"My dear. I have been a bad wicked girl and married another man. Do not try to find me. I shall be all right. Find some other girl, and be happy with her. I shall never be happy without you. My husband is very kind and good. Don't forget me."
"My dear. I have been a bad wicked girl and married another man. Do not try to find me. I shall be all right. Find some other girl, and be happy with her. I shall never be happy without you. My husband is very kind and good. Don't forget me."
At the end of this letter she put no signature, but a single cross to indicate a kiss. Then she addressed an envelope, stamped it, slipped down the stairs and along to the post office. By the time Toby got the letter she and Gaga would no longer be there; and he would not be able to find her afterwards. London was so big. She was afraid of him, and yet she longed to see him again. Five minutes later she was back in the drawing-room, seated at the piano, and singing softly in her clear voice the song that had first so greatly charmed Gaga.
"'Your heart mine, and mine in your keeping,List while I sing to you love's tender song.'"
As she sang, Sally looked up and at the doorway. There, adoringly, stood Gaga, all his love making a radiance in his face which she had not previously seen so distinctly. He came slowly towards her, and as she continued her song he kissed the back of her neck where the hair was brushed up in the first soft incalculable wave.Sally for the first time shrank a little; but she pursued her song unhesitatingly, so schooled was she in her determination that the price she was paying was to be borne.
"'When you and I go down the love path together,Stars shall be shining and the night so fair.'"
"We'll go ... go walking in the moonlight to-night ... shall we?" whispered Gaga. Sally nodded, making her voice quaver by the motion. Gaga could not see her face; but Sally knew that even if he had done so he would have been quite unable to read her thoughts, which were dry and inflexible. He remained by her side until she had finished the song, and then fiercely pressed her head back until he was able by stooping to kiss her lips from above. His hand was under her chin. He kissed her many times, oppressively—little ravenous pecks that were febrile rather than loving; and assertive of his new proprietorship. His kisses left Sally unmoved and slightly frowning. She was surprised at Gaga's simplicity in imagining that any girl valued or could possibly value such ceaseless demonstrative action, such ugly hard little parrot-like caresses.
"Only a soppy kid would," she thought. "She'd like it, I suppose. Think quantity meant love. It doesn't. Like a beak. Silly fool!" And aloud she said quite firmly: "There, that's enough. Shan't have any face left, at this rate. I shall come out in spots. What's the time?"
To soften her words she held and pressed his hand; but only for an instant. Then she rose abruptly from the piano and walked over to the window. With his arm immediately at her waist Gaga followed, like a long, abject greyhound.
"The tide's out," he said, indicating the sun illumined mud by the opposite wall.
"Ugh!" shuddered Sally. "Fancy getting your feet in that stuff! You'd never get out.... Gives me the horrors, it does!" She leaned back into his arms.
They left Penterby by a very early train on the Monday morning, and while Gaga took the two bags to an hotel where the Merricks were to stay for the present Sally went direct to Madame Gala's. She had obtained special permission to be an hour late in the morning, and so she entered the workroom without confusion. It was the same as it had always been—the long benches, and the girls, and Miss Summers sitting apart, as plump and feline as ever. There was, of course, curiosity about Sally. Few of the girls supposed that she had been away with a girl friend, which had been the story; and all looked at her with a knowing suspicion. Only Miss Summers was completely trusting. Sally had slipped off her wedding-ring, and it lay in her purse. She took in the whole scene as she entered, and measured the assumptions of the girls with cool indifference. But she would have done that in any case; for Sally had nothing to learn about workgirls and their thoughts and interpretations, and she had also none of the false self-consciousness which makes wrong-doers imagine that their actions have been providentially revealed to all observers. Had she and Gaga arrived together the case would have been different; but nothing had occurred to make the girls suppose that there was any relation between them, and Sally was perfectly safe from that most dangerous of all recognitions. She was still, to the girls, Sally Minto; and to some of them still the white-faced cocket of Rose Anstey's jealous outburst. Sally looked boldly at Rose as she sat industriously working. Then, with greater stealth, atMiss Summers. That plump face had a solemnly preoccupied expression that gave Sally a faint start of doubt. Immediately, however, she knew that Miss Summers must be worried, not upon Sally's account, but on account of some message respecting Madam which had been received earlier in the morning. This made her seize an excuse to approach Miss Summers.
"How's Madam?" she whispered, surreptitiously.
Miss Summers shook her head with foreboding.
"Still the same. No better; no worse. Sally, I'mafraid."
Sally looked down at Miss Summers. How strangely their relation had been altered by this weekend's doings! Wherever Sally glanced she knew that what she saw was now potentially her own. By the simple act of marrying Gaga she had become, as it were, mistress of the place. And she knew it. She knew it plainly and without swollen conceitedness. Not yet was her power unquestionable; but it was none the less genuine. Even Miss Summers....
"I hope she gets better," said Sally.
Miss Summers shot a quick glance upwards. She started, and a faint redness came into her plump cheeks. The tip of her nose was irritated, and she rubbed it with her knuckle.
"Oh, I dohopeso," breathed Miss Summers. "It would be awful—awful for all of us—if she didn't. You see...."
"She'll have to die some time," remarked Sally.
"But now!" The head was shaken afresh. Miss Summers gave a heavy sigh. She had no such youthful confidence as Sally's. She was a born follower, a born sheep; and with Madam removed she could see nothing ahead but disaster to the business. Sally had a little difficulty in keeping back her smile. She thought of this poor oldpussycat in fear of her life, and her lip slightly curled at the knowledge that she alone had superior knowledge of the situation. Already Sally was casting round for channels in which her new power might be used. She wanted opportunity. It was both a chagrin and a secret relief to her that Madam could not yet be told of the marriage. If she knew it, and disapproved, as Sally knew that she must do, Madam could at any moment annul Sally's hopes of taking a leading part in the business. She could alter her will. Therefore, if she lived, she must be kept ignorant. It would be a trouble. And yet in spite of her assurance Sally was still suspicious of her own ability to master every detail in time to carry on the whole establishment without a great lapse into momentary failure. She planned as a middle-aged woman. At eighteen her plans were profound. But instinctively, and in spite of colossal conceit, she understood that eighteen was not an age at which control can successfully be taken of a large business. Therefore she was fighting against unacknowledged fear.
During that day she hardly saw Gaga at all. He was at home with his mother, and did not come to business until the afternoon. Only in the evening did she creep into his room and submit to his endearments. She then left, and went to the hotel at which for the present they were to stay; and here, in the little sitting-room attached to their bedroom, she was for the first time able to be alone for half-an-hour with her post-nuptial reflections. They were not all pleasant, and they called for the exercise of her natural resoluteness. She had comfort, and the knowledge that she need never again trouble about food and clothing. But she also knew that a husband is a different sort of person from a lover. He seemed to her to be a sort of omnipresent nuisance. Her trouble was that thoughts and ambitions were in conflict with Gaga'samorousness. He could never understand her. He could understand her no better than Toby, and as she had no use for him otherwise than as the instrument of her ambition, she was already, within two days of marriage, bored with him. Sally awaited Gaga's arrival with calm unwillingness. She did not realise how rapid would be her instinctive progress to repugnance; but she had no illusions about her marriage.
