Nocturne

CHAPTER IV: THE WISH

i

Waiting until she had a little recovered her self-control, Jenny presently moved from the door to the fireplace, and proceeded methodically to put coals on the fire. She was still shaking slightly, and the corners of her mouth were uncontrollably twitching with alternate smiles and other raiding emotions; so that she did not yet feel in a fit state to meet Pa’s scrutiny. He might be the old fool he sometimes appeared to be, and, inconveniently, he might not. Just because she did not want him to be particularly bright it was quite probable that he would have a flourish of brilliance. That is as it occasionally happens, in the dullest of mortals. So Jenny was some time in attending to the fire, until she supposed that any undue redness of cheek might be imagined to have been occasioned by her strenuous activities. She then straightened herself and looked down at Pa with a curious mixture of protectiveness and anxiety.

“Pleased with yourself, aren’t you?” she inquired, more to make conversation which might engage the ancient mind in ruminant pastime than to begin any series of inquiries into Pa’s mental states.

“Eh, Jenny?” said Pa, staring back at her. “Ain’t you gone out? Is it Emmy that’s gone out? What did that fool Alf Rylett want? He was shouting.... I heard him.”

“Yes, Pa; but you shouldn’t have listened,” rebuked Jenny, with a fine colour.

Pa shook his shaggy head. He felt cunningly for his empty tankard, hoping that it had been refilled by his benevolent genius. It was not until the full measure of his disappointment had been revealed that he answered her.

“I wasn’t listening,” he quavered. “I didn’t hear what he said.... Did Emmy go out with him?”

“Yes, Pa. To the theatre. Alf brought tickets. Tickets! Tickets for seats.... Oh, dear! Why can’t you understand! Didn’t have to pay at the door....”

Pa suddenly understood.

“Oh ah!” he said. “Didn’t have to pay....” There was a pause. “That’s like Alf Rylett,” presently added Pa. Jenny sat looking at him in consternation at such an uncharitable remark.

“It’s not!” she cried. “I never knew you were such a wicked old man!”

Pa gave an antediluvian chuckle that sounded like a magical and appalling rattle from the inner recesses of his person. He was getting brighter and brighter, as the stars appear to do when the darkness deepens.

“See,” he proceeded. “Did Alf say there was any noos?” He admitted an uncertainty. Furtively he looked at her, suspecting all the time that memory had betrayed him; but in his ancient way continuing to trust to Magic.

“Well, you didn’t seem to think much of what he did bring. But I’ll tell you a bit of news, Pa. And that is, that you’ve got a pair of the rummiest daughters I ever struck!”

Pa looked out from beneath his bushy grey eyebrows, resembling a worn and dilapidated perversion of Whistler’s portrait of Carlyle. His eyelids seemed to work as he brooded upon her announcement. It was as though, together, these two explored the Blanchard archives for confirmation of Jenny’s sweeping statement. The Blanchards of several generations might have been imagined as flitting across a fantastic horizon, keening for their withered laurels, thrown into the shades by these more brighter eccentrics. It was, or it might have been, a fascinating speculation. But Pa did not indulge this antique vein for very long. The moment and its concrete images beguiled him back to the daughter before him and the daughter who was engaged in an unexpected emotional treat. He said:

“I know,” and gave a wide grin that showed the gaps in his teeth as nothing else could have done—not even the profoundest yawn. Jenny was stunned by this evidence of brightness in her parent.

“Well, you’re a caution!” she cried. “And to think of you sitting there saying it! And I reckon they’ve got a pretty rummy old Pa—if the truth was only known.”

Pa’s grin, if possible, stretched wider. Again that terrible chuckle, which suggested a derangement of his internal parts, or the running-down of an overwound clock, wheezed across the startled air.

“Maybe,” Pa said, with some unpardonable complacency. “Maybe.”

“Bless my soul!” exclaimed Jenny. She could not be sure, when his manner returned to one of vacancy, and when the kitchen was silent, whether Pa and she had really talked thus, or whether she had dreamed their talk. To her dying day she was never sure, for Pa certainly added nothing to the conversation thereafter. Was it real? Or had her too excited brain played her a trick? Jenny pinched herself. It was like a fairy tale, in which cats talk and little birds humanly sing, or the tiniest of fairies appear from behind clocks or from within flower-pots. She looked at Pa with fresh awe. There was no knowing where you had him! He had the interest, for her, of one returned by miracle from other regions, gifted with preposterous knowledges.... He became at this instant fabulous, like Rip Van Winkle, or the Sleeping Beauty ... or the White Cat....

