"Charles," said Enid plaintively, "this is the curry—here."
"What? Then fire ahead with it.... But where's Harriet disappeared to?"
"She is fetching the cutlets—and the other things. Do sit down."
"Oh, Harriet, here you are.... Where the dickens have you hidden the wine? This seems to be a verydryparty;" and he gave his stupid cackling laugh just behind Mrs. Marsden's back. "Oh, here we are. Now then, ladies and gentlemen, hock, claret, whisky and soda? Name your tipple. And please excuse short-comings."
But in truth there were no short-comings. Poor Enid had tried so hard to have everything really nice—the best glass and china, pretty flowers, and dainty appetising food, sufficient for twenty people and good enough for princes. And she looked so charming at the head of the table—her face rounder and plumper than it used to be, her figure fuller, her complexion delicately glowing, her eyes shining softly,—the young mother, in what should have been the hour of her undimmed glory. Mrs. Marsden, as she listened to the cackling fool behind her chair and saw the shadow of pain take the brightness from Enid's face, bridled and grew warm.
"Whisky and soda, Mrs. B?... Father, put a name to it."
Mrs. Bulford—a hardy brunette, richly attired, and undoubtedly handsome, but older than she looked in her photographs—was to be the other godmother. She and the host were evidently on excellent terms, understanding each other's form of humour, possessing little secret jokes oftheir own—so that every time Charles cackled she had a suffocating laugh ready. The hostess called her "Mamie," and even "Mamie dear"; but Mrs. Marsden surmised that Enid did not really like her, and had not wanted her for a godmother.
Old Mr. Kenion—the vicar of Chapel Norton—was white-haired, thin, and fragile; and Mrs. Marsden thought he seemed to be a good, weak, over-burdened man. His manner was mild, courteous, kindly. Mrs. Kenion was shabbily pretentious, with faded airs of fashion and dull echoes of distinguished voices. They had brought one of their daughters with them—a spinster of uncertain age in a tailor-made gown and a masculine collar. The curate of the small stone church made up the party.
But old Mr. Kenion would read the christening service, and not this local clergyman.
"Yes," he said, mildly beaming across the table at Mrs. Marsden, "I am to have the privilege to hold my grandchild at the font."
And then presently, when the servant had poured out some hock for him, he addressed Mrs. Marsden again.
"May I advert to a practice that has fallen into disuse, and drink a glass of wine with you?... To our better acquaintance, Mrs. Marsden;" and he bowed in quite a pleasant old-world style.
"Bravo, governor," said Charles. "Fill, and fill again. Nothing like toasts to keep the bottle moving."
"Yes, I'm sure," said the vicar's wife, with patronising urbanity; "so very pleased to make your acquaintance—atlast, don't you know. We onlysawone another at the wedding." And while Charles and Mrs. Bulford took alternate parts in the telling of an anecdote, she continued to talk to Mrs. Marsden. "Of course I have known you in yourpubliccapacity for years. My girls and I have alwaysbeen devoted to Thompson's. 'Get it at Thompson's'—that's what they always said." She was honestly trying to be agreeable. Indeed she particularly wished to please. "All my girls said it. Is it not so, Emily?... She does not hear. She is too much amused by her brother's story.... But that was always the cry. 'Get it at Thompson's!' And I'm sure we never failed at Thompson's."
"Oh, shut up, Pontius," said Mrs. Bulford, loudly. "You're spoiling the point. Let me go on by myself."
"Yes, that's what you often say—but you're glad to have me ahead of you when you think there's wire about."
"Will you be quiet, Pontius?"
And Mrs. Bulford was allowed to finish the anecdote in her own way. Then she suffocated, and Charles cackled; but no one else, not even Mrs. Kenion, could see the point of the little tale.
The local curate, a shy, pink-complexioned young man, had scarcely talked at all; but now he was endeavouring to make a little polite conversation with Enid. He said he hoped the church would be found quite warm; he had given orders that the hot-water apparatus should be set working in good time; and he thought they were, moreover, fortunate to have such genial bright weather. Sometimes April days proved treacherously cold. Then he inquired if the godfather was to be present at the ceremony.
"No," said Charles, answering for his wife. "I am to be proctor—proxy—what d'ye call it?—for Jack Gascoigne, a pal of mine.... You must teach me the business, Mrs. B."
"All right, Pontius," said Mrs. Bulford gaily. "Copy me."
"You will not come to the church in that costume," said old Kenion, with sudden gravity.
"Why not? Ain't I smart enough? These are a new pair of breeches."
"Of course you must change your clothes, Pontius," said Mrs. Bulford. "I wouldn't be seen in church with you like that."
Then old Kenion asked a question which Mrs. Marsden would herself have wished to ask.
"Why do you call my son Pontius?"
"You'd better not ask her to tell you, father. She has been very badly brought up—and she'll shock you."
But Mrs. Bulford insisted upon telling the old vicar.
"I call him Pontius because he is mypilot.... Don't you see? Pontius Pilot!... There, Ihaveshocked him;" and she gave her suffocating laugh and Charles began to cackle.
His father looked distressed and confused; the curate, with the pink of his complexion greatly intensified, examined the design on a dessert plate; Mrs. Marsden frowned and bit her lip; old Mrs. Kenion opened a voluble discourse on the virtues of fresh air for young children.
"I hope, Enid, that you will bring up the little one as a hardy plant. Windows wide—floods of air! I beg of you not to coddle her. I never would allow any of my children to be coddled...."
Charles sat dilatorily drinking port after luncheon; and, while he changed his clothes, everybody was kept waiting with the baby at the church.
That is to say, everybody except Mrs. Bulford. She stayed at the house, having promised to hustle Charles along as quickly as possible. But a shower of rain detained them; and it seemed an immense time before they finally appeared on the church path, walking arm in arm, under one umbrella.
When the service was over, and a group had assembledround the perambulator at the church gate, and all were offering congratulations to the proud mother, old Mrs. Kenion gently drew Mrs. Marsden aside and spoke to her in urgent entreaty.
"Now that they've given you a dear little granddaughter, youwilldo something for them, won't you?"
"But I think," said Mrs. Marsden, rather grimly, "that Ihavedone something for them."
"Yes, but you'll do a littlemorenow, won't you?"
"I fear that your son must not rely on me for further aid."