At last Gaga arrived, his own eagerness unabated, but he was still shaken by the fact that his mother was seriously ill. With Sally in his arms he whispered or murmured alternately professions of love and anxiety. She was all the time secretly astonished at his devotion to Madam, because it corresponded to nothing in her own nature; but she comforted Gaga because it was her impulse to do so. She did not dislike him in this mood. She felt pity for him. It was only for his tremulous persistency in caress that Sally felt contempt. Gradually she began to be able to divert his mind to other matters—to their own future, and the flat they were to take and to furnish; and to the plans they must make for a slow change of her position in the business. Already Sally was obtaining a grasp of the details, but she could go little further until her access to the books and accounts was free. She could do nothing until some scheme had been made. So the two sat together after dinner and discussed what they were to do, and where they were to live, and how the rooms of the flat were to be furnished. It was all, upon Sally's side, practical and clear; and for Gaga a wonderful revelation of Sally's wisdom. He became more and more infatuated, as Sally became more and more cool. And they talked the whole evening through, without realising that with each moment Sally's dominion was more firmly established.
It was only towards the end of the evening that Gaga,unhinged by excitement, became desperately pale, and confessed to a headache. He found his customary drugs, and took them. But to Sally this headache was a new and emphatic indication of Gaga's troublesome temperament. Ugliness and squalor she knew; but sickliness was new to her. In face of a groaning and prostrate man, she turned away. Her heart sank a little. Then, with a shrug, she turned to the advertisements of flats to let in London which she found in various newspapers; and made notes of the addresses of house agents. This occupation she continued until Gaga called almost fretfully from the next room, when she turned off the electric light and joined him. An hour later, while Gaga still lay staring into the darkness, Sally was fast asleep. She had no dreams. For the present she was occupied with facts alone; and she did not suspect that she was unhappy, because she had been absorbing too many details to be able to reflect upon the sinking of her heart and its meaning.
The next evening Sally went to see her mother. Her first object was to get Mrs. Minto away from the room in which they had lived; because it was essential that if Toby came back, as she believed he could not do for some days, he should be unable to trace Sally or her mother. It was for fear of Toby that the removal was to be made. Once get Mrs. Minto away, to some other part of North London, and Toby might seek news of Sally in vain. Only if he came and waited outside Madam's would he be able to find her; and in that case she could still baulk him, as she was going to stay late every evening for the future in order to work with Gaga. But first of all, Sally must arrange to get her mother out of the old house. She would not want to go. She must go. She would pretendthat she could keep herself. She would show the stubborn pride of many old people of the working class, who will work until they kill themselves rather than accept charitable doles. Very well, Sally knew that Mrs. Minto could not keep herself; and she knew also that these same old people have no similar delicacy in taking from their children's earnings. She was going to explain that she was still working, and that what Mrs. Minto would receive came from Sally herself, and not from Sally's husband. And she would herself find a room for her mother in Stoke Newington, a suburb which is farther from Holloway than many more distant places for the reason that no dweller in Holloway has any curiosity about Stoke Newington or any impulse to go there as an adventure.
Sally found Mrs. Minto in a familiar attitude, stooping over a very small fire; but as she ran up the stairs very softly, with a nervous dread of Toby, she had no conception of the welcome which awaited her. She opened the door and went into the dingy room, and stood smiling; and to her great surprise she saw her mother rise almost wildly and come towards her. Two thin arms pressed and fondled her, and a thin old cheek was pressed hard against her own. To herself Mrs. Minto was ejaculating in a shivering way: "My baby, my baby!" Only then did Sally understand how much the separation had meant to her mother. She herself had never once thought of that lonely figure at home.
"Poor old thing!" Sally found herself saying. "Was she lonely then?" She patted her mother's bony shoulders, and hugged her, affected by this involuntary betrayal of love. Mrs. Minto had never been demonstrative. "I wish I'd brought you something, now. A present. I never thought of it."
"Is it all right? Are you happy, my dearie?" demanded Mrs. Minto, with a searching glance.
"I knew what I was doing, ma," proclaimed Sally. "There's not much I don't know."
It was an evasion; a confession of something quite other than the happiness about which she had been asked.
"Ah, that's what I was afraid of...." breathed her mother. "That's what young people always think. You don't know nothing at all, Sally."
"I know more'n you do!" It was a defiance.
"You think you do. Why, you're only a baby...." Mrs. Minto shook her head several times, with lugubrious effect. But her last words had been full of a smothered affection, more truly precious than a hundred of Gaga's kisses or a dozen of Toby's animal hugs.
"In your days I should have been." Sally withdrew herself, and led her mother back to her chair. "Not know! Why, the girls know a lot more now than they used to whenyouwas a girl. No more timid little creatures."
"They onlythinkthey know more," declared Mrs. Minto, trembling. "And it takes 'em longer to find out they don't know nothing at all. It takes a lot of time to get to know. You're in too much of a hurry, my gel. You don't know nothing. Nothing whatever, for all your talk of it. I been thinking about it all these days—frantic, I've been."
"All theseyears!" jeered Sally. "Look here, ma.... Here's my marriage license!" And as she spoke she waved the folded paper before her mother's eyes in such a way that it fell open and showed the official entries. Even as she did this so lightly, Sally was able to catch the sharply hidden expression of relief which crossed Mrs. Minto's face at the reassurance. She made no pretence of misunderstanding. "Say I don't know anything?" she demanded. "Think I don't know enough for that? Silly old fool? What did I tell you? There's abouttwenty million things I know that you don't know. And neverwillknow, what's more. Wake up! I tell you one thing, ma. The people whodon'tknow think a lot worse than the people who do. They fancy more. See? It's a little way they got. All goes on inside their heads, and shakes about. People like me haven't got time to think a lot of muck. Wedothings ... and do them thorough."
Mrs. Minto, reproved, sank into contemplation.
"Well, I don't know, Sally," she went on, after a pause. "You talk a lot. I'd rather think than talk. You say he's rich. Sometimes girls get left."
"Not me, though," Sally assured her. "Soppy ones do. I'm not soppy. And I'll tell you what. I'm going to get you out of this place."
"I ain't going to live with you and him!" declared Mrs. Minto in alarm. "I wouldn't!"
"No. You're going to live somewhere else. I want you to get away from here. You're going to have two decent rooms ... in Stoke Newington. Real paper on the walls, and a carpet, and new mattress that isn't like two horse troughs."
"I won't take nothing from him."
"No. From me. Out of my wages."