In her perplexity Jenny fell once more into a kind of dream, an argumentative dream. She went back over the earlier rows, re-living them, exaggerating unconsciously the noble unselfishness of her own acts and the pointed effectiveness of her speeches, until the scenes were transformed. They now appeared in other hues, in other fashionings. This is what volatile minds are able to do with all recent happenings whatsoever, re-casting them in form altogether more exquisite than the crude realities. The chiaroscuro of their experiences is thus so constantly changing and recomposing that—whatever the apparent result of the scene in fact—the dreamer is in retrospect always victor, in the heroic limelight. With Jenny this was a mood, not a preoccupation; but when she had been moved or excited beyond the ordinary she often did tend to put matters in a fresh aspect, more palatable to her self-love, and more picturesque in detail than the actual happening. That is one of the advantages of the rapidly-working brain, that its power of improvisation is, in solitude, very constant and reassuring. It is as though such a grain, upon this more strictly personal side, were a commonwealth of little cell-building microbes. The chief microbe comes, like the engineer, to estimate the damage to one’s amour propre and to devise means of repair. He then summons all his necessary workmen, who are tiny self-loves and ancient praises and habitual complacencies and the staircase words of which one thinks too late for use in the scene itself; and with their help he restores that proportion without which the human being cannot maintain his self-respect. Jenny was like the British type as recorded in legend; being beaten, she never admitted it; but even, five minutes later, through the adroitness of her special engineer and his handymen, would be able quite seriously to demonstrate a victory to herself.

Defeat? Never! How Alf and Emmy shrank now before her increasing skill in argument. How were they shattered! How inept were their feebleness! How splendid Jenny had been, in act, in motive, in speech, in performance!

“Er, yes!” Jenny said, beginning to ridicule her own highly coloured picture. “Well, it was something like that!” She had too much sense of the ridiculous to maintain for long unquestioned the heroic vein as natural to her own actions. More justly, she resumed her consideration of the scenes, pondering over them in their nakedness and their meanings, trying to see how all these stupid little feelings had burst their way from overcharged hearts, and how each word counted as part of the mosaic of misunderstanding that had been composed.

“Oh, blow!” Jenny impatiently ejaculated, with a sinking heart at the thought of any sequel. A sequel there was bound to be—however muffled. It did not rest with her. There were Emmy and Alf, both alike burning with the wish to avenge themselves—upon her! If only she could disappear—just drop out altogether, like a man overboard at night in a storm; and leave Emmy and Alf to settle together their own trouble. She couldn’t drop out; nobody could, without dying, though they might often wish to do so; and even then their bodies were the only things that were gone, because for a long time they stubbornly survived in memory. No: she couldn’t drop out. There was no chance of it. She was caught in the web of life; not alone, but a single small thing caught in the general mix-up of actions and inter-actions. She had just to go on as she was doing, waking up each morning after the events and taking her old place in the world; and in this instance she would have, somehow, to smooth matters over when the excitements and agitations of the evening were past. It would be terribly difficult. She could not yet see a clear course. If only Emmy didn’t live in the same house! If only, by throwing Alf over as far as concerned herself, she could at the same time throw him into Emmy’s waiting arms. Why couldn’t everybody be sensible? If only they could all be sensible for half-an-hour everything could be arranged and happiness could be made real for each of them. No: misunderstandings were bound to come, angers and jealousies, conflicting desires, stupid suspicions.... Jenny fidgeted in her chair and eyed Pa with a sort of vicarious hostility. Why, even that old man was a complication! Nay, he was the worst thing of all! But for him, she could drop out! There was no getting away from him! He was as much permanently there as the chair upon which he was drowsing. She saw him as an incubus. And then Emmy being so fussy! Standing on her dignity when she’d give her soul for happiness! And then Alf being so ... What was Alf? Well, Alf was stupid. That was the word for Alf. He was stupid. As stupid as any stupid member of his immeasurably stupid sex could be!