"Oh,do," said Mrs. Kenion earnestly. "Poor Charles would not care to ask you himself. So I determined to take my courage in both hands, and speak to you with absolute candour. Itissuch a tight fit for him—andnow, with nurses and all the rest of it! We would come to the rescue so gladly, if we could—but, alas, how can we? You do know that we would, don't you, dear Mrs. Marsden?... No, please, not a definite answer now. Only think about it. Your kind heart will plead for them more eloquently than any words of mine."...
Mrs. Marsden had given the nurse a sovereign. She hurried back to the church, and tipped the clerk and the pew-owner. Then she trudged off to the railway station; and went home, like Sisyphus or the Danaides, to take up her apparently impossible task.
Two years had passed, and the grand old shop was plainly going down.
It could not satisfy chance customers; it had begun to lose its staunchest supporters. Gradually and fatally, cruel words were going round the town and far out into the country villages. "It isn't what it used to be.... It has had its day.... Nothing lasts forever."
Fewer and fewer carriages of the local gentry were to be seen standing outside its doors. Farmers' wives, who for more than a decade had driven into Mallingbridge and spent Saturday afternoons picking and choosing at Thompson's, now did all their shopping somewhere else. The whole world seemed to be discovering that you could get whatever you wanted quite as well and more cheaply somewhere else. And from somewhere else, your goods—no matter where you lived, whether far or near—were delivered free of charge, with marvellous celerity, and "returnable if damaged."
Inside the sinking shop every assistant too well knew that horrid expression, "Somewhere else."
It paralysed the tongues of the shop girls; it struck them stupid. Each time they heard it, their courage waned, their hopes drooped; they gave up struggling.
"Thank you, I won't trouble you any more."
"Not the least trouble, I assure you."
"No, you're very good—but I'm in a hurry. I'll try somewhere else."
"Very well, madam."
A lost customer—no more to be done.
Yet the assistants had before their eyes a fine example of unflagging courage. Of one of the partners at least, it could not be said that there was supineness, neglect, or bungling practices to account for the long-continued and increasing depression that all the employees were feeling so severely.
Of the other partner, the less said the better. They could not indeed find words adequate for the expression of their opinions in regard tohim.
When Mrs. Marsden, bravely facing the situation and calmly acknowledging the logic of facts, had declared that it was imperatively necessary to reduce what in railway management are called running expenses, and at all hazards bring expenditure and receipts again to a proper working ratio, the dominant partner selfishly jumped at the idea, converted it into a fresh weapon of destruction, and used it with wicked force.
Cut down the staff? Yes, this is a luminous notion. Where there have been five assistants at a counter, let us have three—or only two. "We must weed 'em out, Mears. No more cats than can catch mice! I'll soon weed 'em out."
It seemed to the people behind the counters that he took a diabolical pleasure in the weeding-out process. Instead of getting through his dismissals as quickly as possible, he kept the poor souls in suspense—giving the sack to two or three every day; so that these black weeks were a reign of terror, during which one rose each morning with the dreadful doubt whether one would survive till night.
When at last the executions ceased, almost every one of the important heads had fallen. Why pay high wages for subordinate chieftains when the over-lords can supervise for nothing? Mrs. Marsden received instructions to keep aneye on all departments; shop-walkers were made by giving counter-hands additional duties without additional pay; and Mr. Mears and Miss Woolfrey could respectively be considered as remaining in managerial charge of the whole ground floor and the whole first floor.
The gigantic basement was in charge of darkness, damp, and the cold spirit of failure. Marsden never spoke of it himself, and might not be reminded about it by others. He wished to forget the deep hole into which he had poured so much irretrievable gold.
Miss Woolfrey could not boast of having been promoted: she had merely survived: she obtained neither recompense nor praise for doing the extra work that a stern master had pushed into her way. If Mr. Mears had not been driven out into the street, it was because Marsden, whose selfish folly was sometimes tempered by a certain shrewd cunning, had definitely come to the conclusion that, bad as things were, they would be worse if he deprived himself of the help of this faithful servant. Mears had stood up to him; Mears had convinced him; Mears would never be dismissed, because Mears could never be replaced.
It was perhaps some slight comfort to Mrs. Marsden to know now that her oldest shop friend would be allowed to keep his promise, and to stick to her as long as he cared to do so.
Soon after the reduction of the staff, Marsden introduced another economy. Without warning he started an entirely new system of payment. Hitherto all wages had been at fixed rates, with progressive rises; and the staff, feeling security in their situations and able to look to an assured future, had worked loyally without the stimulus of commission. But Marsden said these methods were antiquated, exploded; they did very well before Noah's flood, but they wouldn't do nowadays. Henceforth everybody's screw mustdepend upon the commissions earned: in other words, the basis for the calculation of wages must be the amount of the shop's receipts.
Mears, protesting but submitting, carried the new order into effect.
"I've no objection on principle," said Mears heavily; "but you have chosen a queer time to do it, sir—just when takings have dropped to their lowest, and there's no movement in any line."
Resentment, murmuring, discontent followed; half a dozen sufferers went into voluntary exile; then there was silence.
And then Marsden thought of a third economy. Thompson's had ever been famed for keeping a generous table. You were sure of good sound grub, and as much of it as you could stow away, to sustain you in your toil. The kitchens and dining-rooms were controlled by a man and his wife, with four cook-maids and three waitresses; and for many years these people had given the utmost satisfaction, both to their employer and her daily guests. Now Mr. Marsden swept the lot of them out of doors. He had entered into an agreement with the cheap and nasty restaurant in High Street; and henceforth the staff would be catered for at starvation prices—so much, or rather so little, per head per meal.
This was a fresh and a great misery—short commons bang on top of mutilated salaries,—almost more than one could bear.
Marsden, however, felt thoroughly pleased; and was willing to believe that by the aid of his drastic remedies he had cured the evil which afflicted him. For the end of each of these two years showed a substantial profit.
It was quite useless for Mrs. Marsden and Mears to point out the dangers that lay ahead, to hint that profits now were essentially fictitious, to warn him that what he hadgrasped at as income should more properly be described as realisation of capital, to sigh and shake their heads, and to plead for prompt renewal of diminished stock. He was too well contented with immediate results. To-day is to-day; to-morrow can take care of itself. He had given the business another ferocious squeeze; and, under the pressure, it had yielded what he wanted—some cash to keep him going.
The turf was again engaging his attention; but he pursued his amusement in a far less splendid manner than during those glorious days of fine clothes and full pockets after the honey-moon.