"You ain't going to have.... Don't be silly. I'm well off where I am."
"I'm going to keep on at Madam's. I'm going to have plenty money. And you're going to move. Got it? I'll see about it to-morrow night, get you in Thursday or Friday. Won't take an hour to settle you in. Then you'll be comfortable."
"I'm very well as I am," said Mrs. Minto, obstinately. "I can keep myself. I'm not going to sponge on you. Not likely."
"You'll move Thursday or Friday, I tell you."
It was final. The poor thin little old woman had no fight in her. She looked up at Sally, and her face was the anxious face of a monkey, or of a sick beast that is being tended. Now that she had been comforted about Sally she had nothing left to say. She made a last feeble effort.
"I don't want to move. Mrs. Roberson...."
"Fiddlesticks!"
"My 'ead!"
"Your head'll get better if you keep quiet and have real coal and a bath or two." Sally was imperious, and enjoyingly so. Her spirits had risen. She was a general. She looked down protectingly at her mother, and a ghost of ancient love rose breathing in her heart. "Silly old thing!" she murmured, with a touch of softness; and knelt suddenly. "Got to look after you a bit," she added. "It's you who's the baby now. What a lot of kids people are! Makes me feel a hundred—and over—when I see what fools they are. I'm sorry for you, and that's the truth. You and Miss Summers and Gaga."
"Who's Gaga?"
"He's Mr. Sally Minto," said Sally with mystic insolence. "That's who Gaga is. He calls himself my husband, but he's no more my husband than you are, ma. And never will be. But oh, Lor! He's going to be the worry of my life! Ma, did Pa chase you all over the place when you was married? I mean, chase you all about trying to kiss you and fuss you?"
"No, dear," said Mrs. Minto. "He was drunk. He didn't know what he was doing."
"Hn," Sally grunted. Then she stood up again. "I'm going now," she announced. "I'm going back to Gaga. He's ill. I expect he's being sick."
And before her mother could make startled enquiries, Sally had kissed her and gone to the door. She ran inhigh spirits down the stairs and out of the front door not laughing, but in a curious way moved by this conversation and the strange turn which it had taken. She slammed the door after her, and met with a sudden squall of wind. And as she went away from the house she was conscious of a feeling of relief. She had escaped from it, and her heart was beating rather fast. All the time, under her speech and her thoughts, she had unconsciously been listening for Toby's step upon the stair. Even now, she knew that her shoulders were contracted with apprehensiveness.
She hurried along in the direction of Holloway Road, still flinching, with her nerves uncommonly strained. It was such an odd feeling that she had in thus revisiting her ugly old home. She had noticed it all afresh—the tired linoleum, and the oil stove and the tiny fire made from coal blocks, and the stupid old bed and the browned wallpaper—and she felt that it all belonged to a time when she had been a different girl altogether. She had never before been away from home, without her mother, for so long. She had never once been away from this room for a night, until her marriage. And to come thus into the dark street, in a wind, with the door slamming behind her, took Sally's memories uncontrollably back to the days which followed their first arrival, the days when she had met Toby and talked to him and walked with him about the streets. She recalled her visit to Mrs. Perce, and the sight of that grim figure relentlessly waiting for her outside the Stores; and the struggle with Toby, and her resultant happiness; and the night when he had first come to the room while her mother lay in the hospital. Heigho! She had been young in those days; now she felt an old woman, with all the sense of ageless age which the young feel after a transition from one kind of life to another. She was in a sense disillusioned. She had taken her step,and cut the link that bound her to this neighbourhood and the starveling room. She had cut the link that bound her to Toby. And he was now swiftly back in her consciousness, in her heart; so that she knew she would never forget him because he was the first man she had loved, and thus forever her idea of a lover. So strong was her emotion that she felt a strange little dryness in her throat and her burning eyes, and fancied she heard his voice. It was as though two years had been taken away, as though she once again—as she done two years ago—longed and feared to meet Toby.
As Sally, with her head bent and her thoughts active, pressed onward, she heard the clanging bell of a passing tramcar, and saw its brilliant lights rush by along the Holloway Road. A cart rattled on the rough stones of the road, and the wind blew the leaves of the bushes in the gardens she passed. And as she shivered a little at the wind's onset she again imagined that she heard Toby's voice, and inevitably turned in the direction from which the sound had appeared to reach her. Everything was quite dark; but there was a blackness just behind her that was like the figure of a man. It took shape; it came nearer and nearer. Sally's heart stopped beating, and she shrank back against the railing of one of the houses. She felt a deadly sickness upon her, a dreadful horror.
"Sally!"
ItwasToby. He was abreast, inescapable. He loomed over her like a figure of vengeance. Her heart was like water. She was hysterically afraid.
"Hallo, Sally!" Toby was by her side, and his arms round her, and his kisses on her cheek. "Why, aren't you going to kiss me?"
Sally's eyes opened wide at his tone of innocent surprise. She suffered him to kiss her lips. Toby had not received her letter! He was on leave, and.... She gasped. An indescribable relief caused her to rest limply and unprotestingly in his arms. Once again they were engulfed in merciful darkness, hidden from each other and from anybody who might happen to pass. She could not think at all; but she was thankful at this reprieve. Not yet would he kill her. And as they stood embraced she was suddenly happy, with a passion that astonished her. Toby— Toby, her love; and she herself in his arms again, as she had never thought to be. A strange laugh, low and tender, came from her lips. Her cheek was gently rubbed against his, and her body quite relaxed. Every one of Sally's difficulties suffered an oblivion; they were all dispersed in the extraordinary mist of sensation which enwrapped her.
"Iwassurprised," she murmured, kissing him with all her heart. "Didn't expect to see you. Funny to see you ...so funny... and when I was thinking of you. I must have known you were coming."
"I just got in," Toby said. "I say, where you going, Sal?"
Sally flinched again. Immediately she was conscious of terror.
"Stoke Newington," she cried; in a flash. What was she to do? Whatwasshe to do? She was desperate. Fear was strong; but love was stronger. It was not only now that she did not dare to tell him the truth in case he killed her; much more than that was her understanding of the fact that she could not bear to lose him. Such gust of thankfulness had shaken Sally when she knew that Toby had not received her letter that she was brimming now with joy. It was impossible to lose her rapture at the moment of its full glory. Shecouldnot tell him.
"Stoke Newington? Whatever for? Here, wait till I've had some grub.... No, I'll come with you now. Get some grub later. Have you got to go there now?"
"You musn't come, Toby."
"Why not?" He was instantly suspicious. His grip tightened, and he forced her to look at him.
"Didn't you get my letter?"
"When? Now? I've had no letter. What you going to Stoke Newington for? No, I want to know. You going to meet another chap? I believe you are, you little devil! By Christ! If you.... Iwillcome!" Toby was now fiercely suspicious. She could tell from his ferocious grip, and the urgency of his tone. "If you're playing that game, I'll kill you. By Christ, I will!"
