothered her.... 

_And in the east one pure, prophetic star_--one pure propheticstar--_Trembles between the darkness and the dawn_. 

What you wrote last year. No reason why you shouldn't write modern playsin blank verse if you wanted to. Only people didn't say those things. Youcouldn't do it that way. 

Let the thing go. Tear it to bits and burn them in the kitchen fire. 

If you lay still, perfectly still, and stopped thinking the other thingwould come back. 

 _In dreams He has made you wise, With the wisdom of silence and prayer, God, who has blinded your eyes, With the dusk of your hair_. 

The Mother. The Mother. Mother and Son. 

 _You and he are near akin. Would you slay your brother-in-sin? What he does yourself shall do_--

That was the Son's hereditary destiny. 

Lying on her back under Karva, she dreamed her "Dream-Play"; saying theunfinished verses over and over again, so as to remember them when shegot home. She was unutterably happy. 

She thought: "I don't care what happens so long as I can go on. "

She jumped up to her feet. "I must go and see what Mamma's doing. "

Her mother was sewing in the drawing-room and waiting for her to come totea. She looked up and smiled. 

"What are you so pleased about?" she said. 

"Oh, nothing. "

Mamma was adorable, sitting there like a dove on its nest, dressed in adove's dress, grey on grey, turning dove's eyes to you in soft, crinklylids. She held her head on one side, smiling at some secret that shekept. Mamma was happy, too. 

"What are you looking such an angel for?"

Mamma lifted up her work, showing an envelope that lay on her lap, thecrested flap upwards, a blue gun-carriage on a white ground, and themotto: "_Ubique_. "

Catty had been into Reyburn to shop and had called for the letters. Markwas coming home in April. 

"Oh--Mamma--"

"There's a letter for you, Mary. "

(Not from Mark. )

"If he gets that appointment he won't go back. " She thought: "She'llnever be unhappy again. She'll never be afraid he'll get cholera. "

For a minute their souls met and burned together in the joy they shared. 

Then broke apart. 

"Aren't you going to show me Mr. Sutcliffe's letter?"

"Why should I?"

"You don't mean to say there's anything in it I can't see?"

"You can see it if you like. There's nothing in it. "

That was why she hadn't wanted her to see it. For anything there was init you might never have known him. But Mrs. Sutcliffe had sent her love. 

Mamma looked up sharply. 

"Did you write to him, Mary?"

"Of course I did. "

"You'll not write again. He's let you know pretty plainly he isn't goingto be bothered. "

(It wasn't that. It couldn't be that. )

"Did they say anything more about your going there?"

"No. "

"That ought to show you then.... But as long as you live you'll giveyourself away to people who don't want you. "

"I'd rather you didn't talk about them. "

"I should like to know what I _can_ talk about, " said Mamma. 

She folded up her work and laid it in the basket. 

Her voice dropped from the sharp note of resentment. 

"I wish you'd go and see if those asters have come. "

II. 

The asters had come. She had carried out the long, shallow boxes into thegarden. She had left her mother kneeling beside them, looking withadoration into the large, round, innocent faces, white and purple, mauveand magenta and amethyst and pink. If the asters had not come the memoryof the awful things they had said to each other would have remained withthem till bed-time; but Mamma would be happy with the asters like a childwith its toys, planning where they were to go and planting them. 

She went up to her room. After thirteen years she had still the samechildish pleasure in the thought that it was hers and couldn't be takenfrom her, because nobody else wanted it. 

The bookshelves stretched into three long rows on the white wall aboveher bed to hold the books Mr. Sutcliffe had given her; a light blue rowfor the Thomas Hardys; a dark blue for the George Merediths; royal blueand gold for the Rudyard Kiplings. And in the narrow upright bookcase inthe arm of the T facing her writing-table, Mark's books: the Homers andthe Greek dramatists. Their backs had faded from puce colour to drab. 

Mark's books. --When she looked at them she could still feel her old, childish lust for possession, her childish sense of insecurity, ofdefeat. And something else. The beginning of thinking things about Mamma. She could see herself standing in Mark's bedroom at Five Elms and Mammawith her hands on Mark's books. She could hear herself saying, "You'reafraid. "

"What did I think Mamma was afraid of?"

Mamma was happy out there with the asters. 

There would be three hours before dinner. 

She began setting down the fragments of the "Dream-Play" that had come toher: then the outlines. She saw very clearly and precisely how it wouldhave to be. She was intensely happy. 

 * * * * *

She was still thinking of it as she went across the Green to the postoffice, instead of wondering why the postmistress had sent for her, andwhy Miss Horn waited for her by the house door at the side, or why shelooked at her like that, with a sort of yearning pity and fear. Shefollowed her into the parlour behind the post office. 

Suddenly she was awake to the existence of this parlour and its yellowcane-bottomed chairs and round table with the maroon cloth and the whitealabaster lamp that smelt. The orange envelope lay on the maroon cloth. Miss Horn covered it with her hand. 

"It's for Mr. Dan, " she said. "I daren't send it to the house lest yourmother should get it. "

She gave it up with a slow, unwilling gesture. 

"It's bad news, Miss Mary. "

 "_Your Brother Died This Evening_. "

Her heart stopped, staggered and went on again. _"Poona"_--Mark--

 "_Your Brother Died This Evening_. --SYMONDS. "

"This evening" was yesterday. Mark had died yesterday. 

Her heart stopped again. She had a sudden feeling of suffocation andsickness. 

Her mind left off following the sprawl of the thick grey-black letters onthe livid pink form. 

It woke again to the extraordinary existence of Miss Horn's parlour. Itwent back to Mark, slowly, by the way it had come, by the smell of thelamp, by the orange envelope on the maroon cloth. 

Mark. And something else. 

Mamma--Mamma. She would have to know. 

Miss Horn still faced her, supporting herself by her spread hands presseddown on to the table. Her eyes had a look of gentle, helplessinterrogation, as if she said, "What are you going to do about it?"

She did all the necessary things; asked for a telegram form, filled itin: "_Send Details_, MARY OLIVIER"; and addressed it to Symonds of "E"Company. And all the time, while her hand moved over the paper, she wasthinking, "I shall have to tell Mamma. "

III. 

The five windows of the house stared out at her across the Green. Sheavoided them by cutting through Horn's yard and round by the Back Laneinto the orchard. She was afraid that her mother would see her before shehad thought how she would tell her that Mark was dead. She shut herselfinto her room to think. 

She couldn't think. 

She dragged herself from the window seat to the chair by thewriting-table and from the chair to the bed. 

She could still feel her heart staggering and stopping. Once she thoughtit was going to stop altogether. She had a sudden pang of joy. "If itwould stop altogether--I should go to Mark. Nothing would matter. Ishouldn't have to tell Mamma that he's dead. " But it always went onagain. 

She thought of Mark now without any feeling at all except that bodilydistress. Her mind was fixed in one centre of burning, lucid agony. Mamma. 

"I can't tell her. I can't. It'll kill her.... I don't see how she's tolive if Mark's dead.... I shall send for Aunt Bella. She can do it. Or Imight ask Mrs. Waugh. Or Mr. Rollitt. "

She knew she wouldn't do any of these things. She would have to tell her. 

She heard the clock strike the half hour. Half-past five. Not yet. "Whenit strikes seven I shall go and tell Mamma. "

She lay down on her bed and listened for the strokes of the clock. Shefelt nothing but an immense fatigue, an appalling heaviness. Her back andarms were loaded with weights that held her body down on to the bed. 

"I shall never be able to get up and tell her. "

Six. Half-past. At seven she got up and went downstairs. Through the openside door she saw her mother working in the garden. 

She would have to get her into the house. 

"Mamma--darling. "

But Mamma wouldn't come in. She was planting the last aster in the row. She went on scooping out the hole for it, slowly and deliberately, withher trowel, and patting the earth about it with wilful hands. There was alittle smudge of grey earth above the crinkles in her soft, sallow-whiteforehead. 

"You wait, " she said. 

She smiled like a child pleased with itself for taking its own way. 

Mary waited. 

She thought: "Three hours ago I was angry with her. I was angry with her. And Mark was dead then. And when she read his letter. He was deadyesterday. "

IV. 

Time was not good to you. Time was cruel. Time made you see. 

Yet somehow they had gone through time. Nights of August and Septemberwhen you got up before daybreak to listen at her door. Days when you didnothing. Mamma sat upright in her chair with her hands folded on her lap. She kept her back to the window: you saw her face darkening in the dusk. When the lamp came she raised her arm and the black shawl hung from itand hid her face. Nights of insane fear when you _had_ to open her doorand look in to see whether she were alive or dead. Days when you wereafraid to speak, afraid to look at each other. Nights when you couldn'tsleep for wondering how Mark had died. They might have told you. Theymight have told you in one word. They didn't, because they couldn't;because the word was too awful. They would never say how Mark died. Mammathought he had died of cholera. 

You started at sounds, at the hiss of the flame in the grate, the fall ofthe ashes on the hearth, the tinkling of the front door bell. 

You heard Catty slide back the bolt. People muttered on the doorstep. Yousaw them go back past the window, quietly, their heads turned away. Theywere ashamed. 

You began to go out. You walked slowly, weighted more than ever by yourimmense, inexplicable fatigue. When you saw people coming you tried to goquicker; when you spoke to them you panted and felt absurd. A coldnesscame over you when you saw Mrs. Waugh and Miss Frewin with their heads onone side and their shocked, grieved faces. You smiled at them as youpanted, but they wouldn't smile back. Their grief was too great. Theywould never get over it. 

You began to watch for the Indian mail. 

One day the letter came. You read blunt, jerky sentences that told youMark had died suddenly, in the mess room, of heart failure. CaptainSymonds said he thought you would want to know exactly how ithappened.... "Well, we were 'cock-fighting, ' if you know what that is, after dinner. Peters is the heaviest man in our battery, and MajorOlivier was carrying him on his back. We oughtn't to have let him do it. But we didn't know there was anything wrong with his heart. He didn'tknow it himself. We thought he was fooling when he dropped on thefloor.... Everything was done that could be done.... He couldn't havesuffered.... He was happy up to the last minute of his life--shoutingwith laughter. "

She saw the long lighted room. She saw it with yellow walls and yellowlights, with a long, white table and clear, empty wine-glasses. Men instraw-coloured bamboo armchairs turning round to look. She couldn't seetheir faces. She saw Mark's face. She heard Mark's voice, shouting withlaughter. She saw Mark lying dead on the floor. The men stood upsuddenly. Somebody without a face knelt down and bent over him. 

It was as if she had never known before that Mark was dead and knew itnow. She cried for the first time since his death, not because he wasdead, but because he had died like that--playing. 

He should have died fighting. Why couldn't he? There was the Boer War andthe Khyber Pass and Chitral and the Soudan. He had missed them all. Hehad never had what he had wanted. 

And Mamma who had cried so much had left off crying. 

"The poor man couldn't have liked writing that letter, Mary. You needn'tbe angry with him. "

"I'm not angry with him. I'm angry because Mark died like that. "

"Heigh-h--" The sound in her mother's throat was like a sigh and a soband a laugh jerking out contempt. 

"You don't know what you're talking about. He's gone, Mary. If you werehis mother it wouldn't matter to you how he died so long as he didn'tsuffer. So long as he didn't die of cholera. "

"If he could have got what he wanted--"

"What's that you say?"

"If he could have got what he wanted. "

"None of us ever get what we want in this world, " said Mamma. 

She thought: "It was her son--_her_ son she loved, not Mark's real, secret self. He's got away from her at last--altogether. "

V. 

She sewed. 

Every day she went to the linen cupboard and gathered up all the oldtowels and sheets that wanted mending, and she sewed. 

Her mother had a book in her lap. She noticed that if she left off sewingMamma would take up the book and read, and when she began again she wouldput it down. 

Her thoughts went from Mamma to Mark, from Mark to Mamma. She used tobe pleased when she saw you sewing. "Nothing will ever please her now. She'll never be happy again.... I ought to have died instead of Mark.... That's Anthony Trollope she's reading. "

The long sheet kept slipping. It dragged on her arm. Her arms feltswollen, and heavy like bars of lead. She let them drop to her knees.... Little Mamma. 

She picked up the sheet again. 

"Why are you sewing, Mary?"

"I must do _something_. "

"Why don't you take a book and read?"

"I can't read. "

"Well--why don't you go out for a walk?"

"Too tired. "

"You'd better go and lie down in your room. "

She hated her room. Everything in it reminded her of the day after Markdied. The rows of new books reminded her; and Mark's books in the narrowbookcase. They were hers. She would never be asked to give them backagain. Yesterday she had taken out the Aeschylus and looked at it, and shehad forgotten that Mark was dead and had felt glad because it was hers. To-day she had been afraid to see its shabby drab back lest it shouldremind her of that, too. 

Her mother sighed and put her book away. She sat with her hands beforeher, waiting. 

Her face had its old look of reproach and disapproval, the drawn, irritated look you saw when you came between her and Mark. As if yourgrief for Mark came between her and her grief, as if, deep down insideher, she hated your grief as she had hated your love for him, withoutknowing that she hated it. 

Suddenly she turned on you her blurred, wounded eyes. 

"Mary, when you look at me like that I feel as if you knew everything I'mthinking. "

"I don't. I shall never know. "

Supposing all the time she knew what you were thinking? Supposing Markknew? Supposing the dead knew?

She was glad of the aching of her heart that dragged her thought down andnumbed it. 

The January twilight crept between them. She put down her sewing. At thestroke of the clock her mother stirred in her chair. 

"What day of the month is it?" she said. 

"The twenty-fifth. "

"Then--yesterday was your birthday.... Poor Mary. I forgot.... I sithere, thinking. My own thoughts. They make me forget.... Come here. "

She went to her, drawn by a passion stronger than her passion for Mark, her hard, proud passion for Mark. 

Her mother put up her face. She stooped down and kissed her passionately, on her mouth, her wet cheeks, her dove's eyes, her dove's eyelids. Shecrouched on the floor beside her, leaning her head against her lap. Mamma's hand held it there. 

"Are you twenty-nine or thirty?"

"Thirty. "

"You don't look it. You've always been such a little thing.... Youremember the silly question you used to ask me? 'Mamma--would you loveme better if I was two?'"

She remembered. Long ago. When she came teasing for kisses. The sillyquestion. 

"You remember _that_?"

"Yes. I remember. "

Deep down inside her there was something you would never know. 

XXIX

I. 

Mamma was planting another row of asters in the garden in the place ofthose that had died last September. 

The outline of the map of South Africa had gone from the wall at thebottom. Roddy's bit was indistinguishable from the rest. 

And always you knew what would happen. Outside, on the Green, themovements of the village repeated themselves like the play of aclock-work toy. Always the same figures on the same painted stand, markedwith the same pattern of slanting roads and three-cornered grass-plots. Half-way through prayers the Morfe bus would break loose from High Rowwith a clatter, and the brakes would grind on the hill. An hour aftertea-time it would come back with a mournful tapping and scraping ofhoofs. 