His nose had thickened, his whole face had become coarser and grosser; and flesh round his eyes showed an unhealthy puffiness, and his neck bulged large above an often dirty collar. He wore a brown bowler hat, a weather-proof overcoat, and heavy field boots; crumpled newspapers protruded from his breast, and a glass in a soiled and battered leather case was negligently slung over his shoulders. In fact he looked now like the typical racing man of the third or fourth class; and directly he reached London he mingled with and was lost in a crowd of exactly similar ruffians, hurrying together to make a train-load of disreputability and scoundrelism for Hurst Park or Kempton. But at Mallingbridge he was always noticeable. He produced a wretched impression in the shop each time that, dressed for sport, he passed through it; he was its secret destroyer and its visible disgrace; his mere appearance was sufficient to send thousands of customers somewhere else.
While the cash lasted, the house saw little of him. As soon as the cash gave out, the house again groaned under his presence. Till he could set his hands on more cash, he must be lodged and boarded by the stay-at-home partner.
Many were the dark and dismal days to be remembered,if his wife ever made a retrospect of two years' suffering; humiliations, griefs—darkness with but few gleams of light. Visits from Enid with the child and her nurse—an hour rescued from a long month—formed spots of brightness to look back at. But, for the rest, there was black gloom, as of moonless, starless nights.
Perhaps his most malignant cruelty was the driving away of Yates. The doomed wretch struggled so hard not to be torn from the side of her beloved mistress. Mrs. Marsden knew that the struggle was futile, begged her to go; but still she tried to stay—accepting insults and abuse, and only piteously smiling at her persecutor.
A cruel, most cruel hour, when one evening the shabby old trunks stood corded and waiting at the foot of the stairs, and Yates in her bonnet and shawl came into the drawing-room to say good-bye. That was the final smashing of a home, for the mistress as well as for the maid. All that made the house endurable to Mrs. Marsden had now gone from it—no sound of a friendly voice to welcome her as she came through the door of communication; no solace after the exhausting day; a strange face to meet her, unfamiliar, clumsy hands to wait upon her at the lonely supper.
She never really learned to know the faces of her new servants. They changed so often. No servant would stop with them for long. The work was heavier than it used to be; after Yates had gone the mistress could not afford to keep a maid-housekeeper; in these hard times a cook and a housemaid must suffice for the establishment. Departing servants said the mistress gave little trouble; she was patient and kind; they had no fault to find with her—but the master was "a fair terror."
Yet he had promised, when consummating the sacrifice of Yates, that he would refrain from again upsetting thedomestic arrangements. But what promises would he not make? What promise had he ever failed to break?
Once he promised not to parade his infidelity in Mallingbridge. This was after the scandal he had caused by taking a set of bachelor rooms in the new flats near the railway station, and bringing down a London woman to occupy them from Saturdays to Mondays. Every Sunday he made himself conspicuous by flaunting about the town with this brazen creature.
Probably he was tired of his Sabbath promenades by the time that Mrs. Marsden resolutely declared that, for the sake of the business as well as for her own sake, she would not support so glaring an outrage. Anyhow he said it should cease, and swore that he would for the future be more circumspect.
But he pretended to believe that his wife had given him a letter of license, full authority to resume the habits of bachelorhood, the freedom of manners that naturally accompanies a release from the closer bonds of the marriage state. He had never for a moment thought she would mind; but he vowed that what she was pleased to consider offensive and derogatory to the reputation of herself and the shop should never occur again.
Nevertheless, it was soon known to everybody but Mrs. Marsden that he was committing more local breaches of etiquette. On idle evenings he would prowl about the streets, accosting servant girls and shop girls, loitering at corners, and laughing and chaffing with any little sluts who consented to entertain his badinage. Sense of shame and the last remembrances of shop-propriety seemed to be deserting him. Soon his own young ladies met him talking to the girls that belonged to his great trade rival. That tow-haired huzzy who regularly came mincing up St. Saviour's Court to wait for the guv'nor, was—and the thing seemedso monstrous that it was recorded in an awed whisper—neither more nor less thana ribbon girl from Bence's!
Then, after a little while, the governor told Mears that he had engaged a new hand for the upper floor. She would come in on Monday morning, and Miss Woolfrey had better put her into China and Glass, and see how she got on there. She was good at anything, and would soon pick up the hang of everything.
But what a whisper ran round the shop when the newcomer was seen by the horror-struck assistants! The tow-haired minx from over the road!
It was an open and egregious scandal, shocking everybody except the unsuspecting female partner. The shop spoke of the new girl as "Miss Bence." The governor was always trotting upstairs to murmur and chuckle with Miss Bence. Someone saw him pinching Miss Bence's ear—and so on. It was another outrage that could not be permitted to continue.
Sadly and heavily old Mears told Mrs. Marsden all about it.
The disclosure threw her into a quite unusual agitation. She seemed to be more terrified than disgusted. It was as if, in spite of all attempts to keep a bold front before the world, the mere name of their remorseless and overwhelming rival now had power to set her apprehensively trembling.
"I don't want any communications passing between Bence's and us"—And she showed that this idea was sufficient in itself to frighten her. "The girl may be a spy. She may go back there."
"She won't do that," said Mears. "She was dismissed for misconduct."
Mrs. Marsden seemed relieved rather than shocked by hearing this.
"Besides," added Mears, "Bence never takes anyone back."
"I don't want people passing backwards and forwards—on any pretext. We mustn't allow communications.... Where is Mr. Marsden? I must speak to Mr. Marsden."
There was a terrific scene behind the glass, with Marsden, his wife, and Mears shut in together. Presently the cashier was summoned; books were fetched; accounts were examined. That afternoon Mrs. Marsden went round to the bank; and next day the tow-haired girl had disappeared.
In the evening Mr. Marsden left Mallingbridge. It was understood that he had gone to Monte Carlo. He would not be back for a fortnight at least.
Mears had said that Bence never allowed a discharged servant to return to him, and it was equally true that he never gave back a stolen customer. Bence's was the "somewhere else" to which Thompson & Marsden's customers had nearly all repaired; and of the dozens, the hundreds, who, throwing off their old allegiance, crossed the road to the opposite pavement, not one was ever seen again.
Evidently the claims of those two bad brothers had somehow been satisfied. The leak was stopped; Bence had weathered the storm, and was going full speed ahead.
If there was any truth in the last story of the desperate plight to which he had been reduced, the crisis had long since passed and he had emerged from his difficulties stronger than ever. If one could attach any importance to the firm belief of that sagacious solicitor, Mr. Prentice, Bence must have found the money necessary to save him. Either he had discovered a backer, or he had never needed one. Who could say what was true or false in this connection? Sometimes of course a very little money boldly hazarded will decide the fate of the very largest enterprise; but in thebusiness world it is precisely at such times that it is almost impossible to meet with anyone shrewd enough and courageous enough to risk a small loan on the off chance of making a splendid investment. Therefore Bence had been lucky, or had not really wanted luck.
