The
story
of
a
modern
woman
by
Ella
Hepworth
Dixon
New
York
The
Cassell
Publishing
Company
31
East
17th
Street
(
Union
Square
)
CHAPTER
I
AN
END
AND
A
BEGINNING
GLARING
spring
sunshine
and
a
piercing
east
wind
rioted
out
of
doors
,
and
here
and
there
overflowing
flower-baskets
made
startling
patches
of
colour
against
the
vague
blue-grey
of
the
streets
,
but
indoors
,
in
the
tall
London
house
,
there
was
only
a
sickly
,
yellow
twilight
,
for
the
orange-toned
blinds
were
scrupulously
drawn
down
.
There
was
awe
in
the
passages
,
and
hushed
tones
even
in
the
kitchen
,
as
if
the
dead
could
hear
!
Some
wreaths
and
crosses
of
wax-like
,
exotic
flowers
lay
on
the
hall-table
,
filling
the
passage
with
their
sensuous
odour
.
Friends
calling
to
inquire
had
left
them
there
,
but
they
had
not
yet
been
taken
up
to
that
darkened
room
where
a
marble
figure
—
a
figure
which
was
strangely
unlike
Professor
Erle
—
lay
stretched
,
in
an
enduring
silence
,
on
the
bed
.
Downstairs
,
in
the
little
study
giving
on
a
meagre
London
yard
,
a
girl
was
bending
over
a
desk
.
‘
You
will
,
I
know
,
be
grieved
to
hear
that
my
dear
father
passed
suddenly
away
the
night
before
last
,
’
she
wrote
,
while
a
great
nerve
in
her
forehead
went
tick
,
tick
,
tick
.
The
visitors
who
came
all
day
long
,
leaving
bits
of
paste-board
,
spoke
in
low
,
inquisitive
tones
.
When
the
bell
rang
,
there
were
veiled
whispers
at
the
hall-door
.
‘So
terrible
—
so
sudden
!
’
Mary
could
hear
them
inquire
how
she
was
keeping
up
?
And
Elizabeth
's
answer
:
‘Miss
Erle
is
as
well
as
could
be
expected.’
The
trite
,
worn-out
,
foolish
sentence
almost
made
her
laugh
.
All
the
stock
phrases
of
condolence
,
all
the
mental
trappings
of
woe
,
seemed
to
be
ready-made
for
the
‘sad
occasion
,
’
like
the
crape
skirts
and
cloaks
which
had
been
forwarded
immediately
from
the
mourning
establishment
in
Regent
Street
.
‘Yes
,
I
am
as
well
as
could
be
expected
,
’
she
thought
,
‘and
father
is
dead
.
Father
is
dead.’
And
all
the
long
afternoon
she
went
on
mechanically
writing
:
‘
I
am
sure
you
will
be
sorry
when
I
tell
you
that
my
dear
father
—
’
on
paper
bordered
with
black
an
inch
deep
.
How
he
would
have
disliked
that
foolish
ostentation
of
mourning
;
it
was
contrary
to
the
spirit
of
his
life
.
‘To-morrow
,
’
she
said
to
herself
,
‘I
must
send
for
some
note
paper
with
a
narrower
edge.’
These
letters
were
to
be
sent
abroad
.
The
English
newspapers
had
sufficiently
announced
the
death
,
for
Professor
Erle
was
perhaps
the
best-known
man
of
science
of
the
day
.
In
the
little
back
room
they
had
to
light
the
lamp
early
,
there
was
so
much
to
do
,
so
many
details
to
arrange
.
The
ceremony
was
to
be
as
simple
as
might
be
;
above
all
,
no
paid
priest
would
stand
at
the
grave
to
give
‘hearty
thanks’
that
the
great
thinker
had
been
‘delivered
out
of
the
miseries
of
this
sinful
world.’
The
sinful
world
would
have
as
its
spokesman
another
famous
professor
,
who
had
asked
to
be
allowed
to
say
a
few
words
.
Then
there
were
the
newspapers
.
There
was
the
brisk
,
smartly-dressed
young
gentleman
who
came
to
do
a
leader
for
a
daily
paper
,
and
who
proceeded
to
make
a
number
of
notes
in
shorthand
,
asking
innumerable
questions
as
his
omnivorous
glance
travelled
rapidly
round
the
study
.
Another
press-man
—
a
small
,
apologetic
man
with
greyish
hair
and
a
timid
cough
—
asked
to
see
the
house
for
the
Weekly
Planet
.
He
begged
of
Elizabeth
on
the
hall
steps
,
to
tell
him
if
the
Professor
had
said
anything
—
anything
particular
,
which
would
work
up
as
a
leader
,
just
at
the
last
?
‘Oh
!
sir
,
’
said
Elizabeth
,
‘did
n't
you
know
?
Master
did
n't
say
anything
.
He
just
died
in
his
sleep.’
The
daughter
went
about
her
tasks
with
a
sense
of
detachment
,
of
intense
aloofness
.
‘I
wonder
if
I
really
feel
it
?
’
she
thought
,
‘and
why
I
have
never
cried
?
I
should
like
to
,
but
it
is
impossible
;
I
shall
never
,
never
cry
again.’
It
was
as
if
Death
,
with
his
cruel
,
searing
wings
had
cauterised
her
very
soul
.
Sometimes
she
pictured
herself
in
her
long
crepe
veil
at
the
funeral
,
and
heard
in
imagination
her
friends
murmuring
pitying
words
,
as
they
all
followed
the
coffin
up
the
Highgate
slope
.
Alison
Ives
,
of
course
,
would
be
with
her
;
she
would
stay
by
her
,
perhaps
,
and
hold
her
hand
.
And
probably
Vincent
Hemming
would
be
near
.
Yes
,
he
too
would
be
there
.
At
dinner-time
she
had
to
sit
down
to
table
alone
.
She
was
hungry
,
and
she
ate
,
hardly
knowing
what
was
on
her
plate
.
Nothing
happened
as
it
does
in
tales
and
romances
.
In
innumerable
novels
she
had
read
how
the
heroine
,
in
a
house
of
mourning
,
lies
on
the
bed
for
days
and
steadily
refuses
to
eat
.
As
for
Mary
,
a
demon
of
unrest
possessed
her
during
that
horrible
week
,
and
it
was
as
if
she
could
not
eat
nourishing
food
enough
.
She
never
stopped
arranging
,
writing
,
adding
up
accounts
.
It
was
useless
to
try
and
read
.
Did
she
but
take
up
a
book
,
that
dominant
image
in
her
mind
—
the
image
of
a
dear
face
turned
to
marble
,
with
the
cold
,
triumphant
smile
of
eternity
on
its
lips
—
shut
out
the
sense
of
the
words
as
her
eyes
travelled
down
the
page
.
And
the
strange
,
unmistakable
odour
of
death
,
mixed
with
the
voluptuous
scent
of
waxen
hot-house
flowers
,
hung
,
night
and
day
,
about
the
staircase
.
Towards
the
end
of
the
week
,
there
was
more
noise
and
bustle
,
and
at
last
had
come
the
morning
when
the
house
swarmed
with
undertakers
'
men
,
and
Mary
and
her
young
brother
Jimmie
,
who
had
arrived
from
Winchester
,
sat
with
a
few
old
friends
in
the
dining-room
,
waiting
for
the
signal
to
go
.
There
was
the
shuffling
of
men
's
feet
,
as
they
staggered
down
the
narrow
London
staircase
with
their
heavy
burden
,
and
then
someone
had
made
the
girl
swallow
some
sal
volatile
,
and
she
was
pushed
gently
into
the
first
mourning
carriage
,
along
with
her
brother
.
They
had
made
the
boy
drink
some
of
the
sal
volatile
too
,
and
they
both
felt
strangely
elated
and
highly
strung
.
There
were
only
those
two
now
,
and
Mary
felt
warmly
drawn
to
Jimmie
,
as
they
sat
side
by
side
in
their
new
black
clothes
,
the
two
chief
personages
in
the
ceremony
of
to-day
.