“Great booby!” muttered Jenny. Why, look at the way he had behaved when Emmy had come into the room. It wasn’t honesty, mind you; because he could tell any old lie when he wanted to. It was just funk. He hadn’t known where to look, or what to say. Too slow, he was, to think of anything. What could you do with a man like that? Oh, what stupids men were! She expected that Alf would feel very fine and noble as he walked old Em along to the theatre—and afterwards, when the evening was over and he had gone off in a cloud of glory. He would think it all over and come solemnly to the conclusion that the reason for his mumbling stupidity, his toeing and heeling, and all that idiotic speechlessness that set Emmy on her hind legs, was sheer love of the truth. He couldn’t tell a lie—to a woman. That would be it. He would pretend that Jenny had chivvied him into taking Em, that he was too noble to refuse to take Em, or to let Em really see point-blank that he didn’t want to take her; but when it came to the pinch he hadn’t been able to screw himself into the truly noble attitude needed for such an act of self-sacrifice. He had been speechless when a prompt lie, added to the promptitude and exactitude of Jenny’s lie, would have saved the situation. Not Alf!

“I cannot tell a lie,” sneered Jenny. “To a woman. George Washington. I don’t think!”

Yes; but then, said her secret complacency, preening itself, and suggesting that possibly a moment or two of satisfied pity might be at this point in place, he’d really wanted to take Jenny. He had taken the tickets because he had wanted to be in Jenny’s company for the evening. Not Emmy’s. There was all the difference. If you wanted a cream bun and got fobbed off with a scone! There was something in that. Jenny was rather flattered by her happy figure. She even excitedly giggled at the comparison of Emmy with a scone. Jenny did not like scones. She thought them stodgy. She had also that astounding feminine love of cream buns which no true man could ever acknowledge or understand. So Emmy became a scone, with not too many currents in it. Jenny’s fluent fancy was inclined to dwell upon this notion. She a little lost sight of Alf’s grievance in her pleasure at the figures she had drawn. Her mind was recalled with a jerk. Now: what was it? Alf had wanted to take her—Jenny. Right! He had taken Emmy. Because he had taken Emmy, he had a grievance. Right! But against whom? Against Emmy? Certainly not. Against himself? By no means. Against Jenny? A horribly exulting and yet nervously penitent little giggle shook Jenny at her inability to answer this point as she had answered the others. For Alf had a grievance against Jenny, and she knew it. No amount of ingenious thought could hoodwink her sense of honesty for more than a debater’s five minutes. No Alf had a grievance. Jenny could not, in strict privacy, deny the fact. She took refuge in a shameless piece of bluster.

“Well, after all!” she cried, “he had the tickets given to him. It’s not as though they cost him anything! So what’s all the row about?”

ii

Thereafter she began to think of Alf. He had taken her out several times—not as many times as Emmy imagined, because Emmy had thought about these excursions a great deal and not only magnified but multiplied them. Nevertheless, Alf had taken Jenny out several times. To a music hall once or twice; to the pictures, where they had sat and thrilled in cushioned darkness while acrobatic humans and grey-faced tragic creatures jerked and darted at top speed in and out of the most amazingly telescoped accidents and difficulties. And Alf had paid more than once, for all Pa said. It is true that Jenny had paid on her birthday for both of them; and that she had occasionally paid for herself upon an impulse of sheer independence. But there had been other times when Alf had really paid for both of them. He had been very decent about it. He had not tried any nonsense, because he was not a flirtatious fellow. Well, it had been very nice; and now it was all spoilt. It was spoilt because of Emmy. Emmy had spoilt it by wanting Alf for herself. Ugh! thought Jenny. Em had always been a jealous cat: if she had just seen Alf somewhere she wouldn’t have wanted him. That was it! Em saw that Alf preferred Jenny; she saw that Jenny went out with him. And because she always wanted to do what Jenny did, and always wanted what Jenny had got, Em wanted to be taken out by Alf. Jenny, with the cruel unerringness of an exasperated woman, was piercing to Emmy’s heart with fierce lambent flashes of insight. And if Alf had taken Em once or twice, and Jenny once or twice, not wanting either one or the other, or not wanting one of them more than the other, Em would have been satisfied. It would have gone no further. It would still have been sensible, without nonsense. But it wouldn’t do for Em. So long as Jenny was going out Emmy stayed at home. She had said to herself: “Why should Jenny go, and not me ... having all this pleasure?” That had been the first stage—Jenny worked it all out. First of all, it had been envy of Jenny’s going out. Then had come stage number two: “Why should Alf Rylett always take Jenny, and not me?” That had been the first stage of jealousy of Alf. And the next time Alf took Jenny, Em had stayed at home, and thought herself sick about it, supposing that Alf and Jenny were happy and that she was unhappy, supposing they had all the fun, envying them the fun, hating them for having what she had not got, hating Jenny for monopolising Alf, hating Alf had monopolising Jenny; then, as she was a woman, hating Jenny for being a more pleasing woman than herself, and having her wounded jealousy moved into a strong craving for Alf, driven deeper and deeper into her heart by long-continued thought and frustrated desire. And so she had come to look upon herself as one defrauded by Jenny of pleasure—of happiness—of love—of Alf Rylett.