She had left off watching for the old red mail-cart to come round thecorner at the bottom. Sometimes, at long intervals, there would be aletter for her from Aunt Lavvy or Dan or Mrs. Sutcliffe. She couldn'ttell when it would come, but she knew on what days the long trolleyswould stop by Mr. Horn's yard loaded with powdery sacks of flour, and onwhat days the brewer's van would draw up to the King's Head and theFarmers' Arms. When she looked out across the Green she caught the hardstare of the Belks' house, the tall, lean, grey house blotched with ironstains. It stood on the sheer edge where the platform dropped to the turnof the road. Every morning at ten o'clock its little door would open andMr. Belk would come out and watch for his London paper. Every evening atten minutes past ten the shadow of Mr. Belk would move across the yellowblind of the drawing-room window on the right; the light would go out, and presently a blond blur would appear behind the blind of the bedroomwindow on the left. 

Every morning at twelve Mrs. Belk would hurry along, waddling andshaking, to leave the paper with her aunt, old Mrs. Heron, in the darkcottage that crouched at the top of the Green. Every afternoon at threeDorsy would bring it back again. 

When Mary came in from the village Mamma would look up and say "Well?" asif she expected her to have something interesting to tell. She wishedthat something would happen so that she might tell Mamma about it. Shetried to think of something, something to say that would interest Mamma. 

"I met Mr. James on the Garthdale Road. Walking like anything. "

"Did you?" Mamma was not interested in Mr. James. 

She wondered, "Why can't I think of things like other people?" She had asense of defeat, of mournful incapacity. 

One day Catty came bustling in with the tea-things, looking important. She had brought news from the village. 

Mrs. Heron had broken her thigh. She had slipped on the landing. Mrs. Belk was with her and wouldn't go away. 

Catty tried to look sorry, but you could see she was pleased because shehad something to tell you. 

They talked about it all through tea-time. They were sorry for Mrs. Heron. They wondered what poor Dorsy would do if anything should happento her. And through all their sorrow there ran a delicate, secret thrillof satisfaction. Something had happened. Something that interested Mamma. 

Two days later Dorsy came in with her tale; her nose was redder, herhare's eyes were frightened. 

"Mrs. Belk's there still, " she said. "She wants to take Aunt to live withher. She wants her to send me away. She says it wouldn't have happened ifI'd looked after her properly. And so it wouldn't, Mary, if I'd beenthere. But I'd a bad headache, and I was lying down for a minute when shefell.... She won't go. She's sitting there in Aunt's room all the time, talking and tiring her. Trying to poison Aunt's mind against me. Workingon her to send me away. "

Dorsy's voice dropped and her face reddened. 

"She thinks I'm after Aunt's money. She's always been afraid of herleaving it to me. I'm only her husband's nephew's daughter. Mrs. Belk'sher real niece.... 

"I'd go to-morrow, Mary, but Aunt wants me there. She doesn't like Mrs. Belk; I think she's afraid of her. And she can't get away from her. Shejust lies there with her poor leg in the splints; there's the four-poundweight from the kitchen scales tied on to keep it on the stretch. If youcould see her eyes turning to me when I come.... 

"One thing--Mrs. Belk's afraid for her life of me. That's why she'strying to poison Aunt's mind. "

When they saw Mrs. Belk hurrying across the Green to Mrs. Heron's housethey knew what she was going for. 

"Poor Dorsy!" they said. 

"Poor Dorsy!"

They had something to talk to each other about now. 

II. 

Winter and spring passed. The thorn-trees flowered on Greffington Edge:dim white groves, magically still under the grey, glassy air. 

May passed and June. The sleek waves of the hay-fields shone with thebrushing of the wind, ready for mowing. 

The elder tree by the garden wall was a froth of greenish white on green. 

At the turn of the schoolhouse lane the flowers began: wild geraniums androse campion, purple and blue and magenta, in a white spray of cow'sparsley: standing high against the stone walls, up and up the green lane. 

Down there, where the two dales spread out at the bottom, a tiny Dutchlandscape. Flat pastures. Trees dotted about. A stiff row of trees at theend. No sky behind them. Trees green on green, not green on blue. Thegreat flood of the sky dammed off by the hills. 

She shut her eyes and saw the flat fields of Ilford, and the low line offlying trees; a thin, watery mirage against the hill. 

Since Mark died she had begun to dream about Ilford. She would struggleand break through out of some dream about Morfe and find herself in LeyStreet, going to Five Elms. She would get past the corner and see the redbrick gable end. Sometimes, when she came up to the gate, the house wouldturn into Greffington Hall. Sometimes it would stand firm with its threerows of flat windows; she would go up the flagged path and see the sumachtree growing by the pantry window; and when the door was opening shewould wake. 

Sometimes the door stood open. She would go in. She would go up thestairs and down the passages, trying to find the schoolroom. She wouldknow that Mark was in the schoolroom. But she could never find it. Shenever saw Mark. The passages led through empty, grey-lit rooms to thebottom of the kitchen stairs, and she would find a dead baby lying amongthe boots and shoes in the cat's cupboard. 

Autumn and winter passed. She was thirty-two. 

III. 

When your mind stopped and stood still it could feel time. Time goingfast, going faster and faster. Every year its rhythm swung on a longercurve. 

Your mind stretched to the span of time. There was something excitingabout this stretch, like a new sense growing. But in your dreams yourmind shrank again; you were a child, a child remembering and returning;haunting old stairs and passages, knocking at shut doors. This childtried to drag you back, it teased you to make rhymes about it. You werenot happy till you had made the rhymes. 

There was something in you that went on, that refused to turn back, tolook for happiness in memory. Your happiness was _now_, in the momentthat you lived, while you made rhymes; while you looked at the whitethorn-trees; while the black-purple cloud passed over Karva. 

Yesterday she had said to Dorsy Heron, "What I can't stand is seeing thesame faces every day. "

But the hill world had never the same face for five minutes. Its veryform changed as the roads turned. The swing of your stride put in play avast, mysterious scene-shifting that disturbed the sky. Moving through ityou stood still in the heart of an immense being that moved. Standingstill you were moved, you were drawn nearer and nearer to its enclosingheart. 

She swung off the road beyond the sickle to the last moor-track that ledto the other side of Karva. She came back by the southern slope, down thetwelve fields, past the four farms. 

The farm of the thorn-tree, the farm of the ash, the farm of the threefirs and the farm all alone. 

Four houses. Four tales to be written. 

There was something in you that would go on, whatever happened. Whateverhappened it would still be happy. Its happiness was not like the queer, sudden, uncertain ecstasy. She had never known _what_ that was. It cameand went; it had gone so long ago that she was sure that whatever it hadbeen it would never come again. She could only remember its happening asyou remember the faint ecstasies of dreams. She thought of it assomething strange and exciting. Sometimes she wondered whether it hadreally happened, whether there wasn't a sort of untruthfulness insupposing it had. 

But that ecstasy and this happiness had one quality in common; theybelonged to some part of you that was free. A you that had no hereditarydestiny; that had got out of the net, or had never been caught in it. 

You could stand aside and look on at its happiness with horror, it didn'tcare. It was utterly indifferent to your praise or blame, and the praiseor blame of other people; or to your happiness and theirs. It was open toyou to own it as your self or to detach yourself from it in your horror. It was stronger and saner than you. If you chose to set up that awfulconflict in your soul that was your own affair. 

Perhaps not your own. Supposing the conflict in you was the tug of thegenerations before you, trying to drag you back to them? Supposing thehorror was _their_ horror, their fear of defeat?

She had left off being afraid of what might happen to her. It might neverhappen. And supposing it did, supposing it had to happen when you wereforty-five, you had still thirteen years to write in. 

"It shan't happen. I won't let it. I won't let them beat me. "

IV. 

Last year the drawer in the writing-table was full. This year it hadoverflowed into the top left-hand drawer of the dressing-table. She hadto turn out all the handkerchiefs and stockings. 

Her mother met her as she was carrying them to the wardrobe in the spareroom. You could see she felt that there was something here that must beenquired into. 

"I should have thought, " she said, "that writing-table drawer wasenough. "

"It isn't. "

"Tt-t--" Mamma nodded her head in a sort of exasperated resignation. 

"Do you mean to say you're going to _keep_ all that?"

"All that? You should see what I've burnt. "

"I should like to know what you're going to do with it!"

"So should I. That's just it--I don't know. "

That night the monstrous thought came to her in bed: Supposing Ipublished those poems--I always meant to do it some day. Why haven't I?Because I don't care? Or because I care too much? Because I'm afraid?Afraid that if somebody reads them the illusion they've created would begone?

How do I know my writing isn't like my playing?

This is different. There's nothing else. If it's taken from me I shan'twant to go on living. 

You didn't want to go on living when Mark died. Yet you went on. As ifMark had never died.... And if Mamma died you'd go on--in your illusion. 

If it is an illusion I'd rather know it. 

How _can_ I know? There isn't anybody here who can tell me. Nobody youcould believe if they told you--I can believe _myself_. I've burnteverything I've written that was bad. 

You believe yourself to-day. You believed yesterday. How do you knowyou'll believe to-morrow?

To-morrow--

V. 

Aunt Lavvy had come to stay. 

When she came you had the old feeling of something interesting about tohappen. Only you knew now that this was an illusion. 

She talked to you as though, instead of being thirty-three, you werestill very small and very young and ignorant of all the things thatreally mattered. She was vaguer and greyer, more placid than ever, andmore content with God. 

Impossible to believe that Papa used to bully her and that Aunt Lavvy hadrevolted. 

"For thirty-three years, Emilius, thirty-three years"--

Sunday supper at Five Elms; on the table James Martineau's _EndeavoursAfter the Christian Life_. 

She wondered why she hadn't thought of Aunt Lavvy. Aunt Lavvy knew Dr. Martineau. As long as you could remember she had always given a strongimpression of knowing him quite well. 

But when Mary had made it clear what she wanted her to ask him to do, itturned out that Aunt Lavvy didn't know Dr. Martineau at all. 

And you could see she thought you presumptuous. 

VI. 

When old Martha brought the message for her to go to tea with MissKendal, Mary slunk out through the orchard into the Back Lane. At thatmoment the prospect of talking two hours with Miss Kendal wasunendurable. 

And there was no other prospect. As long as she lived in Morfe therewould be nothing--apart from her real, secret life there would benothing--to look forward to but that. If it was not Miss Kendal it wouldbe Miss Louisa or Dorsy or old Mrs. Heron. People talked about dying ofboredom who didn't know that you could really die of it. 

If only you didn't keep on wanting somebody--somebody who wasn't there. If, before it killed you, you could kill the desire to know another mind, a luminous, fiery crystal, to see it turn, shining and flashing. To talkto it, to listen to it, to love the human creature it belonged to. 

She envied her youth its capacity for day-dreaming, for imagininginterminable communions. Brilliant hallucinations of a mental hunger. Better than nothing.... If this went on the breaking-point must come. Suddenly you would go smash. Smash. Your mind would die in a delirium ofhunger. 

VII. 

"It's a pity we can't go to his lecture, " said Miss Kendal. 

The train was moving out of Reyburn station. It was awful to think hownearly they had missed it. If Dr. Charles had stayed another minute atthe harness-maker's. 

Miss Kendal sat on the edge of the seat, very upright in her black silkmantle with the accordion-pleated chiffon frills. She had sat like thatsince the train began to pull, ready to get out the instant it stopped atDurlingham. 

"I feel sure it's going to be all right, " she said. 

The white marabou feather nodded. 

Her gentle mauve and sallow face was growing old, with soft curdlings andpuckerings of the skin; but she still carried her head high, nodding atyou with her air of gaiety, of ineffable intrigue. 

"I wouldn't bring you, Mary, if I didn't feel sure. "

If she had not felt sure she wouldn't have put on the grey kid gloves, the mantle and the bonnet with the white marabou feather. You don't dresslike that to go shopping in Durlingham. 

"You mean, " Mary said, "that we shall see him. "

Her heart beat calmly, stilled by the sheer incredibility of theadventure. 

"Of course we shall see him. Mrs. Smythe-Caulfield will manage that. Itmight have been a little difficult if the Professor had been stayinganywhere else. But I know Mrs. Smythe-Caulfield very well. No doubt she'sarranged for you to have a long talk with him. "

"Does she know what I want to see him about?"

"Well--yes--I thought it best, my dear, to tell her just what you toldme, so that she might see how important it is.... There's no knowing whatmay come of it.... Did you bring them with you?"

"No, I didn't. If he won't look at them I should feel such an awfulfool. "

"Perhaps, " said Miss Kendal, "it is wiser not to assume beforehand. Nothing may come of it. Still, I can't help feeling something will.... When you're famous, Mary, I shall think of how we went into Durlinghamtogether. "

"Whatever comes of it I shall think of _you_. "

The marabou feather quivered slightly. 

"How long have we known each other?"

"Seventeen years. "

"Is it so long?... I shall never forget the first day you came with yourmother. I can see you now, Mary, sitting beside my poor father with yourhand on his chair.... And that evening when you played to us, and dearMr. Roddy was there.... "

She thought: "Why can't I be kind--always? Kindness matters more thananything. Some day she'll die and she'll never have said or thought oneunkind thing in all her poor, dreadful little life.... Why didn't I go totea with her on Wednesday?"

On Wednesday her mind had revolted against its destiny of hunger. She hadhated Morfe. She had felt angry with her mother for making her live init, for expecting her to be content, for thinking that Dorsy and MissLouisa and Miss Kendal were enough. She had been angry with Aunt Lavvyfor talking about her to Miss Kendal. 

Yet if it weren't for Miss Kendal she wouldn't be going into Durlinghamto see Professor Lee Ramsden. 

Inconceivable that she should be taken by Miss Kendal to see ProfessorLee Ramsden. Yet this inconceivable thing appeared to be happening. 

She tried to remember what she knew about him. He was Professor ofEnglish literature at the University of London. He had edited Anthologiesand written Introductions. He had written a _History of EnglishLiterature_ from Chaucer to Tennyson and a monograph on Shelley. 

She thought of his mind as a luminous, fiery crystal, shining. 

Posters on the platform at Durlingham announced in red letters thatProfessor Lee Ramsden, M. A. , F. R. S. L. , would lecture in the Town Hall at8 P. M. She heard Miss Kendal saying, "If it had been at three instead ofeight we could have gone. " She had a supreme sense of something about tohappen. 

Heavenly the long, steep-curved glass roof of the station, the ironarches and girders, the fanlights. Foreign and beautiful the black canalbetween the purplish rose-red walls, the white swans swaying on the blackwater, the red shaft of the clock-tower. It shot up high out of theMarket-place, topped with the fantastically large, round, white eye ofits clock. 

She kept on looking up to the clock-tower. At four she would see him. 

They walked about the town. They lunched and shopped. They sat in thePark. They kept on looking at the clock-tower. 

At the bookseller's in the Market-place she bought a second-hand copy ofWalt Whitman's _Leaves of Grass_.... 

A black-grey drive between bushes of smutty laurel and arbutus. Ablack-grey house of big cut stones that stuck out. Gables and bow windowswith sharp freestone facings that stuck out. You waited in a drawing-roomstuffed with fragile mahogany and sea-green plush. Immense sea-greenacanthus leaves, shaded in myrtle green, curled out from the walls. Asuggestion of pictures heaved up from their places by this vigorous, thrusting growth. 

Curtains, cream-coloured net, sea-green plush, veiled the black-greywalks and smutty lawns of the garden. 