She
even
pretended
not
to
hear
when
,
some
gutter
urchins
making
complicated
cartwheels
as
their
contribution
to
the
imposing
procession
,
Jimmie
,
boy-like
,
gave
way
to
a
furtive
giggle
.
The
drive
to
Highgate
seemed
interminable
,
but
at
last
,
when
the
long
procession
crept
slowly
up
the
hill
,
it
was
in
a
kind
of
stupor
that
the
girl
saw
and
heard
what
happened
.
There
was
,
she
remembered
afterwards
,
a
long
line
of
people
,
habited
in
black
,
awaiting
them
in
silence
inside
the
cemetery
gate
;
a
tolling
bell
,
neighing
horses
,
and
a
penetrating
scent
of
early
lilac
.
Sunlight
on
the
paths
,
on
the
shining
marble
tombs
,
on
the
humble
little
mounds
covered
in
plush-like
grass
;
then
a
moving
mass
of
black
,
a
yawning
hole
,
the
creaking
of
ropes
,
and
the
mellifluous
voice
of
the
eminent
professor
,
speaking
his
oration
over
some
upturned
clay
.
‘England
—
I
may
say
the
world
—
is
mourning
to
day
for
her
illustrious
son’
—
how
the
people
pressed
round
the
yawning
gap
,
and
pushed
against
the
guelder
rose-tree
overhead
,
so
that
the
flowers
fell
in
a
minute
white
shower
on
to
the
oaken
coffin
below
—
‘the
world
is
mourning
for
her
illustrious
son
.
Not
that
those
tears
will
flow
in
vain
,
for
they
will
moisten
and
fructify
the
precious
tree
of
Truth
,
a
tree
which
is
evermore
putting
forth
fresh
branches
and
new
fruits
which
are
indispensable
to
the
physical
and
moral
evolution
of
humanity.’
In
a
neighbouring
laburnum-bush
,
a
thrush
was
swelling
its
brown
throat
with
a
joyous
morning
song
.
Athwart
the
pale
sky
dappled
with
fleecy
clouds
,
the
lilac
bushes
were
burgeoning
with
waxen
,
pinkish
blossoms
.
The
very
air
throbbed
with
coming
life
.
‘Nature
,
’
continued
the
orator
,
in
his
measured
,
lecture-room
tones
,
‘Nature
,
who
works
in
inexorable
ways
,
has
taken
to
herself
a
life
full
of
arduous
toil
,
of
epoch-making
achievement
,
of
immeasurable
possibilities
,
but
to
what
end
,
and
for
what
purpose
,
is
not
given
to
us
,
who
stand
to-day
with
full
hearts
and
yearnings
eye
around
his
last
resting-place
,
to
know.’
The
sun
was
warm
overhead
,
the
scent
of
the
pink
may
was
strong
in
the
nostrils
;
a
joyous
twittering
in
an
adjacent
bush
told
of
mating
birds
,
of
new
life
in
the
nests
,
of
Nature
rioting
in
an
insolent
triumph
.
The
orator
paused
for
an
instant
,
coughed
,
and
felt
in
his
breast
pocket
for
his
notes
.
He
was
anxious
,
above
all
things
,
that
the
reporters
should
not
print
a
garbled
version
of
his
speech
.
Round
the
open
grave
pressed
the
devotees
of
science
,
the
followers
of
the
religion
of
humanity
;
grey-skinned
,
anxious-looking
men
and
women
,
with
lined
foreheads
and
hair
prematurely
tinged
with
grey
;
large
heads
with
bulging
foreheads
,
thin
throats
and
sloping
shoulders
;
the
women
with
nervous
,
overworked
worked
faces
,
the
men
with
the
pathetic
,
unrestful
features
of
those
who
are
sustained
in
a
life
of
self-denial
by
their
ethical
sense
alone
.
The
ceremony
of
to-day
was
a
great
moral
demonstration
.
All
classes
who
think
were
represented
.
Side
by
side
stood
a
white-haired
Radical
Countess
in
simple
half-mourning
and
the
spare
form
of
a
Socialist
working
woman
,
with
red
,
ungloved
wrists
and
an
inspired
look
on
her
worn
face
.
There
,
with
her
mother
,
Lady
Jane
,
was
Alison
Ives
.
Lady
Jane
,
who
was
impressionable
,
was
already
exhibiting
a
pocket-handkerchief
,
and
not
far
off
,
Mary
caught
for
one
instant
the
brown
,
wistful
eyes
of
Vincent
Hemming
.
The
sun
grew
hotter
and
hotter
overhead
.
One
or
two
of
the
mourners
began
putting
up
umbrellas
.
The
perfume
of
pink
hawthorn
became
almost
oppressive
;
an
early
butterfly
hovered
over
a
baby
's
grave
planted
with
sweet-smelling
flowers
.
A
light
breeze
fluttered
a
laburnum-bush
which
hung
over
a
neighbouring
marble
tomb
,
a
large
,
opulent
,
marble
tomb
,
on
which
was
cut
in
glittering
gilt
letters
:
‘Of
such
is
the
Kingdom
of
Heaven.’
And
everywhere
there
was
the
whiteness
of
graves
.
In
ridges
,
in
waves
,
in
mounds
,
they
stuck
,
tooth-like
,
from
the
fecund
earth
.
They
shone
,
in
gleaming
,
distant
lines
,
up
to
the
ridge
of
the
hill
;
they
crowded
in
serried
battalions
,
down
to
the
cemetery
gates
.
The
speaker
was
concluding
his
speech
.
‘For
though
to
isolated
men
,
’
he
said
,
raising
his
voice
so
that
all
who
were
on
the
edge
of
the
crowd
should
hear
,
‘it
may
be
given
here
and
there
to
scale
the
loftiest
heights
—
ay
,
and
ever
new
height
rising
upon
height
in
the
great
undiscovered
country
which
we
call
the
realm
of
Science
;
there
,
too
,
the
Finite
touches
the
Infinite
,
and
must
recognise
what
of
tentativeness
,
what
of
inconclusiveness
belongs
to
mere
human
effort
.
Here
,
on
a
sudden
,
the
dark
,
impenetrable
curtain
,
which
none
may
draw
aside
,
envelops
us
;
here
we
know
not
whether
all
ends
with
this
our
last
prison
house
,
or
if
to
us
may
be
opened
out
yet
further
cycles
of
aspiring
activity.’
In
the
silence
which
followed
there
was
heard
one
long
,
sweet
,
penetrating
bird-call
.
One
of
the
chief
mourners
,
the
boy
Jimmie
,
was
sobbing
loudly
when
the
professor
's
voice
stopped
,
and
with
something
gripping
at
her
throat
,
the
sister
led
him
away
.
She
reproached
herself
with
having
brought
him
;
the
young
,
she
thought
,
should
not
know
what
sorrow
is
.
The
two
spare
,
black-clad
figures
stepped
aside
up
the
hill
.
Out
yonder
,
at
their
feet
,
the
dun-colour
of
the
buildings
lost
in
the
murkiness
of
the
horizon
line
,
London
was
spread
out
.
Here
and
there
a
dome
,
a
spire
loomed
out
of
the
dim
bluish-grey
panorama
.
A
warm
haze
hung
over
the
great
city
;
here
and
there
a
faint
fringe
of
tree-tops
told
of
a
placid
park
;
now
and
again
the
shrill
whistle
of
an
engine
,
blown
northward
by
the
wind
,
spoke
of
the
bustle
of
journeys
,
of
the
turmoil
of
railway-stations
,
of
partings
,
of
arrivals
,
of
the
change
and
travail
of
human
life
,
of
the
strangers
who
come
,
of
the
failures
who
must
go
.
‘Jim
,
’
said
the
girl
suddenly
,
taking
the
boy
by
the
arm
,
‘there
's
London
!
We
're
going
to
make
it
listen
to
us
,
you
and
I
.
We
're
not
going
to
be
afraid
of
it
—
just
because
it
's
big
,
and
brutal
,
and
strong.’