"I'm not. I'm not," cried Sally. "You're hurting me, Toby!"
"You swear it?" He relaxed his hold, which was strangling her. In the darkness he again strove to see her expression and judge for himself of her honesty.
"I'm not going to see anybody. I swear I'm not."
"Why did you ask if I'd had your letter? What you bin writing to me?"
"Oo, a lot of lies...." breathed Sally. "Silly talk and rubbish. That's all it was."
"What about?" He was still intense. Sally could hardly breathe, and her courage was fading. They were so much in the darkness that they could not be seen, and she was entirely dominated by Toby's physical strength. Within his grasp she was helpless, and not all her dartingly-imagined expedients would be enough to secure her escape. Hastily she improvised a story.
"Well, I'm not living with ma any longer. I gone out to live in," she lied.
"Stoke Newington?"
"No."
"Lost your job?"
"No."
He was baffled! but he knew that something was amiss. Sally could feel him drawing deep breaths. In the shadow she could imagine that his jaw was firmly set. It was strange to feel so happy in his arms, so afraid of death, so frustrated in the composition of any tale by which she could free herself and thus gain time to make some fresh plan. Sally had never been in a comparable quandary.
"Where you living?" he next demanded.
"Don't be rough. You're hurting. Well, I'm living. I forget the address. Only went there last night. I'm with a friend."
"What sort of a friend? A girl? What's her name?"
"Miss Summers."
Toby considered. He had heard that name, Sally knew, and must remember it. She felt that at last she had stumbled upon something which would seem to him probable enough to allay immediate suspicion.
"She's your forewoman or something, isn't she?" he demanded.
"Yes. She's very kind. She's ever so nice." Sally prayed that he might believe her. There was a long pause of doubt, during which hysteria, rising, nearly provoked a frantic struggle for freedom and flight. But she remembered a former occasion, and her knees were weak at the foreknowledge of failure. He would not be merciful. She feared him and adored him.
"Well," Toby said at last, in a grumble; "when do I see you? Eh?" Thank God, his voice had changed. He had spoken slowly and in acceptance of the tale. Sally conquered a sob that would have betrayed her. Toby had been tricked. There was still a chance that she might be able to manage him for the present.
Sally thought for a moment, but in a distracted blur. All her plans, made upon the assumption that he would be at sea for at least a week longer, had miscarried. There was now no sense in moving her mother hurriedly and secretly. Toby, in the room above, would be aware of everything. She must arrange this differently. It would need a careful scheme. When would Toby receive his letter? Probably it would not be forwarded at all, but would be kept at the offices of the shipping company. That was what had happened once or twice before. He would be at home a week. She had a week. How tired she was! She must get away now, and have a chance to think; but she must see Toby again. Shemust.
"To-morrow," Sally gasped. "To-morrow night. Eight o'clock. Marble Arch. Eight o'clock, or a bit after. I might be kept a little late."
To her inexpressable thankfulness, Toby rather grumblingly agreed.
"We'll go to the pictures," he said. "There's a picture house there."
"Wherever you like. Toby, Imustgo."
They kissed long and passionately; and when Sally was alone, sitting in the tramcar on its way to Holborn, she found that she was trembling from head to foot. She was in consternation, and prevented from crying only by the steadily inquisitive stare of a stout woman opposite. Sally had never been so afraid, so distraught. She had never been in such a bewildering and terrifying difficulty. She was only half conscious.
And when she reached the hotel their sitting-room was in darkness. Gaga had evidently been home, for the evening paper had been thrown upon the floor, and hishat and coat were upon one of the chairs. Sally remembered what she had told her mother, and went quickly to the bedroom door. It was true. Gaga lay groaning in bed, and there was a faint smell of sickness in the air. Sally instinctively recoiled, and went back into the sitting-room. Her hands came together and jerked in a gesture of despair. Everything was against her. The white face was whiter; the mischievous eyes were sombre. She was a lonely and frightened child without any support in her life. She was too young, in spite of her vivacity, to endure such trials unbroken; and in this situation she was overwhelmed.
With her hands to her mouth, Sally stumbled to the hearthrug, and bowed her head against the arm of a chair. Painful sobs shook her body.
"Oh, I wish I was dead! I wish I was dead!" she wailed.
In that moment of lost hope she was faced only with the impossibility of dealing with all her trials. She had been over-excited, and she was desperate. Everything had gone wrong. She was thus early face to face with the consequences of her own blithe and over-confident actions; and the consequences threatened disaster. Death would really at this moment have seemed better than the effort she must make to grapple with her problems. It would have been so much easier, and she was without courage. Afraid lest her sobs might arouse Gaga and bring him groaning to her side, she stifled them. But they made her body heave for a long time, until at last with tear-filled eyes she stared at the fire, and knew that the fit was over.
What was Sally to do? There was the fatal letter already waiting somewhere for Toby, or on its way to him. The thought of it made her body feel as though it were covered with prickles. She could not keep still, but startedto her feet and took several paces, her hand to her cheek, as she remained deep in disturbed thought. If she saw Toby the next night, and was again afraid to tell him of her marriage, what would become of her? Sooner or later he was bound to know. The letter would tell him. Oh, if only she had not written that letter! She would have had time, and time was what she needed—time to remove her mother, to cover her own tracks. And yet she knew now that she could not give Toby up. And yet to give up her ambitions was now a proposition equally impossible. She could not. She would not. She wanted everything. She wanted Toby; but she wanted her opportunity with the business. If Toby would only ... what? She could not bear the idea of his marrying another girl. She wanted him for herself. But if he would only accept the situation—for the present. If he would keep quiet. He would not. She could not control him, because he was another human being, with desires and impulses as insistent as her own.
Her mind came round to another position. If she had not married Gaga—if she had kept on playing with him, tantalising him, until she had been indispensable! No; that was impossible. Wretched creature though she felt him at this moment to be, Gaga also was a human being. Sally was in conflict with the world, because the world opposes to the wilfulness of the individual a steady pressure that is without mercy because it is without considerateness. Nothing is more selfish than the individual, except the mass of individuals, which has greater power. Again, in her torment, Sally longed for death. Then, quickly tangential, she returned to Toby and their coming meeting. If she did not tell him, but let him find her letter—she would have lost him. He would be savagely angry. He would infallibly kill her, because she would have deserved his vengeful hatred.
A moan reached Sally's ears. Her name was called. Gaga must have seen from his bed the light in the next room. She hesitated, repugnance and cruelty struggling in her mind with the knowledge that she must submit to her burden. Then she again turned to the bedroom, fighting down her distaste, her horror of sickness and illness, of invalidism, of Gaga in particular. She saw his grey face all pointed and sunken in the electric light, and took in the general bareness of the bedroom, with its plain iron bedstead and cream coloured crockery and worn carpet and walls of a cold pale blue.