He was safe now—obviously, too obviously safe, with money behind him and success before him. Employees at Thompson & Marsden's, with little else to do, watched him arrive of a morning. His twelve-year-old daughter drove him to business in a pretty basket car with a high-stepping, long-tailed pony; a smart groom who had been waiting on the pavement ascended the car in the place of the happy father, and Mr. Archibald stood smiling and kissing the tips of his fingers as the car drove away. It was a symbol of his greatness: a triumphal car. He himself was neat and natty, perfumed and oiled, smelling of success—with a flower in his coat, new wash-leather gloves on his industrious hands and a shining topper upon his clever bald head.
On window-dressing days he was up and down the street half the morning. He stood with his back to Thompson's, studying the glorious effect of his displays; ran quickly from window to window, and made imperative signs to those within. He put his head one side, twirled his moustaches, rubbed his small face with a rapidly moving paw—and looked now like a sleek, well-fed little rat who meant to nibble away all the cake that the town of Mallingbridge could provide.
And the windows when done—who could resist them? Is it straw hats for ladies? Do you wish one of the new fashionable Leghorns?... Two windows have turned yellow; from ceiling to floor nothing but the finest straw; here are more Leghorns than you would expect to see at a big London warehouse, more than an ignorant person wouldhave supposed that the city of Leghorn could manufacture in a year.... See! Already his Leghorns have caught the eye of the public; young women are bustling; nursemaids with their perambulators have stopped—there is a block on the pavement, and a constable has courteously requested people to keep moving.
There again, the constable is busy outside another window. Do you wish a blouse of the prevailing tint? Mauve blouses, nothing except mauve, all blouses, a window full of them—hardly to be described as for sale, almost literally to be given away.
On advertised bargain-days four policemen are required to regulate the traffic; for Bence opens his doors and locks them—you must wait your turn to get inside. But on all days there is more or less of a crowd outside and inside the triumphant shop.
At elevenA.M.the first batch of red carts go whirling away, round the town and far out on the country roads. This is what Bence calls his mid-day delivery. There will be two more deliveries before the day is done.
If the afternoon proves foggy and dull, there comes a tremendous lightning flash along the extended frontage of Bence; and for a moment you are blinded, as you look towards his windows. Bence has turned on the electric. He makes no appointed hour for lighting up. He will have light whenever he desires it. With his outside arcs and his inside incandescents he makes a light strong enough to throw the shadows of Thompson & Marsden's window columns straight backward across the floor, even when their poor lamps are burning at their brightest.
And no longer can one say that all the goods of Bence are rubbish. High-class expensive articles are mingled with the cheap trash; solidity and lasting value have now a place in his programme; he caters for the large country house as wellas for the restricted villa; he invites patronage from prince and peasant: it is his aim to be a universal provider.
Truly it was an appalling competition; and if it was dangerous to so big a rival as Thompson's, it was deadly to all the lesser powers. No small shop could live beside Bence; and it seemed that he could kill even at a considerable distance.
After the collapse of the sadler and the bookseller, their next-door neighbour, the ironmonger, failed; and the shell of him Bence also swallowed. The man now next to Bence was Mr. Bennett, the old-established butcher; beyond him was Mr. Adcock, the dispensing chemist, and beyond him there were the baker and the auctioneer. Then came Mr. Newall, the greengrocer, whose shop faced the far corner of Thompson's.
One morning the greengrocer did not take down his shutters. He had flitted in the night.
"Well," said Mr. Mears, looking sadly at the shop, "it's fortunate it isn't alongside of Bence, or I suppose he'd grab that too."
Next day workmen erected a hoarding outside the derelict shop. Soon the boards were painted white, and curious saunterers lingered to read the black-lettered notice.
"These premises are being fitted, regardless of expense, in a thoroughly up-to-date manner."They will shortly be opened again."But as what?"Why, just what you want."
"These premises are being fitted, regardless of expense, in a thoroughly up-to-date manner.
"They will shortly be opened again.
"But as what?
"Why, just what you want."
"That's a catchpenny vulgar dodge," said Mears, "if ever I saw one."
"I wonder what it is to be," said Miss Woolfrey. "I guess sweetstuff. It can't be a shooting-gallery. It isn't deep enough."
In a few weeks all knew what it was. Mr. Archibald himself came to see the last boards of the hoarding removed, and to watch the first customers troop into Bence's Fruit & Vegetable Market!
But for a gap of seventy feet made by four ancient traders, Bence now faced Marsden & Thompson for its whole length from end to end. Bence was irresistible, overpowering, deadly. The hearts of many people opposite sank into their boots.
Late one evening, when Marsden was taking what he called his night-cap in the drawing-room, he began to ask questions about the Sheraton desk and cabinets.
"Those things are not at all bad—but they aren't genuine, I suppose?"
"The desk is genuine," said Mrs. Marsden; "but the other things are modern."
"They are uncommonly good imitations," said Marsden; and he knelt in front of one of the cabinets and studied it carefully. "This is an excellently made piece—tip-top workmanship. Why, it must be worth twenty or thirty guineas."
"Yes, it cost something like that."
"Where did you get it?"
"It came out of the shop."
"Ah. Exactly what I supposed;" and he got up from his knees, and stood looking at her thoughtfully. "Out of the shop. Just so.... I must think this out."
But his train of thought was interrupted by a timid knock at the door. It was their last new housemaid, come to ask if the master and the mistress required anything further to-night. She remained on the threshold, breathing hard, and staring shyly, while she waited for an answer—a bouncing, apple-cheeked, country bumpkin of a girl, who had accepted very modest wages for this her first place.
"No," said Marsden shortly, "I don't want anything more—What's your name?"
"Susan, sir."
"All right. Then shut the door, Susan."
"Good night, Susan," said Mrs. Marsden kindly.
"Where did you pickherup?" asked Marsden, when the girl had gone. "She's healthy enough and plump enough—but she looks half-baked."
"She will do very well, if you give her time to learn."
"Oh,I'll let her learn, ifyoucan teach her.... But what was I saying? Oh, yes—about the furniture!"
Then he walked round the room, pointing at different things, and continuing his questions.
"Did this come out of the shop?"
"Yes."