‘N
—
no
,
dearest
,
’
said
the
boy
,
turning
up
a
pretty
,
sensitive
face
,
and
a
pink
nose
all
smeared
with
tears
.
‘Of
course
not.’
The
black
crowd
yonder
was
swaying
,
separating
,
and
disintegrating
itself
into
separate
sable
dots
which
were
now
seen
descending
the
paths
to
the
cemetery-gate
.
And
slowly
,
they
too
stepped
down
the
gravel
path
.
They
came
home
to
a
house
that
was
empty
and
orderly
again
;
a
house
in
which
his
door
stood
open
,
the
pale
light
of
a
spring
afternoon
filling
the
desolate
room
.
The
blinds
were
pulled
up
,
and
downstairs
,
in
the
kitchen
,
the
servants
had
begun
to
talk
and
laugh
.
Towards
dusk
,
Jimmie
got
engrossed
in
a
new
book
of
adventures
,
but
the
girl
,
restless
still
,
wandered
about
the
house
in
her
black
gown
looking
at
everything
with
strange
eyes
.
Something
terrible
,
unforeseen
had
happened
which
altered
her
whole
life
.
Towards
the
boy
poring
over
the
picture-book
she
felt
much
of
a
mother
's
feelings
;
it
behoved
her
to
look
after
him
now
that
his
father
was
gone
.
How
long
the
time
seemed
—
would
the
interminable
day
never
end
?
There
must
be
lots
for
her
to
do
.
And
casting
about
in
her
mind
,
she
remembered
that
this
was
the
day
on
which
she
always
gave
out
the
groceries
from
her
store
cupboard
;
there
was
the
seamstress
to
pay
,
too
,
who
was
altering
a
black
dress
for
her
up-stairs
.
So
Mary
dragged
herself
down
to
the
kitchens
and
presently
to
the
top
of
the
house
.
It
would
be
nice
of
her
,
she
thought
,
to
go
in
and
speak
to
the
woman
who
was
sewing
alone
.
It
was
sad
for
a
young
woman
to
be
alone
.
The
pale
,
pinkish
light
of
a
spring
evening
fell
on
a
drab-complexioned
girl
,
whose
fat
hand
moved
,
as
she
sewed
,
with
the
regularity
of
a
machine
.
Now
the
needle
was
thrust
in
the
fold
of
black
stuff
,
and
the
light
fell
on
her
ill-cut
nails
;
now
the
hand
was
aloft
,
in
the
semi-
obscurity
;
it
was
all
tame
,
monotonous
and
regular
as
a
clock
.
She
was
a
docile
,
humble
,
uncomplaining
creature
,
who
suggested
inevitably
some
patient
domestic
animal
.
Her
features
,
rubbed
out
and
effaced
with
generations
of
servility
,
spoke
of
the
small
mendacities
of
the
women
of
the
lower
classes
,
of
the
women
who
live
on
ministering
to
the
caprices
of
the
well-to-do
.
To-day
it
would
seem
she
had
assumed
an
appropriately
dolorous
expression
.
It
sometimes
soothed
Mary
to
stitch
.
Taking
up
a
strip
of
black
merino
,
she
began
to
hem
.
The
seamstress
's
hand
continued
to
move
with
docile
regularity
,
and
,
as
Mary
looked
at
her
,
she
was
curiously
reminded
of
many
women
she
had
seen
:
ladies
,
mothers
of
large
families
,
who
sat
and
sewed
with
just
such
an
expression
of
unquestioning
resignation
.
The
clicking
sound
of
the
needle
,
the
swish
of
the
drawn-out
thread
,
the
heavy
breathing
of
the
work-woman
,
all
added
to
the
impression
.
Yes
,
they
too
were
content
to
exist
subserviently
,
depending
always
on
someone
else
,
using
the
old
feminine
stratagems
,
the
well-worn
feminine
subterfuges
,
to
gain
their
end
.
The
woman
who
sews
is
eternally
the
same
.
The
light
began
to
fail
now
;
very
soon
it
would
be
dark
.
Mary
threw
down
her
work
with
an
impatient
gesture
,
and
,
in
the
grey
twilight
,
an
immense
pity
seized
her
for
the
patient
figure
bending
,
near
the
window
,
over
her
foolish
strips
of
flounces
,
the
figure
of
the
woman
at
her
monotonous
toil
.
CHAPTER
II
A
CHILD
THE
life
of
Mary
Erle
,
like
that
of
many
another
woman
in
the
end
of
the
nineteenth
century
,
had
been
more
or
less
in
the
nature
of
an
experiment
.
Born
too
late
for
the
simple
days
of
the
fifties
,
when
all
it
behoved
a
young
girl
to
do
was
to
mind
her
account-book
,
read
her
Tennyson
,
show
a
proper
enthusiasm
for
fancy-work
stitches
,
and
finally
,
with
many
blushes
,
accept
the
hand
of
the
first
young
man
who
desired
to
pay
taxes
and
to
fulfil
the
duties
of
a
loyal
British
subject
(
and
the
young
man
,
it
must
be
remembered
,
in
the
middle
of
this
century
,
actually
did
both
)
,
Mary
was
yet
too
soon
for
the
time
when
parents
begin
to
take
their
responsibilities
seriously
,
and
when
the
girl
is
sometimes
as
carefully
prepared
,
as
thoroughly
equipped
,
as
her
brother
for
the
fight
of
life
.
A
garden
full
of
flowers
,
a
house
full
of
books
,
scraps
of
travel
:
these
things
were
her
education
.
Out
of
the
years
she
could
pick
scenes
and
figures
which
typified
her
bringing-up
.
There
was
the
plain
,
self-contained
,
and
not
too
clean
baby
.
A
child
who
was
always
grubbing
in
a
garden
,
for
it
lived
then
in
a
house
in
St.
John
's
Wood
;
a
child
who
was
devoted
to
animals
and
insects
,
who
was
on
intimate
terms
with
the
many-legged
wood-lice
,
which
curled
themselves
up
with
all
haste
into
complete
balls
when
she
touched
them
;
a
child
for
whom
snails
and
black-beetles
had
no
terrors
,
and
who
had
much
to
say
to
the
green
,
hairy
caterpillars
which
hung
about
the
pear
tree
.
There
was
a
huge
,
fluffy
,
black
cat
,
too
,
which
represented
,
perhaps
,
the
child
's
primitive
idea
of
a
deity
;
for
,
though
she
adored
it
,
the
adoration
was
leavened
with
a
wholesome
awe
,
a
feeling
which
was
not
unconnected
with
certain
unmerited
chastisements
in
the
shape
of
scratches
on
her
fat
,
bare
legs
.
More
often
,
to
be
sure
,
the
black
cat
was
amiable
,
and
even
allowed
itself
to
be
carried
up
to
bed
,
with
its
hind
legs
straying
out
helplessly
from
under
the
child
's
arm
,
to
be
presently
concealed
with
all
haste
and
caution
under
the
white
sheets
and
blankets
,
from
whence
its
sharp-pointed
ears
and
wide
black
cheeks
arose
with
the
most
exquisitely
mirth-provoking
effect
.
With
what
inscrutable
amber
eyes
did
the
black
cat
gaze
for
hours
into
hers
!
how
it
imposed
on
her
babyish
imagination
with
its
self-contained
,
majestic
manners
,
its
air
of
detachment
from
the
vain
shows
of
the
world
!
The
man
with
the
kind
smile
,
whom
the
child
called
‘father
,
’
used
to
laugh
at
her
adoration
,
tell
her
she
was
a
little
Egyptian
,
and
called
the
cat
‘Pasht.’
She
thought
it
a
funny
name
,
and
not
being
altogether
sure
the
black
cat
would
approve
of
it
,
generally
addressed
it
as
‘you.’
And
the
cat
would
sit
on
long
summer
afternoons
on
the
grass
under
the
pear
tree
,
or
on
foggy
autumn
days
on
a
stool
by
the
fireside
,
with
paws
neatly
tucked
away
,
its
neck-ruff
fluffed
out
,
purring
benignly
in
response
to
her
confidences
.