"Sally," groaned Gaga. "I've been waiting for you."
"You ill?" she asked, perfunctorily. "Is your head bad?"
"Dreadful! How long you've been." Gaga's voice was feeble. He spoke with difficulty. His hand was reached out for hers. With an effort Sally took it, and bent and kissed Gaga's temple. He looked ghastly, and his face was moist with perspiration. Had Gaga seen the aversion in Sally's eyes he would have released her in horror; but he was self-engrossed. He had been longing for her, and as Sally sat on the edge of the bed smoothing the hair back from his brow he nestled closer to her, appeased by the contact, and genuinely comforted by her presence. His eyes closed. He made no attempt to speak.
So they remained for several moments. Then Sally tried to move, and he resisted her movement with a clinging protest.
"I'm just going to tidy up a bit," she said. "Then I'm coming to bed."
"I wish you'd get me something.... Some Bovril ... or ... something." Gaga was like a wasted child, not fractious, but fretful and wanting to be petted. Sally shuddered as she took steps to gratify him; and was glad to have some occupation that carried her outof the room and gave her something to do. She was momentarily diverted from thought of Toby; but she had a new desire to be away from the hotel, and in some house or flat which she could control by herself. It would be so much easier. It would....
When she was in bed she was prevented from sleeping by her now recurring difficulties. She was absolutely unable to make a plan for Toby. She was disgusted with Gaga and his sickness. She was afraid and rebellious and exasperated. And as she lay there she felt Gaga moving, and heard his faint groaning, and shook with a frenzy that was a thousand times more than irritation at the tangle in which she was placed. Like all young people, she imperiously demanded a fresh start—to cut all this mess away, and begin again as though nothing at all had happened. She tried to repudiate her own actions. It was no good. She could not cancel them. What she had done was done, and the consequences were inexorable. It was with consequences alone that she had to deal. Stifled screams rose within her. She turned frantically from side to side.
"Sally!" peevishly protested Gaga. "I can't get ... get to sleep if you fidget like that. You're keeping me ... awake. Disturbing me."
"Am I?" cried Sally, with suppressed anger steeling her voice. "I can't get to sleep either. It's deadly!"
"But you're ... fidgetting."
"Oh.... I thought I was lying quite still!" she exclaimed, with irony. A bitter laugh was checked upon her lips.
There was a silence, and Sally tried to sleep. It was of no use. With a deep sigh that was almost a passionate exclamation, she once again gave way to her uncontrollable restlessness.
"Sally!" came the grizzling voice of Gaga.
"What?" she shouted, past all self-restraint.
"You're fidgetting!"
"Well! Who wouldn't? You groaning—groaning—groaning. Enough to make anybody fidget. Why, you're making me sick! Why can't you look after yourself?... What's the use of eating things that make you ill?"
"I didn't," groaned Gaga. "I only want to get to sleep."
"O—oh!" It was a savage, inhuman sound of horror and despair. Sally, unendurably exasperated, slipped out of bed, and put on a skirt and coat. Then she went into the sitting-room, made up the fire, and curled herself up in one of the armchairs. A thin voice followed her.
"Sally!" It was a direct call to hysteria. "Sally.... Sally...."
"Oh, shut up!" cried Sally. "I can't stand it. I can't stand it."
"My dearest...."
She ignored Gaga; but she could not sleep. Although he called no more, she heard him still occasionally making some plaintive sound, while she continued to lie curled in the chair until her limbs were cramped. Long she pondered upon her fate and her situation; and the morning found her still irresolute, filled with distaste for Gaga, and fear of Toby, and a general loathing of the difficulties which she and they had jointly created. She was unhappy in a way that she had never previously known, helplessly indignant, and all the time argumentative and explanatory to herself because she knew that for all that was now threatening her she alone was at heart to blame. But this did not prevent Sally from disliking Gaga as she had not hitherto disliked him; for Gaga was the person whom she had most injured, and the person who now stood in the way of complete liberty. It was as yet only an hysterical exasperation due to her search forsome scapegoat; but his sickness and his peevish complaints of her restlessness had added to Sally's feeling an ingredient of distaste which she could not overcome.
In the morning, when they met, Gaga was sulkily distant; and Sally sat opposite to him at their chilly breakfast with a puckered brow and a curled lip. It was not hatred that fired her, but repugnance. If Gaga had made any motion towards an embrace she would wildly have pushed him from her. She could not have borne his touch. She was even thankful that he was so silent. In this estrangement she found momentary relief. And all the time, hammering in her head, was the one thought—Toby, Toby. What was she to do with Toby? As she left Gaga at breakfast she was still on the borders of hysteria. She was suffering so much from the trials of the night that she was hardly in her senses.
The workroom, with its routine and the need for hiding her feelings, gave her more relief. She could at least take some pains to sew accurately, to watch the other girls, and to notice how Miss Summers started at the slightest noise. Miss Summers, Sally knew, was worrying about Madam and Madam's health. By now Gaga would be on his way to his mother's home, equally concerned. Only Sally was indifferent to Madam's health. She had no interest in it. Where she would, but for Toby, have followed every report with curiosity, she was now more than callous. Madam was the least of her dilemmas. Sally's eyes closed; slowly she rocked to and fro, forgetting even the girls, and ignoring her work altogether. Toby. Her heart contracted with fear. Toby.
And yet the day wore on, and she came to no conclusion.Late in the afternoon there came a telephone message. Gaga was on the line, asking for Sally. A thrill went round the workroom. Gaga— Sally! All the girls looked at one another. With a quickly-beating heart Sally went into the telephone box and answered. As if directly in her ear, Gaga spoke; but his voice was so strained that she hardly recognised it. She was still unforgiven. The voice said: "Sally, my ... my mother's very ill. I must stay here. I shan't come to the hotel to-night. You ... you'll be all right."
Like lightning Sally answered: "I'll go home to-night."
The voice said "Wha-at?" and she repeated her reply. Gaga seemed almost pleased. He commended the plan. And Sally hung up the receiver with a sudden flush that made her whole body feel warm. It was a profound relief to her. And in the midst of relief she found another emotion more vehement still. She found passionate joy, and overwhelming temptation, and then again a sharp icy fear. The emotions were all gone in an instant. She was once more self-possessed. She returned to the workroom with an impassive face.
"He didn't say anything about Madam. He wants me to take round a parcel he left here last night," she glibly explained. "He's not coming in to-day at all. I'm to take it round after I leave work."
With immediate care, she went into Madam's room and made up a small parcel containing a cheap novel which Gaga had left there. This she brought to her place and kept before her. Incredulously, the other girls watched and sneered. It was the first inkling they had had of any special relationship between Sally and Gaga. To the minds of all occurred memory of that scene in the country, when Gaga had been entranced by Sally's song. They remembered the unknown girl's joyous yell, "What price Gaga on the love path! Whey!" And theyremembered Miss Rapson's word about Sally—"deep." The white-faced cocket! Rose Anstey stared angrily at Sally, who returned the glance with a coolness the more destructive because it arose from indifference. But Sally knew all that was going on around her. Gaga had been a fool to ask for her pointedly; and yet what else, in the circumstances, could he have done?