While she contemplated these things the long hand of the white marbletombstone clock moved from the hour to the quarter. 

She was reading the inscription, in black letters, on the golden plinth:"Presented to Thomas Smythe-Caulfield, Esqr. , M. P. , by the Council andTeachers of St. Paul's Schools, Durlingham"--"Presented"--when Mrs. Smythe-Caulfield came in. 

A foolish, overblown, conceited face. Grey hair arranged with art andscience, curl on curl. Three-cornered eyelids, hutches for small, malevolently watching eyes. A sharp, insolent nose. Fish's mouth peeringout above the backward slope of cascading chins. 

Mrs. Smythe-Caulfield shook hands at a sidelong arm's-length, not lookingat you, holding Miss Kendal in her sharp pointed stare. They were Kateand Eleanor: Eleanor and Kate. 

"You're going to the lecture?"

"If it had been at three instead of eight--"

"The hour was fixed for the townspeople's convenience. "

In five minutes you had gathered that you would not be allowed to seeProfessor Lee Ramsden; that Professor Lee Ramsden did not desire to seeor talk to anybody except Mrs. Smythe-Caulfield; that he kept his bestthings for her; that _all sorts of people_ were trying to get at him, andthat he trusted her to protect him from invasion; that you had beenadmitted in order that Mrs. Smythe-Caulfield might have the pleasure oftelling you these things. 

Mary saw that the moment was atrocious; but it didn't matter. A curioustranquillity possessed her: she felt something there, close to her, likea person in the room, giving her a sudden security. The moment that wasmattering so abominably to her poor, kind friend belonged to a time thatwas not her time. 

She heard the tinkle of tea cups outside the hall; then a male voice, male footsteps. Mrs. Smythe-Caulfield made a large encircling movementtowards the door. Something interceptive took place there. 

As they went back down the black-grey drive between the laurel andarbutus Miss Kendal carried her head higher than ever. 

"That is the first time in my life, Mary, that I've asked a favour. "

"You did it for me. " ("She hated it, but she did it for me. ")

"Never mind. We aren't going to mind, are we? We'll do without them.... That's right, my dear. Laugh. I'm glad you can. I dare say I shall laughmyself to-morrow. "

"I don't _want_ to laugh, " Mary said. She could have cried when shelooked at the grey gloves and the frilled mantle, and the sad, insultedface in the bonnet with the white marabou feather. (And that horriblewoman hadn't even given her tea. )

The enormous eye of the town clock pursued them to the station. 

As they settled into their seats in the Reyburn train Miss Kendal said, "It's a pity we couldn't go to the lecture. "

She leaned back, tired, in her corner. She closed her eyes. 

Mary opened Walt Whitman's _Leaves of Grass_. 

The beginning had begun. 

XXX

I. 

"What are you reading, Mary?"

"The New Testament.... Extraordinary how interesting it is. "

"Interesting!"

"Frightfully interesting. "

"You may say what you like, Mary; you'll change your mind some day. Ipray every night that you may come to Christ; and you'll find in the endyou'll have to come.... "

No. No. Still, he said, "The Kingdom of God is within you. " If the Greekwould bear it--within you. 

Did they understand their Christ? Had anybody ever understood him? Their"Prince of Peace" who said he hadn't come to send peace, but a sword? Thesword of the Self. He said he had come to set a man against his fatherand the daughter against her mother, and that because of him a man's foesshould be those of his own household. "Gentle Jesus, meek and mild. "

He was not meek and mild. He was only gentle with children and women andsick people. He was brave and proud and impatient and ironic. He wouldn'tstay with his father and mother. He liked happy people who could amusethemselves without boring him. He liked to get away from his disciples, and from Lazarus and Martha and Mary of Bethany, and go to the rich, cosmopolitan houses and hear the tax-gatherer's talk and see the youngRoman captains swaggering with their swords and making eyes at Mary ofMagdala. 

He was the sublimest rebel that ever lived. 

He said, "The spirit blows where it wills. You hear the sound of it, butyou can't tell where it comes from or where it goes to. Everybody that isborn from the spirit is like that. " The spirit blows where it wants to. 

He said it was a good thing for them that he was going away. If he didn'tthe Holy Ghost wouldn't come to them; they would never have any realselves; they would never be free. They would set him up as a god outsidethemselves and worship Him, and forget that the Kingdom of God was withinthem, that God was their real self. 

Their hidden self was God. It was their Saviour. Its existence was thehushed secret of the world. 

Christ knew--he must have known--it was greater than he was. 

It was a good thing for them that Christ died. That was how he savedthem. By going away. By a proud, brave, ironic death. Not at all the sortof death you had been taught to believe in. 

And because they couldn't understand a death like that, they went andmade a god of him just the same. 

But the Atonement was that--Christ's going away. 

II. 

February: grey, black-bellied clouds crawling over Greffington Edge, overKarva, swelling out: swollen bodies crawling and climbing, comingtogether, joining. Monstrous bodies ballooning up behind them, mountingon top of them, flattening them out, pressing them down on to the hills;going on, up and up the sky, swelling out overhead, coming together. 

One cloud, grey as sink water, over all the sky, shredded here and there, stirred by slight stretchings, and spoutings of thin steam. 

Then the whole mass coming down, streaming grey sink water. 

She came down the twelve fields on the south slope of Karva: she couldsay them by heart: the field with the big gap, the field above the fourfirs farm, the field below the farm of the ash-tree, the bare field, thefield with the thorn tree, the field with the sheep's well, the fieldwith the wild rose bush, the steep field of long grass, the hillockyfield, the haunted field with the ash grove, the field with the big barn, the last field with the gap to the road. 

She thought of her thirty-four years; of the verses she had sent to themagazines and how they had come back again; of the four farms on thehill, of the four tales not written. 

The wet field grasses swept, cold, round her ankles. 

Mamma sat waiting in her chair, in the drawing-room, in the clear, grey, glassy dusk of the cross-lights. She waited for the fine weather to comewhen she would work again in the garden. She waited for you to come toher. Her forehead unknitted itself; her dove's eyes brightened; shesmiled, and the rough feathers of her eyebrows lay down, appeased. 

At the opening of the door she stirred in her chair. She was glad whenyou came. 

Catty brought in the lamp. When she turned up the wick the rising flamecarved Mamma's face out of the dusk. Her pretty face, delicately dinted, whitened with a powdery down; stained with faint bistres of age. Herlittle, high-bridged nose stood up from the softness, clear and young, firm as ivory. 

The globed light showed like a ball of fire, hung out in the garden, onthe black, glassy darkness, behind the pane. Catty drew down the blindand went. You heard the click of the latch falling to behind her. Theevening had begun. 

They took up their books. Mamma hid her face behind Anthony Trollope, Mary hers behind Thomas Hardy. Presently she would hear Mamma sigh, thenyawn. 

Horrible tension. 

Under the edge of her book she would see Anthony Trollope lying inMamma's lap and Mamma's fingers playing with the fringe of her shawl. Shewould put Thomas Hardy down and take up Anthony Trollope and read aloudtill Mamma's head began bowing in a doze. Then she would take up ThomasHardy. When Mamma waked Hardy would go down under Trollope; when shedozed he would come to the top again. 

After supper Mamma would be wide awake. She would sit straight up in herchair, waiting, motionless, ready. You would pick up your book but youwould have no heart in it. You knew what she wanted. She knew that youknew. You could go on trying to read if you chose; but she would stillsit there, waiting. You would know what she was thinking of. 

The green box in the cabinet drawer. 

The green box. You began to think of it, too, hidden, hidden in thecabinet drawer. You were disturbed by the thought of the green box, ofthe little figures inside it, white and green. You would get up and go tothe cabinet drawer. 

Mamma would put out her hands on the table, ready. She smiled with shutlips, pouting, half ashamed, half delighted. You would set out the greenand white chequer board, the rows of pawns. And the game of halma wouldbegin. White figures leap-frogging over green, green over white. Yourhand and your eyes playing, your brain hanging inert, remembering, forgetting. 

In the pauses of the game you waited; for the clock to strike ten, forCatty to bring in the Bible and the Prayer-book, for the evening to end. Old verses, old unfinished verses, coming and going. 

In the long pauses of the game, when Mamma sat stone-still, hypnotised bythe green and white chequers, her curved hand lifted, holding her pawn, her head quivering with indecision. 

 _In dreams He has made you wise With the wisdom of silence and prayer.... _

Coming and going, between the leap-frogging of the green figures and thewhite. 

 _God, Who has blinded your eyes With the dusk of your hair.... _

Brown hair, sleek and thin, brown hair that wouldn't go grey. 

And the evening would go on, soundless and calm, with soft, annihilatingfeet, with the soft, cruel feet of oblivion. 

III. 

One day, when she came in, she heard the sound of the piano. The knockingof loose hammers on dead wires, the light, hacking clang of chordsrolling like dead drum taps: Droom--Droom, Droom-era-room. 

Alone in the dusk, Mamma was playing the Hungarian March, bowing andswaying as she played. 

When the door opened she started up, turning her back on the piano, frightened, like a child caught in a play it is ashamed of. The pianolooked mournful and self-conscious. 

Then suddenly, all by itself, it shot out a cry like an arrow, a pinging, stinging, violently vibrating cry. 

"I'm afraid, " Mamma said, "something's happened to the piano. "

IV. 

They were turning out the cabinet drawer, when they found the bundle ofletters. Mamma had marked it in her sharp, three cornered hand-writing:"Correspondence, Mary. "

"Dear me, " she said, "I didn't know I'd kept those letters. "

She slipped them from the rubber band and looked at them. You could seeUncle Victor's on the top, then Maurice Jourdain's. You heard the clickof her tongue that dismissed those useless, unimportant things. The slim, yellowish letter at the bottom was Miss Lambert's. 

"Tt-tt--"

"Oh, let me see that. "

She looked over her mother's shoulder. They read together. 

"We don't want her to go.... She made us love her more in one fortnightthan girls we've had with us for years.... Perhaps some day we may haveher again. "

The poor, kind woman. The kind, dead woman. Years ago dead; her poorvoice rising up, a ghostlike wail over your "unbelief. "

That was only the way she began. 

"I say--I say!"

The thin voice was quivering with praise. Incredible, bewildering praise. "Remarkable. --remarkable". --You would have thought there had never beensuch a remarkable child as Mary Olivier. 

It came back to her. She could see Miss Lambert talking to her father onthe platform at Victoria. She could see herself, excited, running up theflagged walk at Five Elms. And Mamma coming down the hall. And whathappened then. The shock and all the misery that came after. 

"That was the letter you wouldn't let me read. "

"What do you mean?"

"The day I came back. I asked you to let me read it and you wouldn't. "

"Really, Mary, you accuse me of the most awful things. I don't believe Iwouldn't let you read it. "

"You didn't. I remember. You didn't want me to know--"

"Well, " her mother said, giving in suddenly, "if I didn't, it was becauseI thought it would make you even more conceited than you were. I don'tsuppose I was very well pleased with you at the time. "

"Still--you kept it. "

But her mother was not even going to admit that she had kept it. 

She said, "I must have overlooked it. But we can burn it now. "

She carried it across the room to the fire. She didn't want evennow--even now. You saw again the old way of it, her little obstinate, triumphant smile, the look that paid you out, that said, "See how I'vesold you. "

The violet ashen sheet clung to the furred soot of the chimney: you couldstill see the blenched letters. 

She couldn't really have thought it would make you conceited. That wasonly what she wanted to think she had thought. 

"It wasn't easy to make you pleased with me all the time.... Still, Ican't think why on earth you weren't pleased. "

She knelt before the fire, watching the violet ashen bit of burnt-outpaper, the cause, the stupid cause of it all. 

Her mother had settled again, placidly, in her chair. 

"Even if I _was_ a bit conceited.... I don't think I was, really. I onlywanted to know whether I could do things. I wanted people to tell me justbecause I didn't know. But even if I was, what did it matter? You musthave known I loved you--desperately--all the time. "

"I didn't know it, Mary. "

"Then you were stup--"

"Oh, say I was stupid. It's what you think. It's what you always havethought. "

"You were--you were, if you didn't see it. "

"See what?"

"How I cared--I can remember--when I was a kid--the awful feeling. Itused to make me ill. "

"I didn't know that. If you did care you'd a queer way of showing it. "

"That was because I thought you didn't. "

"Who told you I didn't care for you?"

"I didn't need to be told. I could see the difference. "

Her mother sat fixed in a curious stillness. She held her elbows pressedtight against her sides. Her face was hard and still. Her eyes lookedaway across the room. 

"You were different, " she said. "You weren't like any of the others. Iwas afraid of you. You used to look at me with your little bright eyes. Ifelt as if you knew everything I was thinking. I never knew what you'dsay or do next. "

No. Her face wasn't hard. There was something else. Something clear. Clear and beautiful. 

"I suppose I--I didn't like your being clever. It was the boys I wantedto do things. Not you. "

"Don't--Mamma darling--_don't_. "

The stiff, tight body let go its hold of itself. The eyes turned to heragain. 

"I was jealous of you, Mary. And I was afraid for my life you'd find itout. "

V. 

Eighteen ninety-eight. Eighteen ninety-nine. Nineteen hundred. Thirty-five--thirty-six--thirty-seven. Three years. Her mind kept onstretching; it held three years in one span like one year. The largerhythm of time appeased and exalted her. 

In the long summers while Mamma worked in the garden she translated_Euripides_. 

The _Bacchae_. You could do it after you had read Whitman. If you gave upthe superstition of singing; the little tunes of rhyme. If you left offthat eternal jingling and listened, you could hear what it ought to be. 

Something between talking and singing. If you wrote verse that could bechanted: that could be whispered, shouted, screamed as they moved. Agaveand her Maenads. Verse that would go with a throbbing beat, excited, exciting; beyond rhyme. That would be nearest to the Greek verse. 

 * * * * *

September, nineteen hundred. 

Across the room she could see the pale buff-coloured magazine, on thetable where, five minutes ago, Mamma had laid it down. She could see theblack letters of its title and the squat column of the table of contents. The magazine with her poem in it. 

And Mamma, sitting very straight, very still. 

You would never know what she was thinking. She hadn't said anything. Youcouldn't tell whether she was glad or sorry; or whether she was afraid. 

The air tingled with the thought of the magazine with your poem in it. But you would never know what she was thinking. 

VI. 

A long letter from Uncle Edward. Uncle Edward was worrying Mamma. 

"He never could get on with your poor father. Or your Uncle Victor. Hedid his best to prevent him being made trustee.... And now he comesmeddling, wanting to upset all their arrangements. "

"Why?"

"Just because poor Victor's business isn't doing quite so well as itdid. "

"Yes, but why's he bothering _you_ about it?"

"Well, he says I ought to make another will, leaving half the boys' moneyto you. That would be taking it from Dan. He always had a grudge againstpoor Dan. "

"But you mustn't do anything of the sort. "

"Well--he knows your father provided for you. You're to have the FiveElms money that's in your Uncle Victor's business. You'd suppose, to hearhim talk, that it wasn't safe there. "

"Just tell him to mind his own business, " Mary said. 