Indeed
,
in
looking
back
,
the
first
tragedy
of
the
child
's
life
was
the
death
of
the
black
cat
.
It
lay
,
one
sultry
July
day
,
under
a
laurel
bush
in
the
garden
,
with
glazed
eyes
which
gave
no
signs
of
life
.
All
morning
and
all
afternoon
the
child
sat
there
and
fanned
the
flies
away
,
until
her
idol
was
stiff
,
and
then
a
hole
was
hastily
dug
,
and
the
black
cat
was
thrust
out
of
sight
.
And
never
any
more
,
in
the
warm
summer
afternoons
,
did
a
soft
,
furry
thing
go
sailing
,
tail
in
air
,
over
the
close-cropped
lawn
;
nor
,
on
winter
evenings
,
was
a
rhythmical
purring
to
be
heard
hard
by
the
tall
fender
which
guarded
the
nursery
fire
.
It
was
the
first
great
void
;
the
first
heartache
had
come
.
A
strange
,
indolent
child
,
whose
little
hands
were
usually
thrust
beneath
her
pinafore
when
anyone
spoke
to
her
;
for
surely
she
could
not
be
always
washing
herself
,
and
to
be
on
really
intimate
terms
with
insects
and
things
,
one
cannot
,
like
grown-up
people
,
be
always
thinking
of
one
's
nails
.
She
usually
,
too
,
concealed
a
small
piece
of
putty
about
her
person
—
an
unpardonable
sin
,
this
,
in
the
eyes
of
mother
and
nurse
—
for
putty
is
useful
in
a
thousand
ways
,
and
is
,
besides
,
so
thrillingly
delicious
to
feel
surreptitiously
in
the
recesses
of
one
's
pocket
.
At
this
time
the
child
held
the
whole
race
of
dolls
in
high
scorn
.
They
were
a
foolish
,
over-dressed
,
uninteresting
tribe
,
with
manifestly
absurd
cheeks
and
eye-lashes
,
and
with
a
simper
which
was
as
artificial
as
that
of
the
ladies
in
chignons
and
flounces
who
came
to
call
at
the
house
of
an
afternoon
.
She
,
on
her
part
,
was
all
for
the
violent
delights
of
miniature
guns
and
real
gunpowder
,
the
toilsome
construction
of
fleets
of
wooden
boats
with
the
aid
of
a
blunt
knife
and
a
plank
of
wood
;
fleets
which
were
set
a-sail
,
with
flying
pennants
,
on
the
cistern
hard
by
the
kitchen
.
There
were
boy
neighbours
who
aided
and
abetted
her
in
these
delights
,
and
great
naval
battles
would
come
off
between
the
Dutch
and
English
fleets
in
the
kitchen
cistern
,
in
which
sometimes
Van
Tromp
,
and
sometimes
Blake
,
emerged
victorious
.
The
child
,
perhaps
,
did
not
take
her
patriotism
seriously
,
as
the
boys
did
;
she
was
content
to
be
Van
Tromp
,
since
they
insisted
on
being
Blake
and
Monk
.
All
that
was
of
vital
importance
was
that
a
fight
of
some
sort
should
come
off
.
The
mother
sank
early
out
of
ken
.
First
they
said
that
she
was
poorly
,
and
had
gone
to
Italy
,
and
then
they
said
that
she
was
very
ill
,
and
afterwards
that
she
was
in
heaven
;
so
that
for
a
long
time
the
child
used
to
think
vaguely
,
as
she
sat
in
the
summer-house
with
pursed-up
lips
and
knitted
brows
,
notching
and
slicing
at
her
ships
,
that
Italy
and
heaven
were
perhaps
the
same
place
.
Nurse
said
that
her
mummy
was
an
angel
now
;
but
,
in
all
the
picture-books
,
angels
had
long
,
smooth
hair
,
wore
a
kind
of
night-gown
,
and
had
enormous
,
folding
wings
.
The
child
could
not
picture
her
mother
looking
like
that
;
she
always
remembered
her
in
many
flounces
,
with
a
headache
;
and
certainly
,
no
,
certainly
,
mummy
never
had
any
wings
out
of
her
back
.
The
child
could
recollect
that
,
some
little
time
before
her
mother
went
to
Italy
,
they
took
her
upstairs
one
day
and
showed
her
a
baby
,
with
a
red
,
crinkled
face
,
lying
in
an
over-trimmed
cradle
.
She
did
not
care
for
babies
,
she
would
rather
have
had
a
nice
,
new
,
fluffy
kitten
to
replace
the
old
black
cat
;
but
when
they
told
her
it
was
a
little
brother
,
of
course
that
altered
matters
.
She
was
sorry
her
brother
should
be
so
small
,
so
fretful
,
and
so
red
in
the
face
;
she
would
rather
have
had
him
the
same
size
as
herself
,
so
that
he
could
have
been
Van
Tromp
for
once
,
and
she
the
victorious
Blake
;
but
still
,
any
sort
or
size
of
brother
was
better
than
none
.
Although
,
in
a
year
or
so
,
the
baby
developed
into
something
suspiciously
like
a
doll
,
with
his
fat
,
pink
cheeks
,
his
round
,
china-blue
eyes
,
his
dump
of
a
nose
,
and
his
entire
absence
of
chin
,
still
,
he
was
far
more
entertaining
than
that
simpering
and
foolish
tribe
.
Baby
Jim
's
pink
toes
could
kick
;
his
little
fist
,
with
the
creases
of
fat
at
the
wrist
,
could
hit
out
;
there
were
warlike
possibilities
in
him
.
In
a
word
,
Baby
Jim
was
alive
.
At
ten
years
old
the
girl
began
to
have
strange
fits
of
vanity
.
There
were
little
shoes
and
frocks
which
she
held
in
high
favour
,
and
others
which
nothing
would
induce
her
to
put
on
.
To
wear
a
pinafore
,
now
,
was
a
bitter
humiliation
,
and
about
this
period
she
had
the
most
definite
theories
about
the
dressing
of
hair
.
The
discussion
on
coiffures
usually
took
place
in
her
bath
,
when
a
small
,
slippery
person
covered
in
soap-suds
was
to
be
heard
arguing
with
her
nurse
—
an
argument
which
was
not
unusually
enforced
by
physical
violence
—
on
the
superior
attractions
of
crimped
to
curled
locks
.
At
ten
years
old
—
she
was
of
opinion
—
a
person
was
grown
up
,
or
at
least
as
old
as
any
one
need
be
.
Why
,
big
,
tall
men
,
with
long
beards
and
spectacles
,
who
came
to
see
her
father
,
would
bend
down
and
ask
her
gravely
if
she
would
be
their
little
wife
?
The
child
had
been
to
more
than
one
wedding
,
and
she
was
aware
that
a
wife
was
a
person
who
began
by
wearing
a
beautiful
white
satin
train
,
with
white
flowers
and
a
veil
;
a
person
who
was
as
imposing
as
that
angel
which
nurse
said
her
mother
had
become
,
although
she
had
not
,
of
course
,
any
wings
.
The
child
was
not
sure
whether
she
would
best
like
to
be
a
bride
or
an
angel
.
The
latter
,
it
was
true
,
had
the
additional
attraction
of
a
golden
halo
;
but
she
thought
,
probably
,
that
matters
might
be
compromised
,
and
that
she
could
be
a
wife
and
have
a
halo
,
too
.
The
scene
shifts
now
,
for
they
had
moved
to
another
quarter
of
London
,
and
the
change
made
a
vast
difference
in
the
child
's
tastes
and
habits
.
There
was
no
cropped
lawn
now
,
where
the
pear
tree
made
long
shadows
on
summer
afternoons
,
where
she
had
a
personal
interest
in
a
plot
of
ground
of
her
own
,
and
at
least
a
bowing
acquaintance
with
a
whole
host
of
fussy
bumble-bees
,
gay
yellow
butterflies
,
furry
caterpillars
,
and
lazy
snails
.