"And this?... And those chairs?... And the sofa?"
She did not understand why he asked. But he soon explained himself. He said that all this furniture was taken out of the shop, and it therefore belonged to the firm—or at any rate could not be considered as her private property.
"A partnership is a partnership," he added sententiously.
"But it was ages before the partnership. And all the things were paid for by me."
"No, not paid for," he said quickly. "Not paid for incash—just a matter of writing down a debit somewhere and a credit somewhere else, and saying it was accounted for. But from the point of view of the shop, that's a bogus transaction."
"How absurd!"
"No,notabsurd—common sense. The shop never got a penny profit, and it seems to me that—"
"Oh, I won't dispute it with you. What is it that you want done?"
"I want therightthing to be done," he replied slowly, as if deliberating on a knotty point. "And it isn't easy to say off-hand what that is."
"Do you want me to send the things back into the department?"
"No.... No, the time has passed for doing that. It would muddle the accounts. Come into the dining-room, and show me the shop things in there."
She obeyed him; and then he asked if there were any shop things upstairs.
"Yes, several."
"Well, you can show me those to-morrow morning.... I begin to see my way. Yes, I think I see now what's fair and proper."
"Do you?"
He said emphatically that in justice and equity he possessed a half share of all goods taken out of his shop, no matter how long ago. And he insisted on having his share. He would obtain a valuation of the goods, and Mrs. Marsden could pay him cash for half the amount, and retain the goods. Or he would send the goods to London and sell them by auction; and they would each take half the proceeds.
Mrs. Marsden chose the second method of dealing with the problem.
"All right," said Marsden. "So be it. I dare say they'll fetch a tidy sum—and it's share and share alike, of course, for the two of us."
Two days after this the house was stripped of nearly all that had given it an air of opulent comfort and decorative luxury. Mrs. Marsden went to the department of the firm, and bought the cheapest bedroom things she could find to fill the blank spaces and ugly gaps upstairs, and paid for everything with her private purse.
In a fortnight the furniture auctioneers wrote to inform Mr. Marsden that the goods under the hammer had brought the respectable sum of one hundred and thirty pounds.Account for commission, etc., with cheque to balance, should follow shortly. And before long he duly received the balancing cheque.
But the loss of the cabinets and sofas made the living rooms seem bare and forlorn. The house and the shop had become alike: in each one could now see the empty, cheerless aspect of impending ruin.
Enid, when next she brought her child to call on granny, uttered an exclamation of surprise and distress.
"Mother! What has happened? Where has everything gone?"
"To London—to be sold."
"Oh, mother. Has he obliged you to do this?"
"Yes."
The barrier of reserve so long maintained by Mrs. Marsden had worn very thin. It gave small shelter now; and the brave defender seemed to be growing careless of exposure. And Enid too was losing the power to protect herself from pity and commiseration. The misery caused by both husbands could not much longer be concealed. Yet Enid's state was surely a happy one, when compared with the prevailing gloom in which her mother vainly laboured. Enid had a child to console her.
Weeks passed; but Marsden said nothing of the "share and share alike" settlement that was to clear up that little difficulty of the furniture. At last his wife asked him if he had heard from the auctioneers.
"Oh, yes. Didn't I tell you? The things went pretty well."
"What did they bring?"
"Oh, about a hundred quid."
"Then when may I have my share?"
"Oh, you shall have your share all right—but you can't have it now."
"Dick, have you spent it—have you spent what belonged to me?"
"Who says I have spent it?" And he turned on her angrily. "If it isn't convenient to me to square up at the moment, why can't you wait? What does it matter to you when you get it? Why should you pretend to be in such a deuce of a hurry?"
This again was late at night. They were alone together in the dismantled drawing-room.
"Dick," she said quietly but resolutely, "I must have my share."
"Then you'll jolly well wait for it.... Look here. Shut up. I'm not going to be nagged at. Be damned to your share. You don't want it."
"Yes, I do want it—I have relied on it."
"Oh,you're all right. You've plenty of money stowed awaysomewhere."
"On my honour, I have no money available."
"Available! That's a good word. That means funds that you don't intend to touch. Prices on change are down, are they?—and you don't care to realise just now?"
She looked at him steadily and unflinchingly. Her eyebrows were contracted; her face had hardened.
"Dick, this isn't fair. It is something that I can't allow," and she spoke slowly and significantly. "Please pull yourself together. You can't go on doing things of this sort. They are dangerous."
"Will you shut up, and stop nagging?"
It was by no means the first time that he had stuck to money when it should have passed through his hands to hers. Indeed in all their private transactions, whenever a chance offered, he had promptly cheated her. But during the last six months it had come to her knowledge that he was notconfining his trickery to transactions which could be considered as outside the business.
"Dick, Imustgo on. It is for your sake as well as mine. There is a principle at stake."
"Rot."
"What you are doing is dishonest. It is embezzlement!" and she turned from him, and looked at the empty fireplace.
With an oath he seized her arm, and swung her round till she faced him again.
"Take that back—or you'll be sorry for it. Do you dare to say that word again? Now we'll see." Holding her with one hand, he swayed her to and fro, as if to force her down to her knees; and his other hand was raised threateningly on a level with her face.
"Are you going to strike me?" And she looked at him with still unflinching eyes. "Why don't you do it? Why are you hesitating? Oh, my God—it only wanted this to justify everything."
Her courage seemed to increase his hesitation. He lowered the threatening hand, but continued to hold her tightly.
"Say what you mean. Out with it."
"Dick, you know very well what I mean.... It must be stopped."
"What must be stopped?"
"Your dangerous irregularities."
"I don't know what you're talking about. Someone has been telling you a pack of lies. You're ready to believe any lie againstme."
"There was a cheque of the firm—made out to bearer—on the third of last month."
"I know nothing about it."
"No more did I. They sent for me to the bank—to look at the signatures and the initials."
"Well?"
"I told them it was all right."
"Well, what about it?"
"There was the hundred pounds that was to be paid Osborn & Gibbs on account—to keep them quiet. It was written off in the books—you showed their acknowledgment for it.... But what's the use of going on? Dick, pull yourself together. I hold theproofof your folly."
He had let her go, and was walking about the room with his hands in his pockets. When he spoke again, it was sullenly and grumblingly.
"I know nothing whatever about it. I can keep accounts in my head just as well as in the books.... If I seem unbusinesslike—it is because I'm called away so often; and those fools don't understand my system.... I go for facts, and don't bother about all the fuss of book-keeping—which is generally in a muddle whenever I ask for plain statements.... No, you've got on to a wrong track. But I'll go to the bottom of the matter to-morrow—or the day after. I'm busy with other things to-morrow."