"Actually, " Mamma went on, "advising me not to pay back any more ofVictor's money. I shall tell him I sent the last of it yesterday. "

There would be no more debts to Uncle Victor. Mark had paid back his;Mamma had paid back Roddy's, scraping and scraping, Mark and Mamma, overten years, over twenty. 

A long letter from Uncle Victor. Uncle Victor was worrying Mamma. 

"Don't imagine that I shall take this money. I have invested it for you, in sound securities. Not in my own business. That, I am afraid I ought totell you, is no longer a sound security. "

"Poor Victor--"

"It almost looks, " Mamma said, "as if Edward might be right. "

So right that in his next letter Uncle Victor prepared you for hisbankruptcy. 

"It will not affect you and Mary, " he wrote. "I may as well tell you nowthat all the Five Elms money has been reinvested, and is safe. As formyself, I can assure you that, after the appalling anxiety of the lastten years, the thought of bankruptcy is a relief. A blessed relief, Caroline. "

All through September and October the long letters came from UncleVictor. 

Then Aunt Lavvy's short letter that told you of his death. 

Then the lawyer's letters. 

It seemed that, after all, Uncle Victor had been mistaken. His affairswere in perfect order. 

Only the Five Elms money was gone; and the money Mark and Mamma had paidback to him. He had taken it all out of his own business, and put it intothe Sheba Mines and Joe's Reef, and the Golconda Company where he thoughtit would be safe. 

The poor dear. The poor dear. 

VII. 

So that you knew--

Mamma might believe what Aunt Lavvy told her, that he had only gone tolook out of the window and had turned giddy. Aunt Lavvy might believethat he didn't know what he was doing. 

But you knew. 

He had been afraid. Afraid. He wouldn't go up to the top-landing afterthey took Aunt Charlotte away; because he was afraid. 

Then, at last, after all those years, he had gone up. When he knew he wascaught in the net and couldn't get out. He had found that they had movedthe linen cupboard from the window back into the night nursery. And hehad bolted the staircase door on himself. He had shut himself up. And thegreat bare, high window was there. And the low sill. And the steep, barewall, dropping to the lane below. 

END OF BOOK FOUR

BOOK FIVEMIDDLE AGE (1900-1910)

XXXI

I. 

She must have been sitting there twenty minutes. 

She was afraid to look up at the clock, afraid to move an eyelid lest sheshould disturb him. 

The library had the same nice, leathery, tobaccoey smell. Rough under herfingers the same little sharp tongue of leather scratched up from the armof her chair. The hanging, half-open fans of the ash-tree would be makingthe same Japanese pattern in the top left hand pane of the third window. She wanted to see it again to make sure of the pattern, but she wasafraid to look up. 

If she looked up she would see him. 

She mustn't. It would disturb him horribly. He couldn't write if hethought you were looking at him. 

It was wonderful that he could go on like that, with somebody in theroom, that he let you sit in it when he was writing. The big man. 

She had asked him whether she hadn't better go away and come back again, and he had said No, he didn't want her to go away. He wouldn't keep herwaiting more than five minutes. 

It was unbelievable that she should be sitting there, in that room, as ifnothing had happened; as if _they_ were there; as if they might come inany minute; as if they had never gone. A week ago she would have said itwas impossible, she couldn't do it, for anybody, no matter how big or howcelebrated he was. 

Why, after ten years--it must be ten years--she couldn't even bear to gopast the house while other people were in it. She hated them, the peoplewho took Greffington Hall for the summer holidays and the autumnshooting. She would go round to Renton by Jackson's yard and the fieldsso as not to see it. But when the brutes were gone and the yellow blindswere down in the long rows of windows that you saw above the grey gardenwall, she liked to pass it and look up and pretend that the house wasonly waiting for them, only sleeping its usual winter sleep, resting tillthey came back. 

It _was_ ten years since they had gone. 

No. If Richard Nicholson hadn't been Mr. Sutcliffe's nephew, shecouldn't, no matter how big and how celebrated he was, or how badly hewanted her help or she wanted his money. 

No matter how wonderful and important it would feel to be RichardNicholson's secretary. 

It wasn't really his money that she wanted. It would be worth whiledoing it for nothing, for the sake of knowing him. She had read his_Euripides_. 

She wondered: Supposing he kept her, how long would it last? He was inthe middle of his First Series of _Studies in Greek Literature_; andthere would be two, or even three if he went on. 

He had taken Greffington Hall for four months. When he went back to Londonhe would have to have somebody else. 

Perhaps he would tell her that, after thinking it over, he had found hedidn't want her. Then to-day would be the end of it. 

If she looked up she would see him. 

She knew what she would see: the fine, cross upper lip lifted backwardsby the moustache, the small grizzled brown moustache, turned up, thatmade it look crosser. The narrow, pensive lower lip, thrust out by itslight jaw. His nose--quite a young nose--that wouldn't be Roman, wouldn'tbe Sutcliffe; it looked out over your head, tilted itself up to sniff theworld, obstinate, alert. His eyes, young too, bright and dark, sheltered, safe from age under the low straight eyebrows. They would never haveshabby, wrinkled sagging lids. Dark brown hair, grey above his ears, clipped close to stop its curling like his uncle's. He liked to goclipped and clean. You felt that he liked his own tall, straightslenderness. 

The big library rustled with the quick, irritable sound of his writing. 

It stopped. He had finished. He looked at the clock. She heard a small, commiserating sound. 

"Forgive me. I really thought it would only take five minutes. How onearth do you manage to keep so quiet? I should have known if a mouse hadmoved. "

He turned towards her. He leaned back in his chair. "You don't mind mysmoking?"

He was settling himself. Now she would know. 

"Well, " he said, "if I did keep you waiting forty minutes, it was a goodtest, wasn't it?"

He meditated. 

"I'm always changing my secretaries because of something. The last onewas admirable, but I couldn't have stood her in the room when I waswriting.... Besides, you work better. "

"Can you tell? In a week?"

"Yes. I can tell.... Are you sure you can spare me four months?"

"Easily. "

"Five? Six?"

"If you were still here. "

"I shan't be. I shall be in London.... Couldn't you come up?"

"I couldn't, possibly. "

His cross mouth and brilliant, irritated eyes questioned her. 

"I couldn't leave my mother. "

II. 

Five weeks of the four months gone. And to-morrow he was going up toLondon. 

Only till Friday. Only for five days. She kept on telling herself hewould stay longer. Once he was there you couldn't tell how many days hemight stay. But say he didn't come back till the middle of July, stillthere would be the rest of July and all August and September. 

To-day he was walking home with her, carrying the books. She likedwalking with him, she liked to be seen walking with him, as she used tolike being seen walking with Roddy and Mark, because she was proud ofthem, proud of belonging to them. She was proud of Richard Nicholsonbecause of what he had done. 

The Morfe people didn't know anything about what he had done; but theyknew he was something wonderful and important; they knew it was wonderfuland important that you should be his secretary. They were proud of you, glad that they had provided him with you, proud that he should have foundwhat he was looking for in Morfe. 

Mr. Belk, for instance, coming along the road. He used to pass you with ajaunty, gallant, curious look as if you were seventeen and he weresaying, "There's a girl who ought to be married. Why isn't she?" He hadjust sidled past them, abashed and obsequious, a little afraid of the bigman. Even Mrs. Belk was obsequious. 

And Mr. Spencer Rollitt. He was proud because Richard Nicholson had askedhim about a secretary and he had recommended you. Funny that people couldgo on disapproving of you for twenty years, and then suddenly approvebecause of Richard Nicholson. 

And Mamma. Mamma thought you wonderful and important, too. 

Mamma liked Mr. Nicholson. Ever since that Sunday when he had called andbrought the roses and stayed to tea. She had gone out of the room andleft them abruptly because she was afraid of his "cleverness, " afraidthat he would begin to talk about something that she didn't understand. 

And he had said, "How beautiful she is--"

After he had gone she had told Mamma that Richard Nicholson had said shewas beautiful; and Mamma had pretended that it didn't matter what hesaid; but she had smiled all the same. 

He carried himself like Mr. Sutcliffe when he walked, straight and tallin his clean cut grey suit. Only he was lighter and leaner. His eyeslooked gentle and peaceable now under the shadow of the Panama hat. 

The front door stood open. She asked him to come in for tea. 

"May I? ... What are you doing afterwards?"

"Going for a walk somewhere. "

"Will you let me come too?... "

He was standing by the window looking at the garden. She saw him smilewhen he heard Catty say that Mamma had gone over to Mrs. Waugh's andwouldn't be back for tea. He smiled to himself, a secret, happy smile, looking out into the garden.... She took him out through the orchard. Hewent stooping under the low apple boughs and laughing. Down the Back Laneand through the gap in the lower fields, along the flagged path to theBottom Lane and through the Rathdale fields to the river. Over thestepping stones. 

She took the stones at a striding run. He followed, running and laughing. 

Up the Rathdale fields to Renton Moor. Not up the schoolhouse lane, or onthe Garthdale Road, or along the fields by the beck. Not up GreffingtonEdge or Karva. Because of Lindley Vickers and Maurice Jourdain; and Roddyand Mark. 

No. She was humbugging herself. Not up Karva because of her secrethappiness. She didn't want to mix him up with _that_ or with the selfthat had felt it. She wanted to keep him in the clear spaces of her mind, away from her memories, away from her emotions. 

They sat down on the side of the moor in the heather. 

Indoors when he was working he was irritable and restless. You would heara gentle sighing sound: "D-amn"; and he would start up and walk about theroom. There would be shakings of his head, twistings of his eyebrows, shruggings of his shoulders, and tormented gestures of his hands. But notout here. He sat in the heather as quiet, as motionless as you were, every muscle at rest. His mind was at rest. 

The strong sunlight beat on him; it showed up small surface signs. Perhaps you could see now that he might really be forty, or evenforty-five. 

No, you couldn't. You couldn't see or feel anything but the burning, inextinguishable youth inside him. The little grey streaks and patchesmight have been powder put on for fun. 

"I want to finish with all my Greek stuff, " he said suddenly. "I want togo on to something else--studies in modern French literature. ThenEnglish. I want to get everything clean and straight in five pages whereother people would take fifty.... I want to go smash through some of thetraditions. The tradition of the long, grey paragraph.... We might learnthings from France. But we're a proud island people. We won't learn.... We're a proud island people, held in too tight, held in till we burst. That's why we've no aesthetic restraint. No restraint of any sort. Takeour economics. Take our politics. We've had to colonise, to burst outover continents. When our minds begin moving it's the same thing. Theyburst out. All over the place.... When we've learned restraint we shalltake our place inside Europe, not outside it. "

"We do restrain our emotions quite a lot. "

"We do. We do. That's precisely why we don't restrain our expression ofthem. Really unrestrained emotion that forces its way through and breaksdown your intellectual defences and saturates you with itself--it hasn'tany words.... It hasn't any words; or very few. "

 * * * * *

The mown fields over there, below Greffington Edge, were bleached withthe sun: the grey cliffs quivered in the hot yellow light. 

"It might be somewhere in the South of France. "

"_Not_ Agaye. "

"No. Not Agaye. The limestone country.... I can't think why I never camehere. My uncle used to ask me dozens of times. I suppose I funked it.... What the poor old chap must have felt like shut up in that house allthose years with my aunt--"

"Please don't. I--I liked her. "

"You mean you liked him and put up with her because of him. We all didthat. "

"She was kind to me. "

"Who wouldn't be?"

"Oh, but you don't know how kind. "

"Kind? Good Lord, yes. There are millions of kind people in the world. It's possible to be kind and at the same time not entirely brainless. "

"He wouldn't mind that. He wouldn't think she was brainless--"

"He wasn't in love with her--there was another woman--a girl. It was solike the dear old duffer to put it off till he was forty-five and thencome a cropper over a little girl of seventeen. "

"That isn't true. I knew him much better than you do. He never cared foranybody but her.... Besides, if it was true you shouldn't have told me. I've no business to know it.... "

"Everybody knew it. The poor dear managed so badly that everybody in theplace knew it. She knew, that's why she dragged him away and made himlive abroad. She hated living abroad, but she liked it better than seeinghim going to pieces over the girl. "

"I don't believe it. If there was anything in it I'd have been sure tohave heard of it.... Why, there wasn't anybody here but me--"

"It must have been years before your time, " he said. "You could hardlyeven have come in for the sad end of it. "

 * * * * *

Dorsy Heron said it was true. 

"It was you he was in love with. Everybody saw it but you. "

She remembered. His face when she came to him. In the library. And whathe had said. 

"A man might be in love with you for ten years and you wouldn't knowabout it if he held his tongue. "

And _her_ face. Her poor face, so worried when people saw them together. And that last night when she stroked your arm and when she saw himlooking at it and stopped. And her eyes. Frightened. Frightened. 

"How I must have hurt him. How I must have hurt them both. "

 * * * * *

Mr. Nicholson had come back on Friday as he had said. 

III. 

He put down his scratching pen and was leaning back in his chair, lookingat her. 

She wondered what he was thinking. Sometimes the space of the room wasenormous between her table by the first tall window and his by the third;sometimes it shrank and brought them close. It was bringing them closenow. 

"You can't see the text for the footnotes, " she said. "The notes must goin the Appendix. "

She wanted to make herself forget that all her own things, the things shehad saved from the last burning, were lying there on his table, staringat her. She was trying not to look that way, not to let herself imaginefor a moment that he had read them. 

"Never mind the notes and the Appendix. "

He had got up. He was leaning now against the tall shutter of her window, looking down at her. 

"Why didn't you tell me? Before I let you in for that horrible drudgery?All that typing and indexing--If I'd only known you were doing anythinglike this.... Why couldn't you have told me?"

"Because I wasn't doing it. It was done ages ago. "

"It's my fault. I ought to have known. I did know there was something. Iought to have attended to it and found out what it was. "

He began walking up and down the room, turning on her again and again, making himself more and more excited. 

"That translation of the _Bacchae_--what made you think of doing itlike that?"

"I'd been reading Walt Whitman--It showed me you could do without rhyme. I knew it must sound as if it was all spoken--chanted--that they mustn'tsing. Then I thought perhaps that was the way to do it. "

"Yes. Yes. It is the way to do it. The only way.... You see, that's whatmy Euripides book's about. The very thing I've been trying to ram downpeople's throats, for years. And all the time you were doing it--downhere--all by yourself--for fun ... I wish I'd known ... What are yougoing to do about it?"

"I didn't think anything could be done. "

He sat down to consider that part of it. 

 * * * * *

He was going to get it published for her. 

He was going to write the Introduction. 

"And--the other things?"

"Oh, well, that's another matter. There's not much of it that'll stand. "

He knew. He would never say more or less than he meant. 

Not much of it that would stand. Now that she knew, it was extraordinaryhow little she minded. 

"Still, there are a few things. They must come out first. In the spring. Then the _Bacchae_ in the autumn. I want it to be clear from the startthat you're a poet translating; not the other way on. "

He walked home with her, discussing gravely how it would be done. 

IV. 

It had come without surprise, almost without excitement; the quiethappening of something secretly foreseen, present to her mind as long asshe could remember. 