There
was
no
summer-house
in
which
ship-building
could
be
carried
on
,
and
no
convenient
cistern
in
which
to
sail
one
's
fleet
.
The
firing
off
of
toy
guns
was
erased
from
the
list
of
possible
amusements
.
The
house
was
a
tall
one
,
in
a
street
in
town
,
and
rural
delights
were
represented
by
a
square
yard
at
the
back
,
which
was
haunted
by
stray
,
attenuated
cats
,
and
in
which
grew
a
solitary
,
stunted
sycamore
.
But
,
on
the
other
hand
,
there
was
the
new
fascination
of
book-shelves
,
which
ran
all
over
the
new
house
,
so
that
the
child
had
but
to
mount
a
chair
and
reach
out
a
small
hand
,
and
,
lo
!
romance
and
battles
,
laughter
and
tears
,
were
all
to
be
enjoyed
at
her
will
.
She
had
only
to
pick
out
her
volume
.
It
was
a
revelation
in
the
possibilities
of
life
.
Looking
back
now
,
it
must
be
owned
that
she
led
an
odd
life
.
The
man
with
the
kind
smile
was
fond
of
his
little
daughter
,
but
he
was
always
at
work
,
either
at
experiments
in
his
laboratory
or
bending
over
his
desk
in
the
study
.
Nothing
happened
in
the
way
of
experience
as
it
does
to
other
children
.
One
night
her
father
took
her
to
the
theatre
for
the
first
time
.
A
famous
actress
,
an
old
friend
,
was
giving
Antony
and
Cleopatra
,
and
they
went
first
behind
the
scenes
.
They
walked
across
a
bare
,
lofty
,
cavern-like
place
,
with
dusty
wooden
boards
,
which
sloped
upwards
,
and
the
child
was
lifted
up
to
peep
through
a
little
hole
in
a
red
velvet
curtain
,
and
through
it
she
saw
a
large
horse-shoe
with
quantities
of
people
chattering
as
they
waited
.
There
was
a
great
deal
of
tawdry
gilt
,
and
many
gas
chandeliers
,
and
the
people
,
especially
at
the
top
of
the
horseshoe
,
stamped
with
their
feet
and
whistled
.
She
did
not
care
much
for
the
play
,
when
they
presently
took
their
places
in
a
box
close
to
the
stage
.
There
was
a
stout
lady
in
long
amber
draperies
,
who
kept
throwing
her
arms
round
a
tired-looking
man
with
a
brown
face
and
a
suit
of
gilt
armour
.
The
child
was
more
amused
when
,
between
the
acts
,
they
went
behind
the
scenes
again
to
see
the
famous
actress
in
her
dressing-room
.
Unfortunately
,
the
stout
lady
looked
fatter
than
ever
when
seen
close
,
but
there
were
so
many
amusing
things
about
—
a
wig
with
long
plaits
,
several
serpent
bracelets
,
a
diadem
,
and
a
beautiful
golden
girdle
set
with
emeralds
as
big
as
pheasants
'
eggs
.
There
was
a
middle-aged
gentleman
,
too
,
who
sat
at
his
ease
in
a
shabby
armchair
,
and
drank
some
pinkish
,
sparkling
wine
out
of
a
low
,
round
glass
.
Some
one
said
that
he
was
the
editor
of
a
great
paper
.
The
child
had
never
seen
an
editor
;
she
was
glad
to
see
one
,
because
she
had
always
thought
they
were
quite
different
from
other
people
.
She
liked
to
see
him
laugh
,
and
whisper
in
a
familiar
,
condescending
way
to
the
stout
lady
,
and
yet
keep
on
drinking
the
pink
wine
out
of
the
round
glass
.
The
child
was
incorrigibly
idle
.
A
mild
,
non-descript
,
unimaginative
governess
and
a
fat
,
bald
Frenchman
who
came
once
a
week
to
instruct
her
in
the
Gallic
tongue
did
nothing
to
take
away
the
inherent
unattractiveness
of
‘lessons.’
She
could
read
,
and
that
was
enough
.
The
child
read
all
day
long
.
She
lay
concealed
among
the
footstools
under
the
long
dining-room
table
,
poring
over
The
Ancient
Mariner
—
her
favourite
poem
—
or
thrilled
with
the
lurid
emotion
of
Wuthering
Heights
.
A
little
later
Villette
became
her
cherished
book
;
a
well-thumbed
copy
,
long
ago
bereft
of
its
cover
,
stands
on
the
girl
's
shelf
to-day
.
Poor
drab
,
patient
,
self-contained
Miss
Snow
!
How
the
child
's
heart
ached
for
you
in
your
bare
,
dismal
,
Belgian
schoolroom
,
when
Dr.
John
grew
fickle
;
how
she
rejoiced
when
you
found
your
ugly
,
be-spectacled
Fate
;
how
choky
she
felt
at
the
throat
when
she
read
those
last
pessimistic
,
despairing
words
—
words
full
of
the
sound
and
fury
of
angry
seas
and
moaning
winds
.
Why
,
poor
patient
hypochondriacal
soul
,
were
you
destined
never
to
be
happy
?
And
all
these
people
were
real
to
the
child
,
much
more
real
than
the
people
she
saw
when
she
went
out
to
tea-parties
in
her
best
frock
and
sash
.
They
were
as
real
as
the
little
Tin
Soldier
and
the
little
Sea-maiden
of
Hans
Christian
Andersen
,
types
of
humanity
which
will
last
as
long
as
there
are
tender
little
human
hearts
to
be
touched
.
And
,
later
on
,
there
is
the
rather
plain
girl
of
fourteen
,
with
somewhat
inscrutable
eyes
,
and
a
seriousness
which
would
have
been
portentous
were
it
not
laughable
.
Gone
,
for
the
time
being
,
were
her
fits
of
high
spirits
and
her
wild
gaiety
;
lost
,
the
love
of
battle
,
and
even
the
love
of
books
about
battles
.
The
girl
had
much
to
occupy
her
mind
.
She
began
to
understand
something
of
life
now
.
It
was
no
longer
a
kind
of
coloured
picture-book
,
made
to
catch
the
eye
and
amuse
an
idle
half-hour
.
The
pictures
meant
a
great
deal
more
than
that
.
There
were
dreadful
things
,
sad
things
,
horrible
things
behind
.
Things
that
the
girl
could
only
guess
at
,
but
which
were
there
,
she
was
sure
,
all
the
same
.
The
world
,
she
could
see
from
her
books
and
newspapers
,
was
full
of
injustice
.
There
was
the
great
wrong
which
had
been
done
some
eighteen
hundred
years
ago
,
when
the
most
beautiful
life
that
was
ever
lived
had
come
to
a
shameful
end
.
The
girl
was
always
reading
that
moving
story
;
the
Old
Testament
,
with
its
revengeful
,
Jewish
Deity
,
did
not
appeal
to
her
at
all
.
The
poignant
tragedy
enacted
at
Jerusalem
ate
into
her
heart
,
and
this
child
of
fourteen
felt
herself
burdened
with
the
reproach
which
that
senseless
crime
has
left
on
humanity
for
well-nigh
two
thousand
years
.
Yes
,
those
were
serious
days
.
Once
in
her
teens
,
she
had
to
make
up
her
mind
on
many
subjects
.
There
were
the
questions
of
marriage
,
of
maternity
,
of
education
.
The
girl
had
learned
French
by
now
,
and
the
chance
fingering
of
a
small
,
last-century
volume
made
her
approach
those
supremely
feminine
subjects
under
the
somewhat
insecure
guidance
of
Jean
Jacques
Rousseau
.
She
imbibed
,
indeed
,
the
Swiss
philosopher
's
diatribes
on
virtue
before
she
had
comprehended
what
civilised
mankind
stigmatises
as
vice
.
Emile
:
ou
,
de
l'Education
was
wearily
,
conscientiously
toiled
through
for
the
sake
of
posterity
.