“And she calls it love!” thought Jenny bitterly. “If that’s love, I’ve got no use for it. Love’s giving, not getting. I know that much. Love’s giving yourself; wanting to give all you’ve got. It’s got nothing at all to do with envy, or hating people, or being jealous....” Then a swift feeling of pity darted through her, changing her thoughts, changing every shade of the portrait of Emmy which she had been etching with her quick corrosive strokes of insight. “Poor old Em!” she murmured. “She’s had a rotten time. I know she has. Let her have Alf if she wants. I don’t want him. I don’t want anybody ... except ...” She closed her eyes in the most fleeting vision. “Nobody except just Keith....”

Slowly Jenny raised her hand and pressed the back of her wrist to her lips, not kissing the wrist, but holding it against her lips so that they were forced hard back upon her teeth. She drew, presently, a deep breath, releasing her arm again and clasping her hands over her knees as she bent lower, staring at the glowing heart of the fire. Her lips were closely, seriously, set now; her eyes sorrowful. Alf and Emmy had receded from her attention as if they had been fantastic shadows. Pa, sitting holding his exhausted hubble-bubble, was as though he had no existence at all. Jenny was lost in memory and the painful aspirations of her own heart.

iii

How the moments passed during her reverie she did not know. For her it seemed that time stood still while she recalled days that were beautified by distance, and imagined days that should be still to come, made to compensate for that long interval of dullness that pressed her each morning into acquiescence. She bent nearer to the fire, smiling to herself. The fire showing under the little door of the kitchener was a bright red glowing ash, the redness that came into her imagination when the words “fire” or “heat” were used—the red heart, burning and consuming itself in its passionate immolation. She loved the fire. It was to her the symbol of rapturous surrender, that feminine ideal that lay still deeper than her pride, locked in the most secret chamber of her nature.

And then, as the seconds ticked away, Jenny awoke from her dream and saw that the clock upon the mantelpiece said half-past eight. Half-past eight was what, in the Blanchard home, was called “time.” When Pa was recalcitrant Jenny occasionally shouted very loud, with what might have appeared to some people an undesirable knowledge of customs, “Act of Parliament, gentlemen, please”—which is a phrase sometimes used in clearing a public-house. To-night there was no need for her to do that. She had only to look at Pa, to take from his hand the almost empty pipe, to knock out the ashes, and to say:

“Time, Pa!” Obediently Pa held out his right hand and clutched in the other his sturdy walking-stick. Together they tottered into the bedroom, stood a moment while Jenny lighted the peep of gas which was Pa’s guardian angel during the night, and then made their way to the bed. Pa sat upon the bed, like a child. Jenny took off Pa’s collar and tie, and his coat and waistcoat; she took off his boots and his socks; she laid beside him the extraordinary faded scarlet nightgown in which Pa slept away the darkness. Then she left him to struggle out of his clothes as well as he could, which Pa did with a skill worthy of his best days. The cunning which replaces competence had shown him how the braces may be made to do their own work, how the shirt may with one hand be so manipulated as to be drawn swiftly over the head... Pa was adept at undressing. He was in bed within five minutes, after a panting, exhausted interval during which he sat in a kind of trance, and was then proudly as usual knocking upon the floor with his walking-stick for Jenny to come and tuck him in for the night.

Jenny came, gave him a big kiss, and went back to the kitchen, where she resumed work upon her hat. It had lost its interest for her. She stitched quickly and roughly, not as one interested in needlework or careful for its own sake of the regularity of the stitch. Ordinarily she was accurate: to-night her attention was elsewhere. It had come back to the rows, because there is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it ever so much more important than it really is. Loneliness with happy thoughts is perhaps an ideal state; but no torment could be greater than loneliness with thoughts that wound. Jenny’s thoughts wounded her. The mood of complacency was gone: that of shame and discontent was upon her. Distress was uppermost in her mind—not the petulant wriggling of a spoilt child, but the sober consciousness of pain in herself and in others. In vain did Jenny give little gasps of annoyance, intended by her humour to disperse the clouds. The gasps and exclamations were unavailing. She was angry, chagrined, miserable. ...At last she could bear the tension no longer, but threw down her work, rose, and walked impatiently about the kitchen.