"Never mind what's past, Dick; but go into matters for the future."
"All right. Then say no more. Don't nag me.... And look here. Of course I fully intend to pay you your share. I admit the debt. I owe you fifty pounds."
He had been cowed for a few moments; but now he was recovering his angry bluster.
"That's enough," he went on. "I'll settle as soon as I can. But, upon my word, youareturning into a harpy for ready money. What have you done with all your own? How have you dribbled it away—and let yourself get so low that you have to come howling for a beggarly fifty pounds?"
Mrs. Marsden raised her hands to her forehead, with a gesture that he might interpret as expressive of hopeless despair; but she did not answer him in words.
"Oh, all right," he growled, to himself rather than to her. "The old explanation, I suppose. I'm to be the scapegoat! But I know jolly well where your money has gone. Enid and that squalling brat have pretty near cleared you out. Nothing's too much for Enid to ask.... If I wasn't a fool, I should forbid her the house.... And I will too, if you drive me to it."
It maddened him to think of all the sovereigns that might have chinked in his pocket, if Enid had not rapaciously intervened.
But in fact Mrs. Marsden had given her daughter no money. And this was not because Enid had refrained from asking for it. Compelled to do so by Kenion, she had more than once reluctantly sued for substantial assistance.
"Enid dear, don't ask me again. Truly, it is impossible."
Mrs. Marsden stood firm in the attitude that she had adopted when pestered by old Mrs. Kenion at the christening. Of course she gave presents to little Jane. The trifling aid that a young mother needs in rearing a beloved child Enid might be sure of obtaining; but the source of supply for a husband's selfish extravagance had run dry.
"Enid, my darling, I can't do it—I simplycan't. He should not send you to me. I told his mother that it was useless to expect more from me."
Enid hugged Mrs. Marsden, said she felt a wretch, begged for forgiveness; but soon she had to confess that Charles bore these rebuffs very badly, and that it would be better for Mrs. Marsden never to come any more to the farmhouse. If she came, Charles might insult her.
And now Richard had hinted that he would not allow Enid to come to St. Saviour's Court. It seemed that soonthe mother and daughter would be able to meet only by stealth and on rare occasions.
If the barrier was shattered and broken in front of Enid, it was completely down between Mrs. Marsden and Mr. Prentice. No further pretence was possible to either of them: the strenuous pressure of open facts had forced both to speak more or less plainly when they spoke of Marsden.
Although Marsden always abused the solicitor behind his back, he ran to him for help every time he got into a scrape; and during the last year one might almost say that he had kept Mr. Prentice busily employed. A horrid mess with London book-makers; two rows with the railway company, about cards in a third-class carriage, and no ticket in a first-class carriage; a fracas with the billiard-marker at his club—one after another, stupid and disgraceful scrapes. Mr. Prentice, doing his best for the culprit, each time found it necessary to obtain Mrs. Marsden's instructions, and to put things before her plainly.
The club committee had eventually desired their obstreperous member to forward a resignation; and, on his refusal to do so, had removed his name from their list. Mr. Marsden, who in his boastful pride once considered himself eligible for the select company of the County gentlemen, had thus been ignominiously expelled from the large society of petty tradesmen, clerks, tag, rag, and bobtail, known as the Mallingbridge Conservative.
At last, after a discussion concerning one of these scrapes, Mr. Prentice abandoned the slightest shadow of pretence, and gave his old client the plainest conceivable advice.
"Screw yourself up to strong measures," said Mr. Prentice, "and get rid of him."
"How could I—even if I were willing?"
"Go for a divorce."
"I shouldn't be given one."
"I think you would."
They were in Mr. Prentice's room—the fine panelled room with the two tall Queen Anne windows, and the pleasant view up Hill Street, and through the side street into Trinity Square. Mrs. Marsden sat facing the light, her back towards the big safe and the racks of tin boxes; and Mr. Prentice, seated by his table, looked at her gravely and watched her changing expression while he spoke.
"I think that you would obtain your divorce," he repeated.
Then he got up, and opened and closed the door. The passage to the clerks' office was empty. He came back to his table, and sat down again.
"Don't give him any more chances. Take it from me—he'll never reform. Get rid of him now."
"Oh no—quite impossible."
"I had a talk the other day with Yates," said Mr. Prentice quietly. "Yates is prepared to give evidence that he knocked you about."
"But it's not true," said Mrs. Marsden hotly.
The blood rose to her cheeks, and her lips trembled; but Mr. Prentice had ceased to watch her face. He was playing with an inkless pen and some white blotting-paper.
"Yates is ready to go into the box and swear it."
"Then she would be swearing an untruth."
"Yates would be a very good witness. Really I don't see how anybody could shake her.... I asked her a few questions.... She impressed me as being just the right sort of witness."
"Please don't say any more."
"Honestly, I believe we should pull it off. And why not? If ever a woman deserved—"
But Mrs. Marsden would hear no more of this kind of advice.
"I see no reason against it," said Mr. Prentice, persisting.
"No, no," said Mrs. Marsden sadly.
"It's the only thing to do."
"You don't understand me." And as she said it, there was dignity as well as sadness in her voice. "Even if it were all easy and straightforward, I could never consent to allow the story of my married life to be told in Court—to the public. I could not bear it. I simply could not bear the shame of it."
"Oh!... Well, it would be like having a tooth out. Soon over."
"But that is only one reason. There are many others."
"Are there?"
"You shouldn't—you mustn't assume that he only is to blame. There are faults on both sides. And I have this on my conscience—that perhaps he would have done very well, if I hadn't married him."
"My dear—forgive my saying so—that is magnanimous, but nonsense."
"No," she said firmly, "it is the truth. He had some good qualities. He was a worker. Idleness—with more money than he was accustomed to—brought temptations;—and he was very young. If he had remained poor, he might have developed into a better man."
"I won't contradict you.... Only it isn't what he might have developed into, but what he has developed into; and what fresh developments we can reasonably expect.... I see no hope. Really, I must say it. I believe, as sure as I sit here, that he'll eat you up—he'll ruin you, if you let him—he'll land you in the workhouse before you've done with him. That's why I say, get rid of him—at all costs."
But Mrs. Marsden only shook her head sadly and wearily.
Mr. Prentice stood at his window, looking down into the street, and mournfully watching her as she walked away.