Le
Contrat
Social
was
a
work
which
it
behoved
a
person
of
fourteen
—
a
person
who
wished
to
understand
the
scheme
of
civilisation
—
to
know
.
Strange
,
anxious
days
,
passed
in
the
twilight
of
ignorance
,
groping
among
the
vain
shadows
with
which
man
in
his
wisdom
has
elected
to
surround
the
future
mothers
of
the
race
.
It
was
not
,
of
course
,
till
years
afterwards
,
that
Mary
became
conscious
of
the
fine
irony
of
the
fact
that
man
—
the
superior
intelligence
—
should
take
his
future
companion
,
shut
her
within
four
walls
,
fill
that
dimly-lighted
interior
with
images
of
facts
and
emotions
which
do
not
exist
,
and
then
,
pushing
her
suddenly
into
the
blinding
glare
of
real
life
,
should
be
amazed
when
he
finds
that
his
exquisite
care
of
her
ethical
sense
has
stultified
her
brain
.
The
girl
was
reading
David
Copperfield
when
she
descended
one
day
,
with
knitted
brows
,
to
the
room
where
her
governess
was
laboriously
copying
in
water-colours
a
lithographed
bunch
of
roses
.
‘What
is
a
lost
woman
really
,
Miss
Brown
?
’
demanded
the
girl
,
with
her
tense
look
.
‘Dickens
says
that
little
Em'ly
is
a
lost
woman
,
because
she
goes
to
Italy
with
that
Mr.
Steerforth
.
Was
Mr.
Steerforth
a
lost
man
,
too
?
’
CHAPTER
III
A
YOUNG
GIRL
LOOKING
back
,
across
the
vague
,
misty
years
,
the
egotism
,
the
ferocious
egotism
,
of
the
young
girl
appears
well-nigh
incredible
.
At
eighteen
,
she
,
with
her
fluffy
hair
and
her
white
shoulders
,
is
the
most
important
thing
in
her
little
world
.
There
is
the
day
she
first
discovers
she
has
a
throat
with
fine
lines
;
the
secret
delight
with
which
she
hears
an
artist
tell
her
that
the
movements
of
her
body
are
graceful
.
Does
black
,
or
blue
,
or
white
become
her
best
?
It
is
never
too
late
,
and
she
is
never
too
tired
,
when
she
comes
back
from
a
ball
,
to
light
all
the
candles
again
in
her
bedroom
and
examine
herself
critically
,
anxiously
,
in
the
glass
.
There
is
a
little
pink
spot
of
excitement
on
each
cheek
;
her
hair
is
ruffled
.
She
looks
pretty
,
she
has
been
happy
to-night
.
Some
one
—
no
matter
who
—
has
told
her
she
looks
charming
.
There
is
the
desire
of
the
young
girl
to
coquet
,
to
play
with
,
to
torture
,
when
she
first
learns
the
all-powerful
influence
which
she
possesses
by
the
primitive
fact
of
her
sex
.
With
all
the
arrogance
which
belongs
to
personal
purity
,
she
stands
on
her
little
pedestal
and
looks
down
on
mankind
with
a
somewhat
condescending
smile
.
She
is
—
and
she
feels
it
instinctively
—
a
thing
apart
,
a
kind
of
forced
plant
,
a
product
of
civilisation
.
At
present
the
ball-room
,
with
its
artificial
atmosphere
,
its
fleeting
devotions
,
its
graceful
mockery
of
real
life
,
is
the
scene
of
her
little
triumphs
.
The
eyes
of
all
men
—
young
and
old
alike
—
follow
the
girl
approvingly
,
wistfully
,
as
she
ascends
the
staircase
,
her
full
heart
beating
against
her
slim
satin
bodice
,
the
clear
,
peachlike
cheeks
pink
with
excitement
,
her
swimming
eyes
raised
invitingly
to
some
favourite
partner
,
or
dropped
as
she
passes
a
man
she
wishes
to
avoid
.
At
the
door
her
slender
white
arms
and
shoulders
disappear
in
a
circle
of
black
coats
;
the
programme
is
scrawled
all
over
;
she
notes
exultantly
that
one
or
two
men
are
scowling
at
each
other
,
and
that
she
has
no
dance
to
give
some
one
who
has
joined
the
group
too
late
.
It
is
the
woman
's
first
taste
of
power
.
There
is
,
too
,
the
joie
de
vivre
,
the
delight
of
the
young
animal
at
play
,
the
imperious
will-to-live
of
a
being
in
perfect
health
.
The
girl
must
dance
till
her
feet
ache
horribly
,
the
room
swings
round
,
and
the
pink
dawn
comes
creeping
in
behind
the
drawn
blinds
;
but
still
she
must
go
on
till
that
music
stops
,
the
swaying
,
voluptuous
heartrending
music
which
draws
her
feet
round
and
round
.
The
violins
,
with
their
navrant
tones
,
the
human
,
dolorous
strains
of
the
cornets
,
the
brilliant
,
metallic
,
artificial
sounds
of
the
piano
,
all
act
powerfully
on
the
young
girl
's
nervous
system
.
Then
come
the
stifling
crowded
supper-room
,
with
its
indigestible
food
and
sweet
champagne
;
the
young
men
who
move
nearer
and
look
at
her
with
strange
eyes
,
after
they
have
eaten
and
drunk
.
It
is
all
new
and
intoxicating
,
and
a
little
frightening
;
but
it
is
life
,
or
the
nearest
approach
to
it
that
a
young
girl
,
gently
nurtured
and
carefully
looked
after
,
can
possibly
know
.
Admiration
,
at
this
period
,
is
the
very
breath
of
her
nostrils
.
No
matter
from
whom
,
no
matter
when
or
where
.
A
smile
,
seen
like
a
flash
,
on
a
face
in
a
passing
hansom
;
the
ill-bred
pertinacity
of
a
raised
lorgnette
at
a
theatre
;
the
dubious
gaze
of
men
about
town
,
leaning
against
ball-room
doors
—
nothing
offends
her
.
It
is
simply
incense
burnt
at
the
feet
of
her
youth
.
But
at
last
,
out
of
the
vague
crowd
of
black
coats
and
wistful
eyes
,
the
first
lover
emerges
.
It
is
a
little
difficult
to
recall
his
face
,
after
all
these
years
.
Looking
back
dispassionately
,
he
seems
to
have
been
very
like
all
the
others
,
only
that
he
made
her
suffer
,
while
the
others
,
perhaps
,
suffered
a
little
for
her
sake
.
There
were
the
horrible
half-hours
of
torture
when
she
waited
,
in
some
crowded
party
,
for
his
sleek
head
and
his
somewhat
foolish
smile
to
appear
in
the
door-way
;
the
blank
,
empty
days
when
there
was
no
letter
;
the
shamefully
sweet
,
the
incredible
surrender
to
the
first
tentative
embrace
,
a
surrender
which
tortured
her
night
and
day
,
and
then
the
joy
,
the
supreme
joy
,
of
knowing
,
for
certain
,
that
he
cared
.
It
is
all
a
little
remote
,
now
,
but
the
beautiful
secret
was
hugged
like
a
very
treasure
.
He
was
young
,
he
was
poor
,
there
were
difficulties
of
every
sort
to
contend
with
,
and
finally
there
was
a
parting
,
one
warm
,
windy
night
in
November
.
It
was
a
Sunday
,
about
seven
o'clock
,
and
through
the
window
,
which
was
ajar
in
the
drawing-room
where
they
stood
,
came
the
sound
of
a
tolling
bell
.
It
was
only
a
neighbouring
church
summoning
pious
folk
to
evening
service
,
but
it
sounded
like
a
knell
.
It
was
a
well-nigh
hopeless
affair
,
and
all
that
they
could
do
was
to
promise
to
write
to
each
other
.