"I always meant that this should happen: something like this. "

Now that it had happened she was afraid, seeing, but not so clearly, whatwould come afterwards: something that would make her want to leave Morfeand Mamma and go away to London and know the people Richard Nicholson hadtold her about, the people who would care for what she had done; thepeople who were doing the things she cared about. To talk to them; tohear them talk. She was afraid of wanting that more than anything in theworld. 

She saw her fear first in Mamma's eyes when she told her. 

And there was something else. Something to do with Richard Nicholson. Something she didn't want to think about. Not fear exactly, but a sort ofuneasiness when she thought about him. 

His mind really was the enormous, perfect crystal she had imagined. Ithad been brought close to her; she had turned it in her hand and seen itflash and shine. She had looked into it and seen beautiful, clear thingsin it: nothing that wasn't beautiful and clear. She was afraid of wantingto look at it again when it wasn't there. Because it had made her happyshe might come to want it more than anything in the world. 

In two weeks it would be gone. She would want it and it would not bethere. 

V. 

When she passed the house and saw the long rows of yellow blinds in thegrey front she thought of him. He would not come back. He had never comebefore, so it wasn't likely he would come again. 

His being there was one of the things that only happened once. Perhapsthose were the perfect things, the things that would never pass away;they would stay for ever, beautiful as you had seen them, fixed in theirmoment of perfection, wearing the very air and light of it for ever. 

You would see them _sub specie ceternitatis_. Under the form of eternity. 

So that Richard Nicholson would always be like that, the same wheneveryou thought of him. 

Look at the others: the ones that hadn't come back and the ones that had. Jimmy Ponsonby, Harry Craven, Mr. Sutcliffe. And Maurice Jourdain andLindley Vickers. If Maurice Jourdain had never come back she would alwayshave seen him standing in the cornfield. If Lindley Vickers had nevercome back she wouldn't have seen him with Nannie Learoyd in theschoolhouse lane; the moment when he held her hands in the drawing-room, standing by the piano, would have been their one eternal moment. 

Because Jimmy Ponsonby had gone away she had never known the awful thinghe had done. She would go through the Ilford fields for ever and everwith her hot hand in his; she happy and he innocent; innocent for everand ever. Harry Craven, her playmate of two hours, he would always beplaying, always laughing, always holding her hand, like Roddy, withoutknowing that he held it. 

Suppose Mr. Sutcliffe had come back. She would have hurt them more andmore. Mrs. Sutcliffe would have hated her. They would have beenmiserable, all three. All three damned for ever and ever. 

She was not sure she wanted Richard Nicholson to come back. 

She was not sure he wasn't spoiling it by writing. She hadn't thought hewould do that. 

A correspondence? Prolonging the beautiful moment, stretching it thin;thinner and thinner; stretching it so thin that it would snap? You wouldcome to identify him with his letters, so that in the end you would losewhat had been real, what had been perfect. You would forget. You wouldhave another and less real kind of memory. 

But his letters were not thin; they were as real as his voice. They_were_ his voice talking to you; you could tell which words would takethe stress of it. "I don't know how _much_ there is of you, whether thisis all of it or only a little bit. You gave me an impression--you made mefeel that there might be any _amount_ gone under that you can't get at, that you may _never_ get at if you go on staying where you are. I believeif you got clean away it might come to the top again. 

"But I don't _know_. I don't know whether you're at the end or thebeginning. I could tell better if you were here. "

She counted the months till April when her poems would come out. Shecounted the days till Tuesday when there might be a letter from RichardNicholson. 

If only he would not keep on telling you you ought to come to London. That was what made you afraid. He might have seen how impossible it was. He had seen Mamma. 

"Don't try to dig me out of my 'hole. ' I _can_ 'go on living in it forever' if I'm never taken out. But if I got out once it would be awfulcoming back. It isn't awful now. Don't make it awful. "

He only wrote: "I'll make it awfuller and _aw_fuller, until out youcome. "

XXXII

I. 

Things were happening in the village. 

The old people were dying. Mr. James had died in a fit the day afterChristmas Day. Old Mrs. Heron had died of a stroke in the first week ofJanuary. She had left Dorsy her house and furniture and seventy pounds ayear. Mrs. Belk got the rest. 

The middle-aged people were growing old. Louisa Wright's hair hung in alimp white fold over each ear, her face had tight lines in it that pulledit into grimaces, her eyes had milky white rings like speedwell when itbegins to fade. Dorsy Heron's otter brown hair was striped with grey; hernose stood up sharp and bleak in her red, withering face; her sharp, tender mouth drooped at the corners. She was forty-nine. 

It was cruel, cruel, cruel; it hurt you to see them. Rather than own itwas cruel they went about pulling faces and pretending they were happy. Their gestures had become exaggerated, tricks that they would never growout of, that gave them the illusion of their youth. 

The old people were dying and the middle-aged people were growing old. Nothing would ever begin for them again. 

Each morning when she got out of bed she had the sacred, solemn certaintythat for her everything was beginning. At thirty-nine. 

What was thirty-nine? A time-feeling, a feeling she hadn't got. If youhaven't got the feeling you are not thirty-nine. You can be any age youplease, twenty-nine, nineteen. 

But she had been horribly old at nineteen. She could remember what it hadfelt like, the desperate, middle-aged sadness, the middle-aged certaintythat nothing interesting would ever happen. She had got hold of life atthe wrong end. 

And all the time her youth had been waiting for her at the other end, atthe turn of the unknown road, at thirty-nine. All through the autumn andwinter Richard Nicholson had kept on writing. Her poems would be out onthe tenth of April. 

On the third the note came. 

"Shall I still find you at Morfe if I come down this week-end?--R. N. "

"You will never find me anywhere else. --M. O. "

"I shall bike from Durlingham. If you've anything to do in Reyburn itwould be nice if you met me at The King's Head about four. We could havetea there and ride out together. --R. N. "

II. 

"I'm excited. I've never been to tea in an hotel before. "

She was chattering like a fool, saying anything that came into her head, to break up the silence he made. 

She was aware of something underneath it, something that was growing moreand more beautiful every minute. She was trying to smash this thing lestit should grow more beautiful than she could bear. 

"You see how I score by being shut up in Morfe. When I do get out it's noend of an adventure. " (Was there ever such an idiot?)

Suddenly she left off trying to smash the silence. 

The silence made everything stand out with a supernatural clearness, thesquare, white-clothed table in the bay of the window, the Queen Annefluting on the Britannia metal teapot, the cups and saucers and plates, white with a gentian blue band, The King's Head stamped in gold like acrest. 

Sitting there so still he had the queer effect of creating for both ofyou a space of your own, more real than the space you had just steppedout of. There, there and not anywhere else, these supernaturally clearthings had reality, a unique but impermanent reality. It would last aslong as you sat there and would go when you went. You knew that whateverelse you might forget you would remember this. 

The rest of the room, the other tables and the people sitting at themwere not quite real. They stood in another space, a different andinferior kind of space. 

"I came first of all, " he said, "to bring you _that_. "

He took out of his pocket and put down between them the thin, new whiteparchment book of her _Poems_. 

"Oh ... Poor thing, I wonder what'll happen to it?" Funny--it was theleast real thing. If it existed at all it existed somewhere else, not inthis space, not in this time. If you took it up and looked at it theclearness, the unique, impermanent reality would be gone, and you wouldnever get it again. 

 * * * * *

They had finished the run down Reyburn hill. Their pace was slackening onthe level. 

He said, "That's a jolly bicycle of yours. "

"Isn't it? I'm sure you'll like to know I bought it with the wonderfulcheque you gave me. I should never have had it without that. "

"I'm glad you got something out of that awful time. "

"Awful? It was one of the nicest times I've ever had.... Nearly all mynice times have been in that house. "

"I know, " he said. "My uncle would let you do anything you liked if youwere young enough. He ought to have had children of his own. They'd havekept him out of mischief. "

"I can't think, " she said to the surrounding hills, "why people get intomischief, or why they go and kill themselves. When they can ride bicyclesinstead. "

III. 

Mamma was sitting upright and averted, with an air of self-consciouseffacement, holding the thin white book before her like a fan. 

Every now and then you could see her face swinging round from behind thecover and her eyes looking at Richard Nicholson, above the rims of herglasses. Uneasy, frightened eyes. 

IV. 

The big pink roses of the chintzes and the gold bordered bowls of theblack mirrors looked at you rememberingly. 

There was a sort of brutality about it. To come here and be happy, tocome here in order to be happy, when _they_ were gone; when you had hurtthem both so horribly. 

"I'm sitting in her chair, " she thought. 

Richard Nicholson sat, in a purely temporary attitude, by the table inthe window. Against the window-pane she could see his side face drawn ina brilliant, furred line of light. His moustache twitched under theshadow of his nose. He was smiling to himself as he wrote the letter toMamma. 

There was a brutality about that, too. She wondered if he had seen oldBaxter's pinched mouth and sliding eyes when he took the letter. He waswatching him as he went out, waiting for the click of the latch. 

"It's all right, " he said. "They expect you. They think it's work. "

He settled himself (in Mr. Sutcliffe's chair). 

"It's the best way, " he said. "I want to see you and I don't want tofrighten your mother. She _is_ afraid of me. "

"No. She's afraid of the whole thing. She wishes it hadn't happened. She's afraid of what'll happen next. I can't make her see that nothingneed happen next. "

"She's cleverer than you think. She sees that something's got to happennext. I couldn't stand another evening like the last. "

"You couldn't, " she agreed. "You couldn't possibly. "

"We can't exactly go on like--like this, you know. "

"Don't let's think about it. Here we are. Now this minute. It's an hourand a half till dinner time. Why, even if I go at nine we've got threehours. "

"That's not enough.... You talk as though we could think or not think, aswe chose. Even if we left off thinking we should have to go on living. Your mother knows that. "

"I don't think she knows more than we do. "

"She knows enough to frighten her. She knows what _I_ want.... I want tomarry you, Mary. "

(This then was what she had been afraid of. But Mamma wouldn't havethought of it. )

"I didn't think you wanted to do that. Why should you?"

"It's the usual thing, isn't it? When you care enough. "

"_Do_ you care enough?"

"More than enough. Don't you? ... It's no use saying you don't. I knowyou do. "

"Can you tell?"

"Yes. "

"Do I go about showing it?"

"No; there hasn't been time. You only began yesterday. "

"When? _When_?"

"In the hotel. When you stopped talking suddenly. And when I gave youyour book. You looked as though you wished I hadn't. As though I'ddragged you away from somewhere where you were happy. "

"Yes.... If it only began yesterday we can stop it. Stop it before itgets worse. "

"I can't. I've been at it longer than that. "

"How long?"

"Oh--I don't know. It might have been that first week. After I'd foundout that there was peace when you came into the room; and no peace whenyou went out. When you're there peace oozes out of you and soaks into meall the time. "

"Does it feel like that?"

"Just like that. "

"But--if it feels like that now, we should spoil it by marrying. "

"Oh no we shouldn't. "

"Yes.... If it's peace you want. There won't be _any_ peace.... Besides, you don't know. Do you remember telling me about your uncle?"

"What's he got to do with it?"

"And that girl. You said I couldn't have known anything about it.... Yousaid I couldn't even have come in for the sad end of it. "

"Well?"

"Well.... I did.... I _was_ the sad end of it.... The girl was me. "

"But you told me it wasn't true. "

... He had got up. He wanted to stand. To stand up high above you. 

"You _know_, " he said, "you told me it wasn't true. "

 * * * * *

They would have to go through with it. Dining. Drinking coffee. Talkingpolitely; talking intelligently; talking. Villiers de L'Isle Adam, Villiers de L'Isle Adam. "The symbolistes are finished ... Do you knowJean Richepin? 'Il était une fois un pauvre gars Qui aimait celle qui nel'aimait pas'? ... 'Le coeur de ta mère pour mon chien. '" He thinks Ilied. "You ought to read Henri de Regnier and Remy de Gourmont. You'dlike them. " ... Le coeur de ta mère. He thinks I lied. Goodness knowswhat he doesn't think. 

The end of it would come at nine o'clock. 

 * * * * *

"Are you still angry?"

He laughed. A dreadful sniffling laugh that came through his nostrils. 

"_I_'m not. If I were I should let you go on thinking I lied. You see, Ididn't know it was true. I didn't know I was the girl. "

"You didn't _know_?"

"How could I when he never said a word?"

"I can't understand your not seeing it. "

"Would you like me better if I had seen it?"

"N-no.... But I wish you hadn't told me. Why did you?"

"I was only trying to break the shock. You thought I couldn't be oldenough to be that girl. I meant you to do a sum in your head: 'If she wasthat girl and she was seventeen, then she must be thirty-nine now. '"

"Is _that_ what you smashed up our evening for?"

"Yes. "

"I shouldn't care if you were fifty-nine. I'm forty-five. "

"You're sorry. You're sorry all the same. "

"I'm sorry because there's so little time, Mary. Sorry I'm six yearsolder than you.... "

Nine o'clock. 

She stood up. He turned to her. He made a queer sound. A sound like adeep, tearing sigh. 

 * * * * *

"If I were twenty I couldn't marry you, because of Mamma. That's onething. You can't marry Mamma. "

"We can talk about your mother afterwards. "

"No. Now. There isn't any afterwards. There's only this minute thatwe're in. And perhaps the next.... You haven't thought what it'll belike. You can't leave London because of your work. I can't leave thisplace because of Mamma. She'd be miserable in London. I can't leaveher. She hasn't anybody but me. I promised my brother I'd look afterher.... She'd have to live with me. "

"Why not?"

"You couldn't live with her. "

"I could, Mary. "

"Not you. You said you couldn't stand another evening like yesterday.... _All the evenings would be like yesterday_.... Please.... Even if therewasn't Mamma, you don't want to marry. If you'd wanted to you'd havedone it long ago, instead of waiting till you're forty-five. Think oftwo people tied up together for life whether they both like it or not. It isn't even as if one of them could be happy. How could you if theother wasn't? Look at the Sutcliffes. Think how he hated it.... And _he_was a kind, patient man. You know you wouldn't dream of marrying me ifyou didn't think it was the only possible way. "

"Well--isn't it?"

"No. The one impossible way. I'd do anything for you but that.... Anything. "

"Would you, Mary? Would you have the courage?"

"It would take infinitely more courage to marry you. We should be riskingmore. All the beautiful things. If it wasn't for Mamma.... But there _is_Mamma. So--you see. "

She thought: "He _hasn't_ kissed me. He _hasn't_ held me in his arms. He'll be all right. It won't hurt him. "

V. 

That was Catty's white apron. 

Catty stood on the cobbled square by the front door, looking for her. When she saw them coming she ran back into the house. 

She was waiting in the passage as Mary came in. 

"The mistress is upset about something, " she said. "After she got Mr. Nicholson's letter. "

"There wasn't anything to upset her in that, Catty. "

"P'raps not, Miss Mary; but I thought I'd tell you. "

Mamma had been crying all evening. Her pocket-handkerchief lay in herlap, a wet rag. 

"I thought you were never coming back again, " she said. 

"Why, where did you think I'd gone?"