She was dressed in black—she who had been so fond of bright colours never wore anything but black now; and the black was growing shabby and rusty. She seemed taller, now that she had become so much thinner; the grey hair at the sides of her forehead and the unfashionable bonnet tied with ribbons under her chin made her appear old; the florid complexion had changed to a dull white—as she turned her face, and hurried across the road, he thought that it showed almost a ghostly whiteness. And truly she was the ghost of the prosperous, radiant, richly-clothed woman that he remembered.
She had been so strong, and now she had become so weak—so pitiably weak; with a weakness that rendered it impossible to save her. His heart ached as he thought of her weakness.
She would be eaten up—soul and body. Secret information made him aware that she had sold the various stocks that she held at her marriage. The manager of the bank had regretfully told him so, at a meeting of the Masonic lodge—a secret between tried friends and trusted Masons, to go no further. She had employed the bank to sell these securities for her. In the old days she would have come to him for advice, and he would have sent the order direct to the stock-brokers; but now she was weakly afraid of his knowing anything about her suicidal transactions.
He was looking out from the same window one afternoon a few weeks later, and he saw something that really horrified him. He could scarcely believe his eyes.
Mrs. Marsden had gone swiftly down the side street, and had vanished through the front door of those shady, wicked solicitors, Hyde & Collins.
He felt so greatly discomposed that he snatched up hishat, ran down into the side street, and stood waiting for her outside the hated and ominous doorway.
When after half an hour she emerged from the clutch of his unworthy confrères, he took her arm and led her into Trinity Square; and, walking with her round and round the small enclosure, reproached her for deserting him in favour of such people.
"But I haven't deserted you," she said meekly bearing the reproaches. "This is only some private business that they are attending to."
"But is it kind to me? You know what I think of them. I ask you, is it kind to me?"
"I meant no unkindness," she said earnestly.
And she offered apologies based on vague generalities. Life is complex and difficult. One is forced out of one's path by unusual circumstances. Sometimes one is driven to do things of so private a nature that one cannot speak about them to one's oldest and best friends.
"Very well. But if you feel disinclined to confide everything to me—there are other men that you could depend on. Go to Dickinson—he's a thorough good sort. Or Loder—or Selby! Go to any one of them. But don't—for mercy's sake—mix yourself up with these brutes."
In order to defend herself, Mrs. Marsden was obliged to defend Hyde & Collins.
"They are quick to understand one. Really they seem sharp—"
"Sharp!Yes—too sharp—a thousand times too sharp. But ask anybody's opinion of them. Look at their clients. They haven't got a single solid client."
"But they still act for Bence's—they do everything for Mr. Bence."
"Yes," said Mr. Prentice contemptuously, "but who's Bence, when all's said and done?"
"Ah!" And Mrs. Marsden drew in her breath, as if she felt incapable of continuing the conversation.
"I grant you that Bence has done wonders—and proved me a bad prophet. But we haven't got to the last chapter of Bence yet. I don't believe Bence is really solid—and I never shall do, while I see him going in and out of Hyde & Collins's."
Mrs. Marsden meekly bore all reproaches; but she showed a stubbornness that no warnings could shake. She met direct questions with generalized vagueness. What is unwise in some circumstances may be not unwise in other circumstances. Life is complex—and so on.
When Mr. Prentice left her, he went back to his office full of the most dismal forebodings. She had placed herself in the hands of Hyde & Collins. She was indisputably done for.
Time was passing. One Sunday morning in November, while the vicar of St. Saviour's preached a sermon about immortality, she looked at the familiar faces of the congregation and thought sadly of the impermanence of all earthly things.
So many of the people she had known were gone; so few remained, and these each showed so plainly the havoc and the change wrought by the flying years. She glanced at the card in the metal frame that was half hidden by her prayer-books—"Mrs. Marsden, two seats." Once the writing on the card read "Mr. and Mrs. Thompson, three seats," and she had sat there with her husband and mother. Then the writing changed again—"Mrs. Thompson, two seats." How many years she and Enid had been here together!
And the other people in the pew—a man and a wife, with little children who had slowly grown into men and women; two elderly ladies; a widower and his sister—all had gone. She glanced across the side aisle at a white-haired feeble old man, and a wizened monkey-like old dame who nodded and shook unceasingly—Mr. Bennett, the High Street butcher, and his palsied helpmate;—and she thought of what they were when first she came to St. Saviour's: a hearty vigorous couple in the prime of life, the man seeming big enough to knock down one of his bullocks, and the woman singing the hymns so loudly that her neighbours could not hear the choir. Now they had dwindled and shrunk to this—nerveless arms, bloodless hues, and frozen silence.
Wherever she turned her eyes, she saw the same signs and could read the same story—bowed backs, bald heads, blue-veined hands. Everyone had grown old, everyone had grown feeble, of those who had seen her as a young bride, as a young mother. And no new faces seemed to have replaced the faces that had vanished. Fashion in recent years had leaned steadily towards the other church. Holy Trinity possessed lighted candles on its altars, embroidered copes on its priests, stringed instruments in its organ loft: it was there that all the young people went—to be thrilled with strange music, to be charmed with smart hats, to be set throbbing with irrelevant dreams of courtship and love. Only the old and the worn out had been true to quiet peaceful St. Saviour's.
She herself was absolutely faithful to the church that she had used and loved for so long. It had become her place of rest, her harbour of refuge. It was only here that she ever felt quite at peace. She knew that here she was safe for an hour at least; while the service lasted no one could molest her; no one could even speak to her: during this brief hour she belonged to herself.
She could not forget the outside world, but she resolutely tried not to think of it. Just now she had driven away a thought of Marsden. He was lying in bed; perhaps he would sleep till late afternoon; perhaps he would be lazily getting ready for his food when she returned to the house;—but she need not think of him. He would not join her here. She folded her hands, and listened to the kind old vicar as he told her of things that are incomprehensible, immutable, and everlasting.
A man had come up the side aisle, and was stupidly staring at the people in the pews. Mrs. Marsden, glancingat him inattentively, vaguely wondered why he didn't take one of the many empty seats and sit down. She knew him very well. He was a loafer of the better class; and on Sundays he regularly made his beat up and down St. Saviour's Court, picking up odd six-pences by running off to fetch cabs, bringing forgotten umbrellas, or retailing second-hand newspapers to laggards who had missed the paper-boy.
Presently he discovered Mrs. Marsden's pew, entered it, and whispered hoarsely.
"You're wanted at the house. The gentleman said you was to come at once."