For
some
weeks
the
girl
watched
,
in
the
column
of
the
shipping
intelligence
,
the
eastward
progress
of
a
Peninsular
and
Oriental
steamer
on
its
way
to
Australia
,
and
after
that
,
on
the
mornings
when
the
mail
came
in
,
she
would
stand
with
her
heart
in
her
mouth
,
and
her
hand
on
the
knob
of
the
dining-room
door
,
afraid
to
go
in
and
find
that
no
foreign
envelope
lay
beside
her
plate
.
For
some
months
,
to
be
sure
,
the
letters
nearly
always
lay
there
,
but
gradually
they
got
rarer
and
rarer
,
and
one
day
she
told
herself
finally
that
she
need
not
expect
any
more
.
Torture
is
not
made
more
bearable
by
being
slowly
applied
.
During
the
months
in
which
those
letters
from
Australia
grew
rarer
,
the
girl
understood
for
the
first
time
the
helplessness
,
the
intolerable
burden
which
society
has
laid
on
her
sex
.
All
things
must
be
endured
with
a
polite
smile
.
Had
she
been
a
boy
,
she
was
aware
that
she
might
have
made
an
effort
to
break
the
maddening
silence
;
have
stifled
her
sorrow
with
dissipation
,
with
travel
or
hard
work
.
As
it
was
,
the
trivial
round
of
civilised
feminine
existence
made
her
,
in
those
days
,
almost
an
automaton
.
One
looks
back
,
with
wonder
,
at
the
courage
of
the
girl
.
To
find
a
smile
with
which
to
face
her
father
at
the
dinner
table
;
to
take
a
sisterly
interest
in
Jim
's
exploits
at
school
;
to
show
due
surprise
each
time
her
brother
announced
the
arrival
of
a
new
batch
of
rabbits
;
and
a
partisan
's
joy
in
the
licking
which
Smith
minor
had
administered
to
Jones
major
—
these
were
the
immediate
duties
which
lay
before
her
.
Not
feeling
strong
just
now
,
the
girl
gave
up
going
to
balls
;
they
reminded
her
too
much
of
that
episode
which
she
wished
to
forget
;
and
now
the
prospect
that
opened
out
before
her
was
a
vista
of
years
full
of
scientific
soirées
where
one
walked
down
long
sparsely-peopled
rooms
and
looked
through
microscopes
at
things
which
wriggled
and
squirmed
.
Sometimes
the
girl
felt
strangely
like
one
of
those
much-observed
bacilli
;
the
daughter
of
a
scientist
,
she
knew
well
enough
that
her
little
troubles
had
about
as
much
importance
as
theirs
in
relation
to
the
vast
universe
.
Yet
there
she
was
,
fixed
down
under
her
little
glass
case
,
while
the
world
kept
a
coldly
observant
eye
upon
her
.
Ah
,
the
torture
of
the
young
—
the
young
who
are
always
unhappy
,
and
whose
little
lives
are
continually
coming
to
a
full
stop
,
with
chapters
that
cease
bluntly
,
brutally
,
without
reason
and
without
explanation
.
That
she
was
thrown
aside
,
dropped
overboard
,
as
it
were
,
in
the
terrific
battle
for
existence
mattered
nothing
to
the
young
girl
.
Having
no
self-pity
,
she
never
questioned
the
justice
of
the
blow
that
had
been
dealt
her
.
Afterwards
,
in
the
years
to
come
,
she
might
wonder
why
she
should
have
been
made
to
suffer
so
?
But
not
then
.
One
's
first
sorrow
is
a
very
precious
thing
.
In
those
far-off
days
,
she
would
gladly
have
sacrificed
everything
—
even
life
itself
—
for
the
young
man
who
forgot
to
write
,
and
whose
face
,
with
its
rather
foolish
smile
,
it
is
so
difficult
to
recall
exactly
as
it
was
.
About
this
time
,
when
she
began
to
work
at
the
Central
London
School
of
Art
,
father
and
daughter
became
great
friends
.
On
the
days
when
he
went
to
lecture
at
the
London
University
,
she
would
either
walk
with
him
,
or
go
to
fetch
him
on
those
afternoons
when
he
was
coming
straight
home
to
tea
instead
of
making
his
way
to
the
Athenæum
Club
.
With
her
chin
in
the
air
,
looking
straight
before
her
,
she
stepped
along
,
in
the
half-dark
,
with
a
royal
scorn
for
the
well-dressed
loafers
who
find
their
pleasure
in
accosting
ladies
in
the
street
.
She
was
twenty-one
,
and
a
woman
now
;
it
behoved
her
to
be
able
to
take
care
of
herself
.
And
after
all
,
they
were
perhaps
more
easily
disposed
of
than
some
of
the
men
who
took
her
in
to
dinner
,
men
who
had
tired
eyes
and
a
dubious
smile
,
and
who
were
fond
of
starting
doubtful
topics
with
a
side-long
,
tentative
glance
.
She
works
now
regularly
with
her
father
,
acting
as
his
amanuensis
when
his
eyes
are
tired
,
or
verifying
facts
in
the
library
.
Jimmie
,
the
little
brother
,
has
grown
into
a
boy
with
charming
,
insinuating
manners
,
who
is
curiously
un-British
in
his
demonstrativeness
.
His
sister
,
he
says
,
is
the
most
charming
of
girls
.
He
announces
that
he
is
always
going
to
live
with
her
.
Nothing
shall
separate
them
.
His
whole
life
,
he
declares
,
with
his
arms
round
her
neck
,
is
to
be
devoted
to
his
dearest
Mary
.
How
well
she
remembered
the
last
time
she
and
her
father
had
gone
out
together
.
She
could
recollect
driving
in
a
hansom
,
and
their
talk
on
the
way
to
the
Foreign
Office
.
His
last
book
but
one
had
but
lately
appeared
,
and
was
now
being
scratched
and
bespluttered
assiduously
by
clerical
pens
,
while
it
was
received
with
rapture
by
the
large
class
which
like
their
advanced
thinking
done
for
them
,
and
turned
out
in
fat
print
with
ample
margins
once
in
every
third
year
.
All
the
way
up
the
crowded
staircase
there
is
a
great
display
of
teeth
,
of
tiaras
,
of
stars
and
orders
,
of
shining
bald
heads
.
The
wife
of
the
Foreign
Secretary
is
delighted
to
see
the
professor
,
though
no
one
in
that
eminently
aristocratic
gathering
‘insists’
on
anything
,
and
most
people
are
content
to
exchange
two
fingers
,
two
words
,
and
two
smiles
,
one
at
greeting
and
one
at
passing
on
.
His
Excellency
the
German
Ambassador
detains
the
father
and
daughter
,
for
he
has
just
heard
that
the
Emperor
intends
to
bestow
on
the
English
professor
the
Order
of
the
Crown
,
for
his
distinguished
services
to
the
progress
of
modern
thought
.
The
two
move
on
,
and
are
caught
up
in
other
small
circles
,
where
they
hear
agreeable
commonplaces
,
in
an
atmosphere
where
everything
is
taken
for
granted
,
and
in
which
smooth
phrases
and
smooth
faces
abound
,
faces
which
have
inherited
,
for
hundreds
of
years
,
the
art
of
expressing
nothing
in
a
polite
way
.
It
is
all
suave
and
artificial
and
decorous
.
No
epigrams
make
themselves
conspicuous
in
the
well-bred
chatter
,
and
one
great
lady
,
exhibiting
a
superfluity
of
bare
flesh
,
raises
a
tortoise-shell
lorgnette
when
some
one
—
who
can
it
be
?
—
is
heard
to
laugh
outright
.
A
famous
guardsman
has
several
charming
things
to
say
,
and
the
girl
finds
her
chatter
received
with
flattering
attention
by
the
handsome
man
with
the
Garter
,
who
is
at
once
a
Viceroy
and
the
most
suave
of
diplomats
.
Surely
,
when
one
looks
back
,
the
girl
's
eyes
are
bright
again
that
night
;
her
blond
hair
is
full
of
electricity
;
she
has
regained
,
though
with
a
curious
little
composed
manner
,
something
of
the
roundness
,
the
joyousness
,
of
nineteen
.