"Goodness knows where. I believe there's nothing you wouldn't do. I've nosecurity with you, Mary.... Staying out till all hours of the night.... Sitting up with that man.... You'll be the talk of the place if you don'ttake care. "

(She thought: "I must let her go on. I won't say anything. If I do it'llbe terrible. ")

"I can't think what possessed you.... "

("Why did I do it? _Why_ did I smash it all up? Uncle Victor suicided. That's what I've done.... I've killed myself.... This isn't me. ")

"If that's what comes of your publishing I'd rather your books were sunkto the bottom of the sea. I'd rather see you in your coffin. "

"I _am_ in my coffin. "

"I wish I were in mine, " her mother said. 

 * * * * *

Mamma was getting up from her chair, raising herself slowly by her arms. 

Mary stooped to pick up the pocket-handkerchief. "Don't, Mamma; I've gotit. "

Mamma went on stooping. Sinking, sliding down sideways, clutching at theedge of the table. 

Mary saw terror, bright, animal terror, darting up to her out of Mamma'seyes, and in a place by themselves the cloth sliding, the lamp rockingand righting itself. 

She was dragging her up by her armpits, holding her up. Mamma's arms weredangling like dolls' arms. 

And like a machine wound up, like a child in a passion, she stillstruggled to walk, her knees thrust out, doubled up, giving way, her feettrailing. 

VI. 

Not a stroke. Well, only a slight stroke, a threatening, a warning. "Remember she's getting old, Mary. "

Any little worry or excitement would do it. 

She was worried and excited about me. Richard worried and excited her. 

If I could only stay awake till she sleeps. She's lying there like alamb, calling me "dear" and afraid of giving me trouble.... Her littlehands dragged the bedclothes up to her chin when Dr. Charles came. Shelooked at him with her bright, terrified eyes. 

She isn't old. She can't be when her eyes are so bright. 

She thinks it's a stroke. She won't believe him. She thinks she'll dielike Mrs. Heron. 

Perhaps she knows. 

Perhaps Dr. Charles really thinks she'll die and won't tell me. Richardthought it. He was sorry and gentle, because he knew. You could see byhis cleared, smoothed face and that dreadfully kind, dreadfully wiselook. He gave into everything--with an air of insincere, provisionalacquiescence, as if he knew it couldn't be for very long. Dr. Charlesmust have told him. 

Richard wants it to happen.... Richard's wanting it can't make it happen. 

It might, though. Richard might get at her. His mind and will might begetting at her all the time, making her die. He might do it withoutknowing he was doing it, because he couldn't help it. He might do it inhis sleep. 

But I can stop that.... If Richard's mind and will can make her die, mymind and will can keep her from dying.... There was something I didbefore. 

That time I wanted to go away with the Sutcliffes. When Roddy was cominghome. Something happened then.... If it happened then it can happen now. 

If I could remember how you do it. Flat on your back with your eyes shut;not tight shut. You mustn't feel your eyelids. You mustn't feel any partof you at all. You think of nothing, absolutely nothing; not even think. You keep on not feeling, not thinking, not seeing things till theblackness comes in waves, blacker and blacker. That's how it was before. Then the blackness was perfectly still. You couldn't feel your breathingor your heart beating.... It's coming all right.... Blacker and blacker. 

It wasn't like this before. 

_This_ is an awful feeling. Dying must be like this. One thing goingafter another. Something holding down your heart, stopping its beat;something holding down your chest, crushing the breath out of it.... Don't think about the feeling. Don't feel. Think of the blackness.... 

It isn't the same blackness. There are specks and shreds of light in it;you can't get the light away.... Don't think about the blackness and thelight. Let everything go except yourself. Hold on to yourself.... But youfelt your self going. 

Going and coming back; gathered together; incredibly free; disentangledfrom the net of nerves and veins. It didn't move any more with themovement of the net. It was clear and still in the blackness; intenselyreal. 

Then it willed. Your self willed. It was free to will. You knew that ithad never been free before except once; it had never willed before exceptonce. Willing was this. Waves and waves of will, coming on and on, makingyour will, driving it through empty time.... "The time of time": that wasthe Self.... Time where nothing happens except this. Where nothinghappens except God's will. God's will in your will. Self of your self. Reality of reality.... It had felt like that. 

Mamma had waked up. She was saying she was better. 

 * * * * *

Mamma was better. She said she felt perfectly well. She could walk acrossthe room. She could walk without your holding her. 

It couldn't have been that. It couldn't, possibly. It was a tinyhaemorrhage and it had dried up. It would have dried up just the same ifyou hadn't done anything. Those things _don't happen_. 

What did happen was extraordinary enough. The queer dying. The freedomafterwards. The intense stillness, the intense energy; the certainty. 

Something was there. 

 * * * * *

That horrible dream. Dorsy oughtn't to have made me go and see the oldwoman in the workhouse. A body without a mind. That's what made the dreamcome. It was Mamma's face; but she was doing what the old woman did. 

"Mamma!"--That's the second time I've dreamed Mamma was dead. 

The little lamb, lying on her back with her mouth open, making that funnynoise: "Cluck-cluck, " like a hen. 

Why can't I dream about something I want to happen? Why can't I dreamabout Richard? ... Poor Richard, how can he go on believing I shallcome to him?

VII. 

Dear Dr. Charles, with his head sticking out between the tubes of thestethoscope, like a ram. His poor old mouth hung loose as he breathed. Hewas out late last night; there was white stubble on his chin. 

"It won't do it when you want it to. "

"It's doing quite enough.... Let me see, it's two years since your motherhad that illness. You must go away, Mary. For a month at least. Dorsy'llcome and take care of your mother. "

"Does it matter where I go?"

"N-no. Not so much. Go where you'll get a thorough change, my dear. Iwouldn't stay with relations, if I were you. "

"All right, I'll go if you'll tell me what's the matter with me. "

"You've got your brother Rodney's heart. But it won't kill you if you'lltake care of yourself. "

(Roddy's heart, the net of flesh and blood drawing in a bit of yourbody. )

XXXIII

I. 

Richard had gone up into his own flat and left her to wash and dress andexplore. He had told her she was to have Tiedeman's flat. Not knowing whoTiedeman was made it more wonderful that God should have put it into hishead to go away for Easter and lend you his flat. 

If you wanted anything you could ring and they would come up from thebasement and look after you. 

She didn't want them to come up yet. She wanted to lie back among hercushions where Richard had packed her, and turn over the moments andremember what they had been like: getting out of the train at King'sCross and finding Richard there; coming with him out of the thin whiteApril light into the rich darkness and brilliant colours of the room; thefeeling of Richard's hands as they undid her fur stole and peeled thesleeves of her coat from her arms; seeing him kneel on the hearthrug andmake tea with an air of doing something intensely interesting, an air ofsecurity and possession. He went about in Tiedeman's rooms as if theybelonged to him. 

She liked Tiedeman's flat: the big outer room, curtained with thickgentian blue and thin violet. There was a bowl of crimson and purpleanemones on the dark oval of the oak table. 

Tiedeman's books covered the walls with their coloured bands and stripesand the illuminated gold of their tooling. The deep bookcases made aledge all round half-way up the wall, and the shallow bookcases went onabove it to the ceiling. 

But--those white books on the table were Richard's books. _MaryOlivier--Mary Olivier. My_ books that I gave him.... They're Richard'srooms. 

She got up and looked about. That long dark thing was her coat and furstretched out on the flat couch in the corner where Richard had laidthem; stretched out in an absolute peace and rest. 

She picked them up and went into the inner room that showed through thewide square opening. The small brown oak-panelled room. No furniture butRichard's writing table and his chair. A tall narrow French windowlooking to the backs of houses, and opening on a leaded balcony. Spindle-wood trees, green balls held up on ramrod stems in green tubs. Richard's garden. 

Curtains of thin silk, brilliant magenta, letting the light through. Thehanging green bough of a plane tree, high up on the pane, between. A wornmagentaish rug on the dark floor. 

She went through the door on the right and found a short, narrow passage. Another French window opening from it on to the balcony. A bathroom onthe other side; a small white panelled bedroom at the end. 

She had no new gown. Nothing but the black chiffon one (black because ofUncle Victor) she had bought two years ago with Richard's cheque. She hadworn it at Greffington that evening when she dined with him. It had along, pointed train. Its thin, open, wide spreading sleeves fell from hershoulders in long pointed wings. It made her feel slender. 

 * * * * *

There was no light in the inner room. Clear glassy dark twilight behindthe tall window. She stood there waiting for Richard to come down. 

Richard loved all this. He loved beautiful books, beautiful things, beautiful anemone colours, red and purple with the light coming throughthem, thin silk curtains that let the light through like the thin silkytissues of flowers. He loved the sooty brown London walls, housesstanding back to back, the dark flanks of the back wings jutting out, almost meeting across the trenches of the gardens, making the colours inhis rooms brilliant as stained glass. 

He loved the sound of the street outside, intensifying the quiet of thehouse. 

It was the backs that were so beautiful at night; the long straightranges of the dark walls, the sudden high dark cliffs and peaks of thewalls, hollowed out into long galleries filled with thick, burning light, rows on rows of oblong casements opening into the light. Here and there atree stood up black in the trenches of the gardens. 

The tight strain in her mind loosened and melted in the stream of thepure new light, the pure new darkness, the pure new colours. 

Richard came in. They stood together a long time, looking out; theydidn't say a word. 

Then, as they turned back to the lighted outer room, "I thought I was tohave had Tiedeman's flat?"

"Well, he's up another flight of stairs and the rain makes a row on theskylight. It was simpler to take his and give you mine. I want you tohave mine. "

II. 

She turned off the electric light and shut her eyes and lay thinking. Theviolent motion of the express prolonged itself in a ghostly vibration, rocking the bed. In still space, unshaken by this tremor, she could seethe other rooms, the quiet, beautiful rooms. 

I wonder how Mamma and Dorsy are getting on.... I'm not going to thinkabout Mamma. It isn't fair to Richard. I shan't think about anybody butRichard for this fortnight. One evening of it's gone already. It mighthave lasted quite another hour if he hadn't got up and gone away sosuddenly. What a fool I was to let him think I was tired. 

There will be thirteen evenings more. Thirteen. You can stretch time outby doing a lot of things in it; doing something different every hour. When you're with Richard every minute's different from the last, and hebrings you the next all bright and new. 

Heaven would be like that. Imagine an eternity of heaven; being withRichard for ever and ever. But nobody ever did imagine an eternity ofheaven. People only talk about it because they can't imagine it. Whatthey mean is that if they had one minute of it they would remember thatfor ever and ever. 

 * * * * *

This is Richard's life. This is what I'd have taken from him if I'd lethim marry me. 

I daren't even think what it would have been like if I'd tried to mix upMamma and Richard in the same house.... And poor little Mamma in astrange place with nothing about it that she could remember, going up anddown in it, trying to get at me, and looking reproachful and disapprovingall the time. She'd have to be shut in her own rooms because Richardwouldn't have her in his. Sitting up waiting to be read aloud to andplayed halma with when Richard wanted me. Saying the same things over andover again. Sighing. 

Richard would go off his head if he heard Mamma sigh. 

He wants to be by himself the whole time, "working like blazes. " He likesto feel that the very servants are battened down in the basement so thathe doesn't know they're there. He couldn't stand Tiedeman and Peters ifthey weren't doing the same thing. Tiedeman working like blazes in theflat above him and Peters working like blazes in the flat below. 

Richard slept in this room last night. He will sleep in it again when I'mgone. 

She switched the light on to look at it for another second: theprivet-white panelled cabin, the small wine-coloured chest of drawers, the small golden-brown wardrobe, shining. 

My hat's in that wardrobe, lying on Richard's waistcoat, fast asleep. 

If Tiedeman's flat's up there, that's Richard walking up and down over myhead.... If it rains there'll be a row on the skylight and he won'tsleep. He isn't sleeping now. 

III. 

It would be much nicer to walk home through Kensington Gardens and HydePark. 

She was glad that they were going to have a quiet evening. After threeevenings at the play and Richard ruining himself in hansoms and notsleeping.... After this unbelievable afternoon. All those people, thoseterribly important people. 

It was amusing to go about with Richard and feel important yourselfbecause you were with him. And to see Richard's ways with them, his niceway of behaving as if _he_ wasn't important in the least, as if it wasyou they had made all that fuss about. 

To think that the little dried up schoolmasterish man was Professor LeeRamsden, prowling about outside the group, eager and shy, waiting to beintroduced to you, nobody taking the smallest notice of him. The womanwho had brought him making soft, sentimental eyes at you through the gapsin the group, and trying to push him in a bit nearer. Then Richard askingyou to be kind for one minute to the poor old thing. It hurt you to seehim shy and humble and out of it. 

And when you thought of his arrogance at Durlingham. 

It was the women's voices that tired you so, and their nervous, snappingeyes. 

The best of all was going away from them quietly with Richard intoKensington Gardens. 

"Did you like it, Mary?"

"Frightfully. But not half so much as this. "

IV. 

She was all alone in the front room, stretched out on the flat couch inthe corner facing the door. 

He was still writing his letter in the inner room. When she heard himmove she would slide her feet to the floor and sit up. 

She wanted to lie still with her hands over her shut eyes, making thefour long, delicious days begin again and go on in her head. 

Richard _would_ take hansoms. You couldn't stop him. Perhaps he wasafraid if you walked too far you would drop down dead. When it was allover your soul would still drive about London in a hansom for ever andever, through blue and gold rain-sprinkled days, through poignant whiteevenings, through the streaming, steep, brown-purple darkness and thestreaming flat, thin gold of the wet nights. 

They were not going to have any more tiring parties. There wasn't enoughtime. 

When she opened her eyes he was sitting on the chair by the foot of thecouch, leaning forward, looking at her. She saw nothing but his loose, hanging hands and straining eyes. 

"Oh, Richard--what time is it?" She swung her feet to the floor and satup suddenly. 

"Only nine. "

"Only nine. The evening's nearly gone. "

 * * * * *

"Is that why you aren't sleeping, Richard? ... I didn't know. I didn'tknow I was hurting you. "

"What-did-you-think? What-did-you-think? Isn't it hurting you?"

"Me? I've got used to it. I was so happy just being with you. "

"So happy and so quiet that I thought you didn't care.... Well, what wasI to think? If you won't marry me. "

"That's because I care so frightfully. Don't let's rake that up again. "

"Well, there it is. "

She thought: "I've no business to come here to his rooms, turning himout, making him so wretched that he can't sleep. No business.... Unless--"

"And we've got to go on living with it, " he said. 

He thinks I haven't the courage ... I can't _tell_ him. 

"Yes, " she said, "there it is. "

Why shouldn't I tell him? ... We've only ten days. As long as I'm herenothing matters but Richard ... If I keep perfectly still, still likethis, if I don't say a word he'll think of it.... 

"Richard--would you rather I hadn't come?"

"No. "

"You remember the evening I came--you got up so suddenly and left me?What did you do that for?"

"Because if I'd stayed another minute I couldn't have left you at all. "

He stood up. 

"And you're only going now because you can't see that I'm not a coward. "

 * * * * *

This wouldn't last, the leaping and knocking of her heart, the eyelidsscrewing themselves tight, the jerking of her nerves at every sound: atthe two harsh rattling screams of the curtain rings along the pole, atthe light click of the switches. Only the small green-shaded lamp stillburning on Richard's writing table in the inner room. She could hear himmoving about, softly and secretly, in there. 

He was Richard. That was Richard, moving about in there. 