“Oh, do shut up!” she cried to her insistent thoughts. “Enough to drive anybody off their nut. And they’re not worth it, either of them. Em’s as stupid as she can be, thinking about herself.... And as for Alf—anybody’d think I’d tricked him. I haven’t. I’ve gone out with him; but what’s that? Lots of girls go out with fellows for months, and nobody expects them to marry. The girls may want it; but the fellows don’t. They don’t want to get settled down. And I don’t blame them. Why is Alf different? I suppose it’s me that’s different. I’m not like other girls....” That notion cheered her. “No: I’m not like other girls. I want my bit of fun. I’ve never had any. And just because I don’t want to settle down and have a lot of kids that mess the place to bits, of course I get hold of Alf! It’s too bad! Why can’t he choose the right sort of girl? Why can’t he choose old Em? She’s the sort that does want to get settled. She knows she’ll have to buck up about it, too. She said I should get left. That’s what she’s afraid of, herself; only she’s afraid of getting left on the shelf.... I wonder why it is the marrying men don’t get hold of the marrying girls! They do, sometimes, I suppose....” Jenny shrugged restlessly and stood looking at nothing. “Oh, it’s sickening! You can’t do anything you like in this world. Nothing at all! You’ve always got to do what you don’t like. They say it’s good for you. It’s your ‘duty.’ Who to? And who are ‘they,’ to say such a thing? What are they after? Just to keep people like me in their place—do as you’re told. Well, I’m not going to do as I’m told. They can lump it! That’s what they can do. What does it matter—what happens to me? I’m me, aren’t I? Got a right to live, haven’t I? Why should I be somebody’s servant all my life? I won’t! If Alf doesn’t want to marry Emmy, he can go and whistle somewhere else. There’s plenty of girls who’d jump at him. But just because I don’t, he’ll worry me to death. If I was to be all over him—see Alf sheer off! He’d think there was something funny about me. Well, there is! I’m Jenny Blanchard; and I’m going to keep Jenny Blanchard. If I’ve got no right to live, then nobody’s got any right to keep me from living. If there’s no rights, other people haven’t got any more than I have. They can’t make me do anything—by any right they’ve got. People—managing people—think that because there isn’t a corner of the earth they haven’t collared they can tell you what you’ve got to do. Give you a ticket and a number, get up at six, eat so much a day, have six children, do what you’re told. That may do for some people; but it’s slavery. And I’m not going to do it. See!” She began to shout in her excited indignation. “See!” she cried again. “Just because I’m poor, I’m to do what I’m told. They seem to think that because they like to do what they’re told, everybody ought to be the same. They’re afraid. They’re afraid of themselves—afraid of being left alone in the dark. They think everybody ought to be afraid—in case anybody should find out that they’re cowards! But I’m not afraid, and I’m not going to do what I’m told.... I won’t!”

In a frenzy she walked about the room, her eyes glittering, her face flushed with tumultuous anger. This was her defiance to life. She had been made into a rebel through long years in which she had unconsciously measured herself with others. Because she was a human being, Jenny thought she had a right to govern her own actions. With a whole priesthood against her, Jenny was a rebel against the world as it appeared to her—a crushing, numerically overwhelming pressure that would rob her of her one spiritual reality—the sense of personal freedom.

“Oh, I can’t stand it!” she said bitterly. “I shall go mad! And Em taking it all in, and ready to have Alf’s foot on her neck for life. And Alf ready to have Em chained to his foot for life. The fools! Why, I wouldn’t ... not even to Keith.... No, I wouldn’t.... Fancy being boxed up and pretending I liked it—just because other people say they like it. Do as you’re told. Do like other people. All be the same—a sticky mass of silly fools doing as they’re told! All for a bit of bread, because somebody’s bagged the flour for ever! And what’s the good of it? If it was any good—but it’s no good at all! And they go on doing it because they’re cowards! Cowards, that’s what they all are. Well, I’m not like that!”