Followed by this seedy messenger, she hastened from the church.
"What is it?" she asked him when they got outside.
"I dunno. The gentleman hollered to me from the door, and sent me to fetch you."
The house door stood ajar; and her husband, in his dressing-gown and slippers, was anxiously waiting for her and guarding the foot of the stairs.
"All right," he said to the loafer. "I'll remember you another time;" and he shut the door and bolted it.
From the top of the stairs there came a sound of wailing and lamentation.
"Jane, look here. I want you to stop this fool's mouth—what's her name—Susan. I've somehow upset her. And that infernal cook is encouraging her to squall the house down."
Without a word Mrs. Marsden hurried upstairs. The cook, a sour-visaged woman of thirty-five, was on the threshold of the kitchen; and Susan, the apple-cheeked housemaid, was clinging to cook's arm, and sobbing and howling.
"Emily—Susan," said Mrs. Marsden quietly, "whatisall this noise and fuss about?"
"The master frightened her," said the cook, very sourly, "and she wishes to go to the police."
"The police! What nonsense! Why?"
"The master rang, and she took up his shaving water—and what happened frightened her."
"Where's father and mother?" cried Susan. "I want my mother. Take me home to tell father. Or let me go to the police station, and I'll tell them."
Marsden had followed his wife upstairs, and he showed himself at the kitchen door. At sight of him, Susan ceased talking and began to howl again.
"She's frightened to death," said the cook.
Mrs. Marsden was patting the girl's shoulder, studying her tear-stained face eagerly and intently.
"There, there," she said gently, as if reassured by all that the red cheeks and streaming eyes had told her. "I think this is a great noise about nothing at all."
"Of course it is," said Marsden, at the door.
"Don't leave me alone with him," bellowed Susan. "I won't be kep' a prisoner. I want to see my mother—and my father."
"Hush—Susan," said Mrs. Marsden, soothingly. "Compose yourself. There is no need to cry any more."
"No need to have cried at all," said Marsden.
Obviously he was afraid: he alternately blustered and cringed.
"You silly girl," he said cringingly, "what rubbish have you got into your head? I pass a few chaffing remarks—and you suddenly behave like a raving lunatic." And then he went on blusteringly. "Talk about going! It'suswho ought to dismiss you for your impudence, and your disrespect."
"You did something to frighten her, sir," said the cook.
"It's a lie—a damned lie."
"If so," said the cook, with concentrated sourness, "why not let her go to the police, as she wishes?"
"No," shouted Marsden. "I can't have my servants libelling and scandalizing me. I've a public position in this town—and I won't have people sneaking out of my house to spread a lot of innuendos against their employers."
Then he beckoned his wife, and spoke to her in a whisper. "For God's sake, shut her up. Give her a present—square her. Shut her mouth somehow.... It's all right, you know—but we mustn't give her the chance of slandering me;" and he went out of the kitchen.
But he returned almost immediately, to beckon and whisper again.
"Jane. Don't let her out of your sight."
So this was her task for the remainder of the day of rest—to sit and chat with a blubbering housemaid until a pacification of nerves and mind had been achieved.
She performed the task, but found it a fatiguing one. Susan made her labours arduous by returning to the starting point every time that any progress had been made.
"I'd sooner go back 'ome at once, ma'am."
"I think that would be a pity, Susan. If you leave me like this, I may not be able to get you another place. Why should you throw up a comfortable situation?"
"It isn't comfortable."
"Susan, you shouldn't say that. Haven't I treated you kindly?"
"Yes,youhave."
"And haven't I taken trouble in teaching you your duties? You are getting on very nicely; and if you stay with me a little longer, I shall be able to recommend you as competent."
But this servant said what all other servants had said toMrs. Marsden. Susan had no fault to find with her mistress.
"I should be comfortable, if it wasn't forhim. But I've never been comfortable with him."
And then she went back to her starting point.
"I'd rather go 'ome. I must ask mother's advice—and tell father too. I don't believe father would wish it 'ushed up."
However, Mrs. Marsden finally succeeded. By bedtime Susan was pacified.
"Yes, I'll stay, ma'am. I'd like to stay with you—but may I sleep in Em'ly's room?"
"Of course you may."
Next morning no one came to call Mrs. Marsden; no fires were lighted; no breakfast was being prepared. Both the servants had gone. In the night cook had persuaded the girl to change her mind.
A letter from cook, conspicuously displayed on the dining-room mantelpiece, explained matters.
"Dear Madame,—"We are sorry to leave you but feel we cannot stay in this house. I have advised Susan to go to her Home and she has gone there."Yours respectfully,"Miss Emily Howard."
"Dear Madame,—
"We are sorry to leave you but feel we cannot stay in this house. I have advised Susan to go to her Home and she has gone there.
"Yours respectfully,"Miss Emily Howard."
Mrs. Marsden went to her husband's room, woke him, and repeated the substance of Miss Howard's note.
He was dreadful to see, in the cold morning light—unshaven, white and puffy; sitting up in bed, biting his coarse fingers, and looking at her with cowardly blood-shot eyes.
"Where is her home?"
Mrs. Marsden said that Susan's parents lived somewhere on the other side of Linkfield.
"Twelve miles away! She's gone out by train. She has got there by now. What are we to do?"
"I scarcely know."
"Let me think a minute.... Yes, look here. Get hold of old Prentice—He's a man of the world. He'll help you. He'll be able to shut them up."
And with terrified haste he gave her his directions. She was to run to Mr. Prentice's private house, and catch him before he started for his office. Then she was to run to Cartwright's garage and hire a motor-car for the day; and then she and Mr. Prentice were to go scouring out into the country, to silence Susan and all her relatives.
"Tell Prentice to take plenty of money with him. And don't forget—ask for Cartwright's open car. It's faster. And don't waste a minute—don't wait for breakfast or anything—and don't let Prentice wait either."
In an hour she and her old friend were spinning along the Linkfield road in the hired motor-car. The east wind cut their faces, dirt sprinkled their arms, gloomy thoughts filled their minds.
This, then, was her Monday's task—to begin Sunday's toil, on a larger scale, all over again.
With some difficulty they found the cottage for which they were seeking. Susan's mother opened the door in response to prolonged tappings. Susan had safely reached home.
"Oh, come inside," said the mother; and she pretended to shed tears. "Oh dear, oh dear. Who could of believed such a thing 'appening?"
"Nothing has happened," said Mr. Prentice, confidently and jovially; "except that your daughter has left hersituation without warning, and we want to know what she means by it."