Her excitement rose as the afternoon progressed; and by the evening she was in a fever. When all the other girls were gathering together their work and their out-of-door clothes she joined the general mêlée with something that approached fierceness. It was not that Sally had any need to hurry, for there were two hours ahead of her; but she was on fire to be gone, to take her little parcel to the hotel, to give the clerk there news of her intended absence for the night, and to make a careful toilette before her appointment. The time was too slow for Sally. She was biting her lips with impatience more than an hour before the time agreed upon for the meeting. Her old longing for Toby had come back with extraordinary strength. As the darkness grew she slipped out of the hotel and into the night-sheltered streets. For long she walked rapidly about London, examining each clock she passed until the vagaries of them all so heightened her passion that she could have shrieked at their fresh discrepancies.
And at last it was nearly eight o'clock, and she walked round and round the Marble Arch in the tortured light of the ballooned lamps, and round the outer side of the wide road thereabouts. There was as yet no sign of Toby. It wanted two or three minutes to the hour. A rush of traffic made Oxford Street roar as if with fury. It was like the sea, but without gradations of sound. Big red motor-omnibuses thundered along, and cabs flew by. There were occasional electric broughams such asshe coveted, which tinkled a bell instead of sounding some one of the ugly horns which added their noise to the general racket. And Toby did not come. A panic seized her. Perhaps her letter after all had been forwarded to him? Perhaps he was not coming? Much as she had dreaded his violence, such a failure now impressed her as even more sinister. She had stopped dead in the violence of this sudden thought, and was for the moment blinded and deafened, when Toby gently took her arm. Sally's first jump of horror was followed by such an abandonment to his arms that she was rendered quite unconscious of the place and the notice of those who passed. Only she recognised that Toby was there, that he was not angry, that he was the same strong lover she had always known, ready and determined, her lover among all men.
"Not the pictures. Not the pictures," she pleaded, with tears in her voice. "Come for a walk. Come this way!"
She pulled at Toby's arm, and drew him towards the entrance to Hyde Park. Her arm was hugging his, her body pressed against Toby's. Only when they were out of that circle of light did she feel safe, appeased, able to think with any of her old clearness. She had been a frightened child. Now she was an exultantly happy one, given over to the great joy of the moment.
They were immediately lost in the darkness of the Park, hidden from all, and oblivious of the flashing lamps of vehicles which drove endlessly up the broad road from Piccadilly. And Sally was in Toby's arms, straining him to her, sobbing and uttering little sounds of love and relief.
"Hullo, hullo!" cried Toby, jerking her chin up with a rough hand.
"I thought you'd never come! I thought you wouldn't come!" whispered Sally. "Oh, Toby, I thought you'd never come!" She was hysterical in her joy.
"Course I come!" exclaimed Toby. "Wodjer take me for?"
"Well,Ididn't know." Sally was quite unguarded. "Thought you might have...." She checked herself. Her body was shaken with a little thrill of laughter—laughter of silly joy. She hugged him closer. "Been away a long time this time," she said. "Quite a sailor, ain't you?... Did you have rough weather? Ship all sloppy with the waves? And you dancing about to keep your feet?"
"It'salwaysrough weather," gloried Toby. "Sea goin' all the time. But she's a daisy to keep steady. Wouldn't hardly notice you was moving."
"I'msure!" cried Sally, ironically. "And you and the captain chatting together in the cabin, and all."
"No." Toby was condescending under chaff. "But we're quite.... Skipper, he's called. You don't call him captain. He's just like me. He's no better; only he...."
"Only he knows how to sail a boat," mocked Sally.
"So do I. I sailed her up the river." He was recklessly and untruthfully boastful, as instinct told her.
"Ishould think so." Sally's voice was so jeering that it laughed his pretensions to nothing at all. "And then you woke up."
Toby became expostulatory. But all the time Sally was not listening. She was not thinking of his words at all; but was only conscious of the warm glow running through her at his nearness and his strong clasp. Every now and then she prompted him to kiss her; andwhen Toby kissed her she felt as though she did not know what unhappiness was. He was so strong, and his chin so firm and rough; and he had such an air of the salt sea about him, that she was like a baby at the breast. She loved him. No thought of Gaga came. Only the moment's delight absorbed them both.
Presently they began to walk along the dark path, Toby's arm still pressing Sally to his side, and his head every now and then almost savagely down against her hair. The small hat she had worn was taken off, and was carried, swinging. Sally was so small and so comparatively weak beside Toby's burly strength that she was all the time relishing his power entirely to subdue her; and her wits were so quick that she never had a moment's hesitation as to the right way to tease him. She was without any least sensation of unhappiness. She had never been so glad of Toby since their first exulting days of passion, and her whole nature was bubbling and trembling towards him in the old way, as if they had come together again after some long dreadful estrangement.
And then Sally remembered Gaga. She had been laughing so much in herself at this long evening of freedom, that the recollection was like ice to her heart. It was all a mockery, a fantasy; and Toby was no more hers. She was separated from him for ever, and the more closely she was embraced by him the less she felt herself free to belong to him. A revulsion of feeling shook her. With an instinctive movement almost savage, she escaped from his arm and walked onward, her face set and her spirits banished.
"No," she cried, when Toby sought to re-establish his protective hold. She was as if deep in thought; but in fact she was not thinking at all, but was only overwhelmed by the old horror of her situation which hadnewly arisen after this short respite of dreaming. Toby let her walk alone, and lighted a cigarette, slouching beside her with his hands in the pockets of his jacket. He was a dim hunched figure in the gloom. Sally could not see him clearly; her sense of him was simply of his strength and his responsiveness to her own physical inclinations. The sense evoked in her heart longing which made Sally bow her head. She sighed deeply; her fixed eyes were closed. She was quite blind. For an instant she was lost in grave humility. Her smile in the darkness held such sweetness that it gave proof of her true love, her beautiful and entranced adoration.
"What time you got to be back?" Toby abruptly questioned in a matter-of-fact tone. It was like the unexpected tearing of calico, so sharply did such a demand break the vision and show his insensitiveness to her mood.
"Back?" Sally was dazed. She could not understand Toby's speech. "Back where?" She had an extraordinary feeling of shock. Her peace was destroyed.
"To-night."
Sally caught her breath. In a strained tone that sounded, as she meant it to sound, as though she had been merely inattentive, she made answer:
"Oh, I.... I'm going home to-night. Holloway. Stopping with mother."
Toby had looked at his watch before throwing his match away.
"It's ha' parce eight," he mentioned.