Exhausted, Jenny sat down again; but she could not keep still. Her feet would not remain quietly in the place she, as the governing intelligence, commanded. They too were rebels, nervous rebels, controlled by forces still stronger than the governing intelligence. She felt trapped, impotent, as though her hands were tied; as though only her whirling thoughts were unfettered. Again she took up the hat, but her hands so trembled that she could not hold the needle steady. It made fierce jabs into the hat. Stormily unhappy, she once more threw the work down. Her lips trembled. She burst into bitter tears, sobbing as though her heart were breaking. Her whole body was shaken with the deep and passionate sobs that echoed her despair.

iv

Presently, when she grew calmer, Jenny wiped her eyes, her face quite pale and her hands still convulsively trembling. She was worn out by the stress of the evening, by the vehemence of her rebellious feelings. When she again spoke to herself it was in a shamed, giggling way that nobody but Emmy had heard from her since the days of childhood. She gave a long sigh, looking through the blur at that clear glow from beneath the iron door of the kitchen grate. Miserably she refused to think again. She was half sick of thoughts that tore at her nerves and lacerated her heart. To herself Jenny felt that it was no good—crying was no good, thinking was no good, loving and sympathising and giving kindness—all these things were in this mood as useless as one another. There was nothing in life but the endless sacrifice of human spirit.

“Oh!” she groaned passionately. “If only something would happen. I don’t care what! But something ... something new ... exciting. Something with a bite in it!”

She stared at the kicking clock, which every now and again seemed to have a spasm of distaste for its steady record of the fleeting seconds. “Wound up to go all day!” she thought, comparing the clock with herself in an angry impatience.

And then, as if it came in answer to her poignant wish for some untoward happening, there was a quick double knock at the front door of the Blanchard’s dwelling, and a sharp whirring ring at the push-bell below the knocker. The sounds seemed to go violently through and through the little house in rapid waves of vibrant noise.

PART TWO

NIGHT

CHAPTER V: THE ADVENTURE

i

So unexpected was this interruption of her loneliness that Jenny was for an instant stupefied. She took one step, and then paused, dread firmly in her mind, paralysing her. What could it be? She could not have been more frightened if the sound had been the turning of a key in the lock. Were they back already? Had her hope been spoiled by some accident? Surely not. It was twenty minutes to nine. They were safe in the theatre by now. Oh, she was afraid! She was alone in the house—worse than alone! Jenny cowered. She felt she could not answer the summons. Tick-tick-tick said the clock, striking across the silences. Again Jenny made a step forward. Then, terrifying her, the noise began once more—the thunderous knock, the ping-ping-ping-whir of the bell....

Wrenching her mind away from apprehensiveness she moved quickly to the kitchen door and into the dimly-lighted dowdy passage-way. Somewhere beyond the gas flicker and the hat-stand lay—what? With all her determination she pushed forward, almost running to the door. Her hand hovered over the little knob of the lock: only horror of a renewal of that dreadful sound prompted her to open the door quickly. She peered into the darkness, faintly silhouetted against the wavering light of the gas. A man stood there.

“Evening, miss,” said the man. “Miss Jenny Blanchard?”

She could see there something white. He was holding it out to her. A letter!

“For me,” she asked, her voice still unsteady. She took the letter, a large square envelope. Mechanically she thanked the man, puzzling at the letter. From whom could a letter be brought to her?

“There’s an answer,” she heard. It came from ever so far away, in the dim distance beyond her vague wonderings. Jenny was lost, submerged in the sensations through which she had passed during the evening. She was quite unlike herself, timid and fearful, a frightened girl alone in an unhappy house.

“Wait a bit!” she said. “Will you wait there?”

“Yes,” answered the man, startlingly enough. “I’ve got the car here.”

The car! What did it mean? She caught now, as her eyes were more used to the darkness, the sheen of light upon a peaked cap such as would be worn by a chauffeur. It filled her mind that this man was in uniform. But if so, why? From whom should the letter come? He had said “Miss Jenny Blanchard.”

“You did say it was for me? I’ll take it inside. ...” She left the door unfastened, but the man pulled it right to, so that the catch clicked. Then Jenny held the letter up under the flame of the passage gas. She read there by this meagre light her own name, the address, written in a large hand, very bold, with a sharp, sweeping stroke under all, such as a man of impetuous strength might make. There was a blue seal fastening the flap—a great pool of solid wax. Trembling so that she was hardly able to tear the envelope, Jenny returned to the kitchen, again scanning the address, the writing, the blue seal with its Minerva head. Still, in her perplexity, it seemed as though her task was first to guess the identity of the sender. Who could have written to her? It was unheard of, a think for wondering jest, if only her lips had been steady and her heart beating with normal pulsation. With a shrug, she turned back from the seal to the address. She felt that some curious mistake had been made, that the letter was not for her at all, but for some other Jenny Blanchard, of whom she had never until now heard. Then, casting such a fantastic thought aside with another impatient effort, she tore the envelope, past the seal, in a ragged dash. Her first glance was at the signature. “Yours always, KEITH.”