V. 

Richard thought his flat was a safe place. But it wasn't. People creepingup the stairs every minute and standing still to listen. People wouldcome and try the handle of the door. 

"They won't, dear. Nobody ever comes in. It has never happened. It isn'tgoing to happen now. "

Yet you couldn't help thinking that just this night it would happen. 

She thought that Peters knew. He wouldn't come out of his door till youhad turned the corner of the stairs. 

She thought the woman in the basement knew. She remembered the evening atGreffington: Baxter's pinched mouth and his eyes sliding sideways to lookat you. She knew now what Baxter had been thinking. The woman's look wasthe female of Baxter's. 

As if that could hurt you!

VI. 

"Mary, do you know you're growing younger every minute?"

"I shall go on growing younger and younger till it's all over. "

"Till what's all over?"

"This. So will you, Richard. "

"Not in the same way. My hair isn't young any more. My face isn't youngany more. "

"I don't want it to be young. It wasn't half so nice a face when it wasyoung.... Some other woman loved it when it was young. "

"Yes. Another woman loved it when it was young. "

"Is she alive and going about?"

"Oh, yes; she's alive and she goes about a lot. "

"Does she love you now?"

"I suppose she does. "

"I wish she didn't. "

"You needn't mind her, Mary. She was never anything to me. She never willbe. "

"But I do mind her. I mind her awfully. I can't bear to think of hergoing about and loving you. She's no business to.... Why do I mind herloving you more than I'd mind your loving her?"

"Because you like loving more than being loved. "

"How do you know?"

"I know every time I hold you in my arms. "

There have been other women then, or he wouldn't know the difference. There must have been a woman that he loved. 

I don't care. It wasn't the same thing. 

"What are you thinking?"

"I'm thinking nothing was ever the same thing as this. "

"No.... Whatever we do, Mary, we mustn't go back on it.... If we couldhave done anything else. But I can't see.... It's not as if it could lastlong. Nothing lasts long. Life doesn't last long. "

He sounded as if he were sorry, as if already, in his mind, he had goneback on it. After three days. 

"You're not _sorry_, Richard?"

"Only when I think of you. The awful risks I've made you take. "

"Can't you see I _like_ risks? I always have liked risks. When we werechildren my brothers and I were always trying to see just how near wecould go to breaking our necks. "

"I know you've courage enough for anything. But that was rather adifferent sort of risk. "

"No. No. There are no different sorts of risk. All intense moments ofdanger are the same. It's always the same feeling. I don't know whetherI've courage or not, but I do know that when danger comes you don't care. You're hoisted up above caring. "

"You _do_ care, Mary. "

"About my 'reputation '? You wouldn't like to think I didn't care aboutit.... Of course, I care frightfully. If I didn't, where's the risk?"

"I hate your having to take it all. I don't risk anything. "

"I wish you did. Then you'd be happier. Poor Richard--so safe in hisman's world.... You can be sorry about that, if you like. But not aboutme. I shall never be sorry. Nothing in this world can make me sorry.... Ishouldn't like Mamma to know about it. But even Mamma couldn't make mesorry.... I've always been happy about the things that matter, the realthings. I hate people who sneak and snivel about real things.... Peoplewho have doubts about God and don't like them and snivel. I had doubtsabout God once, and they made me so happy I could hardly bear it.... Mamma couldn't bear it making me happy. She wouldn't have minded half somuch if I had been sorry and snivelled. She wouldn't mind so much if Iwas sorry and snivelled about this. "

"You _said_ you weren't going to think about your mother. "

"I'm not thinking about her. I'm thinking about how happy I have been andam and shall be. "

Even thinking about Mamma couldn't hurt you now. Nothing could hurt thehappiness you shared with Richard. What it was now it would always be. Pure and remorseless. 

VII. 

Delicious, warm, shining day. She had her coat and hat on ready to godown with him. The hansom stood waiting in the street. 

They were looking up the place on the map, when the loud double knockcame. 

"That's for Peters. He's always getting wires--"

"If we don't go to-day we shall never go. We've only got five more now. "

The long, soft rapping on the door of the room. Knuckles rapping outtheir warning. "You can't say I don't give you time. "

Richard took the orange envelope. 

"It's for you, Mary. "

"Oh, Richard, '_Come at once. Mother ill. --DORSY_. '"

She would catch the ten train. That was what the hansom was there for. 

"I'll send your things on after you. "

The driver and the slog-slogging horse knew that she would catch thetrain. Richard knew. 

He had the same look on his face that was there before when Mamma wasill. Sorrow that wasn't sorrow. And the same clear thought behind it. 

XXXIV

I. 

Dorsey's nerves were in a shocking state. You could see she had beenafraid all the time; from the first day when Mamma had kept on saying, "Has Mary come back?"

Dorsy was sure that was how it began; but she couldn't tell you whetherit was before or afterwards that she had forgotten the days of the week. 

Anybody could forget the days of the week. What frightened Dorsy washearing her say suddenly, "Mary's _gone_. " She said it to herself whenshe didn't know Dorsy was in the room. Then she had left off asking andwondering. For five days she hadn't said anything about you. Not anythingat all. When she heard your name she stared at them with a queer, scaredlook. 

Catty said that yesterday she had begun to be afraid of Dorsy andcouldn't bear her in the room. That was what made them send the wire. 

 * * * * *

What had she been thinking of those five days? It was as though she knew. 

Dorsy said she didn't believe she was thinking anything at all. Dorsydidn't know. 

II. 

Somebody knew. Somebody had been talking. She had found Catty in the roommaking up the bed for her in the corner. Catty was crying as she tuckedin the blankets. "There's some people, " she said, "as had ought to bepoisoned. " But she wouldn't say why she was crying. 

You could tell by Mr. Belk's face, his mouth drawn in between claws ofnose and chin; by Mrs. Belk's face and her busy eyes, staring. By the oldmen sitting on the bench at the corner, their eyes coming together as youpassed. 

And Mr. Spencer Rollitt, stretching himself straight and looking awayover your head and drawing in his breath with a "Fivv-vv-vv" when heasked how Mamma was. His thoughts were hidden behind his bare, woodenface. He was a just and cautious man. He wouldn't accept any statementoutside the Bible without proof. 

You had to go down and talk to Mrs. Waugh. She had come to see how youwould look. Her mouth talked about Mamma but her face was saying all thetime, "I'm not going to ask you what you were doing in London in Mr. Nicholson's flat, Mary. I'm sure you wouldn't do anything you'd be sorryto think of with your poor mother in the state she's in. "

I don't care. I don't care what they think. 

There would still be Catty and Dorsy and Louisa Wright and Miss Kendaland Dr. Charles with their kind eyes that loved you. And Richard livinghis eternal life in your heart. 

And Mamma would never know. 

III. 

Mamma was going backwards and forwards between the open work-table andthe cabinet. She was taking out the ivory reels and thimbles and buttonboxes, wrapping them in tissue paper and hiding them in the cabinet. Whenshe had locked the doors she waited till you weren't looking to lift upher skirt and hide the key in her petticoat pocket. 

She was happy, like a busy child at play. 

She was never ill, only tired like a child that plays too long. Her facewas growing smooth and young and pretty again; a pink flush under hereyes. She would never look disapproving or reproachful any more. Shecouldn't listen any more when you read aloud to her. She had forgottenhow to play halma. 

One day she found the green box in the cabinet drawer. She came to youcarrying it with care. When she had put it down on the table she liftedthe lid and looked at the little green and white pawns and smiled. 

"Roddy's soldiers, " she said. 

 * * * * *

Richard doesn't know what he's talking about when he asks me to give upMamma. He might as well ask me to give up my child. It's no use hissaying she "isn't there. " Any minute she may come back and remember andknow me. 

She must have known me yesterday when she asked me to go and see whatPapa was doing. 

As for "waiting, " he may have to wait years and years. And I'm forty-fivenow. 

IV. 

The round black eye of the mirror looked at them. Their figures would bethere, hers and Richard's, at the bottom of the black crystal bowl, smalllike the figures in the wrong end of a telescope, very clear in the deep, clear swirl of the glass. 

They were sitting close together on the old rose-chintz-covered couch. _Her_ couch. You could see him putting the cushions at her back, tuckingthe wide Victorian skirt in close about the feet in the black velvetslippers. And she would lie there with her poor hands folded in the whitecashmere shawl. 

Richard knew what you were thinking. 

"You can't expect me, " he was saying, "to behave like my uncle.... Besides, it's a little too late, isn't it?... We said, whatever we did wewouldn't go back on it. If it wasn't wrong then, Mary, it isn't wrongnow. "

"It isn't that, Richard. "

(No. Not that. Pure and remorseless then. Pure and remorseless now. )

She wondered whether he had heard it. The crunching on the gravel walkunder the windows, stopping suddenly when the feet stepped on to thegrass. And the hushed growl of the men's voices. Baxter and the gardener. They had come to see whether the light would go out again behind theyellow blinds as it had gone out last night. 

If you were a coward; if you had wanted to get off scot-free, it was toolate. 

Richard knows I'm not a coward. Funk wouldn't keep me from him. It isn't_that_. 

"What is it, then?"

"Can't you see, can't you feel that it's no use coming again, just forthis? It'll never be what it was then. It'll always be like last night, and you'll think I don't care. Something's holding me back from you. Something that's happened to me. I don't know yet what it is. "

"Nerves. Nothing but nerves. "

"No. I thought it was nerves last night. I thought it was this room. Those two poor ghosts, looking at us. I even thought it might be Mark andRoddy--all of them--tugging at me to get me away from you.... But itisn't that. It's something in me. "

"You're trying to tell me you don't want me. "

"I'm trying to tell you what happened. I did want you, all last year. Itwas so awful that I had to stop it. You couldn't go on living likethat.... I willed and willed not to want you. "

"So did I. All the willing in the world couldn't stop me. "

"It isn't that sort of willing. You might go on all your life like thatand nothing would happen. You have to find it out for yourself; and eventhat might take you all your life.... It isn't the thing people callwilling at all. It's much queerer. Awfully queer. "

"How--_queer_?"

"Oh--the sort of queerness you don't like talking about. "

"I'm sorry, Mary. You seem to be talking about something, but I haven'tthe faintest notion what it is. But you can make yourself believeanything you like if you keep on long enough. "

"No. Half the time I'm doing it I don't believe it'll come off.... But italways does. Every time it's the same. Every time; exactly as ifsomething had happened. "

"Poor Mary. "

"But, Richard, it makes you absolutely happy. That's the queer part ofit. It's how you know. "

"Know _what_?"

He was angry. 

"That there's something there. That it's absolutely real. "

"Real?"

"Why not? If it makes you happy without the thing you care most for inthe whole world.... There must be something there. It must be real. Realin a way that nothing else is. "

"You aren't happy now, " he said. 

"No. And you're with me. And I care for you more than anything in thewhole world. "

"I thought you said that was all over. "

"No. It's only just begun. "

"I can't say I see it. "

"You'll see it all right soon.... When you've gone. "

V. 

It was no use not marrying him, no use sending him away, as long as hewas tied to you by his want. 

You had no business to be happy. It wasn't fair. There was he, tied toyou tighter than if you _had_ married him. And there you were in yourinconceivable freedom. Supposing you could give him the same freedom, thesame happiness? Supposing you could "work" it for him, make It (whateverit was) reach out and draw him into your immunity, your peace?

VI. 

Whatever It was It was there. You could doubt away yourself and Richard, but you couldn't doubt away It. 

It might leave you for a time, but it came back. It came back. Its goingonly intensified the wonder of its return. You might lose all sense of itbetween its moments; but the thing was certain while it lasted. Doubt itaway, and still what had been done for you lasted. Done for you once forall, two years ago. And that wasn't the first time. 

Even supposing you could doubt away the other times. --You might have madethe other things happen by yourself. But not that. Not giving Richard upand still being happy. That was something you couldn't possibly have doneyourself. Or you might have done it in time--time might have done it foryou--but not like that, all at once, making that incredible, supernaturalhappiness and peace out of nothing at all, in one night, and going on init, without Richard. Richard himself didn't believe it was possible. Hesimply thought it hadn't happened. 

Still, even then, you might have said it didn't count so long as it wasnothing but your private adventure; but not now, never again now when ithad happened to Richard. 

His letter didn't tell you whether he thought there was anything in it. He saw the "queerness" of it and left it there:

"Something happened that night after you'd gone. You know how I felt. Icouldn't stop wanting you. My mind was tied to you and couldn't get away. Well--that night something let go--quite suddenly. Something went. 

"It's a year ago and it hasn't come back. 

"I didn't know what on earth you meant by 'not wanting and still caring';but I think I see now. I don't 'want' you any more and I 'care' more thanever.... 

"Don't 'work like blazes. ' Still I'm glad you like it. I can get you anyamount of the same thing--more than you'll care to do. "

VII. 

He didn't know how hard it was to "work like blazes. " You had to keepyour eyes ready all the time to see what Mamma was doing. You had to takeher up and down stairs, holding her lest she should turn dizzy and fall. If you left her a minute she would get out of the room, out of the houseand on to the Green by herself and be frightened. 

Mamma couldn't remember the garden. She looked at her flowers withdislike. 

You had brought her on a visit to a strange, disagreeable place and lefther there. She was angry with you because she couldn't get away. 

Then, suddenly, for whole hours she would be good: a child playing itsdelicious game of goodness. When Dr. Charles came in and you took him outof the room to talk about her you would tell her to sit still until youcame back. And she would smile, the sweet, serious smile of a child thatis being trusted, and sit down on the parrot chair; and when you cameback you would find her sitting there, still smiling to herself becauseshe was so good. 

Why do I love her now, when she is like this--when "_this_" is what I wasafraid of, what I thought I could not bear--why do I love her more, ifanything, now than I've ever done before? Why am I happier now than I'veever been before, except in the times when I was writing and the timeswhen I was with Richard?

VIII. 

Forty-five. Yesterday she was forty-five, and to-day. To-morrow she wouldbe forty-six. She had come through the dreadful, dangerous year withoutthinking of it, and nothing had happened. Nothing at all. She couldn'timagine why she had ever been afraid of it; she could hardly rememberwhat being afraid of it had felt like. 

Aunt Charlotte--Uncle Victor--

If I were going to be mad I should have gone mad long ago: when Roddycame back; when Mark died; when I sent Richard away. I should be mad now. 

It was getting worse. 

In the cramped room where the big bed stuck out from the wall to within ayard of the window, Mamma went about, small and weak, in her waddedlavender Japanese dressing-gown, like a child that can't sit still, looking for something it wants that nobody can find. You couldn't thinkbecause of the soft pad-pad of the dreaming, sleepwalking feet in thelamb's-wool slippers. 

When you weren't looking she would slip out of the room on to the landingto the head of the stairs, and stand there, vexed and bewildered when youcaught her. 

IX. 

Mamma was not well enough now to get up and be dressed. They had movedher into Papa's room. It was bright all morning with the sun. She washappy there. She remembered the yellow furniture. She was back in the oldbedroom at Five Elms. 

Mamma lay in the big bed, waiting for you to brush her hair. She wasplaying with her white flannel dressing jacket, spread out before her onthe counterpane, ready. She talked to herself. 