A fierceness shook Sally. It was more than she could bear. She turned upon him in a fury. With such a snarling venom did she speak that Toby drew himself almost defensively to his full height.
"Don't let me keep you!" she cried. "I didn't know you were in a hurry. If you want to go home,go. Go!"She ended almost in a scream, and her fists were frantically jerked.
"Here!" Toby was disconcerted. "What you talking about? I only said the time." He seized her, and Sally struggled as of old. But she could not resist him. There was too great a discrepancy in their strength, and in their will, when her own will so dangerously betrayed her. Toby held her closer and closer. His grip was tyrannic. Sally's breath was short, sobbing; her eyes were again closed, and her lips tragically pressed together. Her face might have been marble. And as he held her fast, Toby forced back Sally's head and many times kissed her hotly and possessively. "What's the row?" he demanded. She heard the savagery of his tone, and felt his warm breath on her cheek; and some undertone of his husky voice vibrated in her ear. "Ain't you well, Sal?" he whispered. "I never meant I wanted to go home. I don't. You know that. I only said the time. Only ... how long had we got? Sally, old girl...."
"All right, all right!" Sally did not know what she was saying. Her brows were knitted in distraction. Then: "Oh, any old time...." And as she spoke temptation suddenly swept her with a tingling heat, and her mouth was dry and her body tense with the excitement of the overwhelming moment. Her heart beat so fast that she was quite breathless. With an impulse too strong for resistance she returned her lips to Toby's, half-crying, and in vehement surrender. She could see no further, could endure no more. At the withdrawal she cried gaspingly: "I needn't ... needn't go home at all ... to-night. Nobody ... expects me. Toby!"
In the morning Sally awoke with a heavy heart. Foreboding was more gloomy than she had ever known it. The hotel bedroom in which they had slept was very small, and the walls towered above her. It was a dirty room, and the bright sunlight that came through the slats of the blinds revealed the thick London dust in the curtains and on the walls. Toby was by her side, fast asleep. She had no sense of wrong-doing—it never troubled Sally, who judged her own conduct by exceptional standards; but she was again full of fear. Lightly she touched Toby's thick strong hair, and kissed it, half raised from her pillow; and bending over him. Her love was undiminished, but her fear of him was suddenly increased. And as she withdrew her hand and sat upright she caught sight of the wedding-ring which she had taken from her purse and slipped onto her finger before they reached the hotel. They had come without luggage, and it had been an impulse of caution which had led her to wear the ring. Slowly she turned it round and round upon her finger, not recalling that it was Gaga's ring, not considering her use of it an added dishonour to Gaga, but looking at it abstractedly. The ring meant so much, and so little. Her marriage had meant so much and so little. A faint smile stole to her lips and played about them.
A stirring of Toby's body made her glance quickly down. His eyes were open, and he was staring solemnly at her. His hair was all roughened, and his dark face was puffed with sleep. He looked like her big baby, irresistibly lovable. The smile deepened; but she did not speak. She made no movement at all; and Toby, stretching out a lazy arm, put it round her waist.
"Ugh!" he said, grunting with satisfaction. Withcalm pleasure she enjoyed the knowledge of his great muscular strength; but she did not respond to him at all. Toby jerked towards her, so that his head rested against her side, and Sally mechanically crooked her arm lightly over his further cheek. Toby blinked a little, and yawned, and looked at the sunshine. "Wha's time?" he gaped. "Oh-o-oo."
"Dunno. Oo, bless me!" Sally roused herself. "I mustn't be late." She reached out for Toby's watch, on the table at his side of the bed, and held it up to the light. The time was half-past-seven. She looked at the old watch, a cheap one with a loud tick. "I'll give you awatch, one day," she said, condescendingly. "Awatch."
"Here!" Toby's voice changed. He caught her wrist sharply—so sharply that Sally almost dropped the watch on the quilt. "What's that?" His tone was so strange that she was surprised, and tried to follow his glance. It rested upon her hand—upon the wedding ring. Sally's blood froze.
"Oh, that?" she said, with an attempt to be easy. "Can't come into a place like this.... I mean, without a ring of some sort."
"Oh?" asked Toby, sternly. "You know all about it, don't you?"
"Well?" Sally was frightened, but simulating defiance. "It's true, isn't it?"
"Where'd you get it?"
"Shop." She was so afraid that she was insolent.
"I s'pose you'reusedto this sort of thing," cried Toby. He sat up beside her, his face deeply crimsoned, his expression accusing. "Used to it, are you?"
"No!" answered Sally.
"What did you get it for?"
Sally could not hide her trembling. She was blanched,and her shoulder was raised as if to avoid a blow. It came. Toby released her wrist, and seized her shoulder. Roughly, he so shoved her away from him that she was thrown upon her face. She scrambled out of bed, and stood panting before him, while Toby, kicking down the bedclothes, seemed crouched upon the bed as if he might murderously spring at her. She watched his hands, fascinated by an imagination of their grip upon her throat.
"What did you get it for?" Toby repeated, in a voice of madness.
"To come here."
"Liar!" He leapt out of bed, and Sally, in a panic, turned to fly. She could not escape. Toby held her shoulder again. Again he savagely pushed her, so that she fell against the wall, her head striking it. Sally slid to the floor, shrinking from him, terrified now that death seemed so near. She did not scream. She could still have done so; but it was not her instinct to cry out. "You liar!" Toby said again. "What did you get it for? Christ!" He dragged Sally once again to her feet. His fingers were bruising her arm. She was physically helpless and half-stunned. "Is that the way you make your living?" demanded Toby, beside himself.
"No!" It was Sally's turn to shout. "No, you fool. Youfool!"
"You dirty little liar! It is!"
"It's not!" cried Sally. With a tremendous effort for self-control she checked a sob that would have plunged her into hysteria. "I'm married!"
Toby fell away, his mouth open. The release sent Sally against the wall once more. He stood looking at her, his face grey, his eyes smouldering.
"You tell methat?" he said. "Married!"
"Yes. Married."
He did not speak. He eyed her with a sombre and threatening appraisement. Then, more quietly, he went on:
"Youcan'tbe. You're mine. You belong tome. Nobody else can't have you!"
"Nobody else can have me. But I'm married, all right," Sally told him. She was recovering some composure. When she moistened her lips she glanced sideways at him, like lightning. Toby had not struck her. He was too surprised.
"Married.... And you come here with me. Liar!"
"My husband's away.... We don't.... His mother's ill. I don't love him—never did. We were only married a few days ago. I wrote to you. You never got the letter."
"Oh,that'swhy...." Toby's tone was vengeful. His fists were clenched.
"See, Toby, I only love you. Only you. But he's rich. We.... I don't sleep with him, Toby. He's never...."
"You liar!" Toby approached her. Sally could see his teeth glistening.
"I swear it's true. Toby!"