Keith! Jenny gave a sob and moved swiftly to the light. Her eyes were quite blurred with shining mist. She could not read the words. Keith! She could only murmur his name, holding the letter close against her.

ii

“MY DEAR JENNY,” said the letter. “Do you remember? I said I should write to you when I got back. Well, here I am. I can’t come to you myself. I’m tied here by the leg, and mustn’t leave for a moment. But you said you’d come to me. Will you? Do! If you can come, you’ll be a most awful dear, and I shall be out of my wits with joy. Not really out of my wits. Do come, there’s a dear good girl. It’s my only chance, as I’m off again in the morning. The man who brings this note will bring you safely to me in the car, and will bring you quite safely home again. Do come! I’m longing to see you. I trust you to come. I will explain everything when we meet. Yours always, KEITH.”

A long sigh broke from Jenny’s lips as she finished reading. She was transfigured. Gone was the defiant look, gone were the sharpnesses that earlier had appeared upon her face. A soft colour flooded her cheeks; her eyes shone. Come to him! She would go to the end of the world.... Keith! She said it aloud, in a voice that was rich with her deep feeling, magically transformed.

“Come to you, my dear!” said Jenny. “As if you need ask!”

Then she remembered that Emmy was out, that she was left at home to look after her father, that to desert him would be a breach of trust. Quickly her face paled, and her eyes became horror-laden. She was shaken by the conflict of love and love, love that was pity and love that was the overwhelming call of her nature. The letter fluttered from her fingers, swooping like a wounded bird to the ground, and lay unheeded at her feet.

iii

“What shall I do?” Nobody to turn to; no help from any hand. To stay was to give up the chance of happiness. To go—oh, she couldn’t go! If Keith was tied, so was Jenny. Half demented, she left the letter where it had fallen, a white square upon the shabby rug. In a frenzy she wrung her hands. What could she do? It was a cry of despair that broke from her heart. She couldn’t go, and Keith was waiting. That it should have happened upon this evening of all others! It was bitter! To send back a message, even though it be written with all her love, which still she must not express to Keith in case he should think her lightly won, would be to lose him for ever. He would never stand it. She saw his quick irritation, the imperious glance. ... He was a king among men. She must go! Whatever the failure in trust, whatever the consequences, she must go. She couldn’t go! Whatever the loss to herself, her place was here. Emmy would not have gone to the theatre if she had not known that Jenny would stay loyally there. It was too hard! The months, the long months during which Keith had not written, were upon her mind like a weariness. She had had no word from him, and the little photograph that he had laughingly offered had been her only consolation. Yes, well, why hadn’t he written? Quickly her love urged his excuse. She might accuse him of having forgotten her, but to herself she explained and pardoned all. That was not for this moment. Keith was not in fault. It was this dreadful difficulty of occasion, binding her here when her heart was with him. To sit moping here by the fire when Keith called to her! Duty—the word was a mockery. “They” would say she ought to stay. Hidden voices throbbed the same message into her consciousness. But every eager impulse, winged with love, bade her go. To whom was her heart given? To Pa? Pity ... pity. ... She pitied him, helpless at home. If anything happened to him! Nothing would happen. What could happen? Supposing she had gone to the chandler’s shop: in those few minutes all might happen that could happen in all the hours she was away. Yet Emmy often ran out, leaving Pa alone. He was in bed, asleep; he would not awaken, and would continue to lie there at rest until morning. Supposing she had gone to bed—she would still be in the house; but in no position to look after Pa. He might die any night while they slept. It was only the idea of leaving him, the superstitious idea that just because she was not there something would happen. Suppose she didn’t go; but sat in the kitchen for two hours and then went to bed. Would she ever forgive herself for letting slip the chance of happiness that had come direct from the clouds’? Never! But if she went, and something did happen, would she ever in that event know self-content again in all the days of her life? Roughly she shouldered away her conscience, those throbbing urgencies that told her to stay. She was to give up everything for a fear? She was to let Keith go for ever? Jenny wrung her hands, drawing sobbing breaths in her distress.

Something made her pick the letter swiftly up and read it through a second time. So wild was the desire to go that she began to whimper, kissing the letter again and again, holding it softly to her cold cheek. Keith! What did it matter? What did anything matter but her love? Was she never to know any happiness? Where, then, was her reward? A heavenly crown of martyrdom? What was the good of that? Who was the better for it? Passionately Jenny sobbed at such a mockery of her overwhelming impulse. “They” hadn’t such a problem to solve. “They” didn’t know what it was to have your whole nature craving for the thing denied. “They” were cowards, enemies to freedom because they liked the music of their manacles! They could not understand what it was to love so that one adored the beloved. Not blood, but water ran in their veins! They didn’t know. ... They couldn’t feel. Jenny knew, Jenny felt; Jenny was racked with the sweet passion that blinds the eyes to consequences. She must go! Wickedness might be her nature: what then? It was a sweet wickedness. It was her choice!