"Lindley Vickers--Vickers Lindley. "

But she was not thinking of Lindley Vickers; she was thinking of Dan, trying to get back to Dan. 

"Is Jenny there? Tell her to go and see what Master Roddy's doing. " Shethought Catty was Jenny.... "Has Dan come in?"

Sometimes it would be Papa; but not often; she soon left him for Dan andRoddy. 

Always Dan and Roddy. And never Mark. 

Never Mark and never Mary. Had she forgotten Mark or did she remember himtoo well? Or was she afraid to remember? Supposing there was a black holein her mind where Mark's death was, and another black hole where Mary hadbeen? Had she always held you together in her mind so that you went downtogether? Did she hold you together now, in some time and place saferthan memory?

She was still playing with the dressing-jacket. She smoothed it, andpatted it, and folded it up and laid it beside her on the bed. She tookup her pocket-handkerchief and shook it out and folded it and put it onthe top of the dressing-jacket. 

"What are you doing, you darling?"

"Going to bed. "

She looked at you with a half-happy, half-frightened smile, because youhad found her out. She was putting out the baby clothes, ready. Seriousand pleased and frightened. 

"Who will take care of my little children when I'm laid aside?"

She knew what she was lying in the big bed for. 

X. 

It was really bedtime. She was sitting up in the armchair while Catty whowas Jenny made her bed. The long white sheet lay smooth and flat on thehigh mattress; it hung down on the floor. 

Mamma was afraid of the white sheet. She wouldn't go back to bed. 

"There's a coffin on the bed. Somebody's died of cholera, " she said. 

Cholera? That was what she thought Mark had died of. 

 * * * * *

She knows who I am now. 

XI. 

Richard had written to say he was married. On the twenty-fifth ofFebruary. That was just ten days after Mamma died. 

"We've known each other the best part of our lives. So you see it's avery sober middle-aged affair. "

He had married the woman who loved him when he was young. "A very sobermiddle-aged affair. " Not what it would have been if you and he--Hedidn't want you to think that _that_ would ever happen again. He wantedyou to see that with him and you it had been different, that you hadloved him and lived with him in that other time he had made for you whereyou were always young. 

He had only made it for you. She, poor thing, would have to put up withother people's time, time that made them middle-aged, made them old. 

You had got to write and tell him you were glad. You had got to tell himMamma died ten days ago. And he would say to himself, "If I'd waitedanother ten days--" There was nothing he could say to you. 

That was why he didn't write again. There was nothing to say. 

XXXV

I. 

She would never get used to the house. 

She couldn't think why she had been such a fool as to take it. On a sevenyears' lease, too; it would feel like being in prison for seven years. 

That was the worst of moving about for a whole year in boats and trains, and staying at hotels; it gave you an unnatural longing to settle down, in a place of your own. 

Your own--Undying lust of possession. If you _had_ to have things, why ahouse? Why six rooms when two would have done as well and left you yourfreedom? After all that ecstasy of space, that succession of heavenlyplaces with singing names: Carcassone and Vezelay; Rome and Florence andSan Gimignano; Marseilles and Arles and Avignon; filling up time, stretching it out, making a long life out of one year. 

If you could go moving on and on while time stood still. 

Oh this damned house. It would be you sitting still while time tore by, as it used to tear by at Morfe before Richard came, and in the threeyears after he had gone, when Mamma--

II. 

It was rather attractive, when you turned the corner and came on itsuddenly, flat-roofed and small, clean white and innocent. The springtwilight gave it that look of being somewhere in Italy, the look thatmade you fall in love with it at first sight. 

As for not getting used to it, that was precisely the effect she wanted:rooms that wouldn't look like anything in the house at Morfe, things thatshe would always come on with a faint, exquisite surprise: the wornmagentaish rug on the dark polished floor, the oak table, the gentianblue chair, the thin magenta curtains letting the light through: thethings Richard had given her because in their beginning they had beenmeant for her. Richard knew that you were safe from unhappiness, that youhad never once "gone back on it, " if you could be happy with his things. 

He had thought, too, that if you had a house you would settle down andwork. 

You would have to; you would have to work like blazes, after spending allthe money Aunt Charlotte left you on rushing about, and half the moneyAunt Lavvy left you on settling down. It was horrible this living onother people's deaths. 

III. 

Catty couldn't bear it being so different. You could see she thought youwere unfaithful not to have kept the piano when Mamma had played on it. 

Catty's faithfulness was unsurpassable. She had wanted to marryBlenkiron, the stonemason at Morfe, but first she wouldn't because ofMamma and then she wouldn't because of Miss Mary. When you told her to goback and marry him at once she would only laugh and say, "There's yourhusband, and there's your children. You're my child, Miss Mary. MasterRoddy was Jenny's child and you was always mine. "

You were only ten years younger than Catty, but like Richard she couldn'tsee that you were old. 

You would never know whether Catty knew about Richard; or whether Dorsyknew. Whatever you did they would love you, Catty because you were herchild, and Dorsy because you were Mark's sister. 

IV. 

The sun had been shining for a fortnight. She could sit out all day nowin the garden. 

It was nonsense to talk about time standing still if you kept on moving. Just now, in the garden, when the light came through the thin green silkleaves of the lime tree, for a moment, while she sat looking at the limetree, time stood still. 

Catty had taken away the tea-things and was going down the four stepsinto the house. It happened between the opening and shutting of the door. 

She saw that the beauty of the tree was its real life, and that its reallife was in her real self and that her real self was God. The leaves andthe light had nothing to do with it; she had seen it before when the treewas a stem and bare branches on a grey sky; and that beauty too was thereal life of the tree. 

V. 

If she could only dream about Mark. But if she dreamed about any of themit was always Mamma. She had left her in the house by herself and she hadgot out of her room to the stair-head. Or they were in London at thecrossing by the Bank and Mamma was frightened. She had to get her throughthe thick of the traffic. The horses pushed at Mamma and you tried tohold back their noses, but she sank down and slid away from you sidewaysunder the wheel. 

Or she would come into this room and find her in it. At first she wouldbe glad to see that Mamma was still there; then she would be unhappy andafraid. She would go on to a clear thought: if Mamma was still there, then she had got back somehow to Morfe. The old life was still going on;it had never really stopped. But if that was real, then this was notreal. Her secure, shining life of last year and now wasn't real; nothingcould make it real; her exquisite sense of it was not real. She had onlythought it had happened. 

Nothing had happened but what had happened before; it was happening now;it would go on and on till it frightened you, till you could not bear it. When she woke up she was glad that the dream had been nothing but adream. 

But that meant that you were glad Mamma was not there. The dream showedyou what you were hiding from yourself. Supposing the dead knew?Supposing Mamma knew, and Mark knew that you were glad--

VI. 

It came to her at queer times, in queer ways. After that horrible eveningat the Dining Club when the secretary woman put her as far as possiblefrom Richard, next to the little Jew financier who smelt of wine. 

She couldn't even hear what Richard was saying; the little wine-lappingJew went on talking about Women's Suffrage and his collection ofFragonards and his wife's portrait by Sargent. His tongue slid betweenone overhanging and one dropping jaw, in and out like a shuttle. 

She tried not to hate him, not to shrink back from his puffing, wine-sourbreath, to be kind to him and listen and smile and remember that his realsecret self was God, and was holy; not to attend to Richard's voicebreaking the beat of her heart. 

She had gone away before Richard could get up and come to her. She wantedto be back in her house by herself. She had pushed open the Frenchwindows of the study to breathe the air of the garden and see the tallsycamore growing deep into the thick blue night. Half the room, reflectedon the long pane, was thrown out into the garden. She saw it thinningaway, going off from the garden into another space, existing there withan unearthly reality of its own. She had sat down at last, too tired togo upstairs, and had found herself crying, incredibly crying; all themisery, all the fear, all the boredom of her life gathered together anddischarging now. 

"If I could get out of it all"--Her crying stopped with a start as ifsomebody had come in and put a hand on her shoulder. Everything wentstill. She had a sense of happiness and peace suddenly there with her inthe room. Not so much her own as the happiness and peace of an immense, invisible, intangible being of whose life she was thus aware. She knew, somehow through It, that there was no need to get away; she was out of itall now, this minute. There was always a point where she could get out ofit and into this enduring happiness and peace. 

VII. 

They were talking to-night about Richard and his wife. They said hewasn't happy; he wasn't in love with her. 

He never had been; she knew it; yet she took him, and tied him to her, anold woman, older than Richard, with grey hair. 

Oh well--she had had to wait for him longer than he waited for me, andshe's in love with him still. She's making it impossible for him to seeme. 

Then I shan't see him. I don't want him to see me if it hurts her. Idon't want her to be hurt. 

I wonder if she knows? _They_ know. I can hear them talking about me whenI've gone. 

... "Mary Olivier, the woman who translated Euripides. "

... "Mary Olivier, the woman Nicholson discovered. "

... "Mary Olivier, the woman who was Nicholson's mistress. "

Richard's mistress--I know that's what they say, but I can't feel thatthey're saying it about _me_. It must be somebody else, some woman Inever heard of. 

VIII. 

Mr. Sutcliffe is dead. He died two weeks ago at Agaye. 

I can see now how beautiful they were; how beautiful he was, going awaylike that, letting her take him away so that the sight of me shouldn'thurt her. 

I can see that what I thought so ugly was really beautiful, theirsticking to each other through it all, his faithfulness and herforgiveness, their long life of faithfulness and forgiveness. 

But my short life with Richard was beautiful too; my coming to him andleaving him free. I shall never go back on that; I shall never be sorryfor it. 

The things I'm sorry for are not caring more for Papa, being unkind toMamma, not doing enough for her, not knowing what she was really like. I'd give anything to have been able to think about her as Mark thought, to feel about her as he felt. If only I had known what she was reallylike. Even now I don't know. I never shall. 

But going to Richard--No. If it was to be done again to-morrow I'd do it. 

And I don't humbug myself about it. If I made Richard happy I made myselfhappy too; _he_ made me happy. Still, if I had had no happiness in it, ifI'd hated it, I'd have done it for Richard all the same. 

IX. 

All this religious resignation. And the paradox of prayer: people prayingone minute, "Thy will be done, " then praying for things to happen or nothappen, just as they please. 

God's will be done--as if it wouldn't be done whatever they did or didn'tdo. God's will was your fate. The thing was to know it and not waste yourstrength in the illusion of resistance. 

If you were part of God your will was God's will at the moment when youreally willed. There was always a point when you knew it: the flash pointof freedom. You couldn't mistake your flash when it came. You couldn'tdoubt away that certainty of freedom any more than you could doubt awaythe certainty of necessity and determination. From the outside they werepart of the show of existence, the illusion of separation from God. Fromthe inside they were God's will, the way things were willed. Free-willwas the reality underneath the illusion of necessity. The flash point offreedom was your consciousness of God. 

Then praying would be willing. There would be no such thing as passiveprayer. There could be no surrender.... And yet there was. Not thesurrender of your will, but of all the things that entangle and confuseit; that stand between it and you, between God and you. When you laystill with your eyes shut and made the darkness come on, wave after wave, blotting out your body and the world, blotting out everything but yourself and your will, that was a dying to live; a real dying, a real life. 

The Christians got hold of real things and turned them into somethingunreal, impossible to believe. The grace of God was a real thing. It wasthat miracle of perfect happiness, with all its queerness, its divinecertainty and uncertainty. The Christians knew at least one thing aboutit; they could see it had nothing to do with deserving. But it hadnothing to do with believing, either, or with being good and getting intoheaven. It _was_ heaven. It had to do with beauty, absolutely un-moralbeauty, more than anything else. 

She couldn't see the way of it beyond that. It had come to her when shewas a child in brilliant, clear flashes; it had come again and again inher adolescence, with more brilliant and clearer flashes; then, afterleaving her for twenty-three years, it had come like this--streaming inand out of her till its ebb and flow were the rhythm of her life. 

Why hadn't she known that this would happen, instead of being afraid thatshe would "go like" Aunt Charlotte or Uncle Victor? People talked a lotabout compensation, but nobody told you that after forty-five life wouldhave this exquisite clearness and intensity. 

Why, since it _could_ happen when you were young--reality breakingthrough, if only in flashes coming and going, going altogether andforgotten--why had you to wait so long before you could remember it andbe aware of it as one continuous, shining background? She had never beenaware of it before; she had only thought about and about it, aboutSubstance, the Thing-in-itself, Reality, God. Thinking was not beingaware. 

She made it out more and more. For twenty-three years something had comebetween her and reality. She could see what it was now. She had gonethrough life wanting things, wanting people, clinging to the thought ofthem, not able to keep off them and let them go. 

X. 

All her life she had gone wrong about happiness. She had attached it tocertain things and certain people: Mamma and Mark, Jenny, visits to AuntBella, the coming of Aunt Charlotte and Aunt Lavvy and Uncle Victor, thethings people would say and do which they had not said and not done: whenshe was older she had attached it to Maurice Jourdain and to Mark stilland Mamma; to going back to Mamma after Dover; to the unknown houses inMorfe; to Maurice Jourdain's coming; then to Mark's coming, to LindleyVickers. And in the end none of these things had brought her thehappiness she had seemed to foresee in them. 

She knew only one thing about perfect happiness: it didn't hide; itdidn't wait for you behind unknown doors. There were little happinesses, pleasures that came like that: the pleasure of feeling good when you satwith Maggie's sister; the pleasure of doing things for Mamma or Dorsy;all the pleasures that had come through the Sutcliffes. The Sutcliffeswent, and yet she had been happy. They had all gone, and yet she washappy. 

If you looked back on any perfect happiness you saw that it had not comefrom the people or the things you thought it had come from, but fromsomewhere inside yourself. When you attached it to people and things theyceased for that moment to be themselves; the space they then seemed toinhabit was not their own space; the time of the wonderful event was nottheir time. They became part of the kingdom of God within you. 

Not Richard. He had become part of the kingdom of God without ceasing tobe himself. 

That was because she had loved him more than herself. Loving him morethan herself she had let him go. 

Letting go had somehow done the trick. 

XI. 

I used to think there was nothing I couldn't give up for Richard. 

Could I give up this? If I had to choose between losing Richard andlosing this? (I suppose it would be generally considered that I _had_lost Richard. ) If I had had to choose seven years ago, before I knew, I'd have chosen Richard; I couldn't have helped myself. But if I hadto choose now--knowing what reality is--between losing Richard in theway I have lost him and losing reality, absolutely and for ever, losing, absolutely and for ever, my real self, knowing that I'd lost it?... 

If there's anything in it at all, losing my real self would be losingRichard, losing Richard's real self absolutely and for ever. Knowingreality is knowing that you can't lose it. That or nothing. 

XII. 

Supposing there isn't anything in it? Supposing--Supposing--

Last night I began thinking about it again. I stripped my soul; I openedall the windows and let my ice-cold thoughts in on the poor thing; itstood shivering between certainty and uncertainty. 

I tried to doubt away this ultimate passion, and it turned my doubt intoits own exquisite sting, the very thrill of the adventure. 

Supposing there's nothing in it, nothing at all?

That's the risk you take. 

XIII. 

There isn't any risk. This time it was clear, clear as the black patternthe sycamore makes on the sky. If it never came again I should remember. 

THE END