Toby suddenly caught her a blow on the arm which sent her spinning across the tiny room. She held on to the mantelpiece to save a fall. They were both panting now; but Toby was like a bulldog. The colour was returning to his cheeks. He was watching Sally, as she was watching him. She was ready to dodge a further blow; but she knew that if he was determined to kill her nothing would stop him. She was filled with abject fear at her own physical powerlessness. But by now her wits were alert again. Toby made a movement, and Sally started, ready to dart away. He did not come nearer. A stupidity seemed to descend upon him.
A loud rap at the door startled them both.
"Hot water. Half-past seven. And less noise there!" came a loud voice. The whole scene was transformed by the interruption. Both became listless.
"Married!" Toby said, as if to himself. He shook his head.
"I loveyou," Sally told him.
He sat dully upon the bed. Timidly, for fear of another outburst, Sally approached him. At last, standing by his side, she held Toby's head to her breast, kissing him with little fierce kisses that must have carried their message to his heart. At last Toby's arms were raised, and around her, and she was pressed to him once more. Their lips met. Toby made a muffled, snarling sound that was a mixture of love and hatred and masterfulness. He held her with ferocity. Then, as suddenly, his muscles relaxed, until Sally by repeated endearments baffled his indignation and softened his anger. She was struggling with all her might to keep possession of him, moving each instant with more assurance among his dull thoughts and his easily-roused passions. As the moments passed she knew that she had kept him, and at this knowledge her own passion rose until it equalled Toby's.
"My love," she whispered. "My dear love."
Later in the day, when she was able to think of all that had happened, Sally had an unexpected glimpse of the situation. She realised that she was a victor. She was almost too satisfied. She had no shame, no contrition; she merely knew that if she might still keep Toby her marriage with Gaga would be bearable. She had none of the turmoil of the conventional married woman who takes a lover; but then she had never been trained to be scrupulous. She was still young enough to be intoxicatedby her own prowess. She could manage Gaga; she could manage Toby; she could manage the business—there was no end to her power. More than anything else, it was necessity to her to gratify her sense of power. If that necessity had been removed she would have known herself for a reckless fool; but the demand for power obliterated every inconvenient thought of risk. As for a sense of honour, Sally had been born without one.
All the girls looked at her "very old-fashioned," as they would have said, when she arrived in the morning; but as the day wore on, and there was no further telephone message for her from Gaga, they began to forget what had happened on the previous day. Sally worked like a mouse, her brain exulting in its vivid memories of her time with Toby; and she did not think of Gaga at all. She only hoped that he would not come to the office. She was feeling too tired to deal effectively with any peevishness from Gaga; although, the causes of her hysteria having been removed, she was not likely to repeat the failure of that other restless night. A heaviness hung upon her as the day wore on; a kind of thick readiness for sleep. She yawned over her work. The workroom seemed stuffy, the day unusually long. The nervous strain of the past few days was reacting, and even Sally's vitality was shaken by the consequences of her successive excitements. When tea-time came she was relieved. But there had been no news of Gaga, or from him: not even a message through Miss Summers. Miss Summers grew more and more fidgetty and anxious as the hours went by.
"I do hope nothing's happened," she clucked. "So funny not having heard. I wonder if I ought to telephone to ask. Perhaps Mr. Bertram's ill. Did youseehim last night? D'you think I ought to ring up? I'mso worried. It's so strange, and Madam being so ill, and that."
"I shouldn't worry," urged Sally. "He'll 'phone fast enough if there's anything to say. Look at yesterday."
"Yes; but perhaps he's ill himself."
"Sick," commented Sally. "He's bilious, you know."
Miss Summers shook her head, and sighed.
"Yes," she readily agreed. "I'm afraid he's not the man his mother is."
They had hardly finished speaking when Miss Summers was called to the telephone. She was away for two or three minutes; and returned with tears streaming down her cheeks. All their pink plumpness was softened into a blur of tearful weakness. She was bent and dissolved under disaster. As she made her way up the long workroom to her place the girls all craned their necks to look at Miss Summers, and one or two—the kinder ones—rose to see if they could do anything to comfort her. But it was to Sally that Miss Summers turned, and within an inch of Sally's cheeks that she shook her tear-stained face. At first she could not speak; but grimaced like a child, as if her cold nose was smarting. Sally was first to hear the news; but all of them had known it from the first glimpse of Miss Summers in tears.
"She's gone," cried Miss Summers, "Poor soul, she's gone. And what will happen to us I don't know."
"We'llbe all right," Sally murmured, with singular confidence. A shock had slightly discomposed her, but it was not a shock of sorrow for the death of Madame Gala. Rather was it a passing thrill of dismay at her own responsibility, which her reassuring speech had been intended to remove.
"She's dead.... Madam's dead...." ran through the workroom. One girl hurried to tell Miss Rapson andthe workers in her department, who came crowding immediately into the room, agog with excitement. They all gathered together in a body, and then in detached groups, talking fast.
"I s'pose we'll all have a day off for the funeral," somebody said with a giggle.
"Oo, yes. Sure to. And have to wear mourning," added another girl, more solemnly and hopefully.
Sally stood, as if by right, with Miss Summers and Miss Rapson. She was definitely a principal figure in the scene. Just as the other girls began to notice this, and murmuringly to comment upon it as a piece of characteristic impudence, Miss Summers had a quick return of memory. Gesticulating with helpless impatience, she said:
"Oh, Sally; I'd quite forgotten. Mr. Bertramisill. And the nurse said he was asking to see you. Yes, asking to see ... Miss Minto."
Asking to see Sally Minto! There was a thrill among the girls that was even greater than the one which they had felt at the news of Madam's death. Gaga asking to see Sally Minto! Whew! Everything became electric. Rose Anstey coloured deeply, and turned upon her heel. Sally knew they were all staring at her, like fish in an aquarium. With something approaching dignity she ignored them and directly addressed Miss Summers.
"Did you mean he wanted me to go at once?" she asked.
"Yes, child. Yes. At once. Better run along now...." Miss Summers was distracted, tearful, inclined to kiss Sally, and altogether without knowledge of what she was doing or what she ought to do. "Wait.... Tell him—perhaps I ought to write a letter? Oh, dear! I don't know...." She pressed her fingers to her temples."No, tell him how sorry we all are. Say if he wantsme.... Run along, run along!"
"Yes, Miss Summers."
In a very leisurely manner, Sally rolled up her pinafore and put her work away. Then she washed and dressed herself to go out. She walked back through the workroom like a queen, sedately bidding Miss Summers "good-afternoon" and smiling a cool farewell to the girls. The buzz of their amazed whispering followed her into the waiting-room. She felt their eyes like stings in her back. On the way downstairs the memory of the scene and an understanding of the girls' feelings made her laugh. Well, that was that; and she was face to face with her problem in its entirety. Unconsciously, Sally walked more erect.