Life
is
a
compromise
,
and
must
not
be
taken
too
seriously
.
It
is
absurd
to
be
much
in
earnest
,
and
it
bores
people
.
So
much
the
girl
has
learned
.
For
the
next
two
or
three
days
,
the
two
hardly
left
the
study
,
except
for
a
short
walk
after
dinner
,
for
the
professor
's
book
absorbed
him
.
Not
feeling
himself
,
he
was
anxious
—
terribly
anxious
—
to
get
it
done
.
After
this
they
would
go
abroad
,
and
get
a
long
holiday
.
He
wanted
to
go
to
Zermatt
.
At
the
Riffel
Alp
he
would
get
the
air
and
exercise
he
craved
.
No
,
he
was
not
quite
himself
;
he
felt
over-strained
,
nervous
,
he
had
a
continual
headache
.
It
was
,
perhaps
,
he
said
,
a
touch
of
bile
.
But
one
evening
,
just
before
dinner
,
the
book
was
actually
done
.
Bending
over
the
girl
at
the
desk
,
he
kissed
her
crisp
hair
,
and
wrote
at
the
bottom
of
the
page
,
in
his
own
cramped
hand
,
these
words
—
‘The
End.’
And
so
it
was
,
indeed
.
The
next
morning
,
when
the
servant
went
up
to
call
him
,
the
professor
had
been
dead
some
hours
.
The
doctors
spoke
of
a
clot
of
blood
in
the
brain
,
of
over-work
,
and
over-strain
.
And
in
the
tall
,
darkened
house
in
Harley
Street
,
the
child
who
had
played
,
the
girl
who
had
danced
,
died
too
.
CHAPTER
IV
ALISON
AS
sometimes
happens
with
busy
people
in
London
,
the
Erles
had
hundreds
of
acquaintances
and
but
few
intimate
friends
.
A
friendship
is
costly
,
in
point
of
time
,
and
Mary
found
,
when
one
chapter
of
her
life
was
done
that
spring
morning
,
that
there
were
two
people
only
that
she
must
imperatively
see
:
a
man
and
a
woman
—
Vincent
Hemming
and
Alison
Ives
.
How
their
features
stood
out
among
the
crowd
of
vague
faces
,
which
belonged
to
that
other
life
!
Alison
Ives
especially
,
who
always
looked
like
a
Reynolds
,
with
her
handsome
,
clever
face
,
her
superb
air
,
and
her
huge
hats
tied
under
the
chin
.
With
that
grave
sweetness
which
endears
to
us
the
Siddons
in
the
National
Gallery
,
she
yet
had
the
look
of
a
thinker
,
modernised
by
a
slightly
bored
expression
,
and
a
little
distinguished
way
which
at
once
made
other
women
in
her
vicinity
look
dowdy
or
vulgar
.
Her
clothes
always
seemed
to
suit
her
,
as
its
feathers
do
a
bird
.
There
are
women
who
look
like
an
édition
de
luxe
of
a
poor
book
;
Alison
Ives
suggested
that
of
a
classic
.
It
had
been
her
habit
for
a
couple
of
years
past
to
sit
at
the
feet
of
Professor
Erle
;
she
constantly
announced
,
indeed
,
that
he
was
the
only
man
she
wanted
to
marry
,
only
that
he
was
firm
,
and
would
not
permit
it
.
Besides
,
it
was
no
good
trying
to
compete
with
her
mother
,
Lady
Jane
,
who
was
sixty-five
—
and
irresistible
.
Women
of
sixty-five
,
she
said
,
were
nowadays
the
only
people
who
inspired
a
great
passion
.
She
supposed
her
turn
would
come
—
a
quarter
of
a
century
hence
.
But
,
all
the
same
,
the
daughter
was
much
admired
in
the
world
;
but
the
world
,
as
understood
by
her
mother
,
Lady
Jane
,
by
no
means
entirely
satisfied
this
eminently
modern
young
woman
.
It
was
whispered
that
she
had
serious
views
,
though
it
was
certain
that
she
was
pretty
enough
to
please
a
Prime
Minister
,
and
clever
enough
to
entertain
a
guardsman
,
if
she
found
herself
next
to
either
at
dinner
.
Alison
did
not
mind
which
,
she
said
;
in
fact
,
after
a
long
day
in
the
East-end
,
when
she
was
tired
,
she
rather
preferred
the
guardsman
,
who
would
be
content
to
talk
of
polo
ponies
,
whereas
,
when
a
young
woman
is
put
next
to
a
Premier
,
it
behoves
her
to
look
,
at
any
rate
,
very
brilliant
indeed
.
Though
she
never
smoked
,
was
ignorant
of
billiard
cues
and
guns
,
and
hated
playing
the
man
,
Alison
had
been
heard
to
murmur
something
like
an
oath
.
It
was
a
habit
which
she
had
picked
up
in
Paris
,
when
she
was
working
in
a
sculptor
's
studio
;
and
she
always
declared
that
dame
and
sapristi
,
being
in
a
foreign
tongue
,
were
notoriously
less
efficacious
,
and
by
inference
more
pardonable
,
than
swearing
in
the
vernacular
.
For
the
rest
,
with
the
best
heart
in
the
world
,
she
had
a
somewhat
caustic
tongue
,
could
interpret
Chopin
like
an
artist
,
and
always
had
her
hair
exquisitely
dressed
.
What
attracted
people
at
once
was
her
womanliness
,
her
lack
of
snobbishness
,
her
real
desire
to
be
in
sympathy
with
her
own
sex
.
Like
all
exceptional
people
,
she
had
her
moods
,
and
sometimes
for
months
together
she
was
heard
of
only
as
forming
one
of
a
party
in
this
or
that
great
country
house
,
while
at
other
times
she
would
come
to
town
and
study
fitfully
,
or
devote
herself
to
the
task
of
helping
young
girls
.
Once
,
in
the
middle
of
the
season
,
she
took
a
lodging
in
a
by-street
in
the
Mile
End
Road
,
but
she
only
stayed
seven
weeks
,
and
,
when
she
appeared
again
,
the
expression
on
her
face
was
sadder
than
before
.
‘Of
course
,
one
ought
to
know
what
it
is
like
,
’
she
said
,
when
Mary
asked
her
why
she
had
left
so
soon
.
‘It
's
an
experience
—
but
a
terrible
one
.
It
's
not
only
the
drunkenness
,
the
down-at-heel
vice
,
the
astounding
absence
of
any
thrift
or
forethought
,
and
the
incredible
repetition
of
one
solitary
adjective
;
but
it
seems
to
me
that
,
when
one
or
two
of
us
go
and
live
down
there
,
we
absolutely
do
no
permanent
good
at
all
.
The
thing
will
be
to
bring
the
East-end
here
—
one
by
one
,
of
course
,
just
as
we
go
there.’
Alison
kept
her
word
.
This
spring
had
found
her
ensconced
in
a
workman
's
flat
in
the
Mayfair
district
,
with
one
small
servant
,
whom
she
had
befriended
in
Whitechapel
.
‘But
it
's
as
much
for
myself
as
her
,
’
explained
Alison
,
laughing
.
She
hated
to
be
thought
philanthropic
.
‘All
we
women
are
so
incredibly
dependent
on
other
people
.
It
's
absurd
that
we
do
n't
know
how
to
do
anything
useful
.
I
shall
keep
my
flat
,
and
go
to
it
now
and
again
,
when
I
am
tired
of
shooting-parties
.
It
will
be
a
little
home
for
my
East-end
girls
,
whom
I
intend
to
train
.
I
daresay
I
shall
be
disappointed
in
them
,
but
that
's
inevitable
with
all
experiments
.
Anyway
,
it
will
probably
do
me
more
good
than
it
will
them
.
The
only
real
slavery
nowadays
is
the
slavery
of
luxury
.
We
are
all
getting
so
pampered
that
we
ca
n't
exist
without
it
.
People
do
the
most
incredible
things
.
I
have
known
a
woman
stay
with
a
husband