Jenny’s glance fell upon the trimmed hat which lay upon the table. Nothing but a cry from her father could have prevented her from taking it up and setting it upon her head. The act was her defiance. She was determined. As one deaf and blind, she went out of the kitchen, and to the hall-stand, fumbling there for her hatpins. She pinned her hat as deliberately as she might have done in leaving the house any morning. Her pale face was set. She had flung the gage. There remained only the acts consequential. And of those, since they lay behind the veil of night, who could now speak? Not Jenny!

iv

There was still Pa. He was there like a secret, lying snug in his warm bed, drowsily coaxing sleep while Jenny planned a desertion. Even when she was in the room, her chin grimly set and her lips quivering, a shudder seemed to still her heart. She was afraid. She could not forget him. He lay there so quiet in the semi-darkness, a long mound under the bedclothes; and she was almost terrified at speaking to him because her imagination was heightened by the sight of his dim outline. He was so helpless! Ah, if there had only been two Jennies, one to go, one to stay. The force of uncontrollable desire grappled with her pity. She still argued within herself, a weary echo of her earlier struggle. He would need nothing, she was sure. It would be for such a short time that she left him. He would hardly know she was not there. He would think she was in the kitchen. But if he needed her? If he called, if he knocked with his stick, and she did not come, he might be alarmed, or stubborn, and might try to find his way through the passage to the kitchen. If he fell! Her flesh crept as she imagined him helpless upon the floor, feebly struggling to rise.... It was of no use. She was bound to tell him....

Jenny moved swiftly from the room, and returned with his nightly glass and jug of water. There could be nothing else that he would want during the night. It was all he ever had, and he would sleep so until morning. She approached the bed upon tiptoe.

“Pa,” she whispered. “Are you awake?” He stirred, and looked out from the bedclothes, and she was fain to bend over him and kiss the tumbled hair. “Pa, dear ... I want to go out. I’ve got to go out. Will you be all right if I leave you? Sure? You’ll be a good boy, and not move! I shall be back before Emmy, and you won’t be lonely, or frightened—will you!” She exhorted him. “See, I’ve got to go out; and if I can’t leave you.... You are awake, Pa?”

“Yes,” breathed Pa, half asleep. “A good boy. Night, Jenny, my dearie girl.”

She drew back from the bed, deeply breathing, and stole to the door. One last glance she took, at the room and at the bed, closed the door and stood irresolute for a moment in the passage. Then she whipped her coat from the peg and put it on. She took her key and opened the front door. Everything was black, except that upon the roofs opposite the rising moon cast a glittering surface of light, and the chimney pots made slanting broad markings upon the silvered slates. The road was quite quiet but for the purring of a motor, and she could now, as her eyes were clearer, observe the outline of a large car drawn to the left of the door. As the lock clicked behind her and as she went forward the side lights of the motor blazed across her vision, blinding her again.

“Are you there?” she softly called.

“Yes, miss.” The man’s deep voice came sharply out of the darkness, and he jumped down from his seat to open the door of the car. The action startled Jenny. Why had the man done that?

“Did you know I was coming?” she suddenly asked, drawing back with a sort of chill.

“Yes, miss,” said the man. Jenny caught her breath. She half turned away, like a shy horse that fears the friendly hand. He had been sure of her, then. Oh, that was a wretched thought! She was shaken to the heart by such confidence. He had been sure of her! There was a flash of time in which she determined not to go; but it passed with dreadful speed. Too late, now, to draw back. Keith was waiting: he expected her! The tears were in her eyes. She was more unhappy than she had been yet, and her heart was like water.

The man still held open the door of the car. The inside was warm and inviting. His hand was upon her elbow; she was lost in the soft cushions, and drowned in the sweet scent of the great nosegay of flowers which hung before her in a shining holder. And the car was purring more loudly, and moving, moving as a ship moves when it glides so gently from the quay. Jenny covered her face with her hands, which cooled her burning cheeks as if they had been ice. Slowly the car nosed out of the road into the wider thoroughfare. Her adventure had begun in earnest. There was no drawing back now.